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Zonasa had something brewing before the holidays, but inactivity killed it unfortunately. We'll try and get it started up once more.

People thirst for blood :P

In Erandi's little 'search for the truth', some things have come to light that aren't going to be resolved peacefully.

Letting Soliferum live?  I really doubt Tharion was behind that.  Not when Soliferum refused to give up Viracocha.

Tharion was after Viracocha, who was in Alanurs, and the first target of Zonasa's assault (which is why Erandi didn't care too much that David moved the armies there, although he was a little perturbed). Alanurs got it bad right off as well because of the amazing 80/100/100 SF RC that was there too.

I think I've taken other regions the same way, actually -- Haul comes to mind.

Haha. True True. Haul was supposed to be gifted to Cathay along with the Duchy of Azros... ungrateful James and meddling Ziode torpedoed that... But I suppose Cathay had other problems than the inability to simply accept a couple of gift duchies from Zonasa.

All this just goes to show nothing Erandi ever plans for Zonasa ever really goes according to plan... But hey, at least he gets the ball rolling sometimes.

And Zonasa had nowhere near enough outside support for that plan.  The fact that anyone in Zonasa thought the coalition would have stood for that boggles my mind.  There is no way that anyone in Cathay or Aenilia was going to accept Zonasa stymieing the war any longer, most of the coalition wanted to attack Zonasa if we couldn't come up with some way to get them to let us through, and Zonasa wanting a duchy out of it outraged even more people.  Zonasa trying to just reduce Soliferum to the peninsula...Man, I wish I'd known that.  Cathay would have gone ballistic.

Err, Tharion and James were consulted the whole time (although admittedly James said little). Tharion was pretty outspoken about it and Aenilia's role. But yea, Cathay knew about the whole thing and James gave his approval. Maybe it was just lip service to get Zonasa into the war. Ziode, who was Duke of Anacan at the time I believe, was put in touch with Ceolwyn about starting the new realm (in Hatdhes)... But of course, the whole thing blew up.

Zonasa really wasn't after Alanurs and really didn't want a duchy, persay. Zonasa's goals were really just to reduce Soliferum a bit and put a friendly realm in Hatdhes. That Alanurs fell to Zonasa was not planned in the slightest. If there was any expansion to be had, Zonasa was really after the strategic location of Masahakon (again, forcing the coalition across the straight and providing a strong defensive position from which to support the new realm in Hatdhes).

Having said that, Phellan thinks the whole "attack Alanurs then declare peace" was the most chicken!@#$ thing ever.     Zonasa should have stuck in the war and fought it out - earned themselves some respect in doing so.   But no, somehow they went from were going to war!  to back to peace in two seconds flat.   

Zonasa's goals for the conflict were accomplished pretty quickly. The idea was to reduce Soliferum back to its holdings on the peninsula, not completely destroy it. Masahakon was supposed to be Zonasan (so that Zonasa could help protect Soliferum's retreat, forcing the attacking armies to sail across the straight), with Alanurs staying with Soliferum. A new realm was supposed to be founded in Hatdhes with the support of Aenilia, Cathay, and Zonasa (to provide a buffer against King Thain in Azros). But Jenred kinda threw a whole wrench in the plan. Well, a wrench is an understatement... he blew it up. Combined with David marching on Alanurs, things went south quickly. He wasn't going to trade one foreign dictator for another (plus the added bit between Edara and Erandi is Razrpot). So Zonasa stepped out. Unfortunate.

Not in the slightest.

If someone has managed to piss off people badly enough, it's perfectly reasonable for them to come after his family, too.  This is particularly true when various members of the family in question have been seen to act in a very similar manner.

Perhaps I'm mistaken then. I could have sworn it was against the spirit of the game to ban someone from a realm based on what family they were from. If someone RPs that a particular character is not very well related to another character of the same family, that should be taken into account and respected. I'm not on the dev. team or anything, but that's just a rule I've been hearing and adhering to for a while.

To tell me, or anyone else, that the way I or my characters think about a particular family is an abuse is pretty frigging ridiculous. I'm not going to bother going into reasons why the McGahee family is untrustworthy, hated, blah, blah, blah, but I will say that I'm entitled to think whatever the bloody hell I like about a character in this game and to be told that the way I think is against the rules of the game...the absurdity boggles the mind.

I don't think I told you or your characters how to think. Your character can think whatever he likes, heck if I care. I think I said you have to judge each character off their merits. If Optimus has said something IC to piss your character off (can be super trivial if you like), then by all means hate the character. But if your character really hasn't had any interaction with Optimus (or Thain, or Jenred, or whoever given all the prominent families on FEI), then your character shouldn't be up in arms when they appear.

It'd be like if I hated everyone with the last name of Smith who walked around the street. There are many Smiths in this world, many of them are cool people, a few have managed to piss me off over the years... just speaking for myself, I'm not going to hate them all as a result (well, unless that's the way you/your characters work, then that's cool too, no worries man).

Soliferum was power-hungry and expansionist.   Somehow Zonasa managed to keep blinders on long enough to actually "defend" (aka help) Soliferum every time it bulllied someone into a war :P   It was just a matter of time once the other Southern Realms were gone until Soliferum either made Zonasa it's pet or turned on it and consumed its land. . .

Exactly. Which is why it kinda irks me when I get (still to this day) OOC messages regarding "backstabbing" Soliferum. Erandi sent repeated messages to Conan, and went through various channels to gather a big 'grievance list' (as Phellan can attest to). When all this was basically thrown back in his face, war was declared (but not before some tension was created between Erandi and Jenred/Edara :) ). I don't care about it too much when presented IC, because not every character knows the details, but getting OOC messages is... unfortunate.

Was that its lone city or did it take Taop or something with it? I was gone for a few years.

I believe it had Ansopen with it for a time. But no other cities when I came around.

Yea, the Rebellion was planned and given the blessing of Optimus, in which case, yea, it would have been smarter for him to just step down, but whatever. I think the idea was that they'd be able to change the name of the realm, which they couldn't otherwise? I don't know. I don't think the players were very well versed in what they were doing.

I don't exactly know where the line is between Toupellon's planned secession and the most rebellion in Cathay, but I do know that there isn't much of one. Both were planned with the blessing/knowledge of the ruler, both were coordinated awkwardly well. Anatole even said today "Fair elections? I laugh at that, for none that I know that minted the crown of Cathay took part to them." Boycotting an election (which the ruler won with a paultry 14% of the vote) just to rebel against his rule a few days later seems similarly contrived. Especially when Erandi heard IC at least a month prior that Colasan was planning to secede anyway. Maybe this is a point that should be raised IC, but if Anatole was so interested in Cathay's future and dedicated to her, then why did he and all the other ruling Dukes (save Optimus) run away from Cathay? Why not win the election and, if Optimus was really that despised, banish/exile him...

Also, I don't know why everyone is hating the McGahee family. Isn't that clearly against the rules of the game? I mean, yea, the guy plays many of his characters alike, but it seems everyone is judging Optimus based on Conan when the player has clearly defined IC that they weren't close nor very well related. Seems to me like an abuse to me that pretty much the whole continent is content to not only let slide, but support. Discouraging. I'd hate for Erandi (honorable, well spoken) to be judged off of Carlos (dubious, indignant, near-illiterate...). I'm pretty sure many of us have characters we play differently, and I would hate for the next character I bring around to be judged off of whatever my former character(s) did...

I can't help but look at the whole stretch from Azros to Akanos with suspicion and, honestly, a little disdain.

Maybe I just don't know all the facts.

The intent isn't as important as the result in this case. Maybe Hupar has a pretty damn good reason to be in the duchy of Remton? It would create a lot of cases where people will have penalties when they didn't use to.

I don't think I agree with that first statement, especially if the result is logical and tempered. Yes, such a system would impose (some, likely light) penalties to duchies that would abuse the system, and these penalties did not exist before. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. Also, to keep regions from switching often just for better recruitment results, a penalty could be imposed where the region would run at decreased efficiency for a length of time and wouldn't be able to switch again for at least another length days, if not longer (like the estate system did when you switched from production to authority, etc...)

Out of all the ideas that have been bandied around for non-capital recruiting, the duchy-based one is the one that Tom said he would look at, if he ever decided it could work. I think the idea was that you could only recruit troops from the duchy to which you belonged, and you would do it in the "duchy capital". (Which we don't have anymore...) It would not be open recruitment where anyone could recruit any troops that were available in the region. They would only be available to nobles who were aligned to that particular duchy. Not sure this would ever actually happen, though.

I really like this idea as well.

Seems like it could be discouraged by having some code that does something similar to the 'distance from capital' mechanic but on the duchy level.

+1

Which starts to be complicated, forcing us to ask ourselves "is it still worth it"? I wouldn't want ducal distance from the capital to just become another burden that forces more realm to spend more time and maintenance and management than warfare.

I think distance from duchy capital could be implemented to be more of an anti-abuse mechanism than a burden to the game. So, giving an example using FEI geography, Hupar, through various region connections, would have a pretty hefty penalty for being part of the duchy of Remton, but absolutely none to be part of the Duchy of Topenah, Colasan, or Hupar. Unfortunately, Itomazh is stuck with Enlod.

As strategic secession and capital movements are typically orchestrated to get troop recruitment closer to the military front lines, why not simply solve this issue by having recruitment centers in all of the duchies, with the only available troops in the recruitment center being those that were from each particular duchy?

I'm sure this has been suggested before (I mean, it's been 10 years or so), but it makes sense to me. I'm no history buff, but the time era, as I understand it, was really built around various powerful duchies operating together under a common banner due to a strong leader. Duchies would send their armies to fight for their King/Queen no? I assume those Dukes did not have to "recruit" troops out of a capital when the troops were trained within their own duchy...

So it would make sense to me if, and given the new tax code this might be a bit easier to do, Duchies worked much like mini-realms. Distance from the duchy-capital would certainly create more problems with control, which would be added to distance from the realm-capital as well. So that if Zonasa was fighting a war against Kindara and wanted to recruit troops from Azarons' cavalry center while stationed in Batesaor, it'd be really difficult to maintain or even do in the first place, because the Duchy would have to run through Hutael and Paplarmi, covering quite the distance and creating significant "distance from Duchy" control problems, on top of "distance from capital" control problems, which might make such strategies rather impractical.

Perhaps this has all been discussed, but it seems like it would alleviate the problems with moving a capital around for military reasons and strategic seceding.

Arcaea always merits a war- someone has to take up the task.   :D

Zonasa's always up for the challenge :). Just so long as it's a fair fight. I hate what is all too common in Battlemaster where realms team up unfairly on another, typically smaller, realm just for easy victory (on FEI see NeoSartania, Papania, et al...) It's disenfranchising, petty, and simply not fun. Erandi's not going to commission Zonasa's armies to march up again without a good and fair motive (the Principality certainly isn't about to become a realm of raiders, looters and pillagers, although I guess the history of Batesaor could push that kind of storyline if need be). The last motive was pretty weak, but something akin to that could be enough I suppose, although I'm sure everyone would appreciate something a bit more substantive.

That may be the shortest war ever...Cathay and Aenilia just reached some sort of arrangement involving Ahael.

I don't think it was designed to be the longest war, and with Brian losing his control over Cathay's governance, it was kinda destined to be short lived. Although cutting a deal regarding Ahael is a bit dubious. Let's see if Zonasa can't get worked up about it. Gotta find some way to pass the time until Arcaea merits another war...

First off, a mini-rant, skip if you'd like:

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After the Aenilian-Arcaean conflict -- which if I must say was a very good one and a lot of fun for me at least -- I looked along with the players of other southern realms as to where the next conflict would emerge. A relative peace fell over the region for maybe 2 or 3 weeks. Nobles in Zonasa became all hissy and a few didn't want to recruit up because we weren't at war and there was nothing to do (although, of course, there was a starving city and some a few regions in disrepair after a bit of starvation).

Now that conflict has come, I must say I'm rather perturbed by the responses from some of those same hissy characters (who of course aren't ideally prepared for this conflict). Many of these characters (who conveniently have friends or family in other realms) want the war to go a different direction, regardless of the ongoing plot lines. "We just got out of a war defending Aenilia along with the Kindarans, we have a history of alliance and friendship with both realms... now's the perfect time to go attack them!!" Or, "Zonasa has a well documented history of fighting against C'thonia and Nighthelm... let's go help them!" etc...

*facepalm*

Just goes to show you can't please everyone, and there are some people you can never please.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

And now, to the Southern Conflict and it's causes from the Zonasan perspective, for those who are a bit farther removed IC-wise from the situation but still OOC curious. Of course, to all the following reasons/motives, one must consider the greed and boredom motives. If realms aren't fighting each other and trying to grow their influence, why play a game called "Battlemaster?" If I leave any motives out, please feel free to add them in the thread. Anyway, here goes:

Kindara is declaring war on C'thonia for a whole host of reasons, which some will debate the influence/merit of. But principally:
1. Giving C'thonia an honorable death -- admittedly the realm has done little and gone nowhere since its initial founding.
2. Removing King Thain, who at least in Zonasa is generally viewed as a future threat to the security of the Duchy of Batesaor, from power.
3. There was a little bit mentioned about C'thonia having betrayed NeoSartania, but I'm not sure of the merit of that motive.

Zonasa, of course, can support any/all of these. There's no love for C'thonia in Zonasa.

Cathay (ally of Zonasa) has also declared war (still unofficial, I think, but forthcoming) on C'thonia with the intention of annexing a few rural regions in order to feed her cities. While Zonasa would typically support this -- because again, there's no love for C'thonia in Zonasa -- in this case the realm has objected to the actions. A few reasons:
1. First and perhaps most important on the sovereignty level, Cathay annexed the region of Ahael from Aenilia (ally of Zonasa) in the previous conflict (with as-of-now unfulfilled promises of returning the region once peace was restored).
2. Also, Kindara has objected to Cathay's advances in the region (how is Kindara to feed Hatdhes without Edairn, afterall?). The region of Edairn has been historically connected to Hatdhes as well.
3. And finally, and this most important to Erandi, Erandi (IC) and I (OOC) object to characters/players blatantly teaming up on isolated or smaller realms because they can (one of the reasons my characters left Beluaterra recently. Also the reason why Zonasa did not attack NeoSartania although she had more cause than any other realm). Therefore, Erandi's own sense of honor (yea, he's got an ivory tower, although Jenred among others can certainly tell everyone why he shouldn't. :P), would dictate that C'thonia should have the chance to fight Kindara mano-a-mano, so to speak. And so by coming in to annex regions while C'thonia is engaged elsewhere, the Cathayans are behaving dishonorably. Erandi doesn't view the Cathayans as enemies of course, just simply misguided. Ergo, as soon as Cathay launches a TO in C'thonian territory, Zonasa will declare war against her ally, with the intention of bringing them back to the 'honorable' path and returning Ahael to the Aenilians.

I don't quite know the full background behind Ohnar West's grievances with Cathay as recently aired on the rulers' forum, nor do I know exactly what's going on in Aenilian politics to speak on those matters. Jenred has said a little about the conflict on the rulers' circuit, but with little in the way of a concrete position. Although I am interested in his reference to a "crusade" and what this could mean for the South...

Anyway, hope that informs those interested in knowing. Cheers.