Zulu

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Originally Posted by Jkarinen

I was unaware that europe had any troops that far into africa during the 18th century... I thought it was a typo on his part.

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This topic is a spin-off, and it started with a question about balance. ETW balance, so 17th-18th century. The Zulus popped up in a what if scenario I think.

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Originally Posted by Poor Bloody Infantry

How does this work? Surely the range is determined purely by the velocity, i.e. faster bullet = longer range.

I admit I don't know much about guns but I do know physics. Do you mean that the bullet comes out spinning faster but with a lower velocity, or that it is spinning slower & thus has higher muzzle velocity, but is less accurate as a result & thus has a shorter range to be able to hit anything at?

Sorry for the off-topic post, just a bit unclear about what you meant by this.

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There is more space for the fumes which propel the bullet out of the gun to escape. The deep ridges dont help the spin at all but are superb at controlling jams to only the trigger area. There is no effect(as far as I know) on the accuracy of the bullet.

There were wars in South Africa in the early 19th century and the Europeans and their allies did inflict horrendous losses on numerically stronger foes. The Battle of Grahamstown is an obvious example.

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Originally Posted by Furious Mental

There were wars in South Africa in the early 19th century and the Europeans and their allies did inflict horrendous losses on numerically stronger foes. The Battle of Grahamstown is an obvious example.

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You mean this one Furious Mental?

Battle of Grahamstown:
The 5th Xhosa War, 1818-1819

A difficulty between the Cape Colony government and the Xhosa arose in 1817, the immediate cause of which was an attempt by the colonial authorities to enforce the restitution of some stolen cattle. When overcrowding among the Xhosa east of the Fish River led to civil war, the British intervened. The Xhosa prophet-chief Maqana Nxele (or Makana) emerged at this time and promised “to turn bullets into water.” He led the Xhosa armies in several attacks. On 22 April 1819, Maqana with 10,000 amaXhosa attacked Graham’s Town, then held by a garrison of 350 troops. The garrison was able to repulse the attack only after timely support was received from a Khoi-khoi group led by Jan Boesak. Maqana suffered the loss of 1,000 soldiers.

This doesn't sound like a field battle on a plain.


It's a man with a spear or club vs a trained man with a gun. One on one, it's quite likely that the gunner can have at least one shot. A striking bullet could take the spearman out of fight immediately or wounds him sufficiently to make it easy for the bayonet or a second round.

Throw more men at the gunman and it becomes more likely that at least one spearman gets close enough for hand to hand combat (while the gun is empty). It's then bayonet vs spear. Anything can happen, the gunman is also trained to use the bayonet, maybe even uses the gun for club and is by no means a sitting duck, but my money is on the spear then. Didn't some also have shields? Those shields could at least partially protect: if they didn't provide some protection against spear like weapons in hand to hand combat, there wouldn't be use to carry them around?

A position uphill, behind rocks, on top of a wall, in narrow streets, behind a barricade or inside houses, only favours the gunmen, not the numerical stronger spearmen and the tribes need an even larger force.

The tribes have, afaik, no siege equipment to help taking down defenses.

Zulu was a great film, the singing is so massive. The Scramble for Africa by Pakenham is a really great book, i am presently reading it. african people did indeed have modern rifles, bought from the traders, as well as older black powder muskets, for which they could produce the ammo at home, and assegai. often small European forces were wiped out or mauled by these or the white african Boer tribe.

i hope the game gives the chance to play as an African power of some kind, an african power base and troops. i wanna be Haile Selassie.

Fort or no, 350 soldiers beating off a force of several thousand and inflicting 1,000 fatalities makes an obvious statement about the power of gunpowder weapons.

Noticeably everyone believes that tribal warriors all fought like berserkers. In fact alot of them preferred to fighting by throwing spears and using bows, which put them in exactly the range where the musket was most effective. And the fact is that muskets were terrifying. As I said above, charging columns European infantrymen with superstitious beliefs about the weapon still broke and fled after receiving a well-timed volley.

Hello,

I don't think the garizon could play cards so to say, but having a fortified position is a huge advantage. Less so if the attacker has nasty siege equipment, which the tribes didn't have?

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Originally Posted by Wikipedia

The garrison was able to repulse the attack only after timely support was received from a Khoi-khoi group led by Jan Boesak.

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The 350 men in a fort were not solily responsible for the defeat of 10,000 and killing of 1,000. The only after even suggest it would not be sufficient to avoid a defeat.

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Originally Posted by Jkarinen

There is more space for the fumes which propel the bullet out of the gun to escape. The deep ridges dont help the spin at all but are superb at controlling jams to only the trigger area. There is no effect(as far as I know) on the accuracy of the bullet.

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Sorry, I'm still a little confused, I still don't see how this would allow the bullet to have higher muzzle velocity but shorter range. Or is the point that by speed you were referring to the rate at which a man could reload and fire the weapon, rather than the velocity of the bullet?

Sorry for being a pedant, I see a tangential reference to physics in a discussion about history and I have to jump on it.:oops:

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Originally Posted by Jkarinen

ok im sorry but did anyone else notice the main flaw in ceaser's point? musketeers..... Hardly most units that served Britain were some of the most technologically advanced units britain had. They used breach loaders with special rifling(the kind of rifling most british and french units used during WW1 in the trenches) the ridges in the barrel are slightly deeper allowing the bullet to come out faster but with a reduced range. and when your in a life or death situation you can fire a good 6-7 rounds in the mad 150 yard dash to your position now multiply that by 130(give or take) and see how many zulu you kill before they even reach you.

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I mis spoke... Dont know what I was getting at there. I believe that was a 'slip of the tongue' so to say.

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Originally Posted by TosaInu

A Zulu medicine man (?) also mentioned special forces. Those used some 'snuf' to become berserk. Such pain ignoring warriors are not easily stopped.

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A bit like starcraft with the medics and firebat stimpacks?