The Raj of Steam and Steel

From Warbirth Wiki

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INTRO:[edit | edit source]

"It's now 2026 AD - almost a century and a half since the celestial disaster known as the Fall which laid low the Northern hemisphere, leaving the world a charnel house of crop failures and cannibalism for more than a century afterward. Time has practically stood still since that fateful year of 1878 AD: motorcars and combustion engines are rarer than the lance or sword; most travel continues either by horse or elephant caravan, and outside the world's greatest empires - being the British Empire in India and Dai-Nippon, the world knows no form of water travel any speedier than the steamship, even if airships and ballooning are very commonplace across the Asia-Pacific region.

"Yet one thing has never changed, and that is humankind's appetite for war. The urge to dominate - to destroy and kill more - remains all the more stronger than ever before - and it seems that storm clouds are now growing again: Russian activity has led to the death of the king of Angreziraj; the empire of Dai-Nippon seeks rapprochement with the Russian Empire - now called Novaya Rossiya and based in Central Asia. And the British have not been idle either, having signed a new military alliance with the beleagured French Empire in Africa, seeking to exert more control over the Middle East through Egypt.

"All the civilised world - mainly, North Africa and Asia - now hold their breath. How will the new fledgling king of Angreziraj - John Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the second of his name (and survivor of the Garuda incident) respond? would he choose to plunge the world into war? or will he choose the path of intrigue over overt confrontation to satiate the need for vengeance? I guess this story is meant to be yours to play out."

Progress log[edit | edit source]

According to S M Stirling himself, on faceBook:

"Well, there’s the question of ‘path dependency’, so it won’t be exactly the same technology. Overall, [the world of the Peshawar Lancers reaches 1920s-era tech in] about twenty years [after the book]."

So that means the mod should take place around 2050.

  • No Towers - only Kraals are permitted.
  • Tech are done but these are mostly rehashes of old ideas for a post-apocalyptic Steampunk world.
  • Mercenaries and regulars. Regular units are few and far between. The war if The Raj of Steam and Steel takes place primarily between mercenaries.

Issues?[edit | edit source]

Mercenaries??[edit | edit source]

Temple / Sanctuary / Church: Balkans, Europeans, Jungle units.

  • New skins need to be developed for the former two.

Merc Quarters:

  • Arabs

Fort: Beidi / Native Americans.

  • New skins will have to be developed
  • Ranged units should all be removed

Architecture[edit | edit source]

What will the architecture of this world look like? clearly it won't resemble the past.

  • South European: used by France, Syria, and most Latin American nations. (m)
  • Indian/Angrezi: Original Indian architecture but with many European accents, this is after all the heart of the British empire. Definitely used by South Africa and Afghanistan too. (e)
  • North European - used by Bavarian Germany and New Britain (n)
  • Colonial - used by Russia, American Republic and California (u)
  • Siam - still uses the Malay style we devised (s). Maybe use this for all African factions too.
  • Japan - Korean (k)
  • China - Chinese (a)
  • (t) Somalia, Saudi

What's the premise?[edit | edit source]

It's 20 years since the events of The Peshawar Lancers. The world has recovered, and things are reaching pre-Fall levels. The main weapons of war continue to be 19th century vintage equipment -- leavened with armoured cars and blimps. Mechanise in order to get better units!

So,

  • Global cooling has created a place where areas which were arid in the 20th century are drier, and areas which were moist, even more so. The northern hemisphere is coming out of a small glacial age but Scandinavia and most of Canada is uninhabitable. Imaginably, littoral North Africa must be more savannah than desert at this point in time, hence the French penchant for staying.
  • Technology is gradually picking up, but peace and stability have meant that military technology has stagnated somewhat, because most nations are interested only in recolonisation and recovery, not attacking one another, many of the inventions of past years, so military technology is somewhat backward, because there are easier pickings. Cannibals don't stand a chance against grenades, muskets or 6 lb guns,
  • Air travel has become more prominent, global empire is based on treaties not conquest. The British are liked by most nations, especially Brazil, California, France and Egypt, but there is near-continuous conflict between them, Russia, and Dainippon and their buffer states.
  • Continuous friction has resulted in the rise of the New Chinese Commonwealth - essentially a somewhat backward state controlling resource-poor Sichuan, who is at war with Dainippon..
  • Democracy is pretty much gone - most nations are either military juntas (Brazil), oligarchies (South Africa), theocracies (California and Syria) or absolute monarchies
  • Russia has lost most of its national character thanks to the Fall. While it retains some of its units, it is more likely to rely on the use of Central Asian cavalrymen to do its bidding.
  • Most of the modern French and British empires were reconstituted, but they are more interested in redeveloping North America and Europe, not Africa. France has for all purposes refounded the Carthaginian Empire.

Syria is the most powerful faction in Africa and all of the Islamic world, having refounded the Achaemenid Empire (of sorts, minus Egypt). But Caliphal Syria (linked to Russia) must still compete with Egypt, Oman, and Saudi Arabia (as well as Afghanistan's warring tribes).

  • Africa is still underdeveloped but the British, Egyptians Ethiopians, and French have made gains across littoral eastern and northern Africa, so that leaves central Africa open. So while South Africa and Egypt are fairly powerful, other nations like Kongo and bUganda are still dirt poor. Europeans control most of the north and east regions except for Ethiopia, Egypt and Morocco - the latter having recolonised Portugal and southwestern Spain.
  • Japan has expanded into Alaska but the British control the Atlantic seaboard.

Mod features[edit | edit source]

Warbirth - The Raj of Steam and Steel can be said to be a fork of Fallen Giants yet it is very much a part of the Wartbirth family.

  • Techs, buildings - mostly follow that of Warbirth.
  • Units: mercenaries for most factions are important. Although it is worth noting that some like France and Japan do not rely a great deal on mercenaries, but others like Angrezi Raj and Novaya Rossiya (as well as the native American civs) are very much dependent on mercenary recruitment.
  • Colonial warfare, expanded. A lot of tribal units still persist for this mod, with Jungle Units for Brazil, and a vast slew of African units for factions like Abyssinia, Kongo, bUganda-bUnyoro and Oman. See if your armies of spearmen and archers can stand up against more modern armies equipped with machine guns and armoured cars.
  • A restricted pop cap. For the purposes of this mod, the pop cap has been set to 400 but the high pop cost to support certain units poses challenges to military composition.
  • No Oil. Unlike Fallen Giants where you need to search for and cap Oil Deposits in Warbirth it is unnecessary. But this however means that many units have a very high cost in Wealth, requiring you to decide if you need to build more super units or concentrate on creating a fast training army of mercs.
  • Modern armoured warfare! We expect there to be 3 armoured units - track carriers, armoured track carriers and assault track carriers. These are all built from a Smelter and are meant to function as late-game units. Track carriers can be found in the armies of many factions - but only the heavy sort can be found in North African and Syrian armies. As well as those of South Africa and Australia. Some factions like China, Ethiopia or the Comanche do NOT build these monstrosities at all.