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Post by marxlives on Feb 1, 2019 22:08:39 GMT
Through invasion and subjugation of an unwilling populace, seems legit. Also, not to put too fine a point on it, but if you work with a witch who sicced the grymkin on an unsuspecting populace, you keep frozen gods of other races in your cupboard, and you use volcanoes as siege weapons....you miggghhhhhtt be a redneck evil faction. The Old Witch was trying to prevent the Infernals from manifesting to claim the souls of most of humanity, so... Might want to rethink who's the villain there. Zerkova chose to hoard Nyssor, secretly, without informing any of her superiors. It wasn't sanctioned by the government / Empress. (I always hated that plot twist, by the way.)
Regarding Acts of War II: we're not responsible for the actions of a bad writer. "Khador is eeeeevil, because Cygnar is good! I get it, let's have them blow up an incredibly valuable city that produces material absolutely vital to the Khadoran war effort, all to find out some secrets from some imprisoned, emaciated warcaster! Move him somewhere more secure? That's dumb! Nope, we've got to blow up the biggest producer of blasting powder in Western Immoren instead!" ....ugh.
The score is definitely fogging from the perspective someone who has been tracking the Mk.III fiction. Khador's wars have been pretty conventional barring the use of Ogroth artifacts. But in Acts of War I, Cygnar used Devil's Gasp (mustard or chlorine gas) during war AND they were the aggressor in invading Lael after the sealing a peace treaty.
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Post by Cryptix on Feb 3, 2019 8:51:46 GMT
I just edited your post to remove the political reference. I know you meant it innocuously, but with the current US political climate I'm not taking any bloody chances.
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Xintas
Junior Strategist
Posts: 824
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Post by Xintas on Feb 4, 2019 16:14:26 GMT
I think the only thing we're going to agree on is that the quality of PP fiction is incredibly variable with a large contingent being amateurish and poorly edited. The best Khador fiction presents a well thought out country with internally consistent behaviors and complex motivations. The VAST MAJORITY puts a Snidely Whiplash mustache on everyone (including Old Witch and Zerkova) in the entire faction.
My original (clearly not explained well) point was that, if you believe 80% of the fiction, there's really no way to argue that Khador is a "good" faction. Is this poor writing and not particularly sustainable? Absolutely. Is it also canon? Unfortunately.
Now that we've had civil discourse, "OMG don't unfold our country with your stupid volcano gun you evil terrorist nation!"
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Post by peemster on Feb 4, 2019 18:47:33 GMT
I just finished Flashpoint and will be reading Aftershock next. Catching up on the Humble Bundle books I bought whenever that sale happened. The most annoying thing to me is the editing discipline. There are so many descriptors that get repeated within 1-2 pages that clearly should have been edited out. There are multiple examples I've noticed in Wrath of the Dragonfather, Blood of Kings, and Flashpoint. The most recent one I can think of was in Flashpoint, when Stryker is holding his war council meetings in his command tent. Rudel describes the tent, the large table and maps spread out on it. The chapter ends. The next chapter begins ...with another description of the same tent, table and maps with slightly different verbiage. Agreed. As someone who has done a bit of professional editing, the editing in Skull Island books is distinctly sub-par. When you don't like to pay for an editor (or can't), it shows.
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leander
Junior Strategist
Posts: 185
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Post by leander on Feb 5, 2019 9:27:33 GMT
Best short story for me is still the Harkevich one regarding a corrupt kayazy and a menite, shows both the good and bad of khador without slapping a twirling moustasche on them.
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Post by michael on Feb 5, 2019 18:26:49 GMT
Best short story for me is still the Harkevich one regarding a corrupt kayazy and a menite, shows both the good and bad of khador without slapping a twirling moustasche on them. That was also good. That piece appeared in Warmachine: Wrath in 2011...
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Post by shadowsword751 on Feb 10, 2019 13:44:00 GMT
With the exception of maybe Cryx and the Legion of Everblight, there are no true good and bad factions. We all have our bias to one or the other that will skew our view points but in the end all the factions fall on the grey scale somewhere.
Privateer has done some good fiction over the years, and many of those who wrote that material are still there. If this project gives them a jumping point to keep the lore and storyline alive then I am all for.
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Post by Charistoph on Feb 10, 2019 16:00:07 GMT
Cephalyx and Skorne are pretty bad, but I guess that depends on your views of enslavement and torture.
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Post by shadowsword751 on Feb 11, 2019 12:05:43 GMT
Cephalyx and Skorne are pretty bad, but I guess that depends on your views of enslavement and torture. True, but still largely perspective. The Skorne have a caste based warrior culture going back thousands of years. Those that are defeated are clearly of a lower status then the warriors who were victorious and their rightful place in the world is as servants of victorious. There is a nice little piece from a No Quarter a few years back of a Skorne warrior trying to understand why Paladin of the Order of the Wall is fighting to defend the weak when he is clearly a superior warrior and should be ruling them. The Skorne warrior just cannot grasp the concept. As for the Cephalyx, the scientist does not cry for the lab rat (at least not usually)
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Post by marxlives on Feb 20, 2019 16:28:00 GMT
I think the only thing we're going to agree on is that the quality of PP fiction is incredibly variable with a large contingent being amateurish and poorly edited. The best Khador fiction presents a well thought out country with internally consistent behaviors and complex motivations. The VAST MAJORITY puts a Snidely Whiplash mustache on everyone (including Old Witch and Zerkova) in the entire faction. My original (clearly not explained well) point was that, if you believe 80% of the fiction, there's really no way to argue that Khador is a "good" faction. Is this poor writing and not particularly sustainable? Absolutely. Is it also canon? Unfortunately. Now that we've had civil discourse, "OMG don't unfold our country with your stupid volcano gun you evil terrorist nation!" True, honestly Into the Storm, Into the Wild is the best I have read so far. That said Miles Holmes who did Way of Caine really up'ed his game and did a great job on Mark of Caine. PP can't hire the most visible talent to write the fiction but what they can do is place their bets on a stable of writers who continually get better, (Chris Jackson's nautical knowledge really helped with Watery Graves and Orrin Grey's Godless, as fan turned writer, was a deep read into Menoth culture) who can get to know the world and a set of characters and produce better fiction over time. It worked for the Black Library and if one of them turns Dave Abnett big, they will produce more books out of gratitude for just getting their break while writing fan fiction.
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Post by hocestbellum on Feb 20, 2019 17:01:26 GMT
Chris Jackson was pretty big before getting into the PP stuff, wasn't he? He's worked for Pathfinder, Shadowrun, and Arkham, and has about 20 other books to his name. Love his work.
But as to your point: I wonder how much scope there is for them just hiring good fan fiction writers like that? I got the impression most companies weren't keen on Fan stuff?
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joedj
Junior Strategist
Posts: 513
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Post by joedj on Apr 5, 2019 10:27:52 GMT
Just played my first scenario in Stormbreak league play. Alas, no civilians were killed Got Nemo3 killed by a ridiculously threatening Makeda3, seemed appropriate. That Opportunist feat is a hoot! And the Tank Commander patch looks just right on my Rhulic army bag! Lookin' forward to this narrative league over the next 4weeks, rather than just more SR 'practice'.
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Post by marxlives on Apr 5, 2019 16:17:53 GMT
I don't really worry about the lore impact. Like Battle Tech and other games with a living universe, characters will come and go, as long as the models are valid everything is cool. I am pretty much anticipating that when Warmachine is 30 years old, you will also choose what era you games are taking place in for tournaments and narrative games.
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Post by marxlives on May 7, 2019 20:10:58 GMT
Chris Jackson was pretty big before getting into the PP stuff, wasn't he? He's worked for Pathfinder, Shadowrun, and Arkham, and has about 20 other books to his name. Love his work. But as to your point: I wonder how much scope there is for them just hiring good fan fiction writers like that? I got the impression most companies weren't keen on Fan stuff? I don't think that most companies don't like hiring fan fiction writers. I think it is just that there are many who are not very good. Best purpose of fan fiction is to build a base, write an independent novel, and then start marketing abstracts of your next Warmachine novel once you got moderate success under your belt.
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Post by gedditoffme on May 17, 2019 11:45:51 GMT
I can see 2 parts out of four. Haven’t read yet but going away for the weekend: are more out or are we waiting?
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