Light bulb Captured Solly fleet

n7axw wrote:Hi Hutch,

Compromise accepted!!!

Don

lyonheart wrote:Hi SpaceKiwi,

I'm very glad you caught that.

"Weapon platform" has a rather different connotation than warship, primarily something much less mobile.

The implication of something other than an orbital fort could be quite accurate, because orbital forts have more firepower and protection, ton for ton, than a warship could; given all that's dedicated to getting it to move faster than a fort [NTM in hyper etc], which moves slowly to avoid being a sitting duck.

So, was RFC simply restating the obvious, or was he hinting that the captured BF SD's could be very useful to someone not worried about the GA attacking, but lesser threats?

Given that in the SL assembly, the Executive Council, the majority of members [~910] have only 2-3 members, almost a third having only one, so that total might be only around 1453 or an eighth of the membership, which then begs the question of how many of the other half of those that supported Beowulf [2912, IIRC] were from similar low membership systems.

Since the minimum membership of this group starts at 4, I'll suggest the average of 5, for another 290 systems or ~1200 out of ~1784, ie possibly just over 2/3 of all SL members.

If I were the GA, those would be among the first I'd consider worth checking as potential allies, or at least trading pardners, etc.

While most of the shells etc have more warships than the core systems that depended on the SLN, with only LAC's to defend them, if only ~5-10% had wallers the other 90-95% might want at least one for balance, so 'ABC' type treaties are quite possible.

If said potential pardner or ally wanted an SD parked in system to scare away potential raiders, the GA has some 600+ old wallers, before adding the IAN's 311, before getting to the 118 BF SD's the GA has so far without the 70 damaged SD's that some SL members might consider repairing though they're certainly not worth the GA's time and effort.

Potentially those 1000+ old wallers could be worth around M$50-60 Trillion, not a small piece of change during such terrible economic times.

L

Spacekiwi wrote:I thought it was a very interesting way of phrasing it, so got suspicious.



I was considering that while not being used for their weapons, they may be used for their sensors, to aid verge planets with better sensor nets , or potentially as distactions to divert from a Ga fleet, or even to act as wedge cover for a ga fleet. Using them as gifts to potential new allies works as well. If unmanned, you could send them through a hostile wormhole to shut it down to delay your opponent and allow reinforcements to arrive.

The emphasis on weapons systems leads me to believe they will be used, just not in battle.

lyonheart wrote:Hi SpaceKiwi,

I'm very glad you caught that.

"Weapon platform" has a rather different connotation than warship, primarily something much less mobile.

The implication of something other than an orbital fort could be quite accurate, because orbital forts have more firepower and protection, ton for ton, than a warship could; given all that's dedicated to getting it to move faster than a fort [NTM in hyper etc], which moves slowly to avoid being a sitting duck.

So, was RFC simply restating the obvious, or was he hinting that the captured BF SD's could be very useful to someone not worried about the GA attacking, but lesser threats?

Given that in the SL assembly, the Executive Council, the majority of members [~910] have only 2-3 members, almost a third having only one, so that total might be only around 1453 or an eighth of the membership, which then begs the question of how many of the other half of those that supported Beowulf [2912, IIRC] were from similar low membership systems.

Since the minimum membership of this group starts at 4, I'll suggest the average of 5, for another 290 systems or ~1200 out of ~1784, ie possibly just over 2/3 of all SL members.

If I were the GA, those would be among the first I'd consider worth checking as potential allies, or at least trading pardners, etc.

While most of the shells etc have more warships than the core systems that depended on the SLN, with only LAC's to defend them, if only ~5-10% had wallers the other 90-95% might want at least one for balance, so 'ABC' type treaties are quite possible.

If said potential pardner or ally wanted an SD parked in system to scare away potential raiders, the GA has some 600+ old wallers, before adding the IAN's 311, before getting to the 118 BF SD's the GA has so far without the 70 damaged SD's that some SL members might consider repairing though they're certainly not worth the GA's time and effort.

Potentially those 1000+ old wallers could be worth around M$50-60 Trillion, not a small piece of change during such terrible economic times.

L

lyonheart wrote:Hi SpaceKiwi,

I wonder if you're might be conbining the Vorkosigan and Honorverse, sending a drone doesn't work in either, but in the Vorkosigan, one block a wormhole temporarily by a pilot sacrificing himself, they're far too big in the honorverse for that to work.

L

Spacekiwi wrote:I was fiugring on the wormhole mass limit destabilization, without having to send crew through. We've known since OBs that putting mass transits through a junction will destabilize it for long periods of time, so these ships could be used as inexpensive disposable junction/bridge blockers, without the need to waste RMN ships on it. If the SLN control both ends for example, and you can take one group on but not both, or want to mouse trap them into the system to leave the other side weak, you maneuver their forces into the desired balance either side, draw the fleet your side away, then hyper in the disposables, eject out the crew, and have them cross the bridge. doesnt matter if they crash or die on the other side, so long as the wormhole is destabilised. Like BOMA 1 and 2, but using a bridge instead of velocity.

Not sure if my intentions are coming through properly, so please tell me if you're still confused.

lyonheart wrote:Hi SpaceKiwi,

I wonder if you're might be conbining the Vorkosigan and Honorverse, sending a drone doesn't work in either, but in the Vorkosigan, one block a wormhole temporarily by a pilot sacrificing himself, they're far too big in the honorverse for that to work.

L

Vince wrote:I would think that sacrificing ships to shut down a hyper bridge temporarily would get extremely expensive, very quickly, unless the hyper bridge has a very, very low maximum mass limit.

To use the Manticore Junction as an example (IIRC, its the only one we have any numbers on at all) it takes approximately a mass transit of 200 million (200,000,000) tons of shipping to lock the hyper bridge that is being transited for only 17 hours.

Note that the Manticoran Wormhole Junction is the largest ever discovered (to date) in the Honorverse, both in number of secondary termini and (IIRC) the maximum mass limit.

Note that a hyper bridge that is associated with a multi-terminus central junction that undergoes a mass transit locks only that hyper bridge, not the other hyper bridges from the central terminus to the other secondary termini.

Example: If the SLN was somehow able to seize the Beowulf terminus and sent 200,000,000 tons of shipping through it, the only hyper bridge that would be locked in both directions (for only 17 hours) would be the Beowulf<--->Manticore hyper bridge. All the other hyper bridge routes would be unaffected.

Spacekiwi wrote:I was fiugring on the wormhole mass limit destabilization, without having to send crew through. We've known since OBs that putting mass transits through a junction will destabilize it for long periods of time, so these ships could be used as inexpensive disposable junction/bridge blockers, without the need to waste RMN ships on it. If the SLN control both ends for example, and you can take one group on but not both, or want to mouse trap them into the system to leave the other side weak, you maneuver their forces into the desired balance either side, draw the fleet your side away, then hyper in the disposables, eject out the crew, and have them cross the bridge. doesnt matter if they crash or die on the other side, so long as the wormhole is destabilised. Like BOMA 1 and 2, but using a bridge instead of velocity.

Not sure if my intentions are coming through properly, so please tell me if you're still confused.

lyonheart wrote:Hi SpaceKiwi,

I wonder if you're might be conbining the Vorkosigan and Honorverse, sending a drone doesn't work in either, but in the Vorkosigan, one block a wormhole temporarily by a pilot sacrificing himself, they're far too big in the honorverse for that to work.

L

Spacekiwi wrote:Oh, I know that, but it was one of the first ideas that popped into my head, as DW had made several mentions of it in text, but not actually performed it, and the ships are free/unable to be used for much else, and 17 hours can give you a hell of a lead time, especially if you can put another lot through when it stabilises. thats only ~32 Scientists, and the junction is described as big, so less might be needed for other bridges.


I was just trying to think of a way of using them disposably, as they had been mentioned to be useless for battle and such, and that was one of the first thoughts in my head, apart from the idea of using their non combat systems to enhance verge planet infrastructure.

Vince wrote:I would think that sacrificing ships to shut down a hyper bridge temporarily would get extremely expensive, very quickly, unless the hyper bridge has a very, very low maximum mass limit.

To use the Manticore Junction as an example (IIRC, its the only one we have any numbers on at all) it takes approximately a mass transit of 200 million (200,000,000) tons of shipping to lock the hyper bridge that is being transited for only 17 hours.

Note that the Manticoran Wormhole Junction is the largest ever discovered (to date) in the Honorverse, both in number of secondary termini and (IIRC) the maximum mass limit.

Note that a hyper bridge that is associated with a multi-terminus central junction that undergoes a mass transit locks only that hyper bridge, not the other hyper bridges from the central terminus to the other secondary termini.

Example: If the SLN was somehow able to seize the Beowulf terminus and sent 200,000,000 tons of shipping through it, the only hyper bridge that would be locked in both directions (for only 17 hours) would be the Beowulf<--->Manticore hyper bridge. All the other hyper bridge routes would be unaffected.

Lord Skimper wrote:

Spacekiwi wrote:Oh, I know that, but it was one of the first ideas that popped into my head, as DW had made several mentions of it in text, but not actually performed it, and the ships are free/unable to be used for much else, and 17 hours can give you a hell of a lead time, especially if you can put another lot through when it stabilises. thats only ~32 Scientists, and the junction is described as big, so less might be needed for other bridges.


I was just trying to think of a way of using them disposably, as they had been mentioned to be useless for battle and such, and that was one of the first thoughts in my head, apart from the idea of using their non combat systems to enhance verge planet infrastructure.

Disposable is easy, use them as big missiles, without crew on board and run them at high G acceleration and ram the enemy ships, stations, etc...

Spacekiwi wrote:Oh, I know that, but it was one of the first ideas that popped into my head, as DW had made several mentions of it in text, but not actually performed it, and the ships are free/unable to be used for much else, and 17 hours can give you a hell of a lead time, especially if you can put another lot through when it stabilises. thats only ~32 Scientists, and the junction is described as big, so less might be needed for other bridges.

I was just trying to think of a way of using them disposably, as they had been mentioned to be useless for battle and such, and that was one of the first thoughts in my head, apart from the idea of using their non combat systems to enhance verge planet infrastructure.