Checking some M'chek assumptions

[Cyberqat]

I've been retrofitting an old chacrter into Avlis and, for the msot part, its fit in very well.

I do need to check on afew assumptions and detail though.

M'Chek has a huge population. In roder to feed sucha population in an agrarian society I would assume that each town is surrounded by extensive farmlands. Is this a reasonable assumption?

Second. One would assume that in addition to farming for food ther would have to be some racnhing of work animals liek horses, clothign animals such as sheep and food animals such as goat if not Cow. (Cows are kidn of resource expensive so you might not see them but rather see goat meat and goats milk products.)

All in all I'd expect it to look a lot like the US midwest, where every almost reasonable peice of dirst is being used but its still very agrarian in look and feel.

Is this on target?

[Nighthawk4]

AFAIK, this may well be reasonable - EXCEPT, look at the M'Chek part of the Wilderness. The land has been destroyed and does not support farming. I believe this is partly as a result of the War and partly due to over-farming and misuse of the resources.

Hence, your arable land turns to a dustbowl. Also, I assume the land and water supply are probably poisoned.

This is one of the main reasons for the dispute between M'Chek and T'Nanshi - the Elves take care of the land and live with Nature and the Humans do not.

This is just my take on the situation and does not constitute the official answer. It may even be wrong

[Cyberqat]

My assumption, right or wrong, is that the "playable" area is a small part of the total country. Granted I havent fully explored the playable area yet but it seems a reasonable assumption to me.

(After all docs say there are 50 towns, and we don't have near that in play do we? )

The problem with assuming eco-disaster across the entire country side is that, baring soem other extremely valuable reources that can be traded for mass quantities of food, the entire M'Chek T'Nanshi problem should be in the process of solving itself. Within 5 to 10 years the population shoudl have starved itsefl down to a viable size. (Less time if the food supply is really totally exhuasted.)

Look how effective mass-starvation is at reducing population in palces like Ethopia and thoes are geeting large scale imports of food for purely moral reasons from countriesd that massively over-produce. Something you aent likley to see in this environment.

I can certainly see the areas around large town to cities beign "farmed out" (or worse, logged out, which really can destroy an area's fertility) but as you get further away you should still see a whole heck of a lot of food production.

Unless ofcourse this entire situation is under 5 years old. But I can't imagine how they could have logged out that much in 5 years.

(I apologize for takign this so deep into analysis, and I could be wrong, but I had some college coursework in the historical relationship btw the plant kingdom and man and I'm just trying to make it all "make sense" to me.)

[AbominationFascination]

Just for the sake of some real-world input on this, populations can exist (and grow, albeit slowly) in a chronic state of malnutrition. In fact, that's pretty much the history of mankind, up until about 1800. Lots of 'empty calorie' from grains and very little meat.

Think of India or China in the early parts of this century or Ireland before the Potato Famine. People were skinny, short, and vulnerable to disease. Yes, a plague or famine would come along and wipe out maybe 1/4 to 1/2 of the population. But then the population starts growing again.

[Flakey]

Look how effective mass-starvation is at reducing population in palces like Ethopia and thoes are geeting large scale imports of food for purely moral reasons from countriesd that massively over-produce. Something you aent likley to see in this environment.

The characters of Elysia constantly help to send food shipments to the poor of Mikona.

[Fifty]

That is no use to us! We need land to be able to assert our independance properly and maintain true nationhood, we do not wish to fall into a state of dependance on T'Nanshi and become a mere vassal state!

Oh, um, sorry, this is OOC here isn't it?

[Greymorn]

Just for the sake of some real-world input on this, populations can exist (and grow, albeit slowly) in a chronic state of malnutrition. In fact, that's pretty much the history of mankind, up until about 1800. Lots of 'empty calorie' from grains and very little meat.

Think of India or China in the early parts of this century or Ireland before the Potato Famine. People were skinny, short, and vulnerable to disease. Yes, a plague or famine would come along and wipe out maybe 1/4 to 1/2 of the population. But then the population starts growing again.

I'm a newbie trying to get a grip on this war, so take this with a large grain of salt.

I think it's safe to say that all of the human and orc nations are chronically malnourished. Ancient scholars lamented that mankind would *always* be doomed to crushing poverty because as soon as you grow more food, the population grows to consume it.

Elven birth rates are low enough, their culture different enough that this is probably NOT the case in T'Nanshi.

Nomadic cultures like the Romini tend to be better fed and healthier than thier civilized cousins. They eat more meat, have a low population density, etc.

M'Chek's problem isn't that they are out of food. They are no more or less starving than any other human or orc nation. M'Chek is out of *space* which is a completely different issue. If anything they are too efficient with their agriculture and grow too much food! If this wasn't true, they would have a similar population density to other human nations.

The downsides of their efficiency are manyfold. They must suffer severe sanitation and transportation problems. They exhaust their farmland and poison their living space. Unlike a steady state of famine, which just produces widespread misery and death, overpopulation degrades the basic resources that sustain a society, including a healthy and productive workforce. This degradation tends to accelerate catestrophically. Eventually the population will stabalize at the previous "normal" state of abject poverty, but the land will only support a much smaller population.

[Greymorn]

The upshot of this is that to solve the M'Chek problem the elves should send a continuous stream of raiding parties into the M'Chek bread-basket to burn their crops and kill their livestock. Ash and blood would renew the soil and within 2 years the humans would have plenty of empty space within their own borders.

Fortunately, the Elves don't appear to have the morals of Joseph Stalin.

Note that the elves have the opposite problem. Their birth rate is so low they can't possibly fill the territory they have. Every casualty lost to battle or disease is irreplacable on a human timescale. This probably makes it very difficult for the humans and elves to understand each other; their frames of reference are too different.

All the humans need to do is keep the war going and make it as intense as possible. Every human death benefits M'Chek. Every Elven death benefits M'Chek. Soon enough there won't be enough elves to defend the borders and humans will pour into T'Nanshi.

Unfortunately, many humans *do* have the morals of Joseph Stalin, and they are often those holding the reigns of power.

[keikobad]

Guys, you're bringing your own assumptions into this War. There are humans and elves with the morals of Joseph Stalin. Heard about the history of the Sereg yet?

If you really want to learn more about the War, do research into it, etc, get in game and start talking to people.