It really is fundamental to understanding why people like Columbus and de Gama were the way they were from knowing the state of Europe at the time. They were violent and desparate mercenaries from a violent and desparate place, when they arrived anywhere their first thoughts were "ok, what can I immediately loot and sell here, if I don't come back with something good my debtors are gonna cut my balls off"
https://www.reddit.com/r/BlackWolfFeed/comments/oj7mzt/540_its_coming_rome_feat_patrick_wyman_71221/
Really looking forward to that Patrick Wyman book. Probably going to get the audiobook version, history books tend to transfer really well to audiobook format for the most part, and Patrick is narrating it himself. Hopefully it keeps it big picture, because some history books will look at conflicts by like discussing munitions and logistics, which is probably the correct perspective but so fucking dry and hard to get through.