Professor Ebbesen stretched his legs out beneath the desk, watching the students file out of the classroom to enter their simulators and begin their world conquest attempts as their Spirit Guide moved them. All the students, that is, except Dustman, who walked humbly up to the desk.
"Professor, can I have my axe back?"
"No, Dustman, it is a helpful instrument and I may find it handy, in the future."
Dustman looked down. "Okay, professor." He turned to the simulation room, where he would be guided by his spirit guide, a fluffy teddy bear with big sad eyes.
"Oh, Dustman, one more thing."
"Yes, Professor?"
WHACK
Ouch
The Professor watched Dustman slink out of the room, and began forming a paper airplane out of one of the extra exam papers. He looked up again; a new student was approaching.
"Prof - Professor Ebbesen?"
"Yes? Name?"
"Da Swede, sir." Interesting name; the Professor tried not to flinch. "Sir, I've designed a simulator and begun to run it as the nation of Gotland, sir." The Professor raised his eyebrows in mild interest. "The little island off the coast of Sweden, sir. A one-province minor world-conquest. Pagan religion and tech group, sir, the rest of Europe quite as usual, sir."
"Impressive. A very challenging nation to play; your spirit guide must be - a dragon? A Nazgul?"
"Well sir...I did, um, make things easier rather somewhat."
Trouble was brewing; the Professor's eyebrows rose once more. "Such as...?"
Da Swede swallowed and looked down. "Infinite manpower, sir, and complete knowledge of the world and unlimited cash and level 60 land and navy tech and -" gulp.
"Swedish fish," Ebbesen angrily. "Look at me now. LOOK at me!"
"Yes sir?"
WHACK
Ouch
"What are you thinking, silly boy? That isn't world conquest, that's ... that's ... that's!!" He couldn't think of what's that. "That's blasphemy! Now wait -" an idea came on swiftly and fluidly and seized hold of his entire brain in seconds. "That's rather a neat idea. As a controlled experiment, mhm, yes, as a method to test the - to see how long the entire world could be conquered, under perfectly ideal circumstances. If there was nothing stopping you but your own utter foolishness, how long would it take you to conquer the world? Hmm, yes, brilliant idea coming from such a - well never mind. Open it up; see how fast it can be done, Swedish - what was your name? Never mind. Go. Let me know what happens. I expect the world to be taken by 1421."
"Well sir..." Da Swede trailed off and began to leave.
"Oh, Swede, one more thing."
"Yes, Professor?"
WHACK
Ouch
"Ah, I feel just that much better," the Professor said, breathing deeply, gratified.
- - -
A few weeks ago Da Swede posted in the EUII forum a new scenario called the "Gotland Time Trial," in which players begin as the tiny Baltic island with a shipyard, conscription center, weapons manufactory, tops technology, and cores on every controlled province of the world (except, unfortunately, some accidentally overlooked American nations).
Upon startup the player was to enter the following cheat codes: swift (add 10,000 population to capital), russianhordes (no manpower limit), alba (no rebellions), and columbus (entire world discovered). Following this, the player is allowed to use two cheats as often as necessary: oranje (reset stability at +3) and vatican (six diplomats; handy when annexing one nation and declaring war on three more all on the same day).
The goal is simple: Take over the world as fast as possible.
Only foolishness and troop construction speed can slow you down.
Let the ridiculous fun begin.
I shall not pretend this game is honorable.
I shall not pretend I am good at it.
I shall not go for the record; after all, the record was set by Nagel in a simply astounding four years - surely the fastest and probably the most dubious world conquest ever. I shall probably not be very high on the leaderboard either, because I am a wimp.
Enough about me.