Remaining holes in SLN intel

drinksmuchcoffee wrote:It seems everyone here makes the assumption that "automation" implies that the human operators cannot or will not be technically sophisticated, or at least not very technically sophisticated.

Not so much "cannot" or "will not," but "don't need to be."

Bureaucracies being what they are, "don't need to be" means "why spend money and time on something they don't need."

There will be some very technically sophisticated people -- Shannon Foracker, for example -- but between the bureaucracy and human nature, most people are only going to be as knowledgeable as they need to be.

I think that automation will stick around in the RMN ships, without any reduction. It's proven to be workable and successful in the field, under wartime conditions. The people in charge of the purse strings, once the war is over, are going to be looking to tighten up the wallet. Automation lets them do that by having fewer people.

Fireflair wrote:I think that automation will stick around in the RMN ships, without any reduction. It's proven to be workable and successful in the field, under wartime conditions. The people in charge of the purse strings, once the war is over, are going to be looking to tighten up the wallet. Automation lets them do that by having fewer people.

The question is the automation really cheaper then more warm bodies when you do not need as many ships? The cost of automation may only be justifiable if they need large numbers of ships.

pnakasone wrote:

Fireflair wrote:I think that automation will stick around in the RMN ships, without any reduction. It's proven to be workable and successful in the field, under wartime conditions. The people in charge of the purse strings, once the war is over, are going to be looking to tighten up the wallet. Automation lets them do that by having fewer people.

The question is the automation really cheaper then more warm bodies when you do not need as many ships? The cost of automation may only be justifiable if they need large numbers of ships.

Automation is always cheaper once it is installed. It does not need three meals a day or clothing cleaned, etc. Why have ships that require lots of personnel? The war may be over; who knows when the next one will come?

Manticore, which has pushed the idea hard, will not be able to simple rest once the war is over. They have to know there are more enemies and those enemies will be developing new weapons.

Losing a war is more expensive than fighting one.

ldwechsler wrote:

pnakasone wrote:The question is the automation really cheaper then more warm bodies when you do not need as many ships? The cost of automation may only be justifiable if they need large numbers of ships.

Automation is always cheaper once it is installed. It does not need three meals a day or clothing cleaned, etc. Why have ships that require lots of personnel? The war may be over; who knows when the next one will come?

Manticore, which has pushed the idea hard, will not be able to simple rest once the war is over. They have to know there are more enemies and those enemies will be developing new weapons.

Losing a war is more expensive than fighting one.

Yeah but political bean counters tend to be worried about today's cost rather then tomorrows savings.

Remember military ships designs are the bastard children of the compromise in cost, competing job criteria, technological limitations, and politics.

Yeah but political bean counters tend to be worried about today's cost rather then tomorrows savings.

Remember military ships designs are the bastard children of the compromise in cost, competing job criteria, technological limitations, and politics.

Automation reduces the possible losses and the pure need og crew. You need time to train a crew, but on the opposite you can put an automated system into a storhouse and use it when needed.

The reduction of possible losses suits politicans good, because they can show the people that they care of the soldiers defending them.

And like my prvious poster wrote: A crew want to eat, sleep, breath, get paid and need a toilet and a kitchen. An automated system need only energy and service. Maschines don´t breath, working 24hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 day a year.

In the end a higher grade of automation leads to a longer operation time of the ship because you don´t need so much supplies for the crew. If I remember correct, then is the operation limit of a submarine the amount of food they have on the sub.

Maldorian wrote:In the end a higher grade of automation leads to a longer operation time of the ship because you don´t need so much supplies for the crew.

You can clearly see this in action, where the highly automated LCS spends far more time at sea than other less automated ships. Oh, wait. Last I knew only 2 of 8 were seaworthy and they had to add 75% more crew to manage even that. Nevermind.

kzt wrote:

Maldorian wrote:In the end a higher grade of automation leads to a longer operation time of the ship because you don´t need so much supplies for the crew.

You can clearly see this in action, where the highly automated LCS spends far more time at sea than other less automated ships. Oh, wait. Last I knew only 2 of 8 were seaworthy and they had to add 75% more crew to manage even that. Nevermind.

Note however that the Hexapuma C's had far less crew. And we know that the SD(P)s did as well. And they fought in battles.

That's different than experimental.

Keep in mind that a lot of things are different in the Honorverse. Terekhov was able to do his taxes in a couple of minutes. And he's wealthy.

Taxes were clearly a lot lower and there had to be far fewer complications than we have. That means smaller government.

Smaller government means fewer bureaucrats.

ldwechsler wrote:Note however that the Hexapuma C's had far less crew. And we know that the SD(P)s did as well. And they fought in battles.

That's different than experimental.

Keep in mind that a lot of things are different in the Honorverse. Terekhov was able to do his taxes in a couple of minutes. And he's wealthy.

Taxes were clearly a lot lower and there had to be far fewer complications than we have. That means smaller government.

Smaller government means fewer bureaucrats.

IIRC, there was an RMN destroyer class pre 1900 that was supposed to be highly automated. It was a major failure, I think that ended up ripping that out and cramming in more crew.

Maldorian wrote:Automation reduces the possible losses and the pure need og crew. You need time to train a crew, but on the opposite you can put an automated system into a storhouse and use it when needed.

The reduction of possible losses suits politicans good, because they can show the people that they care of the soldiers defending them.

And like my prvious poster wrote: A crew want to eat, sleep, breath, get paid and need a toilet and a kitchen. An automated system need only energy and service. Maschines don´t breath, working 24hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 day a year.

In the end a higher grade of automation leads to a longer operation time of the ship because you don´t need so much supplies for the crew. If I remember correct, then is the operation limit of a submarine the amount of food they have on the sub.

But as we saw on a number of occasions the lack warm bodies hindered operations. How much better would SAR operations after the Battle of Spindle gone with more personal to form boarding parties. What if Abigail Hearns had a couple squads of marines to assist her in dealing with the Gendarmerie on Shona Station in the Saltash system.

So the question is what is the new sweet spot in crew size and automation level going to be for ships whose duties will include SAR, boarding operations, and possibly providing prize crews for captured ships?