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I keep on hearing about how the post-ROTJ EU is particularly terrible. Having skimmed through the summaries of the main works, it does seem like it's oriented too much over "random Dark Jedi/warlord/alien of the month threatens the NR." And once you get to the NJO- bleah.

So have you ever thought of your own plots, characters, and ideas that you would put in the EU? Not an entire overhaul of the setting, per se, just things you'd add in.

One idea that I've had lately is for a group that is against Force-users in general- the Normals League. It'd revolve around one antagonist, who I'll call the Force-Hater for now, and the movement he eventually leads. Basically, his ideology is against giving the Jedi (or Sith) any kind of political power or autonomy by the New Republic, plus a general phobia over the "alien philosophies" of the Jedi and the Sith- basically, the psuedo-religious, mystic practices of the Force.

This group would be most active in the tumultous years following the Battle of Endor- I'm not going to wank this up so that it wouuld be a threat to the Jedi once they've rebuilt themselves and brought the image of heroic knights back to the galaxy. This idea is centered around the chaotic times of uncertainty, to serve as a thorn on the side of the NR, and a different form of villain. Which is to say, not a straight-up villain.

The Normals League's ideology isn't an outright shunning of the Force. How would you do that, anyways? Try to build a doomsday device? Hunt down and kill all Force-sensitives, and then start a massive eugenics program to get rid of newly born ones? Too dark and extreme for Star Wars. To use one analogy, human supremacists in SW never advocated Holocaust-styled tactics against aliens, but rather ways to limit their power. To use another, the Force-Hater would be a Jack Chick, not a Fred Phelps. Force-Hating is less about trying to get rid of the Force, but rather about placing huge controls over Force-sensitives, to make them subordinate to the state (whether NR or otherwise- the movement that this becomes eventually becomes popular in some segments of the Imperial Remnant and elsewhere). Making them a tool of the government, completely transparent to normals, and so on. There's a strong strain of irrationality and bigotry in this, of course, and it's also a reactionary movement over the sway that Force-users have over galactic leadership. However, I'd also make it more complex by having Force users join the Normals League as well, but they are forbidden from being aligned to the Jedi or the Sith.

So basically, the Normals League wouldn't be a government at all, but yet another independent organization out of countless. However, it eventually grows into a popular movement, which hassles the NR for some time. In addition, the League creates their own militia force of Force-users. For a potentially idiotic idea that contradicts what has been already established about the Force, this group supplants things like Jedi meditation, the use of anger by the Sith, and all of the philosophy that goes along with it by using technology- cybernetic implants, bioengineering, drugs, and so on. And what you end up is a bunch of imbalanced Force-sensitives who are probably weaker than your average Jedi in training or Dark Side Acolyte, but hey, they're chipping away at the NJO's member pool and support! Also, they have combat droids. Lots of them. I'm thinking about overkill operations against Force users taught from the failures of the Clone War- if you're up against two Jedi, bring a nation's worth of droids. And it's best to blast them from space to be safe.

What happens to the Normals League? They figure prominently in one novel or two, then drift into the background as a bunch of rabble-rousers messing with the NR, the NJO, and the Imperials. They try to set themselves up as a legitimate political faction in the NR, but are constantly being thwarted by the Jedi. Eventually they also try some Darksider hunting, which possibly works for a while but then they find out they're in over their heads and then amusingly the Jedi have to go bail them out. In the end Force-Hater either gets killed by a Sith acolyte or a gung ho Jedi apprentice who had infiltrated the Normals League from the start, and anti-Jedism goes into obscurity again.

So, just how wanky is this idea anyways?

Not too wanky. It sounds something like a Nom Anor plot, ala the Red Knights of Life or, and especially, the Peace Brigade. I think it could work within a limited setting - a few planets or star clusters, especially if they were linked to COMPNOR.

Heres an EU-idea I htought would be interesting.

Basically it would be a smaller version of the "X-Wing" series that revolves around a group of Mercanaries. It starts with them stealing the only 4 Prototypes for a new StarFighter, the "R-Wing" The factory is destroyed in their raid thus they have the only 4 made.

The four I plan to be a bit out of the ordinary as the team has only one HUman. Theres a Nimidian, a Wookie, One of those Bird people and then of course the Human.

The four of them get an old Cargo hauler that they fix up as a makeshift Carrier and mobile base.

R-Wing...that just sounds wrong

Chris OFarrell wrote:R-Wing...that just sounds wrong

Sounds like this

I'd like to see a Black Hawk Down-ish thing with the Imperial Remnant trying to stabilize these few planets who've turned into anarchistic hellholes with warlords and mobs and shit, and the Rebel Alliance is funding these warlords to piss on the Imperials and bleed them dry. While we see the Rebel Alliance doing "humanitarian" shit as well, basically being conniving motherfuckers to win hearts and minds. And we see Stormtroopers getting pinned down when their Lambada shuttle gets downed, and they get hunted by mobs of Imperial-haters AND Rebel elite snipers sent to eliminate them while they meet up with a small elite unit of Stormtrooper Commandos who've discovered that the Rebels are in fact the cause of all the shit that's happening.

Then we see stormies who just want to go home and shit. And then, finally, the Imperial forces get so pissed that they send a Victory Stardestroyer in to directly extract the soldiers while the whole planet is in upheaval.

I hate the clean as a baby's ass image the Rebels get. Fuck them.

Hell, the stormies could even hide in a safehouse/hospital ran by Imperial-sympathetic humanitarians, medical personnel and shit. And then the Rogue Squadron bombs the shit out of them. The stormies escape in the nick of time, and we see one of the heroic stormies take down an evil X-wing with a fancy dandy missile launcher.

Crossroads Inc. wrote:Heres an EU-idea I htought would be interesting.

Basically it would be a smaller version of the "X-Wing" series that revolves around a group of Mercanaries. It starts with them stealing the only 4 Prototypes for a new StarFighter, the "R-Wing" The factory is destroyed in their raid thus they have the only 4 made.

The four I plan to be a bit out of the ordinary as the team has only one HUman. Theres a Nimidian, a Wookie, One of those Bird people and then of course the Human.

The four of them get an old Cargo hauler that they fix up as a makeshift Carrier and mobile base.

So it's basically a grown-up version of Storm Hawks. XD
I'd be cool with that.

I have two ideas, both based on World War II:

1. The first idea I've been kicking around is that of a planet which never joined the Galactic Republic and yet is still moderately populated; perhaps an ideologically-run socialist nation which remained neutral throughout the Clone Wars and sealed its borders after the rise of the Empire only to be forcibly annexed later. We'd follow the actions of the legitimate government as it tried to kick the Imperials off-planet and actually succeed in doing so post-Endor, only to give the Rebellion the shaft also and go back to a life of isolation.

2. I'd like to see more groups organized in open revolt against the Empire than the Rebellion. All things said, the Rebels were nearly as reactionary as the Empire; there was little to no ideological variation between groups, which were based on regional rather than political grounds. This is not at all like real life, where, for instance, as in World War II you can have both outright fascist (like the Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny Falanga) and Communist (ala the Polska Partia Robotnicza - both in Poland) fighting against a greater threat. Where is the political depth? Where are the anarchists? Fascists? Communists? Libertarians? All we see are fucking republicans on one side and authoritarian technocrats and monarchists on the other. There's no reason why every rebellious group in the galaxy ought to want to restore the Republic - it fucking sucked.

I could not have been so bad if it kept a galaxy unified and generally at peace for the vast majority of 25,000 years. We see the shittiest era, the twilight by which time it is already so corrupt that Palpatine could have been a dictator as of TPM according to the canon.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:I could not have been so bad if it kept a galaxy unified and generally at peace for the vast majority of 25,000 years. We see the shittiest era, the twilight by which time it is already so corrupt that Palpatine could have been a dictator as of TPM according to the canon.

Nevertheless, there seems to be a decided lack of ideologically-motivated parties in the GFFA. There are of course parties in favor of droid's rights and whatnot, but I have a hard time believing you'd not find something akin to ideological economic platforms in the Galaxy. It's almost as if the Rebellion has a hegemony over rebellious ideologies - wouldn't at least the perennial anarchist groups use the time between Endor and Coruscant to try to fight off the re-establishment of a centralized galactic government? There's a lot that could have been done here that, unfortunately, wasn't. Only Zahn came close when he created Garm bel Iblis, and that was still a case of an inter-ideological rift.

Given the massive economic disparity between classes under the Empire (far more severe than in real life), I'm almost shocked that there are no communistic groups. We've already had a corporatist/libertarian rebellion in the Clone Wars, though, and that works as a start.

Given the massive economic disparity between classes under the Empire (far more severe than in real life), I'm almost shocked that there are no communistic groups.

There are locally.

ArcturusMengsk, the key to understand the Rebellion is to understand the political model of the Republic. It was more of a Confederation than a Federation or Unitarian government, like the Empire was. Planets in the Republic retained their political and economic structure, where they were part of a larger body. Think of the Republic as of a more powerful UN.

Therefore, nothing prevented ideologically different groups (Rebels were composed of various resistance factions) fighting against the Empire, then secluding back to their own planets, some of which were often even more extremely different economically - feudalistic or tribal/primeval (ewoks).

Interplanetary communist or socialist movements are hard to come by, since the interaction between planets is limited just as interaction between modern nationstates is.

A planets' resources generally make it self-sufficient, and thus less likely to form political conglomerates. Corporations which generally move goods from planet to planet were able to forge an alliance, but there are no interplanetary trade unions or political parties, only vague "movements". The Congress of the Republic is more of a UN body/assembly than a true government with political parties. Remember, it has 1 representative per a sector, and often he is a particular planet's representative.

There are thus little room for galactic political action.

Perhaps a more integrated galaxy with interplanetary Imperialism (Empire, CSA) should have forged such groups, but it was up to the writers. They chose to avoid that.

Anarchism and communism in galactic proportions thus make little sense, especially the former - why fight for anarchy when "intergalactic government" as the Republic of the prequels is a loose federation which only offers military assistance and provides some general lawmaking - that is much less than modern governments do.

I found that the post Endor EU is just too full and old. The idea I liked and wrote a few chapters on was more of a Foundation type thing within the SW universe. Where Skywalker late in his life saw the crumbling of the galactic civilization into a medieval type decay. Hundreds if not thousands of fiefdoms springing up and perpetual warfare between them.

Such a state would have lasted thousands and thousands of years or he could put into place certain things then that would spring into action at a specific time and bring about a unification in the galaxy. Jump forward four thousand years and.....

Yeah, it's a reboot I think but will get you away from the old and tired Sith/Jedi wars or the random ex-Imperial with a Stardestroyer going on a rampage bit the EU is sooooo full of. It would also get you away from the 'main' characters of the OT and merely puts a couple as legend and name dropping.

Now THAT would be an excellent way to make a Foundation and Star Wars crossover.

Now the Second Foundation guys would be Jedi, while the main Foundation on "Terminus" would have no Jedi, some force sensitives, and they'd have to figure out the Force in their own way. And by this time, a whole lot of Force/Jedi/Sith artifacts have already been destroyed, so whatever they develop will surely be not as dogmatic and rigid as the old Jedi Order. Though there is a risk of the Dark Side, but...well...fuck it.

Dooey Jo wrote:

Chris OFarrell wrote:R-Wing...that just sounds wrong

Sounds like this

<_<
>_>

Have no idea what yo uare talking about

ArcturusMengsk wrote:

Illuminatus Primus wrote:I could not have been so bad if it kept a galaxy unified and generally at peace for the vast majority of 25,000 years. We see the shittiest era, the twilight by which time it is already so corrupt that Palpatine could have been a dictator as of TPM according to the canon.

Nevertheless, there seems to be a decided lack of ideologically-motivated parties in the GFFA. There are of course parties in favor of droid's rights and whatnot, but I have a hard time believing you'd not find something akin to ideological economic platforms in the Galaxy. It's almost as if the Rebellion has a hegemony over rebellious ideologies - wouldn't at least the perennial anarchist groups use the time between Endor and Coruscant to try to fight off the re-establishment of a centralized galactic government? There's a lot that could have been done here that, unfortunately, wasn't. Only Zahn came close when he created Garm bel Iblis, and that was still a case of an inter-ideological rift.

Given the massive economic disparity between classes under the Empire (far more severe than in real life), I'm almost shocked that there are no communistic groups. We've already had a corporatist/libertarian rebellion in the Clone Wars, though, and that works as a start.

The vast majority of the galactic population lives in "Mussolinified" worlds where the trains are always on time. I suspect they are "post-scarcity" economic societies, and therefore it become difficult to rouse communistic drives for power and wealth equity. The "periphery" population is just too small to matter in the grand scale, unlike today. The poor maybe be really poor compared to the ultra-rich (owning many planets etc), but they're also not that numerous in relative terms, and they're also usually not starving or dying from pollution or disease except where the Empire has targeted them one way or another for marginalization.

Communist. Droid. Upheaval.

EDIT:

And instead of this lame Mandalorian bullshit, we could get disbanded Clone Troopers and Stormtroopers rebelling from the Empire to form their own nation of Soldiers, where they won't be manipulated by Imperial warlords or any of that shit, where they won't be used as fodder. They'll be led by an old Jango clone with an eyepatch, in search for OUTER HAVEN!

Then they'd have this Galaxy Gun variant in the form of a variable-configuration walker/starfighter. Like, a Metal Gear. But better!

How'd the clones overcome their programming?

Dooey Jo wrote:

Chris OFarrell wrote:R-Wing...that just sounds wrong

Sounds like this

"Also, the lasers can... then home in on targets once fired."

While I don't see a lot of flavors of anti-Imperials springing up that are independent of the NR/Alliance, I am in favor of creating at least one possibly secondary power post-ROTJ: a revived Confederacy driven by corporate interests, criminal syndicates in the Robin Hoodish Stark Combine mold, and lots and lots of systems and planets that are like "screw this, we're leaving." They'd be united by a shared defensive pact, a free trade bloc, and mutual distrust/hate for the two big sides. One possible name is CUSP- Confederacy of Unaligned Systems and Polities. Basially, they'd be bit like the Nonaligned nations in the Cold War- left alone until either side makes a move for them. Then all hell breaks loose.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:I suspect they are "post-scarcity" economic societies, and therefore it become difficult to rouse communistic drives for power and wealth equity

Technically it seems that the Republican worlds are not post-scarcity - even as molecular manufacturing is well-understood and used in the Galaxy, massive supplies of energy and even goods to self-insufficient worlds like Coruscant, Kuat, etc. points at a pre-scarcity society, yet with massive spaceflight capabilities. It's hard to reconcile that with the colossal automated production capabilities SW has, automated shipflight and other things. Technically SW should be able to leap to the Culture's level of society (if not that level of technology) were they serious about it.

Okay, well I mean post-scarcity for shit like food and basic everyday consumer goods. There are still good which are obviously desired but scarce, like owning planets.

Shroom Man 777 wrote:I'd like to see a Black Hawk Down-ish thing with the Imperial Remnant trying to stabilize these few planets who've turned into anarchistic hellholes with warlords and mobs and shit, and the Rebel Alliance is funding these warlords to piss on the Imperials and bleed them dry. While we see the Rebel Alliance doing "humanitarian" shit as well, basically being conniving motherfuckers to win hearts and minds. And we see Stormtroopers getting pinned down when their Lambada shuttle gets downed, and they get hunted by mobs of Imperial-haters AND Rebel elite snipers sent to eliminate them while they meet up with a small elite unit of Stormtrooper Commandos who've discovered that the Rebels are in fact the cause of all the shit that's happening.

Then we see stormies who just want to go home and shit. And then, finally, the Imperial forces get so pissed that they send a Victory Stardestroyer in to directly extract the soldiers while the whole planet is in upheaval.

I hate the clean as a baby's ass image the Rebels get. Fuck them.

Hell, the stormies could even hide in a safehouse/hospital ran by Imperial-sympathetic humanitarians, medical personnel and shit. And then the Rogue Squadron bombs the shit out of them. The stormies escape in the nick of time, and we see one of the heroic stormies take down an evil X-wing with a fancy dandy missile launcher.

That sounds like an interesting story, but it's just plain not Star Wars. The Rebels were the good guys. They were squeaky-clean, because it is a space opera universe.

I think you can do it if you change "Rebel Alliance" in that scenario to evil Imperial faction, or easier yet, mercenaries/space pirates. And you place it in a context of being about a "good Imperial faction" just doing it's job to maintain law and order.

I don't think you can really apply the term 'post scarcity' to Star Wars. From what we've seen, Coruscant does indeed have a seedy underbelly with plenty of poverty. However, I'd say that the attitude on most core worlds is probably very much 'Bread and Circuses' - provided you toe the line, the Empire, despite occasional fits of ineptitude, seems quite capable of keeping you happy, healthy, entertained and oblivious to all the bad things its doing. Once you have uncomplaining perfect slaves in the form of droids, to do all the really crappy work, I can't see much potential for economically motivated left-wing insurrection (Well, excepting when droids rebel, of course).

Any world, even post-scarcity (WRT basic necessities and health etc.), will have seedy underbellies. You expect there not to be thieves and rapists and just fucked up people? The condition of humanity (or sapience, here, I suppose) will lead to it inevitably. You'll still have dysfunctional drug addicts, violent people, corrupt people, insular or fucked up fringe cultures, anti-socialist religions etc. Hell, you have sapient carnivores who murder and eat people in SW because they prefer it to non-sapient foodstuffs. Only the most wide-eyed liberal would claim just because you provided universal social benefits society would be spotless.

ArcturusMengsk wrote:All we see are fucking republicans on one side and authoritarian technocrats and monarchists on the other. There's no reason why every rebellious group in the galaxy ought to want to restore the Republic - it fucking sucked.

Confederates joined the Rebel Alliance based on the NEC and the new comics include Recusant warships, etc with the Alliance. And for the Empire there's plenty of "normal people doing their jobs". Well there isn't too much focus on that but the new comics I believe do

It's almost as if the Rebellion has a hegemony over rebellious ideologies - wouldn't at least the perennial anarchist groups use the time between Endor and Coruscant to try to fight off the re-establishment of a centralized galactic government?

The NR likely included some of their ideas; hence why the NR was a confederacy and much of the various fleets were under sector or local control and tended to give much power to the local members.