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[Ghost Hunter]

As a long time Sansha roleplayer, I've noticed two distinct schools of thought that are involved in Sansha roleplay.

Edit; This is entirely my own observation of the Sansha roleplay environment and not necessarily mainstream canon.

For those who do not know who or what Sansha's Nation is, please look here for a general overview of its history.

The Primary School of Thought

The primary school of thought, or the Path of the True Sansha, is the one that is closest and central to Sansha's Nation's "canon" design.

Typically those involved in this path believe:

• Sansha Kuvakei's vision is the one and only future for mankind
• The True Slaves are permissible/admirable/desirable or otherwise a quality worth keeping
• The Nation must be rebuilt and fulfill Sansha's will (which I infer from canon as galactic domination)

This path can thusly be seen as that of the dominator, imperialist, or conqueror.


The Secondary School of Thought

The secondary school of thought, or the Path of the Reformist, is the one I have seen most Sansha roleplayers center their roleplay on.

Typically those involved in this path believe:

• Sansha Kuvakei's vision is one worth striving for, but he was deeply flawed in how he wanted to achieve it
• The True Slave technology is abhorrent and must be abolished/destroyed
• The Nation needs to be rebuilt, but not in the way that destroyed it (Sansha's unrestricted experiments, the True Slaves, expansionism, etc)

This path can thusly be seen as that of the utopianist, pacifist, or forgiver.


The two schools and their differences

There is a definite friction/conflict between these two schools as they take Sansha's Nation in complete opposite directions. Those from the Path of the True Sansha most likely desire a return to the Nation's former glory and a renewed galactic war to destroy all the other Empires in New Eden. Those on the Path of the Reformist would want to rebuild the Nation and achieve humanity's technological future without instigating a galactic war.


The two schools and their similarities

Although they are at complete odds with how the ruined Nation should progress in the future, both the schools are largely the same on every other front. Both believe in Sansha's vision of a technological human future (akin to the Jovian's and their human genetic path). Both believe the Nation can return to its former glory, both believe in the superiority of Sansha's vision, so on so forth.


Ending commentary

Although I feel I cover both schools of thought enough for people to "get the gist of", do let me know if I should add in more defining information.

[Ashar Kor-Azor]

Very decent work there, Ghost.

What should also probably be covered is some sort of snapshot of what the hell kind of condition the nation's in; and not just its core states but also far-flung outposts in the hands of splinter groups like Traumark or the worlds of Esoteria, or the role played by raving, slavering beasts like Chelm, who probably eats babies for breakfast and kills everything around him whenever he's not getting chewed on by a capsuleer.

You know, a sort of primer on Sansha.

[Graelyn]

Great post. 

Also, quite interested in the stuff Ashar is talking about above.

[Lillith Blackheart]

....I really can't not reply, no matter how much I may want to. . .

Sansha Kuvakei's vision is the one and only future for mankind
The True Slaves are permissible/admirable/desirable or otherwise a quality worth keeping
The Nation must be rebuilt and fulfill Sansha's will (which I infer from canon as galactic domination)

The bolded ones I disagree with. Especially the second one, but in part the first. I never got from Canon that Sansha's Nation was ever a conquering group. Sansha built Sansha's Nation to get away from the failings of Empires and create a "true" Utopia in the vision he had of how it should be. He experimented on people and in doing so created a Dystopian society that, for anyone visiting or living there, would be entirely unnoticed unless they were "in the know" of what was going on.

Sansha's Nation expanded because he was buying up star systems people didn't want anymore. It grew because people heard how great it was to live there and moved on in. They were not conquesting or assaulting anywhere, not until they were attacked. The Empires went after Sansha, not the other way around. Claiming that "Galactic Domination" is part of Sansha's vision seems to me to be something that belongs in the second group, not the first.

Sansha's Vision was about the Empires leaving them the fuck alone, not about taking over space. They didn't start working on that until they were fighting for their very existence.

As for the first part. My gripe is with "one and only". I would replace it with "best".

[Havohej]

The impression I always got was somewhere in between the two extremes: The Nation wanted to be left alone while it perfected itself, but once it reached its utopian perfection it would reach out and start perfecting the rest of the cluster, by force if necessary.

That opinion's based on very little, though - I never searched very hard for Sansha-related PF so there may be stuff I missed :p

[Lillith Blackheart]

...this thread will be my downfall.

Addendum:

I think you have the two "Primary Views of thought" incorrectly set out in general, because by the way you have it focussed the primary disagreement is the True program, and I don't think that there is really much contention in that. Part of being a Sansha is accepting the True program at this point in time. If you do not accept the True program, then I would argue you are not a Sansha, you are a Utopianist. Which the Nation is a part of, but that is very little of the aspect of the Nation in general.

Secondly, I think that the difference is between the Conquest versus the Society.

I would suggest the two schools of thought break down more into whether or not someone wants to be a Pirate and general rabble-rouser, or they want to Rebuild the Nation. What are they fighting for? Are they fighting for the Nation? Are they trying to build Sansha's vision? Or are they looking for an excuse to yell really loud and blow as much up as possible?

I would suggest that one of those is Sansha. The other is not.

[Lillith Blackheart]

The impression I always got was somewhere in between the two extremes: The Nation wanted to be left alone while it perfected itself, but once it reached its utopian perfection it would reach out and start perfecting the rest of the cluster, by force if necessary.

I do not find that to be evidenced anywhere in the PF that is available (when the new book comes out or whatever, is it already?, that may change). Sansha did not strike me as a conqueror, he may easily have become one later, however.

That opinion's based on very little, though - I never searched very hard for Sansha-related PF so there may be stuff I missed :p

There's never been a lot of PF about it, most of the stuff about Sansha that's out there has primarily been player driven.

[Casiella]

The Burning Life is out and it does have a good bit about the Nation. I won't put any spoilers in this thread, but you should probably read it.

[Havohej]

I do not find that to be evidenced anywhere in the PF that is available

Well no, not evidenced.. just seemed kinda implied.

Interested to see what all is in the Burning Life novel - I won't be buying it until it hits paperback, though because I'm poor and stuff.   

[Misan]

It actually is in paperback...$10 on Amazon

The Burning Life is out and it does have a good bit about the Nation. I won't put any spoilers in this thread, but you should probably read it.

That's what the spoiler tags are for!

[Lillith Blackheart]

The Burning Life is out and it does have a good bit about the Nation. I won't put any spoilers in this thread, but you should probably read it.

I would not at all be surprised if they decided to completely alter how the Nation was implied from the start and made it this warlike monster. 

[Havohej]

lol that's a possibility - they like making sweeping changes in a very sudden way that our characters would've seen coming but don't.  Still, even if they have done that it doesn't stop people from RPing more moderate Sanshabots!

[Lillith Blackheart]

I don't know. If you ask me the thing about Sansha's Nation that was appealing to begin with was the fact that it wasn't a typical Pirate entity. Look at all the different pirate groups (non-player) you have out there.

1. Angel Cartel - Bunch of drug-dealing ingrates
2. Serpentis - Loonies!
3. Blooders - Religious Whackjobs!
4. EoM - They want to kill everyone.
5. Guristas - Blatant Pirates
6. Sansha's Nation - A dead civilization that was viewed as a threat by empires concerned for their territory and horrified by unethical scientific methods.

One of these things is not like the others. . .

Turning the Nation into "just another pirate entity" would be, although entirely unsurprising given the nature of the fiction writers CCP has been going, a rather large detraction from what they were about initially, and also make them more SSDD "oh noes a bad guy!11!11!!11!!" faction.

[Havohej]

Hm.. when you put it that way, yeah, would definitely be a pretty weak thing to do story-wise.

[Casiella]

I will say that Hjalti (CCP Abraxas) has a far more subtle approach than Gonzales did, and so I don't think he just converts all the factions into lolstereotypes. For example, the Guristas and Angels have a lot more to them than I recognized, and he does a fine job of humanizing the Sani Sabik and Blood Raiders.