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Gate - thus the jsdf fought there discussion, idea, and recs thread

ToothMaker said:
though it's not a Gate fic - Stuart Slades The Salvation War?
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Bad idea. The Salvation War is really bad. The first story is almost readable in a guilty pleasure popcorn fic kind of way, but the second one is so goddamn dull that I almost fell asleep while reading it. The demons and angels are so pathetically weak that they are literally incapable of doing any damage at all to human military units, and their intelligence gathering is so utterly ineffective, despite having the ability to interrogate the dead and possess the living to cause school shootings, among other things, that they expend their trump card on fucking Detroit because they thought that it was still an industrial center.

Every single thing that ever happens goes perfectly the humans' (read: America's) way, the demons are so pathetic that you actually start to pity them despite them literally eating babies as a snack, Satan himself does nothing of note before being summarily twoshotted in the ending where America occupies Hell using general Abigor as an explicit American puppet.

The second story is so utterly dull and forgettable that I hardly remember it, aside from the archangel of death, Uriel, being easily thwarted and killed by being fried with a radar while failing to kill much of anything, and in the end the story undermines its own moral by having Yehovah get killed in a magical duel by his second in command rather than get shot by the humans. Like I said, it's really bad. Don't waste your time reading this when there are so many actually good stories you could read.
 
Shanejayell said:
*random thoughts on fixing GATE*

Different physics in the fantasy world. Some stuff from Earth works, some stuff doesn't. Kills Tanks & engines?

Magic works better. One thing I just went 'WHAT.' at was the initial curb stomp of the local forces by JSDF. Against DRAGONS?! And no magic used by the armies at all?

So the JSDF still wins the initial battle, but it's a LOT closer. Plus make the whole 'take over and overthrow the empire easily' concept go away...
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Oldschool (pre-4th edtition) Forgotten Realms. Physics was a little off there. So no fuels or explosives work, gunpowder included. You can make them there, using local elements, but nothing brought in works, and the formula is different. (From 3.5 onward they went with the less fun version of "the god of tech says your tech doesn't work here", but I prefer the 2e version)
 
Grey Rook said:
Bad idea. The Salvation War is really bad. The first story is almost readable in a guilty pleasure popcorn fic kind of way, but the second one is so goddamn dull that I almost fell asleep while reading it. The demons and angels are so pathetically weak that they are literally incapable of doing any damage at all to human military units, and their intelligence gathering is so utterly ineffective, despite having the ability to interrogate the dead and possess the living to cause school shootings, among other things, that they expend their trump card on fucking Detroit because they thought that it was still an industrial center.

Every single thing that ever happens goes perfectly the humans' (read: America's) way, the demons are so pathetic that you actually start to pity them despite them literally eating babies as a snack, Satan himself does nothing of note before being summarily twoshotted in the ending where America occupies Hell using general Abigor as an explicit American puppet.

The second story is so utterly dull and forgettable that I hardly remember it, aside from the archangel of death, Uriel, being easily thwarted and killed by being fried with a radar while failing to kill much of anything, and in the end the story undermines its own moral by having Yehovah get killed in a magical duel by his second in command rather than get shot by the humans. Like I said, it's really bad. Don't waste your time reading this when there are so many actually good stories you could read.
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[shrugs] The question was about fics where the modern army doesn't have everything go their own way - and while I mostly agree with all the above points, I still found Salvation War entertaining despite all of that. In no small part because it's the only 'Left Behind' style series I've ever read where humanity has a realistic reaction to 'Revelations' kicking off. :rolleyes:
 
Any of you read the Gate fanfic "And so the Soviets Conquered"? I enjoyed it mostly for not simply replacing Japan with X country and instead having both nations get Gates opened to them and thus providing eachother with a credible threat.
 
Sorry for the thread being a few years old but I'd like to ask.

Does anybody mind discussing an idea I had for a Cyberpunk story that involves Gate?

In that the gate itself opens up on a cyberpunk Earth.
 
Squeegeman said:
Sorry for the thread being a few years old but I'd like to ask.

Does anybody mind discussing an idea I had for a Cyberpunk story that involves Gate?

In that the gate itself opens up on a cyberpunk Earth.
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That sounds like it might be quite interesting but it depends on which cyberpunk world gets involved. Take something like - hold on, gotta get the "way back machine" running - Snowcrash. The book is set in America where economic and social collapse has left the government as a virtual non-entity. People are citizens of corporations instead of being Americans. One of the protagonists is a citizen of a "greater Hong Kong" franchise if memory serves. The military basically doesn't exist but lots of people are armed, technology has advanced, and the people with the money can easily fund a small army equipped with things like Reason. (Imagine an anti-ship railgun had a crazy love child with a Gatling gun.)

The reactions to and by that world would be quite a bit different from the Shadowrun setting.. if only because I expect the Imperial forces would have a hell of a time dealing with all the Shadowrunners who are one-person armies with the right equipment or preparation. If the Imperial army grab the wrong / right people on their slave-taking missions I expect the corps would invest in retrieving those assets. They might even kick that off before an organized, military response. (If only to figure out if there's anything worth seizing on the other side of the Gate before other corps can get there to claim territory / resources / people / loot / bragging rights.)
 
Nicholai said:
That sounds like it might be quite interesting but it depends on which cyberpunk world gets involved. Take something like - hold on, gotta get the "way back machine" running - Snowcrash. The book is set in America where economic and social collapse has left the government as a virtual non-entity. People are citizens of corporations instead of being Americans. One of the protagonists is a citizen of a "greater Hong Kong" franchise if memory serves. The military basically doesn't exist but lots of people are armed, technology has advanced, and the people with the money can easily fund a small army equipped with things like Reason. (Imagine an anti-ship railgun had a crazy love child with a Gatling gun.)

The reactions to and by that world would be quite a bit different from the Shadowrun setting.. if only because I expect the Imperial forces would have a hell of a time dealing with all the Shadowrunners who are one-person armies with the right equipment or preparation. If the Imperial army grab the wrong / right people on their slave-taking missions I expect the corps would invest in retrieving those assets. They might even kick that off before an organized, military response. (If only to figure out if there's anything worth seizing on the other side of the Gate before other corps can get there to claim territory / resources / people / loot / bragging rights.)
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Basically it's an original cyberpunk setting I'm making.

The basic gist is that the world is now run by corporations instead of governments. These corporations engage in cyber and physical warfare, and a gate opens up in what was formerly Ginza.

It was either one mega corporation ruling the world, or dozens of others, but the idea is that they either wish to conquer the Special region, or set up a business relationship with it.

The companies also make use of the advanced warfare of their era, including cybernetic enhancements and robots. A concept I had in mind was a suit akin to Iron man's that is mass produced for soldiers.
 
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Squeegeman said:
The basic gist is that the world is now run by corporations instead of governments. These corporations engage in cyber and physical warfare, and a gate opens up in what was formerly Ginza.

It was either one mega corporation ruling the world, or dozens of others, but the idea is that they either wish to conquer the Special region, or set up a business relationship with it.
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The Corporation(s) conquer as much Falmart territory as they have the logistical means to support; the only meaningful resistance is going to come from their side of the Gate. (Much like canon Gate, really; you would have to go back to probably pre-20th century tech for the Falmart side to have a chance, and even that would be due almost entirely to the fact that the wyverns used by the Empire are heavily resistant to firearms smaller than .50 caliber.) Now, that's entirely a doable story, but there are plenty of ways to go about it.

A 'business relation' story has a similar problem, in that the Corp. side has all the power and can generally dictate terms.

These problems are mitigated somewhat if you increase the power of the Falmart side, but you would need to increase it to a level that should render the world completely different compared to what we see.
 
The only way to make that story interesting from the Falmart side is to up the magic there to Forgotten Realm/Eberron/Golarion levels. Start throwing some high level adventurers at the Corporations.
 
ToothMaker said:
The only way to make that story interesting from the Falmart side is to up the magic there to Forgotten Realm/Eberron/Golarion levels. Start throwing some high level adventurers at the Corporations.
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Doesn't even need to be the adventurers, grab some old school pre-3rd ed nerf dragons, back when a fully grown red was 300+ feet long.

Edit: now there's an idea, have the Gate open in the Isles of Io, the Council of Wyrms setting. D&D dragons as a single united society, with increased magic power and a feudal culture where they rule over the world's elves, gnomes, and dwarves and keep humans as near extinct primitives after the humans waged a war against them.
 
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Now I'm somehow imagining the Gate opening up in the Star Wars Galaxy, either during the empire, or the clone wars.

Just something that came to mind.
 
ToothMaker said:
The only way to make that story interesting from the Falmart side is to up the magic there to Forgotten Realm/Eberron/Golarion levels. Start throwing some high level adventurers at the Corporations.
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As I believe I said earlier in this thread the answer is to have the Falmart side actually using their magic intelligently. They have things like area-of-effect sleep spells. What happens when they use that against helicopter pilots? What happens when they use that against tank crews? What happens when they use illusions to negate the range advantage of modern firearms? What happens if the gods send their Apostles in (Hi, Rory!) because they don't want the cyberpunk "infection" to spread?

And, oh yes, they have wyverns, orcs, and other non-human assets they can use in the war.
 
In general I feel like the neatest things a "Humanity, Fuck Yeah!" Setting like Gate can run into is a much stronger but non-expansionist power. So I like the idea of the Io Dragons going "well, they can't actually be humans, their civilized and understand technology"
 
Nicholai said:
As I believe I said earlier in this thread the answer is to have the Falmart side actually using their magic intelligently. They have things like area-of-effect sleep spells. What happens when they use that against helicopter pilots? What happens when they use that against tank crews? What happens when they use illusions to negate the range advantage of modern firearms? What happens if the gods send their Apostles in (Hi, Rory!) because they don't want the cyberpunk "infection" to spread?
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What illusionary abilities are used in Gate? I don't remember any being used or mentioned, and while I'm pretty sure the explanations we get on magic allow for it, it's quite possible that they simply won't work against a higher-tech opponent. Sleep could be handy, if it has the range and area to be useful in a combat environment. We already know that the physical shielding spells they can make don't hold up to modern firearms, so you've got issues keeping the mages alive while they're doing their casting - and if the other side is able to play its game instead of the mages', Falmart will have lost precious resources. And even if the mages succeed, that doesn't mean the exchange rate will have been worthwhile, because a Corp. would probably be able to just send another army.

Apostles really aren't going to be a super game-changer, either. They're fast, strong, and regenerate, yes, but that just means that bullets are less effective. Explosives and flame weapons can shut them down pretty easily, and there are only a dozen or so of them. The best way to utilize them would probably actually be to hope to slip them in as civilians, unarmed, and have them perform sabotage … but that assumes that the other side allows civilians close enough to do something like that, and that they don't have surveillance to watch for something like that happening (which, if it didn't exist to begin with, almost certainly would after the first or second attack).
 
Since the gods of pantheons exist in Gate, with Aphrodite and Anubis, I wonder.

Could the big guy himself potentially exist? You know, Capital G?
 
Squeegeman said:
Since the gods of pantheons exist in Gate, with Aphrodite and Anubis, I wonder.

Could the big guy himself potentially exist? You know, Capital G?
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Last time someone asked Him to show His Visage, entire mountain range disappeared. So no, even if He exist in this universe, most likely you won't be able to perceive Him.

Saint and Apostles were fair game (somewhat) though.
 
Entropy Judge said:
What illusionary abilities are used in Gate? I don't remember any being used or mentioned, and while I'm pretty sure the explanations we get on magic allow for it, it's quite possible that they simply won't work against a higher-tech opponent. Sleep could be handy, if it has the range and area to be useful in a combat environment. We already know that the physical shielding spells they can make don't hold up to modern firearms, so you've got issues keeping the mages alive while they're doing their casting - and if the other side is able to play its game instead of the mages', Falmart will have lost precious resources. And even if the mages succeed, that doesn't mean the exchange rate will have been worthwhile, because a Corp. would probably be able to just send another army.

Apostles really aren't going to be a super game-changer, either. They're fast, strong, and regenerate, yes, but that just means that bullets are less effective. Explosives and flame weapons can shut them down pretty easily, and there are only a dozen or so of them. The best way to utilize them would probably actually be to hope to slip them in as civilians, unarmed, and have them perform sabotage … but that assumes that the other side allows civilians close enough to do something like that, and that they don't have surveillance to watch for something like that happening (which, if it didn't exist to begin with, almost certainly would after the first or second attack).
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If memory serves there were illusions and some charm spells thrown around during the "let's assassinate the heroine because we're stupid" arc.

A single sleep spell was able to zap a rather wide area of sentries when the Japanese had to sneak into Italica after Itami was captured by Pina's knights.

As for the rest this honestly reads like you want to write another curb-stomp instead of looking at how things could go if the Imperials had a shred of competency. For example in most cyber-punk worlds corporations don't have armies. They have security guards that cause problems for the cyberpunk heroes but are basically small fire teams working in shifts. It would take time to get enough of those security teams into position and organized to invade Falmart. Doing so would require stripping corp assets of their protection, something the corps are well aware could lead to them getting raided by rivals. Thus while the corps could organize relatively large forces it would be a group of individual warriors and not soldiers trained to work together. That matters quite a bit on the battlefield.
 
Nicholai said:
If memory serves there were illusions and some charm spells thrown around during the "let's assassinate the heroine because we're stupid" arc.

A single sleep spell was able to zap a rather wide area of sentries when the Japanese had to sneak into Italica after Itami was captured by Pina's knights.
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One particular species is able to shapeshift, and while Norra doesn't seem to use magic for her manipulation (just psychological manipulation), mental control spells are mentioned a couple times. I'm not sure about the 'wide area,' either, unless you're basing it from the anime; both the manga and the LN are uselessly vague as far as determining anything apart from 'Tuka can put people to sleep with magic.'

For example in most cyber-punk worlds corporations don't have armies.
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I mean, the post I was responding to did say this:
Squeegeman said:
It was either one mega corporation ruling the world, or dozens of others, but the idea is that they either wish to conquer the Special region, or set up a business relationship with it.

The companies also make use of the advanced warfare of their era, including cybernetic enhancements and robots. A concept I had in mind was a suit akin to Iron man's that is mass produced for soldiers.
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It's entirely possible we simply have several definitions at work regarding what's being discussed. Even in the case of 'dozens' of corporations controlling the world, though, you would still have groups that function similarly to and have resources similar to states, which implies the ability to raise large numbers of soldiers, whether baseline human, cyborgs, or robots. In the situation you appear to be thinking of, yes, Falmart could hold their own, but from a basic reading of the post, that didn't seem to be the case to me.
 
Anyway.

What if two gates opened up on Earth.

One leading to Falmart, the other leading to an advanced Sci-fi civilization?
 
Squeegeman said:
What if two gates opened up on Earth.

One leading to Falmart, the other leading to an advanced Sci-fi civilization?
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Depends on where and when the two Gates open, and to where. Opening up to Krieg or Holy Terra is a different matter than opening up to the Citadel or the Jetsons. And whether the second Gate opens near the first or somewhere else entirely. Et cetera and so on.
 
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