Hypothetical 2.5M ton BC(P)

SharkHunter wrote:The suggested counter to the Sag-C's plus freighter approach seems to be a "star system chock full of hidden SDF pods, and the fact that they're not going to deploy one freighter per pair of Sag-Cs. And the fact that Keyhole makes the big new battlecruisers that much better. Agreement on all counts...

However, that doesn't mean the counter is workable. Given that no one outside the GA has shoals of MDM SDF pods, AND Keyhole capable battlecruisers available. So

--snipping--
Do you really think I won't win?...

Perhaps you've forgotten... Space is big.

Whole argument is entirely based on "well I have GA tech and you don't", which makes it really shifty.

Keep in mind, the Republic of Haven took less than 3 T-years to go from no MDMs, no podnoughts, no CLACs or effective LACs, to having all of the above and more or less simultaneously starting to emplace MDM pods in the system-defense format. Granted, that was with Foraker in charge, but they solved the baffle problem that took Manticore, what about 20 to 30 T-years to figure out?, and they[Haven] did it in THREE.

Any hypothetical battles have to assume more or less equal tech, even Manticore knows that it's not going to hold superior technology forever, thus the Harrington Doctrine decision to break up the League into chunks that won't be itching to smash that "upstart neo-barb nation" into dust bunnies in the future.

Somtaaw wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:The suggested counter to the Sag-C's plus freighter approach seems to be a "star system chock full of hidden SDF pods, and the fact that they're not going to deploy one freighter per pair of Sag-Cs. And the fact that Keyhole makes the big new battlecruisers that much better. Agreement on all counts...

However, that doesn't mean the counter is workable. Given that no one outside the GA has shoals of MDM SDF pods, AND Keyhole capable battlecruisers available. So

--snipping--
Do you really think I won't win?...

Perhaps you've forgotten... Space is big.

Whole argument is entirely based on "well I have GA tech and you don't", which makes it really shifty.

Keep in mind, the Republic of Haven took less than 3 T-years to go from no MDMs, no podnoughts, no CLACs or effective LACs, to having all of the above and more or less simultaneously starting to emplace MDM pods in the system-defense format. Granted, that was with Foraker in charge, but they solved the baffle problem that took Manticore, what about 20 to 30 T-years to figure out?, and they[Haven] did it in THREE.

Any hypothetical battles have to assume more or less equal tech, even Manticore knows that it's not going to hold superior technology forever, thus the Harrington Doctrine decision to break up the League into chunks that won't be itching to smash that "upstart neo-barb nation" into dust bunnies in the future.

Once you see the technology in action, it is a usually a lot less expensive and faster for someone else to duplicate it.

A good case in point, it only took russia half the time (2 years instead of 4 year) and about 20% the cost the US spent to create an atomic bomb.

It does requires you to """think outside the box""" something that hemphill and foraker are both good at. On a scale of 1-10, both would be either a 9 or 10.

Unfortunatly, on a scale of 1-10, I would class mesa as about a 3, the SL would be a 1. The cataphract shows that mesa and the SL are not even looking at the baffle problem, but are spacing the drives as far apart as possible.

Once they hit upon the baffle idea, I suspect that they could also create large capacitor driven pod launched MDM's like haven built in 3-5 years, but first the need to scrap the cataphract.

again unfortunately for the SL, it should "shortly" be known that manticore has the tube launched Mk-16 and Mk-23, and the SL is likely to spend several years (decades) trying to figure out how they did it.

There are a thousand plus fully industrialized SL system, with several trillion people living there. The odds that every single system had not a single innovator and absolutely no system government fails to notice that the entire SL has caught fire seems remote.

And if allowing a Manticoran diplomatic mission to talk to a neutral system usuall results in an RMN attack shortly thereafter you probably won't like the obvious countermove.

You don't actually need the "baffle" that Manticore has for system defense multi-stage missiles.
You just build the missile bigger - with sufficient space in between the drive rings. It's not going to be useable with shipboard tubes, but from pods and in the system defense missile role? It'll work just fine.


The BC(P) is most likely to be built by those who don't have practical tube launched dual drive missiles and/or want heavier warheads in the BC's magazines than the dual-stage missiles like the Cataphracts allow.

kzt wrote:There are a thousand plus fully industrialized SL system, with several trillion people living there. The odds that every single system had not a single innovator and absolutely no system government fails to notice that the entire SL has caught fire seems remote.

And if allowing a Manticoran diplomatic mission to talk to a neutral system usuall results in an RMN attack shortly thereafter you probably won't like the obvious countermove.

it is not that the SL dosen't have the innovators, it is that the innovators are not in power.

manticore/grayson/haven reward and promote the innovators and go getters. the creative people that think outside the box are where they need to be, in the weapons development billets.

The solarian leage Penolizes the innovators and go getters. the creative people that think outside the box are the ones in menial jobs because the """rocked the boat"""

Although there may be many times the total number of innovators in the SLN, they will mostly be 3rd class techs because the "mouthed off" when they shouldn't have and got on the shit list of someone in power who decided to destroy their career.

In short One good innovative engineer is worth 100 innovative ditch diggers with shovels in their hands. Manticore has innovative engineers, the SL has innovative ditch diggers.

Somtaaw wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:The suggested counter to the Sag-C's plus freighter approach seems to be a "star system chock full of hidden SDF pods, and the fact that they're not going to deploy one freighter per pair of Sag-Cs. And the fact that Keyhole makes the big new battlecruisers that much better. Agreement on all counts...

However, that doesn't mean the counter is workable. Given that no one outside the GA has shoals of MDM SDF pods, AND Keyhole capable battlecruisers available. So

--snipping--
Do you really think I won't win?...

Perhaps you've forgotten... Space is big.

Whole argument is entirely based on "well I have GA tech and you don't", which makes it really shifty.

Keep in mind, the Republic of Haven took less than 3 T-years to go from no MDMs, no podnoughts, no CLACs or effective LACs, to having all of the above and more or less simultaneously starting to emplace MDM pods in the system-defense format. Granted, that was with Foraker in charge, but they solved the baffle problem that took Manticore, what about 20 to 30 T-years to figure out?, and they[Haven] did it in THREE.

Any hypothetical battles have to assume more or less equal tech, even Manticore knows that it's not going to hold superior technology forever, thus the Harrington Doctrine decision to break up the League into chunks that won't be itching to smash that "upstart neo-barb nation" into dust bunnies in the future.

darrell wrote:Once you see the technology in action, it is a usually a lot less expensive and faster for someone else to duplicate it.

A good case in point, it only took russia half the time (2 years instead of 4 year) and about 20% the cost the US spent to create an atomic bomb.

It does requires you to """think outside the box""" something that hemphill and foraker are both good at. On a scale of 1-10, both would be either a 9 or 10.

Unfortunatly, on a scale of 1-10, I would class mesa as about a 3, the SL would be a 1. The cataphract shows that mesa and the SL are not even looking at the baffle problem, but are spacing the drives as far apart as possible.

Once they hit upon the baffle idea, I suspect that they could also create large capacitor driven pod launched MDM's like haven built in 3-5 years, but first the need to scrap the cataphract.

again unfortunately for the SL, it should "shortly" be known that manticore has the tube launched Mk-16 and Mk-23, and the SL is likely to spend several years (decades) trying to figure out how they did it.

This reply is directed at Somtaaw and this came off a little more brusk than I intended. I was short on time sorry.

Ok point one.

Russia developed the bomb in less time because of 2 factors.

1) They got more of the scientists involved in the research than we did.
2) They had spies deep into the US and already knew a lot about the Manhattan project. The Rosenbergs are a great example of this. They were able to steal a lot of info about the A-Bomb.

Point two.

Erewhon, went over to Haven and gave them everything up to Buttercup on a silver platter. That is how they caught up with Manticore in such short time. Short of the League getting that kind of windfall its going to take them a while to catch up.

I would expect the multi-drive missiles to be the first thing they catch up on, however with just light speed guidance they are going to be badly inaccurate past 30 million km just like Haven and Manticore noticed before Apollo was developed.

Jeroswen wrote:I would expect the multi-drive missiles to be the first thing they catch up on, however with just light speed guidance they are going to be badly inaccurate past 30 million km just like Haven and Manticore noticed before Apollo was developed.

The obvious answer is to build a missile that uses normal drive nodes instead of the missile drives, then harden the missile against the acceleration since you dropped the compensator. Which isn't really that hard given what actually exists in the real world. Rounds hit tens of thousands of g's during the point where they are being accelerated to several km sec in 10 meters or less.

kzt wrote:

Jeroswen wrote:I would expect the multi-drive missiles to be the first thing they catch up on, however with just light speed guidance they are going to be badly inaccurate past 30 million km just like Haven and Manticore noticed before Apollo was developed.

The obvious answer is to build a missile that uses normal drive nodes instead of the missile drives, then harden the missile against the acceleration since you dropped the compensator. Which isn't really that hard given what actually exists in the real world. Rounds hit tens of thousands of g's during the point where they are being accelerated to several km sec in 10 meters or less.

no, the obvious answer is to build a full Dual Drive missile with one impeller ring at each end of the missile

sensors
first impeller
warhead
computer
capacitors
second impeller

This configuration will not need an impeller baffle.

Jeroswen wrote:
This reply is directed at Somtaaw and this came off a little more brusk than I intended. I was short on time sorry.

No problems, I'm rather like Hamish, I love an energetic debate and wrestling a problem down, long as we don't get to insulting one another, I have no problems with your tone... and to address your point two

Jeroswen wrote:Erewhon, went over to Haven and gave them everything up to Buttercup on a silver platter. That is how they caught up with Manticore in such short time. Short of the League getting that kind of windfall its going to take them a while to catch up.

I would expect the multi-drive missiles to be the first thing they catch up on, however with just light speed guidance they are going to be badly inaccurate past 30 million km just like Haven and Manticore noticed before Apollo was developed.

Actually Haven was already developing the tech BEFORE they signed Erewhon. The press release stating Theisman had built 60 podlaying superdreadnoughts was done months before they signed Erewhon. That Erewhon switched sides, meant a great deal to how fast Haven was "catching upto" Manticoran tech during At All Costs post-Thunderbolt era, but Haven developed their own MDMs, podnoughts, CLACs, and modern LACs entirely on their own purely off what they saw during Buttercup. Erewhon's "tech manuals and related" merely let them start the refining and polishing of their designs, but the initial designs are still 100% purely Havenite Foraker specials.

And there are/were repeated references that the League [and others] had observers at many battles, which means the SLN should have reports somewhere. That al-Fanudahi, that's in Solarian League intel and keeps pissing off his superiors because he HAS been stating that Manticore & Haven have pushed new boundaries on weapons technology, and nobody wants to hear it. As long as he isn't punished for such, when they finally start listening, the League could get their own MDM's really quickly. Not quite as quick as Haven did, because the SLN is still using missiles that were at best from pre-Basilisk Station, but they'll still get MDMs pretty quickly.

Somtaaw wrote:

Jeroswen wrote:Point two.

Erewhon, went over to Haven and gave them everything up to Buttercup on a silver platter. That is how they caught up with Manticore in such short time. Short of the League getting that kind of windfall its going to take them a while to catch up.

I would expect the multi-drive missiles to be the first thing they catch up on, however with just light speed guidance they are going to be badly inaccurate past 30 million km just like Haven and Manticore noticed before Apollo was developed.

Actually Haven was already developing the tech BEFORE they signed Erewhon. The press release stating Theisman had built 60 podlaying superdreadnoughts was done months before they signed Erewhon. That Erewhon switched sides, meant a great deal to how fast Haven was "catching upto" Manticoran tech during At All Costs post-Thunderbolt era, but Haven developed their own MDMs, podnoughts, CLACs, and modern LACs entirely on their own purely off what they saw during Buttercup. Erewhon's "tech manuals and related" merely let them start the refining and polishing of their designs, but the initial designs are still 100% purely Havenite Foraker specials.

And there are/were repeated references that the League [and others] had observers at many battles, which means the SLN should have reports somewhere. That al-Fanudahi, that's in Solarian League intel and keeps pissing off his superiors because he HAS been stating that Manticore & Haven have pushed new boundaries on weapons technology, and nobody wants to hear it. As long as he isn't punished for such, when they finally start listening, the League could get their own MDM's really quickly. Not quite as quick as Haven did, because the SLN is still using missiles that were at best from pre-Basilisk Station, but they'll still get MDMs pretty quickly.

It may very well take a while to get MDMs. The MAlign started trying to figure out how to make them and still hasn't.
On the other hand, the Andies did MDMs all on their own as well, after the first war.