Pendraken Miniatures Forum

Wider Wargaming => Genre/Period Discussion => Ancients to Renaissance (3000BC - 1680) => Topic started by: FierceKitty on 14 April 2014, 02:33:35 PM

Title: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 14 April 2014, 02:33:35 PM
History Channel, is that the best you can do?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: Lord Kermit of Birkenhead on 14 April 2014, 03:12:45 PM
It were bad den ?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 14 April 2014, 03:23:57 PM
That it were, arrr.
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: Duke Speedy of Leighton on 14 April 2014, 04:50:12 PM
Sounds... Average?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: toxicpixie on 14 April 2014, 06:53:41 PM
I'm going to regret this, but... In what way was it so bad...
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 15 April 2014, 12:39:40 AM
There's a lot that is known about that battle that the show ignores. The makers gave the impression that they'd read Featherstone and Grant, and maybe skimmed Oman. Uniforms, army composition, units that had long been disbanded, stiff left out, and I think if I'd been told about five-to-one odds once more I'd have thrown my hapless computer across the room. Hmmm....Stop, Kitty. Will you stop, Kitty? I'm afraid. My mind is going. I can feel it.

Watch it if you don't mind grinding some enamel off your molars.  In fact, it could be a good contest for this thread: who can find the most errors and omissions?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: GordonY on 15 April 2014, 06:27:20 AM
If you want to watch it try here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvqJLXXRLA0
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: toxicpixie on 15 April 2014, 08:29:13 AM
Oh dear... so it's a whole based off a game report written on the back of a fag packet and skimming the dust jackets of some books in the second hand shop then  :-\

The 90 secs I've managed to watch look pretty though, and at least it's not Ultimate Warrior.

"Who will win in the contest between... the entire modern US Army, and a peasant with a stick!"
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 15 April 2014, 08:40:13 AM
Hmmm....Peasants with simple knives took out the WTC in New York a while ago.
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: toxicpixie on 15 April 2014, 08:55:51 AM
It's potentially a loaded question ;)

And that's simple knives plus years of training and funding by Western intelligence agencies* & the Saudi's, plus several mahoosive flying bombs. Not quite the same thing...

*I don't subscribe to the theory that "our" security services then deliberately set nutters they'd set up to come back and attack their "benefactors" but surely someone should have thought about the likelihood that setting up terrorists leads to terror?!
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 15 April 2014, 09:24:36 AM
Quote from: toxicpixie on 15 April 2014, 08:55:51 AM
It's potentially a loaded question ;)

And that's simple knives plus years of training and funding by Western intelligence agencies* & the Saudi's, plus several mahoosive flying bombs. Not quite the same thing...

*I don't subscribe to the theory that "our" security services then deliberately set nutters they'd set up to come back and attack their "benefactors" but surely someone should have thought about the likelihood that setting up terrorists leads to terror?!

Or that marrying princesses to barbarians would lead to descendants who claimed the throne, or that making soldiers personally dependent on their generals for their retirement funds was not a good way to keep power in civilian hands, or that employing huge numbers of mercenaries who know no other trade does not lead to a determination to win wars....The USA is not short of idiots, but it certainly doesn't have a monopoly.
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: toxicpixie on 15 April 2014, 09:46:07 AM
Never ascribe to malice that which can be attributed to stupidity...

That was no direct comment on the USA btw, the system that produced the result and the rule of idiocy is global. And can't be too stupid, it deffo works for its owners!
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 15 April 2014, 10:35:23 AM
Easy to stay on top while you have no powerful and aggressive neighbours.
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: Duke Speedy of Leighton on 15 April 2014, 11:44:01 AM
Yeah, when are Canada going to invade and put us out of our misery?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: FierceKitty on 15 April 2014, 11:48:53 AM
Oot of your misery?
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: toxicpixie on 15 April 2014, 11:58:46 AM
Damn terror tactics, Celine Dion and Bryan Adams surely count as torture devices...
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: Duke Speedy of Leighton on 15 April 2014, 11:59:13 AM
Aye oot!
Title: Re: Gaugamela
Post by: Ithoriel on 15 April 2014, 12:11:05 PM
Just watched it. Not nearly as bad as I'd expected from FK's description.

It's the video equivalent of a coffee table book, aimed at those with a general interest and designed to look good.

The endless repetitions are down to the fact that it is designed to be punctuated by American ad breaks and watched by those with the attention span of a goldfish.

Those who watch it will have a damn sight closer idea of what happened and why than those relying on Hollywood History 101 :)

tl:dr - Pretty but all the depth of a teaspoon