My Kingdom got into an OOP war which lasted 10 days, incl eowcf. We won the war, but yet again ended up in the top 10 with our WW. My Kd's LS scrambled to get CFs in place, and I was grateful to them for handling it, because we'd warred through Christmas without a break and I had (still have) the flu. However, I heard two kingdoms were problems. CR and Sparta. Every other kingdom was fairly decent about it. I approached Bart on IRC and asked him for a CF. He said he doesn't give free CFs, especially not to my kingdom. I told him I need a few days at least, to recover from illness. He replied to get a sitter and he could do what he wanted. I had 3 options - Pay up 10% of our land immediately entering fort. Drop pool and grow 40k (??) to war him. Or no CF. I told him those options all left us in a place we didn't like, and I couldn't make decisions like that while running a high-grade fever, to which he scoffed and said he was glad I understood how things were, so too bad. Then he disappeared.
About 12 hours later, we went from EoWCF into fort, and there was Sparta. They waved my kingdom, and I was woken up early in the morning by the news. I tried to talk reason with Bart, but he said, because of the inconvenience of his kingdom "having to leave fort early to wave" us the price had gone up to 15% of our land. When I expressed my anger (in a rather calm way I might add, for me), he told me the price went up yet again to 20% and he knew I had pool I could drop to pay him the land tax he wanted.
My kingdom has never paid land tax for CF. It's a matter of principle, and many in Utopia would feel this is a lousy attitude, that paying a tax is far less damaging than fighting. That's 100% true, especially when the aggressor is 50% bigger than our kingdom. Sparta began targeting our honor very carefully by hitting our fae. Sparta would not let up, and one of my provinces, who had expressed upset at Bart and Sparta, deleted quite suddenly and has not been heard from since. Now Sparta is 50% bigger AND has 2 more provinces.
We are almost at max meter and Sparta continues to hit us, salivating at what they see as an easy win for them. Disgusting. We will continue to fight. We've tried diplo with Bart. Probably half the kingdom has tried, and yes, some wasn't that great and maybe had the opposite effect, but when nothing else works with a Kingdom in which the king has said he has made this personal vendetta against my kingdom - it becomes obvious that no amount or any sort of diplo will do a thing with this irrational, evil player who calls himself a leader of a supposed great kingdom of bullies - unless we do as he says, as though he is our master.
I am not in the forum to cry or whine, but to make clear why we are fighting Bart. I've been messaged repeatedly, asking what the heck is going on with Sparta beating on us. You can see in the forum the glee Bart has about this. It's sick, truly. I'm dismayed as it is by the culture of the top, but I realize that Bart must have a very crappy RL to feel a need to be a D*ck in a virtual environment to fellow players, and he sees it as some kind of strategic genius on his part.
I'm too tired to write more because it feels like we've been battling since December 18th... wait, I think we have? When did this round start? I am war weary, but extremely proud of my kingdom for not backing down, despite the WW we had stripped from us by Bart, and despite the damage he continues to do to our provinces.
True warrior class from my kingdom. Thank you! You make this game worth playing.
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Panthira
