New Reality Seeds

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by patchwork

I've tried to do something with this before, but I don't see how you get a stable situation out of it; like Napoleon, Trotsky will keep declaring war on things until he loses. And that won't actually be that long - if he takes Warsaw in 1920, he's going for Berlin in 1921, and while there will briefly be Bolshie boots on German soil, he's definitely going to be pushed back without taking the capital. He's at the end of a long supply line through fundamentally hostile soil (just-conquered Poland) and is at the very end of his force-projection capability. At that point, how do we prevent the Bolshies from folding under the German counterattack? The treaty of Versailles will have been discarded as toilet tissue 3 years after it was signed. I agree it would be a fun setting, but I don't see how you get there without cabal/aliens etc.

If Trotsky dies in battle and a fight in the Kremlin paralyses the Red Army, a stability is possible.

[Flyndaran]

Anyone have a no Amerind immigration to the Americas variant yet?
Coupled with no megafauna die out here would lead to a very strange colonization alternate history.
(Though I'm not convinced humans were the main cause for it at all.)

[VulpesFulva]

Turtledove's Atlantis series had something similar: he effectively had the eastern half of North America separate from the rest, sort of like a Northern Hemisphere Australia for how odd the critters that were native to the island/continent were.

[patchwork]

Giray-2: The standoff and negotiations along the Ugra River in 1480 go...wrong...and Ivan the Great is dead early. Ivan Molodoy will be busy trying to bring his uncles into line (and will probably fail), Yaroslavl is likely secure but Novgorod and Rostov were both conquered recently enough that rebellion is highly likely, Tver and Kazan were not conquered yet...in such a volatile situation, the Church probably avoids explicitly stating who it thinks is properly Tsar until there's a clear winner to back...and the seizure of Prince Yuri's lands is an isolated incident rather than an established custom.

In this world, "Russia" never unifies and is instead a half-dozen squabbling Principalities. Without a strong Tsar to enforce Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism and Islam are all more prevalent than they were on Homeline. On the other hand, without Ivan Grozny, the Russian states are models of liberal capitalism, whether they are republics or principalities.

I'd put it in Quantum 5 in the age of revolution, perhaps 1780; Poland is disintegrating, but instead of being partitioned between Russia and Prussia, the Russians are doing their best to rebuild the place as several small, liberal nations like they did with Lithuania. Constitutions and Rights of Man are creeping into central Europe from the East, and there is no "Policeman of Europe" to defend absolutism. The Homeline Russian government is happily exploiting Siberian mineral wealth, while the American and French Homeline governments and the Russian Mafiya are all meddling (plus, no doubt, some Homeline idiots unaffiliated with any major government). Infinity's hands will be full dealing with all the people who see an opportunity to make this worldline over in their image.

[warellis]

Regarding the Homeline Russians exploiting this worldline, and the other groups as well, when Homeline groups start doing things like arranging business deals in another worldline do they pretend they're from another part of the world or do they work with people who they've pet in on the Secret?

[patchwork]

Originally Posted by warellis

Regarding the Homeline Russians exploiting this worldline, and the other groups as well, when Homeline groups start doing things like arranging business deals in another worldline do they pretend they're from another part of the world or do they work with people who they've pet in on the Secret?

They pretend they're from another part of the world; to blow the Secret is to get shipped to Coventry IF the I-Cops decide not to simply shoot you. Of course, some of the people meddling here don't care much about the law or acknowledge Infinity's authority.

[warellis]

Originally Posted by patchwork

They pretend they're from another part of the world; to blow the Secret is to get shipped to Coventry IF the I-Cops decide not to simply shoot you. Of course, some of the people meddling here don't care much about the law or acknowledge Infinity's authority.

Wasn't there something in Worlds of Horror about this one worldline where some Homeline EU politicians had connections with some baron in a Europe from a Horror worldline? They had business dealings or something IIRC about uranium. And this baron was like an 18th century guy or something. It was some sort of illegal thing or scandal IIRC.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by warellis

Wasn't there something in Worlds of Horror about this one worldline where some Homeline EU politicians had connections with some baron in a Europe from a Horror worldline? They had business dealings or something IIRC about uranium. And this baron was like an 18th century guy or something. It was some sort of illegal thing or scandal IIRC.

Gothic-2. The uranium is a small aspect of the world, where the elite have taken advantage of Victor Frankenstein's Treatment.

[patchwork]

Yeah. Reich-2's gotta be giving some people in Infinity ulcers too - some of the Resistance have figured out the Secret, but the Patrol wasn't willing to silence people who were fighting Nazi occupiers- but what are they gonna do when they win?

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by patchwork

Yeah. Reich-2's gotta be giving some people in Infinity ulcers too - some of the Resistance have figured out the Secret, but the Patrol wasn't willing to silence people who were fighting Nazi occupiers- but what are they gonna do when they win?

I want to say that that is grossly contradictory with basic Homeline protocol and regular wanton disregard of crosstime life. But as that's normal for real world politics, I'll have to keep mum.

Edit: Before any sarcasm, I mean real nations' contradictory political stances and actual actions in front of and behind the curtain of public knowledge.