This Land Is Your Land: Let's Play Darkest Hour: Kaiserreich

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > This Land Is Your Land: Let's Play Darkest Hour: Kaiserreich

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Jaramin posted:

"Rome was't the world's greatest pre-modern empire! See, we had literally everything they had (we were even so kind to stop at Hadrian's Wall), plus all of Asia "

I don't think Rome even cracks the top 10 of greatest pre-modern empires, judging by either size or population.

# ¿ Mar 31, 2015 20:37

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 15:03

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Reveilled posted:

what about by size of post-fall fanbase? That catches everyone from Charles the Great to Edward Gibbon to fictional but archetypical Paradox Forums poster BasileusAdolphus88

Some of the Caliphates probably have quite a substantial fanbase too.

# ¿ Mar 31, 2015 21:00

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Jaramin posted:

Yeah, that's a fairly stupid metric to judge a state by. Cultures aren't remembered for the sheer number of people they ruled, but rather than the cultural and sociological novelties they left behind that persisted to the nations that followed them. Roman poo poo pervades western society so fully they you can't spit without running into one of their legal principles, descendant languages, alphabet, calender, etc. I'd argued their sole equal in that respect is Han China who essentially left behind a long-lasting legacy in the East like Rome did in the West.

The Mongols wrecked Russia so hard that it still has the effect of making them unreasonable assholes on the world stage, while the Middle East never even recovered. Plus Kaiserreich has the ability to remake the Mongol Empire, but not the Roman one, as far as I can tell? Clearly the Mongols are more important.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2015 07:25

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

paragon1 posted:

I think we can all agree that Trajan was, in fact, the Best Emperor.

Having never exercised power over his fellow man, beyond that which they voluntarily allowed him to, Emperor Norton is clearly the superior emperor.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2015 10:17

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Dibujante posted:

It's really hard to say. To make him the inheritor of Rome's legacy, he would have to adopt Rome's institutions to some extent. Did he? Or is successors? At that point, Rome was an ecclesiastically-endorsed semi-dynastic dictatorship, but not monarchy. Mehmed II most definitely intended to rule as a monarch, and the structure of the Ottoman Empire seems like it was strictly monarchical. That said, some of its power struggles seem fairly Roman (there's nothing the Romans excelled at more than power struggles), although rather than assassinating and overthrowing their leaders, the Ottomans would generally assassinate one and trot out someone else from the dynasty.

Of course, this distinction may simply have been a result of the fact that the Ottoman sultans often had lots of heirs and the Romans often had very few. Maybe there wasn't really an institutional difference.

Is the Fifth Republic still an inheritor of the legacy of France? Hell, perhaps a different government type might have allowed the Byzantines to hang on longer/until the present day, in which case I doubt we'd argue that they weren't the rightful successors to Rome simply because they changed how one came to rule the country.

As an aside, what is the difference between an "ecclesiastically-endorsed semi-dynastic dictatorship" and a monarchy? The name of the titles? It's not like monarchies don't come in many different forms.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2015 23:34

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Dibujante posted:

Yeah, that just seems like linguistic nationalism, which seems to fly in the face of socialist internationalism.

Socialist internationalism according to the French is them giving everyone else the opportunity to become proper Frenchmen. Seriously though, I don't find it entirely unlikely that French chauvinism would still be a thing in a supposedly socialist government. Especially Parisian chauvinism against colonial hicks. "It's not imperialism if you really are better than your subjects." - a French guy

I suppose it might be the more internationalist parts of the government throwing the less so a bone, since I doubt France is entirely uniform in political thought. Better to have them running around in Quebec, helping to put French language signs up, than have them have an actual say in the governance of France.

Dibujante posted:

Royal authority

Well, a lot of European monarchies sorta had the same deal going as the Romans for a while, which took their rulers time to break down until their heirs were automatically put on the throne. Obviously the Roman institutions make it at least superficially different, but the idea of a dynasty having a secure hold on a throne took some time to develop everywhere I think. The contrast between the two is just really stark when it comes to the Ottomans taking over, since they came in with a strong monarchy and replaced a dysfunctional one.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2015 05:46

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 15:03

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Kulkasha posted:

Totalist?! We should have annexed them!

They're just called Totalist by the Americans because they allow stores to refuse entry for people carrying bazookas.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2015 06:26

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > This Land Is Your Land: Let's Play Darkest Hour: Kaiserreich