09-07-2017, 10:23 AM | #431 | |
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Join Date: Mar 2012
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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The hard part is Italy's economy. They were financial trouble BEFORE the war started due to heavy funding of the Spanish civil war. Of course, they were in a better financial situation than basically everyone else in 1930. Mussolini came to power years before the global panic, and was able to basically resist it. This is what got the world's attention and inspired the other fascist leaders, incidentally. So starting the war earlier will help a lot. Italy also struggled because they were the junior partner in a two-country alliance. Adding a third member may make them more powerful, especially if the other two like Italy better than they like each other. So I propose adding France to the alliance. France in the 1930's was a political mess, and the free french fighters spent more time fighting each other than the occupation. A fascist-style take over in france isn't out of the question. This makes Italy the deciding vote between a Germany and a France with a long history of disputes. This is shaped quite differently from world war II, but in some ways it needs to be. So you have this western European block under Italian arbitration that declares war on Soviet Russia in 1936 -- the middle of the great purge. I think you could get some nice itallian outcomes here. But we've sort of done something other than "Itally wins WWI".
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09-07-2017, 12:43 PM | #432 |
Join Date: Feb 2011
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
I mean, we could always try something a little weirder and have Neptune, Mars, Minerva, and Jupiter himself come down from the heavens and take a direct role in the restoration of Rome (and thoroughly bewilder anyone who knows greek mythology).
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09-07-2017, 02:39 PM | #433 |
Join Date: Aug 2008
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
How about someone learns to summon the ghosts of Julius Caesar and Augustus back from the great Beyond. They start giving Mussolini advice on (respectively) how to win wars and fix economies. Depending on when this started and how it developed, Italy might well be the power to beat in Europe when the war finally starts.
The Nazis, of course, get wind of this and this sparks their own mad hunts for Relics and occult lore. Unfortunately for them whoever is feeding the Italians advice is a lot better at this stuff than the Germans and manages to trick the Nazis into one or more massive blunders just before the Italians stab up from the south. Eventually the secrets to this sort of occult activity get out and every government has covert operatives developing their own tools. You end up with the cold war being fought not openly, but rather covertly using magic. The general public has no idea what is actually going on in the shadows and there would be religious uprisings if they did... [[specifics of who/ what/ how the Italians have a hidden Weird advantage vary to GM taste. On the surface at least the effects are the same.]] |
09-07-2017, 02:41 PM | #434 | |
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Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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That could help answer and raise numerous questions.
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09-07-2017, 06:12 PM | #435 |
Join Date: Jun 2017
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
What about having a divergence earlier, say Italy gaining the Dalmatian coast, a larger chunk of Austria, and maybe a couple of the German colonies in Africa after WWI. That would give Italy a bigger economic base before the war, although I doubt it would be enough to make much of a difference. It would also take away a big cause for the rise of Fascism in Italy and you could conceivably get a Italy joining with the Allies from the start.
How about this: after WWI, Italy is given Dalmatia, a good sized chunk of Austria, and German Cameron (Cameroon). During the interwar period, Fascism never takes hold, instead a mild socialist government comes to power. This republican government in Italy intervenes in internal conflicts in the new formed Yugoslavia, putting the closely in the Italian sphere. Later, when the Spanish Civil war breaks out, Italy intervenes on the Republican side, defeating Franco, and forming a close Spanish-Italian Alliance. When Germany invades Poland, the Italian-Spanish-Yugoslav alliance joins France and the UK and declares war on Germany. With the extra support from Italy, the allies accept an Italian plan to invade Germany while much of the German army is busy in Poland. The invasion is a wild success, and Allied troops are marching into Berlin in early 1941. After the war, Germany is reconstructed, and Austria becomes close to Italy in thanks for Italian troops liberating them from the Nazis (with many Austrians forgetting that many Nazis were in fact Austrian). Since the Italian government is mildly Socialist, they are able to serve as an intermediary between the US/UK and the USSSR. It is conceivable that this could lead to a much stronger post-war Italy, but I have a hard time seeing a dominant Italy. I also don't know if this parallel has any fewer holes than what has been suggested so far, but it does keep the alien space bats away. |
09-07-2017, 07:31 PM | #436 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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09-07-2017, 08:38 PM | #437 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: MO, U.S.A.
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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Italy will likely be able to politically dominate this Alliance, Poland is still a bit behind technologically and glaring at the Russians, the Czechs and Slovaks are still disagreeable, Spain is still recovering from a nasty civil war, and France still has the awful inter-World War type governments.
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09-07-2017, 09:13 PM | #438 | |
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Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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But maybe this chronoclast did write how-tos.
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Beware, poor communication skills. No offense intended. If offended, it just means that I failed my writing skill check. |
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09-07-2017, 11:54 PM | #439 |
Join Date: Feb 2011
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
The Prince is an entertaining read. I wouldn't quite call it satire... it pretends to be a how-to guide but in the end tries to subvert the most common mistakes of tyrants -- namely, being so tyrannical that his vassals and people rebel.
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09-08-2017, 12:02 AM | #440 | ||
Join Date: Feb 2011
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Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels
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infinite worlds, weird worlds |
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