Cornelius

Sad to see you guys go. :( Never fun to see our allies depart this world.

Always a shame to see an ally go, and I've seen too many. Farewell GOONS.

I think Satan's given up with how many times Hell has frozen over, and it's now permanently a frozen wasteland.

I honestly didn't think we'd see this day after all that's happened. But our allies kept insisting you guys were good people, and then you actually came to us civily to hash out our differences. I still don't completely trust this, but I trust it enough to proceed cautiously. Here's to hoping this is the real deal.

Just commenting to say that Cap is my favorite comic character, so this is awesome for me. Thank you.

Took the words right out of my mouth. Always sad to lose an ally, but at least we won't be losing the members too.

It's been fun, Daj. Truly.

Thank you Goldie, and I look forward to continuing the good times with the new gov.

I tried to highlight the major coalition in each of those wars. PB was a major force for two wars, and then fell apart. DH (which my alliance is not a part of) has clearly outlasted it, and I acknowledged that. As for the SF comments, we had long ties with the bloc that only ended between the last two wars, and I felt the falling apart of SG was worth mentioning. And the comment about Equilibrium staying together, all I'm saying is that coalitions (and most blocs for that matter) don't have lasting power in this game. Most of the coalitions seem to fall apart or turn on each other. Some blocs simply outlast others. And yes Eddy, the war against Umbrella failed. The war against Umbrella's allies (including VE) succeeded tremendously. Kudos.

Hmm ... let's work through all the major wars starting with GW1 (mainly because earlier wars mainly consisted of one-sided NPO beatdowns of other alliances, and where's the drama in that?). GW1: The Orders stand (mostly) alone against a large coalition of other alliances and face defeat for the first time. This war focuses their FA efforts for months. GW2: The game spills out into real life, when the real government of Norway objects to NoR's use of their national anthem in a NoR recruiting video because of implied Nazi themes. Fark.com reports this on their site, which leads to the formation of the FARK alliance in-game. GOONS, due to a longstanding Something Awful-Fark.com rivalry, decides to attack the new alliance. LUE, still confident from their victory in GW1, objects, even over a possible NAP to prevent conflict. A short, though major, war ensues, where the remnants of the CoaLUEtion from GW1 are defeated, and LUE is abandoned to a long war with NPO's allies in the Initiative. GW3: The Initiative, acting on the opinions of the then-leader of GATO, attacks GATO in order to try to draw out its allies. A few days later they respond, but in a longer war than GW2 are thoroughly defeated. At one point /b/, sensing defeat, spams the boards with inappropriate conflict and hack the game. Many of their members are banned, and the game is left in limbo for a few days. There is rampant speculation over whether the game will even continue. Ultimately the game does come back, and /b/ disbands. Several other alliances on the AEGIS side are forced to disband, such as NAAC, which had been a constant opponent of the Orders almost since the beginning of the game. Others were forced onto different teams, such as LoSS. The first alliances also started leaving WUT as the war drew to a close. UJW: Former Initiative allies faced off against one another. This was a death knell for the bloc that had ruled the game and been on the winning side for the past two major wars. GOONS disbanded, and NPO began working behind the scenes to take down NpO for its actions in this war and for its efforts in reinstating a former Emperor atop NPO. WotC/NoCB: The culmination of NPO's efforts came to a head as NpO was isolated and then hit by a large coaltion of alliances that NPO hoped would become a new base of loyal allies. A lot of doubt was spread among the various alliances though that if NPO could turn on NpO, it could turn on anyone. Karma: For the first time since GW1, NPO tasted defeat. That large coalition it had built for WotC had proven to not be as closely knit as its previous blocs. The famous "Coalition of Cowards" thread had shattered the image of the invincible NPO. The coalition arrayed against it would last for longer than Q, but not forever. BiPolar: NpO's conflicting ties would eventually lead it to switch sides in the middle of a war it had started. There would be rumblings that it had been a set-up to begin with. A major TOP-NpO feud started (or by NpO's words, had simply lain dormant since WotC/NoCB) that would shape the next couple of wars, if not more. PB-NpO: Allegations of spying would spark off a war featuring the first time the new bloc PB would fight together. A separate coaliton involving DH (which included two PB alliances) would strike NPO on the suspicion that they were either waiting to strike themselves or were sitting out to avoid conflict. While the war was a success, it would eventually sow the seeds of PB's disbandment and the rise of the next major power. Grudge War: The culmination of the TOP-NpO feud. TOP had wished for revenge for BiPolar, and now it finally had its chance. Duckroll, built around TOP's ally IRON, now took its turn at the head of a major war, with PB supporting (though with cracks appearing). Now SF found itself on the losing end for the first time since its victory in Karma. Dave War: MK and C&G finally come directly to blows with SF, officially ending the unoffical SG (SF and C&G) coalition that had been in place since Karma. Equlibirium War: A large-scale attempt to bring down the strongest alliance (in terms of upper tier anyway), Umbrella, fails, but in the process many of Umbrella's allies are dealt a big blow and as a whole surrender to the winning coalition Equilibrium. Only time will tell if it will stand together.

You're probably thinking of GOP. Nice to see you join us MW. Have fun out there. ;)

I'd like to thank our allies for joining us in this fight. We all look forward to fighting alongside you on the battlefield.

My reaction to the title is more accurately summed up by this gif than any mere words: [img]http://i.imgur.com/2VzmC.gif[/img] That being said, congrats Umbrella.

[quote name='Mr Vicarious' timestamp='1346279328' post='3026471'] Smooth is on record as to intentionally torpedoing that Q&A due to his own dislike for the idea of joining SF. That may or may not be true, but it is his claim. [/quote] Honestly it wouldn't surprise me. But I do think it wasn't at least entirely intentional. [quote name='Krack' timestamp='1346297903' post='3026550'] This is an excellent accounting of what went on. I will add to it, however. There was an "informal get-together" between SFs' leadership and VE, which began with Smooth saying (paraphrase) "Well, we planned this meeting because we heard FARK didn't want us in SFs. So what's the problem?" Things were on the wrong foot from the start. Then we in FARK provided VE with its one and only test for admission in SFs: We asked what would happen if a SFs alliance was at war with another VE ally. VE flunked the test when it said it would "never allow that to happen".* Prompted more than once, the answer never changed ... even after we said we couldn't let an alliance into SFs with that stance. Smooth just kept becoming more abrasive.This "informal" meeting went soooooo well that the FARK government who was at the meeting suggested letting Smooth talk to FARK's general membership (in Q&A format) - because prior to that meeting the membership had been slightly in favor of admitting VE. We figured it was easier to show the membership for themselves than try and explain it to them. And in spectacular fashion, Smooth flamed out in front of the entire membership - turning what had been a pro-admitting-VE crowd into a "we don't want to have anything to do with them" crowd literally overnight. Any notion that FARK had an antagonistic posture towards VE prior to this Q&A is simply inaccurate.The posture towards VE (and GOD) became antagonistic when Xiph came in and decided to basically insult the entire FARK leadership because of the denial of SFs membership. As I remember it, prior to that tirade, the alliance had a "they seem okay, but we don't want to be tied to them until they prove themselves in a war" attitude towards VE. That was the attitude I had.[size="1"]* Had Smooth said "Of course, we'd defend the SFs alliance 100% however we're asked," there's a good chance VE would have been in SFs by the end of that month.[/size]Here's why ...--------------------I believe that you believe this, but that doesn't make it accurate.This is the first time I've ever heard this, but I honestly don't believe he's capable of intentionally doing as poor a job and wrecking a budding relationship as he did. It had to have been unintentional. Either that or he deserved the Tony award for that year. [/quote] I'll admit we screwed up with regards to FARK, but mistakes were made on both sides. At this point it's all water under the bridge anyway. As for the parts in my quote you highlighted, the "whenever possible" part still resides in nearly every war we've fought in. GW2, UJW, WotC, Karma, BiPolar, and the last two we defended our allies, as well as countless smaller conflicts. The major wars that were the exceptions: GW3 we were jumped by two alliances and outnumbered, and PB-Polar we were defending ourselves against a spy attack (or aggressively attacking NpO, depending on your perspective). As for "we simply tried to get the rest of our allies out of the war" we did so by actually fighting against various alliances attacking our allies and forced peace. We even called it the "Viridian Surrender Tour". I don't know how that could possibly be construed as fence sitting. The last point is admittedly your best one, "we tried to politically defend GOD while trying to please our other allies at the same time" and the only defense I have for that is that we had promised TOP that we would not join the other side, so we kept our word. We did our best to limit the engagement politically, and when that failed when NebX attacked GOD we intervened directly with military force, though only on them alone, again, to keep our word. TOP were still angry, and technically they had a right to be, but we didn't abandon GOD there. As for the last point, about me not being accurate, we'll have to agree to disagree as it's nothing more than an opinion for either of us.

[quote name='Ogaden' timestamp='1346268207' post='3026419'] My god Cornelius why on earth did you step down. o/ the good old days [/quote] The daily grind got to me. When you're in charge, you're expected to do a lot every day for months at a time. Eventually after all the dust from Karma settled and I looked around, I realized that I would have to keep doing it for who knows how long. There's no end to this game, after all. I decided to let some fresh blood work in the brave new world we all found ourselves in, after all they'd be as experienced in it as I was. In short, I was burnt out. 2010 was basically an off-year, 2011 I was head of FA for a while, now I just kind of hang around and help where I can. [quote name='Hereno' timestamp='1346272313' post='3026435'] Something is missing here. [/quote] Please, if you have a question, ask it. I don't have a lot else going on.

Since I was Lord of VE for Karma, I thought I'd give my two cents. My personal motivation for that war was the protection of OV, and that was it. I felt they had been wronged in the lead-up to Karma, and I put my support behind what they felt was the appropriate response to that. If Seth felt that his ZI was best, we would have stood behind that, and if he wanted to continue to negotiate with NPO over a more fair resolution (as is what happened) then we would've stood behind that as well. I personally feared that I might be leading VE to a losing war, but felt that standing up for our ally was more important than winning. Xiphosis was more pro-war than I was (as were some of my fellow Viridians) while several members in C&G (which people tend to forget was also tied to OV) were more for appeasement. Now, we were lucky in several areas: 1. Moo attacked in the middle of TOP-sponsored peace talks, aggravating the Citadel alliances as stated before, 2. after realizing his potential mistake, tried to negotiate with Archon to leave the war and let TORN be a sacrificial lamb (which allowed Archon to then turn around and get TORN to surrender and bow out), and 3. the entire Coalition of Cowards fiasco (that would've gone off [i]much[/i] better had the DoW(s) simply been included in the same post) that basically swung most fence-sitters to our side. Karma could've easily swung the other way, but that would not have affected my decisions in the slightest. I can't speak for anybody else though. As to our failure to join SF, yes, we did take FARK's support for granted. We had been on good relations with the other members beforehand (or we would never have reached that point) and without any tip-off to potential problems with the last member we simply assumed they had no major objections. Obviously, we were wrong. Smooth, being very active at the time, was there when most of the rest of the Viridian delegation wasn't (who had started talks then left for the night), and proceeded to get into a flamefest with several FARK-members. There were people to blame on both sides, but the important thing is when the more level-headed Viridians had returned the damage had been done, and relations with FARK were trashed for months and even years. FARK simply had no respect because of our disbandment, and Smooth and others felt our courage was insulted for the actions of one previous Lord. Because of that day in 2007, we take disbandment seriously. We will never advocate it, and in fact talked GOD out of using it on UPN back in PB-Polar. Yes, not joining SF was an FA-failure on our part, but it wasn't the first and won't be the last. Some have been more serious than others (the worst obviously being the set of failures that led us to disband). And one last thing, I don't understand why some continue to label us as fence-sitters. We don't change sides arbitrarily, and try to stand by our allies whenever possible. In GW2 and GW3, we stood with WUT because they had given our alliance relevance, and when we felt that WUT was moving in a direction counter to ours we left, despite it being the first step that led us to being rolled and disbanded. When we re-emerged, we stood with NpO in the UJW because they had been our biggest advocates in reforming. We stood with them until they stomped our ally FIST with little warning and for petty reasons. We fought with the Coalition in the WotC (aka NoCB) because we were defending OR (an alliance of ex-Viridians that would later help form OV, ironically) and were called to do so by two MADP partners (TORN and NPO, again ironically). Had the FIST thing never happened, I doubt we side against NpO in that war. I've already explained about Karma, war after that was BiPolar, which we actually tried to stay out of until NpO had hit GOD after leaving the war with them and we really would've been skipping out of our obligations. After that, we simply tried to get the rest of our allies out of the war, not demanding any reps. Then there was PB-Polar, which honestly shouldn't have been shocking since we've never tolerated spying, but that's a whole different story. Then the last two wars, one where we tried to politically defend GOD while trying to please our other allies at the same time, then this last one where we went all-in for GOD one last time. Is VE perfect? No, but then nobody is. We do try just as hard as anybody else, though.

[quote name='Alfred von Tirpitz' timestamp='1340856443' post='2999015'] You know me, you ought to be able to understand what i meant. Seriously now. Tell me this, how does it feel to be able and willing to help out an ally who is outnumbered and needs that help? How does it feel to be willing and able to rush to help your beleaguered ally while knowing it will not end well for your own self? How does it feel to know that you would not change a thing about this decision given the same situation, regardless of hindsight? Tell me Viridia. How does it feel to be willing and able to be living upto the adage "my word is my bond"? Does it help you understand stuff? See more clearly? Sleep better? Cmon now, dont be shy, tell me. [/quote] If you're referring to the PB-NpO War, then there's a clear difference. Namely that Taut led us to believe that RoK would fight on our side, and later went back on his word. By contrast, our allies knew our likely course of action from the beginning of this conflict. Had Taut told us from the beginning that RoK planned to defend NpO in that war, then that war may never have happened. We certainly valued our ties to RoK more than pursuing a spy, and we could've worked something out with NpO. The "word is my bond" is the key part in all of this.

[quote name='Banksy' timestamp='1340777033' post='2998077'] can we pay you to take him off our hands? [/quote] How about our post-war reps?

[quote name='Sardonic' timestamp='1340773447' post='2998002'] Please have TPF ghost dec UE in. Why, you ask? No reason, no reason at all. [/quote] Just hit TPF when they come in.

Yay new treaty.

Threw in my lot, I'm the Champion_at_heart guy.

Been in VE for all of these (and fought against the following alliances): GW2 - GATO, NAAC GW3 - LoSS, /b/ UJW - BAPS Wolfpack - Wolfpack (duh) WotC - MK Karma - NPO, IRON VE-GDI - GDI (again, duh) BiPolar - NpO, TOOL, Argent 6Mil - NSO PB-NpO - NpO, STA, IAA BiPolar2 - TUR, Apparatus

Congrats to GPA as a whole, but also specifically to Antonio and Mary, both of whom I am glad to have had the pleasure of knowing personally. Antonio even being a Viridian for a time, and having made my current sig.

Sard understands the treaty web? Is he really Stephen Hawking?

[quote name='Chief Savage Man' timestamp='1326328220' post='2897697'] somebody set FOK! on fire [/quote] Obviously it's a plan by VE to torch the rest of PB, so we can have Umbrella all to ourselves.