"My Favourite What If WWI Scenario" Topic

So, how much difference would it have made if the Austrian-Hungarian Empire had not handcuffed itself to poor budgets, ancient tactics and a high command with poor strategic vision? What if they had modelled training, equipment and managed to weld their various ethnic diversity into a solid organization? What would have been the result?

Would Serbia have survived longer than a couple months?
Would the Russian ever have had the chance to take both Lemberg and Przemyśl?
Would Italy have ever gone against the Austrians?

Given the fighting in the first months of the war and how doggedly the Austrians pursued their victories against the Russian despite the piles of dead and wounded, would they have been as nasty an opponent as the Germans were? I would like to think so. Imagine the results if the Empire had really been a cohesive body instead of a tower of cards in a wind storm!

This is one I would like to see the Computers calculate out!

Might you ask the same of Russia?

Interesting counterfactual, and not entirely misplaced: the relative decline of Austria really spans the 1890-1914 timeframe, and her inability to maintain her position among the great powers was a product, in large part, of a failure of military and political leadership. But these kinds of changes are hard to game, since they would presumably require changes in OOB, unit quality characteristics, and leadership. Given the unique nature of change in WWI, it wouldn't simply be a matter of moving (say) the 1917 OOB to 1914.

The Russian changes envisioned by the Great Program would perhaps be easier to account for at the tactical level, since the biggest changes came at the operational and strategic levels.

My personal favorite counterfactuals all revolve around Gallipoli, since there are few other cases in that war where a tactical operation could have generated strategic results in a matter of days, and they are simpler to model: better troop quality, more artillery, even alternative attacks- and in an area compact enough for a tabletop.

Austrian and German General Staffs actually cooperate in a meaningful way, before and during the war.

French Army comes to it's senses and ditches Plan 17/Attaque à outrance before hundreds of thousands of unnecessary casualties.

Germany dumps the so called Schlieffen Plan (or the version/plan that von Moltke tried to implement) for a plan with more achievable goals.

Russian Army uses generals that don't hate each other and an overall army group commander to coordinate invasion of East Prussia.

Parachutes for pilots. It took six days to build an aeroplane and six months to train a pilot.

There are many interesting "What Ifs" for WW1.

The accompanying guidebook to Avalon Hill's "1914" contained some interesting details of alternative French and German plans dating back to the 1870s. Some interesting possibilities in that one (including two Italian corps, furnished because Italy honoring it's Triple Alliance obligations was a potential scenario).