"The Alliance guys somehow think that running 15 countries and self-farming is substandard play while farming everyone that can't war you is L33t."

lol good way to put it

I would disagree with those who claim that self-farming isn't harming anyone - I think it harms the playability of the game (for everybody), and in the long term it will not do the game any good, will not attract new players, and to that extent it is harmful.

Additional to that - it destroys one of the most interactive and fun aspects of the game, namely FA and diplomacy. If everybody self-farmed, nobody would war, and the game would die very quickly (either that or it just becomes a competition to see who can farm themselves best)

yeah, it does add the whole fa and diplomacy into the game for sure if you go around grabbing people, but in the same sense those exact things cause players to leave. how many people do you know have quit because of suiciders, stupid wars, or things of that nature.

as for driving players away, i really think farming new players into the ground has more impact on driving people away then people that self farm. new people would most likely see people that self farm, and would want to learn how to do it efficiently. again, if we had 10k plus countries self farming would really be an easy cop out, but with 3k and less the only thing you are asking for when you lg is for trouble. there aren't that many clans right now, and if you go around hitting people you are just asking for war, and when you are a hardcore tree hugger that really is something you try and avoid. when, and if, we get more players to the game i'm sure you will see less and less self farming just because more land will be available.