Valiant vs Avalon

MuonNeutrino wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I swear, though I'm having trouble finding it at the moment, that there was a later discussion where Rozsak thought or said that he'd screwed up by getting too close and that his Mk17Es actually had more range than the Cataphracts he was facing (and we know from Duckk that those have 16.5 million km range)

I looked, but I can't find this one either - it might be in some later book instead?

It was, I just found it. Guess I hadn't remembered the magical keyword to find it before. It's in A Rising Thunder, when Rozsak is talking to Governor Barregos.

A Rising Thunder: Ch 8 wrote:And what made it my fault we got hammered was that if I’d thought about it at all, I didn’t have to close as far as I did. Even with those ’cataphract’ missiles, we had them outranged

And by that point Rozsak should have had solid info on the Cataphract's powered range - since Maya should have had access to the captured missile hardware, tactical computers, and crew interrogations from the surviving PNE units.

So if he says his Mark 17s outranged the Cataphract-As he was facing then he's presumably correct.

And finally, in WoH there's the combat between Jessica Epps and Hellbarde which was conducted using extended drive missiles (not that they were called that in the book) at 15 million km.

I went through some of this section of WoH, unfortunately I think you may have misremembered as the range was only 10 million km between Jessica Epps and Hellbarde, which doesn't tell us much that we don't already know.

I think you may be remembering a slightly later discussion instead, where Honor and Mercedes Brigham are discussing a different incident between manty and andy forces. That describes a fight between a manticoran CA and three andy CLs, and says that the manty CA (which had to have been a pre-mk16 design given when War of Honor takes place) opened fire at 15 million km. Unfortunately, we don't know anything about the geometry of the engagement [snip][/quote]
You're right, I didn't go back and double check and I was thinking of that other fight; the one with Ephraim Tudor. And I meant to mention that it was unclear if the 15 million was the missile's "at rest" range or modified by geometry. Usually David gives "at rest" ranges; but not always. That uncertainty was yet another way that the ERM range was far less certain that the rest of Manticore's arsenal.

Have not been lurking recently, so I'm kinda late to the party. With regards to the 'let's build smaller missiles' crowd a few things.

1 tMWW hath spoken: fusion powered SDMs are nogoes, fusion system plus required capacitors for start-up greater than a single drive's requirement for capacitors.

2 If a Mk 16 is overkill then increase EW head proportion and stop using double stacked salvoes. (This gives me an evil idea, everyone knows RMN birds are either EW or Attack, exclusively, so an EW platform with a light warhead is an unexpected thing.)

3 Hammerhead mounts make sense, broadsides are likely going to be squeezed by Keyhole bays.

back to the missiles rozak used at torch. I've always assumed that he was using the early erewhon version of the RMN's Mk 41, the first generation MDMs using capacitors.

when erewhon left the alliance DDMs didn't exist (as far as i can tell) or were still very new, as Sag C was only called a Sag C to get it past Janacek and the new Nike had not yet had full trials a couple of months after Marsh when it was given to Oversteen and Honor.

admittedly if you can build 3 drive missiles, building 2 drive missiles isn't much of a challenge but the idea to step MDMs down a bit so BC could carry them is fairly radical if you've only just got your head around need an even bigger SD to throw the 3 drive versions around.

either way it doesn't really matter as Rozak had always had the range to take out the PnE but the missiles were still fairly new and while the ammo ships contained a good number ammo was not unlimited and he wanted to hold back as many as he could should someone back in the core wake up to what they were doing and tried to do something about it before his BC(P) let alone his SD(p) were ready.

Dauntless wrote:back to the missiles rozak used at torch. I've always assumed that he was using the early erewhon version of the RMN's Mk 41, the first generation MDMs using capacitors.

when erewhon left the alliance DDMs didn't exist (as far as i can tell) or were still very new, as Sag C was only called a Sag C to get it past Janacek and the new Nike had not yet had full trials a couple of months after Marsh when it was given to Oversteen and Honor.

admittedly if you can build 3 drive missiles, building 2 drive missiles isn't much of a challenge but the idea to step MDMs down a bit so BC could carry them is fairly radical if you've only just got your head around need an even bigger SD to throw the 3 drive versions around.

Nope, the one thing ToF was clear on about his missiles was that they weren't MDMs.

Torch of Freedom: Ch 41 wrote:[The Marksman-class ships Rozsak had] carried the Mark-17-E, the Erewhon-built version of the Manticoran Mark-14 missile then-Captain Michael Oversteegen had used to such good effect at the Battle of Refuge three T-years earlier. They weren't multidrive missiles; in fact, Manticore had abandoned further development on them when the Mark 16 dual-drive missile proved a practical concept for cruiser-sized tubes. But they were substantially longer ranged than anything in the Solarian inventory.
[...]
Each of the Masquerade's pod bays just happened to be deep enough to mount three of the Erewhonese Space Navy's standard missile pods stacked end-to-end. [...]The currently available pods also contained the Mark-17-E, not full-scale multi-drive missiles.

It does talk slightly later about the plans to upgrade to pods of "the Mark-19, the ESN's most recent MDM variant"; but that wasn't available in time for the Battle of Torch.

I'd always thought that Mk 14 was a type in that snippet and full mdms meant fusion MDMs.

oh well. thanks for the correction.

Dauntless wrote:I'd always thought that Mk 14 was a type in that snippet and full mdms meant fusion MDMs.

oh well. thanks for the correction.

Nope. Erewhon never got micro-fusion tech at missile size. They might have microfusion tech for recon drones, but that's a different plant than the missile versions.

Kytheros wrote:Nope. Erewhon never got micro-fusion tech at missile size. They might have microfusion tech for recon drones, but that's a different plant than the missile versions.

No, it's exactly the same module.

kzt wrote:

Kytheros wrote:Nope. Erewhon never got micro-fusion tech at missile size. They might have microfusion tech for recon drones, but that's a different plant than the missile versions.

No, it's exactly the same module.

Textev?

kzt wrote:

Kytheros wrote:Nope. Erewhon never got micro-fusion tech at missile size. They might have microfusion tech for recon drones, but that's a different plant than the missile versions.

No, it's exactly the same module.

IIRC they're both described as Ghost Rider micro-fusion tech - but Ghost Rider is such a broad family of breakthroughs that just that statement alone doesn't really show its the exact same module.

Given the differing usage cycles and design goals between missiles and drones I'd actually be a little surprised if they used the exact same design - because it would mean the missile's was overbuilt (which usually translates into excess size and cost).
-- The missile needs power for its drive for no more than 9 minutes, and total powered life of probably less than 30; after which time it's destroyed.
-- In contrast the drone has to swan around a system for days, then usually return to the launching ship where it's refurbished (and time limited parts replaced) to prepare for its next deployment.

Why build the extra operation life, and maintenance access, for a missile?


That said, they'd almost certainly be very closely related designs, so I can't imagine if Erewhon had one that their engineers wouldn't quickly be able to alter the design to better suit the other. So, despite the fact that I doubt the recon drones and missiles share completely identical power plants, I don't think Erewhon had access to any microfusion designs or tech.

Grashtel wrote:

kzt wrote:No, it's exactly the same module.

Textev?

Iirc, it was a comment by David at Honorcon.