Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl
I am not sure that anyone would have concrete evidence of the effectiveness of subtle psychics early on (IRL, governments dabbled with the research until the 1970s, but pretty much gave up because of a lack of concrete results). If the Austrian-Hungarian Empire benefits from first mover advantage, they might be able to recruit potential psychics from other nations and/or sabotage the research of other nations so that their competitors actually do think that psychics are bunk. The investment in psychics over dreadnought would just be a difference in priorities rather than necessarily a prediction.
For example, Austrian-Hungarian telepaths could use conditioning to give thousands of people within a competitor nation the delusion that they have psychic powers in order to foul up any potential research. With a large number of false positive and high profile lunatics claiming psychic powers, the majority of nations would probably just focus on building dreadnoughts. Of course, the fact that Austrian-Hungarian psychics could easily spy on their competitors would give the government an accurate assessment of relative military strength and attitudes.
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yep nice,
Also if it's smart AH will keep the existence of it's own successful physic powers a secret (also more easy to do when you have physic powers available).