Beating up Frontier Fleet, mercilessly

kzt wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:Back to the point of the thread though, about beating up on FF when they come to call "commerce raiding wise", and related to other threads.

Somehow I think the further career of a FF squadron leader (presumably a commodore or rear admiral) is going to be exactly one salvo long, the same time period as Byng, Crandall, Filareta, and Dubroskaya enjoyed.

...

Thoughts?

Let's talk about math.

Manticoran Merchant vessels: tens of thousands.
RMN escort vessels ever constructed: < 550 DDs, < 550 CLs, < 550 CAs. Many of these were lost in that rather violent series of wars, and only some of the survivors can be assigned to convoy escorts due to lots of other pressing problems.
FF warships = many, many thousands.

So either the manticoran merchant marine is going to: a) travel in huge convoys (like 100+ ships) escorted by a few warships, or b) a lot of the manticoran merchants are not going to have any armed escorts, or c) very little of the huge manticoran merchant fleet is going to be doing merchant stuff.

A merchant ship that isn't in active commerce is going to have a lot of issues in fairly short order, as the operating expenses and note on the ship is quite a lot of money. So option C results in the majority of the Manticoran shippers getting liquidated in bankruptcy in fairly short order.

Option A seems reasonable at first glance, but exactly where do you need to send >800 million tons of shipping? The SL core is the obvious answer, but barring that we are dealing with a very limited number of places that can support anything like this.

So my guess is that most merchants will choose option B, because the finances force them to operate and the RMN has far too few ships to protect them. So they will be wandering system to system looking for any cargo they can find.

And this will mean that commerce raiders will mostly find single unescorted merchant ships, which they will promptly blow up.

Minor detail there with just counting the RMN ships, however. Haven, the IAN, and Grayson aren't about to let Frontier Fleet play anywhere in their vicinity or back yards, they are located, plus all those nifty LACs and SDF pods are going to make it pretty dicey to try anything "in system".

That leaves a limited number of routes to patrol, which fewer ships can do much easier. That suggests convoys as a matter of practice, etc., plus no "return to base" strategy that doesn't result in the FF squadrons and bases being targeted for destruction simply as a matter of retaliation for raids.

As always YMMV, opinions and thoughts welcomed.

SharkHunter wrote:That leaves a limited number of routes to patrol, which fewer ships can do much easier. That suggests convoys as a matter of practice, etc., plus no "return to base" strategy that doesn't result in the FF squadrons and bases being targeted for destruction simply as a matter of retaliation for raids.

As always YMMV, opinions and thoughts welcomed.

No, that leaves everyone who is a trading partner vulnerable. There are supposed to be tens of thousands of Manticoran merchant ships. Assuming you only want one 8 million ton vessel per week and each ship reaches one system per month,how many systems does that mean they are traveling too? I get about 2300 systems assuming only 10,000 vessels. How many of them have anything like the defenses you assume they have? Umm, maybe 200? What happens in the other 2100?

FF has been loosing a lot of ships recently in places like the Verge area between Talbott Quadrant and SL space. First there was Byng and then there was Crandall and we have Saltash and Meyers. The FF Admiral with the BC squadron at Zunker had a lesson in just how badly his ships are outclassed and is probably going to spread the word. We keep seeing FF ships loosing to RMN. FF is probably a bit thin (they were already overstretched in their regular duties) in the area where SL and SEM are closest.

Then there is the whole Maya area and the FF ships based there or locally built are already not funtionally part of FF anymore, answering to Barregos and Rozsak. At this point, they are deep in a relationship/deal/alliance with both Torch and Erwhon, building ships with "Manti Lite" tech and have been adapting tactics to take advantage of that. The plan is to disengage from the League and OFS as quietly as possible as things fall apart and they have no intention of sending any of their military resources away from Maya control.

Since FF is esentialy scattered "around" but not in the central or member areas of the SL, FF units will mostly have to be shifted from places in the Protectorates and further outside the central areas of the League. Even with the wormholes (for which we do not have compleat maps and are not really seeing any outside the area covering Erwhon, Manticore , Talbott and the Haven Quadrant) those FF ships are going to have to come from a long way away from where the anticpated fighting/commerce raiding would take place.

Will Kingsford and his subordinates call in and deploy together FF ships for which the officers and crews have worked together in the past? What are the distances to 1) pass the word to order them to departure points for the raiding? 2) will there be any time for the ships to excercise together or is this going to be multiple "pickup" groups thrown together ? 3) will BF officers be assigned to command various FF groups and will any BF ships be included?
4) how many of the ship commanders or group commanders will have any actual experience or even believe the rumors of the GA's capabilities- in fact, how much of what is known by BF will be formally shared along with tactical sensor data so the crews can get at least some idea of what they have to deal with?

What exactly is the capability and condition of that "great pool" of FF ships that are NOT in the areas boardering the Haven and Talbott Quadrants. We don't have any actual reports or news for the majority of area that OFS/FF deal with and there just aren't any stories or information that would show that the FF units and organizations outside our areas of interest have been really doing much beyond playing Enforcer or even getting much practice on anything other than showing up to be a visable threat.

We shall see

Just what do you think the 1st encounters between FF and patrols of the IAE are going to look like?

How many FF or BF officers have EVER encountered an Aldermani warship, anywhere? The IAE is "neutral" in relation to the GA and SL fight and in terms of actual distance, about as far away as you can get from the SL without access to the Manticore Junction wormholes. Even then, it is still a long distance and how many SLN warships of any kind are likely (except Fillerta's fleet and they aren't going to count) have been as far as Manticore let alone to IAN territory or the Silesia group?

Except for actualy finding an FF ship attacking a ship in IAE space, the best the FF can expect is the Aldermani will ask they how they got so lost, take them into protective custody -for their own safety, ofcourse, and drag the ship back to the nearest naval base for questioning the entire crew. If they are attacking merchant shipping or shooting up star systems, they will be treated as pirates. War? What war? What are you doing attacking our or anybody else's shipping in The Empire's space? Explain under what authority you are doing these things- and prove it- or you will be spaced as a pirate. You have 10min to decide.....

Combining some of KZT's thoughts and Brigade XO's, very close to my exact train of thought. The sheer math argues that FF has enough BC hulls to cause a lot of problems, negated by astrography and politics and "news travels slowly". I think most of the "OFS satropy(s)" that learn first about what happened in the Madras sector are going to want to keep most of their FF powder dry and/or use them to try to get their wormholes back. That math says that (let's assume maybe 30 OFS sectors...) let's give each sector as many as 200-250 BC's to patrol and govern maybe 50 of their own systems -- or ONLY 5 BC's per system. So the math works against them if they move too many ships into offensive ops. Whether they even have those force levels is actually doubtful.

For example, let's say that the Mandarin's reach for Luis Rozak's forces as a sort of combined loyalty test for Barregos (who they don't like) and also as the nearest available raiding forces. Rozak might even have the reputation points in the SLN to get tasked first. Given that the Maya sector is supposed to be more successful than most, and Rozak et. al are said to be building up from destroyers and light cruisers, that's not even a valid assumption, by the way. Not only does the Maya Sector leadership have up to date intel on Manti- and GA capabilities, but they're also the least likely to strip their home systems of FF defenses, show up to the dance like obedient minions, or otherwise cooperate worth a damn where Old Earth's instructions are concerned.

At most in that scenario, I think the GA and Rozak stage a mock battle with GA forces and then let his FF "destroyed ships" back to Smoking Frog for better uses later on. Heck, maybe the "GA" actually allows Rozak to take fake losses but "capture" a single whole freighter's worth of useful stuff they want him to have anyway. [a bunch of Shrikes, perhaps?] It's not like he's going to be an obedient little boy and pass "the prize" back to Sol anyway.

That would further the aim of having the FF leadership well and truly underestimate what our good Maya Sector Admiral has to play with later on, thinking that a bunch of his ships are in-the-yard for repairs, yes? Meanwhile Barregos loyalty as a neutral / arm's length ally of the GA is firmly cemented as well and Rozak's forces are further poised to take over other nearby sectors so that the GA doesn't have to.

Meanwhile, yet another "defeat" for the SLN, and you're an OFS sector governor. Do you send your ships out to raid or not?

SharkHunter wrote:For example, let's say that the Mandarin's reach for Luis Rozak's forces as a sort of combined loyalty test for Barregos (who they don't like) and also as the nearest available raiding forces. Rozak might even have the reputation points in the SLN to get tasked first. Given that the Maya sector is supposed to be more successful than most, and Rozak et. al are said to be building up from destroyers and light cruisers, that's not even a valid assumption, by the way. Not only does the Maya Sector leadership have up to date intel on Manti- and GA capabilities, but they're also the least likely to strip their home systems of FF defenses, show up to the dance like obedient minions, or otherwise cooperate worth a damn where Old Earth's instructions are concerned.

At most in that scenario, I think the GA and Rozak stage a mock battle with GA forces and then let his FF "destroyed ships" back to Smoking Frog for better uses later on. Heck, maybe the "GA" actually allows Rozak to take fake losses but "capture" a single whole freighter's worth of useful stuff they want him to have anyway. [a bunch of Shrikes, perhaps?] It's not like he's going to be an obedient little boy and pass "the prize" back to Sol anyway.

That would further the aim of having the FF leadership well and truly underestimate what our good Maya Sector Admiral has to play with later on, thinking that a bunch of his ships are in-the-yard for repairs, yes? Meanwhile Barregos loyalty as a neutral / arm's length ally of the GA is firmly cemented as well and Rozak's forces are further poised to take over other nearby sectors so that the GA doesn't have to.

Meanwhile, yet another "defeat" for the SLN, and you're an OFS sector governor. Do you send your ships out to raid or not?

I think it'd be lower risk, and less exposure for Rozak to not involve the GA forces in that kind of scam.

After all, he can always send his ships out to investigate empty systems, then send back reports that they're still out commerce raiding - or that some are overdue back (and eventually presumed lost) when in reality they were simply deployed on a longer mission that he claimed.

Its almost certain that he can keep that up until the first of his ships return - even if there were people planted on the ships who were tipped off on what the ordered should have been they wouldn't have a chance to report back to the League that the ships did something else until after the ships are back at base (or unless they make a stop at a friendly planet were a message could potentially be dropped)

That's almost as good as staging a fake battle, and way lower exposure. And if exposed its less damaging to be found to have lied about ship ordered than to be found colluding with an enemy during time of war.

Jonathan_S wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:For example, let's say that the Mandarin's reach for Luis Rozak's forces as a sort of combined loyalty test for Barregos (who they don't like) and also as the nearest available raiding forces. Rozak might even have the reputation points in the SLN to get tasked first. Given that the Maya sector is supposed to be more successful than most, and Rozak et. al are said to be building up from destroyers and light cruisers, that's not even a valid assumption, by the way. Not only does the Maya Sector leadership have up to date intel on Manti- and GA capabilities, but they're also the least likely to strip their home systems of FF defenses, show up to the dance like obedient minions, or otherwise cooperate worth a damn where Old Earth's instructions are concerned.

At most in that scenario, I think the GA and Rozak stage a mock battle with GA forces and then let his FF "destroyed ships" back to Smoking Frog for better uses later on. Heck, maybe the "GA" actually allows Rozak to take fake losses but "capture" a single whole freighter's worth of useful stuff they want him to have anyway. [a bunch of Shrikes, perhaps?] It's not like he's going to be an obedient little boy and pass "the prize" back to Sol anyway.

That would further the aim of having the FF leadership well and truly underestimate what our good Maya Sector Admiral has to play with later on, thinking that a bunch of his ships are in-the-yard for repairs, yes? Meanwhile Barregos loyalty as a neutral / arm's length ally of the GA is firmly cemented as well and Rozak's forces are further poised to take over other nearby sectors so that the GA doesn't have to.

Meanwhile, yet another "defeat" for the SLN, and you're an OFS sector governor. Do you send your ships out to raid or not?

I think it'd be lower risk, and less exposure for Rozak to not involve the GA forces in that kind of scam.

After all, he can always send his ships out to investigate empty systems, then send back reports that they're still out commerce raiding - or that some are overdue back (and eventually presumed lost) when in reality they were simply deployed on a longer mission that he claimed.

Its almost certain that he can keep that up until the first of his ships return - even if there were people planted on the ships who were tipped off on what the ordered should have been they wouldn't have a chance to report back to the League that the ships did something else until after the ships are back at base (or unless they make a stop at a friendly planet were a message could potentially be dropped)

That's almost as good as staging a fake battle, and way lower exposure. And if exposed its less damaging to be found to have lied about ship ordered than to be found colluding with an enemy during time of war.

Sort of the same point, I think. The "fake battle" doesn't even have to involve more than a single light cruiser exchanging mutually generated and agreed upon sims while all of the other Mayan "ships lost or overdue" are being squirreled away elsewhere for later use.

Jonathan_S wrote:That's almost as good as staging a fake battle, and way lower exposure. And if exposed its less damaging to be found to have lied about ship ordered than to be found colluding with an enemy during time of war.

The thing you have to remember about their fleet is that the crews are SLN regulars. They have ties to the rest of the SL. Officers will have ties to the families that run the SLN. They send letters, visit, get reassigned to other sectors. So how long you can pull this off is really in doubt.

kzt wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:That's almost as good as staging a fake battle, and way lower exposure. And if exposed its less damaging to be found to have lied about ship ordered than to be found colluding with an enemy during time of war.

The thing you have to remember about their fleet is that the crews are SLN regulars. They have ties to the rest of the SL. Officers will have ties to the families that run the SLN. They send letters, visit, get reassigned to other sectors. So how long you can pull this off is really in doubt.

Good point, with the question being -- for example, how many of the crew for the Madras sector are from that sector, etc. I think Maya would probably try to be minimally staffed "out system", however which might be the reason FF/OFS don't really like Barregos very much.

the grayson's have Burleson class CA's? are they the equivalent of the Sag- C's? just wondering as Burleson is my last name . Also where are they mentioned, if I might ask?