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Originally Posted by Red Diamond
However, in the T2K lore, it seems just the opposite has come to pass. The US and NATO and other allies (ROK, etc) are getting their ass kicked at every turn. The idea that the Red Army could get in a protracted war with China, then lose some of their WARSAW Pact allies to the West and then charge through Poland causing the collapse of Western Europe is crazy. And then, it's the US Government that falls apart- crazy! In My Humble Opinion.
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Which edition are you referring to? In 1e, the ass-kicking is mutual, and the only Warsaw Pact ally that the USSR loses is Romania. NATO, on the other hand, loses Italy and Greece. Most Soviet gains can be attributed to the use of nuclear weapons. By mid-2000, the situation in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia is essentially a stalemate. IMHO, 1e is the least improbable of the three-and-a-half editions of T2k but yes, suspension of disbelief is still necessary.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Diamond
Let's remember, it was the Soviet Union that actually fell apart. It was the Red Army that was much more hollow and ineffective than we had thought, while the US was more capable than we imagined.
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The truth is, we'll never really know. The Cold War Soviet military was never tested against a near peer adversary, and neither was the US military. The lessons derived from the post-Soviet collapse period are informative, but by no means conclusive. We're making sweeping inferences from the poor performance of the rump Russian military in Chechnya and the USA's stellar performance in Desert Storm.
Therefore, whatever the conclusion one arrives at- the USSR as paper tiger or as formidable foe- we're essentially dealing in counterfactuals. The purpose of the OP was to support a plausible alternate reality where the Twilight War, as described in 1e or 2-2.2e canon (4e didn't exist yet), could have occurred.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Diamond
In the end, it's just a game and the GM can determine how he wants to create reality so it shouldn't matter at the PC level.
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That's the crux of it, at a micro level.
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