Light bulb Captured Solly fleet

Weird Harold wrote:This is a case where the argument that the SEM has more modern ships in mothballs is a good argument. If you're going to give obsolete warships to new allies, why not give them ships that can defeat the immediate threat?

RFC has said the captured ships are useless as warships. That applies to giving them away to breakaway shell or verge systems (or to Torch) because they are too manpower intensive and expensive to operate as warships.

Modern RMN ships have tech you don't want questionable people to have.

And the idea that a planet with a few billion population can't find 6000 people to run a ship when you have no other real options is absurd.

Weird Harold wrote:

Relax wrote:Aw common. Anyone who actually postulates going to geostationairy orbit at 22,000+ miles

Don't put words into my mouth.

I have never specified orbital details because I thought it would be obvious that I was talking about "LEO" distances.

So, for the record: Putting ships used as trauma centers or hosting "commuter-students" should be in the lowest orbits consistent with economical station keeping.

WoW.

LEO is at what altitude again?

100-->1000 miles last I checked

Hospital that is on the opposite side of the world, but will "fly" over every few hours. Works wonderfully for ambulances.

Paramedic: "Excuse me (heart attack patient), but you will have to wait until the hospital ship in LEO orbit fly's over."

kzt wrote:No, you can't really demill it. Without an SD capable shipyard, which they don't have. You could remove parts, but I seem to remember you wanted them to be fabricating stuff, so they can build spare parts...

No, I want SLN POWs hired as instructors to teach others to "fabricate stuff."

You seem determined to cast every SLN POW as an arrogant dishonorable fanatic determined to put down every neobarb in the universe. You also seem determined to ignore my repeated assertion that a security force would be necessary.

It doesn't take a shipyard to "spike the guns" -- all it takes is a pair of wire cutters and a security lock/camera on the weapons mounts. It doesn't take a shipyard to put security lockouts on the main engines if simple removing critical components isn't warranted.

kzt wrote:In order to make your plan work, you'd need pretty much every single crewman to volunteer once you eliminate the weapons crews, marines, tactical section, weapon techs, etc from eligibility. Not to mention that 10%+ of the crew are officers.

No, I'd need about one sixth of the enlisted crew to volunteer for harbor watch duty.

Warships in general are overmanned to allow for casualties and to provide three shifts of round-the-clock manning. A harbor watch doesn't need that kind of redundancy and would have apprentices/students learning the skills needed for keeping a ship habitable. I'd need around half of one shift in critical "house-keeping" career paths.

That low percentage would allow -- but not require -- the exclusion of officers, senior petty officers and senior ratings. With 80% of the crews not needed, there would be a lot of latitude to pick and choose supervisory level people.

kzt wrote:This also assumes you can screen these effectively, which seems doubtful.

Ever heard of Treecats? It would only take one or two to pick subversives/SLN fanatics out of a crowd.

kzt wrote:Modern RMN ships have tech you don't want questionable people to have.

The Manticoran Mothball reserve aren't "modern ships" They're more "modern" than current front-line Sollie ships, but not any more capable than what the Erehwons sold Haven -- which according to RFC is about three generations behind current pod-based GA hardware.

kzt wrote:And the idea that a planet with a few billion population can't find 6000 people to run a ship when you have no other real options is absurd.

First, it doesn't take 6,000 to run a ship you have no intention of "running." It doesn't even take 6,000 if you intend to "run" it or even to "fight" it. It takes under a thousand to just keep the ship in orbit and habitable.

Second, finding even a thousand people on Nuncio who can man a harbor watch on Sollie hardware would be difficult. Maybe not so difficult on Rembrandt.
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Relax wrote: Hospital that is on the opposite side of the world, but will "fly" over every few hours. Works wonderfully for ambulances.

LEO orbits take 90 minutes or so for each orbit.

You must have missed or ignored the estimate of "Contra-grav shuttles can reach a ship in orbit from anywhere on the planet in 40 minutes or less -- assuming priority traffic control clearance for med-evacs."

Weird Harold wrote:Ever heard of Treecats? It would only take one or two to pick subversives/SLN fanatics out of a crowd.

How many treecats do you think they have in the entire sector? Last I knew, it was about 4.

How many are trained to interrogate people? I'll guess about zero. So, given that pretty much all the SLN people are kind of pissed. determining their motivation might seem a bit hard.

How many are supposed to have another job, like being a bodyguard or feel the urge to hang around a given person? Pretty much all of them, giving you about zero for this job.

How long do you think it takes to question a few hundred thousand people? Assume an absurdly short period of time, like only 2 minutes per person, and 8 hours a day, 7 days a week with no lunch or breaks. So 240 per day per treecat. If you had any treecats, which they don't.

So if they had a treecat, which they don't, it would take about 833 days with one treecat trying really hard giving a really superficial examination and trying to communicate via sign language what is going on.

Weird Harold wrote:

kzt wrote:Modern RMN ships have tech you don't want questionable people to have.

The Manticoran Mothball reserve aren't "modern ships" They're more "modern" than current front-line Sollie ships, but not any more capable than what the Erehwons sold Haven -- which according to RFC is about three generations behind current pod-based GA hardware.

No they were front line ships up until the second war. So their fire control code is the roughly the same as the RMN uses, their missile seekers are very similar if not identical, their CMs would be modern since it's not like they have oodles of old CMs, their sensor are very similar, the PDLC code is identical, the compensators are modern ones, etc. All things you really don't want immediately sold off to parties unknown.

Weird Harold wrote:

Rakhmamort wrote:and how many small craft are there?

More than the one or two per ship needed as med-evac ambulances.

Rakhmamort wrote:instead of being available for walk in emergencies you have to travel out of the gravity well just to get that spurting artery fixed. not good...

Now you're just being silly. Captured ships would NOT replace existing trauma centers, they would augment existing centers. Just as most of the hospitals in southern Nevada send their most critical trauma victims to the regional trauma center at UMC, existing trauma centers would triage walk-ins and call for orbital med-evac if necessary.

One or 2 space ambulances is too few to even justify keeping a space based hospital running.

I really don't see a reason why said medical facilities in SDs cannot be removed and relocated groundside. Not only are you not spending a lot of resources and manpower to keep th SD operating, you also have to house your hospital staff in the SD or provide them some way to commute to and from their homes. I'm sure most hospital staff would like to be able to hold their loved ones after taking care of dying/almost dead patients at work.

As for augmentation, augmenting what trauma centers? I thought you said they are for planet s that don't have medical facilities? If the planet already has a trauma center, wouldn't it be more logical to augment their equipment rather than have them pack the patients into orbital ambulances. Take them 1 floor up or down instead of sending them to space.

Bringing the equipment into the trauma center gives that center permanent upgrades. Keeping those equipment in a ship destined for the breakers is just delaying the disassembly of said equipment from the ship, not to mention the trouble of relocating the patients already there before they can recycle its materials.

It is a new and unique idea, I'll give it that.

kzt wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:Ever heard of Treecats? It would only take one or two to pick subversives/SLN fanatics out of a crowd.

How many treecats do you think they have in the entire sector? Last I knew, it was about 4.

How many are trained to interrogate people?

It only takes one Treecat and no special training. The TQ had four. One is with Adm Gold Peak, so three.

(As an aside, where are Treecats colonizing next? That's a question for a new thread I think.)

Step 1: Determine needed specialties and query POW lists for possible candidates.

Step 2: Screen Records of possible candidates to eliminate obvious unsuitables.

Step 3: Interview candidates; use one interviewer per ship position needed, (around a thousand interviewers. Stop when the interviewers have accumulated 70-100 candidates.

Step 4: Assemble the candidates (all hundred thousand or so) in a stadiium and administer an "oath of parole" in the presence of a treecat -- have them sign the oath in close proximity to the treecat 100-500 at a time.

Step 5: Reject and replace anyone the Treecat feels might be lieing or has reservations about the terms of parole.

Step 6: rinse and repeat until all slots are filled.