starlord wrote:Looks good, but this would somehow give the kilrathi an untirely new look: They would not be anymore the merciless hartless ruthless (etc...) aggressors.
Maybe you have a point.
If we consider the prophecy (WC prophecy) we are given an explanation to their behaviour: Although it is unclear when, the kilrathi were "visited" by a race called the nephilim which proved so powerful even to them they referred to them as gods. Yet the nephilim leave, refusing to fight the kilrathi as they deem them unworthy to engage ( they no doubt considered K technology too primitive compared to theirs). Yet they stated they would come back (see the prophecy) when the kilrathi would meet their match:
"there shall come a time when he who has the heart of a kilrathi
but is not kilrathi born (blair) shall rain cleansing fire down upon us (temblor bomb, kilrah, WC3) and knathrak, an era of great darkness, shall embrace us (the arrival of the nephilim).
You're mixing up the Mantu and the Nephilim; but everybody does that
Two different races. The neph are insect-like; the mantu aren't.
So what shall we do?
Do we keep the old misteriously savage kilrathi, or do we spawn a kilrathi race immerged in plots very much like the terrans?
I wasn't trying to
modify the k race; I'm trying to *find out* what they are
really like. And it seems to me that, although they are pretty agressive, they are not necessarily like the nephilim (destroy, destroy, destroy). They have a kind of honor, a peculiar kind of honor, but honor after all. They do have emotions, like fear; and much of their bravado is a cover for their cowardice --of each other and their dictator/emperor. They are carnivorous, and they equate carnivore to "superior". And just like carnivores often prefer not to eat other carnivores, it seems to me that might color their thinking about which races to engage in war, and what to do with them. Although sometimes they seem to think af other carnivore races as being good for making slaves of. Which is what ends up happening when they capture human worlds.
What seems to me particularly inconsistent is the number of years that pass from the Iason incident to McAuliffe. It doesn't make sense.
And the battle of McAuliffe happens right after
Terrans formally declare War. Not only that, but the Kirlathi Emperor orders the destruction of McAuliff and all Terran vessels AFTER the Terran war declaration.
The fact that the confederation congress was speaking of "enforcing non-agression" before the war; and then declare war citing "acts of piracy", all these things lead me to believe that the kats were reluctant to get into a war, just as we were; and that what was going on was an escalating pirate war, beyond the control of either government.
It's true the great ideas of those plots (I recognise a privateer player) could make great continuities, yet we may completely remold the kilrathi in the process. I don't know if fans would like it...
What I want to know is whether the image we, fans, have formed about the kilrathi is accurate. The unanswered questions above seem to tell a different story.
Also one thing: one of the greatest assets of the kilrathi is that they are much united under a ductaturial regime (with the exception being the gorath khar rebels). This way, they all consider us as prey fodder, which makes them an even more formidable enemy... If you split them into factions, they will appear vulnerable to emotions, corruption, etc... And will loose some of their charisma and mistery.
But the Kilrathi are much more divided than the Terrans are. It's just that the divisions are not apparent to someone looking from the other side of the front line. There were two assassination attempts on the Emperor or Prince Trakath, I can't remember which. I used to have a good link talking about Kilrathi history... And the fact you have Kilrathi Rebels is in-game proof. Naturally, they will all see humans as "prey and fodder" once the Emperor says we are; but my question is what are they really like
before they become official enemies. There's quite a few years of that, not too well described anywhere. But "acts of piracy" seems like a freudian slip, if the Confed propaganda machine were tring to bury facts contradictory to the new war propaganda.
As I said, those are my feelings and that doesn't prove I'm right. Perhaps later in WCU, we could use that plot and test it on the gorath khar rebels...
Well, that's it. The fact that there are rebels shows that kats are not like the Borg. It's a dictatorship, yes; and they are a very cowardly race; --who can't fight back their own dictators --
unless they live so close to their own enemies (Gorath Khar) that they feel they can switch sides and get the latter's protection...-- think about
that...
EDIT: And this is consistent with a "carnivore" sort of mentality. Carnivores are used to herbivore prey running away; they are not used to them fighting back. Their self-confidence is hard but brittle.
EDIT2:
And when humans declare war, the kat emperor sends a huge fleet. He's gripped by sudden *terror*, I say. But the fear of being seen as cowardly by other Kilrathis wins, and so he sends all the forces he can muster, all at once, in the hope of putting an end to the situation.
EDIT3:
Read this:
http://hkn.eecs.berkeley.edu/~drake/govtscr.html#kilrah
but read between the lines; much of it is from embelished kilrathi accounts.
