Stories you wish were told?

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George J. Smith wrote:I wish the Manticoran government would pass the contents of those databases to all the newsies in the HV, that would really stir up an ants nest.

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I don't remember saying that, maybe a miss-snip from a nested quote by someone, but not me.

Said it before, will say it again:

I want a series based on Haven. Ideally, a three part series.
Book 1- Haven's founding and the golden years, when it was Athens in Space.
Book 2- The slide into the People's Republic, culminating with the DuQuesne Plan.
Book 3- Conquests up to OBS.

The first two books could be told with a dual viewpoint.. One senior character and one junior character who interact, with the characters only being around for 5-6 chapters each as the series rapidly progress across the changing times. Book 3 could give us Parnell as a Captain, Yu as a middy, etc...

I'd love a short (long) story about Earth's Final War, and then another about the founding of the Solarian League. Think of 'By The Book', but more closely related to the actual story!

Finally, a short story on the last Grayson - Masadan war before HotQ. Because why not! And maybe one about the Civil War and Benji the Great!

kzt wrote:

Rincewind wrote:None, but what about an America class Assault ship? Or, if you are wanting to go for something a smaller navy might operate, how about a Mistral class LPD equipped with attack helicopters? Even smaller navies are getting in on the act with aviation capable ships. They may not be big flat tops but they would still be functional. I believe a Honorverse variant of this is what was being proposed.

So , sutting the chase, you are in favor of putting 25% of the US navy off of Somalia to deal with the threat of 4 guys in 20 foot speed boat?

Oddly enough, the US Navy's deployment plans don't include a spare 25% free to suppress the deadly threat of 4 guys with AKs in a 20 foot speed boat, so are you planning on surrendering the Pacific to China or the Persian Gulf to Iran in exchange for suppressing the threat of 4 guys with AKs in a 20 foot speedboat?

The point is none of this is cost-free. There are always a lot more missions you would like to accomplish than you have hulls to assign. So assigning hulls to low value missions means that missions of national importance, the missions that people fund the navy to accomplish, don't get done. Or you get to spend a whole lot more money to build the navy that can do both at the same time.

YOU might not but there are plenty of examples of navies that WOULD! I rechecked to confirm my memory but both the Royal Navy's HMS Albion, (which at the time was the Fleet Flagship) AND one of the Italian Navy's San Giorgio class LPDs acted as flagship of Operation Atalante, the European Union's anti-piracy operation off the coast of Somalia during the period 2011 to 2012. Also, Albion's sister ship, Bulwark has acted as flagship of the EU Task Force dealing with the Mediterranean refugee crisis as has another of the San Giorgio's. I chose the example of an America class Assault Carrier as the closest to the type of ship that he was referring to although I would agree with you that it probably is too much ship. But then again they were saying THAT about the use of the latest Guided Missile Destroyers in anti-piracy operations.

I also reread Weird Harold's original post. In it he referred to a type of reduced size CLAC, an Escort Carrier variant built up a smaller mercantile hull perhaps. That was why I used the example of a Mistral-class LPD. Another would be the San Giorgio class LPD built for the Algerian Navy. The USN MIGHT consider chasing a bunch of guys waving AK47s in a speed boat as not worthy of them & not cost effective but, when faced with the disruption caused by such piracy, regional navies would not. Given the large areas to be covered it is the surveillance & tracking as well as intelligence capabilities if not the combat capabilities of a larger combatant that would be needed. Plus, if they were carrying Troops they could conduct ground assaults on the pirates' home bases.

Finally, on August 31st/September 1st 1945 Japanese suicide boats conducted attacks on the British Task Force sent to reoccupy Hong Kong. In turn they, and their bases were destroyed by airstrikes launched by HMS Indomitable & HMS Venerable because it was the safest, if not the most cost effective way of dealing with the threat. Sometimes a bit of overkill goes a long, long way & an added benefit would be that the ships & crews would get a work up on actual operations which would be invaluable for their readiness posture.

Rincewind wrote:I also reread Weird Harold's original post. In it he referred to a type of reduced size CLAC, an Escort Carrier variant built up a smaller mercantile hull perhaps.

Credit (or blame) where Credit is due: The idea of an escort carrier (eg Agamenon BP(P)s converted to CLACs is Lord Skimper's idea.

The idea of a cargo module adaptation for a couple or several LACs in a Q-Ship-like role is actually RFC's IIRC.

I was rather hoping for a story about Left & Right Stripe adopting a set of twins in the Stephanie Harrington books.

Shoot, I just want to know if that guy Ensign Helen Zilwicki had a crush on (was falling in love with?) survived the attack on Manticore.


(Or as LMB put it in A Civil Campaign (if I recall correctly), "…not only was love contagious, it was highly contagious.")

ncwolf wrote:Shoot, I just want to know if that guy Ensign Helen Zilwicki had a crush on (was falling in love with?) survived the attack on Manticore.


(Or as LMB put it in A Civil Campaign (if I recall correctly), "…not only was love contagious, it was highly contagious.")

Yes he did, he was evacuated to the planet surface in the drill.

ncwolf wrote:Shoot, I just want to know if that guy Ensign Helen Zilwicki had a crush on (was falling in love with?) survived the attack on Manticore.


(Or as LMB put it in A Civil Campaign (if I recall correctly), "…not only was love contagious, it was highly contagious.")

He was on the yard over Gryphon, and that yard was evacuated in time, courtesy of a real life evacuation training ordered by the commanding admiral ... so yes, he survived with a 99.999% probability.

A story I want to read (and hopefully get the chance to do as soon as SOV is available as e-ARC) would cover the fate of Zachariah McBride - that was the Mesan scientist from CoG, who killed his guardian during the Torchese attack against Balcescu station. Did he arrive at Darius or was he catched by the GA? Or let he even happen that catch deliberately if the chance arose?

Firebrand, history, training, missions, successes, close calls, etc... He is the best.

Weird Harold wrote:

Rincewind wrote:I also reread Weird Harold's original post. In it he referred to a type of reduced size CLAC, an Escort Carrier variant built up a smaller mercantile hull perhaps.

Credit (or blame) where Credit is due: The idea of an escort carrier (eg Agamenon BP(P)s converted to CLACs is Lord Skimper's idea.

The idea of a cargo module adaptation for a couple or several LACs in a Q-Ship-like role is actually RFC's IIRC.

We already have design for a escort CLAC namely the Trojan class AMC. Just yank out the SD grade missiles and grazers, keep the pod bay for self defense and limited offense. You could easily carry 24 LAC's and without the extra crew and marines needed that could be extended to say 36 LAC's. That's roughly half the firepower of a Minitore class CLAC.