Uncompromising Honor, Snippet #2

Direwolf18 wrote:This appears to be part of the "commerce raiding" force that Admiral Kingsford was suggesting. Its not a bad idea, if the Manticorian light units hadn't proven they can take out SLN heavies. That being said I have trouble thinking of any good ideas the SLN can do at this point.

Note the date on snippet #1 - July 1922 pd. While the CA's have shown their Chaconnes, news of the light forces really has not percolated. We're going to get some more over lap of the happenings from July-October from other points of view - so we may get to see the formation of the force that Scotty smashed in SoV.

Theemile wrote:

Direwolf18 wrote:This appears to be part of the "commerce raiding" force that Admiral Kingsford was suggesting. Its not a bad idea, if the Manticorian light units hadn't proven they can take out SLN heavies. That being said I have trouble thinking of any good ideas the SLN can do at this point.

Note the date on snippet #1 - July 1922 pd. While the CA's have shown their Chaconnes, news of the light forces really has not percolated. We're going to get some more over lap of the happenings from July-October from other points of view - so we may get to see the formation of the force that Scotty smashed in SoV.

Guys, you do realize that I had "only" 285,000 words or so to work with, right?

runsforcelery wrote:

Theemile wrote:
Note the date on snippet #1 - July 1922 pd. While the CA's have shown their Chaconnes, news of the light forces really has not percolated. We're going to get some more over lap of the happenings from July-October from other points of view - so we may get to see the formation of the force that Scotty smashed in SoV.

Guys, you do realize that I had "only" 285,000 words or so to work with, right?

<hands in the air> Hey, I'm not picking, I'm just pointing out the timeline. We can't expect characters to know what has not happened yet, or is only happening NOW, somewhere else.

Keep the goodness coming

::inhales snippet in single gulp::

Delicious. Can't wait for the next one.

...

“I can’t say I disagree, Gabby,” he said finally. “On the other hand, if the stories about what happened to Eleventh Fleet and Admiral Crandall are anything to go by, this could get . . . interesting.”

“One way to put it, Sir,” Timberlake agreed. “On the other hand, I think I like the thinking behind this. The bastards can’t have those killer missile pods and their damned superdreadnoughts everywhere!”

“They don’t need to have them ‘everywhere’ to ruin our whole day,” Capriotti pointed out dryly. “They only have to have them wherever we turn up.”

...

Plus! Since the League hasn't established a history of battles with the RMN or have prior commerce raiding data to draw upon, they cannot use a high tech AI algorithm to deduce the RMN's likely dispersal of combatants as the RHN did to set a trap for the Salamander. Theisman tore a hole in Honor's undies with that AI.

Besides, with the brains of Crandalls and Byngs to work with, who in the SLN could program such an algorithm. In the SLN it would simply be hampered by GIGO.

The communications delay is going to mostly work against the SLN. Even if a given Admiral or ship commander both believes the reports of RMN or RHN weapons and tactics, they still haven't seen them and have yet to come up with potential responces.

Even when there are starting to be SLN sucesses (they encounter RMN in combat and survive to phone home- note they might not win, just escape with their lives and ship) the information is going to have to be passed back and then distributed.

In the interim, the SLN is going to loose a lot of ships and crews which reduces its capabilities. Much of those losses are mostly going to go unreported unless RMN et al sends casualty lists and even that is going to take time.
Same thing with the communications delay on telling SLN you lost X. Mostly has to go back to Manticore and then to Earth unless the government or an agent on a planet reports via private ship or an SLN ship gets away to hyper from an engagement and eventualy reports in.

That Manticore is passing along casualty lists-and delivering them to the news services- to SLN is also a great piece of psychological warfare. Not only is much of the League (and everybody else) getting to know how bad the League's losses are, the League can't control the releases and must only react to the information. They are bleeding ships and crew at an astounding rate.

So Kingsford has Operation Buccaneer (which Manticore is going to point out is EXACTLY the dirty tricks OFS would use to destabelize inocent systems as Case Buccaneer). A squadron of BCs or other ships show up somewhere and encounter a lone GA ship (say a DD or CA). What happens next? If the lone ship knows it can't successfuly engage a squadron, it could run instead of making some pyric stand. On the other hand, given what the GA is likely to deploy in most area the SLN can get to, a GA warship running is probably faster than the SLN ships and if you start targeting one opponent at a time for (say stacked double broadsides) said SLN squadron is going to be down a couple of ships by the time the GA ship makes it to hyper and is gone. The SLN ships don't even have to be destroyed, any mission killed ship is a signifcant loss because it is probable that the SLN can't recover any ship that looses hyper capasity. Just more bleeding actual combat resources- crews and ships.
Yeah, 12 BC chase one DD out of a system with the loss of 1 BC and sigificant crippleing of 2 others. Really good exchange rate guys:)

Yep, Hit and Run is not going to be a very happy experience for the SLN whenever they actually encounter RMN (IMN?) warships. For the simple reason that even the DDs generally hit from longer range and run faster than whatever the SLN have got to send into dispersed targets. The Sollies can drive the RMN out of a system (temporarily) by using overwhelming force. But, unless they get lucky or have very good intelligence, they can't trap RMN forces and they are going to lose a lot of ships.

Randomiser wrote:Yep, Hit and Run is not going to be a very happy experience for the SLN whenever they actually encounter RMN (IMN?) warships. For the simple reason that even the DDs generally hit from longer range and run faster than whatever the SLN have got to send into dispersed targets. The Sollies can drive the RMN out of a system (temporarily) by using overwhelming force. But, unless they get lucky or have very good intelligence, they can't trap RMN forces and they are going to lose a lot of ships.

All reasonable and cogently argued. I will say, however, that the Sollies come up with a few little surprises of their own. There's a scene in which Sonja and Shannon are discussing probable Solly responses to their war-fighting inferiority and both of them comment on the fact that there's nothing wrong with the League's general technology . . . which suggests that the Sollies are beginning from a better starting point vis-a-vis the GA than the PRH vis-a-vis the SKM. Now, I would argue (but, hey, what do I know?) that the Peeps had a much more realistic awareness of their problems and dug in a heck of a lot sooner, but that doesn't change the fact that the League has a lot of technological knowledge if it ever gets itself organized to start using it.

runsforcelery wrote:All reasonable and cogently argued. I will say, however, that the Sollies come up with a few little surprises of their own. There's a scene in which Sonja and Shannon are discussing probable Solly responses to their war-fighting inferiority and both of them comment on the fact that there's nothing wrong with the League's general technology . . . which suggests that the Sollies are beginning from a better starting point vis-a-vis the GA than the PRH vis-a-vis the SKM. Now, I would argue (but, hey, what do I know?) that the Peeps had a much more realistic awareness of their problems and dug in a heck of a lot sooner, but that doesn't change the fact that the League has a lot of technological knowledge if it ever gets itself organized to start using it.

They have sufficient industrial, financial and technological resources that a tiny fraction of the league getting organized could be a real problem.

If the SLN FF sends out 80-90 ship task forces for case Buccaneer and one such task force is sent to Hypatia to quell a secession plebiscite on its way to the protectorates, that could be what the lone DD runs into. In this case, the DD might be stationed at Hypatia because of the expected plebiscite just in case the SLN responds.

If that's the purpose of the TF, then those ships will be some combination of BCs, CLs, CAs, DDs and support ships. So, we have 5-6 ammo colliers 1-2 repair ships. That suggests 3-4 squadrons of BCs, 1-2 squadrons of CAs and 4 squadrons of CLs and DDs.

Assuming the DD gets a mission kill from every 10 missiles on the SLN BCs should they approach in penny packets, a single Roland with tea tractored pods can successfully snipe all the BCs. If they send the CAs, CLs and DDs, the odds improve for the Roland. Let's grant 2CAs and 3 CLs and DDs for every 10 missiles. Under those conditions, the Roland can snipe everything short of the BCs and still have enough missiles for half to 2/3 of the BCs. This assumes that the new materials for armour hasn't been retrofitted in the SLN and only the new build ships have them. Those materials were introduced in the RMN at the beginning of the first Havenite war, after all.

Even if the Roland dies trying to take out the remaining 8-10 BCs, Hypatia will know the SLN is doomed. The SLN officers who read this report will look at any armed GA ship with undiluted terror. Honor's conversation with Kingsford will end the Solarian League with that anecdote to put the disparity in fighting capability in context.