A Democratic Sort of Strategy AAR (New Chapter Up)

[Paramythion]

Well, my life is relatively devoid of serious occupations at the moment, and I have been wanting to start a serious AAR for... well, a very long time now. And, since the Paradox, Taleworlds, and Total War forums are drowning in AAR's, I figured I might as well bring my story-telling talents (if talents they be) to you lovely citizens of Exilian.

I am open to suggestions as to games, prospective strategies, narrative styles, nations to rule, and anything else yall can come up with. A list of games that are available to me on my present, somewhat rubbish, computer, will be stuck at the bottom of this post.

Oh, and I hope thread titles can be changed after I settle on a game and suitably awesome (or ridiculous) name, or else I am going to feel rather silly.

Games:

Age Of Empires II: It might be a bit odd to do an AAR of it, but it would be possible, and potentially interesting.

Medieval Total War: Viking Invasion. A delightful classic, even with its tendency to crash and corrupt saves if I so much as breath wrong.

Rome Total War/Barbarian Invasion: Playing the Western Roman Empire in BI was the single most stressful event in my childhood.

Civilization III: I haven't actually tried it on this computer, but it is probably old enough to work.

Crusader Kings: If this is chosen, it must be admitted that I sort of suck at it. Which could end up being very... exciting.

Europa Universalis II: All those nations. So many choices.

Victoria: I once laboriously kept Austria-Hungary from dissolving for the entire game. I am excessively proud of that.

Hearts Of Iron II: Nothing to be proud of here. The one time I played, I rather spectacularly lost the war for the Allies..

Two Thrones: I have literally never played this game. Got it in the Strategy Pack, with my other Grand Paradox games.

Crowns Of The North: Same as Two Thrones. I don't even know where these are set.

The Operational Art Of War III: Bit of a lesser known game. Never seen any AAR's for it, but I think I could coax something from it.

--------------------
These are all I can think of, off the top of my head.
Here's hoping for some audience participation. 

P.S. I reserve the right to refuse to play Carthage or the Turks.
Carthago delenda est, and the other burnt my beloved Byzantium.

[Skull]

Did you ever play Knights of Honor? It is worth a try,and you can play as Byzantium,or pretty much any small or great other country in medieval Europe.
I think it would make a very interesting AAR,even more so since you probably never played it. 

Carthago delenda est

Quick,delete that before Jubal sees you,or thou shall be banned! 

[Jubal]

Carthago has freakin' elephants too? 

I'm going to go for AOEII as my shout, it's a brilliant game. If not, I'd be interested to see Civ III as the only Civ that I ever played was the wonderful Civ II.

[Paramythion]

Skull: I have never heard of that, and it looks like an awesome game. Probably won't get my hands on it for a bit though, as I am saving my gaming money for Europa Universalis IV. Priorities. 
As for Carthage, I might as well change my name to Cato. 

Jubal: I was kind of hoping someone would vote for AOE. It was the very first strategy game I ever played as a kid, and the lack of interesting writing for it, especially compared to Paradox or Total War games, has always saddened me a bit. And also, Byzantines! 
I have sadly never played Civ II, or any Civ game besides Civ III a few times. It makes me feel a bit inferior as a strategy fan.

[Jubal]

Now see, I have a massive affinity for both Carthage and Byzantium (in each case the forgotten power - Carthage in the ancient world gets overshadowed in popular culture by Romans and Greeks, and Byzantium does in the Middle ages by Latins and Arabs/Turks). So I accept the Byzantine love but will have to challenge you to a game of something one of these days to teach you a lesson in Carthaginian brilliance. 

[Paramythion]

Jubal: A rematch at Carrhae, perhaps? 
Logically speaking, I should love Carthage, because I also normally love obscure nations, and Carthage was a pretty fascinating place. But the whole baby-sacrificing thing, and the fact that almost every tale of the Punic Wars makes Hannibal out to be a demi-god, and downplays the bravery of the Romans involved, both sort of irk me.

[Jubal]

Rome especially had no place to be moralising to anyone over human sacrifice (although they certainly did so). Yes, the Carthaginians probably sacrificed children to keep the gods happy. The Romans ordered huge massacres of innocent people on many, many times that scale purely for public entertainment. At least the Carthaginians could argue for some sort of compelling necessity of their actions (albeit wrongly), which Rome undeniably could not. So yeah... obviously I don't like child sacrifice either, but at the same time I don't believe that any ancient nation can in general claim any sort of overall moral high ground on average, and Rome is if anything in the worst position to make such claims.

As to the Punic wars... yeah, Hannibal wasn't a demi-god by any means, and in some ways he's overplayed (I'd say his mythos is overplayed; as a field battle commander he was to my mind unquestionably the best tactician in the ancient world, but was a poorer campaign commander than Caesar, Alexander, Philip II, or Epaminondas certainly). I think it's also fair to say that Hannibal was playing with a very poor hand, and that undeniably Rome was politically stronger and its soldiers better trained. But yeah, Hannibal was a rare genius in the field but couldn't force the issue, and once Fabius and Scipio started really utilising Rome's manpower and political advantages Carthage just didn't have the control and organisation to win.

[Paramythion]

Jubal: Ehhh, quit being so convincing.  You make valid points though, and ones that I can not think of a way to effectively counter, so I'll just subtly change the subject so I don't have to admit the hypocrisy inherent in my position. >.>
I will admit that I don't find them nearly as annoying as the Greeks, the most spectacularly overrated people in human history, by a considerable amount.

Also, I am eager to get to writing, so I shall probably start soon and hopefully have something up by tonight or tomorrow. 

[Skull]

Skull: I have never heard of that, and it looks like an awesome game. Probably won't get my hands on it for a bit though, as I am saving my gaming money for Europa Universalis IV. Priorities. 
As for Carthage, I might as well change my name to Cato. 

Well,KOH is really cheap. I think you can easily buy it.It has got MASSIVE potential for a AAR,much more that any other game listed here.
Also,it would be even more interesting,since you never played it. 

The Romans ordered huge massacres of innocent people on many, many times that scale purely for public entertainment.

To what are you exactly referring to?

Also,could we eliminate the term Byzantine? Since the Byzantine Empire never existed.

[Jubal]

Skull: Gladiatorial games. At their peak, the average death toll across the Roman Empire was eight thousand a year, and big spectacles could occasionally off thousands in a single festival. To my mind, even worse morally than sacrifices.

Also, whilst it's true the Byzantines didn't refer to themselves as such, it is a convenient distinction to use for the point after the fall of the Western Empire when the East was predominantly culturally Greek. It makes more sense than Eastern Roman Empire (because the West by that point was nonexistent), is more specific than just calling them the Roman Empire, and avoids confusion with the Germanic/Italian Holy Roman Empire. It's also the term used in basically all academic discourse on the topic. So I think it is a valid & useful term to use (and if we replaced all historical terms with correct self-referential terms, we'd literally never stop; I think the only time it's really worth doing so is if the term perpetuates a racist or ethnographic stereotype, or is otherwise likely to severely hinder people's understanding of the topic. "Byzantine Empire" fits neither of those categories and is moderately well defined.

[Paramythion]

Skull: More potential than Crusader Kings? I would be quite astonished if a game ever came along again that was quite as perfect for story-telling as that game. It will be going on the to-buy and to-play-and-use-as-a-storytelling-device lists however. I plan on making a habit of posting fairly regular AAR's on here, so when I get it, I will be sure to inform you so you can watch my newbish struggles. 
On the subject of "Byzantine", I would have to agree with Jubal. Referring to at as the Roman Empire in normal conversation would cause needless confusion to people who were either unfamiliar with the time-period, or didn't know what was being discussed.
Although in this as well, I am less than consistent. I do often find myself dramatically referring to Byzantium as "The Heart of The Eternal and Glorious Realm of the Romans, and The Queen of Cities" in ordinary conversation, rather then use her new name. 
It has gotten me some odd looks when I say it in public, believe me.

[Pentagathus]

Play none of those games, get The King of Dragon Pass instead.

[Paramythion]

Pentagathus: As mentioned before, I am fairly bereft of cash at the moment. Or, at least, bereft of cash that is not already set aside for a particular purpose. I will certainly look into that though. Especially if it is cheap. 

As for everyone else..
I happen to have been going through my correspondence today, and found an old historical essay that our old friend, the Lord Bladdmor, sent us. Here are some selections from it, for your reading pleasure.

-A small, rather sloppily bound, book. It is written in an almost impossible to read scrawl, illustrated with a tendency towards gory and macabre imagery, and the margins are full of tiny, and almost illegible, notes.-

... But turning aside from these debates on their origin, we look again to the arrival of the Blaiddmor (pronounced blai-th-more) family in their ancestral home. The exact date is unknown, and most of the details that come down to use from those days are cluttered with myths and tales that are sprinkled with magic, creatures of darkness, and feats of bravery that would seem excessive if attributed to a god. However, with the aid of other established history and a logical approach to the myths, some facts can be ascertained.

It is known for certain that the Blaiddmor family were sea raiders of a sort, although it is unlikely that they are in any way connected to the more famous Nords or any of the other assorted clans of the Nordlands. It is also known that the family takes its name from the infamous Blaiddmor who first arrived in the highlands they call their home. His complete name is lost to history, and he is known only by his now-famous nickname, meaning, in the original language of his tribe (The same as the High Speech that is still spoken among members of his family), "like the wolf".


Famous painting of the landing of Blaiddmor and his clan, at the famous Mynyddcyrae. Painting reproduced by permission of the Historical Society of the University of Fleichsiddae.

Also known, is that the Bladdopl (pronounced bla-tho-pal), the fanatically loyal warrior class in most nations ruled by a member of the family, are almost exclusively descended from the notoriously devious and bloodthirsty clan that originally came over the sea with the first Blaiddmor. In a similar fashion, most of the nobles are descended from either the original clan council, or other members of the Bladdopl who were raised to the nobility during the meteoric rise of the Blaiddmor family several centuries later.


A painting of the crowning of Blaiddmor at the Blaiddgraig, supposed site of his semi-legendary encounter with a wolf pack. Painting reproduced by permission of the Historical Society of the University of Fleichsiddae.

Regardless of how it was founded, the rule of the Blaiddmors remained fairly local for many years. Some historians believe it took nearly two centuries for them to take any sort of notice of the outside world, and the event that was to propel them into the spotlight was an event no one could possibly have predicted...

-Here the writing changes abruptly to a discourse on Haelmarian cheese-

Ahhh, I appear to have switched a few chapters around, when all those manuscripts came out of their binding..
I'll take a look through the Cheese section of my library, and I should have the next chapters for you soon.

[Clockwork]

Nice! Always an entertaining read from you

Just a tip; unless you specifically want the Ui in the shot, it's easy to remove it for a screenie.

[Cuddly Khan]

I just had an idea, I should write a story and than illustrate it through AOE2. That'd be so very fun!