Yans

P

Ptarmigan

Spaceman
I read at Wikipedia in the 24th century in the Wing Commander universe, the humans fought an alien race called Yan. The humans fought them and war over the Yan. Then the humans did not have any wars with aliens until the Kilrathi in the 27th century.
Yans
 
You might PM Bob McDob, since he seemed to have created the original article. I have no idea where the Yan turn up.
 
criticalmass said:
You might PM Bob McDob, since he seemed to have created the original article. I have no idea where the Yan turn up.
Click to expand...

There is precisely one mention of the Yan, and that's in Action Stations where they'd had a war with Confed a century or so before the Kilrathi war began. No real data otherwise.
 
Bandit would know something like this.
I had looked over my reference list and the Yan as mention during a conflict but not much
 
The sole reference to the Yan is a throwaway historical bit in Action Stations, in which Cmdr. Turner compares current military readiness to that of the Pacific War and of the "scrap with the Yan".

Contrary to popular assumption, it's *not* related to the 'hundred years ago' war which is cited several times over the course of the novel -- the Yan conflict is specifically placed in the 24th century, which would be the 2300s (so roughly 230 to 330 years before Action Stations).
 
IIRC, Theres also a reference in the Prophecy guide book, I dont have it with me right now but I'll quote it when I get home.
 
It may not be possible to leave Mr. Yan's planet, but it is possible to leave your posting privileges behind, like is going to happen within the next few minutes, thanks to one too many stupid, pointless "pay attention to me!" posts with zero practical content.

I'm starting you with a month's vacation, as there is zero reason to justify just a week's ban. You've been warned about that BS repeatedly, and apparently feel like blowing off the administrative staff.

Not a smart move.

[posted and e-mailed]
 
Hmm, McGruff does have a point, although he chooses to make it in a ridiculous manner. It's strange that the Yan do not show up in any other reference then Action Stations. It's hard to place it in the WC timetable.
 
I don't think that's McGruff's point, not do I think that's true. Action Stations places the war ~300 years before any point where a story in the Wing Commander universe is told... how many times do you find cause to reference the Great Northern War in modern day conversation?
 
Far be it from me to lobby another's man's case and as much as I hate to slide off topic as I find this thread fascinating, but isn't a month a little harsh? I mean that's a long time to be without WC forum goodness. Granted, Mcgruff's comments were definitely on the nonsensical side however I thought he was trying to use poor humor to make a shielded statement. (Much like Monty Python only this episode failed miserably). Well, I'm not admin and I"m not the person being banned so my discussion here is only my two cents (if even that) but please consider a little leniency.

On the actual topic:

I had never read/heard anything on the Yan before (or if I did it slipped my mind) so this little nugget is quite fascinating. I'm wondering on specifially two things...did the Yan (whoever and whatever they were) resolve the conflict and eventually join the confederation? (Doesn't sound like we know the answer to that). Also are they humanlike? (possibly a splintered off faction of the human race etc. Doesn't sound like we know this either). I love interesting bits of knowledge like this as they are very mysterious and leaves a bit of intrigue to the Wing Commander Universe. To be honest I think I liked the Kilrathi a great deal more in the first couple of games for this very reason...the less I knew about them the more fascinating it seemed. Again just another two cents worth...

Good find...
 
Before mentioning an event like this in a story in a set universe, you'd say there would have been taken measures to explore this, after all, it was a professional writer who did the story.

ofcourse, claw marks and victory streak are not in line as well, for example maniac's origin differs

you might take a look at the wing commander academy cartoon, there are alien pilots on the claw, transferred from the trafalgar, like the guy who looks like a fish,
and payback does not look completely human. they had encountered other
races, and were not suprised to find intelligent life on other planets.

there should be a "bible" somewhere. when you are doing multi-million dollar
productions, you do not have your writers making up historical events on the fly.
 
They can't introduce something without... having introduced it somewhere else first? That just plain doesn't make sense - why isn't Action Stations as good a time as any to reference something like this?

We're not talking about a continuity error like listing the wrong home planet -- we're talking about a minor reference that contradicts nothing ever referenced.
 
what i am referring to, is that the writer in this case could not simply introduce a historical event(a war) without agremment of the producer...

for instance, they had to give the enemy a name, the given name was yan, it might have been "bosmongool" as well, at least someone over at originhad to be watching over this fiction thingy.

coming up with a war to complete your sentencse is not done in my vision.
 
what i am referring to, is that the writer in this case could not simply introduce a historical event(a war) without agremment of the producer...

for instance, they had to give the enemy a name, the given name was yan, it might have been "bosmongool" as well, at least someone over at originhad to be watching over this fiction thingy.

coming up with a war to complete your sentencse is not done in my vision.
Click to expand...

I still have no idea what you're trying to suggest -- the novels and manuals are the primary source for expanding the fictional universe over the more generic dialogue of the games themselves.

I guess I don't see how or why you're implying that there *wasn't* some 'agreement'. Origin had approval of the continuity novels, and Baen had editors review the finished manuscripts for continuity errors as well. Creating a fictional event that's wholly unrelated to anything we'll ever see again in Wing Commander seems incredibly unimportant... and is totally outside what a series bible (you can find Wing Commander's bible in our archive section) is for.
 
Mace said:
Before mentioning an event like this in a story in a set universe, you'd say there would have been taken measures to explore this, after all, it was a professional writer who did the story.

ofcourse, claw marks and victory streak are not in line as well, for example maniac's origin differs

you might take a look at the wing commander academy cartoon, there are alien pilots on the claw, transferred from the trafalgar, like the guy who looks like a fish,
and payback does not look completely human. they had encountered other
races, and were not suprised to find intelligent life on other planets.

there should be a "bible" somewhere. when you are doing multi-million dollar
productions, you do not have your writers making up historical events on the fly.
Click to expand...

So... just because something was never mentioned in the game or previous sources, that item doesn't exist or does't belong in the universe? In that case, I guess Anakin Skywalker never had a mother - he just showed up one day and became Darth Vader. Or Obi-Wan never had any master other than Yoda.

Writers' bibles are useful when there's already existing information that you want to preserve continuity with - for example, if you're writing a Star Trek episode, it's useful to remember that you can't have Riker suddenly develop a fish allergy because he was eating fish in one episode of Season 2, or that Picard had a date at one point so that you can either bring back the character he had a date with, or at least avoid having him mention that his social life's been deader than the dinosaurs. When there's no such information to worry about, the writer's bible is a bit less useful.

In the case of Action Stations, the writer's bible would've been used to make sure that the name of the space station and the system (McAuliffe System, Alexandria being the space station), and that the cryptographer's name (Ches M. Penney) were correct. It would not have been used to indicate what alien races had previously been fought, unless it had been mentioned earlier in the series of novels or games. Which, from what I recall, was never done - no, they didn't mention that the Confederation had fought the Yan before the Kilrathi, but they didn't say that the Confederation had fought a species called the Moogles some three hundred years before the Kilrathi. If this had been the case, then the introduction of a war with the Yan in the same period would not have worked, and this is the sort of situation that the editors or a writer's bible would've been called upon.
 
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