Aliens: Resistance (Defiance sequel)

Started by Nightmare Asylum, Sep 28, 2018, 06:24:14 PM

Author
Aliens: Resistance (Defiance sequel) (Read 70,878 times)

SiL

SiL

#375
Mostly when people wanted to test the effectiveness of a concept against a population, they'd use prisoners or captives. Unit 739 did the most heinous, unconscionable shit - but against prisoners during war, not random populations.

My guess is that in this story, being a company, they don't have prisoners - but they do have out of the way colonies they can play with.

My personal issue is any attempt at integrating this stuff with the films. If it were just "f**k it, we'll do whatever with the EU and that's that" I wouldn't bat an eyelid, but when it's trying to dance with canon and slip in it starts feeling like a cheap way to stay in the popular period without rocking the boat.

But, as SM said,  nobody is obligated to like the approach.

The Old One

The Old One

#376
It is cheap.

But even if I take it at face value, say they need to test them this way against a civilian population, to test effectiveness.

Tell me why.

Who are they going to use this tactic on?

SiL

SiL

#377
Urban pacification in a warzone. Drop it on the civilian population to turn them into nightmare monsters that fight whatever insurgents/freedom fighters/terrorists/opposing forces are in the area.

My big problem is that it's pretty easy to see how unleashing monsters onto a population might work in a combat setting. The real test is pacifying the monsters you've now unleashed. Testing that would be better done in a controlled environment, then testing the urban pacification and the monster pacification methods together.

The Old One

The Old One

#378
Perhaps that's why they're using the colony. Only so much of;

Quote from: SiL on Jan 27, 2019, 12:16:57 PM
Testing that would be better done in a controlled environment, then testing the urban pacification and the monster pacification methods together.

You can do in a controlled environment, because there's things in a natural environment you might not have considered in the lab tests.

So the closest you can get to a natural environment that you have control over is one of your own colonies. Okay, say I buy that.

Quote from: SiL on Jan 27, 2019, 12:16:57 PM
Urban pacification in a warzone. Drop it on the civilian population to turn them into nightmare monsters that fight whatever insurgents/freedom fighters/terrorists/opposing forces are in the area.

What freedom fighters/terrorists?
Is my big problem, what's the opposing force? My suspension of disbelief only stretches so much before it breaks. I need to know who they intend to use the Alien against, what justifies in their eyes this kind of viciousness- shadow organisation within W-Y or otherwise.

426Buddy

Why do we need to know the specifics of an opposing force? It would seem unrealistic to think the alien universe doesnt have geopolitical strife, wars, opposing factions/governments/mega corporations. It seems that the bioweapons division knows they can use the alien to make huge profits or shift power struggles in their favor. In order to do that they would need to know just how effective the alien is against human populations.

SiL

SiL

#380
I mean, the fact they have giant f**k-off warships at all is a good indication enemy forces exist. There'd be no sense having the firepower the USCM is carrying on a ship like the Sulaco if there was never a need for it.

The Kurgan

The Kurgan

#381
Either the Alien universe has a major change to what is considered a war crime and what is acceptable to actually use in a war or nobody would ever use it and parties who would, would become pariahs like Syria or North Korea today.

Every country has an army, most have not fought a war in decades. So the fact that war machinery is present indicates nothing.

To assume a a corporation would openly test bio weapons large scale on human populations is ridiculous however you approach it.
As it would need hundreds of sociopaths working together, hundreds of people all in on it, thousands of lose ends to cover it up, all for dubious gains and potentially finishing off the company for good when word gets out.
It just does not add up if you want to keep it grounded in reality and you don't want WY turned into Umbrella with supervillian underground labs and moon bases.


The Old One

The Old One

#382
It's hard to tell to what degree when we aren't shown any opposing forces though, even if there's indication there is. I know we witness Zula Hendricks fighting an unnamed foe. I'm not denying any of these things exist in the Alien Universe:
Quote from: 426Buddy on Jan 27, 2019, 01:38:20 PM
Geopolitical strife, Opposing factions, Mega-Corporations, Governments, Wars.
Ridiculous otherwise.

Quote from: The Kurgan on Jan 27, 2019, 01:58:30 PM
Either the Alien universe has a major change to what is considered a war crime and what is acceptable to actually use in a war or nobody would ever use it.

Exactly. The story needs to justify even the potential use of the Alien, ergo- testing. The Resistance depiction.

Quote from: The Old One on Jan 27, 2019, 12:30:40 PM
My suspension of disbelief only stretches so much before it breaks. I need to know who they intend to use the Alien against, what justifies in their eyes this kind of viciousness- shadow organisation within W-Y or otherwise.

SM

SM

#383
QuoteI always thought "urban pacification" was a completely inadequate euphemism for deliberately unleashing a biological weapon on a civilian population center that kills indiscriminately.

I know.  Great isn't it?

QuoteUnit 739 did the most heinous, unconscionable shit - but against prisoners during war, not random populations.

I specifically mentioned unit 731 as something to be avoided when discussing this storyline.

The Old One

The Old One

#384
I always thought "urban pacification" meant; "We're going to use the Alien's biological components, it's unusual combination of elements (tough SOB) to improve our warfare."

Not; "We're gonna nuke 'em with something we can't control, that may be considered a war crime, we've done the in-lab testing, now we need to see how it'll do out the field. We can use one of our colonies."

The part that's missing that makes the latter make some sense, is an enemy that W-Y intends to use this biological warfare against that threatens their existence so much- it justifies this biological warfare test.

(Perhaps something that threatens the Capitalism itself W-Y exists because of.)

SM

SM

#385
'Urban pacification' is deliberately dropping them on unruly civilians or enemies or "terrorists".

Wren talks about other applications as things that go "way beyond urban pacification".

The Old One

The Old One

#386
Quote from: SM on Jan 27, 2019, 02:45:10 PM
'Urban pacification' is deliberately dropping them on unruly civilians or enemies or "terrorists".

That's not the definition.

"Potential applications go way beyond urban pacification."

You can still utilise the biological components, the Alien has for urban pacification.
Utilisation of the components that make up their "skin" tough and acid resistant seems a worthwhile improvement upon armor for instance don't you think?
Or how about, considering the fact an Alien demonstrated the ability to crawl through an active space-worthy engine; using those same elements seems a worthwhile improvement upon both armor and weapons overheating.

"Like nothing we've ever seen."

"But I have confirmed that he's got an outer layer of protein polysaccharides. He has a funny habit of shedding his cells and replacing them with polarized silicon, which gives him a prolonged resistance to adverse environmental conditions."

"An interesting combination of elements, making him a tough little son of a bitch."

It's a rather weak argument to state;

'Urban pacification' is deliberately dropping them on unruly civilians or enemies or "terrorists".

As if that's their only application for urban pacification.

Necronomicon II

Ugh, Unit 739 is definitely something I didn't need reminding of. Truly incomprehensible horror.

Xenomrph

Quote from: Local Trouble on Jan 27, 2019, 09:39:41 AM
Sterilized facehuggers would actually be pretty effective for non-lethal pacification.
More effective than current methods? Alien eggs take time to produce, they're (presumably) single-use, they sit in eggs unless triggered (in which case you have to wrangle them into a holding container) and you'd need a shitload of them to pacify a riot. Is that easier than using a mechanized assembly line to crank out, like, flying drones that deploy tear gas or whatever?

Luckily they appear to have an indefinite shelf-life.

Speaking of wrangling, I haven't read through Sea of Sorrows all the way yet - does the book cover the capture of the two live facehuggers in 'Aliens'?

Local Trouble

Quote from: Xenomrph on Jan 27, 2019, 04:17:05 PM
Quote from: Local Trouble on Jan 27, 2019, 09:39:41 AM
Sterilized facehuggers would actually be pretty effective for non-lethal pacification.

More effective than current methods? Alien eggs take time to produce, they're (presumably) single-use, they sit in eggs unless triggered (in which case you have to wrangle them into a holding container) and you'd need a shitload of them to pacify a riot. Is that easier than using a mechanized assembly line to crank out, like, flying drones that deploy tear gas or whatever?

No, I think modern methods would be both more effective and more humane.  Then again, I never thought of urban pacification as a potential application until AR brought it up.

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