Keyhole LAC

Fox2! wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:Nike's are probably now the capital ship of the future except in full-on fleet engagements. Not all that efficient compared to what Tremaine used in SoV... which in my mind is an ideal force mix, whether or not you buy the "Barricade" plot device or not.

Barricade was a waste of Mk 23s, the least expendable and most potent weapon the RMN has.

Barricade was also highly successfull in thinning out the incoming solarian missiles - and as small as Tremaines command was, it was a good idea, too. After all, he didn't really know (simply because he coudn't have got the mail in time) how successful possible earlier clashes with Cataphract-hitting solarian taskgroups went. So, why risk possible heavy damages at his ships if he had the chance to minimize said risk? After all, even the least expendable missile is faster to replace than a crew of highly trained Navy-personnel, which works as smoothly as a well-oiled machine.

Eagleeye wrote:Barricade was also highly successfull in thinning out the incoming solarian missiles - and as small as Tremaines command was, it was a good idea, too. After all, he didn't really know (simply because he coudn't have got the mail in time) how successful possible earlier clashes with Cataphract-hitting solarian taskgroups went. So, why risk possible heavy damages at his ships if he had the chance to minimize said risk? After all, even the least expendable missile is faster to replace than a crew of highly trained Navy-personnel, which works as smoothly as a well-oiled machine.

Go ahead, draw out how it worked. Keeping in mind that the SLN missiles were all fired at about the same time, all running at the same acceleration, need to be far enough from each other so they won't have their drive fields impact as they maneuver and are too stupid to be able to find the target if they are not continually observing it themselves from the beginning to end of their run - so no missile can have another missile's drive field in front of it.

kzt wrote:

Eagleeye wrote:Barricade was also highly successfull in thinning out the incoming solarian missiles - and as small as Tremaines command was, it was a good idea, too. After all, he didn't really know (simply because he coudn't have got the mail in time) how successful possible earlier clashes with Cataphract-hitting solarian taskgroups went. So, why risk possible heavy damages at his ships if he had the chance to minimize said risk? After all, even the least expendable missile is faster to replace than a crew of highly trained Navy-personnel, which works as smoothly as a well-oiled machine.

Go ahead, draw out how it worked. Keeping in mind that the SLN missiles were all fired at about the same time, all running at the same acceleration, need to be far enough from each other so they won't have their drive fields impact as they maneuver and are too stupid to be able to find the target if they are not continually observing it themselves from the beginning to end of their run - so no missile can have another missile's drive field in front of it.

Let's take some math, here. Tremaine used 200 Mk 23 in his attack-salvo against a single Solarian BC (out of a whole squadron of 8). He used 3x72 = 216 Mk 23 for his Barricade-maaneuver. That only sums up to 416 missiles.

That's a lot less than he had to use, if he wanted all 8 of the Solarian BCs at least mission-killed. And he had rubbing it under Tamagutchis nose as early as possible, that the Solarians had no chance at all in penetrating active manticoran defenses. Combine that with the effectivity of his own attack against SLNS Lorraine ... Tremaine actually saved missiles instead of wasting them.

True, you could argument, that the manticoran missile defense doctrine should sufficient to kill the 1500 Cataphracts, without using attack-missiles in a defensive role, and that the easiness, with which he destroyed the one BC alone should convince Tamagutchi to surrender - but, as said already, he has responsibility for his own crews, too. Why bring them into danger, if there is no need to?

Eagleeye wrote:Barricade was also highly successfull in thinning out the incoming solarian missiles - and as small as Tremaines command was, it was a good idea, too. After all, he didn't really know (simply because he coudn't have got the mail in time) how successful possible earlier clashes with Cataphract-hitting solarian taskgroups went. So, why risk possible heavy damages at his ships if he had the chance to minimize said risk? After all, even the least expendable missile is faster to replace than a crew of highly trained Navy-personnel, which works as smoothly as a well-oiled machine.

That is the only acceptable rationale for using Mk 23s as a broom to sweep ship killers away before they entered Scotty's missile defense zone. Missiles are, indeed, much cheaper than ships and crews.