Updates at the Domus Publica

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-11-28 02:09am

Robert Treder wrote:"Sic Transit Gloria" is great, although you repeat two paragraphs.

That error has been corrected, thank you.

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2004-11-28 02:19am

Don't mention it. Now that I've finished "A Billion Here, a Billion There..." I can unsurprisingly attest that it's up to your usual high standards. Keep up the good work.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-11-28 02:36am

In "Sic Transit Gloria" - specifically your premises - you describe the "Imperial Remnant" as the state Admiral Pelleaon created "e nihilo." A small typo error, you should add the x.

I am quite impressed, and hardly surprised that that was the only flaw of any calibre I could discover. Its always enlightening, Julius.

Lord Poe · Post by **Lord Poe** » 2004-11-28 02:47am

Here's what Curtis had to say about the Rand Ecliptic:

Only one frame allows comparison between a TIE and the hangar entrance:

the left-middle frame of "rand_ecliptic1.jpg" from issue #12. We need to
look at the lead TIE. Compare it to the height of the hangar aperture,
which is partially but perhaps mostly visible.

However we do not know how many times closer to camera the vertical edge is than the TIE. All we know is that the TIE is closer than the outside
of the ship's brim. If the vertical edge is almost completely within the
comic frame _and_ if it is equidistant with the lead TIE then the hangar
is 24.8m high. However the TIE could be more distant, reducing the hangar height estimate.

When I looked at this, and compared with side views of the whole ship
(with unknown pitch and yaw angles) I found lengths in the range of 0.7km
to 1.3km.

We need more pictures before an accurate determination becomes possible.
:/

It would be good if we knew that a Lambda-class shuttle fitted through the
aperture, but unfortunately the cockpit of Biggs's shuttle (start of issue
#9) looks different from a Lambda.

Armored Goldbar · Post by **Armored Goldbar** » 2004-11-28 03:21am

"Sic Transit Gloria" was quite good. It was a most pleasant read.

However, how do you maintain that the Emperor was well liked, even unto his death? He must have had enormous support and popularity following the Clone Wars (and hopefully ROTS will shed more light on this), but we see in the canon source of ROTJ that the populations of Naboo, Bespin, Tatooine, and Coruscant are celebrating the Rebel victory.

It seems inconsistant to me...

Pcm979 · Post by **Pcm979** » 2004-11-28 03:31am

A few rioters put down soon after the bits we were shown. Easy.

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-11-28 03:47am

Pcm979 wrote:A few rioters put down soon after the bits we were shown. Easy.

Exactly. I would compare the events shown on those planets as being nothing more than a Tiananmen Square -style uprising that was swiftly crushed.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-11-28 03:54am

I think the EU actually said that Madame Director Isard quickly had a squad of her own Stormtroopers head down to the plaza and lay out with automatic E-11 fire.

That's a quick end.

Armored Goldbar · Post by **Armored Goldbar** » 2004-11-28 04:13am

I dunno...except in the case where the EU specifically enumerates a response, it still seems sketchy.

Seems like an awful lot of speculation to make a claim about trillions of people in the face of a canon source that's specifically intented to convey mass joy...unless you want to say that the director himself is a source bias against the Empire....

Pcm979 · Post by **Pcm979** » 2004-11-28 04:15am

Well, going by Suspension of Disbelief, the films are New Republic propoganda. So, quite possibly. Unless you believe that a government which was hated by absolutely everybody everywhere could concievably work.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-11-28 04:16am

Armored Goldbar wrote:I dunno...except in the case where the EU specifically enumerates a response, it still seems sketchy.

Seems like an awful lot of speculation to make a claim about trillions of people in the face of a canon source that's specifically intented to convey mass joy...unless you want to say that the director himself is a source bias against the Empire....

Coruscant has hundreds of trillions of people; you saw a few thousand people celebrating?

Baised sample, my friend.

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2004-11-28 04:20am

Besides, Publius didn't just pull the "beloved old man" line out of his ass. The EU is primarily concerned with the opposition to HIM, to be sure, but it does mention his popularity as well.

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-11-28 04:50am

Armored Goldbar wrote:"Sic Transit Gloria" was quite good. It was a most pleasant read.

However, how do you maintain that the Emperor was well liked, even unto his death? He must have had enormous support and popularity following the Clone Wars (and hopefully ROTS will shed more light on this), but we see in the canon source of ROTJ that the populations of Naboo, Bespin, Tatooine, and Coruscant are celebrating the Rebel victory.

It seems inconsistant to me...

The evidence for his popularity is mentioned in Part I of "Leviathan":

Hence, Lord Vader muses in Return of the Jedi (Ballantine, 1983) that "soon, the old Emperor would die – and though the galaxy would bend from the horror of that loss," and "Who's Who in Star Wars Galaxies" describes him as being "known to the citizens of the Galactic Empire as a frail, beloved old man," enjoying "the support of the ignorant masses [...] so unwavering that the Emperor can order the destruction of entire worlds and the execution of their populations – and has done so, far too many times – and then blame these tragedies on the Rebel Alliance." Indeed, Coruscant and the Core Worlds comments that many Imperial citizens "regard Palpatine as a demigod." Indeed, The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, Second Edition (West End Games, 1992) states that "there were many who distrusted the concept of an emperor, yet trusted Palpatine, and thus accepted the president's action as a temporary and necessary step."

As regards the celebrations on Naboo, Tatooine, Bespin, and Imperial Center, the films use this visually to convey a sense of triumph and celebration. It is also ludicrous to believe that an authoritarian state supposedly hated and feared by its entirely population would be rendered so thoroughly impotent by the death of its leader that it would promptly vanish, which is also implied by the closing sequence (i.e., in a fairy tale notion, the death of the Emperor causes the Empire to simply "go away"). Critical analysis of the films demonstrates that the reactions of a few thousands of individuals are not indicative of any substantive trends amongst masses of people measured in the quadrillions, not to mention the fact that the Empire maintained a token presence in the Outer Rim (i.e., Bespin and Tatooine would be mostly free of Imperial influence), and the Outer Rim has long been a bastion of support for the Rebellion.

Armored Goldbar · Post by **Armored Goldbar** » 2004-11-28 05:17am

Yes, yes. I read "Leviathan." I own Coruscant and the Core Worlds and several other cited works. And, I realize that there must have been a huge number of Imperial citizens who supported Palpy (had I been a Coruscanti or other Core Worlder, I suspect I'd have been one of them).

Please do not mistake me for accusing Publius of making anything up!

It just seems...odd given the juxtaposition of the films and the EU material citing the Emperor's support. The films and the EU give a greatly differing view of life in the Empire. I suppose explaining away the movies as NR propaganda makes sense, though I don't know how admissable it is.

The Byzantine nature of Palpatine's government, coupled by the fact that he specifically designed it so that it cannot function without the Sovereign, makes it, IMO, highly probable that the sudden removal of the Emperor would create a political environment in which the arms of government that previously maintained a police state were held prisoner by inaction (regardless of how temporary it might be). In fact, I was under the impression that many worlds joined the NR during this Emperor-less "system shock."

While I admit that Bespin and Tat are extremely poor examples for this argument, it seems almost like we're engaging in apologetic activity for the Empire when confronted with Rebel victory.

I don't want to engage in a serious debate over it, because 1.) I have read no EU regarding the formation of the NR is years and 2.) it's really moot. Publius worte a fine series of articles, which I admire greatly...but I can't help but wonder if we're allowing ourselves to color our view of Imperial society after defending it's uber-ness against the Trekkies for so long.

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-11-28 05:32am

Description is quite apart from defense. The evidence shows that the Empire is a federative authoritarian state whose population in large part either overtly supported the Galactic Emperor and the Imperial State, or else supported the Galactic Emperor and tolerated the Imperial State, or hated both but was unwilling to overtly support the Rebellion. Hence, the Rebellion had a large degree of theoretical or intellectual passive support, but received limited active support. Whatever one believes about the methods and ideals of these two groups is not discussed. Similarly, no effort is made to comment on the propriety or desirability of the culture described in "Brave New World." The intent is only to present the evidence and to leave the questions of right and wrong to the informed conscience and prudential good judgment of the reader.

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2004-11-28 05:36am

The films don't necessarily have to be viewed as NR propoganda. They simply don't show the lives of average Imperial citizens, since average Imperial citizens are not involved with the events at hand.

The only major system shown throughout the OT is Alderaan (excluding the celebration scenes in question), and we don't see much of it. The celebration scenes are merely added as a storytelling tool, to give the audience something to cheer along with. Under SoD and the Canon Heirarchy, they cannot be taken as showing unanimous or even large-scale animosity towards the Emperor.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2004-11-28 05:42am

A small typo error, you should add the x

I'm fairly certain "e" is correct. "E" and "ex" are used for different cases. I think; it's been nearly 8 months since I've even looked at my Latin textbooks.

Armored Goldbar · Post by **Armored Goldbar** » 2004-11-28 05:44am

Robert Treder wrote: Under SoD and the Canon Heirarchy, they cannot be taken as showing unanimous or even large-scale animosity towards the Emperor.

Unanimous? Of course not! But, I suspect the intent was to show large-scale animosity towards the Emperor or large-scale support of the Rebellion. Either way, something is odd about it.

At any rate, I really have nothing to argue. My initial concerns have been answered with reasoned replies and I have no point to make...except maybe that we might apply too much realism to the situation or that we overanalyze a 30 second montage.

Great articles, Publius. I admire them very much.

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-11-28 09:17pm

A new short story, "The Good Old Days," has been posted.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-11-28 11:29pm

Very good.

Though aren't Soveriegn's called by their first name, whereas an elected official by their last? Wouldn't "Emperor Palpatine" and "Supreme Chancellor Palpatine" imply that he has only a singule name? As it should be "President Bush" and "Emperor George I"'; to borrow a handy example.

Connor MacLeod · Post by **Connor MacLeod** » 2004-11-29 12:20am

Lord Poe wrote:Here's what Curtis had to say about the Rand Ecliptic:

Only one frame allows comparison between a TIE and the hangar entrance:

the left-middle frame of "rand_ecliptic1.jpg" from issue #12. We need to
look at the lead TIE. Compare it to the height of the hangar aperture,
which is partially but perhaps mostly visible.

If this is the same one I am thinking of, yeah, it is partially but mostly visible. The height I scaled at 207 pixels. The TIE panel wing is about 46 pixels high. That makes the height of bhe visible portion approximately 4.5 times greater than the height of the TIE's "solar" panel. I also disagree that that is the *only* image that allows reliable scaling - Randecliptic4.jpg offers at least one if not two other scaling opportunities (one that looks like there is a TIE inside the Hangar or just outside of it - not Biggs' TIE - and the other image shows his TIE just exiting the Hangar, with the Rand Ecliptic in the background (IE Biggs' TIE is in the foreground.)

Other images (randecliptic4.jpg) suggest that the height of the hangar extends as much as 25-30% higher than the visible portion, suggesting it might be closer to 6 times the height of the TIE wing.

My hangar estimates based on the height of the wing (based on the TIE length of ~6 meters I derived a height between 6.5-7 meters tall) suggest something closer to 30-35 meters as the probable hangar height for the visible segment, low end. Scaling by randecliptic4.jpg, the hangar height is no less than 3.2 times higher than the TIE fighter's wing.

However we do not know how many times closer to camera the vertical edge is than the TIE. All we know is that the TIE is closer than the outside
of the ship's brim. If the vertical edge is almost completely within the
comic frame _and_ if it is equidistant with the lead TIE then the hangar
is 24.8m high. However the TIE could be more distant, reducing the hangar height estimate.

By a factor of more than 2 or times at minimum? That seems highly improbable. The edge of the ship's brim is at most a hundred meters or so away, and at least one of the TIEs is much closer to the hangar entrance than to the brim (using the circular vent-like objects as a benchmark, particularily in comparison to other images.) For the ship to be Acclamator-sized, you'd need the hangar entrance to be only about 10-11 meters tall max. The other images do not even remotely suggest that the entrance is that narrow. (eg, randecliptic4.jpg, where at least one image shows a TIE relative to the hangar height from the outside, and beyond the "brim" trench)

When I looked at this, and compared with side views of the whole ship
(with unknown pitch and yaw angles) I found lengths in the range of 0.7km
to 1.3km.

Scaling the hangar's height to the overall length of the ship suggests the hangar height is no less than 1/70th the overall length of the ship, but more likely to be something like 1/80th. At the very minimum, the figures suggest the vessel is at least a mile long, and more likely to be 1 1/2 to 2 miles in length. And that's ignoring the fact we're not seeing the ship totally from a "side" view, meaning it appears shorter than it might actually be.

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-11-29 12:39am

Illuminatus Primus wrote:Very good.

Though aren't Soveriegn's called by their first name, whereas an elected official by their last? Wouldn't "Emperor Palpatine" and "Supreme Chancellor Palpatine" imply that he has only a singule name? As it should be "President Bush" and "Emperor George I"'; to borrow a handy example.

In Crimson Empire II: Council of Blood, Chairman Xandel Carivus dissolved the Interim Ruling Council and proclaimed himself Emperor Carivus. For whatever reason, he clearly felt that the use of his surname was preferable to his given name.

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2004-12-01 05:41am

Did you choose the nickname "Augie" in reference to "Augie's Great Municipal Band," the title of the track on the TPM soundtrack which is essentially the Emperor's theme from ROTJ in parade form?

Publius · Post by **Publius** » 2004-12-01 03:47pm

Robert Treder wrote:Did you choose the nickname "Augie" in reference to "Augie's Great Municipal Band," the title of the track on the TPM soundtrack which is essentially the Emperor's theme from ROTJ in parade form?

Excellent catch! Yes, the nickname is a deliberate reference to Augie's Great Municipal Band (which was actually said to be a group performing in the parade by the Official Site).

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2004-12-01 03:55pm

Nice work!