System Guard

kzt wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I thought the grav lance is fairly widely known (although much less widely implemented; even back in it's day).

But where are MDMs (or I assume their "baffle") linked to the grav lance? Did I miss that somewhere? (I don't see it in HoS where the "baffle" trick is described)

It's mentioned in HoS.

I think I found it, but if so it's so subtle I'd missed it the first time I read the section.

House of Steel (eARC) wrote:The most critical breakthrough [for MDMs/Project Mjølner] was what Sonja Hemphill and some of Gram’s other team leaders had dubbed simply “the baffle”—essentially, a very carefully designed generator which would project a tame plate of focused gravity to shield adjacent, inactive impeller rings from an active one. Doing it in a way that didn’t slice the missile body into divots the moment it came online had turned out to be…moderately tricky, and they still hadn’t quite licked the problem, but current results were promising. Very promising, actually…in an incremental, God-why-does-this-take-so-long, work-your-butt-off sort of way. And if they could only make the baffle work, all the rest of it was simply fiddly bits. Difficult, challenging, and expensive fiddly bits, perhaps, but still only fiddly bits; he was confident of that.

Some other interesting bits and pieces were emerging from the effort, as well. Sonja, for example, was intrigued by the implications of something she’d tentatively christened a “grav lance,” although it looked to Jonas like something which would be useful mainly for capital ships that managed to get to knife-fighting range of one another.

If we assume the "effort" was designing the baffle, rather than the general project Gram research then I can see where the grav lance was linked to the research into MDMs.
But I guess I'd read "effort" as project Gram up until now. <shrug>

Jonathan_S wrote:I thought the grav lance is fairly widely known (although much less widely implemented; even back in it's day).

But where are MDMs (or I assume their "baffle") linked to the grav lance? Did I miss that somewhere? (I don't see it in HoS where the "baffle" trick is described)

IIRC it was NOT common knowledge. Part of the reason back in HotQ and SVW that the PRN was defecating masonry. A CL took out a for real q-ship. And they didn't know how! The only data available was held only by Manticore.

Also think it may have been mentioned in a dump but not sure and too lazy to look either up. <shrug>

Have fun,
T2M

[quote="Jonathan_]
It's mentioned in HoS.[/quote]I think I found it, but if so it's so subtle I'd missed it the first time I read the [/quote]
That's it. So if the world knows about grav lances then they know some of the key data, though it might not be obvious. However if you throw a few million r&d people at it...

thinkstoomuch wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I thought the grav lance is fairly widely known (although much less widely implemented; even back in it's day).

IIRC it was NOT common knowledge. Part of the reason back in HotQ and SVW that the PRN was defecating masonry. A CL took out a for real q-ship. And they didn't know how! The only data available was held only by Manticore.

Also think it may have been mentioned in a dump but not sure and too lazy to look either up. <shrug>

Have fun,
T2M

Certainly it wasn't common knowledge that Fearless had been gutted to install a grav lance and e-torps. But that's seems a bit different than whether the Peeps (or others) knew about grav-lances in general.


But you might well be right. I thought I remembered a statement or post that the Peep's had chosen not to equip their wallers with grav-lances; however since I can't find it now I could well be misremembering...

thinkstoomuch wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I thought the grav lance is fairly widely known (although much less widely implemented; even back in it's day).

But where are MDMs (or I assume their "baffle") linked to the grav lance? Did I miss that somewhere? (I don't see it in HoS where the "baffle" trick is described)

IIRC it was NOT common knowledge. Part of the reason back in HotQ and SVW that the PRN was defecating masonry. A CL took out a for real q-ship. And they didn't know how! The only data available was held only by Manticore.

Also think it may have been mentioned in a dump but not sure and too lazy to look either up. <shrug>

Have fun,
T2M

Been a while since I read OBS, but I always thought the original Courageous-class weapons fit was sufficient to deal with the Q-ship. Hence that little debriefing of the WDB by one then newly-promoted Captain Harrington.

There was a point during the engagement where Fearless was specifically said to be close enough that she should be swinging her broadsides around to fire full missile salvos. Only, there were no missile launchers there due to the refit.

munroburton wrote:Been a while since I read OBS, but I always thought the original Courageous-class weapons fit was sufficient to deal with the Q-ship. Hence that little debriefing of the WDB by one then newly-promoted Captain Harrington.

There was a point during the engagement where Fearless was specifically said to be close enough that she should be swinging her broadsides around to fire full missile salvos. Only, there were no missile launchers there due to the refit.

The Q-ship also used sub-optimal tactics because originally he was just trying to get away (and call off the invasion, but Honor couldn't know that). It had BC-level (albeit Havenite BC-level) armament.

drothgery wrote:

munroburton wrote:Been a while since I read OBS, but I always thought the original Courageous-class weapons fit was sufficient to deal with the Q-ship. Hence that little debriefing of the WDB by one then newly-promoted Captain Harrington.

There was a point during the engagement where Fearless was specifically said to be close enough that she should be swinging her broadsides around to fire full missile salvos. Only, there were no missile launchers there due to the refit.

The Q-ship also used sub-optimal tactics because originally he was just trying to get away (and call off the invasion, but Honor couldn't know that). It had BC-level (albeit Havenite BC-level) armament.

Fearless had been seriously crippled for its normal roles to make it a test bed fro the Weapon That Shall Not Be Mentioned. Honor, dispite the butcher job done to Fearless, was very pleased to be given command of even an old CL. She was determined to do her assigned job to both the best and to the maximum of her assets. The CL was not exactly toothless, just crippled, though nobody except perhaps Young and one or two other officers on his ship knew that. Fearless was essentialy on customs and traffic enforcement duty even before Young took himself home although he hadn't given Honor any particular orders to do anything specific before notifying her of his departure.
Even with annoying people by holding every ship in the system to the customs regulations and causing that havoc that can only come when rules are suddenly enforced, Fearless was more than a match for any actual merchantman in the system even down to being able to cripple some of them with the Fearless's pinnacles if nessisary. Nobody expected a CL in Basilisk to have to go up against a Peep warship, or any kind or warship.

The Q-ship was trying to get the Hell Out Of Dodge without making it obvious that it was a Q-ship or it could have started hammering at Fearless much sooner. At the point where Fearless is doing a stern chase, the Q-ship MIGHT have been able to simply launch but not fire the engines of one or more volleys of its missiles and then set up a double or tripple stack at the trailing CL so that the weapons would arrive more or less at the same time. I don't know of the Peep had the com-links for that but it would seem reasonable, remember they are shooting down the throat of the CL, not a lot of manuvering required.

drothgery wrote:

munroburton wrote:Been a while since I read OBS, but I always thought the original Courageous-class weapons fit was sufficient to deal with the Q-ship. Hence that little debriefing of the WDB by one then newly-promoted Captain Harrington.

There was a point during the engagement where Fearless was specifically said to be close enough that she should be swinging her broadsides around to fire full missile salvos. Only, there were no missile launchers there due to the refit.

The Q-ship also used sub-optimal tactics because originally he was just trying to get away (and call off the invasion, but Honor couldn't know that). It had BC-level (albeit Havenite BC-level) armament.

Yeah, like munroburton, I'd originally thought (given how effective just Fearless's chase tubes were) that she might have been able to take the Q-ship. But RFC made an infodump on that back in Aug 2002

runsforcelery wrote:Under normal circumstances, Sirius should have taken Fearless. And, indeed, she effectively did, except for the fact that Honor was waiting for her with the grav-lance when she closed to finish Fearless off. As the engagement actually broke down, Sirius discovered that her EW capabilities were far inferior to those of Fearless (particularly critical in a missile duel), which offset much of her advantage in firepower and size. She remained much tougher than Fearless, and far more capable of absorbing damage and remaining in action, however.

Like you said, Sirius was just too tough, and had too many missiles and tubes for even the Manticoran edge in ECM and missiles to let a almost DD-sized old CL take on what was in effect a BC hull with merchant holds wrapped around it.

thinkstoomuch wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I thought the grav lance is fairly widely known (although much less widely implemented; even back in it's day).

IIRC it was NOT common knowledge. Part of the reason back in HotQ and SVW that the PRN was defecating masonry. A CL took out a for real q-ship. And they didn't know how! The only data available was held only by Manticore.

Also think it may have been mentioned in a dump but not sure and too lazy to look either up. <shrug>

Have fun,
T2M

And while looking for the infodump above I stumbled across the one I'd been thinking of that touched on whether the Peeps knew about grav-lances. From March 1998:

runsforcelery wrote:As for your comment on the grav lance and larger ships, virtually all RMN ships larger than CAs/BCs (and some of the latter) routinely mount a grav lance in each broadside. They're extremely unlikely to get the opportunity actually to use the thing because of range constraints, but if the chance does arise, the Manties fully intend to make use of it. The Peeps, on the other hand, see absolutely no point in mounting the damned thing (remember, they still don't know exactly how Honor took out the Sirius in OBS), and in this instance, the Graysons tend to go along with the Peeps.

{bold added} That makes it seem that the Peeps did know about grav-lances, they just didn't know Fearless mounted one.

Yet another case of me flipping something 180 in my memory.

Thank you for the info and correction.

I had gone looking after your last post, but other things intruded and didn't find it.

Thanks again,
T2M

Jonathan_S wrote:...snip...
And while looking for the infodump above I stumbled across the one I'd been thinking of that touched on whether the Peeps knew about grav-lances. From March 1998:

runsforcelery wrote:As for your comment on the grav lance and larger ships, virtually all RMN ships larger than CAs/BCs (and some of the latter) routinely mount a grav lance in each broadside. They're extremely unlikely to get the opportunity actually to use the thing because of range constraints, but if the chance does arise, the Manties fully intend to make use of it. The Peeps, on the other hand, see absolutely no point in mounting the damned thing (remember, they still don't know exactly how Honor took out the Sirius in OBS), and in this instance, the Graysons tend to go along with the Peeps.

{bold added} That makes it seem that the Peeps did know about grav-lances, they just didn't know Fearless mounted one.

OK nobody likes the idea of using SD's anymore. How about making a system guard based on BC's. It can start with the older ones. And then progress up with the addition of the BC(P) which nobody else seems to have a use for. The o.d Silly ones captured with the Cataphracts and the redoubtable in mothballs plus any Homers, as they get replaced. This should bring a nice round number of about 12 per Silesian system. 3 being BC(P) and the rest about 3 redoubtable, 2-3 Homer, 2-3 reliant 1's, and 1-2 Solly captured. The BC(P) can used Cataphract pods. Pulling the Cataphract from all the SD's that are captured plus all the reloads should net about 200,000 pods of 10.

These pods might have to be made but you don't need a slip to make a pod.

Most of the slips in Silesia could be upgraded to support these smaller BC even if they are larger than Silesian BC slips. One could also begin asap refitting the slips to support the much larger Mk16 missile lines and the Nike BCL.

BC should have crews less than a 1000 each. Less than 500 for the BC(P). Yet will give am immediate boost to each Silesian system and allow for the development of the system guard. Plus Silesian military crew used to operate BC's and with additional System Guard training should be able to be brought up to speed quickly.

Cataphracts will allow for fast deployment and training while allowing for reasonable defense against any raids and pirates. Plus the older standard BC missiles.

Adding a couple dozen Highlander 2 LAC to each system with a FF "Q" freighter for mobile deployment to round out the local forces and multiply the numbers.

24 LAC armed with 24 LERM each although arming them with the Smaller Cataphracts is also tempting.
8 BC without LERM DDM missiles, although one wonders if upgrading them to LERM standard might not be possible. Cataphract upgrades?
1 Cataphract Ex-solly BC.
3 Agamemnon BC(P) with 3-6000 Cataphract pods in each system.

Eventually the Cataphracts would be replaced with Mk16 pods and the BC with Nike BCL. One wonders if a Highlander 3 LAC could mount Mk16's. May only have 16 total missiles, 4 sets of 4 but still those would be very powerful LAC.