The Word of Blake formed officially on 6 June, 3052, in the aftermath of the Battle of Tukayyid and then Primus Myndo Waterly's ill-fated decision to launch Operation Scorpion. Sickened by the loss of the flower of the ComGuard, and stunned that Myndo Waterly would take such a shockingly ill-advised throw of the dice when ComStar was literally at the mercy of the rest of the Inner Sphere, with no fully intact military formations able to defend its vast holdings outside of the Sol System itself, Anastasius Focht confronted the Primus and shot her dead.
Focht (Who was in fact Frederick Steiner, of the Lyran Commonwealth), arranged to have Precentor Dieron, Sharliar Mori (who was in fact a spy for the Draconis Combine's Orders of the Five Pillars), elected Primus. At this point, Demona Aziz, Precentor Atreus, left the First Circuit (The governing body of ComStar), for the Free Worlds League, taking the few hardcore believers who knew that Focht had murdered the Primus.
In the following months and years, the Word of Blake continued to attract ComStar acoyltes, ROM agents, and ComGuard soldiers who felt that Focht and Mori's liberalization and secularization program was essentially making ComStar the ***** of the Inner Sphere, selling it's technology to the highest bidders. This flow remained steady, but relatively slow, until two things happened. The first was when Klaus Hettig, Focht's right hand man, turned Traitor, and turned the naval yards in the Sol System over to the World of Blake, and the Word of Blake managed to conquer Terra itself in 3058. The blow to Focht's prestige at having his Right Hand Man betray him and his social programs was one he never recovered from.
The second major blow was when Victor Ian Steiner-Davion was named the new Precentor Martial after managing to lose his throne to his sister. When this happened, ComStar began to hemmorhage personnel and material to the Word. It was pretty obvious to many people that ComStar could hardly be neutral with one of the Successor Lords in the second most powerful position in the organization.
What kicked off the JIhad, however, and what most people seem to forget, is that the Word was about to join the Second Star League in 3067. The Successor Lords once again chose to destroy the Star League. The Word of Blake then turned the inconceivably massive arsenal it had built up at that point, and
which it was planning to share with the Star League Defence Force, on the Successor Lords. The forces that attacked New Avalon and Tharkad were equipped with Military Equipment that
had been slated to be turned over to the Alliance and the Suns as gifts.
Long story short, the Successor States cut their own throats. They turned a group of loonies that was prepared to go balls to the wall to crush the Clans onto dust... and managed to get them pointed at themselves, instead.
Thus came Jihad. And the Dark Ages.
Why did I post all this spew? To show that the Word of Blake is just like every other Faction in Battletech. It has it's own agenda, it's own unique flavour, and is as full of backstabbity and insanity as every other faction. Sure, they worship toasters and wear math symbol robes. So what? That makes them awesome. Certainly more awesome in my book than having a culture blatantly ripped off from Feudal Japan, or a society so rich that it can somehow survive six centuries of total military ineptness in total contradiction of every single logical law of military Darwinism, until it marries its 16 year old heir off to the Space French successor Lord and suddenly becomes amazing in the space of half a generation.
Blessed Be the Word of Blake.
Edited by Oshay, 16 July 2012 - 07:06 PM.
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Odweaver, on 15 July 2012 - 06:50 AM, said:
