Veteran VS Rooky recruits

[BardicNerd]

But then the men that are left all have high training, so their kids are even more awesome. That's called evolution!

Anyways I thought BM was pretty equal-opportunity compared to most medieval-type settings. Who's to say all those troops are male?

Because men dying en mass isn't anywhere near the problem for a society that women dying en mass is.  Also, you need people to take care of the kids, and for various reasons it's easier to have women do that (men can't nurse and can't be pregnant among them).

Various other reasons (some of which are perfectly valid, some of which are tradition/remnants of reasons that used to be valid but aren't anymore, probably a few of which are just irrational) aside, there is one overwhelming reason that men have tended to have the hazardous jobs such as warrior and hunter: men are expendable, women aren't.

[Ramiel]

Woman are needed to breed the next generation. Men are also but nearly any male can do that whilst fertile woman have a range. Not to mention one man can impregnate all the women if needed. Whereas you need all your women.

Tis why woman still are not allowed to be front line soldiers expecting to see close action.

[Draco Tanos]

Though I usually call all troops men for simplicity's sake, I have always viewed it more or less like Dragon Age's universe.  Men are the overwhelming majority of soldiers, but there's a splatter of women among their ranks.  Basically, they exist, but they're not dreadfully common.

[Chenier]

Though I usually call all troops men for simplicity's sake, I have always viewed it more or less like Dragon Age's universe.  Men are the overwhelming majority of soldiers, but there's a splatter of women among their ranks.  Basically, they exist, but they're not dreadfully common.

I've never seen any reason to assume such a thing.

In the medieval times, women could be powerful nobles as our characters can be. There were various important queens and duchesses, after all. That doesn't mean you saw women soldiers running around with the men.

[Draco Tanos]

You also didn't see women nobles clad in armor fighting on the frontlines leading soldiers.  When you did, they were called insane.  Like Joan of Arc.

[BardicNerd]

You also didn't see women nobles clad in armor fighting on the frontlines leading soldiers.  When you did, they were called insane.  Like Joan of Arc.

Well, being clad in armor and fighting on the frontlines is not really required for leading an army.

[Draco Tanos]

In the middle ages?  It pretty much was.  Otherwise you would be seen as an honorless craven.

[songqu88@gmail.com]

One of the key breaks from historical reality, which has been made pretty damn clear by the Mr. Tom is that there is gender equality in BM. Which means women do everything men do, and...I suppose vice versa logically...

[Gustav Kuriga]

One of the key breaks from historical reality, which has been made pretty damn clear by the Mr. Tom is that there is gender equality in BM. Which means women do everything men do, and...I suppose vice versa logically...

So apparently women can get men pregnant... interesting....

[Draco Tanos]

That is a disturbing and painful notion.

[Chenier]

One of the key breaks from historical reality, which has been made pretty damn clear by the Mr. Tom is that there is gender equality in BM. Which means women do everything men do, and...I suppose vice versa logically...

For most of the middle ages, women had more rights than they later had in the renaissance.

And how many female heroes do we actually have in the game? I would say they indeed qualify as the oddball.

And female troop leaders doesn't mean female troops.

You are free to RP your unit as being female, though, but I'd be more inclined to say that every single troop that hasn't had it's sex defined is male.

[De-Legro]

Woman are needed to breed the next generation. Men are also but nearly any male can do that whilst fertile woman have a range. Not to mention one man can impregnate all the women if needed. Whereas you need all your women.

Tis why woman still are not allowed to be front line soldiers expecting to see close action.

Many nations actually DO allow women to serve in all roles now, including front line infantry and fighter pilots.  The man arguments in the modern age against women serving in the front line have been

1) The aren't strong enough for the Job. In the armies that allow women to serve in the front line they must pass the exact same fitness tests as men.
2) The enemy would mistreat/rape them if captured.
3) The men serving with them will feel "protective" and may jeopardize the safety of the unit in an effort to "protect" the poor girls.

[De-Legro]

O.o I was under the impression BM was set in medieval times....but then again, I could be wrong. Your right on the part that most where killed, but a few deserted and escaped. One veteran can train 100 new recruits.

Pretending the Veteran is in any way a competent teachers, and that the troops had significant free time to train. But then the reality of most of the medieval age was the main part of the army was almost completely incompetent. The weren't professional soldiers, they didn't get significant training and once the current conflict was over they would return to the fields or craft that they came from.


Only Knights and their men-at-arms trained in a significant fashion, and they were extremely unlikely to teach the honored craft of combat to the mere peasants that formed the bulk of the army. This is why weapons like crossbows were so favored, you could expect new recruits to become competent with the weapon extremely quickly.

The English armies of the Hundred Year wars were a major exception to this. The bulk of those armies were Long Bow men, who while not trained soldiers in the real sense, did have years upon years of training with their weapon.

I've never seen an explanation of where BM troops fit into this mold. Are our units the private men-at-arms cadre that accompanied most knights? Are they semi professional militia's and it is assumed that when you travel home some of the men return to their lives to be replaced by others called into service?

[Bedwyr]

Because men dying en mass isn't anywhere near the problem for a society that women dying en mass is.  Also, you need people to take care of the kids, and for various reasons it's easier to have women do that (men can't nurse and can't be pregnant among them).

While men can't be pregnant, they can nurse, oddly enough.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-true-males-can-lactate&sc=rss

For most of the middle ages, women had more rights than they later had in the renaissance.

And how many female heroes do we actually have in the game? I would say they indeed qualify as the oddball.

And female troop leaders doesn't mean female troops.

You are free to RP your unit as being female, though, but I'd be more inclined to say that every single troop that hasn't had it's sex defined is male.

I've seen a number of female heroes, and plenty of female troop leaders getting wounded in battles.  Not to mention that some realms (Abington comes to mind) have certain centers that were always RP'd as having female troops.

Talking about needing women for biological reasons seems kinda pointless to me given the speed at which people reproduce and grow in this game.  If you really wanted to think about it, gestation in BM has to be very quick, and probably producing litters.  I mean, before the immigration code which made regions recover oh-so-wonderfully faster (thank you thank you thank you) it took, what, a full RL year, roughly, to recover a depopulated city, right?  But that's only (depending on your calendar, but I'm just using a four-seasons=one year) five years or so.  Yeah, limited immigration was part of that, but we still have to be talking about multiple generations in that five years.

[De-Legro]

While men can't be pregnant, they can nurse, oddly enough.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-true-males-can-lactate&sc=rss

I've seen a number of female heroes, and plenty of female troop leaders getting wounded in battles.  Not to mention that some realms (Abington comes to mind) have certain centers that were always RP'd as having female troops.

Talking about needing women for biological reasons seems kinda pointless to me given the speed at which people reproduce and grow in this game.  If you really wanted to think about it, gestation in BM has to be very quick, and probably producing litters.  I mean, before the immigration code which made regions recover oh-so-wonderfully faster (thank you thank you thank you) it took, what, a full RL year, roughly, to recover a depopulated city, right?  But that's only (depending on your calendar, but I'm just using a four-seasons=one year) five years or so.  Yeah, limited immigration was part of that, but we still have to be talking about multiple generations in that five years.

And how quickly the newborn age into useful productive members of society :)