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ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:Basically the capacitors have a linear volume/power ratio. Want twice the power (for twice the endurance) you need twice the volume of capacitors. Micro-fusion isn't linear - or rather there's a very large minimum size no matter how little power you want from it -- the fixed size of the reactor. But adding additional power past that point requires very small increases in size; just a larger fuel tank - which for most usage is tiny compared to the reactor volume.

The linear requirements are an assumption.

It could well be above linear, because losses could increase with size. We have no idea what a plasma capacitor is. It's possible that to increase its size you need to increase the number of parts to keep the charged parts isolated. Like a regular capacitor, the more charge you have, the bigger the isolation you need to keep that charge from rupturing the isolation medium's resistance.

Say it's a simple 1:1.25 (4:5) ratio. To double the capacity, you need 2.5 times the volume, and so on. That would mean it gets really bad very quickly.

Another aspect is the fact that it is a plasma and therefore is very hot. Because of the square-cube law, if you were to double the volume, the area would have only increased by 1.587x. That's the surface that dissipates heat. So it's entirely possible that increasing the size also makes for a hotter object, which in turn makes it less stealthy.

To counteract that, a simple solution is to double the area when doubling the capacitor, which means the internal volume increases by 2.82x. In other words, the proportion of the volume of capacitor to the volume of the torpedo decreases. That could explain why the capacitor-based graser torpedoes are so big.

I agree we need to know more about capacitor technology. The plasma could be contained within some sort of gravity field, held under pressure from the gravity field to increase yield and conserve space.

This thread is pretty much about marrying technologies, with or without permission or manuals.

Can someone clue me in to Erewhon's role in the GA? Originally Erewhon was working with Manticore. Because of High Ridge they were lost to Haven. But Haven is now a part of the GA. So what is the disposition of Erewhon? Erewhon builds ships, and I presume Erewhon makes a pretty penny doing it. Who does Erewhon provide warships for now? Would it be advantageous if the GA can get reps from Erewhon out at Bolthole, or would that be a security risk?

Where was Erewhon's level of technology before Manticore got her? I never understood how Manticore could use Erewhon when Erewhon was never an official ally. Erewhon was always neutral.

cthia wrote:This thread is pretty much about marrying technologies, with or without permission or manuals.

Can someone clue me in to Erewhon's role in the GA? Originally Erewhon was working with Manticore. Because of High Ridge they were lost to Haven. But Haven is now a part of the GA. So what is the disposition of Erewhon? Erewhon builds ships, and I presume Erewhon makes a pretty penny doing it. Who does Erewhon provide warships for now? Would it be advantageous if the GA can get reps from Erewhon out at Bolthole, or would that be a security risk?

Where was Erewhon's level of technology before Manticore got her? I never understood how Manticore could use Erewhon when Erewhon was never an official ally. Erewhon was always neutral.

Erewhon is building ships for the Maya Sector. They were definitely an ally of Manticore before the cease fire and brought the technology as of that point to Haven when they changed sides, because the High Ridge government refused to help Erewhon deal with Verdant Vista (which became Torch) as the previous government had promised. See RFC's thoughts in this Pearl: Erewhon and the Inertial compensator

cthia wrote:Can someone clue me in to Erewhon's role in the GA? Originally Erewhon was working with Manticore. Because of High Ridge they were lost to Haven. But Haven is now a part of the GA. So what is the disposition of Erewhon? Erewhon builds ships, and I presume Erewhon makes a pretty penny doing it. Who does Erewhon provide warships for now? Would it be advantageous if the GA can get reps from Erewhon out at Bolthole, or would that be a security risk?

Where was Erewhon's level of technology before Manticore got her? I never understood how Manticore could use Erewhon when Erewhon was never an official ally. Erewhon was always neutral.

As I understand it, Erewhon is not a member of the GA, but can probably be characterised as an Associated Power. The GA is made up of Manticore, Grayson, Haven, Beowulf, and the Andermani Empire. During the meetings in Landing, Torch was also represented, but Torch doesn't really have the same weight as the others. The Andermani were also de jure out of the GA for the duration of the war against the Solarian League, but they're definitely de facto members.

Erewhon is building ships for itself and for the Maya Autonomous Regional Sector (MARS). From what we've seen so far, they don't have spare capacity, so selling to others is not a risk. Their ships are also markedly inferior to GA's newest, close only to the Havenite pre-Alliance units. As far as we know, they don't have MDMs at all (during the first war, they only got ERMs). But both the ESN and the MARSN may be getting more technology transfers from the GA now: we do know that Manticore was supplying Roszak in Maya with surplus ERMs and getting intel back. It's not a inconceivable that they may have progressed to closer to current generations.

Getting them at Bolthole only makes sense if they are full members and thus would abide by any embargo of technology transfers that apply to the other members.

Who they would be able to sell to? Here's my list:

1. themselves, first and foremost;
2. Maya Sector;
3. Torch;
4. other, old Manticore Alliance members not members of the GA (Alizon, Casca, Minette, Zanzibar, etc.);
5. Madras Sector.

The old MA members only if they don't themselves join the GA or the Manticore-Haven-Grayson Confederation or the Empire itself. Madras doesn't have much money right now and any surplus generated by not having to pay off the transstellars is probably going to be invested in their own infrastructure, but in a few years they'll need a small navy of their own.

This list could grow with other, ex-SL systems that align with the GA and get export clearance.

As for what they can build? I imagine they need to build at least Manticore-export level, because Manticore and Havenite independent cartels are going to be build those.

cthia wrote:This thread is pretty much about marrying technologies, with or without permission or manuals.

Can someone clue me in to Erewhon's role in the GA? Originally Erewhon was working with Manticore. Because of High Ridge they were lost to Haven. But Haven is now a part of the GA. So what is the disposition of Erewhon? Erewhon builds ships, and I presume Erewhon makes a pretty penny doing it. Who does Erewhon provide warships for now? Would it be advantageous if the GA can get reps from Erewhon out at Bolthole, or would that be a security risk?

Where was Erewhon's level of technology before Manticore got her? I never understood how Manticore could use Erewhon when Erewhon was never an official ally. Erewhon was always neutral.

Actually during the first war Erewhon was absolutely an official ally, part of the Manticoran alliance, and was not a neutral. They had SDs they'd purchased from a League shipyard before joining up with Manticore and (unlike the Talbot system that seemed to use their few SDs solely for defense of their home system) deployed them and other units in conjunction with the RMN.

During IEH we get these snippets

In Enemy Hands: Ch. 1 wrote:Eighth Fleet would be the first Allied fleet which was actually composed of more non-Manticoran than RMN units. Given the "seniority" of the Manticoran Navy, there'd never been much question that the RMN would provide the fleet commander, but a good two-thirds of its starships would be drawn from the explosively expanding GSN and the far smaller Erewhon Navy.

In Enemy Hands: Ch. 2 wrote:the Cromarty Government had scored an enormous diplomatic triumph when it added the Erewhon Republic to the Manticoran Alliance seven years ago. Erewhon was only a single-system polity, but like the Star Kingdom itself, though on a lesser scale, it was far wealthier than any single system could normally expect to be, for it just happened to control the only other wormhole terminus connecting to League space from within twelve hundred light-years of the Peeps' capital. There'd been a degree of economic rivalry between Erewhon and Manticore in the past, but both of them had recognized the threat Haven posed to them, and Erewhon's admission to the Alliance had closed the Erewhon Wormhole to the Peeps.

The reason they had Mantie-lite tech by the end of the war was that Manticore was sharing some of its advanced tech with their ally (improved compensators, ERMs) but hadn't yet shared all of it because Erewhon at that time wasn't really yet building heavy ships (remember they'd bought their wall of battle from a Solarian yard). Unlike Grayson (which was building anything it could) Erewhon never got MDMs, fission plants for LACs, any SD(P)s or some of the other latest toys because they couldn't have built them or the ships to use them even if they'd been given the plans. If the war had lasted a bit longer they might have ended up buying modern CLACs and SD(P)s from either Manticoran or Grayson yards; and gotten provided the tech that way; but it didn't.

And I'm pretty sure Erewhon went back to being on its own for several years after High Ridge's actions caused it to dissolve its alliance with Manticore. I don't think the mutual defense treaty happened until much closer to the end of the ceasefire period - in fact ART describes it as "the mutual-defense treaty Erewhon had then signed with the Republic of Haven . . . just in time for the war between Manticore and Haven to start up again"
That's probably not literally true; but even allowing for some hyperbole it's pretty clearly not in the early or middle ceasefire period.


In any case it appears that after Erewhon split from Manticore they finally started putting together a military shipbuilding capability (since, remember, its ships pre-war had come from Solarian yards and I believe Manticore provided it some ships during the war). This appears to have taken them a while as they were only working on BC(P)s, as a stepping stone to their first domestic SD(P)s, when MAlign sponsored attack on Torch happened.

But at some point during establishing their shipbuilding capacity they entered an agreement with the Maya Sector's Governor Barregos to build ships for his forces as well. And we know after the mutual defense treaty with Haven Erewhon shared some of the limited Manti-lite tech they had. I don't recall it being explicitly mentioned, but I'd be surprised if they weren't eventually able to get some help in return from Haven on the secret to MDMs - at least after Haven revealed that they had them.

So as far as we know at Erewhon's ship building capacity is still pretty limited and the only people we know they've exported ships to is the Maya Sector. As they build up they may accept more export orders, or they may be very selective about who they'll export advanced ships and weapons to. It's hard to say.

As for their status with the GA. ART makes the point that their relationship with Manticore is still somewhat strained. Even the fall of the specific government that drove them away doesn't seem to have abated Erewhon's injured honor sufficient to bring them back. They do not appear to have had any involvement in the meetings that led to the Grand Alliance, and so they are presumably still neutral. I'm not sure how Haven joining the GA affects the pre-existing mutual defense treaty with Erewhon - but I suspect Pritchard would have tried very hard to avoid alienating them like High Ridge did, so they were probably consulted offscreen and came to some reasonably amicable mutual agreement with Haven before Haven entered alliance with the power that drove Erewhon away.
So they may or may not still have some form of mutual defense treaty, and if they do it may or may not have been expanded in some way to have call on some non-Haven GA forces.
About the only thing that seems clear is there's no indication that Erewhon actually joined the GA. Not even as a non-public member like the Andermani Empire.

Edit - and in the time it took to dig up the quotes and draft this I see a couple other people beat me to the response.

At this point it is possible that Erwhon is building a ship or two for Torch. Not only do they have defence and trade treaties, they are very close to one another. Erwhon also has at least some building capasity and what Torch can even begin to crew isn't going to be more than a couple of destroyers for a while even after graduating several classes of recruits from basic training, and then various schools including any that might be being held on the captured former PRHIE ships or off with Erwhon.
Nobody has mentioned any Torchies being run through naval tech schooling with Manticore.

Thanks for all of your replies guys. They answered most of my questions, they, plus the informative post tlb supplied from the Pearls.

Initially, I couldn't identify the carrot to acquiring Erewhon, it couldn't have been their shipbuilding capacity. Manticore didn't appear to need them in that "capacity." Well, how could I forgot there are other benefits of acquiring a system. And RFC's post corroborated it. It was more to prevent the Peeps from establishing a closer outpost, and Erewhon was only necessary to the RMN because Trevor's Star was not yet in the bag.

My long harbored question of what tech the RMN lost to Haven was also answered by RFC's post. Again, thanks tlb. It seems Erewhon's shipbuilding prowess has been greatly increased because of their resume and past references.

At any rate, are they building ships of the wall now? Is that a fact or are we postulating?

Why was Erewhon so interested in Torch, what did I miss? And do they still have that same interest?

Also, if their wormhole leads right into SL space why didn't the SL make a play for it at some point? Did Manticore heavily fortify it? If they did, then all of those fortifications, infrastructure, also went with Haven. If it was simply Erewhon's own navy protecting the wormhole from SL aggression, the SL could have acquired it.

Finally, if Erewhon is selling ships to the galaxy, they must have added a very significant shipyard and are now competing with Manticore's exports.

Is Haven exporting ships as well?

cthia wrote:Thanks for all of your replies guys. They answered most of my questions, they, plus the informative post tlb supplied from the Pearls.

Initially, I couldn't identify the carrot to acquiring Erewhon, it couldn't have been their shipbuilding capacity. Manticore didn't appear to need them in that "capacity." Well, how could I forgot there are other benefits of acquiring a system. And RFC's post corroborated it. It was more to prevent the Peeps from establishing a closer outpost, and Erewhon was only necessary to the RMN because Trevor's Star was not yet in the bag.

My long harbored question of what tech the RMN lost to Haven was also answered by RFC's post. Again, thanks tlb. It seems Erewhon's shipbuilding prowess has been greatly increased because of their resume and past references.

At any rate, are they building ships of the wall now? Is that a fact or are we postulating?

Why was Erewhon so interested in Torch, what did I miss? And do they still have that same interest?

Also, if their wormhole leads right into SL space why didn't the SL make a play for it at some point? Did Manticore heavily fortify it? If they did, then all of those fortifications, infrastructure, also went with Haven. If it was simply Erewhon's own navy protecting the wormhole from SL aggression, the SL could have acquired it.

Finally, if Erewhon is selling ships to the galaxy, they must have added a very significant shipyard and are now competing with Manticore's exports.

Is Haven exporting ships as well?

Before joining with Manticore Erewhon had a defensive treaty with the League. Also, MAlign manipulation aside, the League generally doesn't go around invading systems with wormhole connections to them. In fact the League seemed to have so little interest in Erewhon that a major reason Erewhon dropped the defensive treaty with them in exchange for allying with Manticore is they feared the League wouldn't honor its treaty to protect them - and that Haven might therefore not be deterred by that treaty.

No idea if the Erewhon wormhole is fortified. I'd assume so, but they'd likely have purchased forts and defenses from their Solarian military suppliers long before they joined with Manticore.

Also the text I included from my 2nd quote in IEH continued

In Enemy Hands: Ch. 2 wrote:There'd been a degree of economic rivalry between Erewhon and Manticore in the past, but both of them had recognized the threat Haven posed to them, and Erewhon's admission to the Alliance had closed the Erewhon Wormhole to the Peeps. That meant even Peep courier boats, which routinely rode the upper edge of hyper-space's theta bands, required well over six months for the trip to Old Earth, whereas a courier from Manticore could reach the mother world in barely a week.
The diplomatic advantages for the Star Kingdom were obvious

That 6 month delay also would have slowed the under the counter tech transfers from various League transtellars that Haven was relying on at the time to try to catch up with Manticore's pre-war military tech.


Cauldron of Ghosts we get this Torch intel discussion

Cauldron of Ghosts: Ch. 28 wrote:“What sort of manufacturing?” she asked.
“Naval, mostly. Everything from SDs on down.”
That caused everyone to sit back a little. “They’re building superdreadnoughts for Maya?” asked Hugh.
“How many?” asked Ruth.
“At least a dozen. As well as a lot of lighter warships. You name it, the Erewhonese are building them. Battlecruisers—with pod capability. Multidrive missiles for the arsenal ships that Roszak used so effectively in the Battle of Torch. Cruisers. Destroyers. No CLACs, so far I’ve been able to determine. Not yet, anyway.”

However it is unclear how far those are along and if Erewhon has its own initial domestically constructed SD(P)s in service yet. But yes, assuming Torch's intel isn't totally off they've at least started building ships of the wall now.

cthia wrote:Why was Erewhon so interested in Torch, what did I miss? And do they still have that same interest?

Also, if their wormhole leads right into SL space why didn't the SL make a play for it at some point? Did Manticore heavily fortify it? If they did, then all of those fortifications, infrastructure, also went with Haven. If it was simply Erewhon's own navy protecting the wormhole from SL aggression, the SL could have acquired it.

From Crown of Slaves, chapter 16:

Naomi's face was tight. "Congo poses a constant threat to us. We weren't too concerned until a few years ago, when the Mesans discovered the system had its own wormhole junction. But that changed everything. Sure, Mesa wouldn't attack Erewhon directly—but who's to say whom else those scumbags might allow through the junction? It's like having a gangster for a neighbor, with the combination to your back door. We were assured by the Star Kingdom that after the war with Haven was successfully prosecuted and peace was made, they'd give us whatever help we needed to deal with Congo. Including the promise to put their diplomatic clout into making damned sure that any OFS bureaucrat's temptation to rent Mesa an SLN task force or two was firmly dissuaded. Those assurances were given by the Cromarty Government, of course."
Victor felt the need to play the devil's advocate. Not out of perversity, but because his political instincts told him that he needed to appear objective to the Erewhonese. "In all fairness, Cromarty probably would have kept the promise."
"Yes, probably. Instead, however, Cromarty was assassinated and High Ridge took over, and the new regime has made it crystal clear that they don't feel bound by any commitments made by the previous administration." Harshly: "The dishonorable bastards."

I do not know where the text is; but I believe that Erewhon had been part of the Solarian League, but left it in simpler times while retaining control of the junction (actually I am not sure if they were an full member or were just expected to become a member). I do not know how long after that they became allied with Manticore.

PS. After thinking about it some more, they could not have been a full member; because then the Mandarins could not argue that the right to secede had expired by disuse.

cthia wrote:Thanks for all of your replies guys. They answered most of my questions, they, plus the informative post tlb supplied from the Pearls.

Initially, I couldn't identify the carrot to acquiring Erewhon, it couldn't have been their shipbuilding capacity. Manticore didn't appear to need them in that "capacity." Well, how could I forgot there are other benefits of acquiring a system. And RFC's post corroborated it. It was more to prevent the Peeps from establishing a closer outpost, and Erewhon was only necessary to the RMN because Trevor's Star was not yet in the bag.

My long harbored question of what tech the RMN lost to Haven was also answered by RFC's post. Again, thanks tlb. It seems Erewhon's shipbuilding prowess has been greatly increased because of their resume and past references.

At any rate, are they building ships of the wall now? Is that a fact or are we postulating?

Why was Erewhon so interested in Torch, what did I miss? And do they still have that same interest?

Also, if their wormhole leads right into SL space why didn't the SL make a play for it at some point? Did Manticore heavily fortify it? If they did, then all of those fortifications, infrastructure, also went with Haven. If it was simply Erewhon's own navy protecting the wormhole from SL aggression, the SL could have acquired it.

Finally, if Erewhon is selling ships to the galaxy, they must have added a very significant shipyard and are now competing with Manticore's exports.

Is Haven exporting ships as well?

Well, you could read Crown of Slaves and then Torch of Freedom and that would give you a compleat picture with details. The interwoven threads of the Torch saga (3 books so far) and the Shadow of set give you the iterleaved detail and background.