Arcaea was allied to OW before any of this happened. OW knew that Cathay was denying passage to GA. (They told us this.) We also knew that if GA ignored this, and marched anyway, that GA would be violating a treaty they had signed with Arcaea and Cathay. And If that happened, we knew that Arcaea would attack GA. We knew that Arcaea *wanted* to attack GA, and had wanted this for some time. The Peace of Ahael (I think that's the name) was the only thing holding them back. Once GA broke that, it was Game On for Arcaea.
there is no any game when one side has three or four time more players than the other, and they joint having no much care for long-term history, but for mere sake of gang-banging, that is almost non-playable, as those massibe allinances are, they stall the game completely.
I'm assuming that GA knew all of this, and *expected* to be attacked by Arcaea. They almost certainly knew that Arcaea would attack them back, but probably thought that Arcaea was too busy in the north with Arcachon to free up enough forces to act quickly. Too bad for GA that they telegraphed their intentions for a week or so before the attack, so that Arcaea had plenty of time to prepare.
what you call "telegraphing" was mostly attempt to RP war through medieval-flavored actions, on continent that praise to be rp-ing. war has become because of offense, it is properly and intentionally notified in advance to avoid any thought of blietzkrieg non-medieval flavored surprise attack. it was declared after diplomatic talks were stopped.
And, to be brutally honest, isn't this the kind of thing that you're advocating for? GA gave plenty of warning as to what was going to happen, giving Arcaea plenty of time to prepare for the war. Isn't this exactly what you wanted? Except that this time it apparently worked against you, thus you don't really like the results.
not at all, we were much quicker than opponents even after all advance notifications, probably because of ultimate complacency. again, going from peace to war within one day is worst part of the story, that is nothing but button-playing.
i am advocating significant time delay between two diplomatic changes.
again, they could fulfill all their allied obligations through neutral stance, changing from peace to war in one day is tasteless.
This wasn't an unexpected commando/ninja/specop raid. You seem to be the only who didn't know that Arcaea would attack GA. And if GA didn't know, too bad for them. It just underscores how blind they were to the political situation on the island. (But I don't believe that. I think they knew exactly what they were provoking.)
"political situation" is: 130-140 players is ganging against 30; 25 other players consider joining stronger side...
with enough obstacles, the mentioned being one of them, and emphasis on consequent playing your characters, two strongest realms on the continent would never joint against some weak opponent, they would be simply too proud for that.
Hard to organize? They marched 12 nobles through a Cathayan region to loot some undefended OW regions. What's so hard to organize about that?
they marched through
three or four cathay regions around arcarean lands to respect their peace treaty, with advance notifications, with warnings sent by cathay, yet showed incomparably larger effectiveness than the other side, maybe not much, but better than others at that moment. though when gang-bang rules, nothing else matters...
