Honorverse ramblings and musings

saber964 wrote:Pro-long isn't a be all cure all, look at Dimitri Young ...

Weird Harold wrote:

saber964 wrote:Pro-long isn't a be all cure all, look at Dimitri Young ...

Are we sure that Dimitri was a prolong recipient? He would have been twelve when Prolong was introduced to Manticore, but that doesn't guarantee that he received it before he was too old for even first generation Prolong.

saber964 wrote:Are we sure that Dimitri was a prolong recipient? He would have been twelve when Prolong was introduced to Manticore, but that doesn't guarantee that he received it before he was too old for even first generation Prolong.

"We nailed the son-of-a-bitch, Sir!" Commander Slowacki said, and despite his own fear, his voice was jubilant.

"Well done, Alekan!" Alistair McKeon replied, teeth bared in a wolfish grin of his own. His battle squadron had landed four salvos of Apollo-guided MDMs, and they'd killed a Havenite superdreadnought with each of them. In fact, they'd done better than that; the kill Slowacki had just announced was their fifth.

"Now go find another one," he said, and Slowacki nodded.

"Yes, Sir!"

The ops officer bent back over his displays, eyes bright, and McKeon felt a stab of envy. Slowacki was actually doing something, accomplishing something. In fact, the four Apollo-capable ships of McKeon's squadron were killing Havenite wallers in rapid succession, and Slowacki was too caught up in his task to realize that while he'd been killing five superdreadnoughts, the Havenites had already killed nine of Admiral Kuzak's. And it wouldn't be long before—

"Incoming!" someone shouted, and Intransigent lurched indescribably as the first deadly hits slammed home.

* * *

Alice Truman watched in horror as the Havenite flail came down on Alistair McKeon's squadron.

Was it deliberate? she wondered. Were they able somehow to figure out where Apollo was coming from? Or was it just the luck of the draw?

Not that it mattered.

* * *

Intransigent heaved madly as the lasers blasted into her. Astern of her, HMS Elizabeth I staggered as at least eighty direct hits slammed into her. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then, like her older sister Triumph, she vanished in a brief, terrible new star. Second Yeltsin and Revenge shuddered in agony of their own as the focused hurricane of destruction swept over McKeon's squadron. HMS Incomparable, Imperator's division mate in place of the dead Intolerant, lurched out of formation, impellers dead, wreckage trailing, life pods launching. Then the last few hundred missiles of the concentrated salvo came punching in, and Second Yeltsin blew up while Revenge's wedge went down. She started to fall behind, but before she could at least twelve lasers slammed directly into the unarmored top of her hull, which was supposed to be protected by her wedge. With no armor to stop them, the powerful lasers ripped deep into the superdreadnought's core, probing until they found her heart.

Thirty-one seconds after Second Yeltsin, HMS Revenge joined her in fiery death.

Intransigent survived. The only survivor of her entire squadron, Alistair McKeon's flagship staggered onward, little more than a wreck, but still alive.

* * *

Yet another hit slammed into HMS King Roger III. It stabbed deep, ripping through the wounds two of its predecessors had already torn. It breached the flagship's core hull, tearing its way into central engineering, and the superdreadnought's inertial compensator suddenly failed.

The emergency circuits shut down her impellers almost instantly, but "almost instantly" wasn't good enough for a ship under six hundred and twelve gravities of acceleration.

The ship sustained only moderate structural damage; none of her crew survived.

cthia wrote:How the heck did I miss that there were four Apollo capable ships in McKeon's squadron? And with four Apollo capable ships he could only manage to kill one Peep ship at a time? What the hell? Talk about a massive missile gone limp in McKeon's hands. He was like kryptonite to Apollo! Honor sent McKeon though with four Apollo ships and he still managed to get himself killed?

Temporarily bracketing the question of how the Peeps managed to locate McKeon's ships, what were any -- much less all -- of his squadron doing in range of any enemy forces? Textev bears proof of Honor and immediate family (McKeon especially) brainstorming Apollo's capabilities and tactical uses. So why didn't McKeon hyper in loaded for bear and satisfying his own quota of arse kicking?

Now, about that little matter of the Peeps able to so quickly identify and destroy four Apollo capable ships that were all somehow in range. H-O-W!?

Perhaps it's just me hitting the pipe this time. <shrugs>

cthia wrote:How the heck did I miss that there were four Apollo capable ships in McKeon's squadron? And with four Apollo capable ships he could only manage to kill one Peep ship at a time? What the hell? Talk about a massive missile gone limp in McKeon's hands. He was like kryptonite to Apollo! Honor sent McKeon though with four Apollo ships and he still managed to get himself killed?

Temporarily bracketing the question of how the Peeps managed to locate McKeon's ships, what were any -- much less all -- of his squadron doing in range of any enemy forces? Textev bears proof of Honor and immediate family (McKeon especially) brainstorming Apollo's capabilities and tactical uses. So why didn't McKeon hyper in loaded for bear and satisfying his own quota of arse kicking?

Now, about that little matter of the Peeps able to so quickly identify and destroy four Apollo capable ships that were all somehow in range. H-O-W!?

Perhaps it's just me hitting the pipe this time. <shrugs>

JeffEngel wrote:

cthia wrote:How the heck did I miss that there were four Apollo capable ships in McKeon's squadron? And with four Apollo capable ships he could only manage to kill one Peep ship at a time? What the hell? Talk about a massive missile gone limp in McKeon's hands. He was like kryptonite to Apollo! Honor sent McKeon though with four Apollo ships and he still managed to get himself killed?

Temporarily bracketing the question of how the Peeps managed to locate McKeon's ships, what were any -- much less all -- of his squadron doing in range of any enemy forces? Textev bears proof of Honor and immediate family (McKeon especially) brainstorming Apollo's capabilities and tactical uses. So why didn't McKeon hyper in loaded for bear and satisfying his own quota of arse kicking?

Now, about that little matter of the Peeps able to so quickly identify and destroy four Apollo capable ships that were all somehow in range. H-O-W!?

Perhaps it's just me hitting the pipe this time. <shrugs>

Luck. They got lucky. It happens. There are only so many targets, they're working through them as best they can - given limitations on targeting and 3rd Fleet's defenses - and sometimes, they manage to pick up on one of the targets that, ideally, they'd've selected if they could. I remind you, you're the same person who's constantly berating Haven for not picking up precisely one critical ship and destroying it, but now, you're berating that one (or three or four) critical ships for allowing themselves to be picked out.

In the midst of 3rd Fleet, the 8th Fleet loaners wouldn't be easily picked out, but chance still would leave it an option. Far away from 3rd Fleet, picking them out would have been automatic - and the hits would have been harder for the range and the longer period having to hold the missiles' hands. 3 ship-salvoes to destroy a peer target isn't bad.

Going it alone would have meant not being a part of 3rd Fleet's defense umbrella; not contributing to it; not having Apollo fire concealed among non-Apollo fire; and, if conducted at longer ranges, would have meant less effect per unit time, giving the Havenites more time to hit either RMN force harder. If they could not practically hit the loaners at all, it'd mean finishing 3rd Fleet that much faster instead. "Hey you, suck up fire for me" is not the Saganami Tradition.

kzt wrote:5th jumped inside of powered MDM range of 3rd. There was no magical way for the few Apollo armed ships to get out of powered MDM range of 5th. So you are objecting to the wrong issue.

Eighth Fleet was the only formation in space fully equipped with the new system, and Honor and her captains had spent long, thoughtful hours exploring Apollo's ramifications. Now she was prepared to use them.