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Star Army

Star ArmyⓇ is a landmark of forum roleplaying. Opened in 2002, Star Army is like an internet clubhouse for people who love roleplaying, art, and worldbuilding. Anyone 18 or older may join for free. New members are welcome! Use the "Register" button below.

Note: This is a play-by-post RPG site. If you're looking for the tabletop miniatures wargame "5150: Star Army" instead, see Two Hour Wargames.

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  • 📅 October and November 2024 are YE 46.8 in the RP.

OOC Eucharis Discussion

Due to constraints on my time, attention and willpower I've decided I'm pulling out of the Eucharis.

I've only posted once in the most recent thing after shore leave. You can either NPC her, or retcon the one thing I posted the latest thread and assume she'd fulfilled her laziness quota and bought her way out with her not-christmas prize box winnings.
 
Sorry to see you go, Dumont.
 
Navian said:
I thought we were speaking Trade already? The Star Army Common Skills page seems to say that fluency in Trade is mandatory and Yamataigo is optional.
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Really? I've always assumed that everyone on a Star Army ship is speaking Yamataigo until the point at which they must speak trade.

Since when are Star Army soldiers allowed to not know their home nation's tongue?!

Like, my characters literally are always speaking Yamataigo like an awesome subtitled anime.
 
Since Geshrintall was originally settled by Nepleslian colonists, I think Trade was the most common language on Yamatai before it was Yamatai, and many other worlds before they joined the empire, so it's the common language of the multicultural empire.

Yamataigo seems more like the language of the elite of that society than of 'the nation', like French was in England after the Norman conquest. That would fit with it being optional, but highly desirable. The empire isn't really 'a nation'... it's an empire, so it's got a whole bunch of nations in it.
 
Navian said:
Since Geshrintall was originally settled by Nepleslian colonists, I think Trade was the most common language on Yamatai before it was Yamatai
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No way.

I'd like to see Wes's comment on the change that Yamataigo isn't necessary. Star Army soldiers were expected to be fluent in both Yamataigo and Trade (until recently, apparently) since I've been roleplaying here. What's with this change?
 
On languages: Wazu knows all the basic ones in the Kyoto sector but they are clearly his second (or third/fourth) language so he isn't as fluent as a native speaker.

Wes does some of the same things with Hanako's speach that I do with Wazu but Hanako is being formal intentionally where Wazu uses the more formal wordings because he doesn't know the slang.
 
Trade is the language that everyone knows, and is pretty good anywhere, including Yamatai. Almost everybody speaks Trade in the setting.

Yamataian is also spoken in many places, but it's centered on planet Yamatai. Almost everybody on Yamatai (who is not an immigrant) speaks Yamataian. Historically this has to do with the plague killing most of the people on the planet back in YE 38 except for the Geshrin who overwhelmingly spoke in Yamataian (Japanese) because PNUgen was a group of anime-style mad scientists making catgirl clones (also typical of anime!). The further you go from Yamatai, the less people are using it.

Star Army of Yamatai personnel commonly, but not always, speak Yamataian, or at least key parts of it (a Star Army of Yamatai would know everything on the Star Army glossary even if they couldn't speak Yamataigo fluently). But when there's language barriers people tend to switch to Trade, which everybody knows. An example might be a Phodian or Kodian who might speak Trade and languages of their homeworld, but only a little Yamataian.

The actual requirement these days for soldiers who join the Star Army is fluency in "Yamataigo (邪馬台語) and/or Trade (language)" which means you can get by with only knowing one of them; however, characters are encouraged to learn both of them as their military career advances. In fact going to a language school might be a good excuse for characters who have absences to explain due to players being unavailable for a while.
 
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