Spot on there, Eric.

It only seems to be strange in Downer's odd little world, where people apparently should notify each other of their intentions beforehand.

life as we all know it was essentially destroyed over coffeeshop friendships. if that isnt pathetic on every level i dont know what is

LV were led to believe NY was going to attack them, 3 members of Apples (RIP) family had attacked LV in recent times. Apples herself contacted members of LV to enquire about the surge of demotions to employ bodyguards in LV. There were other concerns that NY were paying close attention to LV for some reason, and with the knowledge that LV were soon to be attacked by NY, LV agreed to join forces with LA and make a move against NY.

There are many things being said here that I may return to comment on at a different time, but this statement really stuck out to me, and cannot be ignored until later. 

First of all, I will not pretend that my mother was oblivious to the number of people in a foreign city hiring mass amounts of protections in a short period of time.  Anyone responsible for a family, who pretends that they do not pay attention to this is lying, or just too stupid to be allowed to live.  However, that being said, my mother most certainly DID NOT contact "members" of LV to enquire about the surge of demotions to employ bodyguards in LV.  She sent a telegram to a recently demoted friend of hers, teasing him.  She said something along the lines of... "is Las Vegas trying to abolish made men?"  It was meant as a joke, and was answered in kind.  Nothing further was said by my mother to anyone at all about the demotions.  I am sure she would be saddened to hear that her friend decided to use this silly message from herself as a reason to fuel the flames of paranoia. 

Next, The_Crow, after about 100 days of working for New York, attacked not only his own city, but also Las Vegas.  This person was only recently placed into Apples crew by her then godfather.  When Marston was still alive, compensation was made, and the matter was thought to be put behind us.   Later that same week... it was discovered that an earner from Apples family was attempting to take down bodyguards from across th country. The offender was killed, and Apples personally compensated by paying well over the amount of money that might be needed to retrain or replace the protection.  To point out that the person who took these bg shots, was invited into the family by the bloodline of Aruba (who by his sons own admission literally joined Apples with the sole purpose of waiting about for 2 months until he had the best opportunity to fuck her over), only says that clearly, this was an attempt by parties to sully Apples name, and attempt to create tension where there was none.  Looks like they played their role well.   I believe the third attempt was just that.... only an attempt, and was quickly dealt with, and again, compensation was made. 

It is regretable that these attacks happened, and it was absolutely a source of embarrassment to my mother, but let us look at every side of this coin shall we?

In the week following Manius' death, Apples family was repeatedly hit by rogues attacks.  One such attack came from a member of Las Vegas called "monkeyface."  This man took not one, not two, but three shots at least on members of New York before he was finally put down.  Las Vegas was contacted after the 1st shot was taken.  We did not have a witness statement for the second shot, and after the third shot, we finally got the issue resolved.  Monkeyface was killed by Las Vegas.  As compensation for these attacks... Apples was offered an apology.  Fair enough I suppose, no one died.  But then crew leader Pimp Gravy mentioned to Apples that monkeyface had been invited by the bloodline of space-pole.  Apples was quick to respond that she believed that space-pole couldn't have known of his ill intentions, but Mr. Gravy simply said.. you might be surprised.  Add this to the fact that Apples had been passed logs of Space-pole being upset, and blaming her specifically for the deaths of Manius' crew... well this looked a bit incriminating.  My mother laid low, and listened to the streets.  Pimpgravy was heard defending her for attempting to give Aruba a chance to become more involved in the family.  This was very much appreciated, and Apples again felt secure in the relationship she was trying to build with the leadership in LV.  Sadly, again, people's mutual paranoia did not allow that relationship to develop to its full potential. 

Just a couple days later.  A civilian, slimer, was heard on the streets, calling for the removal of Apples from leadership.  Fair enough, people were angry and wanted someone specific to blame.  What is not acceptable, is that shortly after, Apples was pased a witness statement of a shot by slimer on one of her members.  21 seconds later, she was passed yet another witness statement of PoisonousJelly shooting the civillian, who he would normally have expected to be innocent.  Since the killing of innocent members of society is generally not acceptable, obviously Apples expected that something was up.  She sent a request for the witness statement on her member, and was shortly approached by the former godfather of Las Vegas with a forged copy of a witness statement that he claimed to have received just before killing this civilian. 

Obviously, this did not look like an act of friendship, this looked like LV agreeing to allow a shot on NY.  I will admit that Apples was very unhappy.  Some people tried to convince my mother that PoisonousJelly had set the whole thing up from the beginning.  She chose to err away from being paranoid.  She looked at her family, recently decimated from a tough battle against Manius, and she decided to believe that he hadn't known that slimer was going to attack her city, and instead only believe that he was informed of the shot by a friend of his as the shot was taken. There was never a "plan" to take out LA, LV, CH, or timbuctu, for that matter. 

For now at least... I must be off to attend to otherworldly obligations.

I will say one thing to you Melons, Slimers decision to shoot was born purely out of the fact he did what he set out to do and said his piece. Had no desire to join any family and figured that if his life was gonna be cut short he may as well try and inflict a little damage to Apples family. His target was chosen purely for his wealth status no other reason.

As for LV having anything to do with it, the only thing PoisonousJelly did was to help an old friend out and end their life. He had no idea what Slimer was planning to do at anytime. The way Slimer figured it he'd already come to the streets calling for Apples removal so why not try and cause her a little extra pain.

As for being angry, Slimer said it then and I'll say it now. Anger had nothing to do with it, as much as you or anyone else might like it to have been. His speech and his miss was undertaken purely because as a a Leader in Slimers eyes Apples wasn't fit for purpose. This was an opinion that was formed not because his kin had died in NY during the laughable take down on Manius, really without DS to back up NY things may have been very different, in fact without DS this past war may have been very different.

Remember the goal was to take out NY, while all of LV and LA died trying to achieve this, more from the dreaded 1% than the other sides guns I must say. To see that only Sammy remains from the original NY leaders and to know the only thing that kept him alive is his army of bodyguards, even thought the aggressors are all dead they did deal a huge blow to NY and their possible plans.

Sounds mad to me.

So Dante... If PJ's involvement in the Slimer shooting was in fact innocent... Why falsify a witness statement?

Dante you really think either city could have taken NY down on its own? No hence why they teamed up so dont go spouting shit about how NY's ally helped them, fact is a poor decision from the leadership of both LA and LV resulted in them being wiped out, it really doesn't matter how you try and spin this LA and LV got paranoid and wanted revenge for their friend Manius, what they did however was underestimate how close and how powerful NY and PH were, so stop talking shit please.

Titanium , that's why only sammy's alive , am i right?

If PH had not gotten involved , NY had no chance to survive..

Generally thats what happens when two cities attack one you had the first wave and still lost whats that say about the strength of LA and LV combined?

People keep using "If"

If Philly hadn't got involved.

If all the first shots had been successful.

If Someone hadn't flown just before the shooting.

Swing all the positive If's you like but there will always be the other side.

What if

The shots on Lancelot and Galahad had missed?

If JohnGalt had wacked back on his first shot and died?

It is a two way street, however we can sit with the reality of the situation and work with what we actually know and not dream of what if.

My name Kunta. Kunta African king. Kunta strong with spear! Kunta almost get shot, but Kunta run fast, and MikeHunt save Kunta. MikeHunt good chief for tribe!

They remind me of that old fella Captain Hindsight...

The real question on everyone's lips is, whose bank account funded all dem BGs!

The shooting itself was innocent but considering what Slimer had planned to do would be looked into he decided on this so as if someone did come questioning things there would be something to fall back on. I'm telling things like it happened and not casting up about anything. If you don't want to accept the truth then that is you choice.

As for whether NY could have survived on their own, well you just have to look at how the three crews of NY had to call in the help of Philly to take out one crew in their city. Also you can look at how when Aruba went rogue and was covered by multiple hitters it was the Philly guns who were out looking for him un-protected while NY hid in their city behind their fortifications.

Also you can look at the amount of the dead in NY's leadership in this last war compared to the losses in Philly. Yes all of LV/LA died in the war but many of those deaths were due to the dreaded 1% and not the guns who were looking for them. If Philly had not been in on NY's side then the end of the war would have seen Sammy fighting on his own against a force that had dodged the bullets of Philly and NY and taken out two thirds of the leaders in NY. So tell me, if Philly hadn't stepped in how well do you really think Sammy could have lasted on his own?

Oh and there is one thing I would add Titanium, being powerful and being fully capped with bodyguards are two very different things.

Dante you love your ifs.


But since you do I imagine

Sammy would have 1%ed each of the people against winning all the pro wacks he needed.

What can I say I'm a dreamer :)

So basically Dante you are crying because my father's ally had bigger guns than your ally? sorry pal your arguement just doesn't hold up two cities attacked New York yes we may well have been screwed but my fathers friend was true to his word and stepped in to aid him, you have a problem with that look closer to home you started a war and lost plain and simple, build a bridge and get over it.

I thought NY removed Manius because they *thought* he would attack them. Why is it then such a bad thing that LV attacked NY because they *thought* NY would attack them? They didn't "suicide two cities" they did as much damage as they could before being struck down in their sleep. Maybe NY presented the reasons in another way, but it all came down to the fact they thought Manius would try to take over NY by force.

It seems to me that the reasons chosen to highlight here are not the most valid ones in my humble opinion. The lack of a demotion for an act that clearly tried to get LA in trouble seems pretty reasonable as a motive to attack. (I'm not saying NY was wrong either. I guess there is some logic in trying to avoid punishing your members as much as you can.)

Three different attacks from one specific crew to another specific crew is another one. Even though I can't deny that Melon's account of Apples' side of the story sounds equally sensible.

I agree more with Tyrion's reasons after having heard what he had to say.