I challenge you: SEIZMIC

[lightnessking.]

scissors > paper, enough said.

[WaSteD]

I wasn't expecting to find a topic like this, bit I enjoyed reading about the views of communism on here. I feel qualified to reply here with regards to communism, having studied it fairly rigorously in the past and currently study political theory as part of my BSc degree; however I won't delve too deeply into the CA BTD issue as I don't play AoC.

I would like to start off by agreeing with Seizmic over the 'working on paper' idea, when comparing the issue to communism. Omega wrote "Seizmic must be using 'works on paper' to mean 'it works unless you actually think about it analytically and rigorously to determine the feasibility'", then P-51 went on to write "communism inverts class interests while retaining the injustices and weighted values of society". Communism was thought about very analytically and rigorously by extreme political heavyweights of the time, of which Lenin is included who helped lead the 1917 Russian Revolution, and this was not the reason for its failure. The reason for the failure of communism is that it was not carried out how it was written on paper . Marx claimed communism would come into effect when there was a complete 'paradigm shift' of the nation, whereby all of the proletariat (the lower, working classes; the main force behind the revolution) would refuse to work under the contradictions within capitalism, having become 'class conscious', and therefore nationwide revolts would occur to overthrow the bourgeoisie (the equivalent of the ruling classes/ the leaders in capitalism). The bourgeoisie would then be given the option to join communism or attempt to flee from it. However with almost all of the 20th century communist revolutions, it was not carried out how it was written on paper. For example in the case of the Russian Revolution, there was no nation-wide revolt, but instead a coup d'etat of a few hundred Bolshevik's who managed to overthrow the Russian empire. The country was not yet ready for communism. This then leads on to P-51's quote about inverting class interests and weighted values of society. In a truly communist society, this would not occur, as class would not exist. There would be entire common ownership of all means of production - complete equality. After the depletion of the state it would become impossible for inequalities to exist.

So I think the issue at stake here is not whether communism worked or not on paper, it is that it failed because it was not carried out how it was written on paper.

Now to the real issue, if Seizmic's idea works on paper and he carries it out properly, then fair enough to him. And as I mentioned, I probably shouldn't have too much say in this part of the topic as I don't play AoC myself, but from what I've read it seems Kazter summed it up fairly well saying "As I've said earlier, dont go expan cav if you know you're vsing swordrusher". Also the level of unit production in the beginning of Mid SH (in EEC at least) makes a massive impact on the later game - in most cases I have seen fast-army producing civ's tend to beat boom civ's (particularly in 1v1's) as a fast army can be reduced to so significantly reduce the economy of the opponent (through cit killing etc.) so it seems it would not be worth removing the BTD of CA.

Sorry for the long post.

*Also for the record I believe capitalism has advanced and communism is too out-dated to now work.

[P-51]

I agree with most of that. The thing I meant about the inverted class interests was that in Marx's theory, a state was to go from capitalism into socialism before it transitioned into communism. And because socialism gives the government total control of all means of production, the intentions of Marx's theory are completely illogical. Marx expects the government to abandon its total control over the economy at a time when it thinks the country is ready to make the transition into communism. I haven't read Marx's books but it sounds like this time is totally arbitrary and has no real definition, and obviously the government is going to enjoy its power and sustain it for as long as possible. So on paper, communism can never be achieved the way Marx intended for it. Like I said before, the way communism operates would be inefficient and impossible for a Great Power. It could work great in a tribal commune but it doesn't make enough sense to be extrapolated into a larger entity.