Comment on the "Spartan Chronicles"

[Aredhran]

I must say to you guys, as Lal the Mad would put it "My hat is off to you".

Truly, it is an excellent story you're putting up here, thanks for the pointer at alpha.owo, Googlie.

I'll try to join if I can find the time.

Aredhran

[Googlie]

Thanks, A.

As you can tell, we're having a whole bunch of fun.

We need to get Mark G to split the Chronicles thread into pages every 20 posts or so (rather than their default 50) because the way this is going in two or three weeks time the story will be a thousand pages long

(I'm now printing 75 pages to have hard copy, and it's only day 3 or 4 of the action )

Feel free to jump in, take a still vacant unit, create your own, disband it if you get bored or can't find the time (or write in a masive defeat, or surrender yeah, right) or write in your unit's absorption into another's.

The more authors, the more unpredictability the more challenge, the freshness.....


Glad you are enjoyning them, anyway.

G.

[Saras]

The first thing I do every morning for the last couple days when I come to work is open the Spartan Chronicles and Microsoft Excel and keep my fingers on Alt-Tab, just in case.

It is absolutely fantastic. I have no other words.

Saras
Admirer of literary talent

[Dcole78]

they are incredible especially considering that you have several different writers but it is still making sense and following a definite plot line. Very Very impressive.

The other stories on here are good as well, but they seem hardly ever to be updated please please do! I love them all

[cmnash]

A new comment on the Spartan Chronicles:-

I am a fan of the Chronicle & look forward to each new instalment, however I have to say that I am disappointed by the new thread involving the inquisitors.

The idea of a Spartan Inquisitor organisation goes against my picture of the faction from the game & the society outlined in the chronicle so far. I would see this organisation far more at home in the opressive regime of Yang's Hive (or perhaps more appropriately, in Miriam's Believers')rooting out dissent & non-conformists.

The whole ethos of the Spartans is towards individual development as a survivor & warrior not collective uniformity, thus making a torture-based inquisition, IMHO totally inappropriate for this society.

Whilst I protest their inclusion I will continue to be an avid fan of the chronicles

[Googlie]

cmnash:

Good observations,

But:

why would you assume that "The Chosen" are a Spartan sect?

Could they not be pan-Chiron?

Ishmael Skye - not Spartan - hints of relationship to Lady Deirdre

"The Chosen" - the name hints at a Believer schism

"The Grand Inquisitor" could be Hivean - or any Police State for that matter.

And if we believe that by 2200 Psi energy and psi power will be understood and utilized, then a "dark" side will surely emerge.

But we know that good will prevail (after all, we are the authors )

Googlie

[Veracitas]

Adding to what Googlie has said, déja,

cmnash, the Spartan Federation is described as "right wing" "sociopaths," which is what you seem to equate the use of torture methods to (id est Believers or Hive (in command structure, not ideology, for the latter)). It is not that odd for the Spartan governmet--a seemingly corporate state (Mussolini fascism)--to have a Department of Inquisition. It is not "official" that they use torture methods and the severity with which the execution was carried out in the post that you witnessed was directed by Ishmael and his evil cult of the "Chosen," not by the Grand Inquisitor of his own volition. Though they use cruel methods, they probably would not have gone to the perverted lengths that Ishmael did.

--Veracitas

[Hydro]

cmnash,

Right-wing governments frequently have official and unofficial 'enforcers' and death squads. El Salvador, Argentina and the ever-present Nazi Germany are good examples. These are outgrowths to control what are seen as dangerous elements that threaten their society or to protect the personal privileges of the elites. I generally see Spartan society as having evolved beyond such inefficient thuggery. States that use these methods don't seem to last very long (certainly not 125 years) and the fact that they are used at all is a symptom of weakness. I can see how elements within the society might gravitate toward such methods.

That said, I too was thrown by the reference to the Inquisition, which has heavy religious overtones and seemed to be an inappropriate name for a Spartan group (unless they are ex-Believers, of course). Also, the techniques suggested seemed, well, 'base' for a technologically sophisticated society. Trickery (technical and otherwise) and terror are more effective than torture. My guess is that it is a group that was driven underground with the enactment of the Spartan Civil Liberties act in MY 2199 (I can’t remember the exact name, it was in one of Googlie’s recent posts). I don’t think that they would have the support of a significant part of Spartan Government, and if they do than Sparta isn’t a much different than the Hive.

Hydro

[cmnash]

Hydro & others,

Having read your responses to my comment, I feel it's time for humble pie - a large portion of!

I was falling into a trap of my own making in viewing the Spartans as 'the good guys' of Alpha Centauri, when in fact there are no good guys in this environment - only 'us' & 'them'.

You were all quite correct in pointing out the right-wing nature of the Spartan society & the connatations that has with death squads, enforcers, etc. I guess I was looking at their society as an extrapolation of modern US society rather than analagous to a military dictatorship, which is what Spartan society is - or was before the Colonel disappeared (or am I behind the story & she's back now? it's hard to keep up with the pace sometimes!).

I apologise if I offended any of the authors of the Chronicles with my ill-considered comment
[This message has been edited by cmnash (edited August 16, 1999).]

[Googlie]

No need to apologize - after all we are the ones who decided that the SE would be Democracy/Green/Power, but have interpreted it as democracy stopping at the Base Governor level (at least I have)

So the Junta ruled, with some semblance of democracy, but the generals would have a hart time reconciling inquisition and torture (at least the ones we've fleshed out).

But that's not to say that The Colonel didn't condone a little of it prior to 2199, when the Grand Inquisitor may have been active.

So keep on challenging us - the more we have to be specific about the society and the choices the Spartans have made, the better and tauter the story line will be.

Googlie

[Veracitas]

killing double post
[This message has been edited by Veracitas (edited August 16, 1999).]

[Veracitas]

As Googlie said, no need to apologise. Constructive criticism is always welcome (though grudgingly we might consider it .

[Tokek Belerang]

cmnash,

Nuff said on the apology - none was required. Challenges like yours present a fresh perspective, and that's always useful.

I had some misgivings about the Grand Inq as well, but that was because I'm a democrat and would like to think of 'our' Sparta as a democracy. I had Levavassier pipe up about Googlie's hard-line intervention just because of that (and had him pipe down again at Googlie's sweet-talking ).

Cheers,
Kek

------------------
Numquam turbae misceri

[Hydro]

MetallicaFan,

One of our SC authors Tokek pulled together a Word doc of the SC. It only goes through 8/18 with post 225. We are now over 400 posts to SC.

If you would like I can e-mail this file to you (warning - it is 330 pages long). For the rest you may have to plow through the posts. Maybe we can con, er - convince, someone to do the rest. Note that Korn is methodically pulling the posts into chapters here at Apolyton (a BIG job!).

Hydro

P.S. - Could you do me a favor, Metallica? Please post your comments and suggestions here! We LOVE feedback! Obviously, no one has posted any SC comments for a while since this thread was buried 2 months ago. Also, I would appreciate it if you could delete your post from the SC thread. We like to keep things neat and tidy...
[This message has been edited by Hydro (edited October 11, 1999).]

[Rynn]

MetallicaFan:

I updated Tokek's work recently and brought it up to date (last night's post)

I'll e-mail it to you

Rynn