AnimeSuki Forum - View Single Post - Mahou Senki Lyrical Nanoha Force Manga Discussion

TheRainbowConnection · 2011-02-12, 08:25

I have no idea how you all have the patience to go back to each individual post and reply to each one, so I'll just do it generally.

To the people complaining about the uninteresting motivations of the Huckebein that make them crappy antagonists, I think you're thinking about this all wrong. Despite everything that we spend our time bitching about, Touma is ostensibly the protagonist of Force. Yes, I know, it's hard to tell. The rest of the roles fall in place in relation to him. Therefore, so far, I see two groups of antagonists in Force--the Huckebein and the TSAB. And so far, it's hard to see how the two groups of antagonists will drive Touma's story.

As for the Huckebein themselves, I think that the banality of their motivations makes them interesting in the context of the TSAB motivations. Though you can argue about evilness and morality with regards to their individual members, the Huckebein on the whole (so far) operates on the principle of "We know we're on the fringes of society, so we try to stay out of your hair and not bother anyone in your charge. You leave us alone, and we'll leave you alone." What's Hayate's response to this? "We'll take steps to stop crime outside of our jurisdiction"? WHOA NELLY! That's a bold statement there. What does that imply for TSAB policy? Forget how our "heroes" (they feel like cogs in the military machine, simply taking orders from above, personally) feel. How does the TSAB truly feel about the Huckebein? Add that to its allowing its top mages to finally use mass-based weaponry, I personally am excited for upcoming changes and developments within the TSAB.

And once again, to address the "Haxbein", they are still a largely unknown enemy. They had some limited information on the Huckebein, and they really didn't get much out of Signum's battle. I mean, if she's still unconscious, what could they have learned? Non-5th gen, non-AEC weapons are not fit for use against the Huckebein? They already knew that; Signum already knew that. Its members are very dangerous? It's likely that they knew that. You can argue about the timing of the Wolfram's confrontation with the Huckebein, but Section 6 did take measures to be more prepared. They took the people most suited for the mission, armed them with the best (effective) weapons they had, and sent them off for an initial engagement. Personally, this battle works better if you see it as a probe into enemy strength and capabilities, as well as field-testing for an entirely new class of weapons. It turned out to be a battle that is far harder than anyone probably expected, but any other unit would've been even more screwed, and the next time Section 6 faces the Huckebein, they'll actually have actionable intelligence and tuned weapons.

2011-02-12, 08:25	Link #211
TheRainbowConnection Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2007	I have no idea how you all have the patience to go back to each individual post and reply to each one, so I'll just do it generally. To the people complaining about the uninteresting motivations of the Huckebein that make them crappy antagonists, I think you're thinking about this all wrong. Despite everything that we spend our time bitching about, Touma is ostensibly the protagonist of Force. Yes, I know, it's hard to tell. The rest of the roles fall in place in relation to him. Therefore, so far, I see two groups of antagonists in Force--the Huckebein and the TSAB. And so far, it's hard to see how the two groups of antagonists will drive Touma's story. As for the Huckebein themselves, I think that the banality of their motivations makes them interesting in the context of the TSAB motivations. Though you can argue about evilness and morality with regards to their individual members, the Huckebein on the whole (so far) operates on the principle of "We know we're on the fringes of society, so we try to stay out of your hair and not bother anyone in your charge. You leave us alone, and we'll leave you alone." What's Hayate's response to this? "We'll take steps to stop crime outside of our jurisdiction"? WHOA NELLY! That's a bold statement there. What does that imply for TSAB policy? Forget how our "heroes" (they feel like cogs in the military machine, simply taking orders from above, personally) feel. How does the TSAB truly feel about the Huckebein? Add that to its allowing its top mages to finally use mass-based weaponry, I personally am excited for upcoming changes and developments within the TSAB. And once again, to address the "Haxbein", they are still a largely unknown enemy. They had some limited information on the Huckebein, and they really didn't get much out of Signum's battle. I mean, if she's still unconscious, what could they have learned? Non-5th gen, non-AEC weapons are not fit for use against the Huckebein? They already knew that; Signum already knew that. Its members are very dangerous? It's likely that they knew that. You can argue about the timing of the Wolfram's confrontation with the Huckebein, but Section 6 did take measures to be more prepared. They took the people most suited for the mission, armed them with the best (effective) weapons they had, and sent them off for an initial engagement. Personally, this battle works better if you see it as a probe into enemy strength and capabilities, as well as field-testing for an entirely new class of weapons. It turned out to be a battle that is far harder than anyone probably expected, but any other unit would've been even more screwed, and the next time Section 6 faces the Huckebein, they'll actually have actionable intelligence and tuned weapons.