The Lunars are only the bad guys if you want them to be. You could just as easily make the Orlanthi into terrorists as the Lunars into jack-booted thugs. (parallels to a modern crises involving a superpower invading a small, fanatic country are perfectly apt...). (The real Bad Guys are the Dwarves. Or the Westerners. Or the Mer-folk. Or the Pentans. Or the Orlanthi. Or the Trolls. Or the third-eye Blue cult. Or the Newtlings. Or a rogue officer inside the Lunar Military who is willing to send the Bat to bomb Russia (Mine Emperor, I can valk!)...)
The Lunars are civilised folk, and it all depends on your point of view as to exactly *who* is the bad guy. The Lunars have been portrayed as jack-booted thugs in HW/HQ scenario books just because those have all been written from the PoV of the oppressed Sartarites so far. But with the ILH series, you'll see a different side of the coin. (Especially since "Lunars" encompasses a whole ton of homelands!).
And there is plenty of finger pointing *inside* the empire as well! it's not one big happy empire, It is all held together by the slederest of margins. Remove the Emperor (or introduce an additional one) and it's all down the drain. Rinliddi will fight Carmanian will fight Dara Happan will fight Pelandan will fight Provincial... (parallels to a certain super-power's electoral process are perfectly apt...). There is plenty of Intrigue, deception and governmental cover-ups (it's nice to have a govenrment that *can* coverup a mess - a lot of "gubbmint conspiracy" plotlines can't really be run in the Orlanthi milieu), as well as external foes to fight.
Heck, even rabidly-Orlanthi Jane is getting on the Lunar bandwagon! ;-)
RR
C'est par mon ordre et pour le bien de l'Etat que le porteur du pr�sent a
fait ce qu'il a fait.
- Richelieu
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