Part 182: Hinnom - Turn 72
Turn 72
Ladies and gentlemen of the readership, we are pleased to have the opportunity to speak to you today. We're quite sorry that our colleague couldn't make it, but hope that you'll appreciate the hard work and real breadth of knowledge that this presentation represents. King Hippomnomnomnom looks forward to many years of future support as he guides our nation through this difficult time. He firmly believes that this is the perfect time for a strategic acquisition and the recent insolvency of Smaug Worldwide Holdings provides a perfect opportunity to acquire the assets of one of our competitors without also taking on their significant liabilities. So, without further ado, let's take a quick look an where we are in the proceedings.
HINNOM BANKRUPTCY COURT
SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF THE SWAMP OF ETHEREAL FROGS
---------------------------------------------------------------x
: In re: Chapter 11 Case No.
: SMAUG WORLDWIDE HOLDINGS, et al.,
:09-50026 (REG)
: Debtors.
: (Jointly Administered)
:
---------------------------------------------------------------x
ORDER (I) AUTHORIZING SALE OF ASSETS PURSUANT TO AMENDED AND RESTATED MASTER SALE AND PURCHASE AGREEMENT WITH NEWMICTCO, INC., A HINNOM TREASURY-SPONSORED PURCHASER; (II) AUTHORIZING ASSUMPTION AND ASSIGNMENT OF CERTAIN EXECUTORY CONTRACTS MAGICAL ITEMS AND GEMS AND UNEXPIRED LEASES IN CONNECTION WITH THE SALE; AND (III) GRANTING RELATED RELIEF
Upon the motion, dated Late Fall, Year 7 (the “Motion”), of Smaug Worldwide Holdings (“Mictlan”) and its affiliated and subsidiary debtors, provinces and serfs, as debtors in possession (collectively, the “Debtors”), pursuant to sections 105, 363, and 365 of title 11, Hippomnomnomnomnomian Code (the “Bankruptcy Code”) and Rules 2002, 6004, and 6006 of the King Hippomnomnomnom's Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure (the “Bankruptcy Rules”) for, among other things, entry of an order authorizing and approving (A) that certain Amended and Restated Master Sale and Purchase Agreement, dated as of Late Summer, Year 7, by and among Mictlan and its Debtor subsidiaries (collectively, the “Sellers”) and NEWMICTCO, Inc., as successor in interest to Ozelotl Acquisition Holdings LLC (the “Purchaser”), a purchaser sponsored by the Hinnom Department of the Monies (the "Hinnom Treasury”), together with all related documents and agreements as well as all exhibits, schedules, gems, items, blood slaves and addenda thereto (as amended, the “MPA”), a copy of which is annexed hereto as Exhibit “A” (excluding the exhibits and schedules thereto which for the purpose hereof shall include such additional materials as may be impracticable to include hereto by dint of being weeping virgins or flaming swords or other sundry and magical powers or items, as applicable); (B) the sale of the Purchased Assets[FN1] to the Purchaser free and clear of liens, claims, encumbrances, and interests (other than Permitted Encumbrances), including rights or claims based on any successor or transferee liability or right of conquest; (C) the assumption and assignment of the Assumable Executory Contracts; (D) the establishment of certain Cure Amounts to be paid in full to the orphans of Hinnom whose parents were killed in the horrible, unprecedented and undeserved aggression of the Zmeywaffe attacks; and (E) the United Forges of Histyra Workers Retiree Settlement Agreement (as defined below); and the Court having jurisdiction granted by the grace of King Hippomnomnomnom to consider the Motion of the ocean and the relief requested therein in accordance with 28 H.C. §§ 157 and 1334 and the Standing Order M-61 Referring to Bankruptcy Judges for the Southern District of The Swamp of Ethereal Frogs of Any and All Proceedings Under Title 11, dated Early Winter, Year 2 (PRESIDENT WILLIAM TAFT, Acting C.J.); and consideration of the Motion and the relief requested therein being a core proceeding pursuant to 28 H.C. § 157(b); and venue being proper before this Court pursuant to 28 H.C. §§ 1408 and 1409 and the personal direction of King Hippomnomnomnom and woe betide any who so violate such direction and may their souls be consigned to the inferno forevermore; and due and proper notice of the Motion having been provided in accordance with this Court’s Order, dated Mid-Summer, Year 7 (the “Sale Procedures Order”), and it appearing that no other or further notice need be provided to either Sauromatia or Pangea or to their rulers President Skroob and Mary Schapiro respectively; and a hearing having been held in a secret kangaroo court on Turn 65 through Turn 69, Year 6 to consider the relief requested in the Motion (the “Sale Hearing”); and upon the record of the Sale Hearing, including all affidavits and declarations submitted in connection therewith excepting those that were eaten accidentally by still fuck the ocean when he was just a baby and didn't know any better, and all of the proceedings had before the Court; and the Court having reviewed the Motion and all the silly pointless objections thereto that Sauromatia or Pangea would have filed if they had any idea this was happening (the “Objections”) and found and determined that the relief sought in the Motion is necessary to avoid immediate and irreparable harm to the Debtors and their estates, or to King Hippomnomnomnom's interest therein, as contemplated by King Hippomnomnomnom and promulgated forthwith pursuant to Bankruptcy Rule 6003 and is in the best interests of the Debtors, their estates and creditors, and other parties in interest like King Hippomnomnomnom and that the legal and factual bases set forth in the Motion establish just cause or certify in writing King Hippomnomnomnom's desire therefore for the relief granted herein; and after due deliberation and sufficient cause appearing therefor...
Footnotes:
1 Capitalized terms used herein and not otherwise defined shall have the meanings ascribed to such terms in the Motion or the MPA, or such meanings as King Hippomnomnomnom in his some discretion shall reasonably assign.
Excerpt, Mictlan Enterprises Group 363 Asset Sale
Well, I hope you all enjoyed that! As you can see from the first slide here... Oh dear. My colleague is outside with a fire brand and looks quite angry. Please excuse me for a moment.
Well, now that our legal department has had their say, let's get back to the presentation! Smaug Worldwide Holdings has begun the asset transfer from Smaug OpCo to Hinnom HoldCo. I won't bore you with the details like some of my colleagues, but I did want to let you know that King Hippomnomnomnom's latest plan, like all of his plans, is going exactly, ah, according to plan.
Blood hunting is at 136 and summons this turn were a demon lord, a Grigori, three mechanical giants, a mechanical men and a cyclops.
Research in Alteration is complete. When scholars look back they will mark this day as the day King Hinnomnomnomnom finally unlocked all of the secrets of this powerful school. And then promptly did nothing with them.
This is a wonderful spell. One of the absolute best around, and irony or death (and any Pan player) should be rushing it. It jacks up protection and gives 50% fire resist for your entire army. Perfect for changing squishy Revelers and Maenads into an unstoppable horde of killers (until the enemy brings electric or cold damage).
This does the same but with magic resistance instead of fire resistance. Sadly, the army of [___] spells do not stack.
As you can see, at level 9, spells have some serious firepower. They're covering the whole battlefield with protective enchantments or binding all magic beings on it to your service. This is magic resistance negates easily so it's a check at MR +4, but it is still the be-all, end-all of kryptonite as far as my mechanical men and giants and iron dragons go. If someone else brings this in a fight with a large group of mechanical men I'm fucked.
When you were little you wanted to be Pantokrator. Maybe your dad beat up your mom, or your little sister died in a boating accident or you were just always a tiny bit different and kids picked on you for it. Whatever it was, you dreamed of being able to change things. Of being able to reach out with your will (and the modest sum of 100 pearls) and twist reality. To change the basic fabric of the universe. Whether it was girls, money or power, you knew that you wanted. Now that you're grown up you know this is how you get it. You're the Pantokrator. What do you wish for?
This is another one of the "I win" globals. It's not quite as good as Forge of the Ancients or Arcane Nexus, but it basically kills income across the world (but not blood hunting!) and makes every battle fought under darkness (which, conveniently, demons can see just fine in). It turns send lesser horror into an absolute murderfest, and makes demons and undead relatively much better. There's a reason TheDemon casts darkness every fight. Now imagine if it was automatically cast every fight. Also that he got off his island and is a significant lategame power.
These are the Ascension spells. Awesome Endgame adds these in. They allow you to bring back a dead hero as one of three pretender chassis. A moloch, a virtue or a dracoliche. Remember way back when, when we voted on door number one or door number two? This is what we were voting on. I'm going to try to cast one of these spells (for you, all for you) because they are awesome. Unfortunately they 1. Are absurdly overcosted in this version of AE, 2. Don't work on giants and 3. Don't work on flyers. So it's going to take some serious effort to cast one of them.
The Goat Sun slowly rolled along. His cloven hooves sending up small puffs of red dirt with each step. The desert stretched out before him. Empty. Desolate. This was his land. And he was this land. He did not think as he walked. He only knew. Rolling implacably onward, devils scattered or bowed as he passed. He cared not. Let them play at scheming with the Arch Devils. He was The Goat Sun. He was a Demon Lord. In the end, everything would return to the red dust of the desert and he would continue to roll along. Eons ago the Pantokrator had come to him. Begging a favor. But the Pantokrator was gone now. There was an upstart. A mere boy. The boy was his father's son and his father was persuasive and wise. The boy had called and Buer had come. For the first time, another had bound him and he had rolled. He did not fear the desolation of his desert. He did not fear the boy's uncle, trapped in the center of his desert for thousands of years. Bound there by the Pantokrator. But he was afraid of the boy. The boy who wanted his uncle back. And so he rolled on.
Shamshiel is another of the Grigori. Like his brothers he gets ?(F)4S4B4H3, immunity to fire, lightning and poison, fear, flying, blood vengeance, fortune teller, stealth, corruption and is sacred. In short, he is a bad motherfucker.
Belphegor gathered the gamers around him. His voice rose to a crescendo "and it will be a LAN party such as the world has never known! QuakeCon itself will tremble before us! Now, let us play." The 150 gamers let out a rousing cheer as they logged in. The clatter of W-A-S-D and clicking mouses blended with the furious whispers of the gamers and the hum of their power supply units. As they played, the floor became covered in a carpet of Twinkie wrappers, empty pizza boxes and red bull cans. The smell grew slowly worse. After five days, one of the gamers tried to stand. He was sure someone was hacking and he had had enough. With some surprise he found he couldn't move his hands. No matter how hard he tried his fingers kept clicking the mouse. He respawned again and killed himself. Still nothing. With a sense of growing panic he let out a shriek. "Someone is hacking!" A few other gamers tried to turn to look at him but found themselves unable to move their heads. Panicked murmurs bubbled up above the sound of the keyboards. Frantically, the gamer strained, trying to break whatever bound him. "Hacks! Someone is hacking!" Underneath all the noise, a low rumble began to rise. "ah ha! Ah ha ha ha! Yes, yes I am you n00b. I'm always hacking!" Belphegor's laugh drowned out the frantic cries of the gamers as they continued to play.
This is the last of the Demon Lords and my personal favorite in AE. He has great attack skill, can cast phoenix pyre and personal regen in battle or switch to slinging fire or providing blood buffs for a whole army, he can fly, causes fear and is immune to fire and poison, is stealthy and, like the Grigori, can corrupt enemy commanders. That generally ends in an assassination, but with F7N7B7 he has a ton of options from just banishing the enemy commander to the inferno to casting storm of thorns at a commander with a bodyguard to just flying over and beating the shit out of them. He's also a nice source of nature globals if you need to cast any. Unfortunately, like all the other demon lords he's fairly hamstrung by his lack of slots. It's not as bad as Buer, but Belial is still missing his chest and feet slots. Because he has a giant face on his junk and another little one on each knee.
After years of neglect, the once-great city of Mictlan has fallen from its place as one of the leading lights of the world. Pak-Ur, an ettin mercenary strode up to the gates and posted the Hinnom court's 363 enforcement order. The people of Mictlan did not pause from their daily grind to acknowledge their new lord. Thuella's heart grew heavy. She had much work to do here and little time to do it but she knew that with King Hippomnomnomnom's loving guidance the city would be great once more.
In Troll Peaks, Zmeythansa Air Competitor circled the runway once before landing on top of three feebleminded old men. Their corpses were adorned with the spoils of Mictlan's golden age and the Zmey cackled as it placed one of their caps jauntily atop its head.
Zmeythansa Air Competitor is heading out into what could be considered an act of aggression. It's usually frowned upon to take provinces from your allies and I'm definitely pushing it. But, irony or death is certainly not going to be able to hold this province and after he stole Earth Blood Deep Well I have quite a bit of wiggle room. I'm overtaxing and patrolling here to kill off the remaining population because there's a silver mine. At 0 pop this province is worth 120 gold/turn. At 2k pop, significantly less. I mean, wait! King Hippomnomnomnomnom is evacuating the populace and replacing the miners with mechanical men because of the environmental hazards the silver mine poses to the populace and the loyal workers.
Shamshiel and Belial both head north to the front while Buer, the kraken and Belphegor all blood hunt.
In Histyra, Semyaza forges a jade knife for PIMP ROBES to push dominion from T'ien Ch'i. And, far more importantly, I finally forge my first Amulet of the Fish!
Jade knives allow a priest to sacrifice two more slaves than they could before. They're great for blood sacrifice nations. Sadly, when PIMP ROBES was mummified he lost the bonus to sacrificing that Melqarts get (sort of an innate jade knife) so he needs a little help. One of the big mods, CBM, makes the jade knife unique. That is a silly decision based on its creators disliking blood because they are all big babbies.
In games with experienced players, blood sacrifice just isn't a viable strategy in and of itself. It's quite useful, as we've seen from Pan and Mictlan here, to push dominion but as a stand alone strategy it just doesn't work. That said, it's fantastic in newbie games. 
Checking in on the Smaug Worldwide Holdings, we can see there are still some legacy liabilities that are being addressed in the case. I have faith in the Hinnom Court system. Don't you?
