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[Svetlana Scarlet]

I think I may write a review tonight. 

How do you write a review for a book that hasn't come out yet?

[Invelious]

LINK

The technology to download the consciousnesses of pilots into multiple clones, the Capsuleers, has finally delivered the dream of immortal soldiers. Train a soldier just once and then however many times he dies he will keep on getting more experienced, more battle toughened, as his brain is downloaded into a ready supply of cloned bodies. But no-one anticpated the effects of the multiple traumas, the multiple stresses of multiple lives and deaths on the battle field. War is hell. And now it can last forever for everyone. A fast-moving action-packed novel of interstellar war and high-tech combat, backed by massive cross promotion.

Can anyone tell me WTF "massive cross promotion" means? Anyway...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-promotion   

so basically. Eve is cross promoting into dust, on a massive scale.

[Vieve]

I think I may write a review tonight. 

How do you write a review for a book that hasn't come out yet?

If you get a copy of the ARC.  Chowda, you work in publishing?

[Akikio L]

You can listen to Tony reading a part from the book here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJfiQ43Adsg

[Seriphyn]

11 minutes into that video. Firstly, good stuff exploring Jacus Roden's background. Less random, confusing shoe-in that we know nothing of. However...

Set 70 years ago...Serpentis formed 30 years ago...bah

Impressed with TonyG's humility however. Also, drugs being apart of Intaki culture for thousands of years huh? Interesting.

[Z.Sinraali]

I wanna say :tonyg: with you there, but Pornstache Sarpati bought Serpentis 30 years ago. The corporation existed prior to that. Now, it's still pushing the limits of credibility, since the booster article says they first appeared "a century" ago and were banned a few decades later, and Serpentis wasn't founded until at least several years after that, but it's within the limits of credibility.

[lallara zhuul]

Interesting coinkydink.

Just reading an Iain M. Banks Culture novel 'Surface Detail' and at least on three occasions I have come across all the concepts that EVE is currently working with, informorphs, repeatedly dying soldiers etc.

If I'd read his stuff earlier I would have probably left EVE ages ago.

[Borza]

I noticed that myself Banks is a superb author.

[Wanoah]

Interesting coinkydink.

Just reading an Iain M. Banks Culture novel 'Surface Detail' and at least on three occasions I have come across all the concepts that EVE is currently working with, informorphs, repeatedly dying soldiers etc.

If I'd read his stuff earlier I would have probably left EVE ages ago.

For a long time, PC Gamer's (UK) mini review of Eve on its recommended games page was "Live that Iain M Banks dream." It was actually that line (and another longer review in an issue that has a preview of Elite IV - yeah :/) that got my attention.

Still, I never really saw much common ground between the Culture stuff and Eve beyond a few general concepts that are fairly commonplace in science fiction settings anyway. Nonetheless, I still have an indy from 2004 called 'Grey Area'

[Saikoyu]

Never read the Culture stuff myself (starting to think I should), but infomorphs seems to be becoming a hot idea these days.  I don't know where the idea started, but I know of two games (Eclipse Phase (rpg) and Infinity (miniture wargame)) that make use of the idea. 

[Lyn Farel]

Ive seen pretty strong informorph influences in Pandora Star (Hamilton) and Takeshi Kovacs (Morgan) more or less recently. Not sure how far it goes too. Something similar to Lain (anime) concepts too.

[Louella Dougans]

A little booklet with a brief excerpt came with the fanfest gear this year. Someone can probably provide a scan.

from http://www.eveger.de/forum/archive/index.php/t-38144.html


[spoiler]

HEIMATAR REGION-HED CONSTELLATION
AMAMAKE SYSTEM
PLANET II: PIKE'S LANDING
CORE FREEDOM COLONY
SOVEREIGNTY OF THE MINMATAR REPUBLIC

AT LONG LAST, the night mercifully surrendered to dawn. A grayish-white fog began to snake its way through the rocky terrain like blood seeping from an old wound. The surviving Minmatar "Valklear" soldiers defending Core Freedom removed their night-vision equipment to see the wickedness in its true light: columns of smoke rising from craters, shattered war machines, and mutilated corpses littering the barren landscape. The elite Valklears had stopped the Amarrian attackers within sight of their objective, but only barely.

Weary to the bone, the Valklears who could still stand began the "mercy and salvage" part of their mission: collecting weapons, unspent ammunition, incapacitated drones, reusable cybernetic limbs or organs from fallen soldiers, and any functional mechanical parts that remained. With no reliable support from the Republic Fleet, every last bit of scrap was precious for the colony, and anything salvageable would be given to the City engineers for reprocessing.

Given the dire lack of supplies, the "mercy" component of the mission was the unconditional execution and harvesting of any surviving enemy soldiers, including officers. They were worth more dead to the Minmatars than alive.

Surveying the battlefield from a gunship was General Vlad Kintreb, who at 160 years of age had been a soldier for more than a century. Though he had experienced far worse, he knew that for many of his soldiers, this had almost certainly been the longest night of their lives.

He ordered the pilot to set the craft down amidst the Carnage. Two MTAC's and a squad of commandos rushed ahead to secure the landing site, as several dazed Valklears looked an with blank, dazed expressions.

The General was going downrange, they muttered, to check upon his children in the field.



Vlad Kintreb still walked under his own power, although most of the bones in his legs were reconstructed with titanium. The usual mineral-scented air—breathable thanks to years of terraforming—reeked of explosives and ionized gas. He breathed the familiar stench deeply, ignoring the rush of past battles roaring through his memory.

Behind him, the bodyguards kept their distance, while the deep metallic thud and crunch of towering combat MTAC's flanked either side of him. The chicken-legged walkers, "Spearstrike" assault variants of Minmatar design, were now a salvaged Patchwork of gold and brown armor plates. Minmatar cannons hung beneath weapon pylons lined with Amarrian guidance systems. Vlad grunted at the sight of them. Like the rest of his garrison, there was a time when there magnificent vehicles were intact.

Pausing over a disemboweled corpse, he reached down to turn the remnants of its severed torso onto its back. The stub of a spine, charred black from an explosion that detached the pelvis, drew his attention. Unfazed by the gore that feil away from exit wounds behind the rib cage, he ran his fingers up the Bone, then inspected the skull and jaw.

Kameiras,' he growled, shaking his head.

For General Kintreb, the irony was sickening. Kintreb's knowledge of human anatomy was developed in classrooms and raw battlefield experience. He could teil just from looking at bones what race he was dealing with. His Valklears had defended the colony from the Amarr elite infantry known as "Kameiras", who were entirely of Minmatar origin. Genetically, Minmatar tribal ethnicities tended to be taller and more physically robust than Amarrians. But the Kameiras were bred from the best physical specimens of slaves in the Amarr Empire to become holy warriors. Eligible children were placed in a conditioning program so that by the age of 19, they were as strong and powerful as was humanly possible without the aid of cybernetic augmentation. The Kameiras were a significant investment for the Empire, and were the best infantrymen they had—arguably more reliable than even their own Paladins.

Vlad stood slowly, ignoring the tinge of pain in his lower back. Distant, muted explosions rumbled through the landscape, and more gunships roared overhead. Somewhere in the mountains beyond, Valklears were cleaning up the last pockets of stragglers who still had the strength to fight back.

General Kintreb brushed the grime off his gloves, glancing back towards the outer fortifications. From a kilometer away, a great complex dominated the entire horizon. Deep behind its walls were anti-ship defenses to which the colony population—and the division of elfte troops left protecting it—owed their lives. If not for them, they would have been vaporized by orbital bombardments ages ago.

The infrastructure at Core Freedom was immensely valuable. Covering nearly 500 square kilometers, a conglomerate of industrial outposts provided access to the massive resource deposits of Pike's Landing. Ore extractors, processors, and an alloy smelting plant provided the nucleus of what was once a thriving industrial hub for the entire system. Central to all this was the colony's most prized possession: its space elevator, the only one an the planet. Its six sky cables tethered to the orbiting industrial megacomplex above, could transport massive amounts of material offworld at a rate that dwarfed the Lift capacity of even the largest dropships.

The Amarrians coveted Core Freedom for its mineral wealth and developed surface infrastructure. But getting ships into position to direct pinpoint orbital strikes was impossible because of deadly anti-ship missile batteries. All ranged ordinance attacks were vulnerable to point defenses and shields. The only way to take the colony and its infrastructure intact was to land troops well beyond the perimeter and unleash a frontal assault, disabhng the planetary defenses and then letting the guns in space impose their will on the targets below.

Last night, Amarr launched a ferocious assault with their best troops leading the charge, and nearly succeeded in breaching the last line of ground defenses before the outer walls. Stretched too thin by the conflict raging closer to the home worlds, the Republic Fleet couldn't afford to divert resources to the frontier, and reinforcements would've been easily shot out of space by capsuleers loyal to the Empress. In fact, very little of the equipment available for General Kintreb's troops was original-issue gear. Most of them deployed with Amarrian weapons, all salvaged from prior battles.
Unless something drastic changed, the General knew that they couldn't hold the colony for muck longer. Pleading to the Republic Fleet for help—even to Sanmatar Maleatu Shakor himself—would do him no good, as there were countless other generals, on other Minmatar frontier worlds, all begging for the same.

Shadowed by men and machine, General Kintreb continued his walk, slowly making his way towards a fallen Valklear lying upright against the wall of a shallow crater. Peering over the ledge, he found another scene of defaced humanity: the corpses of two soldiers, one Valklear, the other Kameiras, sprawled opposite each other. The Valklear corpse—whose IDENT tag he recognized—was decapitated. The Kameiras was on his back, with a charred blast hole in place of where his heart should have been. A white-hot microblade was still clutched and active in his hand.

General Kintreb imagined the men holding this position were surprised by the crazed Kameiras, who—with no ammunition remaining—was determined to fight to the end. Neither Valklear could react fast enough, and as testament to the sheer will and physical strength of the Kameiras, he managed to execute one in a single blow before his partner could slay him. Several laaknyds, voracious scavenging insects accidentally introduced to the planet's ecosystem, had already begun partaking in the decaying corpses. One emerged from the ehest wound of the fallen Kameiras, its serrated pincers full of flesh. Before long, there would be many more of them.

Vlad knelt before an upright Valklear, in which the laaknyds showed na interest. He was still alive.

He gently removed the Valklear's mask and night Vision scope. Wide, unfocused eyes appeared.

Behind him, his bodyguards readied their aim an the soldier.

A rifle lay across his lap, which Vlad slowly lifted and set aside. An inspection followed: skort, irregular breaths. Rapid pulse. Same scarring an the armor, but na breaches.

This was neuro-trauma. PSYKLAD munitions were reportedly used ahead of the assault. Any soldier who was unprotected could hallucinate to the point of self-destructive insanity.

General Kintreb didn't care about the danger.

'State your name and rank,' he ordered.

His eyes blinked, but did nothing else. The upper torso of the dosest MTAC swiveled slowly; the turret beneath its cockpit rotated towards them.
Vlad placed a hand an his shoulder.

Let's just start with your name.'

Another blink; a tremor ran through the soldier's hands.

'I'm sorry about your squadmate,' Vlad continued. 'But you have to get to your feet.'

Laaknyds were approaching the corpses in groups now, segregating themselves into tasks. Same continued their gory excavation, passing fresh meat to couriers that scampered back towards the nest. The larger bulls took up sentry positions, forming a protective cordon around the carcasses. Several laaknyds were facing General Kintreb and his fallen soldier, their raised pincers warning them not to tamper with their meal.

'Stay with me,' Vlad said, gripping both shoulders. 'We've got to go, now—'

The movement was too sudden. The soldier lunged forward and clamped onto the General's neck, pulling him inwards. Vlad sensed that this was either panic or a delusional plea for help, but that na langer mattered as the MTAC—the only protective unit with a clear line of fire—unleashed a single cannon round with a disabled fuse.

Vlad felt warm blood splash across his face, and his grip suddenly gave. His pulse accelerated out of anger, not surprise. The round entered the man's shoulder, exited through his upper back, and burrowed into several meters of volcanic rock. The soldier's arm had been shorn clean off, scattering the insects as it came to rest near the protective cordon.

'Send medics to my position,' he ordered into his comm.

The body armor was doing its part to save the Valklear's life, releasing biofoam around the wound and injecting the man with adrenaline to keep him from slipping into shock. Vlad tore a medpack off the man's kit and removed more biofoam packets, stuffing them into the open wounds.

A beat-up air sied arrived within seconds. Two medics quickly jumped out, hoisting the unconscious soldier into its flatbed.

'Neura-trauma, possible PSYKLAD ordinance,' Vlad grumbled. 'Wipe his memory before he wakes up.'

The medic quickly saluted. 'Yes, sir,'
A moment later, they were gone.

General Kintreb didn't acknowledge the MTAC pilot who fired the shot, nor the bodyguards who eased off their weapons in relief. Instead, he glared at the laaknyds, several of which were taking test nibbles of the severed arm.

Help from the Republic wasn't coming. The blood coursing down his face was evidence of that. Their survival was not likely. lt was time to break some long-standing principles.

'Commander Bishop,' Vlad muttered.

The voice was loud and clear. 'Yes, sir?'

'Mordu's Legion,' Vlad said, wiping some blond off his cheeks. The sun was higher now, and the insects were working quickly to get back into their nest for shelter. 'Malte the call.'

Wilco.'

More gunshots sounded in the distance.

Someone once said that pride was the mask of one's faults, Vlad thought.

The insects were eating around the Valklear Special Forces patch.

Well, here's my ugly face for all to see.

[/spoiler]

[Faraelle Brightman]

LINK


So, apparently the Amarr acquire the DUST soldier first...

Crap, what was the Amarr scripcture 5:14 bit that someone singled out as being possibly relevant?  The reference is probably on Chatsubo and I'm slacking off work too much as it is.

[Helen Ohmiras]

Crap, what was the Amarr scripcture 5:14 bit that someone singled out as being possibly relevant?  The reference is probably on Chatsubo and I'm slacking off work too much as it is.

'Which test reveals more of the soul - the test that a man will take to prove his faith. or the test that finds the man who believed his faith already proven? If you know this answer, then you also know which of these challenges bear the greatest penalty for failure, The gates of paradise will open for you one time only; woe to the soul who dares to knock twice.'
-Book of Missions, 5:14, The Scriptures

Emphasis mine.  Fits quite nicely with the DUST 514 chronicles.

[Faraelle Brightman]

Note to self: Read the Dust chronicles.