Johannes replied to me: > I am aware that i am reaching for straws here. But then doing so, to make > a military or political model viable, that the author thinks is cool has > some tradition in sf. And my ideas for that are all in a brainstorming > phase, since making prison regiments in sf was not something i have > thought about before that thread.
My straw is to make the unit less prison-like. Any draft army has some similarity to a prison -- if draftees were volunteers, they wouldn't get drafted. Of course plenty of reasonably free and democratic countries have the draft in time of need, it is how the draftees are selected and treated, especially in comparison to the volunteers. > Depends on what it is. If they are interested in mining rights, or if they > want the territory for strategic reasons, like they don't want the enemy > to be that close to really important places, then having the area infested > with prison regiments would not be so bad. Infested sounds right -- are we talking about an organized regiment or a horde of warriors? > > * A safety valve for aggressive people with no prospect of a good, > > civilian job. Joining "the Legion" should be one step up from > > joining a street gang, not one step down. > > > > This goes in the direction of finding something for them to do, to keep > them busy, rather then having them do something for the greater good. > Which means it's harder to come up with missions where the players are > motivated to fulfill them. It can be done, but as you said, it is better > suited for a novel. The characters could be given a chance to redeem themselves with heroics above and beyond the ordinary call of duty. If they take and hold that hill for 72 hours, another black mark from their file will be balanced. No ordinary troops could do it, only "the Legion" has the guts for it. If the characters have plenty of black marks, you have a campaign. > It also would be logical if the program would be extended to not only > cover already criminals, but also thoose with the appropriate > psycholigical makeup, before they commit actual crimes, moving it away > from actual prison regiments. Yes. That would be the primary source, since actual convicted criminals have proven that they are stupid and/or unlucky. > > * Expendable troops for nasty little wars. Not many voters will > > worry if they die in droves. > > > > You need to come up with wars, where sending undisciplined hard to control > expendable troops is actually helping to get your objectives done. It > could be wars, where the goverment does not actually need to win, it's > just that surendering before a shot is fired is not politically feasable. > But to get into that situation often enough, to institutionalize prison > regiments requires some explaination. Or enforce iron discipline among the undisciplined troops. The Foreign Legion model again. Pournelle's Falkenberg books. > > * A way to threaten draftees into obedience without large-scale > > death sentences or even court cases. Send 500 troublemakers to > > a shock battalion, when they are down to 50 the survivors can > > go into regular units to spread the tale. > > > > That sounds not like an actual prison regiment. To threaten ordinary > draftees, they need to be afraid to be put into such a regiment, and if > going to prison is a prerequesite, that does not work that well. No, the prison regiment is for people who are convicted of something while they are already in the military, or just draw the ire of their superiors. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafbattalion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shtrafbat Regards Onno _______________________________________________ GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]> http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
