Implenting Case Lacoon I & II after Oyster Bay

Case Lacoon I was simply closing the Manticore Wormhole Junction network to Solarian League shipping.

Case Lacoon II envisions siezing as many wormhole junction nexi and termini (spelling is actually correct for plural forms of "nexus" and "terminus").

Executing Case Lacoon I is easy but is it feasible for Manticore to excute Case Lacoon II after the losses sufferred at Battle of Manticore then Oyster Bay?

I say yes. This is certainly less challenging then going on a general offensive.

However; keep in mind that wormhole termini are outside of steller gravity wells with essentially no hyperlimit. This is one situation where it is possible given extremely accurate navigation for SLN ships to engage RMN ships within energy range without having to withstand a long range missile engagement first. Obviously, Manticore's precious, irreplacable SD(P)s with their almost equally precious, difficult to replace APOLLO SKMs do not have an overwhelming tactical advantage.

I'll piss people off by pointing out that Manticore has recently acquired several squadrons of energy armament heavey, SDs and is likely to acquire a few hundred more such ships courtesy of the SLN.

OK, they are pieces of crap because the don't have MDMs much less on board pods and hundreds of control channels to manage massive salvos. However; they have lots energy armament mounts.

Granted the energy armament on SLN ships aren't as good as Manticoran ships, but this might be easy to rememdy even after OB.

Recall that the various tations were not vaporized. They were torn apart with many fragments (including some that impacted Sphinx) massing hundreds of thousands of tons. What might be salvage from these enormous fragments? WHile it might not be feasible to salvage damaged fabrication modules, what about the contents of warehouse modules? I see it as very plausible that Manticore will recover modules from which they can salvage significant numbers of SKMs, perhaps even APOLLO or Mk-23 pods and hopefully Mk-16s for the NIKEs, SAGANAMI Cs and ROLLANDS.

It is also plausible that the stations had warehouse modules that stored stockpiles of grasers for SD(P)s, lighter combatants and LACs. In USN jargon gun systems have always been thought of as long lead time components that are often manufacutred months or years in advance of the construction of the units that they will be mounted on. The USN also manufactures and stores spare weapons for existing units to facilitate rapid repairs. Grav lens arrays for Grasers are another component that Manticore might also have stockpiled.

Even after the damage incurred during OB, it might be feasible to rearm the captured SLN SDs, replacing their lasers and perhaps their grasers with Manticoran Grasers. Of course they are inferior to Manticoran SD(P)s and even BCs, CAs and may be DDs in a missile duel. However; within energy range they'd kick butt on their SLN counterparts.

The problem here is: A) There is no one to man these ships. B) If you stick a few dozen of these ships out somewhere (anywhere) what's to prevent the the Sollies from sending overwhelming numbers against them and rolling right over them? The main advantage the Manties have is not in the energy weapons, it's in the range of their missiles. Ships that cannot operate MDMs are targets, pure and simple. Manticore cannot afford to lose the people required to man these ships.

zuluwiz wrote:The problem here is: A) There is no one to man these ships. B) If you stick a few dozen of these ships out somewhere (anywhere) what's to prevent the the Sollies from sending overwhelming numbers against them and rolling right over them? The main advantage the Manties have is not in the energy weapons, it's in the range of their missiles. Ships that cannot operate MDMs are targets, pure and simple. Manticore cannot afford to lose the people required to man these ships.

You are outside the hyperlimt, so you can just fire up the hyper generator and jump over the alpha wall against a massive missile volley. Defending something in essentially deep space is very different from system defense.

Maybe I'm missing something, (which is always possible) but most wormhole junctions are within Hyper limit, or at least I thought. I've never read in any book where someone jumped right to the wormhole..

If not why did not Haven just drop out of Hyper right at Trevor star's Termini and engage the fort with energy weapons instead of flying for a few hours to get there?

In OBS it mentions that the terminus is 5 light hours from Medusa, and the hyper limit is on the order of 20 LM.

The problem - at least with wormhole nexi (we don't know, if termini have one as well, but there is a hint1) in the discussion regarding the implementation of Laocoon I and II, that they have one, too) is not the hyperlimit - it is the resonance zone (RZ). You simply don't jump into a RZ if you can avoid it ... and in regard of a navy as conservative as the SLN I think there is a standing order, which will prohibit this maneuver. You can jump from a point in a RZ to a point outside (Both Kuzak and Honor did it in the Battle of Manticore. iIrc) - but nobody will do it the other way ...

1) The hint I mentioned? As far as I remember, someone (Hamish?) said in that discussion, that the technological advantage of the RMN would allow for relatively small pickets to defend termini and nexi at least for the near future. Because the kind of advantage is mostly in missile technology, I think we could assume that termini, too, have RZs, even if they are probably smaller than the ones connected to nexi.

There is no need at all for using captured SLN Wallers for Case Lacoon II.
The Alliance has dozens and dozens of old style Superdreadnoughts still available. You can use them if you want to, but why?
Two modern RMN SD(P) BatRons will take care of anything short of a really big SLN fleet.
You want to jump in on them? How do you think the SLN could accomplish that if it is at all possible?
They would be jumping blind. They don’t have any Ghost Rider equivalent to gather intel on the exact position of the RMN detachment.
The Mantis use Apollo and a FTL sensor sphere. They ll just park the ships somewhere away from the termini and wait till someone shows up. No need for them to guard the termini with active impellers. So no jumping in on them, no fight in energy range.

Another point to consider: There's really no need for wallers for this job. A squadron of battlecruisers and a squadron of heavy cruisers can control enough pods to defend against most threats. The real issue, as I see it, is not to defend or attack any individual points of interest. The issue is to make the Sollies respond to your moves, rather than to be responding to theirs. Seize the initiative. One other small point to consider: taking all, most, or even a bunch of the junctions will slow down Sollie communications considerably. The implications of that are obvious.

Everyone seems to be ignoring the fact that Manticore by implementing Lacoon II will be effectively declaring war upon the star nation that controls the Worm Hole. Effectively this would be like England seizing control of the Suez and Panama Canals.

Yes I realize that none of these star nations would be a threat to Manticore, but it is what they are doing.

Thirdbase wrote:Everyone seems to be ignoring the fact that Manticore by implementing Lacoon II will be effectively declaring war upon the star nation that controls the Worm Hole. Effectively this would be like England seizing control of the Suez and Panama Canals.

Yes I realize that none of these star nations would be a threat to Manticore, but it is what they are doing.

Because the most of these star nations are members of the Solarian League I don't see any problems with that particular stumbling block. After all, for all intents and purposes Manticore is at war with the league. And the declaration of war was the systemwide speech of Queen/Empress Elizabeth. That, at least, will be the opinion of the proverbial men in the streets.

And with the other nations, who aren't SL-members ... how about that? Manticore could show them some of the proofs they got from Zilwicki/Cachat - maybe they get even an invitation to block the Termini/Nexi after that? Or the star nation in question (like ... oh, Erewhon?) does the blocking with its own ships?