Star League - Third Time's a Charm

[Metallgewitter]

2) End of the Ares Superheavy OmniMech / Prometheus?  Main factory went boom, what happened to Mars factories which not noted built fully and then you have Clan Jade Falcon's destructive invasion of said planet

Theory: The Free worlds League and the Federated Suns might be able to reverse engineer the Ares thanks to the examples they have in their ranks. If Redemption Rites is anything to go by the Dragoons also handed the Free Worlds League two full sets of schematics. The Dragoon's CO was rather flippant about it "Oh well they lay around and nobody cared"

The main question will be if the other nations deem them actually useful. After all, those Mechs demand more resources (not to mention a 3 men crew) and you also need more space on dropships (in this case extra designed cubicles like the Durat had build in for RAF raiding parties) And of course training (and not taking stupid pills that cause you to forget how to use SuperHeavies despite having them all for yourself for 15 years!

[Wrangler]

Theory: The Free worlds League and the Federated Suns might be able to reverse engineer the Ares thanks to the examples they have in their ranks. If Redemption Rites is anything to go by the Dragoons also handed the Free Worlds League two full sets of schematics. The Dragoon's CO was rather flippant about it "Oh well they lay around and nobody cared"

The main question will be if the other nations deem them actually useful. After all, those Mechs demand more resources (not to mention a 3 men crew) and you also need more space on dropships (in this case extra designed cubicles like the Durat had build in for RAF raiding parties) And of course training (and not taking stupid pills that cause you to forget how to use SuperHeavies despite having them all for yourself for 15 years!

I'm struck that the SLDF is not handicapped with the Clan mentality, but actual exRepublic soldiers among others doing that they were trained, specially happy Capellans.  They wouldn't being held back using such technology marvels.
I think they have place, I like having OPTIONS. 

[Kerfuffin(925)]

Him thinking he can do all three jobs is the supreme arrogance, and ToB shows that he absolutely can’t. Which is why Noritomo and Chance are doing mountains of work outside their typical roles.

But also, I think Alaric falsely thinks are three are - on some level - one and the same. To him, Wolf is the ilclan, and the ilclan is the Star League itself, with others joining his League under the wolves. Chance, Noritomo, and Anastasia all see the differences, and each then focused on specific roles Alaric isn’t admitting he’s not doing.

This is what I was getting at. They are 3 similar but separate things and all 3 have different goals.

[Wrangler]

I have more basic question the book hasn't made cleared.

What is the Khaganate?  Is this temporary name for the controlled space Terra is in before it began to be called Star League Protectorate or is this formal Clan name for space controlled by ilClan Wolf

[Mendrugo]

Khanate - territory ruled by a Khan.

Khaganate - territory ruled by the Khan of Khans

(Confusingly, ilkhanate was already taken by the Sea Foxes, along with Khanate)

The Khaganate is just the Sol system.  The area outside is the Star League Protectorate.

[Scotty]

The FWL has already deployed more Ares than they received from the Dragoons so I think it's reasonably likely they've found a way to reproduce the design even without the original factory.

[CJC070]

I don't think it's as simple as just his arrogance. 

Alarics power base is still wholly within Clan Wolf.  Once the 3rd League and the SLDF develops as a power base of its own, the Khan of Clan Wolf will become the heir apparent of the ilKhan / First Lord.  I do expect both the titles of the First Lord of the Great Houses and the ilKhan of the Clans to be resident within the same individual.

And if there is no clear line of succession we may have a conflict that will weaken (not destroy) the SLDF and the Wolves.

[tassa_kay]

The ilKhan chooses their own successor, as has already been established previously, and ToB seemed to telegraph that Darren was being set up as that choice.

[Kerfuffin(925)]

The ilKhan chooses their own successor, as has already been established previously, and ToB seemed to telegraph that Darren was being set up as that choice.

Where?

Every other ilKhan has been elected. ilKhan of an ilClan might be different but it’s never actually happened

[BrianDavion]

Where?

Every other ilKhan has been elected. ilKhan of an ilClan might be different but it’s never actually happened

it's eistablished in a few cases. thats kinda the reward of the conquering terra thing, you get to choose your sucessor

[tassa_kay]

Where?

ilClan, most prominently.

[Church14]

Where?

Every other ilKhan has been elected. ilKhan of an ilClan might be different but it’s never actually happened

Sarna cites the old Jade Falcon and Wolf sourcebooks for the choosing successor stuff, and that includes the remembrance passage declaring that conquering Terra is the test.

[Metallgewitter]

Sooo in theory (which will not happen because the story has to be told with Alaric in the lead): what would happen if Alaric keels over right now? There is no successor selected at this point, is there? Would the leaders of the Wolf Clan bash their heads against each other to determine who leads next? Or would the leaders of the other Clans also have a chance again?

[Church14]

Sooo in theory (which will not happen because the story has to be told with Alaric in the lead): what would happen if Alaric keels over right now? There is no successor selected at this point, is there? Would the leaders of the Wolf Clan bash their heads against each other to determine who leads next? Or would the leaders of the other Clans also have a chance again?

I want to say that comes up in ToB. The Wolf Khan would become ilKhan by default. Problem though, because Alaric is keeping all three titles, there's no Wolf Khan if Alaric dies, and Chance's ascension to Khanship could be challenged.

Which is why Anastasia got moved to new SLDF. She's no longer in the running. It carves Chance's biggest threat off.

[Wrangler]

Khanate - territory ruled by a Khan.

Khaganate - territory ruled by the Khan of Khans

(Confusingly, ilkhanate was already taken by the Sea Foxes, along with Khanate)

The Khaganate is just the Sol system.  The area outside is the Star League Protectorate.

Thank you for explaining it.  I didn't find it in the sourcebook or was I missing something that defined Khaganate and Khanate meant or are.

[Geg]

The Khaganate is just the Sol system.  The area outside is the Star League Protectorate.

This was so weakly stated in the IKEO and ToB that I wouldn't be shocked if it changed or evolved.

If the ilKhan is the leader of Clan Society, the Khaganate would the area under Clan leadership and laws, aka clan enclaves, while the First Lord rules over territory that functions under traditional Inner Sphere laws and cultures, then the Khaganate is more a division of people than territory. Terra doesn't proper have enclaves yet, but it looks like the Terran castles are going to become clan enclaves.  With the On pg 46 of IKEO there is a blurb about applying the Khaganate's cultural norms to terra was rescinded, that might have placed most of Terra back into the Protectorate and outside of the Khaganate. The whole thing gets extra muddled, when you think of Sol as just an extension of the Clan Wolf Occupation Zone and Terra's generally special status.  The Exarch (from the 3250 blurbs) needs to get introduced and empowered somewhere in the governance model.

I am personally disappointed in the selection of the term protectorate for the Star League and Clan Protectorate, I think it's going to be highly confusing to anyone new to the Era.  I really hope one or both get folded into something new.

[Cannonshop]

This was so weakly stated in the IKEO and ToB that I wouldn't be shocked if it changed or evolved.

If the ilKhan is the leader of Clan Society, the Khaganate would the area under Clan leadership and laws, aka clan enclaves, while the First Lord rules over territory that functions under traditional Inner Sphere laws and cultures, then the Khaganate is more a division of people than territory. Terra doesn't proper have enclaves yet, but it looks like the Terran castles are going to become clan enclaves.  With the On pg 46 of IKEO there is a blurb about applying the Khaganate's cultural norms to terra was rescinded, that might have placed most of Terra back into the Protectorate and outside of the Khaganate. The whole thing gets extra muddled, when you think of Sol as just an extension of the Clan Wolf Occupation Zone and Terra's generally special status.  The Exarch (from the 3250 blurbs) needs to get introduced and empowered somewhere in the governance model.

I am personally disappointed in the selection of the term protectorate for the Star League and Clan Protectorate, I think it's going to be highly confusing to anyone new to the Era.  I really hope one or both get folded into something new.

It's a transition state.  I suspect after reading IKEO, that the conflicts between the Clan and local populations aren't quite as resolved as anyone on either side would prefer.

[Metallgewitter]

It's a transition state.  I suspect after reading IKEO, that the conflicts between the Clan and local populations aren't quite as resolved as anyone on either side would prefer.

I think right now they are united by simply removing the Confederation from the nearest vicinity. IKEO gives us a hint with the propaganda on Terra painting a picture of Terra under Confederation rule (with everyone being relegated to servitors). Of course there are also the incentives like keeping your family name and so on. But the Wolf Clan section also hinted that despite everything you still have strikes, unrest and other civil disobedience (not to mention that the hardliners struggle to stomach all those "pandering"). While apparently the military resistance is gone for now tensions are still there. Kinda feels like the Wolf empire. Tucker stated in FM 3145 that Alaric is just pushing the problems aside but as long as he is winning nobody seems to care.

[Cannonshop]

I think right now they are united by simply removing the Confederation from the nearest vicinity. IKEO gives us a hint with the propaganda on Terra painting a picture of Terra under Confederation rule (with everyone being relegated to servitors). Of course there are also the incentives like keeping your family name and so on. But the Wolf Clan section also hinted that despite everything you still have strikes, unrest and other civil disobedience (not to mention that the hardliners struggle to stomach all those "pandering"). While apparently the military resistance is gone for now tensions are still there. Kinda feels like the Wolf empire. Tucker stated in FM 3145 that Alaric is just pushing the problems aside but as long as he is winning nobody seems to care.

Well, they must've had a reason to include some of the personalities they did in the 'personalities' section, and some of those are clearly lined up to be ongoing, rather than terminated, problem children.

[Geg]

I am very curios to see how the Star League's and the iKhan's succession shakes out.

It looks like the heir apparent (HA) is going to get adopted into the Ward Bloodhouse, but I am curious if the HA will automatically get elevated to a Khan or SA Khan within Clan Wolf.  Will we keep the situation where the 1st Lord-ilKhan-Wolf Khan are all the same person, and the Wolf SA Khan is the slot occupied by the Heir apparent?  And if so, what does that do to the internal power dynamics of Clan Wolf, where Galaxy Commander is the last stop of the meritocracy.

or

Does the HA get adopted into the Ward Bloodhouse, but they get another Inner Sphere title to designate them as the HA ala a specific SLDF Generalship or maybe the revived Exarch title? This would leave Clan Wolf's internal politics and Khanships to follow more traditional patterns.

and

Will Alaric get to implement these reforms before his matricide and Stone's curse catchup with him.

[Gaiiten]

I am very curios to see how the Star League's and the iKhan's succession shakes out.

It looks like the heir apparent (HA) is going to get adopted into the Ward Bloodhouse, but I am curious if the HA will automatically get elevated to a Khan or SA Khan within Clan Wolf.  Will we keep the situation where the 1st Lord-ilKhan-Wolf Khan are all the same person, and the Wolf SA Khan is the slot occupied by the Heir apparent?  And if so, what does that do to the internal power dynamics of Clan Wolf, where Galaxy Commander is the last stop of the meritocracy.

or

Does the HA get adopted into the Ward Bloodhouse, but they get another Inner Sphere title to designate them as the HA ala a specific SLDF Generalship or maybe the revived Exarch title? This would leave Clan Wolf's internal politics and Khanships to follow more traditional patterns.

and

Will Alaric get to implement these reforms before his matricide and Stone's curse catchup with him.

I think First Lord and IlKhan (+senior Wolf Khan) will be two different persons.

[Wrangler]

Theory: The Free worlds League and the Federated Suns might be able to reverse engineer the Ares thanks to the examples they have in their ranks. If Redemption Rites is anything to go by the Dragoons also handed the Free Worlds League two full sets of schematics. The Dragoon's CO was rather flippant about it "Oh well they lay around and nobody cared"

The main question will be if the other nations deem them actually useful. After all, those Mechs demand more resources (not to mention a 3 men crew) and you also need more space on dropships (in this case extra designed cubicles like the Durat had build in for RAF raiding parties) And of course training (and not taking stupid pills that cause you to forget how to use SuperHeavies despite having them all for yourself for 15 years!

I finally got to the finish line.  My concerns were all for not gladfully, the Rules Annex clear it up.  SLDF does use the Ares / Prothemus SuperHeavies, but no mention if they or handmade Heavy Tripods are being built. We'll see I guess!

[Colt Ward]

If you look at Empire Alone, the Gienah writeup says that Clan systems were not imposed.  However, throughout the main body text, there are three instances cited when Clan administrators forcibly imposed Clan caste systems and economic structures, and got varying degrees of pushback. 

Alaric, focused on the Falcons, Operation Eruptio, and Terra, was probably unaware of the problems the Clan method was causing throughout the Empire, since he didn't see anything going awry on Gienah.  He opted to impose Clan systems on Terra to send a message, right when he was flying high off his victory and coronation, and still believed that swarms of Wolf civvies would be flooding in from the Empire to oversee the cultural shift, along with legions of Ghost Bears.

Then things went off plan.

Not even close to being true.  When Alaric challenged Seth Ward after the turn that stopped Hammerfall he was responsible for overseeing the recovery & integration of the Wolves into their new territory.  He combed the the planets to pick up every single military asset and for political purposes stopped some building projects like the Clan government building on Gienah to keep the Clan's senior leaderships from understanding he built three whole galaxies to be used in the second Lyran conflict along with the logistical support that would be needed to keep the ammo bins stocked.

Which is why Anastasia got moved to new SLDF. She's no longer in the running. It carves Chance's biggest threat off.

Which is Chance's mis-perception, Anastasia has not stopped being Clan nor are those from the Clans in the SLDF- Darren competed for a Clan Wolf bloodname, not a Star League bloodname for example.

[Wrangler]

The entire book again has characters behaving differently from the previous fiction written with them featuring in them.  Alaric more progressive social civilian caste then dense as granite about them and the impacts of handling the lm wrong despite being Schooled by far most legendary level of political actors, such as his gene mother among others.

I'll be happy when they come out with some kaya actual profile book of some kind or a section with key characters describing how they behave and so forth. It's getting tiring to having this jerky behavior between every source that comes out.

[tassa_kay]

I wouldn't hold your breath on that, Wrangler. If there's anything consistent in BattleTech fiction, it's inconsistency. Too many cooks in the kitchen and not enough coordination between them, and too much of putting Plot before Character that often ends up resulting in inorganic and contrived storytelling. Alaric and Anastasia are practically case studies in this very thing. I agree with you in that it's very frustrating indeed.

[Colt Ward]

At least we finally got a Verena reference after . . . 3 sourcebooks and half a dozen novels?  I mean granted it was a encapsulated dig at Anastasia but at least it happened.

I still wonder where Anastasia's doctor friend is, he one true companion for several novels just disappeared without a single line.

[Church14]

Not even close to being true.  When Alaric challenged Seth Ward after the turn that stopped Hammerfall he was responsible for overseeing the recovery & integration of the Wolves into their new territory.  He combed the the planets to pick up every single military asset and for political purposes stopped some building projects like the Clan government building on Gienah to keep the Clan's senior leaderships from understanding he built three whole galaxies to be used in the second Lyran conflict along with the logistical support that would be needed to keep the ammo bins stocked.

All of what you said are examples of Alaric dealing with the war footing. A focus on producing bombs and bullets and warriors for his crusade. There's not much showing he actually has a clue how a basic spheroid works, thinks, or feels. KSD certainly didn't give him a good ground level view or the universe.

Also, worth noting that the early stuff about the Empire painted a pretty peachy image of the Wolf conquest, making it look like a breeze. EA shows that wasn't actually the case. There were a bunch of cracks painted over in earlier sources.

Which is Chance's mis-perception, Anastasia has not stopped being Clan nor are those from the Clans in the SLDF- Darren competed for a Clan Wolf bloodname, not a Star League bloodname for example.

Per trial of birthright, Anastasia would still be a wolf, same as Darren and anyone else, but she wouldn't be part of the touman. So I'm not clear if she would count as part of the clan council anymore. If she isn't, she'd be ineligible to become Khan. There's the possible counter-example of Natasha having been gone for decades and returning, but the Wolf's Dragoons were, fundamentally, a Clan Wolf unit, obedient to Kerlin Ward and Ulric Kerensky, following their orders to the hilt.

Mostly though, politics, not letter of law. Election to Khan is, at its heart, a popularity contest with a dash of murder. In ToB we see Chance, Anastasia, Noritomo, and by extension, everyone else drawing a distinction between the SLDF and Clan Wolf. Wolves are dismissive and arrogant of the SLDF, for they are the ilClan, etc., etc.

At some point, either when Alaric grows up and steps down as Wolf Khan or dies via bullet, heart attack, Seventh Kommando, Fidelis, Sephanie Chistu, or choking on a Big MAC (unit or burger, your choice), there's going to be a popularity contest. Anastasia's position as Commanding General of the SLDF is going to completely gut her chance of ever winning the votes to become Khan.

[Colt Ward]

Bonfire had Alaric in charge of the economic integration, which yes he funneled and prioritized war material output but overseeing/experienceing the economic operation was actually something he wanted.

IIRC the internal monologue Alaric knew he had been ceded the power of the Clan because he made the economic decisions instead of the Khan or saKhan.  Yes he would still have been working with/through the Merchant factors and castes but it gave him experience.  Compare it with Malvina's treatment of worlds outside the original OZ and how they were stripped to the point of collapse- some commanders leaving worlds to starve.

Cyrilla Ward was no longer part of the touman, she still had a vote on the Clan Council which is how she gets access.  The only other qualifier for office is that you are a warrior- see Elias Crichell.

[phoenixalpha]

Doesn't really matter when Alaric bites the big one... the Wolf Clan will always be smaller than the SLDF if the SLDF openly starts recruiting from the Inner Sphere. The Wolves have a semi fixed size limit. Even if every bloodname was filled and they started recruiting from Wolf freeborns, they will never be as large as the SLDF can be due to the nature of the Clan trial system where you must qualify to be a warrior by defeating someone else. The SLDF can just train someone and if they are good enough.... instant SLDF trooper.

[Metallgewitter]

The strange thing about the Wolf Empire is the different perspectives. For example if you add Redemption rites into the mix you know that the Leaguers were stripped of their surnames and depending on where you live you lost a lot. Like that Dragoon adoptee who told his commander that his family lost their company despite the promise of not doing so if he joins the training program. And he also stated that he was gonna go through with it because the warriors hold the power and he would use it to do good. So it sounds to me as if that was a ticking time bomb. After all the more angry freeborns rise up the more you might get challenges against your authority. They streamlined it on Terra because Tera has billions of inhabitants and they are a tiny group compared to that. As Tucker said "We are Billions, they are only a few thousands!"

And it will take time for estavblishing new gene labs and creating the first new trueborn babies. and then it will take at least 16 years until they can join the touman and even then it would only be a couple of cadets out of big groups. As long as the Wolf touman has to ride out the trueborn count will bleed away. And the Empire is also loosing trueborns, especially in the coming war. And if they begin adopting Terrans or other Republicans into their rank they will loose their "true" clan identiy as well