So I've had an idea in the back of my head for several years now to do onto Confederate wank what The Anglo/American-Nazi War does onto Nazi wank, but I have a problem: there doesn't appear to be any plausible way for the CSA to win the Civil War, and I'm not willing to simply present it as a fait accompli. I bring it up from time to time on this board, generally about once or twice a year, and try to be as open-ended as possible, but, well, nothing really comes of it.
So let's get even more open-ended. The only rules are: (1) that a state recognizable as the CSA (that is, covering roughly the same territory, possessing the same political, economic, demographic, etc. realities that the CSA would have possessed, and preferably calling itself the CSA) must succeed from a state recognizable as the Union (same definition); (2) divine intervention can't be the only possible explanation for the Confederacy's blinding luck (and actively courting luck should probably also be kept to a minimum); and (3) at no point does anyone drink enough lead paint for Sealion to start sounding like a good idea to them.
Use as many PODs as you want, spread apart by however much time and space as you need: Replace Lincoln with a jibbering idiot? Fine. Get Grant ran over by a carriage as a child? Fine. Fuck with European politics to the point where it's actually plausible that one of the great powers would want to get involved on the side of the Confederacy? Fine. Do all of the above because not a single one of them is enough on its own to secure a Confederate victory/keep the war from happening (with the possible exception of that last one)? Fine.
I mean, keeping this bullshit to a minimum would be preferable, but if it takes twenty seven PODs over the previous three hundred years in order to make a Confederate victory plausible, so be it.
So let's get even more open-ended. The only rules are: (1) that a state recognizable as the CSA (that is, covering roughly the same territory, possessing the same political, economic, demographic, etc. realities that the CSA would have possessed, and preferably calling itself the CSA) must succeed from a state recognizable as the Union (same definition); (2) divine intervention can't be the only possible explanation for the Confederacy's blinding luck (and actively courting luck should probably also be kept to a minimum); and (3) at no point does anyone drink enough lead paint for Sealion to start sounding like a good idea to them.
Use as many PODs as you want, spread apart by however much time and space as you need: Replace Lincoln with a jibbering idiot? Fine. Get Grant ran over by a carriage as a child? Fine. Fuck with European politics to the point where it's actually plausible that one of the great powers would want to get involved on the side of the Confederacy? Fine. Do all of the above because not a single one of them is enough on its own to secure a Confederate victory/keep the war from happening (with the possible exception of that last one)? Fine.
I mean, keeping this bullshit to a minimum would be preferable, but if it takes twenty seven PODs over the previous three hundred years in order to make a Confederate victory plausible, so be it.