The E wrote:If an enemy combatant gets inside energy range of your podnought, the situation is already dire. There is no way that is going to happen unless several other parts of the situation have already gone to hell. I mean, what's the scenario here? How is this going to work? How is any ship going to be able to get into energy range of a podnought wall without being engaged?
Not necessarily, if (for example) your fleet is engaging an enemy fleet in a running battle. The tendency for admirals is to fire at the biggest, scariest, target first. So your pounding on their SDs (& back). What happens if (realizing their getting the worst anyway) the enemy suddenly detaches a group of cruisers & BCs to turn 90deg strait behind you while redirecting on your own BCs? Do you turn to keep your broadside to the BCs and give your nose to the SDs? No you keep your broadside to the SDs, use your chase on the BCs, & hope for the best.
The E wrote: Uhhh, I think you're misremembering something here. As mentioned in EoH, it was always possible to create bow and stern walls, it's just that noone had any reason to do so. It took the development of a weapons platform for which the drawbacks of a bow/sternwall were irrelevant to make it practical.
No there has always been the vulnerable ends. Having a bow wall on that BC in HotQ would have saved the Masds. But nobody bothered to give them one. If facing a catastrophic capping of the T it would be more important for a commander to temporarily sacrifice his accel for protection. So all ships always had a reason for one, but no-one ever thought to give them one
The E wrote: Could you please not use faulty historical analogies? It's not about "this isn't how things are done", it's about your unsupported assumption that things can be done that way.
Its not faulty – just because someone has come up with a non-cannon excuse why it’s not, doesn’t mean it just can’t be done. That’s not faulty (also even if plasma were being used – which is old 22nd cent S.T. tech & shouldn’t be introduced to a superconducting gav control universe). As I pointed out before. They have PISTOLS that use gav tech. how bulky are these pistols & dose someone have to carry a micro fusion plant on their back to power it? No. so why does the same weapon scaled up to naval size suddenly need this overly complicated & highly dangerous tech to support it when SC are available? Go with “no one thought of it before!” & it’s not getting support in the “old navy” niche.