From: phoenix@ugcs.caltech.edu (Damien Raphael Sullivan) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written Subject: Re: Issola ***Spoilers*** Date: 13 Aug 2001 17:34:09 GMT Organization: Murray's Mud Minions Message-ID: <9l932h$8v8@gap.cco.caltech.edu> sef@kithrup.com (Sean Eric Fagan) wrote: >J.B. Moreno wrote: >>world, the "cops" (in this case the Dragons in the Phoenix Guards) are >>unbribeable, and are practically impossible to intimidate. Good point. >Uh, the Phoenix Guards are _hugely_ bribable. Vlad makes a comment that the >bribes to the guards are less than the Imperial taxes they'd pay if the games >were licensed (and, after Zerika's discussion with Vlad in _Phoenix_, I'm "Phoenix Guards don't like paying taxes more than anyone else." But they won't be bribed about anything important, anymore than they'll deal in assassination. Except for exiled freaks like Kragar. Trying to bribe a Dragon to look the other way while you burn down some Vallista's shop because they didn't pay protection will probably just get you killed by the Dragon. I wonder if this one of the "real" reasons the Jhereg are at the bottom of the cycle just now. You've got Athyra Guards, who are more bribable and less involved, but like throwing sorcery around when they do pay attention, and then you move to Phoenix Guards, who are really Dragons, and later Dragon Guards, and you have to suffer through two reigns of basically honest cops. And then you move to Lyorn Guards, who can't be much better on the bribe front. Finally you escape to a Tiassa reign, and corruption gets easier. No idea why Vallista are at the bottom. (Because Phoenix takes their role?) I wonder if Brust has thought through how the Cycle works. We've gotten hints (reborn Phoenix steps down to Dragon military, or corrupt Phoenix gets couped (how do you have a coup against the Orb normally?) by pissed off Dragons; Dragons someone offend the Lyorn) from Zerika IV talking about stepping down, and Adron's coup, and the beginning of the cycle (Warlord Kieron presumably becomes Emperor, gets killed by Lyorns who didn't like his tolerating the Jhereg). And I can imagine justice-concerned Iorich taking over from the Jhereg, and Teckla having a rebellion against the mercantilist/capitalist Orca. And I've got really tenous stuff, such Issola being polite enough to survive a Dzur reign, and Jhegaala being mystical like the Athyra, but the Athyra are better a5t it, and the Yendi are better plotters (web weavers) than the Chreotha, and the Tiassa take over from the Lyorn because the Lyorn are so _boring_ and everyone wants a change... But I can't picture a Jhereg reign. Or a Chreotha reign. I don't know if most things are supposed to stay the same all the time, life being life, or whether some of the Dragaeran reigns are pretty alien, and the Phoenix are closest to being a government we recognize. And if Brust dares to ever write about other reigns directly, or stick to hinting about them. >pretty sure that the amounts involved are carefully orechestrated). Link to Orb as computer discussion... >I do agree that, on some things, the Phoenix Guards _are_ unbribable, but I >don't think it's a certainty. But Moreno is right; it's going to hamper what the Jhereg can get away with. >As for protection rackets... there was something in, I think, _Jhereg_, that >seemed to indicate they did run protection rackets. Only it was (I thought) >ambiguous: they could just be clearing out anyone not in their employ, thus A Teckla gets mugged, and Vlad gets pissed about that. Muggings are bad for business. Real self-policing, not a protection racket. But contra my claim that the Jhereg doesn't do those sorts of things, maybe they just don't do them _now_, when the cops are honest and the Empress thinks the Teckla are their natural prey. >Remember that Vlad also indimidates Dzurlords, and his comments indicate that >he's had some beaten up. And some killed. Intimidates through reputation. Not physically. Sethra Lavode doesn't intimidate Dzurs or many Dragons. (Although Vlad does say that Loraan's guardds, mostly Dragons and Dzurs, seemed intimidated by Blackwand.) >In some cases, yes, they do get treated like "real crimes" (such as the murder >of Vlad's "God-boss"), but I don't think they're investigated too closely. I thought Tagichatn's murdern wasn't investigated much. A Jhereg bought himself a Dukeship, and the deaths of Dukes have to be investigated. Unlesss that was Tagichatn... but it was the Dukeness which brought down the Imperial investigators. -xx- Damien X-)