Well, I like the way the uprising is presented, but not for the usual reasons (and I fully expect that it won't be to everyone's taste, nor will it even be verifiable, short of an unheard-of intervention from the creative team). First and foremost, I see the Infinity background as works of science fiction - that is that they can be critiqued along the same lines, and to some extent exist independent of the war game. Outrage, for instance, could be seen as an attempt to branch out into a fresh medium, as much as it can be seen as an move into a new market. And, like all good science fiction, it isn't really about spaceships or aliens. It's a mirror to contemporary society and mores. Now, you are perfectly within your grounds to insist that you don't want social commentary in your game of toy soldiers, and I have no problem with those that don't... however, I see the uncritical presentation of the uprising events to be a deliberate comment on the presentation of various global conflicts in our own media. Likewise, I think there are deliberate decisions made in presenting a relatively intact echo chamber, and presenting the interference of (as @Hecaton notes) the European faction in some Other's domestic politics, without any Pan-O self criticism. This isn't necessarily a comment on anyone's domestic politics, by the way, although I think the secession framed as the actions of an extremely nationalistic elite need no complex dissection. However, I can't think that it didn't cross the creative team's collective mind. And, like all *really* good sci-fi, it doesn't try to resolve all these complex contemporary issues satisfactorily. Which is, rather, the point.
I disagree. There's no wink to the audience, and the context of it as narrative designed to sell minis means that it's not meant to be subversive at all. It's an unironic exemplar of the kind of thought you claim it's a criticism of. We, as the audience, are supposed to buy into the echo chamber, not realize there's an echo chamber.
Amusingly, I had that in the first draft of my post. I really am curious as I find it hard to believe. I do believe that it's quite possible that something was written in a vague enough way for some people to have taken it to mean as much, but I would like to see to what extent.
That's absolutely a fair position to take - I wasn't trying to convert anyone to my point of view. However, I don't think there needs to be any explicit wink to tip off the audience, when we live in such interesting times. I don't claim that it's artistically pure either, given the commercial enterprise. And, absolutely I accept that I might be taking from it more than was put in.
What part of "The older fluff was written in such a way that the various nations were obviously acting in their own best interests, so them suddenly not obviously acting in their own best interests is extremely jarring" are you not understanding? Just for @psychoticstorm , yes, I am calling out @Interruptor on this. Having the various powers suddenly not act in their own best interests is a decrease in the believability of the fluff.
Don't mind Hecaton. He's perpetually grumpy. I think your interpretation is interesting, and quite frankly, I'm less on a high horse about it than others because I know how downright insane real history is, so I'm more willing to just go along for the ride, especially when the ride is labelled, after every excerpt, a bit of propaganda.
You know what else I found interesting - the very brief mention of anyone LGBT. Not that it's enough to deserve any plaudits (and, like the representation of women, is itself somewhat questionable), but it piqued my interest. I was sure that I'd read something more substantial earlier in the book, but can't find it now...
It was posted on the PP website somewhere around the transition of Mk1 to Mk2 titled Haley: A Warmachine story. It was deleted though, I think after the backlash it got Seacat tried to quietly retcon the story. Of course, it lives on in the internet. "His whole body trembled with helpless desire, shuddered like a thoroughbred, and strained like a hound ready to be loosed from the leash. Had he not already been lying on his back, he surely would have collapsed. Despite the chill night air on his half-naked body, the soldier felt uncomfortably warm. Part of his mind, looking for any escape from his predicament, noted how very black was the gulf between the stars. Sharp lacquered fingernails traced delicate arcane designs in the hair beneath his navel. “Tis is what you’ve been waiting for these last few years, isn’t it?” she said in a knowing voice. “You deserve a more… personal acknowledgment of your loyalty.” The sergeant pulled his eyes away from the sky to hazard a look down the length of his torso. The face that met his gaze was Victoria’s—Captain Haley’s—but the voice, the voice was something utterly different, sultry and indulgent like black satin and leather. His mind buzzed with sensation, reeled with conflicting emotions, and no words would come. His head flopped helplessly back to the ground. Te smell of dewy earth warred in his nostrils with her scent. “You like this, don’t you?” A pause. “Hmmm?” she added in a throaty purr. He gasped and arched his back. “Yes,” he panted.“ Just tell me, and I’ll finish.” she said. “Westwatch,” he gasped helplessly. “We’re going to Westwatch.” He closed his eyes in pleasure and regret as she started to move with his reward."
I found the whole thing if you wanted to read it in context. The specific passage is under part 3. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6RnC8aHI_TWRkpMeDBrX3lYSjg/view
That's hilarious. Cryx witches/Satyxis being a vector for either Seacat or Soles's bad girl fetish always had me chortling. To be fair, Deneghra was probably the most overtly sexual character in the setting.
To be fair, Seacat didn't write that particular travesty. He's had his fair share of facepalm moments though.
At one stage I swear every single female model in the warmachine line was either masked hooded or otherwise had their face obscured except for their mouth if that, and I'm pretty sure, almost always had either whips or poles. Except for that one. The chained up one with the blindfold...
I was a military awards writer for 5 years, but I didn't learn this particular lesson in the Service. I learned it in a book about Vietnam called LRRP Company Command: Soldiers do a lot of heroic things that are "just doing their job". Do not ever let that stop you from saying, "wait, he did what?!?" and writing up an appropriate award for it. Even if that Award is a Silver Star or a Medal of Honor. (as an aside, the rules for awarding the MOH are very simple: "There can be no question." That's it. Those 5 words. No long-winded bullshit. There's a painfully long process for going through all the hoops, but there is no question that any lesser award adequately conveys the ... selfless badassery exhibited that day.) It wasn't on my sub, but one of the guys who was teaching me Damage Control (and where the hell the bulkhead isolations were) told me a story. The YN3 (that's the ship's clerk, a Petty Officer 3rd class, an E4/Corporal equivalent), maybe 9 months on the ship, was working late in the office one day when he heard this hellacious roar. If you've ever used a big CO2 extinguisher, kinda like that. But louder and it never stopped. He looked around outside his office, and one of the high-pressure air lines over the XO's rack had blown open. The XO (Executive Officer, his boss) was trapped in his bunk, if he moved the air spray would cut him in half (4500PSI/300BAR air supply, folks, you look for a leak with a damn broomstick. And you find one when it cuts the end off the broomstick!). He screams, "hold tight, sir, I'm on it!" YN3 practically flew to the bulkhead (60 feet aft and one deck below), hit ALL the isolation valves, and was back to the XO's rack before the air had stopped screaming out of the crack (6" diameter pipes nearly 100 feet long hold a lot of air). XO filled out the paperwork himself for a Navy Achievement Medal, and handed the kid that medal as soon as the captain signed the award. About two days later, as the shipyard workers were welding the repair together, the XO kinda sheepishly had to ask for it back. "The Squadron Commodore says you didn't earn a NAM, you earned a COM" (Navy Commendation Medal) "but we gotta get that signed by the Commodore's boss, and you only get one award for any action. I told that Captain and the Commodore that I'd kill them myself if they didn't let me pin that medal on you." And the XO had that look in his eye when he was dead serious about something. Kid was "just doing his job" and tried to wave off that first medal. XO told him in no uncertain (and, I'm told, quite profane) terms that "saving a life was NOT just doing your job."
I should add that the Civilians really only hear about the Medal of Honor awardees (not going to say 'winners'). But the Military Times usually covers anything Bronze Star and up. (The lesser awards are often End-of-Tour or End-of Service awards, where you did a good job over the entire time you were there but no single event was award-worthy. My first Captain got a Legion of Merit award for his end-of-tour, he had the best submarine crew in the Pacific as well as several downright awe-inspiring results from inspections. The LM is a big freaking deal, for performance well above and beyond the call of duty, but it's not a combat award.) You see someone with a Bronze Star ribbon, it can be earned out of combat but while in a combat zone, but has a special "Earned in Combat" marker. This pic just shows the basic medal. That white-red-white-blue-white-red-white ribbon is a big deal. Big Damn Hero stuff. Have you seen We Were Soldiers? Remember that reporter who was there for all the fighting? That reporter was Joe Galloway, and his rescue of wounded earned him a Bronze Star with V Device, to denote valor in combat. The Bronze Star is technically a lower award than the Legion of Merit, but can only be awarded to people in a combat zone (regardless of whether it's a Merit award or a Valor award). Valor awards above it are the Soldier's Medal (or Airman's Medal, Navy and Marine Corps Medal, or Coast Guard Medal, depending on branch of service), then the Silver Star, the various service Crosses (Distinguished Service Cross for the Army, Navy Cross, Air Force Cross, Coast Guard Cross, and/or the Presidential Unit Citation for an entire military unit like a Submarine Crew), and at the very top of the stack is the Medal of Honor. My first Chief of the Boat had one, he was a Hospital Corpsman. I never did ask him what he did to earn it, but my guess is rescuing wounded during Desert Storm. I have never been face-to-face with a serviceman who had been awarded anything higher than that, except the guys from the Parche who had Presidential Unit Citations. But the Parche was a projects boat (and the primary topic in Blind Man's Bluff), so the details of what the hell they did to be awarded something that requires "the unit to display such gallantry, determination, and esprit de corps in accomplishing its mission under extremely difficult and hazardous conditions so as to set it apart from and above other units participating in the same campaign against an armed enemy" (emphasis mine) is classified to hell and gone. I'm talking literal "if I told you I'd have to kill you" kinds of stuff. Now, digression aside, @Bostria , @Interruptor , can we please get some Yu Jingese Bronze Star awardees (or higher)? I will happily translate militarese in the awards for you, you can copy/paste the guts of the award into Infinity. I will point out that the US military still uses some forms that date clear back to the Civil War, like the formal Honorable Discharge certificate, which has wording unchanged from 1865(!). I have my great-great-grandfather's Honorable Discharge certificate from 1865, and it's only different from the current certificate in the form number. So I'm pretty sure the boilerplate for the awards is going to stay the same for 177 years into the future! (GW was really bad about copy/pasting Medal of Honor or Victoria Cross award events for their Space Marine fluff, so there is precedent)
At the moment and everything we have seen in Uprising, the only medals YJ are giving to their forces are for butchering civilians... But if there are better actions from YJ forces, those are welcome.
