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We'll see more of Braun-Kennedy in the very next update!

Chapter Two should be a goody...not as much mystery, per say, but plenty of plotting and intrigue. I've now starting chapter four...and (much to my surprise, considering the fact that this AAR is probably best known for the high death-rate...) one of the characters we've already met in chapter one is still alive!
 
Hey all! Just wanted let you know this isn't dead...in fact, not only has Wilcoxchar finished making a great map that'll be up later today, but I was bored at work and ended up visiting all of these ridiculous conspiracy theory websites just for a laugh...and ending finding several that I can tie together and work into this story, which I'm very excited about!

So...at least one more post today (maybe two), plus the map, and then it's back to the adventures of Annelies, Matilda, and Gulsum in...

CHAPTER TWO: CIVIL SERVITUDE

Or...if you prefer...

CHAPTER TWO: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO
 
Yay! Was wondering where you were since you hadn't responded to the email. :p
 
Hey all! Just wanted let you know this isn't dead...in fact, not only has Wilcoxchar finished making a great map that'll be up later today, but I was bored at work and ended up visiting all of these ridiculous conspiracy theory websites just for a laugh...and ending finding several that I can tie together and work into this story, which I'm very excited about!
It's your dime, but I rather like Foucault's Pendulum's idea that the power of conspiracies is our own desire to impose them on the failed best efforts and idiocies of our fathers.

The map'll be nice, though. Wherezat? :)
 
Bah.


That's a bah at me, not you, noble readers. :D


I have...entirely through my own fault...corrupted not ONE, but TWO saved games!


There came a rather awesome plot twist at the exact month that I had already intended chapter two to end, and this pleased me greatly. I then began to play through the period designated as chapter three...only to discover that almost EVERY essential character to the AAR had decided to move away to seperate counties, essentially killing the story that I had developed in my mind as I played.

So I went on to the Crusader Kings forum, where a kind soul or two showed me how to tweak the saved game file, and force them back to Guines.

Of course, the one instruction that I blatently ignored was to backup the saved game file...and now I can't get it to open.

So...that's what I was working on last night (instead of the posts I promised.) Still working it now...I'll keep ya'll updated!
 
It's working! Game oooooon!

It's your dime, but I rather like Foucault's Pendulum's idea that the power of conspiracies is our own desire to impose them on the failed best efforts and idiocies of our fathers.

Ha...the conspiracy I'm most excited about isn't necessarily a conspiracy from our own timeline...but while I was looking at "our" conspiracies, I dug deeper into the people allegedly involved...and found a "conspiracal" answer to a certain question that people have been asking over and over...literally since I BEGAN this AAR (and again, just recently)...and I kept brushing them off because I didn't have a good answer.

Now I do! :D
 
Those darn save games. :p Oh well, can't wait for the next update!
 
(Sorry about the ridiculous delay. Real life keeps interrupting, been traveling all over the northern US for the past two months. Anyhow, finally have time to write again!)

Los Angeles, 2014

Johann Braun-Kennedy threw his phone in disgust. Well...the office lines had already been disconnected, and he had burned out the battery on his own cellphone hours ago...so, in reality, he threw Debra's phone in disgust. His secretary scrambled after the airborne phone, glaring at him as she fumbled her initial attempt to slide the battery back in.

"Sorry. I'll buy you a new one."

"How? We're out of business. And you're out of cash."

"I'll find a...God damn it! What the hell are they thinking in...they're the God-damned...what the hell happened to "No Man Left Behind?"

"It's been two years, John. There was a funeral. You were there."

"It's been two years for US, Debbie. Not him. And you know my name is Johann.."

"That's NOT your name. And you DON'T KNOW that it hasn't been two years there either. You're just guessing. That's all you do. You guess that it's only been a few weeks, but it could just as easily have been decades. Even if he somehow survived the accident, he could well have died from old age by now."

She paused, thinking for a moment.

"Well...I guess he IS dead from old age by now, John."

"That's not how it works. And I've TOLD you to quit calling me that, Debbie."

"And I've told YOU to not call me Debbie. You may refer to me by my married name..." Debra looked away, facing the window. "...or you may call me Mother."

Johann glared at the back of her head.

"You are NOT my..."

"JOHANN BRAUN-KENNEDY!"

The sound of Walter's voice booming from the hallway startled them both. Johann stopped mid-sentence, while Debra spun away from the window in time to see the obese former lead engineer barrelling through the office door. Walter held a stack of loose papers, with a smile that somehow shone even through his lumberjack-like beard.

"You're never going to believe this...it works! The Butterfly Device WORKS!"



But the shock that overwhelmed Johann and Debra as they examined the papers in Walter's hand...was nothing like the shock they MIGHT have experienced, had he not shown up at all.

Had Debra NOT spun away from the window the moment that Walter ran in, she just might have seen a glint of light from across the street. And if she had investigated further, she just might have been shocked to learn that the light was a reflection of the sun, bouncing off the lens of a pair of binoculars.

A pair of binoculars that watched her even now.

But even the person behind the pair of binoculars had no idea that another man had already infiltrated the building.


A man fresh out of prison.


A man who was...at that very moment...slowly climbing up the service elevator shaft's cable.
 
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Damn your cliffhangers!
:d
Damn his service-elevator-shaft's-cable-hangers!

:p

Good to see this again, it's like an old friend returning :)
 
(DANGER WILL ROBINSON! I'm going to be talking here about possibilities for the next chapter. As such, it is entirely possible (even likely) that elements of items below will in fact APPEAR in the next chapter. As such, if you prefer everything to be a complete surprise, then don't read on!)

Okay...I'm at a quandry, kids.

Well...more of a hotel room, than a place to gather rocks from. But you glean my meaning.

Hmm. Perhaps you don't. Because it only now occurs to me that a state of confusion is a quandAry, while a place to gather rocks from is a QuaRry, but a quandry is, in fact, nothing at all.

Regardless.

I have no idea where to take the story from here.

Oh, I have the "2014, Johann, Wilcox, Slinky, Snugglie" storyline basically all mapped out. It's the historical/game portion that I'm struggling with. I have a saved game from roughly where we left off in the story...but where do I go with it?

I've started over at that saved game several times now, and basically followed Matilda as she fled Guines (either on her own or through marriage), sometimes seeking revenge and sometimes simply accepting her new life, and while interesting things happen (involvement in civil wars and such), it quickly blends into the standard AAR territory of this count tries to overthrow this duke, ad infinitum. While this is not only acceptable, but in fact will likely end up being MOST of this story by the time we get to Hearts of Iron 3 (still my intent!), I feel that a character such as Matilda demands more.

So...possibilities:

1) Continue as is. Marry Matilda off, and follow her life in the new country, with standard AAR politics presumably playing a large role.

2) Have Matilda stay in Guines, under the rule of William & Annelies. This probably has the most potential...but Guines is BROKE. As in, they will likely never get out of debt, ever. As such, this severely limits the things I can actually DO with Guines, game-wise.

3) Move Matilda to...wherever the heck her sister is the count of. I've forgotten. At least then, we're with characters we've met before...but it'll still devolve to standard AAR fare.

4) Uh...I don't know.

Also, there is the matter of Gulsum and her sisters...

Any thoughts?
 
Hrmph. That should read, "Wherever the heck her sister'S HUSBAND is the count of."
 
Hmm...other possibilities could even include leaving the de Guines' all together, at least for the time being. In a way...while I could certainly do more things with them...their story COULD be over. The ultimate cliff hanger. :D Maybe the story could go visit Geva (Matilda's sister) and her husband Charles, the Count of Blois (I remembered!) without Matilda joining us. Maybe it could focus on the King of France...or even just a completely random, unrelated county, kicked off by the reappearance of Juvenal Quentis?

If I did leave Guines behind for the next chapter, we WOULD eventually revisit them (at least in an OOC summary) to see what happened to them on their own.

I'm not any more sold on this idea than I am the others of course. Really want to hear your thoughts!
 
I'm fine wuth anything. And while it would be nice to stay in Guines, if you can't do anything then that doesn't make much of a story. :p So moving, at least for a bit, would probably be a good option.
 
Thanks for all the replies...but I ended up stumbling upon the answer on my own! I've now played through 1120 (the last actually story update, I think, takes place around 1087 or so), and it's working great so far. Lots of intrigue, lots of great new characters...but most importantly, it stays true to the world I tried to create in the first chapter. This was the problem with all my other attempts...interesting things would happen, but the characters (especially Matilda) never seemed to be the same people we've been spending the past 25 years with.

So...I'll do one more update tonight, wrapping up the first part of Johann and Company's story (plus the map created by Wilcox!). Then I'm going to take a day or two to go back and re-read everything I've written so far, to refresh my memory of each (surviving) character's speech patterns, relationships with each other, and the other little details that I've forgotten (I think the last time we saw Matilda and family was probably October or so!)

And then, hopefully...back to daily updates again, as we finally get to see what has come of the world, now that Annelies has successfully killed them all! ;c)
 
And then, hopefully...back to daily updates again, as we finally get to see what has come of the world, now that Annelies has successfully killed them all! ;c)
Yes, hopefully. :p Oh well, can't wait to see what you've got in store for us. :D