Blackwater (CivRealms 2.0)

The Blackwater Group started on Civrealms May 10th, 2020. It was formed by longtime friends and ex-HCF players and is ran by a collective style leadership. Blackwater is best known for it's participation in server conflicts, The Eslenti Invasion and the War against Hell. The Blackwater nation also includes Anvard, The Calormen, and the Bobangan Federation.

Refusal to bend the knee
Blackwater joined mid-may when the Kingdom of Savaguard was the major power nation of the server. The King of Savaguard, "Invader1337" made an offer: In exchange for land and "High Lord" status in Savaguard, all members of Blackwater would have to bend the knee. The Blackwater boys ain't really bout that roleplay, and this offer would later prove to be Invaders downfall.

The Vah Acquisition and subsequent alt-raiding
Vah was the only new member to the Blackwater Group when we got started on the server. He contributed heavily to the groups beginning on the server, especially in making prot/gearing the squad up, and helped us learn about the server in a lot of different aspects. He also came up big on several occasions, securing multiple pearls of players that the Blackwater group looked to acquire.

Vah got into a lot of controversy when he was exposed himself as "Shaqattack118". Many players on the server were upset over his alt raiding, and a bounty was placed on his alt. Blackwater would not succumb to external pressure and protected Vah, encouraging him to pay reps, which he did willingly before returning to the life of a peaceful beet farmer.

The Cantina Alliance
With essentially nothing to our name, we asked Cantina for land to get started. Cantina hooked it up with no strings attached, factory access, and starting tools. The past reputation of the group and defenseless start left us exposed, Cantina guaranteed our safety and stated "An attack on Blackwater is an attack on Cantina". The initial help and prior friendships between the groups lead to a strong alliance between Blackwater and Cantina.

Failed Eslenti Merger
Looking to further secure the south, Blackwater & Cantina made an offer to Eslenti to join a Southern Alliance. After discussions took place, Eslenti proposed a merger between Blackwater-Eslenti. Both groups agreed, however interpersonal conflicts and the uneasiness of trusting a new group led to cancellation of the merger. Later reports confirmed during the fallout that "Sovakat" aka Brocktree had attempted to convince the Kingdom of Savaguard to launch a pre-emptive attack against Blackwater/Cantina. Upon hearing this betrayal, Vah pearled Sovakat and SirCrowley. However, SirCrowley was released due to a glitch with the Prisonpearl plugin.

The Eslenti Invasion
On May 27th, 2020, the invasion of Eslenti by Blackwater & Cantina began. SirCrowley and Ian_X12 attempted to defend the city by bow spamming out of the Eslenti Bunker. They weren't able provide much of a resistance and after the bastions were broken they logged out, previously owned Eslenti land would now be claimed over by Blackwater. During the aftermath of the war a friendship was formed between Anvard and Blackwater. Anvard had previously been invaded by Eslenti and strongly supported Blackwaters actions against their former enemies. Anvard would later join Blackwater and return home to the land that was taken from them

Nike goes rogue in Savaguard
Following the Invasion, on May 31st 2020, Nikeboom was unsatisfied with the sentences handed out to Eslenti. He along with his good friends Apacheblitz & Drslippy, decided to take justice into their own hands. They took to the streets of Savaguard, murdering and pillaging everything in sight as punishment for them entertaining the idea of attacking Blackwater. Although they set out to defend their friends in Blackwater, the Blackwater group did not condone these actions and they were removed from the group prior to launching the assault. To this day Nikeboom remains pearled, along with Drslippy. Apacheblitz on the other hand was released on June 27th 2020 for good behavior.

The Hell War
On June 16th 2020, after the Varathia vault was disabled and many Varathians were pearled, Blackwater pledged its support and went to war with Hell. Alongside Cantina, Otanabee & Chungus the alliance attacked Hells bunker south of the Varathian Vault, disabling the bunker.

Blackwater helped organize what turned into a server alliance against Hell, which at its height had 114 players added to the citadel group. During the war blackwater members managed to secure the pearls of Kicky, Incarnite & Swiftfizz.

Operation Paperclip
Following the Hell War, the Hell group was in a state of disarray. Hell members were being actively hunted, and the group had no place to call home. To keep his friends together Saren_Solaris proposed a merger with Blackwater which would be known as "Operation Paperclip". On June 28th 2020 Hell joined Blackwater under Operation Paperclip.

A lot of people didn't understand why this happened. During the aftermath of the Hell War, the server alliance had meetings with the leader of every nation to discuss terms for the Hell group. Opinions were divided and initially Seared, a leader from Cantina, was alone in advocating for lighter sentencing. He was able to convince others to see his reasoning, and in this case namely Blackwater.

The proposed terms for Vanax and Hantzu were not accepted. Phacad3 contacted the two directly to open communication and find terms that would later be pitched to the alliance. However an individual who was working with Phacad3, and apart of the alliance, disagreed on the terms, and after some confusion leaked the new terms to the alliance before terms were set. The alliance rejected the terms; and Phacad3 decided to leave the alliance.

Goodfellas
Read here: The Goodfellas

Leadership
The core Blackwater group is mainly longtime friends, decisions are made through discussions with everybody included, and so we call ourselves a Collective. When it comes to communicating with other nations we centralize it around one person, who speaks for the group, and brings anything that needs to be discussed back to the team. The main leader has no authority over the rest of the group, and is usually the most involved in keeping the team organized and up to date on issues that are of interest to Blackwater.

One nation under Phacad3
May 10th - July 17th

When we started on May 10th the main leader of Blackwater was Phacad3. Issues arose internally in Blackwater near the end of the Hell War, particularly on two topics, the first: Phacad3 publicly calling off the Cantina alliance. There was a falling out between Phacad3 and an individual in Cantina leadership, however both groups were willing to find a working solution and the alliance was never over. Blackwater did not discuss ending the alliance internally and preferred to remain allies. Secondly the Hell merger also led to heated internal discussions, at the time not all members were willing to open the door to a group we had went to war less than two weeks ago. The discussions and conclusion left many members feeling like their opinions weren't being valued, on July 17th Phacad3 was asked to step down and leave Blackwater.

The rise of Peeedz
July 17th - Present

The group needed someone to step into the main leader position, and the best person to represent what the members of the group wanted and also being trusted with Primary Owner on groups was Peeedz. This was business as usual for the team as Peeedz had years of past leadership on HCF with mainly the same group of guys. His first challenge was the arrival of the new expansion islands, and through various negotiations brought home a lot of stamina for the group through protection contracts. Next, when Cantina horses were killed by a cheater, Hantzu demanded a large number of Cantina members turn over their pearls. In response, Peeedz removed all members of Hell from Blackwater.