Fleet Action questions

I admited that there is a plausible in-story explanation to the difference.

I'm just saying that there were also outside creative divergences that created this differences in the first place. There is no doubt that Forstchen planned other things to Tolwyn. In FC tolwyn is kinda paranoid, but still an essencialy a good, caring man, who struggled to stop a military conspiracy which planned to take the power from the civil government. The author gives us access to Tolwyn's thoughts... And he still believes in Confed and Humanity. In WC4 he was the powerhungry mastermind of a military conspiracy that intended to slaughter 90% of humankind. Here your point that Tolwyn was just nice to his friends and grumpy to the ones he didn't like goes down. The difference is more than just that. Apart from the outside explanation cited above, we must admit that somewhere along the way our dear admiral just snapped.

I do agree that we can blame the really high pressure and hard experiences tolwyn went through. We just have to admit that there are two different personalities for him.
 
I don't think WC3 Tolwyn can be explained by bad writing and "evil flag officer" stereotype. Don't the newsflash scenes they left out of the game indicated they already had WCIV in mind?
 
Actually, in FC we see that Tolwyn wasn't exactly forthcoming with Jason about the situation, which, to me, made it seem as if he was a more of a conspiracy himself than the B. Group.

I have to agree that, at the ending time of the war, he was being stretched pretty hard. I'm sure his sleep was very unrestful, with all that he had on his mind at any given time. And, sure, he was vindictive against the Kilrathi. He lost a wife and sons. His body bore permanent scars (which probably gave him some physical difficulties that we simply never heard about). I agree that it was most likely the BoT that stretched him just far enough to bring really desperate ideas into his head. Now, Behemoth was already well in the works (ten years, I believe?). That was no product of him being stretched. His suddenly out-of-character behavior over the handling of the project was probably a result of him being stretched and desperate. I imagine that it was Behemoth's failure that devastated his mind. I think that that was the birth of the Tolwyn we see in WC4 (we see the effects of his devastation in FC, where he seems so paranoid and distant).
 
Edfilho said:
But I think it is quite clear that Origin and Forstchen had different plans for the character. Personally I think he's even more complex and life-like because of that. Such an important person is seldon simple or obvious. The tension between both interpretations led to a better character. I see that now.
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Exactly my thoughts on the matter. Also, I'd have to agree with Overmortal - BoT nearly broke him, as we see allusions to this in FC and in WC3, but IMO, he is still a "sane" Tolwyn until the failure of the Behemoth.

As much as I liked FC, I wished Forstchen could have explored Tolwyn's brain a little deeper. It might have saved us a couple thousand posts or so. :D
 
Don't the newsflash scenes they left out of the game indicated they already had WCIV in mind?
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I don't know exactly what you mean... but no, they didn't have the WCIV plot in the works when WCIII was filmed.

There is no doubt that Forstchen planned other things to Tolwyn.
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To the best of my knowledge, the only other plans for Tolwyn in the books would have been a second 'Action Stations' style prequel novel.

In FC tolwyn is kinda paranoid, but still an essencialy a good, caring man, who struggled to stop a military conspiracy which planned to take the power from the civil government. The author gives us access to Tolwyn's thoughts... And he still believes in Confed and Humanity. In WC4 he was the powerhungry mastermind of a military conspiracy that intended to slaughter 90% of humankind. Here your point that Tolwyn was just nice to his friends and grumpy to the ones he didn't like goes down. The difference is more than just that. Apart from the outside explanation cited above, we must admit that somewhere along the way our dear admiral just snapped.
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I think you need to re-read False Colors. The book makes very, very clear that the entire 'military coup' situation that Tolwyn 'stops' is part of his own conspiracy... and it also makes clear that Bondarevsky recognizes that Tolwyn isn't the same person anymore. It's *not* a case of Tolwyn suddenly changing after the novel. (False Colors was written *entirely* after WCIV... it's not a case of Andrew Keith having to change the book at the last minute.)
 
overmortal said:
Actually, in FC we see that Tolwyn wasn't exactly forthcoming with Jason about the situation, which, to me, made it seem as if he was a more of a conspiracy himself than the B. Group.

I have to agree that, at the ending time of the war, he was being stretched pretty hard. I'm sure his sleep was very unrestful, with all that he had on his mind at any given time. And, sure, he was vindictive against the Kilrathi. He lost a wife and sons. His body bore permanent scars (which probably gave him some physical difficulties that we simply never heard about). I agree that it was most likely the BoT that stretched him just far enough to bring really desperate ideas into his head. Now, Behemoth was already well in the works (ten years, I believe?). That was no product of him being stretched. His suddenly out-of-character behavior over the handling of the project was probably a result of him being stretched and desperate. I imagine that it was Behemoth's failure that devastated his mind. I think that that was the birth of the Tolwyn we see in WC4 (we see the effects of his devastation in FC, where he seems so paranoid and distant).
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I do agree with these explanations.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
To the best of my knowledge, the only other plans for Tolwyn in the books would have been a second 'Action Stations' style prequel novel.
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I didn't make myself clear, I couldn't say that Forstchen had solid plans of writing more books after FC, I just wanted to say that the book writers (not limited to Forstchen only) pictured a different character in their minds. That based on a psycoanalitycal profile of Tolwyn in game and in book.



Bandit LOAF said:
I think you need to re-read False Colors. The book makes very, very clear that the entire 'military coup' situation that Tolwyn 'stops' is part of his own conspiracy... and it also makes clear that Bondarevsky recognizes that Tolwyn isn't the same person anymore. It's *not* a case of Tolwyn suddenly changing after the novel. (False Colors was written *entirely* after WCIV... it's not a case of Andrew Keith having to change the book at the last minute.)
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Sincerely, I never got this impression. I've never come accross this particular interpretation. You could be right, is it possible for you to point me the quotes, so I needn't re-read the whole thing??
 
The personality of Tolwyn in the years following so1 and so2 to his execution is a topic that has been much dissected. So there's only a few small things I wanted to add.

I think it's mentioned that Kevin Tolwyn's mother (Tolwyn's sister I think, although could be sister-inlaw) is still alive and wanted him to take a staff job instead of being a pilot. It's interesting to note that Kevin has a lot in common with his famous uncle going from fighter pilot to an admiral. They also both have a person who they admire in an important way that ends up saving their lives (Vance Richards and Jason Bondarevsky).

One thing that I noticed has not been mentioned about Tolwyn at the time of the behemoth's destruction is the court martial that followed. Kevin mentions in FC how much that had damaged Tolwyn. He was acquitted but only because of the influence of belisarus (I hate spelling that god damn name) group in the matter.


Bandit LOAF said:
I think you need to re-read False Colors. The book makes very, very clear that the entire 'military coup' situation that Tolwyn 'stops' is part of his own conspiracy... and it also makes clear that Bondarevsky recognizes that Tolwyn isn't the same person anymore. It's *not* a case of Tolwyn suddenly changing after the novel. (False Colors was written *entirely* after WCIV... it's not a case of Andrew Keith having to change the book at the last minute.)
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In the years following the events that lead up to BoT, Tolwyn is put under an amazing amount of stress on several occasions.
From commanding 3rd fleet, then on to take over a project whose old commanding officer killed themselves, only to push himself and the project's staff to the limit with trying to get the project online, then losing it as the result of a kat spy, without knowing until later about Paladin's project which he would have supported, his learning of a military coup because of the events that led to Confed almost losing the war.
Most of these events are also witnessed by Bondarevsky, who participates at least somehow in all those events, allowing him to have an amazing insight into how Tolwyn fell apart. His views expressed in FC can be viewed as the best way to understand why Tolwyn is Tolwyn in wc4.

It would have been interesting if the other FC novel about Bondarevsky that Keith wanted to write or TPoF had mentioned his views on Tolwyn during and following the events in wc4....
 
Everything...you'll probably want to reread it, there are a lot of things that are important in it and you might miss them the first time through....
 
I didn't make myself clear, I couldn't say that Forstchen had solid plans of writing more books after FC, I just wanted to say that the book writers (not limited to Forstchen only) pictured a different character in their minds. That based on a psycoanalitycal profile of Tolwyn in game and in book.
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I don't think Forstchen had too much to do with False Colors - he outlined the story, Andrew Keith wrote it. Forstchen did his job the right way - he based Tolwyn on the character information available at the time, and then he adapted him to 'fit' with later versions... I just don't see the percieved bad blood over the issue.

Sincerely, I never got this impression. I've never come accross this particular interpretation. You could be right, is it possible for you to point me the quotes, so I needn't re-read the whole thing??
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Hmm, I don't have a copy on me at the time, but I can point you towards two good areas:

- Right after Tolwyn 'explains' the conspiracy to Bondarevsky, he 'thinks' about how it's all just a ruse to cover up his own GE program.
- Throughout the beginning of the book (at the moonbase, on the trip to the Landreich), Bondarevsky makes references to how much different/more darker Tolwyn has become.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
I don't know exactly what you mean... but no, they didn't have the WCIV plot in the works when WCIII was filmed.
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So the part where Tolwyn has a breakdown is just a coincidence?
 
Bandit LOAF said:
I don't think Forstchen had too much to do with False Colors - he outlined the story, Andrew Keith wrote it. Forstchen did his job the right way - he based Tolwyn on the character information available at the time, and then he adapted him to 'fit' with later versions... I just don't see the percieved bad blood over the issue.
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Ok, so whenever I wrote Forstchen, please read "book writers"...



Bandit LOAF said:
Hmm, I don't have a copy on me at the time, but I can point you towards two good areas:

- Right after Tolwyn 'explains' the conspiracy to Bondarevsky, he 'thinks' about how it's all just a ruse to cover up his own GE program.
- Throughout the beginning of the book (at the moonbase, on the trip to the Landreich), Bondarevsky makes references to how much different/more darker Tolwyn has become.
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Blimey, I can't remember the first part... I do remember all the instances of Jason seeing him as darker though, never disputed that.

Anyway, I was refering to the Tolwyn in ER and FA... That guy is different from the guy in WC3&4.
 
Anyway, I was refering to the Tolwyn in ER and FA... That guy is different from the guy in WC3&4.
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Eh, but Fleet Action *literally* ends with him having a breakdown (crying on the carrier deck). :)
 
Sure, but remember, I admit that the break down is a good enough explanation :)

I'm not argueing about it being wrong/impossible/divergent, I'm just pointing that we see Tolwyn presenting two very different behaviours, and that the origin of this was in different artists, but that the in-story breakdown explanation fits ok.
 
There are somethings to consider:
Coming out of SO2 and even End Run, we had a damned good chance at winning the war, or at least hurting the Kilrathi pretty badly in the long term. After Fleet Action, the Kilrathi were on top, and the government was playing games with the fleet, so Tolwyn was not in a good position. As of WC3, the Kilrathi were becoming victorious as Confed was pressed, time and again, and forced to fall back.

Behemoth and Temblor were both desperation projects, desgined to end the war as quickly as possible and break the Kilrathi's back in one crippling blow. We were on the ropes and losing the war, and it was taking it's toll on everyone, and we could not have kept up the fight too much longer. Thrakath's little toys, the dreadnaughts, were not an improvement to the situation.

As Nietzche said, "Those who fight monsters should be careful they do not themselves become monsters." Even the purest of men can be corrupted if worn down long enough, and any man will break under sufficient pressure. Tolwyn was under an enourmous strain, and after contemplating killing billions of innocents, perhaps his conscience simply lost out to his desperation to protect humanity. The survival of humanity, at any cost, is that much easier to consider after one has already committed such a horrific act of desperation, or attempted to. In the end, his point of view, while morally corrupt, is not so hard to understand. In time of war, horrible acts are committed, both on and off the battlefield, in the name of 'security' or 'victory'. The role Army Intelligence played in the recent Iraqi prison scandals, or the internment of Japanese-Americans in World War II.

Blair was never under the amount of strain Tolwyn was, despite his usage of the Temblor bomb, and he never had access to all the information the admiral did. Tolwyn knew just how close humanity came to being wiped out, and in the end, it broke him to an extent. He changed under the strain, his conscsience subordinate to his desires. This could happen to anyone under sufficient strain, and Tolwyn was in a position to do so in a big way. He made a logical, if corrupt, choice: the goal of the salvation of Man at any price, even Man's own Huamnity. He fought the monsters for so long that he himself became one.

The fall of a hero is always hard, and always captivating. Perhaps it is this that captures our attention?
 
Blair is mentioned in TPoF as having nightmares about dropping the t-bomb on kilrah.

There is only so much a person can do before their will just lets go. Tolwyn's "breakdown" at the end of FA is definately a step in his demise. It's also one of the great moments in WC, as few people expected Tolwyn to cry, but he feared for his nephew (who after ER and in the beginning of FA Tolwyn became very close to him, they shared a sabre for a long ride), it almost like we can see the point when the "two" Tolwyn's bridge, the pre-breakdown and what is to come...
 
I thought his emotional response was one of joy. But, I guess, for anyone as cool and calculated as Tolwyn, getting to the point where your emotions cannot be hidden would be detrimental, either way. The stress of the BoT, and the involvement of his nephew was what set him up to really crack after the failure of Behemoth. I'm not sure if Malcom McDowel was given as much background on Tolwyn as was publicly available for hardcore fans, but, even so, the utter devastation was evident in Tolwyn's eyes in the "leaky ship" scene of WC3, even under his calm, cool demeanor.

Personally, I think it would be fair to say that the WC has turned out to be somewhat like Star Wars in this respect (and you don't have to agree with me on this, because the theory *is* somewhat flawed): WC, aside from the obvious larger story of pilots fighting a war, is about the rise and fall of Tolwyn, primarily as seen through the eyes of Christopher Blair (as the player, but also from some others in books and such). This is much in the same manner as SW was about the fall and redemption of Anakin, later seen from Luke's standpoint. I personally think that is why Tolwyn has become such a deep and dynamic character.

Obviously, WC wasn't intended to be about Tolwyn, but as the fictions progressed, it became a story about this man, and was told primarily from the point of someone who knew him (Blair), and was accordingly somewhat biased by Blair's point of view. Thoughts?
 
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