Time Travel and Associated Anachronisms

Time Travel has long held a fascination for me. Doctor Who, It's About Time, Mr Peabody and the Wayback Machine, and the Time Tunnel were TV shows that all fed my childhood imagination in the 1960s

Recently I read the book '1632', about a West Virginian town transplanted whole from recent times into the 17th century.

The idea of troops from the nineteenth and twentieth century meeting those from ancient and Medieval times is one that I intend to develop at some time. It just requires a premise, for example aliens transplanting them on another planet, or some sort of time warp or time machine.
This is not as alien (pun intended) as it first appears. In history technologically superior European nations had interesting encounters with societies that were hundreds or thousands of years behind them in technology, notably weapons technology. If a nineteenth century power encountered a somehow quarantined Ancient Greek or Roman civilization it would be analogous to the Europeans early encounters with Japan and China. I suspect that, provided there was time, the ancient civilizations would do as Japan did and begin to copy and adapt. Other societies might adapt only sufficiently to delay their conquest. The American Indians were in this category.

I'll be adding to this page with discussion of time travel stories and concepts and eventually wargames on this theme.
Below: This ancient Greek (Airfix space warrior) has adapted to his contact with the nineteenth century by 'borrowing' a revolver.

CASE STUDIES - A WARGAME

Frank Perry, known for his first and Second Books of Wargaming incorporated a sort of time travel mechanism in his wargames. The time travel happened as a result of his land of Caspia incorporating civilizations at various stages of development so modern encountered ancient civilizations. Early Plastic Warrior magazines featured articles on this. In one case a helicopter was shot down when an ancient Egyptian archer shot the low flying pilot! In another case a WW1 tank had its crew smothered by an ancient army sitting on it! So the moderns didn't always get their own way. Whilst this might sound fanciful brave soldiers with inferior technology, but some advantages of intellect, cunning and home ground may at least stall a technologically superior enemy as we saw happen in the 19th century with various primitive or barbarous societies. Some of these also acquired at least some of the civilized society's weapons.

In the 20th century invasion of Abyssinia by Italy tankettes sometimes were trapped by the terrain and set afire by the locals. The Abyssinians had some modern weapons, including armored cars and anti-aircraft guns but much of the army was equipped with 19th century firearms and others were tribesmen with shields and edged weapons. Frank, however drew the line at poison gas in his games as being just too lethal for the technologically inferior society. In fact, poison gas proved the undoing of the Abyssinians too. In my own version of this Borduria invaded Lionia with tankettes and modern armed troops only to be massacred by the locals who took advantage of hidden deployment and cover. The invaders were a mixture of Lone Star and Matchbox Germans versus some converted Airfix Japanese and AIP Sudanese. The latter also had the advantage of trained 'attack lions'!

It can be seen, therefore that the anachronistic has historical precedent!  The difference is that it gives a wargamer or toy soldier enthusiast an excuse to use more figures from his different collections and to create a fantasy world. I once set up a large wargame where the players could choose their armies at a points value from any period of history. One side had a very large army but less fire power whilst the other, although including some ancients, had a smaller army and concentrated fire power. Without scenarios for ambush and stealth it was a foregone conclusion that charging chariots were not much good against percussion muskets, SLRs, assault rifles and ray guns!

Presently Matt and I are playing a campaign, primarily medieval, of his Bogavania against my Beerstein. However we have the 'Hillmen' who are basically assorted Vikings and barbarians, who lack heavy armor but who are skilled and ferocious in close combat. Neighboring Fezia, which is presently on friendly terms with Bogavania, is a combination of medieval Turkey and ancient Persia so it has chariots and elephants as well as some plate armored and chainmail armored troops to bolster its lights. it has a province called Aztecia which gives me a chance to field my Aztecs.

I have also formulated one hundred chance happenings that we will refer on a percentage dice to once or twice in a campaign year of about ten map moves. Some of the scenarios call for the arrival, by a portal, of ancient Romans and Greeks or 17th century pikemen and musketmen. This would not be a huge jump in technology as we already incorporate Renaissance types, including early handgunners. I was prepared to include the arrival of more modern types but Matt is not too keen on this idea. It is a fun SF concept though. naturally the arrival of flame throwers ( although these did exist in ancient times - Greek fire), modern fire arms and so on , would be very demoralizing for the locals. But in a campaign, how long does the modern ammunition last? Obviously, if they were allied to a local ruler he would use the arrivals in select parts of the battlefield for a limited time so he could also use them in another battle. Modern soldiers, trained in stealth, could also be used to infiltrate. When the ammunition finally ran out they would have to employ contemporary weapons and would become increasingly chronologically hybrid in appearance.

The other possibility which is not exactly time travel is the introduction of supernatural or magical forces and this is also catered for on our yearly chance roll. Orks, elves, undead and demonic types can all make a major or minor appearance.

UPDATE, 2023

Mat and I have been playing our campaign game for many years now. We have already partially moved to a 17th century footing and use many A Call to Arms figures mixed in with knights and others. We also managed to incorporate the odd dinosaur after bringing back eggs from Aztecia (a tropical pseudo-Aztec land). Mat has lost a lot of territory to my Beerstein but we have the mechanism set now for our countries to move forward in time. His 'nation' is actually now two nations, Bogavnaia and Beerstein. At the end of our current campaign we will roll the percentage dice to see how many years have passed. I am anticipating moving into the '18th century'. The main change will be incorporation of flintlocks and improved artillery. that can fire every move, and, eventually, horse artillery which can move and unlimber in the same turn. Musket men will also be able to form square to defend against cavalry, the assumption being the invention of the bayonet.

Meanwhile, our third powers will be developing at a slower rate. My invention of the country, Patra, (originating from the name, Cleopatra) is basically ancient. Yet, its war against Fezia included capture of cannons so I am going to assume, given their special genius, that they have learnt how to use them. This means I can potentially enjoy setting up Romans and Greeks manning gunpowder artillery and not just catapults or ballistas. However, they will have the old kind which fires only every other move.

Necrollia and Chaos (respectively Undead with the usual skeletons and vampires etc and a land of Chaos warriors and demon lords in the tradition of Michael Moorcock's Elric series and Warhammer) have not entered our wars yet, but I am going to assume, initially at least, that they use a primitive technology, medieval or ancient in nature with their main strengths being powerful nd supernatural creatures plus magic. There is no reason, though, that they might not eventually use newer technology. I even have a vision of them one day using demonic or 'undead' tanks, with appropriate bony or slimy arms and mouths attached!

In this fantasy/Sf world passage of time is the main mechanism for technological change. However, given that it is a world created by aliens, there is also the possibility of arrivals from other technologies.

My favorite literary example of this is 'The Lost Regiment' novel series by Willian R Forstchen. An American Civil War Union regiment passed through a portal into an early parallel medieval Russia. The nice touch was that humans were regularly 'harvested' by another intelligent species, large Mongol-like and orc-like creatures. The new arrivals, after showing who is boss over the feudal humans then protect them against these carnivorous Tugar. An arms race occurs as kidnapped or traitorous humans help the Tugar improve their weaponry. 

In my own created world the new arrivals are more likely to have been kidnapped by the mysterious aliens. However, so far Mat and I have a rule that no new countries can be more technologically advanced than our own! The partial exception is we have provision, on the chance dice roll, for the arrival of a 'lost' regiment which may ally with one of our countries. This could be an ACW or a 20th century one. On the other hand, their numbers are surmised to be insufficient to totally defeat, on their own, one of our countries.

UPDATE 2024

Mat and I have started our newest campaign, this time with a war between Beerstein and Necrolia and between Fezia/Bogavania and Aztecia. Mat has taken the role of Necrolia and I am organizing the armies of Aztecia.

This scenario pits quite different armies against each other. The first battle between Beerstein and Necrolia pitted my army, with five cannons and flintlocks armed troops against an army with few ranged normal weapons but strong in magic. The battle occurred on map  move 2 when the secret movement of both armies  led to a clash in a border map hex. The occurrence of rain led to occasional wet gun powder, which reduced my fire power and obviously favored my Necrolian enemy. The rules would have made this worse for matchlock armed troops. Both armies were commanded by cautious generals (something earlier determined when we rolled a percentage die for their traits). This meant that most exchanges were from a distance until later in the battle. Each commander had to roll under his boldness level which was in the forties. The roll was made every four moves then we switched to every move so something more interesting could happen! So we rolled under the percentage required on move nine. This meant we could advance units past our earlier designated point on the battlefield.

  If victory was assigned just on casualties inflicted on the enemy, then I won by ten or so points but I had some significant setbacks. Unless it is a major defeat or victory then we don't really focus on it too much because all battles are tied to a greater consideration of the campaign. 

     I actually face some problems. Two of my five cannons misfired and blew up and my sorceress cast a misspell of dimensional cascade (from Warhamer Lore of Beasts). Instead of turning into a dragon she was blown to bits! Considering that the Undead have two wizards this is a handicap for me for my next battle. Also, my light cavalry mercenary scouts discovered another Undead army behind the one I am already battling. The Undead also generated a new unit, this time of zombies! My ability to get reinforcements is presently poor and do I weaken another part of the country to reinforce this army?