Tales of Orkfia I
Though not as bulky, the lofty object falling from the skies had the same impact on an unsuspecting Raven as that great bringer of death would have in due time. Scarcely dressed, as even its lightest feathers had been launched to faraway lands, the poor creature lied there, on the ground, an unsuspecting look still in its innocent eyes. This was a young one, prolly unexperienced in the art of dodging – which was always essential for the likes of these.
Brad Brittlewood attempted to kick the life back into it with the sturdy boots he had only finished cleaning moments ago. It resulted in no sign of life; a single feather was waving along the rhytm of the cold northern winds, as to testify its surrender to nature’s cruel lot.
“Think ye killed it, Brad”, Hamr Smashthud remarked as he lifted the Raven’s wings to have a peek what valuables it would be hiding under there. They always had something with them, some momento of battles past, a little bit of gold to survive the most disastrous seperating from the pack; it was no miracle that most of this gold generally ended up in the hands of whoever managed to get a clean shot first.
“H-ey! Whaddayamean! I was stuck with the coal all this time!” Brittlewood staunchly protested.
“Sure ye wernt…”
“-No, no!”
Brad always carried around a spyglass, of which the rest of the crew suspected him of abuse – of the naughty kind. It seemed the Brits were always busy searching for potential mates, even when high up in the sky, far away from anybody of his own kind that could even remotely socialize with Brittlewood. Sometimes this caused loss of engine power and the sort of trouble that came with that, such as crashing into unsuspecting Blackwings. Although his task was relatively simple, the rest of the crew was already discussing behind his back to have Brad lifted of his duties, and to leave him behind with merchants.
They wouldn’t bother selling him, since the Brits weren’t known for making themselves useful anyway – all they could was some vaguely techy stuff nobody really cared for. Not strong enough to work with a smith, unfit for physical labour, prone to mistakes and random killings of unsuspected Raven; the long list continued. Especially that last point was quite a sensitive one, for you never knew what moment the birds would choose to get their revenge. Nobody had senses that reflexive.
Brittlewood had joined the crew just a few weeks ago, when they found him being chased down the western plains by a wicked bunch of Half-Giants.
Even though they couldn’t even match Brad’s height if three of them stood on top of each other, armed with some of those pointy spears, they sure could. The suggestion of Artel Smashthud, the airship’s master of arms, inventor and designer of generally malfunctioning equipment nobody cared about, and brother of Hamr, to have Yallahad, himself an aging Wood Elf with a refined set of psychological problems due to his fading immortality (and the peril that generally comes with actually growing older like normal surface-dwellers, such as visibility problems) and the crew’s only person actually capable of handling a bow, fire an arrow drenched in oil and set to fire, resulted in scorching more than ten acres of perfectly arable land, the frying of a set of infamously strong Uruk Hai (among the deceased that day was Blafgratskuru, well-known younger brother of none else than the local Uruk Hai chieftain, making this area a good one to avoid in the near future) and the burning of Brad’s humanoid behind, barely saved by scooping him up into the airship thanks to a well-timed maneuver by its captain, the clumsy Canuck known only to the rest, and himself, as Iden, whose anachronistic presence in this day and age was puzzling to even the wisest High Elves of the magical metropolis Crystallion.
He would have still been an object of interest to their scientific studies were it not for the fact that the grumpy old pointy-eared chosen ones of nature temporarily had bigger fish to fry. Death from above was a bit too imminent for uncovering a lonely Canuck’s whereabouts. At any rate, as long as his lot was not tied to those living on the ground, it didn’t matter for Iden, since his conviction was that only those of royal blood had any need for knowledge of their forefathers, and he sure wasn’t one of those.
Brad had wittingly suggested that perhaps Iden had been brought into this world by time travelling Harpies, but the rest of the gang weren’t really impressed by Brittlewood’s constant rambling on various theories, not just on Iden’s identity, but also about the coming of the Comet, the reason why Artel’s inventions always turned out to be failures and general comments on the mating rituals of the avarage Brittonian, of which he sure wasn’t one.
How such a strange crew came together requires several volumes of adventerous tales, but it suffices to say that, 
with the exception of Brittlewood, the people aboard that airship had seen more of Orkfia than even the renowned explorer and Grassrunner Run Trailfinder. Iden knew that the events of the past were nothing compared to what the leaders of this unholy plane were facing now, and that even the Undead uprising against their former masters in the already irrevocably historic Battle of the Deathless Kings turned out to be insignificant, which only ended in High Elven defeat once, under the Magic Sun’s influence, the Vikings were able to forge weapons that were able to slay even an High Elf, regardless of his natural immortality, and passed this subversive knowledge on to the newly raised Nazgul monarchy.
These events brough the Empire in complete disarray and eventually meant the creation of the first High Elven republic, their monarchy losing the power they had held since the dawn of history. But of course, all these events had little to no meaning in a world facing impending annihilation. The Undead, and the coalition of the living, had their revenge for centuries of oppression and slavery, but it was too little, too late.
As Trailfinder, himself a Wood Elf, wrote in the Orkfian Times: “The Empire now finds itself at the mercy, not only of her former worker class, but also of fate, which has turned against her as to draw attention to the intolerable cruelties committed against her most beloved creations. It is only natural that justice is dealt eventually. It is not only Judgmant which passes laws; these are but the cold, rational equivalent of a higher, spiritual essence that binds all, ruler and servant alike”.
Yallahad was a great admirer of Trailfinder and only joined Iden because of a strong need to see the world as described by his icon. Of course, as a Wood Elf, leaving behind the treetops was considered almost heretical and thus Yallahad, declared himself to be, by these actions, unfit for service in the army or druidry. Trailfinder had, almost naturally, a great following, mostly among the younger generation of Wood Elves, who almost all were of High Elven descent.
They had long given up their immortality by wandering out of the realm entrustred to them by their ancient forefathers that had established the High Elven Empire at the Aegestidan Rift, from which the energy flows, that, over time, the High Elves learned to harnass to harmonious perfection. Nationalistic as the High Elves were, they waged war with the defectors upon discovering them along the borders of their domain, but as the Wood Elves penetrated deeper and deeper into the forgotten forests, the High Elves gave up the persuit as they dared not wander too far away from their source of greatest strenght. When the coalition of the living fought their war for, as they called it, justice and restoration of equality, the Wood Elves were highly reluctant to join the efforts and instead migrated further away from the zone of conflict that kept expanding as the populations of the various freed races exploded.
“Know what I always wondered?” Brittlewood started, taking a pondering pose while moving closer to the campfire, sitting on the anchor of the Icarain that hovered silently above them.
“Ye, we know. I jes dun care, man”, Hamr snarled.
“What is it?” Inquired Yallahad, ignore Hamr’s chronically bad temper.
“What happens if you just start digging, you know, down? All the way down?”
Artel Smashtud grabbed a piece of coal lying close to him and held it up.
“Ye’d find this, loads of ‘t”, he answered, banally, attempting to evade the real issue.
“Yeah, I know, I know! But what if you really dig down, to the end?” Brittlewood persisted.
Surely, everyone on the crew had at some point pondered on this question, at night, in bed, unable to catch sleep, or just on any occasion when there was little to do aboard an airship, occasions which probably made up quite a staggering percentage of their daily lives. Iden thought he knew, but he shrugged off most of his knowledge as simple misteachings from his time spent with the High Elves.
There was the Cradle at the center of the realm, a bunch of stars that revolved around it, then the surface of the Orkfian world, almost limitless in expanse; one could not see the Orkfia above oneself even with the best of Artel’s telescopes, which was actually not even as good as the worst the High Elves employed to search the skies. Regardless, the Cradle cast a blue too fierce to see through clearly. Unfortunately, it did not outshine the disaster that was looming years ahead.
“You know what I think’s down there? The Canuck!” Brad continued, waving his arms frantically, trying to draw attention to another one of his wild theories. Iden didn’t even look up anymore at the mentioning of the word.
“How do you imagine this to be?” Yallahad asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, obviously, I bet they retreated underground cause they all saw it coming and soon Comet’s gonna smash into Orkfia and they won’t even break a sweat! And I bet, as long as we stick with Iden, we’re gonna be fine, cause they’re only using him to…”
“Ye talkin the biggest ponyshit this Dwarf’s heard in…”
“Guys, guys!”
And as usual, dinner escalated into an ordinary yelling contest, arousing the attention of robbers and thieves interested in gaining a fully furnished gondola, which had happened more than once in its history. All times, though, the perpetrators could be stopped because they were stupid enough to enter the room called the ‘Room of Doom’ by the actual owners, except by of course Artel Smashthud himself, who stored his “world-famous” weaponry there, of which not even a wooden bow turned out to be quite that accurate. The only thing of real concern, though, was whether the gunpowder stored there was safe from the unintentional combustion of various devices.
Rapairs to the ship could take up days, weeks, months, since they had to rely on the same guy to fix what was destroyed. It was no miracle that the Smashthud brothers had been expelled from their own tribe – the miracle was, instead, that a bunch of outcasts this inept survived in a world so littered with dangers.
Interview – Acwder and Martel
Interview with the Admins – Acwder and Martel
OT Q1: Martel, when was it that you first started as Admin of Orkfia and what does this involve?
Martel I started as Admin in the old ORKFiA (the version created in 2001 by MoDo, Kadagar and C4lv1n) around 2005 to be fRoSt’s “right hand”, I was the last admin of quite a number. It involved running staff, re-organizing it, and working with code (by 2006 I had removed most known bugs and I ran several problem free “Old” ages).
The nice thing with Alliances at War (AatW) is that it will run without me interfering. It’s what players do that matters the most (you can start a war, or not, or you may go all dragons, or remain on top… Players and their actions make AatW exciting). I really only must be here to start and end ages, but that will also change, it’s just a matter of time until dev and players work out what achievements may trigger age victories.
OT Who arranges/pays for the server that AatW runs on?
Martel AatW has a dedicated server that I personally pay for, but everyone who sponsors contributes to decreasing that cost.
OT Do you still code for AatW?
Martel Almost everyday, I take the time during ages to prepare changes and improvements that will show up for next age. Lately I’ve had company by HaRRy (Development) and we’ve been quite productive for next age (Age 18).
OT Q2: It must have been a difficult decision to essentially “give away” the code of the game you had been working on, along with server space and potentially players to Scarlo for the “Classic” version of Orkfia.. what was your thinking behind this and how do you think it’s working out so far?
Martel Giving away my code, well, I felt that I owed it to the old ORKFiA coders, that game began as open source, and with Classic I’d like to continue in that spirit. I can’t force that Max (their current coder) does the same, but someone might take over from him one day, and then that tradition is kept up with. It also allows me to consider Alliances-at-War actually, truly, my own.
It was all my code, I spent several years rewriting it, creating new pictures, etc. but I made it in that spirit and I always accredited my work to “ORKFiA”. Now with Alliances-at-War, I can finally credit myself for the code I write and the graphics / interfaces I produce. It’s such a relief, and it’s thanks to giving away the “new” Classic version for a new admin in the old tradition. So while I wrote before that I was the last old ORKFiA admin, one could say that Acwder is the first of a new generation.
I really rely on the players. Without players it wouldn’t be much of a game, I wouldn’t get input from anywhere and no response on game changes, players make up all of staff, players outside staff help sponsoring, players outside staff posts game suggestions and discusses with those in dev, etc. – I’m just building this game from their input.
OT yeah its a real community feeling to the whole game..and i think part of what makes Orkfia special is that here, players feel staff (you) listen to them and act on their ideas like no other game they play.
OT Q3: Acwder tell us a bit about your history, how did you make the transition from regular Orkfia player to Admin of a Classic version and what makes you so passionate about this?
Acwder Its a kinda odd story really, I was contacted by several old vets back in late November last year who said that Orkfia Classic was gonna go live soon, there had existed a small forum about this for some time that I visited once in a while (Origin which was set up by Scarlo and Natix). The game got launched, during the first age I volunteered to be a moderator on #Orkfia, as time went on I noticed several flaws in the setup; the guide being one of them, so during Christmas last year I sat down and updated it. Next project I had (which is ongoing) was the creation of the Orkfia Portal, a place where the community could grow. Somehow I kept climbing until I became one of the admins
About the passion I have for the game, well its hard to explain, I simply do what I can to improve it, I never expected to become one of the Admins on Classic, and there are loads of projects going on, I just simply love this game and it’s potential! Its been small steps, but continuous ones, I don’t believe in slacking and I think most ppl around me have noticed that 
OT Q4: Do either of you play either version?
Acwder I tried out Infinity way back just after it got launched, tho busy with other stuff it never sticked, at the moment I only have a tribe in AatW for the Orkfia-Portal to keep up with the stuff happening there:)
Martel I got the chance to play Classic competively this age, in Acwder’s alliance even, which was a blast (to the past?)
OT Oh – did you play in an alliance together in the past?
Acwder Martel recruited me into Interflora I think it was way back after the first age of FUN
Martel we did.. I once recruited a big dragon (it was right?) to my first alliance, guess who that was
Acwder hehe
OT Q5: There has been talk of new races appearing in Alliances at War, with Owls and Rept Hai even sneaking into the player guide – are these real races that are being worked on and if so when are we likely to see them?
Martel You would have to ask HaRRy, but I’m as excited about this as anyone else, all I can say is that we’re going to expand the Orkfia universe now with Alliances-at-War on it’s own new track It’s a good opportunity for anyone to suggest races to be added as we’re listening completely to non-staff players on this one… Relying on players, even.
OT So essentially now that Classic carrys the original code you are free to make any changes in AatW that take people’s fancy?
Martel Essentially, yes 
OT No doubt others will be surprised too to see the addition of Classic is a positive thing for you in the end too
Martel I love Classic, I played it this age and relived many old memories (good and bad). I was just worried about bugs and such, what drove me to be admin in the first place.
OT Q6: In Classic last age you removed some buildings and introduced entirely new ones (Tents and Temples) how has this worked out and did it have the effect you hoped for?
Acwder Yeah, we removed Markets and Labs – starting with the removal: One thing that makes it hard for new people to learn this game is the protection, where you spend 48 hours protected to get your tribe ready for the age, this time is really important in Classic since one age only lasts for four weeks, Markets made this time really hard for newbies unless they had some vet in the alli to teach them how to use it, other than that this also gave room for more % of other buildings speeding things up even more. The labs were removed cause I personally and lots with me hated how Orkfia became “Scifia” where you would run max labs for 3 weeks to max those 66% and own some alliances late age, now you buy rps for cash instead and the sci is limited to 25%.
About the new buildings – we wanted some new dimension to the game, up until last age there were only 4 ways of gaining acres; exploring, grabbing, random news and the selfspells for Birds and Elves. With Tents we added a fifth way that would work as a option for exploring and in addition would give more acres percentage wise for smaller tribes than for the larger tribes.
The other new building Temples was also added to further enhance the game, especially with the changes for Age 34, Temples and it’s units Priests really are playing a bigger role in wars now, which really is what Orkfia Classic is all about. The Tents worked out great during this first age and now with the Temples improved we think that things can only get better!
OT Q7: Orkfia is very reliant on a strong staff team, although it’s been a feature of past admins to “burn out” and then disapear. What keeps you doing what you’re doing and can you see an end to it?
Acwder For me it was just about taking over what the previous Classic staff failed/burned out over, I mean Martel was never supposed to take care of both Classic and AatW, and the ones who were supposed to take care of Classic all went missing in action one after another. I just wanted to help out, it took me all the way up here, only end I can see is if someone comes around and does a better job then me then I’ll gladly step down and focus on my other projects instead. It’s all about evolving, if one stops the progress the game will become static and die on itself, one single person can only bring so much to it, new blood is always needed.
Martel I’ve seen my relief from ORKFiA adminship just how Acwder describes it (he does a better job in Classic than I would) I constantly was on the verge of burning out recoding the old game, the big question was always ‘for who am I doing this?’ as long as I managed to answer that question to myself I kept at it I guess. With AatW the answer is more and more for ‘myself’, which really helps to keep motivation up. I get rewards for this on a daily basis with player comments, chatting in IRC and players becoming sponsors to help me out. It’s just a great thing to be part of Orkfia as a whole.
Acwder and now with two different version both being developed it adds more competition between us which in return makes us improve the versions even more.
Martel it really does, as long as I can refrain from just stealing their ideas :p
Acwder haha likewise
Martel need to work in different directions, but some good ideas can be used in both games, which is really what you’d call synergy.
OT Q8: Science has always been a big part of Orkfia in the past and was a bugbear for many players of both versions. In the last age both versions developed different ways of dealing with this problem. How do you think your solutions have gone?
Martel well in AatW it has become an optional tool, like how Joe wanted it, maybe something could be done to make that tool even more useful in the future (now all alliances are on a more equal footing which should be good for the game)
Acwder I think the Classic version’s way of dealing with it will really show in the next age since the price has now been sorted on a better level then the first age, science should be an addition to the game not be the game
Martel i really like how in Classic game play suddenly got a lot more focused and not stopping up growth mid-way to pump sci (and sacrifice growth), some would call that a feature, but for me playing classic was as most fun when you simply just compete in growth
Acwder yeah both Classic and AatW have now adopted the idea that it shouldnt be Scifia anymore, 66% bonuses gave a huge advantage
OT Q9: Although these are two distinctly different versions of Orkfia, with different staff and different ambitions, both versions share the name of Orkfia and the community. What are your feelings about this… is it better to keep everything as separate as possible or do you think both versions will prosper through sharing some things?
Martel For AatW we’re giving up the Old “ORKFiA” name, but our heritage includes the world Orkfia, and that world we wish to keep expanding on in the future.
OT Oh really? so Alliances at War will now be just that – no more “Orkfia”?
Martel I’m not too sure yet, at the moment it’s just “Alliances At War” but we also go by Orkfia Infinity, maybe they will become synonymous. Still i’d say we’re all Orkfians no matter domain name changes :p
Acwder Indeed we are.
Acwder The whole goal for the Orkfia-Portal was to bring AatW and Classic closer, lately the development has been more focused on Classic due to the world forum being replaced by the Portal forum, though about the different staff Im quite sure we got several staffmembers that are part of both versions, the versions will grow on their own but the community as a whole would prolly gain more on having some common ground Orkfia Classic is also going to be changed, atm its not sure if we aswell are droping Orkfia or not, prolly not, its just the “Classic” part that rings the bells of a static old version thats not being developed anymore.
Martel it’s just the odd ORKFiA acronym that I think we’re both getting rid of (?)
Acwder still not decided for the Classic version but we are working on it:)
Martel In my opinion it symbolises the old ORKFiA version which I have given up, in order to let AatW prosper on its own and strictly speaking from a code context, the code has been rewritten so that connection with the old has been gone for long
Acwder There is a danger with being named Orkfia, that is that ppl coming back from being away for several years expects to find just their version of the game, this isnt the case here since both the games are constantly being developed.
Martel I agree with Acwder there too
OT Thanks for your very interesting answers – is there anything either of you would like to add?
Acwder yeah one add would be that don’t hesitate to play both versions:)
Martel Indeed, I find classic to be time consuming, but that is the whole point of it too.. a hardcore game experience no other game can offer… at least in my opinion I play Alliances-at-War to enjoy other people, the fantasy surrounding and a different world that is quite enjoyable. Nothing says both aren’t possible to play at once, I know many do.
~ Thanks to both Acwder and Martel for this interview, I hope it is interesting for everyone to read – Interview conducted by Jamzi for the Orkfian Times~
Orkfia Survey Launched
Hello there, I hope most of you remember the previous Orkfian Survey, now its time for a new one, the Survey will be open for three weeks. Please take your time to fill out the form.
Survey — Click Me
Make sure you mention this Survey to all your Orkfian friends:)
The results will be shown here when the deadline is reached.
Due to a removed filter quite a few old posts has been “messed” up, I will fix all of them but it will unfortunatly take more then a second;)
Cheers
In the Rear-view Mirror: War Report – GNS vs. SIN
This war took place during Age 14
The age was passing from start-age and leaning towards mid-age, since OOP we had seen 2 alliances, mostly, competing for the #1 in land, those were; GENESIS, and “The Round Table”.
At the top for personal land rankings we could se 2 ravens and 1 Dwarf from “The Round Table” #6, these unbeatble beasts took more or less control over the game and held the rest of ORKFiA down.
GENESIS, whom had 6 moris just beneath RTs attackers, did quickly realise something needed to be done as thier Moirs were hurting and could not grow and “RT’s” TMs were exploring freely.
As time passed the Moris of GENESIS, whom had alot of credits, pumped thier armies, raised MLs and started to mass grab RT’s TMs for thousands of acres, also one of the Moris “meepmeep” grab the biggest Raven, “King Arthur”. Of course now the Moris grew into range of the big Ravens & Dwarf, and got retalled.
What followed next was that RT secretly had started making plans of wars, and started to convert buildings.The same night as the last grabs was made on them, 12hours had passed, and RT had set killtarget, the target was “meepmeep”, the one who had grabed the invincible “King Arthur”. Sadly enough the meepmeep had razed his Academies during night and was easily killed while offline saving a cat, the war had just taken its first victime, the final blow was laid in meepmeeps career, a 4380acre mori.
However, GENESIS was not late to respond and quickly started converting buildings, this was not taken by suprise, they had known a war was doomed to happen sooner or later.
During the time for GENESIS guilds to be filled, Round Table had been throwing some heavy OPs on one of GENESIS’s Brittionians, but without luck as the tribe defended himself very good, and could not be killed. However, there was another brittionian whom had recently explored and was low on ML, this Round Table quikly realised and could easily kill, a final blow was laid in Brettonians career. In this a new record was set in the old bug, and a 10-fold kill was made.
Now GENESIS had gotten thier buildings in, guilds were filled, thieves was trained, and killtarget was set. The target was, Sir Bruin the Black. A well defended DE but a final blow was laid. Shortly after Round Table started targeting one of the Moris, but he was proven to be more difficult than they had thought, and survived.
Second target of GENESIS was set, Sir Dinadan, a ~3800 acre eagle, who got the final blowlaid shortly.
Round Table had now started thier crusade against one of the Moris, 3 BCs were done, closely followed up with massive raids and OPs, with a bit of luck and skills the mori managed to stay alive for some hours. Unluckely the mori had lost net connection, and couldn’t stay logged on at all times and after heavy ops/raids a final blow could be made, and the second mori was killed, ~4000acres.
During the raids on the night Galahad had missed his attack one hour and was beaten down big time, this was made near the killtime set by GENESIS, and now it was Sir Galahad whom was target. Failing first try, the Raven came online close to the next update, but did not realse any troops and was easily killed.
As Round Table was also fast to retal and started targeting one of GENESIS smaller tribes, Brown Magic Mushroom, and with heavy OPs and raids, he still manage to survive for some time. During this time GENESIS tried another kill, this time a Spirit, but failed, as the Spirit realsed big amounts of thieves and got heavily crippled.
However, shortly after GENESIS swap target, and was able to lay a final blow in a DE, Sir Palomides. Round Table still opping Brown Magic Mushroom, but without luck as he proved to be a tough cookie to break.
Meanwhile GENESIS finished another kill on Sir Balan, and 6h later they followed up with a kill on Queen Morgana Le Fay.
The war was coming to an end, and a final killtime was set by GENESIS. During the night 3 of thier Moris had trained big amounts of troops and trippled grabbed King Arthur, though not suprised he grabed one of them back, and 3h GENSIS started hurling thier TM firepower, and last seconds remaining, King Arthur tried another grab at one of the Moris but failed, and a final blow was laid in King Arthus career.
Both alliances agreed to stop the heavy opping and both went their own way again
Much has been said about the war,and indeed, it was a tough war, for both sides, but in the end GENESIS got upper hand and had almost 18-19 tribes online at all times, moving from second place in land to first, and Round Table dropped to a #6 in land.
Final score: 7-3 GENESIS – Round Table
Do you have an old war report, story or interview laying around from the old days? Don’t hesitate to send em in
In the Rear-view mirror Tuesday: Interview with JHUN
Its finaly tuesday again and its time for another look into the rear-view mirror. This time its a interview that took place back in 2003. Torrow we got a Alliances at War Warreport so stay tuned.
***
JHUN is one of the top players in orkfia, there is lot to be said about him, in my eyes there are two main sides, on one side there’s the people who dislikes him and takes every first chance they get of trash-talk him, on the other side theres the people who thinks he is one of the greatest players to ever set foot in ORKFiA.
I decided to take the chance and interview him, at the end of this article perhaps you’ll have some more grounds to stand on in your opinions about him.
JHUN lives in Malaysia, with his mom, dad and two younger siblings. At day time he studies law at high rate and meets his girlfirend whom he deeply cares for.
JHUN has played for 2 years nearly, he started out playing after he overheared his Queen in Utopia and some other guy talking about “missbattling eagles” and what not.
He started out playing for Kengu, who thought they were really good and all, but in fact they weren’t THAT good to quote JHUN.
Some Q/A’s.
Wheelie:
Do you have any orkfia player you admire? And if so, who?
JHUN:
Other orkfian player I admire…….hmm thats a toughie. To be honest, I don’t really O_o most of the other good players have had their hands in some dirt except maybe chosen. Most of em are pious hypocrites.
Maybe jamzi, she plays for fun, but ends up doing well 
Wheelie:
There have been a lot of war blocks this age, is it anything you have experienced and what do you think of it?
JHUN:
Hmm ok basically i think war blocking is a strategy, tho I do not condone an ABUSE of it. Using warblocking to avoid a potentially disastrous war against an alliance you KNOW is going to war you AND kick ur ass in the process is basic strategy.
However i certainly cannot appreciate those alliances who revolve their entire age around warblocking…eg a raven hit one of us some time back then immediately jumped into war. A flyover of that alliance showed that he basically did that all age, made a grab, jumped into war, did nothing throughout the war, undeclared, rinse and repeat. We grabbed him anyway.
The main issue I have however is with the way penalties against warblocking is enforced.
If a big alliance ‘warblocks’ , admins are all over em (like the alleged warblock our alliance had with Anno some ages back). However most of the warblocking and other underhanded schemes are committed by the smaller or less known alliances, who i might add, get away with it most of the time.
I will not name any names, but Generallee take a look at most of the small alliances and u see warblocking being abused left and right, with nothing done by admins, or blatant intra alliance co-op etc.
Wheelie:
Your known as the guy who is constantly “on-the-run” or “harassed” by BROWN and your disputes with them/theirs with you, are well known by everyone, but what started did this “war” in the first place? I think theres more to it than is commenly known?
JHUN:
hmm ok i think it basically started in my 3rd age I think, the old BROWN crew were in that cheater reaver’s alliance…….although they ‘apparently’ didnt know of the cheating he was pulling off, i wasnt so sure and it certainly didnt endear them to me :/
Then as ages past, they were always the ones in my freaking news right from day 1 OOP. when I was in weaker alliances they used to just give me pages and pages of ops, ino real damage, but mainly to just annoy me, and to slow me down.
Wheelie:
why you?
JHUN:
Cos i always grew fast regardless of what they did and I guess they weren’t happy that i did it. A lot of other alliances opd me regularly as well, but BROWN mainly concentrated on me, then when the stupid unbalanced war system was implemented, BROWN was the alliance which started killing me.
First time they did it i mean, i didnt mind since the age was so boring and I wasn’t really playing (that was the age mb won in the end somehow)
After that they kept harassing me so i finally just got fed up of them.
Wheelie:
If you would name one worthy enemy alliance, which would that be? And why?
JHUN:
hmmm………ironically i wud say it wud have to be BROWN. Their slow growing style is something we’ve always had problems with ever since the bottomfeeding cap was implemented. Plus they can be very coordinated.
Wheelie:
Finally do you have any tips or tricks you would like to share with your fellow orkfians?
JHUN:
hmm……..tips or tricks e?
Best way to do well is not to sit around blindly following a strat or building what you can, but to truly understand the game and how it works.
Wheelie:
Other than that is there anything you would like to add?
JHUN:
Yeah i have something to add : I’m not the insane game loophole finding, bug-abuser a lot of ppl seem to think :p
Basically, i may stretch SOME rules (when the rules of orkfia were still shaky).
But i can only name one time when i broke a rule,some ages back when i got pissed that i died due to a mana bug which let DEs have full mana in 2-3 turns,despite overwhhelming proof that the allianc which killed me abused the bug, frost deleted my reinstated account. I got so pissed i took all my alliance account info and conducted mass wars by my lonesome.
other than that….i havent broken any rules, a couple of things i did (not more than 3) were considered unethical by some, but then i played to win. Im not trying to push blame, but a lot of ppl especially from the smaller alliances do a lot more crap.
Plus if i really wanna multi, i cud easily have used a proxy , when i multied that age, i didnt even bother hiding my ip.
18/09/03
In the Rear-view mirror Tuesday: War Report – GNS vs. ORKFiA
Starting today we will now every Tuesday look into the rear-view mirror and have some old interviews and war reports posted here. We are kicking of with GNS vs. ORKFiA which took place the first age that Orkfia Classic got launched (age 26). Written by the GNS elder Wheelie. Enjoy.
Something Old, something New, something Blue -
ORKFiA CLASSIC
The story about a broken and lonely alliance with trigger happy TMs.
Chapter one – Genesis
I was asked by the elder and co-elders in #21 to write a war report on the war between us. However I quickly realised that this would prove to be a lot harder than it sounds. The war between us (Genesis (#32)) and #21 was a mere result of something that had been going on the whole age, only to bloom during the past week, before the actuall war broke out between us.
Where was I suppose to start? What should I take into consideration? What would I write about?
If I was suppose to explain the war between us from our side I would have to do it from scratch, so people could relate easier to the situaion and perhaps understand a bit more. I suppose the first thing to start with would be the war with #12.
Chapter two – P.O.O, butt, what does it mean?
ORKFiA was back, veterans had returned, a lot of the old top alliances were back to give ORKFiA some loving again. There was rejoice, excitement and a lot of assumptions of who was going to rule the age during the first few hours of OOP. Then came the bug and we had to postpone the age with a 24h delay, a classic orkfia start.
Grabs were flying around, people were exchanging land, feeding on defenceless OOPers, hunting ravens. The grabwars had started. It didnt take long before a 2-3 alliances broke loose from the OOP pack and started to fight for top spot. At first there were two competitors, mainly #12 and #21, who keept bashing each other, both alliances had nasty attacker setup’s, we tried our best with our Uruk team and after a while #12 stood alone, while we were making our way to them. We quickly understood that they were a problem with their scary Olegs and Dwarf, a problem which had to be delt with sooner or later. #21 had some scary looking attackers aswell, mainly one Oleg, but that proved to be no problem. The mere nuisance he caused, he managed to cause for himself aswell and went down before anyone knew what had happend.
I think it was around the second week or so, people were barely around 2.5-3k acres when we started noticing #12 preapering themselves for war, the signal was lid, war was coming.
They were converting, we were converting, tick by tick we were getting filled by a sudden rush, the nerves were getting weaker and weaker. The KT was set and as the final hour was reached we declared the official war, and the killtime was upon us. Slowly and gaspingly the good old orkfian feeling of joy/excitement/happiness but at the same time fright/paranoia and fear, fear of knowing what you are capable of and knowing that the enemy can do exactly the same thing – was starting to crawl up the spine.
The end of the hour was coming closer, hands were shaking, windows were ready, the guild IRC chat was being nervously spammed, the climax was full and had almost reached its max when – BAM! First blood! We had laid the final blow in what was going to be the first kill in our war. What followed was joy, pleasure and hunger, hunger for more blood!
But what was this? In all the excitement something had gone terribly wrong. One by one we all started to realise that we all had more than our max tp/mp’s. Rapidly the guild chat begun to take diffrent directions as to what we had to do. Quickly Scarlo was summoned and the discussion were in full shape. As we were talking to Scarlo he talked to the elder’s of #12. It would seem that by us getting a quadropple kill on them, the war bonuses you gain for getting a kill/having someone getting killed i war, had increased times four. We offered them peace, for the duration of the bug, but they didnt want to hear it and insisted on keeping it as it was so they could pursue thier kill. The same hour as we got the bug they had their KT, on our “Vadå tema? (#32)”, which they ironicly failed even with the war bonuses. Then they came in return afterwards asking us for peace, well as you understand there was no way now for us to accept it.
Thing’s were harsh, they had some nasty attackers, we had our wolfpack of Vikings and Uruk team. The Viking wolfpack was still too small, however our Team Uruk, consisting of “Silence…I Kill U! (#32)” and “Too Much Jäger! (#32)” were hungry, they had been sneaking for the top and started claiming the throne as theirs. They started a havok on #12 unseen before. They wrecked everything in their way, leaving nothing but a trail of blood. After #12′s failed KT on us we regained and slained another one.
At #12s front things were going silent, had they had enough? Given up? Well after our second kill we had the answer, they surrendered, after passing on a huge grab on 500 acres to our brave “Minttu Memories (#32)” who would later on prove to be the bullied, fat kid of orkfia, through out the entire age.
Once we got the win, which was of course also bugged, so we only gained the fame part, we started to look around. We were in warmode now and feelt strong, it was time for some payback.
Score: 3 kills, 0 deaths.
Chapter three – Ruffled feathers and Bondage Gnome’s.
So we had been victorious in the war against #12, came out as top dogs with Team Uruk on top of ORKFiA and one brave Viking had managed to feed on #12′s TM team and started to poke his way up, it was the “Bondage Gnome (#32)”. Thing’s were undoubtedly looking good for us, but we had no idéa of what was in store for us.
Leaving #12, our trigger happy TM crew demanded more, they had feelt the bloodthirst for the first time. We started to eradicate some of #19′s tribes, which had been feeding on us for some time. #19 was a small alliance full of potential dangerous attackers. One by one they went down. After 4 kill’s our TM crew feelt satisfied and we went back to growth mode.
This periode was rather boring and each day passing feelt like an eternity. Team Uruk were ripping through orkfia like a plauge and the brave Bondage Gnome (#32) had recently joined them. As time passed by we knew that a new challanger would soon rise, who would it be? Core? MH? The more time that passed the more we tried to preapere ourselves. You could almost feel the tension in the air, it was thick. War was coming yet again. We did what we could do best and gather resources, however, one brave tribe was feeling more lucky than others and let down his TM def, Bondage Gnome (#32) razed TM def in exchange for being able to pump more resources for the alliance. Little did he know that this move was the one which would lead to his death.
This is where the “war report” is suppose to start but I feelt compelled to add the first part. So sue me :<
Three weeks of the age had passed when I was at work and got _the call_. I was unable to answer but when I saw the unaswered call I just knew, I dialed up the number and found out that; Vogon Destructor (#14) has laid the final blow in Bondage Gnome’s ORKFiA career. I sounded the alarm and we were converting.
Mostly Harmless was a ruthless alliance lead by a evil finnish mastermind, they were not to be underestimated. MH was packing a fearsome TM crew consisting of dangerous Eagles and Britts, with a notorious Mori Hai.
They had killed Bondage Gnome (#32) which meant they could probebly quite easy kill anyone els of us. As we were converting we were all in a state of chock after the kill, we quickly organised a KT and unleashed Team Uruk on them. The first kill went rather easily, a battlemage Undead with no thief defence. During the passed war we didnt have any real thieves, this war we had however been preapering for days, so our thieves had sharpened their knives, and the trigger happy TM crew were craving.
The following kill would prove to be a bit harder. While were working on their TMs we had let loose Team Uruk who were spreading havok through their alliance. However, one of our suicidal and self-proclaimed Immortal Britt had gone wild. By using ML 15 and thieves he claimed he would rule the world, as you can imagine we were worried and tried to talk some sense into him. Of course it didnt take long time before #14 found him and commenced their KT.
If it was pure luck or if he is truely immortal, we dont know, what we do know is that he is still alive and kicking. By this time we had already managed to get a second and thired kill. By the time we got our fourth kill they had already waved the white flagg and given up.
Score: 4 kills, 1 death(s).
Chapter four – The Coreans.
Victorious once again and still in warmode we werent sure on what to do, we knew there was still threats out there, #21 was a growing concern but even more so, core. We knew what Core had done in the past and we feared what they could do in the present.
At the same time one of Cores much feared High Elf, Reefer Madness (#20), had increased his offence by a huge bit we decided that Core had to be top priority, even more so the HE. However with a TM def that looked impossible to break we were not sure what to start with. Core had a steady TM team, mostly DE’s, with their 2 HEs and a Oleg who had been trouble in the past.
We decided that the HE had to go, with his massive offence.
A bit wary from the past war with MH we set the KT and went all out. We had to take him down no matter what, if we would fail, it could mean the death of more members. Once again our TM crew proved to be at their edges, and we could slay the High Elf with little trouble and some luck.
The following kill would be on Saturday Night Fever (#20), which proved to be no problem at all. With no thief defence and no activity we could simply walk into the lands and grab everything we wanted. Still there was no real sign of Core’s TMs, however both their Oleg and smaller HE proved to be trouble makers and keept bullying one of our tribes, yet again Minttu Memories (#32) took a few for the team.
Mauling through their TMs, disabling their Oleg by having him release all his off we left Core.
Score: 5 kill’s, 0 deaths.
Chapter five – Bloodshed and tears.
Having battled 2 wars, we were still on top, Team Uruk was looking supreme, one of our brave vikings had died and we were not sure on what to do. By the looks of it we could really have used a break, get some of our lower tribes on top and our sci on the run again. Our science had been decaying like nuts. The trigger happy TM crew were voicing their opinions, they saw #21 and wanted them dead.
This did not make our decision any easier. This decision however was made for us. #21 were converting. Once again we sounded the alarm and set a KT.
We managed to get of them during two hours at night, however, what followed next was a sneaking and devious move.
Somehow #21 had managed to slay our “Silence…I kill U! (#32)”, by having their Mori Hai suiciding along with their Oleg pumping monster off to do a double grabb on him during night and then blast him into never-neverland.
Team uruk had been splitt. The painful echos of “Too Much Jäger! (#32)” could be heared throughout orkfia. The crying and longing for its partner was unbareble. Too Much Jäger! (#32) required, no, demanded revenage like there was no tomorrow. What followed next was a manifestation of our rage.
Weary from past wars, troubled by our dead Uruk we gathered what we had. Our Wolfpack of Vikings feasted upon the suiciding Mori Hai while our thieves raped and plundered his lands. We easily took him down, making it 3 kills in less time than 6hours.
Still there was a concern of the Oleg. He had boosted his offence quite a bit and increased his TM def a lot, much like the HE he seemed like a impossible kill, only bigger. However earlier during the age we had watched him and knew that he would never last all the way, he just didnt have what it took. Up till now another of our brave wolfpack of Vikings had started to take his baby steps to the top, it was Milliways (#32), who along with the rest of the wolfpack, rose to shine. Along with the raging uruk they would toghter wear the Oleg down. The Olegs TM def proved to be most difficult of our TM crew so we had to relay on our brave attackers, untile the time was right.
It did take some more time than the ones before, but we knew he was going down, which he also did. Much unfortunetly the happiniess was brief. As all the thieves had their minions out, raping the Oleg, #21 had a KT set, the tick after. They quickly saw their oppertunity and advantage. Setting their KT on the elder of opposing alliance (who happend to be a very honorble and most handsome man!).
Another one of us went down, things were getting more and more weary in the alliance and sci just keept decaying and decaying. As it looked now, things were going down the drain. They attempted our second uruk, then swapped to our Randomness (#32), without any luck at all on either one. We attempted some of their Spirits aswell, but failed. In the meantime our wolfpack, Vikings were growing on them, sneaking their way up, just trying to cause as much havok as possible.
Probebly sick of failing attempts on our bigger tribes #21 tried a diffrent angle and killed our smallest tribe that had been stuck behind for the most part of the age.
Then like a divine fire from above, we gripped toghter once again, reunited and blew off 2 kills in a row on them, with a thired in sight. They failed yet another kill on our Minimaräng (#32), who managed to survive most skillfully. It was probebly this, that made #21 surrender as their next move.
I have to give #21 credit for their TM crew though, It was not what we expected
Score: 6 kill’s, 3 deaths.
All in all; 18 (22 if you count #19) kills, 4 deaths.
And that is where we are today. It is 1½ week left of the age, a lot can still happen and I have probebly doomed my own alliance (and myself) by writing this, we can probebly expect some sort of co-opness. Alas, it was a fun but hard age for us, this far. It proved to be just all that ORKFiA has been in the past with all bugs, grabwars, and alliance conflicts. Also, we had 4 completly new people to ORKFiA playing their first age with us and all of them exceeded our expectations, made the age a whole lot more fun.
I wish all of you good luck for the remaining of this age and the upcoming age!
Oh, and a Merry Christmas and happy new year!
THE END
~[GNS] Wheelie
Editorial Note: GNS ended that age with 31 Kills and 4 Deaths.
Interview – Contest Winner Guran
First of I would like to congratulate you on your Contest writing victory.
Q: How does it feel to be the winner?
A: It feels pretty good. Its a good thing to hear that my writing is appreciated. And that I keep getting better at it. I honestly didn’t expect to win because other players had pretty good and sometimes even larger stories.
Q: Most people know you as the war reporter and a great writer, tell us more about you
A: Well, in daily life I am a student, with student meals, student bedtimes and student activities. In my little spare time I am working on a fantasy novel. Furthermore I play badminton, magic the gathering and offcourse Orkfia. All of this takes place in the beautifull province Zeeland in the Netherlands where I’ve lived for a long, long time.
Q: Talking about fantasy novels, your currently working on the Orkfiology aswell, any comments on that?
A: Yes, I’ve been approached to write a refreshing story for the classic relaunch. I’m using loads off the old story, but I’ve given an entire new angle to it and dived even deeper in the murky depts of the mysterious Orkfian history. For example: There will finally be an insight on the nature of the “Comet”.
Q: If you could add anything to the two games what would that be?
A: A larger playerbase offcourse. Although to do that you should actually first give something else. In my view a good marketing strategy that really grabs players.
Q: If you could remove anything from the two games what would that be?
A: This new magic system in infinity. It totally renders pestilence useless and takes some fun away. And I want my signature DA back!
Q: Will we be honoured with more war reports anytime soon?;)
A: Right now there is no one in our war range. A few weeks ago we wanted to butcher #14. I totally worked out a strategy that would make us win. But a lot of people weren’t able to make the first KA, Imogi would die halfway the war, JRE would be gone the entire second day, taking two of my ravens away. But I’m writing an in between ages report about the warhunt for Lepel. That was a short useless classic war, but it was fun nonetheless.
Q: What would you say to someone thats totaly new to this game?
A: Join a bootcamp, have fun, keep smiling and speak soon.
Five Quick Questions:
IRL or Internet
IRC or MSN
Attacker or T/M
Download or Buying
Graphical or Textbased
With that I would like to thank Guran for participating in this interview
~Acwder
Exclusive Interview with “Max”
Q:With the two previous people that got interviewed I asked them about their nicknames.
You are one of the few using their real name, how come?
A: Cause internet is serious buisness.
On a serious note, I dont really know.
Q:What do you do for a living?
A: Kind of unemployed atm 
Q:You’re not new to Orkfia, when did you first start playing it?
A: My first age was the final beta, so its quite a few years ago. Prior to that I played utopia, but orkfias much faster pace was alot more appealing to me.
Q:Tell us a little bit what you’ve been through in your Orkfian career since your start
A: Hmm… is there anything I havent been through!? I’ve seen the rise and fall of all the old alliances, I’ve been killed countless of times, and killed even more myself.
One of the things that had direct impact on the game was my “eagle” age, one of those being “foiled by time”. (Check issue 21 in the orkfian times!:) Its since after that age we have a 25% explore cap
[Editorial Note: This Article]
Q:What player have done the biggest impact to your Orkfian experience?
A: Thats most likely Wheelie. After I introduced him to the game, and him being my rl friend who played orkfia, We sticked playing together for the most part. If it was not for him I might not have played in alliances like bamse and genesis.
Q:You are the latest addition to the Orkfia Classic Staff, how do you feel about that?
A: I hope its going to be fun.
Q:What would you like to accomplish in your new position?
A: Obviously, I want to help orkfia become a better game (and more fun to play).
Q:Being a coder for Orkfian stuff isnt really totaly new for you is it?
A: I’ve helped Acwder with some of his tools and gadgets for the portal.
Q:With you joining staff as a coder the future of Orkfia Classic suddenly seems more optimistic, do you agree on that?
A: Yes, but dont celebrate just yet. Let me see if I can get something done first
Q:Earlier there has been a question about what people would like to change in the game IF they could, now you can for sure but what would you like to change first?
A: To make blue the default color again!
Q:There has been discussions about making Orkfia to a game for cellphones now that way better ones keep entering the scene, what is your opinion on that matter?
A: Im fairly sure you can play from cellphones already, but a better/smarter/faster interface for cellphones would be a nice feature.
Q:Is there anything you would like to say to any new members out there?
A: The fun has just begun >:D
Five Quick Questions:
IRL or Internet
IRC or MSN
Attacker or T/M
Download or Buying
Graphical or Textbased
With that Id like to thank Max for taking his time with this Interview
~Acwder
