Recent content by Elfwine

It makes about as much sense as William being interested in resolving this with a sword duel.

There's also the question why the Georgians would want this union, for that matter. Even apart from wildly varying succession laws, there's not a lot of motivation for anyone to push for this here.

How much would you put their collapse as domestic problems vs. foreign ones?

The reason I'm not sure is that someone could argue that Edward IV dying without an adult heir doesn't seem that invincible, but it sure counts as the dynasty being kicked off the high seat within five years of the founder's (given that Edward's father was never king) death. I think that makes...

The House of York's end seems like it ought to count as at least worth mentioning, although I'm not sure what "within five years or less" refers to here - five years or less of what?

This one raises a question as far as what could have been and what was not a possibility: What stops the bourgeoise from seeing the King as a better ally than the nobility? Their goals and interests? The King's? Just no one seeing there as a point to that?

The other thing is that no one knows if this is going to be worth the effort and expense in advance. Not to say that means they don't do anything, but it's a factor that will influence what the Romans see this plant as.

What Nivek said, pretty much. If it's just some random thing that people grow purely because the rich have the money to waste, it's rather unlikely that they're going to make extensive use of it - especially in any fashion that would lead to experiments leading to vulcanization.

What, in this time period, do you see rubber as doing that other materials would not do better?

Not helped by him bouncing between awkwardly Anglophilic and awkwardly Anglophobic as far as his personal behavior. Without getting into if which one would be better for Germany past "It depends." that is a great way to ruffle feathers and a poor way to indicate any preference on strategy to -...

It probably falls within another few years barring some shocking twist (Michael VIII being killed/usurped, say). John IV is all of eleven and without any powerful figures on his side - the Laskarids were popular with the population, but that's not quite the same thing.

Apart from neither ever getting in a position to besiege Constantinople in the first place (OTL), I'm not sure the technology had been developed yet. That seems the main reason for most of the sieges not using anything comparable.

I am sure that Conrad's army would pillage everything in its path Just not sure that it means destroying the Seljuks as a power without more commitment to this than "I want to get through Anatolia as soon as possible and waiting up for Manuel is secondary at best." Edited to add: I do want to...

The first example of this that comes to mind is that Louis and Conrad were not interested in taking land in Anatolia. They didn't even focus on Edessa once they got through Anatolia. I'd happily agree that if Louis and Conrad were determined to take (for example) Iconium that it's far from...

I'm not sure it was doomed, but it was definitely a gamble - not helped by the fact that once things fell apart, Manuel's response seems to have been "I did not expect this!" as opposed to this: "In every battle there comes a time when both sides consider themselves beaten, then he who...