# Tvtropes: 'reinvented' tactics **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 20, 2019, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371 "2019-07-20T23:24:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2019, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/1 "2019-07-20T23:24:09Z")
I can’t find if tvtropes has a page for this one. I’d be really surprised if they don’t. Hero is a [Fish out of Temporal Water](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FishOutOfTemporalWater) but with an addition. He gets involved in a future war, and ‘invents’ tactics of a war that’s just been fought in his original time. No one remembers these in the future time, so they’re highly effective. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2019, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/2 "2019-07-20T23:38:32Z")
If you have an example of a work that contains that trope, you can check on that work’s page. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/3 "2019-07-21T00:05:35Z")
I have two examples: _Armegaddon 2419 A. D._ which is the original Buck Rogers book and _Book of Ptath_ by A. E. van Vogt. Neither seems to have a specific page, although there is one for [Buck Rogers (comic strip)](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ComicStrip/BuckRogers), of course. Couldn’t find it there, most likely because the trope probably didn’t occur in the comic strip. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/4 "2019-07-21T00:27:16Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > I have two examples: _Armegaddon 2419 A. D._ which is the original Buck Rogers book and _Book of Ptath_ by A. E. van Vogt. Neither seems to have a specific page, although there is one for [Buck Rogers (comic strip)](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ComicStrip/BuckRogers), of course. Couldn’t find it there, most likely because the trope probably didn’t occur in the comic strip. The page for the Buck Rogers [TV show](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Series/BuckRogersInTheTwentyFifthCentury) names him as the Ur-Example for the trope of “Like A Duck Takes To Water”: getting the win with 20th-century dogfighting skills in a time when everyone else relies on shipboard computers, adapting football-field tactics for use against people who’ve never even heard of the sport, knowing _exactly_ what’s going on when the bad guys come into possession of centuries-old weapons that our hero is a comparative expert on, and et cetera. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/5 "2019-07-21T00:47:42Z")
thanks for reminding me MEtv has buck rogers on tonight … I think ill make my aunt watch it again … I caught the tail end of last weeks episode and got all teary-eyed in squeezy cheese nostalgia as I was about 5 or 6 when it was originally on ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/6 "2019-07-21T00:57:49Z")
> [@nightshadea](#): > > thanks for reminding me MEtv has buck rogers on tonight … With special guest star Jamie Lee Curtis! ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/7 "2019-07-21T04:26:14Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > Hero is a [Fish out of Temporal Water](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FishOutOfTemporalWater) but with an addition. He gets involved in a future war, and ‘invents’ tactics of a war that’s just been fought in his original time. No one remembers these in the future time, so they’re highly effective. This reminds me of the Isaac Asimov story [“The Feeling of Power”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Feeling_of_Power) which was published in 1958. Except it didn’t involve time travel; just a regular guy who re-invented a forgotten skill. > **[Isaac Asimov: The Feeling Of Power](https://urbigenous.net/library/power.html)** > > A classic short story by Isaac Asimov. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Bill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mr.Bill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Bill)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/8 "2019-07-21T09:24:18Z")
I could be wrong here, since it’s decades since I read it and I don’t remember any plot details, but I suspect that occurred in Twain’s **A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.** ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/9 "2019-07-21T11:42:30Z")
> [@Mr.Bill](#): > > I could be wrong here, since it’s decades since I read it and I don’t remember any plot details, but I suspect that occurred in Twain’s **A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.** That’s kind of the reverse: the protagonist goes back in time, and uses knowledge of things that hadn’t been invented yet (predicting an eclipse, the telegraph, etc.) Actually, wouldn’t \*Idiocracy \*qualify? In the future, people were so stupid they’d forgotten how to grow crops. The time travelers from the past brought that knowledge back with them. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/10 "2019-07-21T16:06:15Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > The page for the Buck Rogers [TV show](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Series/BuckRogersInTheTwentyFifthCentury) names him as the Ur-Example for the trope of “Like A Duck Takes To Water”: getting the win with 20th-century dogfighting skills in a time when everyone else relies on shipboard computers, adapting football-field tactics for use against people who’ve never even heard of the sport, knowing _exactly_ what’s going on when the bad guys come into possession of centuries-old weapons that our hero is a comparative expert on, and et cetera. That’s not exactly it, but perhaps it’s as close as tvtropes has. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/11 "2019-07-21T16:24:40Z")
**King David’s Spaceship** by Jerry Pournelle. A couple of the main characters introduce the phalanx and a few other “lost” military ideas to a culture paralyzed by a religious dictatorship. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/12 "2019-07-21T17:24:22Z")
I looked through TVtropes’s main future index [We Will Not Use an Index in the Future - TV Tropes](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WeWillNotUseAnIndexInTheFuture) and didn’t see anything that looked likely. I did however find on the Atomic Rockets site their version:[Everything Old is New Again](http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/prelimnotes.php#id--Scientific_Hardness--Everything_Old_Is_New_Again) ,which cites several examples throughout that site. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/13 "2019-07-21T18:25:37Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > That’s not exactly it, but perhaps it’s as close as tvtropes has. Thanks. Find more examples and suggest a variant: _Like a Duck in Temporal Water_. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/14 "2019-07-21T18:45:56Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > **King David’s Spaceship** by Jerry Pournelle. A couple of the main characters introduce the phalanx and a few other “lost” military ideas to a culture paralyzed by a religious dictatorship. That’s another case like _Connecticut Yankee_. What I’m thinking of is the opposite. That is, the culture is so high tech they’ve forgotten the low-tech tactics of the past, whereas the hero remembers because they were used in the war he’d just fought in. In my two examples, Rogers uses tactics from WWI (which may seem really strange, since our view is that that was a war with really bad tactics, in general) and the other book uses blitzkrieg tactics from WWII. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/15 "2019-07-21T19:39:29Z")
This happened in Star Trek IV - the Enterprise crew goes to the past and (IIRC) Scotty and McCoy go to a certain person in charge of a company for some special kind of plastic that could be used to make a whale tank in the Enterprise. Scotty designs it on the guy’s computer, and when McCoy objects that he’s revealing knowledge of the future, Scotty tells him that this is the guy who invented that type of plastic in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/16 "2019-07-21T19:44:15Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Scotty tells him that this is the guy who invented that type of plastic in the first place. ISTR Scotty not being completely sure about that. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/17 "2019-07-21T19:56:54Z")
“Transparent Aluminum” ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/18 "2019-07-21T20:18:58Z")
And as I recall it, Scotty traded him the formula for transparent aluminum for the readily available plexiglas. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/19 "2019-07-21T20:37:58Z")
Not the future but parallel reality, but “Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen” by H. Beam Piper seems to fill the bill. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2019, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371/20 "2019-07-21T20:40:52Z")
Yeah, I know I was a bit fuzzy on the details, but the scene seems to fit what the OP was talking about. If there’s a TV Trope for it, he might find it in the Star Trek IV page. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tvtropes-reinvented-tactics/837371.md?page=2)