Author Topic: 'Shattered Fortress' release this summer - the timeline advances! (Read 61807 times)

Kidd · « **Reply #120 on:** 13 March 2018, 14:06:14 »

Quote from: Kitsune413 on 13 March 2018, 13:45:45

Also if the Home Clans swing in to beat up the Inner Sphere I'd like all the characters in game to point out how absurd it is that they're having the exact same problem a second time.

whyever not? that is practically the raison d'etre of the "true" Clans since inception

it would be nice to see how CGL tackles Op Revival 2.0

phoenixalpha · « **Reply #121 on:** 13 March 2018, 14:40:06 »

It doesn't need to be a home clan invasion. It could be as simple as the Adders (along with their auxiliaries - the rest of the homeworld clans), pop in en masses to the Terran system, say "hey... we'd like to reach an accommodation.... we'll be your armies, let the Republic become the TH 2.0 and we can form a Star League with the Republic/Hegemony at its head and we'll become the SL Army again. Jobs a good un, no hassle no grief, anyone disagrees we've got a lot of troops to say otherwise".

Reform the SL, reorg all the factions, with Clan Star League Adder as its army, the SL armed forces go skelp some upstarts around, peace in our time, jump a bit in time, as the existing factions have old dying leaders, new leaders have come into the fold ... tensions threaten to break apart the SL....

Reboot the whole danged settings in a believable way. People still have some skin in the game, as their faction wont be *gone* just slightly different.

Scotty · « **Reply #122 on:** 13 March 2018, 15:55:47 »

That's only believable if you haven't read Wars of Reaving.

Tai Dai Cultist · « **Reply #123 on:** 13 March 2018, 16:03:12 »

I'm completely convinced that it was a mistake to ever have the individual Clans be treated as discrete factions rather than flavored units of the same "Clan" faction.

Mendrugo · « **Reply #124 on:** 13 March 2018, 16:03:59 »

Bring back Clan Punisher!! Khan Frank Castle for ilKhan!

winters_night · « **Reply #125 on:** 13 March 2018, 17:04:43 »

Quote from: Frabby on 13 March 2018, 04:43:10

IlClan means one Clan managed to occupy Terra (or otherwise found a way to lay claim to the title in the usual might-makes-right Clan fashion).
That doesn't neccessarily require the demise of the Republic as a faction to happen, though it doesn't bode well for them.

I imagine it will bode poorly for the Republic, if a clan manages to take Terra I can't see the Republic lasting much longer. ALSO I can't imagine whatever clan took Terra lasting long before the rest of the sphere converges and just beats the snot outta them and liberates Terra again. I'd imagine the Star Adders will hold the title of Ilclan for a brief period before they get annihilated in detail.

Kitsune413 · « **Reply #126 on:** 13 March 2018, 17:07:52 »

Quote from: phoenixalpha on 13 March 2018, 14:40:06

It doesn't need to be a home clan invasion. It could be as simple as the Adders (along with their auxiliaries - the rest of the homeworld clans), pop in en masses to the Terran system, say "hey... we'd like to reach an accommodation.... we'll be your armies, let the Republic become the TH 2.0 and we can form a Star League with the Republic/Hegemony at its head and we'll become the SL Army again. Jobs a good un, no hassle no grief, anyone disagrees we've got a lot of troops to say otherwise".

Reform the SL, reorg all the factions, with Clan Star League Adder as its army, the SL armed forces go skelp some upstarts around, peace in our time, jump a bit in time, as the existing factions have old dying leaders, new leaders have come into the fold ... tensions threaten to break apart the SL....

Reboot the whole danged settings in a believable way. People still have some skin in the game, as their faction wont be *gone* just slightly different.

I know that I play Clan Sea Fox, so this may be unexpected... but... This isn't diplomacytech... I need mechs to shoot. And if those mechs come from an unrecognizable faction I can be sarcastically bigoted against then so much the better.

Sartris · « **Reply #127 on:** 13 March 2018, 17:47:24 »

Join the free worlds league, where everyone is a potential target!

Vition2 · « **Reply #128 on:** 13 March 2018, 20:32:10 »

I want Terra DEAD. It's time for the "successor" states to start looking outwards rather than continue to rehash the same battle over and over and over and ...

Jaim Magnus · « **Reply #129 on:** 13 March 2018, 20:33:35 »

Quote from: Vition2 on 13 March 2018, 20:32:10

I want Terra DEAD. It's time for the "successor" states to start looking outwards rather than continue to rehash the same battle over and over and over and ...

But that's history... always doomed to repeat itself.

Daemion · « **Reply #130 on:** 13 March 2018, 21:05:49 »

Quote from: Tai Dai Cultist on 13 March 2018, 16:03:12

I'm completely convinced that it was a mistake to ever have the individual Clans be treated as discrete factions rather than flavored units of the same "Clan" faction.

Agreed. You can see that each clan had a particular role. I see the same problem in a lot of depicted Clan Galaxies, too, and how they're stationed. I recall a Wolf Galaxy in the source book made completely of elementals stationed on one world, and a galaxy dedicated to aerospace on another.

sadlerbw · « **Reply #131 on:** 13 March 2018, 22:28:18 »

I was pretty happy when the ghost bears and FRR merged. Two of my favorite wintry factions smooshed together like peanut butter and jelly. If they had managed to recruit the snow ravens as their fleet arm, I think I may have actually swooned!

While I certainly have factions I enjoy that have been around for various large fractions of the games lifetime, there have been enough others that have come and gone without ruining my fun that I don’t worry as much about it these days. As long as it makes sense, tells a good story, and improves the game, I don’t think there is any faction whose death would push me away from the game. I may gripe about it for years, but I’ll still play. I’m not saying I WANT the fedsuns and ghost bears (my favorite IS and clan factions) to get erased, but I’d get over it if they did.

Azakael · « **Reply #132 on:** 14 March 2018, 01:10:39 »

I'm just one marriage of convenience away from the Draconis Suns...

...

What? It could happen?

AldanFerrox · « **Reply #133 on:** 14 March 2018, 01:34:33 »

Quote from: Azakael on 14 March 2018, 01:10:39

I'm just one marriage of convenience away from the Draconis Suns...

...

What? It could happen?

You think that Julian Davion would marry Yori Kurita?

Kidd · « **Reply #134 on:** 14 March 2018, 02:12:37 »

The only Davion matchup that hasn't been done yet is Davion-Liao. Victor was pretty profligate in conquering the scionesses of his enemies, the dog.

Julian and Danai, united by a common hate for Caleb... make it so! :D

SCC · « **Reply #135 on:** 14 March 2018, 02:59:21 »

Quote from: Adrian Gideon on 13 March 2018, 12:01:47

I think several wires are being crossed here. Bosch, Cubby and Kit are all absolutely correct in their last several posts, but it’s easy to think their points are mutually exclusive. They’re not.

There are too many factions. There are. As a tabletop game—as a setting used as a basis for games—there are too many factions. This is a valid, financial, production and storytelling issue. However, the Jihad and other storylines were not built around solving that issue. It’s a matter of focus. FASA expanded that focus too much, which —in my opinion (shared by past and current owners and licensees of the various IPs)—is not conducive to a gaming setting nor for a setting with a living timeline that moves as rapidly as BT’s.

It would probably be more manageable if the unit situation was better, there's the myth (?) about FASA making TRO's because they sold best and both these problems compound themselves (see MUL)

Kit deSummersville · « **Reply #136 on:** 14 March 2018, 07:29:07 »

Quote from: Kidd on 14 March 2018, 02:12:37

The only Davion matchup that hasn't been done yet is Davion-Liao.

Sun Tzu's dad was Hanse....

phoenixalpha · « **Reply #137 on:** 14 March 2018, 08:08:14 »

All the heirs/rulers to the IS Houses are from Hanse :)

Mendrugo · « **Reply #138 on:** 14 March 2018, 08:25:03 »

Davion weddings are odd affairs.

Michael Hasek married Marie Davion (herself the illegitimate product of an affair) and he renamed himself Michael Hasek-Davion. Looking through the original Davion sourcebook, though, you find a number of his relatives in positions of authority in the Capellan March who also use the name Hasek-Davion.

Did Marie mass-marry the entire extended Hasek clan?

Tai Dai Cultist · « **Reply #139 on:** 14 March 2018, 08:36:35 »

Quote from: Mendrugo on 14 March 2018, 08:25:03

Did Marie mass-marry the entire extended Hasek clan?

Well genealogically, it's technically incorrect for Michael's siblings/cousins/etc to adopt the cadet "Hasek-Davion" name. It should be reserved for his and Marie's offspring (and so on).

Of course, rules are funny things. Some say they're made to be broken. And people in the positions of power like nobility of the IS can pretty much do what they want. And one would presume anyone proudly but "incorrectly" adopting the Hasek-Davion name is in a position to make the implicit decree stick.

Adrian Gideon · « **Reply #140 on:** 14 March 2018, 08:44:22 »

Yup.

ActionButler · « **Reply #141 on:** 14 March 2018, 09:18:19 »

Quote from: Tai Dai Cultist on 13 March 2018, 16:03:12

I'm completely convinced that it was a mistake to ever have the individual Clans be treated as discrete factions rather than flavored units of the same "Clan" faction.

I tend to agree with this.

"The Clans" could have been a single faction wherein individual Galaxies were either totem-flavored or just generic Warriors of Kerensky.
Or we could have just had fewer of them. I understand that there were Plans and Plans Within Plans for them and there there were probably very good reasons for suddenly injecting twenty new factions to the game, but that was a lot of New for a game that had previously gotten on with five major players.

Kidd · « **Reply #142 on:** 14 March 2018, 09:52:30 »

Well, as it stands, we had

Wolf - actually good guys (until this was further split into Good Wolf and Bad Wolf)
Jade Falcon - bad guys we love
Smoke Jaguar - bad guys we love to beat up on
Ghost Bear - the cool good guys
Nova Cat - ~~trippy, kinda dorky good guys~~ who are no longer relevant
Diamond Shark - bad-good guys who can be bought off

and the rest sort of agglutinates together in a mass of kinda-bad guys.

As far as "flavours of Clan" goes we kind of maxed out really at about 6 or so. So yes, 20 was rather stretching it. But more than 1 or 2 flavours was nice to have.

sadlerbw · « **Reply #143 on:** 14 March 2018, 10:22:53 »

This is the downside to accomplished authors. They come up with great stories, but don’t give much of a thought to gameplay consequences. 20 clans has given us a pretty rich tapestry of stories...but they suck up a ton of page space to stat out in a more than cursory fashion.

I get the feeling the current crop of management have lived through such problems and are well aware of them when the authors are pitching ideas. So, will Stackpole be allowed to split clan wolf into the timber wolves, were wolves, arctic wolves, and irradiated Russian wolves? Probably not. At this point we have enough factions lying about that authors can politely be asked to pick one of those rather than making a new one.

Sartris · « **Reply #144 on:** 14 March 2018, 12:29:56 »

i've mentioned before I thought it would have been better for the absorption of clans by other clans during the political century rather than have 17 active at the start of the clan invasion, ten of which were just hanging out in a separate space that pulled attention away from the main setting.

Also, while cool, the field manual series chewed up huge numbers of pages and has proven to be an unsustainable model. Faction guides like that are better served for a universe that does not advance on a timeline or have mostly separate, well-defined eras of play.

Quote from: sadlerbw on 14 March 2018, 10:22:53

This is the downside to accomplished authors. They come up with great stories, but don’t give much of a thought to gameplay consequences. 20 clans has given us a pretty rich tapestry of stories...but they suck up a ton of page space to stat out in a more than cursory fashion.

I get the feeling the current crop of management have lived through such problems and are well aware of them when the authors are pitching ideas. So, will Stackpole be allowed to split clan wolf into the timber wolves, were wolves, arctic wolves, and irradiated Russian wolves? Probably not. At this point we have enough factions lying about that authors can politely be asked to pick one of those rather than making a new one.

clan jaded wolf will be the forces that didn't win the bid to attack terra

I'll see myself out

nckestrel · « **Reply #145 on:** 14 March 2018, 13:16:09 »

Quote from: Sartris on 14 March 2018, 12:29:56

Also, while cool, the field manual series chewed up huge numbers of pages and has proven to be an unsustainable model.

I'm curious how you came to that conclusion?

Sartris · « **Reply #146 on:** 14 March 2018, 13:52:20 »

I was speaking to the one faction Fasa 3058-3063 books (typing in between tending to a fussy infant leads to incomplete thoughts).

i prefer the current omnibus format embraced since FM updates

Kitsune413 · « **Reply #147 on:** 14 March 2018, 20:32:43 »

Quote from: Vition2 on 13 March 2018, 20:32:10

I want Terra DEAD. It's time for the "successor" states to start looking outwards rather than continue to rehash the same battle over and over and over and ...

Terra is just where the Star League leader sits. Maybe. If you blew up Terra that doesn't mean that the Successor states wouldn't all still be arguing over who rules the galaxy.

Kitsune413 · « **Reply #148 on:** 14 March 2018, 20:40:12 »

Even though I think everyone agrees that 20 extra factions is a mistake and it was probably just supposed to be a single faction that got out of hand...

We got the Wars of Reaving out of it. So alls well that ends well.

Most of the Clans have been folded into existing entities. Clan Snow Raven + Outworlds Alliance. Clan Ghost Bear + FRR... Nova Cats have moved around a bit. They were the Draconis Combine clan but now they're the Free Worlds League clan with a different title. The Falcons and Hells Horses are at least fairly similar...

Clan Wolf and the Lyrans merged. I'd like to see them do it a second time.

Then the problem is solved, essentially.

Robroy · « **Reply #149 on:** 14 March 2018, 20:55:15 »

Not just clans that can be consolidated. Could also bring the Taurian Concordat and Calderon Protectorate back together.