10 replies to this topic

[Signal27]

I was more heavily into the BattleTech lore and tabletop wargame as a teenager, more than 20 years ago (damn, where does all the time go?). Since then, I've forgotten a lot about BattleTech history from the 3025 era, the 3050 era (which I played most heavily in), and I'm almost completely ignorant of what happened after the Clan invasion. To get caught up I've read the Sarna entries on each respective Great House and Clan.

But let's get back to basics, and be perfectly honest with ourselves: Some factions were written to be the "good guys" and some factions were written to be the "bad guys." At least in how they were largely portrayed in the BattleTech novels that came out.

That said, I'm under the impression that in the 3025 era, the "good guys" were supposed to be House Steiner and House Davion, while the "bad guys" were supposed to be House Kurita and House Liao. And Marik... was just there.

In 3050, it was pretty much the same except Kurita MIGHT have been considered a "protagonist" faction if only because they had to stand up to the Clans and cooperate with the other Great Houses.

Would you say that's a pretty fair assessment, given all things considered? And did this mostly stay the same after the Clan Invasion?

And finally: Has Marik ever done anything really all that significant except for maybe being the "bad guy faction" when Blake came around?

[Metus regem]

No one was really a good guy, like our world it is not black and white, more shades of grey.

Davion is often written as the good guys, but they were often the aggressors of most of the conflicts between 2750 and 3049...

[MeiSooHaityu]

BattleTech universe in a nutshell...

• Protagonists: Everyone
  
• Antagonists: Everyone

Really though, it comes down to the story you want to tell. Everyone has blood on their hands and everyone is very much in it for themselves.

If you are a Marik fan and dislike Davion, you could play out a story where Marik is doing something noble and you are preventing Davion from doing something terrible...and it could make sense. The universe is just that grey and flexible.

Heck, Even some of the darker shades of grey like the Smoke Jaguars could probably have a story play out where they were the righteous ones given the right story.

It's the beauty of BattleTech.

[Bombast]

Davion were the good guys, Steiner were the conflicted good guys (State sponsered self-terrorist cells?), Liao was mustache twirling evil, and Kurita were the 'non-evil antagonist.'

[SilentScreamer]

Signal27, on 23 April 2018 - 08:44 PM, said:

But let's get back to basics, and be perfectly honest with ourselves: Some factions were written to be the "good guys" and some factions were written to be the "bad guys." At least in how they were largely portrayed in the BattleTech novels that came out.

That said, I'm under the impression that in the 3025 era, the "good guys" were supposed to be House Steiner and House Davion, while the "bad guys" were supposed to be House Kurita and House Liao. And Marik... was just there.

Remember, Battletech fiction has many different authors. Each author brings their own thoughts and ideas into the novel. Yes, the Battletech Universe as a whole has characters/Houses/Clans/Organizations which lean towards the reader's view of good or bad morality, but ultimately the author of each novel writes their actions and we as readers judge the character based on those actions.

Example (semi-spoiler, no actual character names used)

Spoiler

A) The Head of a Organization and a subordinate disagree on certain decisions made by the boss. The subordinat is military minded and executes his boss, taking command. Widely regarded as a hero for doing so.

B) A gifted military commander is suitable for sucession leading a Great House, but lost. He is graciously given the chance to die honorably on a suicide mission, which he attempts and fails but survives in secret. Most would regard such a character as a villian/antangonist or at least a semi-willing cat's paw.

Both are the same character. Circumstances are similar, outcomes are opposite. Success, even though through questionably immoral actions equals hero. Failure, even though he believed in his cause, resulted in an effective death sentence. Not that the winners are always the good guys, but it is a common theme and the reader's judgment of good/bad depends on how the author builds actions of a character to the outcome.

Authors could easily write stories with Davion/Steiner as villians and Kurita/Liao/Marik as good guys, but they would have to 1) create new main characters to fufill the roles as Hanse, Victor, Kai, etc. are already established as protangonists, and 2) place events in a time or place isolated from established characters.

The Taurian Concordat history may be appealing if you want to see Federated Suns darker side.
http://www.sarna.net...urian_Concordat

Edited by SilentScreamer, 02 May 2018 - 10:34 AM.

[MischiefSC]

Kurita had a lot of villains in it. They were the "honorable villains".

Liao, Romano Liao specifically, was pretty much the North Korea of Battletech.

Davion was largely the good guys but to be clear they were the goodguys in the context of "doing this good deed is in our benefit and makes us look good".

Marik and Steiner were both very fractious and had good and bad people in them.

[Tordin]

I love underdogs, so Liao for me. Sure they backstab like crazy and are schemers, but what would you do when others stigmatize you, mock you and grab your territory and stamp you as a bad guy? Gotta do what you gotta do to survive. If those words from a certain person about giving the Capellans over as a wedding "gift" soent trigger then I dont know what.

But Im not the sharpest loremaster here around, free to correct me

Oh how I wish they could retcon the FRR or turn the Dark Age timeline into something better, I sooo want the FRR to be a respected 6th house but as the sole truly democratic state, but they elect prince instead of prime minister as far as I understand?

I dont bother looking through Sarna now but in short of what I got out from it some time ago.

FRR --> Clan Invasion, Clan Ghost Bear consumed FRR and --->

CGB Dominion
-----> Some purist FRR rebelled but were put down to keep the "peace treaty" between the Ghost Bears and the FRR. I guess the remnants of the FRR fled to the Jarnfolk star cluster, east outside of Kurita space in that periphery? I know there are "nordic" like civilizations there too.

----- > Clan part of the dominion in the early 3100 dwindled or became more IS/ FRR like, so it all became more and more like FRR once again, still had princes and khans, shared military and culture but still, got renamed to Rasalhague Dominion.
thanks to the frigging HPG blackout, it seems it all got shady on whats going on over there now....

[Exilyth]

Let's take a look at what counts for a short history of the inner sphere in certain circles:

29?? (star league):

• Everything is good until Amaris pulls a coup and Kerensky runs away

(here be lots of fighting and loss of technology)




3025 (succession wars):

• Davion are obviously the bad guys, constantly attacking Kurita (and calling them 'snakes' and other terms) and invading large portions of Liao space. And they always use their media to twist the truth about events to make it seem like they're always the good guys to the average population (which is also kept illiterate on purpose).
  
• Comstar is facebook X scientology: generous with honeyed words and false promises while collecting tech and data from everyone. Would you like some dogma with your HPG mesage?
  
• Steiner is kind of just there, trading stuff, promoting social generals, fighting internal struggles.
  
• Marik are trying to resolve everything with diplomacy and using force when diplomacy fails - sometimes against their own population.
  
• Liao is a cornered dog, defending its small corner of space and suffering from mismanagement.

3050 (clan invasion):

• Clans: Mysterious invaders breeding their own people for war, making them fight each other for 'glory' and waging war about any minor thing under the pretense of 'honor'. "That sandwich you're holding - I challenge you to a trial of possession over it. Circle of equals in the hangar - now!"
  
• Clan Wolf: Shizophrenic totem worshipers who can't decide whether to destroy or protect the inner sphere.
  
• Clan Jade Falcon: Pretty much a bunch of people taking the whole clan system too serious.
  
• Clan Smoke Jaguar: Pretty much a bunch of space facists (see e.g. turtle bay).
  
• Clan Ghost Bear: To protect the inner sphere, they wage war on it.
  
• All inner sphere powers: "Hey, let's try to put our differences aside for a few month and maybe try to stop the clans?"
  
• Marik: Knights of the inner sphere aim to make chivalry great again.
  
• Evil Davions kill Joshua Marik, the son of thomas Marik.
  
• Steiner is flirting with the wolves.

3060 (civil war):

• Clans bully each other after being stopped at Tukkayyid.
  
• Clan Ghost Bear: Decide to settle down in the inner sphere.
  
• Katherine tries to defend the Federated Commonwealth from the ambitions of Victor, but has to succumb to plot armour, propaganda and political intrigue.
  
• Liao: glorious Xin Cheng makes their small corner a bit brighter.
  
• Comstar/Word: having an identity crisis about whether to apply or worship science, the two groups split up.
  
• Marik: takes in homeless word of blake fanatics and gives them a place to stay.
  
• Chaos March: Like the periphery, but in the middle of the sphere.

30?? (jihad):

• Plot twist: turns out the religious fanatics from the word of blake have indeed been the evil guys all along!
  
• Everyone is the good guys defending their home planets from the mysterious invaders known as... wait, what faction is that even?
  
• Everyone is the bad guys hindering the others from defending their homeworlds.
  
• Let's not talk about this time period.

30?? (republic of the sphere):

• All praise glorious leader Devlin Stone! Where did that guy even come from?
  
• The republic finally restores the order - but still has no proper HPGs.
  
• Everyone else kind of messes around, throwing paranoid glances (and dropships) at their neightbors.
  
• Diplomatic missions sent to clan space to aquire information about what's happening there keep on getting lost.
  
• Praise Devlin Stone!
  
• Caleb Davion performs (trigger warning!)
  Spoiler

  non-consentual intercourse
  with Danai Liao-Centrella, proving once again that the Davions are the true bad guys.

Now, you don't need to be an academic to see that this abridged timeline is clearly intended to portray certain factions in a better light than others. It is, indeed, a crudely fabricated piece of propaganda, intended to lure the weakest of minds into turning against their own people. But you, the average davion citizen, are way too intelligent to believe such drivel, aren't you?




[note: To be read out loud on town meetings and similar gatherings. Keep on the lookout for subversive elements which would disrupt peace by e.g. asking loaded questions during the post-reading q&a session. Ensure personnel is not drunk while on duty.]

Spoiler

Disclaimer: In universe text does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the author. This piece of text is highly non-canon. Warranty void if seal is clubbed. Do not cosume without bite-sized amounts of NACL. Yadda yadda.

Edited by Exilyth, 05 May 2018 - 03:09 PM.

[NimoStar]

Battletech was written during the cold war era and as such Liao was originally the evil yellow peril / red menace as an amalgam of chinese and russians, and Davion was the good guys (Britain/USA) with Steiner as a goofy sidekick with all the "social general"/"assault mech doctrine" stuff...

Then came the clan era where the Clan are obviously the main antagonists (Surprise, surprise, they are Russian based too, but mixed with some Mongol-horde like characteristics)

What is bothered me was that Davion was a kind of mary sue do-good, even in the videogames, they always "help the locals", even though they are the strongest (and largest?) empire (how did they get so big if they only "help the locals to liberate themselves", huh?)

Edited by NimoStar, 03 May 2018 - 05:31 PM.

[SmokedJag]

Davion definitely gets sympathetic POV despite being the one that starts both the 4th Succession War and the War of 3039. Both of the adversaries are portrayed as unpleasant and culturally dysfunctional with crazy, nasty leadership. For bonus they're also antagonistic to the mercenary POVs as well.

The Clans are then also painted as an antagonist (and essentially alien) despite their war ethos being far less destructive for far more gain than anything the Inner Sphere (or SLDF for that matter...) ever did. Oh and they're also dysfunctional - well, everyone besides the Ghost Bears (under new management), the Star Adders and the Pimp Fish. Even the Wolves are pretty bad with most taking the animal and Crusader/Warden stuff way too seriously

BattleTech always had a hard time writing meta antagonists as heroes of their own story. Sun-Tzu Liao finally does some of that. And then Kathy S-D is back to "insane bloodthirsty enemy" even though it would have been *fine* for her to just be like her father except the bad guy.

Edited by SmokedJag, 05 May 2018 - 01:25 PM.

[NimoStar]

I guess in the context that it was written in the 80's / 90's "moustache-twirling evil" antagonists for more or less heroic and upright protagonists was sort of the norm for storytelling, specially of the sci-fi pulp kind and in mecha anime of course.

But that doesn't mean it's not incoherent anyways since it directly conflicts with the premises of the universe which are gray morality and all factions are either amoral and scheming and/or fanatical and misguided in their own ways. Having clearly defined "good guys" and "bad guys" which are consistently the same factions sort of defeats that purpose. The story could have been better told with accounting for all sides, in which the opposing sides are credibly portrayed as the "villains" for them of course. We got some of this stuff for example in simple storytelling such as Starcraft campaigns.

But instead of that we have stuff like the Liao/Capellan Confederation that conveniently incarnate (at least traditionally) every evil stereotype for westerners. They are chinese, AND russian, AND commie, AND dictatorship, AND secret police, AND stealth and subversion, AND dishonorable, AND literally insane (outright described as a genetic trait of the Liao house).
Well, at least they are not {Godwin's Law} (Clans, specially Smoke Jaguars, got that "honor" eventually...)