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[Steffanie Saissore]

Having come in to what seems the middle of the two major arcs at the moment (this one and the Heth one), my knowledge is a little thin as to what's going on, and I'm okay with that at the moment.  That said, I don't quite fully get Minmatar's 'invasion' of Gallente and even more confusing has been the seemingly lack of response from the Federation government.

I know we can't be given a backstage pass to what's going on offstage, but some of the actions/reactions of the NPC community seems very odd at times.  Still, it does make things interesting 

[Shintoko Akahoshi]

And before people start pointing at the Federation... this was an issue for the Federation up until the aftermath of TEA, with the formation of the Black Eagles and the Eturrer immolation. It's about time that the Minmatar got knocked back down to the level where everyone else is.

I don't think that's true, actually. I remember back in the early days of Fed-vs-State RP, the fact that the Federation responded to a terrorist attack by literally attempting to glass the Caldari homeworld was frequently tossed around. To me it always made the Federation a little more interesting: They're trying to do the right thing, but they've got poor impulse control and anger management issues...

Reading the new expanded Gallente history and demographics articles, I'm really pleased with how CCP is reinforcing this aspect of the Federation, by the way. Federation political history reads like an enormous ship making very slow course corrections based on a long history of big mistakes.

[Morwen Lagann]

It's part of the backstory though, Shin, not part of our history-in-progress, which is what tends to change how people approach RPing factions in the short-term.

I've never really seen any "the Fed is horrible evil grimdark buttfaces" stuff aside from maybe the Methods of Torture chronicle coming from before the aftermath of TEA, and it's that stuff that sticks in people's minds.

That's what I meant. Yes, the Fed has some pretty dark shit in its old, old, pre-game history. But I think recent history is more responsible for a lot of the shifts in how we view the political landscape in EVE than the older stuff that is occasionally being tweaked or updated.

[Arnulf Ogunkoya]

What annoyed me about the ark isn't that the Republic's authorities threw their weight around in the Fed, but that they did so in such a incompetent way. And effectively got fifteen crews killed for nothing, plus the losses they inflicted.

Personally I would have had a dev actor contact a group & have them transport a passenger or passengers to a station in Luminaire, maybe using dev powers to have the passenger speaking in local or with an actor flying with the courier.

Then have Fed Intelligence find out about it ahead of time and try to intercept with their own capsuleer supporters. Think of it as a live version of one of the "intercept the saboteurs" missions. If anyone breaks security ahead of time, well that's the last time they get contacted by the security service concerned.

Maybe even do some decoy or backup runs so people in different timezones could get a look-in?

Flagging could be done by the Federal authorities on intercept. The smugglers would only be able to return fire once fired upon.

This could even be done with no actor participation apart from pickup and delivery, with an actor issuing a courier contract.

[Lyn Farel]

What annoyed me about the ark isn't that the Republic's authorities threw their weight around in the Fed, but that they did so in such a incompetent way.

Welcome in the Amarr shoes back in time. 

[Shintoko Akahoshi]

It's part of the backstory though, Shin, not part of our history-in-progress, which is what tends to change how people approach RPing factions in the short-term.

That's very true. At the same time, you could count the number of significant non-backstory events for the Federation pre-TEA on one hand. After losing some fingers. For a very long time, backstory was really all we had (and I say "we" as a founding member of the Gallente Union, which was literally begging CCP to give us a little Federation meat). When you can't get what you want, you fall back to using what you have.

[Galen Darksmith]

What annoyed me about the ark isn't that the Republic's authorities threw their weight around in the Fed, but that they did so in such a incompetent way. And effectively got fifteen crews killed for nothing, plus the losses they inflicted.

That pretty much cuts to the heart of my only concern with this arc.  I like having the Republic be overly aggressive loose cannons from time to time, but I dislike it when ANY faction displays such gross incompetence it leaves you wondering how the hell they're supposed to have made it this long as a culture, let alone a government.

The more I think about it, the more I suspect the alliance between the Republic and Federation will remain, in spite of lack of apology or anything else from the Republic on the matter.  Hoping I'm wrong, though.

[Repentence Tyrathlion]

What annoyed me about the ark isn't that the Republic's authorities threw their weight around in the Fed, but that they did so in such a incompetent way. And effectively got fifteen crews killed for nothing, plus the losses they inflicted.

That pretty much cuts to the heart of my only concern with this arc.  I like having the Republic be overly aggressive loose cannons from time to time, but I dislike it when ANY faction displays such gross incompetence it leaves you wondering how the hell they're supposed to have made it this long as a culture, let alone a government.

The more I think about it, the more I suspect the alliance between the Republic and Federation will remain, in spite of lack of apology or anything else from the Republic on the matter.  Hoping I'm wrong, though.

I'll be severely disappointed if so.  With this kind of buildup, and the Republic spitting in the Federation's face repeatedly (with the Feds providing plenty of rope, to mix metaphors)... to just return to status quo would be an enormous cop out.  There must be something more going on here.  I guess time will tell, though.

[Galen Darksmith]

Hurry up, time!

[Galen Darksmith]

Finally, some news:

Republic denies Senate request to join Midular funeral procession

 Pator – The Minmatar Tribal Council has turned down a request from the Gallente Senate to allow an official Senatorial delegation to join in the funeral procession of Karin Midular. Midular, known as the Ray of Matar, is scheduled to be removed from the Grand Caravanserai and laid to rest according to Sebiestor customs on the 4th.

The Senate had made the request a week ago via private channels, according to a source. “The request was made in completely good faith. Relations with the Minmatar have obviously been strained during this entire ordeal. The Senate just wanted to remind the Republic that, despite the brief flaring of tempers, we remain friends.”

However, the statement released by the Tribal Council said, “The funeral of Karin Midular will not be turned into political spectacle. We will not prevent anyone from attending the procession, but to afford special status to a group of foreign dignitaries during the final farewell to our Ray of Matar would be disrespectful.”

According to the Senatorial source, “No special accommodations were requested,” but added that the Senate “has no plans to press the issue.”

The Federation seem to be just bending over backward here.   Given the recent relaxation of Caldari-Gallente tensions, this seems like the exact WORST time the Republic would want to make the Federation consider breaking the alliance, or at least limiting/halting aid.   It might be that CCP wants to paint the Federation in a sympathetic light by having them try to make amends in face of insult after insult until they finally put their foot down, but it really just makes them look weak.  If you can't get your own allies to apologize after invading you, and still try to be allies with them after...it doesn't look all that great.

Would also be interesting to see what the opinion of the general populaces are of this mess.  Is the Republic fully behind Shakor, or are there elements who think things escalated too far?  How are Federal Minmatar faring?  Is the general Federation population happy with how their government has been handling the situation?

[Arnulf Ogunkoya]

It would really, really help. If we could get some sort of indication as to why Republic loyalists are supposed to consider this sort of behaviour reasonable.

At least most of the other groups have some rationale behind their more cranky actions.

[Shintoko Akahoshi]

The Federation seem to be just bending over backward here.   Given the recent relaxation of Caldari-Gallente tensions, this seems like the exact WORST time the Republic would want to make the Federation consider breaking the alliance, or at least limiting/halting aid.   It might be that CCP wants to paint the Federation in a sympathetic light by having them try to make amends in face of insult after insult until they finally put their foot down, but it really just makes them look weak.  If you can't get your own allies to apologize after invading you, and still try to be allies with them after...it doesn't look all that great.

I'd love to see more in-depth news articles about this. I could easily see a number of possibilities:

• With a hawkish President in office, perhaps the majority (or a significant minority) in the Senate are doves. If that's the case, there could be all sorts of multipartisan arguments going around in the FedGov. Reactions from the other voting blocs, or from Roden, would be interesting.
• Perhaps this is an attempt to "give the Republic enough rope" on the part of the Senate. Making both the request and the rejection public issues might be a tactic aimed at the fickle voter - especially with a Presidential election coming up.
• Perhaps the FedGov as a whole might earnestly believe that the alliance must be preserved no matter what. Like Galent says, this makes the FedGov look weak, but you do what you feel you have to when the chips are down.

Which of these (if any) would become clear in the follow-up. Nudge-nudge, CCP...

[Makkal]

I don't think this makes the Federation look weak.

It does continue to paint the Republic in a bad light though.

[Galen Darksmith]

I don't think this makes the Federation look weak.

It does continue to paint the Republic in a bad light though.

The reason I think it makes the Federation look weak is because it sets the precedent that they don't respect their own sovereignty. It's also completely out of character for them given past reactions to invasions.  Caldari invade: fight a capsuleer proxy war with them.  Amarrian House invades: invade right the hell back.  Republic invades:  Oh my gosh I'm so sorry I made you angry here I baked you a cake please don't be mad at me.

If anything, if an ally backstabs you, you need to respond MORE firmly than if an enemy attacks.  What the Federation has done has sent the message to the Republic that it can basically do whatever it wants to the Federation and get away with it.  I mean, shit, where do you go from invasion?  Actually taking and holding Federation territory?

Things the Federation could have done differently:

Met the invading fleet with overwhelming force.  Don't just matching their dread count, drop 50 dreads with carrier and supercapital support.  The idea isn't to win the fight, but to make fighting an unattractive option in the first place.  (I'm making the assumption that the Federation can activate a cynojammer once their fleet jumps in so the Republic can't escalate.)  If no shots are fired, great.  The situation is defused.  If the enemy DO fire shots, the battle is over quickly and with a minimum of casualties on your side.  This is important in a society like the Federation; the families of thousands of slain crewman can (and certainly should be) go on a media campaign to raise awareness for the slain and demand that the Republic be brought to heel.  Minimize casualties, minimize negative public opinion.

Not given Broteau without an apology.  You have something the Republic wants and they JUST put several thousand of your crewmen to the sword.  Why the hell are you giving them shit for free?

Made more noise when Broteau was executed.  Ok, you wanted to give them rope to hang themselves, and they did.  Why are you letting them off the hook? 

I'm not a big fan of the whole "warmongering facists" flavor of the Federation, but neither do I find "bunch of wimps who can't stand up for themselves" all that interesting, either. 

And yeah, some more info on the Republic's reasoning throughout this process would be nice too.  What political reason do they have to be so belligerent, besides the fact that they can apparently get away with it?

[Shintoko Akahoshi]

This is important in a society like the Federation; the families of thousands of slain crewman can (and certainly should be) go on a media campaign to raise awareness for the slain and demand that the Republic be brought to heel.  Minimize casualties, minimize negative public opinion.

That's a big part of what's been driving Shin's reaction to the whole thing: She lost a very good friend at the battle, and that's affected her pretty heavily. She used to support the Republic pretty heavily - to the extent that she flew with E.M. back before FW happened - and the whole thing seemed so out of character for them. When she first found out about her friend being killed, she tried pretty heavily to engage with Republicans she respected, to no avail. Most of the ones she particularly respected refused to engage, and the ones that did displayed nothing but arrogant disdain. This is why she's now firmly in the "burn the alliance!" camp.

I'm not a big fan of the whole "warmongering facists" flavor of the Federation, but neither do I find "bunch of wimps who can't stand up for themselves" all that interesting, either.

I agree. There aren't a lot of hawkish Fed RPers, so I'm pleased to have Shin rejoin the fold/come out of the closet in that regard.