New Reality Seeds

[Astromancer]

Try this one. Robert fulton offered the steamship to Napoleon in about 1804 or 1805. At least in our history he did this. Napoleon rejected the steamship as an absurd and silly idea. However, imagine a world where Napoleon understood what Fulton offered and what it could do for him. In 1807, a fleet of armored French troop transport craft leave port for southern England moving against the wind and tides. The Brits are caught flat footed.

Now Napoleon's Empire was built on archaic financial structures, finance by plunder mainly. French banks were way behind the times and didn't fully catch up to best practises until decades later in our world. So, in this world, although Napoleon has conquered the United Kingdom, and changed it into the Anglican, Caladonian, Cambrian, and Hiberian Republics, his Empire still falls. Only it falls apart in 1857.

It's now 1865, all Europe is at war. The monarchists allied with the churches (the historic norm) and the Republicans allied with the Urban masses (again the historic norm). This would be a wild setting for steampunk swashbuckling.

[fwcain]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

(Napoleon accepts Robert Fulton's steamship, conquers UK...Napoleon not defeated until 1857...)

It's now 1865 -- all of Europe is at war.
(Astromancer's timing synchs up with American Civil War...)

The monarchists allied with the churches (the historic norm), and the Republicans allied with the Urban masses (again, the historic norm). This would be a wild setting for steam-punk swashbuckling.

(scribbles notes for future use)

Excellent... >;-D
Franklin

[Gedrin]

In our timeline, in 1896 a cloudy day leads Henri Becquerel to set aside his phosphorescence experiment, leaving potassium uranyl sulphate crystals, unexposed to sunlight, next to a photo plate in a closed drawer. For reasons unknown, he chooses to examine the supposedly unexposed plate. The resulting imprint of the plate shows the exposure shadow from the radioactive crystals, leading to the discovery of radioactivity and numerous cascading advances.

In an alternate timeline, the day is sunny, and a similar insight does not come about until 1904. While there's little reason to believe overall advancement would be stalled or slowed, the timing and personalities of those involved would be changed.

[tshiggins]

Originally Posted by fwcain

(scribbles notes for future use)

Excellent... >;-D
Franklin

Yep. Swiped.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by abe ray

not sure of the time frame, but here goes, Joan of ark helps win the war!
not sure of the implications though.

You are aware Joan gets far more credit for winning the 100 years war than anyone else? The only other factor that gets near as much credit is the french adopting firearms...

[Frost]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Try this idea, place a millitary genius in the family of a key supporter of Louis Napoleon (in our world the kid dies in infancy). The French still start the Franco-Prussian war outnumbered and outguned, but with a general of genius. Bismark finds the Prussian army fought to a standstill.

I would be tempted to make this putative military genius a logistic specialist rather than rather than the classic choice of a military commander. French performance in 1871, at least in the opening stages of the war was an artefact of haphazard mobilisation.

If the French were able to mobilise and deploy more effectively they might have been in a position to exploit the fairly significant weaknesses in the Prussian deployment. From the Prussian point of view a stalemate would be the least of their problems outright defeat would be a significant possibility.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Frost

I would be tempted to make this putative military genius a logistic specialist rather than rather than the classic choice of a military commander. French performance in 1871, at least in the opening stages of the war was an artefact of haphazard mobilisation.

If the French were able to mobilise and deploy more effectively they might have been in a position to exploit the fairly significant weaknesses in the Prussian deployment. From the Prussian point of view a stalemate would be the least of their problems outright defeat would be a significant possibility.

Good point, much of the advantage the Germans had in the Franco-Prussian war and for that matter the Union in the ACW was logistics.

[Astromancer]

Try this reality seed Henri, Count of Chambord swallows his pride and gets a clue. He accepts the Throne of France in the 1870's and is polite about it. In the next few years, working with reactionaries and others, he successfully allies with the Versailles Parliament (the government of the 3rd Republic stayed out out of Paris for a decade) and France moves in a reactionary direction. Most of France's major scientists and artists leave the nation. France becomes a minor European power.

In the 1890's Germany successfully gets Great Britain to agree to an Anglo-Germman defence pact (as a means of controlling and counter-ballancing Russian expanionism). When the WWI comes, Germany takes down a weak and degenerate France easily. Britain and Germany then take Russia on in Poland and Anatolia. Both the Crazist state and the Bourbon state fall. Unstable republics replace both. anarchists, communists, fascists, and others, suggle violently in the streets of Paris fighting to create a new France.

You can use this as a Pulp Primpernell setting, fight commies in 20's Paris, fight for socialism, or simply swashbuckle.

[Astromancer]

Further thoughts on the Chambord as King of France setting. WWI is much less traumatic and disruptive as well as being much shorter. America is never involved in the struggle. Thus the delegitimation of the old order never occurs in Europe while, absent the Palmerson raids or the drive to promote American entry into the War, Socialism and Social-Democratic ideas continue to flourish. Wilson's ill health isn't ignored and he's made to resign soon after his second election.

Thus you have an America which is the great magnet pulling all the progressives out of Europe. Europe 1920 is, except for the technology and the cultural changes in Britain, more like Europe 1890 than not. Monarchies go blithely on, imperialism is unquestioned, and France is given as the reason one votes Conservative. America is politely ignored (or cursed under the breath) and the Whole masquerade goes on.

[Astromancer]

Try this idea, give Kara Mustafa Pasha a younger brother who is both a talented millitary man (nothing incredible, just a throughly credible Ottoman millitary man) and has his bother's ear and the ability to get him to see things his way on millitary tactics and the like. The main reason Kara Mustafa Pasha failed to take Vienna was his amazing military incompetence and his inability to listen to skilled commanders. with the addition of this younger brother Vienna falls and the Polish and Bavarrian armies are stoped at key river fords.

Move ahead fourty-five years, the Ottoman state controlls most of southern Germany and has a border with France. Italy is also under Ottoman rule and the Pope lives in Barcelona. However, European technology is still moving forward, the English, French, and Dutch, all can trade with the Far East more cheaply by sailing around Africa. The ecconomic base of the Ottoman state is fading away.

Meanwhile, the Trukish invasion of Germany has caused a massive upsurge in the numbers of Germans settling in the King of England's American realms. The population is already about three million people (in our history that number wasn't achieved until seventy years later). The American colonies are as much a place of self-government and religious freedom in this world as in ours, which attracts the attention of the Sublime Porte. This leads the Sultan to ask, "If a new Christian power grows up in the west, how will we ever complete the conquest of the world for Islam?"

Thus you have a cold/hot war setting Swashers and Arabian Nights mixture with frequient trips to the Carribean and the American colonies with trukish pirates trying to size up the Americas and perhaps attack them if they can. Complex multipolar politics would be slid into this.