When 16 Hibs can take all the Alb keeps, take Excal AND hold it between the Hib relic making it's way to Dun Lamfhota, then bug off with the remaining 2 strength relics, and Albion needs 200 people to accomplish the same thing, you'll forgive me if I dont feel too sorry for the hibs. Albs didnt bother to come help defend their frontier that night. Mids and Hibs show up in force to defend their RKs when they get hit. So yes, against 100 defenders at a RK, you NEED 200 attackers, especially when the terrain has you fighting an uphill battle, something you do not need to do, say, when attacking Myrd.
I played Mid for a while on MLF, needed a break from Zergalot, erm Lancellot. And let me tell you, I'd trade my cleric's BOF for my healer's instant stun any day. Funny thing is, Mids there also complained about alb SOS and BoF. Hibs have their group purge, which is one of the best "toys", to use your term, around. Each realm has its own little toys. If my sorcerer had the same options with his pet, as, say, my spiritmaster on MLF has (pet intercepts hits for example), or if the only aoe insta stun available to Albion didnt reside high on the cleric spec smite line... It's harder to build a balanced group on Albion, compared to Hib or Mid, with the way the different skills and abilities are spread in Albion, no news there.
Also, it is much easier to get your RP count grow and your RR rise when you are in the underdog realm. A balanced group of skilled or FOTM or "built to win" players will usually just farm a zerg of low RR PUGs(shall we say one group of LA farming 3+ PUGs of Albs for the sake of argument) And we can all agree that a group of RR 7 will knock the heck out of a group of RR 3-4 any day. Because Albion population is so big, the RPs are spread very thin in most cases, compared to Hib and Mid. Zerg mentality in Alb will guarantee better individual RPs for the ones that do not zerg. Or the ones that kill the zerg.
That's the other side of the coin you conveniently ignore.
Albion zerg broke your doors once. TNO broke the doors of most if not all of Albion keeps for every night for a while, and ended their night's fun after farming the few PUGs that are still awake and that try to take them on by beating on Excal.
Remember the first night TNO busted 2 doors in Excal and got stopped on door 3, and afterwards said "we didnt want the relics, we just opened the doors for the Mids hoping they'd come get them", or something to that effect... Mind telling me how THAT is different from Albs breaking down Hib RK doors ? If you want to take the relics, fine. If you want to just make the other realm pay for new doors, with all due respect, there is NOTHING different between that raid the Hibs whine about to this day, and what present day Hibs did not so long ago. And no, I'm not talking about the night they TOOK the relics. So again, we have the famous double standard rear its ugly head.
As for Hibs quitting, let me tell you that my will to start my playing day (timezone is EST + 7) by retaking 4-5 keeps isn't my idea of fun. But try as I might, I can't seem to convince enough Albs to go and RvR in Hadrian's Wall instead of emain. Stopping Hibs there = RPs AND no need to retake keeps is a hard concept for me to explain apparently. But I did not whine constantly about it, nor did I quit the game as a result. Right now? Enjoy all the keeps for all I care, it's kinda nice knowing we do not have to rush to Excal. There is a downside. People get tired of getting farmed when they run 1 group vs 3 groups attacking the alb keeps nightly, especially when those groups always seem to be able to find your 1 group whereever you are. The result is, the 3 groups dont get anyone to play with on OUR end after a while. Sort of like YOUR argument from the Hib side. Perhaps some Albs took Cyce at his word "we dont want the strength relics" ?
If indeed AWC made a decision not to bother defending the relics at all, it's unfortunate. But the night the hibs got the relics, Gheris WAS out there leading a force of Albs, till he had to hit the sack. Excal was hit later.
Hibs deserved the relics that night, both because of the very well gameplay employed by TNO that night and because majority of Albs (of those that were online) couldnt be bothered to come and defend. With zero uber guards at the RK, 3-5 Albs at excal defending against 2 groups of attackers, and the albs rushing to defend excal moving off in 1-3s only to get killed there, the result was obvious.
I did a /who 50 when the relic keep was hit, we had 102 level 50s online.
Oh yes, I havent been in Ice Dragons or in AWC since late October 2003. So the Ice Dragons hate argument, which is in itself uncalled for, can hardly apply to my post.
