The Coalition States are not the bad guy

[eliakon]

Three. We view the CS with today's moral value, add in demons , nonhuman invaders , alien plagues, magic and the rest of that craziness, and all that moral value goes out the window if not you end up something's next meal or its "pet"

does it really? because last i checked, the NGR is explicitly surrounded by (sub)demons and nonhuman invaders (many of which have access to at least some form of magic) to a much greater extent than the CS, but have managed to get by without indiscriminately murdering large numbers of innocent d-bees, without suppressing knowledge, without altering history, without declaring war on nations that value things which they don't but do not pose a threat, and without straight-up outlawing other manufacturers of products that are pretty much essential to survival on rifts earth, but they seem to have managed to get by just fine without turning into anything's meal or pet.

they may not be a shining beacon of morality and the kind treatment of d-bees, but they haven't gone remotely as far as the CS, and their enemy is explicitly stated to be a more dangerous one than anything the CS faces. they haven't embraced magic, they haven't even embraced psionics, they haven't genetically engineered any slave races to use as expendable troops or to help them purge their territory of magic users, and yet, there they are, not dead, not eaten, not enslaved.

That because palladium books doesn't what to offend anyone, hence why you will never see a rifts Middle East book or we would have one , ever notice every other human nation seems just a little too nice to d-bees compared to CS , heck humans can't get along with each other half the time , but we are to believe after a earth shattering event , other humans are nice to the d-bees when they haven't a history of being nice to each other.
The good old ngr, last time I check they needed others in their war, including the CS for manpower and supplies. Yup upstanding moral folks there.

I really don't get your argument here.....
I think that your saying that somehow only the CS is really an accurate representation of humanity? That everyone else is artificially sweetened?
No one is saying the NGR is a bastion of sweetness and light. Its a great place......if your a pure-breed human. But its not a xenophobic place of genocide, slavery, and wholesale revisionism of history. (Japan is even nicer ) The simple fact that they can survive with out doing this proves empirically that such is not needed.
Complaining that there is no middle east book proves nothing.....Palladium is quite willing to offend people (Have you read Spirit West, or Australia?) They have all sorts of evil people and nasty nations. They would be fine with making everyone evil....if that was needed. It isn't needed though, so they don't do that. They only make the bad guys evil......

Name one evil human nation other then CS or FQ.

Hmmmmmmm maybe this suggests that Evil isn't actually necessary....
The fact that there are only a few evil nations doesn't mean that evil is being avoided. Reids Rangers is evil, Ciudad Juarez is fairly evil, Tarnow is falling to evil, several of the Warlords are pretty brutal and evil, the 'True Federation of Magic', the Grim Reapers and the Society of Sages are all evil. Tolkeen ended up falling into evil.
None of which has any thing to do with the price of tea in China. The fact that there are very few evil empires does not prove that they are artificially sweetening the facts....there are hundreds of nations on Earth today and only a couple of them would be described as 'evil' or genocidal, or xenophobic......hmmmmmm maybe this means that it is actually a good representation of reality?

[Killer Cyborg]

No one is saying the NGR is a bastion of sweetness and light. Its a great place......if your a pure-breed human. But its not a xenophobic place of genocide...

Maybe I haven't read up enough on NGR/Gargoyle relations.
I always assumed that they had an Attack on Sight policy towards the gargoyles.

[eliakon]

No one is saying the NGR is a bastion of sweetness and light. Its a great place......if your a pure-breed human. But its not a xenophobic place of genocide...

Maybe I haven't read up enough on NGR/Gargoyle relations.
I always assumed that they had an Attack on Sight policy towards the gargoyles.

*Sigh* The NGR is not trying to murder everyone who is not like them. Ergo they are not "xenophobic genocides". They are trying to wipe out the gargoyles yes. This is one reason I said that they are not a bastion of sweetness and light. However there is a slight difference between "we are fighting a battle to the knife against a foe" and "we are killing everyone who is not like us" Ask General Rasheem

[Killer Cyborg]

No one is saying the NGR is a bastion of sweetness and light. Its a great place......if your a pure-breed human. But its not a xenophobic place of genocide...

Maybe I haven't read up enough on NGR/Gargoyle relations.
I always assumed that they had an Attack on Sight policy towards the gargoyles.

*Sigh* The NGR is not trying to murder everyone who is not like them. Ergo they are not "xenophobic genocides". They are trying to wipe out the gargoyles yes. This is one reason I said that they are not a bastion of sweetness and light. However there is a slight difference between "we are fighting a battle to the knife against a foe" and "we are killing everyone who is not like us" Ask General Rasheem

The CS isn't "killing everyone who isn't like them" either... so that's a false standard.
And I'm not sure why you're okay with a war of genocide, as long as it's not "xenophobic." Also, I'm not sure how you think that the NGR isn't xenophobic.

Let's take a closer look:

NGR 15
In reaction to gargoyles and their allies "pillaging the countryside with increasing frequency and growing numbers," the NGR responded with The Bloody Campaign:
To the humans and their robot legions, the so-called demons are not recognized as valid life forms, but as evil, hell-spawned abominations bent on the destruction of humankind. The soldiers saw only demonic predators that needed to be destroyed. The next five years was one of the worst campaigns of destruction since the Great Cataclysm. The bloodiest of these battles were waged in the Polish wilderness. Hundreds of thousands of gargoyles, monsters and monstrous d-bees were erased from the face of the planet. Entire tribes were slaughtered without mercy.

And it worked. For 30 years, everybody was too afraid to mess with the NGR. They had lasting peace... because they the same kind of thing that you claim makes the CS evil.

The gargoyles retaliated, and the NGR was flooded with human and non-human refugees.

NGR 16
Pressed by the needs of so many, the NGR madea decision of historic consequence in favor of human supremacy...
...All non-human refugees were separated from the humans and forced out of the country. Those who resisted expulsion were beaten and killed. When the D-Bee citizens of the NGR protested this brutal action, they became the next target. The D-Bee populations of entire cities and villages were taken from their homes (forcibly if necessary), transported beyond the border of the NGR and left in the wilderness to fend for themselves [against countless hordes of mega-damage monsters]...
...Approximately 3.4 million D-Bees were displaced.

The NGR book is set in 103 PA, 60 years after the NGR booted the non-humans out of the country, and guess what?
They haven't really softened their policy on non-humans. They still don't give them any protection or aid.

NGR 17
...the NGR and Triax have been preparing to launch another assault against their supernatural nemeses. A devastating and relentless assault that will make the Bloody Campaign of 3 PA pale by comparison.

Remember, the Bloody Campaign had a death toll of hundreds of thousands of non-humans, who were all exterminated because of their race.

To this end, the NGR has spent the last 15 years building on human fears and hatred of non-human monsters and aliens in general; and specifically gargoyles, brodkil and so-called demons.

NGR 33
Areas known to be inhabited by large concentrations of monsters are designated as Monster Zones. Human and D-Bee communities in the Monster Zones are left to the mercies of the god. The NGR seldom has any presence at these enemy strongholds and avoids them unless waging a major offensive to 'clear' an area of hostiles.
'Clearing' an area of hostiles is just as likely to displace, injure and kill innocent D-Bees as it is to eliminate enemy troops. However, since even humans living in these areas are looked upon with suspicion, D-bees are considered to be the enemy, the military has little compassion for their plight.

Seems pretty xenophobic to me, and pretty actively genocidal.
Yes, they do have D-Bees that they've allowed to live... but so does the CS. Remember, the CS (as of 102 PA) had 10 million nonhumans living in CS territory.

[Killer Cyborg]

SB1 17
Like the real world, situations are seldom black and white; yes or no. The Coalition falls into a void of moral and philosophical grey tones.

[Mech-Viper Prime]

Well KC , I guess I stand corrected by you, but damn, I forgot the genocide the ngr is doing.

[Tor]

we aren't over stating Karls power.
The "laws" can be changed at his whim
making them dictates rather than laws

Source?

IF the people D have that power to depose Prosek and don't then the people are indeed evil.

Why?

Do people with the power to depose a leader necessarily think the leader is evil or recognize the leader has an evil alignment?

Would they naturally know of a superior replacement guaranteed to improve the nation rather than make it worse?

No that doesn't flow the other way that the already stated people of the CS not being primarily evil per the canon, not choosing to depose prosek makes him good.

I don't think anyone here is arguing that Karl has a good alignment because he wasn't deposed.

1. Prosek does hold all the power and as such makes the nation evil.
2. Prosek does not have all the power and the people choose not to depose him cuz those with the power to do so are evil therefore making the nation evil.
3. Prosek does not have all the power and the good people of the nation do nothing out of fear allowing the nation to be evil.

You seem to be under the impression that bad people cannot lead a good nation, I don't agree with that. Leaders may be diabolic in their self-interest but do good acts to placate the populace, resulting in a good nation even if done for selfish purposes.

Lex Luthor being evil doesn't make LexCorp evil. Lex Luthor getting elected president doesn't make America evil.

last i checked, the NGR is explicitly surrounded by (sub)demons and nonhuman invaders (many of which have access to at least some form of magic) to a much greater extent than the CS

The CS and NGR face very different threats. I'd suggest a 'who is more good' NGR vs CS thread to explore this in better depth.

The CS has explicitly had to deal with loads of shape-changers, magical flying demon army accidents and invasion by a magical nation. When has the NGR been described as having to deal with this?

I can accept that the brute force of the combined numbers of the Brodkil/Gargoyles may outweigh the sum of force the CS has had to face. But I don't think they are as intricate, as subtle, as sneaky, as manipulative, as the enemies the CS had had to face.

They could be if they were smart, ie the Brodkil staying invisible all the time, but for some reason they love bionics and probably like getting shot at too or something.

Even an invisible 12ft Brodkil is way easier to pick up by thermal imaging than an invisible 6ft human though.

indiscriminately murdering large numbers of innocent d-bees

When the CS murders large numbers of innocent D-Bees, it does not do so indiscriminately. There's a reason some species like the Slurmph get targeted with genocide and other kinds of D-Bees do not.

without suppressing knowledge, without altering history

The CS does not alter history, it simply presents an official version of it. A version they have gone to the time of fact-checking.

Does it mention anywhere that the CS has explicitly lied about history? Am curious if that's actually happened.

If the CS suppresses information, they may not be altering history, just not calling a claim history because they haven't actually verified it.

The concerns that people are lying about pre-Rifts history: is that pure bunk? Or could people actually be lying about pre-Rifts history? Why wouldn't this be a real concern?

Consider the issue of 'Holocaust Revisionism' in modern day, and disagreements people have about numbers. That's relating to stuff about 70 years ago. In a world much more stable than in Rifts. When you're dealing with stuff CENTURIES ago, after nuclear disasters and scavengers, where you don't have international academia and peace to verify scientifically the discoveries... what, we should just rely on some Indiana-Jones at their word to tell people the truth about the world that came before?

declaring war on nations that value things which they don't but do not pose a threat

That never happened.

Free Quebec was hurting its people by allowing too much free access to Juicer Conversion. Glitter Boys were too much power in the hands of one man, which on its own might not have been a problem except by refusing Psi-Hounds they were leaving their back door open to magical and psionic mind control.

Tolkeen was militarizing and making war machines, they were suspects in terrorist attacks originating in Old Chicago, they didn't voluntarily stop summoning demons or regulate magic practitioners who could do it. In spite of leaving the FoM, not wanting to join the Great City militarizing against Chi-Town, they ended up making the same mistakes. The CS saw the writing on the wall and this time attacked first, not wanting a repeat of the Battle of Chi-Town or the winged-demon massacre.

without straight-up outlawing other manufacturers of products that are pretty much essential to survival on rifts earth, but they seem to have managed to get by just fine without turning into anything's meal or pet.

What are you talking about here, Wilk's or something? I thought all the CS outlawed of theirs were their plastic guns that could get through metal detectors.

they haven't gone remotely as far as the CS, and their enemy is explicitly stated to be a more dangerous one than anything the CS faces.

More blatently dangerous but not as insidious. I mean, technically a force that assassinates your leadership and replaces it with changelings and dragons and enslaves you isn't as dangerous as an enemy that is coming to eat all of you. But each has different kinds of responses.

they haven't embraced magic, they haven't even embraced psionics, they haven't genetically engineered any slave races to use as expendable troops or to help them purge their territory of magic users, and yet, there they are, not dead, not eaten, not enslaved.

They also survived the Coming of the Rifts with far less damage than North America. They had a higher base of tech and resources to defend themselves with.

Superman: "hey Batman, I just walk up and crush the guns of criminals so they can't fire and hit innocent people, why do you have to be so brutal and go and break their wrist so they drop their gun? it's completely unnecessary .. and don't even get me started on Olly, putting arrows through people's hands like that, why can't you be more considerate like me?"

they squash freedom even for their own

Of course, same as we do. I do not have the freedom to go assault whoever I like just because they were rude to me. In return I enjoy the freedom from such abuses myself.

"safety" is a ridiculous standard - someone in solitary confinement has safety... but zero freedom.

They have the freedom to sleep without being eaten by a demon.

The Declaration of Independence lists "life" and "liberty" separately because having one neither guarantees nor even implies the other.

Having liberty means you are alive, there is no liberty while dead, unless you become a ghost in which case you can liberally walk through walls and cool stuff.

Being alive means you have some level of liberty, although it may be minimal so additional assurances of liberty would be good. The constitution hopefully goes into more detail about what added liberties those are.

"good" requires that the life and freedom supported is more than your own, and that the sacrifice is largely your own.

That may apply on an individual system (the "always help others" requirement) but it does not apply on the level of nations. A nation can be good simply for caring for and protecting its people, doesn't have to go out and help other nations to be good. The government and its people are distinct entities so a government can be good by helping non-government people.

The presence of living humans is not proof of the virtue or necessity of their policies. It just proves that people lived, and doesn't even prove that they would have otherwise died.

True, but the proof is more by contrast to surrounding areas. We know there are alligators out there, and they are in fact camping on the doorstep.

The wilderness outside the Chi-Town burbs is so bad that D-Bees are willing to come to the Burbs for protection. Why else would they be there? Did they come to invade or steal from humans or something? If that's the case, then CS concerns are still affirmed.

many of those killed are not threats, any more than is someone with an MDC rifle and armor.

Owning MD weapons and MDC armor do not give you the capacity to summon monsters that will kill people. This capacity is present in many spellcasters and the CS doesn't have any reliable means of distinguishing which ones. The level of danger is very different. The level of subtlety is different.

Totalitarianism is the main process of the CS

Not sure I agree, what if I see industrial expansion as their main process and totalitarianism being a possibly brief interlude that happens in response to the assassination of their previous leader?

justifying it as a means to an end means accepting that their (The CS? The Proseks?) desired end is worth the means that they use to obtain it.

You can weigh this with other options too. I mean heck, let's examine the shape-changer purge of 1 PA.

If auto-Gs and changelings and dragons were going around killing people with basic impunity, is not persecuting these shape-changers as a whole and kicking them out of your nation a means that is worth the end it will lead to?

So... the CS benefits the CS and tends to its own basic needs? That is a characteristic of any group that wishes to continue, good, selfish, or even evil.

No, it also tends to the basic needs (albeit secondarily) of others who are not members.

If you are going to hand-wave the impact of that as "they are just being groomed as member states" then you can hand-wave most acts of kindness or aid this way.

Help someone? You probably just want them to feel like they owe you, want them to be your friend, think if you help them they will be less likely to attack you, selfish!

The only pure aid could be untrackable anonymous donations where you could never be identified. You'd have to sneak around and help people without them knowing who was helpipng them.

In that way, the Vanguard is probably more good/selfless helping the CS than the CS is helping a border town full of possible army recruits (perhaps a new member state in decades to come) but I still think the CS is doing good things, in spite of these good things possibly having karmic rewards for them later.

if you are going to summarily discard the words of Erin Tarn you should really compare her writings with the actual write-ups - there are a few things that she gets wrong but she was included as a way to convey the reality of the world to the players and her descriptions are generally in step with the rules.

Being right about some things doesn't mean you're right about them all. The best liars will mostly tell the truth and only lie occasionally, so there are fewer holes in their stories and they've built up rapport.

I guess based on that: maybe she was lying about being rescued by a SAMAS Squadron from a Lorica Wraith. Though I'm not sure why she would since it seems in her interest not to paint guys wanting her captured as good guys. Telling the truth about their good deeds (or inventing them to appear balanced and impartial if that was the case) doesn't mean I should believe her about her bad ones. She calls Karl "the devil" after all.

that section of RUE also includes this line: I do see the CS as villains.

RUEp230? Third paragraph of right column? How KS sees them in his campaigns is irrelevant and he tells us as much. He opens the "How to Use Coalition Characters" section with saying Coalition characters can be played as good guys and bad guys, and I think that extends to the States as well.

He says they have "become the villains" for "most gamers and Game Masters" (did he take a poll or something?) so KS' attitudes seem to fall in line with what most gamers/GMs think (or perhaps he thinks most gamers/GM share his preferences? *shrug*)

His answering "is the Coalition good or evil" with "yes" means he recognizes the dichotomy. He says the CS reflects duality, not black and white (in spite of the armor) but every shade of grey. KS mentions he plays different CS groups differently.

Notably at the start of RUEp231 we are told "the real patriots" are "good guys". This means that people in the CS who are not good are not patriots. Shouldn't we define a nation by true patriots rather than non-patriots?

we have explicit statements in various places of the evil and villainy of the CS. Do we have citations of them doing good? Not "some act that can be interpreted as good with the right spin."

Sure, RUEp230's 'How to use' 5th paragraph 6th sentence

"Bold heroes ready to help their fellow humans and risk their own lives to save innocent people - human people. And they do. They die in droves to save human lives and won't hesitate to risk their own lives to save an innocent farmer or child from the clutches of an evil monster or wicked D-Bee"

This says nothing about the farmer or child having to be a CS citizen. Seems protective stuff the CS does gets spun as self-interest while offensive stuff they do gets spun as cruelty rather than self-interest or protecting others.

actual, factual. "On this day, in this place the CS did this specific good thing for this good reason?"

Soldiers dying to rescue the enslaved village Tarn was in doesn't count because that must've been soldiers seeing a chance to waste ammo shooting monsters for the lulz. CS army has so much fun fighting monsters they just want to run up and die impaled on barbed tentacles for a chance to go HtH and hack it up with a vibro-blade. Had nothing at all to do with putting yourself in between a monster and the village kids beckoned to its fake slavery circus.

(Japan is even nicer )

and even less touched by the damage of the rifts...

I like how Tor for some reason thinks that the C.S. has political parties, as if the Emperor is voted in or "allowed" to rule.

He was, he was elected Chairman in a democratic process, just as his father was. Sedition goes into detail about that in the timeline.

Once democratically elected Chairman, he served in that post for 5 years before he opted to become Emperor.

There was a group of people in the CS (unclear on the size) who kept pushing for this to happen. He ignored them for years and eventually was like "k whatev" and did so, so they could shut up and he could keep doing his job.

He doesn't realize it is a Monarchy

I guess that's why I said " It is possible to maintain a monarch while limiting their power"

and not like the modern figurehead monarchies of England or Japan.

While I accept that Karl is more than a figurehead and holds more power than the Japanese Emperor or the Queen of England in present times, that still doesn't mean he has unlimited power or has Palpatinian levels of control.

It might help if people could find statements about just how much sway Karl has. I know it's a great deal but I'm not sure if I buy into Karl being able to do whatever he wants.

In that SoT plotline about possibly mind-altering Karl into a goodguy (Orb of Solomon) it talks about how Karl would have to make CS changes gradually to avoid upsetting people. This shows there are limits on what he can do.

There is no voting him out, there is no lords ousting him, because any sign of rebellion is sure to meet a swift demise because the instigator(s) were influenced by magic or some inhuman power.

Any sources for this?

What if Loni Kashbrook wanted to be elected Chairwoman/Empress and went on some kind of "women make better leaders than men" or "Karl is too old, and Joseph is too young, we need an experienced-but-vibrant intermediate leader" platform, but otherwise fell in line with CS preferences and policies?

You really think that this would be utterly impossible? That nothing in CS law would allow for it? Based on what?

This isn't to say Karl would be okay with it, or that Joseph wouldn't spread "Loni might be a succubus" rumors to sway the voters, but that just reflects on shady politics, it doesn't mean a political system absolutely can't exist. I'd say we don't know enough about CS law regarding the position of Chairman or Emperor to know whether it is possible to repeal it or not.

The NGR is not trying to murder everyone who is not like them.

Nor is the CS, which is why D-Bees get less aggression than supernatural beings.

Ergo they are not "xenophobic genocides".

Dimension Book 2 makes it explicitly clear that the CS does not fall under the category of genocidal xenophobes either, they are merely at risk of becoming this in the future. The CS are ranked on the level of the Kreeghor and Splugorth: they are aggressive racial supremists, not genocidal xenophobes. In CS society, humans come first, everyone else comes second. Just as Kreeghor come first in the Transgalactic Emprie and Splugorth/Lords come first in the Splugorth empires.

there is a slight difference between "we are fighting a battle to the knife against a foe" and "we are killing everyone who is not like us"

Except the CS is not actually doing that, only isolated elements of the CS are. The CS just doesn't have policies in place to stop that abuse (aside from concerns of wasting ammo) because they have other priorities.

Are we thinking that the NGR goes to extreme lengths to stop their human supremacist robot pilots from killing D-Bees they get in disputes with on the border towns?

[eliakon]

Yes, they do have D-Bees that they've allowed to live... but so does the CS. Remember, the CS (as of 102 PA) had 10 million nonhumans living in CS territory.

And how many of those are Psi-Stalkers, Psi-Ghosts, Mutant Animals.....

[Killer Cyborg]

Yes, they do have D-Bees that they've allowed to live... but so does the CS. Remember, the CS (as of 102 PA) had 10 million nonhumans living in CS territory.

And how many of those are Psi-Stalkers, Psi-Ghosts, Mutant Animals.....

12% of the overall population were psychics, iirc, and 10% were Dog Boys as of SB1.
That's 2.4 million Dog Boys, and maybe 2.88 million psychics.

[Tor]

Population percentages tend to confuse, I'd want to see the exact pages and phrasing to review.

[Pepsi Jedi]

No one is saying the NGR is a bastion of sweetness and light. Its a great place......if your a pure-breed human. But its not a xenophobic place of genocide...

Maybe I haven't read up enough on NGR/Gargoyle relations.
I always assumed that they had an Attack on Sight policy towards the gargoyles.

*Sigh* The NGR is not trying to murder everyone who is not like them. Ergo they are not "xenophobic genocides". They are trying to wipe out the gargoyles yes. This is one reason I said that they are not a bastion of sweetness and light. However there is a slight difference between "we are fighting a battle to the knife against a foe" and "we are killing everyone who is not like us" Ask General Rasheem

Yes the old 'Man we painted our selves into a corner with Rasheem" Thing. lol

If you read the NGR books, it's addressed. yes they very much tried to ignore Rasheem after he was first mentioned but when it didn't work they addressed it. Rasheem exists. He's a rare exception to the rule.

In general the NGR treats their dbees with a hair more care than the CS. If you serve in their military for decades as cannon fodder against the Demon armies, and some how don't manage to die, you can stay in the NGR as a second class citizen. Like those 5 guys that managed to serve as cannon fodder against MDC foes for literal Decades. 99.9% of them die before that point but hey, you could get lucky.

Other than that the NGR Gently and ever so kindly 'deports' Dbees. Which people are quick to point out is better than when the CS kills them.

But... not really.

Because the NGR is under siege from Demonic forces of hundreds of thousands of MDC demons. So when the good soldiers of the NGR military make the DBees pack up their village and gently deport them to beyond the NGR Borders....

They're quite literally throwing them into the mouths of the beseiging army.

Now... it's not written like the NGR soldiers are snickering into their hands the entire time, but lets be honest, it's no better than the CS (Whom don't actually shoot every DBee they see but will often run off or deport them, and yes sometimes shoot them).

The NGR policy of deportation looks gentle. It looks kind. "oh they can survive, just please not in our country" but when you look at what's being done, they're killing those Dbees but putting the blood on someone elses hands. I.E. the Gargoyles.

Still, it's the NGR that's doing it. If they didn't force the Dbees out into Gargoyle held territory to 'live', then they wouldn't die.

It's like the NGR are on a boat, found a stowaway and push someone into shark infested water then hold up their hands and go 'Hey... I didn't kill um. I didn't even cut um.. Sharks ate um. The SHARK killed that guy. Not me"

Now the difference between Beating a stow away and maybe killing him (maybe not) but pushing him out into the general ocean where there may or may not be sharks, where he may or may not live if he tries hard

And

Finding that same stowaway and pushing him into water teaming with 1000s of blood thirsty sharks.... .

Is minimal.

[Shark_Force]

the NGR has a lot of border. not all of it is infested with gargoyles.

now, when you consider how likely it is for d-bees to come *out* of gargoyle-infested territory to settle a village and somehow be completely unable to cope with being in gargoyle-infested territory, it's much more likely for those d-bee villages to be in other parts of the NGR that don't border on active warzones.

because places that have been active warzones with demons generally don't produce a ton of villages of anything except demons (if you want to call demon settlements villages at all, that is).

now, when they did their original purge, that probably did kill a lot of d-bees (note that it groups them in with the gargoyles in numbers killed though, and more likely than not the bloody campaign killed mostly gargoyles with relatively few d-bees, at least compared to the gargoyles. still, i expect a lot of d-bees died as the result of being expelled from NGR territory at that time even if we assume relatively low direct casualties).

but the ones that are left now? very unlikely that they're unable to cope with living in gargoyle territory if they came from gargoyle territory to set up their villages. and again, i suspect many of them are more on the sides of the NGR that are not bordering gargoyle lands.

[Tor]

Still, it's the NGR that's doing it. If they didn't force the Dbees out into Gargoyle held territory to 'live', then they wouldn't die.

"I'm not drowning/suffocating you, I just own this water/space ship and do not want you on it. I can't be blamed for what the water/vacuum does."

[Zer0 Kay]

Still, it's the NGR that's doing it. If they didn't force the Dbees out into Gargoyle held territory to 'live', then they wouldn't die.

"I'm not drowning/suffocating you, I just own this water/space ship and do not want you on it. I can't be blamed for what the water/vacuum does."

You sure as heck could be blamed for spacing someone as you could legally be blamed for leaving someone at sea.

[Tor]

A lot of people would, sure. I expect the CCW would also prosecute people who evict people from their planet into a gargoyle pit too, like the NGR does.

[eliakon]

Well it would be....if the NGR was the only place in Europe that was free of the Gargoyles. There are a number of other nations listed......
Its not like there are just two places and if your not in one your in the other.....
A false Dichotomy is not really a good logical position to base a claim on.

[Tor]

What other places are you talking about, and how will expelled D-Bees get there from Germany?

When I look a the map at the top of WB5p223, the entire eastern border (Poland/Czechslovakia) of the NGR is Brodkil, the entire southern border (Austra/Switzerland) is Gargoyles. This leaves a narrow water-bordered path going north (Denmark) or west (Belgium/France).

WB5p23 ("D-Bees of the NGR") mention 700 thou D-Bees on "war-torn borders" which probably means eastBrod/southGarg problems. I'm not sure if this is in addition to or part of the 1.5 million who sneak back into Germany. "Along the borders" is kinda vague since it might mean just inside or just outside or just on the border so I don't know if that counts as the ones who snuck back in or not. Even if we tally this up as 1.5+0.7+0.2 we have 2.4 million. WB5p16 mentions 3.4 million got displaced. That leaves 1 million unaccounted for. I wonder how many of them survived... although there was a time lapse. Not sure exactly when it happened, I figure sometime after 38 PA since the "exercise of retribution" was displacing humans around that time.

I can't recall if Denmark was elaborated upon in WB5, but WB31p48 mentions that the NGR has claimed Denmark and that it's off-limits. So much for the northern path. It is uninhabitable except for a few pockets.

So what about the west?

WB5p215 mentions that France is a dangerous wasteland filled with monsters, that the Gargoyle Empire has claimed its Alps, and that a non-Empire clan of Gargoyles lives in Paris. It's also full of evil Blood Druids.

So what about Belgium? WB5p219 mentions that the Gargoyle Empire claims Belgium. WB31p17 mentions that there are aviaries there guarded by Gargoyle Mages. Page 18 mentions them launching attacks into France from Belgium.

So how about the Netherlands? WB31p21 says that Gargoyles have been encroaching on that area for years. Page 45 mentions how Gargoyles have expanded territory in both Belgium/Netherlands in the last decade. Page 52 mentions how railroads leading to Belgium/Netherlands from the Poznan collective were severed by the Gargoyle Empire.

So it really seems like there is nowhere to go that's free of Gargoyles or Brodkil or other monsters. I guess if you had a boat you could try sailing to England or something.

If there's anywhere at all to go besides that, it might be Norway or Sweden. Since we're still awaiting a world book to expand on this "Rifts Scandinavia", they might be friendlier to D-Bees than the NGR is.

Of course GETTING there could be a problem, with what we know of the dangerous of sea travel in Rifts. Particularly since so many of these D-Bees lose their assets when getting kicked out. I don't see the NGR building free boats for these people, much less the MDC/weaponized boats you'd need to have any reliable chance of survival trying to cross seas north to other lands.

The idea of them procuring planes seems even harder to believe. There might be some rare D-Bees with super-boats and super-planes but the vast majority aren't going to have advanced resources to jump these barriers and will be stuck border-guarding.

WB5p16 mentions that they could not bring machinery or livestock with them. Vehicles are machines. That means no vehicles or even horses. Sounds like they had to walk to me.

[Crash187]

Wow guys. I started the original 'the CS izent really evil.' Thread way back when i was in my twenties. I beleive my argument was centered on the fact that earth was human property and the cs' various methodologies while sometimes distasteful(the cs DOES actively engage in slavery, genocide and the oppression of its own people +its leadership is clearly currupt & probably insane)its an all or nothing do or die kind of thing. Moreover i would suggest that they are the only humans on earth who are still willing to step up and be counted as proprieters to the entire planet. I actualy said a lot more about it but im sure you'll see for yourself.

Today id like to comment on how this all relates to the image a gm should use to present my favorite misunderstood and misbehaved freedom fighting nazis.

They are people. They act like people. They arent stupid. They can be ignorant but they do in fact learn and they think of themselves as americans. (They seriously paint a very patriotic picture of themselves as the last sons of george washington) this does not mean they know anything about america in terms we would recognize but thats where the ignorance i mentioned comes in. The average character our heroes are likely to enteract with is too busy doing his job and trying to survive to be thinking about all that. He is interested in procedures, protocols, policies, orders, and whatever he saw on tv last night. If your char is clearly against protocol, e.g. not human or an unregistered mutant then our cs friend is likely to react aggressively (and prolly express an unhealthy degree of fear/paranoia) but what i said earlier about the 'bureaucratic' reaction remains true in this case however its his training that he will rely on.
The cs does have death and work camps where dbees are sent whenever its inconvenient to slaughter them outright and these places are very disturbing however the average cs citizen or soldier has very little idea about what these camps are or how they are run. If you still want your evil empire you can still have it but this way its a much darker more insidious kind of thing. Anyway ill try to come back later and ramble on. I need to go now.

Earth for humans first!!!!

[Shark_Force]

Wow guys. I started the original 'the CS izent really evil.' Thread way back when i was in my twenties. I beleive my argument was centered on the fact that earth was human property and the cs' various methodologies while sometimes distasteful(the cs DOES actively engage in slavery, genocide and the oppression of its own people +its leadership is clearly currupt & probably insane)its an all or nothing do or die kind of thing. Moreover i would suggest that they are the only humans on earth who are still willing to step up and be counted as proprieters to the entire planet. I actualy said a lot more about it but im sure you'll see for yourself.

Today id like to comment on how this all relates to the image a gm should use to present my favorite misunderstood and misbehaved freedom fighting nazis.

They are people. They act like people. They arent stupid. They can be ignorant but they do in fact learn and they think of themselves as americans. (They seriously paint a very patriotic picture of themselves as the last sons of george washington) this does not mean they know anything about america in terms we would recognize but thats where the ignorance i mentioned comes in. The average character our heroes are likely to enteract with is too busy doing his job and trying to survive to be thinking about all that. He is interested in procedures, protocols, policies, orders, and whatever he saw on tv last night. If your char is clearly against protocol, e.g. not human or an unregistered mutant then our cs friend is likely to react aggressively (and prolly express an unhealthy degree of fear/paranoia) but what i said earlier about the 'bureaucratic' reaction remains true in this case however its his training that he will rely on.
The cs does have death and work camps where dbees are sent whenever its inconvenient to slaughter them outright and these places are very disturbing however the average cs citizen or soldier has very little idea about what these camps are or how they are run. If you still want your evil empire you can still have it but this way its a much darker more insidious kind of thing. Anyway ill try to come back later and ramble on. I need to go now.

Earth for humans first!!!!

as i've said already several times, i understand *why* they are evil. they are a very human kind of evil, very distinct from demons and other such creatures.

but they're still evil for doing all those evil things. it doesn't matter if their goal is not inherently evil. the methods they have chosen to accomplish that goal are evil, therefore they are evil. they might be evil out of sheer ignorance, and they certainly won't think of themselves as being evil, but that doesn't change them to somehow being less evil.

[eliakon]

Wow guys. I started the original 'the CS izent really evil.' Thread way back when i was in my twenties. I beleive my argument was centered on the fact that earth was human property and the cs' various methodologies while sometimes distasteful(the cs DOES actively engage in slavery, genocide and the oppression of its own people +its leadership is clearly currupt & probably insane)its an all or nothing do or die kind of thing. Moreover i would suggest that they are the only humans on earth who are still willing to step up and be counted as proprieters to the entire planet. I actualy said a lot more about it but im sure you'll see for yourself.

Today id like to comment on how this all relates to the image a gm should use to present my favorite misunderstood and misbehaved freedom fighting nazis.

They are people. They act like people. They arent stupid. They can be ignorant but they do in fact learn and they think of themselves as americans. (They seriously paint a very patriotic picture of themselves as the last sons of george washington) this does not mean they know anything about america in terms we would recognize but thats where the ignorance i mentioned comes in. The average character our heroes are likely to enteract with is too busy doing his job and trying to survive to be thinking about all that. He is interested in procedures, protocols, policies, orders, and whatever he saw on tv last night. If your char is clearly against protocol, e.g. not human or an unregistered mutant then our cs friend is likely to react aggressively (and prolly express an unhealthy degree of fear/paranoia) but what i said earlier about the 'bureaucratic' reaction remains true in this case however its his training that he will rely on.
The cs does have death and work camps where dbees are sent whenever its inconvenient to slaughter them outright and these places are very disturbing however the average cs citizen or soldier has very little idea about what these camps are or how they are run. If you still want your evil empire you can still have it but this way its a much darker more insidious kind of thing. Anyway ill try to come back later and ramble on. I need to go now.

Earth for humans first!!!!

Unfortunately Evil is still Evil. Even if your not as evil as the other guy over there. "But I only murder and eat babies on Thursdays, and he does it every day. So he is evil and I am not." Doesn't hold any water.

And as I pointed out earlier in the thread the CS is not claiming Earth for the humans. They are claiming Earth for the CS. There is a HUGE difference. The CS has no intention of sharing with the various other humans who have as much (if not better) claim to the land. Ask the Native Americans who have been on North America for millennium who has rights to the land.....but the CS says that they need to go....

And the claim that they are the only ones willing to stand up and be counted as the 'proprietors' of the whole planet....That is just the point. They aren't the proprietors of the whole planet. Its not Emperor Proseks Planet. Tritonia, the New Navy, Japan......l could go on and on listing places that have as good or better claims to be the inheritors of the Earth.....ones that are not run by genocidal megalomaniacs. You cant give someone credit as being a good guy' for standing up and saying "I think that the people who own this property are doing it wrong. So I want to murder them all, steal their domains and run it the way that I think it should be run" That isn't good, that is in fact the very definition of evil.

[Pepsi Jedi]

the NGR has a lot of border. not all of it is infested with gargoyles.

now, when you consider how likely it is for d-bees to come *out* of gargoyle-infested territory to settle a village and somehow be completely unable to cope with being in gargoyle-infested territory, it's much more likely for those d-bee villages to be in other parts of the NGR that don't border on active warzones.

because places that have been active warzones with demons generally don't produce a ton of villages of anything except demons (if you want to call demon settlements villages at all, that is).

now, when they did their original purge, that probably did kill a lot of d-bees (note that it groups them in with the gargoyles in numbers killed though, and more likely than not the bloody campaign killed mostly gargoyles with relatively few d-bees, at least compared to the gargoyles. still, i expect a lot of d-bees died as the result of being expelled from NGR territory at that time even if we assume relatively low direct casualties).

but the ones that are left now? very unlikely that they're unable to cope with living in gargoyle territory if they came from gargoyle territory to set up their villages. and again, i suspect many of them are more on the sides of the NGR that are not bordering gargoyle lands.

Surrounded and under seige, means that yes, if you're kicked out, you're kicked into the lands in the control of the surrounding and beseiging army. lol

Yes ,the NGR are kicking out the DBees to their death.

[Pepsi Jedi]

Still, it's the NGR that's doing it. If they didn't force the Dbees out into Gargoyle held territory to 'live', then they wouldn't die.

"I'm not drowning/suffocating you, I just own this water/space ship and do not want you on it. I can't be blamed for what the water/vacuum does."

You sure as heck could be blamed for spacing someone as you could legally be blamed for leaving someone at sea.

That's the point. That's what the NGR is doing. They're not putting a gun to the Dbees head and pulling the trigger.

They're throwing them out into lands held by invading demonic armies, and THEY kill them. (Just like the ocean and space would kill people..)

[Pepsi Jedi]

Well it would be....if the NGR was the only place in Europe that was free of the Gargoyles. There are a number of other nations listed......
Its not like there are just two places and if your not in one your in the other.....
A false Dichotomy is not really a good logical position to base a claim on.

Right.... because when you Deport aliens, you use military units to break through the lines of a besieging army of literal demons, to get them out of danger and through the vast lands held by those demons to get them some place safe.....

*chuckles* They're escorted to the border and told more or less. "Good luck"

[flatline]

Well it would be....if the NGR was the only place in Europe that was free of the Gargoyles. There are a number of other nations listed......
Its not like there are just two places and if your not in one your in the other.....
A false Dichotomy is not really a good logical position to base a claim on.

Right.... because when you Deport aliens, you use military units to break through the lines of a besieging army of literal demons, to get them out of danger and through the vast lands held by those demons to get them some place safe.....

*chuckles* They're escorted to the border and told more or less. "Good luck"

Well, the NGR is perfectly capable of flying over/around the enemy lines. They do this routinely. But that does seem like an excessive courtesy to folks being deported. Maybe put them on a boat?

You'll have to remind me, is the NGR completely surrounded by their enemies? The GMG shows the Gargoyles to their south and perhaps (if I'm reading this right) Brodkil on either side?

--flatline

[eliakon]

Well it would be....if the NGR was the only place in Europe that was free of the Gargoyles. There are a number of other nations listed......
Its not like there are just two places and if your not in one your in the other.....
A false Dichotomy is not really a good logical position to base a claim on.

Right.... because when you Deport aliens, you use military units to break through the lines of a besieging army of literal demons, to get them out of danger and through the vast lands held by those demons to get them some place safe.....

*chuckles* They're escorted to the border and told more or less. "Good luck"

Well, the NGR is perfectly capable of flying over/around the enemy lines. They do this routinely. But that does seem like an excessive courtesy to folks being deported. Maybe put them on a boat?

You'll have to remind me, is the NGR completely surrounded by their enemies? The GMG shows the Gargoyles to their south and perhaps (if I'm reading this right) Brodkil on either side?

--flatline

The Ponzna collective in Poland is allied with the NGR, trades with them and has joint bases.....
France is explicitly unclaimed (it is contested wilderness.....the same description used for the American West......)
Tarnow is yet another kingdom that trades with the NGR
England trades and is said to take in refugees

And of course the Gargoyles and Broadkil are described as controlling cities and claiming territory but not patrolling it, and having D-bee villages with in their 'boarders'

But hey if we ignore the actual book sure, its instant death to be outside the NGR......

[Killer Cyborg]

Well it would be....if the NGR was the only place in Europe that was free of the Gargoyles. There are a number of other nations listed......
Its not like there are just two places and if your not in one your in the other.....
A false Dichotomy is not really a good logical position to base a claim on.

Right.... because when you Deport aliens, you use military units to break through the lines of a besieging army of literal demons, to get them out of danger and through the vast lands held by those demons to get them some place safe.....

*chuckles* They're escorted to the border and told more or less. "Good luck"

Well, the NGR is perfectly capable of flying over/around the enemy lines. They do this routinely. But that does seem like an excessive courtesy to folks being deported. Maybe put them on a boat?

You'll have to remind me, is the NGR completely surrounded by their enemies? The GMG shows the Gargoyles to their south and perhaps (if I'm reading this right) Brodkil on either side?

--flatline

The Ponzna collective in Poland is allied with the NGR, trades with them and has joint bases.....
France is explicitly unclaimed (it is contested wilderness.....the same description used for the American West......)
Tarnow is yet another kingdom that trades with the NGR
England trades and is said to take in refugees

And of course the Gargoyles and Broadkil are described as controlling cities and claiming territory but not patrolling it, and having D-bee villages with in their 'boarders'

But hey if we ignore the actual book sure, its instant death to be outside the NGR......

Not instant death, but hardly shangri-la either.
The D-Bees were forced from their homes and "left to fend for themselves." The fact that the D-Bees as of 103 PA were still living on the borders of the NGR, and/or have snuck back inside the borders, indicates that they weren'd shipped off to a lovely resort in France, but rather were just dumped outside the border. According to NGR 16, 250k loyal D-Bee former citizens were "allowed to establish new villages along the most remote and hostile areas along the borders."
Those were the loyal D-Bees. I doubt that the disloyal or disgruntled D-Bees got better treatment.

[Alrik Vas]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

[Killer Cyborg]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

If that's another way of saying, "the point is the NGR is roughly as genocidal as the CS overall," then I'm with you.

[Shark_Force]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

If that's another way of saying, "the point is the NGR is roughly as genocidal as the CS overall," then I'm with you.

eh, i wouldn't go that far.

the CS is known for personally killing a lot of d-bees, often on sight.

the NGR is known for driving them into dangerous territory (but not so dangerous to make it guaranteed death), and likely wouldn't care if they were driving them into non-dangerous territory at all so long as it isn't NGR territory. and in fact, in certain parts of their territory, most likely do just that (the gargoyles are not literally everywhere, after all). in all likelihood, any d-bees that get driven into dangerous territory most likely try to make their way towards those less dangerous borders as well, though that certainly isn't the result of any benevelonce on the part of the NGR.

main point being, the NGR doesn't care if they live or die, while the CS explicitly cares that they do die, enough to make the effort to kill them.

neither is what i would describe as being "good", but they are definitely not equivalent either.

[Killer Cyborg]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

If that's another way of saying, "the point is the NGR is roughly as genocidal as the CS overall," then I'm with you.

eh, i wouldn't go that far.

the CS is known for personally killing a lot of d-bees, often on sight.

Again:
NGR 15
In reaction to gargoyles and their allies "pillaging the countryside with increasing frequency and growing numbers," the NGR responded with The Bloody Campaign:
To the humans and their robot legions, the so-called demons are not recognized as valid life forms, but as evil, hell-spawned abominations bent on the destruction of humankind. The soldiers saw only demonic predators that needed to be destroyed. The next five years was one of the worst campaigns of destruction since the Great Cataclysm. The bloodiest of these battles were waged in the Polish wilderness. Hundreds of thousands of gargoyles, monsters and monstrous d-bees were erased from the face of the planet. Entire tribes were slaughtered without mercy.

main point being, the NGR doesn't care if they live or die, while the CS explicitly cares that they do die, enough to make the effort to kill them.

The NGR has 1.5 million d-bees that have snuck back into their territory, another 700,000 allowed to live "along the NGR's war-torn borders," (a number which causes some alarm with in the NGR), and there are an additional 200,000 D-Bees scattered throughout the cities and occasional villages of Germany.
The Coalition has 10 million "D-bees, mutants, and other intelligent non-humans" living in their territory. 2.4 million of those are Dog Boys, but any way you slice it the CS allows far more D-Bees within their borders than the NGR does. The CS is obviously not overly preoccupied with slaughtering them, and they haven't even focused on expelling them.
Heck, the CS allows The Burbs within their territory and that's something that the NGR would never tolerate.

[eliakon]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

If that's another way of saying, "the point is the NGR is roughly as genocidal as the CS overall," then I'm with you.

eh, i wouldn't go that far.

the CS is known for personally killing a lot of d-bees, often on sight.

Again:
NGR 15
In reaction to gargoyles and their allies "pillaging the countryside with increasing frequency and growing numbers," the NGR responded with The Bloody Campaign:
To the humans and their robot legions, the so-called demons are not recognized as valid life forms, but as evil, hell-spawned abominations bent on the destruction of humankind. The soldiers saw only demonic predators that needed to be destroyed. The next five years was one of the worst campaigns of destruction since the Great Cataclysm. The bloodiest of these battles were waged in the Polish wilderness. Hundreds of thousands of gargoyles, monsters and monstrous d-bees were erased from the face of the planet. Entire tribes were slaughtered without mercy.

So the NGR, in its bloodiest campaign to date killed about as many (Combined total) Demons, Monsters, and Monstrous D-Bees as the CS has killed Slumph (just one peaceful race)......

[Alrik Vas]

I'm confused on your point, eliakon. It sounds like you're saying the NGR isn't the bad guy when you look at the CS.

Kind of like saying the CS isn't the bad guy when you look at the splugort.

[Shark_Force]

I'm confused on your point, eliakon. It sounds like you're saying the NGR isn't the bad guy when you look at the CS.

Kind of like saying the CS isn't the bad guy when you look at the splugort.

nope, just refuting the claim that the NGR is just as focused on genocide as the CS.

they don't care about d-bee lives. they'll kill them in certain circumstances (the only one particularly mentioned was a single event, rather than a continuous thing, and was of an unspecified number since the hundreds of thousands mentioned included gargoyles and monsters. personally, i'm inclined to suspect that the NGR probably killed more gargoyles and monsters (probably mostly brodkil, since iirc poland is brodkil empire territory) than they killed monstrous d-bees, considering the entire campaign was specifically being aimed against the gargoyles.

note that entire tribes could be referring to gargoyles, not just monstrous d-bees. during the time in question, the gargoyles were iirc not an empire yet, so they would have been individual tribes, and the slaughtering of said tribes would have included non-combatants (presumably children; i don't recall any mention of female gargoyles being non-combatants).

which is not to say that no d-bees were slaughtered. certainly, if the NGR perceived them as an imminent threat, then or now, i presume the NGR would move against them without mercy. but if they're not perceived as an imminent threat, the NGR just doesn't care.

but it is worth noticing that since that time, the NGR has not continued their campaign of slaughter. and there is a pretty substantial difference between a person (or nation) that does a bad thing once, and a person or nation that does bad things over and over and over again.

[Killer Cyborg]

So... I guess it's not genocide when you target certain races for destruction, if you leave others relatively intact...?

[Shark_Force]

So... I guess it's not genocide when you target certain races for destruction, if you leave others relatively intact...?

they didn't try to kill them all, actually. they killed a lot in response to repeated attacks (which in itself is a major difference from the CS, who slaughter peaceful d-bees that pose no threat to them), and then left without further prompting.

they certainly killed a *lot* of gargoyles, but iirc ~30 years later the empire was back in sufficient numbers to represent an even larger threat when they retaliated.

[Killer Cyborg]

So... I guess it's not genocide when you target certain races for destruction, if you leave others relatively intact...?

they didn't try to kill them all, actually. they killed a lot in response to repeated attacks (which in itself is a major difference from the CS, who slaughter peaceful d-bees that pose no threat to them), and then left without further prompting.

You kill an entire tribe, that's genocide.
And I do t think it was on accident.

they certainly killed a *lot* of gargoyles, but iirc ~30 years later the empire was back in sufficient numbers to represent an even larger threat when they retaliated.

Maybe in 30 years, the Slumph will be back too.
No harm done.

[Pepsi Jedi]

Point is the NGR isn't in the d-bee rescue business. Think that's pretty well understood by now.

If that's another way of saying, "the point is the NGR is roughly as genocidal as the CS overall," then I'm with you.

eh, i wouldn't go that far.

the CS is known for personally killing a lot of d-bees, often on sight.

Again:
NGR 15
In reaction to gargoyles and their allies "pillaging the countryside with increasing frequency and growing numbers," the NGR responded with The Bloody Campaign:
To the humans and their robot legions, the so-called demons are not recognized as valid life forms, but as evil, hell-spawned abominations bent on the destruction of humankind. The soldiers saw only demonic predators that needed to be destroyed. The next five years was one of the worst campaigns of destruction since the Great Cataclysm. The bloodiest of these battles were waged in the Polish wilderness. Hundreds of thousands of gargoyles, monsters and monstrous d-bees were erased from the face of the planet. Entire tribes were slaughtered without mercy.

So the NGR, in its bloodiest campaign to date killed about as many (Combined total) Demons, Monsters, and Monstrous D-Bees as the CS has killed Slumph (just one peaceful race)......

This again, is based on what is pretty clearly a misprint.

[Pepsi Jedi]

So... I guess it's not genocide when you target certain races for destruction, if you leave others relatively intact...?

I've pointed this out from the start. Noone seems to mind genocide of 'demons' but 'dbees' is totally different. One you're a hero, the other a villain.

[Q99]

I think this stems from one simple thing: Demons are almost certainly going to try and kill you, or innocents. It's generally considered ok to kill someone who's trying to kill you or others. Heck, I'll say it's ok to wipe out a D-Bee faction if they're actively trying to wipe you out, enslave you, or so on. The real problem comes in with going after ones that are not coming after you, not going around killing people, and can be reasoned with.

Considering they're immortal, almost every demon is likely to have obscene body counts, as well. They're also not known for negotiating honestly.


There is a major difference between acting in defense or protection of others, and against ones who often don't need any convincing to not kill you because it didn't cross their mind, or at the least peace can be had with words.

[Killer Cyborg]

I think this stems from one simple thing: Demons are almost certainly going to try and kill you, or innocents. It's generally considered ok to kill someone who's trying to kill you or others.

I'm down with that... but there are some folks around here who have claimed that genocide is inherently evil, and they keep using the term as if it meant that the people committing genocide are necessarily evil.

Next question:
Is it okay to kill somebody who you honestly believe is trying to kill you or others?

[Killer Cyborg]

Also, if anybody can find anything about the NGR trying to negotiate before the Bloody Campaign, let me know.

[Zer0 Kay]

A lot of people would, sure. I expect the CCW would also prosecute people who evict people from their planet into a gargoyle pit too, like the NGR does.

I object sir. Gargoyles are not an immediate execution like spacing. So ejection into a gargoyle or other demon infested wilderness is not in itself an immediate death sentence but a callous action from which a person may die but who's death is not guaranteed. Spacing is no different then electrocution or other means of execution where death is almost certain. It is more certain that your gonna kill someone spacing them than shooting them. I'd argue the same for abandoning them at sea. Granted by sea or by space even if given minimal survival gear the survival rate doesn't climb much higher. Of course all of this is dependant on whatever is spaced, or abandoned at sea not being specialized for the particular environment.

Now we should stop comparing it to individuals and compare it to nation/states. A spacing or something equally deadly is an execution, being dumped into the wilderness to rely on their own skill is banishment and in gargoyle territory may still be more survivable than banishment into some of the harsher environments on Earth, even without monsters in them.

[Pepsi Jedi]

I think this stems from one simple thing: Demons are almost certainly going to try and kill you, or innocents. It's generally considered ok to kill someone who's trying to kill you or others. Heck, I'll say it's ok to wipe out a D-Bee faction if they're actively trying to wipe you out, enslave you, or so on. The real problem comes in with going after ones that are not coming after you, not going around killing people, and can be reasoned with.

Considering they're immortal, almost every demon is likely to have obscene body counts, as well. They're also not known for negotiating honestly.


There is a major difference between acting in defense or protection of others, and against ones who often don't need any convincing to not kill you because it didn't cross their mind, or at the least peace can be had with words.

By this sort of logic the CS should be 'ok' then. The creatures which they (The CS) are hostile against are alien invaders of our planet, and have as a whole or inpart, preyed upon humanity for 300 years, nearly wiping them from the face of the earth. The CS is fighting against creatures (Aliens, dimensional beings, supernatural beings) that have tried to kill them and wipe them out.

The 'DBees' may claim other wise, but so do Demons and Deevils when put to the test.

The difference being that we as readers, 'know' most demons to be evil. ( Not all are. You can play them as chars. i have a demoness in a HU game right now), and we as readers 'know' that not 'all' Dbees are evil.

in world though, the difference between a "Demon" and "Scary looking DBee" is going to be largely lost on the rank and file of humanity. After 300 years of predation upon the human race, people don't stop to get a real real real good look and sociological report on the scary looking alien. They're lumped together. (Same as demons are lumped together and called bad)

(Which is what, I imagine KC is going to get to with his query)

The CS ___HONESTLY BELIEVES___ That the Dbees and aliens and everything is trying to kill them. Because for the most part for the previous 300 years, they -have-.

[Alrik Vas]

A lot of people would, sure. I expect the CCW would also prosecute people who evict people from their planet into a gargoyle pit too, like the NGR does.

I object sir. Gargoyles are not an immediate execution like spacing. So ejection into a gargoyle or other demon infested wilderness is not in itself an immediate death sentence but a callous action from which a person may die but who's death is not guaranteed. Spacing is no different then electrocution or other means of execution where death is almost certain. It is more certain that your gonna kill someone spacing them than shooting them. I'd argue the same for abandoning them at sea. Granted by sea or by space even if given minimal survival gear the survival rate doesn't climb much higher. Of course all of this is dependant on whatever is spaced, or abandoned at sea not being specialized for the particular environment.

Now we should stop comparing it to individuals and compare it to nation/states. A spacing or something equally deadly is an execution, being dumped into the wilderness to rely on their own skill is banishment and in gargoyle territory may still be more survivable than banishment into some of the harsher environments on Earth, even without monsters in them.

I agree they're different, but the NGR still executes d-bees, and without trial, when they feel it necessary or just more convenient. That's a practice they share with the CS. Doing it less doesn't exclude them from having done it.

But, considering these practices, I think it would be interesting to compare the alignments of the leadership in each human supremacist nation with their deeds for or against non-humans.

Might produce some interesting data about the moral absolute of the setting.

[flatline]

There seem to be some interesting sub-topics that could be explored. Perhaps it's time to give them their own threads and let this one die.

--flatline

[Jefffar]

A lot of people would, sure. I expect the CCW would also prosecute people who evict people from their planet into a gargoyle pit too, like the NGR does.

I object sir. Gargoyles are not an immediate execution like spacing. So ejection into a gargoyle or other demon infested wilderness is not in itself an immediate death sentence but a callous action from which a person may die but who's death is not guaranteed. Spacing is no different then electrocution or other means of execution where death is almost certain. It is more certain that your gonna kill someone spacing them than shooting them. I'd argue the same for abandoning them at sea. Granted by sea or by space even if given minimal survival gear the survival rate doesn't climb much higher. Of course all of this is dependant on whatever is spaced, or abandoned at sea not being specialized for the particular environment.

Now we should stop comparing it to individuals and compare it to nation/states. A spacing or something equally deadly is an execution, being dumped into the wilderness to rely on their own skill is banishment and in gargoyle territory may still be more survivable than banishment into some of the harsher environments on Earth, even without monsters in them.

Wasn't a similar logic used by the villain in a number of Greek myths to get around being punished by the gods for killing one's kin? Have the baby left out on the hillside with its legs bound. Put the daughter and her child in a box and drop it in the ocean. It was okay to put them in the way of certain death, just as long as you didnt directly kill them.

[Tor]

they're still evil for doing all those evil things.

The 'Coalition States' is a nation, something must be explicitly a national action to call the nation evil. There have been serial killers in Canada, doesn't make Canada evil for being able to produce serial killer citizens.

Slavery doesn't appear to be evil under alignment guidelines, so long as you went about it with some ethical restrictions (ie don't kill slaves who talk back, punish them more gently).

As for genocide, that's not explicitly evil under alignment guidelines either. Individual killings would be judged on a case by case basis.

Note that to prove something is 'evil', you can't just prove it isn't 'good' (violating principled/scrupulous), you must also prove it's not selfish (unprincipled/anarchist can't do it either)

the CS is not claiming Earth for the humans. They are claiming Earth for the CS.

Source? Is this why they're promising to conquer Ishpeming, Germany, Cordoba, Columbia and Japan?

Being expansionist and unfriendly to mage/D-Bee cities in NA doesn't mean they won't respect the sovereignty of responsible human nations intercontinentally.

The CS has no intention of sharing with the various other humans who have as much (if not better) claim to the land. Ask the Native Americans who have been on North America for millennium who has rights to the land.....but the CS says that they need to go....

The CS is not opposed to Native Americans.

They are opposed to a segment of puritan traditionalists who practise magic and who LEFT EARTH (to live in some pocket dimension) since they abandoned their home and want to sell out humanity to alien gods.

They aren't the proprietors of the whole planet. Its not Emperor Proseks Planet. Tritonia, the New Navy, Japan......l could go on and on listing places that have as good or better claims to be the inheritors of the Earth.....

The CS is not claiming that the CS are the sole inheritors of the earth, they are claiming that humanity is, and they are agents of humanity. Unless you can point out where the CS absolutely denies any other nation of humans having a claim, I don't see why we should jump to this conclusion.

They do war on nations containing human populations who engage in wreckless magic and d-bee-friending which could doom the planet once more, but that doesn't equate to ignoring other secular humans like themself having a claim.

ones that are not run by genocidal megalomaniacs.

Karl has created a nation which tolerates genocidal maniacs and has toyed with it as a military option but I haven't seen enough to view him as being genocidal himself.

You cant give someone credit as being a good guy' for standing up and saying "I think that the people who own this property are doing it wrong. So I want to murder them all, steal their domains and run it the way that I think it should be run" That isn't good, that is in fact the very definition of evil.

I don't agree with you about that.

If people are running property wrongly enough to the point of allowing terrorism, human sacrifice, making weapons of mass destruction, not making adequate steps to improve, it is perfectly fine to step in when they are endangering others.

Well, the NGR is perfectly capable of flying over/around the enemy lines. They do this routinely. But that does seem like an excessive courtesy to folks being deported. Maybe put them on a boat?

Slave trading lines between Atlantis and London of Splynn say hi.

You'll have to remind me, is the NGR completely surrounded by their enemies? The GMG shows the Gargoyles to their south and perhaps (if I'm reading this right) Brodkil on either side?

Yes they are, except for Denmark which is a barely habitable wasteland where the NGR does military tests, so that's the best option.

I did a breakdown viewtopic.php?p=2870547#p2870547 of this, of the NGR's bordering countries and evidence they're all dominated by monsters. Dunno if flatline might have me blocked, if anyone wants to send it do him.

The Ponzna collective in Poland is allied with the NGR, trades with them and has joint bases.....

Did not consider this option, sounds like an interesting alternative to ruined-denmark and dangerous-seas.

France is explicitly unclaimed (it is contested wilderness.....the same description used for the American West......)

Wrong, at least a portion of it has been claimed by the Gargoyle Kingdom, the alps. Gkingdom launches attacks on NGR through france so it is not safe. Plus a 2nd clan of Gargoyles in paris, and roaming Blood Druids. Even if it's not 100% front battle lines, it is incredibly hostile.

Tarnow is yet another kingdom that trades with the NGR

When I look on page 110 of the Mindwerks sourcebook, the place where Tarnow Kingdom appears on the top map seems to fall within the area Brodkil Empire on the bottom map which is cross-hatch to indicate they dominate the region. As opposed to Poznan/Wroclaw which fall within an area that Brodkil Empire claims but which they do not dominate.

Page 88 also clearly states that Tarnow rests at the heart of the Brodkil Empire.

Just because this city can trade with the NGR does not mean it would be easy for D-Bees to make their way there from the NGR borders. Trade convoys get protection escorts, D-Bees wouldn't have enjoyed that, cept maybe some rare examples who had a spot secured at Tarnow ahead of time.

Page 92 under Peter Wojtyla's allies mentions that there isn't a formal relationship between the NGR and Tarnow, that Peter prefers to be unaffiliated, and that the NGR has nothing to do with Tarnow because it associates openly with D-Bees. Doesn't sound like there would be any kind of 'here let me send you these D-Bees on this next trade convoy' situation going on.

England trades and is said to take in refugees

Do you mean New Camelot? Unfortunately to get that far north, you have to sail right past London of Splynn to get there, and who is going to foot the bill to protect these guys?

The NGR doesn't let D-Bees take machines with them, unlike cars a boat can be simple enough not to call a machine I guess. But most won't own one, so they would have had to trade a lot of the meager supplies they had to get access to one. Very little protection in basic boats. One of those big armored fish could easily eat you, introduced in Rifts England.

hey if we ignore the actual book sure, its instant death to be outside the NGR......

Nobody's saying instant death, just a high likelihood of eventual death.

In theory if you're thrown off a ship, you can just float on your back and eat raw fish that swim up to you, but it's not incredibly likely to succeed.

the CS is known for personally killing a lot of d-bees, often on sight.

Within their territory, sure. Unless, like in the NGR, they have work permits. The primary difference is that NGR has a path to citizenship for D-Bees whereas the CS does not and requires a human to take responsibility for them.

What do you think the NGR does to D-Bees who enter NGR territory without authorization and resist leaving?

the NGR is known for driving them into dangerous territory (but not so dangerous to make it guaranteed death), and likely wouldn't care if they were driving them into non-dangerous territory at all so long as it isn't NGR territory.

I see the CS as doing the same thing.

in certain parts of their territory, most likely do just that (the gargoyles are not literally everywhere, after all).

CS soldiers aren't everywhere killing D-Bees either, they in fact avoid killing them enough that a huge swath of them are able to lurk around Chi-Town, the big capital city of the empire.

the NGR doesn't care if they live or die, while the CS explicitly cares that they do die, enough to make the effort to kill them.

You think the NGR are pacifists regarding D-Bees who refuse to leave?

The CS cares about killing D-Bees who invade human territory, same as NGR. They don't care about traveling everywhere to kill them. It's not as if they care about conquering other planets, other dimensions, that aliens come from.

The CS wants to secure a sizeable territory for humans.

Hundreds of thousands of gargoyles, monsters and monstrous d-bees were erased from the face of the planet. Entire tribes were slaughtered without mercy.

Yup, and 'monstrous d-bee' (explicitly not monsters, since listed separately) could be pretty broad. Probably includes potentially benign folk like Giants, Wolfen, Ogres, Kankoran, Troglodytes and Kobolds, sparing maybe some pretty folk like Gnomes/Dwarves/Elves.

The NGR has 1.5 million d-bees that have snuck back into their territory, another 700,000 allowed to live "along the NGR's war-torn borders," (a number which causes some alarm with in the NGR), and there are an additional 200,000 D-Bees scattered throughout the cities and occasional villages of Germany.
The Coalition has 10 million "D-bees, mutants, and other intelligent non-humans" living in their territory. 2.4 million of those are Dog Boys, but any way you slice it the CS allows far more D-Bees within their borders than the NGR does. The CS is obviously not overly preoccupied with slaughtering them, and they haven't even focused on expelling them.
Heck, the CS allows The Burbs within their territory and that's something that the NGR would never tolerate.

Excellent, didn't even think of tallying this up for comparison.

So the NGR, in its bloodiest campaign to date killed about as many (Combined total) Demons, Monsters, and Monstrous D-Bees as the CS has killed Slumph (just one peaceful race)......

I don't consider the Slurmphs peaceful, I think they eat too much and cause slipping hazards.

It's also easy to wipe them out when you consider them a pest and let dog boys dig up their young like truffles.

Their young are abandoned by parents so unless they get taken in early by soemone else to raise them up, they will be monstrous and eating wildly, with only a minority encountering a mentor to teach them to be peaceful and farm and engage in commerce.

So... I guess it's not genocide when you target certain races for destruction, if you leave others relatively intact...?

they didn't try to kill them all, actually. they killed a lot in response to repeated attacks (which in itself is a major difference from the CS

This is exactly what Joseph Prosek's Bloody Campaign did when they invaded the magic zone. They didn't wipe out everyone there, they only wiped out members of the class who were primarily attacking them, the mages and their supernatural minions. They were both genocides, probably why they both share the 'Bloody Campaign' moniker.

slaughter peaceful d-bees that pose no threat to them

Please tell me an example of a peaceful D-Bee that poses 'no threat' to the CS which they have slaughtered.

WB30's Slurmph (p190) and Swamp-Sludger (p200) do not qualify. Both endanger food supplies. Slurmphs are risks to ground vehicle traffic by leaving slippery parts everywhere. Sludgers fire weapons into crowds and recklessly start machines or steal items.

they certainly killed a *lot* of gargoyles, but iirc ~30 years later the empire was back in sufficient numbers to represent an even larger threat when they retaliated.

They breed fast, which is why the NGR is now considering napalming their egg hatcheries. How much more innocent do you need their victims to be before we accept they are ruthless?

I think this stems from one simple thing: Demons are almost certainly going to try and kill you, or innocents.

Wrong, a lot of demons just like to mess around with you, maybe corrupt your morals, take you on as a servant, make you offer it a finger or two to eat.

It's generally considered ok to kill someone who's trying to kill you or others.

But we are discussing the pre-emptive killing of monsters because they 'almost certainly' will try to kill you (you know, the way the CS thinks of mages/d-bees) not actually waiting until they try.

I'll say it's ok to wipe out a D-Bee faction if they're actively trying to wipe you out, enslave you, or so on.

The victims of the NGR were not explicitly described as doing this.

Considering they're immortal, almost every demon is likely to have obscene body counts, as well. They're also not known for negotiating honestly.

So the Succubi aren't master manipulators, they just go around killing people?

There is a major difference between acting in defense or protection of others, and against ones who often don't need any convincing to not kill you because it didn't cross their mind, or at the least peace can be had with words.

What group are you talking about here?

Did attacking the CS not cross the mind of Tolkeen or something? I guess their build-up of war machines was exclusively a north-based anti-Xiticix defense and not a south-based CS assault force?

I object sir. Gargoyles are not an immediate execution like spacing.

I object sir, spacing is not an immediate execution, I think you could survive a couple seconds if you were a tough fellow.

You might survive a couple weeks in a Gargoyle-ridden wilderness, so I guess it's better than being dumped into a pit of Tomb-Vipers who will kill you within minutes. I guess Gargoyle-dumping is more like dying of thirst, or at best, getting starved to death, in terms of 'time to die' whereas being dumped in a pit of snakes is more like drowning.

ejection into a gargoyle or other demon infested wilderness is not in itself an immediate death sentence but a callous action from which a person may die but who's death is not guaranteed.

And worse treatment than the Coalition who lets 10x as many D-Bees sneak into their borders.

I guess gargoyle dumping is like how at sea you might get left on a deserted mini-island with 1 round in your pistol.

being dumped into the wilderness to rely on their own skill is banishment and in gargoyle territory may still be more survivable than banishment into some of the harsher environments on Earth, even without monsters in them.

Like being exiled to Denmark?

the NGR still executes d-bees, and without trial, when they feel it necessary or just more convenient.

This appeals to me but I forgot if I saw it somewhere, anyone remember page?

Wasn't a similar logic used by the villain in a number of Greek myths to get around being punished by the gods for killing one's kin? Have the baby left out on the hillside with its legs bound. Put the daughter and her child in a box and drop it in the ocean. It was okay to put them in the way of certain death, just as long as you didnt directly kill them.

This was also an issue of contention in the "Outlander" series where in old Scotland the protagonist comes across a baby left in a tree to die of exposure because it was sick so it must have been a "Fae baby" so they were just returning it to the Fae.

[Killer Cyborg]

The CS has no intention of sharing with the various other humans who have as much (if not better) claim to the land. Ask the Native Americans who have been on North America for millennium who has rights to the land.....but the CS says that they need to go....

Hm.
Do you consider the United States of America to be Evil?

[Shark_Force]

I agree they're different, but the NGR still executes d-bees, and without trial, when they feel it necessary or just more convenient. That's a practice they share with the CS. Doing it less doesn't exclude them from having done it.

are they doing this consistently? i don't remember anything about this happening, though i also don't own triax 2.

as i said earlier, doing something once (and voluntarily stopping) is very different from doing something repeatedly with no signs that you ever intend to stop, or indeed when you're explicitly and clearly stating that you intend to keep on doing it.

a person who tells one lie when under great pressure is not the same as a person who always lies any time the truth is inconvenient to them.

a person who steals once when under great pressure is not the same as a person who steals regularly because they don't feel like earning an honest living.

and yes, a nation that wages all-out war after once, after repeatedly occuring recent attacks, and kills a lot of others* while killing primarily combatants but stops voluntarily before killing off all of them is different from a nation that kills people that they have no actual grievance against, which plans to continue killing those people without actual provocation, and has directly stated they intend to continue that practice until they have exterminated any of those people who are unable or unwilling to get off of the planet.

* it is worth noting that some or even most of those "monstrous d-bees" could have actually been the gargoyles' allies and may have been part of the attacks against the NGR that provoked the bloody campaign in the first place, although we have no compelling evidence one way or the other. we do know that the gargoyles will accept a wide variety of creatures into their social structure; we don't know whether the d-bees in question were part of the social structure, though, in much the same way that we don't know how many of the hundreds of thousands killed were d-bees rather than monsters and gargoyles specifically.

[Blue_Lion]

The CS has no intention of sharing with the various other humans who have as much (if not better) claim to the land. Ask the Native Americans who have been on North America for millennium who has rights to the land.....but the CS says that they need to go....

Hm.
Do you consider the United States of America to be Evil?

At times our policy towards them have been.
The treatment of Native Americans during much of our nations expansion is a dark chapter in our history.