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redwings1340

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One thing that's been bothering me a ton during the last five years or so is people conflating different types of actions done in regards to our elections, and making them seem identical when they are incredibly different. We talk about foreign interference in elections, voter fraud, voter suppression, voter manipulation, etc, and if you aren't paying super close attention, it’s really easy to get the impression that Russia is hacking our voting machines to get them to vote for Trump, or that the DNC intentionally disenfranchised Sanders voters during the Democratic primary. More importantly, talking about this issue carelessly opens us up to endless intentional misinterpretation that can be abused by people who want to discredit arguments against them.


Ok, so, I'm going to attempt to categorize various types of vote manipulation and give a detailed explanation of what they mean. I don't really care about the specific terms people use, so long as we explain things clearly enough that its easily identifiable what we're talking about, and complaining about.


Voter Fraud: This is the most direct way to influence an election, and what Trumpians are alleging happened during the 2020 election. Basically, this would include: throwing out and not counting ballots that were legally casted, voting multiple times, filling out ballots submitted by dead people who may not have yet been removed from the system to artificially inflate vote count, any voting by someone who is not eligible to vote, or just straight out lying about the number of votes tallied for each candidate. From what I can tell, all of Trump’s claims have been completely fictional, as they have all either been clerical anomalies that were later explained and corrected, or people not understanding how ballot processing work and confusing normal things with voter fraud.


Generally, studies have shown that voting fraud is extremely rare, small scale, and often caught. Studies of voter fraud haven’t really panned out the idea that this is commonplace, and in Colorado, Oregon, and Washington, three mail in voting states, “officials identified just 372 possible cases of double voting or voting on behalf of deceased people out of about 14.6 million votes cast by mail in the 2016 and 2018 general elections, or 0.0025 percent.” The most recent confirmed case of voter fraud that I’m aware of happened in 2018 in Bladen County, NC, where Leslie McCrae Dowless ran an operation of collecting absentee ballots and submitting them for his candidate, while discarding them when they voted for not his candidate. Data seems to indicate that he did this during the 2016 and 2018 republican primaries and general elections before he was caught, and North Carolina redid their district elections as a result of this fraud. Considering the data irregularities extend in to the republican primaries in this county, and one of them worked against an incumbent, it seems likely that this operation was localized in a very small area and done without the republican party’s knowledge.


https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54811410


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/minuscule-number-of-potentially-fraudulent-ballots-in-states-with-universal-mail-voting-undercuts-trump-claims-about-election-risks/2020/06/08/1e78aa26-a5c5-11ea-bb20-ebf0921f3bbd_story.html


https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-the-heck-is-happening-in-that-north-carolina-house-race/


https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-fight-over-election-fraud-in-north-carolina-could-drag-on-for-months/


Voter Suppression: While republicans talk a lot about voter fraud, the democrats biggest talking point is generally about voter suppression. This is when states make it extremely difficult for certain groups to vote, meaning the votes submitted don’t necessarily reflect the potential votes that could have been submitted. In the Jim Crow era, voting suppression was extremely prevalent. Examples include poll taxes, literacy tests, property tests, grandfather clause, and all white primaries. Some of the literacy tests were absurd too, like this one from Louisiana, where one wrong answer would mean you’d fail the test, which really meant the person giving the test could decide if you could vote or not.


https://sharetngov.tnsosfiles.com/tsla/exhibits/aale/pdfs/Voter%20Test%20LA.pdf


https://www.abhmuseum.org/voting-rights-for-blacks-and-poor-whites-in-the-jim-crow-south/


Today, voter suppression is generally alleged to be in more subtle forms, usually involving voter registration and in creating limited access to polling places. Basically, democrats claim that voter ID laws, felon and former felon voting restrictions, and a lack of polling places is today’s modern version of Jim Crow voting suppression. In Iowa, Kentucky, and Florida, for instance, being arrested for a nonviolent drug crime can strip you of your right to vote for life. When you combine that with police being more likely to arrest black people for drug crimes than white people, you get a scenario where a lot of people can’t vote over something fairly small and also legal in a lot of the country now. However, one reason this remains an issue is because we tend to oversimplify these arguments. Should some crimes strip you of voting rights? Probably, I’m totally fine with convicted murderers not being able to vote, and republicans who argue that democrats want convicted murderers to be able to vote are usually oversimplifying the issue to demonize the other side.


https://www.aclu.org/blog/voting-rights/voter-restoration/time-served-non-violent-drug-offense-sorry-you-still-cant-vote


One other form of voter suppression is the lack of polling places in cities, particularly in republican run states. The reasoning here is that fewer polling places means people have to wait in lines longer to vote, which will make potential voters give up. The fact that election day is on a Tuesday is another form of this type of voter suppression, because people who have jobs usually can’t get off work to go to the polls, especially if they have a several hour long wait period. The good news is that I think early voting and mail voting is helping with this type of voter suppression considerably, which is probably one big reason why turnout was increased so much this election!


People who vote should be registered in some way or form, so long as there’s a reasonable and safe way to identify who is voting. We also should recognize that voter suppression is not voter fraud. They are different, in that whether its moral or immoral, voter suppression is, most of the time, legal. Some of it might even be a genuine effort to fight perceived or potential voter fraud. While we need to change some laws to help fight modern day voter suppression, we should also talk about this carefully to avoid giving the impression that voter suppression and voter fraud are the same thing.


Voter Manipulation and Foreign Interference: Now this… This is where I see people lose control the most, and conflate these things with voter fraud and voter suppression. What Russia is doing is neither of the above, they have not hacked voting machines in the US, they have not submitted extra ballots, all they are doing is creating troll farms to spread misinformation and cause as much chaos as possible. Biden accused Iran, China, and Russia of interfering with American Sovereignty during a debate, and… I… Well, this attitude and lack of detailed explanation really concerns me, because it takes a hard line at something super unclear, which is to what extent should countries be able to influence elections of other countries?


The answer to this question can’t be zero, and the US has never held itself to a no interference standard. In fact, you could argue the US has been historically massively overzealous about influencing sovereignty of other nations, going so far to instigate coups or support one side in civil wars. You could also argue that the French were interfering with British Sovereignty during the revolutionary war. In a perhaps more relevant example, the United States putting sanctions on Iran could be argued as trying to influence the elections in Iran to go against their current president, or that sanctions on North Korea is a repudiation of North Korea’s dictatorship and policies. In general, I think we need to get rid of this recent idea that all foreign interference is bad interference, and that nobody should be able to have an opinion about American elections outside of America. The discussion should be about what foreign influence is reasonable foreign influence, what foreign influence is unreasonable, and what America should specifically do about it.


The unreasonable aspect of what Russia is doing is that they are not just sending a message of support for a candidate or using state powers to try and assert their authority over something, its that they are misrepresenting themselves and lying to try and radicalize American voters. Their troll farms are honestly fairly simple, they retweet controversial statements, make controversial statements, post comments on articles claiming to be Americans in a hope to drive public opinion about an article in a certain direction, and are purposefully lying about facts in order to divide the American public. They basically are really annoying, really effective, incredibly hard to deal with trolls, and since they don’t live in America, there’s not much we can actually do about it aside from preaching our own information. Another part of what makes this so difficult is that there are real Americans latching on to and repeating what might have originally been a Russian talking point, which means the distribution of this misinformation leaves Russian control immediately after its initial dissemination. This means that Russia could stop doing anything, and all the misinformation and conspiracy theories will still be out there, and building on each other, without Russian influence. Basically, what Russia is doing is awful, but also very, very hard to stop. Thankfully, because it doesn’t directly influence the election in any way, we can also take steps to stop this from unduly influencing the election, and that’s where I think we really need to focus.


Disinformation is everywhere, I’ve seen it, you’ve seen it, some of us have shared it at times. If you see anything on a facebook post that you didn’t know about beforehand, and/or are suspicious about… pause before hitting that share button, and google the information! Google it! Do ittttttt! Please! Did you know that Trump once said something about how if he ran, he’d run as a republican because republicans would believe anything he’d say? I don’t, because its not true. I’ve seen that post multiple times on facebook before, shared by people I’m friends with, and it is misinformation. False and misleading information exists on every side of the political spectrum, and before you hit that share button, google the information you’re sharing and make sure its true. Sometimes you’ll find it is true, particularly in 2020, there have been multiple Trump tweets that I’ve been like, “no, no way, this has to be false, not even he would say this,” then I googled it, and it turned out he made the tweet that morning. Then, there are other times I’ve seen things and been like, “really? This seems odd, really?” and it turned out to be false. If its true, you’ll usually find like 5 articles about it from reliable sources immediately. If its false, you’ll find nothing or a snopes article disproving it. GOOGLEEEEEEEEE IS YOUR FRIEND! USE ITTTT! In today’s world, we need to know how to be the arbiters of true and false information, and this is a skill we can learn. Russia will continue pushing falsehoods, but only we can let them influence elections.


https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/29/technology/russia-troll-farm-election.html


Political Parties controlling elections: One of the most common complaints I hear the political left make is that Bernie Sanders was screwed out of the democratic nomination by the Democratic Party. This is… extremely oversimplified. In the democratic primaries, Bernie Sanders had a lot of support, but ultimately fell short because people voted for Clinton and Biden, not because the Democratic Party engaged in any sort of voter fraud. However, there were a lot of structural advantages Clinton and Biden had in these primaries that Sanders did not have, partially based on luck, and partially based on people within the Democratic party favoring their candidate.


First of all, in perhaps the part that’s most personal to me, are closed primaries, or primaries that independents can not vote in. As a liberal independent, this means I would need to change my registration to the democratic party to vote in any democratic party primaries, and I don’t want to do that because I think the two-party system is really, really bad for America. When closed primaries determine who runs in the general election, you only need to appeal to about 20% of Americans to become one of the final two candidates. In congressional and senate elections where the primary is basically a coronation for one candidate, the minority party is essentially robbed of any voice in the election. Republicans in Maryland, Democrats in Alabama, and independents in both, for instance, are pretty much given no meaningful vote on the state electoral level. This is pretty screwed up. Maybe if democrats had open primaries, Sanders would have had more of a shot, but this system wasn’t created to intentionally screw over Sanders or any individual candidate. This is a systemic problem, not an individual candidate problem.


The other allegation against the democratic party is that they scheduled debates at times they thought would help Biden or Clinton, and avoided scheduling them when they thought it might help Sanders. I remember one allegation about debate questions given to Clinton before a debate, but not given to Sanders. These are… bad. The democratic party really shouldn’t play favorites this way. It is also not vote rigging, and the negative fallout from these stories probably had more potential to help Sanders than the initial actions did to help Clinton. Ultimately, the elections went Clinton’s and Biden’s way because democrats voted for them. There are very real structural problems in political parties that make it difficult to have democracy, but it does not make for complete lack of democracy.


Gerrymandering and the Electoral College: Gerrymandering is the creation of districts in such a way that the proportion of voters for each party in a state does not reflect the proportion of representatives of each party in a state. This is a massive issue that favors the ruling party, and helps them maintain control even when the population shifts against them. While on average, gerrymandering benefits republicans, that is only because more states lean republican than lean democrat. Democrats take advantage of gerrymandering too, and my home state, Maryland, is sadly one of the most gerrymandered places in the country, with some district lines that are a bit absurd. Gerrymandering, unfortunately, is legal right now, and while it shouldn’t be legal, it’s a law we need to change rather than an example of voter fraud. Every vote is counted, it’s just made so that some votes count more than others for county and district elections.


The electoral college is a kinda bad system created when this country was created, as a compromise between people who wanted congress to pick the president, and others who wanted the popular vote to pick the president. The compromise was that states would vote for electors instead of picking the president directly, who would then vote for the president in congress. Before recently, the electoral college was mostly ignored because there haven’t been too many conflicts between the electoral college and the national popular vote, but with smaller states going more consistently republican recently, this is changing quite a bit. On one hand, Trump took advantage of this electoral college system to get elected in 2016, on the other hand, we have, as a nation, agreed to use this electoral college system since 1787. This system was not designed specifically to help Trump or hurt Democrats, which is important, because that makes it… if not good, then legitimate. I support either overturning the constitution, or supporting making a law giving individual states electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote, but until we do this, we’re stuck in the electoral college. At least we can say the founding fathers designed the perfect system to really make politics feel like a sport. The electoral college really is the most exciting election system in the entire world. Not the best, but I mean, watching those electoral votes trickle in, watching states get called one by one, trying to predict it, being able to get mad at voters in specific states that are near 50/50, nothing beats the soul crushing anxiety and horrific refresh spamming energy that the electoral college provides.


https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/27/us/what-is-gerrymandering.html


https://www.history.com/news/electoral-college-founding-fathers-constitutional-convention


Conclusion: When people are complaining about voter suppression, don’t accuse them about being hypocritical on voter fraud. When someone complains about foreign interference in elections, don’t let them say that made the election illegitimate. Complain about what you want to complain about, but recognize that American Elections are complicated! There is so much going on, so many different aspects to discuss and criticize. Some complaints are valid, some aren’t valid, and the solution to each complaint is different. When you talk about all of these different types of vote manipulation as one thing, people will dismiss you, and assume you’re talking about something you’re not. Take time to explain things, and maybe you can get a real discussion in.

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Hey there, I’m going to do something a bit different than my usual never doing anything on this account today, and start what may be a one-off post, or may be a series, depending on how often I have the urge to do something like this. If this is a series, it will just be a series of arbitrary thoughts that occur to me, based around a certain subject.

 

So, today’s topic is television show openings, and what I think works well when creating them. I happen to love video editing, and a TV show opening is basically a music video with a few specific purposes. A good opening introduces the major characters of a TV show, the setting, and the theme of the show. A lot of openings are very similar for a reason, because most of the common tropes in openings work to get an emotional response from the viewer.

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibPCLM… (this is an accurate representation of what most anime openings look like, for instance)

 

Even if most openings follow this general formula, some shows decide to create introductions that are specifically memorable because of ways they decide to show off their opening a little differently. Here are a few that I think are particularly good, and my thoughts on what make them good.

 

Pokemon – The original opening: www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xKWiC…

Everyone who watched Pokemon as a kid more or less knows the lyrics to this song, and for good reason. The opening is cliché in many ways, but is an example of how cliché isn’t always bad. Every kid watching this opening can put themselves in Ash’s shoes, because the dream of becoming a pokemon master is that strong for the generation who followed this show. This opening shows off Pokemon as your best friends, but also as a force to be reckoned with and not underestimated. Going on this pokemon journey is dangerous, but its also worth doing, and this opening really makes both of these factors clear.

 

The Simpsons - www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5DhHu…

This opening does everything an opening should, it introduces all the characters, gives viewers a good idea about what each of them is like, and introduces the setting. However, one of the things that makes this opening unique, and makes people want to watch it, is something not many shows replicate. This opening is always slightly different, which makes it part of the show rather than something people want to skip.

 

These are some of the gold standards in terms of ‘standard’ openings, but now, we’ll move on to some more abnormal openings that either push the boundaries of what openings should look like, and/or are extremely well executed.

 

Attack on Titan - www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OkpRK…

Everything about this screams intense violent struggle. The people in this show are trapped by an overwhelming foe that is always out there, always menacing, always ready to rip in to your face and eat you. The walls offer some protection, but do nothing to solve the overall problem, just delay the threat from arriving and creates a false sense of security.

 

Those who fight are brave heroes. Those who fight die. Those who don’t fight will die slower. So… There’s no choice but to fight, because it’s a better option than dying without fighting, a better option than being trapped in a cage. When you watch this series, you know you’re going to be watching cool badasses fighting giant monsters with an undertone of philosophy, and that’s what you get with this show. This is just intense and pulls you in to the setting, making you ready to defend the world against titans.

 

Game of Thrones - www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7L2PV…

Early on in this piece, I mentioned that a good opening usually introduces the characters, the theme, and the setting of a TV show. All the other openings on this list do that well, but this one… doesn’t show any characters at all. They didn’t need to go down the route they did, they could have done a standard opening, introducing all the characters and their personalities, but this show didn’t. Why not?

Well, Game of Thrones isn’t really a story about characters. It’s a story about Westeros told through characters. There is no singular protagonist in game of thrones, there is no ‘good’ guy and ‘bad’ guy. Ok, there are a lot of ‘bad’ guys, but the individuals aren’t important, it’s the land. The North is bigger than Ned Stark. The Lannisters and Castle Rock are bigger than Cersei or Tywin. Each character in the show is representing something bigger than themselves, so instead of showing the characters, this intro shows the accomplishments of the lands, and what the characters represent.

 

Westeros is beautiful, dangerous, and powerful, and this intro represents that as opposed to representing the individual characters. It’s incredible.

 

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya - www.youtube.com/watch?v=C337sh…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jjE9Q… – English dubbed. I can’t find an English subbed version on it, but the lyrics are an important part of this.

 

The first ten seconds of this opener is a masterpiece. In 10 seconds, we introduce Haruhi, what she likes, what she longs for, while also offering the viewer a chance to join her adventure. This show is about exploring the unknown, figuring out the depths of our minds and our creativity. I feel inspired by the first 10 seconds of this, I want to hold Haruhi’s hand and explore the unknown with her, because I also feel a longing to know the mysteries of the universe.

 

The rest of the intro is pretty standard, but it reinforces the idea that this show is going to be a little surreal, a little strange, and a little abnormal. It is an adventure, and you are part of it.

 

Angel Beats - www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yp8fb8…

 

Often, show intros tell you almost exactly what you’re going to get in a show, but this one… is a little more open ended. The main ‘villain’ of the show, Angel, plays piano accompanying a pretty upbeat song. However, the video hints at something less than ok in the background, as one of the main characters has a gun she uses to directly threaten Angel, and we start to see hints of mission briefings, which indicates that this might not be such a perfect world after all.

 

The lyrics to this song are interesting, and leave you thinking about them until the very end of the show. “I watched the millions of stars as they disappeared and waved them goodbye. So happy for them.” What does this mean? Well, you kind of have to watch the series to find out, but it leaves you intrigued and confused, ready to try and sort out the true purpose behind everything going on in this show.

 

Avatar: The Last Airbender - www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1EnW4…

 

Everything changed when the fire nation attacked. Instead of setting this intro to a song, like most intros do, this one set it to Katara’s narration. We know this is about Aang, and we know this is a story of a kid tasked with restoring a world that’s out of balance. Beyond that, this intro doesn’t go in to very much, it doesn’t introduce characters other than Aang, Sokka, and Katara, and it doesn’t really need to. They could have, but sometimes, a simple introduction is a memorable introduction, and this one certainly is extremely memorable.

 

So are there any intros you’ve found incredibly memorable or good? What made them stand out, and why do you enjoy them? I’m curious to hear any thoughts you have on this subject.

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I’ve heard that in the next civ game, we might just jump up to deity and try that, so before we begin, I want to present to you…

 

Redwings1340’s Guide to Deity and Beyond!

So, deity will be challenging. The AI is not smarter on deity, it is still the broken mess of coding it is on prince, that tries and fails to play the game properly. What it does get, however, are bonuses, huge bonuses that any human player would absolutely crush us with if they got. The AI’s bonuses come mostly at the start of the game, which means that for the first half of the game, we will be behind, and there is nothing we can do about it. Our main priority is survival, while trying to build as much infrastructure as we can to slowly catch up to the AI, and snowball ahead in the second half of the game. To do this, you have to exploit the AI at every opportunity, and take advantage of all the flaws the AI has, while maximizing what you can do in the limited space you have.


Note: A lot of this advice below is only applicable on deity. Specifically, this guide is meant for someone who has played civ games before, but has not played civ games on deity, and is meant to give you hints on how to adjust your playstyle to succeed on the hardest difficulty. Some of these tips are unnecessary or even straight up wrong on lower difficulties, and I will try to explain why in each individual piece of advice.

DO (especially on deity, but always consider this): Settle on hills. You get +1 production for settling on a hill tile, which is good by itself, and cities get extra defense for being on a hill tile. Whenever you settle on deity, you need to think about the things that are normally important, good tiles nearby (2 food/1 production tiles are the best), luxury resources (essential for happiness), and rivers (useful but not necessary), but also think about its defensive position. Will this city get overrun by the zulu in 5 turns? If so, don’t settle there! Its not worth that risk.

DON’T (on deity, or really on emperor or above): Build wonders before you get a tech lead. Especially early game wonders. The only time you can build an early game wonder is if you spawn in a bunch of forests, get an early game worker, get mining, then beeline towards whatever technology you’re going for, and chop down all of your forests to get that wonder. Even then its risky, and some wonders are just unobtainable. If you have an amazing spot… you might be able to get Stonehenge or the oracle, but probably won’t be able to. Don’t build wonders until you’ve caught up or are ahead in tech, the AI will aggressively build wonders and get them before you.

DO (always a good idea): Focus on Food, production, and science. If you’re low on gold, you can detour for a market or something (don’t wanna become bankrupt), but food, production, and science are the most important elements of civ. Once you have a solid empire, you can do anything, don’t worry about your victory condition. But to have a solid empire, you need those three things first. Big cities that can produce lots of stuff can do anything you want them to, they just need to get there first.

DON’T (especially on deity): Start next to Alexander, Shaka, Atilla, or really any warmongering civ that is going to create a huge army and destroy you before you can do anything. If you do start next to a civ that might do that (I know, this isn't actually something you can control), explore the map and bribe them to declare war on someone else. Sure, it may be relatively expensive, you may need to give away a luxury resource or something, but if they’re at war with someone else, they won’t be at war with you, and if they aren’t at war with you, you won’t die and lose the game. The early game is the toughest part of deity, so be active with your diplomacy early on.

DO (generally a good idea on any difficulty): Sell your iron and horses to other civs. You can even exploit this by selling one iron for 2 gold per turn 5 times, getting 10 gold per turn instead of 5. You can also cripple an enemy AI by stealing a worker or settler from them with an early scout, or stealing a worker from a city state or two with your early scout (if you declare war on them, steal a worker, then declare peace the same turn, you can get out free with just a temporary penalty from the city state you went to war with, and no real other consequences). Normally I’d say this tactic is cheap, but on deity, you kind of need every advantage you can get. You can steal two workers from city states without really experiencing much punishment. Steal more and city states will start to hate you though, so don’t overdo this.

DO (generally a good idea on any difficulty): Get a national college as early as you can without sacrificing too much else. A national college gives you +50% science in your capital, which is huge early game! That is a gigantic boost, this is one of the best buildings in the game! Sometimes its worth waiting on your third and fourth cities so you can get this up a little earlier, since you’re required to have libraries in all of your cities to build this. Even if you have your settlers built, sometimes you may want to delay planting them if you can, just to finish this building in your capital.

DO (especially on deity): Build ranged units, and get ranged unit upgrades as soon as you need them. Archers, composite bows, and crossbows will carry you through the early game, and are amazing in defensive wars. They can sometimes even carry you in offensive wars. Melee units are a bit underpowered in this game, and ranged units are a bit overpowered. Have at least one ranged unit per city, probably more if an AI looks like they’re going to be aggressive. Try to get composite bows early on, they provide a huge upgrade on archers. Melee units aren’t necessarily useless, but they serve primarily as path blockers and tanks that help buy you time, ranged units are your damage dealers and what you should focus on first.

DON'T (especially on deity): Start in a jungle. Jungles just kind of suck. If you do start in a jungle, I wish you the best of luck, because you'll need it. There's just not much production in a jungle, so if you have a terrible start and get crushed, sometimes that's just bad luck and there's not much you can do.

DO (only on immortal/deity, actually worse on lower difficulties): Try to create early game trade routes to the AI. Eventually you may want to change your trade routes to be internal, feeding your capital is generally great, but because the AI starts so far ahead of you, you can get a lot of science just by sending them a trade route. It also makes them like you more and makes them less likely to attack you. 

DON'T (Especially on Deity): Give up too early. Are they fifteen techs ahead of you in the renaissance, and getting out frigates while you are barely pushing out a few triremes? That's pretty normal. The AI gets a ton of bonuses but does not play this game well. You're a better player than they are. You can win wars with fewer troops, you can plan better than the AI can, and you can catch up. If you're in the modern era and still are 15 techs down, you're in trouble, but even then, the AI is also very bad at actually winning the game. There's always hope, the AI might have 100,000 gold, but won't use it to challenge you on city states all the time for some reason. If all else fails, you can still probably win a diplomatic victory if you're still alive by the modern era.

 

An Exploration of Social Policies: Which one should you choose and why?

 

Tradition: This is definitely the most consistent social policy choice, and on deity, its advantages only get better. +3 culture from the opener of tradition lets you move through the tree pretty quickly, the free culture building in your first four cities (usually monument) is really nice in the early game, monarchy is the best policy in the early game at fighting unhappiness, and landed elite is just a very nice bonus that adds up throughout the game. The free aquaducts for finishing the tree is also fantastic, as that saves you a lot of time creating them when you want to be doing other things. Even oligarchy, the policy that makes garrisoned units not cost maintenance and gives your cities better ranged attack strength with a garrison, is incredible on deity, because it helps you stay alive against the overwhelming hordes of the AI. On higher difficulties, getting tradition and four early cities is definitely the most consistent strategy, and the strategy you can go for if you don’t really know what you’re going to be doing. It is always good. Late game it allows you to purchase great engineers with faith, which is also a fantastic bonus.

 

Liberty: For everything I’ve said about tradition, liberty actually might be stronger than tradition in some ways. The issue is consistency, it is better for large empires, and gives you some great boosts to getting your empire off the ground. Citizenship/Collective rule gives you a settler and a worker for free, and gives you bonuses towards those, so if you have a lot of empty space with a lot of good luxuries near you, liberty is actually amazing at gobbling up land really quickly. Meritocracy lets you fight unhappiness pretty successfully with a large empire, the other policies are good at helping you get cities off the ground fast. The free great person for completing liberty is pretty nice as well, it can give you a great engineer for a wonder (the exception to my no early game wonders rule), or you can get a great scientist for an academy, a great admiral for early ocean exploration, or even a great prophet for a religion. Liberty is solid, if you have a lot of space to expand. Its probably the best choice on lower difficulties a lot of the time. On higher difficulties though, the AI will expand so fast, that space becomes really limited very quickly. If you’re going to be able to settle about 6 or 7 cities pretty early, liberty is great. If you don’t have the space for that or are feeling like these cities will get overrun by the AI if you try that, tradition is probably better.

 

Honor: The honor opener is great on lower difficulties, but on higher difficulties, it gets worse, because the AI deals with barbarians so fast with their overwhelming troop count. Discipline is ok, but ranged units are so much better than melee units, so you probably won’t be using it much. Military caste lets you fight unhappiness somewhat effectively in peacetime, but you need a huge army for it to mean much during wartimes, when you really need that happiness boost. Military tradition is very nice, professional army is… a bit too slow, warrior code is nice for the great general. The honor finisher, getting gold for kills, actually can be fantastic on higher difficulties, because the AI will have tons of troops to throw at you, but honor is really slow, and doesn’t give you enough production or culture to be worthwhile on high difficulties. The Aztecs can make it work. Maybe a couple other civs. Most civs can’t though, not on deity, where barbarians will get cleaned up before you even see them. This doesn’t mean war unviable on deity, it can be viable (in fact, if you win a war, you can capture some insanely good cities that will be amazing for you), but… on deity honor just leaves you behind in every aspect other than military, and… that’s just not a winning strategy in civ.

 

Piety: So, Piety has some cool stuff in it, that can speed you ahead on the religious game, but, like honor, leaves you so far behind in so many other areas that it’s not usually worth it. Piety is also worse on deity because it is really freaking hard to get a religion on deity, let alone a good religion. The AI gets so many bonuses and can just missionary spam for days, so you’re generally just better off taking one of their religions. That said, Piety does have some nice things going for it. Mandate of heaven (20% discount on faith purchases) is an awesome policy by itself. Organized religion (+1 faith from shrines and temples) is kind of nice if you have a big empire. The reformation belief is amazing if you’ve founded a religion. Theocracy is fine. Unfortunately for piety, religious tolerance is one of the worst social policies in the game, building shrines and temples in half time is… fine, but not amazing, additional culture from holy sites is… fine, but not amazing. Aside from religious tolerance being awful, piety isn’t that bad, the issue is that getting a good religion on deity is borderline impossible unless you are Ethiopia or the mayans, and piety doesn’t provide any food or production bonuses. Theoretically your religion can help with that, and with happiness as well, but if you go piety you’re playing catch up, trying to use your religion to do what other civs are doing already. Its really hard to make work, and piety is generally not a good policy tree to go in to, at least on high difficulties. It can work on lower difficulties though if you’re really careful about it.

 

Other policies: The early game is the most important part of civ, so I’m not going to go in to depth on the other policies. The most consistent social policy ordering is probably tradition/patronage/rationalism/(order/freedom). Patronage gives you a ton of city state bonuses, and city state allies are really nice to have. Rationalism is definitely the best late game tree, because it gives you direct bonuses to science, which is, in the end, what you want in this game. Freedom is best for small empires that wants to work a lot of specialists, order is better if you’ve conquered a lot of territory or have a large empire, because it has some insane bonuses in it. There’s a fair bit of choice in the midgame though, so don’t just blindly follow that.

The exploration opener is a stealthily good policy, getting +1 movement and vision on all your ships lets you explore faster, and gives you a nice edge in naval combat, and naval combat is one area where you can definitely abuse the AI. The AI is even worse at naval combat than it is in land combat. I’m not huge on aesthetics, personally, I think that’s one of the weaker trees of the game, but I don’t go for culture that much so I could be underestimating it. Still, the lack of bonuses to food, production, and science in that tree make it a bit weaker than the others, I think. The commerce opener is very good and worth getting if your capital is producing a lot of money, and big ben is a pretty nice wonder you can get as well with it. In the commerce tree, mercantilism (purchasing items requires less gold, and extra science from commerce buildings) is an amazing policy, and protectionism (+2 happiness for luxuries) is also pretty fantastic, but to get there you have to wade through three terrible policies, so I don’t think that’s usually worth it. Exploration can be worth going down if you have a lot of costal cities, navigation school (+2 movement for great admirals and faster great admirals) is the only bad policy in that, because great admirals… don’t really do you that much if you get a lot of them, but the other policies in this tree can be good if you have a lot of costal cities. The only issue with them is that they’re often competing with incredibly powerful ideology policies and rationalism policies, so its hard to find the time to go down this tree. The finisher for exploration is also meh, so don’t feel like you need to finish exploration, just get the policies you need from it. For rationalism, you often don’t need to go down the entire rationalism tree immediately (I usually start it before ideologies, then come back to it after picking a bunch of ideology policies), but the rationalism opener and secularism are two very strong policies you’ll probably want to get as soon as possible, simply because science is amazing.

By the time ideologies roll around, the game is often over one way or another, but ideologies are very powerful, and is one of the most balanced parts of the game. Which ideology is best for you is very dependent on what you’re doing as an empire. They’re interesting, so I’ll go through them, but this part isn’t that important until you get to it.

Freedom: Freedom has a lot of policies that can look underwhelming at first glance, but are actually sneakily powerful. Freedom is best for small empires with big cities, because they have a lot of policies that make specialists especially powerful. The Statue of Liberty (+1 production from every specialist in every city) is an amazing wonder that synergizes with a lot of freedom policies very well, and helps make freedom as powerful as the other two ideologies. Avante Garde (+25% GP generation), and Civil Society (Specialists produce half the amount of food as normal) are the best t1 freedom policies, and they go together very well. Combine that with Universal suffrage (unhappiness from specialists is halfed, golden ages last 50% longer), and you can start seeing where freedom can get insane. Combine this with secularism in the rationalism tree (+2 science from every specialist), and your specialists take up 50% food, provide +1 production, +2 science, +25% GP generation, and 50% unhappiness, and man these things become good. Big cities can work a lot of specialists, so these stacking effects are magnified the most when you focus on a few huge cities.

Freedom doesn’t stop there, the other T1 freedom policies are… not great, honestly, but it has some really neat other t2 policies. New Deal is good if you’ve produced a lot of great people this game and want to improve yields on great person tiles. Arsenal of democracy is an amazing standalone ability, +15% production towards military units is pretty good by itself, but adding +15 influence for gifting units to city states in the picture, and you can build up a whole bunch of cheap units to give to city states, and make them your allies very quickly. Volunteer army (6 free foreign legions) can boost your army from bad to insane if you get that early in the game, this ability can basically win you a war by itself sometimes, and also helps reduce the cost of your military long term, which is always nice. The T3 freedom policies aren’t that amazing, but each one helps with a specific victory condition, which is pretty nice.

 

Order: If freedom is hyper focused on a few huge, powerful cities, and autocracy is hyper focused on dominating the map with a very strong army, order gives a nice medium that’s centered around empire building that allows you to support a huge sprawling empire with a lot of cities. If you’ve done a fair bit of conquest in the game, or settled more than four cities and want to develop your empire to become more than just a war machine, order provides some insane bonuses to allow you to do so, and has some of the best policies in the game. Hero of the people (+25% gp generation) is always good, maybe not as good with synergy as the freedom version, but still useful. Socialist Realism (+2 happiness per monument, build monuments in half time) is an amazing happiness booster (needed in huge empires), and skyscrapers (-33% building cost reduction) is generally very good. Rounding out t1, order has a couple other happiness policies that is quite useful, because a large empire usually needs that extra happiness to grow.

If Order has good t1 policies, it has some amazing t2 policies. Workers Faculties (+25% science in cities with a factory, build factories in half time) is one of the best policies in the game, and five year plan/party leadership are both nice production bonuses that work very well for large empires. Academy of sciences can be more happiness, which is also nice. Cultural revolution isn’t that good, and Resettlement comes too late in the game to be useful, but it doesn’t matter, workers faculties carries order by itself, and order has some other nice policies to support it.

Order also probably has the best t3 policies in the game for general empire building. Iron curtain gives +50% food and production for internal trade routes, which is incredible, because internal trade routes are already very strong (free courthouse upon city capture is nice too), and spaceflight pioneers gives a great scientist and a great engineer immediately, which is honestly fantastic late game by itself, even if the additional effect (able to finish spaceship parts with a great engineer) isn’t that great. The last t3 policy, dictatorship of the proletariat (+34% tourism to civs with less happiness) is also pretty good, because order has so many happiness policies its pretty easy to use them to meet that condition. So, basically, if you have a big empire, order is a very good choice.

 

Autocracy: So, Autocracy is very good at two things, it’s the best ideology to pick when you’re behind, and its very good at building a military to take over the world. Industrial espionage (spies steal twice as fast) is amazing if you’re behind in tech, though the other t1 autocracy policies fall a bit short. Fortified borders requires building mostly useless buildings that require a lot of production to make work, universal healthcare is good if you capture other national wonders, mobilization and united front can help sometimes but aren’t that consistently good. Industrial espionage is the only amazing t1 autocracy policy, and that’s only amazing if you’re behind.

However, autocracy has some amazing t2 and t3 policies that help it a lot. Militarism (+2 happiness per barracks, armory, military academy) really helps your war machine start, because these buildings are cheaper than the happiness buildings you would otherwise be building, while serving a second purpose. Police state (+3 happiness from courthouses, build courhouses in half the time) helps with your happiness if you’re doing a lot of conquest, nationalism (-33% unit maintinence) helps keep you not bankrupt, Third alternative (double strategic resources, +5 food and +5 science in capital) is good if you want units that require these resources, total war (+25% production towards military, +15 exp for new units) is incredible and lets you get powerful promotions on new units very quickly. Lightning warfare isn’t bad either. Autocracy has some amazing t2 policies if you are willing to accept some subpar t1 policies.

For level 3, cult of personality isn’t that good, but Gunboat Diplomacy (Gain 6 more Influence (Civ5) Influence per turn with City-States you could demand tribute from. Military units are 50% more effective at intimidating City-States) really lets you ally with nearby city states fast, and Clausewitz's Legacy (Receive a +25% attack bonus to all Military Units for the first 50 turns after this tenet is added.) is a very strong boost if you need it for a war, defensive or offensive. Autocracy is incredible if you have a powerful war machine you want to get off the ground, or if you’re behind and you want to catch up (and use your military to do it). Its not good if you’re ahead or playing peacefully, but has some very strong options in specific situations.

 

So now that I’ve written up this incredibly long and elaborate guide, lets do this! Or not! Really up to you, I had fun writing this regardless. Good luck, and may you build a civilization that stands the test of time.

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             Jennifer stared down her opponent. On the surface, this gym leader looked pretty nonthreatening. He was about six years younger than Jennifer, and quite a bit shorter. Despite the discrepancy, he was still a powerful trainer and a gym leader, and Jennifer knew she couldn’t take him lightly.

            “Ordinarily I don’t take on challengers who have less than two Pokemon, but for you I’ll make an exception. Are you ready to face your first gym challenge, Jennifer?”

            “I’m ready,” Jennifer responded, perhaps sounding a bit more confident than she actually was. After her escape from Team Rocket, she had spent most of the day training as per Forrest’s instructions. She did pretty well in her practice battles, winning about seventy percent against the Viridian Forest Trainer’s club, which put her close to the top trainer there. Still, only two of the trainers at this club had the Pewter gym badge, one of them claiming they got very lucky with their butterfree’s confusion in the battle, the other being an experienced trainer who was only dropping by to see a friend. To make matters worse, Jennifer lost to both of those trainers in practice matches, so she didn’t have the transitive property of battling to claim she could win. Her best chance it seemed was in her typing advantage, and never before had she been so happy she had picked Squirtle.

            “Go for it, Onix!” Forrest shouted out, sending out his massive rock snake. She had heard tales of this Onix battling many of the trainers she had battled against the previous day. Almost none of them had managed to bring it down.

            “Come on out, Squirtle!” Jennifer thought about the upcoming battle. Some battles required a decent amount of complicated strategy, but this one was pretty simple for her. Trying to tackle this onix would be pointless, but water attacks would be pretty effective.

            Brock was acting as the official judge of this battle, and started talking to make the battle official. “The gym battle between challenger Jennifer and gym leader Forrest will start now! This will be a one on one battle, with no substitutions allowed. Begin!”

            “Squirtle, bubble!”

            “Onix, rock throw!”

            Onix moved first, and hit Squirtle with a powerful volley of rocks. The extra training from the previous day paid off though, as Squirtle managed to take the hit with ease and fired back a barrage of bubbles at the target. It hit the Onix with incredible force to leave it barely standing.

            “Onix, slam! End this battle now!”

            “Squirtle, follow up with a water gun!”

            Onix tried to move and directly confront its opponent, but the water from bubble made it slow, allowing Squirtle to fire before it could reach the turtle. Squirtle then fired a water gun and hit the Onix directly in the face. The snake could not withstand the water, and collapsed on the battlefield.

            Brock raised his flag and started to speak. “Onix is unable to battle. Squirtle is the winner, so Jennifer wins the match!”

            “Onix, return!” Forrest started to speak. “Jennifer, you are now the proud owner of the bolderbadge, one of the eight badges you need to get to the Johto/Kanto league tournament. With your skill and determination, I am confident you can get there. Now, I asked you to have our battle this early for a reason. We’re now going to focus on getting you to Cereulan without incident, so listen carefully.”

            “Hold on!” Jennifer exclaimed, “Did you go easy on me there to make sure I could escape this city? I was, well, expecting a more intense battle!”

            “I was definitely trying to win,” Forrest explained. “I usually battle novice trainers with a Geodude and an Onix in a 2v2 battle. Since this was a 1v1 battle, I only used Onix, but my gym generally gives novice trainers a sense of the importance of typing in battle. I tend not to win against water or grass type Pokemon, but don’t worry, you’ll find other gyms to be tougher.”

            Jennifer considered this argument. “All right, what’s your plan to get me out of here?”

            Forrest tossed over an oran berry to Squirtle, who started eating it happily. “We don’t have time for the Pokemon center right now, so take this. Jennifer, if anyone asks, you lost this battle, all right?

            “Um, sure, I can do that. Why?”

            “Team Rocket has a pretty big base of operations hidden nearby,” Forrest explained, “but they aren’t strong enough to directly attack the city in an attempt to kidnap you, not with Brock and me here. If we wait in Pewter long enough, they might gather reinforcements and try this, but it would be pretty costly for them and not their first option, especially since I doubt capturing you is an incredibly high priority for them. It isn’t, right?”

            “I… I doubt it,” Jennifer said, “They’re doing it for money. A fair bit of money, but I’m reasonably sure I’m not essential to any of their plans.”

            “All right, good,” Forrest responded. “That means they will probably be constantly watching the city, waiting for you to go out on your own. Well, today, you are going to go out with Brock to Viridian Forest to catch a Pokemon, and then you will get lost. ”

            “I don’t need to go to Viridian Forest though, I need to head to Mount Moon again to get to Cerulean City!”

            Brock spoke up, “Pewter City has a network of underground tunnels with many secret entrances. I can lead you to one of these entrances in Viridian Forest, and then I will tell you where to go from there to get to the foot of Mount Moon. In the ensuing chaos, I will be racing Team Rocket to search for you in the vast forest, and they will spend a lot of time searching for you in the wrong place. This is more convincing if you need to train there anyway in preparation for a gym rematch. You can easily get lost in the Forest just running after a Pikachu. If we get lucky, Team Rocket won’t catch on until it’s too late.”

            Jennifer spoke up, “Team Rocket isn’t that stupid! They’re bound to have someone watching the foot of Mount Moon. I might get lucky, but this sounds like an incredibly risky plan. I can’t fight off a Rocket Grunt on my own.”

            “That’s why,” Brock stated, “I will be giving you my Steelix for the duration of your journey. When you get to Cerulean City, you can give it back to me through the PC system. Even if they do notice you, try not to reveal this Pokemon until you have no other option. Your Squirtle should be enough to run away from or defeat most of the wild Pokemon in Mount Moon, but avoid trainer battles while you’re there.”

            Jennifer became frightened at this new responsibility. “But… Brock! I can’t! If I lose or get caught, Team Rocket takes it away! I’m sorry, but… I can’t accept that possibility.”

            “Jennifer, Steelix is a steel type Pokemon, and most Rocket Grunts are only allowed to use poison types or Rattatas. My Steelix is also tougher than any of Team Rocket’s Pokemon even before typing is put in to play, so long as you don’t go up against an executive or Giovanni himself. He will protect you, and I know that you are a good trainer for him.”

            “Fine, lets just get this operation underway. When does the Viridian Forest Battle Club start?”

            Forrest laughed. “Just about… well, now, in fact. It’s almost like I chose the gym battle for this time on purpose. Brock and Jennifer, good luck. If Team Rocket captures you, I will personally come to help you out.”

            “Thanks.”

            Brock and Jennifer left to the Viridian city battle club, where Sarah led the novice battlers in another day of training. Sarah was watching a match when she saw the two of them pass by, and ran up to Jennifer.

            “Jennifer! Are you done with your gym battle? How did you do? Do you have a shiny new badge to show me?”

            Jennifer glanced at Brock for a split second and then sighed. “I got crushed. Brock is taking me in to the forest today and I’m going to get another Pokemon. We decided afterwards that Forrest was being a little too hasty in letting me challenge him.”

            “Oh, that’s too bad. Can I come with you? I’m not doing much else today, and I’d love to help you catch a Pokemon. With Team Rocket around, you need all the backup you can get.”

            Jennifer sighed. Sarah was great, but if she realized what was going on, she would want to come with her. Jennifer couldn’t risk anyone else in the equation here.

            “I’m sorry, but I think I’ll just go with Brock today. I’ll see you later, Sarah!”

            Sarah smiled and didn’t press the point. “Ok, see you later, I can’t wait to see what you catch! We’ll have to have another battle once you get another Pokemon.”

            Jennifer waved goodbye and looked down. She liked Sarah, and made a mental note to herself to make sure to revisit Pewter after a while. She didn’t really mind lying, but lying to a friend like this felt like a betrayal in a sense. She shook her head, keeping Sarah in her mind was going to get her unfocused and off the mission. She needed to be sharp today if she was going to get to Cerulean.

            “Hey, Jennifer, are you feeling ok?”

            Jennifer blinked a couple of times and looked at Brock, who was showing concern.

            “Oh, yeah, I’m all right. Just a bit nervous. Lets move.”

            Brock nodded and they soon lost sight of the viridian battle club. Jennifer got lost, and was relying on Brock to find the entrances to the tunnels that were supposedly beneath the city. With Brock as her guide, they got to where they needed to go without incident.

            “Now, Jennifer, this tunnel should lead you straight in to Mount Moon. Here, let me give you a map of the mountain. Look at it, you see where you need to go once you get there?”

            Jennifer studied the map. “All right, this shouldn’t be too difficult if I’m not spotted. Does Team Rocket know about these underground tunnels beneath Pewter?”

            Brock sighed. “I don’t know. Not many people do, and I’ve never heard any reports about team rocket scouting these tunnels, but it’s not impossible they have learned about them. Be careful and don’t assume you’re safe at any moment. The tunnel provides a straight route to mount moon, just head east from here, and don’t head up to the surface or make any turns until the tunnel ends.”

            Jennifer nodded. “Got it. I guess this is goodbye then. Thanks for your help, Brock, I couldn’t have gotten this far without you.”

            “Goodbye. Before you go, here’s my Steelix. Give it back to me when you get to Cerulean. He will protect you on your way. I’ll check this place again in five minutes. If you run in to trouble or decide against leaving in this way, make sure to wait here for me before you come up.”

            Jennifer smiled and took the poke-ball. “Thank you, I appreciate it. I’ll make sure to give this back to you later.”

            Brock waved goodbye and finally left the room. Jennifer sighed. She appreciated what Brock was trying to do, but at the same time… She placed the Steelix poke-ball on the ground and started running. This was her journey. Nobody was going to get hurt other than her.

            “Squirtle, come on out! We have a long journey ahead of us. Lets go!”

            Squirtle exited the poke-ball, and the two started running off, getting away from Pewter. Brock shouted out her name in the distance, and the race was on. Five minutes later, she heard a Steelix roar, but that wasn’t her concern anymore. She continued racing on to freedom as fast as she could, and eventually reached the end of the tunnel. She saw the exit, which was disguised on the ground near an entrance to Mount Moon. Seeing nobody observing the tunnel exit, she climbed out of the tunnel only and entered the mountain.

            “Huh, it’s a bit dark in here. Squirtle, we need to be careful we don’t trip on any Geodude arms.”

            A voice on the other side of the room laughed. “Hah, I swear they intentionally get in the way to troll people. What’s your name?”

            Jennifer sighed and glanced in that direction. “It’s Katie. What’s your name?”

            The figure headed closer to her and she sees a uniform come in to focus a little more. The figure is smiling and polite until she looked a bit closer at Jennifer. Then she grinned evily.

            “Are you sure your name is Katie? Lets go, Ekans. Glare!”

            Jennifer felt in shock as the Ekans looked in to her eyes, and suddenly she couldn't move. “S… Squirtle! Run!”

            The Rocket grunt laughed happily.

            “Well then, you’re a nice surprise. I didn’t expect you to be here today. Ekans, deal with that Squirtle while I have a nice little chat with our new prisoner here. I guess sometimes the boring assignments are the most rewarding. It’s nothing personal Jennifer, but it’s time for you to go back home.”
           

End of Chapter 7

 

To be continued in Chapter 8: A New Friend

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Upon reading my book, it will eventually become apparent that this universe is not exactly like any canon pokemon universe or twitchverse. This universe is my hybrid universe that combines the game, the anime, and the movies (the parts I like about all of them), and here is the timeline for it.

           

The Game/Anime Unified Pokemon Timeline

 

These dates are going to be changed eventually to fit the pokemon universe calendar. Right now I am concerned with relative dates though, as that is all that matters with the story.

 

April 1987: Ash is born

 

April 1994: Zack is born

 

December 1995: Jennifer is born

 

April 1997: Ash leaves on his adventure

 

January 1999: Ash starts journey in the Orange Islands

 

July 1999: Mewtwo creates clones in what looks like an attempt to dominate the world, but is stopped by Ash before his plans seriously effect everything.

 

October 1999: Ash journeys in Johto

 

July 2000: Power of One.  Disturb not the harmony of fire, ice or lightning, lest these titans wreak destruction upon the world in which they clash. Though the water's great guardian shall arise to quell the fighting, alone its song will fail, and thus the earth shall turn to ash. O Chosen One, into thine hands bring together all three. Their treasures combined tame the Beast of the Sea.

The Earth shall turn to ash is one of the best puns this series has ever produced.

 

April 2001: A girl named Molly accidentally activates a bunch of unknown, and temporarily becomes a demigod in her own version of reality. Ash stops the unknown from warping reality, and the unknown return to wherever they came from.

 

October 2002: Celebi: Voice of the Forest. Not all that much happens. The Masked Marauder has dark balls from somewhere, but the person who created them got arrested soon afterwards, and the secret to making one never left his hands.

 

November 2003: Ash starts his journey in Hoenn

 

April 2004: Red starts his journey in Kanto. Blue is not Professor Oak’s grandson, but also starts his adventure. Forrest is the gym leader of Pewter City, not Brock, but otherwise the events of the game happen the same way.

 

January 2005: First major contact with extraterrestrial life.

 

September 2006: Ash starts his journey in Sinnoh

 

November 2006: Red defeats Giovanni to earn his eighth gym badge after stopping Team Rocket several other times. Giovanni decides to fold Team Rocket and starts intensive training.

 

June 2007: Gold starts his journey in Johto

 

June 2007: The Johto league and Kanto league tournaments have their first unified region tournament. This is the first in a series of moves that bring the regions closer together. Red beats Blue in the finals to win this tournament, creating the perception that Kanto region trainers are stronger than Johto region trainers. Statistics from the tournament loosely support this perception, but a lot of the difference was likely due to chance. After this tournament, Red becomes reclusive, often hanging out in Mount Silver.

 

July 2007: Blue becomes the new leader of the Viridian City gym.

 

February 2008: The Rise of Darkrai. Time and space get seriously damaged when Palkia and Dialga meet and start fighting. Ash saves the day, and the day/night cycle.

 

September 2008: Cinnabar Island has a volcanic eruption. Blaine relocates the gym temporarily to the Seafoam Islands.

 

October 2008: Former Team Rocket executives try to revive Team Rocket, but Gold and Lance manage to stop them together

 

March 2009: Giratina and the Sky Warrior. Giratina starts trying to attack Dialga.

 

November 2009: Arceus and the Jewel of Life. Arceus wakes up and almost destroys everything. Giratina stops attacking Dialga, and time/space and the pokemon world heal.

 

January 2009: Ghetstis forms Team Plasma after years of planning out his moves.

 

September 2010: Ash starts his journey in Kalos and never goes to Unova.

 

December 2010: Giovanni returns and revives Team Rocket. At the moment it is unclear why he returned, but Team Rocket quickly returns to prominence

 

March 2010: Team Plasma takes over Unova, but a hero rises up and defeats N in a battle between the two legendary pokemon. Ghetsis escapes and becomes an insane man without a plan. The hero joins Reshiram and leaves the region, while N takes Zekrom and becomes a recluse. Technically, with Reshiram, the hero is the new Unova Pokemon league champion, but since she and N do not want the post as champion, Alder takes up the position again, thoroughly embarrassed about it all.

 

January 2011: Iris defeats Alder and becomes the new Unova Pokemon league champion.

 

August 2011: The new Team Plasma, under Ghetsis and Colress, control Kyurem-B, but then loses to a trainer from Aspertia City.

 

April 2012: Zack and Jennifer start their Pokemon adventure (book begins)

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