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Progress Report 37: The Escadron Forevermore
First things first, we are aware that it has been a very long time since we had one of these concern France proper. And I do mean LONG time. To be more precise, 5 years have passed since our 27th Dev Diary which announced the upcoming France rework on 29th May of 2021. Since then, a lot has changed. The dev team underwent months upon months of restructuring in terms of both the membership and our attitude to mod design, not to mention the numerous updates that came to eventually precede BM despite the initial conception intending them to build on top of it. I could go on and on into exact details about what exactly had changed since then, but knowing that it's far from what you've come for here, I will try to keep it as brief and concise as possible: simply put, our earlier progress report started off a horrendously wrong foot, not just in retrospect but even for the time it was made. It gave audiences a massively skewed image of what France is like on the eve of January 1st 1936, and even worse one for a large number of people who came out of it holding a sincere conviction that this is what all of France's content will look like. Also, the icons were way below the standard of what is the norm of Red Flood as of 2025 but that's a different matter entirely. So, without further ado, here is the re-reworked (yes, BM has been inconsistently worked on for so long that it received reworks of its own. Beat you to the joke.) intro tree with some of the flavour and character introduction events tied to it. Moving on. THE SQUADRONS OF THE FUTURE With that out of the way, we can move to the actual substance of this Progress Report. I am Deldels, and I have come to be something of a lead designer when it comes to the faction covered here, though such title holds little real substance given the laissez-faire organization of the Red Flood dev team. At the minimum, it allows me the dignity of introducing (re-introducing?) you to the first of the many factions vying for the control of France covered in depth. L’Escadron du Futur or the Squadron of the Future or simply “the Escadron” in layman's language, is something of an organizational anomaly as far as politics of 1936 are concerned. First conceived by Guillaume Apollinaire and Charles Nungesser in 1930 as a way to bring together the various disunited and poorly organized paramilitaries constituting the French Far-Right of the interwar period, including the Camelots du Roi of the Action Française and Le Faisceau of Georges Valois, following the successful revolution that had put the FNAG into power, it had grown into one of the political parties which form said Front and the primary backbone of the Army Federation system that came to replace the newly dissolved French armed forces. Both from a meta perspective and within the setting itself, the Escadron serves as something of a mascot for the ideology of the Avant-Garde state. For the playerbase and the wider HOI4 community, it carries all that constitutes the aesthetics and guiding mentality of RF France: Fast cars. Tacky leather jackets. Mannerbund. Spontaneous bouts of ideologically driven violence. Perhaps partially thanks to the poor path layout of 0.1 France, no other faction captures the ethos of the entire tag in a bottle as much as this militant band of misfits. And among them, none captures it nearly as well as Guillaume Apollinaire. Apollinaire himself is the archetypal soldier-poet of Red Flood’s new age. A Polish-French art critic, poet, and writer, he was likely the one to coin the name of the school of Surrealism, not to mention deeply involved in early Cubism, and a one-time dabbler in anarchism. Having narrowly survived the Great War, he was a founder of the L’Audacieux veterans paramilitary, inspired by the example of the Italian Arditi. This org was involved in the right-wing alliance making up the postwar Bernanos government, though this alliance only lasted a few years due to political differences. In the aftermath, L’Audaceiux came together under the revolutionary rightist grouping that would become the proto-FNAG. The importance of Apollinaire as a unifying figure and nationalist war hero makes him a figure in the movement as important, if not more, than Antonin Artaud himself, coming up through the veteran wing rather than the Surrealists and Parisian government. Naturally, he is named Prime Minister of the new regime shortly after it takes power. His untimely death, of course, comes as no surprise to anyone who had been following BM's progress. You were made aware of his fate a long ago. Felled by the bullet of a mentally ill Anti-France fanatic, the Master's children vie for two things: revenge and power. THE CENTRE Starting off, the Centre-Escadron is something of a misnomer. Lacking much theoretical ground of its own, it had come to represent something of a “practical core” for the organization as a whole, based either on borrowed allegiance (for the far-right paramilitaries that had allowed themselves to be merged into a central body) and personal loyalty to Apollinaire. With personal loyalty come personal beliefs of course, and in a roundabout way, the Centre-Escadron is Apollinaire. Contrary to what this might initially imply, none of it reflects ideological pragmatism. Rather, there is a level of value dissonance in effect, and as much as Apollinaire and Nungesser might boast of themselves as “men of action” above all else, they cannot escape the shadow of theoretical grounding, as eclectic as it might be. Because poor Guillaume lays dead and buried and because we spoke of him a fair amount earlier, this PR will move the focus entirely on his prince-regnant and fellow staunch defender of French culture. The start of Nungesser's content kicks off with a recursive loop back to his and François Coli's political infancy: The Poilutariat Manifesto. Penned by the duo during their brief stay on France's electoral left (and with whose premises they had founded the Social Party of the Combatants of War a week after their expulsion from SFIO on the grounds of advocating a position of uncompromising revanchism deemed unacceptable for the wider party), it becomes once more a source of legitimacy for the young pilot firebrand, though he had long since radicalised from its premises of vulgar soldier populism. Revanchisme et Légitimité remain the two guiding principles of Nungesser, as they had been of his mentor before, though their meanings had long since diverged from the definitions given to them under the duress of the mainstream politics of the rotten Third and the doomed-in-the-cradle Fourth Republics. Revanchism, divergent from the simple desire to shatter the confines of the hexagon, becomes a bond and a creed that, in a dream not unlike the theories outlined by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, transcends the political and ascends towards the natural. Apollinaire believed that a populus nurtured from infancy to the art of warfare will grow to find nourishment and purpose in it. The wounds they receive will come to reshape their biological state of being, as they did to the cromagnons before. Skin will grow where shrapnel has fallen and absorb it, allowing the human layer to evolve into something grander, no longer constricted from evolution by modernity's grooming to docility. Of course, like in the Sparta of old, the evolution of the people cannot come without the evolution of the state to go with it. A forceful removal of much reviled anti-France elements is in order, as is a total realignment of the government towards where its purpose lies. Under Artaud and Breton, the revolution had forgotten its fuel and lifeblood: the men who had withstood the trenches of Somme and all their horrors, who had given their all at the doom of Verdun, only to be sold out and betrayed by opportunistic middlemen, to them belongs the state. They are the artisans of victory, and the economy shall rest well within their hands. The “economic revolution” declared by the nascent regime takes myriad of forms, no longer intended to revitalize the economy as the 1932 government had, but towards the goal of an eventual ideological transformation: Paper currency will be abolished in favour of a system of credits closely monitored by a central bureau, local representatives shall be subjected to evaluations of their work arbitrated jointly by both the government and the people they serve, a spear shall be thrust in the heart of pacifism by a strong showing of the unity of the French people in face of all adversity, regardless of where it comes from. Legitimism, in turn, split from the ideal of the restoration of the Bourbons to the throne of France, under Nungesser comes to represent the throne itself. The memories of past regimes had melded themselves to the spirit of Frenchness as one, celeber whole. The empire. The cornerstone of civilization against kultur. We no longer speak of republics or restorations, of aristocrats or proles. The past stands buried in the rubble downwards from the world to come. I've seen the future, and it is righteous murder. THE LEFT The Left Escadron is, at least at the outset, perhaps the most orthodox Sorelian faction in the Escadron. Its leader, Philippe Lamour, and éminence grise, Georges Valois, find their ideological nourishment in the Sorelian ideal of myth as the animating force of life and action, and look towards the original 1913 pact between Sorel, Maurras, and the Cercle Proudhon as the wellspring of their legitimacy. As such, the traditionally chauvinist outlook which dominates the Escadron is initially somewhat muted, instead being channeled towards the realization of the Sorelian ideal of Producerism and the restructuring of the environment of France to meet the new consciousness being assembled, drawing on some familiar characters to do so. Such an effort begins initially with the refocus on Plan Voisin, the reinvigoration of Le Soleil, with the hopes of shaping the capital as an architectonic representation of France’s economic reorganization under the auspices of Left Escadron. The purpose here, as those perhaps already familiar with the thought of Sorel and some of his (many) ideological successors already know, is not so much class collaboration as class harmonization. The antagonism remains, but through each class’ adoption of a guiding set of myths and images, their actions become oriented towards the ends of the nation. In looking at the particulars of this renewed mythos, we find the first major break between the Left-Escadron and Sorel himself. While the regime follows in their precursor’s footsteps by championing the power of intuitive art, the engineers of the New Order, and Lamour in particular, look towards technology as the ultimate instantiation of mythic power in communal existence. Indeed, the Left-Escadron places its faith in the near limitless power of technology to effortlessly meld with organic instinct to act as a new fountain for the vitalist energies that so enchanted Sorel. Despite this, the Left-Escadron is far from what we call, in the context of Red Flood, “Technocratic.” For one, the guiding organizational ethos of the economy is not, as we see in Howard Scott, based around the rigid dictates of science, but rather refer instead to a sort of vital feeling or cultural sentiment; and it is from this that the second major difference between the L-Escadron and a more traditionally technocratic movement springs: an ardent regionalism undergirded by a belief in the unique experiences conferred by local cultures and environments. The more concrete economic organization of France under the Left-Escadron, in its initial stages, therefore looks a great deal like the regionalist syndicalism championed by Valois and Hubert Lagardelle. While this certainly doesn’t mean that the Left-Escadron is any less rabidly nationalistic than its counterparts to its right, it does lay the eventual groundwork for an idiosyncratic version of French nationalism to emerge. Perceptive readers will have noticed the manner by which I have qualified many of my statements with some form of “initially.” This is because in Lamour we find a particularly apt absorption of Sorel’s enthusiasm for dynamism and his later enthusiasm for William James. As a consequence, the Left-Escadron is a faction which prides itself on its capacity for mutation, to assimilate and jettison new strains of thought and tactics as it comes into contact with the formative power of violence and crisis, an embrace of trial by fire found first in the Italian War. The eruption of conflict, as France’s first major test, sees the Left-Escadron forced to shed old allies and look in unconventional places for new ones. Ultimately, the War In Italy will unavoidably shift the face of the Left-Escadron, radically reinventing its techniques while reinforcing its guiding ethos of a violent, mythic, France… Nation beyond politics, class beyond economy. THE RIGHT At the outset of the Great War, Valentine de Saint-Point and Ricciotto Canudo were already known in fame and infamy alike as rabble rousing heartthrobs of the decadent Parisian scene, important forerunners of practically every genre of contemporary Avant-Garde that comes to mind. Their influence on the Revolution of 1932, though never given much publicity, cannot go understated, and their familiarity with both Apollinaire and Marinetti had made them an important factor in tying Fiume to Le Soleil. It is they, joined to lesser extent by Rene Guénon, who can claim what is called the Right Escadron as their brainchild. Originally simply an extension of the Collège Idéiste, an influence group for the Central Committee of the FNAG, it has long since broken free from its status as a small bookclub of arthouse nepotists, becoming a major personal influence on both Artaud and the now deceased Apollinaire - something that had always driven a wedge between these two men and their allies within the PSF, who proudly present themselves as being “above reality”. For the Right Escadron, the spirit and the real are a matrimony, a marriage of contradictions, once united in what was called the Science until its unbinding by Constantine. At the core of this Science stands the flesh, the ethos of creation that drives all mankind. It is the most natural thing in the world, and in this way it also becomes the most otherworldly, for it is bid upon and understood very little. To bring back the dominance of the flesh, the passive constraints of modern life have to be shed in the favour of a healthier, more natural, perhaps “primitive” form of despotism. Like the phoenix, democracy has to burn so that its ashes can once more grow into the cruelty of the Orient, now embraced in a symbiosis of yes and no with the whirls of machinery. Synarchy, as defined by Alexandre Saint-Yves d'Alveydre, is the rule of harmony. Its guiding premise is that as long as there is a hidden other to enforce the association of everyone with everyone else and serve as an intermediary in these dealings, the state can work as one, all-encompassing body, its organs sustaining each other, driven by an ordained duty reinforced through ritual. This duty is in turn relegated to an anointed sovereign. Of course, no organization in France stands more fit to fulfil the duties of this hidden, sagely other than the Collège Idéiste, yet the state of the sovereign himself remains in dispute. The ever-volative Antonin Artaud is a righteous and gifted soul, rich in Science but held back by the hubris stuffed to him by bureaucratic sycophants. It is the duty of the true sons of the Sun to make it clear that they are the only friends he shall ever need, and that there is no shame in letting his base impulses run wild. The mandate of power comes to those who are deserving of it, and the young tyrant has many enemies who wish to deprive him of it. The suggestion of the sages? One long night of gruesome accidents, a cleansing fire within the very heart of the realm to purify it of filth. What remains is the post-release clarity of the half-a-decade-long process of revolution. The Sun, once contained merely within the former city of Paris, had now taken the form of all of France. The proletariat had turned away from the miasma of Marxism, free to run wild as a noble warrior, boundless chaser of eternal high, while the aristocrat had returned to his natural lot in life, the bourgeoisie and the false clergy once more lay dead at his feet. The purple-blooded, guided by the wise ordinance of the sages, loves freedom and admires it in those who love being in his service. Where churches to decay once stood now stand temples of virility, of warfare, of destruction driven by lust. Synergy, the knot that ties mankind together, has been achieved. All thanks to the First Magus, who rules but does not lead and his lockstep legions. The project of the Science is universal, France merely a place of rebirth once the glory of Old Egypt had faded. Even outside of it, small flickers of fire prophesize a grander flame. In Finland, wise men uncover the great truth of mankind from which their homeland is not spared and in the lands of the Middle East, the boundless elan vital of the Moslem faith continues to topple the modern imperial crusaders. Thousands of learned men and women await the coming of the unbound Dionysus, the next in the great line of conquerors such as Thutmose, Alexander, Tamerlane who shall rape the stale and the obsolete into submission, leaving nothing in the way of creation. And find him they shall, as the Collegiates know, in Antonin Artaud. POST-SCRIPT And with that concludes the second Progress Report of BM France, taking you through the reworked Escadron in some of its glory. Far from all. The trees shown here cover only the first three years from the ten total of their respective paths, up to the invasion with Italy and cutting short at its jubilant conclusion. Seems overly ambitious? You don't have to remind us. Burning Memories had gone a long way from its embryonic form, starting as what was intended to be some flavour edits to the 0.1 tree and spiralling into a giant moloch of planned content, some of it cut into smaller updates to tone down the sheer gargantuan scope of it all. We are not totally ignorant of how this fares with the playerbase itself either, having long since phased out any hopes of continuing doing updates on this scale after its release, opting for a more decentralised system of “Release what you have as soon as its done”, which will hopefully shush some of the (perfectly justified) complains about the pace of the mod’s updates. Of course, we are open to hearing your thoughts about this, but sorry to whoever believed we were going to do an update giving 10 years of content to every Central European tag after BM. The team simply isn’t equipped for it in terms of size (though you can always help in that regard). To that end, I would like to thank each and every dev who had contributed to the update in any shape or form, no matter how small, whether they still work on the mod or not, as well as to all of you who had stayed with us for so long. We can only hope that your patience and support will be rewarded and that this progress report, long overdue, has fulfilled some of your expectations. Because after all, without you, there would be not much purpose to doing any of this. In spite of its ideological diversity, Escadron scratches only the surface of all the paths and personalities Avant-Garde France has at its disposal. Worry not, because this will not be the last status update concerning everyone's favorite tag. Since the announcement of BM as an update, we have revealed scarily little of our cards in terms of France content, an issue we hope to remedy in the future. For now, await the Progress Report that concerns its sister nation, who had once nurtured futurism with her breast milk. Merry Christmas. R.J Ycizqo Wppgkm kj qibtt c kfxgo submitted by /u/Lollandir2 to r/RedFloodMod [link] [comments]
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reddit.com |
Lollandir2 |
Dec 23, 2025 |
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An Open Letter of Concern about Denmark
Dear Everyone While it is certainly admirable that Denmark is receiving a rework in Kaiserreich, I think personally that there are major issues with the content and the backstory as it stands, to the point of it being borderline character assassination and outright historical vandalism. Let us start with the historical background and how it breaks down on first contact with original sources - Historically, in 1920, the Easter Crisis erupted over an issue that would not even be relevant in KRTL, let alone exist - The plebescites in Schleswig-Holstein. But let us assume the best from Iffy and that the crisis erupts because Christian X deposes the government for fear of what happened in France, and uses the excuse that Zahle refused to sack the Social Democrat ministers. What happened historically, and I struggle to see why this would also not happen in KRTL was an immediate denounciation from the majority in Parliament and the threat of a general strike to force the King to follow parliamentary principles.[1][2] In our world, the King bent to public pressure and appointed a technocratic caretaker until elections could be held. In other words, if the Easter Crisis had actually proceeded as proposed, the result would have been a repeat of France! The King would have ended up creating the conditions where a general strike could have toppled a government, and especially in an as heated atmosphere as KRTL's 1920. Additionally - Where's the drop in agricultural exports and the subsequent crippling depression? 60% of all Danish exports in 1920 went to Britain.[3] If Germany took over that share, then Denmark would not just have to go through a very rough economic crisis which would certainly have turfed out any government for sheer magnitude, it would also almost certainly make Denmark totally dependent on Germany. 75% of all exports were agricultural and 80% of those went to Britain.[4] Even if we assume Britain reopened trade to a degree, the messy circumstances of the 1925 Revolution, plus the lack of any currency means trade would by necessity have to be conducted in natural resources, something Denmark didn't have a lot of need for historically. But enough about historical backgrounds, let us look at the actual content from 1936 onwards. First a look at the rogue's (and not so rogue's) gallery of figures: Firstly our main character, Thorvald Stauning: Why does he want to rearm? Even in the face of Nazi Germany, which was a lot close to home and a lot more bellicose about going to war, there was never any attempt to rearm. Even in 1937, when Swedish and Norwegian papers decried Danish pacifism, his response was to get up in front of them and give them the rethorical finger.[5] While Munch was a pacifist, and a large one, he and his party were far from the only people involved in it. Secondly, most of the people who are talked about on the political right were nowhere near actual power for a reason - That reason mostly being that they were upper-class twits whose actual political nous bordered on zero. Pürschel was such a bad uniter that he got couped less than a year into office, and there's a good argument to be made that most of the really nasty viewpoints only developed after he got thrown out.[6] If you're looking for anti-democrats who actually had brains and influence, I can recommend Højgaardkredsen.[7][8] Even then, it is very clear that parliamentary democracy by 1940 was strong enough to resist such delusions. Moving further left - The S party discipline has always been extremely strong. The idea of Munch taking over is a dud, and it is a dud for the main reason that Munch would never lead a government with K and that S would always want their man on top - It gives the impression of having been lazily copied from Germany at a glance, and if it locks you out of the tree, it's bad gameplay design. Now for the third issue - The Constitutional Crisis Since it seems like that Christian X was cowed in the Easter Crisis from the bio, the idea that he would suddenly try to meddle in politics is out and out character assassination. When Højgaardkredsen tried to have Stauning deposed in 1940 under much more worrying circumstances[7][8], they were rebuffed. Christian X was many things but out and out politically suicidal in trying to meddle directly in politics and threatening to depose the government if they don't comply is a step too far. Such actions would have two consequences; He is told to piss up a rope. He gets deposed as King. It is not as if Denmark was actually neutral during the First World War - Denmark bowed to German pressure to put mines into the Danish Belts on several occasions.[9] And about that Chancellor Street Compromise - The real reason it was done was because it required primary legislation and thus it couldn't be done without V...or K. Mygdal was leader yes, but by 1933 had less and less influence, and considering the apocalyptic crisis the farmers would still be in, the other participants would be very ready to take some sort of relief for their constitutents.[4] Now, let's be clear, it could still fail, it took 18 hours and a few bottle of good schnapps before it was agreed upon, but the idea that it deserves some sort of mechanic is ludicrous.[10] Lastly, the socialists. Oh dear - I can excuse, to a degree the reuse of names from the Second World War for familiarity - I suspect that the inclusion of the sailor's union is due to the fact that they were led historically by a syndicalist. Let me detail something for the reader: Number of sailors organized in 1936: 7,790 Number of workers organized in the slaughterhouse unions in 1936: 8,396 Total number of workes organized in 1936: 603,930 [11] The idea that anyone would even remotely entertain literally giving about 1.2% of the workers the keys to the country is outrageous for obvious reasons. What it roughly translates to is giving control of the United States to an alliance of farmer and utility workers - on the idea of sexual liberation - While it generally makes sense that there would be a revolution, considering that influential (for a given value) syndicalists in Denmark were very much in favour of abortion, considering the historical vandalism that has been rendered on other figures, I do not have high hopes for this either.[12] While I have a fair few suggestions, this letter is already hitting three standard pages and so, if wished for, I can detail them later Sincerely, a long-time follower of Kaiserreich, an experienced modder and a very concerned person with access to and ability to read original-language sources. PS: The note about Christian X being a freemason is out of place at best and a frankly plainly weird thing to include unless you're planning a "SEKRIT MASONIC LODGE DENMARK PATH!!!!!" Sources, and more can be provided on demand: [1]https://natmus.dk/historisk-viden/temaer/kongeraekken/christian-10/ [2]https://www.ft.dk/da/folkestyret/grundloven-og-folkestyret/grundlovens-og-folkestyrets-udvikling [3]https://danmarkshistorien.dk/perioder/verdenskrigsepoken-1914-1945/oekonomisk-krise-og-statslig-regulering [4]https://tidsskrift.dk/landbohist/article/view/5768/5076 [5]https://danmarkshistorien.dk/vis/materiale/statsminister-thorvald-staunings-s-laenkehunds-tale-8-marts-1937 [6]https://biografiskleksikon.lex.dk/Victor_P%C3%BCrschel [7]https://meile.dk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Hoejgaardkredsen1940.pdf [8]https://denstoredanske.lex.dk/H%C3%B8jgaardkredsen [9]https://www.kristeligt-dagblad.dk/debat/2014-08-05/de-danske-str%C3%A6der-fik-l%C3%A5s-p%C3%A5-i-dag-pr%C3%A6cis-100-%C3%A5r-siden.-udl%C3%A6gning-af-miner-holdt [10]https://danmarkshistorien.dk/vis/materiale/kanslergadeforliget-1933 [11]https://www.dst.dk/Site/Dst/Udgivelser/GetPubFile.aspx?id=13898&sid=hele, pg. 126 and 127 [12]https://web.archive.org/web/20131219000258/http://sfah.dk/upload_dir/pics/Tidsskrift/Aargang-1995-1999/1997-2/AH97-2-K_DalsgaardLarsen.pdf submitted by /u/VoidTemplar2000 to r/Kaiserreich [link] [comments]
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reddit.com |
VoidTemplar2000 |
Oct 2, 2024 |
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Minor Monday 61: Beiyang World Expansion (QIE, SZC, LEP. HNN, ANQ, FNG)
Introduction: Greetings everyone, my name is Hazo, and I am one of the contributors that work on the China region. I am ecstatic to announce a series of China content updates that I have spearheaded, intended to appear in the next upcoming update. Compiled into a singular Minor Monday, they affect primarily the tags that owe their legacy to the Beiyang Republic. Qing (QIE): Starting with a government that I hold a special place for in my heart, one of the first I ever played in Kaiserreich, and the government I am the maintainer of, the Qing Government. As we all know, the setup for the Qing is renowned and iconic, with the tag seeing continued popularity and interest ever since its release 5 years ago. Representing the fusion of the Manchu Imperial Court of Aisin-Gioro Puyi, the Zhili Clique of Cao Kun and Wu Peifu, alongside the Beiyang Republic Pre-Anguojun (Zhang Zuolin’s Beiyang Republic). A truly unique setup that a lot of China owes its legacy towards. However, such a setup has never been truly developed or explored, and it carried with it the remnants of Kaiserreich: Darkest Hour’s design philosophies, limited Chinese sources at the time of development, and a focus on the Manchu Court, rather than the foundation it had been draped over. With the Manchu Restoration receiving a revamp by my predecessor Chiron29 two years ago, it has proved particularly popular with players, yet again it intensifies the focus on the Manchu Court whilst leaving the Beiyang elements in the shadows. Therefore, following onwards from recent changes to its military content, the Zhili have received a full scale revamp of its content. Featuring first and foremost, a complete re-do of all focus names, descriptions and effects, they have all been updated and modernised towards current Kaiserreich standards. Whilst the focus tree structure itself has not changed, and no focuses have been added, practically everything has been replaced except the kitchen sink. Retaining all three Zhili-related paths, the government’s political battleground continues its patriotic Anti-Concessionist versus pragmatic Pro-Concessionist split, born between the ideals of the two titans of the Zhili Clique, Cao Kun and Wu Peifu. Similarly, the Republic, something I hold especially dear, has received a do-over harkening to the true qualities of the Xinhai Revolution. And lest we forget the Military/Industrial tree, and the army tree! Now to address the elephant in the room. Cao Kun. For those who load up the Kaiserreich of today, one would bear witness to a broken man, tied up to the bottle as a “Drunken Dabbler”, more of a liability than anything. However, after discussions with the original developers, my lore advisor, and conducting research of my own, it was deliberated that such a depiction had little basis. It was greatly exaggerated, and served as an easy way to sideline the pre-eminent figure of the Zhili. And so it was a mission to characterise him correctly, as this magnanimous Grey-Eminence who was the King of the Zhili Clique. Through this task, the Zhili would also now work to highlight more figures of the clique, rather than having the whole tag revolve around Wu Peifu. Therefore, I am proud to display the tag’s advisor roster. No longer shall Cao be a detriment in his own country, instead he is the Co-Protagonist of the Zhili narrative, handling various other figures within the Clique. To further explore Beiyang politics, there has also been a further implementation of an alignment flavour system not too dissimilar to the work on Hunan, highlighting the various factions of the current political scene. The Luoyang faction of the Zhili, led by Wu Peifu, and the Jinbao faction, led by Cao Kun, amongst other minor groups. In relation to this, I am also happy to show off the starting party list, although political developments can result in quite…significant changes to both the advisor roster and parties. Not to forget all the unique theorists, alongside the old, and new, generals and admirals! Oh, and for you lore fiends, there has been a painstaking dramatic increase in the total amount of text for the tag in the form of events, character bios, focus descriptions, idea descriptions and more! All of which come together to detail the various power players, the political parties, the cut-throat world of Beiyang politics, and other qualities of Beiyang. Sichuan Zhili Remnants (SZC): Following on but staying in tune with the Zhili, we move to another incredibly popular warlord to play as, Sichuan. A fan favourite, Sichuan tells a zero-to-hero story like no other, especially with its Zhili Exile and Federalist Exile paths. Following on from changes to the Zhili in their home-government, the Zhili Exiles are certainly not left hanging, and therefore have been granted the same treatment as the Qing. Perhaps an element that has received significant scrutiny over the years for those who are familiar with his career and work, the role of Jiang Baili in the Zhili Remnants is that of a misconstrued one. Jiang was never really within the Zhili Clique, let alone devoted, or close enough to Wu Peifu to be his second-in-command and the rallying figure of the Zhili military. After another re-evaluation with the team, it was decided that instead of forcing Jiang into this role and re-factoring the content for him, we would instead remove Jiang from his role as the ultra-militarist completely. In his place lies one of the many secondary figures of the Zhili, the singular figure Wu Peifu feared, Wang Chengbin. Now, those familiar with the Qing would ask: Isn’t he the old guy that dies in the first month? Yes! You would be correct. Yet his circumstances for dying in Kaiserreich were never fully delved into, beyond the fact that he did die early on in 1936 in our timeline. Notably, however, he died of illness, living in squalor and exile in Tianjin. Wang is perfect for this role as the “backup” of the Zhili militarists, as he is Wu Peifu’s one rival under Cao Kun (as both men are Cao’s protégés). Representing the revival of his Tianjin faction of the Zhili Clique, a component of the overall Jinbao faction, Wang institutes a form of military rule not too dissimilar to Presidents of Beiyang’s past, staking it all on reclaiming Beijing. To counter his influence within the remnants, Yan Huiqing remains in-charge. With his content focused more on immediate reform of the Beiyang Republic’s institutions, collaborating with the civilian bureaucracy and Luoyang faction. That’s not all! There exists a third figure who rises to prominence in the vacuum left by Wu and Cao. Gao Lingwei. Acting as the Prime Minister for both Wang and Yan, Gao is another key figure of the Tianjin faction of the Zhili, and serves as the face of its Civilian arm. Gao has also taken the place of Yan Huiqing, if you puppet an authoritarian China, or in the United Provinces of China elections, where he is a possible Democratic Constitutionalist Party Candidate Finally, once you re-capture Beijing, the post-reconquest focus tree will open up, deciding the fate of the Beiyang Republic for decades to come. To round things off, here are the three possible Exile Heads of State! Oh, and penultimately, the Young China Party has now found their roots in their home province! The League of Eight Provinces (LEP): That’s not all! Touching base upon the Northern Zhili naturally led me to make efforts within the Southern Zhili. Therefore, the League of Eight Provinces is also experiencing a trickle-down effect of the Zhili makeover. The League as a country is quite an interesting phenomenon, being one of the few Kaiserreich warlords to legitimately sport a singular path. Yet the figures it retains within its political circles were a bit muddied. Having already alluded to character changes by moving Wang Kemin to Qing, I am also proud to showcase the League’s new Advisor roster in 1936! Similarly, I would like to highlight the expansion of its General and Admiral Roster! (at its maximum). Oh, and don’t forget more unique theorists! Alongside new generals and characters, the country has received a brand-spanking new military tree, and walking hand-in-hand with a new foreign policy tree! Moving onto one of the most fascinating facets of the League, we approach the renowned Smiling Tiger, Sun Chuanfang. A multi-faceted “Good and Honest Warlord”, the depiction of Sun in previous renditions of Kaiserreich was that of a sell-out who was allowing German intrusion into the country merely to satiate his desire for wealth and power. Whilst this is in-character in some aspects, the Smiling Tiger was far more nuanced. Simultaneously capable of great violence, he was also capable of kindness to those who won his favour. Similarly, as recent research has shown, he retained a sort of begrudging Anti-Concessionist outlook. Make no mistake however, Sun is a violent, oppressive warlord, just a colourful one. Now one would ask: Doesn’t that upset the whole story of the League? Luckily, however, the League already had a willing candidate to be the Concessionist supporter. Qi Xieyuan. Someone who willingly threw his lot in with Japan, was theorised to have killed his previous superior, Li Chun, and other further unscrupulous actions, he serves as the perfect foil for Sun. Having rewritten the narrative of the League Collapse, one can explore a brief glimpse into the mind of the Smiling Tiger, his government, his personality, and see the downfall of all he has built at the hands of Qi, the Germans, and Chen Tiaoyuan. Similarly to the North, the League has also overseen a makeover of its political parties, has had all of its character bios rewritten, and of course, every single event! Anqing (ANQ): Accompanying changes to the League of Eight Provinces is Chen Tiaoyuan’s own little fiefdom! With Chen and his compatriots playing an integral role in the League Collapse, he has also received a bit of love, sporting a new trait for Chen referencing his moniker, a new advisor roster, a new general roster, and all character bios rewritten too! Hunan (HNN): In Hunan, Tang Xiangming’s Southwestern China Political Council has been given a small expansion. Tang will get the title of “Inspector-General of Xiang-Yue-Gui“ upon forming it, and for every Province he incorporates into the Council there will be an event explaining how he incorporates it under his control, either by appointing Governors or negotiating with local figures. Alongside this, the ending events for Tang Xiangming’s political tree have been changed to reflect if he is Inspector-General or not. Fengtian (FNG): Finally, we turn to the oldest Chinese warlord to still retain its original design in some shape or form. Integral to such a design is the role that advisors and characters play in the Fengtian Clique. Be it through the members of the Shenyang Assembly, the Shikan Clique, the Shaoshuai Clique, or that of the Old Guard. Most curiously however, Fengtian advisors never received descriptions, and similarly some of its general descriptions were lacking. Therefore, they have been completely redone to finally detail lore about these figures, their relations, and why they are in the tag. In this line of thought, Fengtian characters have also received traits indicating their allegiances within the clique. Conclusion: If you are an enduring reader, you might have noticed that Sun Chuanfang, Chen Tiaoyuan, and the Zhili Exile leaders sported new “Alignment” traits, and your eyes would not deceive you! As a final round out, every Chinese leader will now tell you their alignment from a mere hover of their name! I would like to take a moment to thank my fellow team members of the China development team for supporting and aiding me in leading these various revamp endeavours, and the previous generation of China developers for even making such content possible. With the release of these revamps, I hope to return to my main project of Regional China Work. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask here or on the Discord.Oh, and one last thing! As is customary to assist in explaining complex factional dynamics, I have also made a non-comprehensive chart of the Beiyang political scene, attempting to map out the chaotic world of the Five Races Under One Union. On behalf of the China team, I hope you all enjoy the next content update, and forever remain under the Auspicious Cloud! submitted by /u/KingHazo to r/Kaiserreich [link] [comments]
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reddit.com |
KingHazo |
Aug 26, 2024 |