2001-08-01 - 11:20 p.m.

Planetarion: Conversation With a Madman

After the events recorded here and here, an uneasy calm settled on our fractured galaxy. Everyone knew that we were going to get attacked again, we just didn't know when.

It also became apparent that the galaxy was split into two factions, for good. By default it seemed that I was the leader of the opposition. I'd asked for the vote of people in the galaxy that I felt were my allies, and I'd gotten most of them. However there were a number of people who were inactive, and probably out of touch with what was going on, and to them I’d look like some sort of an upstart traitor, unless they'd seen all of the dreadful things that had happened over the last few days.

The vote for Galactic Commander currently stands at Sharon 15, Uberhamster 10.

I'm just three votes away from being GC, but I really feel that I have all the votes I can expect. There are some who are sympathetic to my cause, but they like Sharon too much to ever change their vote.

I also find that my stupid comment about attacking then exiling Sharon is coming back to haunt me. I've apologized for it publicly, but still people keep bringing it up.

Well, welcome to politics, Mr. Hamster.

There are a couple of people that I felt should be on my side, but they just don't seem like they get what is going on. Arthur plainly means our galaxy harm, and Sharon is feeding him information. While that might not exactly make her a traitor, it makes her not trustable as a GC. However, Sharon seems to view her position as some sort of God-given birthright, so anyone who tries to take it away from her must be a black-hearted criminal.

However, I really think it is useless to try to lobby people to change their votes. Instead of convincing them, it probably would only alienate them further. Better to just be mellow, and see if they change their minds on their own. Frankly, I'm not optimistic, but then again the round is almost over.

Yesterday Britannia had a talk with Arthur on IRC. Britannia is one of the best online debaters that I've ever seen, and he does not have a high opinion of Arthur's intellect. He thought it would be fun to verbally spar with him for a while. While I was working Britannia would gleefully PM me little snippits of their conversation. Then he fell silent. When he picked up the conversation again he sounded very different. He actually sounded afraid.

Britannia advised me to talk to Sharon and see if I could patch things up with her. This about-face from Britannia was startling. Why should I do that?

Because, he said, Arthur is psychotic and he means all of us harm. He called me "The biggest prick in Planetarion" and Britannia was convinced that if Arthur met me on the street he would try to kill me.

Good thing Arthur lives in New Zealand!

Arthur had promised Britannia that he and his allies were going to attack our galaxy nonstop, and this time it wouldn't be just the Fury players, it would be everyone. And he wouldn't stop there, he promised to hunt us all down next round, and the next and the next, or as Britannia put it "until ten years after you are dead."

Britannia has one of the coolest heads in IRC debate that I have ever seen. Seeing him unnerved like that was definitely unsettling. I also got another report from another galaxy mate who was not even Fury of a similar conversation with Arthur.

Typing this out now, it looks kind of ludicrous, but seeing how concerned Britannia was gave me pause. Getting my planet destroyed was one thing, but I really did not want Arthur raining death down on my (mainly) innocent galaxy mates.

It was about 10 PM at night and I was working on my chess column when a PM from Arthur popped up on my IRC screen. Steeling myself, I went to answer it.

Arthur wanted to talk. He wanted to know what my point of view was about what was going on.

At that point I made a decision. Maybe it was a stupid one. I decided that I was going to put my chess column aside and try to devote my full attention to Arthur, to try to put my point of view forward as clearly and persuasively as I could. It seemed like the last best hope to save my galaxy from certain destruction at the hands of Arthur and his galaxy mates.

I didn't know what I was getting myself in for. I wound up talking to Arthur until 4:30 in the morning.

Arthur is a very angry, bitter, troubled young man. He has obviously put a lot of himself into Planetarion, and he seems to take everything that happens there personally. The phrase "But it's only a game!" would be meaningless to him.

I know I talk a lot about Planetarion here, and I imagine that my readers are probably bored to distraction by it. I've been finding it an interesting game to play, and also an unusual tool for exploring my own psyche. For all that, the minute that Lily and I turn off our computers, Planetarion is forgotten. It is not really that big a part of our lives.

You'd think that Arthur would be in a much better mood, seeing that he was the Galactic Commander of Planetarion's #1 galaxy, but that doesn't seem to be the case. At several times, he bubbled over with rage and began threatening me again. Throughout I remained calm and reasonable, and tried my best to calm him down.

Of course I couldn't resist getting some pointers from him on how he ran his galaxy. Arthur said that he thought of himself as a "salesman" - trying to sell his galaxy-mates on his alliance, and vice versa. This made me realize that, by accident, I'd done much to make my non-Fury galaxy mates hate Fury.

However, for all of Arthur's ranting and raving he sounded more like a heartbroken little boy than the dark god of vengeance that Britannia had painted him as. At one point I asked Arthur what he wanted out of this, and he replied desolately: "To forget that any of you ever existed."

The relationship between Arthur and Sharon had always seemed kind of weird and intense. There had been rumors that they had been more than friends, but he seemed to want to forget about her, too.

Arthur then said that he was going to wash his hands of us. He wasn't angry at us any more, but that didn’t matter. He was tired of protecting us from the wrath of his allies and his galaxy mates. Now all the people that wanted to get even with us were going to get their chance, without Arthur holding them back.

It was 4:30 in the morning, and I was exhausted. I'd spent the whole night trying to reason with him, and it had done no good. So I said: "Fine, go ahead. It's not like we could stop you anyway."

I then turned off the computer and dragged myself to bed. However just two hours later, Lily gently shook me awake.

"Uber, wake up. Arthur's galaxy is attacking us again."

(Continued, tomorrow)