Honorverse ramblings and musings

No, pods certainly existed. They were not very much used because of "reasons" involving something like how the lack of a grav launcher reduced the terminal velocity by 1% and that was just too awful for words. Or some other hand waving reason.

But they were certainly being hauled around in the opening stages of the war by both sides.

kzt wrote:But they were certainly being hauled around in the opening stages of the war by both sides.

The pods used in SVW were new-style pods with grav-drivers from GRAM. I'm not sure about Havenite pods, but they came later in response to RMN pods.

At the time a moon-based missile base would have been built, there were no pods in general use, let alone for System Defense Missiles; the didn't have the size or endurance for the job.

cthia wrote:With Honorverse weaponry - even normal tech available to the average consumer - that could be used as murder weapons probably makes it difficult for crime fighters. There are probably a plethora of ways to completely destroy a body. No body, weak case. Power tools with incredible power to completely pulverize bone in the average garage. Sheesh!

With Honorverse tech, there are also new techniques for forensics.

Monitors and detectors are probably fairly ubiquitous. Police can probably track people's movements well, through their portable comm units, their data devices, anything they carry around with a chip. They can probably analyze residual organic materials, even lingering molecules in the air, in real-time. Powerful tools may have built-in sensors and recorders. I'm sure there are many other forensic tools I haven't imagined yet.

Yes, I'm sure it's difficult. Forensics and police work is forever in a race against criminal innovation. That's one thing I liked about the short-lived tv series Almost Human. In the Honorverse, we saw Kevin Usher assassinate a top-ranking member of the Legislaturalists with the Honorverse equivalent of a surface-to-air missile, and get away with it. On the other hand, he was professionally trained, had access to the resources of a rebel movement, and was indirectly aided by an insider in InSec. So I suspect that, though the police have a hard time, they can do pretty well much of the time.

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:I really must read "House of Steel."

We have never seen the missile base used. What are the tactical/strategic reasons for there to be a missile base on the moon? Blackbird was a special case.

Before GRAM and Ghost Rider, system defense missiles had to be ground based; there were no pods and the missiles were too large for ship-board deployment.

In modern times, there is probably some value as a training base or secondary command center, or something. It's probably NOT actually useful as a missile base, per se, in the current combat environment.

And Thorsen has had a small missile base for a long time. There was a passing mention of a missile base there back in Travis Young's time; 450-ish years before OBS.

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:I really must read "House of Steel."

We have never seen the missile base used. What are the tactical/strategic reasons for there to be a missile base on the moon? Blackbird was a special case.

Before GRAM and Ghost Rider, system defense missiles had to be ground based; there were no pods and the missiles were too large for ship-board deployment.

In modern times, there is probably some value as a training base or secondary command center, or something. It's probably NOT actually useful as a missile base, per se, in the current combat environment.

Johnathan_S wrote:And Thorsen has had a small missile base for a long time. There was a passing mention of a missile base there back in Travis Young's time; 450-ish years before OBS.

I don't understand the use of any missile base in the current combat environment or even way back when, to be useful for any utility beyond protecting the base itself. For system defense, how could it be useful in any era? The enemy would just steer clear of the moon and even if the missiles had the legs, the control links wouldn't and by the time the missiles reached their intended targets the ships are long gone -- there's no Apollo to real time update. What am I missing?

I just cannot imagine a moonbase's utility for anything beyond protecting the moonbase itself - and not for system defense.

And it seems prudent for any attacker to know the phases of an enemy's moon.

cthia wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:
Before GRAM and Ghost Rider, system defense missiles had to be ground based; there were no pods and the missiles were too large for ship-board deployment.

In modern times, there is probably some value as a training base or secondary command center, or something. It's probably NOT actually useful as a missile base, per se, in the current combat environment.

Johnathan_S wrote:And Thorsen has had a small missile base for a long time. There was a passing mention of a missile base there back in Travis Young's time; 450-ish years before OBS.

I don't understand the use of any missile base in the current combat environment or even way back when, to be useful for any utility beyond protecting the base itself. For system defense, how could it be useful in any era? The enemy would just steer clear of the moon and even if the missiles had the legs, the control links wouldn't and by the time the missiles reached their intended targets the ships are long gone -- there's no Apollo to real time update. What am I missing?

I just cannot imagine a moonbase's utility for anything beyond protecting the moonbase itself - and not for system defense.

And it seems prudent for any attacker to know the phases of an enemy's moon.

If memory serves, the old planerary defense missiles were huge and longer burn times (more capacitors) and bigger warheads. They weren't system defense systems, but planetary ones, giving the planetary defenders a powerful first shot. Since a moon is a big thing, multiple launchers could be located giving a massive salvo before the attackers could fire in powered range.

Usually the launchers had a couple reloads in their automatic reloaders.

However, moons cannot have sidewalls nor can they dodge, so the installations were very vulnerable to ballistic fire.

cthia wrote:
Before GRAM and Ghost Rider, system defense missiles had to be ground based; there were no pods and the missiles were too large for ship-board deployment.

In modern times, there is probably some value as a training base or secondary command center, or something. It's probably NOT actually useful as a missile base, per se, in the current combat environment.

What in a system are you defending?

Ultimately, it's where people and resources are. Habitable worlds are the star of the defense priority show. Remote shipyards and asteroid extraction centers are also in there, but they're not universal and they won't be in the league of the habitable worlds for that purpose. (Unless it's like Gryphon - habitable as a kind of courtesy title....)

Habitable worlds will often - usually, always? - have some sort of natural satellite. That natural satellite is a fine place to slap a base. It's about as conveniently located as any other nearby chunk of orbit; if you have an engineering/tactical use for the rock, there it is; and unlike the planet, you don't have to worry about bujillions of casualties from return fire.

Edit - Pardon the quoting errors; the quoted portion is from Weird Harold, not cthia, though the points are ones cthia got behind and pushed.

cthia wrote:I don't understand the use of any missile base in the current combat environment or even way back when, to be useful for any utility beyond protecting the base itself. For system defense, how could it be useful in any era? The enemy would just steer clear of the moon and even if the missiles had the legs, the control links wouldn't and by the time the missiles reached their intended targets the ships are long gone -- there's no Apollo to real time update. What am I missing?

I just cannot imagine a moonbase's utility for anything beyond protecting the moonbase itself - and not for system defense.

And it seems prudent for any attacker to know the phases of an enemy's moon.

Think back to Blackbird. It was not an anomaly. Remember the missiles that were fired from Blackbird? They were much bigger than capital missiles, and had much longer range. The text specifically states that ground-based missiles could be much bigger and more powerful than ship-board missiles.

Even 1900, launching these missiles from the moon could defend the planet from any ships approaching the planet, long before they could range on the moonbase itself.

SWM wrote:

cthia wrote:I don't understand the use of any missile base in the current combat environment or even way back when, to be useful for any utility beyond protecting the base itself. For system defense, how could it be useful in any era? The enemy would just steer clear of the moon and even if the missiles had the legs, the control links wouldn't and by the time the missiles reached their intended targets the ships are long gone -- there's no Apollo to real time update. What am I missing?

I just cannot imagine a moonbase's utility for anything beyond protecting the moonbase itself - and not for system defense.

And it seems prudent for any attacker to know the phases of an enemy's moon.

Think back to Blackbird. It was not an anomaly. Remember the missiles that were fired from Blackbird? They were much bigger than capital missiles, and had much longer range. The text specifically states that ground-based missiles could be much bigger and more powerful than ship-board missiles.

Even 1900, launching these missiles from the moon could defend the planet from any ships approaching the planet, long before they could range on the moonbase itself.

Planet defense! I knew I was missing something. But even then, if you know the phases of the enemy's moon why can't you attack holding the planet between you and the defending moon?

And how does a moon defense control such long legged missiles? Especially in the early days of moonbase defenses?

cthia wrote:

SWM wrote:Think back to Blackbird. It was not an anomaly. Remember the missiles that were fired from Blackbird? They were much bigger than capital missiles, and had much longer range. The text specifically states that ground-based missiles could be much bigger and more powerful than ship-board missiles.

Even 1900, launching these missiles from the moon could defend the planet from any ships approaching the planet, long before they could range on the moonbase itself.

Planet defense! I knew I was missing something. But even then, if you know the phases of the enemy's moon why can't you attack holding the planet between you and the defending moon?

And how does a moon defense control such long legged missiles? Especially in the early days of moonbase defenses?

Sure, it's not perfect. But it does give you a way to have long-range planetary defense even with 1900-era tech. It's far better than nothing. Given the tech, it's pretty darn good.

Control is not a big problem. Range was not a problem for control of SDMs--even these missiles simply can't reach far enough for control range to be a problem. We aren't talking even DDM range. And missiles don't have to go straight. They can curve around the planet. If necessary, control could be passed off to stations on the other side of the planet, perhaps. It would not be optimal, of course. Trying to throw missiles around the planet would not give you very much range beyond the planet. It might not even be worth trying.

But you wouldn't rely on a lunar missile base as your only defenses. And what defense such a base has is big and powerful. More than half of the approach vectors to the planet are controlled from a lunar base. At the very least, it would prevent anyone from claiming the orbitals without taking out the lunar base. And those big missiles could take out quite an attacking force that did try to take the planet.