War, HUH! It's out on pdf Options

[hermit]

Well, a certain western neighbour also likes to do that, hence world and not Eastern Europe (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Touché. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

However, translating a text while keeping the German exonyms is like keeping all instances of "Köln" istead of translating them to "Cologne". Even without any regard to the sensitivities between Germany and our eastern neighbours, it is a clear and objective mistranslation.

Agreed. However, to be fair, he probably looked at the Czech names with all their special markers on their letters, though "wtf" and went with the German stuff that seemed less overwhelmingly alien for him. After all, the dots on some vowels, but not all, probably freak him out enough. It still si bad, bad style and definitly should have been caught and edited.

I've spoken to several european immigrants like me, from France, Denmark, couple other places. We grew up with the stories of our grand parents about WWII. It's a very visceral thing for us. I know that Germans of today aren't the Germans of the 1940's.. but it hasn't been that long. That self-Flagellation isn't un-earned.

There's the guilt about things we can be rightfully guilty of, and then here's overdrive, like Leftie nuts burining German flags a turk electronics shop hangs up to cheer for the (mainly ethnically non-German) stars of the German national team in this year's world cup because the flag "reminds them of WW2". The turkish guy bought another flag. And another, each consecutively larger. There're a couple of those stories (another good one is the black, nationalised immigrant who wears a flag-colored bracelet in a support the team egsture and is cast out of an anti discrimination seminar held by some leftie fringe group because of the bracelet). Try and imagine that in France.

I assume that's what Cochise is refering to, not whether or not we should start te revisionism.

[sabs]

You can take the French flag from our Cold dead hands (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Which given the state of our Military.. wouldn't really be THAT hard.

[hermit]

Hey, your carrier is just now havin non-repair time, isn't it? You really should do something about those planes though.

Plus, you still have the Legion. Think if the German Army. We can't use our own artillery in Afghanistan (because that would look like OMG we're fighting a war there!) and hence, we have to borrow the self-propelled artillery from the Netherlands. All five pieces.

[sabs]

I firmly believe that the push for the EU is all about making sure that Germany is so economically intertwined with the rest of Europe that WWII can never happen again.
That reminds me.. the Legion, in 2072.. that would be an awesome write up.

Japan has the same problem (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Though their police force is pretty brutal.

[hermit]

I firmly believe that the push for the EU is all about making sure that Germany is so economically intertwined with the rest of Europe that WWII can never happen again.

That's actually verified. I personally wouldn't mind a military uniopn and some sort of economical governance, too, actually (and an ELECTED EU council).

That reminds me.. the Legion, in 2072.. that would be an awesome write up.

Yes. That needs to be done (SR France has one, but I don't really like it). Should have been in War!, just as the Gurkhas, but I suppose it fell victim to it's authors' prejudices.

Though their police force is pretty brutal.

Actually, that's my impression of French police, especially police nationale. Jeez. They're that bad?

[kzt]

Japan has the same problem (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Though their police force is pretty brutal.

They are very polite until they decide it's time to not be polite. It's in your best interests for them to decide that it's never time to stop being polite to you.

Remember, in Japan it's illegal to beat a confession out of someone, but the confession is admissible and the cops will at most be told not to do that again.

[Demonseed Elite]

I haven't finished reading War! yet (in fact, I'm still very early into it). I'll put together a full review once I've read it completely a couple of times. But right off the bat, I'm put off by some poor design/layout choices and some terrible editing. I found a problem with grammatical tenses just in the very first sentence of the first chapter! A few pages in and it clearly occurred to me that this book is in desperate need of an introduction. If I hadn't seen that the cover said "War!" on it, I would have thought I was reading a book about Bogota, not warfare. Dropping the reader into setting background for an event you haven't introduced yet is pretty jarring and confusing and does not serve the overall theme of the book very well.

[hermit]

They are very polite until they decide it's time to not be polite. It's in your best interests for them to decide that it's never time to stop being polite to you.

Remember, in Japan it's illegal to beat a confession out of someone, but the confession is admissible and the cops will at most be told not to do that again.

O_o

[Sengir]

Well, it certainly is not bad enough to be actually illegal in Germany. As one might expect there have been several court cases about the use of "Arbeit macht frei", and basically it only gets illegal if the context already would be illegal anyway. Even a game show presenter who used that phrase faced no legal repercussions.

Our friends at the BPjM could see that section as "socio-ethically disorienting" and put War on the Index. De jure stuff on that list is not banned and may still be purchased by everybody over 18, de facto the heavy restrictions (no advertisement, no public presentation, no regular mail order) make such media hard to get. However, such a judgement would be unusually strict, it rarely gets that bad in practice...unless it's about computer games, where swastikas on tailfins in a flight sim = illegal.


PS: We (finally) have three howitzers in Afghanistan, although only as stationary artillery...which the crews surely appreciate, because somebody at the BWB decided air conditioning was superfluous comfort (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[hermit]

because somebody at the BWB decided air conditioning was superfluous comfort

That's consensus in Germany. Ever seen the Deutsche-Bahn-Tower building in Berlin? Look at all that glass. It has no air conditioning, and the windows cannot be opened because it is ecofriendly like that. Friend of mine works there. Imagine what it's like in summer.

Also, the censors used to have an eye on gaming too once (back in the DSA macht dich zu Satanisten days), but I think it's too niche and, age structue wise, too mature a market now to be relevant to them.

[Sengir]

That's consensus in Germany. Ever seen the Deutsche-Bahn-Tower building in Berlin? Look at all that glass. It has no air conditioning, and the windows cannot be opened because it is ecofriendly like that. Friend of mine works there. Imagine what it's like in summer.

And now add the standard military bureaucracy. And remember: Zuständig für dezentale Beschaffung ist der Bereich für Zentrale Aufgaben

Also, the censors used to have an eye on gaming too once (back in the DSA macht dich zu Satanisten days), but I think it's too niche and, age structue wise, too mature a market now to be relevant to them.

Yep, RPG satanism kinda got out of fashion some time ago...

[hermit]

And now add the standard military bureaucracy. And remember: Zuständig für dezentale Beschaffung ist der Bereich für Zentrale Aufgaben

And we never wanted to use these things anyway. It's a common assumption Germany can unilaterally declare world peace, after all. Especially among the Lefties (but also among the Churches).

[Yerameyahu]

(Deleted, wrong thread. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) )

[The Monk]

question for all you who have read War!

Should I discourage my players from buying it if I'm going to run stuff out of it? Not that I am, I'll probably get it when it comes out in hardcopy so I won't know if the setting will be useful till then.

The problem is my players might pick it up for the gear.

[Doc Chase]

question for all you who have read War!

Should I discourage my players from buying it if I'm going to run stuff out of it? Not that I am, I'll probably get it when it comes out in hardcopy so I won't know if the setting will be useful till then.

The problem is my players might pick it up for the gear.

You should discourage them from getting it if you yourself aren't running gear from it. If you are going to run with it, there's no reason for them to not get the book - good luck getting any related info out of it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[The Monk]

so there is nothing in there that a GM would not want the players to know if he is using the setting?

[Prime Mover]

The good thing about war is the confirmation the end is near.
The unholy trimutive is confirmed.

Dragons lording over us all: Check
Immortal Elves pulling the strings: Natch
*Evil trees corrupting our young and taking over our inner cities: Ayep

Evil has revealed itself fully and now we can face off against them with some military hardware!

*Ghost Cartels & War
(This is neither a positive or negative on current discussions, just made me smile.)

[sabs]

I think we're saying that the setting is so.. confused and badly written that you'd have a hard time finding a setting to USE.

[hermit]

Unless you'Re of a mind to do a jew zombie slaying dungeon crawl for Mengele's scalpel.

[Prime Mover]

so there is nothing in there that a GM would not want the players to know if he is using the setting?

From what I've read so far theres not much to act as spoilers as far as events of the war. It looks like most of the conflict will be up to the GM to flesh out. Some scattered behind the scenes stuff but maybe just ask players to avoid fluff sections of the book till you had the opportunity to decide what your using.

[Doc Chase]

so there is nothing in there that a GM would not want the players to know if he is using the setting?

No. The book has been written in a voice that is almost entirely conjecture with few, if any, confirmed facts.

You aren't going to get whole arcs out of it that you don't already make yourself. When people say there is no map, they are correct. There are no maps of anything. It gives you a very good idea of how Bogota works, to avoid the flesh-eating Epileptic Trees, and how long to wait before the nanoforge will spit out your (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) 1.2 billion THOR satellite.

[Kagetenshi]

Unless you'Re of a mind to do a jew zombie slaying dungeon crawl for Mengele's scalpel.

Worse than that, it was Wirth's scalpel, wasn't it? You know, the director who delegated all the experiments to other people?

On the other hand, you could inject a little extra hilarity into everything by changing the item to Wirth's pen (and keeping the current stats).

~J

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

That's consensus in Germany. Ever seen the Deutsche-Bahn-Tower building in Berlin? Look at all that glass. It has no air conditioning, and the windows cannot be opened because it is ecofriendly like that. Friend of mine works there. Imagine what it's like in summer.

What is the average temperature and humidity in Berlin during summer?
If it is lower than 30ºC and 88% you guys have no right to complain (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[Ryu]

I reject the idea of wringing a Nazi artefact from the hand of Jewish ghosts, to the extent of not seeing the need for discussion. As the German perspective on that is and should be unique and individual, discussions will turn to politics, see TOS 4. For the evaluation of the book there is more than a half page to cover.

What kind of introduction would be needed? Given the strong focus on Bogota, the text on the back of the book would have to be the starting point. The whole book is mostly about a single conflict. An introductory not-Captain-Chaos post is IMO only the second step.

More as not-soon I read on.

[hermit]

What is the average temperature and humidity in Berlin during summer?
If it is lower than 30ºC and 88% you guys have no right to complain

It's pretty arid, but last summer's average was around 28 degrees, since we got a couple very continental years now. Peaks regularily are around 36° to 40°. Point is, though, this thing is an oven and there is no mechanism to counter that. I trust in Brazil, AC is a rather common thing, like in SE Asia, China and Hawaii? If not, oh my god how can you people live there. How.

@Ryu: The basic lack is they do never, ever give you any solid info about the war. The Night of the Living Holocaust Victim and Gypsy Progrom 101 are only icing on the turd, if you will.