Some notes about the German civilization

Ecthy · October 27, 2001, 10:33

Some want the Weimar Republic to be the Golden Age of the Germans...

The time of the Wimar Republic is not a good idea for a golden age. That is because of high unemployment, dying economy and growing hatred towards racially different groups.... just cinema and art were on a climax, maybe also science... but inthat time, the science was globally used, not nationally... so the discoveries of Bohr, Heisenberg, etc were not useful for Germany as a country, just general physical acknowledgements... in contrast to CIV, where a tech is something crucial for the single civ only...

Also, the capital of Germany during the Wimar Republic was Berlin. From the first point on. Yet the national congress took place in Weimar because there were riots in Berlin.

And then, what unit would cause that golden age? Zeppelin of WWI?

The Panzer unit as a unique one is not a good diea either. Truly, we had some damn good tanks in WWII, but so did the Russians and also the Americans and English... ours weren't that cool... and then, a winning Panzer would make the war time the beginning of a golden age... the end of the Nazi time...

Of course, the golden age would also cover the time after the war, including the time of economic growth... you might argue history won't repeat in CIV, but you have to consider the facts from real history...

There are 2 phases of German history that are in my eyes elligible for golden ages for the whole empire.

1. Middle Ages. Expansion to the north and east, conquering territories of Prussia, Pommerania, expansion ofthe territory of the Teutonic Order etc... the unique unit causing this age would be a Teutonic Knight, an improved Knight

2. Founder's Age. Foundign of the 2nd Reich under Bismarck and Wilhelm I in 1871. Introduced expansion of the empire in Africa (4 puny colonies, OK) and economic growth, though there was that crisis from 1873-1879. anyway, the causing unit could be some infantry unit, because the empire was founded after beating France... a Prussian Grenadier would be a good unit, some kind of improved Rifleman. In this case the golden age would end at 1890 (20 turns after the victory over France)... and who resigned in 1890?

Another idea would be some time in the 18th century, expansion of Prussia, works of Leibniz and all, but there was no unified Germany back then, not really...

So I dislike both the ideas of Panzer being unique unit and Weimar Republic being golden age, as some wanted it to be... Either we go for the Founder's Age with the Prussian Grenadier, or we stick with the fine middle ages for Germany... but then, the latter would cause Germany to be strong in the renaissance time, which it surely wasn't...

Discuss.

Kenobi · October 27, 2001, 23:34

Quote:

Originally posted by Ecthelion
Some want the Weimar Republic to be the Golden Age of the Germans...

There are 2 phases of German history that are in my eyes elligible for golden ages for the whole empire.

1. Middle Ages.
2. Founder's Age. Foundign of the 2nd Reich under Bismarck and Wilhelm I in 1871.

So I dislike both the ideas of Panzer being unique unit and Weimar Republic being golden age, as some wanted it to be... Either we go for the Founder's Age with the Prussian Grenadier, or we stick with the fine middle ages for Germany... but then, the latter would cause Germany to be strong in the renaissance time, which it surely wasn't...

Discuss.

Interesting thread, Eccy. I think your second option sounds right: the foundation of the 2nd Reich represented the re-unification of (most of) the German-speaking peoples and brought the nation-state of Germany to true European-power status. The Prussian army was widely regarded as the strongest of its era due to its professionalism and organisation, and would be well-represented by Grenadier or Jaeger infantry.

Regarding the panzer hoopla, I also agree with you: German tanks weren't that much better than American or Soviet. What made the difference was the superior tactics developed by generals like Heinz Guderian and Erwin Rommel. These tactics were copied within several years, however, so the German advantage was very temporary.

Dr. Nick · October 28, 2001, 03:19

Someone wants the Weimar Republic to be the German golden age? ARE THEY OUT OF THEIR MIND?!

2nd Reich should be the golden age for Germany, definetly, the appearance of Germany as a world power in a matter of a couple of decades. The UU should also be a Grenadier, the panzer would create a golden age in the wrong period of time...

Ecthy · October 28, 2001, 04:23

Yeah, I almost vomitted onto my keyboard when I read that Weimar Republic idea.... I'm glad I get positive response... maybe we can affect the game before its release

kIndal · October 28, 2001, 04:45

Ecthelion, what do you think about a Landsknecht as unique unit? could be a good one, German mercenaries were very important in Renaissance armies (well and in most ages). It would be a improved pikemen.

And what about some kind Barbarian rider from the age of the fall of Roman Empire...

Arent · October 28, 2001, 06:18

Quote:

Originally posted by Ecthelion
Some want the Weimar Republic to be the Golden Age of the Germans...

Golden ages will be started by wonders in most cases. (i. e. early in game)
How to tell the player that he has to wait till time of weimar republic!?

Quote:

.... a winning Panzer would make the war time the beginning of a golden age... the end of the Nazi time...

I would not associate golden age too much with unique units (perhaps they should
even remove this GA trigger and only allow GA's by building wonders).
...
*All* UUs of *all* civs are famous cause they killed a lot of people - and are
associated with cruel wars. Panzers are ok - there are IMHO too few
modern age UUs.

Quote:

2. Founder's Age. Foundign of the 2nd Reich under Bismarck and Wilhelm I...
Discuss.

Isn't Bismarck leader of germany already?

Arent

Ecthy · October 28, 2001, 07:36

Quote:

Originally posted by Arent
Isn't Bismarck leader of germany already?

I'm talking about the golden age not the leaders... tell me one civ where the golden age, unique units and leaders fit inot one time... or better: proof that is the case with most of the civs... there, you can't

Arent · October 28, 2001, 14:42

Hey, no need to get angy. !?
My point is: Nobody ever said GA of
germany is WW2. And the argument that UU
start GA and thus a panzer would indicate
WW2 as GA - I could just respond that
Bismarck is leader and this indicates
"founders age" to be GA.
I simply humbly wanted to state that
your suggestion is already halfway done
- the other part would be to have a unit
of "founders age". But I think there
are far too many infantry units in the
game already, panzers are ok.

Arent

Ecthy · October 30, 2001, 16:23

bump

so what is the German special unit? trigger for German golden age? German leader? cities?

Arent · October 30, 2001, 16:52

Ecthelion, I already stated in my first
post that you should not associate
golden age and unique units too much.
And I already said why: The golden age
will most of the time be started by
building wonders.
And I already stated that IMHO they
even should remove the golden age trigger
of unique units.
And I already stated that all unique units
are military units and thus would mean
war being the trigger for an golden age
which *is* somewhat cynical but if you
take a look on history it is actually
understandable.
That it would - in the case of Germany -
mean WW2 makes no difference, war is war,
it doesn't make any sense to count the
victims.
AFAIK the vast maiority of civers already
adorses the panzer tank and it's icon is
really cool

Arent

Ecthy · October 30, 2001, 17:04

be stupid again and I'll ignore you forever...

where did I associate the unique unit with the golden age in my last post? or did I just ask for a possible trigger for the German golden age? or did I say there can't be any otehr triggerthan a unique unit? it is ****ers like you I make several posts in the row for making the DIFFERENT points clear... but then I get banned for spamming... damn, you can never make it right...

Arent · October 30, 2001, 18:56

So ingore me.
If I read your answers to my posts again
I just get the idea you didn't even read
them or lost interest in the topic.
You said discuss, did you?
Now off with this.
...

The only idea here I really liked was
the "barbarian rider". While I don't
think Germans had that many horses,
some scenario where you are a German
tribe (*one* of the many) and have to
move/fight your way into roman territory
would be *really* cool... ok I think I'll
make one

Leader being Arminius, UU perhaps a barbarian
2/2/1 with one additional hitpoint (?)
Militarist/Expansionist et cetera.
Would be really hard to wear down superior
legions and well defended towns...

Arent

David Floyd · October 30, 2001, 22:20

Ummmm....people....German tanks were FAR better than American or British tanks...at the end of the war the US Pershing and Britihs Firefly were coming close to the high end German tanks, but that's it for them...Sherman's sucked against anything about a PzIV, or even upgunned PzIIIs...Granted, the Russians had (marginally) better tanks...mainly just had more of them though...

DarkCloud · October 30, 2001, 22:29

Arent- Germans UU a Barbarian!
If Ecthelion gets mad at you because he says you are trolling- I may very well agree... I hope you don't mean that the Germans were the greatest as "Barbarians"!

Anyways, why name a unit a "Barbarian", call it a "Rider" or a "Dragoon" or something of the sort.

I vote for Germany's Golden age (Under Civ's definition of Expansion, Enlightenment, etc.)
As either the first one that Ecthelion listed, or World War II- Germany nearly conquered the world...

-David- Russia had better tanks. Germany had the second best (during most of the war)- however they had much better tactics, and that is why they won- Which is a good argument for making the Panzer a UU for them, for what is a UU but a specialized type of unit that a country uses well.

DarkCloud · October 30, 2001, 22:36

...Then again if you merely mean the UU for a certain scenario, I forgive you

Also, Ecthelion- exactly why did you become so angry at Arent? I will admit, his ideas are scatterbrained and hard to see- but I see nowhere where he contradicts you in his last three posts... You seem to be agreeing with each other, and yet you yell at each other????

Ironwood · October 31, 2001, 00:45

I have a feeling Arent simply is not very good at writing in English, like so many other Apolytoners, though he seems to feel he has a great deal to say, and people's capacity to comprehend his writing be damned.

Still, his very name (Arent... just missing the apostrophe), does suggest an inherent knee-jerk negativity...

Arent · October 31, 2001, 07:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Ironwood
...
Still, his very name (Arent... just missing the apostrophe), does suggest an inherent knee-jerk negativity...

OOOH! I won't leave my house at least for
five days now.

Arent

P.s.: You better insult ecthelion for his scatterbrained replies.
It's been a while I was talking that much and the other guy just didn't get it.
Oh well...

Arent · October 31, 2001, 12:06

Ecthelion, could it be that you are a bit serious about the panzer? I just read this "next civ of the week" thread and you brought it up there, too. Ok, well third reich as golden age seems a little misplaced but the panzer is quite famous due to hundreds of wargames ("Panzer general" for example).
...
Btw. I think they made the panzer quite well. It has 3 movement points - so one may very well assume that this simulates "better tactics".
Just imagine fighting your way out of Europe (cramped with 3-4 civs) and then it comes down to you and the isolated civs which had all the time to develop. This'll be hell on deity

Arent

Jason · November 2, 2001, 01:58

Incidentally, the Panzer as a UU also at least highlights a sort of German strength, armoured tactics in a certain period. Grenadiers? The only time German infantry were notably superior to their conterparts is what, Frederick the Great's time? Or perhaps the first and second world wars. The infantry of the Franco-Prussian war wasn't anything so special, and worse equipped than the French. Artillery superiority and bungled French command had more to do with it.

A lot of the UUs are quite silly of course. "Musketeers" for France? Uh huh. First they appear to have blunderbusses instead of muskets. And secondly I think the famous French musketeers are a tad more literary than historically significant. A Napoleonic citizen soldier or perhaps an improved Cannon for Charles the Bold would make sense. Ah well.

Looking for a real degree of historical accuracy in a game that is very abstract and gameplay-based is pretty futile in the end. I can appreciate your concern however.

I personally sympathize with poor old Weimar, and I wish people wouldn't skip right from 1924 to 1929 and ignore the little glimmer of hope in there, but it WAS a pretty doomed regime I guess

Rosacrux · November 2, 2001, 03:17

Quote:

Incidentally, the Panzer as a UU also at least highlights a sort of German strength, armoured tactics in a certain period. Grenadiers? The only time German infantry were notably superior to their conterparts is what, Frederick the Great's time? Or perhaps the first and second world wars. The infantry of the Franco-Prussian war wasn't anything so special, and worse equipped than the French. Artillery superiority and bungled French command had more to do with it.

Err... what???

The Prussian infantry is considered the best of all times - along with the Spartan hoplites and the WW2 German army - by every military expert in the whole world.

The golden era of the Prussian infantry starts with Frederick the Great and peaks when Moltke gets (after 1860) becomes #1 of the military hierarchy - the excellent performance of the Prussian soldiers was the cornerstone of the continuus military victories of the respective army in that era.

About the 18th century Prussian army... Prussia was a relatively small kingdom placed in North eastern Europe, facing the great powers of the era - Austro Hungaria, Russia, Sweden, France in the many wars fought this century. Only with England they were mostly at the same side.

Heavily outnumbered, with little (and initially of bad quality) cavalry and artillery, they managed to double the size of their country and establish Prussia among the continental powers - and that all due to the excellent performance of the simple Prussian soldier.

I'd suggest you read some military history and only after that proceed to judgements about what the Prussin infantry was - simply the best infantry of all epochs.

Duh!

Ecthy · November 2, 2001, 07:40

Arent - I actually wasn't mad at you personally... just the cyclical mix of depression and damnation of everything around you... it's a long story

Rosacrux - thank you for making that clear.

Will anyone join me in creating some kind of game edition where the German UU is an improved rifleman? Of course, the Rifleman unit is more a 19th century than an 18th century unit, but as I said, when there's no unified Germany, a golden age doesn't make sense, so it should start in the second half of the 19th century. Therefore, the Prussian infantrist should be a rifleman not an improved musketman or whatever there is.

Anyway, I'm still connecting the unique units with golden ages. What might be another goof trigger for the German golden age?

Jason · November 2, 2001, 15:17

I'm a historian, and military history is a speciality of mine. That's why I know the actual history of Prussia and not the high-school version.

The Prussian army started to suffer from calcification around the end of Frederick's career.

Quote:

The golden era of the Prussian infantry starts with Frederick the Great and peaks when Moltke gets (after 1860) becomes #1 of the military hierarchy - the excellent performance of the Prussian soldiers was the cornerstone of the continuus military victories of the respective army in that era.

Wrong. Right smack in the middle of your "military golden age" you have the Jena campaign, when an obsolete, ill-led and ill-motivated Prussian army was utterly crushed and the army and state had to be re-fashioned.

The Prussian army became strong again with Moltke, certainly, but in technical and training terms they weren't marketly superior to the French. The French had finer rifles with a major range advantage and primitive machine guns. It was the horrible leadership of Napoleon III and constant strategic and operational blunders that caused the victory to assume the scope that it did.

It's you who needs to reevalute your "history." Try reading scholarly monographs instead of un-footnoted pulp-fiction history and you'll do better.

Might start with Craig's "Politics of the Prussian Army," the first chapter or so (to 1807) will correct a few misconceptions you seem to have.

Bottom line, in terms of a significant Prussian "unit" that's uniquely better than it's counterparts, I'd say the soldiers of the army of Frederick the Great, a WWI infantry unit with extra defensive power, a dive-bomber or the existing panzer make the best choices.

Personally I think the German UU is well realized; the extra movement is very useful and reflects that the German armored advantage in the Blitzkrieg wasn't raw firepower.

Quote:

I'd suggest you read some military history and only after that proceed to judgements about what the Prussin infantry was - simply the best infantry of all epochs.

Once more, lol. I'm assuming this is ignorance and not jingoism, but please come back and try again when you know who Scharnhorst and Gneisenau are, and I don't mean the ships. I happen to be a big fan of the Prussians, but that doesn't mean I give them super-powers and turn them into a cartoon. They had their ups and their downs.

Ecthy · November 2, 2001, 17:20

Thank you for making that point clear, Jason. But let's not get into a debate about this

Well, whenever I read something about the Franco-Prussian war, I get the idea of technologically superior Prussian infantrists... oh well

Apparently, Frederick's armies were the best, and there's no decent unique unit around in the time from 1700-1940 as it seems... I still think it should be an industrial infantry unit. The Germans are an industrial nation in Civ3 as well...

Jason · November 2, 2001, 18:42

Actually they're Scientific and Militaristic if you mean in terms of national abilities. Cheap libraries and cheap barracks, and extra military promotions.

I agree that the Prussians could most credibly have the good late musket era UU. French Musketeer is probobly just a tip of the hat to the novels, rather than any historical abilities. The French were pretty normal till the revolution, it's unusual to give them the musket-era stand-up power.

Sorry if I was a little abrupt, I just enjoy this area, (I was absolutely infatuated with Prussia for a while) and didn't much take to having my opinion dismissed as unqualified. As it happens, I'm actually writing a paper in a week or two on the improvement of Prussian arms under the great elector. I don't think the Panzer should be sold short though. Yes, it's the obvious choice, but it IS a defining highlight of German military history. The golden-age triggered by the first Panzer victory isn't so important; you can get golden ages from building wonders and such anyway. And in practical terms having a UU in the lategame is a definite plus, and extra-mobile tanks are definately better than normal tanks.

Apart from the advantage of having a fast advancing army, consider the value of penetrating a civ and cutting its critical links to strategic resources. I look forward to having the fastest tanks for a while.

Franco-Prussian war I always get the idea that the real problem is leadership, the higher the worse. The army that "invaded" Germany was practically decapitated, the leadership was so uninvolved, and it only got worse. That war was one fiasco after another at a time when France had to be on top of its game to win.

Ecthy · November 3, 2001, 13:03

ah well, what does a golden age do anyway? doesn't it just add one food and one shield to each square? I think that affects the game more in medieval/industrial times than in the later game...

SirSebastian · November 5, 2001, 19:03

Speaking of that... I think it's silly that the Germans aren't considered Industrious... come on... we all know that the Germans are fleißig! Of course, you'd have to take away either Militaristic or Scientific... hmmm..

oriel94 · November 7, 2001, 10:16

Trouble is, the Germans are just so damned talented! Don't they just make you so mad? How to select only 2 CSAs for them? Anything except religious (Luther aside) could be a perfectly credible CSA for the Germans.

Ecthy · November 9, 2001, 10:05

well, militaristic and industrious would be the way to go if you ask me... commercial, scientific and religious just don't fit... I should know what I'm talking about