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| Iron Triangle Alliance and Thesali
Alliance Crush Raid Attempts on Baishi and Uziz! 5/28/00 - Two seperate attempts by the foul forces of Evil to assault innocent towns were utterly crushed by the swift and organized reactions of a mixed group of Hos/CeD/Iron Triangle/Thesali defenders. The first assault occured in Baishi where Parabolic, Sexy MoFo, Seventhis and other PK Scum were swiftly apprehended and executed by the forces of Good. The second assualt occured less than 10 minutes later, when a large gang of thugs led by Elemental Blast were caught in an ambush between two groups of defenders and annihilated to the last man. Here's an eyewitness account from Voltaire of AMN: The timing could not have been better. It happened just like we thought it would. We popped in right behind EB and his gang of thugs. It was a sandwhich. They'd severely misjudged our numbers and now they were trapped between two waves of defenders. Needless to say, the battle was quick (about 2 minutes). The attackers who weren't utterly smashed right away were slowly beaten down or chased into the swamps and slaughtered there. I almost felt sorry for them.....nah. Good work, and a round of applause to all of the brave Anti-PKs who were involved. (Click here to comment on this story)Thoughts on
Player-Run Governments (Click here to comment on this story)Victory Over Evil in
Fremont! Of course, certain skills aren't in much demand anymore. Nobody ever asks me to help set up a defensive perimeter with interlocking fields of fire anymore. And nobody really cares what wine goes with the fish. Other skills though, get me called upon regularly. If somebody in our circle of friends is going to buy a car, I'm the guy they come to for advice on how to get the best deal, and defeat the evil sales forces of automotive greed. So, a friend's wife's younger brother wanted to buy a car. I gave him the usual advice: Know what car you want before you go to a dealer. Do all your pricing research on the internet. Go through a broker, or deal directly with a dealer's fleet manager. And most importantly, turn down EVERYTHING offered in the dealer's finance office…especially anything offered for free. He did all of that, and had a deal worked out for $500 over invoice on the car he wanted. So far so good. I agreed to go along with the whole family on the weekend to buy the car, and get a free lunch out of the deal. Woo Hoo. Unfortunately, no battle plan survives contact with the enemy: The dealer didn't have the right color car on their lot. They would have to do a dealer trade with another dealership, trading the white one they had for a red one on another dealer's lot. But, being the weekend, the dealer couldn't spare a salesperson to drive there and back….at least not for a mini-deal. This was not good. Lauro wanted that car so bad he could taste it. Not Monday, not Tuesday, but right now. Plus, the whole family (including the Matriarch) was gathered, Lauro's girlfriend was present for the big purchase, and returning home without the car would be like stone-age hunters returning home without the mastodon. Something had to be done. Fortunately, I'd read the printout on the Fleet Manager's desk. The nearest red Honda Prelude stickshift was in Fremont. The family consulted, and we were off to the wilds of the East Bay…..determined to capture our elusive prey. We arrived in Fremont, searched the lot, and found the car. I jotted down the stock number and the VIN, and we went to grab this dealership's Fleet Manager. Disaster struck. He wasn't in on Saturdays. This meant we'd have to negotiate. I tried to brief Lauro for the coming ordeal, so that he could be strong in the face of the enemy. "OK, here's the deal." I briefed him, "We can't let them know three things. First, we know their invoice is $21,422…but we can't start negotiating from where we want to end up. Tell them you're willing to pay $500 over invoice…which your extensive internet research shows to be $19,500." "Second," I continued," don't sweat whatever number they show you for monthly payment. Don't worry about that. They're going to heavily pad the monthly payment to leave room for the snake oil and extra warranties when you get to finance. We need to leave that as their avenue of retreat in price negotiations. Never cut off all avenues of retreat." Lauro nodded. "And third", I concluded," don't show how much you want the car…put on your poker face." The women had secured a salesperson, and were luring him back to the table where the hunters lay in ambush. We told the salesperson we wanted the car, we handed him the sheet of paper with the stock number and VIN. He decided to cut corners, barely going through the motions. No test drive. No walk-around. He grabbed a four square and wrote down the offer, penciling in a few slides as eyewash, and took it to the desk. The salesperson came back with the first pencil. Full asking price of $26,900 in big bold print, and an insane monthly payment. Lauro bumped up $500, and didn't mention the monthly payments. The bump wasn't enough to save the salesperson. The desk sent in a replacement. The new salesperson brought in the second pencil: $24,500 "Manager's Special". Back and forth it went for a few more rounds, until finally the invoice was on the table, and Lauro agreed to pay $21,922 plus tax and things, and a monthly payment that was insanely high. So far so good. "We're half way there.", I advised," Now we're supposed to relax, because the negotiations are over. Except of course, those monthly payment figures have about $5,000 extra buried in there. The finance guy is supposed to throw in for free and include at no extra charge enough stuff to fill out the extra five grand." Lauro grinned. "Just say No.", he quipped. Lauro handled the finance guy flawlessly. No extra warranty. No paint protection. No special fabric treatment. No added security system. Amazingly, the finance guy discovered that someone had calculated the monthly payments incorrectly. He let Lauro know that the payment would be for only 48 months, not 60 months. Ooops. We left that day, with Lauro in proud possession of his new car. The hunter had returned from the hunt with the trophies of his kill, and the tribe ate well (ok, we didn't eat the car, but I did get a free dinner and some beer out of the deal). Another victory for the forces of Good :) (Click here to comment on this story)New Atriarch
Warfare Info (Click here to comment on this story)Graphics Engine
For AC2? (Click here to comment on this story)GZR Publishing
Empire Expands (Click here to comment on this story) |
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