Why did everyone become dumb at the end of TEIF?

tlb wrote:Text has been presented that shows the Ghosts were the first ones to test the maneuver that the Sharks used to fool the hyper detection grid at Manticore; therefore the Ghosts have to be hyper capable and being transported in a ship was out of convenience, not necessity (That is the same mistake I made and the text was presented to prove me wrong).

ThinksMarkedly wrote:The other thing is that they had to leave after they completed their task. If they weren't hypercapable, they'd need to go somewhere that a freighter could jump in and collect them. That's risky in the aftermath of Oyster Bay, because the RMN and GSN would be pouncing on every single hyperspace contact.

Actually if they needed to be picked up, the obvious solution would be to have the freighter at the rendezvous site prior to Oyster bay: have it come through the junction with an apparent course that says it will hyper out to someplace like Zanzibar. Only instead of making the transition at some point well outside the hyper-limit, go quiet and wait for the Ghosts. Once loaded a hyper transition out would not be noticed.

tlb wrote:Actually if they needed to be picked up, the obvious solution would be to have the freighter at the rendezvous site prior to Oyster bay: have it come through the junction with an apparent course that says they will hyper out to someplace like Zanzibar. Only instead of making the hyper transition at some point, go quiet and wait for the Ghosts. Once loaded a hyper transition out would not be noticed.

Hmm... that requires that they stay in n-space for some time after leaving the Junction limit. Wouldn't that stand out? Doesn't everyone hyper out immediately after they've crossed the limit? What's the range in sensing an outbound translation?

They can't say they're having difficulty with their generator. Traffic control might just send a pinnace to help out. Moreover, it would be SOP to turn over and decelerate if you're having difficulties. Traffic Control would be pissed at having to chase someone who kept on going.

In fact, ships not going to Manticore via n-space would be expected to cut acceleration once outside the hyperlimit and any traffic. They lose 92% of their relative velocity when translating, so it's pointless to continue doing so in n-space. Not only that, speedy translations put extra strain on the generators, the ship, and the crew, so no freighter would legitimately continue accelerating.

All this said, it's possible Traffic Control would simply chalk this up to an eccentric and/or naive pilot who only needs to get his licence reexamined, in the days prior to Oyster Bay, the same way that the insertion happened. But unlike the insertion, this ship would be counting on luck to avoid an inspection, which is not something planners could rely on. Plus, the Ghosts wouldn't know ahead of time if their ride home hadn't been intercepted and in its place there's an ambush.

tlb wrote:Actually if they needed to be picked up, the obvious solution would be to have the freighter at the rendezvous site prior to Oyster bay: have it come through the junction with an apparent course that says they will hyper out to someplace like Zanzibar. Only instead of making the hyper transition at some point, go quiet and wait for the Ghosts. Once loaded a hyper transition out would not be noticed.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Hmm... that requires that they stay in n-space for some time after leaving the Junction limit. Wouldn't that stand out? Doesn't everyone hyper out immediately after they've crossed the limit? What's the range in sensing an outbound translation?

They can't say they're having difficulty with their generator. Traffic control might just send a pinnace to help out. Moreover, it would be SOP to turn over and decelerate if you're having difficulties. Traffic Control would be pissed at having to chase someone who kept on going.

In fact, ships not going to Manticore via n-space would be expected to cut acceleration once outside the hyperlimit and any traffic. They lose 92% of their relative velocity when translating, so it's pointless to continue doing so in n-space. Not only that, speedy translations put extra strain on the generators, the ship, and the crew, so no freighter would legitimately continue accelerating.

All this said, it's possible Traffic Control would simply chalk this up to an eccentric and/or naive pilot who only needs to get his licence reexamined, in the days prior to Oyster Bay, the same way that the insertion happened. But unlike the insertion, this ship would be counting on luck to avoid an inspection, which is not something planners could rely on. Plus, the Ghosts wouldn't know ahead of time if their ride home hadn't been intercepted and in its place there's an ambush.

A ship going dark and quiet can not be distinguished from a ship that made a hyper transition.

tlb wrote:A ship going dark and quiet can not be distinguished from a ship that made a hyper transition.

At what distance is that true? It's clear that from far away it is, while from up close and personal it isn't. So what's the distance where that changes?

We know that the majority of the translation energy splashes on the arrival band, but do we know that none of it stays in the departure one? We know that ships not moving can hide their translation out, but this freighter would be moving, albeit no faster than a snail at 0.004c.

Then there's the hypergenerator itself. That thing is producing a lot of energy while it's running. So what is the range at which it is detectable?

My point is: a ship trying to pretend it translated at half a million km from the Junction centre may not pull it off. Not only might that be too close to the Junction's own detectors -- which would be spread out, not in the centre anyway -- there would be other ships possibly nearby that might just comm the freighter and ask "hey buddy, everything ok?"

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
We know that the majority of the translation energy splashes on the arrival band, but do we know that none of it stays in the departure one? We know that ships not moving can hide their translation out, but this freighter would be moving, albeit no faster than a snail at 0.004c.

We know this because David has flat out stated that this is how it works.

Then there's the hypergenerator itself. That thing is producing a lot of energy while it's running. So what is the range at which it is detectable?

My point is: a ship trying to pretend it translated at half a million km from the Junction centre may not pull it off. Not only might that be too close to the Junction's own detectors -- which would be spread out, not in the centre anyway -- there would be other ships possibly nearby that might just comm the freighter and ask "hey buddy, everything ok?"

The other issue is that the possibility of being identified is a whole lot higher if they can produce a list of ships to investigate and your secret ship is on it.

As they have no idea when the ghosts arrive they really don't have a good start, but I'd be deeply looking at events in the week before and after is I was an intel analyst who wasn't assigned to one of the primary RMN naval bases. If I was, well I'd probably be dead.

kzt wrote:The other issue is that the possibility of being identified is a whole lot higher if they can produce a list of ships to investigate and your secret ship is on it.

As they have no idea when the ghosts arrive they really don't have a good start, but I'd be deeply looking at events in the week before and after is I was an intel analyst who wasn't assigned to one of the primary RMN naval bases. If I was, well I'd probably be dead.

That's an interesting question.

Follow-up question: did they do exactly that after the Beowulf Strike? The freighters that delivered the Silver Bullets must have come to the transfer stations.

tlb wrote:Text has been presented that shows the Ghosts were the first ones to test the maneuver that the Sharks used to fool the hyper detection grid at Manticore; therefore the Ghosts have to be hyper capable and being transported in a ship was out of convenience, not necessity (That is the same mistake I made and the text was presented to prove me wrong).

I assumed that it actually was out of a necessity in the form of maintaining OpSec. Which assumes the Ghosts are of a totally divergent ship design that couldn't be risked seen in hyperspace, because stealth won't actually work in hyperspace. It is like an automotive manufacturer going to all of the trouble to mask a new car model when it takes it out for a spin. The MA simply used a freighter.

This brings up another point. The LDs have sails, but they won't be stealthy while in hyper which means someone can spot them while in hyper. Does that imply that the LDs have the streak drive that allows them to travel "first class" in the Alpha bands while every other warship has to travel in coach? LOL The Ghosts may have this ability as well.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:The other thing is that they had to leave after they completed their task. If they weren't hypercapable, they'd need to go somewhere that a freighter could jump in and collect them. That's risky in the aftermath of Oyster Bay, because the RMN and GSN would be pouncing on every single hyperspace contact.

Pounding how? In the aftermath of OB, you need to maintain cohesion in the Home System, the RMN didn't actually know the attack was over. So, pounce with what? LACs aren't hyper capable. And if they are in the habit of chasing after ghosts in an attack of that nature, that is a good way to be lured into an ambush. Several ambushes.

The freighter that delivered the Silver Bullets to Beowulf would have gone to a transfer station or some other in-system regular delivery point. It appears to have been a ship on a regular run- would have been really interesting to divert some random freighter to deliver one or a small number of items from where it was otherwise going. Sure, it could have been just something that had come into the other system and picked up cargo for to drop at Beowulf but originally scheduled to skip Beowulf system and go through the Sigma Draconis terminus on the way to somewhere else. Not that likely but could be.
The freighter motors into the Beowulf inner system (releasing the Silver Bullet on the way in) makes it's stop to deliver whatever was on the manifest for Beowulf system, pick up anything it has room for going to destinations along it's scheduled (probably regular) flight plan and heads out of the system. Only real question is if it is then heading to the terminus. This could be a freighter on a regular trade circuit that does not touch anything of the Manticore Junction wormholes or it could be something that uses up to a couple of wormhole bridges in a normal delivery route. Either way, it would have to have something (if only one thing but that is probably unlikely) to deliver into the Beowulf freight system and even if not on a fixed schedule, would be expected to take items to the next couple of locations -at least- on it's flight plan......turning down cargo you have room for is going to attract attention and the command crew was already concerned about what they had been ordered to do and are not going to want to attract any attention by refusing paid cargo.

kzt wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
We know that the majority of the translation energy splashes on the arrival band, but do we know that none of it stays in the departure one? We know that ships not moving can hide their translation out, but this freighter would be moving, albeit no faster than a snail at 0.004c.

We know this because David has flat out stated that this is how it works.

Then there's the hypergenerator itself. That thing is producing a lot of energy while it's running. So what is the range at which it is detectable?

My point is: a ship trying to pretend it translated at half a million km from the Junction centre may not pull it off. Not only might that be too close to the Junction's own detectors -- which would be spread out, not in the centre anyway -- there would be other ships possibly nearby that might just comm the freighter and ask "hey buddy, everything ok?"

I agree that on grav sensors you can't see the hyper generator operation on a hyper out.
Thought its possible that from close enough range you can tell the difference between an impeller wedge that disappears instantly because the ship hypered out and a wedge that was shut down (i.e. seeing a quick but non-instant drop in power output on the shutting down wedge).

But that's probably irrelevant - a freighter that within even a couple million km of the Junction is probably perfectly observable on the Junction defenses light-speed sensors. Especially if it's just left the Junction and thus been tracked the whole way. They'd easily be able to tell that a freighter that's that close hadn't hypered out because while they'd see the wedge disappear the ship itself would still be there on radar and optical sensors from all the RDs and sensor platforms forming the surveillance shell around the Junction.


However - knowing the timing of OB if they'd really wanted to use a freighter to pick up the Ghosts all they'd need to do is have one scheduled to arrive at Sphinx a few hours after OB is supposed to start. So when the OB attack kicks off it'd be trundling its way in normal space between the Junction and the hyper limit - and could then pretend to panic and then 'flee' or 'hide'. At that point it's far enough from anybody that it's probably not being tracked on lightspeed sensors -- and even if it is the defenders are too busy to deal with one apparently panicking freighter that's decided to try to hide until the situation is clearer.

tlb wrote:Text has been presented that shows the Ghosts were the first ones to test the maneuver that the Sharks used to fool the hyper detection grid at Manticore; therefore the Ghosts have to be hyper capable and being transported in a ship was out of convenience, not necessity (That is the same mistake I made and the text was presented to prove me wrong).

cthia wrote:I assumed that it actually was out of a necessity in the form of maintaining OpSec. Which assumes the Ghosts are of a totally divergent ship design that couldn't be risked seen in hyperspace, because stealth won't actually work in hyperspace. It is like an automotive manufacturer going to all of the trouble to mask a new car model when it takes it out for a spin. The MA simply used a freighter.

This brings up another point. The LDs have sails, but they won't be stealthy while in hyper which means someone can spot them while in hyper. Does that imply that the LDs have the streak drive that allows them to travel "first class" in the Alpha bands while every other warship has to travel in coach? LOL The Ghosts may have this ability as well.

The Ghosts ARE of a totally divergent ship design (the three keel design of all Spider drive vessels), but we assume that all hyper-capable Spider drive ships ARE equipped with the streak drive. Because, why not?

But the use of a freighter was NOT to hide the Ghosts (since we do assume they have the streak drive, the same as the Sharks - that did not use a freighter to travel through hyperspace), we have speculated on the reason and are not sure why. Was it limited fuel capacity, if so wouldn't they need a freighter ride back? However a rendezvous is simpler if they could travel a short way in hyper to the site.