NationStates Jolt Archive

Previously in the Eastgate federal dispute (http://www.nationstates.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=80585&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0)..

Five fighting line gunships and two heavy transport vessels from Baston state had finally arrived off the Hoodeish coast at Fort Ludele. A fireship was sent against them, but the inexperience of the defenders meant that it sailed under unfavourable conditions, and was easily avoided. Though the Bastonians broke formation there was nothing with which the periphery state militiamen could hope to capitalise. In the end the fervent and disdainful westerners used the fireship for nothing more than gunnery practice- although the rate and volume of fire, and degree of cheering that met the boat's final sinking suggested that the crew saw more significance in the action.

Indeed, it was begining to look as if this conflict might easily become quite exceptionally brutal.

"Aye, they'll regret what they did to the King's Militia." Said a confident Lord Millard, commander of the fleet, as he watched the ships turn their flanks on the town..

http://www.battleships-cruisers.co.uk/images/hmsvictoria.jpg
The Bastonian State Fleet approaches Great Hoode at Fort Ludele, state capital and approximate scene of the King's Militia's decimation.


(ooc: While it is unlikely that much of the world cares greatly for the internal power struggles of a state a good seven or eight generations behind the times, and while I'm quite happy to putter along developing the nation all on its lonesome, I thought that at least it couldn't hurt to dedicate a thread to the civil war.. for the sake of public curiosity if nothing else.)

Edit: If anyone is interested in any degree of involvement, feel free to check out the thread linked at the top, where you are more than welcome to make landfall on New Eastgate. From there we can see where it goes.
I am thinking of allowing someone else to have some control over character from New Eastgate at some point- maybe a native chief or tribe, or even a general on one or other side of the civil war. I think this is certainly a time for bombastic colourful characters!
(I sort of see it as a hectic mix of frontier days/American civil war/British industrial revolution and God knows what else- maybe we'll have an inquisition)

Curious Hoodeians gathering along the harbour looked out at the fairly alien tall ships from the west. Such things rarely ventured far past the (river) Pollice, and though they were presented with something of a novelty the generally hardy and simple Hoodeians were not readily much impressed. Amongst the throng of fishermen, woodsmen, dockers, shop-keeps, and their families stood a few more dishevelled characters, never more than a yard or two from the end of a stick or the crack of a whip.

Aboard HMS St.Peter Lord Millard called the captain’s attention to the shore.
“Look at them” He said.
“Yes sir, they have Negroes standing in amongst their wives and children!”
“Aye Captain Hund, they say the Negro is stronger than the Polynesian. These men are soft of body as well as mind, sir, if they need such slaves. This affair will be dispatched and forgotten inside two months if they don’t come crawling to us by nightfall!”

The Captain took that as signal enough.

“Firing pattern one, gunnery officer! Shoot!”

____________________

“What do you suppose they’re doing out there, all lined up like that?”
“They’re just stood up there looking at us, see them?”
“Aye.. and we’re stood lookin’ back! Maybe we’d best send someone to tell them to clear off!”
“Ha, rather you than me, did you see the fire-ship this morni..”

The fishmonger was cut short as a single 12pdr gun aboard St.Peter rudely spat at the town behind him, the solid metal shot clipping the corner of a stone warehouse before skipping off through the canopy of the outdoor fish-market.

“Christ! They’re shooting at us!”
“This is because of what Kindsley’s lot did to the Militia! Damnable separatist!”

Goston/Waylu borderlands

March ye men of Larton Vale, unfurl your banners in the field,
Be brave as if your blood ran ale, and feel your hearts now firmly steeled!
What tho’ evry hill and dale, echoes now with war’s alarms,
Eastgate hearts can never quail, when Goston calls to arms!

The First Goston Rifles marched from the (inexplicably) scarcely temperate and increasingly sooty towns of the western states on into the equatorial sun of Waylu state. Seven score fusiliers and for score hangers-on.

Goston wasn’t a fighting state –protected, traditionally, by the peripheries against native incursion, the nation had no other enemies to fear. The First would simply be a spearhead, getting a point across to the insubordinate woodsmen, before a larger army could be raised to finish the matter.

They had the best weapons, of course;.64 inch long rifles; and the men, being the first to arms, could safely be assumed the most keen and ready for action.
Nary a thought was spared for quite who would train their eventual support, let alone arm them. Maybe that clever Mister Arnold would invent a steamy contraption specifically for turning out uniform rifle parts.

Horace Stark; the unit’s incidental leader and self appointed General; rode proudly atop one of the few horses to be seen- an Arabian specimen imported by the Nicobarese, probably, as what few horses the continent’s first Europeans had brought failed to breed sufficient stock to last five centuries.

Bellowing with deliberate distortion, Stark revelled in his efforts to play the professional soldier. “Earooo! Fwoarrrd.. Uht!” He boomed, brandishing his sabre as his steed circled on the spot, evidently no more able to follow Horace’s instruction than were the men.

Less than a thousand yards away in the low, parched hills of southern Waylu, bright eyes gazed silently from naked tanned bodies as the brilliant red column with its dirty brown tail of cooks and barbers blundered across the ill defined and meaningless border.

Fort Ludele, Great Hoode

“...Kindsley’s a better man than you, fishmonger! He’d tell ‘em what for!”
And with tacky Hollywood timing stepped forth from the shocked crowd a thin, well-dressed man, powdered wig framing his finely etched early middle age features.
“Aye, and shall!” Senator Kindsley’s voice rang confident and clear above the gasps of the fearful Ludelians.

Presently a party was assembled, counting Kindsley, the fishmonger, and his friend amongst its number, and a boat was brought for their conveyance to the ominous Baston state fleet off shore.

The townsfolk looked on as the little launch was rowed out, Senator Kindsley sat bolt upright astern in an effort to appear dignified, and in truth petrified.

“They’ve not shot ‘em yet.”
“Have faith, lad.”
“That they’ll shoot them?”
“That they won’t.. oh get out of it!”

Some half-hour later the launch splashed its way home.

Kindsley took his time in speaking after alighting, though the faces of his ordinary companions hinted at the nature of his eventual report.

“Gentlemen” He said to the crowd of common labourers, slaves, women, and children, “I believe we have war with the western states.”

Silently horrified expressions had barely begun to give way some minutes later to disbelieving chatter when the Bastonian warships loosed their first broadside on the city.

*TAG*

OOC: you're having to much fun eastgate

OOC: you're having to much fun eastgate

I refute that! I'll have you know I'm a very sad and lonely person!

I mean.. crap.

Dearest!
What’s the Good Word from home, Eth? Do tell me of Mr.Arnold’s latest enterprize, and how are the Childeren?
We are having a time of it! ‘tis all song and step-step-step, with blades flashing and pipes Playing, I should think the Waylu shan’t come out against us so much as to simply see us! I’m having a terrible time trying to keep the dust off my tunic, and we’ve run out of flour twice already and had to wait for more lest our Wigs grey and spoil the display!
Oh! ha! And we should Enjoy bread with our Cheese!
In all this is a Good time to be a young man of goston, though I can’t help but wonder how much farther we must go on marching- i fear we may go quite past the Waylu and end up in a village of Savages!

-jasper

Southern Waylu state

“Parcels! Come one, lads! Parcels from ‘ome!”

“’ere, they’re ‘andin’ out parcels from ‘ome! Ow! You didn’t ‘ave to ‘it me!”
“Parcels from h.. “ The fusilier coughed to keep from another repetition. “How can they have caught up with us? We’ve been marching a good pace for days!”
“Sendin’ ‘em half way on t’ steam-railer. Looks like they got a couple of horses ride ‘em up the border.”
The fusilier set to grumbling about their enforced bipedal progress while steam-engines had been in a position to carry them half way, and was cut off only when the quartermaster called out, “Jackson!”
Having collected his parcel, Jackson was accosted by his previously informative friend, who was now keenly inquiring into the contents.
“Turnips.” He said. “They’re from Ethal. Jamesin’* turnips. ‘They’ll keep’, she says. Damn right they’ll keep, and stay kept!”
His friend laughed, absently cutting off a chunk of raw onion from the many found in his own parcel, and eating it as if it were a slice of the juiciest apple.


*James, Jamesing (or Jamesin’) is in some parts of Eastgate, particularly (what’s left of) rural Goston, is a mild curse of sorts. Its origins lie in folklaw pertaining to the west coast pioneers, when a fellow purportedly named James James got up to some significant mischief involving local Polynesians, leading to the death, so it is said, of several early settlers and to his eternal infamy.

Fort Ludele, Great Hoode

The citizens of the southern periphery state’s capital picked themselves up after the barrage lifted, and shakily began to grope for fallen friends and family amongst the rubble of the waterfront.

By now on the east side of town, Senator Kindsley, having briefly, and without looking back, halted his carriage on hearing the initial shots, cracked the reins urging his mule forward. Kindsley was keen to make the most of this incident as quickly as possible.. before anyone had time to question the sincerity of his efforts for peace, made aboard the St.Peter.

Aboard that ship Lord Millard and Captain Hund surveyed the smouldering buildings from afar.
“Now what, sah?”
“Now..” Millard paused, and would continue to pause at length during the making and delivering of his decision, “Now.. we consider that a message has been sent.. and so we make for home..”
“Aye m’lord.”

Southern Waylu State


“’ere! Mind out! You’ve got yer stuff all over me turnips! What is this? Is this blood? Oh Christ!”

Jasper Jackson’s last words, uttered through a mouth-full of unwanted turnips, saw him engaged by a spear and presently he would be slumped across the body of his fusilier friend.

“Pollywogs! To arms! To arms!”

General Stark fumbled with his steel breastplate in a desperate bid to armour himself against the native ambush.

“My horse! Bring up my horse!”

Stark’s stable-boy lay with his throat slit, and the horse was long gone-over to the native cause, along with several token items from the 1st Goston Rifles’ supply train.

By the time Stark had decided to square his men, the attackers were long gone, leaving six of 220 Gostonians dead.

Sudbury, Goston State

Word of success against Fort Ludele had reached the federal capital, and the senate -presided over by HM King Paul IV- was in session to review events thus far consigned to the incomplete history of the Eastgate Federal Dispute.

“While it is true that there has as yet been no word from Great Hoode, we can, I am confident, invest faith in their impending capitulation. Rest assured, they have been whipped and know full well that they themselves brought it on. Better yet, the Waylu have been sent a message.”

A visibly proud Mayor Bansgate of Port Gavin rose to speak, “Aye, Senator! And just as soon as news of Ludele’s defeat reaches Waylu, they shall certainly come out for Goston’s 1st Rifles, and with their apologies prepared!”

A murmur of approving concurrence washed across the floor to be soaked up by the already bloated Bansgate, who took his seat once more after a smiling tug on his braces.

Fintoria, Great Hoode

"..and with the massacre of the King's Militia effectivelly erased by the latest atrocity -the naval bombardment of Fort Ludele by the Bastonians- the state of Great Hoode can bank on at least some significant backing should we take our plight before the world."

Senator Nero's dull address on why Great Hoode should seek foreign military backing in a quest for outright conquest of the western states finally came to an end. A sleepy murmur half congratulated his speech, or possibly the conclusion of same.

This rose to near rapture, however, as Senators Nero and Kindsley swapped places. Kindsley demanded that the Perihery States; Great Hoode and Waylu; bond together in a massive and deliberate effort to out-manouver and contain the self-important Western or Royalist States.

His cry for unity included a proposal for the creation of a professional Peripheral Army. This would be used to lead the westerners about the vast virgin lands of the east, while peripheral militias strangled their supply lines. The small Waylu fleet could even launch a surprise attack against Goston to buy time for the raising of the proposed Peripheral Army.

Riders were dispatched to Waylu that night.

Somewhere in virgin east Waylu

The First Goston Rifles, all six score of them, soldiers and civilians, dashed faster towards the looming hills than they lately thought their parched bodies capable.

From a distance the low hills had almost looked green. The might provide water, food, at least shelter from this infernal sun, or at least they may conceal something of worth to their east.

That they indeed did. A major Mauatu villiage existed less than two miles from the course the luckless Gostonians now headed.

Amongst the Polynesians residing there was Putukeki, one of the greatest aboriginal princes of all the continent known to some as New Eastgate. His influence spread from the Waylu river in the south-west, near which his warriors had first ambushed the Rifles, to the foot of Mount Caligo in the north, and across to the Gran Desavi in the east.

Over the last two months the Mauatu had been at the core of the First Rifles' reduction from a brilliant red contingent of 220 singing patriots to a lost and famished rabble of 120 shadows, living off carrion and cacti.

The bombastic General Stark had been forced to allow the consumption of his precious Arabian stallion more than twenty days ago, and since then no one had tasted fresh food.

Two months earlier the 1st Rifles were closing on one of the largest Waylu villiages before the State capital, when they were met by a state militia they had not believed to be expecting their arrival. The Waylu, unlike their western cousins, did not uniformly fear the natives that surrounded them. Though they often fought, many minor tribes were in regular contact with the Waylu, and the state was alerted to the Gostonian incursion in plenty of time to meet it on favourable terms.

Forced off the well trod rode, the 1st Rifles quickly became hopelessly lost in the sparsely peopled state, and the supply wagons sent after them by the unwitting authorities were uniformly taken-over by the Waylu.

Worse yet for the western states Hoodeian Senator Kindsley's vision of a Unified Professional Peripheral Army had been realised. The joining of Hoodeian and Waylu forces meant that the 1st Rifles were hopelessly cut-off, and that the oblivious western states were increasingly isolated from the vast resources of the east.

Prestatyn village
Just north of Larton, Goston State

"This isn't how it was in my day!" The bruised shopkeep insisted to the elderly lady stooped over him.
"Ooh, aye." She replied, "Boys will be boys, but time was a clip round th'ear would send them on their way. These days they've no respect!"

The shopkeep agreed as he picked himself up and searched for a chalk with which to take an inventory.

"Hit in the eye for a quater pound of boiled Gavin Mints." He concluded.

"And my window's broke." Added the old woman, peering through the cracked pane. She appeared then to have caught a glimpse of something that could as well have been the four horsemen judging from her reaction.

Turning his gaze after hers, the shopkeep's one good eye made out tallships closing from the north. He squinted at their colours.

"Good Christ! It's the Waylu!"

With the Goston State fleet bafflingly anchored still at Port Gavin around the tip of the Goston Peninsula Prestatyn would be lucky to get word to Larton before the attack, let alone to Port Gavin, and in time for the fleet to make around the headland.

Eastern Waylu State

Still scrambling through the dusty rocks below, most of the surviving members of the 1st Rifles appeared to be having only moderate luck in finding food and water. Private Wallace noted with some quiet surprise that the Great Fraud "General" Stark was actually holding himself together quite well, and leaving all of the best lizard meat to his soldiers and bearers.

Had he looked closer Wallace might have noticed a tear in the deflated noble's eye. Whether this was a tear born of relief at the discovery of even this small bounty, or of despair over the continued hopelessness of the situation one could not have confidently asserted.

In any case the private hadn't an eye for such detail, being consumed as he was with a mix of awe, shock and fright as he regarded the sprawling Mauatu encampment. Stuttering he tried to call down to his comrades in the passes below his lofty vantage point but his parched throat failed him.

Wallace scrambled in no certain course down the hillside, sqeaking a little and pointing weakly to the east. He didn't want to cry out any longer, having been taken by the vain hope of escape before detection by Putukeki's warriors.

OOC: While there are other threads linked in the first post, I can't help supposing that this might all be difficult to follow, perhaps to the point of creating confused disinterest.
"What are the Waylu? Are they natives?" "Where's Great Hoode in relation to Goston?" "Who on earth is Senator Kindsley?" "Why don't the 1st Rifles just machinegun their way out of it or call in air support?"
I wonder if I should make a new post/thread dedicated to explaining these things and forcing people to ask questions..

Eastern Waylu State

The hunt was going well, thought Putukeki. Mostly peacocks, but plenty of them. The big game would be back within weeks, he was sure of it. Then his braves would have something significant to occupy their restless young bodies- one must remember that the Mauatu had no horses and only stone-age technologies, with which they regularly took-down bison and various Eastgate deer or gazelle, depending on their region.

Back at the semi-permanent camp some six hundred Mauatu went about their business, cleaning skins, collecting water, tending to children and so forth as they awaited the return of their hunting parties.

A few hundred yards to the west a party of the few remaining braves -all of whom were young boys in training or old men with nowhere else to go- sighted part of the dishevelled 1st Rifles column picking under rocks at the bottom of a shallow valley. One of the boys made to cast his shell-tipped spear at a fusilier, but his hand was caught by his grandfather who convinced the lad that the quartet of generously termed warriors would be well advised to raise the alarm.

They would arrive back at the southern end of the settlement at about the same time as General Stark strode sabre-drawn and blank-faced into the northern end.

Years later debate would surely continue over the truth of Stark's motivation. Despairing bravery, tactical genius, or pure broken insanity?

The result was the same. After some delay his men began to follow and an attack fell into being. The better part of a hundred worn riflemen ripped a few volleys into skin tents and bare bodies, and then fixing bayonets stumbled into the six-hundred Mauatu.

Lifting embers from the natives' own cooking fires the Rifles made short work of their target before partaking of the Mauatu's surviving meat, fruit, water, and wives.

By the time Putukeki's lightly armed hunting party saw the smoke rising from their village the Rifles had taken their fill and made ready to leave, refreshed and with confidence in their leader renewed. Home didn't look quite so far away.

(By way of this clumsy half-encouragment/half-tag, I'd just like to let you know that I'm reading it ;))

(heh ta, I wish I knew where I was going with this. I don't know who's supposed to win, which explains why mobilisation is so terribly slow. We're an anarchy again, so I might just get side-tracked with some piracy and highwaymen. -strokes chin and tries to come up with a good highwayman-name-)

Prestatyn village
Just north of Larton, Goston State

The bombardment of the little Goston village was quick, and in truth not terribly accurate, but then the destruction of Prestatyn was never a major war-aim for the Peripheries. It did its job, the Gostonians were in equal measure terrified and enraged, not to mention embarrassed.

One old man stood on the shore, bolt upright through out the barrage, waving his pipe in some defiance. "Damn Waylu!" He bellowed time and again. "You have made a covenant with death and with hell you are in agreement. You're all going to die! Don't you realise? Can't you see? You're all going to die! Die... Death awaits you all! Die!"

By the time he was through with this a good half dozen launches were ashore and Waylu infantry were streaming up the beach towards the panic-stricken stone and thatch settlement.

One there the sixty-two infantrymen fired a few shots into the air, up-turned a few rickshaws, and stole some melons before making off to the south east.

"Shut that gate!" "Murtle's out!" "Stop that bison cow!"

Sudbury, Goston State

The Combined State Council had finally come to order, though it had taken a stutter from His usually silent Majesty King Paul IV to settle the matter.

This was, you see, a rather unusual CSC meeting, being as Senators from Waylu and Great Hoode Were evident by their absence.

So unprecitented was a Combined State Countil meeting without proper representation from all five Federal States that more than half an hour had passed by with little more than mumbling and none-committal expressions of reservation.

This was all done in near pitch black, as it happened, since it was deemed proper that all CSC meetings began thus. Usually the condition lasted only moments, but without the raising of the two Peripheral torches nobody could agree on whether or not it was really appropriate to let there be light.

The King's stammering was eventually enough to convince newly declared First Speaker Bishop Edgar Hampshand of Raysee of his duty, and with the loudest, "Fiat lux!" since creation he'd brought the three Western States to commencement of the meeting.

Mumbling and non-committal expressions of reservation filled the now flickering hall. Ah, democracy was a fine thing indeed" Or so it appeared to the nervous Eastgater monarch as he observed the scene below.

Some hours later it was concluded that there had been an attack just north of Larton, that the village in the thick of it was called either Preston or Prestatyn depending on whether one asked Welsh or English origin residents there of, and that it (the attack) was, all things considered, a jolly nasty turn of events.

Oh, and since the Waylu were clearly behind it there was nothing for it but to send Stark back into the thick of it to show those Peripheral waifs what for.

Stark would be delighted! Assuming he had time to recover from severe sunstroke and malnutrition, of course.

Goston State

General Stark's title was now accepted across the Western States. He'd lead the 1st Goston Rifles deep into Waylu territory, wiped out a potentially dangerous Mauatu war-camp, and escaped hundreds of miles back to Goston. Why he'd even sighted the Gran Desavi, making him the first man to go so far east in twenty-odd years!

Anyone with a decent map and an IQ of multiple figures could have figured-out that if Stark had reached the river he claimed to have seen then he must have run none stop for his several months of absence, but that mattered little. Goston needed a hero, and Horace Stark was it.

He now lead the Goston State Militia in almost full strength as it made to head-off the marauding Waylu after their raid near Larton.

Either the would make right for Larton, Stark supposed of his quarry, or else they're after something bigger- they know that the Western States have them outnumbered and outgunned and will win a protracted conflict.. therefore.. I must concluded that they are headead south east.. for Sudbury!

The fact that Stark was begining to put some thought into his over-stated charges about the Eastgate countryside showed some growth on the part of the West's finest General.

He was of course completely wrong.

Port Gavin, western Goston

South West of the Waylu raid on Porthmadog, and far far west of the capital, Sudbury, the port city of Gavin sat-back, content to bluster disdainfully of the Peripheral barbarians while the State Militia hunted them to extinction. The fleet, as mentioned during the Waylu raid, was largely stationed here and showing little sign of life. A couple of small ocean-going vessels had been dispatched to seek new trade links, but they were not many and showed little by way of direction or haste.

Port Gavin housed an impressive 480,000 Eastgaters, making it the state's largest city, and the third largest on the continent. Most of the unimpressive international trade done by New Eastgate would at one time or other have passed through Port Gavin.

In spite of all this the city was virtually defenceless, save for the Goston State Fleet at anchor, and that was hardly ready for split-second deployment. Militia volunteers were off marching behind Stark as he made for Sudbury over three-hundred miles east.

The horizon's revelation then of several Waylu standards caused a mix of absurd disbelief and abject panic from street to street. Again the sixty-two Waylu; lead as it happened by an aged Lieutenant name of Brundle, since the Waylu State Fleet wouldn't tollerate a marine who could outrank the captains of the ships on which he men sailed; brought terror to thousands of Gostonians.

Brundle, skirted by just three musketeers, marched up the highstreet and offered a pale Mayor Bansgate the chance to surrender before his artillery and native volunteer brigades engaged the town's defences.

Knowing the town's defences to be a few score baton-wielding constables and believing -thanks to his own side's propaganda- the Waylu to be capable of joining arms with the savage hordes -again recently inflated by Western States media- Bansgate turned over the key to the city in a symbolic gesture of resignation to Waylu authority.

For several hours the Waylu remained, making no effort to prevent a runner making for the east, prefering to prevent Gostonians from outside coming into the city. These people would know that no native horde and no artillery lay outside.

During their stay the Waylu collected a few choice items from public buildings, held a mock-trial for the city's chief justice before hanging him, and filled their satchels from the city's granaries. Their evening departure was light by the outlying public offices to which they put torches before vanishing into the night, still before Stark's State Militia knew they had arrived.

Toluaa, Baston Island

This was said to be the most crowded place on earth. Nobody on hand argued, as it wasn’t possible to see where anyone or anything else could possibly fit. Of course Toluaa was a relatively low-rise city, being in the first years of industrialisation, but this hadn’t stopped the population from reaching seven figures.

Conditions here were made all the less comfortable by Toluaa’s big sister. Just a few miles west-Northwest along the coast was Hexton, biggest city in New Eastgate, and the richest, too. Industry wasn’t going to be based in Hexton, no no! That was a centre for politics and finance, not labour and manufacture. Toluaa bore the weight of Baston’s silver dollars, and Hexton spent them...usually on boosting Toluaa’s industrial out-put.

By enlarge it was the people of Baston who were considered the continent’s most cynical. Everywhere else in New Eastgate “Smokies” were greeted with either unabashed excitement or abject terror (except perhaps in landlocked Gregoria where one can only guess at a ship’s likely greeting). In Baston it was considered somewhat undignified even to glance up at a passing smokestack.

Most of Toluaa’s population was quite happy with that. They built the damn things day in day out. This one though was different. Its vast, black hulk had, ever since its launching –though construction was still very much incomplete- been called variously The Annex, The Conservatory, and The East Wing, as Toluaans joked that they were floating out a much needed extension to their crowded little city.

In reality they were more than half way to completing construction of New Eastgate’s first armoured smokey warship. Testudo was already assigned her first mission, though she might struggle to destroy even the tiny Hoodeian fleet in her current condition and without a crew..

OOC: Another steamtech-ish nation?

My nation is mostly steamtech with a bit of Crimson Skies thrown in for good measure.

I could lead you some military Zepplins.

Hey, New Eastgate you're back. Nice RP.

ooc: NE isn't particular about what time it exists in. Technologically speaking.. well, a Bastonian named Charlton Arnold displayed his new invention, the steam-engine, just a couple of years ago. However, we've begun to capitalise a little sooner than did the real world, and the western states are probably easily early C19th in terms of technology, and racing on towards Crimean levels. The Peripheries are largely happy with C18th means, and the Polynesian tribes to the east are stuck in the stone age.
I'm still not sure exatly where the war's heading, but NE isn't in too great a hurry to advance. It'll be a while before we accept that flying in anything more than a teathered balloon is other than the work of the devil. We will interact with other nations though, certainly for trade if nothing else (though we're not going to buy modern weapons off you, no, that'd be boring :) Foodstuffs, livestock, raw materials and such. Horses are hugely prized here, as there a no native horses, and the few dozen brought with original pioneers are long since died out)

ooc:Anyone have any ideas about how I can make this a bit more.. interactive? I mean, considering it's essentially an early C19th civil war fought in a nation with as yet next to no outside contacts.

I suppose I should just suspend disbelief and have one of the states.. one one from each side.. pour resources into building ocean-going vessels that won't even fight, but rather go over seas to establish relations as if everything were fine and dandy, eh?

..Actually that sounds like a fairly Bastonian/Gostonian thing to do. Some piffling civil war shouldn't get in the way of society's normal functions!

(Not that I'm at all opposed to the prospect of continuing beating the heck out of myself all alone ;) What do you think, time for a plan-wrecking Mauatu rising?)

Goston State

By now word had reached Sudbury, and the recently arrived General Stark. Port Gavin had been attacked by the Waylu. By now they might be anywhere. This war had been misjudgement after misjudgement, and the Perihperies weren't even getting so much as a talking to for them to ignore.

Amongst the millions of divided Eastgaters however there must have been at least some few who saw beyond this. While others began to suspect a previously unthinkable level of Peripheral power, a minority considered the real value of events so far. The Waylu had run circles around Stark, but they hadn't done any lasting or tactical damage. Yes, their raids would scare a few, but steel the rest for a more concerted war effort. Where previously had existed a casual disregard for the only losely considered enemy states there was now a real sense of rivalry, and the West had more men, more money, and more factories. Indeed, unless Perihperal men were really a species apart from the West there could only be one victor. Soon Stark would tire of chasing shadows and march back into Waylu State.

Gregoria State

The rural centre of the Eastgate Catholic Church and second home of the monarchy, Gregoria was less densly populated than even the Peripheries. There was no good reason for this. Unlike Great Hoode Gregoria was a pleasant and fertile land.

Nobody had planned to make the low rolling hills a major battleground, and the soft, furrowed soil had not expected to run blood.

South east of Raysee, state capital, Senator Kindsley's ox-drawn cart rolled along amongst four thousand Hoodeian militiamen. The Senator was no General, there were plenty of men keen to make officers of themselves anyway, Kindsley was the figurehead, and the architect of the imminent Peripheral Army. From the north approached two and a half thousand Waylu, while Stark was busy chasing three score of them about tens of miles to the west.

However, to assume that even the careless Westerners would leave Raysee completely without blocker to Peripheral aggression would be foolish. General Baden and his seventeen thousand Baston State Rifles represented a fairly small percentage of the six million peopled state's militiary potential, but had the combined Peripherals outnumbered none the less.

Neither side was yet aware of the other. Despite the Bastonians' apparent drive towards the interception of the incursion their assumption was still that they should set up new headquarters in Gregoria thus making sure that future fighting didn't occur on the west coast. Port Gavin hadn't liked it when that'd happened last.

Northwestern Waylu State

Ah, Waylu, rural Waylu. Countless miles of uncombed beach, uncut trees, skies free of smoke and its stacks, bright fields and rugged hills, giant masts under the State flag. Wait, this was unusual! The Mauatu foragers were quite taken by the sight of three exceptional trees bearing the white man's mark at their tops. Stranger yet, they seemed to grow below the cliffs, which provided a most unsuitable habitat, last anyone cared to check.

Closer investigation revealed greater strangeness still. A Waylu settlement of some sort had sprung up further north than the whites were often seen, and their bare trees were rooted in the sea itself. The Free Ship Audacious had just been launched from what was arguably New Eastgate's first secret military base, thus far called Port Audacity by its few hundred resident labourers and craftsmen.

In answer to the naval superiority lauded by the Western States, Waylu had -after much cajoling by Hoodeian Senator Kindsley- established a shipyard beyond the usual reach of Gostonian fighting line heavy gun ships. Its first product, Mauatu alarm aside, was the Audacious, a fighting fast gun ship, according to those concerned with its conception.

Her captain, State Fleet Admiral Colia, was one amongst those, and he seemed quite pleased with his baby. True, the 207ft ship hadn't a hope of standing up to the likes of Baston's St.Peter class, but then the project had been conceived in the full knowledge that the peripheries couldn't hope to compete head to head on the high seas. The fighting fast gun ships were meant to frighten, to raid, to distract, and to harass, and that Colia would do.

"Mister Gingerly!" He said with authority. "Come about! We're off to the hunt!"

And so went her 545 hands, 56 guns, three masts, and copper bottom. The Captain was especially proud of his 24pdrs- two thousand yard range, don't you know? Far better than the Peripheries' previous best, the 16pdr (which she also carried). Not that this meant Audacious was ready for the 25 and 40pdrs aboard many Western fighting line ships..

Toulaa, Baston Island

Quite unaware of the latest developments up north, HMLS Testudo's crew suffered the pleasure of being informed that their new home -long called the conservatory by Toulaa's bayside population- had finished airing.

"Chances are she won't even break apart and we shall be stuck until Christmas." Grumbled one seaman to a comrade as they hauled sacks of coal down into the dungeonesque house of the ironcoat's 2,400hp machinery.

OOC: (Arguably) significant development!

I'm somewhat bored of sitting about in this time period, visited only by a few lost souls that never stay for more than a few weeks. New Eastgate will hereby leap forwards in time some years, the states will be united and the industrial revolution well under way- NE found someone else to play with :) This thread will likely carry on roughly.. whenever I get the urge for a wooden-wall showdown or such, and people are still welcome to chip in. The exact nature of the civil war's end may well remain a mystery even to myself, for some time at least.

During the years following, it is to become evident that some Eastgaters, presumably unhappy with the conflict's outcome, have forged ahead into the vast eastern Efferus Flats and beyond, establishing their own state. Over time they become quite apart from new eastgate, because, well, NE has nothing to do with them anymore- we get a neighbour though, yay. There'll have been another war eventually, between my New Eastgaters and this new fellow's lot, and frankly we kick their black-sheep-of-the-family rumps to the far coast. Hurrah!

What I'm saying is, when/if you see some new nation referencing war with NE in its history, don't jump on 'em for befouling our name just because you love me so much ;) It's all worked out, up to a point. In their universe, NE will have advanced to.. I'm not sure, Victorian or early C20th tech, and will be looking to become a major Pacific power.

Now (give a few days/weeks) we return to regular domestic feuding-under-arms.