EPIC FAIL Master Races

[Darth Hoth]

Anyway, almost anything can be construed to fit Sidewinder's category. I mean, he basically cited nationalistic pulp fiction from... all nations from all time periods! Man. Hell, you could fit the Hebrews and Israelites in his category. The Bible isn't really that different from wuxia novels or British adventure stories, and has just as many flaws, if not more.

The comparison fails because the Bible more or less only talks about how the Hebrews suck and fail at everything they try. Then when they whine enough about it, God helps them, and things work out . . . sometimes. But the people themselves are nothing special.

Except King David, maybe. And God-damn Samson, certainly. Although he's an idiot.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah, I'd really like to see some kind of internally consistent standards applied as to what constitutes "EPIC FAIL."

As it is, it sounds like Sidewinder created this thread as an excuse to snicker at everyone in all of fiction who ever loses for any reason.

[lance]

Just throwing out some things

Coordinators
Innovades
Spacenoids or whatever Zeon called themselves

Mutants seem to get genocided more often than not

[mr friendly guy]

Sorry, I'm letting Tsui Hark's adaptations cloud my perception of Jin Yong's original novels. This is seen in The East is Red, where martial arts learned in the Chrysanthemum Scroll, allow East the Invincible to catch cannonballs in midair.

1. The East is Red is a shitty movie which borrowed character from the novel "Smiling Proud Wanderer". It sucked in so many ways. That being said...

2. I fail to see how this fits into your definition in the OP. Dongfang Bu Bai was wanked up, powerful enough to catch cannon balls and stop bullets etc. However he didn't win because of his enemy's incompetence. He won because he was wanked. Winning through incompetence would be if the Europeans decided to attack him in hand to hand combat instead of using their firearms, if the story shows him vulnerable to firearms.

[lord Martiya]

What, the fuck, are you talking about?

It was a remote detonated nuclear mine that they didn't see being planted. You are demanding they have some kind of way of knowing it's there.

What are the criteria we apply here? Cunning behaviour? The Minbari don't do a great deal of that. But their technology is far superior, to the point that that was the only non-suicidal victory in the war, and the mere promise of access to some Minbari technology later gets Earth to join the Interstellar Alliance. No one dares attack them, and short of god races, their technology is supreme. They have never lost a war, and are a dominant force in galactic politics, remaining so even in a million years time, ascending to First One status themselves. They live longer, are stronger, more resilient, have a less oppressive culture (compare psicorps with Mimbari teeps) and are a preeminent power.

How does this suck?

My criteria was to actually use common sense. Given Minbari policies, the Black Star commander should have at least expected some kind of trap (anyone would do), but instead he just walked in it and got blowed up, and the rest of the Warrior Caste treated Sheridan as a dishonorable monster instead of admitting their commander was (or at least acted like) an idiot. That's why I included the WARRIOR CASTE, and only the Warrior Caste: while the rest of the Minbari were smarter and as good as you said, the Warrior Caste on the show acted like a master race but had this tendence to treat Sheridan's taking a wise precaution before calling for help as dishonorable.

[inviz345]

Sontarans

[Sidewinder]

As it is, it sounds like Sidewinder created this thread as an excuse to snicker at everyone in all of fiction who ever loses for any reason.

No, this thread was created to snicker at everyone who depends on authorial fiat to win, and who'd be ass-raped the moment such protection is withdrawn. See the Yuuzhon Vong, whose success depended on 1) The New Republic failing to concentrate their forces and avoid the risk of defeat in detail, 2) The New Republic EPIC FAILing to use their naval assets in a competent manner, and 3) The Jedi becoming limp-wrist pacifists.

[NecronLord]

My criteria was to actually use common sense. Given Minbari policies, the Black Star commander should have at least expected some kind of trap (anyone would do),

And? Suspecting doesn't mean it's avoidable. And your proposal seems to be sending out the fighters because they're disposable; that's irrational.

but instead he just walked in it and got blowed up, and the rest of the Warrior Caste treated Sheridan as a dishonorable monster instead of admitting their commander was (or at least acted like) an idiot. That's why I included the WARRIOR CASTE, and only the Warrior Caste: while the rest of the Minbari were smarter and as good as you said, the Warrior Caste on the show acted like a master race but had this tendence to treat Sheridan's taking a wise precaution before calling for help as dishonorable.

This is one specific example. In a war they were, on the whole, winning in a "lulzy rofflestomp." Their code of honour is strange when it encounters aliens; so do humans' even when encountering other cultures; thus they're inferior?

This is directly comparable to US hawks saying that Iraqis/Taliban/etc are dishonorable when they kill/injure better-equipped American soldiers using IEDs (while simultaneously bombing ill-equipped enemies from miles high). It's a perfectly realistic behavior; they want the humans to fight the kind of war that favors them; everyone does. It's arrogant, yes, but I think a whole war where they won every battle and won the war in all but name is hardly unjustified arrogance.

[Alien-Carrot]

I'm wondering if "The Race" from Turtledoves "worldwar" series would count.
Having conquered 2 primitive societies, the beleive themselves to be the superior power in the universe. Then we assrape them with FUCKING GINGER.

pun intended

[NecronLord]

Isn't the point that the author doesn't know they suck? And don't the Race suck incredibly, epically hard?

[Sarevok]

The author does know they suck. He set them up such as that humans could feel proud about defeating a star faring civilization.

[Ilya Muromets]

So, anyone in fiction that has stupid enemies qualifies then, whether hero or villain? Because, honestly, the OP is confusing. It starts off looking for EPIC FAIL "Master Races" which, I assume, would have been something like Daleks, who declare themselves a master race but essentially keep getting their assess kicked by one dude.

But then it goes into a rant about fictional writers making their own countries look good while making outsiders look dumb. What.

Then we assrape them with FUCKING GINGER.

pun intended

First off, you only get to use "pun intended" when the pun actually makes even the slightest bit of sense.

What, is the assrape punned with ginger? Because it looks like, if you really really stretch, a penis. A painfully deformed one.

Or is it something to do with ginger as slang for redheads, which doesn't make sense. Or maybe something to do with the slang term "ginger beer" which at least makes some sense, but then fuck you for using offensive slang for homosexuals.

Or is the pun on the word fucking. At which point that is just stupid because the pun only works with something that's not an essential part of the sentence and can be easily replaced by another expletive.

Or maybe I'm just doing all this because, as laem as this pedantry is, it's still a more coherent topic than the OP.

[HMS Sophia]

ginger beer"

That's slang for homosexuals?

[Ilya Muromets]

Apparently, yes. I encountered it looking over a manuscript of some story set in London. When I asked what it meant, the English writer said it was offensive Cockney rhyming slang.

[Captain Seafort]

Apparently, yes. I encountered it looking over a manuscript of some story set in London. When I asked what it meant, the English writer said it was offensive Cockney rhyming slang.

It's one of the more complicated bits of rhyming slang, like "septics" - rhyming slang for slang. In this case, ginger beer - queer.

[Lusankya]

Then we assrape them with FUCKING GINGER.

pun intended

First off, you only get to use "pun intended" when the pun actually makes even the slightest bit of sense.

What, is the assrape punned with ginger? Because it looks like, if you really really stretch, a penis. A painfully deformed one.

Or is it something to do with ginger as slang for redheads, which doesn't make sense. Or maybe something to do with the slang term "ginger beer" which at least makes some sense, but then fuck you for using offensive slang for homosexuals.

Or is the pun on the word fucking. At which point that is just stupid because the pun only works with something that's not an essential part of the sentence and can be easily replaced by another expletive.

Or maybe I'm just doing all this because, as laem as this pedantry is, it's still a more coherent topic than the OP.

I think the pun is in the fact that ginger makes the Alien females spontaneously go into heat, which results in sexytimes all round. And being lizards, I guess they don't have vaginas, which means they would be taking it in the arse.

[Sithking Zero]

I kind of have to agree. We need a more accurate/well explained definition of what a "Master Race" is. There are two ideas that come to mind:

1) a foe the author makes out to be a Mary Sue race that wouldn't be all that dangerous against a competent foe (the Na'Vi from Avatar, the Draka, the elves in the Inheritance/Eragon series, etc) but don't receive the comeuppance they so richly deserve, or

2) Races that carry around the villain ball and believe themselves unstoppable, but in reality are kinda weak, which the heroes exploit. (the Race (Worldwar, Colonization, Homeward Bound,) the Wraith, the Ori, the Goa'Uld, the Decepticons, etc.)

For 1, I would like to suggest the Elves from Eragon, because they are viewed as having the perfect, ultimate society with the rest of the world's races being inferior and weak in comparison. In reality, they're outnumbered by about a thousand to one by everyone else, and a really competent army could wreck havoc on their flowery, oh-so-perfect-that-sun-shines-out-their-asses... asses. Didn't think that insult through.

For two, perhaps the Horvath and Rangora from the "Troy Rising," series would be more applicable? They were up and coming races that believed that they were superior because they had been around for a few thousand years. The problem was that when they were contacted, they weren't even at the agricultural age yet, so they inherited all the bias' and strategies of all the spacefaring races who came before. Humans, however, were contacted in 2012, so we've had time to imagine sci-fi and all sorts of crazy stuff no one even considered, so we came out of left field and started kicking ass because no one suspected the strategies we use would even exist.

Does this make sense, or am I spilling out a random word salad on the page?

[HMS Sophia]

It's one of the more complicated bits of rhyming slang, like "septics" - rhyming slang for slang. In this case, ginger beer - queer.

It made more sense once I knew it was rhyming slang Yeah okay, I can actually see that one...

[Sidewinder]

I kind of have to agree. We need a more accurate/well explained definition of what a "Master Race" is. There are two ideas that come to mind:

1) a foe the author makes out to be a Mary Sue race that wouldn't be all that dangerous against a competent foe (the Na'Vi from Avatar, the Draka, the elves in the Inheritance/Eragon series, etc) but don't receive the comeuppance they so richly deserve.

This was the point I was getting at. Thank you for articulating it so clearly.

Anyways, two examples of EPIC FAIL master races from Star Trek include the Vulcans and the Klingons. The Vulcans because, for a race so obsessed with logic, they don't act very logically- as Spock learned the Hard Way, when the Vulcans squandered a golden opportunity towards Reunification when they refused to help save Romulus. The Klingons because, for a race that sees itself as mighty warriors, they're not very good at war, as demonstrated when they repeatedly bring swords to a gunfight, instead of bayonets ATTACHED TO RIFLES.

[NecronLord]

Insert standard Na'vi defense here, suffice to say it's evident from the context that the corporate goons are not permitted to simply bomb them from space or any of the shit internet tough guys usually want to do to them to make sure the guys with guns and way cool rockets win. To do so would probably result in execution or at least perpetual imprisonment upon return to Earth and real authority.

First off, you only get to use "pun intended" when the pun actually makes even the slightest bit of sense.

What, is the assrape punned with ginger? Because it looks like, if you really really stretch, a penis. A painfully deformed one.

He is perhaps talking about 'figging' which is a sadomasochistic sexual practice involving ginger root as an anal penetrator.

[NecronLord]

Anyways, two examples of EPIC FAIL master races from Star Trek include the Vulcans and the Klingons. The Vulcans because, for a race so obsessed with logic, they don't act very logically- as Spock learned the Hard Way, when the Vulcans squandered a golden opportunity towards Reunification when they refused to help save Romulus.

Why is unification with an oppressive culture far more powerful and numerous than your own desireable? In any reunified culture, the Romulans, by dint of being a star empire rather than one planet, would surely be in the driving seat. I can't see why the Vulcan High Council would want to see their society annexed to a nation that's tried to conquer them before.

[NecronLord]

The author does know they suck. He set them up such as that humans could feel proud about defeating a star faring civilization.

I rephrase.

Isn't the point of the thread that the author doesn't know they suck? Turtledove knows the Race sucks, and writes about how they suck.

[lord Martiya]

And? Suspecting doesn't mean it's avoidable. And your proposal seems to be sending out the fighters because they're disposable; that's irrational.

My proposal was to check with something relatively unimportant before going in with the freaking flagship, or, alternatively, try and deal with the desperate vessel in a perfect ambush location with something a bit more disposable than the flagship.

This is one specific example. In a war they were, on the whole, winning in a "lulzy rofflestomp." Their code of honour is strange when it encounters aliens; so do humans' even when encountering other cultures; thus they're inferior?

This is directly comparable to US hawks saying that Iraqis/Taliban/etc are dishonorable when they kill/injure better-equipped American soldiers using IEDs (while simultaneously bombing ill-equipped enemies from miles high). It's a perfectly realistic behavior; they want the humans to fight the kind of war that favors them; everyone does. It's arrogant, yes, but I think a whole war where they won every battle and won the war in all but name is hardly unjustified arrogance.

I know that they are arrogant, and that everyone would be so in their place. What I'm saying is that the Minbari should have expected some kind of trick from the enemy they were massacring (exactly as the American soldiers should expect from their lesser-equipped enemies. It's a realistic behaviour). I don't say that the various possible precautions could prevent ANY damage, just that they could limit them (when on November 12 2003 Iraqi insurgents bombed the Italian garrison in Nasiriyya, the sentinel that managed to identify the truck bomb before the explosion failed to prevent it, but at least managed to get it to explode outside the barracks, thus limiting the losses).
And that's not just the only example of suicidal arrogance and lack of common sense: the first contact between Earthforce and Minbari saw the Warrior Caste ordering to open the gunports as a sign of peace, an act with such a great misunderstanding potential that Dukat died as he was ordering them closed and (I could be mistaken) seemed quite horrified from such an act being made with someone they meet for the first time and can't possibly expect would know about that custom. And they apparently failed to tell Earth about that custom, if Sinclair, ten years after the war, mistook a warcruiser showing up with open gunports as a threath instead of a sign of peace and respect (thankfully, Neroon had no reason to activate the stealth device, so Babylon 5 could verify the weapons were unarmed, and Delenn had the sense to go and explain that custom).

[Simon_Jester]

As it is, it sounds like Sidewinder created this thread as an excuse to snicker at everyone in all of fiction who ever loses for any reason.

No, this thread was created to snicker at everyone who depends on authorial fiat to win, and who'd be ass-raped the moment such protection is withdrawn. See the Yuuzhon Vong, whose success depended on 1) The New Republic failing to concentrate their forces and avoid the risk of defeat in detail, 2) The New Republic EPIC FAILing to use their naval assets in a competent manner, and 3) The Jedi becoming limp-wrist pacifists.

And yet you include, for example, the British Empire. Who had a number of things other than authorial fiat backing them up even in fictional depictions- repeating rifles come to mind.

I kind of have to agree. We need a more accurate/well explained definition of what a "Master Race" is. There are two ideas that come to mind:

1) a foe the author makes out to be a Mary Sue race that wouldn't be all that dangerous against a competent foe (the Na'Vi from Avatar, the Draka, the elves in the Inheritance/Eragon series, etc) but don't receive the comeuppance they so richly deserve.

This was the point I was getting at. Thank you for articulating it so clearly.

Anyways, two examples of EPIC FAIL master races from Star Trek include the Vulcans and the Klingons. The Vulcans because, for a race so obsessed with logic, they don't act very logically- as Spock learned the Hard Way, when the Vulcans squandered a golden opportunity towards Reunification when they refused to help save Romulus. The Klingons because, for a race that sees itself as mighty warriors, they're not very good at war, as demonstrated when they repeatedly bring swords to a gunfight, instead of bayonets ATTACHED TO RIFLES.

But the Vulcans aren't presented as a master race in the story- no one except a handful of particularly annoying Vulcans seriously behaves as if they are superior to (as opposed to 'different then') humans. The Klingons, likewise- their culture values toughness and bravery, and they themselves talk a lot about it, but it's not like everyone else cowers in fear of having to fight Klingons.

Klingons and Vulcans are people who value specific things which they don't always excel at accomplishing. Just as humans might value, I don't know, freedom or love or self-determination... but not always attain those things, and often just pay lip service to them while ignoring them in practice.

These aren't "master races," they're just foreign cultures, for crying out loud.

Compare this to someone like the Draka- who are presented as being out and out better, man for man, than anyone else in the world, no matter what. When Draka lose or seem like they might lose in their home setting, it's pretty much always because of superior numbers, never for lack of brains, determination, good equipment, or any other specific virtue.

[Sithking Zero]

I kind of have to agree. We need a more accurate/well explained definition of what a "Master Race" is. There are two ideas that come to mind:

1) a foe the author makes out to be a Mary Sue race that wouldn't be all that dangerous against a competent foe (the Na'Vi from Avatar, the Draka, the elves in the Inheritance/Eragon series, etc) but don't receive the comeuppance they so richly deserve.

This was the point I was getting at. Thank you for articulating it so clearly.

Anyways, two examples of EPIC FAIL master races from Star Trek include the Vulcans and the Klingons. The Vulcans because, for a race so obsessed with logic, they don't act very logically- as Spock learned the Hard Way, when the Vulcans squandered a golden opportunity towards Reunification when they refused to help save Romulus. The Klingons because, for a race that sees itself as mighty warriors, they're not very good at war, as demonstrated when they repeatedly bring swords to a gunfight, instead of bayonets ATTACHED TO RIFLES.

But the Vulcans aren't presented as a master race in the story- no one except a handful of particularly annoying Vulcans seriously behaves as if they are superior to (as opposed to 'different then') humans. The Klingons, likewise- their culture values toughness and bravery, and they themselves talk a lot about it, but it's not like everyone else cowers in fear of having to fight Klingons.

Klingons and Vulcans are people who value specific things which they don't always excel at accomplishing. Just as humans might value, I don't know, freedom or love or self-determination... but not always attain those things, and often just pay lip service to them while ignoring them in practice.

These aren't "master races," they're just foreign cultures, for crying out loud.

Compare this to someone like the Draka- who are presented as being out and out better, man for man, than anyone else in the world, no matter what. When Draka lose or seem like they might lose in their home setting, it's pretty much always because of superior numbers, never for lack of brains, determination, good equipment, or any other specific virtue.

Maybe we need to rename this, not as "Master Races," as that seems to have caused some confusion, to "Mary Sue Races," as that seems to carry across the intent and true meaning far more effectively.