One reason I don't post in forums. Create a new thread about something previously discussed, people jump on you for starting duplicate threads. Search for an old thread and try to reply because you want to discuss the issue, people jump on you for necroing old threads.
There are good reasons why I have so far refused to sign up for a Twitter account. I don't care to contribute to the death of language and the further erosion of attention spans.
you can avoid that while still not copying war & peace's style of being over wordy
I was trained to be an academic. Old habits die hard.
War and Peace? Really? I should be that talented.
But come on, an 800+ page novel is hardly a few paragraphs -- and believe me, I've written far longer posts elsewhere than I have here. In fact, I still hold the record at one forum for the longest post ever written there (it was, iirc, 27 pages in Wordpad), but the quoted comments of others in the post contributed heavily to the length of that.
not necroing now as the thread is already zombified.
AD/Romulan Republic
IMHO the Republic plot is just a little stupid:
- what Republic? All i see is some minority politician D'Tan which got a lot of support from unknown sources (see reunification with vulcans)
- We did have a senate, didn't we?
- Where is the civilian political head of former Romulan Star Empire?
So i would (and it is still not too late) propose a featured plotline:
- D'Tan is a puppet of iconians/vulcan spies/crazy TRIBBLE/perhaps together with some Fed/KDF leaders
- out toon gets to uncover him/them
- new Romulan Republic Senate is being elected, some of old senators being reinstated (?Sela?)
- the new Delta command takes the ruling role and our toons join a special cross/faction delta command fleet
- finally there is only one faction story wise (for all queues, PVP, and all new missions)
- Tal'Shiar still remains the bad guy
The thing is, i really dislike Sela, but D'Tan drives me crazy. The most uncharismatic Star Trek toon EVER!
I was trained to be an academic. Old habits die hard.
War and Peace? Really? I should be that talented.
But come on, an 800+ page novel is hardly a few paragraphs -- and believe me, I've written far longer posts elsewhere than I have here. In fact, I still hold the record at one forum for the longest post ever written there (it was, iirc, 27 pages in Wordpad), but the quoted comments of others in the post contributed heavily to the length of that.
Imo its an appropriate analogy given that some of your replies are a page or so long when a paragraph or two are needed. War and Peace could easily have told the same story, and been more gripping imo, with about 1/2 the words. I've written my own stories and clocked 30pages easily, even done a couple forum based collaborative RP stories that I plonked into wordpad and edited for spelling and grammar. Those were pretty huge, well over 60 pages.
Point is, it isnt about word count its about HOW you get your point across. I am not surprised to hear you were trained to be an academic, most of your posts are about as fun to read as a textbook. You could say so much more with so many fewer words proto. I gave up trying to read your novel sized posts a couple months after we first started doing our rounds on each other, weather those posts were directed at me or not.
but meh to each their own I guess
@duaths1
-sure the reunificationists supported him, but also former RSE military officers, and a few intel agents that were not Tal Shiar(this may be a shock but they weren't the be all of intel agencies *gasp*)
-please read the dialogue over the course of the romulan story, the republic senate is referenced several times.
-the RSE's civilian political head was on Romulus when it went ker-splat(or was that ker-plewie), arguably Donatra stepped into that role but was ousted by Taris and later Sela both of whom had 0 interest in restoring civilian authority.
as to your proposals
-we don't get that lucky
-would be cool (sela? oh hell no)
-Alliance Command tries it and I think you'll see plenty of warbirds turn around and shoot their 'allies'
-that would effectively finish killing off much of STO's appeal, but give Cryptic time, they're working towards it.
-How bout the Tal Shiar finally get killed off instead
As for D'Twerp, nah he's not the most out of character... that role goes to the impossibly two-dimensional, cartoonishly villain, Hakeev. D'Twerp started out dangerously close, I agree, but the last few time we see him in voiced cutscene's he's actually acted a bit more like a Romulan than a cardboard cutout.
not necroing now as the thread is already zombified.
AD/Romulan Republic
IMHO the Republic plot is just a little stupid:
- what Republic? All i see is some minority politician D'Tan which got a lot of support from unknown sources (see reunification with vulcans)
- We did have a senate, didn't we?
- Where is the civilian political head of former Romulan Star Empire?
So i would (and it is still not too late) propose a featured plotline:
- D'Tan is a puppet of iconians/vulcan spies/crazy [REDACTED]/perhaps together with some Fed/KDF leaders
- out toon gets to uncover him/them
- new Romulan Republic Senate is being elected, some of old senators being reinstated (?Sela?)
- the new Delta command takes the ruling role and our toons join a special cross/faction delta command fleet
- finally there is only one faction story wise (for all queues, PVP, and all new missions)
- Tal'Shiar still remains the bad guy
The thing is, i really dislike Sela, but D'Tan drives me crazy. The most uncharismatic Star Trek toon EVER!
You "really dislike" Sela, but because D'Tan "drives [you] crazy," you're suggesting that she be reinstated as a Senator? Are you familiar with the term "bifurcation fallacy"?
D'Tan is not a puppet, and his sexuality should not even be in question, much less with the use of a slur which shows that you have absolutely no clue what Star Trek is about. On the contrary, in the space of a year and a half, he has presided over the discovery of a new homeworld for the Romulan and Reman peoples, abolished slavery, led our peoples to a restored position of power (thereby preserving "Romulan" as one of the three major powers of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants), given his military commanders sufficient rein to drive the Star Empire and/or Tal'Shiar back to a rapidly-dwindling token of territory, been instrumental in the Jenolan Accords which led to a cease-fire between the Feds and the Klinks, started the building of a Capitol City on New Romulus, helped form the Delta Alliance, ...
What has Sela done? Covered her own behind (and usually not with great success), failed to discharge command responsibility over sociopaths like Hhakhifv, allowed unprovoked attacks on peaceful and loyal colony worlds, allowed Romulans and Remans to be hunted by Hirogen, allowed Romulans and Remans to be made into food for Elachi young, acted as a sometimes-absentee Empress over the Star Empire in its death-throes, been "captured" (or rescued) by Iconians, and generally strutted around trying to act tough while speaking in condescending tones to everyone.
Why would anyone want one faction story-wise? This is not remotely consistent with your other comments.
I'm inclined to simply write you off as a troll after the slur you used, coupled with the other illogic in your post, but the point needs to be driven home once and for all: Sela is an incompetent, narcissistic, Machiavellian maniac, and not a leader in any sense, while D'Tan has demonstrated leadership qualities consistently (with the one exception in which nearly everyone -- Kererek only excepted --, including the mighty Klingons, displayed defeatist body language, but were all rallied by Kererek's speech).
Yeah, but the thing is, we all (including you) know by this point that it's not going to happen, for multiple reasons.
1. Story explanation
Cryptic could go with part of my backstory, that I came forward in time and learned of the destruction, and my first act was to go back and try to undo it, only to find that too many people had already tampered with space-time around that event (Spock and Nero were canonical; I'm sure plenty of people have some kind of fanfic of having gone then/there to do something as well) so that it was no longer possible to alter it in any way.
2. Story explanation
Cryptic could go with what has been stated two or three times in other threads (including once in the thread you linked), that we go back and undo it, and then return to 2410 only to find that the blundering Hhakhifv and his Doktor Mengele have managed to bring about the assimilation of the RSE by the Bhorgsu, and so we have no choice but to restore the timeline.
3. IP Holder Objections
CBS would probably veto it.
4. Numbers
Sadly, if the metrics we've seen were accurate, RRF has even less regular players than the KDF. We can argue about why that is so, but at the end, we have to accept that it is so. Making another faction (or half-faction or whatever you want to call it) for a rather small minority of the RRF players would not be a particularly intelligent thing to do. (Then again, we are talking about game developers here ...)
5. Villain faction
But mostly, time and time again in the industry, villain factions have been shown, with extremely rare exceptions, to give insufficient RoI for any gaming company to risk so much on them. And let's not pretend that the RSE after Shinzon's rebellion, at least, was or would be anything but a villain faction, unless -- and this is only a possibility, because she was shown to be opportunistic in Nemesis -- Donatra had managed to become Praetor or Empress and hold onto the office.
For what it's worth (nothing ) my personal headcanon leads, more or less inevitably, to a RR that takes over where the RSE left off and sooner or later there will be war between the RR and the UFP and Klingons again. The reasoning behind it is that what we see from D'Tan and the RR may be ifnluenced by unificationist movement, overall however it strikes me as almost fanatically nationalistic. To me, isolation and at one point new found fear of the other "powers" will lead to a new "cold war" scenario. In "my" Romulan story the Garidians also play a part, though. For those who don't know, the TNG point and click adventure "A Final Unity" by Spectrum Holobyte introduced a Romulan client state powerful enough to maintain it's own (puppet?)government and engaged in friendly terms with the Empire at least so far as they were supplied Romulan starships (including Warbirds) which operated under their own flag. The background for this society was quite interesting and I thought their presence in the story makes sense to explain how the RR is able to maintain a fleet and military strength at this point in the storyline. Basically, most ships and the RR uniforms etc are Garidian surplus.
By the end of the TNG game, Garidian society is thrown into a bloody revolution (depending on your choices int he game, which is quite cool) which is when my headcanon kicks in. The Gridians discovered Romulan intrigues in their government during the violent uprising of the plebejen caste which is why relations between the Empire and Garid grew dark. When Hobus happened, Garid decided to support D'Tans faction between all the infighting that ensued and bolstered them to be the second strongest faction (next to the loyalists). Since Garid is supposedly roughly located around the area which STO marks as the origin of the Alpha(Beta) quadrant's Borg incursion the Garidians suffered heavy blows against roaming Borg cubes which procedually leads to the strenghtened RR slowly absorbing them and after STO, in the future, it takes turns I outlioned above.
My Klingulan character is a Garidian (Patrician born) and part of the Garidian Defense Fleet, ultimately combining her resoures with OMEGA to counter the Borg.
What I am trying to say is possiblities that the Republic will at some point become the reborn RSE do potentially exist.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
AD/Romulan Republic
IMHO the Republic plot is just a little stupid:
- what Republic? All i see is some minority politician D'Tan which got a lot of support from unknown sources (see reunification with vulcans)
- We did have a senate, didn't we?
- Where is the civilian political head of former Romulan Star Empire?
- I wouldn't say minority... The gameplay map, and the fact that it's only the Republic that's involved in galatic events of late, seem to suggest that the Republic is in fact the larger faction. The RSE all but disappeared entirely from the storyline, until Sela came back for a visit. And even then, she admitted that the Imperial Remnant / Tal'Shiar was a mess.
- Yes, and I'd expect us to have one again. D'Tan uses the title Proconsul, which is direct from the Romulan senatorial system. I hope to one day actually see the Senate, but that remains up to Cryptic to design the art assets and finish the city on New Romulus / Mol'Rihan
- That's a good question. It's up in the air as to who is now in charge of the "RSE," which is likely just a bunch of mini-factions vying for control at this point.
And yeah... lay off the hateful language - replying to a post unfortunately removes the auto-filter, so we can see what you said. Using derogatory language isn't appropriate.
What I am trying to say is possiblities that the Republic will at some point become the reborn RSE do potentially exist.
In some 600+ years from now, maybe the Republic would devolve into Empire again (except that it won't, because we've already seen the future of the Trek universe, and we therefore know better). In the meantime, the likelihood of Romulans and Remans doing so now that they are finally tasting freedom again after several hundred years is rather minuscule.
And all this xenophobia stuff was first seen in TNG, so I don't see that as particularly characteristic of Romulan/Reman psycho-sociology.
In some 600+ years from now, maybe the Republic would devolve into Empire again (except that it won't, because we've already seen the future of the Trek universe, and we therefore know better). In the meantime, the likelihood of Romulans and Remans doing so now that they are finally tasting freedom again after several hundred years is rather minuscule.
And all this xenophobia stuff was first seen in TNG, so I don't see that as particularly characteristic of Romulan/Reman psycho-sociology.
Finally, patriotism =/= nationalism.
Where did we get a glimpse in STOs future? I might have honestly missed that. Regarding the development of the new Republic, I don't think Xenophobia is necessarily a Romulan trait, but I imagine them in a place somewhat similiar to Germany's situation following the November Revolution. While they now have a taste of freedom and a parlimentary democracy, the Republic of Weimar has succesfully been decomposed by the TRIBBLE rather quickly, the consequences are well known. The Romulan Republic is, at least how I see it, far from stable - if, however, STO at some point did tell us how things will turn out (although glimpses in the future are always just possible outcomes of a myriad of variables) I will reconsider that stance.
I don't really want to discuss Nationalism/Patriotism. My personal stance is just that nothing good can grow from either of those seeds
EDIT: Nationalsocialist's acronym is censored
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
I don't really want to discuss Nationalism/Patriotism. My personal stance is just that nothing good can grow from either of those seeds
Nationalism and patriotism are not the same thing. Patriotism is largely positive, and nationalism almost exclusively negative. Patriotism is passive, love and support for ones own country, pride in its history, institutions, values, and beliefs, and desire to defend it. Nationalism on the other hand, is aggressive, the belief that your country is superior to all others, and often leads to the desire to prove it. Nationalists tend to focus on cultural heritage, rather than shared beliefs and values. As and example, the aforementioned National Socialists were nationalists, but not patriots. They touted the supremacy of their culture and the ethnic purity they desired. However, they despised many of the values of their formerly democratic society, and warped their nation's history and institutions to serve their needs.
Also, I believe that the Romulans in STO are more accurately represented by the Japanese after the end of the isolation of the Tokugawa shogunate. The RSE before the creation of the Tal Shiar is roughly equivalent to Meiji era Japan. The RSE during the TNG era is Pre-War Japan, with the militarism, widespread oppression, and secret police state of that period. The twin events of Shinzon's revolt and the Hobus disaster are the equivalent of the disaster that WWII was to the Japanese people, with the Republic being post-war Japan, picking up the pieces and rebuilding with the aid of former enemies, creating a free and democratic society free from the aggressive nationalism, militarism, and xenophobia of the past.
A case could also be made for the Romulans resembling Germany. RSE=Imperial Germany, TNG RSE+Tal Shiar = Germany 1933-45, Shinzon+Hobus = WWII (Again), and Romulan Republic = Postwar Germany.
And all this xenophobia stuff was first seen in TNG, so I don't see that as particularly characteristic of Romulan/Reman psycho-sociology.
Regarding the development of the new Republic, I don't think Xenophobia is necessarily a Romulan trait, but I imagine them in a place somewhat similiar to Germany's situation following the November Revolution.
(One good thing about this new forum - it's very easy to multi-quote)
Despite Roddenberry having not been a fan of the Rihannsu series, the TNG Romulans - or at least the Tal'Shiar-driven commanders that we saw - seemed to be pulling from the oldest Romulan ways from just after the Sundering. Romuans were xenophobic at first, given that Vulcan's first contact was with Orion pirates... and understandibly, that didn't sit well with both the Vulcans and the group of interstellar Travellers that became the Romulans. So, the first handful of centuries of Romulan history post-Settlement on Romulus / ch'Rihan were de facto xenophobic, as they focused on building their society without anyone trying to muck things up.
Obviously, Romulans got past this and built an Empire, including a variety of subject worlds - of which we're only aware of 5 or so, across various canon, soft-canon, and weak-canon sources.
Where TNG seemed to showcase xenophobia was mainly in the case of the Tal'Shiar. Like the EMH Doctor said, paranoia was in fact a way of life for the Tal'Shiar. That involved an intense dislike of foreign cultures, and a big superiority attitude. And we saw a lot of that attitude being thrown at the Federation when we saw Romulans on Starfleet viewscreens.
But of course, that's only the Starfleet's side we saw. Whenever we got a glimpse into the 'average' Romulan military people, they seemed pretty fair. Toreth, Donatra, the Romulan commanders from TOS' "The Enterprise Incident" and TNG's "The Chase," Cretak, and so on... they weren't xenophobic at all. And, by Human standards, they all seemed pretty much run-of-the-mill normal, compared to the comedy of villians that started shooting their mouths off at the begining of TNG.
From what I see (and this is all canon, on-screen), the Romulan social chronology is shown to us as viwers like this:
- TOS: we see Romulans as honourable, and as an equal match for the most cunning of Humans
- TNG: we're at first led to believe that the Romulans are massive xenophobes
- late-TNG and DS9: we're led slowly back through to the other side of the viewscreen, and we see Romulans as decent people again. We're finally shown that the 'guidance' of questionable leaders and close surveillance of the Tal'Shiar's eye is in fact the majority of the reasoning behind the sudden strangeness of early-TNG Romulans
Sole reason the RR exists is because a) the star empire is considered a "villian faction" and players should only play "good" guys and b) it needs a somewhat desolate half-faction so STOs two-faction model still works. The RSE wouldn't be all that needy to appeal to the big ones.
5. Villain faction
But mostly, time and time again in the industry, villain factions have been shown, with extremely rare exceptions, to give insufficient RoI for any gaming company to risk so much on them. And let's not pretend that the RSE after Shinzon's rebellion, at least, was or would be anything but a villain faction, unless -- and this is only a possibility, because she was shown to be opportunistic in Nemesis -- Donatra had managed to become Praetor or Empress and hold onto the office.
I call massive bulldung on this, both parts... City of Villains had a healthy player base, SWTOR Imperials out number Republic on several servers, other cases exist. People, and developers, have it in their heads that no one wants to play villains so they never even try. Even if you were proven right and a RSE faction would have done worse than the RR fraction did, that just opens a whole episode chain where WE help bring down the corrupt regime and establish freedom and happy epoh for everyone. That would have been far more interesting.
As to post Shinzon RSE? Well Donatra or not, Riker was taking the Titan into Romulan space for more open dialogues.. I think Shinzon could easily have been the jolt the RSE needed.... their old TRIBBLE brigade was dead, ash on the senate floor, Remans had been given the taste, and those dominoes could have cause quite the storm. Donatra was, I think, a bit opportunistic yes, but also I think once she saw Shinzon for what he was and how far he was going to go, she knew Romulus, and her people would pay. That was far too far across the line for her, thus her aiding the Enterprise. Impossible to tell really tho.
Also, I believe that the Romulans in STO are more accurately represented by the Japanese after the end of the isolation of the Tokugawa shogunate. The RSE before the creation of the Tal Shiar is roughly equivalent to Meiji era Japan. The RSE during the TNG era is Pre-War Japan, with the militarism, widespread oppression, and secret police state of that period. The twin events of Shinzon's revolt and the Hobus disaster are the equivalent of the disaster that WWII was to the Japanese people, with the Republic being post-war Japan, picking up the pieces and rebuilding with the aid of former enemies, creating a free and democratic society free from the aggressive nationalism, militarism, and xenophobia of the past.
There were definitely some idea pulls from that era of Japan, yes, but the two cultures were far too dissimilar to make real good comparisons. The RSE lacked a culture similar to Japan as that shtick had been given to the Klingons thanks to Dorn and Roddenberry. Also Japan didn't really get overly oppressive of its own until after the 2-26 incident in 1936. That's when there was a severe authoritarian shift, but that's for another place. Also Japan was not given "the aid of former enemies" frankly. They had an american rifle to their proverbial skulls and were told, "This is how you WILL do things or I'll kill you." It was largely left to its own devices to pick up the pieces of their shattered pride and culture. They weren't even allowed the SDF until murikan interests pulled their troops away from Japan. We forced a constitution on them, they had no say in their own government, and murika forced it to state they had to be pacifists. Not much comparison with D'Tan's movement at all, if anything more like how the Tal Shiar would handle things... "You will do it my way and love it. Now enjoy your 'freedom' before I shoot you."
----
Also I never saw xenophobia in early TNG era Romulan actions... I saw a severe disdain and even disgust of anything not Romulan. Again, there is a similarity here to WWI-WWII era Japanese mentality in that. But they were not afraid of foreign culture, or influence, by their actions they just found everything not them inferior and wanted nothing to do with it. I'm not sure what the proper term for that would be but I don't think xenoPHOBIA is correct there.
jeeze I give proto TRIBBLE about wordy posts then go on a tear myself
Comments
I was trained to be an academic. Old habits die hard.
War and Peace? Really? I should be that talented.
But come on, an 800+ page novel is hardly a few paragraphs -- and believe me, I've written far longer posts elsewhere than I have here. In fact, I still hold the record at one forum for the longest post ever written there (it was, iirc, 27 pages in Wordpad), but the quoted comments of others in the post contributed heavily to the length of that.
AD/Romulan Republic
IMHO the Republic plot is just a little stupid:
- what Republic? All i see is some minority politician D'Tan which got a lot of support from unknown sources (see reunification with vulcans)
- We did have a senate, didn't we?
- Where is the civilian political head of former Romulan Star Empire?
So i would (and it is still not too late) propose a featured plotline:
- D'Tan is a puppet of iconians/vulcan spies/crazy TRIBBLE/perhaps together with some Fed/KDF leaders
- out toon gets to uncover him/them
- new Romulan Republic Senate is being elected, some of old senators being reinstated (?Sela?)
- the new Delta command takes the ruling role and our toons join a special cross/faction delta command fleet
- finally there is only one faction story wise (for all queues, PVP, and all new missions)
- Tal'Shiar still remains the bad guy
The thing is, i really dislike Sela, but D'Tan drives me crazy. The most uncharismatic Star Trek toon EVER!
Point is, it isnt about word count its about HOW you get your point across. I am not surprised to hear you were trained to be an academic, most of your posts are about as fun to read as a textbook. You could say so much more with so many fewer words proto. I gave up trying to read your novel sized posts a couple months after we first started doing our rounds on each other, weather those posts were directed at me or not.
but meh to each their own I guess
@duaths1
-sure the reunificationists supported him, but also former RSE military officers, and a few intel agents that were not Tal Shiar(this may be a shock but they weren't the be all of intel agencies *gasp*)
-please read the dialogue over the course of the romulan story, the republic senate is referenced several times.
-the RSE's civilian political head was on Romulus when it went ker-splat(or was that ker-plewie), arguably Donatra stepped into that role but was ousted by Taris and later Sela both of whom had 0 interest in restoring civilian authority.
as to your proposals
-we don't get that lucky
-would be cool (sela? oh hell no)
-Alliance Command tries it and I think you'll see plenty of warbirds turn around and shoot their 'allies'
-that would effectively finish killing off much of STO's appeal, but give Cryptic time, they're working towards it.
-How bout the Tal Shiar finally get killed off instead
As for D'Twerp, nah he's not the most out of character... that role goes to the impossibly two-dimensional, cartoonishly villain, Hakeev. D'Twerp started out dangerously close, I agree, but the last few time we see him in voiced cutscene's he's actually acted a bit more like a Romulan than a cardboard cutout.
You "really dislike" Sela, but because D'Tan "drives [you] crazy," you're suggesting that she be reinstated as a Senator? Are you familiar with the term "bifurcation fallacy"?
D'Tan is not a puppet, and his sexuality should not even be in question, much less with the use of a slur which shows that you have absolutely no clue what Star Trek is about. On the contrary, in the space of a year and a half, he has presided over the discovery of a new homeworld for the Romulan and Reman peoples, abolished slavery, led our peoples to a restored position of power (thereby preserving "Romulan" as one of the three major powers of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants), given his military commanders sufficient rein to drive the Star Empire and/or Tal'Shiar back to a rapidly-dwindling token of territory, been instrumental in the Jenolan Accords which led to a cease-fire between the Feds and the Klinks, started the building of a Capitol City on New Romulus, helped form the Delta Alliance, ...
What has Sela done? Covered her own behind (and usually not with great success), failed to discharge command responsibility over sociopaths like Hhakhifv, allowed unprovoked attacks on peaceful and loyal colony worlds, allowed Romulans and Remans to be hunted by Hirogen, allowed Romulans and Remans to be made into food for Elachi young, acted as a sometimes-absentee Empress over the Star Empire in its death-throes, been "captured" (or rescued) by Iconians, and generally strutted around trying to act tough while speaking in condescending tones to everyone.
Why would anyone want one faction story-wise? This is not remotely consistent with your other comments.
I'm inclined to simply write you off as a troll after the slur you used, coupled with the other illogic in your post, but the point needs to be driven home once and for all: Sela is an incompetent, narcissistic, Machiavellian maniac, and not a leader in any sense, while D'Tan has demonstrated leadership qualities consistently (with the one exception in which nearly everyone -- Kererek only excepted --, including the mighty Klingons, displayed defeatist body language, but were all rallied by Kererek's speech).
Yeah, but the thing is, we all (including you) know by this point that it's not going to happen, for multiple reasons.
1. Story explanation
Cryptic could go with part of my backstory, that I came forward in time and learned of the destruction, and my first act was to go back and try to undo it, only to find that too many people had already tampered with space-time around that event (Spock and Nero were canonical; I'm sure plenty of people have some kind of fanfic of having gone then/there to do something as well) so that it was no longer possible to alter it in any way.
2. Story explanation
Cryptic could go with what has been stated two or three times in other threads (including once in the thread you linked), that we go back and undo it, and then return to 2410 only to find that the blundering Hhakhifv and his Doktor Mengele have managed to bring about the assimilation of the RSE by the Bhorgsu, and so we have no choice but to restore the timeline.
3. IP Holder Objections
CBS would probably veto it.
4. Numbers
Sadly, if the metrics we've seen were accurate, RRF has even less regular players than the KDF. We can argue about why that is so, but at the end, we have to accept that it is so. Making another faction (or half-faction or whatever you want to call it) for a rather small minority of the RRF players would not be a particularly intelligent thing to do. (Then again, we are talking about game developers here ...)
5. Villain faction
But mostly, time and time again in the industry, villain factions have been shown, with extremely rare exceptions, to give insufficient RoI for any gaming company to risk so much on them. And let's not pretend that the RSE after Shinzon's rebellion, at least, was or would be anything but a villain faction, unless -- and this is only a possibility, because she was shown to be opportunistic in Nemesis -- Donatra had managed to become Praetor or Empress and hold onto the office.
Anyway, I posted a reply there.
By the end of the TNG game, Garidian society is thrown into a bloody revolution (depending on your choices int he game, which is quite cool) which is when my headcanon kicks in. The Gridians discovered Romulan intrigues in their government during the violent uprising of the plebejen caste which is why relations between the Empire and Garid grew dark. When Hobus happened, Garid decided to support D'Tans faction between all the infighting that ensued and bolstered them to be the second strongest faction (next to the loyalists). Since Garid is supposedly roughly located around the area which STO marks as the origin of the Alpha(Beta) quadrant's Borg incursion the Garidians suffered heavy blows against roaming Borg cubes which procedually leads to the strenghtened RR slowly absorbing them and after STO, in the future, it takes turns I outlioned above.
My Klingulan character is a Garidian (Patrician born) and part of the Garidian Defense Fleet, ultimately combining her resoures with OMEGA to counter the Borg.
What I am trying to say is possiblities that the Republic will at some point become the reborn RSE do potentially exist.
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- I wouldn't say minority... The gameplay map, and the fact that it's only the Republic that's involved in galatic events of late, seem to suggest that the Republic is in fact the larger faction. The RSE all but disappeared entirely from the storyline, until Sela came back for a visit. And even then, she admitted that the Imperial Remnant / Tal'Shiar was a mess.
- Yes, and I'd expect us to have one again. D'Tan uses the title Proconsul, which is direct from the Romulan senatorial system. I hope to one day actually see the Senate, but that remains up to Cryptic to design the art assets and finish the city on New Romulus / Mol'Rihan
- That's a good question. It's up in the air as to who is now in charge of the "RSE," which is likely just a bunch of mini-factions vying for control at this point.
And yeah... lay off the hateful language - replying to a post unfortunately removes the auto-filter, so we can see what you said. Using derogatory language isn't appropriate.
In some 600+ years from now, maybe the Republic would devolve into Empire again (except that it won't, because we've already seen the future of the Trek universe, and we therefore know better). In the meantime, the likelihood of Romulans and Remans doing so now that they are finally tasting freedom again after several hundred years is rather minuscule.
And all this xenophobia stuff was first seen in TNG, so I don't see that as particularly characteristic of Romulan/Reman psycho-sociology.
Finally, patriotism =/= nationalism.
Where did we get a glimpse in STOs future? I might have honestly missed that. Regarding the development of the new Republic, I don't think Xenophobia is necessarily a Romulan trait, but I imagine them in a place somewhat similiar to Germany's situation following the November Revolution. While they now have a taste of freedom and a parlimentary democracy, the Republic of Weimar has succesfully been decomposed by the TRIBBLE rather quickly, the consequences are well known. The Romulan Republic is, at least how I see it, far from stable - if, however, STO at some point did tell us how things will turn out (although glimpses in the future are always just possible outcomes of a myriad of variables) I will reconsider that stance.
I don't really want to discuss Nationalism/Patriotism. My personal stance is just that nothing good can grow from either of those seeds
EDIT: Nationalsocialist's acronym is censored
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Nationalism and patriotism are not the same thing. Patriotism is largely positive, and nationalism almost exclusively negative. Patriotism is passive, love and support for ones own country, pride in its history, institutions, values, and beliefs, and desire to defend it. Nationalism on the other hand, is aggressive, the belief that your country is superior to all others, and often leads to the desire to prove it. Nationalists tend to focus on cultural heritage, rather than shared beliefs and values. As and example, the aforementioned National Socialists were nationalists, but not patriots. They touted the supremacy of their culture and the ethnic purity they desired. However, they despised many of the values of their formerly democratic society, and warped their nation's history and institutions to serve their needs.
Also, I believe that the Romulans in STO are more accurately represented by the Japanese after the end of the isolation of the Tokugawa shogunate. The RSE before the creation of the Tal Shiar is roughly equivalent to Meiji era Japan. The RSE during the TNG era is Pre-War Japan, with the militarism, widespread oppression, and secret police state of that period. The twin events of Shinzon's revolt and the Hobus disaster are the equivalent of the disaster that WWII was to the Japanese people, with the Republic being post-war Japan, picking up the pieces and rebuilding with the aid of former enemies, creating a free and democratic society free from the aggressive nationalism, militarism, and xenophobia of the past.
A case could also be made for the Romulans resembling Germany. RSE=Imperial Germany, TNG RSE+Tal Shiar = Germany 1933-45, Shinzon+Hobus = WWII (Again), and Romulan Republic = Postwar Germany.
(One good thing about this new forum - it's very easy to multi-quote)
Despite Roddenberry having not been a fan of the Rihannsu series, the TNG Romulans - or at least the Tal'Shiar-driven commanders that we saw - seemed to be pulling from the oldest Romulan ways from just after the Sundering. Romuans were xenophobic at first, given that Vulcan's first contact was with Orion pirates... and understandibly, that didn't sit well with both the Vulcans and the group of interstellar Travellers that became the Romulans. So, the first handful of centuries of Romulan history post-Settlement on Romulus / ch'Rihan were de facto xenophobic, as they focused on building their society without anyone trying to muck things up.
Obviously, Romulans got past this and built an Empire, including a variety of subject worlds - of which we're only aware of 5 or so, across various canon, soft-canon, and weak-canon sources.
Where TNG seemed to showcase xenophobia was mainly in the case of the Tal'Shiar. Like the EMH Doctor said, paranoia was in fact a way of life for the Tal'Shiar. That involved an intense dislike of foreign cultures, and a big superiority attitude. And we saw a lot of that attitude being thrown at the Federation when we saw Romulans on Starfleet viewscreens.
But of course, that's only the Starfleet's side we saw. Whenever we got a glimpse into the 'average' Romulan military people, they seemed pretty fair. Toreth, Donatra, the Romulan commanders from TOS' "The Enterprise Incident" and TNG's "The Chase," Cretak, and so on... they weren't xenophobic at all. And, by Human standards, they all seemed pretty much run-of-the-mill normal, compared to the comedy of villians that started shooting their mouths off at the begining of TNG.
From what I see (and this is all canon, on-screen), the Romulan social chronology is shown to us as viwers like this:
- TOS: we see Romulans as honourable, and as an equal match for the most cunning of Humans
- TNG: we're at first led to believe that the Romulans are massive xenophobes
- late-TNG and DS9: we're led slowly back through to the other side of the viewscreen, and we see Romulans as decent people again. We're finally shown that the 'guidance' of questionable leaders and close surveillance of the Tal'Shiar's eye is in fact the majority of the reasoning behind the sudden strangeness of early-TNG Romulans
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
I dare you to do better.
I call massive bulldung on this, both parts... City of Villains had a healthy player base, SWTOR Imperials out number Republic on several servers, other cases exist. People, and developers, have it in their heads that no one wants to play villains so they never even try. Even if you were proven right and a RSE faction would have done worse than the RR fraction did, that just opens a whole episode chain where WE help bring down the corrupt regime and establish freedom and happy epoh for everyone. That would have been far more interesting.
As to post Shinzon RSE? Well Donatra or not, Riker was taking the Titan into Romulan space for more open dialogues.. I think Shinzon could easily have been the jolt the RSE needed.... their old TRIBBLE brigade was dead, ash on the senate floor, Remans had been given the taste, and those dominoes could have cause quite the storm. Donatra was, I think, a bit opportunistic yes, but also I think once she saw Shinzon for what he was and how far he was going to go, she knew Romulus, and her people would pay. That was far too far across the line for her, thus her aiding the Enterprise. Impossible to tell really tho.
There were definitely some idea pulls from that era of Japan, yes, but the two cultures were far too dissimilar to make real good comparisons. The RSE lacked a culture similar to Japan as that shtick had been given to the Klingons thanks to Dorn and Roddenberry. Also Japan didn't really get overly oppressive of its own until after the 2-26 incident in 1936. That's when there was a severe authoritarian shift, but that's for another place. Also Japan was not given "the aid of former enemies" frankly. They had an american rifle to their proverbial skulls and were told, "This is how you WILL do things or I'll kill you." It was largely left to its own devices to pick up the pieces of their shattered pride and culture. They weren't even allowed the SDF until murikan interests pulled their troops away from Japan. We forced a constitution on them, they had no say in their own government, and murika forced it to state they had to be pacifists. Not much comparison with D'Tan's movement at all, if anything more like how the Tal Shiar would handle things... "You will do it my way and love it. Now enjoy your 'freedom' before I shoot you."
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Also I never saw xenophobia in early TNG era Romulan actions... I saw a severe disdain and even disgust of anything not Romulan. Again, there is a similarity here to WWI-WWII era Japanese mentality in that. But they were not afraid of foreign culture, or influence, by their actions they just found everything not them inferior and wanted nothing to do with it. I'm not sure what the proper term for that would be but I don't think xenoPHOBIA is correct there.
jeeze I give proto TRIBBLE about wordy posts then go on a tear myself