That Hobbes thing.

A

AzraeL

Spaceman
Is it just me, or did anyone else think that that whole Hobbes defection (or maybe that is undefection) in WC3 sucked. I don't know why, but the concept just strikes me as very wrong.

Why? I'm not sure. Maybe because much of what I knew, or at least thought I knew, about the Kilrathi came from him. Proud, strong, but above all noble and honorable. They were an enemy I could respect. Then it turns out Hobbes IS the traitor, and everyone else is right and you are wrong. I felt betrayed. Not just by Hobbes, but everything I though I knew about the Kilrathi was suddenly wrong. No honor, no respect, just treachery and deceit.

Maybe that's how I was meant to feel. It still feels wrong. Personally, I feel Cobra would have made a much better traitor. Hating the Kilrathi, hating herself for it, but still doing what she was forced to do. A much deeper option. You could explore by what dark method the Emperor managed to turn her against herself, while leaving the Kilrathi (and Hobbes) at least a few redeeming virtues.

We talk about the guilt Blair bears for destroying the Kilrah homeworld. However, in his situation, I would feel no guilt. Thrakath has just killed his girl in cold blood, the only cat he thought he could trust turns out to be nothing more than a lousy traitor. Kill the lot of them I say. Don't stop until they all die.

If the Kilrathi have no redeeming characteristics, then any guilt you are meant to feel over their destruction, any mercy you might feel towards them, is pointless. And to me, any redeeming characteristics the Kilrathi might have had as a race ended with Hobbes' undefection. If it was Hobbes that was killed by another traitor, then Blair would still have cause to believe the Kilrathi were worth saving.
 
Interesting thoughts... Have you seen the "Hobbes Explanation"?

We've had the discussion on Hobbes double-crossing before, and I like to think of him as Quarto said: It wasn't the 'real' Hobbes which resurfaced upon Thrakhath's message, it was the 'real' Hobbes which was destroyed upon hearing the words "Heart of the Tiger." :)
 
Originally posted by AzraeL
Then it turns out Hobbes IS the traitor, and everyone else is right and you are wrong. I felt betrayed. Not just by Hobbes, but everything I though I knew about the Kilrathi was suddenly wrong. No honor, no respect, just treachery and deceit.
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Hobbes wasn't the traitor, Ralgha was... They were like two different beings, both of them honorable, and certainly deserving respect as enemies, but once Thrak used the triger, Hobbes was gone, and the only thing Ralgha could do was go back to the Kilrathi.

And personally, I think that Cobra (any anyone that hated the Kilrathi so much) would be too obvious.
 
I must agree with you EW, even though Hobbes died so to speak you will notice that He is still honorable enough to explain his actions to blair, a man who had befriended his alter ego and defended him when others didn't. a man who he considered honorable enough to require an explanation of his defection and his double crossing.
 
Neither Hobbes nor Ralgha were traitors in a way, and both were doing what they had to do. Both were very honorable Kilrathi in different ways. Hobbes was a Kilrathi that became sick of the injustices and atrocities he saw around them. He wasn't unique, there were other Kilrathi who honestly felt the same way and were not programmed. On the other hand, Ralgha's extreme duty was to the empire, and once Hobbes was removed, Ralgha had to do his duty.

If there's a dishonorable character in this story, it's Thrakhath..
 
Maybe so, but the whole 'programming' thing was cut right out of WC3. Yes, I know they did it to reduce size or something, but you were left without any real explanation as to why Hobbes/Ralha did it. I just felt cheated, like Chris Roberts had taken the easy way out.

Maybe, this was partly my fault. I found the easiest way to do the Kilrah run was to do the last stage cloaked. Then there's just Hobbes and Thrak floating around the nav point. Pull in behind Hobbes, lock a full broadside of missiles on, uncloak and boom. Go for Thrak. All over in 20 seconds and you're on your way down. No time for him to explain I guess.

Strange how EVERYBODY but Blair can spot that Hobbes is a traitor.
 
That's when the personality overlay was made. The scene in the book describes the tests done to see if the process worked.
 
I think that Hobes/Rhalga Defection didn't suck at all. It came as an suprise. I trusted Hobes, but to go after him and screw the operation and letting Vaquaro get killed goes to far for me.

Hobbes was just a pogram, excuted by the trigger. He did it's job, although I think he didn't like it (the way he explains it to Blair).

Hobbes was a good wingman, Ralgha was a good "program". Like they say in the movies: he never existed. Hobbes was made (in my opinion) to cover up doomsday weapons, and maybe to kill Blair.
 
I agree that it was pretty good for the story line that Chris Roberts made Hobbes a traitor. I would have never expected it since you fly with him since WC2. Yet I too get the feeling that the "human" noblility and honor concept of the Kilrathi as a whole is lost. Yes the Kilrathi still have honor as far as they are concerned but for the most part Kilrathi will use trechary and deceit to get what they want becuase most don't think humans worthy of any honor. If you remember an episode in WCATV "Word of Honor" where Blair and Grunt crach land on that planet, Blair trusted the Kilrathi, but the Kilrathi was deceitful never showing any traits of "human" honor. That Kilrathi would rather die than work together with Blair to get off the Planet. Yet, there is another episode where Blair is on an Ice planet and another Kilrathi wants to defect becuase he is one the last of his clan. That particular Kilrathi did have noble Hobbes like traits. Kirha and Melek are the only other truly noble Kilrathi that I can remember unless you can think of more.
There are also the citizens on Ghora Kar who defected to confed as well as a couple of other planets. I am not sure what happended to them after WC2, but they may also fall under the category of honorable Kilrathi. Actually during the WC2 game, I thought the only way that Confed was going to be able to beat the Kilrathi is convince the rest of the Kilrathi colonies to stop the fighting after so much loss.

Well, those are my thoughts on the subject, anybody else have any comments?
 
The Cats on Gorhi Kah actually werenot honorable by anydefinition, because they abbandonned their race to fight on the side of their mortal enemies in other terms they were turncoats and thus the lowest members of any species/race/country
 
I aggree that they were considered traitors by thier sosciety but what I meant is how human's considered them. The way we view honor is much diffrerent than the way a Kilrathi views honor.
 
No honor is roughly the same, it is behaving in a moral and consitant way, that follows one's own sence of ethics regardless and above all else, not betraying anybody who at one point trusted you, thus under any form of honor the defecting Cats were dishonorable
 
Honor is a term that is loosely defined, as are most words that deal with a concept instead of a solid object. So honor would not just differ between races, but in individuals. Thus under YOUR form of honor the cats were dishonorable do not presume YOUR form of honor is consistent with all forms of honor.

By MY definition of honor, an honorable soldier is one who has looked at both sides of the conflict and made his own judgement of which side it is right to fight for if ether. As apposed to being born onto a side and staying loyal under all circumstances. Slaying the innocent,inslaving,fighting for an immoral cause, all so that you can stay loyal to the side you were born into is in no means honorable by my definition.

We are all endowed with the ability to make our own decisions,this should be utilized not ignored.We by no means need to stay on the path our parents walked down before us, we need not fight there wars, we need not practice there religion, we need not pursue there careers.We need not inherit there prejudices.
 
That's kinda my whole point. We all have our own ideals of what 'Honor' is. The Japanese, particularly in the days of Feudal Japan, have an honor system that seems very strange to Western society - absolute loyalty to your liege Lord without question and to the death, honorable suicide in preference to surrender etc. The Kilrathi clan system seemed to be modelled to some extend upon this (they wouldn't be the first fictional species to be thus modelled). Even the 'attrocities' comitted by the Kilrathi are reminicsent of those committed by the Japanese in WW2. Why did they do this sort of thing? You've got me. I'm not Japanese. Yet despite this we still managed to make peace with the Japanese (I think. A damn Toyota nearly got me yesterday).

So I guess what I was searching for in the Kilrathi was some form of humanity or human values that I could understand. If the cats see humankind an opponent worthy of some respect and are themselves worthy of our respect, then there remains hope for some form of truce. If they see us as some form of worthless pond slime, then they can never be trusted and there is no hope for peace. I found that humanity in Hobbes - I thought that the Kilrathi were a race that, while different to ourselves, still had some trace of humanity. They were worthy of respect. Take that away, and they are just a bunch of murdering, treacherous aliens who should be exterminated to the last kitten.

I don't have a problem with the whole Hobbes/Ralgha programming thing, EXCEPT THAT IT WAS LEFT OUT OF THE GAME ENTIRELY. I mean, if I/you/Blair HAD got a message saying "Sorry, This was not entirely my fault/desire. I only did what I had to do. You were an honorable friend and I hope my kittens grow up to be just like you." (well, maybe not exactly that) then you can still hold the thought that maybe the Kilrathi are an honorable opponent.

But it's not there. There's nothing, nil, nada, zilch in the game. At least nothing I found in the many times I played it. It wasn't until I came to the CIC and found that there was a deleted scene that I even knew about the programming. Without this explanation, the feeling I was left with is "Hah hah suckers! Had you fooled the whole time". Considering Thrak has just done the shishkabab trick with my girlfriend, and Hobbes has done ditto with Cobra on my own flight deck, then the last thing I would be feeling about wiping out a planet of cats is guilt or remorse.

Anyway, I guess what I'm complaining about isn't the whole programming/betrayal thing. When you know about that, it isn't quite so bad. I WAS disappointed with the way it was presented in the game. After fighting through what had, up till then, been an enthralling, incredible experience (can you rememember the rush those cutscenes generated ... there was NOTHING like that around at the time) I was just left with an empty feeling, like I'd been cheated. Like ... what, is that the best you can do, Chris? I needed an explanation, some reason other than Humans are good, Kats are bad.


Oh, and on a side note, to me Thrakath IS the honorable one, at least in my vision of what honor is. He respects Blair as an honorable warrior, enough that he gives Angel (a spy and saboteur on his own planet) an 'honorable' warriors death. Melek, on the other hand, could hardly be more dishonorable then to surrender his entire species. Sometimes honor is not always what is best. (Surely you remember the Ultima series. There are always questions that make you choose between honor and some other virtue).
 
The Kilrathi ARE NOT human. They are not even our own species. Would you take any wild animal and say it has humanity in it? No, cause it wouldn't be human. Same with the Kilrathi.

The Kilrathi are very honorable. It's Kilrathi honor, but that doen't mean it isn't honor or anything less than "Terran" honor. The only Kilrathi that can be considered dishonorablee are all trairtos and Tharhath, bbith for obvious reasons

[Edited by Meson on 02-02-2001 at 02:54]
 
Originally posted by Meson
The Kilrathi ARE NOT human. They are not even our own species. Would you take any wild animal and say it has humanity in it? No, cause it wouldn't be human. Same with the Kilrathi.
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Yes, yes I would. As I said earlier, I was looking for some sign of humanity, as in, of something recognizeable as human virtue, e.g. what we consider to be honor, honesty, compassion etc. We can look at animals and say, yes, a human would do that. Hobbes (pre-undefection) made me believe that the Kilrathi had virtues that, while different to our own, were still recognizeable and in some ways comparable to our own.

Originally posted by Meson
The Kilrathi are very honorable. It's Kilrathi honor, but that doen't mean it isn't honor or anything less than "Terran" honor. The only Kilrathi that can be considered dishonorablee are all trairtos and Tharhath, bbith for obvious reasons
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Quite the contrary. By your own definition, Thrakath IS honorable. He is never treacherous (to the Kilrathi) or deceitful (to the Kilrathi). In fact, he is rarely dishonorable to the Terrans. Melek, on the other hand, IS dishonorable. Kilrathi honor demands that they fight to the death. Melek dishonors his entire race. That he does so to end the bloodshed and preserve his species is irrelevant, it is still dishonorable. Is sacrificing your honor for a noble cause honorable itself? It depends whose standards you are applying.



[Edited by AzraeL on 02-02-2001 at 03:18]
 
There was a growing sentiment in the Empire that the war was no longer an honorable endeavour. There was the use of bio-weapons, the false peace, assasination of Confed's High Command and stealth weapons, just to name four, which stained the honor of the Kilrathi. Some Kilrathi it seemed felt that the Terrans, through their acts of bravery during the war were honorable as well and earned the right to co-exist. The fact that the Emperor and Thrakath had to resort to deception and bio-weapons to try to gain an advantage, merely showed that they were corrupting Kilrathi honor. While Thrak and the Emporer did not come up with the idea, in fact it came form somone who had spent consierable time studying humans, they still quickly embraced the false peace to keep from losing the war. Melek merely did the honorable thing by submiting to what he felt was a superior force. There is no honor in slaughter.
 
While some cats might have been questioning the war, melek was dishonorable in surrendering to a blood enemy of the empire and of his entire race. The only honorable thing he did was that he did not surrender to humanity, he surrendered to Blair, who was an honorable warrior with the heart of a kilrathi. So maybe he was honorable maybe he wasn't we can all decide in 568 years when it really happens :)
 
I don't think honour is really all that significant... if you think about it, honour was basically invented by lords to make sure that their warriors would do what they're supposed to. While that "what they're supposed to" part varies from culture to culture, the basic theory is still the same. Thus, there's nothing... honourable... about honour.

That having been said, if we accept the mainstream definition of honour, then indeed Melek was THE most honourable Kilrathi we've ever seen. He sacrificed everything to save his race... he sacrificed his honour. For a Kilrathi, would death have been a greater loss? Undoubtedly not.
 
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