So, we've got a full up Sydraxian Civil War, and any chance of diplomacy beyond "surrender unconditionally or die" with the Hishimari just vanished.
I have no doubt that the hawks would like us to drop a fleetball on the Hishimari's ass.
1) I dunno, it really does depend on the stance taken by the Hishmeri themselves, and we have so little contact with them we don't know what they'll do.
2) The Hawks are a small minority party. Focus on what Development and Expansion are going to think. There is no possible Council majority that doesn't contain at least two of {Development, Expansionist, Pacifist}.
But, a "science advancement" faction? None of the existing factions, none of the populace are against science. Like, what position are these guys going to take that others are going to disagree with? If it's about allowing the Gaeni brand of mad science, it's not like the Federation is going to inhibit them other than enforcing the ban of forbidden technology that the Gaeni don't seem to be interested in anyway. Their technology and engineering are considered crazy by even Human standards, but it's not considered recklessly dangerous to civilization. What is their policy going to be that they think other factions may disagree with?
I mean, just to be clear, an advancer faction could work. But it would make much more sense coming out of the Orions or Licori (if the latter ever become members) due to the various bans and prejudices against genetic augmentation, or other trans-sophonist themes, that they favor. Much of the Federation is hostile to the notion, or neutral at best, so this advancer faction do have a policy that they can fight for.
The Gaeni do cybernetics fairly heavily although it's kind of a background thing, probably because the Federation doesn't have the reflexive loathing of cybernetics is likely picked up from encountering the Borg. I can actually imagine a cross-party caucus emerging between the Gaeni and the Orions on augmentation research, but it wouldn't necessarily make sense for them to form their own party.
I suspect the Rigellians
almost formed such a caucus, but concluded they'd have a lot more leverage as a small group of councilors voting in a block, plus I suspect some of the existing parties may have antagonized them with counter-mercantile policies.
I still think the Pacifists would just shuffle their priorities slightly and absorb what would become a Science party, if such it really were about to form. They have no strong disagreements with each other, unless I am missing something, and mostly want the same things, even if they differ a bit in which of the things they want are the most important.
All it would take is Stesk announcing that he now considers Science ultra-super-mega-awesome instead of just mega-awesome.
Something that could prevent this though is that the Gaeni could dislike the Pacifists a bit after the tantrum they threw during the Licori crisis. I have already mentioned that it would be a nice curveball if the Gaeni became a bit hawkish because of their recent experiences.
I can't see the Gaeni as members of the Pacifist Party. They're too... recklessly bold. The people who are willing to drop antimatter in cocktails to prove a point, and who
don't even consider this illegal, aren't going to turn around and make opposition to warfare one of the cornerstones of their party.
On the other hand, they probably won't join the Hawks either. I honestly think that we're likely to see a three-way competition between Mercantilists (who align with the existing Institute hierarchies), Development (who appeal to the Gaeni's
technocratic impulses), and Expansionist (who appeal to the Gaeni's exploratory-observer impulses). Any of them could plausibly earn seats from the Gaeni in my opinion.
The Caldonians might go Pacifist (but observe the low-order civil war they just had), and won't go Hawk- but again, they
could go Development. "Science" isn't a uniquely Expansionist-aligned activity, and a lot of the best science is done in heavily funded, built-up laboratories with lots of infrastructure, the way Development likes things to be.
Actually, that would be a definite thing Starfleet (or at least Star Trek) would get involved in, even if only tangentially.
I'm not saying Starfleet wouldn't get involved, I'm saying we wouldn't
know, as players, until someone tripped over the evidence. What it comes down to is that we have very limited access to, or information about, the Federation civilian economy. We only barely understand our own logistics network, let alone all the stuff that we don't own and doesn't directly affect us. If N'Gir were doing all kinds of good stuff that just
doesn't directly affect us, we'd never know.
Then how did anon_user, a Cardassian, get in?
Defected, how else?
Considering they've been here longer than we've had contact with the Cardassians, that's a really good question.
Defected
very quickly.
Wait, what?
Edit: What about
@Leila Hann the Orion? How did she get in?
Oh, we've had Orions in Starfleet since some time last century.
That's no problem.
