I actually don't feel this is an unfair characterization at all. This comes from the observation of how the fluff has been executed and defended vs what the world building has attempted to accomplish in the past. If you feel the statement does not represent you, then no problem, the statement does not represent you, your arguments have not been simplified and there's no need to be upset about it. I think this is really it. I don't play Yu Jing, and I have no desire to collect JSA either. I've been playing Haqq since the days of second edition and am in the process of branching out towards Druze Bayram Security. I'm drawn in by the quality of the models as well as the world building. My concern is that by stepping on Yu Jing so consistently over the past few years and leaving it in this incomplete state to fester, the world building has been cheapened as a whole. Full disclaimer here, a lot of my enjoyment of Infinity comes from the setting and the world building, not just the table top game. Haqqislam didn't lose anything during Uprising, since it wasn't really about them. But I feel that the way Haqqislam interacted with Yu Jing felt off, the way almost everyone else behaved during Uprising felt off and one dimensional to me. Yu Jing may have lost its Japanese population, but Haqqislam lost some consistency as well. I hope Corvus Belli can correct course with Yu Jing as a faction and also with the interactions the other factions have with it. They're not supposed to be buddy buddy, conflict between Yu Jing vs everyone else and Haqqislam vs everyone else is what drives the game and its meta-plot, but this conflict happens within certain logical boundaries that I feel are being stretched.
Perhaps villain is not the correct word to define YJ. Ruthless, doubtable moral, authoritarian, superb and powerful enough to be like this. "The culprits were facing the Celestials Guards in front the wall, full of bullet holes and splashed with blood, having to stand above lots of corpses of previous executed traitors. A Crane agent was supervising the executions in front a warcore. -We are here to protect the civilians against the japanese terrorism. Our severe actions are meant to guarantee the security and wellness of every citizen. Those that break the curfew or pass the line will be judged for terrorism. Those that help terrorist will be executed. Those that hold weapons without permission or open fire against Yu Jing forces or citiznes will we executed. We will not tolerate any aggression. Then the Celestial guards opened fire, and more traitors were placed in front the wall." THATS is a fearsome, ruthless ISS we are. We are not exalted mercs. WE are the will of the State Empire.
That's disingenuous. You earlier were talking about it being a brutal authoritarian regime and people shouldn't be complaining. If PanO was being portrayed this negatively you'd be shitting a brick.
As it has already been pointed death this thread was never about the community wanting Yu Jing to be flawless and never lose or wanting Pano to fail at everything. But rather about how the portrayal of the faction has become one note in the latest fluff advances. That note being mainly incompetence and absurd vilany. Which is contradictory to the established lore. To give concrete examples what is desired is a portrayal in the style of "Outrage" instead of Uprising. In Outrage, we can see Yu Jing being Machiavellian, opprtunistic, pragmatic and above all competent. While in Uprising they are just portrayed as incompetent and authoritarian. In the end Yu Jing lost both scenarios but outrage clearly did a better job at following the established traits of the faction. As for how to fix Uprising its hard considering the quality of the book but in future references they could work in how the Japanese Gui Fengs like Yuriko diverted "the eyes" attention from the Gray Man. For the iss I would recommnd suggesting a deal with the triads to act out distracting them from the insurrecton and a mayor military operation to occupy most of the armed forces and making redeployment a difficult and time consuming thing to achieve. Although I still maintain that them liberating the Japanese homeland was absurd and should have been made an overarching faction goal instead.
I did say they were an authoritarian regime because they are one. They are certainly not democratic. How else would you describe the Yu Jing government? So the ISS gets overzealous and kills innocent civilians while hunting terrorists. That a far cry from making Yu Jing into mustache twirling saturday morning cartoon villains.
Weirdly, they seem to be more democratic than PanO. AFAIK in PanO there's no voting, power is held in corporate lobbies, who obviously have to have the interests of the populace in mind to avoid a revolt, but the only "voting" that takes place appears to be on corporate boards. Yu Jing, on the other hand, has a limited form of democracy where at the local level there is voting that takes place, with conservative and liberal wings of the Party represented.
That is an amusing point. Pano emphases the illusion of personal freedom while Yu Jing demands citizens uphold their duty to the state. That strong sense of duty is what makes Yu Jing cool to roleplay. They vaguely remind me of the Draconis Combine from Battletech. A sense of honor so strong it can lead their troops to commit terrible acts for the sake of duty, honor, and the stability of the state.
And the opposing view presented by some of us is that we do not see the facts presented as painting Yu Jing as incompetent but as the Kuge as very competent adversaries that got lucky. As for the fact Yu Jing is presented as authoritarian they have been shown as such since the beginning. allow me to quote some N2 fluf about Yu Jing. That is not the description of a progressive democracy that is the description of a authoritarian regime. They do vote in PanO. Simply speaking the lobbies have replaced the political parties. Members of a lobby vote on issues to decide the how to use their voting power to further the lobby goal. A lobby is typical one or more corporations working along NGO and Citizen groups joined by common goals.
I think @Section9 demonstrated pretty conclusively that that viewpoint is either ignorant or being presented in bad faith.
I respect Section 9's posts and enjoy reading them but not all of us agree with his viewpoint or are convinced by his arguments.
Mass Graves. Floods over civilian populations. ISS agents presented as performing acts of petty villainy... Hi, Aleph main here (nomads, CA and Haqquislam too...). I wonder what was Aleph doing during the Uprising if it did anything at all... then again, it seems like all the sphere and the Tohaa knew of the Uprising before YJ. In fact my worst fear is that Uprising ends with this book and no more data gets out, maybe some in the RPG book with a JSA supplement, but that's it. Things don't happen in a vacuum, after all. Yet they have been dumped into Mad Liao suddenly. There is a reason for inept villanous nations to not exist: unless they are a proxy, they get devoured by their neighbours pretty quickly. It's a 4x, after all (eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate) in which all players follow the logical rationale: I do it or the others will, and if they get too much advantage, they will devour me. Too lucky, frankly. The plan had too many potential leaks, and YJ too many oppotunities to discover the plot. It went on for years... Then again, as Pratchett said, gods love one in a million chances. Unless they are ATEK Yet few, if any, provide compelling arguments on the other direction. This seems logic Vs faith, frankly, and we all know how it goes, and ends.
More like pessimism vs optimism. We just have to be patient while we wait for the Invincible Army and White Banner. Speaking of which, since the JSA TAG is now gone maybe the White Banner will have a new TAG for Yu Jing after all.
Logic? This is essentially a reading group discussion. We all bring our different subjectivities and interpretations to the table. There is no certainty or consensus to be had.
This is something that I am willing to be optimistic about. If CV's intention is to knock Yu Jing down and then build them back up, then great. The issue I have here is that this has been communicated very poorly, with Yu Jing players being left in the dark, and the rest of us unsure if this is truly the path which CV plans to go down. So if I were optimistic, this path will go a long way to bringing back some balance to the faction and the setting as a whole.
You know, that would be pretty cool. I'll have to hang on to your hope that CB Pearl Harbouring the ISS is a way to drop the ISS as a sectorial and completely re-arrange the Yu Jing armies and sectorials. Maybe they will do a Yu Jing codex, with like 2 or 3 new sectorials? (Kind of like how they just did a Codex for JSA and the other NA2 armies) Hopefully they give prior warning as to whats going to happen so everyone doesn't lose their minds.
I would prefer the more evil aspects of Yu Jing to be kept within the ISS. That way the Invincible Army and White Banner can play up heroic patriotism and honor.
Isn't part of the appeal of ISS that they're so damn sinister? I'm pretty sure a lot of players would be upset if they got "sanitized".
Sinister isn't the same as evil. There's a lot of good that the ISS brings to Yu Jing: stability, protection and order for the lives of the vast majority is a pretty major selling point. They are a ruthless organisation, but they are, ultimately, opposed to egregious waste of human life: they stamp out insurgencies and organised crime so that they don't hurt innocents. That's actually why I find it somewhat infuriating how people conflate authoritarian with totalitarian. Yu Jing is authoritarian (it enforces strict obedience), it is not totalitarian (it is not dictatorial, and there are limits to their authority with checks and balances). There certainly is overlap, but they're not one and the same.
I find its a more compelling argument that the ISS has gone too far into villain territory than Yu Jing as a whole. But as I said, I suspect theres going to be a big reshuffling of leadership after the JSA debacle. Still, the ISS being brutal has always been a part of its fluff. Perhaps we need fluff about Sun Tze reforming the ISS to better handle insurrections.
