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Strategic Planning

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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by drinksmuchcoffee   » Sat Sep 30, 2017 3:03 pm

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Another important question is what are the Centers of Gravity of the League from the GAs standpoint.

I'm with Mahan that the proper target of the fleet is the enemy fleet. How would you most effectively attack said fleet?

My first thought is that the SLN already has an underdeveloped Fleet Train and logistics system. I'd assume, since they probably use civilian bottoms as part of that Fleet Train, that Laacoon I and II have already adversely impacted their logistics. I'd imagine also that more than a few Manty freighters were hauling supplies for the SLN before the current conflict.

Having said that, it is also obvious that the increased emphasis on missile combat would make an already difficult situation worse for the SLN.

Also, given the likely parlous state of SLN morale, a lack of new missiles and other supplies would likely make it even less likely that SLN forces would attempt to engage the GA.

So it seems a target for the GA that would cause maximum damage for minimum effort would be the Fleet Train, at least what is left of it.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Weird Harold   » Sat Sep 30, 2017 5:37 pm

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drinksmuchcoffee wrote:Another important question is what are the Centers of Gravity of the League from the GAs standpoint.

I'm with Mahan that the proper target of the fleet is the enemy fleet. How would you most effectively attack said fleet?

...

So it seems a target for the GA that would cause maximum damage for minimum effort would be the Fleet Train, at least what is left of it.


The best way to disrupt the fleet train -- a moving target -- would be to occupy the destinations of shipments. The locations of FF bases are known and aren't moving. Take out the FF bases and you remove the majority of your commerce raider problems and deny support to those you don't remove.

You also remove the SLN threat to verge and protectorate systems to encourage them to break with the League; thereby removing financial support for the Mandarins and SLN.

Battle Fleet bases and task forces would be the next step; They are mostly within the Core and Shell of the League and BF is unsuited to commerce raiding. Postponing their elimination gives the SLN time to consolidate their forces so the GA doesn't have to chase them down. :shock:

By the time the GA gets around to dealing with BF bases, the Mandarins and SLN will have committed enough atrocities that systems with BF bases will welcome the GA as liberators and secede from the League.

Frontier Fleet is the main threat to the GA. Battle Fleet is shaping up to be a threat to non-aligned worlds and secessionist movements. The GA is going to have to balance the threat from Frontier Fleet to the home-front and commerce against the threat of atrocities against non-aligned and secessionist planetary populations.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by kzt   » Sat Sep 30, 2017 7:06 pm

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Weird Harold wrote:The best way to disrupt the fleet train -- a moving target -- would be to occupy the destinations of shipments. The locations of FF bases are known and aren't moving. Take out the FF bases and you remove the majority of your commerce raider problems and deny support to those you don't remove.

In a year or two. These are not coal fired ships, they are going to be operations months from base and not burning much ammo just blowing up merchants.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Fox2!   » Sat Sep 30, 2017 9:51 pm

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ldwechsler wrote:
blackjack217 wrote:I think the more interesting thing is what are the SSL's plans for commerce raiding. Personally, if I were them and I had to fight, my main target would be the Grayson-Mantacore route. We know that the main merchant routes make grave wave combat possible, it happened in Short Victorious War, and grave wave combat prohibits missile exchanges and forces people into beam range combat. Which means that the playing field is far, far more level, and the SLN should seek to force grave wave combat wherever possible.

Easier said than done of course, but its about the only field where I could see an SLN victory, and I think they need at least one.



What we are seeing, however, is an attack on independents. These are NOT generally considered legal targets. If they are actually the center of the attacks, it leaves the GA basically intact. And if GA ships rescue planets, they will be far more likely to NOT be interested in joining the League.

They may also demand payment later.


I would hate to be the task group commander found with those orders in my computers. You would end up copping a plea and a video confession so the the RMMC sergeant beside you would put a pulser dart behind your ear before they opened the airlock door.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Weird Harold   » Sat Sep 30, 2017 10:21 pm

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kzt wrote:In a year or two. These are not coal fired ships, they are going to be operations months from base and not burning much ammo just blowing up merchants.


They are also going to be engaging in "Foraging" for perishables and consumables.

Taking the bases will get you information on where the ships not at home when you take over might be found. Taking a commerce raider in the act of attacking a merchant will probably only tell you where "home" is, since even the SLN has to have some idea of "need to know" security precautions.
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Answers! I got lots of answers!

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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by pappilon   » Sun Oct 01, 2017 2:08 pm

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Weird Harold wrote:
kzt wrote:In a year or two. These are not coal fired ships, they are going to be operations months from base and not burning much ammo just blowing up merchants.


They are also going to be engaging in "Foraging" for perishables and consumables.

Taking the bases will get you information on where the ships not at home when you take over might be found. Taking a commerce raider in the act of attacking a merchant will probably only tell you where "home" is, since even the SLN has to have some idea of "need to know" security precautions.


I really don't think the locations of bases is a particular secret. (1) FF is based by sector with administrative centers where the detachment is based. Probably everyone except Sanctuary knows where these sectors are. (2) BF probably operates from central nodes distributed around the core worlds. Again, probably less generally known, but I'm sure Beowulf has that information somewhere in their SDF database. (3) Why does the 600 kT gorilla need to hide? Who could possibly attack it.

Which targets to prioritize becomes the only question. The ones most logically to be used to attack the GA becomes the obvious[to me] answer. Closest to Haven & Beowulf would be tops on my list.
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The imagination has to be trained into foresight and empathy.
Ursula K. LeGuinn

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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Brigade XO   » Sun Oct 01, 2017 5:38 pm

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If the GA knows where the OFS/FF sector hedquaters/logistic bases are outside of the Talbot Quadrant,(and I'm sure they do) it might be prudent to send some small groupls of warships to stake-out said systems and jump incoming fleet support ships or warships.

Think of it as adapting pirate tactics. Unless FF is sending squadrons of ships forward though any give set of OFS/FF nodal locations, what is going to be comming in is singleton or at most small groups of warships or a couple of freighters with a single warship escort. This kind of transit is USUSALLY on a least-time course and if traffic normally comes in from X then you can manuver your ships in to stay relative to where imcomming traffic from X would come out of hyper. Say you send a DD in to drop into normal space way out of normal range of system sensors (these ar SLN sensors at best) and just creep in to just outside the hyper limit. Then you park your strike force appropriatly in hyper and wait. The victims show up, the DD hypers out send's the tactical readings on the system and new target, and the strike pounces.

This has several advantages. One is that you are probably going to kill at least one FF warship before anyone knows your there and, if you get lucky, get several and some logistic support ships. You have also poked the hornets nest if there are any SLN ships in system but wether or not they would attempt to come after you is a good question. Even if they charge at you, the GA ships should have a major range advantage and- if they stay outside the hyper limit- can just go away. You have also now set up the situation where OFS/FF has to attempt to deal with marauders lying in wait just outside the hyper limit and take steps to change shipping routes (use unusual entry points to that system or send things elcewhere).
If there is nothing much in the way of FF shipping in the system, the strike force could always come ripping in-system after having delt with the incomming ship/convoy to shoot up the FF vessels in-system. Failing that, they could at least chase the FF ships out of the system.....another galling failure of the SLN to be able to survive and engagement with the GA or just run instead of attempting to defend an OFS held system. Neither very good.

Not quite as effective for FF/BF to attempt to do the same thing against a GA held or allied system. GA has better sensors and could (at least after this kind of thing gets started) deploy more depth of coverage for long range sensors.
I suspect that the first couple of times it is used, the FF could inflict losses on the GA but 1) getting word of the sucess back where it could do any good and 2) making it enough of a surpize of catch multiple GA ships at one time, arn't going to be good. Still, any SLN victory -that can get reported home- would be a major propaganda victory.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Theemile   » Sun Oct 01, 2017 6:01 pm

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pappilon wrote:
Weird Harold wrote:Thanks

They are also going to be engaging in "Foraging" for perishables and consumables.

Taking the bases will get you information on where the ships not at home when you take over might be found. Taking a commerce raider in the act of attacking a merchant will probably only tell you where "home" is, since even the SLN has to have some idea of "need to know" security precautions.


I really don't think the locations of bases is a particular secret. (1) FF is based by sector with administrative centers where the detachment is based. Probably everyone except Sanctuary knows where these sectors are. (2) BF probably operates from central nodes distributed around the core worlds. Again, probably less generally known, but I'm sure Beowulf has that information somewhere in their SDF database. (3) Why does the 600 kT gorilla need to hide? Who could possibly attack it.

Which targets to prioritize becomes the only question. The ones most logically to be used to attack the GA becomes the obvious[to me] answer. Closest to Haven & Beowulf would be tops on my list.



It"s already cannon that the BF has only 5-6 main bases and rarely leaves them. They are completely public, and everybody knows about them. Crandall and Filareta were also only 2 of 5 instances where the BF has moved outside the core en-force in 250 years. Most of BF's active support ships were used with them.

Also correct on FF. They operate out of standard, well known bases, and are designed as a patrolling force, not a deep raiding force. So their organic support fleet is also very limited, mostly to what is required to support the logistic legs between it's bases.

The biggest consumable is hydrogen, and it can be readily manufactured in the field from the solar wind, water/ice, or gas Giants. Starships have hydroponics sections for many of their food needs. Eventually the other food stocks will run out, but probably not before parts and ammo. And those specifically will be hard to find in the verge.
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RFC said "refitting a Beowulfan SD to Manticoran standards would be just as difficult as refitting a standard SLN SD to those standards. In other words, it would be cheaper and faster to build new ships."
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by drinksmuchcoffee   » Sun Oct 01, 2017 7:07 pm

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Brigade XO wrote:If the GA knows where the OFS/FF sector hedquaters/logistic bases are outside of the Talbot Quadrant,(and I'm sure they do) it might be prudent to send some small groupls of warships to stake-out said systems and jump incoming fleet support ships or warships.

Think of it as adapting pirate tactics. Unless FF is sending squadrons of ships forward though any give set of OFS/FF nodal locations, what is going to be comming in is singleton or at most small groups of warships or a couple of freighters with a single warship escort. This kind of transit is USUSALLY on a least-time course and if traffic normally comes in from X then you can manuver your ships in to stay relative to where imcomming traffic from X would come out of hyper. ...


This would actually work better than you might suspect. Because "least-time" courses aren't necessarily straight lines in the Honorverse due to grav waves. Especially if a system has a nearby grav wave chances are many least-time routes from likely locations would go through that grav wave, and thus would emerge from hyper in approximately the same place relative to the system primary.

From the standpoint of future threats, FF is probably a bigger threat than BF since their officer corps is much more likely to come up with innovative and flexible ideas that might pose a threat to the GA. Plus, if the GA spends its time beating up on FF and leaves BF alone that will encourage BF's denial of reality and make their intertia and NIH problems even worse.

Still in all, if I were an FF task force commander given orders to go up against the GA I might seriously consider running with my task force and find some lost colony world that I could take over and take a barbarian bride.
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Re: Strategic Planning
Post by Weird Harold   » Sun Oct 01, 2017 7:38 pm

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pappilon wrote:
Weird Harold wrote:They are also going to be engaging in "Foraging" for perishables and consumables.

Taking the bases will get you information on where the ships not at home when you take over might be found. Taking a commerce raider in the act of attacking a merchant will probably only tell you where "home" is, since even the SLN has to have some idea of "need to know" security precautions.


I really don't think the locations of bases is a particular secret.


That was pretty much my whole point. Why not take out the enemy where you KNOW he can be found instead of chasing rumors and incidents. Taking the bases might well tell you where to look for the rest of the fleet assigned there.
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Answers! I got lots of answers!

(Now if I could just find the right questions.)
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