*Yes I know one of the quote marks is backwards. I tried fixing it three different ways and none of them worked. Fuck you Blogger.
First off, if I hadn't already assassinated the Hierarchy of Doom, then they would have censured me for even referring to anyone under level 20 as a 'Dark Lord'. It's a title that's an acknowledgment of a high level of success, as well as a job description. So, for those under a minimum of fifteenth level, I'm doing you a flattery by even including you in a discussion aimed at actual Dark Lords.
Be thankful.
I have been criticized to a moderate degree of late for only offering advice that will be of use to very advanced level Dark Lords, ignoring the plethora of aspiring talent out there, scheming endlessly in their quest for meaningful power.
I call rocshit on that because I have frequently offered sage counsel to my lowly would be brethren. Remember, I was born into high level privilege but ruined it by being a short-sighted sack-wart and as a result had to start over again at the bottom of the food chain. I have been there, done that and bought the tunic.
I have lived it.
So for some pompous minded readers to suggest that I am not mindful of my (secondary) roots, well, it just pisses me off. I will find their worlds and conquer them even if I have to invent spaceships and warp drives, I don't care. My quest to destroy them will give my life meaning, and when you have it all, after a while, a reason to get up every day is a valuable thing indeed.
That being stated, let's get into some rank level shit here, m'kay? To satisfy those naysayers whose world's I'm going to burn eventually. Sound good?
It's time for your first 'fortress'. You've reached that 5th or 6th level that says "I'm ready to establish my very first stronghold, let's cut some logs and and mix some wattle and daub. Make sure there's space inside for the livestock".
It isn't gonna be majestic or even imposing to anyone who could operate a longbow or throw a rock, but it will be your first Evil Holdfast. A place where your slowly growing alliance of scumbags, cutthroats and swords for hire can coagulate while you plan atrocities for them to commit.
The form this den of inequity will take depends largely on the landscape you power base is located within. You wouldn't for example expect to build a log palisade in the desert, or a subterranean bunker in fathomless loam, would you?
Only if you're 'have an Uncle-Daddy' stupid.
SO, this will seem like very basic advice, but that's the theme of this post.
Build your first defiant structure within the means provided by your sphere of control. What this entails , for the small minded and big dreamed idiots among you, is that you're not going to carve an Ice Castle in a jungle. Nor are you going to be able to build a Granite Fortress in a bog because it will sink until your bed floats and your guards drown.
Use your head you drooling embarrassment.
I can see this is going to be an uphill battle, so let me break it down for all you over-muscled, under-brained wannabes out there. I will also preface this by stating that at early levels, your first Dread Fortress may just be a particular island in a swamp. Or a hidden glen in a forest, a cave etc etc. It won't necessarily be any sort of structure in the man made sense.
Sometimes your headquarters is just a bolt hole no one else knows about. There is no shame in this, or very little anyway.
FOREST: You have two ways you can go here.*1
A) The Hidden Forest Stronghold. When you're just starting out, oftentimes all you need is a place to run when it gets too hot in the kitchen so to speak. Robin Hood had one of these. Just a big ass oak tree located so deep in a primeval forest, that no one else could find it without him knowing about it well in advance.
That's it. Just a tree. No palisade or walls, didn't require it.
B) The 'Everyone Knows Where It Is' Forest Stronghold. That's because you've cleared the land well beyond bowshot so you can see folks a-comin. You've put up your motte and bailey "castle" squarely in the center and every now and then you lead your collection of evil fucks out of the gates to perpetrate horrible shit on the surrounding countryside, or your enemy's hamlet.
SWAMP: I don't recommend this AT ALL. Swamps and bogs are fine for seeking refuge in once you've burned someone else's real estate, but for fuck's sake, don't try to build anything there. It's merely an escape route and safe spot to gather your resources, gird your loins and plot your next violent power/money grab.
I knew a Dark Lord once who tried building a Forbidding Swamp Keep, against my advice I might add.
Well lo and behold it sank into the swamp. So he built a second one and it sank into the swamp. The third one burned down, fell over and sank into the swamp. But his forth one is still standing to the best of my knowledge, gods bless him and his pigheadedness. Had he but put half the resources he spent on constructing four Swamp Keeps into expanding his realm and hiring some serious freelance talent, he could've gotten big enough where I noticed him and felt compelled to eradicate all traces of him, his rule, his "nation" and his memory.
OR, I could've just slapped his forces around in the military equivalent of "being too big to play with the other kids" and then offered him a job running one of my Destination Dungeons. That's what I usually do for minor leaguers who show some promise.
DESERT: I fucking hate deserts. On a personal level., that is. Professionally, once you've conquered all other terrains, you're sort of forced to go after some nomadic desert assholes because you have no one better left to subdue.
But building anything out in a godforsaken sandpit it costlier than try to build something in a swamp. Water alone is critical and difficult to obtain in adequate amounts. As a man born of a properly forested, well rivered homeland, I can't logically understand why anyone would choose to live in a place where there wasn't a drink available every 30 feet.
"Hey let's live in a tent all year and roam around a desert wasteland where being without better nation's number one resource will result in the death of your whole tribe. Yeah, that'll be fun for twenty generations. What do you mean you can 'grow' food?"
Deserts. Just avoid em.
MOUNTAINS: Nothing like some impossibly huge, multi-turreted edifice carved out of the side of a fucking mountain to really give an enemy the willies. Who the hell has the resources to pull that shit off, it begs the question.
Well, you don't. Being a low level aspiring Dark Lord, you can't hack a sweet ass Doom Fortress into the side of the living earth. You're no where near the level where mountain-scaping becomes available to you. When you're just a pissant troublemaker, no offense intended, you're more likely to utilize a handy and obscure cave as your "Mountain Fasthold". You shan't be building anything on a mountain any time soon.
Unless you're of the Dwarven persuasion of course, and then mountains is just what you're into.
Hi-Ho, motherfucker.
JUNGLE: Don't have any other options, huh? Homeland it just one outrageously huge, steamy and lethal jungle. Well, good luck boyo. Everything living thing in the jungle is either trying to kill you or is plotting with every other adversity the jungle can offer to do you in. Not sure which I hate more, deserts or jungles. They both suck troll balls and you can have em.
Honestly if I had to die in one or the other though, I'd take the desert. That way I could perish alone with my thoughts, not being slowly consumed while still alive by eight million ravenous insects. It's also worth noting that no Dark Lord worth mentioning has ever come from a jungle nation. There's just something about the crushing heat and humidity...and the fucking bugs....that makes one content with conquering a nearby nation or two.
Had I been born in a godforsaken jungle, I would've booked passage to a better climate in whatever boat I could afford after stabbing my first victim.
So, constructing fortresses in a jungle, yeah? You aren't gonna accomplish shit without an entire civilization at your disposal. Just the crews to cut back the relentlessly encroaching foliage on a daily basis would be crippling financially to someone without adequate slave labor or a solid cash flow and available work force.
My advice is don't even attempt it until your resources are superior to the task at hand. Don't think to yourself " I believe I have enough subjugates, time for that first step pyramid", because you'll probably be wrong. Whatever numbers of workers you believe you need, double it if not triple.
Fucktons of those workers are gonna die from a large variety of causes. WAY more than you think. Have you cleared ground to grow crops to feed your workforce? It's super fun in a jungle. Some people who weren't born in a jungle and have never been in a real one just assume that abundant food grows everywhere in the lush verdant bosom of Mother Jungle. I mean, just look at that lush canopy....
What they don't realize is that they're wrong. It can sustain small populations. But to support enough bipeds to build you a thriving jungle kingdom, you're going to require a whole bunch of workable farmland. And the fucking jungle isn't giving that up without a fight. Then, once you've painstakingly cleared the land, you find that the soil is crap, which is ironic because of all the stubborn vegetation you had to repeatedly massacre just to get to the soil.
Jungles. Find a better place to subdue.
Steppe: Steppe is a word which means 'frozen desert' in some language. I don't know which one, but somewhere, in the multiverse, it has to be. Steppe regions have two seasons, Permafrost and Summer Week. Why anyone would willingly live there if there are better regions to vanquish and colonize is beyond me. If you're idea of heaven is endless, sparse grassland with an occasional tiny hill to spark some excitement, then god bless ya for being so easily entertained. I prefer some landscape, so I took a bunch of it.
That being said, it's no wonder why herds of small, pony-mounted, arrow-spewing bastards are exceptionally good at conquering other nations, they like to get away from their bleak homelands while the weather is good.
So if you're going to construct some sort of Foreboding Edifice in a steppe region, don't get carried away. A really big yurt will do because no one is coming for your land and whatever your headquarters may be, they won't need to be defensible. No one wants 800 million acres of mostly frozen grassland except dudes who live very intimate lives with small, bad tempered and nearly indestructible ponies
Island: Islands come with a whole bunch of advantages and disadvantages. Really they're ideal for lower lever Dark Lords, but generally (sometimes based on the size of the island) they become more of a liability in the long run.
It goes without saying that if you are an aspiring Island Dark Lord, then to conquer anything other than your own isle, your going to need a navy. Or an air force. But as discussed earlier in this blog, air forces substantial enough to actually allow you to overrun another nation are the province of the upper echelon of our trade, way out of your league, small timer. Best focus on a navy first, lad.
Among the other disadvantages of an island stronghold are:
-Difficult to grow/herd enough food to sustain a hearty population to feed your war machine.
-Island paradise weather and hot, slender topless girls make going to war seem kinda pointless, therefore volunteers may be hard to come by.
-As difficult it is for other powers to attack you, it is equally tough for you to attack them.
-There's nowhere to run.
-Island are notorious for volcanic acitvity, one day, your island may explode.
-You are exceedingly vulnerable to Water-Mages. Which is embarrassing.
I hope some low level ambitious scumbags will take heed of the advice posted above, free of charge I might add. My PR department is angry with me for not selling it in tome form, but I figure what the hel, right? Giving back to the community and whatnot.
I look forward to challenges from those who benefit from my wisdom, it makes crushing them all the sweeter.
Yours in Conquest,
-Lord Hurderoth
Be Law His Word May
*1 Unless you're an Elf, obviously.
First off, if I hadn't already assassinated the Hierarchy of Doom, then they would have censured me for even referring to anyone under level 20 as a 'Dark Lord'. It's a title that's an acknowledgment of a high level of success, as well as a job description. So, for those under a minimum of fifteenth level, I'm doing you a flattery by even including you in a discussion aimed at actual Dark Lords.
Be thankful.
I have been criticized to a moderate degree of late for only offering advice that will be of use to very advanced level Dark Lords, ignoring the plethora of aspiring talent out there, scheming endlessly in their quest for meaningful power.
I call rocshit on that because I have frequently offered sage counsel to my lowly would be brethren. Remember, I was born into high level privilege but ruined it by being a short-sighted sack-wart and as a result had to start over again at the bottom of the food chain. I have been there, done that and bought the tunic.
I have lived it.
So for some pompous minded readers to suggest that I am not mindful of my (secondary) roots, well, it just pisses me off. I will find their worlds and conquer them even if I have to invent spaceships and warp drives, I don't care. My quest to destroy them will give my life meaning, and when you have it all, after a while, a reason to get up every day is a valuable thing indeed.
That being stated, let's get into some rank level shit here, m'kay? To satisfy those naysayers whose world's I'm going to burn eventually. Sound good?
It's time for your first 'fortress'. You've reached that 5th or 6th level that says "I'm ready to establish my very first stronghold, let's cut some logs and and mix some wattle and daub. Make sure there's space inside for the livestock".
It isn't gonna be majestic or even imposing to anyone who could operate a longbow or throw a rock, but it will be your first Evil Holdfast. A place where your slowly growing alliance of scumbags, cutthroats and swords for hire can coagulate while you plan atrocities for them to commit.
The form this den of inequity will take depends largely on the landscape you power base is located within. You wouldn't for example expect to build a log palisade in the desert, or a subterranean bunker in fathomless loam, would you?
Only if you're 'have an Uncle-Daddy' stupid.
SO, this will seem like very basic advice, but that's the theme of this post.
Build your first defiant structure within the means provided by your sphere of control. What this entails , for the small minded and big dreamed idiots among you, is that you're not going to carve an Ice Castle in a jungle. Nor are you going to be able to build a Granite Fortress in a bog because it will sink until your bed floats and your guards drown.
Use your head you drooling embarrassment.
I can see this is going to be an uphill battle, so let me break it down for all you over-muscled, under-brained wannabes out there. I will also preface this by stating that at early levels, your first Dread Fortress may just be a particular island in a swamp. Or a hidden glen in a forest, a cave etc etc. It won't necessarily be any sort of structure in the man made sense.
Sometimes your headquarters is just a bolt hole no one else knows about. There is no shame in this, or very little anyway.
FOREST: You have two ways you can go here.*1
A) The Hidden Forest Stronghold. When you're just starting out, oftentimes all you need is a place to run when it gets too hot in the kitchen so to speak. Robin Hood had one of these. Just a big ass oak tree located so deep in a primeval forest, that no one else could find it without him knowing about it well in advance.
That's it. Just a tree. No palisade or walls, didn't require it.
B) The 'Everyone Knows Where It Is' Forest Stronghold. That's because you've cleared the land well beyond bowshot so you can see folks a-comin. You've put up your motte and bailey "castle" squarely in the center and every now and then you lead your collection of evil fucks out of the gates to perpetrate horrible shit on the surrounding countryside, or your enemy's hamlet.
SWAMP: I don't recommend this AT ALL. Swamps and bogs are fine for seeking refuge in once you've burned someone else's real estate, but for fuck's sake, don't try to build anything there. It's merely an escape route and safe spot to gather your resources, gird your loins and plot your next violent power/money grab.
I knew a Dark Lord once who tried building a Forbidding Swamp Keep, against my advice I might add.
Well lo and behold it sank into the swamp. So he built a second one and it sank into the swamp. The third one burned down, fell over and sank into the swamp. But his forth one is still standing to the best of my knowledge, gods bless him and his pigheadedness. Had he but put half the resources he spent on constructing four Swamp Keeps into expanding his realm and hiring some serious freelance talent, he could've gotten big enough where I noticed him and felt compelled to eradicate all traces of him, his rule, his "nation" and his memory.
OR, I could've just slapped his forces around in the military equivalent of "being too big to play with the other kids" and then offered him a job running one of my Destination Dungeons. That's what I usually do for minor leaguers who show some promise.
DESERT: I fucking hate deserts. On a personal level., that is. Professionally, once you've conquered all other terrains, you're sort of forced to go after some nomadic desert assholes because you have no one better left to subdue.
But building anything out in a godforsaken sandpit it costlier than try to build something in a swamp. Water alone is critical and difficult to obtain in adequate amounts. As a man born of a properly forested, well rivered homeland, I can't logically understand why anyone would choose to live in a place where there wasn't a drink available every 30 feet.
"Hey let's live in a tent all year and roam around a desert wasteland where being without better nation's number one resource will result in the death of your whole tribe. Yeah, that'll be fun for twenty generations. What do you mean you can 'grow' food?"
Deserts. Just avoid em.
MOUNTAINS: Nothing like some impossibly huge, multi-turreted edifice carved out of the side of a fucking mountain to really give an enemy the willies. Who the hell has the resources to pull that shit off, it begs the question.
Well, you don't. Being a low level aspiring Dark Lord, you can't hack a sweet ass Doom Fortress into the side of the living earth. You're no where near the level where mountain-scaping becomes available to you. When you're just a pissant troublemaker, no offense intended, you're more likely to utilize a handy and obscure cave as your "Mountain Fasthold". You shan't be building anything on a mountain any time soon.
Unless you're of the Dwarven persuasion of course, and then mountains is just what you're into.
Hi-Ho, motherfucker.
JUNGLE: Don't have any other options, huh? Homeland it just one outrageously huge, steamy and lethal jungle. Well, good luck boyo. Everything living thing in the jungle is either trying to kill you or is plotting with every other adversity the jungle can offer to do you in. Not sure which I hate more, deserts or jungles. They both suck troll balls and you can have em.
Honestly if I had to die in one or the other though, I'd take the desert. That way I could perish alone with my thoughts, not being slowly consumed while still alive by eight million ravenous insects. It's also worth noting that no Dark Lord worth mentioning has ever come from a jungle nation. There's just something about the crushing heat and humidity...and the fucking bugs....that makes one content with conquering a nearby nation or two.
Had I been born in a godforsaken jungle, I would've booked passage to a better climate in whatever boat I could afford after stabbing my first victim.
So, constructing fortresses in a jungle, yeah? You aren't gonna accomplish shit without an entire civilization at your disposal. Just the crews to cut back the relentlessly encroaching foliage on a daily basis would be crippling financially to someone without adequate slave labor or a solid cash flow and available work force.
My advice is don't even attempt it until your resources are superior to the task at hand. Don't think to yourself " I believe I have enough subjugates, time for that first step pyramid", because you'll probably be wrong. Whatever numbers of workers you believe you need, double it if not triple.
Fucktons of those workers are gonna die from a large variety of causes. WAY more than you think. Have you cleared ground to grow crops to feed your workforce? It's super fun in a jungle. Some people who weren't born in a jungle and have never been in a real one just assume that abundant food grows everywhere in the lush verdant bosom of Mother Jungle. I mean, just look at that lush canopy....
What they don't realize is that they're wrong. It can sustain small populations. But to support enough bipeds to build you a thriving jungle kingdom, you're going to require a whole bunch of workable farmland. And the fucking jungle isn't giving that up without a fight. Then, once you've painstakingly cleared the land, you find that the soil is crap, which is ironic because of all the stubborn vegetation you had to repeatedly massacre just to get to the soil.
Jungles. Find a better place to subdue.
Steppe: Steppe is a word which means 'frozen desert' in some language. I don't know which one, but somewhere, in the multiverse, it has to be. Steppe regions have two seasons, Permafrost and Summer Week. Why anyone would willingly live there if there are better regions to vanquish and colonize is beyond me. If you're idea of heaven is endless, sparse grassland with an occasional tiny hill to spark some excitement, then god bless ya for being so easily entertained. I prefer some landscape, so I took a bunch of it.
That being said, it's no wonder why herds of small, pony-mounted, arrow-spewing bastards are exceptionally good at conquering other nations, they like to get away from their bleak homelands while the weather is good.
So if you're going to construct some sort of Foreboding Edifice in a steppe region, don't get carried away. A really big yurt will do because no one is coming for your land and whatever your headquarters may be, they won't need to be defensible. No one wants 800 million acres of mostly frozen grassland except dudes who live very intimate lives with small, bad tempered and nearly indestructible ponies
Island: Islands come with a whole bunch of advantages and disadvantages. Really they're ideal for lower lever Dark Lords, but generally (sometimes based on the size of the island) they become more of a liability in the long run.
It goes without saying that if you are an aspiring Island Dark Lord, then to conquer anything other than your own isle, your going to need a navy. Or an air force. But as discussed earlier in this blog, air forces substantial enough to actually allow you to overrun another nation are the province of the upper echelon of our trade, way out of your league, small timer. Best focus on a navy first, lad.
Among the other disadvantages of an island stronghold are:
-Difficult to grow/herd enough food to sustain a hearty population to feed your war machine.
-Island paradise weather and hot, slender topless girls make going to war seem kinda pointless, therefore volunteers may be hard to come by.
-As difficult it is for other powers to attack you, it is equally tough for you to attack them.
-There's nowhere to run.
-Island are notorious for volcanic acitvity, one day, your island may explode.
-You are exceedingly vulnerable to Water-Mages. Which is embarrassing.
I hope some low level ambitious scumbags will take heed of the advice posted above, free of charge I might add. My PR department is angry with me for not selling it in tome form, but I figure what the hel, right? Giving back to the community and whatnot.
I look forward to challenges from those who benefit from my wisdom, it makes crushing them all the sweeter.
Yours in Conquest,
-Lord Hurderoth
Be Law His Word May
*1 Unless you're an Elf, obviously.
