Re: (1357) Mercenary, Mercenarier, Mercenariest.

 In Archive-Message-Number 1357, Bertil Jonell writes:
 >
 >1. Those darn repatriation bonds.
 >  The olde book 'Mercenary' talked about 'Repatriation Bonds'. This
 >was made up to be the saviour of every merc that was stranded on a
 >(hostile?) world because the employing government lost the war and

     Well, yeah, hostile.  People you've been *shooting at* don't
usually think friendly thoughts about you, especially when you're on
the losing side in a war.

 >ceased to exist. It was defined as 'money held in escrew by a third
 >party' (probably Hortalez or Zirunkarish) that was supposed to be
 >spent upon mid-passage to some system of the merc's choise (defined
 >beforehand, supposedly).

     Usually one system for the entire unit, seeing as how mercenary
tickets are only intended for combat-ready, organized units (individual
mercenaries are responsible to their commander, who in turn deals with
the employer).

 >  What I realized when my players decided to employ two squads of
 >merc's was that the amount of Cr's needed to even transport those two
 >squads one jump, was far larger than the total salary and bonus of
 >the entire unit! And several jumps was totally out of the question.
 >  There is not many countries in desperate need of a merc unit that
 >can afford to pay several times 8kCr per person in the merc unit. The
 >fact that the money is't lost weighs light when the country itself
 >might  not be around to make use of the refunded money. They would
 >probably be better off buying weapons for the money instead of
 >letting them mould in a locked account at Hortalez et Cie's :-)

     That's the whole point of a repatriation bond.  If you lose (and,
consequently, are unable to pay your mercenaries), the mercenary unit
can still get off-world (and, presumably, find work elsewhere--they
hope) using banked money that you no longer have any use for (since you
no longer exist as an organization).  If you win, then, great.  Reclaim
the bond, use it to pay off your mercenaries, then take what's left and
use it for a much-deserved trip to the famous vacation world of Riviera.
You've won the war--now it's Miller time...  ;-)

 >2. Who exacly can hire a merc unit?
 >  It is hard to imagine that the Imperium let's every Tom, Dick, and
 >Norris hire a band of armed soldiers for some mission that certainly
 >will require that laws is to be broken. If 'Union of Vranx' wants to
 >invade it's neighbour on the balcanized planet, the 'Uurk
 >Federation', to capture their resources, they'll probably going to
 >break a whole lot of local laws in the 'Federation', yet, this seems
 >to be a perfectly ok use of mercs.

     Since mercenaries are *soldiers*, they are usually hired for the
purpose of warfare (less often for use as cadre or military police/
occupation troops).  The people who hire them are either "true" (de
jure) governments, de facto governments (such as MegaCorps), or
would-be governments (like rebels).  Notice that all these potential
employers are fairly large organizations, usually with easy access to
the kind of wealth that is needed to hire even a modest-sized
mercenary unit.  Remember, decent troops don't come cheap.

 >  What is the real differece between this and if Wild Bill Hicock
 >wants to knock over a bank and hires 4 commandos to help him.

     Easy.  It's the same as the difference between legitimate warfare
and commiting a criminal act.  Fighting a war is *not* the same as
robbing a bank, either legally or practically.

 >  One possible answer to this is that the Imperium don't bother with
 >groundling conflicts unless they break the 'Imperial Rules of War'
 >that talks about 'Major economic damage to the region' and 'Excessive
 >extraplanetary involvement'.

     Right.  As long as you don't use any nuclear explosives and keep
your invasions *quick* and relatively clean, the Imperium doesn't care.

 >  Second possible answer: Only governments and similar organizations
 >is allowed to hire mercs: Probably wrong for several reasons,
 >foremost that several MegaCorps have employed mercs repeatedly.

     Since when are MegaCorps *not* governments?  Within their (usually
extensive) on-planet holdings they have the force of a government, and
can still get off world (and, presumably, find work elsewhere--they
in the case where they own an entire planet (or system) then they most
definitely *are* a government.  Anyone who can command the kind of
wealth and power that a MegaCorp represents definitely qualifies for
membership in the Major Players Club.


- --
     Brent

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