Apollo Redundancy

Somtaaw wrote:Second reason, the Apollo missiles are both notably behind the attack missiles, and using them as shields to ensure it's able to transmit & receive FTL orders as long as possible. So one would imagine it's actually directly following one missile or another, specifically so it will plow directly into an explosion to be vaporized and leave little to no hardware that could be possibly be salvaged.

Molycircs that slag themselves can do a lot to stop reverse engineering circuitry and software. But things like MDM baffles & FTL grav-pulse are physical hardware that not even slagging the circuitry can stop. But nobody can reverse-engineer physical hardware from hot plasma, in this universe anyways.

Off-hand, you'd need someone like Q from Star Trek, or Marvel Doctor Strange with the Time Stone levels of plot-hack devices to turn hot plasma back into a physical Apollo missile that you can (try to) hack it's secrets.

Also, the ACMs all have microfusion power plants. Turning off the containment on those is going to be a nearly foolproof way to self-destruct the missile.

It'd be very hard to lose the ability to break containment without having a bad enough fault, or damage, that it'd have taken out the containment anyway as a side effect.

One other important thing is that no DSO is going to go after the ACMs first in a counter-battery. They have to focus on the actual attack birds. Even if they could kill all the ACMs, the attack missiles are still damn good Mk23D and they're the most important threat. You can blunt the full salvo somewhat by tanking away 11% of it that is the ACM, but you'd probably do better taking away 11% of the actual warheads. Even if they take out some Dazzlers or Dragon's Teeth instead of warheads, it's probably still a better use of the CMs.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:One other important thing is that no DSO is going to go after the ACMs first in a counter-battery. They have to focus on the actual attack birds. Even if they could kill all the ACMs, the attack missiles are still damn good Mk23D and they're the most important threat. You can blunt the full salvo somewhat by tanking away 11% of it that is the ACM, but you'd probably do better taking away 11% of the actual warheads. Even if they take out some Dazzlers or Dragon's Teeth instead of warheads, it's probably still a better use of the CMs.

I'm not sure Solarian, or most others including Maya, keep an RD sphere that could even see Apollo's due to the attack missiles in front. The description from Henke's briefings and her own launch (simulations) seem to suggest the 8 missiles associated with a specific Apollo Control cluster around it, specifically to hide it's powerful FTL from the target. You could only see it, or tell them apart if you have RD's with enough vertical separation above/below to see them (less chance of transmission lag), or from behind the attack missiles which could be subject to considerable lag.

Manticore, Grayson and Haven definitely keep a close-in RD sphere, likely somewhere just beyond the limit of where standard laser/radio drops off and FTL efficiency soars. Andermani may now do so, since they were handed Ghost Rider and trained up to Manticoran standards during their stint with Eighth Fleet.

That's far enough out that, assuming some hostile entity were to somehow acquire control of Apollo pods, Grand Alliance would have RDs to see Apollo with up-the-kilt scans but before they're in attack range.


Otherwise yes, I also concur by the time you could possibly distinguish Apollo from attack missiles, it won't matter. So from the POV of trying to survive most effectively, your CMs and PDLCs are much better off trying to target the attack missiles, and praying you don't hit any Dazzlers or Dragon Teeth (itself or its phantom images).

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Somtaaw wrote:if an Apollo ACM is taken out by counter-fire, whether laser or counter-missile, the Mk23's it was controlling are a heartbeat from detonating. So there's no point to another Apollo missile trying to give them last second instructions. Not even a last microsecond abort command can stop the attack at this point. The missile is already oriented by RCS thruster, the laser rods are pointed at a target, the gravity lens is probably already spinning upto full strength, and the nuke itself is milliseconds away from detonating which will destroy the nearby Apollo's.

Not necessarily, and especially not against Mk21 CMs.

The RMN and now GA CM doctrine begins intercepting from very far away. Against Cataphracts, Sir Martin Lessem used 5 waves of CMs during the Battle of the Ajay-Prime Warp Bridge. Mk23 would have a higher relative velocity if it's at the end of its second stage or into the third stage, which would limit the number of waves that there can be in the interception range of CMs.

But the point is that the outer interception range is 2 million km, or nearly 7 light-seconds. That's 8.3 seconds of flight time, even at terminal velocity, assuming negligible relative velocity between the ships being attacked and the launch platform. So it's entirely possible for a CM to take out ACMs way before the controlled missiles are ready to attack.

This hasn't been an issue against the SLN because the SLN CMs were low in density, slowly fired, and terrible at long ranges. The Mk23 came crashing down usually across a single CM wave, then practically immediately after that they fired. But against an opponent that has had time to improve their CMs and their doctrine to fight 3-stage MDMs, that has to be taken into account.

In fact, that must have been taken into account because the Apollos were designed to fight the RHN and those could fire multiple CM waves. It just happened that the war ended before they developed the doctrine and our seeing it in action. The two times where Apollos were used against the RHN were the Battle of Lovat, which is the first time they were used, and the Battle of Manticore, when Chin was too busy trying to escape Honor and Alistair's missiles were mixed in the rest of Third Fleet's salvos.

It's possible the first gen Apollos didn't have a way to do hand-over, because they were somewhat rushed to the front. But that technique can't have been far behind, because if the war had lasted, it would be used.

By the time of the Battle of Galton, I'm sure it was in place. The Galton Navy representing the MAlign was not stupid and they did have some surprises up their sleeves; they had been following the war with Haven very closely.

Theemile wrote:Even with the Mk 31/32 CMs, the outer intercept range is in the 3-3.5 million KM range, or just over 10 light seconds. MDMs would be coming in at ~.5c, so we're talking about the last ~20 seconds of the missile life. At that point, the Missiles are settling down on their attack runs and have "final" attack profiles. Jammers will be on or programmed to come on, and missile will already have assigned targets.

Also, The ACM is multiple thousand KM behind the attack missiles, and is using them for protection, like a quarterback, it can use missiles as armor to defend itself against CMs by interposing the attack missile wedges between CMs and the ACM.

Thanks for clearing up my error in thinking the ACM was located in the midst of the brood. However, if it is trailing, why aren't its sensors affected by the wedges of its brood?* If it is trailing far enough behind that it isn't, that should also put it out on a limb alone against a stealthy opponent that can isolate and strike at it laterally.

I thought the sensors of the ACM are much more robust which is important during autonomous mode, but if the wedges of the brood obscure it ...

I must be in error about the ACM sensors, which may rely solely on a FTL signal from the mother ship? If that is true, then it may be impossible for a ACM to ram anyway, as we have discussed and argued over in the past.

Where are my disconnects?

cthia wrote:Thanks for clearing up my error in thinking the ACM was located in the midst of the brood. However, if it is trailing, why aren't its sensors affected by the wedges of its brood?* If it is trailing far enough behind that it isn't, that should also put it out on a limb alone against a stealthy opponent that can isolate and strike at it laterally.

I thought the sensors of the ACM are much more robust which is important during autonomous mode, but if the wedges of the brood obscure it ...

I must be in error about the ACM sensors, which may rely solely on a FTL signal from the mother ship? If that is true, then it may be impossible for a ACM to ram anyway, as we have discussed and argued over in the past.

Where are my disconnects?

That seems to be a good point about the control missiles sensor's being obscured by the wedges of its pod mates; but it is in constant communication with those missiles, so perhaps it is using their sensors instead? Anyway, it is no good to try to use the mother ship's sensors, both because of the distance making sensing more difficult and the associated time lag (even with FTL communication).

cthia wrote:Thanks for clearing up my error in thinking the ACM was located in the midst of the brood. However, if it is trailing, why aren't its sensors affected by the wedges of its brood?* If it is trailing far enough behind that it isn't, that should also put it out on a limb alone against a stealthy opponent that can isolate and strike at it laterally.

I thought the sensors of the ACM are much more robust which is important during autonomous mode, but if the wedges of the brood obscure it ...

I must be in error about the ACM sensors, which may rely solely on a FTL signal from the mother ship? If that is true, then it may be impossible for a ACM to ram anyway, as we have discussed and argued over in the past.

Where are my disconnects?

Its computers are more robust; not so much its sensors -- but it's using sensor fusion to get its improved look at the target.

It uses its high bandwidth links to the 8 missiles in its brood to receive each one's raw sensor feeds, and then its superior computing power to process those, much like a spare telescope array, to generate a much higher resolution composite view of the target. Then it exchanges that information laterally to other Mk 23E ACMs in the same salvo -- allowing the swarm to compare takes and further refine their collective picture of the targets.

It's that collective picture, from many viewpoints spread across the "wave front" of the salvo that lets the Mk 23Es be so effective at target discrimination, and decoy/jamming rejection, when in autonomous mode.


It doesn't really matter if the wedges of its brood basically obscure any sensors the 23E itself carries -- because it's seeing through their "eyes" anyway

cthia wrote:Thanks for clearing up my error in thinking the ACM was located in the midst of the brood. However, if it is trailing, why aren't its sensors affected by the wedges of its brood?* If it is trailing far enough behind that it isn't, that should also put it out on a limb alone against a stealthy opponent that can isolate and strike at it laterally.

I thought the sensors of the ACM are much more robust which is important during autonomous mode, but if the wedges of the brood obscure it ...

I must be in error about the ACM sensors, which may rely solely on a FTL signal from the mother ship? If that is true, then it may be impossible for a ACM to ram anyway, as we have discussed and argued over in the past.

Where are my disconnects?

What Jonathan said, but here's some of the tex from Storm From Shadows, which say much the same thing.

"Once we'd taken up ways to deal with that particular objection," Halstead went on, "it became evident that our only choices were to either strip the drive stage out of the birds, as we'd originally planned, or else to add a dedicated missile. One whose sole function would be to provide the FTL link between the firing ship and the attack birds. There were some potential drawbacks to that, but it allowed us not only to retain the full range of the MDM, but actually required very few modifications to the existing Mark 23. And, somewhat to the surprise of several members of our team, using a dedicated control missile actually increased tactical flexibility enormously. It let us put in a significantly more capable—and longer-ranged—transciever, and we were also able to fit in a much more capable data processing and AI node. The Mark 23s are slaved to the control bird—the real 'Apollo' missile—using their standard light-speed systems, reconfigured for maximum bandwidth rather than maximum sensitivity, and the Apollo's internal AI manages its slaved attack birds while simultaneously collecting and analyzing the data from all of their on-board sensors. It transmits the consolidated output from all of its slaved missiles to the firing vessel, which gives the ship's tactical department a real-time, close-up and personal view of the tactical environment.

I'd have to grab the texts from mainline Honor books to find the bits that describe Apollo as riding behind the attack missiles. Which means finding them, I only have this because I happen to be rereading Shadows series atm.

But overall for long-distance strikes, your missiles are configured for maximum sensitivity because obviously at long distance hitting them (accurately) with a transmission to update their orders is difficult. You only use maximum broadband for close to maybe mid-range missiles because there's no lag in signal transmitting and you can 'guide' the missile a lot better, and it responds much faster in broadband mode.

Apollo removes that signal lag, so all your attack missiles are constantly receiving orders from effectively point blank, which is what allows Apollo-guided missiles to actually thread around incoming CMs (like at Lovat, or Manticore).

That maximum broadband allows for much finer control of the missiles, and Apollo has an upsized 'brain' compared to the Mk23s. And obviously if Apollo is the "brains" you don't want it right up front with an equal chance to be struck by CMs. So you keep it marginally back, and even use the attack missiles to conceal it from the target(s) by having physical missile wedges between them.


Or to put it another way, remember the Battle of Selker Sheer? Honor with Wayfarer deliberately flying in and out of being directly between the Peep Sultan and "Artemis" especially as they'd power up another decoy drone. Apollo is doing the same thing, but putting Mk23's between it and the target, so the target cannot spot and destroy the Apollo's before they can update the local missiles. Losing a Mk23 or three won't change how tremendously lethal the other 3 would be, with an Apollo still giving them up to date information, even sharing info from other Apollo's.

To reduce that chance of being sniped, Apollo cannot be on the front line. But it can't be too far behind either or you'd be able to distinguish it as two distinct salvos, one big one followed by one that is strangely only 1/8th the size. That leads to people asking questions, and that could lead to counters being thought up faster. So the Apollo's are right on the Mk23 coattails, close enough it appears to be 1 salvo & Mk23s can be used to physically (and gravimetrically shield) the Apollo and it's FTL emitter with their own wedges, but far enough back they are less likely to eat a countermissile.

Thinking about the geometry of trying to pick off ACMs in flight -- and it just doesn't seem to work.
Even an undetected stealthy ship most of the way towards the launching fleet would have a lot of trouble picking off passing ACMs. Sure once they're abreast of it it should be able to see them just fine. But hitting them is another matter.


Even by the time the first MDM drive burns out, just 3 minutes into the flight (only 7.3 million km from the ships that launched them) they're already moving faster than the terminal velocity of a really good CM. The stealthed ship could pick off any that happened to be within PDLC range (what's that, 100,000 km or so?) - but that's not going to be more than a handful.
And at that point the MDMs are already moving at 0.27c, and still accelerating away from you hard -- not even a Mk31 can catch them (and that's the quickest and longest lasting CM we know of)

Sure, a Mk31 has a terminal velocity of 0.32c -- but it takes 75 seconds to build up to it; and give the MDMs that same 75 extra seconds and they're up to 0.38c. They just left any pursuing CMs in the dust.


But you can't launch before the ACMs are abreast of you of else it's just a normal CM launch and you'd have to make it through the slaved Mk23s to get at the 23E.


So it seems to me that the only way to pick off the 23E ACMs mid-flight, to crippled the salvo, is to sneak a stealthed ship to within about 3.5 million km of the launching fleet! And it's life expectancy after engaging that first MDM salvo is going to be measured in seconds!! (Assuming it wasn't detected in the first place, and destroyed, trying to sneak through the surrounding recon shells to within 1/5th of a light minute of a GA fleet!)

Jonathan_S wrote:Thinking about the geometry of trying to pick off ACMs in flight -- and it just doesn't seem to work.
Even an undetected stealthy ship most of the way towards the launching fleet would have a lot of trouble picking off passing ACMs. Sure once they're abreast of it it should be able to see them just fine. But hitting them is another matter.

Your assumption is flawed that a stealthed ship somewhere between the two ships is only using CMs for anti-missile. During the ballistic phase, attack missiles (if you can localize them) are HIGHLY vulnerable to beam weapons. Mk23s are only crowding the 0.3-0.6 range, but beams are twice as fast and there's no missile wedges to block the laser/graser.

If you had a ship that was entirely, or mostly beam-based, they'd be able to put a pretty large hurting on a ballistic Apollo salvo. And being at the mid-point, it would have much better eyes on where Apollo's stage 2 drive burnt out and the salvo went ballistic; than the ultimate target would.



The ultimate target also would get pretty good interceptions against Apollo if it were far enough back to easily tell them apart from attack missiles. But by that point in time, Apollo has already done 99% of its job, and could self-destruct on it's own, the only last reason for Apollo to follow the Mk23's into laserhead range is on the off-chance of an 'abort attack' command being issued.


Another thing to consider, is whether or not anybody is going to develop some form of grav-pulse emitter jammers. Intentionally filling space with loud or frequent pulses to quite literally drown out Ghost Rider, Apollo, and Grand Alliance ships from talking to each other.

If they can't pull FTL data from their RDs, and can't FTL update Apollo, the GA does lose many of it's advantages. They'd be down to better compensators, and relying on Apollo's jacked-up borderline AI computers being in autonomous mode.

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:Thanks for clearing up my error in thinking the ACM was located in the midst of the brood. However, if it is trailing, why aren't its sensors affected by the wedges of its brood?* If it is trailing far enough behind that it isn't, that should also put it out on a limb alone against a stealthy opponent that can isolate and strike at it laterally.

I thought the sensors of the ACM are much more robust which is important during autonomous mode, but if the wedges of the brood obscure it ...

I must be in error about the ACM sensors, which may rely solely on a FTL signal from the mother ship? If that is true, then it may be impossible for a ACM to ram anyway, as we have discussed and argued over in the past.

Where are my disconnects?

That seems to be a good point about the control missiles sensor's being obscured by the wedges of its pod mates; but it is in constant communication with those missiles, so perhaps it is using their sensors instead? Anyway, it is no good to try to use the mother ship's sensors, both because of the distance making sensing more difficult and the associated time lag (even with FTL communication).

The ACMs have a mesh network between their respective attack missiles and other ACMs, so essentially every ACM can see the battlefield through the sensors of every missile in the salvo, giving them a much better view of the battle than if they just used their sensors alone.