Twilight Struggle

Chapters

Setup: How the Heck do we Play This?
Turn 1: Hit the Ground Stumbling
Turn 2: Raise this Barn!
Turn 3: Take it Back!
Turn 5: Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You...
Turn 6: Don't Panic!
Turn 7: Feast in the Middle East
Turn 8: Distraction
Turn 9: Cleanup on Isle Nine
Turn 10: The Great and Powerful
Final Scoring: A Winrar is You!
Cleaning Up: Sweeping it Under the Rug
Turn 4: Not in My Backyard!

Setup: How the Heck do we Play This?

Author's Note

This whole thing was a writing experiment for me, to see if I could make a feasible story out of playing a board game. I'm happy with the result, but I'm well aware that it's far from perfect.

This first chapter is more of an introduction, which explains the basic rules of the board game 'Twilight Struggle,' a game about the Cold War which will be the focus of the story. It's a little boring, but still a worthwhile read, even if you already know the rules. I've also made a few changes, the most notable of which is adding another 'China Card' in place of Russia.

Challenge yourself and see if you can trudge through it. Victory for Twilight and Spike isn't certain, but absurd antics are. This took about a week to write, and I sure hope it's worth reading.

P.S: The map that they're using is a [heavily] modified version of this one where, among other things, Nigeria and the Ivory Coast have been merged into a totalitarian communist superpower shithole, Russia and China are now battleground countries, and all of the leaders' faces were replaced with pictures of ponies. I designed the map myself, but FimFiction won't let me upload it as the cover photo, probably because it's too big.
Original Map
Ponified Version

Setup: How the Heck do we Play This?

--Setup: How the Heck do we Play This?--

“Liberty Prime is Online! All systems Nominal!”

Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria…

…there came an era when the ideals of friendship gave way to greed, selfishness, paranoia, and a jealous reaping of dwindling space and natural resources. Then Discord was defeated and everything turned back to normal. Then there came another era in which the ideals of friendship gave way to greed, selfishness, paranoia, and a jealous reaping of dwindling space and natural resources. But this time Discord wasn’t responsible, and it lasted much, much, much longer than the Discord era, and it pretty much couldn’t be stopped. Lands took up arms against their neighbors, (heh, heh, ‘neigh’ bors. Ahhh, too much…) the end of the world occurred much as we had predicted, abyss of balefire and dark magic, blah, blah, blah, 99.99% of the ponies died, in ~~vault 101~~ stable 2 nopony ever enters and nopony ever leaves, the republic and the legion kill each other over a stupid water chip, Littlepip ate a kebab of Iguana bits, you get the point.

…But all was not lost. At least, not yet. For, although negotiations between the two powers broke down quickly in universe 4.1-S02-P, the ponies and zebras in alternate universe 4.3-S04-P were far more cautious and went to greater lengths to avoid war altogether. They were also more calculating and had gone ahead and developed ‘megaspell’ MLP nukes twenty years earlier than their 4.1-S02-P counterparts. Our story begins when tensions were high between the two nations, but they were not yet trying to squeeze the piss out of each other on the (conventional) battlefield.

“Yo, Twilight!” said Princess Celestia as she barged into Twilight Sparkle’s brand-spankin’-new season 4 alicorn friendship princess castle in Ponyville one bright and sunny pre-war morning.

“Aaagghhh!” screamed Twilight in semi-frustration but mostly surprise the way ponies do when they get snuck up on.

“P-P-Princess Celestia?” Twilight stammered. “I didn’t know you were coming here to Ponyville.”

“Well, I’m here now” said Princess Celestia. “I didn’t tell you because I wanted it to be a surprise!”

“Well….I don’t really like surprises,” said Twilight. “I like things nice and orderly.”

“And that’s why you’ll like this new job so much!” said Princess Celestia. “Because it’ll pretty much involve you doing the same things over and over again for the next ten years.”

“Ten years?” asked Twilight incredulously. “Is this job going to take up a lot of my time? Because, well, I hate to complain, but between all of my studying and my friendship princess stuff, I don’t have much time for anything else.”

“Oh, it will take all of your time,” said Princess Celestia. “All of it. Don’t worry, though. It will go by quickly. And besides, now that you’re an alicorn princess, you’ll have all the time in the world since you’re virtually immortal.”

“Alright,” said Twilight. “So… what’s this job you want me to do?”

“Well,” began Princess Celestia, “You know how tensions are heating up between Equestria and the big, bad Zebra Empire?”

“Yeah…” said Twilight.

“I’ve been thinking,” continued Princess Celestia, “That, in order to better steer Equestria through this crisis, that Princess Luna should reorganize the government.”

“What?” exclaimed Twilight, shocked. “You mean… you want Princess Luna to take power and then create six new ministries, five of which become the tools used to mold Equestria into a fascist dictatorship and living hell???”

“Nah,” said Princess Celestia with a downward flick of her hoof. “I’m not going that far. All I’m doing is making a few minor reorganizational changes and forming a new Ministry of Homeland Security, granting more power to the already nearly omnipotent monarchy, and turning our budgetary surplus into a deficit. You know, George Bush stuff.”

“Ahhh,” said Twilight in agreement. “I get it. So… what’s this got to do with me?”

“I need somepony to handle all of the diplomacy stuff for me,” said Princess Celestia. “And since you’re the Princess of Friendship, I figured it’s within your job description. I don’t know how I survived for a thousand years without appointing a foreign minister, but what the hey. You’re stuck with it now.”

“So do I have to do what Hillary Clinton did?” asked Twilight.

“Yes. You’re now Equestria’s version of Hillary Clinton,” said Princess Celestia. “Or John Kerry. Or Condoleezza Rice, or Colin Powell, or Madeleine Albright, or whoever you want to be. It might help though if you tried to act like Henry Kissinger or Dean Rusk…. And by the way, please don’t pull a William Seward. We don’t need any more land.”

“Alright!” cried Twilight with delight. “I’m ready! First of all, do we have any diplomatic compounds in dangerous places that I can inadequately defend? And are there any other mares that Flash Sentry can cheat on while I’m away?”

“You’ll have to figure that out for yourself,” said Princess Celestia. “I’m sure you’ll do fine. In the meantime, while you’re hauled up in this castle trying to manage all of Equestria’s world affairs on your own, I’m going to abdicate my crown and go on an extended vacation until all this blows over. Have fun!”

Then Princess Celestia began trotting towards the door.

“Wait!!!” cried Twilight. “But how am I supposed to manage all of Equestria’s foreign relations from right here? And on my own? That’s impossible!”

Princess Celestia stopped mid-trot and came back over to Twilight.

“Oh, I almost forgot!” said Princess Celestia.

Princess Celestia did some magic and suddenly a map of the world appeared on Twilight’s table. The map contained most of the important countries in the world, as well as trackers for all the important metrics that she would need to keep track of in the race against communism zebra-ism. Appearing next to it were three decks of cards, and two piles of small cardboard squares.

“This high-tech management software will allow you to manage world events from the comfort of your own home,” said Princess Celestia. “I’ll leave the help notifications on since it’s your first time. I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got to go now. Bye!”

And with that she was gone. She might have ran out, or maybe she teleported, but as the great Kkat once said, ‘the details were pointless.’ All that mattered now was that Princess Celestia was gone and Twilight had to balance the fate of the world all by herself. She peered over the board, trying to make sense of it, but was overwhelmed by its infinitely complex nature.

“Oh, no!” said Twilight. “I can’t seem to make heads or tails of this map! I wish one of my friends was here to help me!”

Suddenly, Spike’s head appeared in the upper right hoof corner of Twilight’s vision, as if he was some sort of tutorial in a strategy game.
“Spike?” asked Twilight. “What are you doing here?”

“You said you needed help,” said Spike. “And that’s what I’m here for!”

“But I said I wanted help from one of my friends!” whined Twilight.

Spike glared at her.

“Are you saying that I’m not one of your friends?” asked Spike.

“No, I’m not saying that…” said Twilight, “but I was thinking somepony like Pinkie, or Rarity, or—“

“I’m the new Rainbow Dash,” interrupted Spike, “In case you forgot.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “Rainbow Dash will do. Speaking of Rainbow Dash, where is she?”

“I don’t know,” said Spike. “But that’s not what I’m here for. I’m here to help you understand this game.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “Walk me through it.”

“The first thing we’ve got here is the map,” began Spike. “Which shows all the countries in the world. These countries are divided into six continents, two of which are further divided into sub-continents. The six continents are as follows:”

“Primus is a continent east of Equestria, on the other side of the ocean,” continued Spike. “It’s full of old buildings and rich snobby ponies, like Canterlot, but bigger. It’s the most important region in the game because it’s the richest, and if you lose the region, then you lose the game. Also, Primus is divided into two sub-regions, East and West. Besides the West being richer and more important than the East, some events will only affect one of these sub-regions. Everything making sense so far?”

“Yeah,” said Twilight. “Keep going.”

“Ok,” said Spike. “Anyway, the second most important continent is Kadur, on the far eastern end of the map. It’s kind of poor, but it’s important because there are a lot of people there. There is one sub-region, Southeast Kadur, which is affected by certain events and scored differently.”

“Before we move on, there is something you should be aware of in Primus and Kadur,” said Spike. “In Eastern Primus and non-Southeast Kadur, there are two large countries, the Changeling Kingdom and The Three Kingdoms. Both of these countries are called ‘Card Countries’ because there they both have cards associated with them that make it easier to do stuff in their respective regions. These are very important battleground regions, so you should try to keep influence over at least one of them.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “I’ll make a mental note of that. Continue.”

“Next, near the center of the map, we have Centralia,” continued Spike. “Centralia is a poor and deserty place with lots of explosions, but it’s important because it has oil. Next comes Emerelda, which is really poor and full of mosquitoes and stuff. That’s where the zebras live, so they have a lot of power there (which is probably the reason why they’re so poor), but there are also a lot of other countries that could easily be turned against them. West of Emerelda is Prekt, which is jungly and poor, and generally a place that nopony really cares about. The last continent is Solace, just to the north of Prekt and immediately south of Equestria. It’s also poor and jungly, but it’s kind of important to you because it’s so close to Equestria. Don’t let the Zebras take control of it, or else Equestria will be in some really big trouble.”

“Most of what you’ll be doing for the next ten years is fighting over control of the world’s countries,” said Spike. “You won’t be invading them directly because this is a cold war, but you can bribe their leaders and launch coups against governments you don’t like. What you’re essentially is trying to gain enough influence so you can easily manipulate each country into doing what you want, or in a nutshell, making friends.”

“Great!” said Twilight. “I’m great at making friends! Through both kindness and coercion!”

“That’s the spirit!” said Spike. “But keep in mind that the zebras are also trying to do the same. It’s kind of like Equestria Girls all over again, except that this time Sunset Shimmer doesn't have such incompetent assistants. And that we’re dealing with people’s lives here, and not just some stupid homecoming dance.”

“It wasn't just an ordinary homecoming!” protested Twilight. “She took my crown!”

“And the zebras will incinerate it if you fail,” said Spike. “Pay attention. We still have stuff to cover. Now then, where was I? Oh, yeah! So, the game works by playing cards. At the beginning of each turn, you will be dealt some cards, and then you will be dealt your cards, and then you will have to play one of them at the same time as your opponent. Then you and the zebras will take turns playing cards. Cards may be played in one of two ways: as events, or as operations points. If played as events, the event on the card is carried out. If played as operations points, you will have the number of points in the upper left hoof corner of the card to ‘make friends’ with. Note that the events on most cards are associated with either Equestria or Zebrica. If you play a card with an event associated with Zebrica for operations points, the event still occurs.”

“At the end of each turn, the amount of ‘Friendship’ operations you carry out will be compared to the current DEFCON number. If you fail to carry out the required ‘Friendship’ operations, you will be docked one victory point per operation. The player with the most victory points at the end wins.”

“What’s this ‘Space Race’ track for?” asked Twilight, eyeing the Space Race track in the upper right-hoof corner of the board.
“Ah, yes, the Space Race track,” said Spike. “The space race track is another competition in which you and the zebras will be playing against. Doing better in the space race can give you bonuses that can help you in the Twilight Struggle. To advance in the space race, you must spend Operations points and roll a die to see if your endeavor is successful.”

“Gotcha,” said Twilight, comprehendingly.

“And one last thing,” said Spike. “The most important thing on the gameboard is the DEFCON status. The DEFCON status tells us how close we are to getting in an MLP equivalent of a global thermonuclear war. It starts at ‘5,’ but can be changed by the actions of ourselves and our zebra counterparts. If it gets all the way down to ‘1,’ then all of us will be dead. So don’t let it do that, ok?”
“Ok!” said Twilight. “Now can we start?”

“Why, of course,” said Spike. “Draw eight cards from the deck.”

Twilight drew eight cards from the deck.

“Now you need to place your influence markers,” said Spike. “These represent the countries you already have good relations with. Most of these will be pre-determined, but you have seven points you can spend freely in any country in Western Primus. Be careful, though. The friends you choose today might change the lives of millions tomorrow.”

“Okay, okay,” said Twilight dismissively. “Just let me place my influence markers now.”

“Ok,” said Spike, “Go ahead.”

“Hmmm…” said Twilight as she glanced over the map.

Her eyes were set upon the Lost Unicorn Kingdom, which was split between east and west.

“The zebras already have two influence points there, so I think I’ll place two points to match them.”

“Five points left,” informed Spike.

“Ok,” said Twilight. “It’s just hard because there are so many countries.”

“The names with a blue background are battleground countries,” hinted Spike. “They’re more important for scoring.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “There are four battleground countries in Western Primus, and I have five points left. I think I’ll place two points in North Griffonia and one in Prance. The Zebras’ three points in Reiterland concern me, so I think I’ll place my last remaining two points there.”

“You now have control over North Griffonia,” announced Spike. “The Zebras control Reiterland in Primus and North Chollima in Kadur.”

“How do I know when I control a country?” asked Twilight.

“You control a country if you have influence points equal to the stability number – the number next to the country’s name—and more points in the country than your opponent.”

“You could have told me that earlier,” said Twilight.

“You didn’t ask,” said Spike.

“Well…” said Twilight, “Is that it? Am I all set up? And is there anything else I need to know before my first turn?”

“Nope,” said Spike. “You are now ready to begin turn one.”

Turn 1: Hit the Ground Stumbling

Author's Note

If you want to add some flavor, use this as background music during the radio broadcasts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssZwjjEeWyQ

Turn 1: Hit the Ground Stumbling

--Turn 1: Hit the Ground Stumbling--
“Mission: The Destruction of any and all Chinese Communists!”

“Because grass ain’t enough, and a bush is too low. It’s me, Tree Dog!” said the voice of a green Fluttershy recolor over the radio.

“Got lots of stuff goin’ on in Pre-Apocalyptia these days. How’s everypony doing? Here’s some of the latest news:”

“Equestria’s off to a bad start in this whole cold war thing,” lamented Tree Dog. “The zebras have just instigated a full-on revolution in the former Prench colony of Vietmane. Not only have they just taken control of Vietmane, they’ll now be getting a bonus to all operations in Southeast Kadur for the remainder of the year.”

“And that’s not all, folks!” continued Tree Dog. “The Equestrians ain’t got it good in Primus, either. The Kingdom of Warclaw has just announced an anti-Equestrian military alliance with their fellow Eastern Primians. And of all the countries that could have possibly joined, look who’s been elected this year’s chair! The Lost Unicorn Kingdom! This deals a huge blow to the relations that Equestria’s new foreign minister, the esteemed Princess Twilight Sparkle, has been trying to build in that region. Until next time, children! This is Tree Dog! Achoo! And now, some music…”

Twilight flicked off the radio and pondered over her map.

“Twilight, what in the hay was that for?” asked Spike furiously. “Playing ‘Warclaw Pact’ as your headline event? Why???”

“It enables play of FATO,” said Twilight. “And besides, I didn’t have much influence in Eastern Primus anyway.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to let the zebras remove your influence in the Lost Kingdom,” argued Spike.

“I didn’t realize that I got to choose the countries I removed my influence from!” said Twilight.

“Oh, well,” grumbled Spike, “Try to do better next time, ok?”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “I will. I’m already ready to play my next card, too.”

“Wait,” said Spike. “The zebras go first.”

Even though there weren’t any other people in the room, a phantom force at the other end of the table played the card ‘Striped Scare/Purge’ on behalf of the zebras.

“Damnit!” said Spike. “They’ve played ‘Purge’ on us! Now you have a -1 point penalty to all operations points you play for the remainder of the turn.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “Well, I play ‘FATO:’ Friendship Alliance Treaty Organization!”

Twilight played the card, which blocked the zebras from making any coups, realignment rolls, or playing the ‘Brushie War’ card against Equestrian-controlled countries in Primus.

The phantom zebra played ‘Legacy of Nightmare Moon.’

“Oh, no!” cried Twilight. “Nightmare Moon!”

“Does anypony still remember that?” asked Spike wryly. “It seems like nopony cares anymore.”

“It seems like they care,” said Twilight, “Because it just removed three Equestrian influence form the board!”

There was a deep laugh from the other side of the table as one Equestrian influence was removed from North Griffonia, Reiterland, and the Crystal Empire. North Griffonia was no longer under Equestrian control, and the Crystal Empire, which had started the game only two points away from Equestrian control, was now three points away.

“I never really thought that other countries really cared about what happened inside Equestria’s borders,” said Spike.

“Well, if one of your leaders was once a crazy madmare who twice claimed she was going to bring eternal darkness to the world, that would probably frighten most of the world,” said Twilight.

“True,” said Spike, “But the Crystal Empire? They weren’t even around when that happened.”

“I still have to retaliate,” said Twilight. “They took my control of Northern Griffonia, so I’m taking it back. I play ‘Special Relationship!’”

“Way to go, Twilight!” said Spike. “It’s Equestria-controlled, AND FATO is in effect, so you get not only two influence to any Western Primian country, but also two victory points! Where are you gonna put them, Twilight?”

“Northern Griffonia, of course!” said Twilight. “It’s a battleground country, and I said I was going to take it back.”

Twilight placed her two influence points in Northern Griffonia, for a total of three Equestrian influence, bringing the country firmly under Equestrian control. She also gained two victory points in the process, bringing the score to 2-0.

But the phantom zebra remained undaunted. It played the card ‘NORSAD,’ which, although Equestria-associated, was not in affect because the DEFCON was not at two and Equestria did not control the Crystal Empire. The card, worth three operations points, was played in Southeast Kadur, where its value was increased to four due to the recent revolution in Vietmane. Two zebra points were placed in Tigerland and the Fillyppines, bringing both under zebra control.

“Shit!” exclaimed Spike. “Tigerland’s a battleground country, and you already had one influence point in the Fillyppines. You’ve got to take back control of Southeast Kadur before a scoring card is played.”

“A scoring card?” asked Twilight. “You mean like this one?”

She showed Spike the ‘Primus Scoring’ card that was in her hoof.

“Yes, that one!” said Spike. “Except for Southeast Kadur.”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “I’ll use ‘Primus Scoring’ this turn and see what it does.”

“Both sides have a presence in Primus,” said Spike, “So both sides get three victory points. Also, since the zebras control Reiterland, a battleground country, they get one more victory point, for a total of four. And since you have control of Northern Griffonia, you get one victory point, for a total of five. The score is now six to four.”

“Shoot,” said Twilight. “I thought Caledonia was a battleground country, and not Reiterland. Oh, well. I’m still two points ahead.”

The phantom zebra played the card ‘Captured Scientist,’ which advanced their space race box by one.

“They just got ‘Earth Satellite!’” said Spike. “You need to step up your game on the Space Race, otherwise you’ll be left behind!”

“Ok,” said Twilight. “Um…. I play ‘Isle Delfino Revolution’ for operations points.”

“Twilight, no!” screamed Spike, but it was already too late. Twilight gained the two operations points from the card and rolled a die for the space race. She got a four.

“Oooh, so close!” she exclaimed. “Oh well, better luck next time.”

“Twilight, look what you’ve done!” screamed Spike.

Twilight looked. Isle Delfino, just off the southern coast of Equestria, was now under zebra control.

“Drat,” said Twilight. “I guess I should pay more attention next time.”

“Now they have a presence in the region, Twilight,” said Spike. “It doesn’t matter yet, but in a few years, we might be fighting over that place.”

“You’re right, Spike,” said Twilight. “I need to protect my neighbors. But first, we have to face whatever the zebras are doing next.”

The zebra phantom, for its last action round, played ‘Containment,’ which gave a +1 bonus to all further operations points played by Equestria (to a maximum value of four). It didn’t really matter much since it was the last action round before the end of the turn, which was probably why it was being played now. The zebra phantom used the three operations points of the card to build influence in Southeast Kadur. With the added bonus from the Vietmane revolution, two zebra influence was placed in Marelaysia, and two in Indoneighsia, taking two more countries under the zebras’ hypothetical wings.

“Ummm…” said Twilight, as she tried to decide which of her three remaining cards to play for her last action round. “I can keep the cards I still have left for next round, right?”

“Yes,” said Spike. “The cards you don’t use now will be saved for next turn. Unless it says ‘May Not be Held,’ then you can keep it.”

“Great,” said Twilight. “This card won’t be useful until later. Maybe I’ll play ‘Blockade’ for the points.”

“Bad Idea, Twilight,” said Spike. “You just triggered its event. Now you have to discard a card worth three points or lose all your influence in Reiterland.”

“Drat,” said Twilight. “I’m eliminating ‘COMICON.’ Not much use to me, anyway.”

‘COMICON’ was placed into the discard pile and crisis was averted. Twilight used her operations point in Prance, which, aided by the +1 from the ‘Containment’ card, bringing her total in the country up to three.

“One more and I’ll control it,” said Twilight happily. “I’m ready to end this turn.”

The action round counter was reset to six and required ‘friendship operations’ was reset to zero for both sides. Both sides failed to make their five required ‘friendship’ operations, and were thus docked points. The score ends at one to negative one.

The DEFCON meter remains at five, its highest point.

Turn 2: Raise this Barn!

--Turn 2: Raise This Barn--
“Primary Targets: Any and All Red Chinese Invaders!”

“Hello, chillllllllllllldren!” sang a familiar voice from the radio. “It’s Tree Dog, achoo! And you’re listening to Universe News Radio, bringing you the news!”

“We’ve got a major news flash straight from Canterlot! As all of you know, Equestria’s locked in a tight cold war against the zebras. Not a rough and physical war like the wars of old, but a psychological one. Instead of tanks and soldiers, this war’s being fought with PR campaigns and spies. Speaking of spies, a ring of them known as ‘The Canterlot Five’ was recently outed after passing along secret documents to zebra agents. Only four of ‘em were discovered, meaning the fifth one is still missing. In response to this, her majesty Princess Luna has founded a new ministry, the Canterlot Intelligence agency, for the purpose of coordinating espionage activities abroad and strengthening counterintelligence at home. Now those zebras will think twice before spying on our country.”

“Thanks for listening, chilllllllllllllllllllllllllllllldren! This is Tree Dog, achoo! And you’re listening to Universe News Radio—“

Twilight turned off the radio and stuck her tongue out at the phantom. It sighed and revealed all of its cards, Twilight’s reward for brilliantly coming up with the idea for founding the CIA. Well, ok, it wasn’t really her idea because she just read it off a card, but she took credit for it. And she told Princess Luna. Which made it actually happen. You get the point.

Now that Twilight had full view of the zebras’ hoof, she could plan out her next moves more insightfully. But the phantom, through the intelligence gathered by the Canterlot Five, had just revealed the scoring cards that Twilight held: Kadur and Emerelda. Shit was getting tense.

“Where should I spend my ops point, Spike?” asked Twilight.

“Wha-what?” asked Spike, just waking up from a nap. “Your ops point?”

“My ops point,” Twilight repeated. “You know, the operations point I get from the ‘CIA’ card?”

“Oh, that…” said Spike, feigning comprehension. “Um… you should spend it in South Chollima or Suindael. It looks like they might get invaded pretty soon.”

“You’re right,” said Twilight. “I need to support my allies. I think I’ll place it in South Chollima. I’m really lacking in the Kadur region, and they could surely use my help.”

Twilight placed her ops point in South Chollima, which was on the verge of war with North Chollima. With the one point she began the game with, she now had an influence in this country of two.

After strenuously looking over its cards, the zebra phantom played the ‘Applejack Plan’ card for the ops points. It then placed three points in The Three Kingdoms and one point in Leopardia.

At the same time though, it inexplicably caused Applejack to declare that Equestria was giving aid to the nations of Western Primus, and hundreds of long-lost members of the Apple family instantly appeared in Swisherland, South Griffonia, Caledonia, The Kingdom of Canis, Trotterdam, Unicornicopia, and the Tsardom of Muskovy to rebuild damaged structures. Equestria gained one influence point in all of these countries.

“Wow!” exclaimed Twilight. “The stuff we do in this game really does have an impact on real life!”

“And in real time, too!” added Spike. “I never knew that members of the Apple Family could teleport!”

“Well, Pinkie can,” said Twilight. “We’ve known that for a loooong time.”

“Are you sure she’s part of Applejack’s family?” asked Spike. “That episode was inconclusive.”

“Well, if Applejack’s family can teleport just like Pinkie, then of course she’s part of the Apple Family,” reasoned Twilight.

“Applejack is raising a barn in Primus,” boomed a deep electronic voice. “A barn of democracy.”

“Who said that?” asked Twilight, looking around for the mysterious voice yet completely disregarding the giant robot in the corner.

“Beats me,” said Spike, also looking around for the mysterious voice yet completely disregarding the giant robot in the corner. “But he’s right: we just gained seven influence points in Western Primus!”

“But now I’m worried about Kadur,” said Twilight nervously. “The phantom just placed one influence point in Leopardia, taking it over, and three in The Three Kingdoms, taking them over as well!”

“Oh, no!” said Spike. “No, nononononononono. No! This has to end right now! We can’t let them take over the continent!”

“And I won’t!” said Twilight. Then she played ‘Impeccable Planning,’ a card which showed a picture of herself on it.

“Now they have to randomly discard one of their cards,” said Twilight. “Hopefully it will get rid of one of those two ‘war’ cards the phantom’s got.”

The phantom hesitated, then shuffled its cards. It randomly drew one card out and put it in the discard pile.

“‘Nuclear Test Ban?’” exclaimed Spike. “That’s not a war card!”

“Yes…” said Twilight, “But it would have given them victory points.”

“At least we’re still ahead,” said Spike, “But with the scoring cards, that might change.”

“That’s why I’m playing ‘I’d Take Cover If I Were You’ for the ops points,” said Twilight. “With three points, I can take control of Neighpon, which is exactly what I’m going to do.”

“Smart move,” said Spike. “That’ll make it harder for the ‘Chollima War,’ if the phantom ever plays it.”

But the phantom didn’t play it. Instead, it played ‘The Three Kingdoms Card’ for four ops points. The phantom used these points to add four influence to Neighpon, upsetting Equestria’s control over it and turning it into a contested state. Because all of the points were used in Kadur, the Three Kingdoms Card gave it one extra ops point, which the phantom used to take control of Neighpon.
“What???” shrieked Twilight. “It—it—“

“It just took over Neighpon!” shrieked Spike. “What are we going to do?”

“I—I uh… I need to think about this,” stammered Twilight as she collected herself. “I need to gain more influence in that region, otherwise the Chollima war might be a success. Let’s see… maybe if I used ‘Independent Purples’ for the ops points.”

Twilight discarded ‘Independent Purples’ for the ops points. Then she put the ops points into Neighpon, raising her influence up to six and taking back control.

“Phew!” she said. “That was a relief.”

The phantom, agitated by this move, retaliated by discarding his card ‘Death of King Zebra’ for three ops points.” It then used these points to boost zebra influence in Neighpon up to eight.

“Damnit!” cried Twilight. “This is getting pointless. Now I’ll have to play ‘Crimarean Abdication’ for its ops points, even though it will trigger a zebra event.”

“Are you sure you want to do that?” asked Spike. “It only gives one point.”

“I’m doing what I have to,” said Twilight. “There. Discarded for one point. I’ll place it in Leboarnon, over here in Centralia, for when it plays the ‘Suindael War’ card.”

Twilight took control of Leboarnon while the zebras gained sufficient influence in the Crimarea for control. Then it was the zebras’ turn.

The phantom determined that Kadur was ripe for war. It played the dreaded ‘Chollima War’ card as an event, and rolled a die for the invasion. Landing a three, just short of the four that was minimum for victory. Oh, well. The phantom was at least happy to get +2 to the ‘Friendship ops’ track.

Twilight played the ‘Kadur Scoring’ card, not because she wanted to, but because she couldn’t keep it for a later turn. Twilight gained three victory points for having a presence in the region, but the phantom gained seven for dominating it. The score was now 4-6.

“Shit,” spat Twilight. “Now I’m losing.”

But the humiliation was not over yet. Laughing deeply, the phantom now played the ‘Equestria Games’ card.

“’Equestria Games?’” asked Spike, incredulously. “But—I thought that was only a pony thing.”

“No, Spike,” said Twilight sorrowfully. “Zebras are Equines too.”

“But ‘Equestria?’” asked Spike. “That’s the name of our country! We should be deciding where the games are held!”

“Apparently, somepony got the crazy idea that they should be held in enemy territory,” said Twilight. “Oh, well. We have the choice to either participate or boycott. If we participate, we compete, but they get the home field advantage. If we boycott, it lowers the DEFCON by one level and they get 4 ops points. I say let’s participate. It’s not like we have that much to lose.”

The dice were rolled, with Twilight getting one and the phantom six. But, since the phantom was the host, it got to add two more to its roll, for a total of eight. The phantom, being the clear winner, gained two more victory points, bringing its score up to eight.

“I suppose eight is not our lucky number,” said Twilight mournfully. “And perhaps neither is two.”

“Ahhh, cheer up, Twilight,” said Spike. “At least your next card won’t hurt you.”

Twilight’s last card, ‘Emerelda Scoring,’ didn’t grant either side any points since neither controlled any countries in Emerelda.
Except the zebras, but controlling your own homeland in this game doesn’t count.

With the end of the turn came the obligatory ‘Friendship Ops’ count. Neither side obtained the required amount of ‘friendship ops,’ but the zebras had two more than the ponies, losing only three victory points to the ponies’ five. I also forgot to count the zebras’ two victory points that they received from being the first to make an Earth Satellite, so now the score is -1 to 7, with the zebras in the lead by eight points.

The DEFCON is still at 5, its highest level.

Turn 3: Take it Back!

--Turn 3: Take it Back!--
“Obstruction detected! Probability of mission injurence: zero percent!”

“What’s up Equestrians?” said the familiar voice over the radio. “This is Tree Dog, and you’re listening to UNR! That’s Universe News Radio, in case you forgot.”

“Seems we’ve got a good bit of news,” it began. “Just listen to this: It’s a dangerous world out there, and it seems like everyone’s looking for protection. Today’s news is all about treaties. Remember that big ol’ war they had in the Chollimas? Well, even though South Chollima survived that, it set off security fears throughout the region. Her Honor Lady Snow of Neighpon just announced today that Neighpon and Equestria are forming a mutual defense pact. Not only does this secure Equestria’s lucrative trade routes with Neighpon, with an estimated combined value of over two hundred billion bits, it also gives Equestria a secure base of operations in the far east, which is currently dominated by pro-zebra governments. Similar agreements with other governments may be in the works.”

“Closer to home, good ol’ Roan of Arc, sovereign ruler of Prance, has just abdicated her position to go and lead the Knight Templars,” continued Tree Dog. “I’m not sure why she’d go off and lead the antagonists in the Assassin’s Creed series, but if you ask me, I’d say she’s screwing her country over to be going off and doing that in a time like this. But that’s just me. Her sister, Damsel Constancia, has now taken the throne. In addition to continuing her sexual escapades with the ruler of a neighboring country, Dame Constancia has gone off and made friends with the zebras. Just today, she announced that Prance would be leaving FATO, cancelling its protective effects and frustrating Equestrian attempts to court her. Not literally, of course, but—you get the picture. I hope…”

After a pause, Tree Dog concluded, “And now, up next it’s Roy Brown, tellin’ us all about that, ‘Mighty, Mighty Mare...’”

Twilight shut off the radio yet again and went back to her map.

“It’s a shame, really,” lamented Twilight as she pondered over the fate of Primus. “Damsel Constancia, going off like that… it’s against her best interests, really.”

“How so?” asked Spike, who had just come back from stuffing his face full of gem cake.

“FATO could have protected Prance from coups and realignment rolls,” said Twilight. “If only she could have waited for me to build up some more influence in the area. Now all of my influence in Prance is gone and replaced with one zebra influence point.”

“It’s not like you were doing anything in that area anyway,” said Spike, semi-reassuringly. “Everypony’s looking for defense, and they’ll snag the best deals they can get. Besides, that’ll just be a lesson for you to pay more attention to your Primian friends.”

“They weren’t of any use anyway,” said Twilight dismissively. “They were just cheese-eating surrender-monkeys.”

“It won’t help you to recapture them when the zebras play them that soundbite,” said Spike.

“Soundbite?” asked Twilight. “What soundbite? How will they even know I said that?”

A sudden ‘click’ drew their attention to the other side of the table, where the phantom zebra was opening a tape recorder, switching out a filled tape with a fresh one.

“This is politics, Twilight,” warned Spike. “And in politics, everything you say can and will be used against you. Everything.”

“Alright, alright,” said Twilight with exasperation. “I’ll try not to make a faux pas again. There, I used a Prench term. Can we get back to work now?”

“Sure,” said Spike. “Just be careful though.”

“I will,” said Twilight. “Besides, I’m sure I can win them back before the next scoring round.”

“That’s the spirit!” said Spike. “Although it may come sooner than expected. When I was dealing the cards earlier, the deck ran out, so I had to re-shuffle it. You’ll seeing some of the same cards again from before.”

“Ok,” replied Twilight. “Thanks for the heads up.”

“Ah, don’t mention it,” said Spike. “It’s just my duty. I got enough thanks from that delicious gem cake.”

“Wait…” asked Twilight. “Gem cake? Was that you who went on my iPad and stole all of my gems?”

“Errr…. Maybe,” admitted Spike guiltily.

“Well fuck you,” said Twilight, out-of-character-like. “I was saving up to buy Rainbow Dash. Now I have to start all over again.”

“Couldn’t you just use some of your iTunes money to buy more gems?” asked Spike.

“No way!” said Twilight. “I’m using that to buy the next Living Tombstone album.”

“Since when does that guy release albums?” asked Spike. “And since when does he make original pony music? It’s just been remixes and covers for the last six months.”

“I dunno,” said Twilight. “At least he’s got some original non-MLP songs.”

“True,” said Spike. “But enough about that. Phantom zebra’s about to start its action round.”

And indeed it was. Phantom zebra played ‘Decolonization,’ which allowed it to place one zebra influence in each of four Emereldan and/or Kaduran countries of its choice. It chose Markhoristan, The Fillyppines, Nefertia, and Neighpon.

“Well, shit,” said Twilight. “They’ve upset the balance in Neighpon again. When will this battle end?”

“It should be over soon,” said Spike. “All you have to do is make a realignment roll and you can bring their influence down to size. The zebras can’t make a realignment roll or a coup of their own because you have that defensive pact.”

“Good idea,” said Twilight. “I’ll do that later. First I want to make sure I control as many adjacent countries as possible so I can make the realignment roll more effective.”

She looked through the cards in her hoof to see which cards she could play. Then the telephone rang.

“I’ll get it,” said Spike. He picked up the phone and asked, “Hello?”

After a second of cartoony cartoon telephone gibberish on the other end, Spike said, “It’s for you.”

“Well, of course,” said Twilight as she took the phone. “It’s my phone.” Then she asked into the phone, “Hello?”

A few more seconds of cartoony cartoon telephone gibberish. Well, more like fifteen seconds. Or twenty. Then Twilight asked Spike, “The guy on the other end by the name of ‘Great Sun,’ claims he’s a king or a president or something, of some nation called ‘The Fillyppines.’ Says he’s pro-us but his parliament isn’t. Says that if we back a coup, he’ll love us forever and ever. Should we help him?”

“Sounds like one of those banana republic dictator-wannabes,” said Spike. “Better to give him 40 bits in steam cash and tell him to buy Tropico 5.”

“What if his computer doesn’t run Directx 11?” asked Twilight.

“Fine,” said Spike. “Tropico 4 then. You get the point.”

“But I have this 2 ops card associated with my opponent,” said Twilight. “And it doesn’t really do anything important, so I don’t have much to lose.”

“Fine,” said Spike. “Have it your way. It won’t be me they criticize when they put this in the history books twenty years from now.”
“I’ll just have Rarity censor it out,” said Twilight. “Hopefully she’ll still be around twenty years from now. Tabitha St. Germain’s gettin’ old.”

“Hey!” shouted Spike. “She’s not that old!”

“Her Wikipedia article says she’s been active since 1985,” said Twilight. “And, assuming she was at least ten when she started, she’d be at least 40 years old by now.”

“Well, according to Tara Strong’s Wikipedia article, she’s 41.” said Spike.

“Oh, come on,” said Twilight. “She looks like she’s ten years younger, right?”

“At least Tabitha doesn’t have boob implants,” said Spike.

“Boob implants?!?” recoiled Twilight in horror. “How do you know they’re not natural?”

“Oh, come on!” said Spike. “Nobody has natural boobs that big. They’re obviously fake.”

“Well…” said Twilight, trying to think. “...there’s no way that Tabitha’s skin could be that color naturally either. At least Tara doesn’t have a spray tan!”

“Spray tan?” asked Spike. “Of course Tara has a spray tan. She lives in Los Angeles. Everybody has a spray tan down there.”

“Quiet!” screamed a deep voice from the other side of the table. “This is getting annoying! Are we going to play this game, or sit around and riff on brony voice actors and musicians?”

“Sorry,” said Twilight and Spike at the same time, affirming that Tara Strong and Cathy Weseluck are indeed Canadian.

“Thank you,” said the phantom. “Now, play your card.”

“I will,” said Twilight. “I’m playing ‘The Canterlot Five’ for two ops points. I’m also using them to start a coup in the Fillyppines… wherever that is.”

“Okay,” said Spike. “Roll your die.”

Twilight rolled her die. She got a three.

“Three plus two is five,” said Spike. “Minus double the country’s stability number, which is four, you remove one zebra influence point from the country.”

Twilight did so. Now Equestria had one influence point and the zebras had two.

“Damnit,” muttered Twilight. “The zebras still control it. Maybe I should have just bought him a Steam card.”

“And what about the opponent’s associated event?” asked Spike.

“Oh, it was just revealing scoring cards,” said Twilight. “And I don’t have any.”

“That’s a relief,” said Spike. “I wonder what the phantom’s going to do next?”

The phantom played ‘Applejack Doctrine’ for one ops point. It used the point to stage a realignment roll in the South Chollima. Both players rolled sixes. Twilight got +1 to her roll because she had more influence in South Chollima than the phantom did, for a total of seven, but the Phantom got +2 for controlling two adjacent countries ,for a total of eight. The difference, two, was removed from Twilight’s influence over South Chollima. The country was now empty of all influence.

“Jesus Christ!” shouted Spike. “What are we going to do now? Your realignment roll will be in jeopardy!”

“Don’t worry!” said Twilight. “First, the phantom has to execute the event on the Equestria-associated card it just played.”

The Phantom executed the event, which removed all zebra influence from one uncontrolled country in Primus. It chose the Tsardom of Muskovy.

“Is it just me?” asked Spike, “Or have there lately been a lot of events from the Truman administration associated with Applejack?”

“It’s because Truman was from Missouri,” explained Twilight. “And because Applejack’s the most Amerikkkan of the mane six. I mean, her voice actor’s name is ‘Ashleigh,’ for pete’s sake.”

“But—“ protested Spike.

“Ash-leigh!” emphasized Twilight.

“—Canadian!” said Spike, finishing his sentence that Twilight prevented him from getting to the middle of.

“I said, SHUT UP!” boomed the voice of the phantom.

“Sorry,” said Twilight and Spike in unison, reaffirming that Tara Strong and Cathy Weseluck are indeed Canadian.

“Anyhoo,…” Said Twilight, “Now it’s my turn. For my turn, I am going to play ‘Canal Crisis,’ which would normally be bad for me since it is associated with my opponent, but I’m also going to play ‘League of Nations Intervention’ along with it, cancelling it out and allowing me to use its ops value to conduct operations. The card had a value of 3, so I’m now going to place three influence points in South Chollima, effectively taking control.”

“Yeah!” cheered Spike, “Way to go, Twilight!”

And so it was done. Another international incident was prevented, and Twilight got control of South Chollima.

“Your move,” said Twilight to the phantom.

The phantom looked over its cards. Then it played ‘Impeccable Planning’ for three ops points. It placead two of these points in Leboarnon and one in Markhoristan.

“Drat!” said Spike. “It’s taken control of two more countries. Quick, Twilight! Do something!”

“I’m trying, I’m trying!” said Twilight. “Let’s see… which card should I play for points? How about…”

“‘Death of King Zebra?’” suggested Spike.

“No!” cried Twilight. “King Zebra must live! He is a living testament to the evilness of the zebra empire.”

“Your point is…?” asked Spike wryly.

“My point is this:” said Twilight. “King Zebra is evil, right? As long as he speaks sinister words and puts ponies in his pot, it makes the zebras as a whole look bad. And we want to make the zebras look as bad as possible. That’s why we keep King Zebra on the throne.”

“Wow,” said Spike. “I can’t believe we have the power to make the most prolific mass murderer of our time have a stroke and die, and yet we choose to save it for later.”

“Politics,” replied Twilight. “We can’t let petty moral quandaries bog us down. I suspect they’re going to play ‘Suindael War’ pretty soon, so I’m going to play ‘Elephanto-Rhinoli War.’ Rhoniolia invades Elephantia, go!”

Twilight threw a die and got a four, thereby winning the war. She added two victory points to her total, bringing the score up to one to seven, and added two to her required ‘Freindship ops’ track.

“Twilight, you could have gained some influence in Elephantia if the zebras actually had a presence there,” said Spike.

“I did what I could, Spike,” said Twilight. “We’ll just have to do that the next time we get the card.”

Then the phantom took its turn. It played ‘Suindael War,’ an event in which all of Suindael’s neighbors invaded it for conning them into buying cheap and shoddy arms. The phantom rolled a die, getting a two and losing the war because the anti-Suindaelinans were fighting with cheap and shoddy arms. The phantom shrugged, and then added two to its required ‘friendship ops’ track.

Now it was Twilight’s turn.

“War is bad,” said Twilight. “Those zebras are bad because they just started a war. But I’m a good, peace-loving pony, so that’s why I’m playing ‘Nuclear Test Ban.’ Since the DEFCON is currently at ‘5,’ I get three victory points and the DEFCON improves by two levels.”

“Wait--” said Spike. “Not only are you being a hypocrite, but the DEFCON can’t go above five.”

“Yes it can,” said Twilight as she drew some extra squares on the board with a marker. “Now it can go up to ten.”

“What would a DEFCON of ‘seven’ actually mean?” asked Spike.

“That we’re super duper far away from the MLP equivalent of global thermonuclear war, that’s what,” said Twilight. “And that I get to close the scoring gap between myself and the phantom.”

The phantom didn’t hear its name, because it was busy playing the card ‘Defectors’ on the Space Race. It rolled a two, which allowed it to advance its Space Race tracker by one.

“Oh noes!” exclaimed Twilight. “Not only do the zebras have a space thingy in space, now they’ve got a dog!”

“And now they can play two space race cards per turn!” exclaimed Spike. “Now what?”

“I tell you what!” said Twilight. “I’m gonna play my ‘Three Kingdoms Card’ now. I’ll use all of its four ops points in Kadur, giving me five, and I’ll place three in Yokeinawa and two in the Fillyppines.”

“But that just gives the ‘Three Kingdoms’ Card over to the phantom,” said Spike.

“Yeah, but It gives me control over two Kaduran countries adjacent to Neighpon,” said Twilight. “Soon, the realignment roll will be complete, and we shall have another country within our moderately expanding sphere of influence.”

For its last action round of the turn, the phantom played ‘I’d Take Cover if I Were You’ for three ops points. It placed one influence point in the Changeling Kingdom and two in the Roaman Empire, taking them both over and acquiring the ‘Changeling Kingdom’ card.

“Twilight!” yelled Spike, “They’re going to take over Primus! We’ve got to do something!”

“And I’ve got just the card!” replied Twilight. “I play: ‘Eastern Primian Unrest!’”

The card allowed her to remove one zebra influence from each of three Eastern Primian countries of her choosing. For this, she chose the Changeling Kingdom, Yugoatslavia, and the Unicorn Kingdom, freeing the latter two from the tight grip of zebra control.

“You know, they still dominate Primus,” said Spike. “You’re tied for battleground countries, but they still control more countries overall.”

“I’ll change that next turn,” said Twilight. “I promise.”

“You promised to do a realignment roll in Neighpon this turn as well,” said Spike.

“Damnit, Spike!” shouted Twilight. “Stop criticizing me! Are you helping or hurting me?”

“Sorry,” said Spike, affirming that, even though they’re both Canadian, Cathy Weseluck is actually more Canadian than Tara Strong.

Neither country achieved their required five (now seven) ‘friendship ops,’ but Equestria had one more ‘Friendship ops’ point than the zebras did. The zebras are docked five points and the Equestrians are docked four. This brings the total to Zero to Two.
The DEFCON now stands at an impossibly high seven. There is very low risk of an MLP equivalent of global thermonuclear war.
Starting in turn four, the game will proceed into the ‘Mid-War’ phase. This means new cards, new adventures, a total hoof size of nine (the two card countries’ cards do not count towards this limit), and seven action rounds instead of the previous six. Stay tuned for another six exciting years of: Twilight Struggle: The Board Game.

Because the phantom never said ‘sorry’ once in this chapter, (or any of the previous chapters either,) it is affirmed that, whatever it is, it is definitely not Canadian.

Turn 5: Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You...

--Turn 5: Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You…--

“We will not fear the Red Menace!”

“Hellooooo Equestria!” bellowed Tree Dog. “This is Tree Dog, coming to you loud and proud from Universe News Radio. We interrupt our regularly scheduled program for some news…”

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… “ began Tree Dog. “That’s right! It’s a tale of two different cities, both in Equestria, right here and right now. You see, one of these cities is having a really great time right now, and the other… well… not so much. But let’s start with the good news: Cloudsdale’s finally been chosen to hold the Equestria Games! A fiercely competitive team, they’ve never actually had an Equestria Games held in their hometown before. You see, Cloudsdale was for a long time inaccessible to the average pony. Only those with wings could go there. If you didn’t—well, then you’d just fall through the clouds. And hiring enough unicorns to perform cloudwalking spells would have been way too expansive. Cloudsdale’s had this feud with the Games Committee forever. Until about twenty years ago, when somepony down at the weather factory’s labs invented a new kind of cloud that regular ponies could walk on, without needing magic or anything. Thing is, Pegasi are, as I’m sure you already know, mighty stubborn and stuck-up folk, so it’s taken almost twenty years to get these clouds approved. But fears of an MLP equivalent of global thermonuclear war looming on the horizon gave them enough of a push to seriously consider holding an Equestria Games off the ground for once. And now it’s finally here! After some stiff competition from the zebra guests, Equestria prevails, if only by a little bit. Many analysts say the only reason we won was because of the ‘home field advantage’ of having the first-ever Equestria Games in the clouds. But it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that we’ve won, and that’s that. ”

“Woah, I’ve lost track of time!” continued Tree Dog. “Sorry for all that rambling, but it was a really, really great games, and a historic one, too. And thus the sun sets on another great day for Cloudsdale. But at the same time, the night is only beginning for their counterparts down below; a looooong night. You see, while Cloudsdale was having a great time, Canterlot was getting a real run for its money. Somehow it’s gotten itself into a real quagmire of a war in some foreign, marshy, dingy little country deep in the jungles of Southeast Kadur. I don’t know how we got in or why we still care, but it’s clearly rustled the national jimmies ‘cause hundreds of thousands of ponies are flocking to Canterlot to protest. Meanwhile, the bean-counters in the ministries are no longer counting beans, but counting casualties. It’s a real tough spot for Princess Luna to be in right now, and I have absolutely no idea where Twilight Sparkle is right now, but please, if you’re listening, Twilight, bring our ponies back home! Whatever they’re doing out there, it is not the good fight. Please, for the love of Celestia, (wherever the hell she is,) BRING OUR PONIES BACK HOME!”

“But enough of that,” said Tree Dog. “I’m sure y’all get the message. You get the picture. Hey, how about we cheer ourselves up with some music! Here’s Bob Crosby, singin’ to us all about, ‘Happy Times!’”

Twilight shut off the radio yet again and returned to her customary position at the map. By now, her castle was no less a castle than a fortress, and her parlor less of a parlor than a war room. ‘Princess’ Twilight was no longer a princess, but now (almost) officially a general.

And then Spike came in.

“Colonel Spike reporting for duty!” said Colonel Spike, saluting General Twilight.

“At ease, Colonel,” said Twilight, returning the salute. “What’s the latest status on the enemy?”

“Bad,” said Spike. “They’ve played ‘Missile Envy.’”

“’Missile Envy’?” asked Twilight. “What does it do?”

“It forces us to trade our highest value operations card,” replied Spike.

“In return for what?”asked Twilight.

“A ‘Missile Envy’ card,” said Spike.

“That sounds kind of pointless,” said Twilight. “Wouldn’t that just lead to us trading the missile envy card back and forth until the end of the game?”

“You can also use it for ops,” said Spike.

“Ahh,” said Twilight, comprehendingly. “I see. Maybe I’ll get rid of it before it can start a chain reaction… what’s our highest valued card?”

“That would be…” started Spike, “…wait. We have four: ‘Mussuri River Skirmish’, ‘The Great Leap Forward,’ ‘Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You…,’ and ‘Death of King Zebra.’ I recommend either ‘Great Leap Forward’ or ‘Death of King Zebra,’ since they are opponent events.”

“Alright,” said Twilight, “I won’t use ‘Great Leap Forward’ since that would cancel out what I want to do with the ‘Missuri River Skirmish,’ so I’ll use ‘Death of King Zebra.’ If the zebras want to keep that bastard alive any longer, then it’s their fault now.”

“Good choice,” said Spike. “Maybe later we can use ‘Missile Envy’ against them later. If they’re playing it right now, it probably means that they don’t have very valuable cards right now.”

“You’re probably right,” said Twilight. “Hey, we just went through all of that ‘Missile Envy’ stuff without making a single penis joke.”

“We did, didn’t we?” said Spike. “That’s great! We’re so mature, aren’t we, Twilight?”

“Yeah,” said Twilight. “But maybe it’s because we don’t have penises. I read somewhere that dragons don’t have penises. Do you have a penis?”

“How should I know?” asked Spike. “I’m only a baby!”

“You should find out if you have a penis, Spike,” said Twilight. “If you don’t, then remind me to invent a dragon penis.”

“Would having a penis make sex with Rarity better?” asked Spike. “She claims I’m not very good in bed.”

“Oh, absolutely, Spike!” said Twilight. “I hear that Tabitha has a thing for mushrooms.”

“Great!” said Spike. “Does she prefer big ones or small ones?”

“I don’t know, go ask her!” said Twilight. “I’m trying to work right now. The fate of the world is at stake here.”

“Oh,” said Spike. “Sorry. Maybe later.”

“Yes, maybe later,” said Twilight. “Right now we have to deal with this accursed ‘Quagmire.’”

“How about we discard ‘Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You…,” suggested Spike. “It fits the requirements, and it just might get us out of here.”

“I’d really like to save this for another round,” said Twilight, “But what the heck. ‘Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You…’ it is.”
Twilight discarded ‘Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You’ and rolled a die. She got a ‘four,’ which was just barely enough to cancel out the effects of ‘Quagmire.’

Then it was the phantom’s turn again. The phantom played ‘Alliance for Pony,’ which, although it was an Equestria associated event, also gave the phantom three ops points.

“We get one victory point for each battleground country we control in Solace and Prekt,” said Twilight. “We only control one battleground country, ‘Amarezonia,’ so we get one point.

“Yeah, but look!” said Spike. “It’s poisoning our backyard with zebra influence!”
Indeed it was. The nation of Mexicolt was now under Zebra control, and Paneighma was halfway there.

“I’m getting a little desperate here, but here goes,” said Twilight as she played ‘Paneighma Canal Returned.’ Suddenly, the Paneighma Canal, having long been the pride and joy of Equestrian engineering, was suddenly transferred over to Paneighmanian ownership. Equestria gained one influence point in Costa Muleia, Paneighma, and Veneighzuela.

“Good,” said Twilight. “It’s a shame I can only use that card once, though. I wish I had more canals to return.”

“Maybe you could build more canals,” said Spike.

“You know what?” said Twilight, “I probably could. But then that in itself might spend a few valuable ops points, and we can’t afford to waste any more of those.”

“Right,” said Spike. “You’d better be careful. The phantom’s about to play another card.”

And so it did. The phantom played the dreaded ‘Death of King Zebra,’ finally putting an end to the notorious bride-kidnapping pimp-hatted tyrant. The phantom received four influence points to be placed in non-Equestria controlled countries. One was placed in Alpacatina, one in Quetzalia, one in Yugoatslavia, and one in Lynxia. All were suddenly brought under zebra control.

“The creeping menace!” exclaimed Spike. “They’ve just taken over four countries! What do we do now?”

“All I can do now is to found ‘OUS,’” said Twilight. “There. I’ve just played ‘Organization of Ungulate States Founded.’ That will add two influence to nations in Solace and/or Prekt, so I’ll upset their hold over Mexicolt. Now it’s contested.”

And so it was. Mexicolt now had two influence from each power and was therefore contested. At this point, neither side could claim Mexicolt as one of their own.

But the ever-so- dauntless phantom would have none of it. It played ‘Legacy of Nightmare Moon’ for three ops points, two of which were spent in Paneighma and one in Mexicolt. Now both nations were once again under zebra control.

“Twilight!” cried Spike. “They’re taking over again! Do something!”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t,” said Twilight. “I did all I could do over there. Now I have to focus on the other side of the map.”

Twilight played ‘Mussuri River Skirmish’ as an event. Because she already held the Three Kingdoms Card, she was allowed to place four Equestrian influence in Kadur, with a limit of two per country. The countries she chose were Makhoristan, a battleground country controlled by the zebras, in which she placed two points and gained control, and the Crystalline Raj, a large nation that had been ignored completely up until this point. The two influence points were not sufficient enough to gain control, but they greatly facilitated the task.

Then the phantom took its turn and played ‘Living Room Debates,’ for its one ops point. This ops point was used to upset the tossup in Mexicolt and return it to zebra control. The event, an Equestria-associated one, still occurred, being a grand debate between the two powers over which nation had the most livable living rooms. However, even though we all know that Equestrian living rooms are far more livable than zebra living rooms, the zebras still won the debate because they controlled nine battleground countries to Equestria’s six, and thus Equestria did not gain the bonuses it would have gained had it ‘won’ the debates. Twilight and Spike were puzzled as to why anyone would hold a debate over living room quality but judge the contestants over battleground countries held, but they couldn’t argue with the card: Equestria lost the debates fair and square, and that was that.

Twilight, running out of cards to play, played the ‘Great Leap Forward’ card for three ops points, even though its event was associated with the zebras. After giving the Three Kingdoms Card over to the zebras as the card told her to, she spent her three Ops points in Kadur, using one to build up enough influence in the Crystalline Raj to take control, and two to upset the zebras’ control of Tigerland, another battleground country.

Going full throttle, the phantom played ‘Puppet Governments,’ for two ops points, a card normally associated with Equestria. The card permitted Equestria to add one influence in three countries that did not already have influence from either power. This, Twilight did dutifully. After the phantom placed its two influence points in Paneighma (taking control again), Twilight was about to go and waste her points on Kadur and Emerelda when Spike pointed out to her that she could take over three poor and unstable countries in Solace if she used her points there. Twilight, seeing the need for this, agreed and used her points to claim El Saltador, and to upset the zebras’ control over Mexicolt and Paneighma once again.

The phantom, infuriated by the frustration of its plans, vowed revenge.

Twilight took her second-to-last action phase to play ‘Southeast Kadur Scoring,’ not because she wanted to, but because she had to. The zebras earned one victory point each for their control of Marelaysia, Vietname, Leopardia, and Indoneighsia (for a total of four), while the ponies earned one victory point for their control over The Fillyppines. Neither side got the two victory points for holding Tigerland since it was contested. The score was now nine to seven.

The phantom then played ‘Solace Scoring,’ for which the zebras earned four points for dominating the region and the ponies two for having a presence there. The zebras were also awarded one point for controlling one battleground country, and one point for the same country being adjacent to an enemy superpower (Equestria). The score was now eleven to thirteen.

Twilight’s last action round of the turn consisted of her playing ‘Kadur Scoring,’ which scord all of Kadur, including the already-scored Southeast Kadur. The ponies finally won something for once, a whopping seven points for holding marginal dominance over the region, while the zebras were rewarded a consolation prize of three points for their mere ‘presence’ there. The ponies also earned four points for controlling battleground countries while the zebras earned two.

The score was now brought up to 22 to 18. Neither side achieved the required amount of ‘Friendship ops’ points (four), and thus were both docked four points. The score now lies at 18 to 14.

The DEFCON remains at four.

The game is now halfway over.

Turn 6: Don't Panic!

--Turn 6: Don’t Panic!--

“Communism is a temporary setback on the road… to freedom!”

“That was Danny Kaye and the Andre Sisters with ‘Civilization.’” Said Tree Dog over the radio. “Everypony ready for the soon-to-be Equestria wasteland’s latest news? Me neither, but it’s that time again. ”

“We’ve just received word that they’ve made peace in the Middle East!” cried Tree Dog. “No, no, I’m not kidding! They actually did it! The ‘Rainbow Falls Accords’ were a stunning success, getting the nations of Suindael, Camelia, and Nefertia to all put down their weapons and make a big group hug. There won’t be another war in that area for quite some time now, all thanks to this. Credit is given to the enigmatic Princess Twilight Sparkle, who was last seen going into her castle exactly six years ago, the day before Princess Celestia abdicated. Neither have been seen since. Anyway, wherever she is, I’d like to thank Twilight personally for doing this. It means a lot to me and our country as a whole. Our public image in the region has greatly improved due to this peace pact, and we all have Twilight Sparkle to thank for it.”

“But now… for some… sadder news. While the Equestrians have been making peace over on one end of the world, some ponies have been up to nothing but bad. The Canterlot Intelligence Agency reports that it has spotted missile silos on the island of ‘Isle Delfino,’ once a tropical island paradise, now twisted and contorted beyond words by a vile mustachioed dictator known only as ‘El Presidente.’"

"El Presidente’s office could not be contacted for an interview, but the authorities at the Canterlot Intelligenece Agency highly doubt that the island is capable of producing missiles. They believe that they were supplied by an outside source… mainly a nation of striped equinoids on the continent of Emerelda. Sound familiar? You betcha.”

“So what does this mean for Equestria? Take a look at a map and see just how fuckin’ close they are to us! From Isle Delfino, a medium-range missile could hit any city in Equestria in just under three hours. And that old DEFCON meter? It’s been set all the way down at level two! Holy cow! Now, I know that I should be telling you guys not to panic right now, all that ‘keep calm and carry on’ bullshit, but I know you won’t listen to it, so I’m just gonna tell you to do what I do right now: Panic! Run for your lives! Get the hell out of here while you still can! Rob those motherfucking stores, hide yo’ wife, hide yo’ kids, hide everything! Better get into those bunkers, children, or else you just might get scorched! This is Tree Dog! Achoo! And I’m getting’ the fuck outta here! Keep following my broadcast, right form my nuclear bunker, where I’ll still be broadcasting twenty-four-seven and shit, to entertain you and let you know when it’s safe to get out. Until next time, Chiiiillllllllldrennnn—”

Twilight switched off the radio again and returned to her table. The entire hall was now a full-fledged war room with maps showing locations of missile silos and nuclear submarines, kind of like the game DEFCON, except cheesier.

“Well, shit!” spat Twilight as she pondered over the board. “Now I can’t perform any coups this turn without starting an MLP equivalent of a global thermonuclear war.”

“It’s not like you made any coups anyway,” said Spike, who walked in holding an envelope. “Speaking of coups, you just got a Hearth’s Warming Eve card from that one guy you helped take over the Fillyppines.”

“Lemme see it,” said Twilight as she took the envelope. She tore it open, removed a postcard with a picture of the biggest and most impossibly large battleship the world had ever seen, and began reading the back of it.

“Dear Princess Twilight,” she began, “I just want to thank you again for helping me stage a coup and overthrow my parliament. Since then, I’ve worked very hard to consolidate my power. By declaring martial law, I can proudly say that I have imprisoned or executed at least two thirds of all zebra sympathizers in the Fillyppines. In addition, I’ve taken the liberty of rewarding those who made the coup a success with powerful governmental positions and private businesses that I seized from people I didn’t like. I have also become fabulously wealthy by investing taxpayer money in Manehatten luxury skyscrapers. My wife has also made the record books for amassing the world’s largest private collection of shoes—over three thousand of them! Well, thanks anyway for the coup. I just can’t thank you enough! Happy holidays and good luck conquering the world! I’ll be right here if you need me. Your friend, Emperor Great Sun.”

“Wow,” remarked Twilight after she finished reading. “I should really support military coups more often. Not only have I completely changed this guy’s life, I’ve also reduced my opponent’s influence in the country by an additional two points! Remind me to stage more coups after this whole missile crisis thingy is over.”

“Yeah, but are coups really necessary?” asked Spike. “I mean, just bribing them with money is a heck of a lot easier. It’s also more effective, and nopony has to get killed.”

“I was wondering about that,” said Twilight. “It seems like coups and realignment rolls are less effective than they should be.”

“I think it’s because we’re not playing the game right,” said Spike. “There are a few rules that we’ve completely glossed over, that are supposed to make it harder to expand your influence. Like the rule that we can only place influence points in countries adjacent to countries that we already have influence in, or the rule that—“

“Pegasi have wings,” interrupted Twilight. “They can go anywhere.”

“But that doesn’t explain why the zebras—“

“No time for logic, Spike!” snapped Twilight. “The phantom’s about to play a card!”

They both looked at the other end of the table, where the phantom was waiting. After it had their attention, it laid down the card ‘Nuclear Subs’ for two ops points. ‘Nuclear Subs’ was an Equestria-associated event which made it so that Equestrian coup attempts in battleground countries would not affect the DEFCON track for the remainder of the turn, but since its ability was overridden by the Delfino Missile Crisis card, the event didn’t do anything.

“That card would have really helped us,” said Twilight. “If only it weren’t for this stupid missile crisis.”

“We can cancel the missile crisis if we remove two influence points from Reiterland,” said Spike. “Or if we put two points in the Trottoman Empire and then removed them—“

“No,” said Twilight flatly. “We are not doing that. I will not back down, not even under the threat of nuclear annihilation!”

“Be careful with that brinksmareship, Twily,” said Spike. “Or else you just might accidentally start an MLP equivalent of a global thermonuclear war.”

“’Brinksmareship?’” asked Twilight. “Are you accusing me of gambling with the DEFCON meter? I’ll show you ‘Brinksmareship!’ I play ‘ABM Treaty!”

The DEFCON meter suddenly went up to three and Twilight was given four ops points to spend. She spent two of these points on the Space Race, for which she rolled a four. She spent two more points and rolled a one, advancing Equestria by one point on the Space Race tracker.

“Wow, ‘Pony in Space!’” said Spike with amazement. “It looks like we’ve got ourselves our first ‘Equestranaut!’”

“Are you referring to that one ‘Bob’s Burgers’ episode about bronies?” asked Twilight, “Because mocking bronies really isn’t the best thing to do on FimFiction.”

“Aww, come on, Twilight!” said Spike. “Don’t you have the Equesticles to mock the hoof that feeds you?”

“The fourth wall can’t protect us anymore, Spike,” reasoned Twilight. “We broke it down ages ago.”

“So?” asked Spike. “It’s not like some brony is going to stick his fist through the screen and punch me.”
Just then, some brony stuck his fist through the screen aiming for Spike. Fortunately, the fist completely missed Spike and struck the phantom on the opposite side of the table instead.

“Ouch,” said the phantom, anticlimactically.

“And besides,” Spike continued, oblivious to what had just happened, “Even if some brony did stick his fist through the screen and try to hit me, he’d probably miss because everypony knows that bronies are fat fucks who spend all day sitting on their asses playing MMORPGS and browsing 4chan.”

“Spike, do you realize how bad it is to generalize a large group of people like that?” asked Twilight. “Besides, we’ve got more important things to deal with, like what those ugly barbaric slovenly niggardly chicken-eating sub-equine voodoo-hexing tribal fascist anarchist statist communist socialist Marxist Leninist Stalinist Maoist Joseph Kony worshipping Muslim terrorist jihadist Kenyan Obamaist Jew-hating Zionist imperialist corporate globalist provincial egalitarian pedophile weeaboo juggalo furry neo-con Nazi Hitler Zebras are plotting next!”

The phantom played the card ‘Special Relationship’ for two ops points, which it put into the Space Race. It rolled a one. It moved the zebras forward, not getting any bonus points but catching up to the ponies in their technological accomplishments.

Twilight the played the event card ‘We Will Cherry You,’ for four ops points. Because it was an event card associated with her opponent, the event itself occurred.

“‘Unless League of Nations Intervention is played as an event on the pony player’s next round,…’” read Spike, “’Zebrica gains 3 victory points prior to any Equestria victory point award. Degrade DEFCON one level.’ Twilight, what the hell are you doing?”

“I told you I was going to show you ‘Brinksmareship,’” she said. “Now what should I do with these points?”

“Twilight, I have a suggestion for you,” said Spike, “For your long term strategy.”

“I’m listening…” said Twilight.

“You know how you have influence points in a lot of countries in Primus, but you don’t control them?” asked Spike.

“Yeah?” said Twilight.

“If you started focusing on investing points in Europe,…” continued Spike, “…Then you could easily dominate the continent. And since you have FATO in play, the phantom can’t make any coups or realignment rolls in Primian countries that you control. And, if you can manage to dominate Primus, then you’ll instantly win the war!”

“I guess that’s a safe plan,…” said Twilight, “…But wouldn’t the phantom just keep adding points in Primus to stop me?”

“True,” admitted Spike, “But you already have a head start. You’ll be able to catch the phantom in time to add more of your own points. Then it will become a constant struggle between the phantom and you, but if you keep resisting, then the phantom will lose patience and look for other regions to dominate.”

“That is, if it doesn’t know it’s our strategy,” countered Twilight. “Doesn’t it know that control of Primus means an instant win?”

“I was hoping that it wouldn’t,” said Spike. “Or at least it just wouldn’t think about it. If it thinks it’s winning in other regions, it will think it’s winning the war. And if it thinks it’s winning the war, I’m hoping that it will become cocky and start making poor decisions. Let important things slide. Things like that. Kind of like Trixie, the Flim Flam Brothers, Ahuizotl, the Mane-iac, Discord, Queen Chrysalis, Tirek, and all those other villains just before we defeated them.

“I guess you’re right,” said Twilight. “Ok. I’ll try to control Primus for an instant win. But we also have to keep track of other things, like the Space Race and victory points. We also have to keep investing points in other regions, to make it look like we’re actually trying. I’ll spend my next four points all on different continents to make it more confusing.”

“Good Idea,” said Spike.

Twilight spent one point in Veneighzuela, upsetting the zebras’ control, one point in Yugoatslavia, which was still zebra controlled, one point in Leboarnon to upset the zebras’ control, and one point in Tigerland to take control.

The phantom was perplexed by this. It decided to play ‘Universe News Radio’ for two ops points, which it spent to return Mexicolt and Veneighzuela to zebra control.

Twilight played ‘Mooslim Revolution’ for four ops points. She spent one point to take control of Paneighma and Leboarnon, one point in the Three Kingdoms, and one point to force a tie in Yugoatslavia.
The phantom played the card ‘Grain Sales to Zebras’ for two ops points, which it spent on realignment rolls in Tiglerland and Paneighma.

In Tigerland, the phantom rolled a four and Twilight rolled a three. Twilight had the most influence in the country, for a modified score of four. The phantom controlled neighboring Leopardia, Vietmane, and Marelaysia, giving a modified score of seven. The difference, three, was removed from the ponies’ influence in Tigerland. The result was that Tigerland was cleared of all pony influence and thereby returned to zebra control.
In Paneighma, the phantom rolled a five and Twilight rolled a three. Twilight’s higher influence in the country gave her a modified score of four (again), while the Zebra’s control of neighboring Coltombia gave it a modified score of six. The difference, two, was removed from the ponies’ influence in the country, bringing it down to two. The zebras’ influence already there, three, renewed their control.

Twilight played ‘Our Mare in Tehrare,’ which, since she controlled one Centralian country (Leboarnon), allowed her to draw five cards from the draw deck. She did, and had the option to discard any ones she wished but chose not to discard any of them.

The phantom played ‘Colonial Plot Guards,’ for two ops points, which it deposited in the Emereldan nation of Elephantia and the Centralian nation of Jackalya, respectively. It now had sufficient influence in Jackalya to gain control of it.

Twilight played ‘Brushie War,’ which instructed her to attack one country with a stability of one or two. She chose Alpacatina, in the south of Prekt and controlled by the zebras but not adjacent to any other zebra controlled countries. Twilight rolled a three, winning the war, and added three to her ‘Friendship Ops’ track. As her reward for winning, she gained one victory point and replaced the zebra influence points (and control) in Alpacatina with pony influence.

The phantom played ‘Elephantian Unrest,’ which allowed it to place one influence in Elephantia and two influence in any countries adjacent to Elephantia. It placed its two influence points to take control of Rhinolia, a neighboring country which was also a battleground country.
Twilight played ‘Flutter Power,’ a zebra-associated event card, for its four ops points.

“Twilight, what are you doing?” asked Spike. “’Zebras gain two victory points for every subsequently pony played "war card?"’ You just shot yourself in the foot!”

“I had to, Spike!” said Twilight. “I’m trying to save too many cards. Besides, there are only five ‘war cards,’ and I already played one of them earlier this turn.”

“So, what are you gonna do now with those points?” asked Spike.

“I’m going to spend most of them in Emerelda,” said Twilight. “Something fishy’s going on down there. And for my next card, I need to make sure the zebras dominate as few continents as possible.”
Twilight spent two points to take control of Elephantia, one point to take control of Buffalonia, and one point to take control of Yugoatslavia.

“Let’s wait and see what it does next,” said Twilight.

For its last action round of the turn, the phantom played ‘Zasser,’ an early war card which removed half the pony influence in Nefertia and replaced it with two zebra influence. It was a card it had been waiting to play for a long time.

“Shit,” said Spike. “Now they control Nefertia and dominate the continent. What now?”

“I’ll have to postpone my glorious plan,” said Twilight. “I might play ‘Summit’ during the headline phase next turn, but I’ll need some points first. I play: ‘Hasta la Victoria Siempre’ for three ops points.”

She placed two influence points in Nefertia and one in Icantered, taking control of both.

“I sure hope they don’t spoil it by playing some dick move of a card,” said Twilight. “Otherwise we might be in for a world of hurt.”

The ponies reached their required amount of ‘Friendship Operations,’ and thus were not docked any points. The zebras did not do any ‘Friendship Operations,’ and were docked two points. The score now stands at 22 to 12.

The DEFCON remains at two, on the very brink of war.

After the end of the next turn, the game will enter the Late War Era.

Turn 7: Feast in the Middle East

--Turn 7: Feast in the Middle East--

“Embrace Democracy or you will be eradicated!”

“Trrrreeeeee Doooooggggg!” bellowed the now familiar voice of Tree Dog from the radio. “That’s me, kids. Comin’ to you taped from my fortified bunker in the middle of the Manehattan hellhole. Ain’t life grand? No, the world hasn’t exploded yet, so you all can come out of your bunkers now. My apologies for triggering that false alarm earlier. Our future is still uncertain, but at least Princess Twilight’s managed to not get us blown up yet, although she still hasn’t gotten rid of those missiles on Isle Delfino. Neither has she been able to purge the enemy influence from our southern neighbors. But whatever may happen, it looks like our expert planner always has a plan.”

“And now for the recent news,” began Tree Dog. “Ahem: Tensions between the two world powers seem to be rising steadily, but they are still a bit away from a crisis point. Princess Twilight attempted to defuse the situation by organizing an international summit in the famously neutral nation of Swisherland. The atmosphere at the summit remained tense, the oxygen-low mountain air definitely not helping, as diplomats from the two world superpowers remained on the edges of their seats. In the end though, the Equestrians, despite their best efforts, just couldn’t convince the zebras to agree to a limit on ICBMs—that’s Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, for those of you who don’t know—and thus the world remains close to war. Meanwhile, as a continuation in their ever more urgent race for world domination, both sides used the conference to secretly gain a bit of influence among the Swisherland political and economic elite. However, the Swish government remains stable, intent on continuing its policy of neutrality between the two powers and refusing to make a formal alliance with either of them. They won’t budge for either of the two great powers, and nothing short of a military coup—or a hefty amount of bribing, if you know what I mean—will get them to do otherwise.”

“Meanwhile,” continued Tree Dog, “The zebras’ first action after their refusal to decrease tensions (and the DEFCON meter) at the summit was to announce an even more aggressive foreign policy, which analysts are calling ‘The Breezenev Docrine.’ The doctrine, so named after the dogmatic General Secretary of the Zebrican government, is expected to increase the effectiveness of all Zebrican operations worldwide for the next several months.”

“Well, that’s it for the news,” concluded Tree Dog. “Thanks for listening, chiiiiillllllldren! And now, some music…”

Twilight turned off the radio and went back to observing the board.

“At least that missile crisis is over,” said Twilight. “But I’m still bummed that the DEFCON meter is too low to make coup attempts in any important countries.”

“Just stick to the plan, Twilight,” reminded Spike, “Stick to the plan and you’ll have world domination in no time.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” sighed Twilight. “I just hope we can keep the phantom distracted.”
The phantom, seemingly oblivious to the plan, played the card ‘Independent Ungulates’ for two ops points. The card, being an Equestria-related event, was triggered.

“’Add sufficient pony influence in either Yugoatslavia, the Crimarea, Bullgaria, Przewalskia, or the Duchy of Krakow to equal zebra influence’” read Spike. “Quick! While the phantom’s not looking, you could overturn their control in the Crimarea!”

This Twilight did, placing three pony influence points to counter the three already there by the zebras. The territory, formerly zebra controlled, was now contested. Meanwhile, the phantom used its points (two from the card, one extra due to the effect of the ‘Breezenev Doctrine,’) to place one in Leboarnon to match the ponies’ influence and make the territory contested, and to place two in Maretonia, accumulating enough influence to take control.

“It’s making a move in Centralia,” said Spike. “Maybe you should play ‘Chariot Diplomacy’ as an event to protect yourself.”

“I guess you’re right,” said Twilight. “I don’t really have any better cards to play. I play ‘Chariot Diplomacy.’”

Twilight played ‘Chariot Diplomacy,’ which made it so during the next scoring of Kadur or Centralia, (whichever came first,) one zebra dominated battleground country would be removed from the scoring total.

“That should buy me some time in that region,” remarked Twilight. “I have other things to worry about.”

Frustrated, the phantom played ‘Special Relationship’ for two ops points. With the added point from the Breezenev Doctrine, the phantom used its three points to take control of the largest Centralian country, Saddle Arabia.

Twilight, disgruntled, attempted to distract the phantom by playing ‘Junta,’ which allowed her to place two influence in any country in Solace or Prekt, and then make a free coup attempt in one of the two regions. She chose to place two influence in Venighzuela to take control of it, then she launched a coup against the neighboring nation of Coltombia. She rolled a five. This five, plus the two ops points from the card, gave her a modified score of seven, which was far greater than double the country’s stability number (one), giving her five influence points over Coltombia and tight control over the country.

But despite its opponent’s domination of Prekt, the phantom undauntedly continued its scheme in Centralia. It played ‘Mooslim Revolution,’ a card which allowed it to remove all pony influence in two countries out of a list of eight. It chose Icantered and Nefertia, turning the former neutral and the latter to zebra control.

“What the hell is a ‘Mooslim?’” asked Twilight. “And why did I just lose all my influence in two battleground countries?”

Suddenly, the newspaper colt threw the daily newspaper at Twilight Sparkle’s front door. It missed the door and broke through a window, then hit Twilight in the face.

“That looks like it hurt,” said Spike, noting the skin-piercing glass shards embedded in the paper from when it broke through the window.

Twilight removed the newspaper, which was now black and white and red all over, and looked it over.

‘Mooslim Revolution takese Centralia by storm’ read the headline story:

Disgusted with decadent and fattening Equestrian food, many Centralians have overthrown the ponies’ yoke on the world food market and have begun seeking healthier and more wholesome options. The ‘Mooslim Diet,’ named after the world’s number one selling brand of skim milk, promises radical weight loss, better health, and “an eternity of divine virgin-fucking,” according to some users.

“This is a really, really great diet!” exclaimed jubilant Nefertian Moohammed Fatta during an interview with Equestria Daily. “Nine, eleven months ago I was a fatass neckbeard who crashed planes into towers on Macrosoft Flight Simulator all day. Now I have a fit, muscular body and there are seventy two chicks who want to f**k me!”

The Mooslim diet, which promises miraculous results, is not an easy one to follow. Adherents must follw a strict set of dietary guidelines, including prohibitions on the consumption of alcohol, pork, mystery meat, blood, other ponies, insects, carrion, fingernails, paste, bleach, paperclips, airplane food, and a whole bunch of other stuff that nopony eats anyway.

“We’re sick and tired of those Equestrians coming into our countries and shoving their deep-fried lard sticks in our faces,” said Cheerallah, official spokesmare of the Icantered chapter of PETA. “Don’t they realize that some people don’t like eating chocolate covered deep fried twinkies on a stick.”

Cheerallah’s revelation comes amidst an obesity crisis back in Equestria, highlighted by a recent explosion of ‘inflation’ art that would make Fernando Botero cry.

“Going on the Mooslim diet has truly taught me to eat healthier,” reported Cheerallah. “I’ve been growing my own organic vegetable garden, and I’m very happy with how it’s turning out. It’s especially improved since I lost my belly flab. Before, I couldn’t even weed my garden!”

“We also think there should be rules on how they slaughter chickens,” added Islamashy, a popular fanart depiction of staunch anti-war opponent Fluttershy. “And with the Mooslim diet, we have some… we Mooslims are not really big fans of Scootabuse.”

But despite its popularity, the Mooslim diet is getting powerful opponents. Despite public pressure to stock halal products, Super Duper Mart, a global grocery chain infamous for its stores’ derelict appearances and its employees’ ‘barbaric’ uniforms and outright extreme rudeness, insists on stocking Sparkle Colas, Insta-Mash, and two hundred year old ‘Pork and Beans’ cans.

“Theese ‘Mooslims’ are evil!” says Gorge Tush, CEO of Super Duper Mart and Appleloosan billionaire. “They’re just jealous ‘cause they hates our freedoms. Why, if I were an alicorn princess who controlled our foreign policy, I’d send an army right into Maretonia, kill their leaders, an’ take back our oils an’ confiscate their weapons of mass destruction!”

Twilight, having had enough, stopped reading the newspaper and gave it to Spike with orders to immediately incinerate it, which he did dutifully.

“This sure as hell isn’t going to sit well with our corporate puppetmasters at McRonald’s and Mal-Wart,” said Twilight. “We have to fix this!”

Twilight played ‘Ask Not What Rarity Can Do For You’ for three ops points, which she used to force a tie in Saddle Arabia.
The phantom, frustrated as hell, decided to play ‘COMICON’ for three (four with the bonus) ops points. It spent two points to take control of Icantered and two to regain control of Saddle Arabia.

Twilight played ‘Dakari King Mykan Writes a Terrible Fanfiction,’ an event associated with her opponent in which the ruler of the very unfortunate nation of Unicornicopia wrote a terrible hatefic about My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Most of the world ignored it, except for the nations of Rhinolia and Hippostania, which were so gullible that they believed every word (especially the author’s notes). As a result, the zebras gained two influence points in Rhinolia, the Pridelands, and Hippostania, bringing the latter two countries under zebra control. The nation of Unicornicopia then engaged in a national facepalm in honor of their grand ruler, granting Equestria one additional influence point in Unicornicopia, bringing it under Equestrian control.

Twilight used the two ops points from the card to overturn the zebras’ control of Saddle Arabia and force a tie.

Seeing that it could not completely control Centralia, the phantom played ‘Centralia Scoring,’ for which it would settle on simple domination. Despite Twilight’s play of ‘Chariot Diplomacy, the zebras scored five victory points for dominating the region, while the ponies scored none since they didn’t control a single country there. The score was brought up to 22 to 17.

Twilight, running out of good cards to use, played ‘NOPEC,’ for three ops points, which, as an opponent-associated event, gave the zebras one victory point each for their control of Lynxia, Nefertia, Maretonia, and Icantered, for a total of four. She then used these three points to take control of the Roaman Empire, a Primian battleground country.
The phantom played the ‘Changeling Kingdom’ Card for three ops points. It spent two points to take control of Reiterland and one to take control of the Changeling Kingdom, adding two more battleground countries to its horde. The Changeling Card was then passed face-down to Twilight, hers to use starting on the next turn. Then the phantom realized that the ‘Breezenev Doctrine’ gave it one extra point to spend, which it used to wrestle control of the Roaman Empire away from Twilight.

Twilight played ‘Willy Braeburn’ for two ops points, but also triggering a pro-zebra even the process. The card gave one victory point to the zebras, one zebra influence point to Reiterland, and cancels the coup protection that FATO offered Reiterland. Since the DEFCON was at two, coups could not be made in battleground countries anyway and Twilight placed her two influence points there, moving her influence up to four and switching Reiterland to pony control.

For its last action round, the phantom played ‘Primus Scoring.’ For controlling only one country on the continent, the zebras earned three points, but since the ponies dominated the continent, they gained seven. However, due to the ongoing effect of the card ‘We Will Cherry You,’ the zebras gained three victory points prior to the ponies’ point award, so they actually earned six points.

For Twilight’s last turn, she played the card ‘Lone Gunmare’ for one ops point, which she spent to take control of The Crimarea. However, this card also triggered an enemy event. The event forced Twilight to reveal the cards in her hoof (the only ones she had left were ‘Missile Envy’ and the now facedown ‘Changeling Kingdom’ card,) and gave the phantom one ops point, which it used to retake the Roaman Empire. The ‘Breezenev Doctrine’ worked its magic one final time, granting the phantom one more ops point, which it used to force a tie in Yugoatslavia.

“What does this card do, anyway?” asked Twilight. “’Lone Gunmare?’ Is that implying that somepony’s going to get shot?”

As she said this, Twilight’s eyes wandered around the room and then out the window (yes, the same one that got broken earlier). Just outside of Twilight’s castle, Princess Celestia was walking anticlimactically, not suspecting anything. Suddenly, without warning, Twilight and Spike heard a loud gunshot. The next thing they knew, Princess Celestia’s body was lying on the ground.

Neither side made any ‘Friendship’ ops this turn. Both sides are docked two points. The score is now 20 to 19.
The DEFCON remains at two.

End of the Middle War Era. The Late War Era begins on the next turn.

Turn 8: Distraction

--Turn 8: Distraction--

“Alaska’s liberation is imminent!”

“Ponies of Equestria! It is I, your ruler, Prince Blueblood!” announced an over-the-top regal voice from the radio. “Hear me and obey!.... Oh, sorry, that’s that other radio station.”

“Hey, how’s everypony doin’?” asked the now familiar voice of Tree Dog. “It’s me, your host Tree Dog, and it’s time for the news! Almost a year after the ‘Breezenev Doctrine’ was announced, its effect has now faded. The doctrine, once notoriously effective, has virtually been cancelled out by improved Equestrian planning and preparation. In order to turn the tide of war to their favor, the zebras have gone back to one of their favorite old tricks: Spying!”

“Now, before you go crazy and try to beat the crap out of your neighbor just because you think they might be a spy,...” continued Tree Dog, “Remember that those zebras are actually fairly predictable in their modus operandi; just yesterday, a spy ring naming itself the ‘Maripony Five’ after their idols, the notorious ‘Canterlot Five,’ was found in a top secret government research facility. And the pony who turned them in? It wasn’t a pony at all! It was a zebra; a member of the very group. Yeah, that’s right: we’ve got defectors. This zebra was allegedly won over to our side by our love and tolerance, so he went up to the authorities and spilled the beans. Perhaps if we could all be just a little nicer to our zebra neighbors, then maybe they’ll turn over to our side as well. And if they don’t,… well… they’ll probably just suffer the same fate as the other four zebras in the ring who didn’t turn themselves in: they were all caught and thrown into a vat of radioactive fluid as test subjects. The result was a hideous oozing beast that sprawled all over the place. It was hacked down by chainsaw before it could do any harm. Hopefully the scientists have learned never to throw zebras into vats of radioactive fluid ever again…”

“Aaaaannnnnddd that’s all, folks! Our next song is ‘Civilization,’ by Danny Kaye and the Andrews Sisters. Take it away, Danny!”

Twilight shut off the radio and returned to the game board.

“I just can’t get over it…” sighed Twilight. “I..I… I just can’t.”

“What, Princess Celestia?” asked Spike. “Twilight, get over it. That’s old news.”

“But now she’s dead, Spike!” moaned Twilight. “Gone! Lost forever!”

“So?” asked Spike. “She abdicated the throne long ago. Her sister ruled in her place for the last seven years of her life while she just lounged around on a beach somewhere.”

“Yeah, but she was Princess Celestia! Now without her, everything will fall apart, the night will last forever, and the whole world will be like it was in the fanfiction ‘Friendship Was Magic!’”

“That was written before you became an alicorn princess. There’s no way you’ll be reduced to some lowly clerical job in a bureaucrat’s office. Now, you’re the bureaucrat.”

“But what about my friends? What will happen to them? Their lives will become miserable!”

“Ever since we barricaded ourselves up in this place, not a single one of them has ever knocked on our door! If they’ve gotten along this well without you, then they’ll get along without Princess Celestia.”

“Gee, thanks Spike!” spat Twilight bitterly. “Are you saying that our friends don’t need us?”

“No…” said Spike hesitantly. “I’m just asking if they were even your friends at all.”

Twilight thought about this for a moment, and then shrugged.

“I guess you’re right, Spike,” she said. “Maybe it really isn’t a big deal. Now my only concern is that if Princess Luna dies, the next one in line for the throne is Prince Blueblood, which would quickly put an end to the monarchy. But that’s not much of a problem, because I have the power to overthrow regimes with the snap of my metaphorical fingers.”

“Yeah!” said Spike. “And you have way more important things to worry about than the death of some stupid princess, like the card that the phantom’s about to play next!”

The phantom played ‘Libation Theology,’ which allowed it t pace three influence in Solace. It placed two in the Lands of the Eternal Flame and one in Llamidagua, taking control of both.

“What the hell is a libation?” asked Spike.

“A drink,” said Twilight.

“Oh,” said Spike. “But how does a theology based on drink help our enemy?”

“Because you would have to be absolutely drunk to ally with a phantom,” said Twilight as she played ‘Striped Scare.’ “This should sober them up.”

The phantom, disgruntled by the ops point penalty that ‘Striped Scare’ inflicted upon it, proceeded to play ‘The Performer’ as an event, which allowed it to add four influence points to Primus, but could no longer make any coup attempts in the region. The phantom placed two influence apiece in Prance and Reiterland, taking control of the former and seizing control of the latter. They were but the newest trophies which the phantom held in the clutches of its evil empire.

“Shit, it’s going for domination!” cried Spike. “Do you think it might have a scoring card?”

“Perhaps,” said Twilight, “But I’ve got to focus on Prekt and Kadur. That’s where I’ve got scoring cards for. As long as I can keep a leg up in both regions, I should be good.”

Indeed, both regions were presently dominated by Twilight. But things could soon change, because there was no way of knowing what the phantom would do next. But just to make sure, Twilight played ‘Missile Envy’ as insurance.

Pursuant to the rules of play of ‘Missile Envy,’ Twilight gave the phantom the Missile Envy card in return for its highest valued operations card, which was ‘An Evil Empire’ with a value of three. Because the card was an Equestria-associated event, its event occurred immediately. It cancelled ‘Flutter Power’ and gave Equestria one victory point.

“Yeah-hah!” screamed Twilight. “Now that Fluttershy’s anti-war protest is over, I can start making some more of those awesome coups!”

Right on cue, the phantom played ‘Colonial Plot Guards’ for two ops points, which it used to stage a coup in Coltombia. Its roll of five, plus the two ops points from the card, easily overpowered the country’s unstable government and removed all of Twilight’s five influence points in the country. The remaining zebra influence points were enough to return control of the country to the phantom. It also gained two ‘Friendship Operations’ points.

“I didn’t mean like that!” shouted Twilight. “I’m so frustrated that I could make a counter-coup, just to spite them!”

“Don’t waste your action round on that!” said Spike. “Focus on what’s important: I recommend putting more points in to Veneighzuela to protect your interests there.”

“You’re right, Spike,” said Twilight. “I’ll play ‘Solidarity’ for two ops points, and put them both into Veneighzuela… as insurance.”
The phantom played ‘Arms Race,’ and gained three victory points for achieving the two required ‘Friendship Operations.’

“It’s just trying to distract us,” said Spike. “If we act now, we could control all of Prekt and gain extra points.”

“Why would we need extra points?” asked Twilight. “What about our instant win strategy in Primus?”

“The points will give us a time buffer,” explained Spike. “It will buy us time so that we can focus on Primus without falling too far behind in score.”

“That makes sense,” said Twilight. “Okay. I’ll play ‘Elephanto-Rhinoli War’ for two ops points, which I’ll put in Guanacunia.”
The phantom played ‘Guanacone’ as an event, which placed two zebra influence in Guanacunia.

“Don’t be discouraged,” said Spike. “That was actually a crappy card, so the phantom must be running out of good ones. Play ‘Two Small Steps’ for the points and use them to take control of Guanacunia.”

Twilight did just that, spending the two point card and achieving dominance in the country and control over the continent.
The phantom played the Three Kingdoms Card for four ops points, modified by the ‘Striped Scare’ penalty down to three. Then it used them to take control of Markhoristan, a move which completely shocked Twilight and Spike.

“What the--?” cried Twilight. “Wha—wha—how dare it!”

“I wonder if it can read our minds?” wondered Spike. “I mean, it’s just sitting there, grinning like it knew we were going to react this way.”

“I’d like to play a card and take back control,” said Twilight, “but I don’t have enough action rounds left. I’ll just play the Kadur scoring card before it can take anything else.”

The region was scored. With the new addition of Markhoristan into their sphere of influence, the zebras earned seven victory points and Equestria only three.

For its final action round, the phantom played ‘I’d Take Cover If I Were You’ for three ops points, penalized down to two, and spent them to force a tie in Guanacunia. Twilight was forced to play ‘Prekt Scoring,’ which earned the ponies five victory points for domination of the continent and the zebras two for their presence there.

Equestria, for failing to fill its quota of two required ‘Friendship Operations’ during the turn, was docked two victory points.

The score now lay at 27 to 31 and the DEFCON at two. As the game moved into its penultimate turn, the pressure intensified as the two nations postured themselves to achieve world domination. With the game nearing its end and the two points, would Twilight and Spike’s Primus strategy propel them to early victory just in time? Could they reclaim their lost ground in Kadur or overturn the phantom’s grip on Solace or Centralia? And would anypony give a damn about Emerelda, the Crystal Empire, or the Space Race? These questions, and many more, will only be answered in…… the next chapter!

Turn 9: Cleanup on Isle Nine

--Turn 9: Cleanup on Isle Nine--

“Death is a preferable alternative to Communism!”

“Wake up, Equestria!” chimed the well-familiar voice on the radio. “It’s me, Tree Dog! Bringing you all the music and news your little hearts can handle.”

“The forecast for this coming week is cloudy;” began Tree Dog, “grey and dull, all over Equestria. I mean this both figuratively and literally, because in the real world it’s impossible to have the exact same weather all over the country, unless you can actually control the weather, which we can, but that’s not the point. The point is that having the weather be all the same as a whole throughout all of Equestria just doesn’t happen in real life. But most regions of Equestria are predicted to experience cloudy skies and possibly rain during this coming week. But in the geopolitical spectrum, where it is possible to have an entire nation under one cloud, well… it looks like things are about to get really cloudy.”

“You see folks,” continued Tree Dog, “Last month’s Equestria Games in Appleloosa were supposed to be a big relief. To the Appleloosans, to Equestria, and to the world as a whole. Unlike the previous games in Machu Alpacchu, there were wide spaces of flat land and enough oxygen to comfortably breathe. Unlike the games before that in Arachnalia, we weren’t sweating our asses off and we didn’t have to worry at all about mosquitoes and giant spiders. And unlike the games before that in the Changeling Kingdom, it was actually warm enough that you didn’t need to wear a parka in midday. But alas, the Appleloosan Equestria Games weren’t enough to lift our spirits out of the recent economic slump. Instead, it only dug them deeper.”

“Despite our best efforts and our home team advantage, the zebras still eeked out a triumphant victory in overall medal count. Perhaps we picked a location that was too similar in clime to their homeland. Or maybe they trained extra hard, knowing very well how difficult we made our last Equestria Games fro them. Oh, well. Full results are available in today’s edition of Equestria Daily. I’m not gonna read them out to you because we don’t have time.”

“In other news, while everypony else was distracted by the games, the royal guards have recently arrested a young Canterlot Intelligence Agency agent by the name of ‘Pipsqueak’ on charges of espionage and high treason. CIA Authorities noticed early on when files started disappearing and important leads were suddenly cut off, but it took a while to find the culprit. Finally, they began to look at Pipsqueak, the only junior agent who wore designer suits to the office. After bugging his house and rifling through all his personal information, they found that somehow he could afford to purchase a 100,000 bit sportscar—in cash—even though his monthly phone bill exceeded his monthly income. Through a little bit more investigating—a.k.a. sending an ex-marefriend to stalk him—they discovered that Pipsqueak had been soliciting bribes from shady contacts in the zebra embassy. Pipsqueak was arrested and sentenced to life in prison, but not before pulling off the biggest stunt of his career: stealing top-secret plans for a space-based superweapon/missile defense system.”

“Luckily, the project was still in the planning stage and few of the specific logistic details had been answered. Still, that deals a huge blow to our future foreign policy options! Even worse, many of our current foreign policy options have already been revealed to the enemy. It will take some time before the foreign ministry can think of some new ones, but for now we’ll just have to play with our opponents knowing what our next moves will be.”

“Thaaaaaaaanks for listning, chiiiiiillllllldren! And now, some music…”

Having heard more than enough of ‘Wall-o’-text’ Tree Dog, Twilight turned off the radio again. This time, she had figured out how to turn off the radio from halfway across the room, so she didn’t have to walk back over to the table; she was already there.

“Damnit!” she cried as she pounded a hoof on the table. “I always knew that colt wasn’t up to any good! He spilled the beans again, just like he did in ‘Twilight Time!’”

“Didn’t you ever read ‘Great Expectations?’” asked Spike, who brought a tray of chocolate milk glasses to the table. “Ponies named ‘Pip’ will do anything for money.”

“Or sex,” scoffed Twilight as she took one of the glasses. “I saw the 2011 BBC serial. Honestly, Estella wasn’t that hot.”

“You should have seen the 2012 movie,” said Spike. “Holliday Grainger’s kind of hot…. After a few beers, of course.”

“Damnit, both of them are way too long!” grumbled Twilight. “And as much as I love reading, I don’t have time to read the book. Dickens is a wonderful writer, but where the hell can I get a good film version of his work that I can watch in under an hour?”

“Remind me to show you the South Park version,” said Spike. “But right now we’ve got to focus. The phantom’s playing its cards again.”

The phantom played ‘Eastern Primian Unrest’ for three ops points, and placed them all in The Fillyppines, overturning Equestria’s control over the country.

“It’s making a bid for power in Kadur!” cried Spike. “Quickly, do something!”

“I’ve got it, I’ve got it,” said Twilight, casually playing ‘Weather Balloon Incident’ for three ops points, simultaneously causing a totally-not-suspicious Equestrian ‘weather balloon’ and its pilot to be shot down over Zebrican airspace, granting the zebras one victory point in the process.

“I’ll use two ops points to take back the Fillyppines,” said Twilight, “And my last one in Jackalya.”

“Good job,” said Spike. “Way to stick it to the phantom.”

The phantom played ‘Missile Envy’ for two points, which it used to take over the Southeast Kaduran nation of Bengalia. Twilight responded by playing ‘Elephantian Unrest’ for two ops points, which she placed in Maretonia.

The phantom then played ‘Southeast Kadur Scoring,’ which gave it seven victory points and Twilight one. Twilight played ‘Zuri and Pumpkin Cake’ for two ops points, which she used to undo the zebras’ control over Icantered.

The phantom played ‘Celestia Prime Deployed,’ which gave the zebras one victory point and allowed it to remove one pony influence from three countries in Western Primus. It chose Reiterland, the Roaman Empire, and Unicornicopia, the former two of which were battleground countries and the latter now having insufficient influence for Twilight to control.

Twilight played ‘Orcria elected in Llamidagua’ for two ops points, which she spent to force a tie in Jackalya and to take control of Icantered. But by playing this card, it removed all pony influence in Llamidagua and gave the phantom a free coup attempt against a neighboring country. However, this didn’t do anything, because there was no pony influence in Llamidagua to begin with, and the coup against Coasta Muleia, (the only country the phantom could make a coup against,) because its government was too stable.

The phantom did gain two ‘Friendship Ops’ points, though.

Frustrated, the phantom slid the card ‘Wargames’ towards Twilight. It smiled smugly as Spike took the card and looked over it.

“If DEFCON Status 2,…” read Spike, knocking over a glass of Chocolate Milk in the process. “You may immediately end the game (without final scoring phase) after giving opponents 6 VPs.”

“WHAT???” screamed Twilight. “Is that… thing… ending the game already?”

The phantom nodded, smugly.

“Bu-bu-but--” Twilight stammered, “But I wasn’t done playing yet! A-and… it’s ahead by… fourteen victory points. Even with the extra six, I would still be eight behind… and then I’ll never be able to execute my glorious plan!”

Twilight fell to the floor and proceeded to bawl her eyes out, disappointed beyond words that she could not execute her glorious plan. The phantom rolled its eyes and then broke out into an evil laugh. Spike was the only one paying attention to the giant hand that had just smashed through the ceiling.

As the hand came closer and closer towards the gameboard, Spike’s eyes grew wider and wider in anticipation. When the hand was more than halfway to its destination, Spike went over to Twilight and slapped her across the face.

“Owwww!” said Twilight. “What the hell did you do that for? Can’t you see I’m crying over something completely trivial here?”

“There’s no use crying over spilled milk!” said Spike. “Don’t you notice the giant hand that broke through your ceiling?”
The giant hand was now three quarters of the way to the gameboard. Twilight now noticed the hand and began staring at it. The phantom stopped laughing and noticed the hand too. The hand, once it reached the table, placed its finger on the DEFCON status marker and nudged it slightly leftward. Then it ascended (much more quickly than it had descended) and disappeared just as mysteriously as it had arrived.

“Wow,” said Spike. “Nopony’s going to believe this.”

“Lyra’s gonna be sooooo jealous!” said Twilight. “Not only did I see an actual human hand, I saw the Hand of God himself!”

“Is God actually a human?” asked Spike. “He kind of breaks all of the rules that regular humans are supposed to follow, like NOT being able to smash through houses and singlehandedly change DEFCON meters.”

“That debate could go on for hours,” said Twilight. “And I just want to get this game over with. And execute my glorious plan. And clean up the chocolate milk that you spilled all over the board.”

They looked at the board. The entire Primus region was covered in a big chocolate milk puddle, slowly conquering the world like the magic whateveryoucallit in all those Conversion Bureau fanfics.

Suddenly, the Hand of God plummeted back down into the room. It stopped just before it could smash the table and lightly dabbed the Primus region of the gameboard with a God-sized Shamwow. True to the Shamwow Guy’s words, the God-sized Shamwow absorbed all of the chocolate milk that was on the board, but it left a slight stain where the milk had been. Then the hand rose back up into the heavens, leaving the players in peace.

“Oookay….” Said Twilight, not really knowing how to react. “Now that the milk’s been cleaned up, I can cry over the fact that I’ll never be able to implement my glorious plan.”

“But you still can, Twilight!” said Spike. “The card says the DEFCON status has to be two, and now look where it’s at!”
The DEFCON, which had previously been at two, was now in between the ‘two’ and ‘three’ spaces of the DEFCON tracker.

“DEFCON Two point four?” asked Twilight. Then she turned to the phantom. “Well, I guess since it’s not technically at two, you can’t play ‘Wargames.’”

“But—but--” stammered the phantom. “But that happened after I played the card!”

“If the Hand of God broke through our roof and moved DEFCON meter to two point four,” argued Spike, “Then obviously it was a godsend (no pun intended) that we continue our game.”

“Fine,” said the phantom reluctantly. “Have it your way. I’ll play this for four ops points instead of as an event… but I’ll still win! Just you wait!”

With the game back on track, the phantom placed three ops points in the Kingdom of Warclaw and one in Yugoatslavia, taking control of them both.

“And now for my secret plan!” announced Twilight as she triumphantly played ‘Icantered-Maretonia War.’

“That is your secret plan?” asked Spike wryly. “Really, I thought your plan would have been much more epic than that.”

“Hey, shut it,” said Twilight. “I just made this plan, like, three rounds ago, and I didn’t have time to plan anything better. Now roll the die for the invasion, okay?”

Spike rolled the die and got a four. Because Twilight had neutralized all of the adjacent opponent controlled countries through her earlier actions, the Icanteran invasion of Maretonia was a success. Twilight gained two victory points, two ‘Friendship Ops’ points, and replaced the phantom’s three influence points in Maretonia with three of her own. She now controlled both countries.

But the phantom had a surprise planned. In response to the loss of Maretonia, it played ‘Wonderbolts Barracks Bombing,’ which removed all the Equestrian influence in Leboarnon and two influence in a country of the phantom’s choice, which was Saddle Arabia.

The zebras now controlled both countries.

“Damnit!” cried Twilight. “How dare they? This leaves me no choice but to draw from the deck!”
She played ‘Our Mare in Tehrare’ again, which, because she still controlled Icantered and Maretonia, allowed her to draw five cards from the top of the draw deck. She kept three and discarded ‘Glassnose’ and ‘Emerelda Scoring.’

The phantom played ‘Icantered Mustache Crisis,’ which removed all the pony influence from the nation of Icantered and replaced it with two zebra influence. The phantom now had control over that country too.

“Well fuck,” said Twilight. “They just pulled a major dick move right then and there.”

“And what are you going to do about it?” asked Spike. “Take it back?”

“Hell no!” cried Twilight. “Not after how they betrayed me! Instead….”
Twilight picked up a red phone and dialed a number. The phone beeped for a few minutes before it finally connected.

“Hello?” asked Twilight. “Yes, this is Twilight. This phantom just pulled a really big dick move on me. I want you to bomb—… no, not the zebra homeland, you know we’re on the brink of nuclear war! Instead, I want you to bomb… hmmm… no…. no…. ah-ha! Lynxia.
I want you to bomb Lynxia. Show those zebras they’re not safe. AND teach those friggin’ Mooslims not to complain about Equestrian mustache-growing spells….oh, that’s great!..... My credit card number? It’s Equestrian Express, card number [Redacted]. Yeah. Thank you so much. Means a lot to me. Have a good day. Bye.” And then she hung up.

“What was that all about?” asked Spike. “You know those phone lines are hacked. Couldn’t you have just issued the order through that ‘Bomb Lynxia’ card?”

“No, because I needed to make sure I have Equestria’s best pilot on the job,” said Twilight. “And to do that, I needed to make a personal call. To a friend.”

For no apparent reason, a tiny blue airplane appeared on top of Equestria on the gameboard. It took off, crossed the eastern ocean, crossed over Primus, landed in Maretonia to refuel, then flew westward over northern Emerelda. It dropped several small cylinders over Lynxia, which exploded in brilliant rainbow explosions.

“Did you just bomb an oil-rich desert nation?” asked Spike.

“Eeeyup!” replied Twilight. “And I earned a victory point while doing it, too!”
Indeed she did. For the two zebra influence points in the nation which was just bombed, Twilight earned two victory points.

But the little plane wasn’t done just yet. It then turned around and bombed Nefertia, Saddle Arabia, Markhoristan, and Icantered, earning one, two, two, and one victory point respectively. Then the little blue plane landed in Maretonia to refuel again, and then flew home.

Twilight took the card she had been holding, made a few marks on it with a pen, then placed it on top of the discard pile. Spike looked at the result, which read ‘Rainbow Dash bombs loves and tolerates the SHIT out of Lynxia, Nefertia, Saddle Arabia, Markhoristan, and Icantered.’

“Today was a good day,” Spike thought to himself.

Both sides achieved their required number of ‘Friendship Actions’ for the round, neither are docked any victory points. With a score of 43-42, the game enters the final turn nearly tied.

Still reeling from the effects of the bombing, Lynxia, Nefertia, Saddle Arabia, Markhoristan, and Icantered all gained one Equestrian influence point worth of both fear and reverence for the great superpower.

The DEFCON remains at two point four.

Author's Note

Don't worry guys, almost over! Just one last turn and an epilogue.

Congratulations to everypony who's managed to make it this far! I'm not even sure if I could do it if I weren't the one who wrote this.

Turn 10: The Great and Powerful

--Turn 10: The Great and Powerful--

“Tactical assessment; Red Chinese Victory: Impossible!”

“Come one, come all, prepare to be astounded, amazed, and otherwise stupefieid!” bellowed a grandiose voice from the radio. “I am The Great and Powerful Tree Dog, your master of ceremonies! And you are listening to radio free soon-to-be wasteland! That was ‘Maybe’ by the Ink Spots, and you’re listening to Universe News Radio!”

“It’s that time again, time for…. The news!” Tree Dog began. “Yeah, yeah, I know you guys are all sick and tired of my increasingly long and unnecessarily detailed reports of world events, but cheer up, ‘cause this may be the last time you’ll ever hear a report about a foreign country! Yes, it’s true, the end of the Cold War just might be in sight! It’s the tenth year already and both sides are at a near-stalemate. It appears as though both sides are preparing to make massive pushes in an effort to tip the scales in their favor.”

“Now let’s start with everypony’s favorite enemies, the zebras. What have they been up to? Lately, they’ve poured heavy amounts of aid into death squads, revolutionaries, and other guerilla movements all over Prekt and Solace, thus destabilizing the region and making it easier for them to launch coup attempts against the governments there. Unfortunately, this means that Equestria might have a harder time doing the same since there are so many zebra funded guerilla movements waiting to screw everything up. Maybe it would be best for our foreign policy minister to just simply avoid that region for the time being.”

“Meanwhile, our foreign ministry refuses to say anything yet, which means they’ve got some secret plans ahead of them. Things are looking up for us in Northern Primus, however, because they’ve just discovered huge offshore reserves of oil! What does this oil mean for us? Even though we won’t be getting a cut, it means that our Primian allies will no longer be dependent upon oil imports, thus shoving a giant ‘NOPE’ in the face of NOPEC! Ha ha, I just had to make that pun. Seriously, though, with a weaker NOPEC, the zebras won’t be able to leverage the free world’s oil dependency against it…. At least, for now….”

“Wellllll, thanks for listennnnnnniiiiinnnnnggggg, cccchhhhiiiiiiiiilllllddddrrrrreeeennnn! This is Tree Dog, awoooo! And now, some music….”

Twilight telekinetically turned off the radio, then turned to Spike to discuss strategy.

“Half of my cards are opponent-associated events,” she began, “And I have a scoring card for Solace. I wanted to focus on dominating Primus, but I don’t think I’ll be able to this turn.”

“Don’t worry about Solace, Twilight,” reassured Spike. “It’s only worth six victory points. I recommend making a bee line for Primus.”

“But how is that going to help me in the long run?” asked Twilight. “I mean, the Primian scoring card is probably in the discard pile, and in a time like this I should really be focusing on building and protecting my influence over the rest of the world. Otherwise I’ll lose the game!”

“But how else can you win?” asked Spike. “Look, going after the rest of the world might be the safest way, but in times like this, it’s the crazy stupid dangerous plan that will propel you to victory. Take a look at the board, there’s no other way you could win!”

Twilight looked at the board. Solace was already deeply under zebra control. Prekt was currently under pony domination, but a few zebra-backed coups in the region could quickly change that. Centralia and Kadur were zebra dominated, but it would take some work to get them to change. Emerelda… well… nobody cared about them!

“Alright, we’ll go with your strategy,” said Twilight. “But if the zebras win, I’ll have you be the first one they put in their pot.”

“Great!” said Spike. “Now how are we going to do this with the cards we have now?”

“Somehow we’ll have to trick the zebras into thinking that Primus isn’t our main focus,” said Twilight. “Otherwise they’ll actually try to stop us.”

“Try bluffing,” said Spike. “That’s how you beat Trixie in ‘Magic Duel.’”

“Okay,” said Twilight. “I’ll bluff. I don’t think Applejack would approve of it, though.”

“Seriously?” asked Spike. “You’re still worried about what your friends will think? She’s gonna support you no matter what you do here… unless you surrender, of course, or cheat, or lie, or… no, wait a minute… she agreed to have her whole family painted like her just so you could pretend you actually knew how to do age spells. Huh. I guess the element of honesty does approve of lying.”

“It’s not lying, Spike,” corrected Twilight, “It’s bluffing. It’s completely different, and Applejack does it all the time whenever she plays poker. She’s kind of bad at it, though, but that doesn’t really matter. I’m still doing it, because telling one small lie is way better than letting the bad guys win.”

Twilight levitated a card from her hoof into the air, and then across the table.

“Ohhh phantom!” she called seductively. “I’ve got a ‘Solace’ Scoring card right here! Better plan your next moves ac-cor-ding-ly!

The phantom thought about this for a moment, then played ‘Impeccable Planning’ for three ops points. It spent two to take over El Saltador and one to buffer its position in Mexicolt.

Twilight then played 'Twilight and Trixie Twirl a Bunch of Animals Around in the Air While Launching Rockets at Them to Entertain Saddle Arabian Royalty While Fluttershy Cries' as an event, which gave Twilight two influence points (and control) in Saddle Arabia and caused ‘Mooslim Revolution’ to become unplayable as an event. The card would have really helped Twilight earlier in the game, but whatever. It was the final turn, so it didn’t really matter that much anyway.

“Oh, maybe I didn’t have a scoring card for Solace,” she called to the phantom. “Maybe it’s for some other continent!”

The phantom wrinkled its phantom eyebrows and gave a snort of disgust, then quickly looked through its cards to re-evaluate its strategy. It played ‘The Voice of Equestria’ for two ops points, which it used to take back control of Saddle Arabia.

Then Twilight played ‘Canal Crisis’ for three ops points. The opponent-associated event of the card caused the removal of four pony influence from Prance, Caledonia, or Suindael, with no more than two influence removed per country. Because there was no pony influence in Prance at the time, the phantom just removed two influence from Caledonia and two from Suindael. Twilight put two points in the Changeling Kingdom and one in Yugoatslavia, turning both form zebra-controlled to contested territories.

“Oh, maybe I don’t have a scoring card at all!” Twilight taunted. “Maybe I’m just BLUFFING!”
The phantom, enraged, played ‘Legacy of Nightmare Moon’ as an event, which allowed it to remove three pony influence points from Western Primus. It removed two from the Roman Empire and one from Reiterland.

Feeling lucky, Twilight played ‘Brushie War’ against the Roaman Empire. She rolled a six, modified by the zebras’ control of neighboring Prance to a five. With this smashing success, Twilight added three to her ‘Friendship Ops’ track, gained one victory point, and replaced all four of the zebra influence in the country with four pony influence, effectively taking control.

“Actually, I told the truth about the scoring card the first time,” said Twilight, revealing her Solace Scoring card. “You might want to reconsider your strategy…”

The phantom squinted at the card, verifying that it was indeed a Solace Scoring card. Then the zebra looked at the situation in Solace. Getting wise, the zebra ignored Twilight’s taunt and played ‘You’ve Got to Share, You’ve Got to Care’ for three ops points, along with ‘League of Nations Intervention’ to cancel the opponent=related event. It placed these three points in the Roaman Empire.

“The League of Nations interfering with a speech about world peace?” asked Spike. “Isn’t that kind of hypocritical?”

“The League of Nations is always hypocritical, Spike,” informed Twilight. “They always talk about world peace, but never do anything to actually achieve it.”

“Seems like a pretty pointless organization,” said Spike. “Why do we even pay for it in the first place?”

“For world peace,” said Twilight.

“But—” said Spike, but he was cut off by Twilight.

“Quiet!” she barked. “I’m trying to be brilliant here.”

Twilight played the Three Kingdoms Card for four ops points. She put three into the Three Kingdoms themselves and one in the Fillyppines, taking control of both countries. Because she spent all of her points in Kadur, the card gave her one extra point to spend in Kadur, which she used to wreset Markhoristan away from zebra control. Then, as the card directed, Twilight slid it face-down over to her phantom opponent.

“How was that brilliant?” asked Spike. “Your opponent gains an extra victory point just for holding that card.”

“Because I just took over two countries and contested a third,” said Twilight. “Now the balance of power in Kadur is almost even.”

“Aahhh,” said Spike. “I get it.”

But Spike had little time to revel in the euphoria of his newly increased intelligence, for the phantom was about to play a card that would shave the facial foliage off all the gentlesirs.

The phantom played ‘Princess of Fun’ for three ops points, two of which it spent to take back the Roaman Empire, and one of which it spent to take back the Changeling Kingdom. The event of the card, which was Equestria-associated, gave Twilight one victory point, removed all zebra influence form Caledonia (of which there was none), added one pony influence in Alpacatina, and made ‘Legacy of Nightmare Moon’ no longer playable.

“Finally!” yelled Spike. “It took that long for everypony to forget about Nightmare Moon?”

“Ponies hate it when psycho alicorns attempt to plunge the world into everlasting darkness,” said Twilight. “And they certainly don’t like anyone who tries to take over the world. It’s a very serious thing.”

“But why are there so many Hitler jokes on the internet?” asked Spike. “It only took sixty years for the world to forgive him, and yet Princess Luna had to wait a thousand.”

“The internet makes jokes about would-be conquers all the time,” said Twilight. “The latter half of Kim Jong Il’s reign was full of jokes.”

“But Kim Jong Il wasn’t a big threat,” said Spike. “Mostly just a show-off and a bluffer. Like Trixie. Or the phantom. Or you.”

“Speaking of the phantom…” said Twilight, “Let’s see just how much it’s been bluffing.”
Twilight played ‘Grain Sales to Zebras’ as an event, which allowed her to randomly choose one card from the phantom’s hand. She played ‘Churnobyl’ for three ops points, all of which she spent to make Prance into a contested territory.

“Grain Sales?” asked Spike. “They have to import grain? Wow. That’s the mark of bad leadership right there: trying to make a major impact on the world stage when you can’t even keep your own country’s shit together. No wonder why Kim Jong Il was such a failure.”

“Precisely,” said Twilight as she played the Changeling Card for three ops points, spending it all to upset the zebras’ control in Reiterland, and then using the additional point earned from using all of the card’s points in Primus to take control of Reiterland, thus turning the tables on the world stage all while ignoring the Reaganomics-induced credit crunch and resulting economic recession which was currently going on in her own country. She casually slid the Changeling Kingdom Card to the other side of the table, completely oblivious to her own hypocrisy.

Devoid of any other cards to play, the phantom played ‘Zebras Shoot Down CAL-007’ for four ops points. It spent two points in the Three Kingdoms, one in Markhoristan, and one in Guanacunia, taking control of all three battleground countries. However, being an opponent associated card, the event also occurred, which gave Twilight two victory points and degraded the DEFCON by one level.

“The DEFCON is at one point!” shouted Spike. “Does that mean that we just started an MLP equivalent of global thermonuclear war?”

“Maybe,” replied Twilight. “It all depends on how we interpret it. It really shouldn’t have been set at a non-integer in the first place, and I have absolutely no idea how we’re supposed to interpret it. Nopony gave me directions.”

“Damnit, Twilight!” said Spike. “Always trying to follow directions. We need to think outside the box in order to get the result we want!”

“And what is the result we want?” asked Twilight. “To get the most accurate measurement? Because if we were to round the DEFCON to a whole number, it would go directly to one.”

“No, dumbass!” chided Spike. “We’re trying to prevent a nuclear war, not start one! Just…. Round it up to two, okay?”

“But I can’t,” said Twilight. “That’s impossible. You can’t round anything under five tenths upward, because that’s against the rules of mathematics. No, wait a minute. You can round anything under five tenths upward. Okay, you can’t round anything under .444444444444444444444444444444, etc. upward, given that the last digit of whatever number you have is greater than 4. One point four does not meet these conditions, so therefore it must be rounded downward to one.”

“If there was a computer in charge of this,” remarked Spike, “Then we’d all be dead right now…. Okay, how about we just keep the DEFCON where it is, don’t round it anywhere, and because we all want to stay alive, we’ll continue playing on the technicality that because it’s not exactly at one, it doesn’t trigger a nuclear war.”

“But that’s against the rules of rounding,” said Twilight. “We need to round it to one, for math’s sake.”

“No, we need to keep it where it is,” said Spike. “For the sake of the world!”

“Math is more important,” said Twilight. “Unless you can prove me wrong, the DEFCON will be set to one.”

Spike went off to search for something he could prove Twilight wrong with. After two and a half hours, he came back empty-handed.

“Didn’t find anything?” asked Twilight.

“Nope,” said Spike, “Nothing at all.”

“Then it must be set at one,” said Twilight as she moved her hoof towards the DEFCON marker. Spike grabbed the hoof and said,

“Wait! I didn’t find anything that said that the DEFCON had to be at an integer, so we don’t have to round!”
Twilight withdrew her hoof and looked puzzled.

“We don’t?” she asked. “Not a thing. I triple-checked everything that came in the box, and couldn’t find anything that said that the DEFCON had to be an integer.”

“Huh,” said Twilight. “I wonder why they didn’t make that a rule in the rulebook.”

“I don’t think they were expecting it,” said Spike. “I don’t think they were expecting divine intervention either. And besides, we’re not even playing the game right!”

“I guess you’re right, Spike,” said Twilight. “Alright. We’ll keep the DEFCON at one point four, as long as it keeps us all from being obliterated. Now, for my next turn, I’ll play—”

“Wait!” said Spike. “Read the bottom of the card that the phantom just played.”

“’Remove from play if used as an event,’” read Twilight. “So? That’s on a lot of event cards.”

“No, no, the paragraph above it!” said Spike.

“’If South Chollima is pony controlled,…’” read Twilight, “’…then the pony player may place influence or attempt realignments as if they played a 4 Ops card.’ Hey, that’s great! Thanks for catching that, Spike!”

“All in a day’s work,” said Spike. “Ya know, sometimes I wonder if Princess Celestia only sent me to Ponyville to supervise you.”

Twilight didn’t hear Spike’s comment. She was far too engrossed in placing her four ops points, which she split evenly between the Roaman Empire and the Changeling Kingdom to convert both of them to her cause.

Twilight then used her action round to play ‘Prektian Debt Crisis’ for two ops points, which she placed in Prance and Yugoatslavia.

Both countries now belonged to her.

It was now the phantom’s final action round, but it didn’t have any playable cards left, so it couldn’t do anything. Because it could not be held between turns, Twilight played her Solace scoring card, which awarded six victory points to the zebras for controlling the region, and none to the ponies since they didn’t hold a single country there.

“Welp, I guess that ends the game,” said Twilight. “Let’s tally up the points for the final scoring round.”

“No, wait!” interjected Spike. “The ‘North Primus Oil’ card lets you play eight cards this turn!”

“Oh,” said Twilight. “That’s great! For my final card play, I’ll play ‘Decolonization’ for two ops points, which I’ll place in Camelia and Jackalya.”

Twilight played the card, placed the points, and snagged two more nations into her trove. With that, the turn ended and the final scoring of the regions began.

For not completing their required ‘Friendship Operations,’ the zebras were docked one victory point. The ponies had met their required ‘Friendship Operations’ by play of the ‘Brushie War’ card, so they were docked nothing.
The score now rests at 47 to 47, an even tie between both sides. The final scoring will determine who will emerge as victor of…..Twilight Struggle.

The DEFCON rests at one point four.

Final Scoring: A Winrar is You!

--Final Scoring: A Winrar is You!--

“Catastrophic system failure! Initiating core shutdown per emergency initiative!”

As the official non-partisan and completely un-biased scorekeeper, Spike the dragon proceeded to score the regions.

For controlling all of the battleground countries in Solace, (and most of the continent in general,) the zebras earned six victory points. For not controlling even a single country in the region, the ponies did not earn any points.

For controlling more battleground countries in Prekt than the zebras, (and more countries in general,) the ponies had domination over the region, and earned five points. The zebras earned two for their presence there.

For controlling more battleground countries in Emerelda, (and more countries in general,) the zebras earned five points for domination of the region. The ponies earned two for their presence there.

Because both controlled the same number of battleground countries and regular countries in Centralia, the ponies and the zebras each earned three points for their presence there.

For controlling more battleground countries in Kadur than the ponies, (and more countries in general,) the zebras earned seven points for domination of the region. The ponies earned three for their presence there.

“In total, the ponies earned 13 points from the scoring and the zebras earned 23,” proclaimed Spike. “And the winner, with a grand total of 70 points and a lead of ten is…..the zebras!”
Twilight and the phantom stood silently, not saying anything. They just blinked for a few minutes, until Twilight said, “What about Primus?”

“Oh, I almost forgot!” said Spike, suddenly remembering something he totally forgot. “Let me see… with control of one country, the zebras have a presence there and earn three, bringing their score up to 73. But for Twilight… ahhh… wait a minute! For controlling all five battleground countries, and three more countries, that gives you… control over the region! Even though you’re behind by thirteen points, you instantly win the game, Twilight!”
Immediately, confetti and party streamers fell down from the ceiling and a generic party horn blower sound effect cued. These had been unknowingly hidden in Twilight’s ceiling by Pinkie in case of a ‘Twilight won THE GAME’ emergency.

A beam of bright light shot down from the heavens through the hole that the Hand of God had punched through Twilight’s ceiling (it still hadn’t been repaired) and illuminated Twilight in a spotlight of holy holiness. Twilight’s body began to sparkle and floated a meter off the ground in sparkly floating shimmeriness. A laurel wreath appeared atop Twilight’s head. Angels floated down from the skies and circled the room, floating above the ground. Ten Equestrian influence was immediately added to every country on the gameboard, signifying Twilight’s sheer dominance over her opponent. The zebra phantom, no longer having a purpose in its life, spontaneously combusted into a pile of ash, able to spread its vile communist zebra influence no longer. The glorious and pure land of Equestria was finally at peace.

And then, to celebrate Twilight’s glorious victory over her opponent, the angels in the room took a collective deep breath, and then serenaded Twilight with the most wonderful song ever heard by ponykind.

Cleaning Up: Sweeping it Under the Rug

--Cleaning Up: Sweeping it Under the Rug--

“I die so that Democracy may live!”

After power washing the entire castle, scrubbing their battle axes, and burying two dozen angel corpses in the backyard, Twilight and Spike set about to clean up the board game.

“It’s a miracle that we didn’t get any blood on the gameboard,” said Twilight, “Especially after all the hacking and slashing we’ve been doing.”

They took all the markers off the board, put them into their bags, then organized the cards back into their appropriate decks and placed them inside the box. Spike laid the player aids and the gameboard on top and Twilight placed the lid.

“Seriously though,” said Twilight. “This is probably the most dangerous boardgame I’ve ever played. I feel like I’ve been directly responsible for the deaths of millions of ponies.”

“Awww, you’re just overreacting,” said Spike. “Do you honestly believe all that bullshit about us playing the game for ten years straight and never leaving the house?”

“I guess,” said Twilight. “I mean, the radio said so… and so did the newspaper—”

“Nonsense!” said Spike. “Really, think about it. When was the last time you remember going outside? Was it really ten years ago?”
Twilight thought for a moment. The last time she remembered actually going anywhere was a quick shopping trip on the morning of the day Princess Celestia gave her the board game, but it didn’t feel that long ago…

“It was… about ten days ago, I think,” said Twilight. “At least… I think it was ten days ago. I’m not sure. I honestly haven’t been keeping track of time… but then how does that explain the radio? And the newspaper? And the big gaping hole in my ceiling?”

“Just our imaginations,” said Spike. “None of that stuff really happened. I’ve never heard of a radio DJ named ‘Tree Dog’ and I’m sure the big gaping hole is leftover from that one time we asked Pinkie to rewire our built-in stereo system. And if we had really been inside here for ten years straight, how are we still alive? Where would we get our food?”

“Pizza deliveries, perhaps?” suggested Twilight. “I’m sure that if we look around, we’ll probably find some leftover boxes. Also, I had a lot of junk food in the pantry—”

“Nopony can survive for ten years straight only eating pizza and junk food!” said Spike. “Besides, even if a pony could survive one year on just that, they’d have already gone insane and couldn’t think clearly. You executed a well thought-out plan that won the game.”

“But Nightmare Moon gave us those well thought-out puzzles after a thousand years of eating nothing but moon cheese,” protested Twilight. “And Littlepip came up with that plan to defeat the Goddess after just a month of eating nothing but junk food and iguana bits!”

“Wait--whaa?” asked Spike, confused. “’Moon Cheese?’ ‘Littlepip?’ “Iguana Bits?’ You’re obviously stir-crazy. Come on, let’s go for a walk.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” admitted Twilight. “I’m probably just imagining things. Even ten days is a lot to stay indoors. Let’s go outside.”

Twilight and Spike left the castle and began walking down Twilight’s driveway, oblivious to the neck-high grass and foal-sized weeds which had devoured her lawn, or the giant grey clouds which covered the sky. They only began to take notice of their surroundings when Twilight’s hooves began to clip-clop against a hard surface.
Twilight looked down at the ground.

“Spike?” she asked. “Um… why is there a road here?”

“There’s always been a road here, Twilight,” said Spike.

“But it’s not supposed to be paved.”

They looked down at the ground and saw a long black strip of pavement running perpendicular to Twilight’s driveway. Its faded grey color and plethora of wide cracks indicated that it had been there for quite some time.

Then they looked around and observed that overnight the neighboring thatched roof cottages had all morphed into brick housing projects and all the neatly-trimmed hedges had grown into graffiti-laden concrete walls.

“What happened to Ponyville?” asked Spike.

“I don’t know,” said Twilight. “We should ask somepony.”
Just to their luck, the spotted Carrot Top on the other side of the street.

“Hey, Carrot Top!” called Twilight. “Carrot Top!”
Carrot Top stopped and turned.

“How did you know my name?” she asked, surprised. “Who are you?”

“It’s Me, Twilight!” said Twilight. “What the hell happened here?”

“Twilight who?” asked Carrot Top.

“Twilight Sparkle!” said Twilight. “You know, the Princess of Friendship?”

“Never heard of you,” said Carrot Top, who then turned her head and walked away.

“I saved this fucking town from an Ursa Minor, goddamnit!” cried Twilight after her. Then, turning to Spike, she asked, “How could she have forgotten me?”

“Ponies can forget a lot in ten days,” said Spike. “I don’t even remember what I had for dinner last night.”

“Pizza,” said Twilight. “Pizza and snack cakes.”

“I swear I had a gem cake,” said Spike. “What about the night before?”

“Pizza and snack cakes.”

“And the night before?”

“Pizza and snack cakes.”

“What about… the night before?”

“Pizza and a gem cake.”

“Yes!” said Spike. “I knew we couldn’t have been in there for ten years straight! Otherwise, I would have eaten all of our gems during the first few weeks. ”

“Still, I swear we were in there for ten years,” said Twilight. “I always keep track of the date… until you stole my calendar!”

“We ran out of toilet paper!” said Spike. “I didn’t have any choice!”

“Oh,well,” said Twilight. “We can get another calendar, and some more toilet paper, at this store.”
Twilight pointed to a new-ish looking store they had encountered. The two of them went in, finding it strange that the doors magically opened by themselves. They also noticed that this store was a lot larger than Ponyville’s usual stores, which only had a few rows of prouducts. This store had thousands of rows of products, although many of these rows were devoted to displaying the same brands.
Twilight began thumbing through the office supplies aisle when Spike grabbed hear ear and dragged her to the electronics section.

“Come over here, Twilight!” he said. Then he pointed to a row of TVs and said, “Look!”
The TVs were much bigger and flatter than the ones that Twilight remembered, but more important than the TVs themselves was what was on them. All of the TVs were tuned to a news channel, which featured clips of zebras pulling down statues and walls.

“Facing severe economic stagnation and increasing domestic upheaval,” said the news reporter, “Zebrica is finally putting an end to the decade-long cold war against the western world. As the nation turns its focus to preserving the rapidly deteriorating regime of the ruling party, foreign policy analysts are concerned that the conflict between the activists and the coup will deteriorate into a bloody and full-scale revolution, leaving in its wake an enormous power vacuum that…”
Twilight and Spike looked at each other and blinked.

“Told ya,” said Twilight. “I told you it was ten years.”

“Wow,” said Spike, astounded. “I never thought that playing some silly board game would affect the conditions of the real world… though that still doesn’t explain all these sudden changes in Ponyville, though.”

“Since I was right,” said Twilight, “I want you to buy me a Sparkle Cola. I’m thirsty.”

“But we didn’t make a bet,” said Spike. “I don’t have to pay you anything.”

“Can you do it as a friend?” asked Twilight.

“Fine, whatever,” said Spike. “I’ll do it for you. But why do you need me to buy it? Did you forget your wallet?”

“No, I have my wallet,” said Twilight, taking her wallet out of hammerspace. “I always carry my wallet. I just don’t want to pay for it. Have you seen how much the prices have inflated?”

“587,621, 587,622, 587,623…” counted the voice of a very familiar mare. “587,624! There were 587,624 grains of sand stuck in my shoe!”

Princess Celestia stopped counting grains of sand and laid back in her beach chair. She held out her hoof and Philomena gloriously perched upon it like the phoenix she was.

“Ugh, I’m sooooo bored!” she griped to the phoenix. “I never thought that I could be this bored the beach after only ten years! Maybe I should consider going back to Canterlot…”

She thought about it for a moment, and then broke out into laughter.

“Oh, not a chance!” she said. “Not a chance. Still, I’m pretty bored. Maybe I should break out one of the random books I threw in by bag. Hopefully I brought along some interesting reads…”
Princess Celestia reached into her bag and pulled out a small booklet. She glanced over the cover, then flipped through it, then glanced at the cover again.

“Shit!” she said. “I forgot to give Twilight the rule book! I know how much Twilight relies on rulebooks. Well, I sure do hope for Celestia’s sake that she can at least do well without it. So far the world hasn’t ended, so that’s a fairly good sign.”
Then Princess Celestia looked into her glorious setting sun.

“You know, Philomena,” Celestia said to the phoenix, “If the war ended peacefully, without everypony blowing each other to bits, I get this odd feeling that, even though most ponies of the world would survive and continue to fulfil their destinies, I feel like, by ending the war, there are some ponies out there whose destinies might not be realized. Like, imagine if 200 years from now, there was somepony who was an absolute failure in civilized pre-apocalyptic life, but, upon entering the a postwar post-apocalyptic wasteland, finds that she not only survives, but also thrives, to the point where she is able to use some of the most powerful magic known to ponykind to change the world for the better. You know? Like making some goddamn fucking miracles, however they work. But if they couldn’t do that because there never was a wasteland to begin with, then what would happen to them, and what would they do with their life?"

Philomena, who had been fiddling on Celestia’s iPad during her soliloquy, stopped and showed the iPad’s screen to Celestia. Princess Celestia looked at the screen, which showed just one object:

A broken toaster.

The End???

Author's Note

Phew! It's all done and over with!

It took a really long time. About a week to write (and play), several hours to transfer it from Microsoft Word to Fimfiction, and several more hours doing map editing and research.

I might do another fic like this on some other board game (or even a video game), but next time I think I'll spend less time on the actions of the players. Unless someone really wants me to, but even for me it was tedious to go through and record EVERYTHING. Again, this was all an experiment to see if a board game could tell a story. And I've found out that, with a little bit of a modification, a board game can tell a 'great' story! :)

Turn 4: Not in My Backyard!

--Turn 4: Not in My Backyard!--

“Communist detected on American soil! Lethal force engaged!”

“…That was the Ink Spots, with ‘I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire.’” Said the now-familiar radio voice. “And now, here’s the latest news: unemployment is down, stocks are up, and the League of Nations has just declared global peace forever! Now the real news.”

Tree Dog gave a deep sigh before continuing.

“Remember how the DEFCON used to be set all the way up at five? And then how it was raised all the way up to an impossibly high seven? Back then we all thought that the world was immune from nuclear disaster and the world was safe? Well, all that’s changed suddenly as we’re entering a new era: the mid-war. I’m not sure whether or not the war will end in nuclear holocaust or not, but it’s starting to look like it. The DEFCON, once all the way up at seven, was, when I woke up, all the way down to two! Two! Cacn you believe it? Two! Right at the brink, baby! Aaaallll the way down to the brink! At first, I thought somepony was playing a prank on me, but I checked around and the DEFCON was indeed all the way down to two. I dunno who did it, but I suspect that one of the princesses did it.”

“Conspiracy theory or not,” continued Tree Dog, “There’s hope for us at last. The zebras, vile as they may be, may indeed have some sort of a heart, since it was they who called for SALT negotiations. I don’t know why they’d want negotiations over a little white mineral, especially since it’s nearly as common as sand, but they DID set the DEFCON back up to four. Lucky for us. And them, too, I suppose. For now, nuclear disaster has been averted, but be warned: the DEFCON could move at any time, folks. Now, I’m not trying to advertise for Stable-Tec; they’ve just had their best quarter in ages, but I am warning you: things are about to get a whole lot thougher from here on out.”

“Up next we’ve got a Public Service Announcement,” said Tree Dog, changing topic. ”Listen up, children. This stuff’s important...”
Twilight shut off the radio yet again and resumed her vigilant vigil over the gameboard.
The phantom, finishing up its SALT negotiations, leafed through the discard pile and reclaimed the card ‘Decolonization,’ which it restored to its inventory.

“What’s wrong, Twilight?” asked Spike.

“Nothing,” said Twilight. “It’s just that… I’m afraid.”

“Afraid that the phantom has something up its sleeve?” asked Spike.

“Exactly,” said Twilight. “We’ve been doing ok so far, but we might be one card away from losing the game altogether.”

“Aww, cheer up, Twilight,” comforted Spike, “At least your ‘How I Learned to Stop Worrying’ card gave you 5 ‘Friendship Ops’ points.”

“Yeah,” said Twilight. “By the way, why are they called ‘Friendship Ops’ in the first place? It seems like all of them have more to do with war than friendship.”

“Well… I dunno,” said Spike. “Maybe because you have to rely on your friends to win wars, thus building the bond between you. Or maybe it’s that you end up goading all of your friends into pointless fights solely for your own benefit.”

“But—that’s not what friendship is about,” complained Twilight. “That’s not what I did to my friends back in Equestria... before all of this princess bullshit.”

“Lesson Zero?” asked Spike.
Twilight thought about this for a moment.

“Touché,” said Twilight. “But I was only doing that because a princess told me to. Wouldn’t the world be a much better place if there were no princesses?”

“Then Hasbro never would have approved this show in the first place,” said Spike. “You know, Lauren Faust wanted to make Princess Celestia a queen, but Hasbro wanted her to be a princess so they could sell more toys.”

“No,” said Twilight. “I mean, if there was never such a thing as monarchy in the first place. Just think of it: life would be wonderful, nopony would tell us what to do, society could be egalitarian since there would be no hereditary ranks…”

“And that would have happened much, much sooner,” said Spike, pointing to the other side of the table, where the phantom was playing the card ‘Decolonization,’ and placing one zebra influence in the former third world shithole of Neighpon, and the current third world shitholes of the Fillyppines, Lynxia, and Nefertia.

“Shit,” spat Spike. “Now they’ve got control of Nefertia and Neighpon. Plus they’ve upset our control over the Fillyppines. Now what are we going to do?”

“I tell you what I’m going to do!” said Twilight. “I’m going to play ‘Striped Scare!’ Now all of their further operations this turn will have a -1 point penalty to them.”

“I guess that’s a good idea,” said Spike. “Although we still don’t know whether they’re going to do play any operations cards this turn.”

“Oh, they will,” said Twilight devilishly. “They will, alright, they will…”

Now it was the phantom’s turn again. It played ‘Centralia Scoring,’ for which it gained three victory points for having a presence in the region, while Equestria gained nothing because it controlled no colonies there. The score was now zero to five.

But Twilight wasn’t done just yet. She played the card ‘Pinkie Plays The Three Kingdoms Card,’ despite Pinkie’s not actually being there. The card switched the Three Kingdoms Card from the phantom’s possession to Twilight’s possession, albeit face down and unavailable for play until next turn.

“That should cut them off from doing anything in the east,” said Twilight. “Now’s my chance to take back Neighpon!”

The phantom had a hard time deciding which card to play next. It ultimately decided upon playing ‘Stealthbuck Incident,’ for points. With an ops value of three, lowered to two by Twilight’s play of the ‘Striped Scare’ card, the phantom now had only two ops points to spend. It decided to use these two points on achieving control over Veneighzeula on the continent of Prekt.

“It’s trying to start something over there,” announced Spike. “Do you think you could stop it?”

“Maybe,” said Twilight. “I dunno. I guess I could play ‘Amarezonian Death Squads’ for points.”

“Then do it!” said Spike. “Something’s happening over there. I just know it.”

Twilight played ‘Amarezonian Death Squads’ for points, and spent the two ops points on buying influence in Amarezonia. Amarezonia was now under Equestrian control.

The phantom gawked at this, then played ‘Zadat Expels Zebras,’ for its one ops point. Because it was an event associated with Equestria, the event occurred as well, replacing the two zebra influence points in Nefertia with one Equestrian influence point. The phantom then spent the one ops point from the card on controlling Coltombia, Veneighzeula’s neighbor over in Prekt.

“That was stupid,” said Twilight. “It just threw away two of its own influence just to gain one influence.”

“Careful,” warned Spike. “Look where it placed it. It looks like the phantom’s trying to achieve domination of Prekt.”

“So?” asked Twilight. “What should I care? I’ve got better things to do, like retake Neighpon.”

“Ah, well,” sighed Spike. “Suit yourself. Just be warned though, ok?”

“Ok,” said Twilight, not really heeding Spike’s warning. “I’m playing ‘Chariot Diplomacy’ for three points.”

Twilight spent one point to retake the Fillyppines. Then she spent one point on a realignment roll in Neighpon. Twilight rolled a two, but because of her three adjacent controlled countries and Neighpon’s connection directly to Equestria, she had a modifier of four, for a total of six. The phantom also rolled a two, and had a modifier of one because it had more influence points in Neighpon itself, but because six is three more than three, Twilight successfully removed three zebra influence points from Neighpon. Neighpon was now under Equestrian control.

“Finally!” exclaimed Twilight. “We’ve taken back Neighpon! I think I’ll place my last influence point in Makhoristan, just to get a head start.”

“Well done,” Spike congratulated. “The weeaboos will adore you forever.”

But before our heroes could rejoice in celebration of their most recent triumph, the phantom had already begun its turn. It played ‘Benedict XVI Elected Pope,’ for the ops points, but because the event was associated with Equestria, the event occurred too.

The event caused two zebra influence to be removed from Reiterland and one pony influence to be put in its place, thereby loosening the nation from the zebras’ control. But with the two ops points from the card (now reduced to one ops point due to ‘Striped Scare,’) the phantom placed one influence point in Alpacatina, on the southern end of the continent of Prekt.

“Twilight?” asked Spike with a worried look. “It’s still happening…”

“Not now, Spike,” said Twilight. “I’m trying to plan my next move. I think I’ll play… ‘Zebra Trap!’”

Twilight played ‘Zebra Trap.’ This card, although not doing anything good for Twilight, would force the zebra player to discard an operations card worth two or more and roll a die to get rid of it.

The phantom was vexed. Its plans for world domination now had to be put on hold to deal with this distraction. It discarded ‘Libation Theology,’ worth two points, and rolled a six. Six being too high, the phantom did not clear itself out of the trap. It would have to wait until the trap expired next turn.

Twilight now used her turn to play ‘Arms Race,’ which gave her three victory points because she had met the required ‘friendship ops’ points for the turn. The score is now three to five.

The phantom, restrained from its plans for world domination until the next turn, played the only card it was allowed to: a scoring card for Prekt. Since both sides had a presence in the region but neither side dominated it, both sides earned two points each, bringing the score to five to seven.
“Good job, Twilight!” said Spike. “I knew you could do it! Now, what are you going to play for your last action round of the turn? More ops points?”

“No, Spike,” said Twilight. “I’m going to play an event this time because I think this turn needs to end with a bang.”

Twilight played ‘Two Small Steps,’ which only worked its magic if the player was behind in the Space Race. Twilight was behind in the Space Race, and she needed it. ‘Two Small Steps’ gave her a two step boost up the space race track, just enough to catch up with the zebras.

That night, Pinkie’s pet alligator Gummy became the first alligator to fly in space.

For the first time, the ponies were not docked points for failing to meet their ‘Friendship Ops’ requirements. The zebras, not having accrued any ‘Friendship ops’ points during the turn, were docked four points.

Heading into round five, the score is five to three. The DEFCON hovers at four.