aairfccha wrote:Between the sluggish reaction speed of biology and the time constraints imposed by a relativistic approach velocity, this conclusion sounds a little... thin. Also, did the tugs actually intercept the missiles? I only remember them stopping bits and pieces of the stations. In contrast, the Hasta drones in UH tried to dodge the block ships but mostly didn't manage to.
They did not block any of the missiles. The closest thing to that during OB was a freighter dodging a missile.
OTOH, we do have an instance of a piloted ship intercepting a missile - Honor intentionally taking a missile on the wedge of her runabout to protect the Queen and Protector in Ashes of Victory. Moreover, that incident also gives us the far more likely scenario for kamikazes/Kaitens in the Honorverse - the ship that launched those two missiles. The "Kamikaze" crew wouldn't be on board the missiles, they'd be on the ship that launches the missiles with no intention of getting back out afterward. Modify a freighter to carry and dispense mass missile pods (HMS Wayfarer, for instance), drop out of hyper on the limit exactly as any other freighter, and when you get to minimal range you flush the pods and blow your reactor to deny the enemy anyone to interrogate or much in the way of wreckage to examine. Not only is it a devastating attack, it's entirely deniable - especially if you stop a completely legitimate freighter of the same class which is expected to show up about that time and vector and come in under its transponder code. You could probably get all the way into single drive missile range before firing, giving the targets only a couple minutes to react. You get something almost the same level of surprise as OB with little or no new technology needed.
