Tempers, ladies and gentlemen, tempers. We're trying to keep this a civil discussion. I know there are a lot of people who are pissed about this, hell, I'm one of them. We have all made our point about how mad we are. The only way I could make mine any clearer is to post a ragequit thread featuring a minis-and-books bonfire. (That is still on the table, BTW) But please cease and desist with the namecalling. I will report you myself if it continues. As near as I can tell, CB has not made it possible to drop just any consciousness into any body (unlike Altered Carbon). So it's not really possible in this setting to use prisoners as quick re-sleeves. But you're absolutely correct, there's zero reason to have a Cube in combat against the Combined Army. I think this is a big part of it. For the next campaign, I'm hoping that CB weighs the games. If Yu Jing (including ISS) players only make up 1/10 of the games played, but Yu Jing makes up 45% of the population of the Sphere, then the reported games will need a roughly 4.5x weight multiplier. Yes, this can screw the smaller nations. You balance the general factional weighting by giving the small faction's Secret Missions a lot of weight, since a small force in the right place can stop over a hundred times their number. My problem is not the Secession. My problem is not that the Secession succeeded. My problem is that the organizations that are supposed to be the most competent in the entire Sphere at 1) detecting a potential externally-funded secession (the Yanjing) somehow didn't see this coming; and 2) fighting an insurgency (the Imperial Service) managed to make every move in favor of the Secessionists. The Secession has been a brewing thing since Human Sphere N2, which came out in September 2009. (I checked my copy of the book) I also agree that having the Secession happen off-screen, with no player involvement, was a poor choice. Honestly, it would have been cool to make the Secession this year's Global Campaign. Yes, the secession could still happen even if YJ/ISS won most of the battles (I mean, I'm pretty sure they did in the story as presented!). But the players would be less upset about it, because they had input into how it happened. Not completely happy, mind you, because a lot of us really don't like the fluff. But people would be less upset about a perceived lack of agency in what happened. Very much this. Especially since it seems that YJ is only going to get one new sectorial in the next book. I'd assume that this would actually be White Banner, not Invincible Army, because it'd make sense to introduce Svalarheima Sectorials for both PanO and YJ at the same time. Lets you do a themed expansion book. I'm trying, PS, but people are upset and CB's lack of response is quite frankly making things worse. A book in which the [Japanese Sectorial Army] suddenly goes NA2 and slays [Imperial Service] and [Invincible Army] like mook stormtroopers whilst every other faction lines up to piss on [Yu Jing]? About an 8 of 10 for me, mostly because the Secession has been brewing since 2009 (so not exactly a surprise), but the Imperial Service and Yanjing have been exceptionally incompetent in their handling of things leading up to it. Uhm. There have been major issues with the integration of Japan into YJ written as a thing since HSN2 back in 2009. That's 3/4 of the game's life! The Hassassins are the official intelligence service of Haqqislam, for both civilian and military (HSN2, pg45). There's a fluffpiece in Paradiso that says any Hassassin killing is legal because the Hachib and his lawyer say that it is, on pg104. Quoting it here for those that don't have the book. So, no, the Hassassins operate openly and with the full acknowledgement of the Haqqislamite government.
The following is pure conjecture, and simply what I can imagine. I think it might have something to do with how CB came about. Because they were a gaming group they seem to feel comfortable mocking each other's favorite factions or them. Much like my gaming group can do without hurt feelings. Because they are all mates, it might be that they expect the player base to take things the same way they do and are genuinly blind sided by players sensitive natures. The campaigns for example are quite rushed and I dought their fluff bits get sent out to play testers for their opinions. They are a young company (I dought anyone formally trained in PR) and Carlos himself has quite a blunt sense of humor at times. It comes off really well from him in person but the same stile fails to amuse in written form. I really don't believe they want to make anyone feel bad. Hopefully they can find a way to work player desire into the fluff and it does not effect the narrative much. If Yu-Jing are destined to be the baby killers and war criminals as a key part of the story... Well then we are screwed if we don't like it. I do not believe this to be the case anyway.
@Section9 4.5x weight in open warfare, though probably significantly more since Yu Jing has a higher mobilization degree than anyone but Ariadna. For clandestine operations not so much, but it could go so far as to mean the difference between Yu Jing capturing a location (i.e. clandestine operations are a win for YJ) or them destroying it and denying it to the defending faction (clandestine operations/human players lost the location).
From a fluff perspective, since people identify with factions so much, you have to treat the factions themselves like, say, characters in an rpg, or the characters of an ensemble cast show - sure, some of them might get focused on in particular at times, but in the end everyone gets a turn at some point, and everybody gets a chance to show what they're made of - except, possibly, factions that were described as morally irredeemable from the get-go (like, honestly, the Combined Army. They're my first faction, but the descriptions of the EI as "diabolical" and so on have left me quite comfortable playing a villain faction, even if individual Exrah, Shasvastii, and the occasional Morat are ok people. And everyone knows Doc Worm is chill.). Yu Jing wasn't a villain faction from the start - but it seems to have turned into one. And PanO seems to get a pass on actions that look questionable from an outside lens. So it's a bait and switch. If the Umbra commit all these senseless acts of ethnic cleansing, nobody bats an eye, because they are presented as murderous jackasses from the start.
It probably is a bit high for clandestine operations, but remember that YJ's clandestine ops were good enough to force PanO to create the Hexahedron. I did pull that number out of my ass, so it could be way off. I think it's probably close, since the total population of member-states of each faction are close. But Ariadna is a rounding error in population compared to the rest of the Sphere, Haqq could be big (depends on how many of the 1.2bn Muslims became Haqq and then left for Bourak), and Nomads are a bit smaller than Haqq. Based on O-12 representation, I think the NA2 in total are about the same size as YJ, with PanO getting more seats due to larger economy.
I think yu jing is critical to the way the human sphere is arranged. The yin to Pan oceanias yang in terms of sphere politics. Should PanO want to strong arm a small faction, there is always Yu Jing to counterbalance, under the veil of O-12. If yu jing was to continue on this route of being the bad guy and incompentent (not that I fully agree with some of the more sensationalist interpretations of this), the whole pack of cards would be pretty tenuously stacked. While CB's technical story writing is not always the best, the world building to this point has been very good. Yu Jing seems to be on the back foot here, feeling what happens when the other factions seemingly unite. But, the upcoming campaign looks to be based on areas which will be juicy to all the factions, won't involve yu jing home territory (anymore) and may form the turn around where the little beat on yu jing alliance sees some cracks as the resultant land grab gets ugly. The smaller factions may eat some humble pie and come back to yu jing for help when PanO starts flexing its hyperpower all over the show.
@Section9 It seems to me to you're trying too hard to inject your world views into the fluff or atleast thats how it comes across. I understand you're a military member so you know your stuff and you're also quite obviously a fan of Asian cultures and history. The story in my opinion would have been alot more boring without some of these awful acts. It was unfortunately needed to really drive the wedge. @Triumph You obiously don't win an insurgency by blowing up people. Just look at the miserable failures in the middle East. Also please show me where I called for that and said that's how I would handle it or think that's how it should be done? What I was saying though is that the reaction is completely in character not only with yu Jing but with humanity in general. Wars always have atrocities that's just a fact. Innocents die including kids. Look throughout histroy at how quickly humans are willing to shed decency and humanity when attacked especially multiple times. We see it all the time. After 9/11 there were a ton of people wanting to round up brown people. After Pearl harbor we round up Japanese American citizens. We even nuked Japan and people were happy and celebrated it. Heck look at the comments when we see monsters in court like the Aurora shooter or that USA gymnastics doctor sexually abusing all those girls. Normal everyday folk were calling for him to be tortured, mutilated, raped, and murdered. That's what happens when the emotions run high and government's aren't immune to it. A huge chunk of all the world's terrible decisions stem from not being able to control emotions. So I'm sorry but I don't thing you grasp how humanity works when it comes violence and revenge especially when looking at history. Also before you say it I don't condone any of this stuff but again my arguement still stands that it is completely within the realm of possibility and even realistic how yj reacted or over reacted. @Hecaton You're not interested in any discussion you're still just too emotional right now and just looking to trash the faction, the fluff, and the game. Sorry that's boring.
I don't think the 'mass graves' was in character for a Crane Agent. Maybe if it was a much lower ranked member of the ISS, but Crane is a very high rank, and you wouldn't get there in the ISS if you were stupid enough to broadcast atrocities you've committed to a WarCor. A Crane Agent is high up the ladder in an organisation that is made to deal with insurgencies, I really don't think it is in character.
Mad props for the post, mate. Couldn't write it better even if my english wasn't crap. I have to also say that - aside from the fluff - I really, really did not like the schism, full stop. And not just because I have a mish-mash of JSA/YJ minis that I cannot put on the table without being crap(huh... should have bought Hac Taos/Daofei/Kuang shi instead) but because this kind of thing is never good in a miniatures game. CB could have left JSA units in YJ (especially haramaki and raiden) with reduced AVA to highligh the fluff schism and the limited japanese population. Regarding the future of the faction, I now see the last year of minis as laying the groundwork for the cutting of available profiles to vanilla, and that the next YJ mini is a resculpt of the Zhanshi support pack, so no enthusiasm there. I also see the problem with the next campaign, with reduced player population for YJ (and maybe JSA, but I wouldn't be sure about that with the influx of new players), especially since numbers played a large role in the last 2. The only redeeming factor at the moment is that I was always a box of hospitalers and a box of spec. sergeants away from having a functional MO list, and since the YJ stuff i have is painted pretty well, I was able to sell some pieces to buy those boxes second-hand. Will be back playing by end of the week, hopefully.
Psychocrane is apparently an established character in the lines of Dirty Harry (or literally Dirty Harry, I can't remember which)
Cubes are undefined. The "sleeving" process is undefined. We only know that you need "silk" (a name for something that has not been defined aside from "a critical ingredient to facilicate resurrections"), and that people gets those resurrections in artificial bodies (Lhosts) which are mostly blank human clones. Considering how the Cube can write on the brain, somehow, because of the Sepsitor (and don't start with "it's voodootech" people XD, if the Sepsitor were able to write the brains directly, not having a Cube would be irrelevant), we already have a way to overwrite a brain. So... More like "endorsement", I'd say... Are a think that should not have been placed in the game, slapped to the face of the community.
If you want explanation or visualization for Sepsitor, go for the Space Opera of Neal Asher. Without spoiling too much, one of the books has an entity gain sufficient omniscience to be able to hack just about anything through whichever information input the target has. If a Cube reads a person's brain, it isn't unthinkable that the Cube once hacked would be able to write. I should probably expand on this; This Crane is a bit too unknown for what he actually represents. If he was literally called Dirty Harry or had a bunch of "Ortega does this" examples which establishes that this is the dirtiest Agent Yu Jing has, often resorting to extra-judicial righteous violence, the quote would come across with the required amount of information for perspective. As it is, I think most people won't know this (I certainly didn't and truthfully still don't) and will take it as the mouthpiece for the Yu Jing government/judiciary - which it (probably?) isn't meant to be.
Pretty sure the RPG explains that silk is derived from a plant named Nassiat that's grown in the Gabqar region of Bourak.
Thanks. I can totally understand that. They maybe should have been more heavy handed in warning Yu-Jing players away for JSA. Because I have been an infinity magpie for so long, I have enough minis in both to field working lists. But it would have sucked in my first year or so of the game. The proxy rule change also seems to be there as damage control. I was a bit miffed when CB said no one took JSA units in vanilla lists regularly execpt the Ninja. Every list I have made for Yu-Jing since 2010 has had one or two Tokusetsu in it. And since n3 a keisotsu hacker to boost REMs has been in any list that needs one. They were the cheaper option for the roll I wanted and now my favorite list of all time winner of 5 tournaments is no more. Time to switch it up.
I think when they said that they largely meant people didn't take JSA units which were distinctly JSA rather than just being "1-2 pts cheaper" than the equivalent chinese profile. Ie. if the tokusetsu or keisotsu hacker didn't exist, you more than likely would have taken the zhanshi for the same list.
This is nitpicking, but if it was possible to take a Zhanshi instead of a Keisotsu in the same list, people would have done so. Zhanshi is a linear upgrade over Keisotsu, so cost is the only concern, i.e. for exactly all lists where people opted for Keisotsu, Zhanshi were either not an option or would require a significant enough downgrade in more important units. Everyone has their own priorities regarding impact, but for me the loss of the cheapest non-Impetuous order and the loss of all assassins are most important, and the only ones impossible to replicate. As you can see in the way I'm taking pains to express myself, they are replaceable, but not with the current roster.
Knew I was dialing the tongue-in-cheek a little too high to stay canonical there, for sure, but wow I did not remember that passage raising so many questions about how international & human rights laws work in the Human Sphere.
