Aranfan
Team Plasma Grunt
Okay, time to speculate about political breakdowns.
As I see it, there are roughly 3 mindsets in the Serene's at the moment, although a fourth might happen as rural territory expands. Those three are "worker", "idealist", and "pragmatist". The worker mindset arises from the conditions where the puella is almost entirely cut off from combat. The Idealist and Pragmatist mindsets however would find their places in the hunting party, although the idealists would find themselves stronger in the support staff and the pragmatists in the hunters proper.
Workers, as said, are almost entirely insulated from the usual rigors of Puella life. They do their job and then pay their entire wage for the grief seeds they need but did not hunt, thereby supporting the organization that allows them to live a mostly normal life as a magical girl and not have to risk life an limb. Their primary concerns would be for improvements in the quality of life. This faction is where the strongest pushes for things like fun with magic and increased stipends come from. Being insulated from the usual Puella concerns, they don't really have a unified opinion on expansion, territory, or other things.
Pragmatists are concerned with survival primarily, and tend to be rather cynical. Girls who spent time in the wild are more likely to be pragmatists, and for archetypal examples look at Kyoko and Homura. The organization is good and valuable because of the concrete benefits it brings to the girls both in terms of survivability and emotional support, but is not an end in itself. A pragmatist will tend to be against the risks of expansion if the organization has enough territory to sustainable support it's meguca, and strongly in favor of expansion if it does not. Rural territories will be low priority expansion targets in all cases due to their relatively low value. They will tend to be against recruitment as well, unless said recruitment comes with territorial gains to compensate for the additional drain on cubes.
Idealists believe in the mission of magical girls to fight demons and protect humanity. Sayaka types. Girls who contracted into the relative safety of a group, or got recruited early from the wild are more likely to be idealists. They will want expansion into rural territories and even into nomad territories, and this will be the case even if the territory is a (small) net drain on resources. In every case, an expansion in territory or megucapower or money represents an increase in the ability of the organization to fight demons and thereby protect people, so Idealists place high value on increasing all the metrics of organizational power.
Pragmatists are relatively casualty-risk averse, but take less of a morale hit when death does happen. Idealists are relatively casualty-risk tolerant, but take a higher morale hit when death does happen. High turnover tends to produce more pragmatists, low turnover tends to produce more idealists. Resentment of Workers depends on the casualty rate, rather than the general turnover rate since spirals are not connected to the hunter-worker dichotomy. If almost all the deaths are from spirals, then workers are as likely to get hit as hunters, and there isn't really any reason to resent the extra safety. If a substantial chunk of the deaths are from casualties then there is reason to resent the "cushy deal" workers get.
We don't really have enough rural territory to tell if it's different enough to generate another mindset, but I would speculate that rural hunters would be a midpoint between pragmatists and idealists, with the harsher realities of rural hunting leading to both greater cynicism and greater appreciation for the benefits of strong organizational backing.
This is just for the Serene's obviously, although I imagine that something like a pragmatist faction is present in all meguca groups. Idealists would likely be present in most groups that aren't criminal, although much weaker than in the SIMP. Criminal groups would probably have internal splits in the pragmatist group.
I'm probably wrong about something (I'm extrapolating a lot from the house fight and my own speculation), but I think this is probably a good first approximation of the political rifts latent in the Serene Empire.
As I see it, there are roughly 3 mindsets in the Serene's at the moment, although a fourth might happen as rural territory expands. Those three are "worker", "idealist", and "pragmatist". The worker mindset arises from the conditions where the puella is almost entirely cut off from combat. The Idealist and Pragmatist mindsets however would find their places in the hunting party, although the idealists would find themselves stronger in the support staff and the pragmatists in the hunters proper.
Workers, as said, are almost entirely insulated from the usual rigors of Puella life. They do their job and then pay their entire wage for the grief seeds they need but did not hunt, thereby supporting the organization that allows them to live a mostly normal life as a magical girl and not have to risk life an limb. Their primary concerns would be for improvements in the quality of life. This faction is where the strongest pushes for things like fun with magic and increased stipends come from. Being insulated from the usual Puella concerns, they don't really have a unified opinion on expansion, territory, or other things.
Pragmatists are concerned with survival primarily, and tend to be rather cynical. Girls who spent time in the wild are more likely to be pragmatists, and for archetypal examples look at Kyoko and Homura. The organization is good and valuable because of the concrete benefits it brings to the girls both in terms of survivability and emotional support, but is not an end in itself. A pragmatist will tend to be against the risks of expansion if the organization has enough territory to sustainable support it's meguca, and strongly in favor of expansion if it does not. Rural territories will be low priority expansion targets in all cases due to their relatively low value. They will tend to be against recruitment as well, unless said recruitment comes with territorial gains to compensate for the additional drain on cubes.
Idealists believe in the mission of magical girls to fight demons and protect humanity. Sayaka types. Girls who contracted into the relative safety of a group, or got recruited early from the wild are more likely to be idealists. They will want expansion into rural territories and even into nomad territories, and this will be the case even if the territory is a (small) net drain on resources. In every case, an expansion in territory or megucapower or money represents an increase in the ability of the organization to fight demons and thereby protect people, so Idealists place high value on increasing all the metrics of organizational power.
Pragmatists are relatively casualty-risk averse, but take less of a morale hit when death does happen. Idealists are relatively casualty-risk tolerant, but take a higher morale hit when death does happen. High turnover tends to produce more pragmatists, low turnover tends to produce more idealists. Resentment of Workers depends on the casualty rate, rather than the general turnover rate since spirals are not connected to the hunter-worker dichotomy. If almost all the deaths are from spirals, then workers are as likely to get hit as hunters, and there isn't really any reason to resent the extra safety. If a substantial chunk of the deaths are from casualties then there is reason to resent the "cushy deal" workers get.
We don't really have enough rural territory to tell if it's different enough to generate another mindset, but I would speculate that rural hunters would be a midpoint between pragmatists and idealists, with the harsher realities of rural hunting leading to both greater cynicism and greater appreciation for the benefits of strong organizational backing.
This is just for the Serene's obviously, although I imagine that something like a pragmatist faction is present in all meguca groups. Idealists would likely be present in most groups that aren't criminal, although much weaker than in the SIMP. Criminal groups would probably have internal splits in the pragmatist group.
I'm probably wrong about something (I'm extrapolating a lot from the house fight and my own speculation), but I think this is probably a good first approximation of the political rifts latent in the Serene Empire.
