Hard Light Productions Forums
General FreeSpace => FreeSpace Discussion => Topic started by: GammaDraconis6 on April 21, 2010, 05:02:26 pm
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As far as the game tells us, it's basically 21st century capitalism in the 24th century. Human social interaction seems identical. The structure of Vasudan society isn't exactly bizzare either. I know the game is all about the combat, but you would think they could have been a little more imaginative...
Did it ever occur to you people that the T-V war, the turmoil during the Reconstruction Era, Hades Rebellion, Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans' or 'mistranslated greetings,' but that these were just coverups for, well, what 21st century wars are based around...which is economics.
Hmmm?
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Well, you know what they say, capitalism is living it's last centuries... :lol:
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start of the t-v war
Vasudan society is complex and filled with peril for the outsider ignorant of their culture. Vasudans have a range of social tests and protocols, such as The Conversation. A Terran mishandling of The Conversation is presumed to be one of the major causes of the V-T War.
that was a diplomatic cockup on our part and it is implied in my understanding of the tech entry that the vasudans started the war though we dont know for sure their motives and that sparked a war that spiraled out of control for 14 years this shredded both economies, now it dont matter what system of government and social interaction is in place there will be an economy of some sort that will need to be rebuilt and reconditioned away from a war footing and after total war plus the months mass destruction caused in fighting the shivans and the decades implied in the reconstruction period sound right to me.
Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans'
the NTF and the war were tools for bosh to further his own pro shivan agenda, so i would categorize that as a war of idealism, and i dont perceive any imperial aspirations in bosh's long term plan, i certainly dont think he started it to put himself at the top of a government
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now if you had complained about the lack of background behind certain in game situations i could understand but at the same time the story path chosen didnt allow for much more explanation about these events as the player as a pilot wont have automatic clearance for the information in game.
also i would have liked to have seen more about the reconstruction period.
lastly i think if they had gone into more depth some of the plot holes we see today would either not have existed or been papered over.
also i truly believe FS3 was on the cards during development which would have provided the mechanism to explain certain things from the prospective of history
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As far as the game tells us, it's basically 21st century capitalism in the 24th century. Human social interaction seems identical. The structure of Vasudan society isn't exactly bizzare either. I know the game is all about the combat, but you would think they could have been a little more imaginative...
Did it ever occur to you people that the T-V war, the turmoil during the Reconstruction Era, Hades Rebellion, Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans' or 'mistranslated greetings,' but that these were just coverups for, well, what 21st century wars are based around...which is economics.
Hmmm?
You're not quite paying attention if you think that. The entire NTF rebellion in FS2 was explicitly driven by an economic disparity (exploited by Bosch.)
A number of mods have paid a lot of attention to the economic side of things. Derelict was pretty interested in it, and if you check out the /media/prose section of the Blue Planet website you'll find yourself drowning in detail.
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(http://xs.to/image-2654_4BCF7FEE.jpg)
(http://xs.to/image-5BB0_4BCF7FEE.jpg)
$1 a ride!
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Any image memes from this point onward will result in me editing disparaging comments about the offender's mother into their future posts in this folder. In other words, quit it. :p
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Any image memes from this point onward will result in me editing disparaging comments about the offender's mother into their future posts in this folder. In other words, quit it. :p
Spoilsport :p
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I'd say Bosch was more playing on an idealisism of a 'promised land' than any kind of financial situation, indeed, the NTF seems to have an almost religious fervour to it, much like the HoL, but the HoL is far more apparent in its motives. Personally, I'd say that it's easier to look at the NTF's motives (bearing in mind that Bosch's motives were not the same as the NTF's) as an attempt to 'Return to Eden' from which they had been expelled than any kind of finance matters.
For example :
"I have ten thousand officers and crew willing to die for Neo-Terra!"
In a way, that makes a kind of sense, a civilisation has had its heart ripped out, at least the Vasudans have a physical object to look at, and mourn, and know for certain that their homeworld is gone, the GTA, however (in the story) had no such closure, and situations like that will always breed groups who idolize the unreachable and un-knowable.
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Yeah, but that entire ideology was rooted in the economic disparity between Terrans and Vasudans and the relative poverty that this generation had grown up in.
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Well, many more extreme forms of worship are centred around low-income areas, there does seem to be a parity between the two, but I'd say that was more a catalyst than a cause, Bosch was trying to install an almost pseudo-religion over Neo-Terra, and the best place to start with things like that is in the less well-off sections of society.
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it seemed to me from the monologues that bosch was using the economic stuff to recruit rather than it being central to NTF ideology. it's easier to make fanatics out of people who are already disgruntled.
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That's exactly my point. The NTF was fundamentally enabled by economic conditions, just like the Nazi regime and many others.
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All wars are about population growth.
[/blanket statement]
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As far as the game tells us, it's basically 21st century capitalism in the 24th century. Human social interaction seems identical. The structure of Vasudan society isn't exactly bizzare either. I know the game is all about the combat, but you would think they could have been a little more imaginative...
Did it ever occur to you people that the T-V war, the turmoil during the Reconstruction Era, Hades Rebellion, Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans' or 'mistranslated greetings,' but that these were just coverups for, well, what 21st century wars are based around...which is economics.
Hmmm?
I see you've (purposely?) omitted the conflicts with Shivans, the central conflict in both FreeSpace games.
Clearly the Shivans, too, care about these "economics" of which you speak.
The structure of their society isn't exactly bizzare either.
OH WAIT.
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Did it ever occur to you people that the T-V war, the turmoil during the Reconstruction Era, Hades Rebellion, Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans' or 'mistranslated greetings,' but that these were just coverups for, well, what 21st century wars are based around...which is economics.
No, that actually never occurred to me. Because it's very likely wrong. When you stick two imperialistic, aggressive, growing civilizations next to each other, of course there will be tensions. More so when they are of different species, sharing little to no cultural universals. If you associate that with economics, then I'd sooner debate your definition of economics than the more literary aspects of Freespace.
Also, if you're going to quote the Bosch monologues, quote everything that's relevant. "But what my enemies will never understand is that my rebellion is about my love for humanity, not my hatred of Vasudans." Plunging civilization into war and economic turmoil is a pretty stupid way of distracting a civilization from economics. It's also a pretty stupid way to treat a civilization that you love. Lastly, it's quite clear that Bosch's ultimate goal was a bit more relevant to the GTVA's foreign policy than to their economic dealings.
Heck, it's perfectly reasonable to look at FS through an economic lens like this, but it seems like you're doing it wrong. Combine this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_sociology) and this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literary_criticism) to get what I think you're looking for.
I'd write up a short marxist analysis of freespace myself if I weren't too sleepy...
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That's exactly my point. The NTF was fundamentally enabled by economic conditions, just like the Nazi regime and many others.
But that's an inaccurate statement, because while it might have been started by economic problems the war would not be possible if they were still in the grip of a major depression, the same way it wasn't for the Nazis.
A precondition of the NTF Rebellion is that Reconstruction has succeeded, otherwise the NTF would not be able to sustain the eighteen months of combat that occur prior to the game. The economic determinist outlook on the war is explicitly rejected by the GTVA in several of the briefings too, implying that the NTF has enough economic strength to stand them off indefinitely in an attritional battle.
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That's exactly my point. The NTF was fundamentally enabled by economic conditions, just like the Nazi regime and many others.
But that's an inaccurate statement, because while it might have been started by economic problems the war would not be possible if they were still in the grip of a major depression, the same way it wasn't for the Nazis.
Nonsense. We're talking about a rebellion led by someone within the military. Even if your average Joe hasn't got enough money to put bread on the table, the military still has a fleet (be it mothballed or otherwise) and the fact that your average Joe hasn't got enough money to put bread on the table isn't gonna stop your non-average Admiral Bosch from leading a rebellion with ships stolen or defecting to his cause (and possibly those already under his control prior to the rebellion... he was an Admiral in the GTVA, after all). Especially if he can loot the GTVA's food supplies and use it to put bread on your average Joe's plate, in exchange for your average Joe having set up his dinner table in an NTF barracks.
Edit, having taken the time to read the rest of your post:
That said, if there is indeed canon information stating that they had the economics to sustain their war effort indefinitely, I don't remember it.
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That's exactly my point. The NTF was fundamentally enabled by economic conditions, just like the Nazi regime and many others.
But that's an inaccurate statement, because while it might have been started by economic problems the war would not be possible if they were still in the grip of a major depression, the same way it wasn't for the Nazis.
A precondition of the NTF Rebellion is that Reconstruction has succeeded, otherwise the NTF would not be able to sustain the eighteen months of combat that occur prior to the game. The economic determinist outlook on the war is explicitly rejected by the GTVA in several of the briefings too, implying that the NTF has enough economic strength to stand them off indefinitely in an attritional battle.
Not sure what your point is here or how it contradicts mine. I'm also not sure what you mean by economic determinist position.
In both elements of the analogy the regime in question was enabled by a severe economic crisis accompanied by a sense of outrage and injury that became focused on a 'hostile' outgroup which could be blamed for the situation. The enabling conditions did not need to persist.
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Nonsense. We're talking about a rebellion led by someone within the military. Even if your average Joe hasn't got enough money to put bread on the table, the military still has a fleet (be it mothballed or otherwise) and the fact that your average Joe hasn't got enough money to put bread on the table isn't gonna stop your non-average Admiral Bosch from leading a rebellion with ships stolen or defecting to his cause (and possibly those already under his control prior to the rebellion... he was an Admiral in the GTVA, after all). Especially if he can loot the GTVA's food supplies and use it to put bread on your average Joe's plate, in exchange for your average Joe having set up his dinner table in an NTF barracks.
He's got to pay Average Joe. Wars have cost in materials and manpower. Yes, you can prop up the economy by messing with the money supply to some extent, but not much. This is not a war of survival (except in Aken Bosch's head and he explicitly didn't share that with many) so they can't really justify spending without end.
That said, if there is indeed canon information stating that they had the economics to sustain their war effort indefinitely, I don't remember it.
The NTF has stood off the GTVA for eighteen months at the time of the start of the game and is showing no signs of strain. Before deploying the Colossus they specifically say that the GTVA might have to seek peace terms with the NTF because the war cannot be sustained. This implies the the NTF is able to go on with an attritional combat strategy even after taking serious losses in Deneb. That means industrial production at a significant percentage of the GTVA's. Economics.
The enabling conditions did not need to persist.
But if you want to argue the conflict itself is about economics, it does. That you can weaponize previous economic conditions is all well and good, but that only makes it possible, it doesn't make it actually happen.
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So I'm just going to quote myself here, in the very post you originally quoted:
That's exactly my point. The NTF was fundamentally enabled by economic conditions, just like the Nazi regime and many others.
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The NTF has stood off the GTVA for eighteen months at the time of the start of the game and is showing no signs of strain. Before deploying the Colossus they specifically say that the GTVA might have to seek peace terms with the NTF because the war cannot be sustained. This implies the the NTF is able to go on with an attritional combat strategy even after taking serious losses in Deneb. That means industrial production at a significant percentage of the GTVA's. Economics.
Not rly. The GTVA has to defend (or at the very least patrol) 22 systems before it fires a single shot; don't forget that they simply can't devote their entire military to the NTF war, especially after the Shivans arrive. The NTF has to only defend from 3 to 6, depending on what point in time you're focusing on.
Furthermore, it's much easier to wage a defensive war than an offensive one. A rule of thumb I've seen is that the attacking force has to be 3x the defending force to have a reasonable chance of victory. It's probably much more lopsided in the FreeSpace universe because nodes are excellent choke points.
Plunging civilization into war and economic turmoil is a pretty stupid way of distracting a civilization from economics. It's also a pretty stupid way to treat a civilization that you love. Lastly, it's quite clear that Bosch's ultimate goal was a bit more relevant to the GTVA's foreign policy than to their economic dealings.
One could argue that war in some form would have happened anyway, given the conditions at the time. Bosch stepped into the leadership void and focused the sentiments, energy, and societal current into something that he could use for his own purposes.
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A rule of thumb I've seen is that the attacking force has to be 3x the defending force to have a reasonable chance of victory.
That's quotable for ground warfare, and even then, smart commanders can sometimes make-do. There are a few too many variables in FS warfare for that to hold true though, in my opinion, except when you mount the initial invasion (e.g. Breaching the node).
/off-topic.
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Did it ever occur to you people that the T-V war, the turmoil during the Reconstruction Era, Hades Rebellion, Bosch's war, etc...that it wasn't really based around 'hatred of Vasudans' or 'mistranslated greetings,' but that these were just coverups for, well, what 21st century wars are based around...which is economics.
No I fully disagree.
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As far as economic aspects of FS2 goes, the effects are very reaching. The GTVA's main industrial assets were completely destroyed or cutoff at the end of FS1 (Vasuda and Sol, respectively), leaving an industrial vacuum that would've had to be rebuilt on the remaining systems. Any systems that revolted or joined the NTF would have been a major blow to the GTVA war-machine both in terms of population, taxation and industrial infrastructure.
Xenocidal alien species that can implode stars and glass planets for fun tend to throw that economic aspect of war for a spin though.
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Thing is, we never really get much of an idea how established the GTA colonies are, as far as I can remember, so these planets could be anything from non-industrial to highly industrial in nature, without better knowledge of the disposition of wealth within the GTVA, it's really not all the easy to guess how difficult a recovery would be from those situations.
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Thing is, we never really get much of an idea how established the GTA colonies are, as far as I can remember, so these planets could be anything from non-industrial to highly industrial in nature, without better knowledge of the disposition of wealth within the GTVA, it's really not all the easy to guess how difficult a recovery would be from those situations.
We do know canonically that the bulk of the GTA's industry was in Sol.
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And, one would imagine, its population too. FS2 gives the impression that Capella was a relatively-well-populated system...yet it had fewer people living in it than the US does today. There's a significant difference of scale at work there.
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I concur.
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sol may have been THE largest, but i don't think it was the ONLY large industrial base. i think sol was much more important as a business or research hub for the economy rather than resources and actual industrial manufacturing. we do know for instance that shipyards were all over the place, seemingly not centered in sol.
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sol may have been THE largest, but i don't think it was the ONLY large industrial base. i think sol was much more important as a business or research hub for the economy rather than resources and actual industrial manufacturing. we do know for instance that shipyards were all over the place, seemingly not centered in sol.
I believe that Sol was canonically stated to contain either 'the bulk' or 'the majority' of the GTA's industrial base.
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Obviously that would have changed during the reconstruction era.
Some of the smaller industrial bases would likely have been expanded to meet the new demands.
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Indeed. And to think each system has a fleet, therefore, it makes sense to have that system have the infrastructure to support an entire fleet.
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sol may have been THE largest, but i don't think it was the ONLY large industrial base. i think sol was much more important as a business or research hub for the economy rather than resources and actual industrial manufacturing. we do know for instance that shipyards were all over the place, seemingly not centered in sol.
Sol was where the working shield prototypes in "The Hammer and the Anvil" were eventually headed, so that they could be mass-produced in the quantities needed to outfit the whole GTA fleet. In addition, a few of the weapons introduced during the campaign are said to have been developed and tested in Sol. Remember that it presumably wasn't too long after the GTA started exploring and colonizing other systems that it encountered the Vasudans, with the 14-Year War following soon after (I can't seem to find set dates for this, if we have any). There simply wasn't enough time to build up external manufacturing sites on a scale even close to that which already existed back on Sol.
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Canonically, subspace was "discovered" only about ten years before the T-V war. I don't know the exact date, but it's in the FS Ref Bible.
TVWP retcons this into the discovery of intersystem subspace, in order to make the timeline slightly less rushed.
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Which doesn't make sense, because if anything brute-forcing artificial jumps in-system seems to be an extension of the technology developed for using natural nodes. ...plus it undermines whole idea of subspace changing everything overnight.
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Which doesn't make sense, because if anything brute-forcing artificial jumps in-system seems to be an extension of the technology developed for using natural nodes. ...plus it undermines whole idea of subspace changing everything overnight.
We do know that intersystem jumps require substantially more energy than the intrasystem variety, to the point where anything smaller than a freighter couldn't perform them until near the end of the Great War. This would suggest that the intrasystem drive was the first one developed, as it was significantly easier to utilize. I think it also makes sense that the theory of subspace travel via N-dimensional vibration would first be put into practice in that more general sense, as you'd think that there was a lot of chance involved in the discovery of a single anomaly which enabled travel between systems.
As for subspace changing everything, I think that still holds true for intrasystem jumps, as the TVWP fiction suggests. If there were multiple adversarial factions in Sol before the invention of the subspace drive, it would have immediately changed the entire landscape of the system; forces which might have taken weeks, or even months, to meet each other could now do so in seconds. I think you can drawn an analogy to the development of the nuclear ICBM: when the push of a button can quite literally bring about the destruction of civilization as we know it in a manner of minutes, you tend to want to think things through before making any moves.