Honorverse ramblings and musings

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:Yes, the first several pages of that thread and on up to half the thread was me arguing the simple fact that Beowulf's actions would be targeted as treasonous.

Rather than a repetition of the entire discussion, the way I read the first half of that thread was as variations on the following paraphrased statements and responses:

Cthia writes "The Solarian League will consider Beowulf to have committed treason".
Someone else writes "What Beowulf did was legal and not treason at all".
Cthia writes "But Beowulf will have to consider the reaction of the Solarian League to its treason".
Someone else writes "Beowulf did what it needed to do and that was not treason".

About midway through the thread, we finally got you to expound and discovered that there was unspoken clause to your main statement. So it really went like this in your mind:

Cthia writes "The Solarian League will consider Beowulf to have committed treason (,because Beowuf had an obligation to the League that it was breaking)".

You just restated that hidden clause in the post above:

cthia wrote:Um, if you agree that the League would view Beowulf's actions as treasonous, then #1 is implied.

Where #1 is the following contention that we finally got you to state:
1. Beowulf was guilty of actual treason by breaking unwritten, implied obligations to the League that they had accrued by being a founding member.

In my opinion, A does not imply B; but if B were true, then it would justify A.

Fox2! wrote:

Daryl wrote:At this point in this fictional novel, the villain has noticed that the heroine is female (therefore by his culture weaker and softer), wounded, and exhausted. He also knows that he has practiced for years at this martial art, and attained a high rank, while she has only had a few months in a busy schedule to "play" with the sword. I'd be putting money on the villain. Mind you I imagine that if he had won this, his life would have been short anyway, as he would be known as a killer of children, plus someone who took advantage of a potentially breeding female and killed her while she was injured and exhausted. Not a fair test.

Burdette would have out-lived Honor only by the time required for Nimitz to launch a disemboweling attack on him. Even if every Armsman in the Chamber fired at him, Nimitz would succeed in killing Burdette before dying himself.

cthia wrote:

My miffed Niece's Rebuttal

I'll have you know that Nimitz has had plenty of practice holding his breath. You of all people should know that!

<Honor! How am I supposed to refrain from slitting Pavel Young's throat!>

"How?"

<HOW! Honor!>

"Take a deep breath. Go on!"

<I . . . N . . . H . . . A . . . L . . . E>

"Now hold it! . . . Hold it! . . . Hold it! . . ."

Nimitz had PLENTY of practice!

cthia wrote:Over the holiday, a couple of friends brought up the fact that Honor's duel with Burdette featured a search for the "crease" and a "war of wills."

They posit that the real war of wills was fought during the intermission of what they've come to call "halftime" in which Burdette was waiting for his sword. I never even considered the battle of wills, the psychology of mannerisms and such at play. Honor would also have been privy to Burdette's emotions much as she was privy to Summervale's and Young's emotions of fear before they died. Knowing your opponent is frightened may be an advantage in itself. Although frightened life forms can be deadly.

It would be nice to know the elapsed time it took to retrieve his sword. Interesting notion.

stewart wrote:

cthia wrote:Over the holiday, a couple of friends brought up the fact that Honor's duel with Burdette featured a search for the "crease" and a "war of wills."

They posit that the real war of wills was fought during the intermission of what they've come to call "halftime" in which Burdette was waiting for his sword. I never even considered the battle of wills, the psychology of mannerisms and such at play. Honor would also have been privy to Burdette's emotions much as she was privy to Summervale's and Young's emotions of fear before they died. Knowing your opponent is frightened may be an advantage in itself. Although frightened life forms can be deadly.

It would be nice to know the elapsed time it took to retrieve his sword. Interesting notion.

-------------

Actually, at this time in Honor's empathic development, she did not have direct access to Burdette's psyche, nor earlier to Young's or Summerville's. Nimitz was sequestered on board ship for both of the pistol duels as well as the confrontation in the bar with Summervale.
Honor's only link at those times to other's emotions was through Nimitz, and not fully developed then -- re-read Echoes of Honor and Ashes of Victory for specifics.

-- Stewart

cthia wrote:Over the holiday, a couple of friends brought up the fact that Honor's duel with Burdette featured a search for the "crease" and a "war of wills."

They posit that the real war of wills was fought during the intermission of what they've come to call "halftime" in which Burdette was waiting for his sword. I never even considered the battle of wills, the psychology of mannerisms and such at play. Honor would also have been privy to Burdette's emotions much as she was privy to Summervale's and Young's emotions of fear before they died. Knowing your opponent is frightened may be an advantage in itself. Although frightened life forms can be deadly.

It would be nice to know the elapsed time it took to retrieve his sword. Interesting notion.

ywing14 wrote:

cthia wrote:Over the holiday, a couple of friends brought up the fact that Honor's duel with Burdette featured a search for the "crease" and a "war of wills."

They posit that the real war of wills was fought during the intermission of what they've come to call "halftime" in which Burdette was waiting for his sword. I never even considered the battle of wills, the psychology of mannerisms and such at play. Honor would also have been privy to Burdette's emotions much as she was privy to Summervale's and Young's emotions of fear before they died. Knowing your opponent is frightened may be an advantage in itself. Although frightened life forms can be deadly.

It would be nice to know the elapsed time it took to retrieve his sword. Interesting notion.

I don't think at this time in Honor's empathic development knowing Burdette's emotions would be helpful. Frankly I see it more as a hindrance because it would cloud her thinking. Generally speaking fear is a good emotion to have in a fight so long as you don't let it control you it helps heighten your reflexes. Given Burdette's thoughts I don't really think there was any battle of wills. Burdette was too cocky being one of the top 50 swordsmen on the planet and I can't think of a time in any of the books when honor was intimidated.