Why so few AARs?

**Irishmafia2020** · 06-25-2008, 06:18

1. I don't really have time... I have children, wife, etc...

2. More importantly, I cant get @@&$&* pictures to work! I take pictures but they are unavailable except in some MSN program that I don't use... Otherwise I would at least post on the faction progression thread...

**V.T. Marvin** · 06-25-2008, 08:35

I for one have started two AARs (see my sig) but both of them ended rather too soon. The reason is of coure obvious - it takes a huge lot of time to do one. I reckon, that for instance my Pontic AAR which was done as a sigle post covering about 40 years in game terms took me about twenty hours in real time (selecting and editing screenshots, pasting them in place into PowerPoint, adding text, etc.). I love to write AARs, but I have a job and a family and I simply do not have the time to do so. And it would certainly by the reason for other people too. And nothing could be done about that.

But even if I know now that I will not be able to write another AAR, I still think while playing like I will. I imagine what the characters would do or say in an imaginary AAR, I still do take screenshots and thinking about the story that could be construed behind the gameplay. The result is that I enjoy actual playing much more. AAR simply gives more flavour to your game even if you will never write one...

I would not dare to say that the community on this forum is not supportive to AARs. The opposite is true, IMHO, just look at the views number for most threads - it reaches into the order of thousands! And replies score is also rather high.

@Social Infidel - if you want some Pahlavan AAR for inspiration see my sig (Promising start), or - and vastly better still - remind yourself of this legendary one:https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=62656

**General Appo** · 06-25-2008, 08:42

Originally Posted by V.T. Marvin

But even if I know now that I will not be able to write another AAR, I still think while playing like I will. I imagine what the characters would do or say in an imaginary AAR, I still do take screenshots and thinking about the story that could be construed behind the gameplay. The result is that I enjoy actual playing much more. AAR simply gives more flavour to your game even if you will never write one...

I do much the same Marvin. In every campaign I´ve played I´ve imagined my characters talking, and often some narrator commenting on the events. Makes it much more enjoyable in my mind.

One thing that I believe is always needed if you are to write an AAR, is motivation, an urge to actually write sometthing.
For example, when I first started writing on my AAR I only intended it to be a short briefing of what had happened in my campaign, which I were to post on another forum that has an thread named "How is your current campagin going?".
Instead I found myself writing the begining of an AAR, and once I had written that first chapter I just felt like continuing. It was natural, and the writing came naturally. After a while you hit that first brick wall where you don´t feel like continuing the story, but once you get past that it feels like the easiest thing in the world again.

**divulse123** · 06-25-2008, 15:02

Gah, I had an AAR going, and I think it was actually ok. :) Unfortunately, I ran into a tough time at school (getting near to finishing classes, taking exams, and starting the old dissertation), so I had to put it on hold. I'm still playing the same campaign, and I have hundreds of screenshots, so I may actually take up the thread again once things calm down. It was rather fun to write it.

**burn_again** · 06-25-2008, 16:44

I think the most important reasons why I never really considered writing an AAR have already been brought up: It takes a huge amount of work and time and I don't really feel an urge to be a writer or storyteller.
It also takes a lot longer to write in English than it would take me to write in German, but that does not count as an excuse since some of my alltime favorite AARs are written by non-native speakers.

While I don't comment very often (I'm not that talkative), I really enjoy AARs and some of them inspired me to play factions I never thought of before. When I came to EB I wanted to play barbarians only and now I'm totally into hellenistic factions...

Also I never knew that AARs are such a popular thing for other games. It was EB that made me a game geek, so I always had the impression that there are quite many AARs here. Before EB I never even heard the term AAR.

**divulse123** · 06-25-2008, 18:47

Before EB I never even heard the term AAR

Same here! But when I head about them I thought that there is no better game for them than EB! Hmm, al this talking makes me want to start a new campaign...