You don't have to excuse yourself Tomoe. ~_^ I'm certainly
not softening my punches.
I feel that characters like Miles are allowed to perform in such situations merely for the player's sake. Just like how you seem to develop tech stuff on a whim too, because you like to do so and want to show your character is smart even though we know very well that designing that sort of thing so quickly makes no sense at all. If technoogical innovations took so little time to come up for a 'talented individual in the field' and there are many, it simply wouldn't hold up.
Hardcore PvP action, as you state, wouldn't really prove the point because to have decent PvP to be done only on a roleplaying basis with nothing else to turn to on the level of rules and statistics: something we don't do here right now in the SARP. What it ends up like is the sort of battle where one player srikes out at the other, but blunts his attacks because he's worried about offending the other. Some hardheads get into their heads that their character shouldn't lose and it ends up as either being one whom humored the other and decided to lose (often out of fairplay even though the person losing is often in a superior position to the other), or a bitching contest.
No, that doesn't hold up to me. I'd rather rely on common sense and use my head.
The nekovalkyrja are a labor caste of a sort which handles physical combat. Yamataians, Geshrins and Nepleslians are stuck with the less risky deskjobs, it seems (Miles is a scientist, right? Right?). Yamataians are similar enough to nekos to be able to hold their own if they have to get down and get dirty. Are the others able to do as well?
Naww, they shouldn't. A player might happen too, but on the same level of veracity as a human fighter in D&D can have as much hit dice as a dragon.
This really isn't about PvP or humans and dragons and all that crap though. The issue is about Geshrins serving in the Star Army keeping to using a outdated body when they could switch to another which would allow them to be more efficient. The same goes for Nepleslians, especially if they fancy themselves as having combat roles. Yamatai made it mandatory for NH-17 nekos to upgrade to the NH-29 so they'd be able to run with the best power armor systems, make smoother interfaces and have longer running times. Nepleslians are vulnerable to diseases and poisons, boast those disgusting cybernetics (that can't easily be fixed aboard a SAoY ship anyways), are taller so they don't exactly fit easily in available power armor systems and often end up in the Star Army of Yamatai while trying to avoid being home (sounds like refugees to me). Would telling them that they'd need to use yamataian bodies to be able to carry out their duties right on one of their starships (both for their own safety and proper performance, and also for reability so that the SAoY would know there is no weak links which could cause undue risk and harm to soldiers whom would have to cover up for weaker individuals) be such a far stretch, when Yamatai is offering them citizenship, a job and a purpose? I don't think so.
Besides...
Star Army Military Laws
(Proposal #4)
4. The Star Army may discriminate on a basis of species, language, culture, social class, physical attributes, mental attributes, sex, and age so long as it is in the interest of promoting overall efficiency. However, it may not discriminate by not by race, religion, sexual preference, or ancestry.
The Star Army of Yamatai might not be racist, but it's not a charity either. Its personnel ought to function and its military ought to look more like something that's the strongest in the setting. Allowing subpar combattants into the mix and not having capabilities that would allow for proper operation of the ships used (anti-gravity control, mental interfaces, resistance to disease and poison) seems out of character, experience or not.