Jurchen, Korea, Japan.

[Shogun 144]

Hi,

Okay, okay first off I am sorry for being gone for so long. I was not very 'mature' at the time that I last go involved with the Interregnum Project, and I am very sorry, MattyG. I hope that you can forgive me.

The main reason I am responding is to address Panther-Anthro.

First off, I will admit, I do believe that I have gone somewhat overboard in my alt-history. I get excited and all off-track and I tend to take a much brighter look at things then some people. So I admit that perhaps I was being a little too fantastic with this. Like I said this is not the most recent Japan thread.

But the main thing is, Panther-Anthro, is that you seem to be forgetting about Go-Daigo and his attempted revolution when you say this:

So you could get awesome generals like Shingen Takeda etc. I've read a lot about Japanese history during the warring states era, and quite frankly this doesn't do the fact that the Emperor held no power any justice. EMPERORS DO NOT HAVE ANY POWER! THEY HAVENT FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS. THE SHOGUN IS POWERFUL. So you have to opt for a clan to become Shogun, or try and empower the royal family *near impossible to do during this time period, it should be at least* the most centralized government being Imperial, but you might not get as many events, and the like.

My alternate history and based around the premise that Go-Daigo listens to his generals from among the Nitta, Kusunoki, and his own sons, and basically once Japan is split with the Korean backed Ashikaga Regency in the west has a firm base of power.

It was Go-Daigo's attempt to restore Imperial rule that attracted me to make the break with RL with him. In reality Go-Daigo failed and plunged Japan into a civil war, known as the 'War of the Two Courts'. This lasted until the Ashikaga brought about reconciliation.

Another thing is this:

All of this sounds really interesting, but you are forgetting one thing. Nobunaga's personality would've lead him to killing ANY Ashikaga royal family members, and seizing the title of Shogun for himself. There should obviously be events for Nobunaga to spark a major civil war.

Okay one by the time of what I was talking about in that post all of the Ashikaga would be dead anyway, executed or by natural means as a result of unification. And besides, that whole idea about Go-Saimei was abandoned in the later thread. It was too fantastic.

Secondly, Nobunaga never wanted the Shogunate in real life. He was offered the Shogunate by the Imperial Court but rejected it. To be frank, and I forgot this, titles made his skin crawl. Nobunaga did later accept the title of Prime Minister, but resigned in three days later. He didn't kill the Ashikaga in real life, just kicked them out of power because he could not stand them. So why would he kill them here?

Now lastly Panther-Anthro is this:

This would allow for two really cool things to happen: Mainly, what you are forgetting is that even with unification, there are several clans in history, that would've never have accepted the rule of a female. Obviously the Uesegi Clan, Date Clan, Tokugawa Clan, and Oda Clan.

Not to doubt your knowledge of Japanese history here but are you aware that Japan has had real female Emperors (I use Emperor because the title was non-gender in Japanese) eight times? Not just in ancient times either. There was two ruling Female Emperors under the Tokugawa Bakufu: Meisho Tenno and Go-Sakuramachi Tenno. Now the clans didn't have any problems with them, so why would they in alt-history.

It has to be remembered that until the Meiji Emperor's reforms there was no reason why a woman could not succeed and rule. Oft times, they would succeed as a comprimise candidate to the throne. As was agreed in the later thread on this issue.

-Shogun 144

 

[panther-anthro]

I'm implying that Japan has never had a strong 'female Empress? Emperors are weak. Also, Nobunaga Oda 'died' before he could've justified becoming Shogun with total control over Japan, so how can you really be entirely sure that he wouldn't have assumed the reigns of power, if he had made the Oda dominant over all of Japan?

Also, really, I don't see how we can justify having the 'Emperor' of Japan, count as the leader of the country. It should be whoever the Shogun is, which is why I mentioned the various clans. Also, Shogun, the real problem you aren't realizing is, that way is just to much of a general set path, we need actual options, by allowing for any of a set group of say 'monarchs' to take power, we can use 'set flags' etc, to make different 'clans' have different events, and missions etc. I was implying it from a gameplay perspective.

Also, in all honesty, I talked to Don as well, he's quit. The only one who has really done any work on 1.05 AT all as far as I know, is myself and Matty. Also, I don't see what could 'happen' in your history, that would make the 'Emperor' powerful, until something like the Meiji Emperor reforms...

 

[Shogun 144]

Panther-Anthro,

Okay, I see your point about variety. I agree about having multiple clans gain power. One clan could march on Kyoto, declare a Bakufu and then have to deal with the Imperial Court. That would make for some tasty intrigue and player decisions. Basically the Court nobles and the provincial aristocracy could duke it out. Succession struggles between branch families would add to the fun. I already explained about how the Emperors gained power again. Go-Daigo's revolution succeeds in the wake of the Korean Invasion instead collapsing as historically upon his death.

On Nobunaga: Normally that would be true. But Oda Nobunaga was consistent on his dislike of titles. The only one he bore that he kept his whole life was 'Protector of Owari'. Every other title he rejected, and treated the title-giver rudely. Nobunaga only accepted the title of Prime Minister out of respect to the Emperor, and resigned it as soon as properity allowed in three days.

You see that was one of the things that made Nobunaga interesting. He despised titles because he saw them as a relic of an age that had failed Japan. He believed in pure, ruthless, power. It didn't matter how high sounding your title was to Nobunaga, if you did not have power he did not respect you. Period.

That was why he depended so much on people of low circumstances like Hideyoshi. Here was the ultimate example of his philosophy. However Hideyoshi took the opposite stance to Oda, and focused on titles to an extreme.

On the 'Female Emperor' issue: I am sorry, but on that you are wrong. Japan had plenty of powerful woman rulers.

One, Gemmei Tenno, has often been compared to China's Empress Wu, in that her power was great enough to ensure a stable succession from woman to woman. Which is where Wu Zhao failed in the end.

Another, Jito Tenno (older sister of Gemmei), was powerful enough to have seized control upon the death of her husband without bloodshed. Jito began the Imperial tradition of abdication and ruled as a retired (or cloistered) emperor, creating one of Japan's most unique political institutions. Modern historians had recognized her pre-ascension power to be so great that the entire period from 673-697 has been named for her and Temmu, her husband, jointly.

 

[panther-anthro]

Eh? I was implying that the Emperor itself was weak, that's why the Shogunate came into existence. At least in this 'era'.

Also, I was implying that I was unaware of any empresses that actually won any conquests for Japan. Then again, Japan didn't conquer a whole lot, until after the warring states era, and even then it was mostly outlying islands... *attempted Korea.*

Shogun, I'm merely focusing on gameplay rather then history, but my point is that it's much more interesting and replayable as you agreed to have a focus on the various clans. This also opens up routes for lots of 'historical' generals.

Also, I was implying that no militarily powerful empresses existed, when I mentioned that. Japan really had not done much in the way of 'conquering'. I'd like a focus on all the various clans having different objectives, but a conquest of Korea should be an obvious one, and the event chains to deal with it's subjugation.

On a related note: text is useless, focus on what you know how to script, or ideas for actual events. Discussing things is good for a layout, but serves no purpose without actual code to back it up. Also, I'm not even sure how many free tags we have for Japan to use...?

Also, European involvement in this alternate timeline is undefined, there are no events for interaction with Japan that I'm aware of, for the other countries, let's change that.

Who are we going to define as being portugal/england/dutch as far as japanese interaction, and the perspective countries interaction?

Also, if Martin Luther 'does' become the 'pope' then how will this effect the spread of Christianity in Japan?

 

[Shogun 144]

Panther-Anthro,


Thank you for your imput and clarification, I understand what you are trying to get at now.

Anyway about the shogunate, not really. It's more like the samurai perceived that the nobility had betrayed the Court and they stepped in to fix it. Only thing was once in power they found they liked it so much the samurai never left. Enter the numerous Court 'rebellions' to kick them out of power until the 'War between the Courts' settled it. Until Meiji that is. Gross simplifacations but it works.

On the clan focus, that would work. But then again I am the ideas and research guy. I really don't understand code and what does and does not work. I do the research and answer questions. A living library that talks back if you will. Sorry that I can not be of more help with that stuff.

On the female rulers: That is correct, to a point. You see the reason I named my self-scrapped female story what I named it is because Saimei Tenno was the first Emperor to actually attempt a major foreign adventure. In 661 she sent a large naval fleet and land force to Korea to attempt to restore the Korean state of Baekje alongside some Baekje refugees. This attempt failed with Saimei's death that year and the intervention of Tang China. The Japanese forces were destroyed two years later at Baekgang.

On Europe and Christianity: Well honestly I had not given not much thought. But now that I think about it I believe that the best European state to interact with Japan would be Eire with Brittany coming later. Like Portugal and the Dutch in real life.

Interaction between the states is a finicky question though. IMO it should be more open then in RL because I do not see 'this' Japan being as strict and close minded as 'ours' was. If simply because in the game, trade with China never ended as it did historically when the Song fell.

As for Christianity, one thing I was hoping to do was that the appearance of the Europeans might trigger something to do with the native Japanese Christians, the so called 'Keikyo' or Shining Faith. IRL before Hideyoshi and the Tokugawa both Catholic and Keikyo Christianity did remarkably well. We should build on that.

EDIT: Realized I missed your comment on Luther becoming Leo XI. I don't know how it would affect Japan, maybe less friction with the native Christians and the Buddhist/Shinto authorities then with 'regular' Catholicism'?

-Shogun 144

 

[panther-anthro]

The Luther thing is going to be a bigger issue then you think, I'm thinking ahead to the more general problems. I need major help on a general outline, for dates when Europeans should be able to find japan, and begin trading etc with it, and begin Japanese-European events.

I think the hanseatic league, could actually try and take over and establish a COT in southern Japan. Somewhere like the ancestral lands of the Oichi?

 

[Rhodz]

The Luther thing is going to be a bigger issue then you think, I'm thinking ahead to the more general problems. I need major help on a general outline, for dates when Europeans should be able to find japan, and begin trading etc with it, and begin Japanese-European events.

I think the hanseatic league, could actually try and take over and establish a COT in southern Japan. Somewhere like the ancestral lands of the Oichi?

I know that since I disappeared, I probably shouldn't have any say in this, but wasn't the plan to have Korea be the powerhouse in this region? Wouldn't it make more sense for Europeans to try and trade with Korea? Japan is supposed to be being beaten up by the Koreans for a good part of this timeline.

 

[MattyG]

I know that since I disappeared, I probably shouldn't have any say in this, but wasn't the plan to have Korea be the powerhouse in this region? Wouldn't it make more sense for Europeans to try and trade with Korea? Japan is supposed to be being beaten up by the Koreans for a good part of this timeline.

Yes, and this kind of colonialism is very much RW style. Asia is not the pushover that it was in the RW, and many of the states will have a superios military and naval tech by the time states like the Hsna get around there. Plus, of course, the Asian states will also be colonizers.

A stronger Asia is one of the core concepts of the Interregnum world.

 

[panther-anthro]

Yes, and this kind of colonialism is very much RW style. Asia is not the pushover that it was in the RW, and many of the states will have a superios military and naval tech by the time states like the Hsna get around there. Plus, of course, the Asian states will also be colonizers.

A stronger Asia is one of the core concepts of the Interregnum world.

Doesn't mean Europeans won't try and spread Catholicism Matty.