North Vs. South

[Haerthorne]

Cathay and Kindara have been making some pretty poor decisions I have noticed. They're letting the fear of the enemy get to them, at the command level.

Personally I'd like to see a massive shakeup. There are ways to promote war within an empire or whatever, but just because you've beaten an enemy doesn't mean they're going to like the terms you give them. In fact they'll prefer to have territory taken away than having to act in a certain way.

[Anaris]

The problem is, the enemies in this case refuse to accept anything less than the surrender of the Empire. Despite the fact that they've lost 2 1/2 allies and made barely any long-term territorial gains in this war. (They took territory away from Zonasa, but almost every single region they took is now either rogue or iced.)

[Haerthorne]

The problem is, the enemies in this case refuse to accept anything less than the surrender of the Empire. Despite the fact that they've lost 2 1/2 allies and made barely any long-term territorial gains in this war. (They took territory away from Zonasa, but almost every single region they took is now either rogue or iced.)

Cathay and SoliferumKindara really need to step up their diplomacy game. And stop being a bunch of idiots.

[Bedwyr]

Personally, I hope that the island doesn't turn into a "whatever Arcaea says" scenario. I've already gotten some hints of that.

That was never the intent of the Empire, and though Velax has shifted it more in that direction than Jenred would have I doubt it will go too far.

[Foxglove]

The problem is, the enemies in this case refuse to accept anything less than the surrender of the Empire. Despite the fact that they've lost 2 1/2 allies and made barely any long-term territorial gains in this war. (They took territory away from Zonasa, but almost every single region they took is now either rogue or iced.)

Really? And where are you getting that from? It certainly wasn't from Rosalind! The only surrender terms made to Kindara since the glacier event involved them betraying Cathay and fighting them, so were unacceptable to just about everyone. Plus the banishment of several nobles. And the death of another. I remember not so long ago that when Perdan offered similar 'unacceptable' terms to Caligus on EC there was a public outcry.

Cathay and Kindara have been making some pretty poor decisions I have noticed. They're letting the fear of the enemy get to them, at the command level.

From the military stand point, the southern realms haven't been doing bad considering the glacier event made about 20 players in Kindara quit, pause, or move to another island within the first couple of weeks. It seriously limits your fighting ability when half your players disappear that fast. The bonuses given as an iced realm didn't really compensate for the demoralization effect on the players that led them to leave.

With what players remain, Cathay isn't doing bad. But I'm afraid that it's another case of many wargame minded players gravitating towards the easy option of the Imperial realms, leaving the Free Realms with many of the casuals and two or three players with proper experience of the strategy side of the game, meaning the chain of command is thin.

Personally, I hope that the island doesn't turn into a "whatever Arcaea says" scenario. I've already gotten some hints of that.

More than likely. Unless they split up the realm they'll always outnumber and outpower everyone else, shy of some mass immigration of nobles to one of the other realms.

[Anaris]

Really? And where are you getting that from? It certainly wasn't from Rosalind! The only surrender terms made to Kindara since the glacier event involved them betraying Cathay and fighting them, so were unacceptable to just about everyone. Plus the banishment of several nobles. And the death of another. I remember not so long ago that when Perdan offered similar 'unacceptable' terms to Caligus on EC there was a public outcry.

Kindara basically sealed their fate when they let Magnus run around literally torturing our soldiers to death as sacrifices to his Gods.

I was mostly referring to Cathay with that last, which I wasn't clear on. I apologize for that. Kindara's got no hope of survival at this point.

With what players remain, Cathay isn't doing bad. But I'm afraid that it's another case of many wargame minded players gravitating towards the easy option of the Imperial realms, leaving the Free Realms with many of the casuals and two or three players with proper experience of the strategy side of the game, meaning the chain of command is thin.

If that's what you really think is going on, I think you're badly wrong. Unless you and I have significantly different definitions of "wargame-minded players", I don't think that there's any significant tendency for them to gravitate toward Arcaea and its allies. (Zonasa certainly hasn't seen an influx of...well, much of anyone!) If you're including me in that, I'd think twice; I'm pretty much a casual player in terms of how much time I can spend actually playing the game these days myself.

More than likely. Unless they split up the realm they'll always outnumber and outpower everyone else, shy of some mass immigration of nobles to one of the other realms.

There are other things going on, other options besides "Cathay and Kindara destroy Arcaea" or "Arcaea rules everything, forever." Rosalind hasn't been let in on them for reasons that should (considering the source) be obvious ;)

[Foxglove]

Kindara basically sealed their fate when they let Magnus run around literally torturing our soldiers to death as sacrifices to his Gods.

That's thin as an excuse to destroy a realm, so I really do hope that's not being given in game as a primary motivation. It was basically one RP of Magnus hanging soldiers, or something, in a religious ritual. I suppose every time the Imperials hunt soldiers of enemy units they give them all nice farms when they capture them  :P

If that's what you really think is going on, I think you're badly wrong. Unless you and I have significantly different definitions of "wargame-minded players", I don't think that there's any significant tendency for them to gravitate toward Arcaea and its allies. (Zonasa certainly hasn't seen an influx of...well, much of anyone!) If you're including me in that, I'd think twice; I'm pretty much a casual player in terms of how much time I can spend actually playing the game these days myself.

I was mainly talking about Arcaea. It would be a hard sell for you to convince me that their chain of command isn't deeper than any other realm on FEI due to them have more players inclined towards the military side of the game.

[Anaris]

That's thin as an excuse to destroy a realm, so I really do hope that's not being given in game as a primary motivation. It was basically one RP of Magnus hanging soldiers, or something, in a religious ritual. I suppose every time the Imperials hunt soldiers of enemy units they give them all nice farms when they capture them  :P

Well, it's not the only reason. There was also Magnus declaring the entire Empire heathens who should be burned at the stake, or whatever. Plus, y'know, the whole "you did your level best to wipe us out" part ;)

In general, though, Magnus did not do you any favours. If you had disowned him, you'd be getting at least some sympathy at this point.

I was mainly talking about Arcaea. It would be a hard sell for you to convince me that their chain of command isn't deeper than any other realm on FEI due to them have more players inclined towards the military side of the game.

I can't really say first-hand what Arcaea's internal chain of command looks like, so I will leave this to people who are actually there. However, I would point out that even if it's true, having more militarily-inclined players does not imply that they go there because they think it will be "easier."

[Velax]

Really? And where are you getting that from? It certainly wasn't from Rosalind! The only surrender terms made to Kindara since the glacier event involved them betraying Cathay and fighting them, so were unacceptable to just about everyone. Plus the banishment of several nobles. And the death of another. I remember not so long ago that when Perdan offered similar 'unacceptable' terms to Caligus on EC there was a public outcry.

Kindara were offered three sets of terms before that and turned them all down because you didn't want to give up any of the territory you had taken from Zonasa. As shocking as it may be, realms that start wars and then lose don't get to keep the territory they've taken from the winners. Kindara made no effort whatsoever to negotiate the terms they didn't like. The response to our terms every time was basically: "You want us to give back the regions we took? Go !@#$ yourselves." Oh, aside from the one time Kindara offered counter terms, along with the caveat of "I'm offering these counter terms but I'm pretty sure no one in Kindara will accept them".

Cathay were offered terms too. They involved the banning of one noble and the "loss" of one region that Cathay didn't even control. These terms, too, were apparently extraordinarily unreasonable. Why would we even bother trying again at this point?

Oh, and terms to Aenilia early in the war. "Give Anrimap to Zonasa and allow the Empire passage rights and we'll give you back Nahad." "No, but if you give us Nahad, Larmebsi, Talex and a ton of gold, we'll step out of the war. We'll think about passage rights, but you can't use them to attack any of your enemies." And we're the unreasonable ones.

That's thin as an excuse to destroy a realm, so I really do hope that's not being given in game as a primary motivation. It was basically one RP of Magnus hanging soldiers, or something, in a religious ritual. I suppose every time the Imperials hunt soldiers of enemy units they give them all nice farms when they capture them  :P

Well, there's also the fact that Cathay tortured the Emperor's brother, and then Kindara executed him. Could you have come up with any other way of pissing off the Empire's leader more? If the Free Realms stopped putting idiots like that in their Council positions, they may get more sympathy.

I was mainly talking about Arcaea. It would be a hard sell for you to convince me that their chain of command isn't deeper than any other realm on FEI due to them have more players inclined towards the military side of the game.

This has to be the worst excuse for losing I've ever seen. "We're losing because the enemy's nobles are better at war than us." No !@#$.

The fact is the Free Realms have screwed up every step of the way.

1. They screwed up by deciding they could take on the Empire in the first place. A poor decision, given there's been no point at which the Free Realms have even vaguely looked like winning.

2. Kindara and Cathay screwed up by not finishing off Zonasa despite having a half dozen chances to, allowing the Empire's militarily weakest member to keep the Free Realm's militarily strongest member busy while the northern Empire realms dominated Aenilia and Ohnar.

3. The Free Realms screwed up by providing no support whatsoever to Ohnar. Ohnar was your best military realm. Kindara had more numbers but Ohnar had far better co-ordination and responsiveness. But you left them out to dry by giving no support at all, leaving them to be overwhelmed by the northern Empire realms.

4. You also provided no support to Aenilia. While not strong, they were your buffer realm between the north and the south and you let the Empire mash them into the ground. I don't believe I ever saw a single Kindaran or Cathayan noble in Nahad, Idapur or Ipsosez while Aenilia was still alive. Kindara was too busy failing to destroy Zonasa and Cathay was too busy doing very little.

5. A general lack of co-ordination between the Free Realms. Before the glacier forced you to live in each other's pockets, you basically fought as four separate realms. I saw, what, one joint Kindaran-Cathayan attack on Zonasa City and one joint (and disastrous) Free Realm attack on Akanos. Not much for more than a year of war and battles. By contrast, the Empire fights as a cohesive force.

6. Lack of any diplomatic ability. Even if we put aside the "Yeah! Let's murder the Emperor's brother and declare a crusade with our main religion against the Empire! There's no way that can end badly!", the Free Realms have made zero diplomatic attempts since Galiard left. Not once has a Free Realm ruler approached the Empire with, "Hey, would you maybe be willing to discuss some terms?" No, the Empire has done all the approaching and been turned down every time.

7. Failure to take advantage of the glacier benefits. When the glacier hit, Kindara had roughly as many nobles as Arcaea and a sizeable, if unorganized, army. But you did nothing with it. You could have hit Talex, or Topenah, or Idapur or Ozrat. Instead you went for...Ipsosez. Which you'd already taken and lost earlier in the war. Kindara didn't even consolidate the territory around it while Arcaea was struggling to deal with the loss of eight regions and population loss in many others after the food rebalance. You took Ipsosez and then sat on your thumbs. It was a waste.

8. Continued, deliberate attempts to piss the Empire's leader off. "Let's engage in human sacrifice and then declare a crusade against the Empire even though we know he hates it when religion gets involved in secular wars." "Let's take this unique item he was carrying and parade it around so he knows we have it." "Let's take these other two unique items of his off an adventurer we arrested, arrange a one-on-one meeting with Velax to give them back and then ambush him." "Let's offer utterly ridiculous terms that involve the Empire giving us territory, even though we're losing." "Let's burn food and commit genocide even though we've sworn not to and we know how strongly Velax abides by the terms of war." "Let's betray a personal friendship developed with Velax over years just because we're greedy for more territory." "Let's refuse a half dozen sets of reasonable surrender terms and then bitch about how unreasonable they were." "Let's torture and murder his brother." Well done. The plan worked: Velax is pissed. I'm sure that will end well for the Free Realms.

[Anaris]

1. They screwed up by deciding they could take on the Empire in the first place. A poor decision, given there's been no point at which the Free Realms have even vaguely looked like winning.

To be fair to them, at the time the war started, it was just Kindara and Cathay declaring war on Zonasa, newly independent once they broke the federation to attack us (at least in part because we wouldn't help them devour Greater Aenilia). Zonasa wasn't part of the Empire till later.

That said, from what I understand, a fight with the Empire was, if not the explicit intent, at least a strong desire of the Free Realms all along.

[Foxglove]

Kindara made no effort whatsoever to negotiate the terms they didn't like. The response to our terms every time was basically: "You want us to give back the regions we took? Go !@#$ yourselves." Oh, aside from the one time Kindara offered counter terms, along with the caveat of "I'm offering these counter terms but I'm pretty sure no one in Kindara will accept them".

Basically because everyone involved on the Kindaran side felt there was no point in negotiation because Velax wasn't open to it unless his longstanding terms were met. His terms have pretty much remained the same throughout the war (so he gets full marks for consistency), and those terms have been put to the Kindaran nobility through votes numerous times, and always been overwhelmingly rejected. That's why there's never been any budging politically from the Kindaran side - the nobles don't want it. Partially, this is because Kindara became the 'realm of last resort' for everyone on FEI who didn't like the Empire model, and the Imperial advance depopulated opposing realms either by destroying them (Aenilia) or through the dissenters leaving (Ohnar West), leading them to join Kindara.

It's also because the players on the island appear to be polarized into the groups who fancy your experimental Empire model for the future of the island, and those who prefer the more traditional model of each-to-their-own independent realms. The former gathering in the north, the latter in the south.

This has to be the worst excuse for losing I've ever seen. "We're losing because the enemy's nobles are better at war than us." No !@#$.

You completely miss the point of what I said. This isn't about excuses for losing a war. It might surprise you to learn that I don't really give a toss about losing the war. I have more going on in my life.

What I was saying was a general point about the way that players appear to distribute themselves. For Arcaea, you can substitute the Cagilan Empire, Darka (pre-glacier), Perdan, Sirion, etc. On appearances, such realms tend to attract the more military-minded, log in every turn, players (look at the number of players who have character distribution of - character in Perdan; character in pre-glacier Darka; character in Arcaea. Or Perdan/Cagilan Empire/Arcaea. Or some other combination of such relams). This tends to lead to a concentration of such players in certain realms on each island, broadly speaking leading to a thin representation of them in the other realms. This has become even more pronounced due to the decline in player numbers. There are realms out there now who can literally find no-one who can effectively run their military because of the general shortage of people who are into the strategy side of the game.

Personal opinion, of course, but if the game is to remain interesting and thrive, we really need these strategy gamers to spread themselves out across realms in a more even fashion.

Failure to take advantage of the glacier benefits.

Did you play in an almost entirely iced realm during the event? These glacier benefits have been hugely overstated, particularly on FEI with its longer travel times and season impact on crops and travel. We were losing regions faster than we could take them, not only due to the advance of the ice, but also the snow trolls and ice demons with thousands of CS advancing ahead of the ice. We were fighting a war on two fronts for the duration. Add into this the slow travel times and the fact that takeover times remained the same, and the efforts Kindara made were titanic. Although the players were largely feeling demoralized by the event. Even Anaris said here on the forum that Kindara's response to the glacier was the most positive he'd seen. If you'd put the stongest military realm in the game into Kindara's position during the glacier event, I'm sure they wouldn't have done any better due to the limitations of travel times to glacier/monster advance ratio, plus takeover times.

We also wanted to move the capital sooner, and would have benefited from doing so, but we also wanted to stick to the letter of the rules on capital moves so we didn't move it until the ice actually claimed Masahakon. Which was too late, frankly.

To be fair to them, at the time the war started, it was just Kindara and Cathay declaring war on Zonasa, newly independent once they broke the federation to attack us (at least in part because we wouldn't help them devour Greater Aenilia). Zonasa wasn't part of the Empire till later.

Correct. The initial war was between Zonasa and Kindara. The Empire interjected itself into the war at a later stage. It might have been Galiard's intention to fight the Empire (in fact, I'm pretty sure that it was). But Kindara never sought a direct conflict with the Empire at that stage in events (well, with Arcaea and Coralynth - that's all the Empire was then). Arcaea put itself into the war, or Zonasa brought them in by joining the Empire - which ever way you want to look at it.

[Anaris]

It's also because the players on the island appear to be polarized into the groups who fancy your experimental Empire model for the future of the island, and those who prefer the more traditional model of each-to-their-own independent realms. The former gathering in the north, the latter in the south.

Again, I don't believe those are the only options. However, it's hardly uncommon in BattleMaster for people not to believe that there's any middle ground.

It is, however, a problem.

Arcaea put itself into the war, or Zonasa brought them in by joining the Empire - which ever way you want to look at it.

From my perspective, at least, it wasn't precisely either—Zonasa was just desperate for anyone to help them at that point, since it was quite plain that there was no way we could survive without a strong ally, and Arcaea was willing to help us.

Not only that, they've been true to their word in everything thus far. Even when Zonasa's interests have conflicted with Imperial strategic expediency—and even when Baranion has been very vocal and not always terribly diplomatic in pushing those interests—Arcaea has continued to fight for our survival, despite the fact that we have several times come very close to annihilation.

Contrast this with the way our last allies treated us, and you might see why even some people who wouldn't have been happy following Velax at the beginning of this war might be feeling pretty loyal to him right now.

[Indirik]

I just want to stab him. His bounty is bigger than Xarnelf's was. ;)

[Velax]

That's why there's never been any budging politically from the Kindaran side - the nobles don't want it.

Then that sounds like Kindara's problem, not the Empire's. The Empire got into the war with the stated purpose of defending Zonasa, so it's hardly shocking that our terms include returning territory taken from them. It's not unreasonable and certainly not deserving of "public outcry". As previously stated, if a realm starts a war and then loses, they shouldn't expect to keep territory taken from the winners. If the Kindaran nobility has a problem with that, then it's not us being unreasonable.

What I was saying was a general point about the way that players appear to distribute themselves. For Arcaea, you can substitute the Cagilan Empire, Darka (pre-glacier), Perdan, Sirion, etc. On appearances, such realms tend to attract the more military-minded, log in every turn, players (look at the number of players who have character distribution of - character in Perdan; character in pre-glacier Darka; character in Arcaea. Or Perdan/Cagilan Empire/Arcaea. Or some other combination of such relams). This tends to lead to a concentration of such players in certain realms on each island, broadly speaking leading to a thin representation of them in the other realms. This has become even more pronounced due to the decline in player numbers. There are realms out there now who can literally find no-one who can effectively run their military because of the general shortage of people who are into the strategy side of the game.

I don't believe this to be even vaguely true. Given you don't have characters in those realms, you're making guesses based on assumptions. You're mistaking a hyper-active central authority figure for depth of military command. Look at Perdan - and virtually the whole southern alliance - without Atanamir. Struggling.

Correct. The initial war was between Zonasa and Kindara. The Empire interjected itself into the war at a later stage. It might have been Galiard's intention to fight the Empire (in fact, I'm pretty sure that it was). But Kindara never sought a direct conflict with the Empire at that stage in events (well, with Arcaea and Coralynth - that's all the Empire was then). Arcaea put itself into the war, or Zonasa brought them in by joining the Empire - which ever way you want to look at it.

Some corrections: The initial war was between Cathay, Kindara and Zonasa, but the Empire declared its intention to defend Zonasa before any military action took place. The Empire was also composed of Arcaea, Coralynth and Sorraine, not just the former two. Also, Velax did everything he possibly could to keep Kindara out of the war, but you decided to fight anyway, even when Galiard made it very clear the war was now one to destroy the Empire, not Zonasa. You chose the fight and you got it.

[Foxglove]

It's not unreasonable and certainly not deserving of "public outcry". As previously stated, if a realm starts a war and then loses, they shouldn't expect to keep territory taken from the winners. If the Kindaran nobility has a problem with that, then it's not us being unreasonable.

The reason I used the Caligus/Perdan comparision is because the terms were very similiar at their core - "accept drastically reduced territory and turn on your ally". In the case of Caligus, we got considerable OOC public outcry on the forum and elsewhere that Perdan was imposing unreasonable and humiliating terms on Caligus and damaging the game as a result of it. So that pressure eventually made Perdan modify its terms.

I should be absolutely clear that this isn't directed at you personally, Velax, but we now have a situation that's pretty similar on FEI. But we have deafening silence about the surrender terms here on the forum and everywhere else. This is really a criticism of the community, because we seem to be employing considerable double-standards to what we see as reasonable and unreasonable. Why the public outcry when Caligus was given terms its nobles said were unreasonable, but not when another realm is given terms its nobles say are unreasonable? I'm genuinely interested to hear from the community why that is? It seems to me that we either shrug and say "realms fall". Or we go for an approach that we prefer realms to be given face-saving surrender terms that allow them to live on in dignity. But which ever path we take has to be applied universally or it looks like we're all being hypocrites.

Then that sounds like Kindara's problem, not the Empire's.

No, it's a problem for everyone on FEI. Like I said, the subtext running under it all is that the players on the island are deeply polarized into two groups - those who see your new empire model as a way they want to play; and those who are strongly opposed to it as a playing form. If I read his comment right, Anaris also recognised that as a problem for the island. As the Empire gained ground, the players who didn't want to play in it were pushed into Kindara. As you might remember, I initally thought your Empire idea was a good one and supported it through Rosalind in the Kindaran council, but I've since seen how many people are opposed to it. That's why Kindara lost half its noble count overnight when the glacier really started advancing - loads of people left the island because they didn't want to move to Imperial realms and no longer saw a way of fighting the Empire. Others quit, but that's a different story and more the fault of the glacier event than other factors.

Again, I'm not painting you personally or anyone in the Imperial realms as bad guys, but you need to know that there are a lot of players in the south who won't play under the Imperial model for the island. So if the Empire claims the entire island, players will move characters elsewhere or start new characters elsewhere. So the noble/player count on the island will fall. Maybe new nobles will come in to compensate to experience the Empire model of play, or maybe they won't. Who knows. Again, I'm not calling you a bad guy (and I don't know how much more I can emphasise that without putting it in big bold letters). But you need to be aware that there's a big group of players in the south who don't like the Empire model. I know you feel the Empire model will help the game, but I'm just being honest in telling you there are a lot of people who disagree.