| Octovon | September 3rd, 2007 06:43 PM | Quote:
Originally Posted by Emperor Norton I
(Post 3899118)
Hypothetically, at the most I'll give you (maybe) early, early firearms to work with in this discussion but only in limited usage on the Romans part.
But those weapons were slow and cumbersome, and if the Romans fired, hit a few and reloaded with a huge mass of Aztecs charging with weapons they didn't need to reload, the Romans would have been screwed, so firearms would really be counter Roman success. | The advantages of early firearms versus civilizations without firearms was the entire scare-factor. Early French military campaings in New France come to mind. In one encounter, Samuel de Champlain, 2 other Frenchmen and a small Huron war party encountered 200 Iroquois warriors, Champlain shot 2 of the Iroquois warchiefs with his arquebus and the entire Iroquois force fled.
In any case, the Romans wouldn't have gunpowder as the Roman, and later Western Roman Empire pre-dated gunpowder weapons in Europe. The Eastern Empire would have encountered some form of gunpowder weapon prior to its fall in 1453, but at that time (and pretty much from the 7th Century on), the Eastern Empire was then the Byzantine Empire and could hardly be called Roman.
I still hold that a properly-supplied, armed and more importantly, commanded Roman army complete with cavalry and possibly ballistae would have annihilated a Mesoamerican army of the same era, should it be fought on a fair and evenly balanced field of battle. Should it take place in deep jungle, the Romans would have initial setbacks, but the Romans as always would have adapted and overcome, much like they did on the high seas during the 1st Punic War, or on land during the 2nd Punic War. |