... with fava beans and a nice chianti.I'm reasonably sure that's how the old saying goes. Maybe not.
I'm talking about revenge of course, and I must admit, I may have inadvertently started something.
It started innocently enough.
I was bored.
It's been a while since I've had some down time, and with wars and coal and fat evil red people I hadn't really had chance to sit back and take stock.
I am currently Tail-end Charlie in our clan, and while I don't do badly, I still need to check to see who I can sensibly attack when the need arises. So I had an idle flick through the pilot rosters to see what my tally was against those around me.
Not too shabby in a few cases, but there have obviously been a lot of folk who have pummeled me quite handily in the past and I'm only now able to start redressing the balance against.
And as you scroll up through the list, you note the ones which are regular rivals. We have a clan-mate nick-named 'Leghumper' who states publicly the need to regularly test against us, but all it feels like is yet another run in with your Granny's terrier...
There's the regular war rivals who have a crooked score... their wins when they test against you during scouting and the corresponding losses when they have been stupid enough to attack you when you've been in a specialist formation. Else it would probably be a sensible nil all draw.
Oh, and other rivals that if you looked at the lopsided tally you would never attack in a month of Sundays, but you will cheerily tilt at them on The Mountain. There's a few of those, and I'm sure you all have your own... the ones where you groan when you suddenly see you are going to have to fight them again and you just know its going to be a hard day at the office. But you love it just the same.
So I scrolled higher and higher up the roster, idle curiosity compelling me to check to see if there was anyone up amongst the gods that I had scored a victory against, when I happened across a name that I recognised back from when I very first started.
Deborah Roache-Hudak, tally of 609 unanswered victories against me. You have to laugh because that's just an obscene number.
It was then that I remembered a particular in-game tab that I'll be honest, I think I've checked maybe 2 or 3 times ever.
Under 'Battle', you will find the 'Vengeance' option.
Now I'll be honest, I was expecting this to be a list of all those who have beaten you and you have never won against, but it is actually just a list of the people who have beaten you last and you have yet to get around to giving them a good kicking in return.
My list stretches back a long way, and like most folks I would reckon a lot of the entries on there are by folk who have long since retired judging by their level.
But one particular name popped out.
Now I'm reasonably sure we've only faced each other in actual battle once before, and that would have been in a Faction War just after I first joined the staff here. I seem to recall a certain amount of ribbing when a certain person decided he would go 'easy' on me and leave out his 1200 formation for me to try and have a go at.
At least I can claim he needed a a re-spray for his paint job after I'd finished.
I'm talking of course about our esteemed Editor in Chief, Patrick Willis.
Now, I suppose its an unwritten rule that apart from the petty larceny, general snidey comments, bickering, bitching, backstabbing and on one part, occasional bouts of sobriety, we do need to on occasion show that we actually know how to pilot these beasts. Otherwise how are we supposed to be able to give a professional (or coherent) review on things.
So I decided to have a pop, just to see who's opinion should actually hold weight... and admittedly to see if I could do better that to scratch the sott's paintwork.
I might have miffed him a bit, because when I woke up this morning he had counter attacked. That made us 1 for 1 on the exchange. I guess that makes us both reasonably competent when it comes to giving an opinion.
Well, except maybe for the fact that an even exchange between us means that I have to give the old drunkard a 1/4 honour guard and 8 level advantage.
Still, it got him back on the Vengeance list...
Submitted by David McCallum : #701548