05-04-2017, 12:16 AM
(05-03-2017, 05:27 AM)Chimera Wrote: I apologize for crashing your conversation, but I wanted to post this where people would see it.
I like to think that the Avali's choice of weaponry and tactics are considered "unsporting." That they don't have much of a predominant "honor" system from before they became space-faring, and therefore have difficulty understanding other's ideas of "war" or combat. That is, if they care.
The only conflict they have had extensive experience with has been of the "kill animals to eat them" variety, and therefore don't give two sub-zero shits about "warrior's death," or "undue suffering", etc. The most "glory" they associate with it is simple interest: "Noice, how many railgun slugs did it take to make his skull do that?"
Like, a Klingon would challenge a 'Vali to a 1 v 1 duel of honor, and get mad when said 'Vali is backed up by their pack. Or instead of exchanging broadsides in an epic dreadnought battle, they flit around with stealth/drone swarms and gradually wear down the enemy defenses.
Like their aerogel swords, which are, in the world of sword metaphors, jagged, splintery broken bottles. Unorthodox, but leaves nasty wounds, which is a bonus.
TL;DR Avali don't care if you think it's unfair. It works, and your rules suck.
Ryujiin, if I'm wrong, feel free to flip this table-load of idiocy. I'm trying to get ideas going, NOT establish a canon that isn't mine.
I tend to feel similarly, but even beyond an honor system, I feel like they wouldn't have rules of war. They would view war from in a light strongly influenced by their experience with the malefactors: either win, or risk annihilation. War with the avali is total war. No Geneva Convention, no distinction between military and civilian targets, nothing. Your people deserve everything, and your enemies deserve nothing.
With this in mind, you can't really say that the rules suck: not only does total war put civilian populations at risk, but it also generally increases the level of violence and barbarity on both sides because one of the big reason militaries follow laws of war is so that they will be treated that way in turn. If you know that the avali will have no qualms executing or torturing your men if you're captured, the only thing keeping you from responding in kind is your own moral standards, and not everybody can maintain those in times of war. Rules of war to make a horrible activity less horrible.
My TL;DR summary of that runs "If you're part of the avali ingroup, they'll do anything for you. If not, they'll do anything to you."
Also, you might have more success discussing lore in the mod reboot thread: http://community.playstarbound.com/threads/avali-1-0-reboot-discussion.122117
You could also hop over to my machinima thread here, but I don't come here very often.