TO THE REPUBLIC

Vikings can be nice people....I began a King level game, Raging Hordes,
and got lucky with one of my first goodie huts.  It gave me a horsemen,
with which I was able to investigate a good chunk of my portion of the
massive world continent (few islands, and a smaller sub-continent also
existed).  By the time I contacted my nearest neighbors (Greeks,
Japanese), I had a good chunk of the continent, and had been a monarchy
for some time.  I traded technology, and let my two neighbors fight each
other for a while.  By then I had a fair sized empire, and had just
completed the Great Library, when the Greeks, being Greeks, attacked. 
Soon I had a two front war going, as the Japanese joined in.  The Greeks
where easy to bottle up-they where on a narrow peninsula with 2 right
angled turns in it-and I accepted their cease fire.  Then I went after
the Japs, who soon where running out of units.  It turned out that they
had only 4 cities....They didn't last long.  
As a reward for my suffering empire, I switched to a Republic, AND
STAYED THERE FOR MOST OF THE GAME.  First the Celts where wiped out by
the Spanish, who then began getting frisky when they obtained
gunpowder.  After I took one of their cities, they became quiet again.  
When the Greeks attacked again, my Dragoons let them keep only Athens. 
I then gave the Greeks some Technology, and entered an alliance.  The
Americans where on their own small sub-continent for the longest time,
as where the Zulus, who only 1 city in the 
1700's!  The Spanish soon became a major headache.  
Each of my cities (~ 30 by now) supplied one military unit (Had Sun
Tzu's Wonder.), thereby spreading out the unhappiness, and I kept up a
fairly sizeable force on the border.  The combination of the Sun Tzu's
and Leonardo's wonders where great, as I kept one upping the Spanish in
technology.  They would attack with dragoons, I soon had cavalry,etc.,
etc.
And all this time I was still a republic.  As the others waffled back
and forth with fundamentalism or communism, I built up a steady stream
of cities, technology,and wonders (Bach; Mich.;Women Suffarage.)
One mistake I made was letting the Spanish get the UN.  Now a monotonous
pattern of ...they break the cease fire, I take a city, the UN forces a
cease fire occured.  But I was patient.  
I slowly took out their ports, one at a time, with my Marines & Navy
each time they hit me.  And then I finally got cruise missles....(~1920)
Finally! Enough was enough!  I poured in the bombers and Missles, and
Madrid (and the UN) was mine!  But then the Americans decide to steal
technology from me while I was involved with the Spanish!  In the next
20 years I systematically wiped both of them out.  While my Navy was
mostly taking care of the Americans, my Army  and Air Force whittled
away the Spanish.  As an afterthought, I took out the Zulu's after they
foolishly declared war on me in support of the Spanish.  
I was supreme, with only Athens not in my republic.  Instead of taking
them out, I built, built, to build my spaceship.  I switched to
Democracy once I had the Statue of Liberty (Thanks America!)  I had only
minor guerilla trouble, and the fool greeks decided to attack with their
muskets when I launched my spaceship!  I waited until 2020, when my
spaceship landed, to take them out.  (They still hadn't discovered
Navigation!)  And was rewarded with the title STASH THE MAGNIFICENT!  
Who says you need to be a fascist to rule the world??

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Robert J. DiStasio, Jr. <stash@datasync.com>
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