Wormhole Assault: MA Style

No, the turbulence is there all the time. If a ship drives through a WH area without detecting it is will be utterly destroyed. I asked David how come they didn’t spot these centuries earlier due to the destruction of ships and his response was that these were a relatively small area many light hours away from anything interesting. Essentially nobody ever encountered them and certainly never witnessed a ship blowing up from this.

kzt wrote:No, the turbulence is there all the time. If a ship drives through a WH area without detecting it is will be utterly destroyed. I asked David how come they didn’t spot these centuries earlier due to the destruction of ships and his response was that these were a relatively small area many light hours away from anything interesting. Essentially nobody ever encountered them and certainly never witnessed a ship blowing up from this.

I missed that conversation - but the point remains - there is nothing to hide behind.

Theemile wrote:

kzt wrote:No, the turbulence is there all the time. If a ship drives through a WH area without detecting it is will be utterly destroyed. I asked David how come they didn’t spot these centuries earlier due to the destruction of ships and his response was that these were a relatively small area many light hours away from anything interesting. Essentially nobody ever encountered them and certainly never witnessed a ship blowing up from this.

I missed that conversation - but the point remains - there is nothing to hide behind.

Why can't you hide behind the turbulence? Which is essentially the WH itself. Warships essentially used the tactic in the age of sail, using storms to "hide" from - and as a buffer between - enemy ships.

Do note that when I say "hide" in this instance, I don't mean literally, but akin to hiding behind a wall. Enemy ships will still know they are there and can still see them (except the LDs) but the turbulence is a safety buffer from missiles, although not lasers. However, the invisible LDs cannot be readily targeted by energy weapons if they cannot be localized. And missiles cannot penetrate the turbulence.

cthia wrote:

Theemile wrote:I missed that conversation - but the point remains - there is nothing to hide behind.

Why can't you hide behind the turbulence? Which is essentially the WH itself. Warships essentially used the tactic in the age of sail, using storms to "hide" from - and as a buffer between - enemy ships.

Do note that when I say "hide" in this instance, I don't mean literally, but akin to hiding behind a wall. Enemy ships will still know they are there and can still see them (except the LDs) but the turbulence is a safety buffer from missiles, although not lasers. However, the invisible LDs cannot be readily targeted by energy weapons if they cannot be localized. And missiles cannot penetrate the turbulence.

Missiles (especially MDMs) could just fly around the turbulence to get at any target back there that their launch platforms can see.

And since there are forts covering all aspects of the wormhole the turbulence can never be between all the forts and the target.

Honestly given how small the no-impeller area is compared to stand-off range it's unlikely than more than 5 - 10% of the forts at a time have the no-impeller turbulence zone between then and any spot within the Junction area.


This isn't a ship hiding behind a wall, it's a yacht trying to hide behind the Statue of Liberty from people in battery park, on Governors island, and lining both sides of the upper bay. The people basically encircle the area it's trying to hide in, and it can only interpose the Statue between itself and a small fraction of them at any time. No mater how it circles Liberty Island and the statue it is still directly exposed to the majority of those folks.

cthia wrote:

Theemile wrote:I missed that conversation - but the point remains - there is nothing to hide behind.

Why can't you hide behind the turbulence? Which is essentially the WH itself. Warships essentially used the tactic in the age of sail, using storms to "hide" from - and as a buffer between - enemy ships.

Do note that when I say "hide" in this instance, I don't mean literally, but akin to hiding behind a wall. Enemy ships will still know they are there and can still see them (except the LDs) but the turbulence is a safety buffer from missiles, although not lasers. However, the invisible LDs cannot be readily targeted by energy weapons if they cannot be localized. And missiles cannot penetrate the turbulence.

Jonathan_S wrote:Missiles (especially MDMs) could just fly around the turbulence to get at any target back there that their launch platforms can see.

And since there are forts covering all aspects of the wormhole the turbulence can never be between all the forts and the target.

Honestly given how small the no-impeller area is compared to stand-off range it's unlikely than more than 5 - 10% of the forts at a time have the no-impeller turbulence zone between then and any spot within the Junction area.


This isn't a ship hiding behind a wall, it's a yacht trying to hide behind the Statue of Liberty from people in battery park, on Governors island, and lining both sides of the upper bay. The people basically encircle the area it's trying to hide in, and it can only interpose the Statue between itself and a small fraction of them at any time. No mater how it circles Liberty Island and the statue it is still directly exposed to the majority of those folks.

If the missiles are going to fly around then they are going to have a low terminal velocity, thus easily picked off by pods laid by the LD. And, they will still be blind fired at an unlocalized enemy.

I still think an MA plan that takes out a certain number of specific forts allows this tactic.

Also, if the turbulence zone allows the stacking of an entire fleet for transit, then a single LD sheltering in its wake will be more like a Yugo hiding behind the Pentagon.

It is my impression that entrance/exit lanes of the Manticore Junction are spaced around a center point (and not on a plane, but in 3-D). Thus, there is no behind. The termini could have a behind, but I suspect that fortresses can cover that region.

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:It is my impression that entrance/exit lanes of the Manticore Junction are spaced around a center point (and not on a plane, but in 3-D). Thus, there is no behind. The termini could have a behind, but I suspect that fortresses can cover that region.

Well, even planes in space are 3-D.

In no way is the possibility of this plan being feasible written in stone. There are simply too many unanswered questions that only the author can know. However, the notion is plaguing my brain and misery loves company.

I certainly must agree that the degree of success for the MA in taking out enough specific forts to matter seems low, but low isn't the same thing as impossible. Especially for an unprecedented enemy using unprecedented tech... and compulsion.

I recall a thread discussing the arrangement of the forts which stated they are allocated in concentric circles which perform a well choreographed dance which rotate undamaged forts toward the enemy. A concentric circular arrangement may prove to be problematic in taking out enough specific forts to make this work. One redeeming notion in that respect is the LDs stealth and the fact that (if I'm correct) forts are not arranged on top of each other. It seems they would be arranged equidistant with respect to their range. Which would imply enough space in-between formations for an invisible enemy to sneak.

It seems another problem for the forts will be that the range of energy weapons can't be controlled. Firing energy weapons at an unlocalized enemy (even if localized) - it would seem is dangerous to your own forces when shooting blind, as a miss may carry right on thru the WH and destroy one of your own ships on the "other side." In fact, this is one benefit of the tactic. The sheltered LD could destroy any ships trying to transit and which are arriving. That would effectively shut down the WH.

OTOH, the forts, like Rooks, are mobile and they may elect to converge on the area which is sheltering the LD, closing the distance enough to identify it. But to do that, enough of them have to move to make it work. Too few could be destroyed by an enemy that has brought along contingency plans. That movement may also pull key forts out of position, of the remaining forts which survived the opening phases of destruction.

Jonathan_S wrote:This isn't a ship hiding behind a wall, it's a yacht trying to hide behind the Statue of Liberty from people in battery park, on Governors island, and lining both sides of the upper bay. The people basically encircle the area it's trying to hide in, and it can only interpose the Statue between itself and a small fraction of them at any time. No mater how it circles Liberty Island and the statue it is still directly exposed to the majority of those folks.

I think it's more like a ship trying to hide behind by a specially strong gust of wind. There's nothing to block your line of sight and vision to the enemy, only your stealth. The gust of wind may deflect your ballistic projectiles (and in the case of the HV, destroy them by shear), but powered missiles can indeed go around.

As suggested above, they will come with low terminal velocity, but when we're talking about the full engagement happening inside of a half-million km radius, there is no high terminal velocity in the first place. The missile can also fly a spiral course to maximise its terminal velocity. And the gravity shear is localised, so the missiles can just skirt the edge of that too.

cthia wrote:I certainly must agree that the degree of success for the MA in taking out enough specific forts to matter seems low, but low isn't the same thing as impossible. Especially for an unprecedented enemy using unprecedented tech... and compulsion.

They may try, but given everything we've discussed so far it seems unlikely they'd launch such a low-probability attack. They'd indeed need some unprecedented tech we haven't heard about, like the million-gee acceleration missiles.

As I said before in this thread, a high-speed pass attack like the original Oyster Bay has a higher probability of success and thus a higher probability of being launched again.

I recall a thread discussing the arrangement of the forts which stated they are allocated in concentric circles which perform a well choreographed dance which rotate undamaged forts toward the enemy. A concentric circular arrangement may prove to be problematic in taking out enough specific forts to make this work. One redeeming notion in that respect is the LDs stealth and the fact that (if I'm correct) forts are not arranged on top of each other. It seems they would be arranged equidistant with respect to their range. Which would imply enough space in-between formations for an invisible enemy to sneak.

It seems another problem for the forts will be that the range of energy weapons can't be controlled. Firing energy weapons at an unlocalized enemy (even if localized) - it would seem is dangerous to your own forces when shooting blind, as a miss may carry right on thru the WH and destroy one of your own ships on the "other side." In fact, this is one benefit of the tactic. The sheltered LD could destroy any ships trying to transit and which are arriving. That would effectively shut down the WH.

Sure, there is a lot of space between forts. And like Douglas Adams reminds us, "Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is." So with the right kind of stealth, you can sneak in a whole fleet of ships through the gaps between forts. The question is only how capable the stealth is versus the detection capabilities, because they will be passing within 1 light-second of multiple forts.

The formation will also not be exactly equidistant. There will always be a degree of randomisation of the forts, both because of chaos theory and for evasion reasons. It takes effort to keep an exact distribution, so the forts simply won't make it. They'll keep a formation, but that doesn't mean separations down to the hair width. This means the intruder can sit exactly between at most 2 forts: any two points form a line and the intruder can choose that line, but three points don't necessarily form a line. Four points don't form a plane either and two dozen definitely won't, unless they're trying to.

That and the same "space is vast" works to the defender's benefit: the risk of friendly fire by shooting at the general direction of forts on the other side is near zero. The defenders know exactly where the other defenders are, so they know exactly the direction they can't shoot at. At less than 1 million km, the dispersion for energy weapons is small enough that they can fire at predicted enemy positions without hitting anything legitimate by accident. They are not shooting completely blind. In fact, it's only a bit worse than pre-MDM energy-range engagements: you know where the enemy is only to within a few thousand (maybe tens of thousands) of km, instead of to within 100 km. And unlike those, you have all aspects open to shoot at, there are two dozen platforms to shoot from, and you have "an eternity" to fire, instead of high-speed pass between two fleets.

OTOH, the forts, like Rooks, are mobile and they may elect to converge on the area which is sheltering the LD, closing the distance enough to identify it. But to do that, enough of them have to move to make it work. Too few could be destroyed by an enemy that has brought along contingency plans. That movement may also pull key forts out of position, of the remaining forts which survived the opening phases of destruction.

They don't need to move (though they will start stronger evasion routines). They can send Ghost Riders, which themselves are stealthy and accelerate at 3000 gravities, to close that distance. They can maybe close to within 100,000 km the first time the LD fires and this is already below the detection threshold that the LD was designed for. If the LD fires again, either at them or at a target ship, they'll close even further, raising the odds of detection. And all through this time, the forts are firing at every smudge detection, hoping to score a hit.

Even a glancing hit at this point is fatal for the LD.

So, in summary, this tactic has a low probability of success, a high probability of the loss of the asset, a high probability that proprietary technology will fall into the hands of the RMN as a result, and a very skewed risk/reward ratio.

I don't see this being done unless the reasoning itself is also completely skewed, like the galaxy-sized holes being ignored for compulsion reasons. The Detweilers don't seem to be that disconnected from reality to me.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:This isn't a ship hiding behind a wall, it's a yacht trying to hide behind the Statue of Liberty from people in battery park, on Governors island, and lining both sides of the upper bay. The people basically encircle the area it's trying to hide in, and it can only interpose the Statue between itself and a small fraction of them at any time. No mater how it circles Liberty Island and the statue it is still directly exposed to the majority of those folks.

I think it's more like a ship trying to hide behind by a specially strong gust of wind. There's nothing to block your line of sight and vision to the enemy, only your stealth. The gust of wind may deflect your ballistic projectiles (and in the case of the HV, destroy them by shear), but powered missiles can indeed go around.

As suggested above, they will come with low terminal velocity, but when we're talking about the full engagement happening inside of a half-million km radius, there is no high terminal velocity in the first place. The missile can also fly a spiral course to maximise its terminal velocity. And the gravity shear is localised, so the missiles can just skirt the edge of that too.

Plus the ship can't magically materialize next to that gust of wind.

The wind gust (or in this case the terminus) is in the middle of multiple concentric spherical shells of forts that, as I understand it, surround the entire Junction area.

That alone seems to make debating about the ability to hide behind a terminus pointless.

The only way I can see for a ship to get there in the first place be to have already slipped through shells of forts. The point of closest approach would have been somewhere while tiptoeing past the forts. So almost be definition any ship hiding there was already able to sneak past the defenders without any assistance from the turbulence of the terminus.


If you can only hide because of turbulence, then you can't reach the turbulence to hide in. If you can hide without it then it's kind of irrelevant whether or not it might help you hide.