No doubt it will strike many as odd that I chose to give my fleet to my biggest opponent’s closest ally. It strikes me as odd too, but it is not a decision I made lightly. Sprog and I were indeed adversaries for over a year, and yes, I know how annoying he can be to play against (don’t deny it, Karl, you know it’s true lol). However, I also discovered that he is also one of the best allies anyone could hope for and is an incredibly skilled fleeter who gets far less credit than he deserves. And, just as importantly, he always gave me the credit and respect I deserved at the end of the day. We had (and have) our differences, but he allowed me the chance to prove myself and earn his respect. He was open enough to change his mind about me. I’ve always thought the very best players are a bit of a pain to play against and a pleasure to play with. If you ask me, Karl met and exceeded those criteria. The whole story of how I eventually decided to retire my fleet to him is too long and tedious to tell here, but suffice it to say we played together in Generals, and a series of not wholly unhappy accidents lead us to become friends despite ourselves.
There comes a point when everyone grows tired of running… I started far too late; I was never going to be safe on this server, no matter how well I did. I saw myself as ultimately having three options:
1. Continue to build up and inevitably crash (almost certainly to Gozar) at some point when RL finally caught up to me.
2. Go perma-blue or sell the account to someone who would probably just lose the fleet.
3. Retire my fleet to a friend and go out on my own terms.
It’s obvious which option I chose, and to those of you who know me, I think it will also be obvious why. I prefer to hold my fate in my own hands.
I would say I have no regrets about my decision, but that would be a lie. It does smart to be retiring to the leader of AZGD and the closest ally of a player who I was never able to see eye to eye with, and who I still feel has treated me unfairly. But things happen in curious ways; whatever I did I was going to have mixed feelings. At the end of the day I decided friendship and mutual respect were good enough reasons for me to retire to Karl in spite of his affiliation with Gozar.
I owe both special thanks and a special apology to FleetHound and Thunderheart, my two remaining ever-loyal, ever-persistent, ever-supportive allies; if there is anyone I must apologize to for this, it is the two of you. There’s no way around it, in the end I gave my fleet to the enemy. It’s just a game, but I do feel I have let the two of you down. And for that, I am sorry.
I plan to return to my little accounts in Speed and Massacre shortly, and I’ll definitely be there when the new server is finally out, but I’m glad to be putting X behind me. It was (mostly) fun while it lasted; thanks to all of the wonderful friends who helped make it that way, though many of you are long gone. There are too many of you to name, and if I tried I would be doing a disservice to those I left out.
So, without further ado, here are the numbers:
The defender has won the battle !
The attacker has lost a total of 37.588.701.950 units.
The defender has lost a total of 6.796.514.050 units.
A debris field containing 13.903.758.600 units of Metal and 12.727.371.000 units of Crystal has formed in orbit around the planet.
The probability of creating a moon is : 19 %
I asked Karl to drop his tag for the hit, as a symbolic gesture. I know it’s a bit silly, but, hey, at least I can say that it wasn’t Azguard that got me in the end.
