Understanding Missile Ranges

kzt wrote:No, he was heading 2nd fleet out beyond the hyperlimit to rearm and pull out the damaged ships. Then they would come back. However not blowing up the Sphinx orbital stuff in passing makes it a lot harder to deal with Manticore if the Queen doesn’t just surrender.

He was specifically attempting to pull any surviving defenders away from the center of the system and resupply. This is a repeat of the (unseen) tactics at Zanzibar, where the defenders were pulled out of the inner system and had their magazines depleted in a long battle. The Havenite attackers jumped to hyper - mated with fast reloaders, then returned before the RMN defenders could kill their outward velocity and return to the inner system to rearm. The defenders were then overwhelmed piecemeal, with low magazines away from the support of the fixed defenses, which were also handled piece by piece.

Pretty much. But the fixed defenses of Manticore are probably an order of magnitude tougher. So every exposure to them is to be minimized. If they had already gotten Sphinx then going after Manticore is possible. Going after both with the equivalent of something like 70 operational SDs seems unwise.

Admittedly, if they get both of them that is a vast percentage of RMN capability gone. But it’s a suicide mission.

kzt wrote:Pretty much. But the fixed defenses of Manticore are probably an order of magnitude tougher. So every exposure to them is to be minimized. If they had already gotten Sphinx then going after Manticore is possible. Going after both with the equivalent of something like 70 operational SDs seems unwise.

Admittedly, if they get both of them that is a vast percentage of RMN capability gone. But it’s a suicide mission.

There's no reason to bother with Sphinx. It's for all the marbles--take Manticore and demand surrender. If they can't take Manticore there's no point in the attack in the first place.

Loren Pechtel wrote:There's no reason to bother with Sphinx. It's for all the marbles--take Manticore and demand surrender. If they can't take Manticore there's no point in the attack in the first place.

If you destroy the production facilities at Sphinx and Manticore you have destroyed something like 80-90%+ of Manticore production, as well as the two biggest and best RMN bases and the ordinance stockpiles on them.

Which means that, even if the RHN takes 100% casualties in doing this, the next RHN wave kills the rest of the RMN production long before Manticore can rebuild a fleet.

Attrition strategies are ugly and bloody, but they often work.

kzt wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:There's no reason to bother with Sphinx. It's for all the marbles--take Manticore and demand surrender. If they can't take Manticore there's no point in the attack in the first place.

If you destroy the production facilities at Sphinx and Manticore you have destroyed something like 80-90%+ of Manticore production, as well as the two biggest and best RMN bases and the ordinance stockpiles on them.

Which means that, even if the RHN takes 100% casualties in doing this, the next RHN wave kills the rest of the RMN production long before Manticore can rebuild a fleet.

Attrition strategies are ugly and bloody, but they often work.

But it does nothing about the Blackbird yard and Apollo is a trump card even without the new ships (Haven didn't know that it required new ships to use at maximum effectiveness.) This was an all-in gamble, they would go for Manticore.

Furthermore, at the point she pulled her bluff Thiesman knew that she had entire Apollo-armed fleet. If he can't take Manticore before she can destroy him she could simply flip the scene, take her flee and do the same thing to Haven. Again, this says his target must be a zero-zero with Manticore.

To go within Sphinx's missile envelope would be a big mistake.

Loren Pechtel wrote:But it does nothing about the Blackbird yard and Apollo is a trump card even without the new ships (Haven didn't know that it required new ships to use at maximum effectiveness.) This was an all-in gamble, they would go for Manticore.

Furthermore, at the point she pulled her bluff Thiesman knew that she had entire Apollo-armed fleet. If he can't take Manticore before she can destroy him she could simply flip the scene, take her flee and do the same thing to Haven. Again, this says his target must be a zero-zero with Manticore.

To go within Sphinx's missile envelope would be a big mistake.

Gryphon has minimal production capability. That's why they could evacuate - they didn't have 2 million people on it. It's mostly R&D.

And I'll point out that 2nd Fleet WAS inside the powered missile range of Sphinx.