Bretonian RP - Stagnant? New Ideas? Pushing the line?

[Ironwatsas]

There are a couple of main points I'd like to address in my (flawless) opinion. Now, I've been RPing in Bretonia primarily from the perspective of Planetform, but I've also been playing Discovery basically since the Kusari-Bretonia war began. And at this point, it's basically been the same war going on for 6 years.

Now, there's a wide range of problems which discourage activity in Bretonia. The Jumpgate/Hole network is a clogged up mess. All the good trade routes terminate in Newcastle, which, even with trade-lanes, huge and intimidating to navigate. The forever war. Leeds and Edinburgh being cut off. And, if you think about it, the fact that most of Bretonia, and most of it's ships, are brown, dull, and depressing to look at.

There needs to be a major shift in the Nature of the Gallic War in order to spark activity. Each faction within the Gallic War needs to have it's own specific role to play.

1. Bretonia is still the house being invaded, so would handle most of the front-line combat.
   
2. Liberty is THE industrial powerhouse, and would be able to back the BAF up and basically go "Arsenal of Democracy"
   
3. The Colonial Republic needs to get a bigger role. Taking back Tau-44 and intrigue in getting the IMG to somehow screw Gallia from behind the lines should be their goal.
   
4. QCP should end up being the "token evil teammate" working in it's own interests.
   
5. Kusari Exiles should be trying to retake Kusari in order to get it to stab Gallia in the back.
   
6. Council, Maquis, etc are still fighting the war within Gallia. But some severe geography shifting needs to be done in terms of Gallic System design to make them at all interesting.
   

The thing is, from a strategic perspective, Gallia is unbelievably screwed no matter how advanced it's technology and numbers are. Infact, those two factors make it worse for a simple reason. Logistics.

Every munition and piece of equipment it uses needs to be shipped in from the Gallic Core worlds. Due to the huge size of Gallic space, Council/Brigand/QCP/etc raiders, etc, that's easier said than done. Another thing to take into account is that Gallia would have taken not-insignificant losses from the early battles and general attrition.

From a gameplay perspective, shifting Bretonia's jump-holes and trade routes around to make it more appealing to traders would be a logical idea, since that's basically the allies' ace in the hole. There need to be some hugely profitable Liberty-Bretonia routes to represent the general nature of the war. Furthermore, the frontline needs to shift away from Leeds. Either to Tau-31, Newcastle, Magellan, or somewhere else.

The most plausible scenario is that the Rheinland/Liberty war winds down and Liberty enters the Gallic war wholesale. It throws pretty much everything it has into defending Bretonia, which allows successful joint operations across a wide front. The BAF and Liberty Navy form a joint command. They then begin a large-scale counteroffensive in Magellan and Tau-31 (via Dundee and Newcastle) which basically forces the GRN to defend a wider area, breaking up it's forces and allowing different fleets to be defeated in detail.

The Colonial Republic, with aid from either the Kusari Exiles, IMG, Council, or some combination of the three launches a series of raids with the objective of Re-taking Tau-44. They may or may not, for some reason or another, be assisted or opposed by the Golden Chrysanthemums (who are also in desperate need of activity, and due to the proximity of Tau-65). This forces further Gallic force transfers to defend the region. From a game mechanics standpoint, this would mean putting a CR base/NPC battleship into the system.

Another major wild-card is Kusari. Kogen's exile wouldn't have happened spontaneously, and it damn sure wouldn't have been popular. That'd be sort of like overthrowing the Pope and declaring the Vatican a protestant state. There are already a number of parties (Exiles/Samura, GC, Dragons, Kemeitai, Iseijin, and Ame-chan) plotting various regime changes in Kusari and at-least one of them WILL succeed. Odds are whoever does so won't be too friendly to Gallic domination.

Either Kusari will be thrown into a civil war or the regime will change quietly to one which is harmful to Gallia. If Kusari were to try anything overt, it would probably lose badly, considering the shoddy state of the KNF, but it would create another huge manpower sump which would break Gallia's back.

There's no real way, considering the stated logistical situation, for Gallia to decisively take over or even defeat Bretonia and occupy it successfully. Even if it were to take over all of Bretonia's stations, planets, and infrastructure, and Even if the BAF were annihilated tomorrow, it would be faced with a series of guerrilla wars and would still be fighting Liberty and the Council.

On the other hand, and for the same reasons, I don't see it likely that any or all Sirian houses, even united, would be able to completely destroy the Gallic House, largely for the same reasons. Gallia is unknown territory, is huge, and is too well defended.

After this point, Gallia is slowly pushed back to Orkney by the combined Allied fleet. A series of final, decisive battles are fought in the Upper Tau Regions basically to a draw. Either an Armistice is declared or the Council siezes control of the Gallic Government (or both) and the war officially ends. Lingering tensions and holdout skirmishes remain in order to give something for the factions to do, but after this point, Bretonia/Liberty and Gallia normalize relations and rebuild.

As for lesser factions like Mollys, Gaians, Bretonian corporations, Kusari Unlawfuls, etc, each "minor" faction should gain atleast one major "side story" plotline that might be interesting.

One example being a Gaian-Planetform war going back and forth between Harris and Islay (Planetform tries to recapture/destroy Perth to cover something up, or the Gaians try something bold to take over/destroy Harris' facilities now that the BAF isn't defending it).

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All that begins must end.