Possible way to take out the OBS...

OlorinNight wrote:Firstly, the nuke would explode outside the OBS range, meaning far away from the planet.

Secondly, a nuke exploding into the atmosphere won't start a "Planetary fire". Russia tested a 57 Mt device at 80 km from the ground. it looks like we are still there to speak about it, isn't it? and 80 km is still Inside the atmosphere, while the OBS is probably far outside it (otherwise, it would not be "in orbit").

Finally, the idea is that by creating small size rocks, those would be destroyed while entering atmosphere. I agree that making sure that you have only small size rocks may be more tricky, but there may be ways around that too...

And if yougive it the right angle, you may even manage it so that most if not all of those rocks won't even be able to enter atmosphere and will be brushed aside by it... (without the right entry angle, small objects can't enter atmosphere, if I recall correctly)...

80 km from the ground.

Err, no.

It was air dropped. From a propeller bomber. Admittedly one of the best propeller bombers in the history of the world, but a propeller bomber.

There are Youtube segments of the test.

Indeed Phillies, you're right. Don't know why I was thinking 80 km.

As for the asteroïde, since you would have to carve in it in order to put the nuke, you could at the same time put weaken it's structure in order for it to break in small pièces.
It is indeed a lot of work, but since it would be performed by robots...

Another way would be to "glue" together a lot of small rocks and create and artificiall asteroids that you'd blow in the same circonstance...

Not easy, but RFC is not in the habit to make it easy for his characters...

I'm kinda wondering where all this space lift capacity to throw large asteroids en masse around is coming from. As far as we know, all Merlin has are some skimmers and shuttles as far as large space assets go, and I suspect that they're woefully inadequate for moving asteroids around in any kind of timely manner. After all, skimmers and shuttles are meant for planet to orbit and back ops, not interplanetary travel.

I suspect that in order to grab some asteroids, Merlin is going to have to build a ship for the job. And if he can build a SHIP, why not an ARMED ship capable of taking out the OBS on its own? Or just cut out the ship and use planet-side rail gun batteries or something that can shoot small bits of the planet at the OBS?

Of course, given how much trouble it was just to build a single PICA, building any of the above out of the Cave's resouces is probably going to require going Minecraft and building tools to build the tools and infrastructure needed just to MINE all the required elements to build a spaceship. Then you need to construct a yard to build the ship in...

And by the time that first ship is done, Charis will have won the war, won the follow up war, seized control of the Temple and the OBS control system, and be well on its way to building their own starships.

evilauthor wrote:I'm kinda wondering where all this space lift capacity to throw large asteroids en masse around is coming from. As far as we know, all Merlin has are some skimmers and shuttles as far as large space assets go, and I suspect that they're woefully inadequate for moving asteroids around in any kind of timely manner. After all, skimmers and shuttles are meant for planet to orbit and back ops, not interplanetary travel.

I suspect that in order to grab some asteroids, Merlin is going to have to build a ship for the job. And if he can build a SHIP, why not an ARMED ship capable of taking out the OBS on its own? Or just cut out the ship and use planet-side rail gun batteries or something that can shoot small bits of the planet at the OBS?

Of course, given how much trouble it was just to build a single PICA, building any of the above out of the Cave's resouces is probably going to require going Minecraft and building tools to build the tools and infrastructure needed just to MINE all the required elements to build a spaceship. Then you need to construct a yard to build the ship in...

And by the time that first ship is done, Charis will have won the war, won the follow up war, seized control of the Temple and the OBS control system, and be well on its way to building their own starships.

You guys are sooooo cute . . . .

You guys are sooooo cute . . . . [/quote]


I don't know how good your theories are, but they seem to be entertaining.

I don't think the nano thing has been foreshadowed enough to use as a resolution. It'll probably be based on something that was mentioned in OAR but we didn't see back then.

Good idea! Time to go reread OAR again, but extremely carefully in light of our 'current' level of knowledge. However, I suspect that even so, our wonderful author has got us so evilly misdirected again, as usual... Ah well, it will keep the conversation lively anyway!!!

cralkhi wrote:I don't think the nano thing has been foreshadowed enough to use as a resolution. It'll probably be based on something that was mentioned in OAR but we didn't see back then.

Most likely theory is that the Assault Shuttles and stockpile of energy rifles left in Merlin's cave are going to be used for a lightning raid somewhere. Most likely to capture the Temple, but I've read theories that they could be used to forcefully board a ship in space (human or Gbaba).