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Is there a reason it's taking so long to reach a verdict? This case was started well over a month ago and it's now been well over a week since we heard it would take a day or so to hear the final verdict.

I don't often post on the forums these days but since the case against myself I've obviously been checking them more of late.

Firstly I'd just like to say that I've played with TH for many RL years now and in that time I've only ever known him to be a genuinely nice and understanding person on an OOC level and I'd certainly be disappointed to see him insulted on an OOC level. 

Some of the letters are pushing the boundaries but Atamara is not SMA. Also taking a step back I have to remind myself that the majority here are actually adults because seriously has this what BM has become?

That being said I'd have liked to see TH send an OOC letter stating that he felt the situation was becoming personal and would appreciate people backing off a little before filing a magistrates case as this situation could easily be avoided. A lot of flak Merlin is getting is because he did something cool but pushed the boundaries.  It's important to distinguish angry characters and angry players. This is the difficulty here.

I'm sorry but I really fail to see how this is a realm merger.  Saeculo knew he could find sanctuary in Tara, his realm was destroyed, Merlin had ordered the use of torture against him and had tried to kill him with infils so he sought protection in Tara. Sicarius who was ruler remained with Coria and I had no intention of him moving to Tara whilst Coria still existed.  The fact the region revolted quite a few turns (a day at least as far as I'm aware) after Saeculo moved to Tara was completely out of my hands.  How this can be seen as a realm merger is extremely confusing for me.

If people don't want this situation to arise,  the last region of a 'realm' shouldn't be allowed to revolt to another realm.  I'm assuming TH didn't know that Lothruin revolted rather and thought I'd changed Duchies, otherwise I'd state this was a very petty accusation against me.

This may sound controversial, but I really LIKE the fact that votes are anonymous. For so many reasons!

Firstly, I do not like to play the two characters I have in the same realm the same. In fact, Sicarius often doesn't agree with his brother Saeculo (and as a result votes against him on certain issues). Yet if these were to become public, he'd have no choice but to support his older brother, lest he suffer a backlash.

On this path of thought, I also think it opens up the possibility of a lot more backstabbing, I read on the Wiki years ago a funny description of being offered a cookie to vote for person A, and then taking the cookie, eating it and voting for person B without person A ever knowing. I like this. I also like the fact that less powerful characters can make their own decision without the threat of repercussions of more powerful characters. If there was only one Duke for example, he could easily force everyone to obey his commands, and anyone who did not, well he could make their lives extremely difficult. (Depending on the government system, would depend on how relevant this is).

This is not to say that I don't think the above would make things interesting, I just think that there are two sides to it.

As a player I had mixed feelings about the Empire, on the one hand I thought it novel, I also was excited by the response of other players who genuinely thought it may change things. On the other hand however, part of me though it was merely an expansions of the current 'Alliance, peace, war, hatred' system already in place. To some extent is also seemed an OOC motivation to 'spice' up AT and remove the dominance of the Central Alliance.

IG-wise, I think Merlin has been just as guilty as Saeculo of underhand tactics.

First and foremost was using the opportunity to change the realm to a Monarchy from a Republic. Isolating not only an extremely close friend, but a fairly powerful one at that, was one of Merlins primary mistakes (although we've discussed this OOC in private between ourselves and I sort of see the reasoning). Either way, it came across as a power-play IG and was thus strongly protested against by some of the Corian characters.

The revelation of the Protectorate (Saeculo revealed such "private" letters only once Merlin disclosed existance of the Protectorate. After that, as it was no longer a secret organisation, and neither were its contents as far as Saeculo was concerned).

If Merlin was so determined not to harm the CE, why in private conversation amongst close friends did he openly state so?

Additionally, the choice IC to lie to various rulers (or not tell the entire truth) was perhaps the worst move. If this was presented to the CE as a "we want to strengthen the Empire even more by joining other realms together, and I may have to use deceit to do this" Merlin wouldn't have lost all the trust he has from his allies who suddenly see that he wants to weaken and attack them.

Additionally, Saeculo, and from what I hear, Ravendon both tried to give Merlin a way out before the majority of these revelations. He could have retired as Duke and still retained influence within Coria. Perhaps even gone away, reformed his plans and tried again. Now, I'm doubtful as to whether Coria's allies would accept such a character being in a position of influence.

It certainly spiced the game up (at least in Coria), so on an OOC level I'd like to thank you for that. IC, I doubt Merlin or Saeculo will ever be friends again in the same way they once were. Though I'll be interested were these suicide RP's end up!

I knew Coria and Tara headbutted on a couple of things during the War. Especially their perceived lack of support. But how did it get so bad that there were rumours of us contemplating attacking them!? What did I miss when I left!?



[suspicious]P.S This looks like an interesting button! Suspicious![/suspicious]

Now, *I* helped Coria negotiate a favorable peace treaty with Eston. But, Coria surrendered, we did not "pull out of the war.

Perhaps Perth can clear this up, as I'm pretty sure Kerwin and Saeculo were the ones discussing the peace treaty and the advantages etc. Maybe Merlin had an influence, but I was under the impression that it was Kerwin and Saeculo who made it happen.

Coria pulled out of the war with Eston. Sure CE wasn't happy, but we endured.

You're kidding right? Coria was being RAPED by the North, barely able to defend itself because of Tara and CE could offer no support to us due to their own problems. We signed an AMAZING peace deal with Eston which prevented the North using Coria for Military Access to the CE (we remained a buffer) and you claim CE wasn't happy with that!?

I know CE was more than happy with that because I was Consul at the time. I explicitly discussed it with the PM of CE at the time (Jason?), Aldarion and Ottar all of whom fully supported the decision of Coria. It was stated by myself that Coria risked destruction but would fight on if our allies *really* wanted us to, and I was encouraged to sign peace due to the fact it ensured them a buffer!

You wouldn't believe how much those damn Falasani's crop up in Coria. Saeculo began to think he was simply being paranoid, the only thing he'd hear was rumours of this or that. But they're damn frequent!

For those interested, here is some more of the RP from today:

The City of Barad Gardor

The morning after elections in The City of Barad Gardor Many awoke to noise an commotion in the street as protesters marched down towards the palace.


As they reached the palace they were meet by armed palace guards, now fully dressed in their new uniforms bearing Coria's new emblems and colors. It took little time for the protesters to turn into an unruly mob after a local stable was turned aflame by unknown arsonists. The alarm was raised and more armed troops rushed to the palace guards aid and seeing the fire off in the distance they mobilized in an attempt to extinguish the fire. To the guards folly they tried to push there way through the peasants to reach the fire. As they made there way through the crowd, one of the guards was attacked by a protester and the ordeal quickly spireled of of control with the guards now trying to forcefully quell the unruly populous.


Hours passed as the violence soon spread to other parts of the city and many of the government building were set aflame, in the distance the city could be seen with a glow of amber and smoke.


At the gates of the city a militia of farmers 200 men strong could be seen marching into the city waving the banner of the White Rabbit.

And then this

Saeculo remained in the dark, slowly watching the embers of the once great fire burn down to a sullen red. The summer months had once brought fresh breezes into the keep, however, now that winter had set in, there was a chill in the air and Saeculo sat wrapped in fur.

Ordinarily, there would have been little unusual with this scene for Saeculo was often fond of sitting in front of the fire, his favourite hound laying beneath his heels, yet tonight, the dull embers of the fire picked out a silver sheen beneath the furs. The armour of the past General and Consul of Coria.

Having inititally celebrate the re-election of his old friend after so many years out of politics, Saeculo was astounded to hear that Duke Merlin, one of his closest friends was making a wild bid for power.

At first he had been dumbstruck, there had been reports of rioting and that Duke Merlin had destroyed the emblems and colours of Coria within Shanandoah. Then summoning his courage he had ordered the foundation of a new army, addressed the realm and had protested the actions of his old friend.

Relaxing in his chair, he had thought about the days events. What was the old fool thinking. Saeculo had expressly explained to Merlin that he would never support the foundation of a Monarchy within Coria. He loved the realm too much, a realm he had bled for, a realm he had fought for numberous times throughout the years. Then he remembered the occasion in which Merlin had last led a rebellion against the realm. This was not the first time he had attempted to take control of Coria.

With a furrow of the brow he glanced back at the ambers. He would have to stock more firewood in the future he thought.

The excuse was that you were sending an army south to "visit relatives". That is verbatim the language used (though of course you didn't call it an army).

As for Hammarsett, your shenanigans factored into the decision, even if I didn't cite it as the reason we declared war. In the end I didn't much care about our casus belli - honestly I don't even remember exactly what reason I gave. I had my reasons for going to war that were good enough for me, and that's all that mattered. My allies were behind me, so I didn't really feel that I had to justify myself to everyone else.

Indeed, and after you attacked Coria twice by surprise, without previously declaring War, then we knew we could never trust Hammarsett ever again. At that point, Saeculo wouldn't rest until you were destroyed, which is a shame, as Coria helped to found and support Hammarsett in the early days, and you had a cool culture on our borders. As a player I didn't want it to happen, but obviously as a character I was delighted to see the downfall of Hammarsett.

There IS a reason he eventually lost his position and was replaced.

Yes. And that was because I, as a player, went travelling around South-East Asia for four months and paused my characters. To suggest Saeculo 'lost his position and was replaced' for trying to justify an excursion down South is ludicris at best. If I hadn't gone travelling, Saeculo would probably still be Consul right now.

I don't really recall the incident, but I believe the reasoning behind it is that you couldn't disprove it. No-one called Saeculo a liar at the time. If they had, he would have challanged them to a duel. Nobility didn't just accuse nobility of lying very lightly.

As a side note, I'm pretty sure this 'excuse' was talked about within the Senate, or at least with Merlin.

Besides, it was Hammarsett that broke their treaty with us, not the other way around. They did so by using our lands to attack Tara, we helped Tara and it was THIS that Hammarsett used as it's reasoning for War, not because Coria was marching South.

As an OOC note, I truly tried to play Saeculo as an honest and noble character, but the politics and bias was just unbelievable, and by the end Saeculo was getting fed up of trying for nothing.

This is the first forum post I've made since Core was abandoned, since I could bother trying to remember the password I once used, although I've now reset it.

But I'd agree. Saying that the War is pretty much over would be extremely foolish. The North once said that and the Central Alliance came back into the fight strongly.

The Northern realms are still extremely dangerous and far from beaten. It's been a fairly even fight. Their larger numbers against our quicker refit times, but there has been seemingly frustrating agreements on both sides ... Eston/Coria, Talerium/Darka and Tara/Hammarsett. But that's War I suppose! Whilst not as scared as I once was, I still don't feel very confident in Coria's position and things could certainly change for the worse, although the CE reinforcements will help a LOT.

Well that's the last time I use Battlemaster on my phone! I've just paused my character by accident. How long is it before I can unpause again?

Unless I'm mistaken, this is the treaty that Sordnaz's entire advisory council was against signing because of that crap.

It doesn't even make sense that you guys thought that was part of a suggested peace treaty. The only reason this was suggested...by KK himself no less, was because we couldn't agree on an actual peace treaty and it was said as an assurance that we could trust the word of the North to honour it even though it wasn't put down in writing.

The reason it wasn't put down in writing was because Coria was accused of stalling, and the Northern realms didn't want to sit down and attempt to negotiate the land issue with Coria and Hammarsett in case they lost any momentum with the CE. I'm extremely glad that the CE is still going as strong as ever.