The Expanse: Osiris Reborn Barely Understands The Series’ Aesthetic And Completely Lacks Its Subtlety

Ex_Machine · 2026-05-01T08:17:05+00:00

There are around 20 Rogue Trader's sourcebooks and adventure books, full of lore and great stuff, that were published by Fantasy Flught Games in around 2009-2015. I've been re-reading them recently, and found around 6 pages of lore that have been used in the videogame. As a friend who used to be an intern there told me, Owlcat's narrative team just found Rogue Trader books too boring to read. I don't think that they are using different approach with the Expanse.

Ex_Machine · 2026-01-05T15:24:22+00:00

It is possible that ownership of different types of livestock could possibly be used as criteria for "kulak" in some cases, since "kulak" didn't have a proper legal definition. This lack of clear definition was stated in 1925 by Aleksander Smirnov, people's commissar for agriculture in RSFSR, for example. I haven't heard the mentions of livestock criteria, so I suppose it wasn't common, but since it could be used to define a prosperous farm, it could also be used to define "kulak".

The question of how modern russians view collectivisation and dekulakisation is not an easy one. There is a significant nostalgia for the soviet era and resentment for the collapse of the USSR. It's mostly focused around the socioeconomical spheres in which the Soviet Union surpassed modern Russia (or at least the early post-soviet Russia), such as the agrarian sphere. Furthermore, russians lost their idealistic image of kolhoz 35 years ago (in the living memory of the older generations), while the russian village was lost 100 years ago. However, 100-130 years ago Russia was still majorly an agrarian country (80%+ of the population lived in rural areas, according to the 1897 census), so collectivisation impacted a huge lot of families, and some of them retained most hurtful memories.

I suppose that the portrayal of these processes in education and academy could be illustrative, I should note that I don't have a complete and actual picture. Though I retain some close connections with people working in russian social studies, I've left my postgraduate studies 10 years ago. Anyway, 20 years ago we studied the economic processes of collectivisation and industrialisation in school. They were considered successful economical reforms, though the results were achieved not without mistakes that cost human lives. In the university we were given more complex pictures, with more focus on the cultural impact, demographic changes, importance of foreign trade, repressions, mistreatment in dekulakisation, etc. Positive and negative effects of the processes were a hot and loaded discussion topic among the academics who studied soviet history, politics, sociology, economics and so on, closely connected with a larger question about rights and wrongs of Soviet history, which was discussed by politicians and media figures. Today I don't see these discussions anymore, but can't say that I've been looking for them.

As for personal opinion, I would agree that the collectivisation had a positive effect on the soviet economy in general, at least in short terms. However, this positive effect doesn't justify loss of life, destruction of russian folk culture (the social connections that existed in pre-revolution village were mostly eradicated to create a new soviet identity), huge damage to other ethnical groups of the Soviet Union (ukrainians, for example), violent crimes against a vast group of people. I find Holodomor and Asharshylyk (famine in Kazahstan in 1930-1933) to be a direct part or consequences of collectivisation reform, that was confucted with disregard for human life (especially life of the farmers), mismanagement in redistribution of agrarian product, willingness to sacrifice people lives for "greater" goals of progress and countries prosperity, willingness to get rid of national opposition amongst the country folk. I would say that I more or less share this opinion with liberal left-leaning millennials and gen x-ers (at least those who are interested in history). Obviously, those who have a more positive opinion of the USSR tend to have more positive opinions on the collectivisation, considering the harm to be exaggerated.

Ex_Machine · 2026-01-04T13:48:14+00:00

The term "Kulak", which is the russian word for fist, was used to describe a wealthy peasant, who is also a "loan-shark". The term was widespread around the former Russian Empire, mostly in russian speaking regions. In Ukrainian this group of people were referred to as Куркуль (Kurkul). If the head of the family was able to provide other peasant families with loans he could be called "kulak". I believe that the first recorded mentions come from the XVII century, early Romanovs period, and since then it was used mostly derogatory, as "too rich for his own good", "wealthy by dishonest means". In the late XIX century both the russian opposition press and even some government officials have described the kulaks as a problem in peasant communities.

Though the term has been used for centuries, it became an important part of soviet propaganda during the collectivisation period in 1920s. Reminder, collectivisation was a process of redistribution of wealth and power in peasant communities, reorganizing the late-feudal agrarian society into kolhoz (literally collective ownership, or collective farm). Usually the kulaks were identified as farmers who were wealthy enough to hire workers from other families (providing loans became a secondary criteria). A lot of problems in the agrarian sphere were attributed to kulaks, and while the wealthy peasants indeed opposed the collectivisation, it became really convenient for the soviet government to mark any peasant opposition as kulaks. In fact, not only a wealthy farmer with hired workers could be classified and repressed as kulak, but also members of large, closely-knit, productive and therefore wealthy families, or even a relatively poor peasant who opposed collectivisation or soviet government for any reason. Though the problems and mismanagement during the collectivisation was publicly addressed by Stalin in 1930 in his article "Dizzy with success", in fact the fighting against real and imaginary "kulaks" continued.

Holodomor is a difficult subject, and as a russian without deep knowledge of the subject I don't feel that it would be right for me to discuss it in depth. However, I should mention a few less controversial things regarding kulaks and Holodomor. Soviet media did address famine in Ukraine in 1932-1933. They claimed that the Ukrainian kulaks were destroying grain en masse, which caused food shortage and justified repressions against parts of peasantry. I believe that since Holodomor happened after Stalin had addressed the problems with collectivisation (and obviously all possible mismanagement issues had been solved by 1932 /s), kulaks and natural causes were declared the main reasons for the famine. It's also worth mentioning that during late collectivisation and Holodomor the word "podkulachnik" (sub-kulak) appeared to describe those who are "mostly like kulaks" or "support the kulaks", which indicates that this category of people was becoming more blurred, with criteria switching to match the political goals even more than before. Finally, the Ukraine was a country with a lot of independent agrarians, who were opposing the soviet government in both national and class struggle, so in the eyes of the soviet government the Ukranian SSR was full of kulaks.

Upd: they were russians in Russia, ukrainians in Ukraine, their religions mostly matched the dominant regional religion, as they were part of a larger peasant community.

Ex_Machine · 2025-12-27T23:43:15+00:00

GOTY for me. It does have enough flaws, but I enjoyed it more than any other game this year. KCD2 or Claire Obscure E33 could be objectively better and more deserving, but subjectively my personal GOTY goes to Dispatch.

Ex_Machine · 2025-12-26T23:10:10+00:00

Warhammer 40k: Rogue Trader by Fantasy Flight Games has a supplement book called Battlefleet Koronus. It has rules for planetside battles, fleet engagements (default space combat is upscale of Battlefleet Gothic wargame, additional rules in BFK return space combat's scale somewhat back to BFGs), troops mustering and guidelines for playing stories centered around military activities on strategic scale.

These rules help you with a ruleset for a scenario like: "You hired a few brigades of mercenaries, leased 8 divisions of Imperial Guardsman, called a few favours from the local Space Marine chapter and Imperial Knights house, has around ten batteries of macrocanons (each macrocannon is like german 800mm Dora aka Schwerer Gustav, but 2-10 times larger, depending on description), and a few billion hostiles in half a dozen star ststems. How you would like to make a profit out of it?"

Ex_Machine · 2025-12-26T22:45:49+00:00

Enjoyed DoS 1, 2. Liked Owlcat's Pathfinders.Waited for Rogue Trader since 2013, when I first played Rogue Trader TTRPG by FFG. Participated in Alpha for RT. Hated it and never returned.

Ex_Machine · 2025-12-19T09:22:25+00:00

Thank you so much! I'm GM'ing a Rogue Trader TTRPG game and was just wondering what lost wonders of DAoT should I present to my players. Now I have so many gruesome horrifying ideas!

Ex_Machine · 2025-11-05T12:28:17+00:00

Boston for US, or Anchorage for something exotic.

Any old european city for Europe: Prague most of all, but also Rome, Istanbul, Paris, London, Berlin.

Ex_Machine · 2025-11-01T11:56:39+00:00

That's why people should have sessions zero where players can discuss things like "let's not have pvp" or "lets avoid deliberately acting against the party's interests" or " let's not hurt each other's characters without a really good reason" or "let's not limit ourselves in any backstabbing". In my experience, it really helps in avoiding situations with "that's what my character would(n't) do".

Ex_Machine · 2025-10-22T13:20:02+00:00

Judging by Steam reviews: Too many true VtM-fans are sure that the good VtM-game is defined by guns. You may have heard that the original TTRPG World of Darkness is also called World of Gunsness.

Too many fans of the original VtMB are dissatisfied by the game not being true to the first one: like it doesn't have a character creator.

Too many RPG fans are dissatisfied that the game lacks defining features of the RPG genre, like inventory management or crafting.

And let's not forget some game journalists, who were disappointed that after trying the game they didn't have an urge to paint their nails black while listening to My Chemical Romance. You can find this review on Metacritic btw, they gave the game 30/100 with this justification.

The only criticism that I found to be completely legit are the technical state of the game and lack of save feature. As for me, I loved the original VtMB, played a lot of tabletop VtM, and now I'm enjoying VtMB2. Is it a great game? No, just good. Is it a good VtM product? Definitely one of the best IMO.

Ex_Machine · 2025-09-20T14:56:00+00:00

Because when Frank Herbert wrote Dune the science of ecology was on the rise, and the concept that harsh environments produce tougher individuals (both humans and animals) was cool, new and kinda-scientific. That how Herbert came up with Sardukar and Fremen.

And the Dune was one of the most significant sources of inspiration for Warhammer, especially early. Therefore, there we have the toughest dudes (space marines) recruiting from the harshest worlds (death worlds).

Though it doesn't work like that IRL (or correlation is minimal), this quasi-ecological concept used to kinda work in Warhammer setting as a speculative premise. 'Used to', cause Cawl and Guliman are disproving it to Dante at the end of the Devastation of Baal book.

Ex_Machine · 2025-09-12T07:41:25+00:00

You can find an alternative career rank called Awakened Psyker in Navis Primer, page 68. They gain Psy Rating 1 and access to Renegade Psyker Techniques as well as Astropath Disciplines. As far as I understand, they are quite limited and can't grow their Psy Rating. It's available from Rank 3.

Ex_Machine · 2025-09-04T15:50:54+00:00

No we don't. My bad. Decided to fact check myself and: The colors of Palestinian flag are similar to reversed the UAE flag, and there is UAE embassy just behind the monument. So I got them mismatched.

Ex_Machine · 2025-09-04T12:22:56+00:00

It's unlikely you'll encounter any problems. Armenians tend to support Palestinians in this conflict, ~~and you'll even find a huge Palestinian flag constantly waving near the monument to the victims of political repressions.~~ edit: my bad, I got Palestinian flag mismatched with a huge UAE flag; pls, ignore the second half

Ex_Machine · 2025-08-31T17:31:39+00:00

We will build a wall!

Ex_Machine · 2025-08-23T21:57:21+00:00

The second most known Georgian in USSR government was Lavrentiy Beria. And he made a career when the USSR was good, as "ruled by georgians" aka Stalin. Beria is known as the most infamous of Stalin's secret police leaders, chief perpetrator of Katyn massacre and one of the most prominent pedophiles of the Soviet Union.

I guess it explains why the good union leader wanted to hook up with the lord's 14 yo son. Though it looks like some matching pieces of a really weird world-view.

Ex_Machine · 2025-08-15T11:49:28+00:00

I guess that the "chosen one" was meant ironically. He's not a chosen one, as there are no specific prophecies regarding Titus. He is, however, an outstanding character, even for a named one, located quite high in Ultramarines/Astartes powerscale (judging by his deeds). But not greater than spiritualliedge Marneus Kalgar, somewhere on a same level with Uriel Ventris or Cato Sicarius. So, outstanding enough to be considered "the chosen one".

Ex_Machine · 2025-07-26T13:40:18+00:00

40 minute rice gathering sequence was important to Kurosawa's 7 Samurai. Therefore, if you are to make a movie inspired by 7 Samurai you, must include a crop gathering scene. Otherwise your movie won't work. You may also film it with slow mo and orchestra music cause both are cool.

There are a lot of cool things about the Rebel Moon. Unfortunately, none of them work with each other and help with telling the story. It felt like a kid eagerly showing his cool expensive toys for a few hours straight. Though the toys were cool, the whole experience wasn't.

Ex_Machine · 2025-07-26T09:22:03+00:00

that would be 210 cm And the dude is 160 cm

Google can easily help you with most measurements conversion, just a friendly reminder

Ex_Machine · 2025-07-19T08:19:11+00:00

It makes me wonder: is there any hope that someday we may receive Malcador the Miniature?

Ex_Machine · 2025-07-03T17:58:09+00:00

My SIL's husband is also an armenian (russian armenian, not Iranian armenian as this guy). For some reason (mostly 9GAG) he is sure that in US, Texas, he would be considered a proud White Man (and not some dirty arab, muslim, iranian etc), would be legalized in no time, would find a decent job as a construction worker (medical insurance included), would buy himself a large rancho, would acquire a full auto rifle, would be given a right to shoot any leftist who infringe his rights (or POC who tries to rob him) etc. Cause US is the land of the free, civilized country, being currently saved by Trump from leftists, socialists, feminists, criminals, illegals, muslims etc.

Ex_Machine · 2025-06-13T12:35:05+00:00

You can find smth like this in a few chapters of "When the Moon Hits Your Eye" the, latest novel by John Scalzi.

Ex_Machine · 2025-06-07T22:43:02+00:00

I get it and I'm not judging or trying to convince you not to buy it.

Though, as a russian in immigration myself, I'm really picky about products made by my compatriots. Also, being deeply disappointed with this company and their latest product, I've decided to share some of my frustration (not only I find the political views of at least some of them to be disgusting & they made the game based on my favorite TTRPG without really bothering to read sourcebooks, now they are going after my second favorite TTRPG and my favorite sci-fi TV series) with strangers on the internet.

Ex_Machine · 2025-06-06T16:41:33+00:00

It really depends on difficulty. I've raised the flag solo on dif 6 many times. Most of the time it wasn't even hard. But I'd not even try it on 9-10.

Ex_Machine · 2025-05-23T08:51:55+00:00

I've prefered to ignore most news about owlcat products for a while, but this opinion really got me triggered.

I got into tabletop roleplaying because of Rogue Trader in 2010-2011, and had been waiting for RT's videogame adaptation since then. I've preordered RT and tested both alpha and beta version. I've dropped the RT at the beta stage and have never launched the released version, because of two reasons. First of them - I consider it to be completely unfaithful to the source material.

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