What is next at the Front

Dathi wrote:BUILDING rail in winter conditions is very, very difficult. Is that what you're talking about?

But OPERATING rail isn't. Even massive snow fall in mountains only blocks rail lines briefly in the Rockies of North America, and -40weather barely impedes operation of trains across the Canadian prairies (not that we get that much cold often).

Well, as long as the equipment is built for it.

In WWII didn't German locomotives, even their "winterized" ones have serious issues operating in the '41 Russian winter?

Yeah, here's what a quick google, to back up my recollection, found

Arvo L. Vecamer wrote:One consequence of this was that in the east, only 20% of all of Germany's "winterized" locomotives were operationally available in late 1941. In total, between 70-80% of all German locomotives deployed on the eastern front became inoperable. Conversely, Soviet (and ex-Imperial Russian) locomotives seemed to be in their natural element during the winter months. The situation improved quite a bit when the Germans borrowed a page from Soviet construction techniques - they removed all of the precision parts and basically ran stripped down locomotives until the severe weather receded.

(http://www.feldgrau.com/dreichsbahn.html)

But hopefully Sharonan equipment is designed to work in all the various climates their multi-verse's worlds might offer.

Dathi wrote:How the heck would surveyors manage to move fast enough to properly survey track with a hypothetical building rate of 20 miles a day!!!???

Talents.

Specifically the talents in the civilian portal discovery teams working on contract to the Portal Authority.

Recall that Shaylar's husband was a surveying talent.

This means that Voices are relaying surveying talent information to the Portal Authority prior to the first TTE worker crossing the portal into a new universe.

And also carefully note that the TTE pioneer teams for the rail laying workers likely include railway specialized surveying and distance viewing talents who scout multiple routes for the heavy equipment building trains.

IMO, this talent augmented scouting is one of the big reasons -- combined with 70 years of TTE capital investment in really, Really *HUGE* steam powered earth moving/rail laying capital equipment -- why Sharonans can lay virgin railway right of way so fast.

There are implication in that for how big Ternathian railway artillery can be.

Mil-tech bard wrote:

Dathi wrote:How the heck would surveyors manage to move fast enough to properly survey track with a hypothetical building rate of 20 miles a day!!!???

Talents.

Specifically the talents in the civilian portal discovery teams working on contract to the Portal Authority.

Recall that Shaylar's husband was a surveying talent.

This means that Voices are relaying surveying talent information to the Portal Authority prior to the first TTE worker crossing the portal into a new universe.

And also carefully note that the TTE pioneer teams for the rail laying workers likely include railway specialized surveying and distance viewing talents who scout multiple routes for the heavy equipment building trains.

IMO, this talent augmented scouting is one of the big reasons -- combined with 70 years of TTE capital investment in really, Really *HUGE* steam powered earth moving/rail laying capital equipment -- why Sharonans can lay virgin railway right of way so fast.

There are implication in that for how big Ternathian railway artillery can be.

You missed the big thing, they can (And probably already have for major routes) do the surveying back on Sharonia

SCC wrote:
You missed the big thing, they can (And probably already have for major routes) do the surveying back on Sharonia

That is only good for a rough orientation. You have to survey to make sure you get the actual picture. After all, you can't know what influence the occasional (and purely local) thunderstorm, landslide, earthquake etc. did to the territory in your target-universe compared to the same territory in Sharona. If I remember correctly, there is even textev to that very fact (in HHNF, if memory serves ...)

Eagleeye wrote:

SCC wrote:
You missed the big thing, they can (And probably already have for major routes) do the surveying back on Sharonia

That is only good for a rough orientation. You have to survey to make sure you get the actual picture. After all, you can't know what influence the occasional (and purely local) thunderstorm, landslide, earthquake etc. did to the territory in your target-universe compared to the same territory in Sharona. If I remember correctly, there is even textev to that very fact (in HHNF, if memory serves ...)

True. But some things are unlikely to change, like major mountain passes or even the underlying soil conditions. So at a 'strategic' level they should have enough detail to settle on the approximate route and that at least narrows down their area to survey. No having to detail survey most of the Rockies and Sierra every time looking for usable passes to link together is a nice advantage.

Then send the right Talents down the expected corridor and you're doing the detailed survey a lot faster that anyone could on Earth during the big railway building boom. (Though now to protect against raids you'd need a decent military escort with those talents; so that'll slow things down somewhat compared to peacetime rail surveying)

Jonathan_S wrote:

Eagleeye wrote:
That is only good for a rough orientation. You have to survey to make sure you get the actual picture. After all, you can't know what influence the occasional (and purely local) thunderstorm, landslide, earthquake etc. did to the territory in your target-universe compared to the same territory in Sharona. If I remember correctly, there is even textev to that very fact (in HHNF, if memory serves ...)

True. But some things are unlikely to change, like major mountain passes or even the underlying soil conditions. So at a 'strategic' level they should have enough detail to settle on the approximate route and that at least narrows down their area to survey. No having to detail survey most of the Rockies and Sierra every time looking for usable passes to link together is a nice advantage.

Then send the right Talents down the expected corridor and you're doing the detailed survey a lot faster that anyone could on Earth during the big railway building boom. (Though now to protect against raids you'd need a decent military escort with those talents; so that'll slow things down somewhat compared to peacetime rail surveying)

I suspect the speed will increase over the peace time rate of track laying. The number of Talented surveyors and civil engineering types available will likely increase for the war effort. The same thing is true for good work crews. The primary limiting factor is getting the materials out to the end of the line. Big water gaps are still bottlenecks until more and larger ships can be deployed to those gaps.

PeterZ wrote:I suspect the speed will increase over the peace time rate of track laying. The number of Talented surveyors and civil engineering types available will likely increase for the war effort. The same thing is true for good work crews. The primary limiting factor is getting the materials out to the end of the line. Big water gaps are still bottlenecks until more and larger ships can be deployed to those gaps.

Ships are modular and rail transportable. The infrastructure needed to assemble the ships would follow that pattern. What does this mean?

The larger the water gap the greater the advantage.

Rail extension will proceed at 20 miles per day. Say a modular ship yard will take 30 days to assemble. The rail line has advanced 600 miles and is vulnerable to sabotage. Any ships assembled will have an almost unlimited range with support colliers.

We have not seen any weapon systems which would be effective against iron ships or armored vehicles.

Tim wrote:We have not seen any weapon systems which would be effective against iron ships or armored vehicles.

We've seen no evidence that Sharonan warship or armored vehicles were designed to be gas-proof.

So, in the right conditions, their crews are probably vulnerable to the gas attacks of yellow dragons. (But that's unlikely to occur in the middle of an ocean)

Too date, none of the Sharonan gate fort survivors of dragon gas attacks have made it back to Sharonan line to explain what happened.

There is a chance that Janaki (sp?) sent word about gas attacks via his glimpse, but this was outside his, his father's and his sister's frame of reference.

This is one of the reasons why I see the Sharonan over running of Arcanina pickets as being a huge accelerator of Sharonan anger.

With Sharonan past event viewing "CSI" talents, the story of these gas attacks and how Sharonan prisoners died will get out all in one piece, on top of the assassinated Voice talent.

Jonathan_S wrote:

Tim wrote:We have not seen any weapon systems which would be effective against iron ships or armored vehicles.

We've seen no evidence that Sharonan warship or armored vehicles were designed to be gas-proof.

So, in the right conditions, their crews are probably vulnerable to the gas attacks of yellow dragons. (But that's unlikely to occur in the middle of an ocean)

I agree that when the Sharonans get proof of the killing and torture of surrendered prisoners that is going to set much of the current Sharonan attitudes in stone. I doubt they will get angrier because I don't think them being angrier is possible.

I don't think knowledge of the use of "chemical weapons" will have any effect on Sharonan attitudes at all. It will start R&D on how they can use and defend against them but won't be seen as a war crime. The classification of the use of chemical weapons as a war crime was a consequence of World War I, which the Sharonans never experienced. The classification of chemical weapons as WMDs was a consequence of the development of the concept of WMDs out of atomic weapons, which the Sharonans don't have. The yellow dragons will be seen as another Arcanan weapon but I don't think that the emotional impact you are expecting from "chemical weapons" will happen.

Nicholas

Mil-tech bard wrote:Too date, none of the Sharonan gate fort survivors of dragon gas attacks have made it back to Sharonan line to explain what happened.

There is a chance that Janaki (sp?) sent word about gas attacks via his glimpse, but this was outside his, his father's and his sister's frame of reference.

This is one of the reasons why I see the Sharonan over running of Arcanina pickets as being a huge accelerator of Sharonan anger.

With Sharonan past event viewing "CSI" talents, the story of these gas attacks and how Sharonan prisoners died will get out all in one piece, on top of the assassinated Voice talent.