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Raenir Salazar posted:it seems that Scandinavia was pretty peaceful for the most part once they got over they got over their viking phase. Between the early 17th century and 1721, 25% of all Swedish (including modern Finland and most of the Baltic countries) men died in wars. That's a pretty hefty figure.
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Jan 8, 2015 19:45
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Fangz posted:Of course, the real HARD MODE version of this question is: what if you were a woman? In which case, ... I have no clue. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Jan 8, 2015 |
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Jan 8, 2015 19:45
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Argas posted:Studying would be a grueling process because there's a lot of memorization required. Unless, of course, you happened to know the right people and have a goodly sum of gold available and was living during one of the eras where corruption was more prevalent.
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Jan 8, 2015 19:47
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Ensign Expendable posted:You could always rely on the exotic foreigner angle to weasel your way into a Russian court, maybe you'll end up in one of those Guards units that is so elite and expensive they don't actually get to fight anyone. You could be one of those very tall people who were abducted from around Europe to be one of Frederick William of Prussia's Grenadiers.
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Jan 8, 2015 19:51
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sullat posted:Y'all are letting your civilization biases show. Just go back 18000 years or so, find some tribe, make charcoal draw8ngs of dickbutt. Be treated as a wizard, get all the BBQ mammoth you can eat. Ah yes, back when it's estimated 25-50% of people died violently. The good old days.
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Jan 8, 2015 19:56
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Disinterested posted:You could be one of those very tall people who were abducted from around Europe to be one of Frederick William of Prussia's Grenadiers. That's actually a thing that happened? I thought Voltaire made it up as a joke about every noble's personal guard consisted of really tall people. Would 6'3" be considered "very tall" in this period?
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Jan 8, 2015 19:56
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Davin Valkri posted:That's actually a thing that happened? I thought Voltaire made it up as a joke about every noble's personal guard consisted of really tall people. Would 6'3" be considered "very tall" in this period? Nope. Frederick William liked them Shaq-sized.
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Jan 8, 2015 20:05
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Davin Valkri posted:That's actually a thing that happened? I thought Voltaire made it up as a joke about every noble's personal guard consisted of really tall people. Would 6'3" be considered "very tall" in this period? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potsdam_Giants The requirement is about 6'2", so it looks like you barely qualify.
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Jan 8, 2015 20:06
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Tomn posted:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potsdam_Giants Oh, I thought I remembered the requirement being 6'6". Never mind.
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Jan 8, 2015 20:07
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dublish posted:Oh, I thought I remembered the requirement being 6'6". Never mind. It's possible the requirement got kicked up later - that Wikipedia article states that the ORIGINAL required height was six Prussian feet, or about 6'2". Maybe Freddie decided they just had to be bigger later on.
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Jan 8, 2015 20:09
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I say peaceful but really its more of which era you think you'd best prosper/survive to reach old age; maybe you can be the best mercenary whose ever merc'd. The original variant actually specified "Where in 1066" but I imagine everyone has their own specific favoured year/area. As for being a craftsmen I think we're overestimating the difficult or being too narrow in the definition; I just think that *if* you had the skills, and could feasibly start from scratch with whatever you brought with you; suppose skill in metallurgy, masonry, trapping, and woodworking; I think you'd be hypothetically made for life as long as you brought the minimum tools to start up and socialized and traded your way to rising in productivity.
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Jan 8, 2015 20:39
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Xotl posted:The colonials are nowhere near as impressive in the Second World War as they were in the First, oddly enough - something worth a study, I think. Montgomery did pursue the germans, but they where falling back on interior lines of communication, where as montgomery was advancing forward, and didnt want to be without his logistics.
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Jan 8, 2015 21:04
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Chamale posted:Ah yes, back when it's estimated 25-50% of people died violently. The good old days. Really? I don't know much about what current scholarship says about prehistory. Know of any good books or articles on the subject?
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Jan 8, 2015 21:19
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Kaal posted:I don't disagree with your opinion, but it did take me a bit to work out your meaning when you said "Defining the Bradley as roughly 30 tons, with autocannon turret and ATGM capability, etc.", as being the defining characteristics that the Bradley laid out for future IFV types. Perhaps you're being a little bit too brief. This is probably true, I have to try hard to keep from devolving my internet writing into incoherent collections of acronyms and made-up words because I've basically been ruined as a writer. Koesj posted:IFV stuff I think your issue is more with my word choice than anything. I wasn't meaning to suggest that engineers from Germany or Sweden or wherever went to the UD production line and carefully cloned the superior American technology because they were too dumb build it themselves. Rather, that the Bradley was the first example of the modern heavy IFV that a number of other vehicles wound up following. How their respective militaries/designers arrived at their specific solutions vary pretty significantly but they all wound up being broadly similar to the Bradley. You might say the same about the Centurion or T-54 when it comes to MBTs. As it relates to the characteristics, I'll explain briefly why these aren't arbitrary and why I used them. 30 ton weight class generally implies the following: universally resistant to small arms and HE shrapnel, selectively resistant to autocannons, crew survivable against a certain percentage of mines, MBT tank shots and/or ATGMs. Tracked with associated mobility advantages, but much heavier sustainment. Classed out of C-130 or rotary lift (this is a pretty big deal), but can do a three vehicle lift in a C-17 (also a big deal). This is in contrast to the ~15 ton vehicles (LAV-25, Stryker, etc), that are C-130 capable and have much lower sustainment requirements but have concurrently lower protection and targeting capabilities (note: the BMP is in this class). Another concern in stability, etc operations is that when you hit around 20 tons on a tracked vehicle you start having to seriously consider the effects of vehicle weight and the tracks on civilian roads. Turreted autocannon implies a substantial upgrade in direct fire capability against anything short of a tank, a more robust targeting capability thanks to the turret, and yet more heightened sustainment requirements. ATGM implications should be fairly clear although obviously not all of these systems use integrated launchers which is an important consideration. This is all used in projections and planning and whatnot to sort of broadly apply capabilities to given situations. We do the same process with tanks, attack helicopters, light IFVs, infantry carriers, and so on. Basically, we're lazy and we consider all of these used across the US and allies to be roughly analogous to one another. Same goes for future systems except we assume they'll be lighter and faster and better protected and stuff, hahahahahaha. This is one of the reasons why I find the INTENSE internet discussions about "Leopard 2 vs Abrams" or "Tiger vs Apache" to be so amusing as I've been kind of conditioned to think that it really doesn't matter that much. Re. the MBT discussion, I'm sorry I don't remember what the discussion was but I'd be glad to respond to any thoughts or questions or whatever you might have.
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Jan 8, 2015 21:25
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vuk83 posted:Montgomery did pursue the germans, but they where falling back on interior lines of communication, where as montgomery was advancing forward, and didnt want to be without his logistics. You may substitute "immediately and aggressively pursue" if you like; I thought that was obvious.
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Jan 8, 2015 21:27
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Xotl posted:Blaming the British army's problems solely on its leadership is really simplifying the case. Like pretty much every other aspect of their war effort early on, Britain was paying the piper in the desert for a decade of pre-war neglect. Not just Britain, of course. Just look at the Kasserine Pass... Learning how to fight a war as a member of a previously peacetime military must inevitably be a hairy learning experience.
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Jan 8, 2015 21:30
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sullat posted:Really? I don't know much about what current scholarship says about prehistory. Know of any good books or articles on the subject? Try War Before Civilization by Lawrence Keeley, which is based on archaeology and evidence from present-day non-state societies.
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Jan 8, 2015 21:32
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Trin Tragula posted:100 Years Ago 'The flooding in the Thames valley is apparently receding' As an Oxonian, good to know some things never change... 
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Jan 8, 2015 21:38
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Fangz posted:Well, there's the war of 1812 and Britain is in the middle of the Napoleonic wars. I thought we wanted peaceful? Conscription wasn't a thing during the Napoleonic Wars (assuming you're not a sailor). No need to go get shot if you don't want to. Plus you can speak the language intelligibly and there's an industrial revolution going on which most of us would probably be in a good position to accelerate. Move to Manchester! Run a mill! Exploit the working classes for fun and profit!
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Jan 8, 2015 21:47
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bewbies posted:I think your issue is more with my word choice than anything. Oh sure, but then again your initial post looked a lot like it tried to make an argument about the Bradley being there first and everyone else following it. Because then, specifically, 30t / (to some degree) ATGM / autocannon turret was done by the Marder in 1975 already. In large numbers. Re: this and our previous discussion about AFVs; I think we're hampered by the professional perspective vs the (armchair) historians' one. I *should* have even less of a dog in these kind of 'fights', but will engage in incessant sophistry about what I'd consider salient points in historical developments. In this case, the obscure and wonkish subject of Cold War armored vehicles and convergences/divergences in their solution sets. What I meant is that your characteristics were arbitrary when pertaining to some kind of conclusion about the Bradley's uniqueness at that particular time, not IFVs in general, approached as a category in hindsight.
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Jan 8, 2015 22:09
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feedmegin posted:Conscription wasn't a thing during the Napoleonic Wars (assuming you're not a sailor). No need to go get shot if you don't want to. Plus you can speak the language intelligibly and there's an industrial revolution going on which most of us would probably be in a good position to accelerate. Move to Manchester! Run a mill! Exploit the working classes for fun and profit! Until you get drunk and take the shilling by mistake/trickery and BLAM now you are loving freezing your dick off somewhere along the Spanish/Portuguese frontier.
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Jan 8, 2015 22:45
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Koesj posted:Also, I think that after 1980 the new, fourth, mobilisable company in every PzGrenBtl of the PzGrenBrig (hahahaha eat my German abbreviations!!!) still had their original-sized squads riding in M113s. It was. The fourth company was meant for giving the battalion or brigade the extra manpower for fighting in forested areas and urban warfare - they had double-size squads compared to the Marder companies. Still one man-portable Milan per squad, though. Magni fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Jan 8, 2015 |
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Jan 8, 2015 22:49
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Until you get drunk and take the shilling by mistake/trickery and BLAM now you are loving freezing your dick off somewhere along the Spanish/Portuguese frontier. Considering even northern Spain in winter doesn't get colder than the UK, i'd be more worried about the consistent hot days. Those would be unusual.
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Jan 8, 2015 22:51
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Actually, if you're Jewish the Thirty Years' War would have owned. The Emperor has jurisdiction over all Jews in his territory as a mark of his authority and he prohibited their mistreatment during the war, while because of the belief that all Jews had money all other political entities and every army prohibited their mistreatment as well. And this was enforced. So despite the fact that you would be starving and ill with the rest of the population, you would be less likely than you would have been before to get murdered by some rear end in a top hat for fake reasons, and less likely than your neighbors to get killed by a mercenary. (Depending on how badly your home was affected by war though, you may or may not have been willing to trade the resumption of bigoted violence for peace.) Edit: Also, nobody I've studied and nobody Peter Burschel or Maren Lorenz has studied either seems to give a poo poo about religious differences, so if you wanted to join an army you could have actual non-Jewish friends and social acceptance. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 01:18 on Jan 9, 2015 |
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Jan 8, 2015 23:01
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nothing to seehere posted:Considering even northern Spain in winter doesn't get colder than the UK, i'd be more worried about the consistent hot days. Those would be unusual. Environment, equipment and duty matter a lot more in regards of how much you freeze your dick off than the actual temperature. Spain loving sucked in the Napoleonic wars. It's too hot, or it's too cold. It's generally too dusty, but when it's not, it's too muddy. There's never any food. Everyone hates each other.
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Jan 8, 2015 23:03
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HEY GAL posted:Edit: Also, nobody I've studied and nobody Peter Burschel or Maren Lorenz has studied either seems to give a poo poo about religious differences, so if you wanted to join an army you could have actual non-Jewish friends and social acceptance. Do your guys have any strong opinions about the Ottoman Turks?
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Jan 9, 2015 00:07
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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PittTheElder posted:Do your guys have any strong opinions about the Ottoman Turks?
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Jan 9, 2015 00:09
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Raenir Salazar posted:I say peaceful but really its more of which era you think you'd best prosper/survive to reach old age; maybe you can be the best mercenary whose ever merc'd. The original variant actually specified "Where in 1066" but I imagine everyone has their own specific favoured year/area. Assuming you are English/American and can read/write fairly well and otherwise know your sums, your path to prosperity at some point in the past probably depends on the answer to the question "How okay are you with Slavery?" Lots of people got very rich off the Atlantic trade.
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Jan 9, 2015 00:18
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Take some maps and navigation charts and start exploring the world few years before anybody else in Europe. Avoid places with hostile native population. Maybe head straight for China.
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Jan 9, 2015 00:27
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If you're a Hapsburg, do not, I repeat do not, study inheritance. It's better this way.
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Jan 9, 2015 00:31
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Even the most glorious kings and emperors of the distant past never got to drink whiskey, smoke a cigarette, eat a burger from McDonalds, poop in a modern flush toilet, or post on the internet. Oh also no matter how peaceful the time is you've still got painful dentistry and the possibility of dying from something very very normal like blood-poisoning if the knife slips while you're cutting some chicken. The past sucked, the future is amazing. We're living in the only time in all of human history where more people die from being fat than from warfare, and that's pretty much the most incredible thing because really no one could have ever foreseen that even just a hundred years ago.
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Jan 9, 2015 00:34
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HEY GAL posted:If you're a Hapsburg, do not, I repeat do not, study inheritance. It's better this way. 
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Jan 9, 2015 00:38
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Gotta love how the obsession with the purity of "Royal Blood" ends up leading to inbreeding and hemophilia.
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Jan 9, 2015 01:07
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jng2058 posted:Gotta love how the obsession with the purity of "Royal Blood" ends up leading to inbreeding and hemophilia. Edit: I think hemophilia might have been the one thing they didn't have. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 01:21 on Jan 9, 2015 |
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Jan 9, 2015 01:10
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HEY GAL posted:Nah, the Hapsburgs intermarried to secure alliances among themselves. If someone's your uncle and your brother at the same time he's that much more likely not to throw you under the bus when you ask him for help. Particularly when you are a dynasty split between ruling Austria and Spain.
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Jan 9, 2015 01:22
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HEY GAL posted:Nah, the Hapsburgs intermarried to secure alliances among themselves. If someone's your uncle and your brother at the same time he's that much more likely not to throw you under the bus when you ask him for help. Were the Hapsburgs at all aware of the dangers of inbreeding? I'd have thought that animal husbandry was advanced enough at that point that farmers or dog-breeders at least knew better than to inbreed too often. Was that not the case, or did the Hapsburgs just ignore that for whatever reason?
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Jan 9, 2015 01:26
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Tomn posted:Were the Hapsburgs at all aware of the dangers of inbreeding? I'd have thought that animal husbandry was advanced enough at that point that farmers or dog-breeders at least knew better than to inbreed too often. Was that not the case, or did the Hapsburgs just ignore that for whatever reason? They were, but that chart involves lots of cousins marrying over a period of 200 years to get to the end result.
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Jan 9, 2015 01:31
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I have no idea when we discovered inbreeding depression, that's a good question.
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Jan 9, 2015 01:34
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HEY GAL posted:I have no idea when we discovered inbreeding depression, that's a good question. Is that depression in the inbred, depression in those studying it or both?
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Jan 9, 2015 02:19
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Everyone in European royalty was incredibly consanguineous. This could be very useful for the papacy, since marriages were technically prohibited within certain degrees of consanguinity. Given everyone already was, the Church always had an excuse for not granting permission for a wedding if it wanted it.
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Jan 9, 2015 02:51
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