Topic Actions

Topic Search

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 36 guests

Did the MBS corner the market on trade?

Join us in talking discussing all things Honor, including (but not limited to) tactics, favorite characters, and book discussions.
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by cthia   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 7:42 am

cthia
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 14951
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:10 pm

TM, rereading that exchange I think we both misunderstood each other. I intended to say the RMN no longer needs to defend against anything coming through from Beowulf. Certainly, Beowulf needs to defend their side of it. But if something DOES get through, what can they do? In fact, if Beowulf's side is taken without a whisper, it'd be better for the Manties if the enemy WOULD tip their hand and come thru before some unwitting ship were to transit into the gorilla's jaws.

Blocking the junction from the Beowulf side is what I don't think the RMN gave enough thought. Tsang could have changed her mission on the fly IF her mission was dependent upon contact with the DB. Also dependent, of course, upon Tsang's force being the true fist of the gorilla, since she had time to receive critical new toys. That is what I meant by Beowulf being held at gunpoint by a raving lunatic who was already capable of the likes of Case Bucaneer, Parthian Shot, and blasting warships with their wedges down; considering how the gorilla's rage was already at critical over the infidelity of his wife who was clearly sleeping with the enemy.

In fact, that DB could have activated potential orders to Tsang to go ahead and sterilize Beowulf. Or simply prompted an insane Tsang to go ahead and do it anyway. IOW, that DB could have set in motion some very nasty contingency plans.

And, if Tsang's force had been able to overcome her opposition, and shut down the Beowulf side, then Beowulf would have been at her mercy, or lack thereof. It turned out somewhat OK in the end, barring the KARMA that came home to roost. But, I suspect in one of Honor's advanced classes on Saganami, releasing that Dispatch Boat will be shown as a risk that shouldn't have been taken.

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by tlb   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 9:41 am

tlb
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3854
Joined: Mon Sep 03, 2012 11:34 am

cthia wrote:In fact, that DB could have activated potential orders to Tsang to go ahead and sterilize Beowulf. Or simply prompted an insane Tsang to go ahead and do it anyway. IOW, that DB could have set in motion some very nasty contingency plans.

And, if Tsang's force had been able to overcome her opposition, and shut down the Beowulf side, then Beowulf would have been at her mercy, or lack thereof. It turned out somewhat OK in the end, barring the KARMA that came home to roost. But, I suspect in one of Honor's advanced classes on Saganami, releasing that Dispatch Boat will be shown as a risk that shouldn't have been taken.

The question of permitting the passage of the DB was made at a far higher pay grade than that of any serving officer of the Navy; so it is unlikely to be taught in a Saganami class, not just because nothing bad came of it.

Whether or not Admiral Tsang is going to have a psychotic episode is not really dependent on the presence, or absence, of the DB. Should that happen, Operation Raging Honor Harrington would hit the Sol System much earlier in the story.

Although you continually harp on KARMA afflicting Beowulf, what actually happened to them had nothing to do with the interactions with the Solarian League (which is what you proclaimed) and everything to do with the centuries long hatred by the Detweilers triggered by the nuclear suicide of the father.
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by cthia   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 10:03 am

cthia
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 14951
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:10 pm

tlb wrote:
cthia wrote:In fact, that DB could have activated potential orders to Tsang to go ahead and sterilize Beowulf. Or simply prompted an insane Tsang to go ahead and do it anyway. IOW, that DB could have set in motion some very nasty contingency plans.

And, if Tsang's force had been able to overcome her opposition, and shut down the Beowulf side, then Beowulf would have been at her mercy, or lack thereof. It turned out somewhat OK in the end, barring the KARMA that came home to roost. But, I suspect in one of Honor's advanced classes on Saganami, releasing that Dispatch Boat will be shown as a risk that shouldn't have been taken.

The question of permitting the passage of the DB was made at a far higher pay grade than that of any serving officer of the Navy; so it is unlikely to be taught in a Saganami class, not just because nothing bad came of it.

Whether or not Admiral Tsang is going to have a psychotic episode is not really dependent on the presence, or absence, of the DB. Should that happen, Operation Raging Honor Harrington would hit the Sol System much earlier in the story.

Although you continually harp on KARMA afflicting Beowulf, what actually happened to them had nothing to do with the interactions with the Solarian League (which is what you proclaimed) and everything to do with the centuries long hatred by the Detweilers triggered by the nuclear suicide of the father.

Since we know by way of textev the decision to release the boat came from Beowulf, your point makes no sense. There is nobody on Beowulf's side of the junction who outranked the RMN on matters of war. And we know the Queen doesn't backseat drive.

You still haven't come to terms with karma, I see. She's not that complicated a bitch. Just a bitch.

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by tlb   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 10:19 am

tlb
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3854
Joined: Mon Sep 03, 2012 11:34 am

cthia wrote:Since we know by way of textev the decision to release the boat came from Beowulf, your point makes no sense. There is nobody on Beowulf's side of the junction who outranked the RMN on matters of war. And we know the Queen doesn't backseat drive.

You still haven't come to terms with karma, I see. She's not that complicated a bitch. Just a bitch.

All we know from the text is that someone thinks that the decision was made by Beowulf, but that would still require authorities on Manticore to agree (since it is Manticoran Astro Control that controls traffic).

Obviously you keep presenting the idea of Tsang going bonkers, because that would match what you think Karma should dish out to Beowulf.
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by cthia   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 10:31 am

cthia
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 14951
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:10 pm

tlb wrote:
cthia wrote:Since we know by way of textev the decision to release the boat came from Beowulf, your point makes no sense. There is nobody on Beowulf's side of the junction who outranked the RMN on matters of war. And we know the Queen doesn't backseat drive.

You still haven't come to terms with karma, I see. She's not that complicated a bitch. Just a bitch.

All we know from the text is that someone thinks that the decision was made by Beowulf, but that would still require authorities on Manticore to agree (since it is Manticoran Astro Control that controls traffic).

Obviously you keep presenting the idea of Tsang going bonkers, because that would match your idea of what you think Karma should dish out to Beowulf.

No, tlb, it would match the portrayal of the League I made looong ago that they were a bunch of heartless maniacs. In fact, I resisted Duckk's argument when he said the SLN was not a bunch of suicidal maniacs in response to me arguing that they would simply begin kewing planets. Duckk's freezer is still full of crow. Granted, even I didn't know the full measure of the SLN's insanity. That DB could have set in motion Case Bucaneer and Parthian shot with a vengeance.

Name ONE thing that made the SLN ever fear retaliation for horrid deeds done. They certainly didn't fear Harrington.

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by tlb   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:28 am

tlb
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 3854
Joined: Mon Sep 03, 2012 11:34 am

cthia wrote:Since we know by way of textev the decision to release the boat came from Beowulf, your point makes no sense. There is nobody on Beowulf's side of the junction who outranked the RMN on matters of war. And we know the Queen doesn't backseat drive.

You still haven't come to terms with karma, I see. She's not that complicated a bitch. Just a bitch.

tlb wrote:All we know from the text is that someone thinks that the decision was made by Beowulf, but that would still require authorities on Manticore to agree (since it is Manticoran Astro Control that controls traffic).

Obviously you keep presenting the idea of Tsang going bonkers, because that would match your idea of what you think Karma should dish out to Beowulf.

cthia wrote:No, tlb, it would match the portrayal of the League I made looong ago that they were a bunch of heartless maniacs. In fact, I resisted Duckk's argument when he said the SLN was not a bunch of suicidal maniacs in response to me arguing that they would simply begin kewing planets. Duckk's freezer is still full of crow. Granted, even I didn't know the full measure of the SLN's insanity. That DB could have set in motion Case Bucaneer and Parthian shot with a vengeance.

Name ONE thing that made the SLN ever fear retaliation for horrid deeds done. They certainly didn't fear Harrington.

Exactly, your idea was that the Solarian Navy was so terrible that they would take vengeance on Beowulf for its "treason". That is what you predicted and strenuously defended in the thread you keep referencing. That is what you keep presenting as a possible outcome of Tsang's fleet at Beowulf.

No one has argued that the Solarian Navy was afraid of retaliation. Instead they were supremely confident in their ability to control events, right up to the point when they had to surrender the forces at Sol to Honor. I did not say the Honor would deter them, only that Honor would take action against them even sooner if Tsang had attacked the planet.

In the interaction between Sol and Beowulf, karma was more of a bitch to Sol. The massive damage to Beowulf was solely at the hands of the Malign grievance by the Detweilers.
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by Jonathan_S   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:39 am

Jonathan_S
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 8269
Joined: Fri Jun 24, 2011 2:01 pm
Location: Virginia, USA

cthia wrote:Indeed. That part about the LACs should have been parenthesized. It was more for MY edification, and simply a throwaway statement.
One LAC would have a hard time holding a wormhole against transiting SDs. If the SDs came in a mass transit it wouldn't have a prayer of doing so.

Yes ships are extremely vulnerable right after they transit, unable to use decoys, CM, missiles, wedges or sidewalls. But an SD still had massive armor on its flanks and while the dorsal and ventral armor is much weaker there's still secondary internal armor wrapping around the core systems. There's a 50% chance that a single LAC will be facing the thick broadside armor, rather than the weaker top/bottom armor (and the ship can roll to bring/keep that thicker armor pointed at a single LAC as it races ahead to the point where it can bring up wedge and sidewalls). Even the graser on the latest mark of Shrike isn't likely to hit anything critical through an SD's broadside armor - not from ~700,000 km. (Get much closer and the SD's own grasers can kill the LAC through it's bow wall).
And a LAC's missiles just don't carry heavy enough warheads to be able to cripple or kill an SD in the numbers a single LAC can spew out.

Now a single Shrike would have a reasonable chance of killing a single, or possibly even a stream of BCs, and could certainly wreck anything smaller that didn't come through in a mass transit. But you'd really want a couple of wings of them; and even then to hold off a SD based assault you'd want them backed with capital missile pods. (Because at some point you just lack the firepower to take advantage of even the most vulnerable position a warship can be caught in)
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by Jonathan_S   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:40 am

Jonathan_S
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 8269
Joined: Fri Jun 24, 2011 2:01 pm
Location: Virginia, USA

cthia wrote:At what point in the timeline did Manticore exceed the League's ability to carry trade? Exactly when could the RMN have surpassed the League in the number of freighters?
I'm not convinced that they ever did.

Yes the majority of cargoes within the League are said to travel part of their journey in Manticoran freighters. But that seems mostly an artifact of the lower fees those freighters pay to carry cargo through the Manticoran controlled wormhole network. It's cost effective to transfer cargo to Manticoran ships for the wormhole legs; but those freighters probably aren't doing much of the last-LY work. They'd mostly be shuttling cargoes to and from warehouses relatively near wormhole termini. Other freighters would be concentrating and dispersing the cargo from those warehouses. (While they're probably a bit more manpower efficient, and possibly lower crew costs that SL merchants they probably have higher fees imposed by League worlds than the League freighters do)

Now we also know that SLN freighters tend not to come so far out into the Verge (it was somewhat surprising to see one in Talbot) so the Manties may have a majority of the Shell to Verge traffic; but that's far less traffic than Core to Core or Core to Shell.

I suspect, if you look at total freighter numbers serving within Core + Shell space, or look at (non-wormhole) ton/LY carried, that Manticoran freighters would be a distinct minority.
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by Jonathan_S   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:44 am

Jonathan_S
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 8269
Joined: Fri Jun 24, 2011 2:01 pm
Location: Virginia, USA

ThinksMarkedly wrote:First, the aforementioned forts: those can't contribute to the defence of the home system even if they wanted to. Moving such a giant is a work of at least a week, probably longer. As I said before, forts are overt defences and anyone who transited the Junction in the last 3 months would have seen them.

Not quite that bad; but still isn't happening on a tactical timescale. A fort can move itself, since it does have a wedge (even though it doesn't normally fight that way); and it said to have an acceleration under 100 gees.

But even at 50g a fort can self-relocated the 7 light-hours from the Junction to Manticore in about 70 hours (reaching a top speed around 0.2c before starting to slow again). That's only 3 days; not an entire week.
Top
Re: Did the MBS corner the market on trade?
Post by cthia   » Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:45 am

cthia
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 14951
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:10 pm

Jonathan_S wrote:
cthia wrote:Indeed. That part about the LACs should have been parenthesized. It was more for MY edification, and simply a throwaway statement.
One LAC would have a hard time holding a wormhole against transiting SDs. If the SDs came in a mass transit it wouldn't have a prayer of doing so.

Yes ships are extremely vulnerable right after they transit, unable to use decoys, CM, missiles, wedges or sidewalls. But an SD still had massive armor on its flanks and while the dorsal and ventral armor is much weaker there's still secondary internal armor wrapping around the core systems. There's a 50% chance that a single LAC will be facing the thick broadside armor, rather than the weaker top/bottom armor (and the ship can roll to bring/keep that thicker armor pointed at a single LAC as it races ahead to the point where it can bring up wedge and sidewalls). Even the graser on the latest mark of Shrike isn't likely to hit anything critical through an SD's broadside armor - not from ~700,000 km. (Get much closer and the SD's own grasers can kill the LAC through it's bow wall).
And a LAC's missiles just don't carry heavy enough warheads to be able to cripple or kill an SD in the numbers a single LAC can spew out.

Now a single Shrike would have a reasonable chance of killing a single, or possibly even a stream of BCs, and could certainly wreck anything smaller that didn't come through in a mass transit. But you'd really want a couple of wings of them; and even then to hold off a SD based assault you'd want them backed with capital missile pods. (Because at some point you just lack the firepower to take advantage of even the most vulnerable position a warship can be caught in)

A single LAC or even a few of them certainly couldn't do it. Remember, they are limited by their inability to recharge the capacitators during battle. Their shots are limited.

Son, your mother says I have to hang you. Personally I don't think this is a capital offense. But if I don't hang you, she's gonna hang me and frankly, I'm not the one in trouble. —cthia's father. Incident in ? Axiom of Common Sense
Top

Return to Honorverse