[AZN]

[AzN] is the pet project of TheBub, currently the second most powerful player in the game, after BoozerBear. It is one of the oldest clans still in active existence. According to various accounts from TheBub, [AzN] was formed between April and June 2003, at a time when the game was comparatively in its infancy, and the number of total clans was in double digits. One must remember that clan mechanics and interaction were quite different then; clan warfare was not implemented until August 2003, and so rivalries between clans were carried out either via PvP matches or flame wars on the forum boards. With so few clans, with so few potential members, and without a deeply established elite, most clans were open to relative newbies (indeed, even Sparkle Motion had more or less open enrollment early in the game). When clan warfare did finally hit the scene, those rivalries spilled out onto the public stage to an unprecedented level, and a constantly shifting set of alliances, loose affiliations, and outright feuds heated up between the major clans. These included, but were not limited to, Sparkle Motion!, Hatred, 1337 sn4x0rs, Tricky Tricky, and the Cool Guy Crew. [AzN] was another of the prime players on the nascent clan warfare scene, and appeared intermittently on the power leaderboards; the clan had a Level 1000+ requirement for joining under the old level system, and was at certain points one of the largest clans in the game (with 50-60 members).

One of the unique qualities about [AzN] was its ranking policy. [AzN] allotted restricted clan privileges to many of its members, an unusual degree of trust that eventually resulted in their undoing, more than once. On August 29, 2003, Spikey (see Tricky Tricky) snuck into [AzN] with a multi (spikey69), was given booting privileges, and then proceeded to boot every member of [AzN] except TheBub. Spikey and TheBub had been at each other’s throats since time immemorial; Tricky Tricky spent a great deal of time attacking TheBub in-game and on the forums (the infamous anti-TheBub spammer Morehen was a member of Tricky Tricky) and vice versa, and it appears that the news of [AzN]’s demise came as no great surprise to the other clan leaders. This occurred a second time soon after, with a player from the clan TJAS industries, and the rankings system was soon changed.

On September 13, 2003, this occurred again, but from the outside, through a clan hack. A player named Quantillum (#5000) created a clan called [ AzN ], and was automatically put into [AzN] with clan leader privileges. All members, including TheBub, were kicked out, and the clan was deleted. Jick had backed up the clan, however, and [AzN] was fully restored. It was later revealed that Quantillum was an alias of Pimonkey. That might have been the end of it, but Pi wasn’t done with TheBub. On October 27, 2003, Pimonkey directly hacked TheBub’s account and deleted his character. TheBub was restored by Jick and Mr. Skullhead, and Pimonkey publicly vowed not to use his hacking skills for ill will again.

Aside from Tricky Tricky, [AzN] also had a storied rivalry with 1337 sn4x0rs. During the later months of 2003, they evolved into a group of the most dominant players in clan warfare, with many high-level members of [AzN] leaving to join the sn4x0rs. By and large, [AzN] came out losers in this war, but TheBub recalls a few major victories for [AzN], though their exact dates have been forgotten. At some point, JJaz managed to sneak into 1337 sn4x0rs, receive tons of clan stat potions paid for with Sn4x0r funds, and return to [AzN] with the loot. Later (November or December ’03) TheBub found a way to hack his closet such that he could keep meat above the 2.1 billion meat limit in place at the time. He used the meat to fund a huge assault on the 1337 sn4x0rs compound, and took every single bag of goodies they had at the time. As he recalls it, "TheBub utilized a current closet hack, having been tipped off by a friend in Hatred. The hack involved using a url to take ten of an item that wasn’t there by simply entering the item number in the correct space of the url in the closet.php “take” section of the script." The meat hack allowed [AzN] to buy massive defenses and dominate in clan warfare for months afterward (as well as stock an astounding clan stash), and indeed they were well-known for frequent clan war wins throughout much of 2004. In fact, TheBub claims, they did not lose a single fight for several months during the 24-hour warfare rollover era. This included a major takedown of Hatred in early ’04, another perennial clan board leader. Hatred’s relationship with [AzN] has been schizophrenic over time; Adamson was sympathetic when the clan was deleted, and at one point accepted TheBub into his clan for a few days (he was almost immediately booted for not donating to the clan stash). But such truces were short-lived, and inevitably the two clans would clash again, with Hatred coming out the better.

In recent months (especially the Warclan and post-Warclan eras), [AzN] has more or less laid low; it has not aggressively recruited, and many of its old members have ceased playing. It held a spot on the clan leader boards for a long time, but the non-active players still in its ranks dragged it off the power boards until the rules were changed in December 2004. They are still active in warfare, however, and rank on the Most Wins list as of this writing; [AzN] has also not lost its reputation as a haven for leet multis.

Major Members:

-TheBub (#905) – A true legend of KoL, TheBub has the 2^nd highest power ranking of any player, 2^nd highest level, highest Muscle of any player (from at least June 2004-November 2004), top ten in all three stats during (and probably much before) summer and early fall 2004. He has played over 90,000 turns, and is, unsurprisingly, a leading spelunker of Fernswarthy’s basement as well, but his greatest claim to fame is the empire he created under the [AzN] banner. TheBub was briefly a member of Hatred (mentioned above) and CGC Elite (merely to spy on the clan defenses), but [AzN] has been his main project throughout his KoL history. Mall regulars might also recognize his store, Chronic Warez, for its bizarre menagerie of unconventional characters. As forum moderator, TheBub has, along with the no longer active Nietzsche, presided as moderator over the Ring of Flame since March of 2004.

In a strange twist of fate, TheBub left [AzN] in December 2004 to join 1337 sn4x0rs, leaving the clan in the care of SirPrintALot (#1475).

-Blade (#496)- Co-leader of [AzN] in its early months, and one of its first members. Blade was a quiet, dedicated powergamer who made his way through the game cheat-less and hack-less, and still became quite powerful. Blade left [AzN] after several months for unclear reasons to form his own clan; he is no longer an active player.

-LadyVamp (#2101) – Also former member of Hatred and current member of Conquest; more information forthcoming. Both LadyVamp and her sister, Conn (playerID unknown), were early [AzN] members.

-BULLY (#2068) – An active member during [AzN]’s early days, Bully was one of the first clan looters ever. When clan stashes were changed so that multiple items could be taken at once, Bully cleared out [AzN]’s clan stash, and after he was booted, did the same to several other clans, including *~Rage~*. Faced with Jick’s wrath, Bully eventually apologized to avoid account deletion; blackballed from most respected clans, he has all but quit the game.

-MeAN MaCHInE (#4225) – longtime [AzN] veteran. Mean Machine has come and gone from the clan; according to TheBub, he has raided the clan stash several times but was a shrewd market player and brought in as much as he took out. Mean Machine had some sort of controversy with LukeStickDude (see CGC Elite), and is rumored to have hacked his account.

-Bigfatposer (#1455) – also a longtime member of 1337 sn4x0rs; recently deleted for inactivity. Bigfatposer was on the Top 10 players board for a long time, and had only recently been knocked off when her account was deleted. More information forthcoming.

-logicus (#4094) – Longstanding [AzN] member. Logicus had been in the clan longer than anyone except TheBub himself; his account was recently deleted.

-Giri_choco (playerid unknown; believed to be #3XXX) – In October 2003, a widely-used bug allowed players to use clan stat boosters an unlimited amount of times; by repeatedly clicking the "use" button, one would time out the server, and be able to start again from scratch. This allowed players to gain massive stats in the time the hole was left open, effectively blowing up the leaderboards. In its aftermath, Jick nerfed the stats of the top 50 players, lowering them approximately to their pre-bug levels; Giri_choco was #51. She was, however, quickly displaced by Simon (see CGC Elite).

-JJaz (#1480) – JJaz has, by far, the familiar with the most kills in the game. His leprechaun, TheGreatYak©, has over 85,000 kills to its (borrowed) name.

-cleft1 (playerid unknown; likely under 3000) – Formerly an elite PvP’er. More information forthcoming.

-GHOST (#2327) – Formerly an elite PvP’er.

-Scyld (#33237) – Scyld is a powergamer who joined [AzN] in fall of 2004. He was well-known for his prodigious forum-posting habits (in particular, voluminous contributions to the 3,500/10,000/25,000-post thread), which eventually netted him a position as forum moderator when Random Ramblings was reconstituted in November 2004. Scyld left the clan with TheBub to join 1337 sn4x0rs in December 2004.

-Grayson (#98602) – well-known forum poster. Grayson is a recent recruit to [AzN].

-Jiminator (#88399) – well-known forum poster and KOL artist. Jiminator joined [AzN] in December 2004.