KickStarter BattleTech Pre-Release Thread

[mutonizer]

We're probably going to get blacklisted by HBS after I newspost this.
Maybe Vaarna_Aarne can tell us how BattleTech treats ethnic ancestry.

Why would they, they are the retards and racists here, and they are not even hiding it.

Sane normal non racist people do NOT list 2+ "ancestry" on EVERY single character panel!! "He's a dude, she's a dude, they're dudes". Done.

 

[DeepOcean]

Does HBS even know that fucking Egypt was conquered an settled by many different civiliations and cultures over a few thousand years and what exist today is alot different from 6000 years ago? Imagine that fucking thousands of years on the future? Do they think civilizations and people would remain stable especially after fucking interplanetary expansion? Fuck, the ignorant rule the world. Egyptian ancestry? Fucking Maori ancestry? It is very sketchy that someone would care an USA existed at some point, even worse at the fucking Maori.

 

[Infinitron]

From reading some BattleTech wikis, there is mention of different planets being settled by people from different ethnic origins and races. And of course the setting's major factions are obvious references (House Davion - American, House Steiner - European, House Kurita - Japanese, House Liao - Chinese). But I'm not sure how aware everyday people in the setting are of that stuff.

 

[mutonizer]

From reading some BattleTech wikis, there is mention of different planets being settled by people from different ethnic origins and races. And of course the setting's major factions are obvious references (House Davion - American, House Steiner - European, House Kurita - Japanese, House Liao - Chinese). But I'm not sure how aware everyday people in the setting are aware or care about that stuff.

Yea but they clearly are using it as a genetic marker, not cultural.

Something like "born and raised within the Davion sphere, he blablabla", "raised in pure Kurita tradition, she bblablabla" would be just fine. Brings up the lore, if you don't know it, you go and check on the net. Then you get the drawing for the mental image, and a text for what they do now. Done.

This "quota-filling-ramdownyourthroat" bullshit is just insulting and shows how their diseased minds work, which isn't really "Hype" friendly...

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

WOW ... I mean Wow ... Chinks niggers and cunts ...

When they came for the indies I didnt care cause I am past NES
When they came for the ArPeeGees I didnt care because I am not a retarded story fag
And now they came for Tactikewl gaymes...

Whats next? Tabletop wargaming and taking Stalingrad with your niggress troops?

 

[veevoir]

1/4 chinese, 1/8 egyptian, 1/2 jew, 1/8 potato. Feels 65% female 30% male 5% plant.
Sexual orientation: dendrosexual

Other important character information: has a name.

 

[Zombra]

Jesus christ, it's like none of you ever saw Star Trek.

 

[veevoir]

Jesus christ, it's like none of you ever saw Star Trek.

Just quickly - where does star trek give you 2+ ancestral origins to show how inclusive crew is? Some folks in STwere white, some yellow, some black, some mixed. And nobody gave a fuck or mentioned it because everyone considered it normal.

That's how you do incloosive. Not by "look at all those incloosive characteristics!" in your face approach. The more you need to indicate inclusiveness the worse is the effect.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

From reading some BattleTech wikis, there is mention of different planets being settled by people from different ethnic origins and races. And of course the setting's major factions are obvious references (House Davion - American, House Steiner - European, House Kurita - Japanese, House Liao - Chinese). But I'm not sure how aware everyday people in the setting are aware or care about that stuff.

They do, and Battletech was always 'diverse', with a lot of Asian influences in particular. And the major factions are described in terms of broad ethnic groupings who live in their various regions, with some mixing too, obviously. But this thing with every single character as an oddly-specific exotic dna cocktail is taking things to a new level - probably handwaved with some lore about the part of the periphery they're at. And yet if you threw these mixes they listed together in a remote part of the periphery within a few generations most people would be a blend of just about everything instead of calling themselves Maori/South African or whatever.

 

[Infinitron]

From reading some BattleTech wikis, there is mention of different planets being settled by people from different ethnic origins and races. And of course the setting's major factions are obvious references (House Davion - American, House Steiner - European, House Kurita - Japanese, House Liao - Chinese). But I'm not sure how aware everyday people in the setting are aware or care about that stuff.

They do, and Battletech was always 'diverse', with a lot of Asian influences in particular. And the major factions are described in terms of broad ethnic groupings who live in their various regions, with some mixing too, obviously. But this thing with every single character as an oddly-specific exotic dna cocktail is taking things to a new level - probably handwaved with some lore about the part of the periphery they're at. And yet if you threw these mixes they listed together in a remote part of the periphery within a few generations most people would be a blend of just about everything instead of calling themselves Maori/South African or whatever.

Maybe the artists just wanted to show their work. Ie, "We decided to make the Espinosas look like a mix of South Africans and Spanish". So it's not really their identity in the world of the game but that's how they were visually designed.

 

[mutonizer]

Jesus christ, it's like none of you ever saw Star Trek.

You do know that most non "standard European caucassian" characters in Star Trek are only there to artificially fill quotas right? Even Sulu was meant to embody ALL Asians and Chekov was only there to not piss of Russia too much and the black chick was the chick and the black all in one. It's the most racist PG quota bullshit you could come up with at that time. Today, they'd need a fat dude and a handicap as well, probably one of them gay.

Sorry but Star Trek original is not a good "counter-example" to this level of retardation.

Maybe the artists just wanted to show their work. Ie, "We decided to make the Espinosas look like a mix of South Africans and Spanish". So it's not so much that that's their identity in the world of the game but that's what they were visually modelled after.

Yea that'd be a "postitive" guess. It's too neat though, too presentable, and it's in their PR campaign...So it's approved as a message, which brings us back to the stupidity of it

 

[vonAchdorf]

Maybe the artists just wanted to show their work. Ie, "We decided to make the Espinosas look like a mix of South Africans and Spanish". So it's not really their identity in the world of the game but that's how they were visually designed.

Yes, and they did a pretty good job at it which is funny, because as the ultra-liberals they are, they surely reject the idea that a "Finn" has to look like a "Finn".

 

[Spectacle]

Well, at least this thread managed to get me hyped for Shock Tactic. Seems interesting.

As for this here...Aside the generic character listing, these "ancestry" info are retarded, so much so that they are even a bit insulting.
Ancestry is either parents in a culture way, or genetic way. In culture way, what the fuck is "Spanish" in the 30th+ century and in the genetic way, Spanish means nothing whatsoever either. Listing not one but two or even three for every single of these characters is just completely moronic and, sadly, they look too PR polished to be forgotten left overs for the art team.

¡HASTA SIEMPRE COMMANDANTE!

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Oh wait, I didnt know that the game is supposed to take place around House Arano and Espinoza. Now I dont have a problem with brown cast. Separate but equal!

The "Egyptian/Portugese" stuff is absolutely retarded still.

 

[Infinitron]

Maybe the artists just wanted to show their work. Ie, "We decided to make the Espinosas look like a mix of South Africans and Spanish". So it's not really their identity in the world of the game but that's how they were visually designed.

Yes, and they did a pretty good job at it which is funny, because as the ultra-liberals they are, they are surely reject the idea that a "Finn" has to look like a "Finn".

Character concept artists and casting directors - two of the most obliviously politically incorrect professions.

 

[DeepOcean]

Jesus christ, it's like none of you ever saw Star Trek.

Yeah, always suspected the Klingons were the, 65% south African, 25% Polynesian and 10% undecided trannies.

 

[Werdna's Revenge]

Battletech has always been pretty diverse, but a lot of the conflicts are driven by the fact that space colonization was done by various earth nations which means whole chunks of space are considered Hindu or Swedish or French Catholic. I guess the characters are a bunch of periphery dwelling scum, but at the very least they could have based the ethnicity on stuff in the actual setting. The part of space they are setting it in is stuck between space USSR/Red China, space 80's Hong Kong, and space Greece/Frontier Colonial USA(The Taurian Concordat is weird since I think it was supposed to be ancient Greece in space initially, but for plot reasons became the anti Earth government, anti tax, dusty frontier worlds area). So any sort of Chinese/Orthodox Slav sorta mix could work for characters, but instead we get stuff like Egyptian/Portuguese?

So much wasted youth on dumb Battletech sourcebooks

Edit:

Worse than that they have Iran and Brazil as ethnicities when in the sourcebooks Brazil lead a revolt against a single earth government and got put down for their troubles and Irans Ayatollahs declared space travel as absolutely haram for a long ass time so Iranians missed the first few colonization waves and never got anywhere (Gotta remember this was first written up as fluff in the early 80s, although I could see them retconing that one if they ever go for a Space Persia of some sort.)

 

[twincast]

The ancestry listings are for the most part (arguably excluding the nobles) needlessly pedantic (and most probably incomplete), yes, but, by His Noodliness, it doesn't hurt anyone! Or anything. No need for butthurt.

 

[Fry]

Ehhh... not a follower of Battletech but why define ancestry on terrestrial terms? Who fucking cares about earth diversity? A guy that grew up on another planet has zero in common with you.

lawl... so much triggering going on here.

Here's an example for you. For the most part, Americans really do care about little piece of Europe, Asia, or wherever their ancestors came from. Does it actually matter at all? No. But they still care. Humans like to divide up into little tribes. Logic has nothing to do with it.

 

[Kev Inkline]

My only gripe with this is that they had to go with the most common Finnish surname, low effort. I don't think this game has as cynical approach to catering for diversity as Hollywood when casting a black Heimdall, for instance.

It's pretty common or space faring people to care for their ancestry is pretty common in scifi, check out Eon for example, iirc Hyperion has that stuff as well.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

The ancestry listings are for the most part (arguably excluding the nobles) needlessly pedantic (and most probably incomplete), yes, but, by His Noodliness, it doesn't hurt anyone! Or anything. No need for butthurt.

twincast is Ignoring...
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140 _____ 249

 

[Haba]

MAXIMUM RACE MIXING!

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Pfffft, the real reason of this is just to make sure nobody goes to look at the ancient BTech character art. Specifically, the in equal parts unfortunate and completely hilarious portraits of House Kurita (and others) cosplaying Tokyo Kid.

PS: Should they make BattleTech 2 (or insert-subtitle-whatever) and have it set in the Clan Invasion and/or Operation Bulldog and/or Operation Scorpion, I demand Kickstarter stretch goal for hiring David Hayter to voice Frederic Steiner Anastasius Focht Big Boss.

We're probably going to get blacklisted by HBS after I newspost this.

Maybe Vaarna_Aarne can tell us how BattleTech treats ethnic ancestry.

Well, most I can remember off hand is that because BattleTech takes place generally one thousand years in the future where it's been several hundred years since the collapse of the interstellar government of the Star League (though in a way it's wrong to describe Star League as a unitary government, it was more like a council of the Great Houses and the SLDF the common military organization), and nearly a thousand years since the first planetary government of Earth began the colonization of space.

Probably the best comparison would be the fairly obvious of Dune, because just like geopolitics (astropolitics?) ethnicity in BattleTech is decidedly POST-EARTH as well. Though not quite to the extent of Dune where human culture and religion has dramatically changed by environment, time, and distance, in BattleTech while language and culture exist and in some cases lead to unintentionally comical theme park worlds like the all-Japanese world of New Kyoto, a more decisive factor than ethnic or linguistic identity is the political identity which is to say the allegiance to the superculture or superethnos identity of any of the interstellar states whether small game on the periphery or Great Houses' empires, or lack of thereof in case of mercenaries. A spanner to these workings is when you factor in the Clans who are decidedly Post-Earth in culture and identity, which would eventually lead us to the Rasalhague Dominion which is the first fusion state of an Inner Sphere colonial state (the short-lived Free Rasalhague Republic) and a Clan, and is culturally a terrifying mixture of Scandianavia in Space and Japan in Space.

My only gripe with this is that they had to go with the most common Finnish surname

Yea we finally get into a space game and of course it's a fucking Virtanen.

 

[anus_pounder]

The fuck did I do to twincast?

On topic - Good good. BT is already delivering in multiple ways.

 

[Ninjerk]

The fuck did I do to twincast?

Spoiler