New Manty ship ideas.

One cannot enter hyperspace does not mean one cannot try, bounce off the lowest band and land back in n-space a little further along. One likely would not be going any faster, likely 20% slower, but the idea that one cannot use existing hyperdrives to enter hyperspace with in the stars limit doesn't mean one can't use a modified engine to bounce along the edge of hyperspace for a few seconds before being forced back into n-space.

Might not be a pleasant ride but depend what kind of buffering or wedge modifications are done to affect such an occurance.

Might be discovered by accident might be worked out on purpose. Might be a product of working on wedges and and finding that something that allows one to use dorsal weapons firing through a wedge also allows one to enter a non hyper space, perhaps hyper limit space, and jump 25 times further for 10 seconds or until the buffer fails, 1 second 5 seconds 21 seconds. You end up with a blink into total stealth (is gone) and then appear further along than you should. Of course ones wedge would look funny, blinky, at the best of times but perhaps one could see, with sensors, through it. Or fire point defense laser or energy torpedo's through it. Might not work as good as a normal wedge but might be harder to see and with a hyperlimit micro jumps possibly more useful. While this might be dangerous for larger ships it might work for LAC or even missiles.

Given that hyperspace is gravity band based and wedges are gravity based somehow, wedges work inside hyper limits, while hyper space engines don't do to some kind of proximity to a stars own gravity, turbulence perhaps. Might be something like the sound barrier, only in this case hyperspace is the light barrier. A microjump may be a bounce back of the light barrier turbulence with a random benefit which if nothing else may confuse sensors.

Trying to do what you're proposing will end up with the immediate, catastrophic destruction of the ship. That's it.

Lord Skimper wrote:One cannot enter hyperspace does not mean one cannot try, bounce off the lowest band and land back in n-space a little further along. One likely would not be going any faster, likely 20% slower, but the idea that one cannot use existing hyperdrives to enter hyperspace with in the stars limit doesn't mean one can't use a modified engine to bounce along the edge of hyperspace for a few seconds before being forced back into n-space.

Might not be a pleasant ride but depend what kind of buffering or wedge modifications are done to affect such an occurance.

Might be discovered by accident might be worked out on purpose. Might be a product of working on wedges and and finding that something that allows one to use dorsal weapons firing through a wedge also allows one to enter a non hyper space, perhaps hyper limit space, and jump 25 times further for 10 seconds or until the buffer fails, 1 second 5 seconds 21 seconds. You end up with a blink into total stealth (is gone) and then appear further along than you should. Of course ones wedge would look funny, blinky, at the best of times but perhaps one could see, with sensors, through it. Or fire point defense laser or energy torpedo's through it. Might not work as good as a normal wedge but might be harder to see and with a hyperlimit micro jumps possibly more useful. While this might be dangerous for larger ships it might work for LAC or even missiles.

Given that hyperspace is gravity band based and wedges are gravity based somehow, wedges work inside hyper limits, while hyper space engines don't do to some kind of proximity to a stars own gravity, turbulence perhaps. Might be something like the sound barrier, only in this case hyperspace is the light barrier. A microjump may be a bounce back of the light barrier turbulence with a random benefit which if nothing else may confuse sensors.

Well what if one could remotely cause an enemy ship to attempt to do that?

We know the crippler would cause civilian wedges to overload, what about making a hyper engine "nitrous oxide effect"that would turn it on and jam it to full effect. No warshawski sail just force jump to hyper, within the star limit to great negative effect and outside to great surprise and amusement.

Knowing everything about the electronics of the Sollie ships and hyperdrives that the Manties now know, perhaps there is something they could do to cause this to happen. Hyperdrives are likely computerised systems.

Lord Skimper wrote:Well what if one could remotely cause an enemy ship to attempt to do that?

We know the crippler would cause civilian wedges to overload, what about making a hyper engine "nitrous oxide effect"that would turn it on and jam it to full effect. No warshawski sail just force jump to hyper, within the star limit to great negative effect and outside to great surprise and amusement.

Knowing everything about the electronics of the Sollie ships and hyperdrives that the Manties now know, perhaps there is something they could do to cause this to happen. Hyperdrives are likely computerised systems.

If Manticore could break into enemy ship computers remotely, there is any number of things they could do to disable the enemy a lot easier than overriding the safeties on the hyperdrive, and without even killing anyone. That's why ship computers are specifically designed to prevent that kind of external hacking. You can be quite sure that Solarian computers are protected a lot better than Havenite computers, and the only reason Shannon managed to do it was because she was sharing programs and files frequently for months with the StateSec ships, had planted her trojans carefully beforehand, and the StateSec ships were primed to accept her commands.

SWM wrote:

Lord Skimper wrote:Well what if one could remotely cause an enemy ship to attempt to do that?

If Manticore could break into enemy ship computers remotely, there is any number of things they could do to disable the enemy a lot easier than overriding the safeties on the hyperdrive, and without even killing anyone. That's why ship computers are specifically designed to prevent that kind of external hacking. You can be quite sure that Solarian computers are protected a lot better than Havenite computers, and the only reason Shannon managed to do it was because she was sharing programs and files frequently for months with the StateSec ships, had planted her trojans carefully beforehand, and the StateSec ships were primed to accept her commands.

Yep, the hyper generator is unlikely to be charged while within the hyper limit - so Lord Skimper is in effect proposing a hack that would required none of the engineering to notice the hyper generator unexpectedly charging for more than 10 minutes.

Or, with roughly the same (widely implausible) level of access you could probably disable the safeties on the fusion generators and watch the ship go *boom*, or attempt to glitch the compensator and turn the crew to paste.

But baring very very special situations we haven't seen external penetration succeed against military targets; much less against ships under weigh.

Seems like most of you don't like new ship ideas.

OK how about a new version of an old weapon. A missile, Apollo ET, with an energy torpedo launcher to fire up or down the open throat of a wedge. Or maybe a ghost rider platform with Energy torpedo launcher. If the can get within 10,000 metres of an SD undetected they could fill the throat of a wedge with a fair amount of plasma. Yes it would suddenly be detected but at 10,000 Km's the energy torpedo would hit it almost instantly. Sooner than a ship could maneuver out of the way. And if it only fires for a couple seconds it would probably be able to disappear into stealth again. While the SD crew panic. Also with a range of 300,000 Km the energy Torpedo would likely be able to take out oodles of missile pods too. Assuming you use enough of them. Fire stealth and move fire stealth and move...

Continuous fire probably wouldn't work with power requirements but 100 GR-ET (ghost rider energytorpedo) firing three shots then evade would knock out 3000 missile pods in 60 seconds. Alternatively the point defense of the Katana would also likely be able to take out a missile pod. A GR-PD (ghost rider point defense) would also work against against fired missiles with the rest of the EW dazzlers etc... Such a weapon system or systems could do a lot of damage.

Lord Skimper wrote:Seems like most of you don't like new ship ideas.

I for one always enjoy well thought out new ideas, just not random stuff that gets spewed out to see what sticks. Add in an obstinate refusal to do any proper research, listen to arguments, or just common sense, and that just brings out the facepalm.

Lord Skimper wrote:OK how about a new version of an old weapon. A missile, Apollo ET, with an energy torpedo launcher to fire up or down the open throat of a wedge. Or maybe a ghost rider platform with Energy torpedo launcher.

If I remember right, Ghost Rider drones are piss slow compared to missiles (<2000G vs 90,000G). They're slower than graser torpedoes and don't even have the advantage of the 'undetectable' spider drive. How big is a energy torpedo launcher? What makes you think you can fit all the parts into a drone? You assume the positive, burden of proof is on you.

Lord Skimper wrote:If the can get within 10,000 metres of an SD undetected they could fill the throat of a wedge with a fair amount of plasma. Yes it would suddenly be detected but at 10,000 Km's the energy torpedo would hit it almost instantly. Sooner than a ship could maneuver out of the way. And if it only fires for a couple seconds it would probably be able to disappear into stealth again.

The SLN Gladiators CAs in Service of the Sword were shooting down Oversteen's drones all day long as they closed towards the throat. So no.

Lord Skimper wrote:Continuous fire probably wouldn't work with power requirements but 100 GR-ET (ghost rider energytorpedo) firing three shots then evade would knock out 3000 missile pods in 60 seconds. Alternatively the point defense of the Katana would also likely be able to take out a missile pod. A GR-PD (ghost rider point defense) would also work against against fired missiles with the rest of the EW dazzlers etc... Such a weapon system or systems could do a lot of damage.

You know what else would do a lot of damage? Those Mistletoe nuke drones used in AAC to take out Moriarty. There's probably a reason why slowass drones which have to close to knife range aren't used in combat though!

Lord Skimper wrote:One cannot enter hyperspace does not mean one cannot try, bounce off the lowest band and land back in n-space a little further along. One likely would not be going any faster, likely 20% slower, but the idea that one cannot use existing hyperdrives to enter hyperspace with in the stars limit doesn't mean one can't use a modified engine to bounce along the edge of hyperspace for a few seconds before being forced back into n-space.

David Weber defines the physics of his universe. Making stuff up doesn't fly here.

Lord Skimper wrote:Seems like most of you don't like new ship ideas.

No, most people don't enjoy having to listen to bad ship ideas due to obviously incorrect data that could be trivially corrected if attention was paid to the books.

OK how about a new version of an old weapon. A missile, Apollo ET, with an energy torpedo launcher to fire up or down the open throat of a wedge. Or maybe a ghost rider platform with Energy torpedo launcher. If the can get within 10,000 metres of an SD undetected they could fill the throat of a wedge with a fair amount of plasma. Yes it would suddenly be detected but at 10,000 Km's the energy torpedo would hit it almost instantly. Sooner than a ship could maneuver out of the way. And if it only fires for a couple seconds it would probably be able to disappear into stealth again. While the SD crew panic. Also with a range of 300,000 Km the energy Torpedo would likely be able to take out oodles of missile pods too. Assuming you use enough of them. Fire stealth and move fire stealth and move...

An energy torpedo mount is still larger than any drone. You cannot fit it onto a missile or drone.

Furthermore, energy torpedoes normally siphon plasma from the ship's fusion plant, which has plenty of plasma to spare. The microfusion plants Ghost Rider uses doesn't have that kind of excess juice to fire a weapon.

And even if you could cram it in and figure out how to power it, there's no way you would be able to get the drone that close to the hull. Heck, if you could get it that close, you could just ram the target. But you can't. Not even Mistletoe can get that close under stealth the entire time.

Continuous fire probably wouldn't work with power requirements but 100 GR-ET (ghost rider energytorpedo) firing three shots then evade would knock out 3000 missile pods in 60 seconds. Alternatively the point defense of the Katana would also likely be able to take out a missile pod. A GR-PD (ghost rider point defense) would also work against against fired missiles with the rest of the EW dazzlers etc... Such a weapon system or systems could do a lot of damage.

Again, won't fit, power limitations, etc.

Lord Skimper wrote:Seems like most of you don't like new ship ideas.

OK how about a new version of an old weapon. A missile, Apollo ET, with an energy torpedo launcher to fire up or down the open throat of a wedge. Or maybe a ghost rider platform with Energy torpedo launcher. If the can get within 10,000 metres of an SD undetected they could fill the throat of a wedge with a fair amount of plasma. Yes it would suddenly be detected but at 10,000 Km's the energy torpedo would hit it almost instantly. Sooner than a ship could maneuver out of the way. And if it only fires for a couple seconds it would probably be able to disappear into stealth again. While the SD crew panic. Also with a range of 300,000 Km the energy Torpedo would likely be able to take out oodles of missile pods too. Assuming you use enough of them. Fire stealth and move fire stealth and move...

Continuous fire probably wouldn't work with power requirements but 100 GR-ET (ghost rider energytorpedo) firing three shots then evade would knock out 3000 missile pods in 60 seconds. Alternatively the point defense of the Katana would also likely be able to take out a missile pod. A GR-PD (ghost rider point defense) would also work against against fired missiles with the rest of the EW dazzlers etc... Such a weapon system or systems could do a lot of damage.

Shipborne ET launchers mass in the 1000 ton range. We don't know the Mass of a Mk 23 is, but the full missile most likely masses LESS than 200 Tons (Seeing the 2 drive, 6 laserhead Mk-16 masses 94 Tons). The only plasma launcher you could use would be a vehicle type launcher, whose range is measured in Kilometers, not 450,000km like te shipborne set. And while such a weapon is good against a assault shuttle, I doubt it is much good against an armored hammerhead - or sufficiently destructive to be better than a contact Nuke.

Also, when have we seen a Apollo controlled missile fly with enough control to cross a ship's T? If you could do that, wouldn't it make more sense to hit it with a normal Laserhead - or better, just fly a contact nuke up there and do it right?

A third problem is the hammerhead is not completely undefended. During battle, ships usually try to take salvos on thier broadsides, so to hit the T , a missile (Traveling >.8c) needs to miss the ship and fire down the throat while it misses. This gives the Broadside PDCLs extra time to engage (since it's not firing at 50-30,000km) and the forward arc PDCLs can engage as well. in addition you need to fire a ballistic object down a narrow path created by the sidewalls and the wedge.

In addition, while I don't have the exact geometry in front of me to do the math, but I'm not certain at MDM velocities it is even possible to even hit the target ship - most likely, the only trajectories available would have the plasma smashing into the far sidewall.

It's not that we're against new ideas. Many of the things you have mentioned have either already been debated at great length here, are easily dismissed because they are simply refuted by the universe the Author has set up, or are not fully thought through.