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36 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

OK, trying to understand the CIS so I can work on understanding Dooku. Sure, you can say "a (Sith) wizard did it" and just hand wave the whole thing, but I'd prefer if the CIS had some reasonable explanation for coming into being even if the Sith manipulated the crap out of it for their own ends.

AFAICT, the worlds that initially join the CIS are those well-off Mid and Outer Rim worlds that want more independence and say in how their resources are utilized. This implies that the Republic has some form of socialism and the worlds that leave to form the CIS are those that are more "givers" to this systems rather than the "takers" of the Core Worlds. This also goes to explain why the Republic cannot afford to simply let them secede, as it will be devastating to the Republic's quality of life.

In order to make this independence feasible against the Republic, these worlds will need the help, both politically and (after the GAR is revealed) militarily, of the entities that come to form the Separatist Council. Unfortunately, these are the same types of organizations that will ruthlessly exploit independent markets/worlds. To counter this, the worlds seeking independence need some higher level of organization, and this is where the Confederacy comes in as a political entity--primarily to stand united against the Republic, but in part to protect the independent worlds from exploitation from their allies of necessity.

Comments?

The other issue is when they request assistance the senate will vote no. So the pay lots of taxes and yet get none of the benefit. To see some of the thinking check out the movements to break up california. Or Brexit.

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Just now, HappyDaze said:

That's if and when the Senate actually gets around to voting at all...

Exactly

23 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Sure, you can say "a (Sith) wizard did it" and just hand wave the whole thing, but I'd prefer if the CIS had some reasonable explanation for coming into being even if the Sith manipulated the crap out of it for their own ends.

I'd say, like all good fascist leaders, the Sith leveraged truthful issues. That's one of the main points of the PT (and more fully explored in TCW) anyway: the leadership of the Republic was so decadent and out of touch, even the average person in the Core was dubious, never mind the outlying planets. So I don't think anyone said "a Sith wizard did it", what you're proposing was already the situation in the nutshell.

26 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

AFAICT, the worlds that initially join the CIS are those well-off Mid and Outer Rim worlds that want more independence and say in how their resources are utilized. This implies that the Republic has some form of socialism and the worlds that leave to form the CIS are those that are more "givers" to this systems rather than the "takers" of the Core Worlds. This also goes to explain why the Republic cannot afford to simply let them secede, as it will be devastating to the Republic's quality of life.

That's not "socialism", that's colonialism pure and simple. An analogous situation in the past might have been the British Commonwealth. All wealth flowed to Britain by exploiting their colonial interests, but for the most part they left the locals to do their own subjugating, so long as the goods kept being produced. At some point though the bureaucracy gets corrupted and decadent, and the locals start wondering why they have to obey a distant authority. If there is a crisis (like WW2, or "taxation of trade routes") that can spell the end, or the beginning of the end. Maybe the CIS is like India in the early 1940s...if Ghandi was a Sith Lord...

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3 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Many of the Mid and Outer Rim worlds (at least the wealthier ones that sought to join the CIS) were never colonies of the Core, so its not really colonialism any more that expecting one state of the US to financially support another state to the expense of its own people would be.

The behavior he is ttalking about is though

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6 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Before focusing back on Dooku, I'm also looking at the CIS government. We have a Head of State (Dooku), the Separatist Council (the big entity backers), and the Separatist Congress (or is the Separatist Senate?). I believe that the HoS is nominally in charge of both of the other two, but I'm not sure how the Council and the Congress are expected to interact. In canon I believe this is just supposed to be a sham government under Dooku, but if the CIS is going to be reframed to make more sense, it might deserve a little more attention.

As the intention of the CIS is a smaller and more responsive federal government, perhaps the HoS leads the Congress and the Council is more of an advisory body/negotiating body without direct lines of power? In this case, the Congress would petition the Council with requests for finances/materials/whatever. Still not enough of a political science guy to know exactly how this would work, but I can't imagine the proudly independent Separatist worlds intentionally setting themselves up to give the greatest voice to the Council.

It's also possible that the Council isn't meant to be a permanent part of the CIS government and is instead a "war council" made up of those entities most important to the war effort. We don't really get a sense of what a long-term or non-wartime CIS government was intended to look like (again, because the Sith never planned it to survive), but the members of Congress must have thought about this since the CIS was formed before the war began.

think of the Council like the cabinet,

also take a look at the Articles of Confederation from US history.

And yes the Sith never Planned for it to survive. The Seperatists were a tool to goad the Senate to give the Chancelor more and more power and to keep the Jedi Busy and kill as many jedi as possible.

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Sure. There is a problem in I dont think the Seperatists were well written. None of their motivations were fleshed out very well. To do it right you probably need to do a basic character worksheet for each major player on the seperatists side. so each has their own motivations etc. What do they want. How far are they willing to go to get it. And so on.
From a brief look on Wookieepedia none of the members of either talked about what the individual wanted. SO they end up kind of 2 dimensional. Maybe come up with an event that was the last straw for each person. a basic what they want and how far they are willing to go to get it and you should be a good way along to making them better characters. I would have some be sympathetic. Like requested aid and didnt get it and someone important to them died. I would have some whose greed was hindered by the Republic.

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2 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

I'm not sure I want to spend much time on every member.

I think I want Dooku to be an ex-Jedi that genuinely believes in the CIS cause. I don't necessarily think he should be a Sith.

I could be happy with Nute Gunray serving as Palpatine's mole in the CIS (he'd been working with Sidious for years). He's a leading member of the Council, so while he's not head of state, he's plenty influential.

just do the bare minimum of what their goal is and motivation. That is all you need till you have a story reason for more.

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1 minute ago, HappyDaze said:

A great example of this is actually Nute Gunray. No, not his motivations for backing the CIS, but rather why the independent worlds would want this guy helping them. Nute and the Trade Federation started the whole mess by blockading and invading Naboo 10 years before the Separatist Crisis. This showed that the Republic wasn't doing much for Mid and Outer Rim worlds. Then a lot of those worlds secede because they want things to be better... and they turn Nute and his Trade Federation for support. It does not make sense.

you are right it doesn't make sense. except I think that was a result of Palpatine manipulation. I know it is a cop out. Which Is why I suggested work from what do each member want? how can they be manipulated? Does Palapatine have dirt? Does Palps control something they want? I think to do it right it needs to be convoluted. But you just need really basic stuff to get the behavior right.

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It is only a lost cause if you want to stick to canon. If you want to make things make more sense that is doable. You can either start with the plot line you want and then assign motivations and goals that result on that plot. Or you assign motivations and then let things unfold in their new pattern... Just dont expect existing plot based writing to make sense.

The real world history has a lot of nations built on idiocy and a foundation of stupid with a metric butload of "just because" to hold it together.

You also have the old adage of politics makes strange bedfellows. Perhaps the council and the CIS senate were two entirely seperate entities with their own end-goals, but came together due to the common goal of wanting out from under the thumb of the Republic?

Maybe the council is a special presidential cabinet like orginization since they bring the military and economic might that isn't directly tied to a planet or system. Then the CIS senate could be the representatives of several worlds or systems. Sort of like how the US has cabinet leaders, secretaries, and czars over various organizations like the department of defense, FBI and so on.

I like the idea of Dooku being a disenfranchised Jedi who, through his leadership and presence, united the disgruntled and downtrodden systems into a revolutionary movement.

On ‎5‎/‎26‎/‎2019 at 11:04 PM, GroggyGolem said:

Here's an idea.

In the past, opposing sides of conflicts tried to be more "humane" in that they weren't sending citizens to their deaths, but were creating artificial beings to fight battles for them.

That is, until the clones decided they knew better and banded against their creators.

Thus began the Clone Wars.

Aye, when the clone wars was mentioned ,this was the kind of imagery I got behind. A war in which the Empire ultimately came to power. That would have made some captivating fiction actually.



Re Seperatist motivations: The important thing worth noting is that not every Rim entity signed up to the Seperatist movement; the major shareholders of that war was a united band of mega corporations who wanted the Republic to leave their interests alone whom had likely built up a large collection of territories with the exhortation tactics they had been engaging with up to that point. Therefore it wasn't that the Rim planets thought that the Seperatists movement was a good thing; it was the megacorporation's who had dominion over those planets who got angry at the republic cracking down on their business and decided to make a stand; after all at this point those corporations who controlled territory for decades could use their entrenched support to make their people believe whatever they wanted them to believe. I like to believe that for most part, what we saw during the movies was information that only the most elite individuals in the galaxy would ever see. There's no reason to suspect that the separatist movement being entirely run for profit was the only motivation; they just advertise the problem the people are having as a biproduct of an inefficient republic and they have the people calling for revolution.

Funnily enough, that is exactly how Amercia works. We've had at least 5 decades of Russia and Amercia having gigantic proxy wars over the middle east that resulted in 9/11, which then resulted in the toppling of several middle eastern countries and the complete chaos in Syeria. But hey, they are pumping out freedom gas as a export, so it doesn't have to be logical to make sense. The Clone Wars literally makes as much sense as that. Or the Amercian civil war, which wasn't fought to abolish slavery (which was only one of the reasons that war happened) but was really fought because the South didn't want the north interfering with their business, and for most part the people who actually fought in the war didn't have any real stake in it; they just wanted to defend their home land, fight for money or whatever else motivated them. Only thing that mattered to the higher ups was power to do whatever they want with the resources and people they owned without outside interference. War after all is the natural state of nations and the reasons don't have to make sense for the common folk to believe in them.

I'm sure there are many more British examples of that; the 100 year war was because Britain was technically a vassel of France and really disliked it, but I don't doubt for a second that anyone but the Nobles really cared about that, people fought to defend their homes or because there was more profit in it then toiling the fields thanklessly. Just aside from Brexit (which isn't a military disaster, but a political storm that never, goes, away.) there isn't really anything that comes to mind, aside from being a puppet state that goes to war for favours for the last 20 or so years.

5 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Then a lot of those worlds secede because they want things to be better... and they turn Nute and his Trade Federation for support. It does not make sense.

Sure it can, if the ones that seceded are the ones that got a better deal. The Trade Federation can also make the case that Naboo wasn't paying its debts (I believe that was its initial argument, and they used it again on Pantora), so a neutral/ignorant observer might see the Trade Federation as the victims. Classic divide and conquer. Heck, even the individual states within the US play a similar game, offering tax cuts and subsidies to corporations so they move operations to their state. The net effect is a race to the bottom for everyone, but the ones that land the "Amazon deal" still think they got something good...until the subsidies fade away and the corporation uproots again.

Sure if you just take the surface fluff from the movies, it isn't all that coherent...but I'm not sure how a 2 hour movie is supposed to delve into all those details and still provide space opera entertainment. What you're proposing isn't outside the realm of possibility, but you have to assume that not all the NPC players view the Trade Federation in the same dim light the movie audience is supposed to.