What are good real world cultures to base a bad guy nation in a space opera off of besides Nazis, the Soviet Union...

This is the real answer if you want villains who are not only threatening, but enduring in some form or another.

Rhodesia?

>Small ruling caste dominates large populace of differing ethnicity.
>The ruled populace is further divided into two major ethnic groups who hate each other's guts, almost as much as they resent the ruling caste.
>Rulers maintain an elite military, supported by recruits from the subservient groups whose ethnic rivalry is played off against each other.

Maybe they're a predatory empire that has to keep expanding because if it sits still too long it will collapse into civil war?
You can also play against the stereotype of the ruling class being decadent and weak by emphasizing the fact that the rulers are brutally self-reliant and paranoid about the subservients rising up against them, and that they see military service as a vital part of their survival as a culture.

Hmm, come to think of it they're starting to sound a bit like Spartans, too...

Corporate America.

Berber pirates

WWII Italy

You could make them religious fanatics ala' Crusader Europe, ISIS, The Spanish Inquisition, etc.

Also, what if Best Korea's space program was legit? What if they made wormholes or some shit to colonize a distant sector of the galaxy?

France.

Colonial Belgium.

Persia.

They weren't total dicks, but their dominance wasn't negotiable. They were pretty solid about trying to bribe you into joining, but if you decline the carrot they'd take out a big stick.

They make the perfect bad guys because they have so many client states. They'd have such a diverse group of cultures and armies to throw at you. They were so vast that your plucky good guys could have a 20:1 k/d ratio and they wouldn't give a fuck because they could afford to just keep shipping men into your blenders until it clogged the machinery up. It's a small blip on the daily reports. They don't give a fuck.

They were really good at bribes. That's the real strength. "Hey, join us, stab your old allies in the back, and not only can you keep ruling your little area as long as you pay us our due, but we'll give you some upfront gold and you can manage their lands too." That makes for great intrigue and sowing distrust.

There's just a lot of angles you can take and you never run out of stuff from a narrative perspective.

Italy was a mess that couldn't manage anything. They were a embarrassment to the axis and I can only assume you posted that as a joke.

Revolutionary France.
Modern-day San Francisco.

Aztecs, Zulu's, any culture with a large warrior class and Slavs population

That's nice dear.

Space Ottomans. Space Bantu. Space Aztecs.

Space Ptolmeic Egypt. Seems like a rich and fat state ruled by degenerate losers. Buuuuut they are important to Space Rome. And you do not fuck with Space Rome. Maybe Space Parthia can get away with it, or the Space Scots, but they both live in the ass end of nowhere as far as Space Rome is Concerned.

>Space Ptolmeic Egypt. Seems like a rich and fat state ruled by degenerate losers

Exactly why it doesn't work. An evil empire made up of effeminate ugly losers isn't intimating.

Post-Alexander

So this guy, let's call him Alexander the Greater, fucks around and conquers everything. Maybe not quite everything, maybe right up to your PC's doorstep (on three sides) but enough that the span of his empire is fucking stupid
Then he dies like a retard, leaving his various favorite generals, fuckbuddies, and bitchniggas in charge of everything. Who immediately start thinking, "Maybe I could be in charge of [my neighbor/rival/buddy]'s stuff too...."

So you wind up with a bunch of incestuous, egotistical mafioso-slash-generalissimos, all of whom are schemeing against each other, backstabbing like drow, plotting and using every dirty trick to try and get the others (not to mention their glorious leader's body; they have a culture that dictates that whoever buries the last king gets to be the new king) and should any exterior state dare to challenge them, 3/4ths of them will stop what they're doing to just smash that motherfucker. Then go back to trying to pick each other apart before they're even done.

I always realize I don't know enough about Persia whenever they came up.

I mean, Alexander was fighting these people. Crassus fought these people. Valerian fought these people. Justinian fought them. Suleiman fought them. Everyone who has ever tried to have a hegemonic power in Anatolia or the Levant has eventually found themselves fighting these pistachio munching goons, and I know basically nothing about the broad outlines of their history and culture.

Well that's the bait and switch. They think they're toppling a corrupt and decadent state. Then the equally corrupt but profoundly deadly state sends some of its proper hardcases in to sort the situation out.

Why not make Space Canada?

They're all nice and polite until you get in their way, and whoops they'll blow your brains out before they clog up your comms with apologies.

>Italy was a mess that couldn't manage anything. They were a embarrassment to the axis and I can only assume you posted that as a joke.

Real life Italy was a mess, but the Italian Space Fascists don't need to be, and they are a pretty good inspiration since they had a unique aesthetic distinct from the other classical bad guy space empires.

Like, for example, Mussolini was basically the Putin of his day, putting on a strong manly man persona complete with shirtless photo ops. In fact Mussolini would go skiing and sledding shirtless in the snow, just to prove how strong and manly he was (pic related).

Canada is no danger to anyone.

You're in luck if you want a beer and pretzels style overview. Dan Carlin just released part three of a podcast about old empires. It also covers Alexander the Great

dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-58-kings-kings-iii/

Byzantines

Space Rwanda. A small nation that responded to genocide with a government change, followed by developing an extremely well trained military and intervening in foreign nations to target the groups that genocided them, as well as gaining economic benefits.

Space Paraguay. Aggressively egalitarian, fanatically devoted to bringing freedom to everyone around them, just add some WMD and now Space Paraguay is winning the Space Paraguayan War.

Untrue, they're a huge danger to themselves.

And then there's the particular aesthetic style of Fascist Italy, which pretty much screams Evil Empire while still having its own flair. Think skulls are overplayed? Do ominous giant faces!

This.

>Germans being autistic
>England basically being jews
>Horny Frenchmen hon hon hon

I rike it.

>some of the dumb shit that happened under Mao and Pol Pot is just pure mustache-twirling evil for the sake of evil.
>The Hundred Flowers Campaign... ....was a period in 1956 in the People's Republic of China during which the Communist Party of China (CPC) encouraged its citizens to openly express their opinions of the communist regime. Differing views and solutions to national policy were encouraged based on the famous expression by Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong: "The policy of letting a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend is designed to promote the flourishing of the arts and the progress of science." After this brief period of liberalization, Mao abruptly changed course. The crackdown continued through 1957 as an Anti-Rightist Campaign against those who were critical of the regime and its ideology. Those targeted were publicly criticized and condemned to prison labor camps.

This all sort of fall into the colonizing state who make life into a nightmare for those outside the ruling class. It's falls into a neat niche between the expansionist death spiral of the Nazis and the broken dream of the Soviets. They're enduring but not expansionist.

>SI SI SI SI SI

Canada is a threat to is my heterosexuality.

Space south Americans rooting out vile communist from their ranks by burning down whole habs and raping and executing suspected commies with the full backing and blessing of Space America.

It blows my mind that they did this on purpose. This is intentional PR.

Italian fascists were literally /pol/ before the internet
One of their preferred torture methods was forcing enemies to chug castor oil so they'd shit themselves to potentially the point of death

Greeks/Romans

Homosexual and pedophiles who wish to exterminate, genocide, and enslave other people who will not accept non-compliance. You cannot keep your culture and language should you be unlucky enough to be conquered by them and if they even THINK you might be rebellious, they will kick you out of the homeland you have had for centuries and send you elsewhere. Also very decadent and love lavish parties giving them a fun edge and a sense of corruption that can turn people.

>Liberia (civil war period)
Not necessarily a bad guy nation, just one that is embroiled in an utterly insane civil war.
Then again, after the civil war, one of the leaders decided to run for president. His slogan was "He killed my ma, he killed my pa, but I will vote for him." Best part is he got elected.

Dubai - Their laws dont protect women of any kind and allow rape.
North Korea - You know, Kim Youn Un and his bunch of illiterates
Brasil - Some regions are very poor and rigged by mercenaries (favelas) while corporations excess in cutting forests.
U.S.A. - The government would be rigged by a president that none in their country likes and they vote for him/her because they hate their opponent. So the country is controlled by a few ones.
Mexico - The drog gangs have killed more people than the war in irak
Venezuela - the president becomes a dictator and the people don't even have access to essential stuff like toilet paper.

A lot of countries in asia and africa dont have rigths to the workers and exploit kids

Thanks /pol you help us a lot

If Roman add in crazy mass industry and the willingness to take the best things from the conquered and make it better. ie armor, weapons, religions, all for the glory of the state/emperor.

The US obviously.

I checked that guy, he sounds like a complete asshole, but I kind of admire the balls of someone who runs for a presidency with a slogan like that.
Though he basically gave them the option of having him as warlord, killing them, or a president over them, so it's not really "getting elected".
Still though, what a slogan

trips, nice

Mongols. Ancient Greeks. Azetcs.

I'm gonna drop Israel and see how we burn

Imperial Sweden, absolute Monarchy with complete backing of the commoners, with scheming nobles fighting a covert battle against the King.

Israel is clearly the plucky underdog state.

fpbp

Americans.
>Live in the ass-end of nowhere but then a giant war destroys all other major powers so they sweep in to claim victory, occupying and/or impoverishing the other powers in the process
>use the threat of military intervention or economic war to keep everyone doing what they say
>Government claims to be open to anyone but is really limited to a small clique of controlling families
>The average citizen is saturated in chemicals to keep them docile and would be genuinely surprised to find that their rule is resented

Elite based on self-reliant farmers?

>Oh man that'll end well

I'm not saying "Don't do it". I'm just saying you're setting your players up for a lose/lose. The fact is that ruling classes exist because other people don't want the responsibility

>2016
>Still believing the Crusades were bad
>Still thinking the Spanish Inquisition was a horrible and unfair court system
Pls do your research.

...

>France
>evil
>ever

>send 'em all back to Africa: The campaign

>Israel
>underdog

>Anglos: hey, you guys should have a democracy and not let your lives be run according to the whims of an absolute monarch
>French: so what you're saying is...blood orgy?

Space Best Korea would be fun.

>Hey Loulou, we're going to make a constitutional monarchy but we still want you as a less-powerful-than-before monarch because you were a decent dude all things considered
>screw your shit I'm betraying you and calling all of the world to fight your shit
2 centuries later
>wew why were french people became so warlike after all the world declared war on them ?

i was about to suggest the same thing. listen to carlin

Yeah yeah, Revolutionary France was a good boy. He dindu nuffin. Need mo money fo dem guillotines!

>British
>liberty

underrated post

It wasn't the Rights of Frenchmen that George Washington was fighting to restore m7y.

Never trust the eternal Anglo and his ally, the corpulent American.

Needs more money to fight the whole world and win. Incidentally including the "freedom-loving" brits, so quick to back a king traitor.

It all depends on your frame of reference

>Equality listed as a bad thing
>"Ingratitude" towards the noblesse de robe that did nothing to justify itself
This isn't biased at all.

>murder
>cruelty
>madness
>injustice
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody_Code

that's pretty fucked up brah, maybe tone it down a bit. How about Mogul Empire India.

>tone it down a bit
>Mogul Empire India

You got that the other way around, bruh. Ultra-nationalist Belgians defend the regime of Leopold II with the words "at least it wasn't Mogul Empire India"

>The average citizen is saturated in chemicals to keep them docile and would be genuinely surprised to find that their rule is resented
I know you're just a troll or a European, but what chemicals are you talking about?

But broseph, things in India have always been shit in some form or fashion so the Mongols didn't really change much save for a regime. The Belgians went around deciding that the Congo was like a Costco and took resources out in bulk and doling out brutality like candy. Way worse Indiana Brones.

>things in India have always been shit in some form or fashion
Africans wuz slaves and shit long before the West or even the Muslims contacted them.

>The Belgians
Small correction: Leopold II. It was his private property (it was supposed to be some philantropic project or something, guess how philantropic that turned out...). After he died the Belgian government took over and things improved. Don't hold the Belgians responsible for something not even their government had control over.

I can't help but love how "equality" is in that big list of bad things alongside treason and murder

Fair enough I suppose, though one man essentially given carte blanche rule over a whole nation like that in hindsight really looks bad. Also I just wanted to make a quick poo joke about India, and unrelated Africa was a decent enough place near the Mediterranean or Indian Ocean where trade with other cultures was prominent. I don't know anything about West Africa though.

Are you, like, surprised to see that the english are slimy fucks ?

>Japan was evil
Nice try americucks

They're not the only ones though. After Napoleon passed laws that were intended to assimilate the Jewish community, the Orthodox Church of Russia literally -LITERALLY- declared Napoleon the anti-Christ and an enemy of all believers. No wonder the Russians were willing to except their supposed protector burning down their own cities, villages and even the Third Rome. That's a sacrificed anyone would be willing to make against the LITERAL ANTI-CHRIST.

>Hmm, come to think of it they're starting to sound a bit like Spartans, too...

This. You could combine with the Confederacy and apartheid-era South Africa as well.

Just look at S.M. Sterling's The Domination series for an Earth-bound example.

WTF? I hate kojimbo now!

>ally

You mean 'alt-englishman'.

Americlaps aren't friends with britbongs, they are britbongs

>British Empire
>evil
Try again with a better bait.

WW2-era USA.

They manipulate innocent neighboring powers into starting wars by unilateraly restricting access to necessary resources. Once the war is started, they promote ethnic cleansing, ("when this war is over, the Xivorian language will only be spoken in hell"), misrepresent necessary medical procedures and experimentation to build propaganda against an innocent nation, and culminate in committing wholesale warcrimes and wiping out huge swathes of the population so they have room to set up a "protectorate" which is really just an imperial vassal state in all but name.

>his country get shitted on for beinga hellhole
>"p-p-pol is here!!"

And say that vaccine cause autism so that the low class don't vaccine their kids, resulting in huge death rate.

We are traditionally portrayed as the bad guys though.

You're all retarded, inbred, hypocrit, stupid, and clueless, but not evil.

You're too dumb to be evil.

The Holy Roman Empire.

Assyrians

"I built a pillar over against his city gate, and I flayed all the chief men who had revolted, and I covered the pillar with their skins; some I walled up within the pillar, some I impaled upon the pillar on stakes, and others I bound to stakes round the about the pillar; many within the border of my own land I flayed, and I spread their skins upon the walls; and I cut off the limbs of the officers, of the royal officers who had rebelled."

Cold War USA.
>experience with various drugs
>lead an anti-communist inquisition
>trains and arms rebels
>tortured and "interrogated" innocents people for no reason
>always while pretending to be the good guys

>Italy was a mess that couldn't manage anything. They were a embarrassment to the axis and I can only assume you posted that as a joke.

Yeah but image related

and