kzt wrote:Eventually they will start to pop the picket forces. You only have so much time before they can effectively do this, and the clock is running. A WH picket is in a terrible defensive position, as the attacker can appear without any warning at energy range. So the defender has to be ready to fight instantly all the time, and the attacker only needs to be ready to fight when they are ready to attack.
It's not that bad - the picket forces only need to be somewhere within about 1.6 million km of the terminus in order to get their 1st salvo in before anybody could clear the lane.
Even if you can emerge with pinpoint accuracy you need to be within 400,000 km of your target to engage with beams; and the blockaders should be moving around in a randomized pattern within that zone - so you'd either need luck or a ton of platforms to be likely to have them within energy range.
Plus termini have small hyperlimits of their own, and a dangerous resonance zone fanning out from them towards the nearest star. So close jumps are a little dangerous.
Oh, and the last time we saw someone try something like that, Citizen Rear Admiral Gregor Darlington's forces at Basilisk missed their jump by a
mere 23.7 million km. Just
slightly more than energy range...
(And that same book made the point that, as least with a crash transition, the crew is somewhat "incapacitated [...] for anywhere from ten seconds to two full minutes, depending on the individual. During those seconds and minutes, only the ships' automated missile defenses were available to stave off attack, and had any hostile vessel been in position to take advantage of that brief helplessness, the price could have been catastrophic.")
I've no doubt that the SLN can chase off the light forces the RMN is using to blockade wormholes. But I doubt they'll be able to catch and crush many of them.