C04 Summary 

This game had one player who had done very well in both of his first Rounds, 
and three players who had been successful in at least one of their first two 
games.  Would the one player be successful a third time, or would the other 
three stop his streak of success?  The players were:

Rorqual was in 43rd place overall after Round B.  His heroes were Elend and 
Luvadea.

Rhonda-B (also known as Mr. Zak and Lord Gumby) wasin 26th place after the 
first two rounds, had the happy happy Bubbles and the nice nice Bunny as his 
two Heroes.

Iceman fell to 57th after the second Round, but he hoped his Heroes Deitech 
and The Lonely One would reverse his fortunes!

Beyaryn (also known as Hegemon in Round A and the Untouchables in Round B) 
was almost at the top of the ladder in second place!  The Heroes Beyaryn and 
Beyarson would be powerful indeed!

In the beginning of the game, each Warlord established their characters.  
Rorqual didn't create very compelling characters, but his writing style was 
infused with a dry wit that was entertaining to read.

>>>>- The communications system is at last fixed, proudly announced the 
Telecommunications and Networks Officer.
- Really fixed ? Would you swear there isn't any bug left in this 
overwhelmingly complicated piece of equipment ?

DEAR WARLORDS. STOP. I'D LIKE ONE OF YOU TO ACCEPT TO BECOME MY TRUSTY ALLY, 
WITH NON-AGGRESSION PACT AND EVERYTHING THAT ENSUES FROM. THIS WORKED FOR ME 
BEFORE. STOP. AND WORKED EVEN BETTER FOR MY ALLY. STOP. OF COURSE DETAILS 
MUST STILL BE NEGOTIATED. STOP. ANYONE WILLING TO ASSOCIATE ?

- What the hell ? I requested a state-of-the-art, full-fledged modern 
telecommunications system, and you can only deliver telegrams ? Return to 
work immediately ! What do you think I pay you (liberally, would say some) 
for ? And while you're at it, summon one of your programmers, we'll have to 
rely on his legs one more time..."<<<<

Rhonda-B, the "goddess of dark and smelly", was annoyed and sickened at her 
Heroes, who turned out to be sweet and nice and joyful, everything that 
Rhonda hated.

>>>>Bubbles prances South, to see if she can find some more friends.  
"Hallooo, City 12.  Won't you be my friend?"

The once sad sad sad people of City 12 see how happy and nice and cute 
Bubbles is, and immediately decide that they, too, want to be happy and nice 
and cute.  They join up with her toot-sweet, and quickly change their name to 
Doggy 12.  "That's so neat!"

Cupid also skips down to the south to City 11, where he shoots all the nice 
people with Looove arrows.  They swoon with ecstasy, and are soon more than 
happy to be one with the Greens as well.  They're so happy, they decide to 
call their city Love 11.  "How cute!", squeels Bubbles.

All the cities are so happy and lovely and joyous, that they give Bubbles 175 
gp each.  "Neat!  How nice!"

*** New City Builds and End-of-Turn Declarations:

Bubbles asks all the cities to make even more friends for her.  "But only if 
they're cute," she giggles.

Love 11 creates Orcish Mobs, over whom Bubbles waves her pixie dust, so that 
they're well behaved Orcish Mobs.  "How nice!"

Doggy 12 breeds Wolfhounds.  "Nice doggies!  Good doggies!  Woof-woof!!!"<<<<

Iceman did not create very much roleplaying of his own in the beginning of 
the game, but as the game progressed he became more involved in participating 
in Beyaryn's roleplaying.  Iceman's hallmark in this game was constant 
diplomacy!

Beyaryn had the most elaborate roleplay, explaining his skull-ornamented 
castles as follows:
>>>>But if there must be a war, there is no reason we may not honor the last 
one even as we fight, and prepare ourselves for the glories of the coming 
war.  Let us march forth, then, in mourning! We shall drape our city walls in 
black, and set up memorial sculptures in each city, town, and fortification.  
Let us carve the skulls of our ancestors upon our very shields, and embroider 
them into our standards, for at each battle, we carry forth with us the honor 
of all those who have fallen in wars past.  We must do the best we can to 
bring glory to our kingdom once more, whether it be glorious victories, or 
glorious death!<<<<

All four Warlords began their expansion quickly, and the first minor 
conflicts were between Iceman and Rorqual in the south, and then Rhonda's 
Hero Bubbles captures a spider-producing city of Rorqual's.  This put a major 
crimp into Rorqual's production, and the subsequent slaying of Bubbles was a 
hollow victory at best for the Red-clad forces.  The Black forces of Beyaryn 
began moving in earnest against the Blue cities to the south - and of course, 
the two sides had vastly different perspectives on the reasons for the 
invasion!  Iceman believed that he was protecting his borders against a 
possible Black invasion, while Beyaryn felt that Iceman was building 
alliances against him and building forces against his Black armies.  Could 
the two sides come to a peaceful coexistence?  No, there was too much bad 
blood between them!  Iceman's Druids had taken the Elven artifact of the Orb 
of Wisdom, and the half-elf tribes of Beyaryn could not let that affront go 
unanswered.  Eventually, using metaphors of pawns, kings, and chess,  Iceman 
was forced to reluctantly 'tip his king' in a gesture of submission to 
Beyaryn - but he did not retreat his Hero towards homeland.  Rightly or 
wrongly, Beyaryn took this as a sign of further agression and going back on 
Iceman's own proposal, and chose to pursue a final campaign designed to 
eradicate Iceman from the land.  As the campaign progressed, the war of words 
between the two sides grew even more heated that the actual combat, with each 
side accusing the other of treachery, agressionist expansion, and 
black-hearted evil in general.  There was little diplomacy from Rhonda or 
Rorqual during this time, as they seemed content to focus on their own 
conflict without too much extraeneous discussion about who was more evil - it 
was fairly well established that Rhonda was the agressor, for all her Hero's 
sunny sunny happy happy ways!  On Turn 13, Beyaryn assaulted Iceman's last 
remaining stronghold with eight seperate waves of attackers, the last being 
led by Beyaryn himself, resulting in final victory over the Blue-clad Druids. 
 But the victory was not complete!  The mortal enemy of Beyaryn, Tylonol, 
that was expected to be found lying among the scattered dead in the 
stronghold was not there, but instead rumored to be entrenched with the 
forces of Rhonda!  War was declared on Rhonda, much to her surprise, creating 
an entirely new dynamic in the war of C04!  At the start of Turn 15, Rhonda 
had 20 cities, Beyaryn had 24, and Rorqual had 4 left.  How would this all 
unfold?  Eventually, in the almost total collapse of Rhonda's empire!

On Turn 19 and 20, one of the most surprising and unusual things ever seen in 
the Warlords tournament took place.  Two turn reports, titled "From the Diary 
Of Beyaryn..." was sent out that revealed Beyaryn to in fact be leading the 
Green forces and deliberately allowing them to come to ruin to the Black 
forces led by the elusive and evil Tylonol.  But was that truly the case?  
The prose was in the style of Beyaryn, but could one Warlord really have been 
controlling two sides in a war like that?  In the past, some Warlords had 
been accused of directing other sides' actions as if they were in charge of 
both sides, but could it be that one Warlord actually DID control two 
seperate sides?

No!  It was Rhonda's descent into madness!  The diary entries were actually 
from Rhonda, leaving the rest of the field more confused by contradictory 
diplomacy coming from (apparently) the same source!  This was a truly 
remarkable and unique development in what was already an exciting game to 
read.

In the end, Beyaryn took over almost all of the world, finishing with 44 
cities out of the 48.  Beyaryn realized that all the battles were not of his 
design, but that of Tylonol, whom had previously been defeated by Beyaryn's 
grandfather many years ago.  Tylonol used an insidious form of mind control 
to get all four sides to fight one another rather than live together in 
peace.  Too late, Beyaryn realized this, as he thought "When the good ones 
fight the good ones, the evil ones can prevail...," an inverse of the Round A 
conclusion that "When the evil ones fight the evil ones, the good ones 
prevail."  The four Standards and four Battle Items were dropped into the 
seas as Beyaryn's last act of defiance against the evil Tylonol, and the 
captured cities were returned in spirit (if not actual possession!) to their 
original owners.....

It is clear that Beyaryn will advance to the Round of 16, and must be 
considered a top prospect to be hailed as The Greatest Warlord in the land.  
Iceman's early exit in this game will probably prevent him from advancing, 
and Rhonda's collapse will also be a major obstacle to overcome in the quest 
to have a chance at the final game.  Rorqual also was unable to stem the 
black tide at the end and will have difficulty advancing to the next round.  
However, Iceman's roleplay was very entertaining to read, as was Rhonda's, 
particularly when Rhonda assumed the personality of Beyaryn!  Hopefully those 
two will continue on through the Warlords Ladder, providing challenges and 
entertainment for all to fight!  Rorqual's good sportsmanship and continued 
efforts long after hope of victory had been abandoned is a great example of 
how to play with honor and dignity in the League, and we certainly hope to 
see him on the Ladder as well.  

Now if somebody could only find and kill that dratted Tylonol.....