Who among the Go4 will be the one to get killed first?

n7axw wrote:It will be fascinating to see if Clyntahn survives long enough to be held publically accountable.

I have to wonder if he will; we know Duchairn and Trynair(sp?) don't think particularly well of him, though up to now neither has had the guts to stand up to him, and there are suggestions at the beginning of LaMA that Magwair is at least sort of feeling the same way. If Magwair is becoming disenchanted with Clyntahn, and Duchairn and Trynair become aware of this, without giving it away to the Inquisition (and therefore to Clyntahn), it's conceivable that the three of them together could stand up to the Chief Inquisitor when the latter tries to demand something stupid.

OTOH, I don't actually see that happening while the war against Charis and Siddermark/the Church of Charis and the Reformists is still being prosecuted and the CoGA's defeat isn't clearly inevitable even to the Go4; you don't show disunity of leadership to the enemy in the middle of a war.

n7axw wrote:
I don't see a negotiated peace. Cayleb has already commented about the day when the transports land the troops in Port Harbor escorted by the Haarahlds. This doesn't even take into account the Protector. After everything that's happened, The good citizens of Zion will be fortunate if the Sidarmarkans don't march into the city playing The Pikes of Kolstyr.

Don

I don't see how there can *not* be a negotiated peace. Public support for the schism is almost entirely based on repugnance toward the Go4, not the Temple. And the Go4 will never survive the war going so badly that the EoC is actually marching on Zion. They'll be deposed long before it gets that bad.

I'd still lay my money on the fall of the Go4 being precipitated by Harchong falling to internal revolt, and either declaring for Charisian Empire or going completely neutral while they re-align their society (and shed a few rivers of noble Harchongian blood.) The clues in the text are abundant... Harchonese new-model infantry elements in thier infancy are looking well trained, well motivated, and decisive in their numerical superiority. It's been noted time and again that the Harchong leadership is the only group Clyntahn is really interested in getting along with, and now that Siddarmark is lost they're the root of the CoGA. The biggest economy, the biggest ultra-orthodox supporters, and likely now the biggest monetary backers. Our Heroes can't survive several million rifle / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well-trained Harchongese soldiers taking the field against them, and the Go4 can't survive without them.

They're what's going to allow the Mad Wizard to wrap this arc up by the next book after this one (if that's his plan.) Once those millions of well trained, well armed serfs decide they don't like being serfs anymore, the Go4 is doomed. Once the hand Clyntahn's head over on a platter and recognize the Church of Charis, there's no war anymore.

I agree with McGuiness that the resulting schisms off of the CoGA will result in unrest for years, but if there's going to be a Plot Fast Forward point for the series, that makes the most logical point.

But this being the Mad Wizards world, means I'm totally wrong, of course.

NervousEnergy wrote:I don't see how there can *not* be a negotiated peace. Public support for the schism is almost entirely based on repugnance toward the Go4, not the Temple. And the Go4 will never survive the war going so badly that the EoC is actually marching on Zion. They'll be deposed long before it gets that bad.

I'd still lay my money on the fall of the Go4 being precipitated by Harchong falling to internal revolt, and either declaring for Charisian Empire or going completely neutral while they re-align their society (and shed a few rivers of noble Harchongian blood.) The clues in the text are abundant... Harchonese new-model infantry elements in thier infancy are looking well trained, well motivated, and decisive in their numerical superiority. It's been noted time and again that the Harchong leadership is the only group Clyntahn is really interested in getting along with, and now that Siddarmark is lost they're the root of the CoGA. The biggest economy, the biggest ultra-orthodox supporters, and likely now the biggest monetary backers. Our Heroes can't survive several million rifle / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well-trained Harchongese soldiers taking the field against them, and the Go4 can't survive without them.

They're what's going to allow the Mad Wizard to wrap this arc up by the next book after this one (if that's his plan.) Once those millions of well trained, well armed serfs decide they don't like being serfs anymore, the Go4 is doomed. Once the hand Clyntahn's head over on a platter and recognize the Church of Charis, there's no war anymore.

I agree with McGuiness that the resulting schisms off of the CoGA will result in unrest for years, but if there's going to be a Plot Fast Forward point for the series, that makes the most logical point.

But this being the Mad Wizards world, means I'm totally wrong, of course.

I don't agree that the Allies can't survive 1 million muzzle loading rifles, rockets and spring launched mortars. By the end of 897 Siddermark will have more troops armed with breach loaders than the GHoGatA will have muzzle loaders. If my memory serves me well, the ICA will have more M96 rifles than the GH will have breach loaders by the time the GH will be ready to launch their offensive.

That said, I do agree that the GH will spark the G4s demise. Consider where the GH will have to march through to get to Siddermark? How many concentration camps will they see? How many GH troopers will say "There but for the grace of God, go I"? How many of those troopers will recall individual acts of brutality done to them or those they love that compare with what those camp prisoners have and are suffering on a mass scale? These common troops of all people know the caprice the upper classes can visit upon those of their station. If they support those that would do this sort of thing on a large systematic scale, will their live be better? How? More likely their lives will suffer more as the sorts of organized punishment of these camps represent migrate to Harchong as another tool in the plethora of their overlords' tool kit for inflicting punishments on serfs that displease them.

Whether they act now before the ICA hands them their heads or afterwards is a good question.

Peasant rebellions can also be helped along. Merlin has established the idea that there are hidden seijins everywhere.

That would be one of the ugliest tactics possible, though.

NervousEnergy wrote:
Our Heroes can't survive several million rifle / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well-trained Harchongese soldiers taking the field against them, and the Go4 can't survive without them.

The Harchongese don't have several million rifle armed / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well trained troops.

In terms of weapons, their situation has improved. But the gap between the two sides is still widening In the EOC's favor. The training has improved, particularly in the atea of discipline, but nobody on the Temple's side has figured out how to beat the ICA which means that their leadership sucks.

As for their mumbers, their agricultural sector is primitive to the point where to recruit the numbers you seem to be implying, they would starve the country and would be unable to feed their army to boot. Then too, the population disparity between the two sides is not as wide as you might believe. The Temple Lands and Harchong between them have less than 300,000, 000, certainly not a Chinese style advantage over the approx 200,000,000 on the allied side with both the allied military and economy a whole lot more efficient than the Temple side.

So what it amounts to is that the Temple is about to get its arse kicked in the coming campaign season. By the end of it, only the Temple lLands and Harchong will be left in the war and Harchong will have to rebuild its army.

So will the allies be able to overrun Zion? Yep. If .not this year, then next.

Don

Expert snuggler wrote:Peasant rebellions can also be helped along. Merlin has established the idea that there are hidden seijins everywhere.

That would be one of the ugliest tactics possible, though.

This is what I don't understand. The peasant rebellion in Harchong is inevitable, it has to happen... according to Merlin. Earth history would tend to support this as well. Merlin has thought about this, and shuddered, more than once in the books, because he knows Harchong could end up losing up to, or even more, of its population in a bloody peasant rebellion.

The thing is, if it is "inevitable", the allies should be preparing to help kick it off as soon as possible, just to keep Harchong away from supporting the CoGA.

Isilith wrote:

Expert snuggler wrote:Peasant rebellions can also be helped along. Merlin has established the idea that there are hidden seijins everywhere.

That would be one of the ugliest tactics possible, though.

This is what I don't understand. The peasant rebellion in Harchong is inevitable, it has to happen... according to Merlin. Earth history would tend to support this as well. Merlin has thought about this, and shuddered, more than once in the books, because he knows Harchong could end up losing up to, or even more, of its population in a bloody peasant rebellion.

The thing is, if it is "inevitable", the allies should be preparing to help kick it off as soon as possible, just to keep Harchong away from supporting the CoGA.

The problem is that the peasants and serfs are religiously religious and will see that first they need to destroy the heretics and 2nd, overthrow their oppressors.

Mean to say up to 50%, or more... sorry about that.

n7axw


The Harchongese don't have several million rifle armed / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well trained troops.
In terms of weapons, their situation has improved. But the gap between the two sides is still widening In the EOC's favor. The training has improved, particularly in the area of discipline, but nobody on the Temple's side has figured out how to beat the ICA which means that their leadership sucks.

It's almost as if the Temple is caught always fighting the last war. (countering what they thought they saw in the last battle) And The Empire is a taking a step ahead in both weapons and tactics (fighting the next war so to speak.)

As you say-arse to be severly kicked.

n7axw wrote:The Harchongese don't have several million rifle armed / angle gun / artillery rocket armed, well trained troops.

In terms of weapons, their situation has improved. But the gap between the two sides is still widening In the EOC's favor. The training has improved, particularly in the atea of discipline, but nobody on the Temple's side has figured out how to beat the ICA which means that their leadership sucks.

As for their mumbers, their agricultural sector is primitive to the point where to recruit the numbers you seem to be implying, they would starve the country and would be unable to feed their army to boot. Then too, the population disparity between the two sides is not as wide as you might believe. The Temple Lands and Harchong between them have less than 300,000, 000, certainly not a Chinese style advantage over the approx 200,000,000 on the allied side with both the allied military and economy a whole lot more efficient than the Temple side.

So what it amounts to is that the Temple is about to get its arse kicked in the coming campaign season. By the end of it, only the Temple lLands and Harchong will be left in the war and Harchong will have to rebuild its army.

So will the allies be able to overrun Zion? Yep. If .not this year, then next.

Don

Actually I think there was text-ev that the Harchongese army is over a million men. But it was extremely badly equipped, especially in terms of rifles. Duchairn has been working to re-equip them but I am pretty sure that when the spring fighting commences only a portion of the Harchongese army will have rifles. The key question is going to be: "how big a portion?"