DUST Search - A small, real life history lesson for K/D fans.

Cerebral Wolf Jr wrote:

I'd call K/D ratio fans more of a tragic figure. They comes from a different school of internet warfare, if you will. They are the best of what "MAG" has to offer, but it just doesn't work in the reality of this game. Take for example Hannibal of Carthage, by far considered the best Hellenistic general of his time. Problem is Hellenistic warfare was hilariously unprepared for the Roman school of war. A Hellenistic general was expected maneuver and delay battle until he held an undeniable advantage. Battle would commence and he would score a victory by inflicting some casualties and getting the other army to route. In Hellenistic warfare retreat and surrender were often allowed and expected, a golden avenue was given to let the other force leave. Terms of peace shortly followed thereafter. This should sound rather familiar as our K/D ration fans believe that kill/death ratios decide the day, they expect one victory after much maneuvering to make their enemy take the golden avenue of retreat, and come terms.

Roman warfare pretty much dictated that it wasn't over till you were no longer a threat. That meant total annihilation or subjugation. Carthage itself was subdued a number of times each time attempting the throw off Roman control. Finally the Romans got pissed enough they said **** it and just burnt all of Carthage to the ground and replaced it with a Roman settlement.

Just giving you all a heads up that you're using a very old style of warfare and it's since been improved on a lot by both ancient military tactics and modern day stuff too. You've all got a lot to learn.
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Minmatar Slave 74136 Sanmatar Kelkoons Minmatar Republic 291	Posted - 2012.09.29 14:51:00 - [1] - Quote Cerebral Wolf Jr wrote: I'd call K/D ratio fans more of a tragic figure. They comes from a different school of internet warfare, if you will. They are the best of what "MAG" has to offer, but it just doesn't work in the reality of this game. Take for example Hannibal of Carthage, by far considered the best Hellenistic general of his time. Problem is Hellenistic warfare was hilariously unprepared for the Roman school of war. A Hellenistic general was expected maneuver and delay battle until he held an undeniable advantage. Battle would commence and he would score a victory by inflicting some casualties and getting the other army to route. In Hellenistic warfare retreat and surrender were often allowed and expected, a golden avenue was given to let the other force leave. Terms of peace shortly followed thereafter. This should sound rather familiar as our K/D ration fans believe that kill/death ratios decide the day, they expect one victory after much maneuvering to make their enemy take the golden avenue of retreat, and come terms. Roman warfare pretty much dictated that it wasn't over till you were no longer a threat. That meant total annihilation or subjugation. Carthage itself was subdued a number of times each time attempting the throw off Roman control. Finally the Romans got pissed enough they said **** it and just burnt all of Carthage to the ground and replaced it with a Roman settlement. Just giving you all a heads up that you're using a very old style of warfare and it's since been improved on a lot by both ancient military tactics and modern day stuff too. You've all got a lot to learn. . The only problem with this line of reasoning, though, is that it was the Romans who were using the outmoded style of warfare up until the Second Punic War in that they were still using the Hellenistic Phalanx as their primary formation and maneuver style. In the Battle of Cannae, Hannibal used a double envelopment maneuver to use the Roman's own phalanx formation against the Romans in order to pin and destroy an estimated eight Legions of Roman troops by the numerically smaller force that Hannibal employed. Now that take that as the reader will to support their positions on this thread, but the fallout of Cannae effectively destroyed the Roman army as a fighting force at that time, but as mentioned upthread there was no capitalization on this. However, the Roman army changed its warfare doctrines to become more tactically flexible as a result of the Cannae debacle, most notably going to its cohort and century system to allow more maneuvrability and ability to adapt to changing situations. As a result of Cannae several city-states did defect to the side of Carthage. I would point out that Hannibal actually did pull together a racially and culturally diverse set of armies under his command, and he did so by creating his own form of culture. Hannibal united all these different groups in their hatred of the Romans, and a shared motivation like hatred can be a powerful thing under a leader that can properly motivate his men. Other events and factors eventually led to the downfall of Carthage, and Hannibal, though. This can almost be applied either way to your original argument, I just thought I would clairfy some of the history behind it.