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Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus

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Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by cstar   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 5:12 pm

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I've be rereading Shadow of Saganami and when I got to the section where the Mesans and OFS explain their plan to Tyler I felt like there were some major holes in their plan.

The plan seems to be based on the idea that the Monicans could overwhelm the pickets and take control of the Lynx terminus before anything from Home Fleet could get there. Based on the 2nd Battle of Basilisk, and the general response to a Case Zulu, I think that its unlikely that any force could get to the terminus fast enough that nothing could go to Manticore and return with a superdreadnought or two.

As I think this is a pretty obvious hole in the plan, I was wondering if Mesa actually thought that it was possible for the plan to succeed, or if they were just trying to cause trouble in Talbot, knowing that neither Monica or the SLN could take control of the terminus.
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by Duckk   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 6:00 pm

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How far have you read into the series? Because this is answered later on...
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by SharkHunter   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 6:43 pm

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Since you're on the forums, I assume that you know from other messages that the bad guys want the cave men with clubs to go up against the machine gun infantry, space wise, aka the Mesan Alignment wants Manticore down in flames no matter the cost to everyone else besides themselves. So....

It's the age old PD 192X question, how do you tell if a Mesan operative is lying? His or her lips are moving. Don't even need a treecat for that.

Without actually trying to be a spoiler here if you haven't read the answers, what the MA wants and what Mesa says they want might just maybe be a leetle different, but they had to sell their fall guy (Tyler) SOMETHING BIG in order to get him to bite. Tyler thinks that he's in bed with "birds of a feather", so he gets the battle cruisers outright, even if the Monicans never try to capture the terminus? Makes him a decently powerful naval player in the region, and he doesn't even have to buy the ships, or get put directly under the thumb of those dirty rotten scoundrels in the OFS that he does business with. "All yaz needz are crewz."

Just sign on the dotted line....

But then again, those Monican lips were moving...
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All my posts are YMMV, IMHO, and welcoming polite discussion, extension, and rebuttal. This is the HonorVerse, after all
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by cstar   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 7:10 pm

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I've read the rest of the series, but it was a while ago so I'm going back through them. I realize that the Alignment doesn't care about what happens as long as it hurts Manticore, but I was more wondering if they actually thought that the plan had any chance of succeeding.

I feel like there are some pretty obvious holes in the plan, mainly a response from Manticore. Tyler even points this out, and the reply is that Mesa can provide missile pods to cover the terminus, but this still relies on taking control of the terminus before even a single SD(P) gets through.

SharkHunter, thanks for answering the question of Tyler's reasons for signing on even if he realized that the plan could succeed, ie getting 14 battlecruisers.

I guess that what I really want to know is if the Mesans ever thought that Monica had a real chance of taking the terminus.
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by kzt   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 7:12 pm

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cstar wrote:I feel like there are some pretty obvious holes in the plan, mainly a response from Manticore. Tyler even points this out, and the reply is that Mesa can provide missile pods to cover the terminus, but this still relies on taking control of the terminus before even a single SD(P) gets through.

They don't need to take control, they need to cover the terminus with effective fire.
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by cstar   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 7:24 pm

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kzt wrote:They don't need to take control, they need to cover the terminus with effective fire.


But that requires them to get in range of the terminus and destroy the pickets before anything can get through to Manticore and a SD(P) can get back. Am I underestimating how close the battlecrusiers could get to the terminus either in hyper because I feel like anything in the transit cue would declare case Zulu, and Home Fleet would start moving through in less time that the battlecrusiers could take control of the terminus?
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by kzt   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 7:25 pm

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They can come out of hyper in energy range of the terminus as far as I know. It's a complex navigation issue to do this, but they can.
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by JeffEngel   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 8:40 pm

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kzt wrote:They can come out of hyper in energy range of the terminus as far as I know. It's a complex navigation issue to do this, but they can.

Would that be 14 battlecruisers with very, very green Monican crews? If so - well, that's an ambitious notion.

I figured (okay, recall as best I can) that the Mesan plan was essentially one more log on the fire to complicate or slow down or destabilize Manticoran moves into Talbott. Any serious attack on the terminus which involved a temporary lapse of control would embolden the anti-annexation forces on both sides of the wormhole and the Talbott oligarchs looking for just Manticoran money and help maintaining their own control. (In effect, in retrospect at least, it's like they were Verge despots looking to use OFS to prop up their regimes, and simply figured Manticore was just another OFS.)

That's even a plot that, as far as it goes, could be one Tyler could believe Manpower would sincerely be behind, even if they were tempting him with much more if it "worked" and a mighty fine consolation prize in the battlecruisers either way.
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by SharkHunter   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 8:51 pm

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Actually since you've reread, one of the critical details is that the Mesan's and Technidyne, etc. were hoping to actually get their hands on RMN hardware because despite best efforts, they've come to the conclusion that their tech isn't "Haven sector good" yet.

So they don't care what happens to Monica or the battle cruisers if they can get the tech that they want. With the bonus that if they can get Byng or anyone in the OFS to jump in the game early, then New Tuscany, and etc. are moot. They want Manticore engaged with the SLN and as far away from Mesa as possible.
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All my posts are YMMV, IMHO, and welcoming polite discussion, extension, and rebuttal. This is the HonorVerse, after all
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Re: Question: Mesan/Monican plan to take the Lynx Terminus
Post by n7axw   » Wed Dec 10, 2014 9:00 pm

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JeffEngel wrote:
kzt wrote:They can come out of hyper in energy range of the terminus as far as I know. It's a complex navigation issue to do this, but they can.

Would that be 14 battlecruisers with very, very green Monican crews? If so - well, that's an ambitious notion.

I figured (okay, recall as best I can) that the Mesan plan was essentially one more log on the fire to complicate or slow down or destabilize Manticoran moves into Talbott. Any serious attack on the terminus which involved a temporary lapse of control would embolden the anti-annexation forces on both sides of the wormhole and the Talbott oligarchs looking for just Manticoran money and help maintaining their own control. (In effect, in retrospect at least, it's like they were Verge despots looking to use OFS to prop up their regimes, and simply figured Manticore was just another OFS.)

That's even a plot that, as far as it goes, could be one Tyler could believe Manpower would sincerely be behind, even if they were tempting him with much more if it "worked" and a mighty fine consolation prize in the battlecruisers either way.


I doubt that they would have succeeded longer than short term. The forts weren't up yet, but they might have made things a bit nasty. Not only were you dealing with those BCs, they were intending to deploy pods like the ones Terokov got hit with. If they could have taken the picket and gotten those pods deployed, they could have made it quite expensive to retake the Lynx side of the terminus.

Don
When any group seeks political power in God's name, both religion and politics are instantly corrupted.
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