Historical inaccuracy doesn't apply to youjo senki, because it is it's own world not tied to ours. Even despite that, there are a lot of small historical easter eggs in the series, just look it up
I got the impression that things like the trenches were a sign of the enemy just not successfully adapting to what amounted to a massive technology jump. Similar to trenches appearing in the first half of WWII before tanks slowly made them largely obsolete. One gets the impression that no one is accustomed to dealing with the level of aerial firepower Tanya's team brings to the battlefield, and it totally wrecks havoc on their strategy.
Agree. These things never bothered me because the show didn't advertise itself as being historically accurate and the fact that magic is being involved also just proves this.
she's not a Nazi, she was never a Nazi, this is alternate ww1 not ww2 why do people keep messing this up? rule of thumb: if there are ever trenches, its probably ww1
King Shoot its not interwar period since there hasnt been a first war yet even. It is essentially just ww1 but starting a decade later. Interwar implies it takes place AFTER a war, and before another.
+King Shoot you forget that most of the culture, mindset, technology and atmosphere were CAUSED by the first world war. If no first world has happened yet then essentially the interwar period doesn't exist yet either.
At the beginning of World War I the French tried to use cavalry like that was still a thing. The Belgians tried to use castles. Nobody knew what they were doing. That's what Youjo Senki is doing with the mages. Tanya gives a speech about it when they invade Dacia. The armies are using outdated military tactics. 'The Empire' comes to understand how to use mages effectively first via Tanya (because she knows history), which mirrors historical Germany, and that's how they start suddenly winning the war - again mirroring history.
Hitler didn't know the first thing about military tactics, the credit to inventing how to use planes, tanks, and infantry in unison in a mobile war a.k.a. blitzkreig goes to a man by the name of Heinz Guderian.
Win actually. Germany lost because of reasons outside their own military superiority. In WWII Germany lost due to bigger errors in judgements. But in terms of military might they still boasted superiority for a large chunk of the war. It's a similar situation to the Pacific Theater where Japan's plans to invade America were almost scarily close to coming to pass and even when they were put on the defensive the US was so scared of the projected losess of invading Japan that they just decided to bomb two civilian cities to scare them into giving up.
I absolutely loved Youjo Senki, and yes, every single time Tanya said things were going her way I knew she was going to suffer for it. Any series that can make you cheer on a character who is, lets face it, the clinical definition of a sociopath is doing something right.
Actually the show is *_insanely_* historically accurate and it really surprised me. For the 1920's the war actually takes place in, the military tech outside the mages magical flying equipment itself is damn accurate. For instance the rifle the mages use is a Mondragón M1908. These guns were actually not that great when used in the trenches of WW1 but proved very effective among the German Imperial flying corps, Luftstreitkräfte, as the they worked perfectly in high altitude conditions. A great rifle to use if you're a mage who fights almost entirely in the sky. Also the counter for the mages in the show are the Air Force which they constantly say reach higher altitudes than mages can fly. In the Show mages largely operate at 6,000 feet, while the planes in the show have a max altitude of roughly 17,000 if their capabilities match those of the WW1 planes they're based off of. It's only Tanya and the soldiers under her command that can reach comparable altitudes of exceeding that of 12,000 feet to do battle against bombers. Additionally The Empire is very interesting in how historically accurate it is to Germany. The flag for instance has a double headed dragon on it that looks very similar to the Imperial Banner of the Holy Roman Empire, the nation that Germans regard as the First Reich. The borders of the Empire also mirror the German Empire's greatest extent which pushes into land that was historically Slavic. In fact both Tanya and Viktoriya's names are Slavic. The occupation of Tanya's world's version of Norway also mimicked the real world occupation of Norway. The ending of the show also places her in a theater that is essentially the North African campaign.
Not to mention, Tanya's goal is probably based on Erwin Rommels goal to reach a high ranking position as fast as he can in order to get away from the front lines.
In a world of magic, where the first world war starts in the 20's, when the creator of the V1 *literally* has "divine inspiration" there's leeway for blending WW1 and 2 a bit.
Mages are the defense against mages really. There isn't really anything non mages can do. It is just that there don't seem to be enough mages to really hold and control territory. It also doesn't help the commanders do not know how to fight effectively with the power of these mages. It is the first big war with them after all. We see the same kind of learning curve with WWI.
Magic has only existed since Tanya was born. About ~10 years before the start of the story. Being X added it as one of the parameters when It initially designed the scenario for the experiment, since it wanted to stack the deck against Tanya a little bit and force them into the conflict.
To me the final after credits scene represented finality. It showed how neither Tanya nor Being X was going to give up anytime soon and both would continue their little disagreement until the bitter end. As such, the battle that Tanya was about to fight was going to be just one more out of many, many more to come. The scene didn't end the show or plot necessarily, but I do think it very clearly showcased the situation Tanya was in; it was never going to end. A second season, in my opinion, would almost seem gratuitous.
Yes, I felt the same. If a second season happens, we will certainly have Sioux's daughter playing the same role her father played, since she also was empowered by X. Perhaps she will be an opponent that will take Tanya longer to defeat, but, basically, we'll have the first season all over again. And so on and so forth, as the LN is on it's seventh installment, with no ending in sight (a sadly repetitive case with LNs, as the author is pressured by the publisher to keep churning up new volumes as long as the series is successful, instead of writing a good, well-thought up and planned series, causing most of it to be painful amounts of filler text upon filler text. I'm reading Overlord, and should the author focus on the story instead of the filler material (long-winded pointless descriptions, excessively detailed scene descriptions, constant huge loads of exposition material, and so on), the story would be far more pleasant to read and last only four or five volumes, instead of the current eleven (with more to come).
Despite it being alternate history, the show is extremely accurate in setting and design. It's based in an alternate First World War and the architecture, set design and even the paintings in the background are all based on real world art and design from the time frame of wwI. The weapons and vehicles while based on real world equivalents do get a little mixed up, some pieces are actually WWII era and not WWI era, for example while tanks where introduced near the end of WWI, just like in the show, the tank designs featured in the show are actually early WWII models of tanks. As a history buff I was pulled into this show initially by its ability to show an alternate yet still visually accurate First World War, I then proceeded to stay because of how interesting a character Tanya was so over all I really enjoyed the show, I just wish there where more shows with this kind of respect for historical accuracy, and possibly one that does it better
Late response but... If you've seen the manga or light novels, you'll notice that there are many, many references to real-life combat and logistics concepts. Basically, the author knows exactly what's what. If anything, the anime is a poor, poor version of those much more fleshed out works, and the anime's English title makes absolutely no sense considering her character in the source.
@let us prey why cant all of you just accept that author take both or many type of war and make his OWN twist? hes own setting.. just stop it with no its ww1.. nah its ww2? or asking for why it can be historically accurate when the author doesnt even want to be accurate.. again.. his OWN kind of war... his own liberty of work.. jeez.. really sad people arguing about something about something that wasnt even the author intention...does magic/mages happen to be in any kind of war.. or does somehow an adult male reincarnated as loli to ANOTHER world making any sense? no?
"This is an alternative universe" "But but historian accuracy, chonological order..." Really GR??? You said yourself, that this world is moving in it's own pace and then complained, that it doesn't follow OUR history???? Btw you question about why they didn't use mages differently and didn't have defense against them, or have trenches can be explained quite simple: 1)Magic tech was developed not that long ago - so as any tech, or invention it takes time to think of the ways to use it. 2)They didn't have any big wars and the last one was a trench one and without any mage units, so they just started with what they knew best 3)Do WE have defense system from flying mages? no, since we were never been attacked by them and we don't have such tech. They didn't have any defense, since this tech was quite new, so the best/fastest way was just fight fire with fire (mage vs mage)
finally people with some sense.. really sad people arguing about something about something that wasnt even the author intention about whether its is ww1 or ww2...does magic/mages happen to be in any kind of war.. or does somehow an adult male reincarnated as loli to ANOTHER world making any sense? no? so it is the author own liberty of work on what he want to put in.. why cant just enjoy his own twist and not being an war elitist like you were there in any of that war.
No no no, it's not that she doesn't believe in god. She doesn't believe that he is a "Benevolent being" as he says he is And she's pissed that he threw her into a Waring world without her consent just so that she will "worship" him
I'll probably get flamed for this but I'll point out that Tanya is 'religious' She just doesn't Worship a God. That's something Being X doesn't understand himself (this is interpreted from part of the Manga but I'd have to go back through to find the volume/page that it's explained)
well im agreed to you about the historical technological achievement but if you have the watch some of the great war videos we can conclude that in the world war 1 every nation didn't really understand how war is being fought, they build trenches ala american civil war but with the invention of machine gun the infantry is going to be mowed down by it, and the cavalry isn't really that much useful in trench warfare , with the invention of the tanks in ww1, barb wire and enemy fortification is becoming useless. so in this anime, the warring nation have the same mindset as our own timeline, they didnt really know how to fight the war in the age of technological achievement with magical elements to it, so i think the historical aspect of the war is pretty accurate, the writer really capture the mindset of the warring nation during world war 1
Especially that it is in a time of research in industrial speed. Were 2-3 years difference can mean vastly different equipment. They showed that even the old guard that did adapt wasn't prepared for everything.
Agreed, it's very clear that this is supposed to be World War I and I honestly don't see that many connections to the second World War. You've already made some points and I won't beat a dead horse but there are a lot of other connections including the way that nations interacted with the superpower Germany and how they united against them. It's so similar to World War I and honestly there weren't that many historical inaccuracies when looked at strictly through that lens. Of course there are some such as tank technology and it's advancements we it doesn't seem like we're that deep into the war yet but I'm willing to give it some leeway.
Something to add: Tanias Squadron (Battalion?) was an innovation to them. And not even on technological ground, but in doctrines. In their training and operation.
Can't agree more, It feels like this was a "What if WWI started a few years later." So technologically these nations are a fair bit advanced then where they were, (I'd say somewhere in the middle of WWI and WWII?). But because of the lack of a major modern war most haven't learned the what these technological advancements can actually bring, Why they need to update, or how to counter them.
Agree. This was one of the few anime in recent times that I actually watched from start to finish. A break out of the usual anime monotony of recurring shounen tropes and overused concepts.
i watched the sub and dub and personally they are amazing the only difference i found was tanya sounds more like a kid in sub and more like a evil person in dub
Queen Bitch KaNoMiko "Most are" I feel like that would apply in the 80's and 90's. I still prefer subs but dubs have come a long way; why does this circlejerk exist in 2017?
+Saru En Because moe still exists in 2017, and the English language might just be capable of doing moe properly. Most anime are moe anime, hence most dubs suck.
Huge mistake in the first 40 seconds of this video...... They aren't Nazi's they are Imperialist's. Please go back and watch the series again, and take note they refer to the nation as an Empire. This is like the biggest mistake people make about this show. Second yeah "it's also not like world war II" because it's like world war I which is pretty obvious. I mean seriously take a look at the majority technology. Take a look at the first time Tanya leads her newly formed and trained unit against the Dukedom of Dakia. Last, to be Nazi's they would need a racial purity motivation.... and that isn't the case.
Ronald Pettit while you are right they aren't nazi's and this is really alt great war, your reasoning is inaccurate. The nazi's call germany the third reich (the third empire). Still the activites done (particularly towards french civilian in the way of the army) and boarders match ww1. The general fighting stile kinda matches ww1 (most generals in the war did not go in with an understanding of war at all. Being said germans were most prepared due to prewar planning). The tanks are easily ww2 and I THINK the same for battleships. Although in this uni the british didn't use the first tank and it seemed like the majority were german.
@@masterm3487 battle ships are from both wars but the design looks like they did come from ww2 era, planes are from ww1, tanks ww2 (pz 3 design so early 1941 area), ww1 submarines. So yeah you are also correct on the timeline mix of wars
Well the common anti-nazi canard is that they wanted to take over the world. This objectively is of course totally false accusation that is not supported by any known facts or documents. Typical de-nazification and war propaganda. Sort of hard to get people across an ocean fired up to go to war otherwise.
They are by the same publisher so they do cross promotion all the time. Like Overlord has many times included ads to promote Youjo Senki in the novel and Vice Versa
yeah but there are groups of people who spam report the video on youtube because they don't like it. and youtube's copyright system being so abusable......
SPOILERS!: arkada dont you remember the episode where they took on an army with only her unit and came out anscathed? magic is like a weapon in devellopment and most countries did not expect its might/ thought it was a passing military experiment. And with every new weapon countermeasures are half assed at best. Take the atomic bomb for example: it took the world powers a good time to figure out the aftereffects of radiation and even more to start making bunkers built to combat said radiation during the cold war. Now take magic which is in part applied to current technologies as we see many times in the show: how does one defend against something illogical and clearly unscientific in its majority? Someone quoted that advanced technology past a level looks like magic to the common man and what can said common man do but dig holes and throw rocks and stones at this impervious enemy
well in this series magic is semi-scientific. They have equations and such for it, but the overall mindset of it is "its been around for a long time, it works, lets see how far we can push it, lets just go with that" kind of deal
my guess is that the british will come and rekt german empire? then probably some another major power like austria-hungary/italy gonna join the war siding with the german and turns into world war just like tanya predicted?
Nope, totally wrong. Spoiler: Russia attacked the empire, but the empire rekt them at a high cost. Britain is being annoying and US is sending volunteers. Tanya slowly becomes depressed due to the war and her battalion keeps losing people. Tanya got promoted to Lt.Col and now leading a Kampfgruppe on the eastern front.
Even more SPOILERS: the Empire lost the war and rumor has it Tanya fled to the Unified States. There are Flash Forwards of 40 Years after the Great War.
The guy had some problems why they didnt use mages and magic more in the series for a more efficient military tactics. Starting with mages in the military, what is glaring for me is that it seems mages are somewhat uncommon to come across since the country has to actively look for them, thats how Tanya was found. Like any specialized soldier, it takes a long time and a lot of money to train a flight mage, similar to building a tank. However, you can always rebuild a tank while you cant readily make a new mage since their occurrence are rare. GR up there wondered why they didnt use the mages more since they are far more efficient than tanks and aeroplanes its because they are a limited resource and far too valuable as a military strength to use all the time. Also, WW1 was an interesting time in the history of warfare, it set the precedence for wars to come from the 20th century all the way to here. Just before WW1 there were remarkable advances in in technology and sciences, so much so that people and governments could not keep track or really understand how far it had come. Then WW1 happen where government finally consolidated everything from gasses, vehicles and equipment, then evaluated everything and their effectiveness and every situation, and used that knowledge to kill people, the frontlines is where the proving grounds were for much warfare. The same thing is happening with the mages in the anime, in addition why flying mages are utilized more got military tactics, they are still trying to figure things. (Got tired of writing)
CaseNumber00 if the enemy was using mage you would think they would have gotten snipped but not sure if that crossed people's minds or they were flying out of their range.
If anything I learned, from Youjo Senki, it's that even though we live in a society where humans are expected to value reason over immediate emotional impulse, that doesn't mean that everyone is willing to comply to such norms otherwise our world would have a much less crime rate. In Tanya's case, in her first life, she had underestimated the type of reaction when people get fired.
I know it is late as half life 3, but I have to mention this. Unfortunately never mentioned in the anime because it would take too much unnecessary time, already cutting a ton of references to strategies, philosophy and psychology, but magic used like pseudo technology in this world is a new thing. Magic and magicians were like the old tales in stories in our world. Grab a chicken kill it under specific conditions and magic will happen. Or leave milk for little helpers with rules and certain things used and done to make something happen. In this world people investigated those complicated and completely inconvenient methods to produce the little crystals they wear. Calculation gems, which allow people to cast spells like they do in video games. Chant, use mana, effect happens. Instead of the old way of doing specific things for long periods of time and waiting to see if it worked or not. To summarize until recently magic was like "The ancient magus bride" magic and it is until recently that it has become industrialized enough to be used in direct warfare. Hence why there is a kingdom who is all, herp derp, air superiority? Whas that? Herp derp. Anti-aircraft formations means we makes squares.
I've always been confused as to what war this is supposed to represent. Like on one hand it utilizes trench warfare from WWI, but on the other it uses magical flying little girls which we all know didn't come about until the second half of WWII.
Most of the countries in that universe didn't have mages or know about magic, so they were fighting with dated tactics. Tanya takes advantage of this many times in the show!
Hello! Could you please consider returning to your old thumbnail style like the one used for the Sailor Moon Review? It is a lot more crisp, unique and eye-catching!
When I was watching this weekly, reading the r/anime thread added a lot to the series. There are actually a ton of historical references in this show, but they're all pretty obscure (or at least I didn't notice them at first.) A lot of the tactical decisions and mistakes of the armies that happen in Tanya actually align really well with real maneuvers and blunders that happened in WWI.
Well if you look at the historical accuracy it seems to work with the addition of manic if you think of it as a new invention. Because not all the nations have magic abilities or the jewels shows that magic is still being taken into account with tactics and other stuff. So I think it works out well.
We do very briefly see a counter to the mages, actually. High-altitude bombers absolutely demolish the standard mages from Not-Germany, and Tanya's squad only dismantles them because they're the equivalent to jet fighters up against propeller planes due to the newly developed tech powering their magic.
I think the thing with the mages is that they're supposed to be fairly new and that just like in real WWI most countries simply weren't prepared for how war had changed and only the biggest countries had adapted.
To be honest, the setting is WWI with the trench warfare, the guns, the uniforms and the country's at play (thought with some modifications) but it has some WWII era technologys like the closed planes, the V1s and Germany conquering Europe only for the allies to evacuate (though not at dunkerk this time). So it is mostly WWI but has some flavour of WWII mixed in
I know noone cares anymore but 5 years later the manga and the LN which are both still ongoing have given massively more information. Basically everyone said it already, but the fact that they don't have any proper defences against mages comes from the rapidly changing doctrines due to technogical advancements. In the Manga it's mentioned that mages had been fighting in the trenches, alongside the infantry, which, comparing to later, is incredibly ineffective. Also, which is introduced in the anime, utilizing Mage Units like this in order to break through, leading spearheads or executing special missions is something Tanya came up with in the Military Academy arc, meaning it hadn't been done before in that scale, so there was no reason to defend oneself against it. Also, as the anime progresses, [Spoiler], and especially in the Battle of Arene arc in the Manga, you can see how other nations adapt to the Imperial doctrine by mirroring them, which shows that the world is constantly advancing and adapting itself, which is just great world building and shows the quality of writing behind it. All in all I was a little bit disappointed in the anime, it didn't stay as faithful to the LN as I had hoped, and I found the character designs awful (except Tanya she was great). TL;DR, Manga and LN is amazing, anime is good, world building is a big strength and after 5 years it has proven itself, that generally everything makes very much sense.
Hey Arkada, First off, I'd like to say that I've always appreciated your work on these anime reviews, and you have always made good points with the series that you choose to review. Thank you for all your hard work! To be honest though, there is one series that I've been hoping you would review for a long time now, and you haven't gotten around to it. When the urge strikes you, I'd love to hear your thoughts on my favorite anime of all time: the Magi series. I can't say whether it would be something that you would particularly enjoy, but if you do get around to watching it, I would absolutely love to see your review on the series. I realize that you're busy, and I know you have lots of people asking to review a number of series, but if there is a way that you might be able to fit it into your schedule, I would be especially grateful. All the best, N
Its announced since march this year, actually date unknown so far many speculate for the next year. So it is coming! www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2017-03-10/overlord-tv-anime-gets-2nd-season/.113293
Well, if the mages are a new thing, it would probably look like that cluster-F. When the enemy started to attack ground troops from planes (by dropping handgrenades!), the first response was to mount a recon-plane and fly as close as possible so that the pilot could unload his revolver at the enemy! Soon they built faster planes that could carry at least a MG. Less than 30 years later there were jets, radar and guided rockets. So, there is a learning curve. First it looks pathetic, but soon it changes everything.
no dont do it dont watch bad anime, and you are not allowed to play mario kart and skateboard for a week! props to whoever knows where i stole this from tho its true DO NOT WATCH BAD SHOWS
Hi Arkada, thank you for making this video! I liked the concept, tried it and ended up watching it all in one sitting. Found my new favorite genre. Evil Lolis. Huge kudos to the studio for not sexualising any characters. They took the story seriously, and it was epic.
My only one complaint against Youjo Senki is the fact that there are Panzerkampfwagen Dreiten (Panzer IIIs) in the 1920s. Yes I am Deutsch, and I know my tanks very well.
@ 3:30 That cheezy sentai dialog cracked me up ... would have never thought about it, as I'm not a fan of the genre ... 🤣 PS, Youjo Senki is my choice for anime of the year ... well, thus far anyway ~ year's not over, it's a strong contender ... 🌟
It's actually explained why the mages cannot simply go overhead and take out the trenches. It drains their mana reserves, which is why that battalion got slaughtered by tanya so easily (besides the fact that she was 'blessed' by god). Great video tho
Its a story about a heartless 40-year-old businessman being reincarnated as a loli because he’s an atheist. I think we’ve flown passed the point of having to stick to realism.
I think the major surprise in the end to her was this was WW1 with a dash of WW2 thrown in. At the end she realises that it is immediately becoming actual WW2, she is being deployed to North Africa at the end.
It's WWI that started 20 years late with magic thrown in, its a common theme that most of the involved parties are completely ill-prepared for the scale of combat, air power, vertical envelopment. Even how the mages are used shows that, they start as WWI style airborne spotters for conventional artillery and evolve into something more akin to modern air-assault infantry.
What impressed me most was the portrayal of the not-Kaiserleichmarine Hoch See Flotte and also the expansion to not-Nord Afrika at the end of the series. The studio really went all out to CGI render the Kaiser class battleships and the interwar not-Kreigsmarine DDs
The fact that trenches were not an effective counter to mages was not a plot hole, but something that was indicative that at the change of the times people were too kept back with thinking of battle in old ways. Tanya being familiar with how real world technology really could change the rules and the way they should be thought about saw that really focusing on mages was the way for advantage. It gave her a head start that had people think she was either crazy or a genius, when really she has maybe a good century on seeing how old ways of battle could be countered.
I am pretty sure that the reason magic is such a small part is because magic in this world isn't a very powerful thing that people always knew about. It might appear naturally be just a type of energy that radiates from people, and it can only do small things such as simply levitating things and shining lights. This is not obvious for warfare. It seems that crystals and batteries are used to amplify a person's natural magic to usable levels. The technology to use magic in warfare might be really new. The reasons some countries can't use it is because they don't have access to said amplifying technology.
You got a like and sub just for mentioning Overlord at the end. One of my favorite shows of the past few years aside from Youjo Senki. I can't wait for S2 to come out.
Trench warfare used hot air ballon mounted observers to direct artillery fire. Mages originally filled this role in YS, not being front line fighters. Occasionally they would fight each other to blind the other side’s artillery, but that was it, until Tanya introduced new doctrine that no one was ready for yet. Its essentially Wrath of Khan, not thinking three dimensionally bc no experience fighting that way.
for your historic question, please note that most commanders in world war 1 didn't understand the tactics or war of that scale. There were cavalry troops that told to charge into no man's land against machine gun placement, some idiots told land ships (tanks) to drive into the muddy area, not knowing they would get stuck. Also there were some radio communication were unencrypted. Trenches were designed to stop ground units like infantry from storming the area. The mages in show were suppose to be countered by other mages and anti-air placements. In real WW1 Trenches were often attack by gas and morter (sp?) strikes. Trench, like I stated, are designed for ground troops, and are meant to slow a enemy army from securing the location.
I like the alternative history stuff. They don't have ground counters to mages, because no one thought they would be so extremely powerful. While trench warfare is useless, that is what actually happened WW1 and was very much a failure of strategy. Also the WW2 stuff seems to be a mixture of events changing due to the direct result of Tanya, and events producing more quickly due to magic being introduced.
The thing with military tactics and strategies is that we have the hindsight of time. If you look from every major war to the next, unless one side loses majorly, there is little advance within the fields. The winner, or slight loser, think that the next war is fought the same way as the last was, every single time. I WW1 the Allies thought that cavalry was the big winner, Germany had exceptionally switched to machineguns which trenches were a factor against. The Allies at the start of WW2 started off with thinking that trenches were the impenetrable bomb. The Maginot Line was a series of trenches and other fortifications built to keep France uninvaded. Against a conventional enemy of the time, it would have worked. Against the Blitz it was useless. This is brought up in the manga, and LN I suppose, when Analogy-for Romania joins the fight and they go into anti-air formations and the Empire mages are too afraid to attack because to them it's common sense that they would die horribly if they kept attacking. They fail to realise that the technology used for flying has advanced and so has the tactics for using them. Tanja notes that attacking them amounts to target practice since they fight in block-sized regiments.
0:39 she's not nazi, basically everyone in this anime isn't nazi, the country in which they live is still basically Imperial Germany(although I thought about where this anime might lead, and very interesting scenario would be if the Empire lost the war, and Tanya, knowing a lot from history, would basically copy Hitler and rise to power).
In regard to the magic and the argument that the opposing army didn't have much of a defense against magic, well in World War I when things started getting going, almost all the generals getting involved were from by-gone eras and had never fought battles with automatic weapons. Most of the killing that happened in the opening weeks were from incompetent leaders (mostly on the Ottoman side) organizing their battalions into giant masses and firing lines and engaged in "gentlemanly" combat. Trench warfare was basically invented on the field and the ones that didn't adapt to automatic weapons basically had no defense and their losses were totally one-sided, just like in the anime here. From what I've seen, there's been a surprising effort to keep things analogous, like its take on Tanya's Schlieffen plan
I'm late to the party. I'm just joining now because Season 2 was just confirmed (probably a 2025 release but there was never a confirmed season or date) and was rewatching the whole series just now. A few notes: 1. Around 4:50 - They kind of explain in the manga (and Light Novel) as to why Mages and Magic have not really caused a very big change in terms of how war was fought. This is for two reasons: A. Mages and Magic have been a relatively new discovery and technological advancement over the last few years, and their application to specifically War has not always been at the forefront of most nations' priority for development. This is because of how most of the Major powers in the world are slow to adjust to new changes in fighting doctrines, especially ones that basically throw their whole war doctrines entirely obsolete. Think of the introduction of the concept of Planes in WW1: It wasn't until WW2 that Air Superiority doctrine was even ever enforced as efficiently and as much in the forefront as it should have been when it was a new concept. Early applications of Mages have been for more mundane things, like easily starting fires for cooking and the like. As such, most countries were split into two camps: Middling/Major Powers that did not really make the biggest changes to their own Armies to properly incorporate Mages into their fighting doctrine (such as the Francois Republic and the Legadonia Entente Alliance); and Minor/Weaker nations that couldn't afford to do so (like the Grand Duchy of Dacia). In fact, one of the major reasons as to why the Empire was even such a force to be reckoned with even before the introduction of Tanya herself was due to their status as being a relatively young nation in the world not being a hindrance in terms of applying major changes to their own country's Armed Forces. This led to the Empire being the first among all countries to apply extensive use of Mages and Mage Battalions in their war doctrine. This has caused the Empire to have been one of the Strongest Nations at the start of the series, rivaling even countries whose existence are more than several centuries older than the Empire itself, and many nations would come to apply lessons learned from how the Empire fought its wars to their own Armies and Mages. B. Not everyone in born in the world was capable of being a Mage. In fact, only a tiny fraction of people had any aptitude of becoming a mage, so it was already hard to employ them as a formidable fighting force or even combat multiplier to most Armies because of how few there were. Unlike Tanks and Planes that can be manufactured en masse by building more factories, Humans cannot be manufactured to immediately have Mage Capabilities from the get-go. It's why in the 2nd episode Tanya explains how her aptitude for Magic was a surefire way of getting conscripted due to the Empire's need for every capable Mage to be part of their Military, which is why she decided to volunteer for their Officer Corps. 2. The Historical Inaccuracies aren't really an issue because their world is not our own. We have to remember that she wasn't sent back to the past, but instead flung into a different world that sort of mirrors our own. There are a significant amount of instances where the show nods to actual historical events that happen in their world as well, such as the Francois Republic's escape to Africa via the Brest Military Port mirroring Dunkirk in our own Timeline, or the Africa Campaign to the south lead by General Romel (not to be confused with Rommel from our own Timeline) who very much acts like his own counterpart in our timeline. TL;DR: - Mages didn't make a big enough change in War Fighting in the Anime due to it being such a new concept and how little mages existed at the time compared to the overall population. In fact, it was the adoption of Mages in large quantities that lead to the Empire being such a powerful nation by the start of the anime. - Historical Inaccuracies don't apply because it isn't the same world, but a different one. There are a few nods to actual historical events in the anime, and you don't even have to look far to see them.
I think the fact that nobody's tactics seem prepared for flying mages kinda reflects the real WW1 and how nobody's tactics seemed prepared for gas, shells, machine guns, tanks, grenades, or planes. There were still people who used cavalry and swords, fighting in WW1
Also fun fact the illustrator for both Youjo Senki and Overlord are the same person and even did a small crossover piece featuring the protagonists of both shows!
Weaponized magic and organized aerial mage wings were fairly new innovations at the start of Youjo Senki, which is why many of the national superpowers (the Empire included) squander their potential quite a bit. Hell, the Grand Duchy of Dacia (aka not-Romania) marched 60 000 men to the imperial borders and lost to an expanded flight wing a mere 48 men strong because they didn't even grasp the concept of air superiority because this is effectively pre-WW1. In the manga this changes over time as Tanya adapts modern aerial stratagems to mage formations and spreads their use to the Empire's other mage battalions, but of course talented mage officers in the *opposition* starts taking pages out of her book too which then takes the war to new heights.
I mostly agree with you about the poor use of such a significant tactical tool as flying mages, however one of the hallmarks of WWI was the incredibly slow and inefficient adaptation of new technology into warfare. Considering the relatively short time span Tanya introduces her innovative use of mages, the resistance of her opponents to adapt to the change of tactics has many parallels in history.
Tanya isn't a Nazi, but I would argue definitely a Machiavellian opportunist. Tanya doesn't have any of views seen specifically in Nazi Germany (Master Race / Anti-Semitism / Eugenics ) - However, she does share the traits of intense nationalism and imperialism (however, it seems she only does this for her own sake, not out of any true sense of duty to country or ideology), also, in the film, she specifically goes out of her way to DUMP ON and specifically HUMILIATE the nation of Communists. She REALLY despises Communism (As any sane person does) - But her disgust towards Communism seems to be genuine. Her genuine disgust for Communism seems to be because in her past life, he/she valued merit above all, even the face of God. He believed that you had to prove your worth, he/she is a social darwinist and the collectivist ideology of Communism is literally the opposite of the individualist/merit-based world view he/she still has. So, no, Tanya isn't a Nazi, she's not a Fascist either, at least not ideologically. She's just a selfish, but extremely driven person with a very Machiavellian personality that allows her to succeed in carrying out the duties of an imperialistic fascist state, which just so happens to benefit her as well, or so she thinks.
