Honour

[ComradeRob]

After having been away from PA for some time, I'm surprised to see that the old 'honour' debate seems to be very much alive, even now.

For those with short memories, the debate about 'honour' has been going on almost since PA's beginnings. At first, it referred mostly to the conduct of individual players, most specifically the [un]fairness of the top players, who were often accused of 'bashing' those ranked far below them. Eventually this resulted in the attack score limit, after various other methods of 'newbie protection' were tried.

However, by that time the honour debate had acquired a new dimension: alliance honour. This related most directly to whether or not alliances kept to their agreements, or whether they 'backstabbed' their erstwhile allies. Of course, how these actions were viewed depended almost entirely on their results - those who broke an agreement and subsequently profited from it were vilified as 'backstabbers', those who lost consoled themselves with having brought some 'excitement' into the game, even if their real intent had been to win.

My personal opinion, based on my experience of PA, Is that honour was always a bankrupt concept. A war game should be just that, and in a war any tactic (so long as it doesn't break any game rules) should be considered acceptable, even if that means upsetting a few people. It certainly makes for a more lively game. The rounds which featured several wars were almost invariably more interesting, for a longer period of time, than the rounds which did not.

This becomes even more clear when one remembers that rounds typically last only a few months. At the end of the round, second place means nothing and all the honour displayed in keeping your agreements is worthless. Doubtless, those who finish above you will be laughing at your complicity in helping them to victory. Those who wish to receive credit for their honour merely end up being ridiculed for their weakness, whilst those who know how to be properly ruthless will end up winning. There is almost no value in keeping an agreement which doesn't help you to win; once an agreement has outlived its usefulness it should be broken. Ultimately, this provides the most opportunities for alliances to prove their skills against each other, something that can never happen if those alliance remain perpetually allied.

When making a decision, a HC can only think "will this help us to win?". Thinking "will this make us popular?" is, quite simply, weakness. People who think like that are simply inviting others to exploit their innocence.

So, what does this mean in practical terms? To me it means that any alliance worthy of the name should always be looking for the opportunity to win, rather than the opportunity to be 'nice'. I think Niccolo Machiavelli summed it up quite well:

War is a profession by which a man cannot live honorably; an employment by which the soldier, if he would reap any profit, is obliged to be false, rapacious, and cruel.

I won't make any attempt to apply this to the current round, since I am under-informed and would not presume to lecture people on how they should behave in a round I have little knowledge of. But the very fact that this debate has gone on so long is testament to the timeless quality of the dilemma; is it better to be feared by your enemies, or loved? My answer would always be the former, though sadly the latter argument often prevails amongst those who want an easy ride, even if their members are motivated and ready for a fight.

Ultimately, the only way to prove an alliance's strength is to fight, and win. The only way to do that is to make war, and to do so on terms where neither side has a terribly unfair advantage.

I suppose I should try to make a personal justification of this though. As HC I often had to deal with these kinds of issues, and I believe I made my decisions based on the principles I outlined. The best example I can think of was round 9. Late in the round, the WEET block was dominant, easily in an unassailable position. No outside force had the capability to so much as threaten us (a situation that inevitably occurs in every round, when one block becomes dominant). It was decided that WEET had to split, the only argument was over how.

We had two options at the time; to remain allied with ToT and Ely, and essentially gang up on WP (who we assumed would becoming a rallying point for all of the other losing alliances, hopefully making some sport out of the resulting war), or to fight both Ely and WP. This was somewhat complicated by the fact that Ely wanted to remain on our side. Ultimately, it was only by making Ely think that we were willing to betray them that the ET vs WE war came about. It was an even war, which we won by the dedication and hard work of our members.

By breaking the WEET agreement, the round was improved considerably for all concerned. It was a lot more fun than playing for 'honour'. Even though I lost a lot of roids and score (knocked down from about 30th to 90th or so) during the war, I always felt it was a lot more fun than sitting around hitting tiny planets in-para every night. This is a lesson that I think some of today's alliances could do well to heed. There is far more honour in fighting than in holding on to second or third place by virtue of agreements with the real winners.

[Vaio]

As usual, wise words there mate

Vaio

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by ComradeRob

My personal opinion, based on my experience of PA, Is that honour was always a bankrupt concept. A war game should be just that, and in a war any tactic (so long as it doesn't break any game rules) should be considered acceptable, even if that means upsetting a few people. It certainly makes for a more lively game. The rounds which featured several wars were almost invariably more interesting, for a longer period of time, than the rounds which did not.

A perfectly valid tactic is also convincing everyone else that honour is something worthwhile and is more important than winning. Certainly the aim of an exciting war-game seems to have pretty much disappeared from a lot of peoples' minds. If FAnG and Phraktos proceed to kill wolfpack over the next 2 weeks odd (and the open denials of any sort of NAP serves to convince a far few people that they aren't being "dishonourable" this way) and then manufacture some sort of incident involving MISTU (being careful to avoid the tag of backstabbers) they'll provide some light amusement for their members and win a round without ever having to fight a proper war.

I'm sure I'm crediting Phraktos with far too much intelligence but they've played a rather good round in my opinion. Assuming there is a next round they won't be lumped under the "**** over at all costs" heading which FAnG will find themselves possessing. Remaining content with a second place finish enables them to finish even higher next round as they won't be hunted down from the very beginning. As long as your goals as an alliance don't exist inside the framework of a single round (which is far worse for the game in my opinion) it's a perfectly valid idea to sacrifice something minor in the short-term for something major later on. Of course it rather stretches the imagination to believe that an alliance, of which both HCs have recently quit, is capable of such long-term strategic planning.

Sadly PA is no longer the place (indeed it only ever really showed brief glimpses) where alliance leaders capable of thinking beyond the "build big block, destroy enemy with overwhelming force, do laundry" concept exist in enough numbers to provide the sort of entertaining wars most of us fondly remember when we look back on our time in planetarion. Previously it seemed like most utterly one-sided wars were accidents more so than deliberately contrived affairs (ie in r3 the relative strength of fury/egion(rb) to everyone else wasn't seen pre-round, in r5 NoS/CELL were seriously over-estimated, in r7 the newx block failed miserably etc etc), and someone always stepped uo to the plate and added a modicum of excitement to the end of the round. Unfortunately this round while everyone acknowledges the capabilities of EVL were over-estimated nobody on the FPMW side (and yes kj I believe the people I've spoken to more than your incessant denials of any (in)formal agreements) seem willing to step up to the plate and do something to alleviate the unbelievable boredom of this round.

In conclusion gg, wp and congratulations on winning this foregone conclusion of an utterly asinine round you ****ing pack of useless faggots.

[The-Matrix]

honour is a dead concept the fact is every alliance at the start of this round wanted to bash ely they did it now were all stuck in gals with all other powerful alliances left with the dullest round ever the result of the round was decided befors a ship was ever sent in anger

[The_Fish]

heh. I agree with you Rob, R9 especially, breaking WEET was the honourable thing to do, just as breaking FPMW would be now. However, its FPM V W, and completely W's fault, and they're dead. Well, they asked for it.

[rnd|One]

Is this a re-post of some old thread? Your R9 part seems a tad sugar-coated and misconceived, but you have a good sentence together with; "There is far more honour in fighting than in holding on to second or third place by virtue of agreements with the real winners." Of all the alliances perhaps Phraktos comes out as a dud, as after all the hype they seemed to only rank 2nd best in /a winning block/ without any real pressure placed on them. Surely FPM's intelligence skills as a group have been a bottom low, however individually one would have thought they would be more ambitious.

...since I am under-informed and would not presume to lecture people on how they should behave in a round I have little knowledge of...

I can spot one old respected HC equivalent lurking around guilty of this henious crime.

[ComradeRob]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

A perfectly valid tactic is also convincing everyone else that honour is something worthwhile and is more important than winning. Certainly the aim of an exciting war-game seems to have pretty much disappeared from a lot of peoples' minds. If FAnG and Phraktos proceed to kill wolfpack over the next 2 weeks odd (and the open denials of any sort of NAP serves to convince a far few people that they aren't being "dishonourable" this way) and then manufacture some sort of incident involving MISTU (being careful to avoid the tag of backstabbers) they'll provide some light amusement for their members and win a round without ever having to fight a proper war.

That's a very good point. Acting 'honourably' (keeping agreements) is only in FAnG's interests since they are (afaik) currently winning. Everyone else below them should really be looking for a way of ending their agreements with FAnG, to target them and hopefully claim victory for themselves. The current attacks on WP give FAnG a bit of breathing space, but I can't imagine a single alliance lasting very long against three others.

Originally Posted by rnd|One

Is this a re-post of some old thread? Your R9 part seems a tad sugar-coated and misconceived

I probably could have saved myself a fair bit of typing by dredging up an old thread, but the post was a spur-of-the-moment thing after talking to a few people on IRC about the state of the current round. I fear I may have gotten a little carried away and wrote more than I intended to, but I was never the most concise of posters

As to the R9 stuff being misconceived, I will concede that my memory may be a little foggy. From my memory, the Eclipse HC were split as to whether to maintain the alliance with Ely at the time of the WE/ET split (the main argument in favour was that Ely would make good long-term partners, as opposed to the argument that Ely were also the biggest obstacle to winning R9). The exact details may have been slightly different, but I distinctly remember arguingin favour of war with both Ely and WP, rather than just WP alone.

[Zh|l]

Originally Posted by ComradeRob

As to the R9 stuff being misconceived, I will concede that my memory may be a little foggy. From my memory, the Eclipse HC were split as to whether to maintain the alliance with Ely at the time of the WE/ET split (the main argument in favour was that Ely would make good long-term partners, as opposed to the argument that Ely were also the biggest obstacle to winning R9). The exact details may have been slightly different, but I distinctly remember arguingin favour of war with both Ely and WP, rather than just WP alone.

I remember arguing against war with Elysium, mainly for image purposes. I am weak

[Bu||seye]

hirr had honour, even though they never "won a round" rankings-wise.
hirr are gone.

[Gerbie]

The WE vs ET split might have been a nice equal split, by the time it came it was already way overdue. Same as the NAR vs WEET split, which had nothing to do with an equal split. Rnd 9 had nothing to do with honour. It was an even lamer example of alliance politics than this round.

[Zh|l]

Originally Posted by Gerbie

The WE vs ET split might have been a nice equal split, by the time it came it was already way overdue. Same as the NAR vs WEET split, which had nothing to do with an equal split. Rnd 9 had nothing to do with honour. It was an even lamer example of alliance politics than this round.

I don't get your logic here.

This round the dominating block hasn't split up at all or provided a war that is midly challenging.

In r9, the dominating block did split up and provided two extra wars ontop of the original. (The NAR vs WEET split wasn't exactly fair no, but it's far better than the sorry excuse of a war this FPM vs WP one is).

Just because Vvomm gave up and were unable to capitalize on any of these wars doesnt make them 'overdue'. I remember certain NAR command members complaining about VVOMM and its attitude towards WEET since they didnt even try and thus NAR got steamrollered. If VVOMM had remotely tried, then VVOMMNAR may have been able to at least damage WEET. The fact they all gave up so early wasn't shitty politics - the politics continued to actually flow after all, unlike this round.

[Helix]

Yes this round is obvious that FPM is afraid to split up, and rather than play the game and make it interesting they would like to take the easy bait and single people out. One thing is clear, phraktos has shown that they have no desire to finish in first, and are content to simply be FAnG's *****

[Legator]

hm, posted into wrong thread...im getting old.

hi rob, and your right with what your wrote....(plz delete this one)

[Lord_Thunderball]

Grim did try, by blocking WP. At least, I think that. After he had seen that the gals are to grouped, members not willing to NOT defend in gal, and attacking gals who where allied all round, Phraktoss saw the only gain would be fame, not rank. And there for not willing to do the effort that was needed.

[xtothez]

Originally Posted by Zh|l

I remember arguing against war with Elysium, mainly for image purposes. I am weak :(

I argued for war with Eclipse purely to avoid stagnating the round (and the associated 'evil' baggage that followed). I really wanted to kill WP :(

[lokken]

FAnG seem to have a strategy that if they can avoid war, they will win as things stand. If however members of their block decide to change that - they lose. So all in all 'honour' suits FAnG very nicely from what I can see, because as Rob points out, they are winning at the mo.

All in all making for a pretty dull round, when really the people who decide to break agreements and go for the win have a great opportunity to be hailed as heroes and win the round for themselves if they do it right on a wave of popularity for ending the misery the universe currently resides in.

[DeadMan]

Originally Posted by The_Fish

heh. I agree with you Rob, R9 especially, breaking WEET was the honourable thing to do, just as breaking FPMW would be now. However, its FPM V W, and completely W's fault, and they're dead. Well, they asked for it.

When did WP die? WP is far from dead, and I don't think they will be either.

[Diamonds]

Originally Posted by DeadMan

When did WP die? WP is far from dead, and I don't think they will be either.

WolfPack died round 5 ><

Some others just decided to keep using the name

But there is a point to ComradeRob's statement, although I would say he misses somewhat. What if the HC looks further into the future than the end of the current round? Then honour plays a somewhat bigger role. I mean like: Can this alliance be trusted to keep its word or will they ditch us and attack us later? An alliance's reputation lasts longer than to the end of the round.

Ironically it was this point that made people moan a lot regarding Legion/Fury/RB. We stayed together because we knew we could trust one another (apart from most of the core Legion HC being very good friends with Fury command) and it was a trust that was built up from about mid round 2 when we decided to gang up on BlueTuba. So we stuck to our agreements and for that we got a lot of moans about powerblocking and making the game turn stale etc etc etc. To be honest it was never Legion's choice to ally with RB and if I remember right we tried to lose them several times. But on the other hand Fury kept their word to RB, and that we had to respect

So, in my honest opinion, a word is a word, and in order to win loyalty, you have to show you are trustworthy. I would never ally with anyone who are known to break that alliance if they seem to think they will gain a little from it. Call me oldfashioned and outdated, but that's just the way I am.

[Scorpio]

Originally Posted by Diamonds

I would never ally with anyone who are known to break that alliance if they seem to think they will gain a little from it. Call me oldfashioned and outdated, but that's just the way I am.

R5, Legion, Elysium...

[Diamonds]

Originally Posted by Scorpio

R5, Legion, Elysium...

That break came about for other reasons as you should know.....

[Rumad]

Originally Posted by lokken

FAnG seem to have a strategy that if they can avoid war, they will win as things stand. If however members of their block decide to change that - they lose. So all in all 'honour' suits FAnG very nicely from what I can see, because as Rob points out, they are winning at the mo.

All in all making for a pretty dull round, when really the people who decide to break agreements and go for the win have a great opportunity to be hailed as heroes and win the round for themselves if they do it right on a wave of popularity for ending the misery the universe currently resides in.

Ur actually wrong with this one, but I guess unless you know what we as a HC want you would have to make certain assumptions I guess.

FAnG has never broken an agrement - something which we are proud of. yeah sure its a bit one sided now, but with best intentions the FAnG hc decided on agreements which we believed to be fair. Phraktos did bring WP into the equation and thats when things get a little onesided.

You cannot say that suitable arrangements of the current block suits FAnG. If the status quo stays the same then yes your absolutely right that this situation will assist us. However there are many things to consider when considering block disintegration and effects which differ from a few rounds ago.

Firstly each alliance is limited to 100 members. This means that unlike previous rounds where galaxy control has been sorted by defection now we are limited to our ability to "control" our galaxies. All members of the block have the same problem if any conisdered breaking away. So none of the main blocking alliances can effectively gain control of there galaxies so all you do is effectively limit the 3 alliances chances of winning by breaking away.

Its easy to say its the most boring round cause we all know that to be true, but all 3 alliances are exceptionally limited with there ability to break away.

I would love FAnG to be seen as the ultimate round winner, but game mechanics as they are breakaways like everyone wants are theorhetically impossible.

[Rumad]

sidenote: Comparison's wih past rounds are all well and fine, but did they ever have limited amounts of members and 72 hour alliance swapping protocols?

[LB|away]

Finally some people who understand

[Tomkat]

I think the introduction of Alliance Rankings wasn't such a great idea. It should maybe have been brought in at the end of the round instead. Or just shown for an hour every week, so people have an indication.

As it is, it's clear who is in #1 and #2 spots. You can't propaganda it to make your alliance sound better. It shows who is on top.

Also, the round isn't over yet. Don't say things should be done that haven't been. Leave the criticism until the end of the round.

[mikay]

Probably the first thing to realise is this isn't war of necessity; You don't have to fight wars here but that is basically the whole point of the game. Also the effects aren't perpetual - you fight a round and then the slate is wiped clean. This just serves to make some of the historic/Machiavellian references inappropriate.

For me the whole point of honour in PA is for future rounds - you can only backstab me once without me expecting it in future. Fury and Legion did indeed stay loyal to oneanother for a very long time but Fury did have a habbit of going through other alliances and dumping them on a regular basis. What amazed me most about that was the the sheer stupidity of alliances siding with them time and again when there was almost a guarantee you would get backstabbed. In any sane world Fury would have ceased to get allies a long time ago but I guess everyone thought they would be different.

So yes the reason to have honour is so you don't get frozen out in future rounds imo.

In a single round scenario it is possibly different. There are probably 3 reasons people play PA: Social reasons, fun (ie fighting wars) and winning. All the "good" alliances are based around winning but you can't dismiss an alliance as bad because they didn't win. hirr were mostly regarded as a joke militarily but the people who joined them weren't motivated by victory and I don't doubt they achieved what they set out to. Equally an alliance that is set on a path of fun regardless (say Deus) might win or lose but if the goal is to battle for the whole round not just the first 3 weeks then they may succeed while coming low in the rankings. Victory over honour is only relevant here in as much as winning is your sole goal.

Personally I just never found winning as the most important thing. Very few alliances will achieve any real credit for winning, basically you're Fury or Legion or you're 2nd rate and nothing will ever change that. It just seems to me that at the moment the lesser alliances are desperate for a round win to legitimise their existence and it's almost a right of passage to being allowed to disband with dignity.

Anyway Rob you don't care about any of that, you just wanna stir dissent in the FPM block you little troll you

[ComradeRob]

Originally Posted by Diamonds

But there is a point to ComradeRob's statement, although I would say he misses somewhat. What if the HC looks further into the future than the end of the current round? Then honour plays a somewhat bigger role. I mean like: Can this alliance be trusted to keep its word or will they ditch us and attack us later? An alliance's reputation lasts longer than to the end of the round.

This is balanced by the fact that if the two alliances do keep their agreements to each other, everyone else will gang up on them in the next round. For the smaller of the two alliances, this means that not only will they not win the current round, they will not win the next round either.

[Scorpio]

Originally Posted by Diamonds

That break came about for other reasons as you should know.....

Not voluntarily, but under heavy pressure from Fury?

[xtothez]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

I think the introduction of Alliance Rankings wasn't such a great idea. It should maybe have been brought in at the end of the round instead. Or just shown for an hour every week, so people have an indication.
As it is, it's clear who is in #1 and #2 spots. You can't propaganda it to make your alliance sound better. It shows who is on top. .

I doubt that would make any difference. All major alliances know the whereabouts of the others, something particularly helped by the small size of the universe and intelligence shared within a block. I'd be surprised if our universe listing is under 95% accurate. Intel is far too easy to acquire these days.

[Kjeldoran]

Originally Posted by xtothez

I doubt that would make any difference. All major alliances know the whereabouts of the others, something particularly helped by the small size of the universe and intelligence shared within a block. I'd be surprised if our universe listing is under 95% accurate. Intel is far too easy to acquire these days.

I agree, esp in private galaxies, makes it all the easier

rgds Kj

[Zh|l]

Originally Posted by mikay

For me the whole point of honour in PA is for future rounds - you can only backstab me once without me expecting it in future. Fury and Legion did indeed stay loyal to oneanother for a very long time but Fury did have a habbit of going through other alliances and dumping them on a regular basis. What amazed me most about that was the the sheer stupidity of alliances siding with them time and again when there was almost a guarantee you would get backstabbed. In any sane world Fury would have ceased to get allies a long time ago but I guess everyone thought they would be different.

Alot of Fury's apparent backstabbings weren't backstabbings. I dont see where you get the Fury having a habit of going through other alliances - the only one you could possibly say fits this is r5, but there are various reasons to how and why r5 happened. You don't see Elysium command from that era complaining about Fury - you see them doing it so about Legion. WP/Ni had a fair chance vs Legion with a whole host of alliances under their banner.

As for r7, Legion/FAnG were hardly best of friends anyway and refused to really acknowledge eachother. I remember the long nights of Fury trying to mediate the block. Sadly enough, Titans and RaH seemed to be the only other sane people.

[Diamonds]

Originally Posted by Scorpio

Not voluntarily, but under heavy pressure from Fury?

Not really. I would say the inaccessability of Ely command was a major reason. I remember waiting for 24? hours to get some officer/HC give me an answer, by that time the matter was moot ofc Howver funnily the joint channel was spammed with officers/HCs joining like 5 mins after we announced that we would severe our ties with Ely, go figure etc.....

[K-W]

Mikay, luckily those people who ran alliances that worked with Fury knew more about Fury than you obviously do. Fury were not backstabbers and in many many cases made rounds alot worse because of thier refusal to backstab people. If Fury had been backstabbers PA would have been alot more exciting.

Originally Posted by Bu||seye

hirr had honour, even though they never "won a round" rankings-wise.
hirr are gone.

Utter crap. It is this kind of conceptualization of PA that has ruined it. Hirr knew they had no shot of ever winning, so they found other ways to add fun to the game. This involved playing with different goals. Congrats to them, it was a good idea and a fun alliance, but to compare them to alliances that played to win in the catagory of honour is garbage.


The fact of the matter is that Honor has always simply been a PR term in this game. People exploited the legitimate desire for fairness and honor to produce some of the least fair and least honorable situations the game has ever seen. The only proper way to play a game like this is to say fck honor and fck loyalty. We are all friends playing a game and we all try to beat each other. At the end of the round we say congrats to the winners and we all jump in again and play. If PA were played like that it would still be thriving, but instead people cared about honor and loyalty.

Grudges begat blocks. Loyalty begat blocks. Blocks begat polarization. Polarization begat stagnation.

We could go from round 1 on and see exactly how the nature of the game evolved to what it is today and a big part of that was early alliances valueing loyalty of other alliances. And alot of it came from the community constantly punishing any alliance that ever dared to break agreements. I think that rd 4 was a turning point. Rounds 1-4 were a differenct game for me, because after the disdain of nos for daring to be sneaky no one ever would again. No major alliance would ever risk making themselves pariahs for the rest of PA just to have a fun one round. And it is everyones fault that this community chose loyalty over fun politics and fun combat.

[Rumad]

Originally Posted by K-W

Mikay, luckily those people who ran alliances that worked with Fury knew more about Fury than you obviously do. Fury were not backstabbers and in many many cases made rounds alot worse because of thier refusal to backstab people. If Fury had been backstabbers PA would have been alot more exciting.

So your saying round 7 you never backstabbed FAnG (after the fact we supportedyou in certain incidences I dont think you can class our dropping as anything but a kick in the teeth)?

You were offered Titans and as a make weight legon were offered us.

and zhil - our relations with Legion weren't nearly as bad as our relations with Titans (we launched on Titans and vice versa).

Fury command sufering from subjective long term memory syndrome?

[Goatsemaster]

Originally Posted by K-W

Grudges begat blocks. Loyalty begat blocks. Blocks begat polarization. Polarization begat stagnation.

This has to be one of your best posts.

When making a decision, a HC can only think "will this help us to win?". Thinking "will this make us popular?" is, quite simply, weakness. People who think like that are simply inviting others to exploit their innocence.

The obvious exception being when popularity will help you win. I've always liked the alliances that didn't seem to be trying to win popularity contests though. Late-r4 Fury for example, or FAnG*.

I'd also like to point out that the rounds with the most ship movement and combat are invariably the ones with most 'betrayels'. Round 4 and nos come to mind, round 6 and um, that alliance, as well. If the tail end of Round 7 had come earlier it could've been a lot more active. Of course some people do actually thrive on stagnation, because a personal victory can be easier to assure if the alliance is less willing to take risks. This last point probably leads to a conflict of interest in many cases.

* They have to be doing it on purpose, I mean no one can be... [ed. let's not derail this thread, eh?]

[mikay]

Originally Posted by K-W

The fact of the matter is that Honor has always simply been a PR term in this game. People exploited the legitimate desire for fairness and honor to produce some of the least fair and least honorable situations the game has ever seen. The only proper way to play a game like this is to say fck honor and fck loyalty. We are all friends playing a game and we all try to beat each other. At the end of the round we say congrats to the winners and we all jump in again and play. If PA were played like that it would still be thriving, but instead people cared about honor and loyalty.

OK my post was long anyway and I did cut corners to simplify it. Honour in this game is irrelevant other than as percieved - ie PR as you say. Fury ditched RB (R3), Ely (R5), FRT(R7). Who cares if Legion was behind it, if the facts were different, the criticism was heaped onto fury, the reputation as backstabbers was heaped onto Fury. Tell people something enough and it becomes history, people who weren't around then will get 3rd generation warped perspectives of "the facts" which is why being seen as honourable can pay off in future.

[K-W]

Originally Posted by Rumad

So your saying round 7 you never backstabbed FAnG (after the fact we supportedyou in certain incidences I dont think you can class our dropping as anything but a kick in the teeth)?

You were offered Titans and as a make weight legon were offered us.

and zhil - our relations with Legion weren't nearly as bad as our relations with Titans (we launched on Titans and vice versa).

Fury command sufering from subjective long term memory syndrome?

Oh for christ sake Rumad. Fury's agreement with Fang in round 7 included a provision for the ceasation of relations. We made it absolutely positively clear from Day 1 that our alliance with Fang was not as strong as our alliance with our main allies. The eventual decision to end cooperation with Fang was done with much hesitation and regret. And as a sign of respect and thanks to Fang, we retained a nap with you, we simply could not continue to fight on your side when you were fighting our allies and we were busy in a war with Titans. It was a bad situation but by absolutely no definition was it backstabbing.

And legion f'n hated you. Perhaps you were never fully aware of this, but Legion never wanted to touch Fang with a ten foot pole and was looking all round for an excuse to hit you. After being betrayed by Titans and the concordium mess, Fury could no longer prevent the block from hitting Fang and we were not willing to go to war to stop them. We were under no obligation to do so, and you knew that full well.

I was in contact with Fang the entire time and I never once lied to them. Fury acted in full accordance with all its agreements. Considering the fact that without Fury Fang would have not been in the block and probably would have been roided into smithereens early on in the round, and never gotten a chance to show, as it did, that it was an effective alliance, your bitterness towards Fury over round 7 is misplaced, especially since enough time has passed for the emotional reaction to die down.

Furies original goal mid-rd7 was to increase ties with Titans and Fang. We saw both as alliances with potential and we knew legion was close to disbanding. But the end of the round threw everything for a loop. Im sorry that after a round of building good relations we chose to end relations, but under the circumstances we decided it was the best option for Fury and we backstabbed no one.

[K-W]

Originally Posted by mikay

OK my post was long anyway and I did cut corners to simplify it. Honour in this game is irrelevant other than as percieved - ie PR as you say. Fury ditched RB (R3), Ely (R5), FRT(R7). Who cares if Legion was behind it, if the facts were different, the criticism was heaped onto fury, the reputation as backstabbers was heaped onto Fury. Tell people something enough and it becomes history, people who weren't around then will get 3rd generation warped perspectives of "the facts" which is why being seen as honourable can pay off in future.

Very true. Im sorry if I misunderstood your post. And that fact always played a part in alliance decisions, Fury and all the others. Especially with Fury's mostly undeserved reputation, we had to be very careful not to become the next Nos's. Trust me, if becoming pariahs in a block neccesasary universe was not an issue, late round fury, at least (I cannot speak for sid) would have acted alot diferently and probably alot more fun for everyone. I would have loved a more interesting political and military game as much or more than anyone, but one can not mortage the entire future of an alliance for one fun round that most likely would have no effect on later rounds other than to remove one's alliance from prominance in them. The community never gave amyone another choice. We were either evil backstabbers or evil stagnators. We were evil no matter what we did so we had to pick the evil that was best for our alliance.

[Kjeldoran]

Originally Posted by K-W

I was in contact with Fang the entire time and I never once lied to them. Fury acted in full accordance with all its agreements. Considering the fact that without Fury Fang would have not been in the block and probably would have been roided into smithereens early on in the round, and never gotten a chance to show, as it did, that it was an effective alliance, your bitterness towards Fury over round 7 is misplaced, especially since enough time has passed for the emotional reaction to die down.

that is correct. You've treated us correctly (with respect etc) and you haven't lied to us. The decision you made was in the best interest of your members and I would have taken the same call.

Nonetheless, and we've discussed this alot before, we got dropped and that's how simple it was.

And we very well know Legion wanted us death, so did Virus and Titans. You know aswell those feelings were mutual and Legion was too weak to take on any alliance within FLTV alone so deals got made etc. I guess we became the victime of this.

rgds Kj

[Kjeldoran]

Originally Posted by K-W

Furies original goal mid-rd7 was to increase ties with Titans and Fang. We saw both as alliances with potential and we knew legion was close to disbanding. But the end of the round threw everything for a loop. Im sorry that after a round of building good relations we chose to end relations, but under the circumstances we decided it was the best option for Fury and we backstabbed no one.

well, Fury and FAnG found its way to eachother again in r8 (at the end) so I'd say not all bridges got blown during the end of r7.

rgds Kj

[LB|away]

Originally Posted by Kjeldoran

well, Fury and FAnG found its way to eachother again in r8 (at the end) so I'd say not all bridges got blown during the end of r7.

rgds Kj

cos we are all honourable ppl

[Razorback]

we saw where it lead to in r8 tho, a major internal explosion in Fang.

[LB|away]

Originally Posted by Razorback

we saw where it lead to in r8 tho, a major internal explosion in Fang.

thank god we got smart ppl in the command now

[ComradeRob]

Originally Posted by Kjeldoran

well, Fury and FAnG found its way to eachother again in r8 (at the end) so I'd say not all bridges got blown during the end of r7.

rgds Kj

That's the irony of the situation, really. Although most alliances are terrified of becoming pariahs, even the most hated of alliances still have no trouble finding allies. I think the fear of being seen as 'evil' is greatly exaggerated in the minds of most alliance HCs (myself included, in the past).

[LB|away]

Originally Posted by ComradeRob

That's the irony of the situation, really. Although most alliances are terrified of becoming pariahs, even the most hated of alliances still have no trouble finding allies. I think the fear of being seen as 'evil' is greatly exaggerated in the minds of most alliance HCs (myself included, in the past).

I totally agree with you there rob.
people can do whatever
well fang could... we will get flamed anyways.

[Chaos]

once an agreement has outlived its usefulness it should be broken

There are many ways to end an agreement. I would recomend the peaceful way. just explaining you no longer desire to be bound by your agree ment. you shake hands, and go your seperate ways. No body is pissed at anybody.

But the way most ally's do it is just plainly find a good moment while your "Ally" is vulnerable and hit them hard and good. This might benefit you most That round, but don't expect that ally to trust you ever again. (or atleast not for a few rounds)

There is always an Honourable way to do things. But mostly ppl just don't care. THAT's what makes them Villains.

What you describe is winning at any cost. This is just a game, why **** ppl over?

[K-W]

Alliances and Naps should be done with the full understanding by everyone involved that they are for mutual benefit of two alliances trying to win. In this context it doesnt matter how they end, certainly an alliance that takes advantage of other alliances will make diplomacy more difficult for themselves in the future. But thats part of diplomacy, the problem with blocking is the lack of diplomacy, everyone gets on sides pre round, usually totally based on the last round and then once the round starts diplomacy stops.

[lokken]

My personal preference to break agreements is with a ton of incoming, but people didn't like it

[hook]

Originally Posted by K-W

Utter crap. It is this kind of conceptualization of PA that has ruined it. Hirr knew they had no shot of ever winning, so they found other ways to add fun to the game. This involved playing with different goals. Congrats to them, it was a good idea and a fun alliance, but to compare them to alliances that played to win in the catagory of honour is garbage.

1) It's hirr, not Hirr, you should know that by now.
2) I believe R4 hirr did play to win, and honestly I think they had a shot, not of winning, but atleast of doing pretty good. Unfortunately, they pretty much joined the wrong side of the fence.

About the different goals - you're right. Ever since R5 we've pretty much played by the thought that games should be fun... if you're having fun, you're winning.

[Riddim]

Originally Posted by hook

It's hirr, not Hirr, you should know that by now.

it's also the start of a sentence
/me licks Hook \o/

[K-W]

hirr never had a chance to win rd 4