New Civilizations ( OOC, Always Open, Reboot )

[Cainesland]

Universal, is Nestos planning on expanding into Bulgaria and Constantinople?

[Ralnis]

How many people do you think exist in Elam? 50-80K maybe? Maybe less?

Universal, is Nestos planning on expanding into Bulgaria and Constantinople?

If they do I will invade them so hard.

[G-Tech Corporation]

Disparate cultures? Polities?

What year do you think it is, 1000 AD?

Ain’t nobody here in Central Europe except us Globular Amphora Indo-Europeans.

Tribes and clans all have differing histories, traditions, taboos, customs, languages, and religions - now more than ever, what with no overarching states to enforce any particular cultural doctrines.

Yes, and no - you see, the reason Viktor lands where he does is for reasons of mineral wealth, certainly, but also a really excellent hotbed for nation-state formation.

In essence, the vales of the Erzgebirge/Czechia and Central Europe are just about perfect for building a centralized unitary culture.

What do you want when conquering a state? Centralization, so you can cut off the head, replace it with your own, and the whole machine keeps spinning without falling apart. But when you are forming a state from scratch, the axiom is not-quite true. You don't want -actual- centralization, since they means you have to dismantle systems to replace them, and that begets resistance, either formal or simple as a matter of inertia. No, you want proto-centralization - enough of a forming power structure to have a populace comfortable with the idea of a hierarchical power structure, but not enough to actually engage in that aforementioned resistance.

This is precisely where Central Europe started our RP. Naturally, it still exists in a state of nascent decentralization, with wandering kinship groups and hunter-gatherer bands of ~200 individuals at most being the most sophisticated form of governance. No polities, no institutionalization, but ad hoc governance provided along individual social ties. Most hunter gatherer bands are controlled by a vague form of egalitarianism, with the heads of families informally choosing how to handle matters like social taboos and yearly rounds. Normally this would be a very difficult place to form any government at all - transient peoples just move away if they don't like being ruled, and obviously any state above a certain scale will find it impossible to create the social bonds which these societies rely upon for governance. Viktor can't be intermarried with ten thousand tribes, any more than he can fly to the moon. A more or less insurmountable problem, you would think.

Except, there is a confounding factor, a factor which has only recently come into play but which is of great importance to the Imperium's progress; Indo-Europeanization. Within the last two hundred years or so, hierarchical patrilineal nomads out of the Ukraine have moved into central Czechia, leaving indelible cultural impacts on the region, though the exact nature of their migration is debatable. My working theory for this RP is the elite recruitment hypothesis, where demonstrable benefits from their culture were adopted by the local Globular Amphora Culture leaders, particularly in the realm of vague agrarianism, a warrior class, and social stratification. This intermixing is ongoing as Viktor arrives in the past, as born out by the archaelogical record.

So, forming centralization. In this period we see the rise of more formalized governance structures - the kinship chieftain - and actual settlements as well as - importantly - the introduction of proto-Indo-European (PIE) as a nearly universal language. We're not talking true sedentarianism, the formation of the city-state, but rather the first inklings of formalized meeting points and seasonal habitations. These meeting points have existed in Central Europe for thousands of years, and are vitally important as trade nodes and for the exchange of brides and grooms between otherwise inbred nomadic bands, but just in this period we start seeing the first construction of actual buildings at these sites.

It is a perfect storm for Viktor's ambitions. People are now acclimatized or being acclimatized to a social hierarchy and rule from above, but he comes too early for these social institutions to have deep roots or have expanded beyond kinship groups into polities capable of resisting his ambitions militarily. Warrior cultures have led to the creation of particular segments of a society that can be recruited for martial pursuits, but it will be another eight hundred years before the first archaeologically significant skirmishing is evident, betraying a continued state of senescence and plenty for the populace. An excellent entry point for a person willing to mobilize this warrior class with the knowledge of how to use them. And, most importantly for matters such as artisan specialization and the creation of material culture, urbanization is still in its infancy, but exists, in some form. Cities are not valued by individual bands, and so easy prey for integration, but also form logical points for local agglomeration as political ties reach throughout the region.

As I said, a perfect storm. A shallow but relatively unified culture, a near-universal language, but little in the way of entrenched social, military, or religious institutions, and so clay for the shaping of an Author.

In summary, there are very valid reasons I drop Viktor where he was

[Bortslovakia]

Not saying an authoritarian state can maintain a war for longer than a democratic state. I'm saying Pat has no formal mechanism that can stop him from escalating, while Rikardus does.

The lack of a formal mechanism is not the same as the lack of a mechanism in general. No legal, administrative, or any other formal distinction stops the thralls in the Northlands from being equal in the natives, yet they somehow seem to always end up with the least desirable jobs.

An autocrat needs to keep his lackies at least somewhat pleased to hold on to power, and said lackies have their own lackies to satisfy, down and down to the common guardsman in the ranks.

I will say though, it's awfully convenient how slow and bureaucratic the Stórþing is when you need it to be OOC, and yet during this proposed 15 year timeskip you'll be able to organize funding for walls in settlements that seemingly have no natural threats,

You believe that it will be difficult for the government to organize such a fortification effort once the Irish start raiding our coasts in retaliation? I was thinking more along the lines of everyone will be scrambling to do so whether we tell them to or not.

Even if I accept your estimate of 5 years as the length of the war, that’s more than enough time for even thebnot-so-large towns to put up masonry walls.

convince what are essentially a disparate band of private contractors to fight for reasons beyond profit, and expand the federal army by orders of magnitude.

The Northlands National Guard is, compared to the population backing it, tiny. The political will required to increase its size by an order of magnitude is rather less than the political will, say, Hibernia would have to come up with in order to increase their military by an order of magnitude.

Nobody wants a repetition of the disastrous Norse-Imperial war.

None of those are things you just pass in one go, and some seem oddly specific when the justification is the Imperium war. Surely the Stórþing would be more interested in funding the defense of the southern border if that were the case?

It is, yes. But preparing for a war with the Imperium is rather less important than fighting the war that’s actually happening. Those projects will largely be suspended when the Irish war begins.

And where are you getting the idea that you can sneak a sizable force onto Ireland, and pillage cities and farms without anyone noticing until it's too late? We've had this discussion before, and I'd rather not repeat myself. It almost always ends poorly for the raiders. Especially since in 15 years we'll at least have some form of cavalry thanks to Issac speeding along our own program, probably skirmishers and messengers, meaning the time of response will be even shorter. "Surviving off the land" requires remaining in the field for an extended period of time in order for it to have any negative effect on the enemy. Which in this case translates to being trapped between an army, and a fleet with no means of resupply beyond foraging.

And I still disagree on this point. An arbitrarily selected village can get a call for help out to the nearest garrison and have said help arrive the same day? Really?

Of course, that’s on a clear day for a village that has a good lookout point. For a village without good vision out into the sea, I really doubt it takes more than a couple hours to ask for tribute and burn down your fields if we don’t get a positive answer.

Catching the Norse in the open sea is an even more hopeless concept. I can’t patrol the Irish waters even if I mobilise the entire country’s merchant marine of 200-odd ships into the task. The distances involved are just too vast.

Also you'll have your response to Clara shortly. I am doing it, I swear!

I might end up just writing out the treaty OOC here as well so I don’t have to wait for your IC responses in back-and-forty negotiations.

With that in mind, I am starting to chafe a bit at the 10,000 number we've assigned Ireland. Not only is it inaccurate, but it seems like what was supposed to be an overall population nerf to everyone has really only effected me. Especially since Icedonia has 10,000 people living in it alone with literally no factual basis.

No more than. It’s a key phrase. I estimated the combined population of England and Wales at 33,000. Since I have no clue on how that is distributed within that region, I generously estimated a third of them live in Icedonian borders.

More realistically you’d be looking at a fraction of that.

I will note that the Imperium’s Central Europe and whatever future state will eventually emerge in Central Americas saw large cuts as well, which I imagine is the reason why neither seem to be particularly willing to accept my estimates.

Which, fair enough, but we do need a standardised global population scheme and I’ve yet to see someone else put their own up.

...So I wrote a response, then my computer decided to shut itself off. Probably for the best, as it was pretty long.

TLDR of that...

Ireland is smaller than you think, and the majority of its population is in the east. Probably 70-80%, with the plurality of that being along the Boyne river. Excluding the far northeast settlements around Belfast, the MAXIMUM distance a large settlement is from any support is a day. Dublin to Drogheda is only 32 miles. Easily manageable with clear roads at a forced march. The Boyne cities and villages are only a few hours between each other, and the largest of them probably have anywhere from 400-600 people.

Between strategic ports, and intimate knowledge of the water's we're sailing, yes we can predict with a fair degree of accuracy where an enemy longship would likely be. You have two viable entrances to the Irish sea, one being more likely than the other. Though not infallible, it doesn't take a genius to come up with an efficient patrol route.

The counter raids would most certainly not be at the beginning of the war. That'd be a wasted opportunity. The goal is a relatively bloodless seizing of Orkney. If the Norse continue their offensive for an unreasonable amount of time, only then will the Irish act. Partially to lure the Norse into a false sense of security (A la "The war is over there in Britain, not here at home"), and partially because sacking cities is no easily stomached thing. If it does come to that though, the assault will be rapid, highly aggressive, and targeted at the largest of Scandinavia's Atlantic ports. While the Stórþing is reeling, that's when Hibernia will send its demands. At least that's the theory. Long term it will basically butcher any attempt at a friendship, but wars an ugly thing.

For the population thing, I won't deny most of that. It does seem like a lot of people are ignoring the implications. I may make a more cohesive population map of the British isles using the numbers you've provided, just to make things a tad less vague while staying consistent.

You will get your response to Clara today. I know I've been inconsistent (real life sucks), but it's almost done.

[Plzen]

Ireland is smaller than you think, and the majority of its population is in the east. Probably 70-80%, with the plurality of that being along the Boyne river. Excluding the far northeast settlements around Belfast, the MAXIMUM distance a large settlement is from any support is a day. Dublin to Drogheda is only 32 miles. Easily manageable with clear roads at a forced march. The Boyne cities and villages are only a few hours between each other, and the largest of them probably have anywhere from 400-600 people.

...32 miles is 3 days' round trip on foot, on good roads. Even on horseback I can't see someone making a hundred kilometres a day. For an early modern army 74 miles is probably closer to a week's trip, but neither of our armies are advanced enough to require much in the way of logistics. Food, a bit of ammunition. But it's still well, well over a day's journey.

Assuming that you can in fact get help within a day, in order to have a day's forewarning you probably need lookouts for at least 30~40km out into sea. Slightly under half a day's sail in, pillage, and slightly under half a day's sail out. Seeing a longship that's, oh, 10m high 30km out into sea means a lookout post at least 60~70 metres above sea level, and hilly is not a good description of the mouth of the Boyne river.

Between strategic ports, and intimate knowledge of the water's we're sailing, yes we can predict with a fair degree of accuracy where an enemy longship would likely be. You have two viable entrances to the Irish sea, one being more likely than the other. Though not infallible, it doesn't take a genius to come up with an efficient patrol route.

Assume your patrol finds a Norse fleet. Then what? You're going to engage a superior naval force? Send a ship to your nearest naval base for help - and who knows where the Norse fleet would have sailed to when that help arrives? You don't need a patrol, you need an actual naval force on those channels capable of intercepting any fleets that try to come through.

St. George's Channel is a bit under 80km wide on a map. If you can get a man 10m above sea level on one of your ships, which gives you a line of sight of about 3.5km each way on a clear day, you can close about 10% of that route with one fleet. That's fairly significant. A couple of fleets on patrol, spaced out enough for ships within each fleet to easily help and communicate but not spaced out so much that they can be defeated piecemeal, would probably catch a quarter of Norse attempts to force fleets into the Irish Sea. This would probably be sufficient to discourage raids on eastern Ireland in favour of the more open west, instead.

A couple fleets, each capable of defeating the longships of the Norwegian Republican Guards, which would be the smallest of the three forces I'm hypothesising would be raiding Ireland, is 10~15 ships. To catch that combined force of 1,400 men you probably want at least 30 ships per fleet, which would be 90 for the two patrols on the south and to close the northern entrance to the Sea. Say, don't you have other places where you might need those ships? To support a siege of the Orkney Norse settlements or raids on Scandinavia proper, perhaps?

The counter raids would most certainly not be at the beginning of the war. That'd be a wasted opportunity. The goal is a relatively bloodless seizing of Orkney.

The settlements on the Orkneys will be fortified. I think it would be rather severely out-of-character for Pat and Hibernia to jump at the seizure of a friendly power (because we are friendly, right now) without at least trying some diplomatic demands and negotiations first, and as slow as our government can be, the settlers of the Orkneys won't be and they can read the writing on the wall.

If the Norse continue their offensive for an unreasonable amount of time, only then will the Irish act. Partially to lure the Norse into a false sense of security (A la "The war is over there in Britain, not here at home"), and partially because sacking cities is no easily stomached thing. If it does come to that though, the assault will be rapid, highly aggressive, and targeted at the largest of Scandinavia's Atlantic ports. While the Stórþing is reeling, that's when Hibernia will send its demands. At least that's the theory. Long term it will basically butcher any attempt at a friendship, but wars an ugly thing.

The "largest Atlantic ports" would probably have close to 400 inhabitants at that time, which means 150~200 local defenders. In highly constricted, urban terrain that partially nullifies the advantage of numerical superiority, it isn't that much of a stretch to say that they can probably put 100~150 casualties into your army each.

How many men can you burn on a Scandinavian campaign, again?

For the population thing, I won't deny most of that. It does seem like a lot of people are ignoring the implications. I may make a more cohesive population map of the British isles using the numbers you've provided, just to make things a tad less vague while staying consistent.

I greatly look forwards to this. I'd take inspiration and maybe make my own, but... well, I already made a year 40 map that vaguely hints at population densities, and it would be a bit redundant to make another one for year 25~30.

You will get your response to Clara today. I know I've been inconsistent (real life sucks), but it's almost done.

I greatly look forwards to this also.

[Plzen]

You know, all this discussion of the future Irish-Norse war reminds me, what are the Imperium's raiding policies like? I figure that's a pertinent question to ask, since you'll be using it on the South Jylland settlements. What I said in the above post about storming cities applies to the Imperium as well. If the Imperium is intent on razing those settlements, they can probably put fairly large pressure on the assembly, but no matter how many advantages the Imperium enjoys charging into urban terrain is going to be rather costly in terms of casualties; it's difficult to get numbers to bear in constricted terrain.

What do you think the casualties on the Siege of Kiel is going to be? The Northlands is probably going to lose its entire force by death, injury, or capture, which is about 400 men. But with Kiel being supplied by sea and possessing a number of brick structures that are rather difficult to knock down, you are going to have to assault the city at some point unless you want to spend months knocking down brick houses with ballista fire. I'm thinking 150 or so Imperial total to the 400 Norse total, with 1/3 of that (on both sides) being during the skirmishing between Norse archers and Imperial artillery, 100 a side during the charge, and the rest of the Norse casualties killed or captured after the resistance breaks.

[G-Tech Corporation]

You know, all this discussion of the future Irish-Norse war reminds me, what are the Imperium's raiding policies like? I figure that's a pertinent question to ask, since you'll be using it on the South Jylland settlements. What I said in the above post about storming cities applies to the Imperium as well. If the Imperium is intent on razing those settlements, they can probably put fairly large pressure on the assembly, but no matter how many advantages the Imperium enjoys charging into urban terrain is going to be rather costly in terms of casualties; it's difficult to get numbers to bear in constricted terrain.

What do you think the casualties on the Siege of Kiel is going to be? The Northlands is probably going to lose its entire force by death, injury, or capture, which is about 400 men. But with Kiel being supplied by sea and possessing a number of brick structures that are rather difficult to knock down, you are going to have to assault the city at some point unless you want to spend months knocking down brick houses with ballista fire. I'm thinking 150 or so Imperial total to the 400 Norse total, with 1/3 of that (on both sides) being during the skirmishing between Norse archers and Imperial artillery, 100 a side during the charge, and the rest of the Norse casualties killed or captured after the resistance breaks.

As a rule of thumb, raiding is disavowed, since it causes more geopolitical problems than it solves. Federal forces won't engage in it, though the Norse war is a larger precedent-less issue.

That said, looting and the like is physically impossible to prevent across the various warbands and the like nominally Imperium-aligned polities on the fringe might engage in against external foes, though highly discouraged. It would be prosecuted for the related activities (rape, murder, etc.) if anyone with standing brought the case to an Arbiter, but functionally most of the folks who might be capable of providing evidence an Arbiter would accept won't have any idea such a case could be brought, if that makes sense.

In the Northlands we are, as I said, working on a precedent-less scale. The Imperium has never faced a polity larger than a kinship group of some hundreds, and so the concept of raiding as a method of forcing political compliance will be a theoretical one with unfortunate practical connotations.

Razing will certainly be the operant method of forcing terrain denial. Fire, in buildings which are still mostly wood and thatch, is a powerful tool for destroying permanent settlements. Even settlements like Kiel, which have been integrated for a year or three, will still likely be majority-wood, and even brick buildings will have structural components vulnerable to fire. Forcing a population to surrender to military force, burning down their settlement, and driving the civilians northward will be the general principle.

I'm not sure if you're on the same page as what would be in place when you speak of urban terrain casualties. Even a settlement of hundreds might only have thirty buildings in this period, with extended families preferring to live in a single dwelling due to the time-costs of construction, and Kiel isn't likely to be larger in peacetime than a hundred souls or so.

If you're planning to resupply by sea, and have anything like the centralized logistics for that (which seems... dodgy, at least in a true siege situation), ships are amply vulnerable to incendiaries. The Imperium will have no qualms about setting up warmachines interdicting the ~200 m channel into Kiel itself and burning supply vessels rather than actually engaging in man to man combat. The same is true of the village itself. An intermittent bombardment to reduce most of Kiel to ash, and particularly destroy vulnerable supplies, will probably see Kiel's defenders forced to sally or flee via said interdicted channel within a fortnight.

I can't say Cerrus has any motivation to assault the city itself. Even though I doubt a small village like we are talking about will give any notable urban warfare effects favorable to a defender. The Imperium's policy toward casualties has been clear, and I can't really change it now, even if a shock assault might be advantageous - they're uninterested in dying in order to kill their enemies, preferring instead more languid methods of destruction.

Of course, that puts Rikardus in a bit of a bind. A frontal assault toward the Imperium once standing in Kiel becomes unviable will certainly cause more casualties in his foes than trying to flee by sea, but it will see the end of his National Guard as a fighting force and greatly contribute to Northern war weariness. Fleeing by sea is similarly fraught with danger, but might see at least a few ships slip away with minimal casualties, ready to carry on the fight.

[Alaroma]

God conversations like this remind me what a clusterfuck Europe is. Speaking of, what’s going on in Egypt?

[Plzen]

Razing will certainly be the operant method of forcing terrain denial. Fire, in buildings which are still mostly wood and thatch, is a powerful tool for destroying permanent settlements. Even settlements like Kiel, which have been integrated for a year or three, will still likely be majority-wood, and even brick buildings will have structural components vulnerable to fire. Forcing a population to surrender to military force, burning down their settlement, and driving the civilians northward will be the general principle.

It's very unlikely that your forces will be let into the settlement unless you force your way in. From the perspective of the people who live there, what keeps you from killing everyone once you're already spread out through the town?

But burning wood and thatch structures via ranged attacks, that sounds quite viable as a method of raiding. I assume this will also include torching farmland.

I'm not sure if you're on the same page as what would be in place when you speak of urban terrain casualties. Even a settlement of hundreds might only have thirty buildings in this period, with extended families preferring to live in a single dwelling due to the time-costs of construction, and Kiel isn't likely to be larger in peacetime than a hundred souls or so.

Closer to 200 than 100. It might not be urban terrain by the standards of, oh, the Second World War, but even with just a score of buildings it's developed enough that any charge would be broken up into many smaller fights in and between buildings, not one open battle of eight hundreds against four in a plaza large enough to accommodate 1,200 men. Simply put, you can't force 800 men into the city and have that number bear down in any meaningful way. It would be hard to have more than 100 or 200 people on each side on the front lines at any given point.

If you're planning to resupply by sea, and have anything like the centralized logistics for that (which seems... dodgy, at least in a true siege situation), ships are amply vulnerable to incendiaries. The Imperium will have no qualms about setting up warmachines interdicting the ~200 m channel into Kiel itself and burning supply vessels rather than actually engaging in man to man combat. The same is true of the village itself. An intermittent bombardment to reduce most of Kiel to ash, and particularly destroy vulnerable supplies, will probably see Kiel's defenders forced to sally or flee via said interdicted channel within a fortnight.

The oldest signatories in this region would have been part of the Commonwealth for 6~7 years now (fuzzy borders, remember? ), so there's brick buildings enough to stash food and ammunition in. As I said, an army in this period really only needs its stomach full and bows loaded. Burning down most of the town would present some rather obvious overcrowding problems, though, which does bring up disease as a major killer in a siege.

It'll take well over a fortnight for the defenders to run out of supplies, though, even without resupply. The National Guard and the raiding band would be used to carrying around weeks of supplies, although given the time of year the town itself might be fairly impoverished.

I can't say Cerrus has any motivation to assault the city itself. Even though I doubt a small village like we are talking about will give any notable urban warfare effects favorable to a defender. The Imperium's policy toward casualties has been clear, and I can't really change it now, even if a shock assault might be advantageous - they're uninterested in dying in order to kill their enemies, preferring instead more languid methods of destruction.

Then you're looking at a long siege, really. A couple months, maybe.

Of course, that puts Rikardus in a bit of a bind. A frontal assault toward the Imperium once standing in Kiel becomes unviable will certainly cause more casualties in his foes than trying to flee by sea, but it will see the end of his National Guard as a fighting force and greatly contribute to Northern war weariness. Fleeing by sea is similarly fraught with danger, but might see at least a few ships slip away with minimal casualties, ready to carry on the fight.

Rikardus will probably conditional-surrender his force, in all honesty, if there is an understanding that they'll be returned unharmed at the conclusion of hostilities. An escape by sea only makes sense if there's a reasonable expectation that they'll be at least partially successful which, if you've been sinking resupply vessels left and right, there won't be.

[Ralnis]

God conversations like this remind me what a clusterfuck Europe is. Speaking of, what’s going on in Egypt?

I have them about to march on Axum to destroy the Christian menace

Just joking.

[ImperialRussia]

Quest is another cluster war again

[Hanafuridake]

[Plzen]

(Image)

You mean, Rikardus after the Commonwealth-Imperium war?

After all, it's going to be the side that lost the war that burns up in revanchist fury, not the winners.

[G-Tech Corporation]

It's very unlikely that your forces will be let into the settlement unless you force your way in. From the perspective of the people who live there, what keeps you from killing everyone once you're already spread out through the town?

But burning wood and thatch structures via ranged attacks, that sounds quite viable as a method of raiding. I assume this will also include torching farmland.

Oh, I don't mean let in as in, peacefully accommodated. More along the lines of, if a few hundred soldiers show up and you have a solid dozen men with spears, and those hundreds offer to allow you to surrender, some folks will take that. Then the signatories will be allowed to gather their personal possessions and flee north while the village behind is destroyed.

In more dangerous circumstances where people have the means to resist, yes, exactly that - dragoons with incendiaries can fire fields and outlying structures with minimal risk, while making those settlements unviable to sustain.

Closer to 200 than 100. It might not be urban terrain by the standards of, oh, the Second World War, but even with just a score of buildings it's developed enough that any charge would be broken up into many smaller fights in and between buildings, not one open battle of eight hundreds against four in a plaza large enough to accommodate 1,200 men. Simply put, you can't force 800 men into the city and have that number bear down in any meaningful way. It would be hard to have more than 100 or 200 people on each side on the front lines at any given point.

You're talking about a charge, but the Imperium doesn't really do that. At any rate, its worth considering that any operations into the city itself will only follow after the settlement has effectively been reduced to rubble. That really shouldn't take too long - a few days at most. And then we're looking more at Imperial forces advancing to a range where their repeaters can be employed optimally to butcher any remaining opposition. Rikardus will probably want to be busy surrendering before that, because things are going to be looking very grim.

The oldest signatories in this region would have been part of the Commonwealth for 6~7 years now (fuzzy borders, remember? ), so there's brick buildings enough to stash food and ammunition in. As I said, an army in this period really only needs its stomach full and bows loaded. Burning down most of the town would present some rather obvious overcrowding problems, though, which does bring up disease as a major killer in a siege.

It'll take well over a fortnight for the defenders to run out of supplies, though, even without resupply. The National Guard and the raiding band would be used to carrying around weeks of supplies, although given the time of year the town itself might be fairly impoverished.

A settlement without the wherewithal to construct a palisade to defend itself has constructed enough brick buildings to house supplies for hundreds of men? That... seems quite unlikely.

Even setting that aside though, I doubt Kiel's buildings are constructed entirely of brick, floors, ceilings, walls, and.. doors? Shingle roofs would be prohibitively expensive this far from the center of the Northlands, so we're talking thatch. And thatch burns a right trick. As do support beams which most brick buildings would have of any size. Certainly brick walls will give time to save more supplies, but there at any rate, a village reduced to a few brick skeletons is not a village capable of being meaningfully defended or lived within for an extensive period of time. That's a minor quibble though.

Then you're looking at a long siege, really. A couple months, maybe.

Eh, I doubt it will take that long. If the only thing that was happening was starving out the National Guard, perhaps, but the bombardment will be more extensive than that. The heavy flechettes the Imperium's warmachines use will be causing casualties daily even with a desultory assault, and likely fatalities given the status of Nordic medical science (which I'm not aware of having been advanced beyond things like epidemic control?). Two weeks of a half dozen casualties a day, more when skirmishers are pushed forward, and the National Guard won't exist as a fighting force.

Rikardus will probably conditional-surrender his force, in all honesty, if there is an understanding that they'll be returned unharmed at the conclusion of hostilities. An escape by sea only makes sense if there's a reasonable expectation that they'll be at least partially successful which, if you've been sinking resupply vessels left and right, there won't be.

Probably wise. There will be a bit of an opportunity there in that the Imperium generally ransoms prisoners, even in ongoing conflicts... though that will be a dangerous choice for many members of the National Guard, due to the oaths sworn for ransoming.

[Alaroma]

God conversations like this remind me what a clusterfuck Europe is. Speaking of, what’s going on in Egypt?

I have them about to march on Axum to destroy the Christian menace

Just joking.

Bruh.

But seriously what’s going on down there.

[Joohan]

Borts... wasnt dublin like, only 200 people just 5 years ago?

Where did these 800 more people come from?

[Joohan]

(Image)

You mean, Rikardus after the Commonwealth-Imperium war?

After all, it's going to be the side that lost the war that burns up in revanchist fury, not the winners.

Italy did win the great war though....

[G-Tech Corporation]

You mean, Rikardus after the Commonwealth-Imperium war?

After all, it's going to be the side that lost the war that burns up in revanchist fury, not the winners.

Italy did win the great war though....

Clearly they want proper territorial concessions.

[Plzen]

A settlement without the wherewithal to construct a palisade to defend itself has constructed enough brick buildings to house supplies for hundreds of men? That... seems quite unlikely.

400 people would go through about a third a cubic metre of wheat a day. Crops being not as nutritious in the neolithic as it was in the industrial era, call it maybe 30~40 cubic metres for the entire venture. A communal house that size would be maybe 20 metres of brick wall plus ceiling. Putting a city wall around Kiel would be rather considerably more than 20 metres of brick wall.

Even setting that aside though, I doubt Kiel's buildings are constructed entirely of brick, floors, ceilings, walls, and.. doors? Shingle roofs would be prohibitively expensive this far from the center of the Northlands, so we're talking thatch. And thatch burns a right trick. As do support beams which most brick buildings would have of any size. Certainly brick walls will give time to save more supplies, but there at any rate, a village reduced to a few brick skeletons is not a village capable of being meaningfully defended or lived within for an extensive period of time. That's a minor quibble though.

Kiel is half a week's sail from Roskilde. It's really not "far from the centre of the Northlands." Roskilde-Sigtuna is double that distance and Roskilde-Bergen three times as long. Most buildings aren't brick construction, but the ones that are don't have thatched roofs.

Eh, I doubt it will take that long. If the only thing that was happening was starving out the National Guard, perhaps, but the bombardment will be more extensive than that. The heavy flechettes the Imperium's warmachines use will be causing casualties daily even with a desultory assault, and likely fatalities [...] Two weeks of a half dozen casualties a day, more when skirmishers are pushed forward, and the National Guard won't exist as a fighting force.

It'll only be people in the open who are caught in those, though. Half a dozen casualties a day sounds like a rather large estimate. For anyone except skirmishers there's little reason to spend long lengths of time outside of cover, wherever that's available.

given the status of Nordic medical science (which I'm not aware of having been advanced beyond things like epidemic control?).

That and sanitation, pretty much. Cleanliness keeps disease away. Certainly the ratios of deaths to nonfatal injuries would lean much heavier towards deaths than it has been in 20th Century conflicts.

[Hanafuridake]

(Image)

You mean, Rikardus after the Commonwealth-Imperium war?

After all, it's going to be the side that lost the war that burns up in revanchist fury, not the winners.

I think the footage was taken after the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, which Mussolini won. Hence why it applies more to Viktor.

Also we know that Mussolini is the only one who can compete with him in ego.

[Alaroma]

You mean, Rikardus after the Commonwealth-Imperium war?

After all, it's going to be the side that lost the war that burns up in revanchist fury, not the winners.

I think the footage was taken after the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, which Mussolini won. Hence why it applies more to Viktor.

Also we know that Mussolini is the only one who can compete with him in ego.

Takes out a not! Gladius

Any Italians trying to get frisky are gonna get skewered.

[G-Tech Corporation]

400 people would go through about a third a cubic metre of wheat a day. Crops being not as nutritious in the neolithic as it was in the industrial era, call it maybe 30~40 cubic metres for the entire venture. A communal house that size would be maybe 20 metres of brick wall plus ceiling. Putting a city wall around Kiel would be rather considerably more than 20 metres of brick wall.

Oh yes - I didn't mean to imply that building three brick houses was equivalent to a palisade around the entire village. But you're not merely storing food in there. You're hiding men in there, storing supplies in there, keeping civilians safe in there. Even if we're being generous and saying, oh, a quarter of Kiel's buildings are made of brick, shipped from Roskilde or wherever brickmaking is occurring in the Northlands, that's really not a viable strategy for protecting the town. Shingle roofs burn under incendiaries just like thatch, if slightly less merrily, and fighting fires will expose men to far more lethal odds than simple starvation.

Kiel is half a week's sail from Roskilde. It's really not "far from the centre of the Northlands." Roskilde-Sigtuna is double that distance and Roskilde-Bergen three times as long. Most buildings aren't brick construction, but the ones that are don't have thatched roofs.

Fine, fine. Even if we concede the point of this settlement, never before mentioned, containing brick buildings and non-thatched roofs, the vast part of the village is ample tinder. Fighting in an urban setting becomes much less of an issue if that urban setting is a half dozen dispersed buildings surrounded by so much ash and charred wood.

It'll only be people in the open who are caught in those, though. Half a dozen casualties a day sounds like a rather large estimate. For anyone except skirmishers there's little reason to spend long lengths of time outside of cover, wherever that's available.

I actually considered that very generous. Men fighting fires, trying to pull supplies off of ships down by the shore, sentries watching out for advancing Imperial forces, whatever guard is drawn up to ward against an assault, etc. are likely to number in the dozens of relatively easy targets. An arbalest can reach and punch through even full iron chainmail to a depth of ten inches at two hundred yards, and a puncture wound that deep anywhere is probably going to kill in this era.

Take this scenario, for instance - an Imperial ballista lands an incendiary on the roof of a building where soldiers are sheltering. Outside of heavy rain, even treated shingles will catch within a minute. They either burn to death inside, or do the logical thing and disperse outside to fight the fire and seek shelter elsewhere. If, say, three dozen men are stuffed into one of these buildings, they're all simple targets for skirmishers who have found range on the dwelling. That'll find your six casualties in one day easily, if one ballista lands one shot on one building.

That and sanitation, pretty much. Cleanliness keeps disease away. Certainly the ratios of deaths to nonfatal injuries would lean much heavier towards deaths than it has been in 20th Century conflicts.

Ah, fair. And I suppose they don't have much in the way of battlefield medicine, this being the first serious conflict. In that case, men cooped up inside avoiding the siege are an amazing transmission vector for normal battlefield diseases. Especially if, as has been seen in a great variety of sieges, they aren't likely to follow good sanitation practices if those practices result in them getting shot.

At any rate, I don't need to belabor the point. I know you don't enjoy these conversations when they get down into the weeds. My basic conclusion is that I don't think a prolonged siege to starvation will be necessary, given what Kiel is composed of, and the Imperium's ability to inflict casualties on the defenders at an outsize rate.

Edit: Puncture woods aren't a thing.

[Hanafuridake]

Grace's solution to the issue of religious unrest which plagues Japan right now is going to be modeled on the 十住心 (jū-jūshin) which organized the various religions of 9th century East Asia into a graded system ranking from hedonism to absolute truth. At this point she's gotten tired of using religion as a basis for rule and is settling on a more subordinate position for it. Monks and monasteries will receive a degree of autonomy but are expected to have no say in government (how successful this turns out will take time).

The Jātaka tales are going to be useful because they're stories about Shaka's past lives as gods, humans, and animals. These Aesop fables could be reworked to accommodate the animist worship of the Jōmon people by claiming that the various animal spirits and deities they worship were past lives of the Buddha. Which is similar to the honji suijaku system where Buddhas and bodhisattva were believed to incarnate as native gods to deliver people from suffering.

[Plzen]

Fine, fine. Even if we concede the point of this settlement, never before mentioned,

You can't possibly expect me to mention IC'ly each one of the hundreds of settlements in the Northlands, nor can you possibly expect me to list every significant innovation or material progress developed or pushed forwards by Clara. I'm going to assume that the nation progresses year after year even if I don't write IC posts detailing what is getting done where.

Politics interests me more than writing fifty IC posts about incremental technological improvements, so I'm going to write politics in some detail and mention only those technological innovations I find most significant.

At any rate, I don't need to belabor the point. I know you don't enjoy these conversations. My basic conclusion is that I don't think a prolonged siege to starvation will be necessary, given what Kiel is composed of, and the Imperium's ability to inflict casualties on the defenders at an outsize rate.

Fine. I concede the point. I really am starting to understand Ralnis' perspective on this RP, I must say.

[Joohan]

Fine, fine. Even if we concede the point of this settlement, never before mentioned,

You can't possibly expect me to mention IC'ly each one of the hundreds of settlements in the Northlands, nor can you possibly expect me to list every significant innovation or material progress developed or pushed forwards by Clara. I'm going to assume that the nation progresses year after year even if I don't write IC posts detailing what is getting done where.

Politics interests me more than writing fifty IC posts about incremental technological improvements, so I'm going to write politics in some detail and mention only those technological innovations I find most significant.

At any rate, I don't need to belabor the point. I know you don't enjoy these conversations. My basic conclusion is that I don't think a prolonged siege to starvation will be necessary, given what Kiel is composed of, and the Imperium's ability to inflict casualties on the defenders at an outsize rate.

Fine. I concede the point. I really am starting to understand Ralnis' perspective on this RP, I must say.

Hey... when we meet, its gonna be ideological and cultural clashes galore. And I'm not nearly as pretentious.

Cheer up kiddo