- Location
- Israel
We might actually have a bit more PP to spend than usual. That's pretty awesome.
There is no emotion... (A Jedi Order Quest)
- Thread starter Voikirium
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
- Location
- Northeast Ohio, United States
I like that, which sect was that?
Barondoctor
The things I chase come to me.
- Location
- The other side of the mirror
- Pronouns
- He/His/Him
The Jedi who followed Djinn Altis. Rejected the Council, served the Republic. Mobile academy called the Chu'unthor, (yes, there were two of them), and a lot of his other philosophy comes out of a Watsonian rejection of the Council's interpretation of the Code and a Doylist need to allow him to serve as the Reasonable Authority Figure for RPG player characters that may not have levels in Jedi, but still need to be part of the Altisian Jedi.
Rejected age limits. Rejected discouraging marriage. Rejected One Master, One Student (though probably out of necessity, not having as many masters as would like to have). Developed unusual Force Techniques, including moving one's spirit into an object. Because they were very mobile and somewhat less connected, survived Order 66 (another point in favor of being spread out, it prevents complete extinction).
I'm also fond of the Almas Academy for similar reasons--a more "communal" learning style--One Student, Many Teachers and One Teacher, Many Students simultaneously. Again, a Watsonian justification for a Doylist necessity, but one I like. Star Wars tends to be good at that.
The Englanderish
Schrödinger's Kuudere Kitty Caliph(a)
- Location
- Califat de Chats
Honestly, morality notwithstanding, I seriously doubt Atris in the war would've ended in anything other than a darkAtris to make the one we ended up getting seem quaint. And I think the real trap of the war was that neither choice was optimal, but neither was indefensible - the true corrupting problem was in the schism caused amongst the Jedi and the infighting, the inability to reconcile the differences. And in many ways we still see that attatchment to the past in Atris's subtle self-flaggelation here. At some point, she is going to need to let go of the past in both directions, in order to become a Knight or Master again.
Altis and Almas are always a bit iffy creatively, since they always seemed to basically exist for precisely two reasons - the first being to get around the prequel era Jedi requirements for characters (and in Almas's case act as an rpg character generation vehicle), and the second to just dunk on the prequel Jedi - especially Altis as written by Travis given her tendencies to turn mainline Jedi uniformally into glaringly bumbling idiots while unironically trumpeting her chad Mando special snowflake culture. In theory I should like them, but in practice the context they exist in makes them often feel just kinda... unpleasant, and insufferable.
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
- Location
- Northeast Ohio, United States
Ah, the Altisians. They were pretty great, I didn't know they had a 'code' of sorts. Of course 'be good' isn't very specific as far as advice goes, but on the other hand it's so vague that it would be hard for future generations to turn it into stultifying orthodoxy, and that's a good thing. Something that roughly translates to 'the only rule is to think critically and follow your conscience' makes for an Order that's rather freeform and ad hoc in its approaches.
The more college-like model of having many teachers and many students, with students flowing between teachers who suits their needs at any given time does make a lot of sense. Although there is also something to be said for having at least one teacher who keeps tabs on a student throughout their whole apprenticeship.
Of course with standard Jedi training ages they also needed a surrogate parent, which is probably a lot of what drove the one teacher one student thing.
My personal ideal might be something like 'You have a master who interacts with you often, but you're encouraged to spend some of your time studying with other masters to learn about their specialties and approaches to problems'. That seems pragmatic and practical.
It always seemed strongly counterproductive for the Jedi to reject marriage, given that Force aptitude appears to have a genetic component and Jedi are some of the strongest force users around. The galaxy is better off with more Jedi, so Jedi should be encouraged to have kids with one another. And the Jedi already treat one another as one big family in many ways anyway.
Sure, I could see the possibility of Hogwarts-like friction between Jedi from established lines and civilian born Jedi, but hopefully any nonsense of that sort could be smothered in its crib by wise elders. Maybe by civilian born Jedi younglings being adopted into Jedi families and raised as equals to the natural born, although that means taking them away from their birth families which I was never a big fan of.
Barondoctor
The things I chase come to me.
- Location
- The other side of the mirror
- Pronouns
- He/His/Him
Altis is also being "held responsible" for the weirdness involved in the Callista trilogy (before the prequels, before a lot of Jedi stuff was codified). Again, Watsonian justifications for Doylist reasons and motives.
The prequel Jedi get posterized in canon. "Hey, neat, a mysteriously-dead Jedi Master made a clone army that came to our rescue earlier. He was associated with a Jedi who left the Order and is now the big face of the other side of the war. Hmmmmm. Weird. How come he never mentioned it or told us about it or any--hey wait a minute why are we Generals we never went to military school?" "Shut up, that kind of thinking is frowned upon." "Okay, let's not ask any more questions then."
Dunking on them in side-stories is par for the course, to be honest.
Thus, my Kreia-style question.
The timing, location, and strength of intervention is always going to be an ethical question for anybody trying to make and maintain peace.
Do you intervene here where the victims are richer or there where the victims are being more heavily abused? Do you intervene before innocent blood is shed or wait until after that bloodshed has occurred, and what of the difference between precognitive warnings and plain old cognitive warnings? Do you intervene with a stern word or a quick flick of a lightsaber? So many interesting philosophical discussion questions, especially with the chance to "reinvent" an entire organization.
I suppose the thing to say is thank you @Voikirium for the opportunity to explore the philosophical space.
Solarion
For Light and Life
- Location
- From Cybertron
Yeah, I have to agree. I like the concept of the Altissian Jedi just fine, but in execution...
Justified criticism of the Jedi Order's mistakes is not the same thing as bashing them.
And that's not what the Order did. They didn't know about the clone army until they were put in charge of it and they wanted to investigate, but between Palaptine's manipulations and the war, they didn't have the time or the resources to spare.
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Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
TBQH that just doesn't have the right timber.
On a different note, content is coming. It might be a bit late (like weekendish) though, cause to be honest one of the events is a doozy.
(Like big, not that you fucked it up)
Auxiliary Mission Report
Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Auxiliary Mission Report
Q4 3945
Mission 1 (Bao-Dur, 1 Jedi Sentinel, 3 Padawans, the Core)
The Sith are out there.
Watching. Waiting. Hoping for the moment when we let our guard down. So they can take their revenge.
I refuse to heap on the back-breaking weight of an unfriendly great power so near Coruscant.
To that end I have requested passage to the Yuuzhan Vong homeworld and/or capital; to make the case to their ruling Council of Shapers directly. They have agreed and dispatched their flagship vessel, the Endeavor, to transfer our party.
--
The docking clamps meets the shell of the vast vessel, linking together the Republic's borrowed freighter and the Vong explorer. Shaped like a crustacean, vast as a carrier but, supposedly, much the more lavishly apportioned. You can feel the life burning throughout this thing; the born neuromatter, hidden in deep chamber; the repurposed circulatory system, pumping coolant and fuel; even nerves, neural synapses, that function at least efficiently as anything the Republic can produce, if not moreso. More than that, he can feel almost all the thoughts and emotions and hopes and fears of the non-Vong members of the crew.
The Unbowed's captain, a Vong man bald as an egg and clad in black and red, with wires to integrate himself into the thing's central nervous system, waits in the docking bay as they transfer over.
"Hello, Jedi Bao-Dur." He has an accent, compared to the rest, that you can't place.
"Hello, shipmaster Ikkar."
"I have quarters prepared for you and your party; as this vessel, unlike yours, does not spend space on militaristic affairs, you should find them...acceptable."
Kador blinks as the man walks off. However, before your party can lose too much face, one of the non-Vong approaches you.
Clearly not mammalian, they are almost built like one of the guard droids from the tombs of Dantooine, as described by Bastila. A The trunk of the body is carried by six large legs, while up top a small, single-eyed head peers out. From the trunk, two small manipulators extend as well, analogous to arms. A black void opens up under the eye, until you realize they nearly unhinged their jaw to speak. "This way, Jedi-Contacts-Diplomats."
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
Criminy, kriff and crying, this Ikkar is an ass! If it isn't lecturing us about the virtue of non-violence, it's looking at me as the leader of a cheap cult. Don't need the Force to notice that either. Not that his bridge crew, from what I've seen of them, is much better; his XO is a smug, self-righteous piece of work who keeps trying to lecture Vyrna about the White Vine he smokes as part of his meditations, calling it "a chemical dependence." The rest of the crew has been distant to my party, and so much the better.
More than that, I think...I think they all know that I am a soldier. And it repulses them. That I was angry. What I did to the Mandalorians...Everything about me seems to set them off. Everything about us. They think we're a cult, and they are treating my students to match.
I have been reading what I can about the Vong history, and it is here that I am, unfortunately, forced to concede one virtue: they are diplomatic to the extreme, and open as well. Compared to the other nightmares we have stumbled across in the Deep Core and Unknown Regions, they are nothing.
--
Aldor Dro sits at an abandoned table, made of the same coral of the rest of the ships, lightsaber disassembled in front of him. A small "engineering bay", where the non-organic technology of the Vong members is repaired, what little there is. He begins polishing the crystal to a mirror sheen, distantly marking the notches on his hilt.
Ona Dai watches hom from the corner of the room, the Vong-raised looking with an almost weary eye on the Jedi. The strange weapon that sits before him, the archaic robes, the wild, untamed hair, all of it frightens him.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you it's rude to stare?"
He steps out, warily eying the lethal device. "You walk around with a weapon everywhere?"
"Last I checked that's a blaster at your side."
"It's got a stun function, unlike that death stick you wave around, wizard."
"I haven't done deathsticks since I left school, thanks. As for my lightsaber, it is a conduit into the Force, a unifying bridge between my will and the Force." He clenches his hand in front of his face. "More importantly, I can use it with grace, sophistication, and cunning, unlike that clumsy apparatus you swing around. Tell me, when's the last time you blocked a shot with that thing?"
Before they can continue, the lights cut out.
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
We are making apace to the Vong Capital, a roaming world ship. Currently it is in the hinterlands of their claimed territory, near the border with a power we have, as yet, made no contact with-
What happened to the lights?
(Static)
--
The halls are dark. If it weren't for his flashlight, Guard Twarz could hardly find his way through the Ion-Blasted vessel. Neural fibres and cardio systems attempt to restore power, but there is only so much they can do so quickly.
A sixth-sense, that bonedeep feeling that something is wrong, causes him to turn around. He does, and the beam of his flashlight flickers and wavers under the effect of a cloaking device.
It drops, exposing the snarling faces visage of an Osbif warrior; mammalian, snouted, hairy and mean. The Osbif cocks back his arm with the spear, ready to run through the Vong.
Twarz closes his eyes.
After a minute has passed and he still hasn't died, he opens them again. The Osbif is stuck on the ceiling?
There's a snap hiss like the sun in his ears, and Twarz turns around, only to see the Jedi alien standing there, his fist up. An emerald fire burns from the hilt in his hands, and the robes he wears flap despite the lack of breeze.
A blaster shot streaks from the dark. With impeccable instinct the alien sends it back, a smoking corpse falling to the ground. He stomps past Twarz, dispatching the Osbif still clinging to the ceiling, and engaging in the most horrific violence the guardsman has ever seen.
But.
The alien has saved his life...
The Jedi seems not to care either way, calmly, cooly dispatching the enemy as he goes, sometimes removing heads from bodies, other times a less-than-lethal response, "just" arms from bodies or hilts to various, sensitive bits and pieces.
Within an hour, the Jedi will have reclaimed the floors they were staying on, allowing the security forces to reclaim it much the faster...
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
The Yuuzhan Vong are not native to this galaxy. That seems to be all the excuse their neighbors, especially the cloak using Osbif Empire, need to assail their vessels, raid their planets, and kill their people. In that regard, I feel I am beginning to understand their nonviolence better: as long as they make their pacifism so utterly total that even that will not make them rise to the level of war, then the odds of said raiders and neighbors, all of them authoritarian, deciding to unite to attack them becomes...less so, since they cannot trust each other.
Of course, it has obvious flaws, but it does, at least, put a proximate cause to their reasoning.
In any case, we have secured the vessel. My next report should arrive after I arrive on the Ondrama Zana Worldship.
--
(+10 PP, +20 RP, -10 For Corellia)
Q4 3945
Mission 1 (Bao-Dur, 1 Jedi Sentinel, 3 Padawans, the Core)
The Sith are out there.
Watching. Waiting. Hoping for the moment when we let our guard down. So they can take their revenge.
I refuse to heap on the back-breaking weight of an unfriendly great power so near Coruscant.
To that end I have requested passage to the Yuuzhan Vong homeworld and/or capital; to make the case to their ruling Council of Shapers directly. They have agreed and dispatched their flagship vessel, the Endeavor, to transfer our party.
--
The docking clamps meets the shell of the vast vessel, linking together the Republic's borrowed freighter and the Vong explorer. Shaped like a crustacean, vast as a carrier but, supposedly, much the more lavishly apportioned. You can feel the life burning throughout this thing; the born neuromatter, hidden in deep chamber; the repurposed circulatory system, pumping coolant and fuel; even nerves, neural synapses, that function at least efficiently as anything the Republic can produce, if not moreso. More than that, he can feel almost all the thoughts and emotions and hopes and fears of the non-Vong members of the crew.
The Unbowed's captain, a Vong man bald as an egg and clad in black and red, with wires to integrate himself into the thing's central nervous system, waits in the docking bay as they transfer over.
"Hello, Jedi Bao-Dur." He has an accent, compared to the rest, that you can't place.
"Hello, shipmaster Ikkar."
"I have quarters prepared for you and your party; as this vessel, unlike yours, does not spend space on militaristic affairs, you should find them...acceptable."
Kador blinks as the man walks off. However, before your party can lose too much face, one of the non-Vong approaches you.
Clearly not mammalian, they are almost built like one of the guard droids from the tombs of Dantooine, as described by Bastila. A The trunk of the body is carried by six large legs, while up top a small, single-eyed head peers out. From the trunk, two small manipulators extend as well, analogous to arms. A black void opens up under the eye, until you realize they nearly unhinged their jaw to speak. "This way, Jedi-Contacts-Diplomats."
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
Criminy, kriff and crying, this Ikkar is an ass! If it isn't lecturing us about the virtue of non-violence, it's looking at me as the leader of a cheap cult. Don't need the Force to notice that either. Not that his bridge crew, from what I've seen of them, is much better; his XO is a smug, self-righteous piece of work who keeps trying to lecture Vyrna about the White Vine he smokes as part of his meditations, calling it "a chemical dependence." The rest of the crew has been distant to my party, and so much the better.
More than that, I think...I think they all know that I am a soldier. And it repulses them. That I was angry. What I did to the Mandalorians...Everything about me seems to set them off. Everything about us. They think we're a cult, and they are treating my students to match.
I have been reading what I can about the Vong history, and it is here that I am, unfortunately, forced to concede one virtue: they are diplomatic to the extreme, and open as well. Compared to the other nightmares we have stumbled across in the Deep Core and Unknown Regions, they are nothing.
--
Aldor Dro sits at an abandoned table, made of the same coral of the rest of the ships, lightsaber disassembled in front of him. A small "engineering bay", where the non-organic technology of the Vong members is repaired, what little there is. He begins polishing the crystal to a mirror sheen, distantly marking the notches on his hilt.
Ona Dai watches hom from the corner of the room, the Vong-raised looking with an almost weary eye on the Jedi. The strange weapon that sits before him, the archaic robes, the wild, untamed hair, all of it frightens him.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you it's rude to stare?"
He steps out, warily eying the lethal device. "You walk around with a weapon everywhere?"
"Last I checked that's a blaster at your side."
"It's got a stun function, unlike that death stick you wave around, wizard."
"I haven't done deathsticks since I left school, thanks. As for my lightsaber, it is a conduit into the Force, a unifying bridge between my will and the Force." He clenches his hand in front of his face. "More importantly, I can use it with grace, sophistication, and cunning, unlike that clumsy apparatus you swing around. Tell me, when's the last time you blocked a shot with that thing?"
Before they can continue, the lights cut out.
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
We are making apace to the Vong Capital, a roaming world ship. Currently it is in the hinterlands of their claimed territory, near the border with a power we have, as yet, made no contact with-
What happened to the lights?
(Static)
--
The halls are dark. If it weren't for his flashlight, Guard Twarz could hardly find his way through the Ion-Blasted vessel. Neural fibres and cardio systems attempt to restore power, but there is only so much they can do so quickly.
A sixth-sense, that bonedeep feeling that something is wrong, causes him to turn around. He does, and the beam of his flashlight flickers and wavers under the effect of a cloaking device.
It drops, exposing the snarling faces visage of an Osbif warrior; mammalian, snouted, hairy and mean. The Osbif cocks back his arm with the spear, ready to run through the Vong.
Twarz closes his eyes.
After a minute has passed and he still hasn't died, he opens them again. The Osbif is stuck on the ceiling?
There's a snap hiss like the sun in his ears, and Twarz turns around, only to see the Jedi alien standing there, his fist up. An emerald fire burns from the hilt in his hands, and the robes he wears flap despite the lack of breeze.
A blaster shot streaks from the dark. With impeccable instinct the alien sends it back, a smoking corpse falling to the ground. He stomps past Twarz, dispatching the Osbif still clinging to the ceiling, and engaging in the most horrific violence the guardsman has ever seen.
But.
The alien has saved his life...
The Jedi seems not to care either way, calmly, cooly dispatching the enemy as he goes, sometimes removing heads from bodies, other times a less-than-lethal response, "just" arms from bodies or hilts to various, sensitive bits and pieces.
Within an hour, the Jedi will have reclaimed the floors they were staying on, allowing the security forces to reclaim it much the faster...
--
Mission Report Auxiliary
The Yuuzhan Vong are not native to this galaxy. That seems to be all the excuse their neighbors, especially the cloak using Osbif Empire, need to assail their vessels, raid their planets, and kill their people. In that regard, I feel I am beginning to understand their nonviolence better: as long as they make their pacifism so utterly total that even that will not make them rise to the level of war, then the odds of said raiders and neighbors, all of them authoritarian, deciding to unite to attack them becomes...less so, since they cannot trust each other.
Of course, it has obvious flaws, but it does, at least, put a proximate cause to their reasoning.
In any case, we have secured the vessel. My next report should arrive after I arrive on the Ondrama Zana Worldship.
--
(+10 PP, +20 RP, -10 For Corellia)
Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I am going somewhere with this, do not worry, they are not just me dunking on the Federation.
They are that, don't get me wrong, but not just that.
- Location
- Florida
Honestly I dislike this version of the Yuuzhan Vong. If you don't want to have the Vong in your story that's fine but I have to admit this reimagining as the Vong as a parody of the United Federation of Planets doesn't really fit. Also despite some detractors claims the Federation during the TNG era were not so unwilling to fight that they were pacifist they just recognized that fighting a war should be the last resort of a nation rather then the first resort something that many current nations would benefit from if they adapted similar ideas.
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Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Alright, to pull back the mechanics a tiny little bit:
The big, proximate cause for the Vong being Like That is that your rolls, diplomatically, with them, have hovered somewhere in the miserable to unimpressive range, meaning you've gotten a face full of their worst at start.
The big, proximate cause for the Vong being Like That is that your rolls, diplomatically, with them, have hovered somewhere in the miserable to unimpressive range, meaning you've gotten a face full of their worst at start.
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Icipall
Don't worry, we can fanfix that!
- Location
- Cold snow fields of Finland
I have to wonder, since these Vong are still extra galactic, how things went differently in their home galaxy that they still were forced to leave, without becoming militaristic, zealous, machine hating empire, but still being cut off from the Force.
Oh boy, those kinds of people.
That's good, at least.
Ooh, sass!
Reminds me of Vader's corridor scene from Rogue One.
There are many reason why Jedi have violence and combat as the last resort. One of those is that they tend to be very good at it.
Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I realize I quoted this once already but honestly I sort of misread and would like to say something:
TOS, TNG, and for that matter most of the other Trek strains of thought are present in them, you've just had the poor luck to run into, respectively, ENT then Early TNG.
The Englanderish
Schrödinger's Kuudere Kitty Caliph(a)
- Location
- Califat de Chats
I for one welcome a major space polity that isn't big on trying to kill us and most likely won't be ever.
- Location
- not here any more
I gotta ask: what's the canon base, if any, of pacifist!settled the Deep Core!Yuuzhan Vong, here?
Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
There really isn't one, to be honest. I am just deeply uncomfortable with canon Vong so have toyed around with a not-so-canon Vong that maintains the bits I like (The Biotechnology, the worldships, etc) and ditched the late 90s, early 2000s vintage Islamaphobia.
Then you rolled to make contact with a major power, so there you have it.
Barondoctor
The things I chase come to me.
- Location
- The other side of the mirror
- Pronouns
- He/His/Him
I'd be curious to see what you do with the Anzat (given their "willing predators of sentients, eaters of brains" status in canon) and Mnggal-Mnggal (given its "sentient evil biological gray goo existential threat" status in canon). Not because I actually want to encounter them, but because if you're making actual interesting decisions, those two probably have the furthest to go to get there.
The Englanderish
Schrödinger's Kuudere Kitty Caliph(a)
- Location
- Califat de Chats
Given we only ever see Anzati on the individual or incredibly small-scale level, I've always been a bit perplexed at the fan assumption of just writing them off.
Barondoctor
The things I chase come to me.
- Location
- The other side of the mirror
- Pronouns
- He/His/Him
Brain eaters tend to be rather unsympathetic.
Add on that every time we see an Anzat, their story inevitably ends in them either murdering people or trying to, generally in very creepy and predatory sorts of ways. When the most positive example available is temporarily an okay person but eventually falls to the dark side?
The Englanderish
Schrödinger's Kuudere Kitty Caliph(a)
- Location
- Califat de Chats
Named Anzati characters barely makes it off one hand tho. A lot of it comes back to the can/will situation I guess, and the general thing of you'd never know someone was an Anzati most of the time until the tendrils come out... and that's obviously only going to happen if they're going to drink some brains. Confirmation bias issues, of a sort. But then I always had a nagging suspicion that Tholme was meant to come across as Anzati subtextually, so eh.
Icipall
Don't worry, we can fanfix that!
- Location
- Cold snow fields of Finland
The thing about Anzati is that they're very isolationist and secretive race, so actually seeing them is rare, thus even though Anzati are morally just as capable of good or evil as any other race the few ones that story characters, who are often jedi, run into is when someone wants an capable assassin or bounty hunter to deal with said jedi. This is not helped by the fact that due to their dietary needs, very long lifespans and evolving as an apex predatory species has led to a certain level of feelings of superiority amongst many Anzati. And since Anzati culture greatly values hunting, combat skills and anonymity, being employed as assassins and bounty hunters is common for them in the wider galaxy.
Thus we very rarely see Anzati who don't fit into those categories. From the top of my head the only one I can remember was Jedi Master Tholme's martial arts instructor, Akku Seii.
There's also the fact that the Legends wasn't fully clear if Anzati feeding on "soup" always killed the target, or if they could actually survive without it. Volfe Karkko lived for decades before trying the "soup" for the first time.
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Voikirium
SV's Estalia Guy
- Location
- Ruritania Illinois
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Like.
At base, the Vong represent something, metatexually, and yes, a heaping helping of Trek was the best way to convey that something aesthetically.
I am hoping one day it will be clear but I will at a certain point just reveal my notes if you never "get it," as it were.
At base, the Vong represent something, metatexually, and yes, a heaping helping of Trek was the best way to convey that something aesthetically.
I am hoping one day it will be clear but I will at a certain point just reveal my notes if you never "get it," as it were.
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