Re: Traditions

> > > One side breaks
> > > them,
> > > and out the door they go.
> >
> >Not necessarily.  Even when part of ones army violate the "rules"
> most
> >of the army will generally follow them (there are numerous
> historical
> >examples of this, as well as capable commanders who violated the
> rules
> >coming to be despised by their own people).
>
> You're using humans as an example, and we're talking about a universe
> with
> multitudes of races, all with different natures than humans - just as
> orcs
> have a certain alignment tendancy, so to do humans.

So I should use cockroaches as an example?  Every society in SJ is
based on human societ-y/-ies.  Our ideas about what logic is and how
intelligent creatures interact are all based on human experience.  The
scro are very based on humans.  Completely based on humans.  No one has
tried to define scro in any way that is not humans.  If we said scro
are just humans instead of orcs it wouldn't change a single thing about
their behavior.

> > > Unless they had to for some reason, asn as soon
> > > as that
> > > reason was gone they'd throw the rules to the wind.
> >
> >The "rules" are there because you want the other guy to folow them
> and
> >you don't want to be labeled as "rogue", "pirate", or whatever.
>
> The rules are there because groups use those rules to their benefit.
> The
> average space traveler would enjoy the benifit of not dying.

That's what I just said.

  I
> seriously
> doubt peer pressure, and not wanting to be labeled a "rouge" would be
> much
> motivation for an illithid.

Really?  Illithids are lawful.  Very lawful.  So peer pressure
obviously matters to them very much, regardless of your doubts.  And
being labeled a rogue illithid, well, I know I wouldn't want illithids
chasing me, no matter how psionic I am.  Not to mention suddenly
becoming fair game for everyone else in space.  The illithids have an
embassy on Bral so obviously they interact with the rest of the
spacefaring community on an equal footing at times.  And they don't
want a war (or else they wouldn't bother with diplomacy).  So illithids
who give other illithids a bad name are disavowed.

  An illithid would use rules to try and
> impose
> it's evil desires upon others.

Sounds like politics to me.  No wonder they have an ambassador. :)

  A chaotic evil being would not depend
> on
> rules to impose its will, but would use force.

Why?  Why does a CE have to use force?  They couldn't use subtlety,
trickery, and guile?  Damn, and I thought alignment was a moral and
ethical tendency not a definition of modus operandi.

  A neutral human
> merchant
> would use the rules to make his trip through space more easy and
> safer, so
> he culd ply his wares, and imposing evil desires would not come into
> it.

And a LE and CE and CN and ... adfinitum merchants would do so also.
Because they're merchants and the laws and traditions of spacefaring
are there to benefit them.  If they were pirates (of whatever stripe)
they would obviously have a different view.

> >Why do
> >armies take prisoners when its a huge pain in the ass?  Because they
> >want their surrender to be accepted when they have to give it one
> day.
> >Why treat prisoners well?  Because you've got friends who're
> prisoners.
>
> Sometimes they just take them because those are the orders they are
> given,
> and those orders are given by politicians with political reasons.

Obviously you've never served in the military.  When the shooting
starts troops don't fight for ideals, or leaders, or whatever.  They
fight for the guy beside them who's fighting for them (believe it or
not this is exactly what studies show, they may be on the battlefield
for all those other things but when the dying starts that all gets
lost).  Why are people told to take prisoners?  For exactly the reasons
given.

> The
> Mongolians took no prisioners, they just leveled the entire village
> and
> killed every man woman and child.  They found that when they did this
> the
> word spread and the next ten villages all gave up completely with no
> fighting whatsoever.  They saved a lot of Mongolian lives and avoided
> extra
> fighting that way, but the price was that they had to keep thier word
> and
> kill everyone if the village fought back.

Interesting.  I've heard they did that on certain occasions but on
others they didn't.  Usually they'd been badly insulted first.

> It does no good to take prisoners for the reasons you give when they
> enemy
> does not reciprocate.

And if you take no prisoners the other guy will never reciprocate.

  Taking a Mongolian prisoner wouldn't have made
> them
> start taking your people prisoner instead of killing them.

That's a pretty stupid argument.  If the Mongols had met an enemy that
stopped them in their tracks and led to a long and bloody campaign they
would have taken prisoners if the other side had.  Because if they
didn't they would have died out.  And if they didn't get the hint the
other side would have wiped their prisoners out.  The Mongols weren't
in a good position to lose their wars against anyone who could carry
the war to them.  Fortunately for them, they never ended up in this
situation.  If they'd lost a war and been chased using their men would
have been losing their providers and their families would have starved.
 Situations like that are why people start taking prisoners.

  We don't
> take
> terrorists prisoners now because we think their buddies won't kill us
> if we
> do this.  We take them prisoners for our own reasons, and what they
> think or
> do has nothing to do with it at all.  It doesn't even come into the
> equation.

That's interesting.  I didn't know terrorists were a lawful military
force.  I thought it was rather the opposite.

> > >  Maybe some rules
> > > of
> > > conflict between elven ships and dwarven ships, according to
> > > tradition or
> > > treaty, and among human ships.
> >
> >I'm not talking about specific treaties, I'm talking the "civilized
> >norm" every nation recognizes similar to the way the European powers
> >operated for centuries.
>
> My point is that there can never be a norm everywhere, just in
> certain
> regions, among certain groups.

Among the civilized spacefaring nations in the known spheres (however
you define it) there will be such traditions.  The neogis are all
outlaws of everyone else because they don't follow any of these
conventions.  Of course, when they do you end up with the Astromundi
Cluster where they are accepted.  And so we see that once again,
there's a price for going rogue, just as I've said.

> > > I'd imagine the rules about showing your colors and passing on a
> > > certain
> > > side were European rules created by the English, French,Spanish,
> et
> > > al.
> > > They probably did not hold in Asian seas during the same time
> frame.
> >
> >Sure they did.  For European ships.
>
> Well, duh.  That goes without saying.  Among a specific group, not
> among
> everybody.

??  Sure among everybody.  When Europeans came to dominate the area
everyone followed their rules.  Or suffered for it.  And in Europe
there were European norms, not English vs. French vs. Dutch vs. Spanish
norms just because you were suddenly off a different coast.

> It seems to me that you think I am saying there is no use to make
> these
> rules and customs for the SJ universe.  I don't know where you came
> to that
> conclusion, I never said that.

Interesting, I never said you did say that.  You come up with a lot of
interesting ideas.

  I just pointed out the rules would
> only work
> among certain groups.

Well, duh.  They wouldn't work with pirates and other rogue groups.
Wow.

> The more details the better.  And applying shipping customs and rules
> of
> etiquite to certain groups and not to others is even another detail,
> to add
> even more flavor to your campaign.

Why don't you read what I wrote.  And as far as all these groups go,
the problem Europe had *when they finally encountered Asia* was that
the Asians had no contact with them.  In SJ you have to buy your helms
from the Arcane so everyone who's actually in space does have a
beginning common reference.

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