Petals of Titanium -- My Life as a Mecha Setting Bridge Bunny Quest
- Thread starter Gazetteer
- Start date
- Original Sci-Fi Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Or, you know, the loss cascades. An expensive fleet dies, shattering the myth of invincibility, draining troops you need to keep subjugated planets in line, inspiring rebellions and protests, and sparking internal feuding and violence because of the failure. It doesn't matter if they have the rest of the solar system if they're shooting each other in a succession crisis.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Kind of sorry to hear you feel that way. I'm pretty aware that the actual opposing empire, its ethos and its general deal is like... broad to say the least, and was generally pretty low hanging fruit in terms of a villain faction. But I've also been going out of my way for literally the entire run of this quest to not depict the individuals fighting for it as all being one-dimensional cartoon cutouts? It took until Nakamura before I was actually willing to say "here, have a genuinely unhinged zealot." In terms of character writing, I do not typically try to deal in caricature.
- Location
- madison
As someone who recently finished reading this quest, the actual empire characters are not really that one dimensional. So far, they have been a mix of sneering nobles, self-serving assholes and genuine religious believers which is the sort of thing you'd expect to see in the armies of a ruthless theocratic god-king. Kim having a breakdown when she realized what she had done was pretty humanizing.
That said, the empire seems to have formed when reactionary nobles pushed back against the old empire reigning in their pointless atrocities. So aside from the true belives, it makes sense its leadership would be made up of the kind of noble who would be into that.
- Location
- madison
depends if you go by % killed V total number of deaths, or consider being caple of being civil to someone a mitigating factor.
serra2
Himouto! Sylvanas-chan
Yeah, from what I could get from the imperials sections of the updates, this seemed to be an all-or-nothing gamble. The intention was to take advantage of speed, stealth, and overwhelming strength to quickly rip through the defenses and pretty much sweep to victory. Both the Rose escaping from the first engagement and taken word back to the fleet, as well as their recent defeats, have pretty much sealed the deal on that plan. They are not going to have another shot at this for a long time, and by then everything about the situation might have changed.
- Location
- madison
technically, the lesser of their two-prong assault failed. My understanding is that if they purge titan, they still win as without it the Saturn settlements collapse. Which does raise the point of why the bothered with a two-prong assault rather than just putting it all into titan. They have had massive setbacks sure, but they are still one lucky battle from ultimate victory.
- Location
- Finland
I doubt the indoctrination has gotten all that deep in the empire, yet.
Like the current system is young, as in started within the living memory of current soldiers young.
Give it a generation or two and it would be a huge mess.
But as it is, outside the military, i suspect it would not be all that popular, especially among anyone older than 30.
Break the navy (or even just a significant chunk of it, like that fleet just now), and suddenly you could start to see lot of minor insurrections popping up, and even if they probably would get stamped down fast, they would take up resources to handle, making it easier to make further gains against the empire.
Like the current system is young, as in started within the living memory of current soldiers young.
Give it a generation or two and it would be a huge mess.
But as it is, outside the military, i suspect it would not be all that popular, especially among anyone older than 30.
Break the navy (or even just a significant chunk of it, like that fleet just now), and suddenly you could start to see lot of minor insurrections popping up, and even if they probably would get stamped down fast, they would take up resources to handle, making it easier to make further gains against the empire.
Thors_Alumni
Proud member of Thors Class VII from Liberl
- Location
- Liberl Zemuria.
Is it wrong of me that I hope that it happens that way and the beginning of the end starts for the false empore
r?
- Location
- Finland
Emperor.
False emperor, false emporer would be someone pretending to be a shopkeeper.
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
And to be fair, he is trying to sell the idea that he's the rightful ruler harder than most shopkeepers would.
- Location
- his hidden lair
What is government if not selling people on you being in charge one way or another?
Thors_Alumni
Proud member of Thors Class VII from Liberl
- Location
- Liberl Zemuria.
[X] You commit what time you can to recording a message for your family, just in case (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Captain Andre (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Captain Andre (one downtime)
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- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Inserted tally
- Location
- Hawaii
[X] You speak with Captain Andre (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You commit what time you can to recording a message for your family, just in case (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You commit what time you can to recording a message for your family, just in case (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Captain Andre (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You commit what time you can to recording a message for your family, just in case (one downtime)
[X] You speak with Guardswoman 1st Class J6 (one downtime)
[X] You commit what time you can to recording a message for your family, just in case (one downtime)
Call me an optimist, but I believe Ensign North will survive the upcoming battle. If I may be so bold, I even think the Imperial Navy will triumph over the so-called Divine Navy.
So if Amani wants to send her family back at Iapetus another message, in addition to the farewells she's already given, she can damn well deliver it in person after winning the battle. Long live the rightfully elected Empress!
But even in victory there will likely be losses among the mecha pilots. That's why it's important to talk to J6 and Owusu while we still can. A good talk may bolster morale on the eve of battle, improving their odds of survival. And if the worst comes to pass, at least we won't regret not taking our last chance to see them before the final battle.
As for Captain Andre, while Amani respects the captain I don't think she's as close to her superior officer as she is to J6 or Owusu. In-character I'm not sure she would choose to spend her time with Andre over the others, while from a meta perspective Amani's words may not have as much of an effect as they would with the other choices. I daresay XO Grayson is in a better position to talk to Andre than anyone else.
Pragmatically, there's also the fact that Andre and Grayson have a better chance of surviving the battle than the mecha pilots, as does Amani, and anything which kills Grayson or Andre is likely to kill Amani too.
While Amani is not familiar with Perbeck's new pilots yet, she did just talk to Sub-lieutenant Sylva. That discussion led directly to Amani's thoughts regarding how to spend her time before the battle, so it would not be out of character to pay them a visit, perhaps while Amani is looking for Lori, especially since the talk with Sylva suggests they could use some reassurance. Also, as the ones working closest with Perbeck their performance will have the greatest potential impact on the survival of Amani's romantic interest. Plus, from Lori's thoughts we know it would ease her mind if she didn't have to lose yet another set of wingmates.
So if Amani wants to send her family back at Iapetus another message, in addition to the farewells she's already given, she can damn well deliver it in person after winning the battle. Long live the rightfully elected Empress!
But even in victory there will likely be losses among the mecha pilots. That's why it's important to talk to J6 and Owusu while we still can. A good talk may bolster morale on the eve of battle, improving their odds of survival. And if the worst comes to pass, at least we won't regret not taking our last chance to see them before the final battle.
As for Captain Andre, while Amani respects the captain I don't think she's as close to her superior officer as she is to J6 or Owusu. In-character I'm not sure she would choose to spend her time with Andre over the others, while from a meta perspective Amani's words may not have as much of an effect as they would with the other choices. I daresay XO Grayson is in a better position to talk to Andre than anyone else.
Pragmatically, there's also the fact that Andre and Grayson have a better chance of surviving the battle than the mecha pilots, as does Amani, and anything which kills Grayson or Andre is likely to kill Amani too.
While Amani is not familiar with Perbeck's new pilots yet, she did just talk to Sub-lieutenant Sylva. That discussion led directly to Amani's thoughts regarding how to spend her time before the battle, so it would not be out of character to pay them a visit, perhaps while Amani is looking for Lori, especially since the talk with Sylva suggests they could use some reassurance. Also, as the ones working closest with Perbeck their performance will have the greatest potential impact on the survival of Amani's romantic interest. Plus, from Lori's thoughts we know it would ease her mind if she didn't have to lose yet another set of wingmates.
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Or really, the various nationalist regimes in the WWI/WWII period likely had the same:
Reaction by everyone who faced angery nationalists coming out of the everywhere.