Bad Wormholes?

n7axw wrote:I got shot down, probably rightly, a while back for suggesting that the solution to the Torch wormhole would be dropping through a squadron of Nikes at battle stations.

Hoo boy, that was an argument...tops even the "what to do with the Sollie SD's" as a point of contention. So I concur, let's not go there (at least, not for awhile yet... )

I think that the wormhole will eventually be used either by the MAlign in which event the GA will know what happened to Harvest Joy or by the GA discovering it from the other side.

Don

I can't see the MAlignment using it, since I am sure that Torch/the GA/Maya-Erewhon will have either ships or sensors in the area and would definitely react if something, especially MAlignment ships, came through.

The other side is possible, but I still think about that mysterious"kick" Wix and Kare charted...and both of those very smart fellows are still alive due to being 'grounded' by Queen Berry, so....

We shall see, eventually.

This probably belongs in the Chekov's Gun thread, but here goes. Notice that RFC has used the catalog number of "The Twins" in several places. I think that it means someone knows that catalog number, and can be induced to mention it under the right circumstances. By induced I don't mean necessarily by interrogation; it could just as well be in a casual conversation about the Torch wormhole. There are at least two people currently in play who might know it and be able to hand it over to the GA.

Whether that's the way RFC is going to play it is something only he knows.

I think that one thing we can count on is that the GA is going to be actively looking for the MAlign. That could eventually mean discovering who was under Mesa's sphere of influence and exploring the wormholes in the neighborhood and possibly even finding Mannerheim's route to Darius.

This last is a bit of a stretch involving intelligence work and more than a little luck along with exploring. But the point is that it is not beyond the realm of possibility that the GA could find the Torch worm hole from the other side.

As for MAlign using the wormhole, they could easily enough send through streaks and even seize Torch as their gateway into the Haven Quadrant. But that would show the GA that the wormhole is usable. And besides, are their spiders properly set up for wormhole transit? Given all of this it seems to me that for the MAlign, the Torch wormhole is best left unused.

Still it has bothered me a bit that the GA has left Torch uncovered, especially given Harvest Joy's disapearance because they have to know that if anyone comes through that wormhole it will be unfriendly bad guys.

Don

n7axw wrote:I think that one thing we can count on is that the GA is going to be actively looking for the MAlign. That could eventually mean discovering who was under Mesa's sphere of influence and exploring the wormholes in the neighborhood and possibly even finding Mannerheim's route to Darius.

This last is a bit of a stretch involving intelligence work and more than a little luck along with exploring. But the point is that it is not beyond the realm of possibility that the GA could find the Torch worm hole from the other side.

As for MAlign using the wormhole, they could easily enough send through streaks and even seize Torch as their gateway into the Haven Quadrant. But that would show the GA that the wormhole is usable. And besides, are their spiders properly set up for wormhole transit? Given all of this it seems to me that for the MAlign, the Torch wormhole is best left unused.

Still it has bothered me a bit that the GA has left Torch uncovered, especially given Harvest Joy's disapearance because they have to know that if anyone comes through that wormhole it will be unfriendly bad guys.

Don

Who said that the Torch wormhole is uncovered? Nobody has ever said one way of the other, and given the relitivly low cost of some mines, I would be amazed if nobody decided to drop a clutch of them around the wormhole.

crewdude48 wrote:Who said that the Torch wormhole is uncovered? Nobody has ever said one way of the other, and given the relitivly low cost of some mines, I would be amazed if nobody decided to drop a clutch of them around the wormhole.

Mines are only effective if they are on automatic proximity trigger. Assuming the wormhole is not an automatic death trap, but some other oddity, the first thing coming through might be an innocent survey ship from the other side, so do you really want to blow that up without any humans in the decision loop?

Whitecold wrote:

crewdude48 wrote:Who said that the Torch wormhole is uncovered? Nobody has ever said one way of the other, and given the relitivly low cost of some mines, I would be amazed if nobody decided to drop a clutch of them around the wormhole.

Mines are only effective if they are on automatic proximity trigger. Assuming the wormhole is not an automatic death trap, but some other oddity, the first thing coming through might be an innocent survey ship from the other side, so do you really want to blow that up without any humans in the decision loop?

I guess my thinking would be that we know that Harvest Joy was sent through and disappeared and is presumed lost. The two possibilities here that I can see is that either the ship was dumped by the wormhole into the local sun or suffered some other natural mischief or is lost to enemy action.

Were another ship to come through, it would indicate enemy action rather than the wormhole eating Harvest Joy. So if another ship comes through, they had better explain themselves pretty fast or get blown out of space.

As I recall, the gravitational forces would prevent mining a worm hole. I would cover it with pods of Mark 16s controlled by Sag-Cs at first and eventually install Moriarity or Mycroft.

Don

n7axw wrote: Still it has bothered me a bit that the GA has left Torch uncovered, especially given Harvest Joy's disapearance because they have to know that if anyone comes through that wormhole it will be unfriendly bad guys.

Don

Why? Who says "they have to know" that anyone coming through "will be unfriendly bad guys?"

They don't know why Havest Joy disappeared. They don't even know if Harvest joy has even been destroyed. They know nothing [/Sgt. Shultz].

The only people who know what happened to Harvest Joy are the people that captured/destroyed her, and the readers.

As far as in-universe characters are concerned, Harvest Joy is later than normal returning from surveying a WH. It's a cause for concern for the possibly lost ship and crew (possibly due to spacial anomalies), but nothing to get their knickers in a bunch over... yet.

Even if something *does* come through, they're still not going to know right away whether they're friendlies or not. There's going to be some confusion for a few minutes, or at least until whatever comes through starts firing missiles or whatever.

Edit: There's also the possibility that the ship coming through might be a friendly ship coming to get parts to repair a broken Harvest Joy that can't go back through the wormhole because the wormhole-travel-widget broke. One can't just assume that because a ship comes through where another that was expected didn't that it's a "bad guy".

Quotes reordered to avoid embedding limit.

crewdude48 wrote:Who said that the Torch wormhole is uncovered? Nobody has ever said one way of the other, and given the relitivly low cost of some mines, I would be amazed if nobody decided to drop a clutch of them around the wormhole.

Whitecold wrote:Mines are only effective if they are on automatic proximity trigger. Assuming the wormhole is not an automatic death trap, but some other oddity, the first thing coming through might be an innocent survey ship from the other side, so do you really want to blow that up without any humans in the decision loop?

n7axw wrote:I guess my thinking would be that we know that Harvest Joy was sent through and disappeared and is presumed lost. The two possibilities here that I can see is that either the ship was dumped by the wormhole into the local sun or suffered some other natural mischief or is lost to enemy action.

Were another ship to come through, it would indicate enemy action rather than the wormhole eating Harvest Joy. So if another ship comes through, they had better explain themselves pretty fast or get blown out of space.

As I recall, the gravitational forces would prevent mining a worm hole. I would cover it with pods of Mark 16s controlled by Sag-Cs at first and eventually install Moriarity or Mycroft.

Don

Mines in the Honorverse have low power drives that allow them to keep station on a location. The wartime plans for defending the Manticoran Wormhole Junction (as of On Basilisk Station) included deploying and using mines at the Junction to defend the inbound terminus lanes from Trevor's star against an attacking force.

n7axw, you might be confusing the problems faced with mining a warp point in the StarFire universe versus mining a wormhole terminus in the Honorverse. In the StarFire universe you can only place mines very close to closed warp points - the open warp points gravitic stresses suck in and destroy mines placed closely around open warp points. The Honorverse wormhole termini don't have that problem. Also most mines in the StarFire universe are of the contact nuke or contact antimatter* types, with bomb-pumped X-ray laser mines a minority. The original plans for using mines to defend the Junction in the Honorverse as of On Basilisk Station was to use sidewall burning mines. The replacement of the sidewall burning mines with the newer X-ray laser-head mines (used in The Short Victorious War) makes mines (backed up with missile pods controlled by fortresses or mobile forces) much more effective and cost effective in defending a terminus in the Honorverse.

Whether the Torch wormhole terminus has been mined as a precaution or not is an open question.

* Antimatter is effectively non-existent in the Honorverse.

MaxxQ wrote:

n7axw wrote: Still it has bothered me a bit that the GA has left Torch uncovered, especially given Harvest Joy's disapearance because they have to know that if anyone comes through that wormhole it will be unfriendly bad guys.

Don

Why? Who says "they have to know" that anyone coming through "will be unfriendly bad guys?"

They don't know why Havest Joy disappeared. They don't even know if Harvest joy has even been destroyed. They know nothing [/Sgt. Shultz].

The only people who know what happened to Harvest Joy are the people that captured/destroyed her, and the readers.

As far as in-universe characters are concerned, Harvest Joy is later than normal returning from surveying a WH. It's a cause for concern for the possibly lost ship and crew (possibly due to spacial anomalies), but nothing to get their knickers in a bunch over... yet.

Even if something *does* come through, they're still not going to know right away whether they're friendlies or not. There's going to be some confusion for a few minutes, or at least until whatever comes through starts firing missiles or whatever.

Edit: There's also the possibility that the ship coming through might be a friendly ship coming to get parts to repair a broken Harvest Joy that can't go back through the wormhole because the wormhole-travel-widget broke. One can't just assume that because a ship comes through where another that was expected didn't that it's a "bad guy".

Hi MaxxQ,

Kinda hazardous for me to argue with BuNine...

BUT...

Here is the argument that occurs to me. Torch is not just any ole place in the galaxy. Prior to its liberation, it was in the possession of Mesa which would mean that Mesa also knew about the wormhole. It is only a very short jump from there to presuming that Mesa explored the wormhole.

So looking at the situation from a security standpoint, Harvest Joy's disappearance would have to be suspicious at the very least. As I already acknowledged in my previous post, the wormhole or some other natural phenomena could have eaten the ship. But if you are concerned for Torch's security, you can't assume that what ate Harvest Joy (possibly unfriendly bad guys) wouldn't come through to eat Torch as well.

That same completely justified suspicion means that Torch should be covered to make the exit to the Torch side of the wormhole as thoroughly unpleasant for whoever comes through as it was for Harvest Joy going the other way, presuming, of course, as I think you have to, that bad guys were responsible for Torch's disappearance.

So how about a squadron of Sag-Cs and a few hundred pods? I'm not insisting that anything that comes through be smashed INSTANTLY. But I am insisting that it get its wedge down and heave to for inspection and to explain itself PDQ.

Don

n7axw wrote:So how about a squadron of Sag-Cs and a few hundred pods? I'm not insisting that anything that comes through be smashed INSTANTLY. But I am insisting that it get its wedge down and heave to for inspection and to explain itself PDQ.

So how about we permanently station a carrier battle group off of Guadalcanal, because a few decades ago it was an important place and we really don't have anything important for our Navy to do, so assigning 3 CBGs to the middle of nowhere isn't a problem.