theres a reason why africa wasnt conquered till the 19 century my friend
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Just lost a battle against.... African natives.
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Of course there was. Just try to read a bit more in this thread before you spam 'valuable' information...
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Right, and the 300 proves Greeks should be invincible unless you can get the help of a traitor and flank them from behind. They were never defeated by any equivalent military or god forbid conquered by Heathens from outside of Europe.
I'm not saying European elite troops are not superior, just that you can't randomly throw Europeans at RotW army and expect to steam roll the opposition.
Ofc if you really read anything about Greek history, you would know that there were thousands of Greeks in the battle of Thermopylae, and that 300 isn't exactly history.
Though speaking on 300, why couldn't just Leonidas have used that guy when the Athenians were attacking >_>. I'm sure he would have won the movie.
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And while the battle of thermopylae is legendary, the fact that it actually did not stop the Persian advance is often overlooked. Persia advanced well into Greece, only turning back when the campaign season ended.
My point was, the Portugal general intelligently assessed the situation and chose the correct choke point to make his stand, much like the legendary 300. It wasn't a bunch of super humans charging into the enemy, a single swing cleaving 20 indians, musouing their way through the enemy.
150 Europeans stood against tens of thousands natives, and what worried them most were not the numbers but five cannons the natives gained from other Europeans.
They had four ships and defeated the whole enemy fleet consisting of hundreds of vessels.
PLUS, yes, they were smart. Being 'smart', disciplined, well-organized, purpose-driven, etc. is perhaps the most important advantage of people stemming from advanced civilization when confronted with people of less advanced civilization.
Yes, this example is extreme, perhaps. But it is supported by general trend, and is not limited to Europeans.
Please, consider the difference in population between Afghanistan and India. And yet, for many centuries and repeatedly, Turks coming from Afghanistan were able to conquer much of India and establish and maintain (!) rule over Indians many times their numbers. These facts suggest that Persianized Turks possessed advantage not only in military, but also cultural and administrative.
After all, it was not Indian merchants with whom the Europeans competed in Indian ocean, but Muslim ones. Muslim merchants dominated trade in the region, they even ousted Chinese merchants from their positions. They did exactly the same as Europeans did once they reached Indian ocean and prevailed over Muslims.
These facts are telling, they suggest some kind of 'ranking' - centuries before Industrial revolution.
Again, I can offer a few points to ponder (as I did for geomorphology's effect on the rise and fall of states, in an earlier post). Just my opinion, though...
What we are looking at isn't so much "European vs RotW" as "dynamic vs stagnant states". Two non-European examples from before the EU-4 time period might clarify what I mean: Hyksos vs Egypt, and Mongols vs China.
1) The Hyksos invaders were far outnumbered by the Egyptians, but they took over the state remarkably quickly. One important factor was that Egypt at that time was a water-monopoly empire... society was very stratified, and the government (hereditary God-Kings) had direct control of irrigation along with many other sweeping powers. In that sort of situation, the levels of society tend to lose touch with each other with the gap between the nobility and the commoners, between the rich and poor, getting wider with each generation. The ordinary people have little stake in the outcome of a war, and rarely fight with any determination. This means that any war against an invader is often accompanied by social disintegration... and this social decay in turn makes outside conquest more likely.
2) The case of the Mongol invasion of China was very similar... again, China at that time was a water-monopoly empire (and the invading Mongols were not). Again, the levels of society had lost touch and the typical peasant-on-the-street had little reason to risk his life to protect the privileged position of the nobles. The outcome was much the same.
What we are looking at isn't so much "European vs RotW" as "dynamic vs stagnant states". Two non-European examples from before the EU-4 time period might clarify what I mean: Hyksos vs Egypt, and Mongols vs China.
1) The Hyksos invaders were far outnumbered by the Egyptians, but they took over the state remarkably quickly. One important factor was that Egypt at that time was a water-monopoly empire... society was very stratified, and the government (hereditary God-Kings) had direct control of irrigation along with many other sweeping powers. In that sort of situation, the levels of society tend to lose touch with each other with the gap between the nobility and the commoners, between the rich and poor, getting wider with each generation. The ordinary people have little stake in the outcome of a war, and rarely fight with any determination. This means that any war against an invader is often accompanied by social disintegration... and this social decay in turn makes outside conquest more likely.
2) The case of the Mongol invasion of China was very similar... again, China at that time was a water-monopoly empire (and the invading Mongols were not). Again, the levels of society had lost touch and the typical peasant-on-the-street had little reason to risk his life to protect the privileged position of the nobles. The outcome was much the same.
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@blue emu
Good point.
That calls for noticing that European society was strikingly different exactly in this respect. The social basis was much broader.
The ruler was not the sole lord without limits. On the contrary, these limits were pretty tough. What we can see looks like permanent instability: various factions struggling for power and influence. Instability on surface, but in some respect quite the contrary: Many people somehow participated in executing the power, not only ruler/government and his/her subordinates, but also church (independent in the West, and not much centralized itself), landowners/aristocracy, cities. It was not easy to overthrow such a social arrangement, because too many people would rise up to its defence, too many people were directly involved and interested.
I think this is also one of the important differences between the West and the Rest. It was relatively easy to annihilate eastern empires, say, Ilkhanate, Delhi sultanate, Mamluk state, because vast majority of people did not care a bit. But to remove Denmark from the map ... though tiny, it survived.
We can see this phenomenon also recently. In democracy, various groups struggle against each other, and it often makes the society seemingly paralyzed, ineffective, pain in the ass. But resilient.
On the other hand, when you remove a Saddam through a coup or short military campaign, nobody regrets. New forces emerge instantly and don't derive their validity from past dictators. Well, so it happens in Iraq that these new factions are not used to share power with others, they bitterly struggle to submit the others, instead. They lack the European tradition of participation, competitive co-existence, and uneasy collaboration.
I'd like to stress that this unique feature of Western society was clearly present in 1444, and not truly adopted in majority of non-Western societies until now. If they do (like recent India, par example), it's an import and adoption of Western ideas. (Revisionists call it a 'genocide', for some obscure reason...)
Good point.
That calls for noticing that European society was strikingly different exactly in this respect. The social basis was much broader.
The ruler was not the sole lord without limits. On the contrary, these limits were pretty tough. What we can see looks like permanent instability: various factions struggling for power and influence. Instability on surface, but in some respect quite the contrary: Many people somehow participated in executing the power, not only ruler/government and his/her subordinates, but also church (independent in the West, and not much centralized itself), landowners/aristocracy, cities. It was not easy to overthrow such a social arrangement, because too many people would rise up to its defence, too many people were directly involved and interested.
I think this is also one of the important differences between the West and the Rest. It was relatively easy to annihilate eastern empires, say, Ilkhanate, Delhi sultanate, Mamluk state, because vast majority of people did not care a bit. But to remove Denmark from the map ... though tiny, it survived.
We can see this phenomenon also recently. In democracy, various groups struggle against each other, and it often makes the society seemingly paralyzed, ineffective, pain in the ass. But resilient.
On the other hand, when you remove a Saddam through a coup or short military campaign, nobody regrets. New forces emerge instantly and don't derive their validity from past dictators. Well, so it happens in Iraq that these new factions are not used to share power with others, they bitterly struggle to submit the others, instead. They lack the European tradition of participation, competitive co-existence, and uneasy collaboration.
I'd like to stress that this unique feature of Western society was clearly present in 1444, and not truly adopted in majority of non-Western societies until now. If they do (like recent India, par example), it's an import and adoption of Western ideas. (Revisionists call it a 'genocide', for some obscure reason...)
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Regarding "Hyksos vs Egypt"... see my thread in the Off-Topic forum: "Most Bizarre War Declaration in History?"
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...st-bizarre-war-declaration-in-history.961414/
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...st-bizarre-war-declaration-in-history.961414/
these kinds of questions are pointless in this forum not because the actual question is pointless but players here have this huge sense of deniability when it comes to battles not working as intended.
the AI definitely gets some hidden bonuses with how their armies perform. other than some maybe morale / general / discipline bonuses I have to say you probably just got screwed by the game.
the AI definitely gets some hidden bonuses with how their armies perform. other than some maybe morale / general / discipline bonuses I have to say you probably just got screwed by the game.
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Why does the myth that the ai gets these battle bonuses keep appearing. Of the cheats the ai gets that is not one. Every experienced player can testify battles play out pretty close to expectations.
As long as there are players who lack the knowledge about land combat mechanics, this myth will appear again and again.
This is wrong. Moreover, what's kind of absurd about this argument is that EU4 actually depicts the key points at which these qualities of European society began to emerge. It wasn't 1444. Even in the most extreme account of European social development, it was closer to 1648.
The reformation, quite literally, tore Europe apart. It lead to one of the bloodiest periods (relative to population at the time) in European history, because "participation" and "coexistence" in European society, up until that point, had been defined by inclusion in the established state-church, which in Western Europe was Roman Catholicism. Without that, the entire fabric of society collapsed. Populations which had coexisted for centuries turned on and massacred each other because there was no underlying basis for coexistence or "uneasy collaboration". It turns out people were never loyal to Denmark, they were loyal to the religious infrastructure on which the kingdom of Denmark, as a Christian kingdom existing within Christendom as a broader affiliation, had been built.
In 1648 we have the peace of Westphalia, bringing to an end one of the more obvious manifestations of the religious warfare after the reformation. Actual revisionists sometimes question the singular importance of the peace of Westphalia, and like many revisionist arguments to a certain extent they are correct. It is somewhat unreasonable to ascribe a broad transformation in European models of law and sovereignty to a single document, however, the peace of Westphalia is important, certainly in the German states, because it explicitly creates a domain of monarchical authority which is above religion. This general move towards greater state authority in relation to religion would ultimately become the basis of what we now call "absolutism". Under absolutism, the sovereign is held to be the absolute authority, even on matters of religion or personal conscience. The sovereign can ask someone to violate his or her religious conscience and expect obedience, but at the same time the obedience of the subject does not change his or her religious identity. Instead, it becomes a private identity, tolerable to the extent that it does not interrupt public loyalty to the sovereign. At this point, we also start to get the concept of nations, because the sovereign no longer rules a bunch of subjects who are bound to him by a hierarchical arrangement based in religion, but a bunch of people who may have nothing in common save that they can all now be asked to act as subjects of the sovereign, that loyalty becomes their shared identity as a people, and thus the basis for a proto-nationalistic sentiment which would ultimately grow beyond the limited terms allowed by the absolutist state.
Europe as a uniquely pluralistic society comes about not due to some feudal arrangement of cooperation and alliances. All societies have some means of securing cooperation, otherwise they wouldn't exist. The real basis of a pluralistic society in which anyone can participate comes about through the emergence, in response to the fear of religious war, of an idea of absolute monarchical power. That is why, even up to the end of the eighteenth century, Kant is still pushing this idea that political freedom and religious and intellectual freedom are in some way diametrically opposed ("argue what you like, but obey"). This isn't just a random assumption on his part, it's the fulfilment of a long intellectual tradition based on the very real fear that a society without a strong political authority would be unable to tolerate difference.
Incidentally, "revisionism" is not an insult. Challenging orthodox interpretations of history is not, in and of itself, a bad thing. Sometimes revisionist history can be weak or flawed, but so can orthodox history. It's the strength of the arguments and evidence that matters, not whether it is orthodox or not.
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Yes, quite an achievement, not denying that, but your conclusion is not very convincing.
I do agree the situation in Europe better faciliated development of military tradition which gave birth to good generals.
AI armies always perform better than human controlled ones when everything is equal. so had it been the AI with the same exact Euro troops, tech ideas, leader and terrain and the player with the same 6K african troops he would have probably gotten stack wiped or lost decisively to the same 20k euro troops .
that being said, even if you want to say I am wrong about that there is no way 20k euro troops should be losing to 6k congolese who are crossing a river -1 and are 4 techs behind. with the details the OP gives, something went wrong with the game. we can't conclude what it is unless he actually showed us screens of the battle and showed us what his army had but that seems to be the case if you accept the details given.
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I do want to say you are wrong. You are wrong. Save a game before a battle. Watch it. Reload. Watch again. Watch the die rolls, check all factors, number of infantry, cavalry, artillery, combat width, terrain, discipline, +CA abilities. Then tag switch and do it again. There is no bias against the player in battles.
If the AI armies always outperform you, quite frankly it means you do not know how the mechanics work. Do not ascribe that lack of knowledge to the game cheating when every single person who understands the mechanics tells you the game doesn't cheat.
When the OP lost, it is because, indeed, he did something very wrong. There is nothing inherently bad about this. Mistakes are how we learn. Or fail to learn. That's really on the individual.
Edit: Phone autocorrects.
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This claim is factually incorrect. The Sikh trader Baba Makhan Shah Labana of Gujarat (1619-1674) sailed to Portugal and other Mediterranean ports (including Egypt) to trade in the early to mid 17th century.
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Indeed. The most typical one is violence. A society can be kept together by violence.
In reality, violence is never completely missing, nor the sole instrument. But we can see differences among various societies. And those who have no (or only very little) word in public issues, are kept within by force or by force-threat.
European feudalism is unique precisely in this respect of relatively broad participation. You don't see that, you think differently, but that's about all you can do about it.
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Indeed. The most typical one is violence. A society can be kept together by violence.
In reality, violence is never completely missing, nor the sole instrument. But we can see differences among various societies. And those who have no (or only very little) word in public issues, are kept within by force or by force-threat.
European feudalism is unique precisely in this respect of relatively broad participation. You don't see that, you think differently, but that's about all you can do about it.
True, in a sense. However, I can point out that your argument is based on premises which you have not supported.
Firstly, "relatively broad participation" is a statement that requires a frame of reference. Which societies, specifically, are less "broad" in their participation than European feudalism. The way you've phrased it makes it sound like your point of reference is the rest of the world as a whole, which I have to say makes no sense. Non-European societies produced countless devolved systems of government and examples of hereditary aristocratic privilege analogous to European feudalism (to the point where they are routinely referred to as feudalism in English sources, the most obvious case being Japan). Why do these not constitute a "broad participation" in the sense you're claiming is unique to European feudalism?
Secondly, are we supposed to believe by the general inference here that European social order was uniquely non-violent or non-coercive? On what basis can that be said to be true? Until only a few hundred years ago spectacular execution (meaning execution specifically intended to impress on its audience the dire consequences of disobedience, through public torture or the display of body parts, for example) was a normal and routine part of enforcing the European social order. In England, hanging drawing and quartering only ended in the 19th century. Burning at the stake was a perfectly normal sentence for heresy in the 17th century. Robert Francois Damiens was publicly tortured for four hours before finally being burned to death on the cosmopolitan streets of 18th century Paris. The ultimate expression of the power of the monarchy and the church, in medieval and early modern Europe alike, was the ability to kill you in really horrible ways, and to do it publicly in order to show everyone the dire consequences of going against legitimate authority.
What is the actual, reasoned basis of this idea that pre-modern Europe is exceptional, either in the broad nature of its society or in the degree to which violence is involved in maintaining the social order? Can you actually show the reasoning by which you arrive that claim, or do you merely claim the right to disagree?
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