61 replies to this topic

[cazidin]

RestosIII, on 28 December 2016 - 08:16 PM, said:

I have family members that legitimately, not joking or being hyperbolic on purpose, have said that we should just nuke the Middle East. So I don't trust anyone I meet to not be insane any more.

Sir Restos the Third, would you kindly find me an anime gif equivalent to the Star Trek Picard and Riker facepalm?

[Kasumi Sumika]

Clans dominating the Inner Spheres. Clans won but they will tearing apart each other in long term. IS remmants exodus to safe spaces and preparing to invade Clans when it's done.

[Valdarion Silarius]

cazidin, on 28 December 2016 - 11:43 AM, said:

Greetings MechWarriors. Today I have a few simple questions. What would have happened, in TT, if the Battle of Tukayyid was lost to the Clans? How would that shape the future of the IS? What would the timeline look like?

The time line would look like this if the clans won Tukayyid.



If you don't agree then you are obviously a salty free birth toad.

[Bombast]

Arnold The Governator, on 28 December 2016 - 08:30 PM, said:

If you don't agree then you are obviously a salty free birth toad.

Well, then I guess it's just good fortune for the toads that the Clans are all run by incompetent trashcan babies that didn't, couldn't, and never did win.

[Quxudica]

Snowbluff, on 28 December 2016 - 08:22 PM, said:

This is both naive and unethical. If you can remove a target without risking any of your men, that's a victory. Of course, if you have other objectives, it's hazier, but an orbital bombardment would be the right choice for the Jags (who don't care about collateral or hearts and minds) in that situation.

Trouble is Humans don't like nuance in general. We prefer things to be simple, straightforward and black and white. The more complicated an issue is the exponentially more difficult it becomes for the average person to deal with. Some people even get angry when confronted with complicated problems with no clear solution.

I have people in my family with this line of thought as well, I've tried to break it down like this:
City A has 75 moderates and 25 extremists, Cities B, C and D have 99 moderates and 1 extremist each. You wipe out all of City A. City B, C and D now have 75 moderates and 25 extremists because you just killed 75 people those Cities saw as innocent. It's an oversimplification to be sure, but its as clear as I can make it. The middle east is such a quagmire precisely because it's a whole tangled mess of problems that do not have a military solution.

Unfortunately it's very easy for opportunistic politicians to use the situation to garner power and money for themselves by pushing the false belief that there is a simple magic bullet that will solve the entire problem. Since the average person is already mentally predisposition towards want simple solutions.. they accept it eagerly as a real possibility.

[Valdarion Silarius]

Bombast, on 28 December 2016 - 08:41 PM, said:

Well, then I guess it's just good fortune for the toads that the Clans are all run by incompetent trashcan babies that didn't, couldn't, and never did win.

You are getting alpha'd you freebirth noob.



*Summoner overheats and explodes because ghost heat*

[Bombast]

Arnold The Governator, on 28 December 2016 - 09:08 PM, said:

*Summoner overheats and explodes because ghost heat*

[RestosIII]

cazidin, on 28 December 2016 - 08:24 PM, said:

Sir Restos the Third, would you kindly find me an anime gif equivalent to the Star Trek Picard and Riker facepalm?

These two are my personal favorites that don't involve a face meeting a wall/desk.

Spoiler

And I might as well drop in my favorite non-gif one.

Spoiler

[The Zohan]

I never understood why we never used our warships (other than to retaliate on this one planet which name escapes me). First thing I would of done when invading a starsystem is destroying all spaceships and orbital defenses, then wipe out all military installations from space and call in strikes when needed on the ground.
Our honor code went out the window when we first encountered the cowardism that is the IS way of fighting anyway.

[RestosIII]

The Zohan, on 28 December 2016 - 10:54 PM, said:

I never understood why we never used our warships (other than to retaliate on this one planet which name escapes me). First thing I would of done when invading a starsystem is destroying all spaceships and orbital defenses, then wipe out all military installations from space and call in strikes when needed on the ground.
Our honor code went out the window when we first encountered the cowardism that is the IS way of fighting anyway.

The planet was Turtle Bay. You completely demolished the city of Edo. And nothing is more cowardly than bombing a planet from orbit, especially when civilians are involved. Plus, in an actual fight people can surrender. When you're bombing them from orbit, no-one lives.

[El Bandito]

The Zohan, on 28 December 2016 - 10:54 PM, said:

I never understood why we never used our warships (other than to retaliate on this one planet which name escapes me). First thing I would of done when invading a starsystem is destroying all spaceships and orbital defenses, then wipe out all military installations from space and call in strikes when needed on the ground.
Our honor code went out the window when we first encountered the cowardism that is the IS way of fighting anyway.

Because thanks to Phelan Kell's ingenuity, Clans began to bid away their warships when competing for targets (cause if you do not bid away your warship, you basically lost). Which means no "ace in the hole" for them, should things go horribly wrong, like what happened to Smoked Jags in Wolcott. Read more about it in the Blood of Kerensky Trilogy novels.

Edited by El Bandito, 28 December 2016 - 11:50 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

The Zohan, on 28 December 2016 - 10:54 PM, said:

I never understood why we never used our warships (other than to retaliate on this one planet which name escapes me). First thing I would of done when invading a starsystem is destroying all spaceships and orbital defenses, then wipe out all military installations from space and call in strikes when needed on the ground.
Our honor code went out the window when we first encountered the cowardism that is the IS way of fighting anyway.

Oh yes. Cowardice, like pretending to bid a fair fight knowing full well that you will not bid your own forces so low that there is the possibility of losing. Yes. Cowardice indeed.

Trash Jags, the most hypocritical, sub-human filth of the entire BT universe.

[Jerry Beard]

Clans would have lost either way. IS was never in true danger as the Clans had no way to bring total war to the IS. As was shown in WWII you need to not only defeat and enemies field Army you need to Destroy an enemies infrastructure. People fail to realize these days that the Field Army of an enemy can only sustain itself through the will of it's people. To unconditionally defeat an enemy you must destroy not only his equipment but his will to continue the fight at home. Since WWII we have seen what going to war with limited objectives and aims has done. It causes way more problems than it fixes. Take what we did to Germany and Japan, we utterly destroyed those countries then turned and rebuilt and restructured them. They are 2 of the most un war like countries on the planet for the sheer fact that they truly understand what it means to be brought to the brink of complete destruction. Now look at Iraq, we have twice stopped short of destroying that country. We never made them earn back their freedom and now it is a festering cesspool. While total war is not nice and the most horrible thing one can do to another it does bring about peace. The Clans could have never defeated the IS because they had not the will nor the Infrastructure to bring total war to the IS. Plain and simple..

Edited by Jerry Beard, 29 December 2016 - 05:25 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

DrxAbstract, on 28 December 2016 - 11:49 AM, said:

Go back even further and ask what would have happened if Comstar hadn't broken their vow of neutrality and not shared sensitive Clan communications and intel with the IS.

Go further back and ask would have happened if Comstar had not hampered IS communications from the Periphery and had not shared intel with the Clans. Comstar shared their info with IS once they knew they could not influence what the Clans were doing...

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 29 December 2016 - 05:34 AM.

[MeiSooHaityu]

If the Clans won at Tukayyid, I think that would be the start of the slow demise of the Inner Sphere.

The Clans would continue to push towards Terra until one clan conquered it and absorbed all other clans to form a Star League in it's image. The exact fate of the houses would depend on which Clan took Terra first (Warden or Crusader).

I don't think that the rest of the clans would have held back and watched the IS destroy whichever clan took Terra, that would go against their grand plan. Whichever Clan took Terra would instantly become one combined Star League force. The Inner Sphere forces that tried to trap the clan invader on Terra would be steam rolled from behind by the newly founded Star League.

I think a lot of the finger pointing, bickering, and inter-clan warfare (like the Refusal War) essentially came about because of the Clan loss at Tukayyid. It shook the Clans to their core and of course incompetence within the ranks had to be the cause. It caused the Clans to doubt their leadership and that caused the cracks to start and the fracturing to occur.

Granted, they never got a long to begin with, but mutual respect for Nicholas Kerensky's dream would have kept them at least willing to go through with the plan.

and without the pause in the invasion to give the IS time to try and upfit their units, plus the demoralizing loss to the clans, probably meant the IS forces would never fully recover. Afterall, in the eyes of the houses and IS forces, the Clans would still be an unstoppable force. The Clan loss at Tukayyid probably gave the IS a HUGE morale boost by showing the superior clans could be beaten.

I will say this though. The Clans were essentially bred and engineered for one sole purpose. To take back the Inner Sphere and be it's protector or supreme ruler (depending on which philosophy won). Either way, as time would go by, the newly established Clan Star League would probably go through a crisis of purpose at some point. I think it would be a matter of time before the new clan Star League would colapse into infighting (probably due to the opposite philosophy trying to usurp power).

It would be interesting to see an alternate timeline of novels dedicated to covering this scenario.

Edited by MeiSooHaityu, 29 December 2016 - 06:13 AM.

[Novakaine]

The Clans just like the Axis in WW2 simply did not have the manpower to match the IS.
And if worst came to worst I'm sure the IS would have nuked them into oblivion.
Then moved on to Clan Homeworlds and done much the same.
Leaving the Clans a greasy collection dna in a tube.
Pretty much what they are anyway.

Edited by Novakaine, 29 December 2016 - 07:09 PM.

[cazidin]

RestosIII, on 28 December 2016 - 10:26 PM, said:

These two are my personal favorites that don't involve a face meeting a wall/desk.

Spoiler

And I might as well drop in my favorite non-gif one.

Spoiler

How many C-bills for the Blonde Princess Gif?

[RestosIII]

cazidin, on 29 December 2016 - 08:16 AM, said:

How many C-bills for the Blonde Princess Gif?

There's a reason CDS invented the ChatterWeb: The sharing of information between people for free. That, and trolling the Snow Raven Khan.

[Dracol]

Op, the correct answer is: whatever the writers wanted to happen.

[Bombast]

Dracol, on 29 December 2016 - 10:58 AM, said:

Op, the correct answer is: whatever the writers wanted to happen.