(SPOILERS) Expected defeat at Beowulf.

Somtaaw wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:Frontier Fleet is said to be chronically short of hulls for their mission of keeping the iron heel on the neck of the Protectorates and the rest of the Verge; a lot of the regular allotment have been siphoned off to form the screen for the 600 SDs at Tasmania, and more are being siphoned off to form the commerce raiding force.

I'd disagree about Frontier Fleet actually having a lot forming screen for Tasmania. Filareta had virtually no screen when he went straight for Manticore, and I think Crandall was also very light on screen when she tried to hit Spindle.

We're used to powerful screens because both Manticore and Haven have been hammering back and forth with powerful walls, guarded by proper screen. While the Solarian League hasn't fought battles since the mentioned Farley's Crossing.... they rely on reputation more than actually being powerful, and after centuries with no threats or engagements, the senior officers likely don't even understand what 'proper screen' even is.


Frontier Fleet is so strapped for ships, they literally cant provide the screen, because they're still so busy running around pissing on fires. Now, it's possible if the SLN figures someway to reactivate their Reserve SD's, and use those as a force to stop forest fires, they could consolidate their much more modern light units for other duties (such as the commerce raiding, screen, scouting, etc)

If you look up a few posts, you'll find a snippet from MoH (posted by CRC) that says the follow-up force at Tasmania has a screen supplied by Frontier Fleet. That's where I got the info.

Although the SL has decided not to reactivate the reserve, let's think about an issue that has been mentioned but not really talked through in depth - where are they going to get 6 million officers and enlisted?

It's going to take time to train them from the ground up, so they need something like a Naval Reserve. Assuming they do two weeks every year, where do they train? Do they spend several weeks traveling to and from an anchorage where there are mothballed (and very obsolete) wallers, or do they have a "Reserve Training Command" with its own fleet of wallers that they keep moving from one planet with reservists to the next so they can do their two weeks? Given transit times between systems, that may account for 800 to a thousand wallers that are actually in commission.

JohnRoth wrote:Although the SL has decided not to reactivate the reserve, let's think about an issue that has been mentioned but not really talked through in depth - where are they going to get 6 million officers and enlisted?

That is part of the reason they have decided not to even try to reactivate the reserve -- no money, no manpower, and nothing but death-traps in the reserve.

JohnRoth wrote:

Somtaaw wrote:I'd disagree about Frontier Fleet actually having a lot forming screen for Tasmania. Filareta had virtually no screen when he went straight for Manticore, and I think Crandall was also very light on screen when she tried to hit Spindle.

We're used to powerful screens because both Manticore and Haven have been hammering back and forth with powerful walls, guarded by proper screen. While the Solarian League hasn't fought battles since the mentioned Farley's Crossing.... they rely on reputation more than actually being powerful, and after centuries with no threats or engagements, the senior officers likely don't even understand what 'proper screen' even is.


Frontier Fleet is so strapped for ships, they literally cant provide the screen, because they're still so busy running around pissing on fires. Now, it's possible if the SLN figures someway to reactivate their Reserve SD's, and use those as a force to stop forest fires, they could consolidate their much more modern light units for other duties (such as the commerce raiding, screen, scouting, etc)

If you look up a few posts, you'll find a snippet from MoH (posted by CRC) that says the follow-up force at Tasmania has a screen supplied by Frontier Fleet. That's where I got the info.

It may still be an inadequate screen by the standards of other navies, or even the SLN for full-scale wartime planning; it's still going to have problems with BF/FF friction along with no practice in screening duty; and it still means that FF is that much even thinner spread than always. So there's no reason to doubt that providing that screen is causing all the problems you may expect for modest returns; there's just very good reason to believe it really does exist.

Well - there is the possibility still that the FF formations ordered to surrender units for that screen were not able or were not quite willing to comply, or that they're doing so slowly, and that word confirming that sorry state of affairs isn't back to Old Chicago yet.

JohnRoth wrote:Although the SL has decided not to reactivate the reserve, let's think about an issue that has been mentioned but not really talked through in depth - where are they going to get 6 million officers and enlisted?

It's going to take time to train them from the ground up, so they need something like a Naval Reserve. Assuming they do two weeks every year, where do they train? Do they spend several weeks traveling to and from an anchorage where there are mothballed (and very obsolete) wallers, or do they have a "Reserve Training Command" with its own fleet of wallers that they keep moving from one planet with reservists to the next so they can do their two weeks? Given transit times between systems, that may account for 800 to a thousand wallers that are actually in commission.

I don't think that wallers without crews even nominally aboard are being counted as in commission. That said, it could be that some of the "in commission" wallers are in fact short of crew by SLN standards, with lots and lots of them on indefinite leave while the waller rests in orbit and the unit and fleet commander are confident they won't possibly be called upon. Still, things have been worrisome for the SLN long enough for those crews to be called back with fair urgency by now.

When I asked about what plan the SLN had for manning the Reserve even in theory some months ago, the consensus was there probably was no plan that had survived the centuries in any shape to be actually implemented. It's worth remembering that the Reserve wasn't meant to be something that could be up and going in its entirety or majority in just a number of months - it was meant to assure that, even if a need for expansion or replacement of the active fleet crept up on the League in a mere 5-20 year period, they'd be able to do that expansion/replacement far, far faster than if they would have had to build that entire force. Stuff with Manticore didn't creep up, it leapt out, and the pace of losses - with Manticore suffering trivial losses meanwhile and in fact getting lots of allies! - has been vastly more than any Reserve plan ever contemplated. And that's before the advances in warfighting technology making the Reserve useless were ever factored in.

Brigade XO wrote:We see Crandall get reamed at Spindle the Filerta looses that entire fleet at 2nd Manticore. So, in it's wisdom the SLN now has (or had) 600 SDs AND supporting screen /logistics units at Tasmania that was going to be the 2nd (and larger) attack if 400 SD couldn't take the Manticore System.
Who or what is minding the store back in the League?

Exactly what kind of system is Tasmania anyway? What is there that could support 1st 400 and then 600 SDs and attached screening + logistics units (and ships stuffed with Marines)?
Does Tasmania get ANY civilian traffic? That could be inconvenient if some freighter stops to offload and then load cargo and goes anywhere it could mention it was in this little out-of-the-way place and there was this gargantuan SL waller fleet sitting in the system. Would probably take a reallly piss poor sensor system to miss a fleet the size of Filerta's if you pulled into a system to do cargo transfer and there were , say, 500 warships, sitting with impellers on or even just anti-collision lights/beacons.

Too bad the Alignment doesn't have something that could slip into the system and shoot the crap out of the next best 600 SLN wallers and screen. Oh, wait, they do, and they know those ships are there.

The Alignment isn't going to shoot at the Sollies--that would make the willful blindness the Mandarins are engaging in much harder to keep up. I also don't think they have the ability to shoot them up--we have seen no indication of advanced weapons in Alignment hands. All they have are those weapons they used against Manticore but I don't think they're really anything special. Nobody else built anything like it because it's not a viable weapon other than for a sneak attack. To work they have to close to energy range--and that means surviving the CM fire. Since they don't have missile-grade acceleration they can't come in fast other than by a C-frac strike, the CMs will eat them up.

They also used everything they had in Oyster Bay.

JeffEngel wrote:It may still be an inadequate screen by the standards of other navies, or even the SLN for full-scale wartime planning; it's still going to have problems with BF/FF friction along with no practice in screening duty; and it still means that FF is that much even thinner spread than always. So there's no reason to doubt that providing that screen is causing all the problems you may expect for modest returns; there's just very good reason to believe it really does exist.

Well - there is the possibility still that the FF formations ordered to surrender units for that screen were not able or were not quite willing to comply, or that they're doing so slowly, and that word confirming that sorry state of affairs isn't back to Old Chicago yet.

There's another simpler issue concerning the Screen for the Tasmania 2 force - namely where is it going to come from? Tasmania 1 already raided the region around Tasmania and the surrounding sectors for their screen, So a repeat will turn up mostly bare cupboards as the remaining ships in those sectors will be scattered on missions and not available.. No, You'll have to call in every spare ship in the northern SL quadrant to form a decent screen. Of course the region won't be bare, but there will be no reserves left to deal with any issues.

Theemile wrote:

JeffEngel wrote:It may still be an inadequate screen by the standards of other navies, or even the SLN for full-scale wartime planning; it's still going to have problems with BF/FF friction along with no practice in screening duty; and it still means that FF is that much even thinner spread than always. So there's no reason to doubt that providing that screen is causing all the problems you may expect for modest returns; there's just very good reason to believe it really does exist.

Well - there is the possibility still that the FF formations ordered to surrender units for that screen were not able or were not quite willing to comply, or that they're doing so slowly, and that word confirming that sorry state of affairs isn't back to Old Chicago yet.

There's another simpler issue concerning the Screen for the Tasmania 2 force - namely where is it going to come from? Tasmania 1 already raided the region around Tasmania and the surrounding sectors for their screen, So a repeat will turn up mostly bare cupboards as the remaining ships in those sectors will be scattered on missions and not available.. No, You'll have to call in every spare ship in the northern SL quadrant to form a decent screen. Of course the region won't be bare, but there will be no reserves left to deal with any issues.

And it'd be precisely that area that would be least distant from most GA targets for Kingsford's commerce raiding plans. They could raid Talbott Quadrant shipping, such as it is, with western FF forces - but those are in much, much worse shape now than Old Chicago yet realizes after Gold Peak's rampage.

Darn shame the League's never bothered to build and crew an appropriate fleet mix.

Theemile wrote:...No, You'll have to call in every spare ship ...

Frontier Fleet has NO "spare ships." Especially not if they're going to be tasked with commerce raiding in addition to all of the routine duties they already don't have enough ships to do right without relying on the reputation of an 800 Kilo Gorilla.

Weird Harold wrote:

Theemile wrote:...No, You'll have to call in every spare ship ...

Frontier Fleet has NO "spare ships." Especially not if they're going to be tasked with commerce raiding in addition to all of the routine duties they already don't have enough ships to do right without relying on the reputation of an 800 Kilo Gorilla.

Usually any force will have:

Normal Policing/fighting levels
Minimum Policing/fighting levels
a central reserve
Maintenance rotation.

The Reserve and the maintenance rotation are usually above the Normal levels. Any "reserve" might not be sitting on it's hands, but it might be busy running to deal with issues the normal forces can't (ie DD/CLs for patrolling - CA/BC divisions for playing wack-a-mole)

While it has constantly been stated that the FF is short staffed and under sized for it's job, even if it shouldn't, every organization has contingency plans for when it has to cut levels to the bone. It may not want to, Service will suffer, but the job will get done...ish.

After Tasmania 1, the whole region has to be down near minimum force levels, and whatever reserve they did have for emergencies is gone. So the FF in those regions will have trouble just doing their normal jobs.

Sounds like the perfect place to stir the pot to me.