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The double tap of Writer and Character Writer of the Week, very impressive. Congratulations @Staehr !
 
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The double tap of Writer and Character Writer of the Week, very impressive. Congratulations @Staehr !
Oh thanks! I got lucky with Scrappy, he just shambled into my head at some point while I was testing out Lithoid blocker-clearing shenanigans. Then I saw the Dyson sphere and thought yeah, there has to be a story here. Apparently there was!

I'm gonna check out Crusader Kings too. It looks like it's a lot more up close and personal than Stellaris, should be great for narratives.

But not until after summer, cause now it's beachcombing time! Sun's out, guns out!
 
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Congratulations @Staehr ! Very impressive thing indeed to win two of these on the bounce :D
 
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I really wanna do the community some justice here, but between working 11hr crunches and moving apartments I simply don't have the time to read stories at the moment.

Can someone help me pass the crown? @Macavity116?
 
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I really wanna do the community some justice here, but between working 11hr crunches and moving apartments I simply don't have the time to read stories at the moment.

Can someone help me pass the crown? @Macavity116?
If you open up the award to nominations, I can answer the summons. I don't run this show. I'm just your friendly neighborhood Kingmaker. ;)
 
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I recently started playing Crusader Kings III, which means I've also been exploring CK3's AAR section. And along the way, I discovered a writer who styles themselves as @Peter Ebbesen, also known as "the conqueror."

@Peter Ebbesen has been writing an unexpectedly hilarious tale called Born to Breed: House of the Prophets. It's a fun story with good characters that keep your attention the whole time, such as Sigurd Snake-in-the-Eye, the poet Gertruda, and the Shieldmaiden Irmele.

I rarely give out this award for the whole cast of a story, but this time it feels justified. I would like to nominate @Peter Ebbesen for Best Character Writer of the Week, for the entire cast of Born to Breed: House of the Prophets!
 
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Congratulations, Peter! I had no idea you were writing AARs again. One more for the reading list :D
 
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*Reads post. Double checks and reads again. Sighs. Pushes the Doomsday Clock a good few minutes closer to midnight because Macavity has not nominated Steallaris.*

With that sign of the apocalypse out of the way (though are we sure this is really Macavity and not an imposter?), congratulations indeed @Peter Ebbesen :)
 
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*Reads post. Double checks and reads again. Sighs. Pushes the Doomsday Clock a good few minutes closer to midnight because Macavity has not nominated Steallaris.*
It was actually a pretty close call; I almost nominated @Arithmetician instead. (for Darth Vidia from Stellaris Wars) But @Peter Ebbesen just barely won my heart with the most recent update to their own story.

are we sure this is really Macavity and not an imposter?
Remember the old T.S. Elliot poem:

You may meet him in a by-street, you may see him in the square-
But when a crime's discovered, then Macavity's not there!
 
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A most excellent pick! Congratulations for the deserved win. @Peter Ebbesen !
 
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Victory speech time. Some time since I did one of those.

Amusingly, I think this is the first time I've won this particular award; While it is many years since I was a prolific AAR writer (2002-2006 period), I have written no less that 31 AARs (some multiplayer or collaborative), and am currently writing my 32nd, Born to Breed: House of the Prophets, so I thought I had won most of the awards by now*, but this one has apparently evaded me. I'll chalk it up to the excellent quality of the competition.

That being said, I thank you for correcting that oversight, @Macavity116, even if my AAR won your appreciation only by a hair over Stellaris Wars, and fitting that it should happen to one of my strongly character-focused AARs. :)

Apart from AARs I am a frequent contributor to Guess The Author with 14 entries over the years, which mention admittedly has nothing whatsoever to do with this award and everything to do with me wanting to promote GTA to any reader of this thread, who is not already aware of that venerable AARland institution.

The AAR @Macavity116 has nominated me for, Born to Breed: House of the Prophets is a spiritual sequel of sorts to Born to Breed: The Estridsen Lectures (abandoned due to overwork/crunch time), my CK2 AAR, and The Byzantine Letters (abandoned due to the court going critical with too many Ducases causing extreme slowdown), my CK1 AAR.

It originated as a thought experiment. I usually have a specific set of overall goals for my AAR games, but beyond that the story follows the gameplay. What if I were to write an AAR where the gameplay flowed from the story rather than, as is usual, the reverse? How would I go about doing that? And would it make for a good or a bad fit?

When I got CK3 this spring I realized I had an excellent platform for the experiment. Write a story outline with prophets and other major characters at key points in the development of a realm, filling in the details of what each character must achieve through his life – and then play the game, with any character theoretically able to meet the next milestone in the story attempting to achieve it. So House of the Prophets goes story outline => gameplay => AAR based on gameplay.

The story follows the dynasty of Sigurd, and so far playing to a script is working fine, even if it occasionally gives me trouble when the game doesn't want to do what my story outline calls for, so I am hopeful that it will keep me interested long enough to enough to complete it... always assuming that COVID-19 gives me enough spare time and that PDS DLC releases/free updates don't mess up my savegame or mods beyond repair along the way, that is.


* If nobody else, Khünbish Jalair from My Inevitable Greatness should have been a shoe-in. Such a memorable character. :p
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As for handing on the award; Am I limited to nominating people based on currently ongoing AARs or can I choose a blast from the past? (within some reasonable time range)
 
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As for handing on the award; Am I limited to nominating people based on currently ongoing AARs or can I choose a blast from the past? (within some reasonable time range)
To the extent of my knowledge, no such limitation exists. Choose away and pass on the award to someone you deem worthy of it. Although I will point out that you are the fourth person in a row who has received the award directly from me. So I strongly encourage you to choose a winner without restriction, lest my terrible reign over this awAARd continue... ;)
 
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Well done!
 
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