Decline of the Old Guard

The 'Old Guard' the being the Big 4, as well as the leaders of the Big 4 include Escharia, Yimmu-Audal, Uldarash and Valdreach. These 4 empires, at the time of writing, maintain just about 50% of the entire population of Rathnir, the First Rathnir Census placing 15.9% in Valdreach, 12.8% in both Uldarash and Escharien each, and 8.7% in Yimmu-Audal. Additionally, these nation all predated Stoney's video on the Turtlonian Wars. In their high-time, world politics were entirely influenced by the actions of these nations, any and all conflicts had an eye peering in from these nations. Interestingly, as a testament to the power of these nations, the Empire of Uldarash, which itself would become amongst their ranks later, originally formed as a Western counterbalance to these nations, and a coalition of nations in Haven. This would serves as a predecessor to similar to unions in Alteniquia Minor and the North, with the Vastallosi Alliance and Silver Coalition respectively.

Eventually though, these nations would lose the absolute hegemony they once possessed across the Rathnirian political space, in part due to succession of the following influential leaders:

That being Emperor Siegfried (ES), Empress Viomelia (VIR), Emperor Blue-Marble (YA) and finally Emperor Wilusa (EU)

Empire of Escharien
The 'Empire of the East' has long since been a staple of 'Eastern Civility' or rather just how for the longest time, the majority of nations, as well as people, lived in the East. The Eastern Empire did not undergo a period of decline but rather a period of stagnation and internal panic. Despite their victory in the Turtlonian Wars, their stagnation was marked by the resignation of power by Emperor Siegfried/Arminius (SikkeOst). Admittedly, he still held on to quite a bit of power as well as influence, although he did step down from being an 'absolute monarch' of Escharien, taking up a figurehead position. In his stead, he granted governing of the country to the Senate, which ironically, more or less made it into the republic that the Pax Romanians, at the very least, 'claimed' they wanted in the Escharian Civil War. Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, the stagnation of this empire has been characterized by the alliance between Yimmu-Audal and Valdreach, which effectively cut Escharien off from the rest of Rathnir, all of its actions being overshadowed with the lingering threat of foreign invasion, as well being undermined in regards to those who could have been possible allies to the Eastern Empire, however often instead elect for neutrality as to not bring upon the wrath of the Audalad-Valdreach alliance. But recently, with the abolition of the Senate, Escharia has broken free from the chains of stagnation with the annexation of several surrounding towns along with the forging of alliances to counteract the Audalad-Valdreach alliance. As of the 17th of November, Escharia, the Silver Coalition, and Bardonia formed the Trillium Alliance.

Empire of Yimmu-Audal
Yimmu-Audal, the foreign empire from Jagdas has not received major decline, but rather entered a period of stabilization as its borders solidified across a particular claimed area and its player-base fixated on a specific number of dedicated citizens. It can be argued that Yimmu-Audal has been experiencing a decline in player activity, especially due to the anticipation for the entrance of new and exciting attributes into Rathnir as promised by the deity Enfys. However, Yimmu-Audal has maintained its status as the strongest military power of Rathnir despite this, with adept combat trained players residing in its stronghold of The Last Bastion. In the Rathnir Census, it was shown that Yimmu-Audal which was by far the most populous nation of Jagdas, and perhaps even the most populous in the early stages of Rathnir, had declined in proportion of Rathnirian population to around 8.5%. These data may be misleading however, given that many Audalad players did not partake in the census due to their non-participation on the Stoneworks discord. Furthermore, these data should be remembered as proportional to the total population of Rathnir, which underwent a significant increase following Stoney's Turtleonian Wars video, and which has since declined in player activity. The stabilization of Yimmu Audal's foreign policy and its decreased intervention in world-wide affairs has also been influenced by the traditional transfer of power which was exercised in the resignation of Emperor Blue_Marble who passed on control of the empire to his former Head Diplomat Harbardr. While Harbardr's reign been a positive force in Yimmu-Audal, with their mainland territorial claim extending wildly, his imperial administration did lose interest in globalism and power projection across Rathnir. As such, the former colonies of Lumaire and Ardat Mosul have gained their independence from the empire (However, Ardat Mosul rejoined Yimmu-Audal following Calipha-Empress Dalatra's Coronation). Since then, Yimmu-Audal has focused on centralizing its Alteniquian possessions and largely stayed out of world affairs such as the Great Western War. However, the Empire has mediated conflicts happening to concern its allies such as representing its interests in the Ardat Mosul-Sewermafia negotiations. Recently, the Empire has also been expanding its list of allies and has entered a defensive pact with the Serene Republic of Carvay which was later expanded to include all of the Vastallos Alliance of Western Rathnir. Of course, Yimmu-Audal's alliances, policies, and adept citizens, despite proportional population population loss and less globalist attitude, has kept the Empire "a force to be reckon with". With the recent coronation of Calipha-Empress Dalatra, Yimmu-Audal has grown significantly, re-uniting with its former colony Ardat Mosul and acquiring the allegiance of Tálor. So far Dalatra has expressed political goals which seek to "make everyone love Yimmu-Audal, like I [Dalatra] did with Ardat ."

Empire of Uldarash
The 'Empire of the West', counterbalance to the 'imperialistic ways' of the Easterners, despite being founded much after those 'imperialistic' Easterners, has itself experienced downfall. Their downfall however, remains unique amongst the Big Four, primarily in that its fall was much more sudden, and much more pronounced.

While player attendance from the rest of the Big Four had steadily been going down in proportion the the rest of Rathnir alongside political instability in the case of Valdreach, general stagnation in the case of Escharien, or more regional foreign policy in the case of Yimmu-Audal, Uldarash, ever isolated in The West, remained as if a seemingly more and more prominent force, claiming an "ambitious" area of territory. This of course, was up until the Great Western War, whereupon their loss to Bardonia, the empire suffered catastrophic loss of territory, with their holding in the Mesa and Ummarnu being lost. Additionally, they suffered the loss of Paloro, whom upon the Uldarash's engagement in war, sought independence. On top of all this, mere hours after the war ended, Emperor WilusaWarrior announced his resignation. With him announcing no clear heir to his seat of emperor, the position was abolished, making Emperor Dentro the sole emperor of Uldarash. Also worth mentioning is, while at least at the time of writing no change has taken place, the Council of Lords, have been discussing significant governmental reforms

Valdreach Imperial Republic
The Valdreach Imperial Republic, long since by far the most populous of all the empires, certainly, still maintains it influence over world affairs. However, the Old Guard of this nation, that being Empress Viomelia as well as God-Empress Mera, have both been ousted, representing their beginning decline. On the same day of Harbardr's coronation as the new emperor of Yimmu-Audal, Empress Viomelia was expelled from the VIR in a religious coup-d'etat, commonly referred to as the Valdreach Valor Rebellion, establishing God-Empress Mera in her place. In a case of cosmic irony, not a few weeks later on November 9th, God-Empress Mera herself would face another religious coup-d'etat by the Imperial Temple's High Priest, Assurdirapal, who claimed to have received godly powers through an unholy syncretic combination of religions. Assurdirapal would be defeated, but God-Empress Mera still ceded the throne to Interim President Noodles, whom herself was then proclaimed Princess Regent Noodles. Following Assurdirapal's exile, former Empress Viomelia nearly pulled off yet another coup supported by foriegn powers, but instead decided to leave Rathnir forever after some drama with members of other nations. Certainly, the intense political instablity of the VIR remains a prevalent factor in their downfall. Of course, alongside this matter, the loss of the territories of Posaravia, Tlahatl and recently Shirûn additionally remain as strong sign of their downfall.

But it may be too early to count them out. Despite VIR's heavy stagnation and struggles with foreign intervention, the new Empress of Yimmu-Audal, Dalatria, has always had strong relations with the VIR through her royal family relations with the von Valdreach imperial dynasty, as well as her recent marriage with Princess Regent Noodles. At her coronation, Dalatria promised to "return Valdreach to their ancient glory in the name of my wife Noodles, princess regent".

Final Words
Finally, it is particularly mentionable from the decisive loss of the Empire of Uldarash to the allied VAWR and Bardonians forces, both 2 international entities which are actually quite new on the world stage, that this Fall of the Old Guard, does not represent a Dark-Age like event. Rather, what it represents is a massive, if slow, shift in global power. For most of Rathnir's history, power has presided primarily in the East, with Escharien, Yimmu-Audal and the VIR all clustered around the Central-East. Admittedly, Uldarash itself served as a factor to pull influence away from the East, however the empire, for the most part, instead seemed to act as a boogey-man: someone commonly referred to instill discipline, however rarely actually involved (i.e. by citing that in a conflict, the lesser side would run to them for defense) Overall influence remained in the East.

At the time of writing however, the Great Western War, despite not including any of the Easterners, serves to represent something. It represents a shift, or perhaps the beginnings of a shift. That shift being, slowly from the great, sprawling empires of the East, to the diverse coalitions of the West and North. The Vastallos Alliance of Western Rathnir, the Republic of Bardonia and the Silver Coalition, all proved themselves, not only able to stand against the old world order-but to annihilate it. Certainly, if all the Big 4 united against the rest of the world, at the time of writing: they would prevail. However, with every passing day, this victory becomes, little by little, more and more unsure. Unless something changes, the current evidence projects that one day, it will not be the Easterners calling the shots and influencing world affairs, but instead will be some others. Hopefully, this others take kindly to the forefathers, Eastern, Western or otherwise.