NationStates Jolt Archive

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House Garindi International Academy

Sensing an opportunity in a thriving international market, the sublime Padishah Emperor has assembled 114 of some of his finest mentats, who specialize in the training of other mentats, and founded a mentat Academy open to people of all nations.

In an age where you are able to trust no one, your very own thinking machines could be planning a revolt against you. This is where having a mentat is essential. mentats are humans whose minds have been conditioned under a lifetime of training and special use of the spice melange to become human computers. The potential for a mentat is limitless. They can specialize in anything from book keeping calculations to military leadership to complex space navigation. Also, because of the use of the spice melange in their training, mentats will live on average five times longer than a normal human. This means that your investment will be paying off for many generations.

Your mentat assistant can also be a life-saving bodyguard. The quickness of their minds allow them to spot details that other guards might miss, and grants them lightning quick reflexes that have proven essential countless times.

In a new age of warfare like the one we live in, our enemies weapons or battle tactics might assume that we use complex computers or electronics. If you rely on electronic thinking machines and are attacked by an EMP device, you are not going to be going anywhere!

On the other hand, a mentat is not only immune to such attacks, but they are also able to defend themselves should they be attacked by enemies. Your average computer could not do that.

In order to get your own mentat(s), send children to the House Garindi International Academy on the planet of Caladan. They must be under five years of age to be accepted, and training will begin immediately. Tuition of students starts at 135 750 000 000 000 solaris per year, which includes the cost of the spice melange that must be used during the training period. Typically, students reach the point where they require no further training from us and may train by themselves after the age of 22. They still will require large amounts of melange in order to carry out their mentat duties. This spice can be purchased from the House Garindi Spice Company.

An important part of mentat training is that the youth must not know that they are being trained as a mentat. Do not inform them of this, or else it will spoil the entire training.

So, begin weening yourself off of the time bomb that is the mutinous thinking machines today and send your children to become skillful mentats.

It seems to be that multiple projectiles will hurt a Mentat far more than they'll hurt an armoured AI.

But can an armored AI analyze the morale state of his troops to give an optimally worded speech to boost confidence before a major engagement? You will find that there are an almost infinite amount of advantages that a mentat has over a thinking machine, and vice versa. Also, depending on the kind of projectile and distance from the mentat, the mentat may be able to dodge or block the projectile because of their literally lightening quick reflexes. Mentats are always analyzing every situation, and will be prepared for a fired projectile if they deem that it is likely in the current scenario.

But can an armored AI analyze the morale state of his troops to give an optimally worded speech to boost confidence before a major engagement?

So far, we have found optimally worded speeches to be easily administered through simple hormonal manipulation, without the speeches in question.

Assuming 135 750 000 000 000 solaris to be approximately equal to New Realm monetary units (Our currency is rather valuable at the current time, so we feel this assumption is reasonable), that is approximately 135 trillion units per year. We could purchase a small starfleet for that sort of money.

Hmmm...Perhaps a readjustment of the price down several thousanths? Menats were common and 135 trillion is a bit excessive.:p How about 135 billion total? installment plans for the poorer country...would this be a military or administrative item?:eek:

There are some inconsistencies here. Duke Paul Atreides had been fully trained as a mentat prior to his having partaken of the spice. The price is far too high. A small house could have a mentat. That is a thousand people.... The spice gives prescience something which mentats do not have, the ability to predict the future-- in the Dune universe, spice gave limited prescience to whoever used it.

We would like to have them and probably could offer something similar at a much more reasonable price, memory training (memory castle), computational training (savant mathematics-- intuitive math), awareness intensification (meditation), visualization training, body reading (body language), void meditation (total blockage of outside factors), speed information absorption (speed reading and mental filtering), intensive learning training, prana, yoga, breathing meditation, logic, science, engineering, religion, biofeedback training, rhetoric, military strategy, peak performance mental flow, martial arts, etc. This would make something very similar to a mentat or young Paul Atreides. The program might last from the age 6 to around 16 (the end) 100,000 per year 10 years $1,000,000. You would have to provide exceptionally bright individuals 160 IQ+ with very stable emotional patterns.

We are interested in the components of your training

So your mentats all have a melange habit which costs a billion dollars per decagram...

We will stick to our own Commonii specialists, their training comes with wetware biocomputers, bionanites and implants to use AIs. This makes them post human something which the Garindi would find terrifying.

(OOC: Nope, there are not inconsistencies here. That is not to say that my nation is an exact replica of the Dune universe, but let me explain. The price is high because I am assuming that FT nations are a lot richer than their MT nations (it takes a lot more money to build a spaceship than a navy vessel). The price is still high even with that considered, but that is because of the spice. There are two reasons why spice is mandatory. For one, even the greatest mentat can still have his mind further quickened by the spice. The spice is required so that only the best mentats are trained. The more important reason, however, is that the Emperor wants people to think that spice is required in mentat training. Since the Emperor ultimately owns spice production, he will not have any threats to his monopoly and tries to shut out any mentat training that does not utilize spice. I also never said that these mentats are given prescient ability, although their reflexes and intuition can sometimes make it seem like they have it.)

The Bene Grillon Verte (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?p=11064718) cricket ship translated into a GEO orbit around the House Garindi Mentat Facility. They had came to pick up some new instructors for the Académie Bene Grillon Verte. Contact had recently been made between the two Great Houses and a cultural and social exchange was underway. The Blade had decided to allow the House Garindi to establish a small college (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=485473&page=2) that would teach their methods.

The Cherry Blossom shuttles broke free of the Cricket and slowly descended to the major spaceport facility.

Académie Bene Grillon Verte
to House Garindi Mentat Académie

We have come as Sacred Guest and in peace.
We send have sent an unarmed Cherry Blossom shuttle bearing our vessel's water gift to your Tribe.
You have our promised professors?
They will Rendevous with us in two Oulde hours.
<end>

ooc: Our methods are similar to the Commonii's but are more heavily influenced by the esoteric traditions of many of the old religions. Namely we draw more heavily upon Buddhism, Daoism, Sufi, and Yogas. We will not offer the same types of mentats that Garindi has made...our success rate is much lower...but the modifications don't always take. And we must destroy many of the twisted Abominitaions. :p

The price is high because I am assuming that FT nations are a lot richer than their MT nations (it takes a lot more money to build a spaceship than a navy vessel).

Just so you know, many nations here (both FT and MT) tend to rely on NSEconomy (http://nseconomy.thirdgeek.com/nseconomy.php) to determine the amount of money their governments have in their disposal (if you haven't checked NSEconomy yet, then perhaps you should, especially since your own nation (http://nseconomy.thirdgeek.com/nseconomy.php?nation=Garindi) has the most peculiar Government Budget :D ).

Duke Paul Atreides had mentat abilities, but he was no mentat. Smaller houses could often only afford failed mentats, as noted in the one of the prequels. I believe Garandi's price to be a tad excessive, and it depends on whether he is using Tleilaxu style Axolotl tanks to produce back ups, sort of like a free refil ;)
Are there many Dune nations on here? It would be interesting to have a Dune RP. I'm from FED2k (http://www.dune2k.com) if any of you lot visit it as well, we've had quite a few RPs there, as well as becoming the official Emperor Battle for Dune site.

135 750 000 000 000 solaris converted to my native beads?