Interesting< i shall go over and have a look. Btw Catknight, I think it certainly has a purpose. It has shown me a number of AAR's I otherwise would never have found or started reading. So you have my vote!
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A great choice, as I've enjoyed this AAR for some time. Congrats, cthulhu!
As for the award, I think it's one of my favorite awards because it focuses on the work and not the author. It helps keep one abreast of some of the great AARs out there that one might be missing, and the writers you don't always get a chance to check out.
As for the award, I think it's one of my favorite awards because it focuses on the work and not the author. It helps keep one abreast of some of the great AARs out there that one might be missing, and the writers you don't always get a chance to check out.
I think that the awards definitely serve a purpose. This is my first award. It is very motivating to receive an award. I get a lot of hit counts but not a whole lot of feedback. It takes most of my free time to write an AAR. So it is good to know my efforts are appreciated.
CatKnight, I think you reflect a poor attitude in your last posts and in your PM to me. I certainly do not want to be the last straw in some however many failures you may have experienced in naming successors.
Personally, I do not think that I should name a successor because I am not a person who reads many AARs. I certainly could not recommend an AAR from a different Paradox game for which I know nothing about. Here I am trying to make progress in my AAR and what am I supposed to do? Should I put the AAR on hold for a week while I search for an AAR that will meet your criteria for an award? I gave one suggestion that although appears abandoned is one of few AARs I find interesting because: no surprise, it is a EU2 game and is written in a style very much like mine. Perhaps DesertFox abandoned his Maya AAR because my AAR took center stage. We WC players tend to prefer to do things in a grand way.
I could just click on some random link and nominate that AAR. But what is the purpose in that? An award means little if it is just assigned randomly. It may as well be random for all I know about other Paradox games.
So rather than end the award altogether because you appear to have some frustration, I suggest you reevaluate the method by which the awards are assigned. There are apparently avid AAR readers. Perhaps there would be a panel of volunteers or a voting system or base the award on number of hits in a month.
I know there is this push that an AAR writer should also encourage other AAR writers and we should all be like comrades congratulating each other all the time. In reality there are more likely to be those that are mostly writers and those that are mostly readers. When I am not writing, I may be more likely to read. I tend to be a lurker though because my Internet access is usually more limited. I do not have any relevant comments until weeks after a post, at which point someone else usually beats me to it.
Anyway, I will finish my AAR, and you do what you like. I only began the AAR due to interest from others. Apparently WC with Xhosa was decidedly "impossible" for recent versions. So people were interested to see how it can be done. I am just doing my best.
CatKnight, I think you reflect a poor attitude in your last posts and in your PM to me. I certainly do not want to be the last straw in some however many failures you may have experienced in naming successors.
Personally, I do not think that I should name a successor because I am not a person who reads many AARs. I certainly could not recommend an AAR from a different Paradox game for which I know nothing about. Here I am trying to make progress in my AAR and what am I supposed to do? Should I put the AAR on hold for a week while I search for an AAR that will meet your criteria for an award? I gave one suggestion that although appears abandoned is one of few AARs I find interesting because: no surprise, it is a EU2 game and is written in a style very much like mine. Perhaps DesertFox abandoned his Maya AAR because my AAR took center stage. We WC players tend to prefer to do things in a grand way.
I could just click on some random link and nominate that AAR. But what is the purpose in that? An award means little if it is just assigned randomly. It may as well be random for all I know about other Paradox games.
So rather than end the award altogether because you appear to have some frustration, I suggest you reevaluate the method by which the awards are assigned. There are apparently avid AAR readers. Perhaps there would be a panel of volunteers or a voting system or base the award on number of hits in a month.
I know there is this push that an AAR writer should also encourage other AAR writers and we should all be like comrades congratulating each other all the time. In reality there are more likely to be those that are mostly writers and those that are mostly readers. When I am not writing, I may be more likely to read. I tend to be a lurker though because my Internet access is usually more limited. I do not have any relevant comments until weeks after a post, at which point someone else usually beats me to it.
Anyway, I will finish my AAR, and you do what you like. I only began the AAR due to interest from others. Apparently WC with Xhosa was decidedly "impossible" for recent versions. So people were interested to see how it can be done. I am just doing my best.
Well, avoiding entering the fray once more, congratulations cthulhu for that tremendous piece of work.
Hmmm...always difficult to carry on discussion while trying to congratulate at the same time. So let me begin with the discussion part and then I will move to congrats.
For the discussion, I will say this - this award is for singling out high quality work and in that process, making the writer of said work feel good (and welcomed into the community) for being singled out. Hopefully they will get more views on that work and in turn, will pass that feeling (and thus opportunity) onto someone else. If that is not happening, then the award breaks down. Catknight has done a great service, I think, in trying to re-establish this award for the larger community. No fault lies with him in this endeavor. His frustration is only that some winners do not seem to want to practice the "pass it on" phase. Why would that be? Not important enough? Perhaps. And if that is the case overall, then there is little reason to try and keep it going for his part. If this is not an honored thing, then it is no thing.
For the most part, this award may have just hit a snag, as Catknight suggested. Whether it be because of summer time, busy schedules all around or whatever, things sometimes just hit a lull. But if that lull persists, then it may be time to put this baby to bed with other past projects that have also been killed by lack of interest. I hope that is not the case.
Now - with that out of the way, congrats cthulhu. Certainly a deserved honor and a great work from what I've been able to read of it. Hopefully I'll get a chance to read even more of it now. Sorry the discussion seems to happen at the same time you win. Hope it does not take away any of the enjoyment.
For the discussion, I will say this - this award is for singling out high quality work and in that process, making the writer of said work feel good (and welcomed into the community) for being singled out. Hopefully they will get more views on that work and in turn, will pass that feeling (and thus opportunity) onto someone else. If that is not happening, then the award breaks down. Catknight has done a great service, I think, in trying to re-establish this award for the larger community. No fault lies with him in this endeavor. His frustration is only that some winners do not seem to want to practice the "pass it on" phase. Why would that be? Not important enough? Perhaps. And if that is the case overall, then there is little reason to try and keep it going for his part. If this is not an honored thing, then it is no thing.
For the most part, this award may have just hit a snag, as Catknight suggested. Whether it be because of summer time, busy schedules all around or whatever, things sometimes just hit a lull. But if that lull persists, then it may be time to put this baby to bed with other past projects that have also been killed by lack of interest. I hope that is not the case.
Now - with that out of the way, congrats cthulhu. Certainly a deserved honor and a great work from what I've been able to read of it. Hopefully I'll get a chance to read even more of it now. Sorry the discussion seems to happen at the same time you win. Hope it does not take away any of the enjoyment.
Thanks Catknight & Dead William, Mettermrck, Sir Humphrey, coz1, Alhazen! I’m honored. 
I started working on my story little over a year ago. It’s alternate history where post Great War turmoil in France leads to the restoration of the House of Bonaparte in 1924. The Third Empire navigates through the politics and wars of the 1930s expanding it’s terrioty and plays out Germany against Great Britain. But human nations are not the only players in the game of global domination: cosmic evil lurks in the shadows. The story is a combination of both reports on politics/war and narrative, describing events in the lives of a group of heroes as well as villains. I was highly inspired by Yogi’s Fu Manchu AAR but I never intended more than a hint of a Mythos presence, but it was simply too much fun writing about the main villain in my story, Oliver Haddo, and the dire forces his reckless acts have unleashed upon an unsuspecting world.
As for the discussion, I like the fact that the award winner has a responsibility to pick a successor. If you like getting awards and comments on your work, you should, in my opinion, be courteous enough to take an interest in other people's writing. As most of you know there are a lot of great stories to be found in AARland.
I started working on my story little over a year ago. It’s alternate history where post Great War turmoil in France leads to the restoration of the House of Bonaparte in 1924. The Third Empire navigates through the politics and wars of the 1930s expanding it’s terrioty and plays out Germany against Great Britain. But human nations are not the only players in the game of global domination: cosmic evil lurks in the shadows. The story is a combination of both reports on politics/war and narrative, describing events in the lives of a group of heroes as well as villains. I was highly inspired by Yogi’s Fu Manchu AAR but I never intended more than a hint of a Mythos presence, but it was simply too much fun writing about the main villain in my story, Oliver Haddo, and the dire forces his reckless acts have unleashed upon an unsuspecting world.
As for the discussion, I like the fact that the award winner has a responsibility to pick a successor. If you like getting awards and comments on your work, you should, in my opinion, be courteous enough to take an interest in other people's writing. As most of you know there are a lot of great stories to be found in AARland.
Let me congratulate you in this thread too, cthulhu! The Third Empire is classic stuff already, one of the truly great HOI AARs. Well done!
Congratulations, Cthulhu! I wish I could get HOI2.... In time, I shall.
As for the awards, there is a certain responsibility given to those who receive it. It's a distinct honor to be singled out in this manner, and I think it is just and right that someone devote what attention they can to finding a deserving successor.
Yes, there is some time commitment. And sometimes people just don't have time -- I certainly know that difficulty.
But there are alternatives, such as posting to the board to ask for suggestions or nominations (by PM, presumably). A brief reading of 3-5 suggested choices should be sufficient to know whether an AAR strikes ones' fancy. Or a brief survey of those recently updated from a couple of different games, etc. If anyone needs help, I am sure there are those willing to help!
Please, let's play on, and keep this going for the good of our community!
Again, congrats, Cthulhu! It's a very interesting concept for an AAR, and I must say I'm very impressed by that index you have going on the front page!
Rensslaer
As for the awards, there is a certain responsibility given to those who receive it. It's a distinct honor to be singled out in this manner, and I think it is just and right that someone devote what attention they can to finding a deserving successor.
Yes, there is some time commitment. And sometimes people just don't have time -- I certainly know that difficulty.
But there are alternatives, such as posting to the board to ask for suggestions or nominations (by PM, presumably). A brief reading of 3-5 suggested choices should be sufficient to know whether an AAR strikes ones' fancy. Or a brief survey of those recently updated from a couple of different games, etc. If anyone needs help, I am sure there are those willing to help!
Please, let's play on, and keep this going for the good of our community!
Again, congrats, Cthulhu! It's a very interesting concept for an AAR, and I must say I'm very impressed by that index you have going on the front page!
Rensslaer
The time has come to choose a new AAR to receive the honor of being next week’s AAR Showcase. First I thank everyone that has congratulated me. Now, I must say that it has been very hard deciding the recipient of this honor. The ‘finalists’, so to speak, in this process were works by esteemed writers such as: Mettermrck, Allenby, Director, Sir Humphrey and Prufrock451.
In the end I had to choose the AAR that not only has a great plot and is superbly written, but also is the one that entertains me the most: Empire of Fu Manchu by The Yogi. It’s the second part of a saga covering the plots of the nefarious Chinaman Fu Manchu and the heroes (and villains) that oppose his bid for world domination. It’s a superb homage to the pulp fiction genre.
Congratulations Yogi!
In the end I had to choose the AAR that not only has a great plot and is superbly written, but also is the one that entertains me the most: Empire of Fu Manchu by The Yogi. It’s the second part of a saga covering the plots of the nefarious Chinaman Fu Manchu and the heroes (and villains) that oppose his bid for world domination. It’s a superb homage to the pulp fiction genre.
Congratulations Yogi!
Congrats, Yogi! One of these days, I promise, I will make sure to get through your latest work. But even without reading it, word of mouth cannot be dismissed. Very much deserved, this honor is!
It was only a matter time before Yogi's latest masterpiece got honored. Fu Manchu is an amazing universe mixing so many different comic and fiction noir elements. It's a pleasure to read. Congratulations, sir!
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First of all, thank you all for your congratulations and thank you for this honour cthulhu! I’m very happy that this award has gone to the Fu Manchu saga, which it seems has always been the least popular of my AARs, although the one best loved by me. While I have been blessed with a group of very supportive readers, of which cthulhu is perhaps the most vocal one, nothing pleases me more than fresh recruits.
The Fu Manchu saga began shortly after I had completed “Where the Iron Crosses Grow”, a military history book style AAR which after a while got some literary elements, which I called interludes. I discovered I actually enjoyed writing those best, and many of the readers seemed to like them, so for my next AAR, I decided to go all the way to a character-based story, where the game would make up only the background world in which the action took place. I would also let the plot create new “hidden” reasons behind existing CORE or vanilla events: The Hindenburg disaster was an assassination attempt by Fu Manchu on his arch-enemy Sir Dennis Nayland Smith, the Stalin purges were initiated by the Fu Manchu through the planting of evidence in order to weaken the Red Army during a time that he felt militarily vulnerable, and so on.
Of the heroes chosen, Sir Dennis Nayland Smith (and Fah Loo Sue, who’s status as villain or hero is by now a bit muddled) came on the bandwagon with Fu Manchu himself from Sax Rohmer’s stories. Indiana Jones was chosen as a good comic relief character – in the first instalments, he played a very Watson-like role to Nayland Smith’s Sherlock Holmes, but has since been a valuable plot instrument for all things occult, ancient and archaeological. The introduction of James Bond was originally just an excuse to include the subplot about his dubious parentage, and the resulting banter with Dr Jones, but now his is the story of how he became the James Bond we know from the movies and books – as of yet he is a very different young man, who suffers moral torment over assassination missions and nurtures a hopeless platonic love for the German aviatrix Hannah Reitsch. She herself was chosen at first like a female counterpart to Otto Skorzeny, and like all action story pairs, they’re mismatched: he’s the joker, she the serious-minded, he the cynic, she the true believer, he the Nitschean nihilist, she the devout catholic. Unfortunately, the real Hannah Reitsch was not the babe all pulp story heroines should be. I have included only one photo of her in the original AAR where she looks reasonably good, and for the rest I describe her being as highly attractive, imagine a dark blond and dimpled Helena Bonham Carter. Artistic licence if you will.
Otto Skorzeny finally was unavoidable as the German action hero, not the least because of the cult following he has on these boards, but also because I longed to make him more human than I could in WTICG – someone who can love, learn, long for freedom and develop as a person, as well as blow things up and laugh like a madman. From a fencing civilian and amateur investigator at the start of the story, he’s now a sword-wielding, martial arts expert high-ranking SS-Liebstandarte officer who also happens to be the torture-and-hypnosis-conditioned love slave of Fu Manchu’s daughter. I’m not afraid to admit that he and Fah Loo Sue are my favourite characters of the story.
A late addition to the gallery is the sinister SS-sorcerer Günther Duhrn, who was introduced by cthulhu during his stint as guest writer. This charmingly dark character joins in one person two clichés, making him IMHO highly original: the evil necromancer and the coldly cruel Nazi officer. Duhrn, even more than Indiana Jones, is the perfect plot instrument to the occult sides of the story, and he is also interesting because while arguably one of the most unambiguous villains of the story, he is also a staunch and powerful opponent of Fu Manchu. I’m very fond of evil vs evil stories.
Now, what is in store for you in the future? Without giving too much away, you’ll read about Indiana Jones’s search for the lost tombs of Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan, Otto Skorzeny’s continued quest to free his beloved Fah Loo Sue, James Bond on mission in war-torn France, the aerial battles of the “Queen of Spades”, ace pilot Hannah Reitsch and of course, massive, global, brutal and apocalyptic WAR!
Read all about it in “Empire of Fu Manchu”!
The Fu Manchu saga began shortly after I had completed “Where the Iron Crosses Grow”, a military history book style AAR which after a while got some literary elements, which I called interludes. I discovered I actually enjoyed writing those best, and many of the readers seemed to like them, so for my next AAR, I decided to go all the way to a character-based story, where the game would make up only the background world in which the action took place. I would also let the plot create new “hidden” reasons behind existing CORE or vanilla events: The Hindenburg disaster was an assassination attempt by Fu Manchu on his arch-enemy Sir Dennis Nayland Smith, the Stalin purges were initiated by the Fu Manchu through the planting of evidence in order to weaken the Red Army during a time that he felt militarily vulnerable, and so on.
Of the heroes chosen, Sir Dennis Nayland Smith (and Fah Loo Sue, who’s status as villain or hero is by now a bit muddled) came on the bandwagon with Fu Manchu himself from Sax Rohmer’s stories. Indiana Jones was chosen as a good comic relief character – in the first instalments, he played a very Watson-like role to Nayland Smith’s Sherlock Holmes, but has since been a valuable plot instrument for all things occult, ancient and archaeological. The introduction of James Bond was originally just an excuse to include the subplot about his dubious parentage, and the resulting banter with Dr Jones, but now his is the story of how he became the James Bond we know from the movies and books – as of yet he is a very different young man, who suffers moral torment over assassination missions and nurtures a hopeless platonic love for the German aviatrix Hannah Reitsch. She herself was chosen at first like a female counterpart to Otto Skorzeny, and like all action story pairs, they’re mismatched: he’s the joker, she the serious-minded, he the cynic, she the true believer, he the Nitschean nihilist, she the devout catholic. Unfortunately, the real Hannah Reitsch was not the babe all pulp story heroines should be. I have included only one photo of her in the original AAR where she looks reasonably good, and for the rest I describe her being as highly attractive, imagine a dark blond and dimpled Helena Bonham Carter. Artistic licence if you will.
Otto Skorzeny finally was unavoidable as the German action hero, not the least because of the cult following he has on these boards, but also because I longed to make him more human than I could in WTICG – someone who can love, learn, long for freedom and develop as a person, as well as blow things up and laugh like a madman. From a fencing civilian and amateur investigator at the start of the story, he’s now a sword-wielding, martial arts expert high-ranking SS-Liebstandarte officer who also happens to be the torture-and-hypnosis-conditioned love slave of Fu Manchu’s daughter. I’m not afraid to admit that he and Fah Loo Sue are my favourite characters of the story.
A late addition to the gallery is the sinister SS-sorcerer Günther Duhrn, who was introduced by cthulhu during his stint as guest writer. This charmingly dark character joins in one person two clichés, making him IMHO highly original: the evil necromancer and the coldly cruel Nazi officer. Duhrn, even more than Indiana Jones, is the perfect plot instrument to the occult sides of the story, and he is also interesting because while arguably one of the most unambiguous villains of the story, he is also a staunch and powerful opponent of Fu Manchu. I’m very fond of evil vs evil stories.
Now, what is in store for you in the future? Without giving too much away, you’ll read about Indiana Jones’s search for the lost tombs of Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan, Otto Skorzeny’s continued quest to free his beloved Fah Loo Sue, James Bond on mission in war-torn France, the aerial battles of the “Queen of Spades”, ace pilot Hannah Reitsch and of course, massive, global, brutal and apocalyptic WAR!
Read all about it in “Empire of Fu Manchu”!
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