Attacking Darius:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

markusschaber wrote:As far as I remember, there has been some technologies (especially the spider drives) which were not available to Galton to begin with, but nothing has been "taken away" from Galton which they had before. They produced as much of the newest generation weapons as their infrastructure could sustain, including FTL and rather good stealth. It's just cutting edge technology, and only a single star system, so their production capacity has been limited and still ramping up.

There's also no proof that the extra MAlign technology would have helped. Well, literally, because they haven't been in use against an enemy.

Thinksmarkedly wrote:But I will say that the spiders and the full MAlign package could not have saved Galton. First, at least at this point in the timeline, there's no way that Galton could have produced enough hardware to even come close to what I imagine penny imagines the Darius system will be protected with. There would be no LDs available; the biggest ships would be Sharks and those can't fire torpedoes internally. The torpedoes would have been a nasty surprise and would have taken some toll on the GF, but it would be a matter of time until the GF found a workaround and the Galtonians ran out of them anyway.

Second, Gail was right: even if Galton managed to stop the GF short by inflicting debilitating losses, the Galton infrastructure would be gone but the GA's wouldn't. The GF would reform and come back in a few months. Meanwhile, Galton wouldn't have anything new (if suddenly new hardware appeared, then the existence of Darius would be obvious).

Thinksmarkedly wrote:Third, because I don't think even Darius can withstand the determined GF. It may take multiple battles, but once the lair is found, the GA wins due to its superior navy and industry sizes and quality.

penny wrote:Okay, everybody. What other officer are you planning on sentencing to death when he / she attacks Darius?

Who? ... since Honor is retired.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

markusschaber wrote:As far as I remember, there has been some technologies (especially the spider drives) which were not available to Galton to begin with, but nothing has been "taken away" from Galton which they had before. They produced as much of the newest generation weapons as their infrastructure could sustain, including FTL and rather good stealth. It's just cutting edge technology, and only a single star system, so their production capacity has been limited and still ramping up.

There's also no proof that the extra MAlign technology would have helped. Well, literally, because they haven't been in use against an enemy.

She watched the attacking Grand Alliance fleet drive into the teeth of Alpha’s defenses and wished yet again that she’d been allowed to use the graser torpedoes. The spider drive was slower than any impeller-drive missile, but it was also virtually undetectable. If she’d been allowed to deploy a few thousand torpedoes on the attacker’s probable approach vectors, they could have wreaked havoc on the capital ships and LAC carriers that never saw them coming. And they could strike their targets well before the attacker reached her own range of Alpha System’s vital organs. No one had explained to her why she couldn’t employ them, but it was self-evident to her that if her superiors had regarded Alpha’s survival as truly vital, they would have released the torpedoes to her.
Not that it would have made much difference in the end.
And that, she had realized, was what bothered her the most.
This entire effort, everything she, Carpinteria, and their team had put together over the past months, was an exercise in futility. The plain, ugly truth was that no single star system could successfully defend itself against the kind of massive, sophisticated firepower which was the Grand Alliance’s signature. It simply couldn’t be done. Fixed defenses, however powerful, were ultimately doomed against anyone with that sort of long-ranged, stand-off capability and deep enough magazines.
<snip>
At the very least, a sufficiently massive wave of torpedoes had the potential to inflict enough damage to compel the attackers to…reevaluate their own approach. Yet even that would be—could be—only a stay of execution. Because the next time the attackers would know about the torpedoes. They would drop across the wall, acquire their targets, dump their shoals of missiles, and then promptly disappear back into hyper, counting on the Mark 23-E’s sophisticated AI to manage that torrent of destruction*.
<snip>
And neither did the fact that, like every other tactic she’d been able to generate, her victory had been ultimately futile. The Grand Alliance would be back again, assuming Alpha was remotely as important as it appeared to be, and all she’d really accomplished was to kill thirty or forty thousand Grand Alliance spacers.

munroburton wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:There's also no proof that the extra MAlign technology would have helped. Well, literally, because they haven't been in use against an enemy.

And there's pretty good proof that it wouldn't have helped. The MAlign's best tactician(at Darius) was sinking into depression whilst running sims on defending Galton from a GA attack. At one point she wishes she could use everything the Alignment had access to, but concedes that it would not make a difference to Galton's fate, merely increase the GA's butcher bill.

munroburton wrote:And there's pretty good proof that it wouldn't have helped. The MAlign's best tactician(at Darius) was sinking into depression whilst running sims on defending Galton from a GA attack. At one point she wishes she could use everything the Alignment had access to, but concedes that it would not make a difference to Galton's fate, merely increase the GA's butcher bill.

She watched the attacking Grand Alliance fleet drive into the teeth of Alpha’s defenses and wished yet again that she’d been allowed to use the graser torpedoes. The spider drive was slower than any impeller-drive missile, but it was also virtually undetectable. If she’d been allowed to deploy a few thousand torpedoes on the attacker’s probable approach vectors, they could have wreaked havoc on the capital ships and LAC carriers that never saw them coming. And they could strike their targets well before the attacker reached her own range of Alpha System’s vital organs.
[cut]

Forty thousand dead spacers, or the equivalent of 20 SD(P)s, is quite a bloody nose but small beer compared to First Manticore. Haven's donkey surprise was far more devastating.

They would drop across the wall, acquire their targets, dump their shoals of missiles, and then promptly disappear back into hyper, counting on the Mark 23-E’s sophisticated AI to manage that torrent of destruction.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:But I want to point out another assumption in Gail's tactical plans where she failed to account for reality: in the passage above, she's talking about possibly seeding thousands of torpedoes on the GF's probable approach vectors and inflict damage before the GF ranged on the Galton infrastructure.

But we know Honor did no such thing. Maybe this was Honor's touch, but all she did was not drive in the system. She fired from the hyperlimit and the battle was entirely conducted from some 10 light-minutes away. The "System Alpha" infrastructure was in range the moment that the GF translated from hyper. The Mk23E/F capabilities were actually worse than what Gail assumed would be the fallback option:

They would drop across the wall, acquire their targets, dump their shoals of missiles, and then promptly disappear back into hyper, counting on the Mark 23-E’s sophisticated AI to manage that torrent of destruction.

That's exactly what happened, except for the GF translating back into hyper to escape. So the thousands of g-torps wouldn't have helped because they would be nowhere near the GF.

They'd have had to accelerate into the fleet, like the Hastas III did. Whether they'd be picked up early enough is anyone's guess. But even if they weren't picked, I doubt they could have generated an attack on HMS Imperator itself to exclusion of everyone else.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Thank you, munro.

But I want to point out another assumption in Gail's tactical plans where she failed to account for reality: in the passage above, she's talking about possibly seeding thousands of torpedoes on the GF's probable approach vectors and inflict damage before the GF ranged on the Galton infrastructure.

But we know Honor did no such thing. Maybe this was Honor's touch, but all she did was not drive in the system. She fired from the hyperlimit and the battle was entirely conducted from some 10 light-minutes away. The "System Alpha" infrastructure was in range the moment that the GF translated from hyper. The Mk23E/F capabilities were actually worse than what Gail assumed would be the fallback option:

They would drop across the wall, acquire their targets, dump their shoals of missiles, and then promptly disappear back into hyper, counting on the Mark 23-E’s sophisticated AI to manage that torrent of destruction.

That's exactly what happened, except for the GF translating back into hyper to escape. So the thousands of g-torps wouldn't have helped because they would be nowhere near the GF.

tlb wrote:To be fair, if they had located all those Hasta III's somewhere just outside the hyper limit on the direct approach to Galton, then they would never needed to accelerate; because they would be in firing range of the fleet as it translated. The Malign should have noted how she attacked the Sol System.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

tlb wrote:To be fair, if they had located all those Hasta III's somewhere just outside the hyper limit on the direct approach to Galton, then they would never needed to accelerate; because they would be in firing range of the fleet as it translated. The Malign should have noted how she attacked the Sol System.

And Honor did translate down right on the hyperlimit... which was reckless. Maybe it was slightly off the minimum time course, but still.

Especially since she didn't need to be that close for the opening salvos.