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[Shal Novastorm]

So! I just made a bright shiny Caldari alt because while I love my golden bananas of God, I really love Caldari style and aesthetics as well.

One problem...I don't know much about them!

Ok I know the basics, I know their elevator pitch, but I need more if I'm gonna write a character! So here's a few questions that are mainly my stumbling points.

1) What's up with the megacorps? Ok I know the names and how the general system works, but has there been any fiction and such about what life is actually like in megacorp controlled stuff? Like, is the 'culture' in Lai Dai holdings different than Kaalakiota like going from, say China to...I dunno...France? Or is there kinda a unified 'Caldari culture' by now? Along with that, how are the 'smaller corporations' handled, do they exist at all or is it just one huge web of subsidiaries and shells and all?

2) Tube Babies, what's up with that? So I know it's a background for Deteis but what about Civire?  How are these guys viewed by the people, especially considering apparently the program stopped? Is it just like 'yea that's Ted his mom was a machine, weird' or are they lower on the food chain or what have you?

3) So...how we doin? This is mainly just my own lack of reading about Caldari up until right now, really, but what's the current state of things for them? What would be something their people are concerned about, either domestic or interplanetary? Related to that, what's the current diplomatic standings with them? Obviously they and Gallente aren't on good terms but what about the rest of the folks out there, do we have any other major enemies or friends to keep in mind?

I will probably have more questions later but right now these are the pressing ones 

[Veiki]

Simple answer is to just watch as much Japanese anime as you can until you reach cringeworthy levels of weeabo. Then proceed to slap on whatever mish-mash of eastern religions/philosophies on top of all the anime tropes you have extracted and you end up with a pretty close approximation of how Caldari are interpreted by the majority of roleplayers.

Bonus points for knowing who John Galt is.

Bonus points for Zaibatsu.

Bonus points for using Napaanii as placeholders for -senpai and -desu suffixes.

[Elmund Egivand]

If you wanna get really into the Caldari, I suggest you play the old Syndicate game (not the new one, as I hear many bad things about it) or Satellite Reign, watch Ghost in the Shell (lots of it), play Shadowrun (also lots of that), consume lots and lots of Cyberpunk fiction especially those that feature the Neo-Japan, and then start a Caldari character.

The Gallente Federation covers the 'sex, drugs, rock-and-roll' part of Cyberpunk fiction while the Caldari State covers the rest of it (surveillance, Corporate culture, Corporations being the government, Corporate Warfare...').

[Shal Novastorm]

Yea I already love stuff like Syndicate and Shadowrun so I think I have a good baseline of 'living in corporate controlled world'.

[Elmund Egivand]

Yea I already love stuff like Syndicate and Shadowrun so I think I have a good baseline of 'living in corporate controlled world'.

Just be aware that unlike typical Cyberpunk megacorps, the Caldari State megas aren't exactly all corrupt profit-driven psychopathic organisations. They will give a damn about their citizens for as long as said citizens have *something* to contribute to their society, so also expect them to subject underperforming citizens to intense vocational training in an attempt to make them useful at something. They will only fire him and strip him of his citizenship if he turned out to be just so bad at everything. 

Pre-Heth Caldari State is through and through Cyberpunk Megacorp Society though so might want to take note of that and work that into the roleplay.

[The Rook]

1)
All Caldari are first and foremost that, Caldari. The differences may not be easily spotted by outsiders and probably just in the more extreme cases, as even the most liberal and the most conservative subfactions tick very similarily. More or less all basic tenets are identical and politically, the corporations differ not in their direction but on the ways to achieve this. This is important to state, as in public day to day play was often (The author is not without guilt) focused on verbal conflict without having real opportunities to show the other side: Regardless what the problem is, against an outside threat, Caldari tend to stand together.
This is characteristical of a closed society, and one that has been forged from conflict: Surviving on and emerging from a less-than-optimal planet and of course the secession war. So in peacetime Caldari will happily disagree, squabble, fight and backstab each other for gains and power.

So, the big eight, their subcorporations and the other multi-regional huge corporations (and smaller that have not yet been swallowed) that comprise the State will show differences. All variations of a theme.


2) The test tube program was aimed at bolstering population numbers.
[spoiler]
"Bottle of mine, it's you I've always wanted!
Bottle of mine, why was I ever decanted?
Skies are blue inside of you,
The weather's always fine;
For there ain't no Bottle in all the world
Like that dear little Bottle of mine."
A. Huxley, Brave New World, 1931, Chapter 5, Part 1, pg. 76.[/spoiler]
There's not much lore around the acceptance in the population, but it would be safe to assume that if you go to the trouble of growing your humans you will select only very apt specimen. And then socialize them completely over your own corporate creches and programs. So, where Huxley's vision has no traditional upbringing anymore and breeds everyone according to their future position with the tools they need (and only those) for the job, CCP's caldari use this to bolster their natural growth and probably would aim rather at perfection than breeding simpletons. Seeing as capsuleers are the 0.000001% you can also make a case that this may be the byproduct of a project to create a statistically higher number of people in the population who can survive capsuleer implants.


3) Heth has been removed, the provist revolution is over and the remaining elements are branded as terrorists. There is a Kaalakiota spring (of interest for the author) and a tough spot for the remaining provist elements in capsuleerdom. The conflict with the gallente is still unresolved and the once reoccupied home planet has been fought over and held in a very unstable draw until one of the liberal megacorporations (Ishukone) stepped in with direct negotiations, leading to a lot of internal friction. In the end, diplomacy has led to a divided Berlin Caldari Prime and probably done more for the conflict than further escalation would have merited.
Relations with the other empires are more or less as usual.
The Republic is allied with the federation but neither the Caldari nor the Minmatar have any interest in fighting each other.
With the Amarr, the recent drifter mediated empressectomy has lead to the question who is going to be the next emperor. There are many candidates and from a caldari perspective, someone who is not that hard into the whole Reclamation business of all nonbelievers would be preferable.

4) I can recommend reading some of the caldari chronicles. The three about the Caldari/Gallente war are worthwhile, as is 'State Factionalism' and the Caldari demographics article. They should be on the copy of evelopedia on this page. History of the Gallente Federation has, in the appropriate section of the timeline, also some interesting bits about the Caldari/Gallente war.

[Pieter Tuulinen]

Simple answer is to just watch as much Japanese anime as you can until you reach cringeworthy levels of weeabo. Then proceed to slap on whatever mish-mash of eastern religions/philosophies on top of all the anime tropes you have extracted and you end up with a pretty close approximation of how Caldari are interpreted by the majority of roleplayers.

Bonus points for knowing who John Galt is.

Bonus points for Zaibatsu.

Bonus points for using Napaanii as placeholders for -senpai and -desu suffixes.

In case you don't speak Australian, Veikitamo is suggesting you DON'T do the above. Strongly suggesting it.

[Veiki]

To answer your questions more fully though:

1) I've always viewed all the Megas as having subtley distinct cultures which are variations on an overall Caldari culture. For example you can take two Megacorps like Kaalakiota and Wiyrkomi within the same political and economic sphere to see potential differences.

Kaalakiota: The corporation of Mathias Sobaseki who was the CEO during the secession and one of its chief architects and orators. The largest Megacorporation in terms of population and market capitalization to the extent it is larger still than the next two Megas combined. The first Megacorp to create its own corporate military in the Home Guard. One of the largest weapons manufacturers in the entire cluster.

Kaalakiota and its citizens are probably seen as arrogant, proud, conservative, and militant even by the standards of the Caldari. They have a strong Manifest Destiny ideology in which they consider themselves as continuing the work of Mathias Sobaseki and are the defenders of a, "True," Caldari culture. The war with the Federation has never truly ended for Kaalakiota and the citizens of the other Megacorporations might be seen as the inheritors of backstabbers and traitors for signing the first peace with the Federation. The size of its military industries are directly tied to its belief of continued war against the Federation. Kaalakiota is likely a significant reason there has not been a thaw in relations between State and Federation.

Its internal culture is one that is deeply militarized, ruthless, and ambitious in the sense that its citizens are not just doing things for themselves or the company itself but pursuing that manifest destiny of strength and power for the Caldari people. What is good for Kaalakiota is good for the Caldari.

Wiyrkomi: Controlled by the ruling Seituoda family, Wiyrkomi exist as staunch traditionalists. Due to the nature of being controlled by a single dynastic family Wiyrkomi likely has very strong associations with traditional Caldari feudalism in which the Seituoda are regarded as the modern incarnation of a Warlord family that existed well into the Caldari industrial age before contact with the Gallente.

The focus on traditional feudalism is an important basis in ensuring continued support for the Seituoda family. Wiyrkomi's involvement with Kaalakiota and Lai Dai in the Patriot faction also hints at the fact that it might be a focus on the more martial aspects of Caldari feudalism combined with nationalist sentiment which would make sense if the intent is to use both as the foundations of the Seituoda dynasty.

Wiyrkomi's internal culture is probably one that focuses on things like the traditional code of honour, Heiian, combined with following the unwritten rules and protocols during the Caldari Warlord period. I suppose if anything it would be Wiyrkomi that would be the closest Caldari approximation to being a blend of Japan during its Daimyo/Shogunate era combined with corporate principles.

All the Megas have distinct flavours to them when you look deeper aside from Ishukone which is understandable since it's only used to drive whatever CCP plot is needed and thus is its culture can be described as being for roleplay Fuckbois only.

2) Yes, there are probably Civire tube children. It's a Deteis background because when the tube program was implemented the Deteis population was much smaller and in decline. There's a dichotomy to tube children since on the one hand they have the stigma of not conforming to the Caldari ideal of being raised in a, "Proper," Family with a Mother and Father. On the other, as orphans raised by a corporation if they were not adopted into a family they are potentially some of the most loyal and zealous corporate citizens.

Whilst I think many of them did potentially fall to the bottom rungs of the corporate ladder I believe it was the unintentional consequence of not having access to the same social and patronage networks within the corporations that would have occurred if they had parents (advantage building upon advantage). To the extent that many would probably have found the rhetoric of the Provists appealing due to resentment at feeling underutilized and disenfranchized by the nepotism as they saw it within the State.

However, due to their being raised solely by a Mega itself many tube children might also have found themselves in positions of power and authority within corporate security and intelligence circles in particular.

3) In brief Tibus Heth screwed over Kaalakiota as its CEO by driving it into a massive debt burden trying to fund the current war and lacking the skills of knowing how to rub two coins together to make a third. He got booted out along with the Provists and his predecessor Haatakan Oiritsuu came back in.

The State appears to be in a recovery and re-organization period. Ishukone continues its proud tradition of selling out to the Federation for more shekels.

That's about it.

[Aria Jenneth]

Hrm. I haven't really played a straight-up Caldari since it got clarified how much Achura are their own thing. But....

1) What's up with the megacorps? Ok I know the names and how the general system works, but has there been any fiction and such about what life is actually like in megacorp controlled stuff? Like, is the 'culture' in Lai Dai holdings different than Kaalakiota like going from, say China to...I dunno...France? Or is there kinda a unified 'Caldari culture' by now? Along with that, how are the 'smaller corporations' handled, do they exist at all or is it just one huge web of subsidiaries and shells and all?

Caldari culture: broadly unified, but there's certainly some variation (mostly agree with Gesakaarin). I might compare it to regional differences within a nation state. As others have noted, Caldari bicker among themselves but generally pull together against outside threats.

Smaller corps: there may be such a thing, somewhere ("special category" operations that don't fit  into the normal Caldari social structure but have carved out a stable niche), but mostly it's apt to be a quasi-feudal structure where every business owes fealty to something higher. I'd guess that it's not illegal to start your own, just really, really hard because every corporation will do its flat best to force you to conform and submit to corporate oversight (refusing to do business with such a disreputable operation being a typical angle). Note that losing all megacorporate sponsorship typically means becoming a Nonentity, which means you're no longer a person and anyone can do basically anything they want to you.

So-- yeah. Being independent: majorly hard road to travel, and probably one usually taken by necessity rather than choice. I can easily see some Nonentities banding together to run a sort of deniable "odd jobs" or courier service, shades of Firefly or Shadowrun.

2) Tube Babies, what's up with that? So I know it's a background for Deteis but what about Civire?  How are these guys viewed by the people, especially considering apparently the program stopped? Is it just like 'yea that's Ted his mom was a machine, weird' or are they lower on the food chain or what have you?

Largely discussed by others. I do think something deemed so important is unlikely to carry much social stigma, and Caldari aren't usually very questioning of authority. I'd expect the most common attitude is, "Well, it's a little weird, but I guess it's for the good and greater glory of the State, so-- welcome to the world, kid!"

Mind you, tube children will normally, and necessarily, have been raised in the creche system. Some of the old PF implied that some parts of that were just awful, IIRC.

3) So...how we doin? This is mainly just my own lack of reading about Caldari up until right now, really, but what's the current state of things for them? What would be something their people are concerned about, either domestic or interplanetary? Related to that, what's the current diplomatic standings with them? Obviously they and Gallente aren't on good terms but what about the rest of the folks out there, do we have any other major enemies or friends to keep in mind?

Vox populi: generally experiencing buyer's remorse for ever having backed the now-deposed Heth. Lots of, "Well, he did some good, though, didn't he?" combined with, "Sure, but I'm not sure it was worth it," and "Meh. Whatever; it just goes to show, don't poke your nose above your station. Let's get back to work."

International relations ...

Gallente: more complicated than it looks. At (limited) war, sure, but the two remain entangled at a bunch of levels and are sharing jurisdiction over Caldari Prime. Plenty of tension, but it's only a shooting war in the actual war zone. Caldari often bristle at any hint of a Gallentean telling them what they ought to do, especially for a moral or values-based reason.

Amarr: allies (sort of) of convenience. The Caldari don't like slavery (even if some of their own practices occasionally come damn close), and they're EXTREMELY protective of their own culture. Amarr characters (IC) often make hopeful noises about the Caldari peacefully converting, but actual Caldari (or Amarr who have lived in the State) tend to be well aware that it's not a realistic possibility.

Khanid Kingdom (splinter off Amarr) (note that this is distinct from the Khanid bloodline): much better relations, extensive trade. Khanid nationals in the State are actually allowed to practice their religion (!) so long as they do it in private.

Mordu's Legion: probably slightly strained relations since Heth, but generally on very good terms. Retiring Mordu's mercs are offered State (I'm assuming corporate, of their choice) citizenship. That's how well these groups get along.

Minmatar: culturally, maybe simpatico. Politically, not so much, but that might change at some point. As long as the Republic backs the Federation, and vice versa, though, they're still basically at odds with the State.

Many others to cover, but data is sketchy and I need breakfast.

[Aria Jenneth]

Simple answer is to just watch as much Japanese anime as you can until you reach cringeworthy levels of weeabo. Then proceed to slap on whatever mish-mash of eastern religions/philosophies on top of all the anime tropes you have extracted and you end up with a pretty close approximation of how Caldari are interpreted by the majority of roleplayers.

Bonus points for knowing who John Galt is.

Bonus points for Zaibatsu.

Bonus points for using Napaanii as placeholders for -senpai and -desu suffixes.

In case you don't speak Australian, Veikitamo is suggesting you DON'T do the above. Strongly suggesting it.

In which case, in the same spirit and vein, further bonus points for playing Caldari as the second coming of the Helghast.

[The Rook]

You're being sarcastic, but it's actually not a terrible link. It doesn't need much turning up of the trope to end up with die-hard ("late") provists.

[Pieter Tuulinen]

In which case, in the same spirit and vein, further bonus points for playing Caldari as the second coming of the Helghast.

Do I get further bonus points for having helped develop the Helghast? If anyone gets to play one in Eve, it ought to be the guy who wrote half of Visari's propaganda...

[The Rook]

In which case, in the same spirit and vein, further bonus points for playing Caldari as the second coming of the Helghast.

Do I get further bonus points for having helped develop the Helghast? If anyone gets to play one in Eve, it ought to be the guy who wrote half of Visari's propaganda...

Moist.

[Aria Jenneth]

You're being sarcastic, but it's actually not a terrible link. It doesn't need much turning up of the trope to end up with die-hard ("late") provists.

Oh, I'm well aware of the connection, just as Veiki is aware of the Shinto overtones of the Way of the Winds (it's easy to argue that the Caldari aren't Japanese; it's a little harder to argue that there's no inspiration being  drawn from there, or from East Asia generally. Directly prescribing death by suicide as a matter of honor and the idea that another culture's native religion is the same as your own despite obvious superficial differences are two examples. Naming conventions and a host of little cultural tropes are others. A lot of the old discussions of the Caldari painted them as a sort of blend of German, Japanese, and Finnish cultural traits).

My objection to dealing with the Caldari as Space Nazis has less to do with there being no basis for it, and more to do with feeling that approaching it that way sells them short and renders them far less interesting. The Caldari have gotten a lot of canonical detail the last few years, and I'm far and away more interested in seeing such things played with than being up to our eyeballs in unvarnished fascists.

So, sure, you can play a Templis Dragonaur if you like, but I wouldn't expect it  to be a very interesting experience, at least compared to the alternatives.

[Veiki]

The thing is, the canonical details of the Caldari State provide an image of a society that is not Nazi Germany or the Helghast, but it is one that is deeply authoritarian. By that I mean a society that considers itself under continuous external threat and which becomes one that is highly militarized; prioritizes security over concepts such as personal liberties or human rights; and which has the expectations that citizens conform to particular cultural and social norms in return for being rewarded with a middle-class existence.

So when Caldari are called fascists and thus prescribing to a political ideology whose core tenets was a belief that the individual, society, and the institutions of the state were not separate but one and the same then it is a jackboot that fits quite well.