Discussions on raiding...

Duckk wrote:[In AAC, places like Alizon and Zanzibar had multiple cruiser squadrons, some wallers, many discrete patterns of system defense pods, and hundreds of LACs. The second tier Havenite systems hit during Operation Cutworm had a couple hundred pods and a LAC wing, along with a cruiser or battlecruiser squadron, with the occasional battleship.

Hindreds of LACs might be too low a number. When Zanzibar got hit the first time after the ceasefire they exposed the fact that, in addition to the inner system pods and LAC bases they'd also seeded the hyper limit area with out-system LACs bases supported by pods. With a roughly 40 lightminute diameter hyperlimit you'd need at least 18 separate out-system bases to have just touching powered MDM engagement range spheres. And based on the description it sounded like noticeably more dense. So a secondary Ally probably had north of 36 LAC bases between the in-system and out-system installations - all backed by MDM pods.

Of course much of that was political. Reassuring them after they'd gotten hammered in the first war; and because Manticore didn't have the depth to have truly unimportant systems to defend. But even the minimal tripwire bases in occupied Perp systems like Tequila would have enough LACs to put a hurt on BC scale raiding forces (unless they came in truly vast numbers).

Edit2: (I'd originally missed there was a 2nd station) Tequila's two stations, T-001 and T-002, launched a combined 211 LACs at the Peeps -- roughly double what a CLAC carried; and the Peeps thought there might have been 4 or 5 more down for maintenance. T-001, and presumable also T-002, was modified to support "a standard group of a hundred and eight LACs", 2 of which groups would fit with the Peep's intel count

I think they're going to figure out that they're screwed pretty much everywhere they go. Might as well go for a target like Bolthole on a suicide run. Though its not like they could find bolthole anyway. Unless... Uh, guys, is Amos Parnell still in the Solarian League? Because I think a bunch of people would like to talk to him about what the Manties and Havanites have been doing.

Bill Woods wrote:

Fireflair wrote:I'm glad this was able to strike up a good discussion. I had forgotten the numbers of ships in the Havenite initial battle against LACs, and the fact that they were the much larger BBs and not BC's. It seems to be the consensus that any small number, say fifty or less, of SLN BCs will be sticking their hand in a blender if they go after an alliance system.

How many times do you think they'll do that before they realize it's a loosing proposition?

A while, I'd guess. Send off a task force with a rousing speech. A few months later, they reach their target system. A month or two after that you get word from the Manties, claiming another victory, with an appended list of captured spacers. And after that the surviving ships return.

Not that many. Frontier Fleet by itself was said to outmass the entire pre-war RMN and based on the 1905 chart, this allows for ~3,000 BCs or equivalent in more numerous(but smaller) vessels.

My guess would be 1500 BCs plus about 2000 or 2500 cruisers and destroyers... except if FF has more than four thousand vessels, then they wouldn't be so strapped for hulls in the Verge/Protectorate - there are only 4,000 or so systems out there to police/oppress. Very few, if any, accompanied Filareta's fleet(I think all of Filareta's screen were formally BF units).

So those numbers are perhaps optimistic. In any case, with this impressive armada, the League can raid 30 systems with 50 BCs each, if it goes completely on the offensive and leaves nothing defended or garrisoned.

50 BCs are going to have a tough time overcoming a LAC wing or two plus two SD(P)s worth of pods. At least 1,000 - probably 2,000 pods. Twenty thousand missiles is 400 per BC.

The loss rate would be unsustainable. They'd run out of ships as quickly as Battle Fleet is running out of them.

Fireflair wrote:I'm glad this was able to strike up a good discussion. I had forgotten the numbers of ships in the Havenite initial battle against LACs, and the fact that they were the much larger BBs and not BC's. It seems to be the consensus that any small number, say fifty or less, of SLN BCs will be sticking their hand in a blender if they go after an alliance system.

How many times do you think they'll do that before they realize it's a loosing proposition?

Bill Woods wrote: A while, I'd guess. Send off a task force with a rousing speech. A few months later, they reach their target system. A month or two after that you get word from the Manties, claiming another victory, with an appended list of captured spacers. And after that the surviving ships return.

munroburton wrote:
Not that many. Frontier Fleet by itself was said to outmass the entire pre-war RMN and based on the 1905 chart, this allows for ~3,000 BCs or equivalent in more numerous(but smaller) vessels.

My guess would be 1500 BCs plus about 2000 or 2500 cruisers and destroyers... except if FF has more than four thousand vessels, then they wouldn't be so strapped for hulls in the Verge/Protectorate - there are only 4,000 or so systems out there to police/oppress. Very few, if any, accompanied Filareta's fleet(I think all of Filareta's screen were formally BF units).

So those numbers are perhaps optimistic. In any case, with this impressive armada, the League can raid 30 systems with 50 BCs each, if it goes completely on the offensive and leaves nothing defended or garrisoned.

50 BCs are going to have a tough time overcoming a LAC wing or two plus two SD(P)s worth of pods. At least 1,000 - probably 2,000 pods. Twenty thousand missiles is 400 per BC.

The loss rate would be unsustainable. They'd run out of ships as quickly as Battle Fleet is running out of them.

My point was that the cycle time is rather long. You try a set of raids, and they get shot to pieces. But maybe the plan was poorly executed or they were unlucky? So you make some adjustments and try again ... and they also get shot to pieces. So maybe version 3.0 will be a winner? Or maybe now you give up that strategy -- but you've already burned up about a year (as well as a lot of ships).

Bill Woods wrote:... and they also get shot to pieces. So maybe version 3.0 will be a winner? Or maybe now you give up that strategy -- but you've already burned up about a year (as well as a lot of ships).

"Hey Rocky, watch me pull a successful raid out of my..."

"Oh Bullwinkle, that trick never works."

"...a**."

They could probably do considerable damage to the pretty non-existent infrastructure of Nuncio. I don't recall Montana having much besides some couple of hundred year old weather/nav satellites. After Lacoon I there'd be slim pickings for Manty shipping. Maybe they could pop over to Silesia and knock off a few Andermani Freighters.

Bill Woods wrote:My point was that the cycle time is rather long. You try a set of raids, and they get shot to pieces. But maybe the plan was poorly executed or they were unlucky? So you make some adjustments and try again ... and they also get shot to pieces. So maybe version 3.0 will be a winner? Or maybe now you give up that strategy -- but you've already burned up about a year (as well as a lot of ships).

Well, time is relative.

One year is a very small amount of time to utterly destroy the largest navy to ever exist. The first Manticore-Haven war lasted 10 years; the second lasted three years.

If the Grendelsbane loss is ignored, the SLN has lost almost more tonnage in two battles than both sides did during both wars.

WeirdlyWired wrote:After Lacoon I there'd be slim pickings for Manty shipping. Maybe they could pop over to Silesia and knock off a few Andermani Freighters.

Well except for the fact that Manticore and the Andies have been building up the defenses there since the end if the ceasefire. Remember Thunderbolt started with an attack on Marsh, and there was commerce raiding there during the first war. Can't imagine that after the partition there weren't steps taken to discourage a repeat of that raiding. Plus of course at 100+ LY past Manticore it's an extra half month or more of max speed cruising for warships beyond the lengthy travel it took the forces of Raging Justice to reach Manticore. Your operational cycles to Silesia are going to suck worse than any other place you might try to strike at Mantie shipping.

Jonathan_S wrote:

Edit: Tequila's station, T-001, launched 211 LACs at the Peeps -- roughly double what a CLAC carried; and the Peeps thought there might have been 4 or 5 more down for maintenance. Though confusingly, ch 55 said it was modified to support "a standard group of a hundred and eight LACs" while ch 56 talks about the aforementioned 211, mentions "both LAC groups", and then has the 700+ Peep LACs facing "less than a third that many Manty LACs"; all self-consitent with the idea the station actually supported 2 standard groups, for a nominal 216 LACs.

I can answer that one easily enough for you Jon. Tequila had two stations, we only got the information on T-001, because that was the one LAC skipper, who'd been in the Buttercup Offensive and had been busting ass for command. So one station holding the "standard group of 108 LACs" doubled puts the total Tequila LAC force at 216, which matches up to Havenite observed 211 launched plus four or five down.

jtg452 wrote:Here's a question, how does the SLN BC's sidewalls match up against those huge BC class spinal weapons mounted in the Shrikes? SLN doctrine already has their ships light on CM and PD and their sensors are pretty close to junk so how well could they stand up to a LAC 'mugging' (slip in close under stealth and make firing runs like they did against the Havenite BB's)?

Actually, we know from both pre-First War, and after Henke captured Byng's force at New Tuscany that Solarian ships actually aren't all *that* bad on the hardware side.

Where they truly come up short, on both sensors and their decoys, is the programming that operates that hardware is very much coming up short. SLN ships would still be light on PDLC batteries, and CM tubes, but if they fired a better/smarter CM, and their sensors and decoys were properly programmed, they could almost give as good as they get.

But just updating their sensor, for lack of a better term software drivers, and updating their decoy softwares since even HALO was almost as capable as RMN decoys, they could avoid an ultra close range LAC mugging that starts with complete surprise. No SLN ships are fast enough to avoid the mugging completely, but they should be able to detect the LACs far enough out to make them work for the mugging, instead of being completely ignorant of LAC presence.

Somtaaw wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:

Edit: Tequila's station, T-001, launched 211 LACs at the Peeps -- roughly double what a CLAC carried; and the Peeps thought there might have been 4 or 5 more down for maintenance. Though confusingly, ch 55 said it was modified to support "a standard group of a hundred and eight LACs" while ch 56 talks about the aforementioned 211, mentions "both LAC groups", and then has the 700+ Peep LACs facing "less than a third that many Manty LACs"; all self-consitent with the idea the station actually supported 2 standard groups, for a nominal 216 LACs.

I can answer that one easily enough for you Jon. Tequila had two stations, we only got the information on T-001, because that was the one LAC skipper, who'd been in the Buttercup Offensive and had been busting ass for command. So one station holding the "standard group of 108 LACs" doubled puts the total Tequila LAC force at 216, which matches up to Havenite observed 211 launched plus four or five down.

Ah, thanks. That's the danger of doing searches through books rather than rereading them; you miss things like "T-001 and her sister station T-002 were all the defenders the Tequila System had"
(I'll go edit my earlier post)