Theemile wrote:Refining KZT's point, let's define the players. The League has just under 1800 members, and an unknown number of protectorates (probably somewhere between 200 and 500). With wormholes, double planet systems, military bases, etc, we could easily say that there are 2500 major "targets" in the League.
[/The textev repeatedly says 'several hundred protectorates', which I take to mean at least 600, while the number of known wormhole termini is probably between 50-60 throughout interstellar humanity's explored space, and given the SL's penchant for corruption, I doubt there are few naval bases in uninhabited systems within the SL, when so much can be made by the host system, so I'll buy approximately 2500 total potential targets, but note they aren't all simultaneously critically important]
Assuming the RMN has retired or sold off most of the light and legacy fleet units seen in the 1920 fleet list and extrapolating from HOS's build numbers ( as well as figuring in known losses) we can figure that the active Manty fleet is probably smaller than 2000 units, with ~25% being capital ships. Grayson's fleet is insanely top heavy, with capital ships being over half of it's ~500 ships.
[/Very good, yet keep in mind the 1920 FSC is often contradicted by HoS; and given OB, I suspect all escorts are being retained to cope with the construction crisis, which would include some 700 'legacy' ships of the 840 on the chart, while the last ten monthes of new construction was certainly greater than the first ten monthes (391 CA's, CL's, and DD's) so some 900 N/C should also be in service, along with approximately one hundred more BCP/L's and CLAC's, for a total of 200 each, besides 2-300 SDP's and the 230 old SD's, for something between 2400-2500.
The GSN's OoB isn't that strange since it doesn't have the MMM to protect, so aside from fleet work, they just have just a few local convoys to near neighbors, NTM HoS credits them with 54 DD's not 20, and 40 not 60 CA's.
Compared to the other fleets listed, the GSN's is fairly reasonable, the rest are truly ludicrous given their obvious requirements.
Indeed at the first HonorCon I managed to talk to RFC while he was waiting to sign books, and pestered him into admitting the IAN's listed escorts were far too few {which is why he signed my SoS HB with "I should have paid more attention!"
, although that was even more true of the RHN's, given 150 star system's to patrol and protect.
According to the chart, the IAN had only 280 active and 60 reserve cruisers and destroyers to patrol and protect ~39 star systems before adding Silesia's 33+ [their 51+%], which using the n(n-1)/2 rule to determine the number of potential routes (741) that free trade and commerce might choose to use, and while smaller distributed networks of only around 4-5 systems in ~5-6 weeks could drastically reduce convoy routes to perhaps 5-6%, the rate or frequency of visits (requiring more escorts) is critical to keeping the economy moving if not growing smoothly.
Indeed back at the bar, I argued the grossly inadequate peep escorts were a major reason the peep economy was choking if not starving; there weren't enough convoys moving enough goods fast enough.
My solution to this was to infer that all peep escorts of 5/8's or less tonnage than the latest RMN class [ie >53.125 Kt, which given the RHN was estimated to be ~25% superior to peep's of the same size meant the old ones had a less than 50% chance of surviving] were turned over to the commerce or interior ministries, to help deal with pirates (though some were ex-naval units from occupied systems), who generally had worse ships, and while the numbers were still grossly inadequate, any escort was far better than none.
Of course it might have helped that most such peep convoys may not have carried cargoes pirates wanted.
Unfortunately, it didn't seem appropriate or courteous to go back to my room to find my notes then return and lay all of my figures and reasoning on a hapless RFC, when he couldn't do the same.
So the great influx of thousands of MMM freighters into the RoH might turn out to be the best economic shot in the arm the RoH's more distant systems has yet experienced.
Thus, while the RHN's 571 escorts look better than the IAN's 340, the diminished RoH still had ~150 star systems for over 11,000 potential separate routes, so even 1% of those arranged for convoy routes makes the chart figures pitiful even without any for working for the fleet.]
We don't know Haven's build numbers yet, but the 1920 fleet list shows Haven's small fraction of light units. The massive losses at Manticore really hurt their light forces ( 100 CA and BCs were destroyed) in addition to the losses from Honor's raids. Unless they kicked up their light construction, we can extrapolate their 1923 fleet to be ~2000-2500 ships, with a capital fraction over 50%.
[/Since the RoH has some 40 industrialized systems, assigning several to construct each class should turn out huge numbers in the ~33 monthes since the second war began.
I think we all agree that Bolthole had to be doing some R&D on all RHN classes, though SDP's and CLAC's had the obvious maximum priority, and thence provided construction blueprints to each ship class group when the new design was approved [fairly quickly given the exigences of the war]; HoL will be very intriguing indeed.
With 12-13 times the number of industrialized star systems, and at least a 75% longer construction period (since the war began), twice or even three times the SKM/SEM's new construction total to OB seems very possible, for a combined total closer to 6000, leaving out the IAN which should add another 1000+.]
So the GA has ~4500-5000 warships from it's 3 major players to defend itself, it's convoys AND take the fight to the opposition.
And then there comes the problem of how the GA will know what anyone in the SL is doing. The major information gathering arm, the MMM, has been pulled from SL space, and some planets are still a month or more from a wormhole via DB; unless you send a ship to every target, you don't know what they are doing. And doing so will stretch the GA
fleets too far.
