The Incredible Tale of Update Hell!

Update Hell!
...where Civ stories go to die!

Hello, members of CivFanatics… It has been a long time… and that’s an understatement. I haven’t visited these forums since, let’s see… May 28th, 2012 . I left without warning or prior statement, and I believe it’s about time I correct that rather unepic mistake. Just today, a thought popped into my head, and I went back to these forums for the first time in a long time… The first thing I read, caught up on, was METY’s (hopefully not dead) story, [RFC] Rome: Eternal Empire. This update, convinced me that I should not leave Lenin in Update Hell, and that I should return to the forums.
Not that the forum doesn’t have a lot of amazing stories currently ongoing (kudos to constantinople for your Venice story), but overall, it seems to me, there are way too many dead stories, and the forum most definitely lacks the mass quantity of stories occurring simultaneously as it once did. That is depressing; Civ 4 is by far the best game I have ever played. But I soon discovered something much more depressing, that the best comedic writer, MaxWar, is gone as well! Therefore, I am going to start a new story, largely based on Update Hell, and other stories.
The main characters, will be Lenin from The Russians are coming… to Earth 18 Civs!, and Asoka, from RandomLand. I’m gonna try to emulate MaxWar’s comedic skills blended with mine into a new story. The plot? These two characters will be escaping from… UPDATE HELL! What is update hell? A new map I plan to create, where Lenin and Asoka, decide to embark from their Cow-sade utopia, to conquer the unknown swaths of dead stories. The map will look something like this: Each of the different colored bars represents a part of the map that will be based on a story that has been dead (or unupdated) for a long time, with plenty of hostile units to fight through.
I definitely plan to put The French are coming… To Earth 18 Civs, RandomLand, and [RFC] Rome: Eternal Empire, as several portions of the maps, but I’m welcome to suggestions as for what the other sections should be.
Once again, my apologies for being off for so long… I can only say that with RL being much more important, things must be phased out… it’s not easy to update, what was it… 7 stories regularly. I certainly won't go to such an insane level like that again, but I can promise regular updates for this story.
Regardless, I hope you enjoy this story, I plan to have the first update of cowsading out as soon as I have enough dead stories to fill the huge map, so please, suggestions are appreciated. Hopefully this will spur interest in those dead stories, and (maybe ) convince their writers to resume them .

Oh, and to those who have never read my stories before, this will be a comedy, similar to my other Earth 18 civs stories.
Edit: Slight change to format

brandon.herren said:

Unfortunately, I have reached a small impasse here; I figured out the 13 stories that I would like to have as levels of Update Hell... However, when choosing them, I was mainly focusing towards more well known stories. Well known stories generally = super super super long. And while I've read a majority of the stories chosen, the amount of time to read the rest sort of makes any short term update on this story non-feasible.
No worries though, I still plan to continue this story, just under a new format (without 13 levels, but still a maze of "Update Hell"), which will still include Asoka and Lenin traveling through a deadly land with enemies. I completed a new map, that IMO is awesome! See if you agree, I'm posting the introduction to this idea momentarily...

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Looks cool.

I assume the cow-saders are descendants from the cows from RandomLand.

Subbed

Can't wait! Also, you should include one of my unfinished stories as one of the layers. Just a suggestion.

Thanks for the interest! Unfortunately, I have reached a small impasse here; I figured out the 13 stories that I would like to have as levels of Update Hell... However, when choosing them, I was mainly focusing towards more well known stories. Well known stories generally = super super super long. And while I've read a majority of the stories chosen, the amount of time to read the rest sort of makes any short term update on this story non-feasible.
No worries though, I still plan to continue this story, just under a new format, which will still include Asoka and Lenin traveling through a deadly land with enemies. I completed a new map, that IMO is awesome! See if you agree, I'm posting the introduction to this idea momentarily...

Preview of Update Hell!




Background: The king of RandomLand, Asoka, once ruled the entire world. He vanquished enemy upon enemy with his mighty cows! horses! and porks!
But then, RANDOMLY! darkness overcame the land. The mysterious god of RandomLand, MaxWar... disappeared! And from the ground, the gigantic cow queen, Victoria, resurrected herself, and destroyed Asoka's empire.
Asoka went into hiding, and organized a resistance movement to fight the she-cow, but he now lives in a dark, desolate land. With his band of fellow Cow-sade loyalists, he plans to topple Victoria's regime by conquering the greatest city in the world, and the new capital of Victoria's empire, Constantinople.

HOW? HOW? HOW?: There are only two ways to Constantinople - both perilous journeys.

Way #1... By Bridge, By Field

The maze is a cesspool of dead ends, and Victoria's armies! So if you can, find your way through the early maze to... "The Field"
Of course, the Field, is no walk in the park itself...


IF they manage to cross the Field, which stretches another 50 tiles across, and contains a total of nearly 400 barbarian units , the obstacles keep coming.
They must next conquer the Victorian outpost of Thessalonica, a major Greek city on the Aegean.


Given the limited number of soldiers in Asoka's army, getting through these heavily entrenched Skirmishers and Longbows will NOT be easy...
And if they make it past here, the narrow land bridge that crosses over into Anatolia is there only way to Constantinople.


And finally, they will arrive at the front gates of Constantinople, where they must battle there way to the center of the city, and reclaim the empire.



Way #2: By Maze, by Hills, by Sea!

Dead ends aren't that bad... or at least preferable to 400 barbarian units. Should they choose this path, here is what awaits them...



Victoria's Imperial Outposts! Each containing a platoon of fighting soldiers, and a major roadblock in any potential maze exploration. And the occasional stray Cataphracts that roam the area, of course.
You next travel to the hills, under the control of the hill warriors...



This way sure doesn't seem as difficult so far, right? Wrong! As soon as you conquer the hills, an entirely new obstacle awaits you...



THE SEA! Of course, they do have a small navy, and I stress small... But with only one galley capable of transferring the troops, any crossing of the river is bound to have problems...
And finally, they'd arrive at the gates of Constantinople, which are a bit more frightening on this side...



Now, just a warning here, when I create this scenario, it was SUPPOSED to be impossible. Which means, unless I get super lucky, I am GOING to die, almost guaranteed. But that won't stop me from having fun

The Characters:
Each represents one of the 6 units we have to get through the maze (each from either my Russian story or RandomLand)

Asoka the Great!; Unit: Cataphract
Lenin the Crusader!; Unit: Praetorian
Catherine the Great!; Unit: Landsknecht
Asoka's Sidekick - THE COW!; Unit: Catapult
Gilgy (Asoka's vassal servant); Unit: Spearman
Peter the Great!; Unit: Explorer



Update coming sometime within next few days, hope you like the map
Oh, and just so you know, we aren't the only ones claimants of the RandomLand empire...

Looks cool!
Any reason the city is called Constantinople?

Oh That was an unintended coincidence. I'm just a major Byzantine Empire fan Plus, the geography of that area goes well with what I wanted the map to be like.

Who all are you playing with?

That journey seems very treacherous indeed... you should make the AI go into the fray first.
EDIT: And can you tell us the 13 stories you chose?

War ger, mon g'er war ger mon?

I happen to have an unfinished story about Constantinople, in case you are still looking for stories to use.

A.Caesar said:

Who all are you playing with?

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Not quite sure what you mean by that? If you mean which of the civs, Byzantium

trexeric said:

That journey seems very treacherous indeed... you should make the AI go into the fray first.
EDIT: And can you tell us the 13 stories you chose?

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That's the plan . Let's see... I deleted the list, but it included what I mentioned above + your viking story + some of Pacifist46's stories + Sisiutil's Princes of the Universe Pt. 2 + MaxWar's Babylonian Idol + N. Korean story. Plus some other good stories that I could find that I have yet to read. They'll all be used in a future story eventually. Just, creating a map portion for each of them would require me to reread most of them, which I'll do over time.

Daedwartin said:

War ger, mon g'er war ger mon?

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War mon, ger mon war warger mon! Ah, warmongerese

strijder20 said:

I happen to have an unfinished story about Constantinople, in case you are still looking for stories to use.

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Ok! Although I'm not going to use them at the moment, I plan to resurrect that whole structure/idea eventually, so I'll make sure to include that story.

Who are you playing against?

Looks I should update the Rise of Peter more often.

Another one for the fire and the flames!

This is going to be great, I just know it.

I think you should add Update Hell as a level.

It's weird the OP bothered to make such a gigantic map without starting it at all.
Something bothers me; how is it possible to win this at all. There are bazillions units from which the player will undergo RNG. Suffice of a couple super bad lucks and the game is over. And how the AI will figure out what to do. Not to mention the AI mini-stack will die in no time.

If I were him, I would have made Peter a sentry explorers; at least to help the squad to avoid most fights.

constantinople said:

I think you should add Update Hell as a level.

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So true.