So has this died ?

[mbrinkhues]

Originally posted by Nordviking:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Malenfant:
Was anyone really interested in it to start with? Its board didn't seem to get much traffic ever.

(I've still never heard of the books)

You should read them. The best Military Sci-Fi I have ever read </font>[/QUOTE]I disagree. The first three books are readable, book four feels odd and let's not talk about "Cally's War"(1) or "Watch on the Rhine"(2)

When it comes to Mil. SciFi they rank far behind the Stuff written by Pournelle (with or without Barnes), the David Drakes "Hammers Slammers" or quite a few of the "Bolo" books. Even some early Clancys (i.e Red Storm) are better IMHO.

As for "Legacy" as an RPG universe: About as viable as Honor Harrington which means unplayable.

As they say in the coach advertisements: Your furlongs may vary.


(1) A female-written version of "Gor" comes to mind
(2) Let's just say the ideas of the author about germany/europe are heavily biased and his heros should be put against a wall rather then throug re-juvenation

 

[Nordviking]

Originally posted by Michael Brinkhues:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Nordviking:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Malenfant:
Was anyone really interested in it to start with? Its board didn't seem to get much traffic ever.

(I've still never heard of the books)

You should read them. The best Military Sci-Fi I have ever read </font>[/QUOTE]I disagree. The first three books are readable, book four feels odd and let's not talk about "Cally's War"(1) or "Watch on the Rhine"(2)

When it comes to Mil. SciFi they rank far behind the Stuff written by Pournelle (with or without Barnes), the David Drakes "Hammers Slammers" or quite a few of the "Bolo" books. Even some early Clancys (i.e Red Storm) are better IMHO.

As for "Legacy" as an RPG universe: About as viable as Honor Harrington which means unplayable.

As they say in the coach advertisements: Your furlongs may vary.


(1) A female-written version of "Gor" comes to mind
(2) Let's just say the ideas of the author about germany/europe are heavily biased and his heros should be put against a wall rather then throug re-juvenation </font>[/QUOTE]Never heard of Pournelle so he can not be that good. Hammer Slammer series are a good read but Clancy's stuff is pretty lame.Watch on the Rhine was OK , It was a good change from America saves the world. The SS would have been the best candidates for re-juvenation , They Fielded some of the best Tankers in history.

 

[Border Reiver]

Pournelle is one of the best Military Science Fiction writers of the last 30 years. He wrote the Janissaries series (good fun IMOH) and co-wrote The Mote in God's Eye, Footfall and many others with Larry Niven.

Footfall has one of the best space battles I've ever read and the fighting on the ground is excellent.

 

[mbrinkhues]

Okay, we have to produce a "Coalation of Culture" and invade Australia. Knowledge of Pournelle is absolutely essential for human well-being

Pournelle wrote (often with Niven and/or Barnes)

Janissarians: 20th century CIA Mercs on a low tech planet working for alien drug-lords. They have to find a way to get land and think of ways to survive once the aliens try to kill them after drug season

Future History: Aka CoDominion. A 2300AD style SciFi universe with national (and commercial) colonies("Has been colonised by AMEX back in ...), resonably cheap but restricted interstellar travel (using Jumplines) and quite costly surface-orbit travel. This universe is home to the Mercenary series dealing with the Mercenary unit Falkenbergs Legion, the War World series dealing with the events on Earth most distant colonie Haven and it's occupation by the Saurons, a gene-altered race of humans as well as the Moat books dealing with humans first contact with aliens quite some time after the other two series

Various others The above mentioned Footfall has a fascinating (and IIRC rather realistic) space battle and interesting aliens. Not to mention the presidents expert commitee on alien affairs.

Luzifers Hammer is an interesting outlook at civilisation after a comet impact, Fallen Angels is "Greenies triumphant" with a twist


Pournelle's action is driven by his Korean war experience and it's dirty, lethal and personal. No clean "You see something that is hit by something and that something is destroyed due to that hit" warfare, no Ares Convention, no "civilised man don't do that". Even his heros are never totaly clean.

Some of his stuff is IIRC up on BEANs booksite. Some of the rest is currently re-printed (Saw a brand-new copy of Luzifers Hammer last week) sometimes under Niven/Pournelle or Niven.

 

[mbrinkhues]

As for Clancy: I agree on his later stuff. Anything after "Sum of all the fears" is rapidly going down-hill with "Dept of Honor" raising strange feelings post 9/11.

Otoh don't judge Clancy by the (rather lousy) films. And "Red Storm" is actually quite good. Maybe even more if you read it while sitting in a german barrack packing for an exercise that should prepare for just that war.

 

[mbrinkhues]

As for any type of SS let me quote a WWII Wehrmacht tanker: "SA Thugs with tanks"

The "quality" of the Goontroopers is debateable, some are good-acceptable, quite a few are prone to "Banzai" charges due to lousy training high on propaganda and low on fieldcraft. For every Wittmann you get ten who consider a Tiger a "close combat weapon" and died. Using troops and weapons in the regular army would have achieved better results.

IMHO the way the French and Russian troops dealt with captures SS personal quite often should have been the default way. And I don't care wether there is a "Waffen" before the SS.

 

[Chaos]

Originally posted by Michael Brinkhues:
As for Clancy: I agree on his later stuff. Anything after "Sum of all the fears" is rapidly going down-hill with "Dept of Honor" raising strange feelings post 9/11.

Otoh don't judge Clancy by the (rather lousy) films. And "Red Storm" is actually quite good. Maybe even more if you read it while sitting in a german barrack packing for an exercise that should prepare for just that war.

Or if, like a friend of mine, you are serving with 5th Armored Cavalry - the unit to which the American tank crew portrayed in the novel belonged to.

I agree that Clancy has lost it in recent years, though.

 

[Nordviking]

Originally posted by Michael Brinkhues:
As for any type of SS let me quote a WWII Wehrmacht tanker: "SA Thugs with tanks"

The "quality" of the Goontroopers is debateable, some are good-acceptable, quite a few are prone to "Banzai" charges due to lousy training high on propaganda and low on fieldcraft. For every Wittmann you get ten who consider a Tiger a "close combat weapon" and died. Using troops and weapons in the regular army would have achieved better results.

IMHO the way the French and Russian troops dealt with captures SS personal quite often should have been the default way. And I don't care wether there is a "Waffen" before the SS.

Your right ,
Most of the late war SS formations were crap but units like LSSAH,Das Reich, Totenkopf and Wiking were first rate units. I would even add the 12th SS Panzer Division to that list. Most of these units held firm when others would have crumbled.

 

[whartung]

Well...This topic seems mildly borked -- both pages 1 and 2 are almost identical.

No matter...

I read the first 3 of these books. They were "OK", IMHO. I simply didn't care much for the 1:1000 odds they played with. Total munchkin warfare.

Outside of that it wasn't too bad. I liked the off battle times better.

I am shocked (SHOCKED) seeing someone mention that they hadn't heard of Pournelle, much less read him. He's still doing his Chaos Manor computer column, and he's got one of the earliest "Blogs" on the net of assorted random mumblings. I did have the great pleasure of having dinner with him with a bunch of BIX Sci Fi people. There were, oh, 8-10 of us I think. I didn't even know he was coming. We ate chinese, and it was a great time. He's also fun to listen to at Conventions. Dunno if he still goes. Been awhile since I've been to one.

His War Worlds books have a mix of fiction and non-fiction in them. I have not read them all, but the early ones were OK. They tend to be collections by different authors, with Jerry basically the editor.

Clancy was good up to "Debt of Honor", the whole Jack Ryan saga. I didn't care for the last few.

"Red October" is a GREAT book, heck I even liked the movie -- and the movie was only half the book.

But truth be told, my favorite military-esque sci-fi is Dorsai and the Childe Cycle by Dickson. It's not typical mil sci-fi, but it's durn good stuff.

 

[Jame]

The problem is that the two chain stores I go to don't carry any Pournelle aside from what he wrote with Niven (I got a copy of Jannissaries and still feel lucky).

 

[mwturnage]

If you're a Pournelle fan, make the effort to hunt down anything by H. Beam Piper. Piper was a friend and major influence of Pournelle, and it's very easy to see where many of JP's series came from. The Jannisaries books were influence by Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, and the CoDominium/Mote in Gods Eye stories have their roots in Piper's Terro-Human Future History novels. Not to mention Piper's Space Viking which is about as Traveller a book as you'll ever read...

Sadly, most of Piper is out of print these days, but if you haunt used book stores you can still find them on occasion.

 

[mbrinkhues]

Originally posted by MW Turnage:
If you're a Pournelle fan, make the effort to hunt down anything by H. Beam Piper. Piper was a friend and major influence of Pournelle, and it's very easy to see where many of JP's series came from. The Jannisaries books were influence by Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, and the CoDominium/Mote in Gods Eye stories have their roots in Piper's Terro-Human Future History novels. Not to mention Piper's Space Viking which is about as Traveller a book as you'll ever read...

Sadly, most of Piper is out of print these days, but if you haunt used book stores you can still find them on occasion.

Quite a bit of his work can be found HERE in an online form, including the Space Vikings. Great stuff indeed.

 

[Jame]

Originally posted by Michael Brinkhues:
Quite a bit of his work can be found HERE in an online form, including the Space Vikings. Great stuff indeed.

Which of the listed items are Space Vikings?

 

[mbrinkhues]

IIRC only the one titles "The Space Vikings" is one. I am only slowly making my way through it and just read "He walked around the horses". VEERY FUNNY with a very nice end joke for the historically interested.

 

[eclipse]

Interesting SciFi geek observation. In Ullr Uprising, there is a character named Major Falkenberg...

 

[Ganidirsii O'Flynn]

EWOKS SHOULD BE KILLED AND REPLACED BY FUZZIES! And, NO, they are NOT alot alike...

For one thing, Ewoks don't curse in frustration cuz it makes them feel better, whereas Fuzzies do. ('nuff said)

 

[Enoff]

I'm enjoying reading a 1983 Ace edition of Uller Uprising right now.

Interesting it has an added article by a Dr. Clark giving very scientific information about the planets Uller and Nifliem plus their solar systems.

The intro says that Piper might have been submitting Uller as part of a writer's contest were you had to take into account the information Dr. Clark provides.

 

[eclipse]

You can find a fair amount of Piper on Gutenberg as well.

 

[Enoff]

Originally posted by eclipse:
You can find a fair amount of Piper on Gutenberg as well.

Salute fellow Piper fan!

Yes I have been aware for sometime that Piper's stories are available from Gutenberg. I like getting my stuff from manybooks.net since they will convert text into pdf format.

Also I have been collecting Piper paperbacks. My current collection:

Federation
Uller Uprising
Cosmic Computer
Space Viking
Empire

all published by Ace.

Rereading it all, great stuff.

I am also a big Hemmingway fan. Interesting to compare and contrast Hemmingway's popularity, fame and life in general to Piper not to mention their suicides by weapons they owned. They were both avid gun lovers.

 

[su_liam]

Is this back or is it just an artifact of the new software?