Concerning Stratanian history

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[Curgan]

It's one of my intentions. I just need some time and I have lot's of new works planned ore in progress

[Gean Firefeet]

Ack I'm late with replying, sorry to let you wait Curgann.

Here goes what I made up:
In time you speak off, around 650-620 b.S. the Stratanian government will have decided, secretly, to have more business employed beside trade, namely piracy. Trade ships are upgraded with better armory on board and start to attack other trade confederation. Because they were still sailing as normal traders and weren't officially recognized by the government (and because they would loose a valuable source of income) the Stratanian reacted furious when in 628 b.S. Milkengradian navy vessels started attacking "common traders".

Support of the official navy was sent to surpress the vile and rude navy of Milkengrad to cover the secret government operation, followed by the alliance of the red and the fall of Milkengrad.

[Curgan]

This is Ok with me and seems pretty logical.
However, If some Stratanian noblemen had "armed milita" to protect them and a fleet to attack ships, how could the goverment of Stratania stop them?  

[Koldar Mondrakken]

To make it more 'piracy' like I would suggest that they didn't actually upgraded ships (which would be actually easily noticed) but they started to tolerate piracy by own home ships and even paid off noblemen and merchants that borrowed them armed ships in war-times (very common phenomen at this time?)

The result was that poor noblemen (or noblemen who thought they deserved more than their land was able to give them) started to build up flottilas of fast, armed (pirate ships were never that big because they normally only attacked unarmed merchants) ships and started to plunder the sea and coasts.

This guaranteed the Stratanian sea superiority for several centuries... (if I remember right!! )

Sooner or later the pirates/merchants concentrated more on each other and suddenly the Stratanian navy was ordered to hunt down and sink any pirates around.

I would also think that piracy was not uncommon between seafaring nations. There should be always monopols to break or trade routes to cut off to take them over so the Milkengradian and Stratanian "Sea War" should be a phenomen that lasted for centuries in some kind of 'semi-hot' war that was lead by both nations in secret...

Would explain strong militias and big fleets of freelancers.

Bye, Koldar

[Greybark]

Hey Curgan!
I like the philosophy you're building in Milkengrad! The co-operation of the races, and all that. Wanted to ask...would you be interested in taking Milkengrad's Rat Brownies off my hands? As Rat Brownies, they are quite moldable (only need to stay 6 inches tall - everything else can be changed). Maybe join a Fratae or something? I dunno, just like what you are doing and wanted to give you free reign if you wish it.

[Gean Firefeet]

OK my final offer, I hope you all agree on this.  
After reading through all the discussion etc etc I think this is what happened.

At a certan point in history Stratania secretly allowed traders to start terrozing the seas if they paid a certain tribute to the state from their booty.
This went all right for sometime but one day a group of traders started for their own, no longer paying tribute to the Stratanian government.
The government, angered by this lack of loyalty, made them become outcasts, to be hunted down by anyone who wished, thus Milkengradian navy took thier chance and sweeped the pirates from the seas. Other pirates, still paying thier tribute, saw and felt that the state had betrayed them. They opened an offensive upon Milkengrad, leaving the Stratanian site, going for their own.

Edited by: Gean Firefeet at: 1/20/01 8:59:20 am

[Curgan]

"At a certan point in history Santharia secretly allowed traders"
Santharia would become a country 630 years later. At this time there were independent human kingdoms, such as Centorauria, Erpheronia, stratania etc.
At the tribes section is a map to read about the borders of each tribe.

[Gean Firefeet]

Ack! I ment Stratania demmit. *goes editing post*
Now that's corrected, how's the idea, still needing amendments?

[Koldar Mondrakken]

Sounds nice indeed, but... (this had to happen! Sorry!   )

Only thing I'm a little confused about is that Milkengrad would not just tolerate pirates attacking their ship lanes only because Strata is saying they can do this.

I would suggest that the Stratanian government wanted to increase their fleet size by having traders, merchants and other rich people sign up contracts that allow them to hunt and pillage foreign ships but strengthen the Stratanian navy in war-times. Some kind of letter of marque. Just sounds more reasonable than just allow them to hunt down foreign ships and split the profit (although, this might be another element of the contract. They can take the loot but hand the ship over to the navy?)
Would be more profitable for the government (they risk war with other seafaring nations, you know)

Hope, I'm not cutting on your nerves!

That this ran out of hand overtime and ended in uncontrolled pirate fleets attack coasts and portcities  sounds like reasoned assumption. (One last question, then I'll stop: Would pirates that feel betrayed not more likely attack Strata or Stratanian cities/ships and not start war with Milkengrad?)

Bye, Koldar *hiding in the darkness he was coming from*

Edited by: Koldar Mondrakken at: 1/21/01 1:31:13 am

[Curgan]

Why should the pirates being renegades? They could be just soldiers who earn an "allowance" that encourages them to stay quite at peacetime and spare the poor stratania from trouble. Not to mention the feeling that it is for theman act of justice against the nothern and arrogant powers.
A few bad kings can change a nation drasticaly. After all, the Germans are not evil Nazis because Hitler once came to power!  

[Koldar Mondrakken]

Hey Curgan, just read your name's compendium entry. The War of Milkengrad confused me a bit.

250000 men against 9000?

Well, although this Red Alliance sounded strong I would still think that they would not come up with such a force (would wreck their money, especially when they fight a weak enemy as Milkengrad was at this time and can attack directly the enemy capital rather than fight a long war)
250000 sounds maximal like the army size in whole Epheronia, Strata and the other allies together.
I can't imagine that anybody could handle military operations on this scale.

I would think an army of 30000 men would be enough. Additional to this the Stratanian fleet and reinforcements.
Alltogether 80000 max.
With fleet support that should be enough to take out a force of around 10000.

Don't want to destroy the message of the story (Curgan as tragical person) but I would think this seemed more 'realistic'.

I think I can claim a Fan of Medieval and Ancient military in some way (Well history in general is also cool, but this just slightly better!  ). That's why I was irritated by this element of the story...

Bye, Koldar

[Curgan]

Nice remarks Koldar and well accepted (and there's no reason to get irritated by anything  ).
The reason I deliberately chose such a number, was because:

1. The Helcrani were notorious for being excelent warriors. The Centoraurian cavalry is undoubtedly the best all over the Sarvonian continent and the Helcrani in specific were distinguished as mercenaries. Some centuries earlies they invaded Erpheronia and they laid siege on Voldar before being crushed by Ileor (see History).
There are many historical examples were a bunch of well armed and better trained warriors defeated an extremely superior enemy (the Persian wars is an example).

2. Milkengrad was surrounded by the fierce Ogygian walls, one of the strongest fortifications of the time. Many troops were needed to violate the perimeter. Not to mention that the Alliance wanted to ensure that their troops would land in Efirhal. If they tried to take over the bridges the siege would last till today. In order to execute a landing and apply pressure in two "schwerpunkts" defended by a superior in technique opponent you need overwhelming numbers. Not to mention that many troops were barbarian mercenaries who wanted just the loot and were paid after the battle, Stratanians thirsty for revenge and Erpheronians fighting for the honor of their king (the Helcrani had kidnaped his daughter during the previous war between Erpheronia and Centorauria. In either case the Helcrani (who 've been fighting civil wars, when they ceazed fighting someone else) of that time had only three good things I.They were excelent warriors II. They had a passion for science and beauty III.They loved the sea

3. I realy wanted to indicate the hopeless of the battle.

4. The numbers are quite similar to those of the actual siege of Constantinople in 1453.

However, he idea of reducing numbers, because the Alliance couldn't deploy so many troops isn't bad...
But how much population did they have at the time? We 're talking about centuries of peacetime...

[Koldar Mondrakken]

Looked everything up I know about Persian Wars etc.
To give you some impressions.
The Spartanians send a Elite force of 600-1000 men at the Thermophylae to slow down the Persian advance. Not known (at least to me) was that there were several thousand men at arms send by other allies making the force to increase to several thousand. Also some historians are thinking that the Persian army has to be sized down from 100000 to (some say 30000 others more, it's unsure how much the Greek historians exaggerated on this topic... )

At Issus (Alexander the Great) the Macedonian army was 50000 against 70000 and in the battle at Gaugamela the Greek-Macedonian force won the day against a Persian army maximal 5 times bigger (250000).

The problem is that with a force of 9000 you've no reserves and too few men to defend the whole line against such a force. (while 50000 is already something to work with)
When the attacking armies are sized down to 80000 and 50000 detached to win the bridges you can assume the Milkengrads might have fought well at first but after the first waves they'll have no reserves left while the Red Alliance can still bring in fresh troops. So at first they might have fiought as well as you told but then they were exhausted and had to retreat.

The other thing is that you'll lay siege to a fortified city like Milkengrad and not attack at once (the best chance for an attacker in this situation is to let them suffer from starvation, see Constantinopel which was battered with siege weapons for months before the final attack.). Perhaps have it change from several days to several months and perhaps the Stratanian navy should win the day against the Milkengrad navy. The Milkengrad navy is able to prevent an at once landing of the Stratanians (10000-20000 men) but cannot prevent the blockade.

To give another (although not popular) example: The Germans were on full retreat still Stalingrad, but at every battle against the Sowjets the Russians still suffered more losses than the Germans. The problem was the Germans had no reserves left and no supplies (after the first waves which they hold of with terrible losses for the Russians they had no ammo left and their equipment broke down while the Russians could keep up their fire power for days). So the Germans again retreated... That should be the problem of the Milkengradians. At first they stand pretty well but then they're just pushed back by force.

I would deploy the things like this:
-30000 Eupheronian warriors (they have to keep their fortresses manned and cannot mount everything for a campaign)
-15000 Stratanians (they cannot bring that many men with their fleet because they will run short on supplies)
-5000-10000 other allies (are not as powerful as Eupheronia and only want some goodies for participating in this campaign but see no need to lose many men)
-20000-30000 mecenaries used for the first waves against the Milkengradian. Common "cannon fodder" so to speak.

I would say against the mecenaries the Milkengradians fought well, but the regular units of the Eupheronians and Strata should be more tough and forces to reckon with.

Well, this post has gotten long enough. Hope it's sounds reasoned...

[Artimidor Federkiel]

*hehe* Good job, Koldar, and a good sense for accuracy! That's also something we need here in Santharia whenever we try to be authentic. Next time you'll write a book about these things, eh? *grin*

P.S. Aren't you supposed to learn some java?

[Koldar Mondrakken]

Java is out-of.date. Now I try to ´brainstorm DVS (Datenverarbeitungssysteme), not as interesting as Java and the quadruple number of pages.

Just a small pause!

*hurry back to his books*

BYe, Koldar

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