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I've made a table of all the military ranks to be encountered in my T2K setting.
It was not that hard, but a pain in the butt to transcribe from wikipedia to odt file.
Not every nation uses all the same ranks as the others. Some skip ranks.
The US has four ranks (PV1, PV2, PFC, SPC) for the single rank of "private" for example.
Also fun is the Bundeswehr Heer and Nationale Volksarmee use the same ranks, but at slightly different levels in some places.
While double checking a couple items for T2K, like the AN/PEQ-2, I noticed that they all pre-date rail systems that are common today.
"That's impressive, where on the rifle does it go?"
Proprietary mountings were the norm before the widespread adoption of Picatinny rails.
The AR-15 has become the new Mauser.
Just about everyone is converting to some variation of the AR now. Some closer to the original than others...
The book Les Liaisons Dangereuses is set in the same year it was published, 1782.
Since it's main characters are all French nobility, they only have seven to ten years or so before the revolution overtakes them.
Marquise Isabelle de Merteuil will not have to suffer her humiliation long...
Today is the day that slavery was legally abolished in the USA.
Right after a war that decided that it would be THE USA.
Since the oldest person ever verified was "just" 116 years old and the oldest person claimed was 122...
I think we're on pretty firm footing that any former slave in the United States is no longer with us.
Probably even outside their grandchildren's lives.
I'm not saying that racism and bigotry did not happen after the 13th Amendment was ratified.
I am saying to stop citing slavery when speaking of the injustices you wish to address.
Also, limit yourself to injustice that happened to YOU. Not your brother's nephew's cousin's roommate.
I'm familiar with most of this kit from photos and books, but never seen most of them in action.
Pretty neat!
There's a truism about WW2; "The war was won with British intelligence, American steel and Russian blood." It's attributed to Stalin himself.
I became aware of this truism from some British subject explaining how us Americans didn't really do much and we shouldn't be saying we won the war.
They refer to WW1 in this light too.
Well, WW1 would probably have ended differently after the collapse of Russia and without the injection of American troops to the Western Front. Even if the Germans eventually lost, the surrender terms would likely have been a lot less provocative. Might even have prevented WW2 from happening at all.
But the "American steel" part misses something very important.
American FOOD.
If we'd sat it out completely, England would have starved. Literally.
I don't believe that the US won the war in Europe single-handedly. But I do think that the US was instrumental in achieving that victory.
Twilight:2000 happens as some long held paradigms in infantry weapons changed.
The Austrians and British had changed over to bullpup rifles which used magnified optics instead of iron sights. The Germans were working on a caseless bullpup rifle that used a scope instead of irons.
The US and Canada were slicing the carry handles off their M16 derivatives and replacing them with a rail which wasn't specific to a particular optic. The US with the, now, ubiquitous Picatinny rail, Canada going with a modification of the ancient Weaver system. Picatinny is also a modification of the Weaver system, but different from the Canadian version.
It's the slots. Weaver and Canada use narrower slots (0.180" vs 0.206"). Weaver doesn't specify spacing of the slots, Canada and Picatinny do.
Canada and Picatinny use different spacing (0.394" center to center for Picatinny) with the Canadian system getting 14 slots in the same space as Picatinny getting 13.
This creates some incompatibilities. Don't get too down on Canada here, they simply licensed an existing Weaver modification from A.R.M.S. mere months before the Picatinny rail was developed and NATO adopted it.
Anything designed for a Weaver base will fit both.
Anything designed for a Canadian rail will fit a Picatinny rail.
Some things designed for a Picatinny rail will fit on a Weaver or Canadian rail. Trial and error here.
And then there's the Soviets and Warsaw Pact...
Nominally there are two standard side-rails for their weapons. The AK pattern and the SVD pattern.
The same scope can be found with either mounting style. Except for the mounting, they are identical.
Later scopes, outside the scope (pun) of T2K have a mounting system that can used with both style of rails.
I would have mentioned the anniversary end of Prohibition 92 years ago on Friday, but I was busy drinking.
Today is Pearl Harbor Day.
84 years since The Empire of Japan opened hostilities against the US and touched the boats.
NEVER.
TOUCH.
THE.
BOATS!
Cue the Beatles... Abbey Road, side 2, song 1.
108 years ago Finland decided to stop being part of Russia and declined it's first invitation to be part of the Soviet Union.
The G41 was a program that West Germany launched when the G11 program was showing all the signs of being an epic failure.
It's basically an HK33 that uses a normal STANAG magazine.
In the real world the end of the cold war killed the G11 project and German reunification delayed adoption of a 5.56 rifle for a few years; culminating in the G36.
In T2K, the G11's problems were solved, but it was still expensive, so the G41 was adopted as a secondary standard.
I'm having trouble finding the introduction dates for the folding backup iron sights the military issues.
I am thinking I will have to revise my T2K list, again, and make the detachable carry handle the default BUIS.
This is not to say that such sights weren't available, they just weren't issued.
I think that ARMS #40 was around in time for Twilight, but I am not certain.
Since I've made him a character in my scribbles, I've been reading about George Crook.
In particular the battle of the Rosebud.
This is where General Crook learned that the northern plains Indians fought a little differently from the Apache and Northwest Indians he'd been accustomed to.
But part of that difference was from a change in how the Sioux and Cheyenne were dealing with Whites.
They'd gotten new leaders who were aggressive, take-the-fight-to-the-enemy types.
And they took the fight to Crook at Rosebud creek.
I've read several accounts of that fight and the worst I can call it for Crook is a draw.
The outcome of the battle was not decisive for either side, but it did fix Crook in one spot for
Both sides apparently fought until ammunition levels were getting critical and the Sioux withdrew. Crook then sent riders to his supply dump and withdrew to a better position until fresh supplies arrived.
Those supplies did not arrive until after Col. Custer had met his fate.
Something I've not seen mentioned is I think the Indians had something of an after action review of the Rosebud battle and did a "this worked, this didn't" kind of analysis and applied it to the Battle of the Greasy Grass.
I think some historians forget that Indians are people too and capable of learning and changing their approaches to problems.
I also think a lot of historians keep missing that Rosebud and Little Big Horn are separated by about a week and how long it takes to move a supplies when it's carried by wagon or mule (or how far a wagon or mule can go in a day).
Someone mentioned that the pros study logistics, some obscure general I think.
I have also noticed that George Crook was an unpopular officer with his contemporaries who really only kept his job by being relentlessly successful... Until Rosebud.
There's a lot to unpack about the man, but history is written from what people wrote about someone and those someones hate you...
Still thinking about the world of Twilight: 2000 and things that I never considered back in 1985 when I first got the game and started playing.
We didn't do mines, so there were no minefields. There should have been. There should, at least, be signage indicating minefields, even if they are fake, just to keep some of the marauders out of the crops.
Unexploded ordnance would be everywhere. The T2K world exists before agreements about cluster munitions were signed and Soviet bomblets had a depressingly high percentage that didn't go off on impact as intended.
Because of marauders and how the militaries generally treated the civilian populations, they should be a lot more hostile to the party escaping Kalisz. It makes me wonder if a re-writing The Seven Samurai for T2K would work... No, I don't wonder, it'd work great! The big question is whether the players would be the Samurai or the bandits. It works great both ways.
Because the characters are soldiers and the equipment list is, essentially, a weapons list; two big things get missed.
The Battle of Kalisz is the end of the war. The party runs for it, but the battle ends with both sides basically wiping each other out. WW3 is over except for the mopping up.
Because the war is over, they can participate in the rebuilding of society and having a part in how that proceeds. They can settle. They can try to get home. They can be part of a local warlord or town becoming a government or nation.
The vistas are wider than I would have imagined in 1985 when the Soviet Union was just a solid as the West and NATO.
Thanksgiving post at ¡No Pasarán!
My research has led to some awkward conversations with my Blackfoot wife, Harvey.
Nobody wants their ancestors to be the baddies.
This research has made it exceedingly difficult to make progress with my little Sabers and Sorcerers story because all the bad shit I'd planned for the Googoo to do to show how baddie they are... The Sioux did in real history!
Never mind the Sioux crossing to the alternate Earth, Maka Tanka, and doing unto the Googoo what white gold prospectors and the US government did to the Sioux in the Black Hills. For the Sioux it's kind of a repeat because they'd already done it to the Cheyenne and Pawnee.
SIGH
The entire world was on the gold standard in the 16th and 17th centuries.
One of the reasons for the golden age of piracy was the massive devaluation of gold thanks to Spain massively increasing the supply of available gold in Europe because they were moving it from the new world.
It's a great example of how even gold can have inflation.
It seems unlikely that we're going to find a massive enough amount of gold to cause it to devalue like when Spain toppled all those kingdoms in the new world, but Elon is still working on super heavy launchers.
Who knows what's in the asteroids?
I was talking with Harvey about my Will it GURPS of the Kennedy assassination and she asked if the shot was really hard or not.
One thing I expressed was the distances weren't terribly long for a rifle.
I reminded her of the time we spent on a 100 yard range once and said, "that's as far away as Kennedy ever got from Oswald."
She said, "that was pretty long..."
I replied, "But did I have any trouble hitting with my Springfield?"
"Oh!" she said.
The difference in elevation and the movement of the car are complications, but not insurmountable ones.
It's moderately difficult, not impossible.
It is within the skill set of most hunters.
Assuming Oswald makes the relatively simple shot...
-7 for the skull.
+4 for Acc for aiming.
+1 for braced.
40 yards for the first shot, (-10 for elevation) effectively 30. -7 for range.
The 20 yards per second speed of the limo adds to the range making it 50 yards, effectively, and -8 to hit.
-10 to hit, this is the shot that missed! He'd need a skill of, at least, 13 to get a roll at all.
70 yards for the second shot. 90 for the third. Very little lateral movement from vehicle speed.
-9 for the second shot and -10 for the third.-7 to hit the skull.
+4 for Acc for aiming.
+1 for braced.
-11 for the second shot, -12 for the third.
To get a roll at all for the third shot, Oswald has to have a skill of, at least, 15.
I've statted myself at 16 from measuring my groups and accounting for all the variables and I don't think of myself as an awesome shot...
I've seen players roll statistically unlikely rolls in the game before, so a skill of 18 and a rolls of 9+, 7- and 6- in a row is plausible.
5d pi to the neck/body. No DR. 10 HP. Avg damage roll will be 17.5 points, or 17. Possible damage ranges from 5 to 30 points.
10 HP done to Kennedy, 7 continues to Connally.
Hit to the body. If average hit, wrist cannot be struck.
Normally the rules don't allow for the wrist to be struck either, but we can extrapolate...
It would take 3 points of damage to cripple a hand. That means Connally had to have taken 13 points of damage and Kennedy 23.
Using both the Bleeding rules from B420 and the Body Hits rules from High Tech 162, the first shot only does 10 points of damage to Kennedy and 13 to Connally.
Both people hit appear to have made their consciousness rolls.
5d pi to the skull. DR 2 from the bone. An average, 17 point, hit will get 15 points to penetrate and is quadrupled for 60. Auto death.
The Kennedy assassination GURPS.
Update: Simple math mistake fixed and the effects of that changed. 4 x 15 is NOT 30. DURRRR.
