New Civilizations III ( OOC, Always Open )

[Northern Socialist Council Republics]

get your butt back in the game my dude

What would be the point? The strategic situation has not changed.

In any case, I have a different RP going on in a different site that’s eating up all my spare motivation at the moment, I’m afraid. Just... I’m just too tired to get back into the stress-inducing mess that is New Civs.

Much easier to snipe from the sidelines. ;)

[Orostan]

get your butt back in the game my dude

What would be the point? The strategic situation has not changed.

In any case, I have a different RP going on in a different site that’s eating up all my spare motivation at the moment, I’m afraid. Just... I’m just too tired to get back into the stress-inducing mess that is New Civs.

Much easier to snipe from the sidelines.

join as a new guy in south china

[G-Tech Corporation]

Oh dear. You should probably turn this event over to me for resolution Joohan. Otherwise you’ve just doomed human urban civilization outside of the Imperium

[G-Tech Corporation]

There were two civil wars? 20 straight years of civil war? I'd probably want Ralnis to clear that up, at least on my end. But 1,000 deaths per year, ( or ebbing tides, given the need to regroup and conduct new campaigns ) I don't think 10,000 dead in 10 years to be undercutting the whole affair. The Sumerian's martial ability on land hasn't exactly much advanced since their author's arrival - nor has he contributed anything like revolutionary tactics or strategies as far as I'm aware.

Well, it is important to remember that Sumeria went from Ur to controlling all of Mesopotamia in the first war of unification, with fairly minimal tactical or strategic advances. That's something very few conquerors ever managed, and the only way I can guess Luther accomplished that aim was piling endless bodies against Sumerian city walls, to a degree never seen in our history. Especially given then conquest took less than ten years, and saw Ur go from... Ur... to all of Sumeria under her heel.

The second civil war was probably even worse, because though Ur was more advanced, so too were here enemies, and they were united. Ur's fleet, with the lion's share of her military investment and a large portion of her soldiery, was sunk (the infamous bronze-clad galley fleet). Then Uruk and many of her subjugated cities rose up against her, wielding weapons and tactics they got from Ur, and probably themselves advanced for the first few years of the war while Ur rebuilt her military. There was a need to crush internal revolts of men seeking to restore the Annunaki, and pacify those cities which supported Uruk. Then years of bloody reaving across the north from Nestos and her mercenary bands until Uruk was weak enough to siege and reduce via assault, alongside her fortress-allies...

Sounds like a lot of death.

I wouldn't imagine that the Imperium would sell steel to unsworn barbarian tribes - but like silk and porcelain from China, these things have a way of getting out regardless the dictates of the emperor. If an imperial citizen wanted to trade with his barbarian neighbor, there's hardly anything local authorities could do to effectively stop it. Then of course are the entrepreneuring men of the Imperium who would look to trade these goods under the table for black market profit. For how spaced out the Imperium is and how close their eager neighbors are, keeping steel out of their hands would be a feat in futility.

Oh sure, sure. I'm not saying steel won't get around. Its worth too much, after all. But the steelmaking process itself isn't something people who happen to have steel axe or steel plow can exactly pass on.

And like your recent post highlighted, there is often a blood relation between those living outside and within the Imperium. Familial bond, economic incentive, relatively few ways of prevention, prevalence, and little to no cost of risk would make knowledge diffusion inevitable. High end expensive manufacturing would be still well and out of their hands or means - but low end cost effective iron forging would be something absolutely within their means of achieving given a decade or more.

For sure, for sure. It isn't hard to take an iron axe, melt it down, and cast it into a sword. If you can build a hot enough fire, of course. But without technical knowledge of ferrous metallurgy, you're making a weapon that is objectively inferior to something made out of bronze, or even arsenic copper. Managing the phase changes in an iron blade is absolutely crucial if you want something useful, and that's technical knowledge which won't even make sense to most Neolithic folks, let alone be replicated.

[G-Tech Corporation]

I would imagine the Aegean and the other parts would not have been hit as hard. Islands are much easier to quarantine. A considerable amount of the Nestos League has expanded into places like Lemnos, Thassos, Cyprus, Santorini, pieces of Crete, places like Troa and similar places. The act of not letting boats land on islands allows a more natural control of the Red Plague. Basically, islands can shut themselves down and block out people coming in. Cyrene and Troa are also considerably farther away than the center of the League. One of the reasons that Victor Spear is in the islands, is that they are not as damaged. They will be necessary to rebuild once the plague is done. I imagine some of the islands like Heliopolis would just completely shut down and not let anyone in.

Well, not really. Prior to the modern era, being on an island during the time of plague is quite rough. We get by now because we can communicate without personal contact, tell people they need to quarantine weeks before the need approaches their isolated living places. In antiquity plague arrives along with the need itself, and so still infects islands. And islands don't have places you can run to, wilderness areas where you can live away from people and so survive. Their compact urban centers were charnel houses during the Black Death and other pre-modern epidemics...

It is not perfect, I am not a doctor. At this point, they would have reached Salt, Varna, Abdera, Oak, Sand, and some of the coastal settlements, possibly even the border of the Imperium. Varna, Salt, and some of the cities on the Black Sea would be vigilant about people at the border. Mainly this area.

Yeaahhhhh that might be the issue. The trouble is, even with a fearsomely effective quarantine put up inhumanly quickly for a Neolithic society, the Red Plague still kills the League.

You started mentioning quarantine four months after the Plague began. If the Red Plague has an r-value near that of smallpox, it would have already infected effectively the entirety of the League before then. A rough guesstimate would be 130,000 total infected, with a fifth of the infected dying every eight days. Those are societal collapse figures, and even if let's say this quarantine brought in in month 4 is 75% effective, you're still not pulling the r-value down below replication.

The League gets entirely infected, and entirely reinfected every time the plague comes back through. Before month 4, ~35% of the population is dead.

[UniversalCommons]

I would imagine the Aegean and the other parts would not have been hit as hard. Islands are much easier to quarantine. A considerable amount of the Nestos League has expanded into places like Lemnos, Thassos, Cyprus, Santorini, pieces of Crete, places like Troa and similar places. The act of not letting boats land on islands allows a more natural control of the Red Plague. Basically, islands can shut themselves down and block out people coming in. Cyrene and Troa are also considerably farther away than the center of the League. One of the reasons that Victor Spear is in the islands, is that they are not as damaged. They will be necessary to rebuild once the plague is done. I imagine some of the islands like Heliopolis would just completely shut down and not let anyone in.

Well, not really. Prior to the modern era, being on an island during the time of plague is quite rough. We get by now because we can communicate without personal contact, tell people they need to quarantine weeks before the need approaches their isolated living places. In antiquity plague arrives along with the need itself, and so still infects islands. And islands don't have places you can run to, wilderness areas where you can live away from people and so survive. Their compact urban centers were charnel houses during the Black Death and other pre-modern epidemics...

It is not perfect, I am not a doctor. At this point, they would have reached Salt, Varna, Abdera, Oak, Sand, and some of the coastal settlements, possibly even the border of the Imperium. Varna, Salt, and some of the cities on the Black Sea would be vigilant about people at the border. Mainly this area.

Yeaahhhhh that might be the issue. The trouble is, even with a fearsomely effective quarantine put up inhumanly quickly for a Neolithic society, the Red Plague still kills the League.

You started mentioning quarantine four months after the Plague began. If the Red Plague has an r-value near that of smallpox, it would have already infected effectively the entirety of the League before then. A rough guesstimate would be 130,000 total infected, with a fifth of the infected dying every eight days. Those are societal collapse figures, and even if let's say this quarantine brought in in month 4 is 75% effective, you're still not pulling the r-value down below replication.

Quarantine is an official reaction.
1) The first thing that happens is that the doctor has to identify the disease.-- Round 1 everyone gets it.
2) Then they have to attempt to cure it. Round 2 everyone gets it.--

So everyone probably gets the disease at least twice everywhere including the Imperium. It is not a recognized disease except for in Ur. Everyone dies including the Imperium.

In the Antonine Plague, 1/3 of the population died and Roman Society did not collapse. In the plague of Athens 25% of the population died.

What determines survival in the first two rounds is the wisdom of the crowd and the doctors.

1) The physician separates the patients in their own section.-- This would follow the protocols which happened during the pigeon plague. So the sick are in the hospitals initially. Most of the people in the hospitals die in the first week. People stay away from the hospitals they are afraid. Every hospital everywhere becomes a charnel house including the Imperium. Concentrated death-- people stay away from hospitals. The Temple of the Body Parts starts out as a morgue. (Death in the place of healing-- The charnel house of the Temple of the Body Parts.). (Partial containment)

2) The physician states not the government according to Egyptian and Mesopotamian go to the open spaces. Up to 50% of survival with Nonpharmaceutical intervention is staying away from other people. You must flee the cities to the places where there are less people and the air is pure. (Fleeing to the countryside and the open spaces). Massive move away from the city. This is actually part of both Egyptian and Vedic Medicine. The sick should not go to the healthy cities.

3) We are terrified and we must keep clean and healthy. People look for anything they can that will keep them alive. Soap, medicine, etc. This means there is a little bit more survival.

4) There is no description of how long the virus survives outside humans.

5) I can also say that we have soap and we also have a previous plague to refer to, so people are aware of the plague on some level.

A large portion of the population might not get it because 1) They run away to the countryside or are terrified of people and stay away. 2) They try and stay healthy with various religious, herbal, and purifying actions. 3) A lot of the initial sickness might be in contained in the hospitals. Contagion is a known concept in ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt. It is not a modern concept. It is more about angels and devils.


This is the classic problem of the government and the people. Before the quarantine is put into effect, a lot of the people flee to wide open spaces and are afraid to gather. They go to the temple and the temple says move away go to the open spaces, do not gather. This is where 50% of survival occurs in a plague-- social distance and moving away from dangerous spaces. This is the reason why people might survive the initial plague.



This is the actual message from Vedic medicine, do not gather, keep your distance, no public spaces. If you read about Mesopotamian places, it starts with keep the sick separate, do not let the sick into healthy cities.

[G-Tech Corporation]

So everyone probably gets the disease at least twice everywhere including the Imperium.

Ah, but you see - there's a silver bullet.

I won't tell you what it is. But it does exist. Dacia in the Imperium? Yeah, they're in a rough place. Deaths will only start dropping off once variolation takes hold. But there are very good reasons the disease only barely made it to Serbia, and no further yet. That would be telling.

[Orostan]

Telegram I sent to Joohan and G-Tech about population stuff and in general what I think the problems for authors would be in this RP:

this is very long and i have included a TL;DR at the bottom.

--


Hello,

I'm finishing up on my next post and I want to do a census after that and to do that I need to know exactly what China's population could be. To me it seems like the world population, at least according to what wikipedia is citing, is around 45 million people. Wikipedia's page on historical Chinese censuses also usually puts China at a quarter or more of the world's population at any given time. However, given that I don't control all of China but do control the most densely populated bits of it I think it's fair to say that I might have 60% of a quarter of the world's population, which comes out to 6.75 million people. If this is too much or you believe that China was not as densely populated as this yet I think that 4-5 million people would still be a very reasonable population considering the time period.

The thought that at this point i control the better part of two river valleys and only have 100,000 people seems strange to me - and even stranger that this should put me at #3 or something in population. The Imperium should likewise have a similar or larger number of people in it as it controls an incredible amount of river territory. The issue for both China and the Imperium would be social organization and travel. Where the Imperium has significant geographical boundaries to expansion that isn't on rivers, China has no such boundaries but is also basically contained and limited in size by practical concerns. The greatest issue for our authors should not be gathering enough people for something, but getting enough bureaucrats and trained specialists together to do anything. China can put a hundred thousand men to work mining iron, but it requires planning and organization to distribute that iron and maintain a society that can manage such an economic system. I think I've implied enough times that basically anyone who can read in China has a fast track to social advancement because bureaucrats are in high demand.

Essentially, I am arguing that the focus on population actually harms the RP and that the focus should not be on economic output or sheer size but on the ability to effectively organize that place and produce relatively advanced goods. A place like my China where a relatively small part of the population that is very disproportionately urban can read is a place where the state has very limited power to enforce rules that aren't very basic and don't satisfy immediate economic or political considerations. I can't ban dumb shit I don't like because I have no ability to enforce laws and have difficulty enforcing things as is. Largeness doesn't equal strength this way and is only associated with it this way, not directly correlated.

Basically, I am asking if we can change the discussion in a lot of the RP from talk about how many people authors have to what ability authors have to organize those people. In my next few posts after the big war post is done I want to go over how China is doing this, even if you don't want to make this "policy". For example, I plan to:

-reform the political system to reduce the number of provinces and centralize the state further so that I can reduce the work load on administrators and increase oversight of their actions. This also allows them to be more easily replaced if they become corrupt.

-reform the system of military recruitment to be more similar to a professional military. Rather than peasant soldiers picking up spears when the government calls upon their village to contribute manpower to their defense, they'd enlist mostly voluntarily for a few years or so and be incentivized to do so by the military providing a basic education and routes for social advancement. For example, a soldier could become involved with logistics and then administration or go into engineering and receive an education from the military for both of those things, which are both of immense social value and immediate military value.

-Reform the legal system to make applying the law simpler. Rather than provincial judges being forced to interpret laws originally written in a language that may differ from theirs law would be clear and outline clear punishments for crime as well as procedures. The central government would no longer be so involved with law at the local level, but instead have the most literate and qualified people overseeing the multitude of less literate and less qualified provincial justice officials.

-Reform the system of economic planning to make the Ministry of the Public Stock more centralized. Rather than simply setting production quotas or deciding in what way to distribute resources, the MPS would give clear instructions on how things are to be done and why and the provincial and city branches would have far less independence in how they run themselves. It makes no sense that a ministry branch in the city of Ji might choose to stockpile more rice and grain than a ministry branch in the city of Kuaiji, instead stockpile requirements would be set centrally and local branches would make far fewer decisions on how they use their resources. They'd follow a far more centralized plan that allows far larger building and construction efforts.

-Change the system of provincial councils from what is basically a very urban centered confederation of what we might today call labor unions into an actual government where rural populations are far more able to voice concerns and be represented. Villages no longer are being dealt with as basically foreigners to be traded with, they are being dealt with as parts of society and must similarly have some input into the society they comprise an important part of. Previously villages basically used provincial councils as complaint offices, now they will be used as actual governments for villages with the addition of satellite councils of villages around the provincial council and with their own permanent representation on said provincial council. This is basically a check against Luoyang deciding things that may cause villages to revolt. Most civil conflict is based on differing economic interests from the urban or town population and the villages - this is a way to make sure the government takes into account village interests more frequently rather than simply using village complaints to provincial assemblies as warnings of when the villages will revolt. It requires the government, especially local officials, actually take rural populations seriously.

I hope what I'm trying to say and suggest comes through clearly here, sorry about how long it is.

TL;DR - This discussion about population numbers is pointless, all author states have basically infinite people and "not enough people" should not be an issue for most people in fertile areas. Issues in the RP should revolve more about how effectively authors are able to organize society rather than if there are enough people to organize. People to hold spears or who can learn to read are not in short supply, but people who can teach them how to hold a spear or can teach them to read are.

[G-Tech Corporation]

Sounds exactly like my concerns about your number of smiths to arm the Chinese military that you dismissed

[UniversalCommons]

So everyone probably gets the disease at least twice everywhere including the Imperium.

Ah, but you see - there's a silver bullet.

I won't tell you what it is. But it does exist. Dacia in the Imperium? Yeah, they're in a rough place. Deaths will only start dropping off once variolation takes hold. But there are very good reasons the disease only barely made it to Serbia, and no further yet. That would be telling.

I seriously doubt that there is a silver bullet for a disease like you are describing in terms of quarantine. There are other ways it can get to the Imperium. Through Cucuteni lands, along the Danube, and other ways. There are also ships in the Aegean from the Imperium from what I am reading. There are points with the Single Market. Having a few chokepoints won't stop this disease. A chokepoint could easily be overrun with this disease even with protective clothing. I don't think it would have been recognized on the Danube until it spread down the river. Cold won't stop it.

Also how quickly could you identify this disease? That is the question. One week, two weeks, a month. Then once it is identified put in place proper protective clothing. It requires full body coverage and the only thing I am reading about is cloth masks on sick people. There never has been mention of masks on live people or even gloves. The only mention seems to be heavy cloth clothing. Then create a way to stop the disease.

The soldiers who stopped people crossing the border would have very quickly been affected without protective gear.

Even with some knowledge of epidemics, it takes a while to identify new epidemics.

[Orostan]

Sounds exactly like my concerns about your number of smiths to arm the Chinese military that you dismissed

Honestly I think you're right about that the more I think about it, the only issue is that I think it's on a much larger scale than you suggested. Rather than being the difference between a hundred guys with iron halberds and a thousand, it would be the difference between ten thousand guys and fifty thousand guys. I'd have a more difficult time making enough tools for farmers than I would making enough weapons for soldiers. Farmers outnumber soldiers and would go through tools quicker.

[G-Tech Corporation]

A chokepoint could easily be overrun with this disease even with protective clothing. I don't think it would have been recognized on the Danube until it spread down the river.

Closer, closer, though not quite there. There's a critical element to resisting a novel disease like the Red Plague - something which must, if one seeks to prevent catastrophic infection, spread even faster than the contagion. And that is where the Imperium has an advantage no other civilization enjoys, to my knowledge. Though you're not far off - chokepoints are vital in any case.

Sounds exactly like my concerns about your number of smiths to arm the Chinese military that you dismissed

Honestly I think you're right about that the more I think about it, the only issue is that I think it's on a much larger scale than you suggested. Rather than being the difference between a hundred guys with iron halberds and a thousand, it would be the difference between ten thousand guys and fifty thousand guys. I'd have a more difficult time making enough tools for farmers than I would making enough weapons for soldiers. Farmers outnumber soldiers and would go through tools quicker.

Well, remember our discussion about training new smiths. Aaron is the only guy who has even a vague idea of smithing, and he's working from trial and error and first principles himself. Not to mention hilariously busy setting up his new state.

Say he trains three smiths, well and comprehensively, within the first two or three years. Each of these men trains another three apprentices every year, then moves on to working full time to churn out what the Yellow River State requires. In ten years, you're looking at perhaps a hundred really well trained smiths, and that's about it, since you're focusing on conquest and arming your people instead of the replication of knowledge.

You can upscale that significantly if, say, people train more than they smith. But then we aren't looking at this giant China in ten years of conquest.

[Orostan]

A chokepoint could easily be overrun with this disease even with protective clothing. I don't think it would have been recognized on the Danube until it spread down the river.

Closer, closer, though not quite there. There's a critical element to resisting a novel disease like the Red Plague - something which must, if one seeks to prevent catastrophic infection, spread even faster than the contagion. And that is where the Imperium has an advantage no other civilization enjoys, to my knowledge. Though you're not far off - chokepoints are vital in any case.

Honestly I think you're right about that the more I think about it, the only issue is that I think it's on a much larger scale than you suggested. Rather than being the difference between a hundred guys with iron halberds and a thousand, it would be the difference between ten thousand guys and fifty thousand guys. I'd have a more difficult time making enough tools for farmers than I would making enough weapons for soldiers. Farmers outnumber soldiers and would go through tools quicker.

Well, remember our discussion about training new smiths. Aaron is the only guy who has even a vague idea of smithing, and he's working from trial and error and first principles himself. Not to mention hilariously busy setting up his new state.

Say he trains three smiths, well and comprehensively, within the first two or three years. Each of these men trains another three apprentices every year, then moves on to working full time to churn out what the Yellow River State requires. In ten years, you're looking at perhaps a hundred really well trained smiths, and that's about it, since you're focusing on conquest and arming your people instead of the replication of knowledge.

You can upscale that significantly if, say, people train more than they smith. But then we aren't looking at this giant China in ten years of conquest.

Again, you are looking at this on too small a scale. So far almost all of the metal objects I have created are very simple. A halberd head has less metal mass than a sword and is simpler to make in reasonable enough quality to be effective. This is part of the reason why I'm making so many of them. One smith in our situation can educate maybe ten new smiths in a few weeks to be just good enough to meet quality standards. Skilled labor is an issue, of course, but not on that small of a scale. Maybe there are only a hundred very good smiths in China, but there are by now many just good enough smiths. This is especially the case because I have tried to make the process of making metal goods as simple as possible and kept the goods themselves simple too.

Shaping copper is common in China right now, and shaping bronze is just being discovered in many parts of it. You understate the scale of these societies.

[G-Tech Corporation]

Again, you are looking at this on too small a scale. So far almost all of the metal objects I have created are very simple. A halberd head has less metal mass than a sword and is simpler to make in reasonable enough quality to be effective. This is part of the reason why I'm making so many of them. One smith in our situation can educate maybe ten new smiths in a few weeks to be just good enough to meet quality standards. Skilled labor is an issue, of course, but not on that small of a scale. Maybe there are only a hundred very good smiths in China, but there are by now many just good enough smiths. This is especially the case because I have tried to make the process of making metal goods as simple as possible and kept the goods themselves simple too.

Shaping copper is common in China right now, and shaping bronze is just being discovered in many parts of it. You understate the scale of these societies.

Ah, I see. So you don't have any real smiths, but a lot of people who can cast iron, or beat it into something like the shape of a halberd. Fair enough. Sounds like a great way to get a lot of people killed with poor weapons, and waste immense amounts of iron, but I suppose if you're willing to conscript and use slaves to drag as much ore out of the pits as you can, that's not really an issue.

Definitely a good way to make sure you hold down China's population growth as much as possible though!

[Orostan]

Again, you are looking at this on too small a scale. So far almost all of the metal objects I have created are very simple. A halberd head has less metal mass than a sword and is simpler to make in reasonable enough quality to be effective. This is part of the reason why I'm making so many of them. One smith in our situation can educate maybe ten new smiths in a few weeks to be just good enough to meet quality standards. Skilled labor is an issue, of course, but not on that small of a scale. Maybe there are only a hundred very good smiths in China, but there are by now many just good enough smiths. This is especially the case because I have tried to make the process of making metal goods as simple as possible and kept the goods themselves simple too.

Shaping copper is common in China right now, and shaping bronze is just being discovered in many parts of it. You understate the scale of these societies.

Ah, I see. So you don't have any real smiths, but a lot of people who can cast iron, or beat it into something like the shape of a halberd. Fair enough. Sounds like a great way to get a lot of people killed with poor weapons, and waste immense amounts of iron, but I suppose if you're willing to conscript and use slaves to drag as much ore out of the pits as you can, that's not really an issue.

Definitely a good way to make sure you hold down China's population growth as much as possible though!

>nooooooo you need years to train people to shape metal into simple shapes how dare you do anything of interest at all for the next ten years
>please ignore my massive empire that would have problems a hundred times worse than anything happening in China

Those weapons aren't going to be so poor but I know they're not going to be the peak of quality either. Also, avoiding seasonal famines is a great way to boost population growth as is producing tools for use on farms. I think you are being overly pessimistic towards what I can do. If equal standards were applied to you, would have nothing.

[G-Tech Corporation]

>nooooooo you need years to train people to shape metal into simple shapes how dare you do anything of interest at all for the next ten years
>please ignore my massive empire that would have problems a hundred times worse than anything happening in China

Those weapons aren't going to be so poor but I know they're not going to be the peak of quality either. Also, avoiding seasonal famines is a great way to boost population growth as is producing tools for use on farms. I think you are being overly pessimistic towards what I can do. If equal standards were applied to you, would have nothing.

I wouldn't say that. Remember, the Imperium has had thrice as long to tool up as your China - and started from a more cogent base. Not to mention composing ~a quarter of the total land area.

[Joohan]

Oh dear. You should probably turn this event over to me for resolution Joohan. Otherwise you’ve just doomed human urban civilization outside of the Imperium

Oh, and what do you think has just occurred? I can assure you, that only the Imperium is affected by it.

[G-Tech Corporation]

Oh dear. You should probably turn this event over to me for resolution Joohan. Otherwise you’ve just doomed human urban civilization outside of the Imperium

Oh, and what do you think has just occurred? I can assure you, that only the Imperium is affected by it.

I have several theories.

Either that a variolation was contaminated, or that the Blessing has a new strain, or that the Red Plague has a new strain.

One is the most plausible, but won't effect anywhere near thousands.

Two is very bad for the world, since if this new strain can outcompete the old strain, 20% of Sumeria and Egypt dies.

Three is very bad for the world on an unprecedented scale, since without a strain to protect from the Plague, humanity dies by 20% per eight days eventually.

The other premise is that there were ineffective variolations, and so some people were exposed that thought they were safe. That I had intended to RP anyway, but I don't think lines up with your several years and thousands of deaths.

[Orostan]

>nooooooo you need years to train people to shape metal into simple shapes how dare you do anything of interest at all for the next ten years
>please ignore my massive empire that would have problems a hundred times worse than anything happening in China

Those weapons aren't going to be so poor but I know they're not going to be the peak of quality either. Also, avoiding seasonal famines is a great way to boost population growth as is producing tools for use on farms. I think you are being overly pessimistic towards what I can do. If equal standards were applied to you, would have nothing.

I wouldn't say that. Remember, the Imperium has had thrice as long to tool up as your China - and started from a more cogent base. Not to mention composing ~a quarter of the total land area.

Your geography is far less able to support a massive empire and even so you would still basically have nothing, certainly not enough skilled labor to support a massive empire if every smith that can make a simple halberd takes ten years to train.

Also, how did you have a "more cogent base"? I've got two of the most densely populated river valleys in the world. Only Mesopotamia or some other already established society would be "more cogent" than that.

[G-Tech Corporation]

@ Orostan:

Since we're comparing dick sizes.

Here's a map of the Imperium at year ten since Viktor landed.

Please prune China to an analogous area, actually a bit smaller since you're not expanding along rivers. Thanks!

[Joohan]

In regards to infectivity of the red plague, as I've said before - the max number of deaths possible can not exceed 20% total population. This, given total failure on part of any state to react to the plague. I can assure you, that given the actions undertaken by all parties, that no one is reaching such catastrophic proportions.

[G-Tech Corporation]

Your geography is far less able to support a massive empire and even so you would still basically have nothing, certainly not enough skilled labor to support a massive empire if every smith that can make a simple halberd takes ten years to train.

Personally I said a year, while you countered with weeks. I'm perfectly happy saying I could train someone to be a competent apprentice in ironworking within a year. Ten years would be wholly unnecessary.

Also, how did you have a "more cogent base"? I've got two of the most densely populated river valleys in the world. Only Mesopotamia or some other already established society would be "more cogent" than that.

Here I'm speaking about the matter of smithing - since your Author, Aaron, and you, don't work with iron on anything other than a theoretical basis. I, and thus my Author, spent five years on a materials science degree, focused in ferrous metallurgy, and prior to the pandemic did commission work in the field. I think one is more valuable than the other when it comes to the practical impacts. Unless you disagree?

[Orostan]

@ Orostan:

Since we're comparing dick sizes.

Here's a map of the Imperium at year ten since Viktor landed.

(Image)

Please prune China to an analogous area, actually a bit smaller since you're not expanding along rivers. Thanks!

This would be a good argument if China didn't have a much better geography for big empires. I don't need to expand strictly on rivers if I can actually walk to the places I want to go in basically a straight line. And besides that, I did offer to cut my territory down quite a bit to an area more comparable to that - but you and Joohan agreed that I didn't need to!

[G-Tech Corporation]

In regards to infectivity of the red plague, as I've said before - the max number of deaths possible can not exceed 20% total population. This, given total failure on part of any state to react to the plague. I can assure you, that given the actions undertaken by all parties, that no one is reaching such catastrophic proportions.

Hm. I'm not sure I follow. If the Red Plague kills even 1% of those it infects, and doesn't produce any immunity within the infected population, what prevents it from returning to claim more lives? The death rate in such circumstances isn't limited by any factor save time, and only increases over time.

I'd also generically note though that the bar for societal collapse is commonly stated as 5% casualties within the course of a year. 20% will absolutely destroy any given state.

[Orostan]

Your geography is far less able to support a massive empire and even so you would still basically have nothing, certainly not enough skilled labor to support a massive empire if every smith that can make a simple halberd takes ten years to train.

Personally I said a year, while you countered with weeks. I'm perfectly happy saying I could train someone to be a competent apprentice in ironworking within a year. Ten years would be wholly unnecessary.

Also, how did you have a "more cogent base"? I've got two of the most densely populated river valleys in the world. Only Mesopotamia or some other already established society would be "more cogent" than that.

Here I'm speaking about the matter of smithing - since your Author, Aaron, and you, don't work with iron on anything other than a theoretical basis. I, and thus my Author, spent five years on a materials science degree, focused in ferrous metallurgy, and prior to the pandemic did commission work in the field. I think one is more valuable than the other when it comes to the practical impacts. Unless you disagree?

Okay, but I don't need "competent" people I need good enough people.

Maybe instead of making assertions you could make arguments.