Building the BSDF into the Beowulf Space Navy

What you should be considering is making Sphinx or any other plant in the SEM an unattractive target. In the most basic case, it will have a defense component that should be difficult to overcome- read expensive to the attacker in terms of people and equipment.
You can't devote the same amount of resources to Sphinx as Manticore but you can make it very expensive to an attacker to move on Sphinx. That, however, does not eliminate the possibility of planting bombs on civilian stations in orbit- something the Alignment is totally in love with doing as it is a terror weapon and relatively inexpensive- after all, you are using fairly low level pawns to set them off and you hide in the shadows while you are doing its
Keeping an enemy from using Sphinx or any other planet in the SEM as a hostage is the minimum plan. What you can't do is duplicate something the size of the Home Fleet for each component of the empire. Just how much and what you commit to ongoing defense and security is the question.

lyonheart wrote:Howdy All!

Going from a system defense force with a large cruiser force to protect its shipping and search for slave smugglers, is going to be a challenge. What should they build first?

What should Hypatia follow and in turn copy?

I think that you're getting ahead of yourself by designing hardware instead of designing the mission set and political objectives of Beowulf. I think once we establish that, the build-out policy becomes a lot clearer.

Let us make one big assumption. The Grand Alliance for the 10-15 years after the conquest of Duckk: removed for spoiler will think that the Alignment is out of the picture. If I am wrong on that assumption, disregard the rest.

Let us make three medium assumptions.
1) On a technological basis, attacking a system with full FTL Mycroft + system defense Apollo is a very very very hard nut to crack.

2) Any waller built before ~1912 PD anywhere is functionally obsolete in the face of heavy system defenses.

3) Beowulf and Manticore will maintain very good relations AND the RMN can be counted on to at least hold the terminus in an absolute emergency.

So, what are the political objectives of Beowulf?

Their big ideological enemy, the Mesan Alignment/Dettweiller adherents have been smashed into the ground. As part of the smashing, the entire interstellar security system has been broken into a dozen pieces. Beowulf is aligned with if not explicitly allied to the biggest and toughest piece. Beowulf political leadership will have several objectives.

A-1: Maintain security of the high orbitals of their home world.

A-2: Maintain free and open access to the Beowulf side of the Manticoran wormhole junction.

These are objectives that can mostly be met with fixed defenses that are likely to be tasked to be tough enough to hold against an Apollo-light fleet of ~100+ podnoughts. There will likely be a mobile element under armor (podnoughts) but the main weight of the defense is likely to be non-hyper capable to save on money, complexity and mission creep.

The following are middle tier objectives.

B-3: Provide for security of daughter colonies and non-Manticoran trading partners as the league breaks up. This can be provided by either the forward deployment of light trip-wire forces with heavy counter-attacking forces based in a nodal position, heavy covering forces, or heavy fixed defenses. Richer partner nations can burden share a higher proportion of their own defense and collective defense.

B-4: Continue to break up the remnants of Mesan and Manpower connected networks.

B-5: Protect Beowulfian commerce from pirates, privateers, and freebooters.

And then we have some tertiary objectives:

C-6: Maintain cordial relations with all members of the Grand Alliance.

C-7: Project power into the Solarian League Core to influence and/or prevent revanchism.

C-8: Open up new markets and new space


This is, in my opinion, a plausible set of political objectives and priorities for Beowulf. If the political leadership of Beowulf agrees with me, that is one particular take on building/rebuilding their fleet as anything larger than a battlecruiser is definitely obsolete and anything smaller than a battlecruiser is viable against at least all near-peers if not against all peers (RFC decision as to what gets retrofitted to 1900 PD designs etc).

However, if the political leadership of Beowulf have a different set of objectives, their fleet plan will also be incredibly different.

I think that my fleet plan is heavy on patrol warships that can establish a presence with 150+ light years of Beowulf and fairly light on podnoughts, or at least light on podnoughts for the first decade. And if they are building mostly peace-time-ish ships that are expected to mostly operate independently or in small groups, then I don't think taking a war time single problem optimization warship (ROLAND) and tweaking it is a good place to start. Instead, Beowulfian designers may find it more productive to talk with the Manticoran AVALON and Grayson DISCIPLE class design teams on how to get a long range patrol ship with enough redundancy to handle a wide variety of missions into space as soon as possible.

fester wrote:Let us make one big assumption. The Grand Alliance for the 10-15 years after

Snip.

This is not a spoiler thread. We can't discuss that here, yet. Give it another couple of months (I'd say 3 from the book's publication is a safe margin).

I disagree with your political assumptions, but I can't give you my arguments why.

1) On a technological basis, attacking a system with full FTL Mycroft + system defense Apollo is a very very very hard nut to crack.

2) Any waller built before ~1912 PD anywhere is functionally obsolete in the face of heavy system defenses.

3) Beowulf and Manticore will maintain very good relations AND the RMN can be counted on to at least hold the terminus in an absolute emergency.

Agreed. Though the agreement apparently requires Beowulf to be responsible for the Beowulf side of the terminus, which implies it imposes on Beowulf to build and maintain a fleet capable of doing that against reasonable threats. So while the RMN can be counted on in an emergency, that's not going to be the case for the regular day-to-day. It can also only push about 20 wallers through the Junction in a mass transit, so that's little reinforcement if someone does come to the Terminus with something capable of beating the Beowulf forces.

Their big ideological enemy, the Mesan Alignment/Dettweiller adherents

Spoiler part snipped. See all the spoiler threads why that may or may not be an accurate assumption.

A-1: Maintain security of the high orbitals of their home world.

A-2: Maintain free and open access to the Beowulf side of the Manticoran wormhole junction.

These are objectives that can mostly be met with fixed defenses that are likely to be tasked to be tough enough to hold against an Apollo-light fleet of ~100+ podnoughts. There will likely be a mobile element under armor (podnoughts) but the main weight of the defense is likely to be non-hyper capable to save on money, complexity and mission creep.

I agree on the fixed and non-hypercapable parts. Those are definitely cheaper and much more effective, on a tonne-for-tonne ratio, than a hypercapable waller.

Except for the part about withstanding against a 100 SD(P) fleet deploying Apollo-like missiles, even lightly. Right now, no one but the GA has that, but you're right that the assumptions for ongoing defence should include the possibility of someone coming up with it. In that case, 36 wallers, which is what the unit count BSDF had, will not suffice.

Or maybe it will. The wallers and the fixed defences will probably exact a high enough price on any attacker that to take the Junction they'd lose two thirds of the fleet. Aside from the GA and the SLN, no one has 100 SDs (much less SD(P)s) to spare. Mind you, whoever is doing this attacking must also protect their home system, so they must have a much bigger force left at home or by other means making their home system impenetrable (like stealth torpedoes or location unknown). The good thing is that the build up of any such force will be slow and noticeable, so Beowulf and the GA have time.

B-3: Provide for security of daughter colonies and non-Manticoran trading partners as the league breaks up. This can be provided by either the forward deployment of light trip-wire forces with heavy counter-attacking forces based in a nodal position, heavy covering forces, or heavy fixed defenses. Richer partner nations can burden share a higher proportion of their own defense and collective defense.

B-4: Continue to break up the remnants of Mesan and Manpower connected networks.

B-5: Protect Beowulfian commerce from pirates, privateers, and freebooters.

Agreed.

C-6: Maintain cordial relations with all members of the Grand Alliance.

C-7: Project power into the Solarian League Core to influence and/or prevent revanchism.

C-8: Open up new markets and new space

Agreed on C-6, I'm not sure about the other two. I mean, C-7 will happen, but having a big force in the Core's "backyard" can backfire. C-8 is a political objective, not a military one. Beowulf shouldn't be opening up markets at gunpoint.

Though as the single oldest colony in existence, and technologically advanced as it is, I'm not sure what new markets there can be for Beowulf. It's probably a huge trading partner for everyone close by, and a considerable one for everyone far enough that can afford the trade. So what new markets can there be, that can afford what Beowulf produces, and aren't already partners? We're not talking about a new wormhole route being discovered that shortens transit time and thus cost to some mid-wealthy systems.

The only recent change in that commercial landscape is the GA itself, in particular Haven. Through the Junction, Beowulf now has access to the heart of the Republic of Haven, something that being a staunch ally of Manticore would have prevented them from engaging in until the end of the second war. And as being members of the GA, possibly with the new Union that is coming, the tariffs to Haven will be very small.

This is, in my opinion, a plausible set of political objectives and priorities for Beowulf. If the political leadership of Beowulf agrees with me, that is one particular take on building/rebuilding their fleet as anything larger than a battlecruiser is definitely obsolete and anything smaller than a battlecruiser is viable against at least all near-peers if not against all peers (RFC decision as to what gets retrofitted to 1900 PD designs etc).

I do not agree because I don't agree with some of the original assumptions. Beowulf will need to have modern wallers. And both ART and UH made it clear those are coming.

I think that my fleet plan is heavy on patrol warships that can establish a presence with 150+ light years of Beowulf and fairly light on podnoughts, or at least light on podnoughts for the first decade. And if they are building mostly peace-time-ish ships that are expected to mostly operate independently or in small groups, then I don't think taking a war time single problem optimization warship (ROLAND) and tweaking it is a good place to start. Instead, Beowulfian designers may find it more productive to talk with the Manticoran AVALON and Grayson DISCIPLE class design teams on how to get a long range patrol ship with enough redundancy to handle a wide variety of missions into space as soon as possible.

I agree on sub-wall unit side. On wallers, it depends on "fairly light," which is vague. If by that you mean "less than 1000 like Haven" or even "less than 200 like the GSN and RMN," then I agree with you. If you mean "fairly light" by the standards of everyone else and especially SL Core systems, then I don't.

I expect Beowulf will go for a 1:1 replacement of their waller units and will thus become the fifth largest navy in capital ships, after Haven, Manticore, Grayson and the Andermani, at least until the SLN manages to produce their own SD(P)s and build them, something that will take more than a decade.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:C-8 is a political objective, not a military one. Beowulf shouldn't be opening up markets at gunpoint.

Though as the single oldest colony in existence, and technologically advanced as it is, I'm not sure what new markets there can be for Beowulf. It's probably a huge trading partner for everyone close by, and a considerable one for everyone far enough that can afford the trade. So what new markets can there be, that can afford what Beowulf produces, and aren't already partners? We're not talking about a new wormhole route being discovered that shortens transit time and thus cost to some mid-wealthy systems.

The only recent change in that commercial landscape is the GA itself, in particular Haven. Through the Junction, Beowulf now has access to the heart of the Republic of Haven, something that being a staunch ally of Manticore would have prevented them from engaging in until the end of the second war. And as being members of the GA, possibly with the new Union that is coming, the tariffs to Haven will be very small.

Well the Lynx terminus is still pretty new, and I suspect that members of the GA get preferential transit rates. Beowulf might not get much business in the SEM's Talbott systems; but that wormhole link does dramatically cut transit times (and thus presumably costs) from Beowulf to that side of the League; as well a further out into the Verge beyond Talbott -- thought that's less likely to be profitable in the short term.

Still, access to Haven's markets and improved access to the far side of the League sounds like a fair bit of potential market growth for Beowulf. OTOH both of those areas should be secure enough that there shouldn't be much, if any, need for naval escorts or involvement for entering those markets.

Jonathan_S wrote:Well the Lynx terminus is still pretty new, and I suspect that members of the GA get preferential transit rates. Beowulf might not get much business in the SEM's Talbott systems; but that wormhole link does dramatically cut transit times (and thus presumably costs) from Beowulf to that side of the League; as well a further out into the Verge beyond Talbott -- thought that's less likely to be profitable in the short term.

Still, access to Haven's markets and improved access to the far side of the League sounds like a fair bit of potential market growth for Beowulf. OTOH both of those areas should be secure enough that there shouldn't be much, if any, need for naval escorts or involvement for entering those markets.

That is also true, though a year or two older than the access to the RoH. But the Talbott Quadrant is also less economically capable than the average Havenite system that had been experiencing an economic boom since 1915, much less than Haven and the other five or six central Havenite worlds.

Beyond the Quadrant, the rest of the Cluster and the Verge sectors beyond it are not going to be huge markets for Beowulf at all. Beowulf should be involved in uplifting those sectors and maybe even send some of their Navy ships through there to help out against pirates and whatever remains of the slaving business, but those aren't going to be large economic partners. That may be a political goal.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

fester wrote:Let us make one big assumption. The Grand Alliance for the 10-15 years after

I do not agree because I don't agree with some of the original assumptions. Beowulf will need to have modern wallers. And both ART and UH made it clear those are coming.

I think that my fleet plan is heavy on patrol warships that can establish a presence with 150+ light years of Beowulf and fairly light on podnoughts, or at least light on podnoughts for the first decade. And if they are building mostly peace-time-ish ships that are expected to mostly operate independently or in small groups, then I don't think taking a war time single problem optimization warship (ROLAND) and tweaking it is a good place to start. Instead, Beowulfian designers may find it more productive to talk with the Manticoran AVALON and Grayson DISCIPLE class design teams on how to get a long range patrol ship with enough redundancy to handle a wide variety of missions into space as soon as possible.

I agree on sub-wall unit side. On wallers, it depends on "fairly light," which is vague. If by that you mean "less than 1000 like Haven" or even "less than 200 like the GSN and RMN," then I agree with you. If you mean "fairly light" by the standards of everyone else and especially SL Core systems, then I don't.

I completely agree that the BSN will have a waller or podnought core (not sure if the wall as a tactical formation makes sense anymore???).

I think the big political question is if the waller core is effectively the system defense force goalkepper that is big enough and powerful enough to make any attacker respect an in-system mobile force while trying to take on the fixed defenses OR if the podnought force is serving both the system defense force goalkeeper role AND an expeditionary striking force role.

I think Beowulf's political leadership will see a lot of value in having an expeditionary striking force component that can either operate independently or as part of a combined fleet with Grand Alliance partners. Now what is required for that expedionary striking capability? That is a good question. Is the expeditionary striking capability designed to be part of a viable Eridani Edict enforcement mechanism? If so, it needs to be big. Is the goal of the expeditionary striking force to prevent warlords and empire builders from gobbling up star systems in the neighborhood? If that is the case, no one else has technological parity with the Alliance, so a squadron or three may be more than enough in surplus to the goalkeeper function of the wall.

fester wrote:I think the big political question is if the waller core is effectively the system defense force goalkepper that is big enough and powerful enough to make any attacker respect an in-system mobile force while trying to take on the fixed defenses OR if the podnought force is serving both the system defense force goalkeeper role AND an expeditionary striking force role.

Good question. I don't know about expeditionary force. There may be several reasons why they have to maintain such a capability, part of their commitments towards the GA of shared defence and offence, for example.

As for fixed defence, I think we can take the lesson from the discussion about Sphinx and Home Fleet: the bulk of the system's defence, for now, will be the fixed defences, Moriarty, and sysdef missiles. The BSN First Fleet will probably serve the same role as the RMN Home Fleet: catch anything that managed to evade those fixed defences and be the hammer to that anvil.

I think Beowulf's political leadership will see a lot of value in having an expeditionary striking force component that can either operate independently or as part of a combined fleet with Grand Alliance partners. Now what is required for that expedionary striking capability? That is a good question. Is the expeditionary striking capability designed to be part of a viable Eridani Edict enforcement mechanism? If so, it needs to be big. Is the goal of the expeditionary striking force to prevent warlords and empire builders from gobbling up star systems in the neighborhood? If that is the case, no one else has technological parity with the Alliance, so a squadron or three may be more than enough in surplus to the goalkeeper function of the wall.

For putting warlords in their place, cruisers will do. Terekhov defeated 70 SDs with a mere heavy cruiser squadron. NO ONE has 70 SDs outside the GA, SLN, and possibly the MAN (which is different from the RFN, which I doubt has that many wallers), much less a warlord . So even if a warlord managed to get their hands on an ageing SD as a white elephant, that can be dealt with a cruiser division.

And as discussed in some thread a year or two ago, such a warlord is not very smart. An SD isn't a very good investment and will attract the attention of someone bigger. But warlords may not be making rational military decisions, so it coul dhappen.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

fester wrote:
I think the big political question is if the waller core is effectively the system defense force goalkepper that is big enough and powerful enough to make any attacker respect an in-system mobile force while trying to take on the fixed defenses OR if the podnought force is serving both the system defense force goalkeeper role AND an expeditionary striking force role.

Good question. I don't know about expeditionary force. There may be several reasons why they have to maintain such a capability, part of their commitments towards the GA of shared defence and offence, for example.

I think Beowulf's political leadership will see a lot of value in having an expeditionary striking force component that can either operate independently or as part of a combined fleet with Grand Alliance partners. Now what is required for that expedionary striking capability? That is a good question. Is the expeditionary striking capability designed to be part of a viable Eridani Edict enforcement mechanism? If so, it needs to be big. Is the goal of the expeditionary striking force to prevent warlords and empire builders from gobbling up star systems in the neighborhood? If that is the case, no one else has technological parity with the Alliance, so a squadron or three may be more than enough in surplus to the goalkeeper function of the wall.

For putting warlords in their place, cruisers will do. Terekhov defeated 70 SDs with a mere heavy cruiser squadron. NO ONE has 70 SDs outside the GA, SLN, and possibly the MAN (which is different from the RFN, which I doubt has that many wallers), much less a warlord . So even if a warlord managed to get their hands on an ageing SD as a white elephant, that can be dealt with a cruiser division.

I don't think that Beowulf can assume that it has or more importantly, it will continue to have enough of a technological edge to fight outmassed 20:30:50:100 to 1 and win. We know that second tier systems like Erewhon and Maya can build warships that are vastly superior to anything that was in space in 1910 PD. We know that the SLN was starting to innovate their way to at least address some of their deficiencies with HASTA. We know that CATAPHRACTS are not Apollo MDMs but they are competitive against anything available in 1913 PD and they are competitive against most non Mk-23 and non-Mk-19 missile cruisers in the galaxy. We know that the surviving officer corps of both Frontier Fleet and Battle Fleet KNOW that they got hammered by a combination of superior technology and superior training that enabled the cutting edge use of that tech edge. They might not be able to directly address every tech edge the Grand Alliance has but they can take immediate and intermediate steps to blunt some of those advantages.

In 1924 a BSDF/BSN cruiser squadron should be able to rip open the guts of a warlord battle squadron if the BSN is towing pods and have at least KH-1-like capability but in 1940 PD, is that the case that a BSN BC-Ron will be able to fight outnumbered 3:1 against the BC forces of a local star system that is able to build their own warships and throw their own weight around in their own cluster?

I think that there is a window where the tech edge is big enough that the Beowulf expeditionary force can be mostly sub-wallers but that edge is going to close as plenty of individuals and star systems are in the know that the edge exists, can reasonably describe the core elements of that edge (FTL, pods, compensators, micro-fusion plants) and then figure out ways to either directly counter that edge by mirror-imagining parts of the package (CATAPHRACT pods for instance) , or asymmetrically change the dynamics by going down other routes to take away some of the Grand Alliance advantages.

On a strategic level, no one should be planning for a CA to combat a SD or a DD to take on a BC. In strategic planning, SDs fight SDs. CAs fight CAs.

Tactically, a 1922 RMN Sag-C is capable of fighting a 1922 SLN SD (and winning). But this is tailoring the capability of a specific unit against a specific unit at that particular time. In 1922 a Roland DD can easily destroy a Nevada BC. In 1923, the Nevada is now pulling schloads of pods, and while the Roland could still win in the scenario, it is no longer optimum for the role.

Tactics are played against the immediate threat. Strategic thinking includes the long term planning.

So if you're pulling out the crystal ball and trying to design fleet levels for 1940 - if you have jobs for 120 SDs, you need 120 SDs.

Well, one Question is, how would be the security situation after the defeat of the solarian league.

Pirates were always an secret or not so secret way to damage your enemy. I can imagine that the one or other world would support pirates to keep the manticorians and their allies buisy.

So, trade protection should be a resonable job for the beowulfian and manticorian forces.

If an increase of pirates really happen, than is the question, are it only modified civilian vessels or some or some more obsolete, speak retired solarian design, warships.