It would be interesting at some point to read a novel (or series of novels) that examined a war between two cultures (archetypically something like the Rebel Alliance vs. the Empire in Star Wars, or the Independents vs. the Alliance in Firefly). And having the rebel/pioneer culture actually hold its own (if not win) against the more heavily stratified/industrial culture not so much because the author wanted them to win or through archetypical heroic gestures and sacrifices, but because they were able to adapt. Able to make use of unfamiliar/foreign technology, able to step into the role of command if no-one else is there, able to made do with very minimal technology, etc.
It would, I imagine, be an utter bastard of a story to research and tell, but it would be a fascinating read.
It would, I imagine, be an utter bastard of a story to research and tell, but it would be a fascinating read.
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Date: 2007-01-09 03:26 pm (UTC)From:However, I'd hardly call it very well researched.
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Date: 2007-01-09 03:35 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-09 03:43 pm (UTC)From:The first...oh, four or so, aren't bad. Unfortunately when he ran out of war, he went downhill very quickly. He cowrote some with another author who was interested in exploring the other side of the war in more detail, so the totality comes out rather well.
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Date: 2007-01-09 11:35 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 01:23 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 08:30 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 08:51 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 04:59 pm (UTC)From:(Needless to say, at 13, I ate this stuff UP.)
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Date: 2007-01-09 03:30 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-09 03:34 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-09 03:35 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 06:12 am (UTC)From:they just can't own planets... small things, like astroids, and what-have-you that are either too small to generate gravity wells, or are close enough to friendly things that big damage to them will hurt the friendly things.
admittedly it's a stretch... but space is big, and you can hide lots in it.
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Date: 2007-01-11 07:38 am (UTC)From:The problem would be to set up such a story so that the plot manages to avoid current cliches about suicide bombers, although suicide attacks are a perfectly valid military method of waging guerilla warfare against a more technologically powerful and numerous enemy. Guerillas don't have to give up so long as they can sneak in, hit, and either die as martyrs who attract more resistance fighters to their cause, or run away to fight another day. They'll never actually lose unless they stand and fight pitched battles, but they also won't control a tterritory unless they do so, and *get the other guy to give up*.
At what point is it necessary to abandon low-level aggravating guerilla nagging methods and finally face the enemy and make them *admit* that they've lost?
Where is that point, in any given strategic situation?
Stories like this have to address questions like that in the world-building they do.
It also makes it mroe tactically interesting whne you show the larger context where they are fighting in other areas besides just poking holes in space stations--possibly the same or different people fighting entire different sorts of sites with quite different tactics. Again, this is all in the world-building matrix in which the story happens. It doesn't necessarily have to be an infodump story, but it might be pretty demanding to do a good job of it.
I think it'd be something like showing Hornblower setting up cannons on a cliffhead after a horse ride, and showing how he dislikes being on land, but it doesn't stop him doing the necessary tactical analysis and getting the job done competently, although this is far from his normal milieu.
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Date: 2007-01-09 03:47 pm (UTC)From:(Firefly doesn't do this because, well, the Independants lost. And it was probably clear they were losing pretty early on, at least to the Alliance admiralty; Star Wars . . .well, it's either evidence of bad storytelling, or of the Force pwning everyone for its own purposes, depending on how you'd want to spin it.)
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Date: 2007-01-09 04:08 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-09 06:52 pm (UTC)From:Which is why DfS is the story of two evenly matched and evenly entrenched powers scrabbling it out, rather than the Plucky Pioneer/Rebel Heroes.
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Date: 2007-01-09 05:04 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 04:10 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-09 11:33 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 04:16 am (UTC)From:Yeah, there's places to start. Not something that's screaming for my attention, fortunately. :)
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Date: 2007-01-10 12:46 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 04:14 am (UTC)From:Would be very tricky to get right, because you'd have people like M going ' . . but that's impossible, didn't you look at [such and so]?'
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Date: 2007-01-10 06:15 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2007-01-10 05:05 pm (UTC)From:I'll pause to let you laugh. :P
Seriously, think about it: the aliens are limited in that Wellsian sense of biology and can't come out of their artificial life support; the humans are limited by the technology of the period, but are damn well not going down to Satanic Bugs From Outer Space. Also, Renaissance Italy is cool as hell and had a lot of infighting that helps with Plot. :)
I've been thinking about writing something like this for a while, though I'd set it in Switzerland, simply because this (http://www.ufoevidence.org/cases/case485.htm) picture's always intrigued me and made me think "what if?"
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Date: 2007-01-10 08:54 pm (UTC)From:(which is to say, ow, my brain.)
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Date: 2007-01-11 07:41 am (UTC)From: