605 replies to this topic

[StUffz]

White Bear 84, on 18 March 2013 - 04:20 AM, said:

I dont hate clans. I go where the money is. Mercenary to hire. Enough said.

As if Clans would claim the service of Mercenaries... lol

[White Bear 84]

StUffz, on 18 March 2013 - 04:22 AM, said:

As if Clans would claim the service of Mercenaries... lol

And i never said they did ...lol

And arent you contradicting yourself, stiener with a madcat in your signature.. .spy!!

Edited by White Bear 84, 18 March 2013 - 04:35 AM.

[CoffiNail]

White Bear 84, on 18 March 2013 - 04:33 AM, said:

And i never said they did ...lol

And arent you contradicting yourself, stiener with a madcat in your signature.. .spy!!

How is the iconic 'MADCAT MKII' logo from Battletech wrong... it was one of the BT logos for sometime.

[Pariah Devalis]

White Bear 84, on 18 March 2013 - 04:33 AM, said:

And i never said they did ...lol

And arent you contradicting yourself, stiener with a madcat in your signature.. .spy!!

It is clearly a Mk II, which was designed to be sold to the Inner Sphere, IIRC.

[CoffiNail]

Pariah Devalis, on 18 March 2013 - 04:44 AM, said:

It is clearly a Mk II, which was designed to be sold to the Inner Sphere, IIRC.

Well, it was designed to be sold to the Clans by Diamond Shark, but no Clan wanted a redesigned Timber Wolf OmniMech that was now a BattleMech. Almost no Clan wanted to trade for them, so they got sold to the IS iirc.

[White Bear 84]

Pariah Devalis, on 18 March 2013 - 04:44 AM, said:

It is clearly a Mk II, which was designed to be sold to the Inner Sphere, IIRC.

Well then, i would stand corrected..

[PaintedWolf]

White Bear 84, on 18 March 2013 - 04:20 AM, said:

I dont hate clans. I go where the money is. Mercenary to hire. Enough said.

Word of Blake.

[PaintedWolf]

Koshirou, on 18 March 2013 - 03:04 AM, said:

I am sorry, but you do make the same basic mistake as these fanboys: You treat the Clans as if they were a real, existing society. They are just a fictional literary device. A horrible fictional literary device, true enough, that appears as if it was thought up by someone who read "The Iron Dream" and didn't get the freakin' joke.


That's actually a key difference in there:
- Most Inner Sphere governments are clearly modeled along the lines of medieval history, that is, a time period which is understood on a basic level by almost everyone to, and that is long enough ago not to arouse major passions anymore. The gaps are filled with, again very basic, common assumptions on how human society works (families, careers, etc.)
- The Clans, on the other hand, are presented as a "new" or "alien" type of society and one that, to put it mildly, incorporates some less than wholesome elements from very recent history. Presenting such a society in SF always carries the risk of real or imagined advocacy - a novel such as "Starship Troopers" is a prime example. With the hot steamy man-love emanating from various Clan sourcebooks and novels, it is obvious that FASA and its successors did not even try to avoid the impression of advocacy. The hordes of Clan fanboys who see the Clans as an actual model for society, an idea for which there are not enough pictures of Picard burying his face in his hand(s) on the entire Internet to adequately respond to, attests to this.

TL;DR: Inner Sphere is okay because it is modeled on an outdated social system no one seriously considers. Clans are not because they are presented as a "new" society that attracts fanboyism among stupid and/or fascist people.

I don't know, many of the Successor States are pretty totalitarian- the Confederation and DCMS. The remaining have huge divides between rich and poor and still plenty of Feudal trappings. I recall a historian not even directly criticizing Hanse Davion's military exercises prior to the 4th Succession Wars and simply being removed from his postings. Pretty much every faction in the Battletech universe has a lot of baggage to it. The best so far is the Republic of Sphere in ethical terms and they are pretty much gone.

So yes the Clans are backwards and militaristic and one can argue they are fascistic (though one could argue they are more socialistic then fascistic, as they really don't have a class/inheritance based system) but they are also meritocratic and tend not to overly involve their civilians in military ventures. Then again there is the Wars of Reaving. Pretty much everything in the IS is determined by inheritance.

Edited by PaintedWolf, 18 March 2013 - 07:22 AM.

[Stormwolf]

PaintedWolf, on 18 March 2013 - 07:17 AM, said:

Word of Blake.

You should probably mention what happend to those mercs after the RoTS was established...

[PaintedWolf]

Stormwolf, on 18 March 2013 - 07:22 AM, said:

You should probably mention what happend to those mercs after the RoTS was established...

They ended up fat and wealthy and well-off, and living happy lives ever after under the protection of the just monastic order. 3067-3081 should be re-named the "War of Coalition Aggression".

Edited by PaintedWolf, 18 March 2013 - 07:26 AM.

[Maurdakar]

PaintedWolf, on 18 March 2013 - 07:22 AM, said:

So yes the Clans are backwards and militaristic and one can argue they are fascistic (though one could argue they are more socialistic then fascistic, as they really don't have a class/inheritance based system) but they are also meritocratic and tend not to overly involve their civilians in military ventures. Then again there is the Wars of Reaving. Pretty much everything in the IS is determined by inheritance.

Wait. How can I not argue they are fascist? Do you even know what Fascism means? They fit the literal definition of fascism, Now lots of fascism can be considered very light in modern society but summed up it means: "I know what is better for you than you do, so I am going to make you act the way I believe is right."

The clans are by definition Fascist especially the crusaders.

And also they aren't a meritocracy either. They are literally controlled by a warrior caste. So people rise based on the 'merit' solely of their fighting and killing abilities. That isn't a meritocracy. It's even worse than nepotism which is what the I.S. has but is somehow portrayed as being more functional because as we've been over, doesn't make sense.

Edited by Maurdakar, 18 March 2013 - 07:46 AM.

[PaintedWolf]

Maurdakar, on 18 March 2013 - 07:43 AM, said:

Wait. How can I not argue they are fascist? Do you even know what Fascism means? They fit the literal definition of fascism, Now lots of fascism can be considered very light in modern society but summed up it means: "I know what is better for you than you do, so I am going to make you act the way I believe is right."

It really depends on who you ask. There are lots of definitions of fascism out there, sometimes completely contradictory. One thing I will note though is that fascists generally had a very strong sense of private property which they maintained under a socialist facade.

I'm not sure if you could really consider the Clan concept of property public or private. In one sense, it does seem to be ultimately controlled by the government and owned as a whole. On the other hand they have slavery "isorla". On the other hand, you could consider it super-privatized in the sense that the Warriors/Merchants ultimately own it.

According to most, strict definitions of the term I don't think you can quite call the Clans fascist, though you could say a lot of them are fascistic. Keep in mind the culture and government differs from Clan to Clan.

IMO they are a wholly new society.

Maurdakar, on 18 March 2013 - 07:43 AM, said:

And also they aren't a meritocracy either. They are literally controlled by a warrior caste. So people rise based on the 'merit' solely of their fighting and killing abilities. That isn't a meritocracy. It's even worse than nepotism which is what the I.S. has but is somehow portrayed as being more functional because as we've been over, doesn't make sense.

The warriors have to earn their rank in trials, there is little in the way of direct inheritance. As do Scientists and Laborers, and they are constantly tested in trials which are relevant to their specific caste. Laborers for example conduct trials which are determined by how they can work in their relevant department, Scientists by intellectual puzzles.

There is an element of inheritance, as Trueborn have a much better chance then Freeborns of entering the warrior caste, and some clans do not even allow freeborns in their ranks at all, but compared to the Successor States it is FAR more meritocratic. Especially when compared to say the Draconis Combine, where if you are born a peasant you will almost certainly die a peasant regardless of your potential.

Last it should be noted one thing that plays a HUGE role in keeping Clan society stable is that lower Castes in many ways live a higher quality of life then higher class. In Exodus Road when the main character washes out and is sent back to Huntress as a second-rate warrior he gets treated to an elaborate steak dinner and relatively lavish quarters.

Edited by PaintedWolf, 18 March 2013 - 08:19 AM.

[Koshirou]

PaintedWolf, on 18 March 2013 - 07:22 AM, said:

I don't know, many of the Successor States are pretty totalitarian- the Confederation and DCMS.

Sorry to be this blunt, but you are the exact type of fanboy I'm talking about.

[PaintedWolf]

Koshirou, on 18 March 2013 - 09:02 AM, said:

Sorry to be this blunt, but you are the exact type of fanboy I'm talking about.

Hey, don't beat around the bush, tell me what you really think. =)

[Yanlowen Cage]

I see a lot of angst vs. The clans, don't know why. I personally have a special place in hell for house davion. So sick of them, like those suck heads who think that the dallas cowboys are the best team ever. Probably now that I think about it the reason so many old battletech suck heads don't like the clans is because they are not house Davion.

I see a lot of angst vs. The clans, don't know why. I personally have a special place in hell for house davion. So sick of them, like those suck heads who think that the dallas cowboys are the best team ever. Probably now that I think about it the reason so many old battletech suck heads don't like the clans is because they are not house Davion.

Yeah I know I said it twice. That's how much I dislike davion.

Edited by Yanlowen Cage, 18 March 2013 - 10:17 AM.

[Yanlowen Cage]

Also they are strikingly similiar to the spartans of ancient greece. Clans that is.

[PaintedWolf]

They also have a lot of elements inspired from Native Americans and Indians. To me the Clan Invasions are kind of like a reversal of the European invasions of the Americas/the Far East and beg the question of what it would have been like if Native Americans had developed more powerful technologies then the Europeans?

It is not completely impossible. Many of the animals Native Americans wiped out (Mastadons, Whooly Rhinos) were prime candidates for domestication. In fact, the reason they were so easy to hunt is because they did not have any natural fear of people. So in theory, if these large animals were domesticated they could have been used to help grow crops, chop down trees, provide grunt labor and surplus populations for specialists, and instead of Columbus arriving in 1492 we could have seen advanced Native Americans riding mamoths arriving in the Dark or Middle Ages. Instead when the Europeans arrived 80% of all large animals in the Americas had been wiped out, and the only domesticated animals were Llamas and Alpacas. Do not underestimate the Alpaca.

Edited by PaintedWolf, 18 March 2013 - 10:27 AM.

[CG Oglethorpe Kerensky]

PaintedWolf, on 18 March 2013 - 08:14 AM, said:

It really depends on who you ask. There are lots of definitions of fascism out there, sometimes completely contradictory. One thing I will note though is that fascists generally had a very strong sense of private property which they maintained under a socialist facade.

Not really. Fascism is a governmental system that has been well defined by political scholars. The clans government is clearly fascist in nature. It is almost as if the writers took the definition and built a society from it.

Quote

According to most, strict definitions of the term I don't think you can quite call the Clans fascist, though you could say a lot of them are fascistic. Keep in mind the culture and government differs from Clan to Clan.

Led by a dictator with complete power - check
Oppression - check
All industry and commerce under govt control - check
Extreme nationalism - check
Racism - check

Quote

The warriors have to earn their rank in trials, there is little in the way of direct inheritance. As do Scientists and Laborers, and they are constantly tested in trials which are relevant to their specific caste. Laborers for example conduct trials which are determined by how they can work in their relevant department, Scientists by intellectual puzzles.

And how smart must a member of the scientist caste be to lead their clan. How shrewd must a merchant be to be a Khan? How good at fixing mechs must a tech be before he rises into the leadership? How hard does a Laborer have to work to speak as an equal at the grand council?
You see it isn't a meritocracy at all. The vast majority of the clans will never have any political power no matter how good they are at their job. Meritocracies are societies led by the smartest and most educated...the clans are a murderocracy.

[Stormwolf]

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Led by a dictator with complete power - check

Wrong, even the Khan has to answer to the Clan council and they have him killed if it is needed.

Quote

Oppression - check

Correct.

Quote

All industry and commerce under govt control - check

Kinda correct, but I should point out that the actual governing body itself leaves this in the hands of the Merchant cast a.k.a. business men. Although in something of a reversal it's usually the merchant caste that asks the warrior caste to trial for certain goods/materials.

Quote

Extreme nationalism - check

Correct, though there are exceptions here.

Quote

Racism - check

Wrong, the Clans have people of all races working alongside each other. Aside from Elementals and Aerotechs you can't tell who is trueborn or not because they share the same attributes.

The word you are looking for is genetic discrimination, which is indeed practiced by the Clans.

[PaintedWolf]

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Not really. Fascism is a governmental system that has been well defined by political scholars. The clans government is clearly fascist in nature. It is almost as if the writers took the definition and built a society from it.

And yet we are still arguing about it.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Led by a dictator with complete power - check

Okay, so I guess the French and British Monarchies in the Middle Ages were Fascist. Egypt under the Pharoahs was a fascist state.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Oppression - check

The Han Dynasty, Babylon, Persia.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

All industry and commerce under govt control - check

The Soviet Union, the allies under World War 2, again most Kingdoms in the Middle Ages. Basically any country that enters a "War Socialism" is now a "Fascist" nation. Also Fascist countries did have Private Corporations and small shops.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Extreme nationalism - check

Every country during World War 1.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

Racism - check

Well it's a good thing the Southern Confederacy was not racist then.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

And how smart must a member of the scientist caste be to lead their clan.

The Scientist Caste did try to overthrow the Warrior Caste and had mixed success. The problem is Scientists are not trained for thinking on the spot, or engaging in war or politics. The purpose of the Trial system is to reduce collateral while maintaining the impetus necessary to drive progress by competition. The rationale is conflict/competition encourage progress, but only so long as cheating and mass destruction do not become rampant.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

How shrewd must a merchant be to be a Khan?

Merchants are by their nature supposed to be a little selfish and greedy whereas the Khan is not.

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

How good at fixing mechs must a tech be before he rises into the leadership? How hard does a Laborer have to work to speak as an equal at the grand council?

They can rise to positions of leadership within their own Caste by showing off their skill. Not being Warriors or Politicians they should have no authority over such, though Politicians/Warriors have authority over them because that is most essential to survival, security and social cohesion. I do not agree with this (well not all of it) necessarily, but I imagine that is more or less their point of view (or the strongest presentation thereof. )

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 18 March 2013 - 10:59 AM, said:

You see it isn't a meritocracy at all. The vast majority of the clans will never have any political power no matter how good they are at their job. Meritocracies are societies led by the smartest and most educated...the clans are a murderocracy.

The best workers are given the highest position in the labor caste, the most adept at intellectual exercises in the scientist caste, the most frugal in the Merchants and Techs are equally tested in competitions that revolve around taking things apart, improving them or putting them together within X amount of time or whatever.

Not all Trials are about fighting, and it is a Trial that determines your rank within your Caste. This is not Meritocratic in an Absolute sense, but it is far more Meritocratic then the Aristocratic Inner Sphere and most of the time Clan civilians are sparred the ravages of war more so then their Inner Sphere counter-parts and in many respects live a higher quality of life with many more freedoms then their Inner Sphere counter-parts.

I'm not sure what you think feudalism is, but if you think it's some sort of RenFair or a dinner at "Medieval Times" you would be in for quite a surprise if you ever found yourself in an actual Feudal State. Not that the Successor States are Feudal States in the strict Medieval sense, they are not as bad probably as say Medieval Europe by a long shot, but they are still ultimately feudal, and in feudal states things are very strictly controlled and inherited.