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Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle

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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by Galactic Sapper   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 4:14 pm

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quite possibly a cat wrote:Totally wiping out the enemy production base, the most important part of which is people, basically always counters everything and it always becomes the last resort of the defender. That wouldn't be unique to drones. Besides, you probably don't want people living in your drone factory!


I meant that destruction of the industrial base becomes the ONLY counter.

Umm... as far as everyone in the SL is concerned the GA already violated the EE. Even if the truth comes out, it doesn't matter since the GA was behind Green Pines. The EE is de facto dead if you can just use a cut out for violations, so it doesn't matter it was actually a seccie who triggered the bomb.


That is something that has always bothered me about the EE. Green Pines was orders of magnitude less destructive than the Yawata strike - and that is even if the debris strikes are ignored! Just the station civilian casualties were orders of magnitude higher than Green Pines. Include the debris and the comparison only gets worse, and that wasn't considered a violation.

If anything, a new version of the EE should include something similar to AP 1 of the Geneva Conventions which ban attacks that lead to the release of dangerous energies or natural forces (bans attacks on dams, nuclear power plants, etc.)

quite possibly a cat wrote:
Dilandu wrote:P.S. And must point out, that the assumption that "Eridani Edict is for universal good" is pretty much biased. Look at the other side; Eridani Edict basically made interstellar wars and imperialism a "joyful, fun and profitable enterprises". And it also left smaller and weaker star nations completely at the mercy of bigger and powerful, because the war in Honorverse is usual way of solving political problems, and lesser star nations could not have conventional forces capable of deterring the more powerful opponent.
Absolutely. Without the EE any star nation can say "Attack and we obliterate you." See the IRL situation with North Korea. War is unthinkable.


Indeed, the Honorverse has wars the same way the 1950s would have without MAD.

quite possibly a cat wrote:Honestly, I think the EE was a terrible idea the way it was mutually written. Defenders should be allowed the means needed to defend themselves. Even if that means planet busting the attacker. Ultimately, you need to be willing to shoot through the human shields or the bad guys win.


Like I said, MAD. Not even on the state-v-state level, either. How much exploitation would have happened in the Verge if the exploited populations had the means to threaten corporate headquarters with improvised kinetic weapons. Not the local headquarters, the corporate headquarters on Old Earth or where ever.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by Galactic Sapper   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 4:22 pm

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Dilandu wrote:
Galactic Sapper wrote:The missiles are already specced to perform the same targeting task on ships capable of 700+ gees. 1000 gees is a trivial incremental increase to that. The missile must target the ship in a handful of milliseconds anyway. It might make a marginal difference in percentage of hits but not the "dodging bullets" type difference you seem to think.


1000 g - maybe. 7000 g - not so much)

Yes, quite so much. At 100,000 mps^2 (10k gee) a ship would be able to displace approximately 5 meters in the 10 milliseconds or so the missile has to aim. Even if the missile takes 50 milliseconds to aim, the ship wouldn't be able to displace more than 125 meters, which is considerably less than the beam or draft of a SD. You're still taking hits - lots of them.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by Dilandu   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 4:45 pm

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Galactic Sapper wrote:Like I said, MAD. Not even on the state-v-state level, either. How much exploitation would have happened in the Verge if the exploited populations had the means to threaten corporate headquarters with improvised kinetic weapons. Not the local headquarters, the corporate headquarters on Old Earth or where ever.


Well, there would be no Havenite or Andermanni empires for sure. Haven clearly would not start the conquests if there were any chances of being hit hard back by its victims, and no military genius of Gustav Andermann would help him, if the opponents could just glass his homeworld. The warfare would be MUCH less common, but, actually, the plain common sense might prevent too much atrocities - like common sense prevented the use of chemical weapons during World War 2. Of course there would be... costly exceptions.
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by quite possibly a cat   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 5:58 pm

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Galactic Sapper wrote:The missiles are already specced to perform the same targeting task on ships capable of 700+ gees. 1000 gees is a trivial incremental increase to that. The missile must target the ship in a handful of milliseconds anyway. It might make a marginal difference in percentage of hits but not the "dodging bullets" type difference you seem to think.

True. If the missiles are programed to hit ships capable of doing 2000+ gees that have 100% efficiency of Wedge to Velocity and don't bother conforming to standard ship design. Otherwise, it would be really easy to fire up a decoy, punch your acceleration and watch the missile hit the decoy.

Galactic Sapper wrote:Yes, quite so much. At 100,000 mps^2 (10k gee) a ship would be able to displace approximately 5 meters in the 10 milliseconds or so the missile has to aim. Even if the missile takes 50 milliseconds to aim, the ship wouldn't be able to displace more than 125 meters, which is considerably less than the beam or draft of a SD. You're still taking hits - lots of them.

You're forgetting the travel times. As far as I can tell, the missiles use EM targeting, NOT Grav-based. So at a stand-off of 30,000km the missile is actually aiming at the ship's location 0.1s ago. Then the beams have to travel another 0.1s to hit the target! At 100km/s^2 that's 2km if I mathed right.

The real limiting factor the jerk of the drone ships. If they can go from 10k gee to 0 gee or visa-versa in the time it takes a missile to aim, they'll be dodging a lot of shots. OTOH, if they take 0.2 seconds to change their acceleration the missile will have much less problems.

Honorverse ships seem to have limited jerk tough. Even at 300 gees, two seconds is enough for 6km!

Dilandu wrote:Well, there would be no Havenite or Andermanni empires for sure. Haven clearly would not start the conquests if there were any chances of being hit hard back by its victims, and no military genius of Gustav Andermann would help him, if the opponents could just glass his homeworld. The warfare would be MUCH less common, but, actually, the plain common sense might prevent too much atrocities - like common sense prevented the use of chemical weapons during World War 2. Of course there would be... costly exceptions.
The Andermanni expansion was (mostly) peaceful. The exception was when they got attacked and took worlds in a defensive war. The Havenite Empire wouldn't exist.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by tlb   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 5:59 pm

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Dilandu wrote:P.S. And must point out, that the assumption that "Eridani Edict is for universal good" is pretty much biased. Look at the other side; Eridani Edict basically made interstellar wars and imperialism a "joyful, fun and profitable enterprises". And it also left smaller and weaker star nations completely at the mercy of bigger and powerful, because the war in Honorverse is usual way of solving political problems, and lesser star nations could not have conventional forces capable of deterring the more powerful opponent.

It's basically the ol' "A Taste of Armageddon", from TOS Star Trek. Eridani Edict created the situation for a "clean and nice war", with very little destruction and very limited suffering. It removed the dread out of the war (except for the fear of defeat, but it is clearly not enough). Just recall how badly Manticoran's reacted on the collateral damage of Yawata Strike. Its basically the reaction of British peoples in 1915, after the first zeppelin's raids - the shocking discovery that the war is not something "far away, only for boys in uniform" anymore, but the destruction could rain over anyone.

So it's pretty disputable, what's worse; the occasional violation of the Edict but with threat of mass destruction as effective show-stopper for interstellar warfare (i.e. the wars are MUCH less common, but SOME of them are quite brutal) or current situation with the "war as usual". I'm not saying that "Honorverse should be better without Edict", but it wrong to consider it as some sort of "universal good."

Galactic Sapper wrote:Like I said, MAD. Not even on the state-v-state level, either. How much exploitation would have happened in the Verge if the exploited populations had the means to threaten corporate headquarters with improvised kinetic weapons. Not the local headquarters, the corporate headquarters on Old Earth or where ever.

Dilandu wrote:Well, there would be no Havenite or Andermanni empires for sure. Haven clearly would not start the conquests if there were any chances of being hit hard back by its victims, and no military genius of Gustav Andermann would help him, if the opponents could just glass his homeworld. The warfare would be MUCH less common, but, actually, the plain common sense might prevent too much atrocities - like common sense prevented the use of chemical weapons during World War 2. Of course there would be... costly exceptions.

The smaller and weaker states would always be at the mercy of the stronger; eliminating the Eridani Edict has no effect on that. Note that during the Manticore versus Haven war about half the strength of each navy was guarding the home planet to prevent an attack.
Prior to attacking Manticore, Haven had conquered many smaller systems with attacks that eliminated their navies; the Edict never came into it. Once defeated those nations could not have bombarded Haven anyway.
The only safeguard for a small nation is to ally itself with someone stronger, such as the League or the Andermani. Unlike your proposition, the planets have largely been at peace (with the exception of piracy) for hundreds of years prior to Haven turning expansionist to fund its failing economy. Where is your evidence that interstellar wars or imperialism were "joyful, fun and profitable enterprises" for most of the existence of the League? Where is your evidence that war in Honorverse is the usual way of solving political problems?
The Andermani Empire expanded because it found worlds in trouble and fixed those problems at the cost of inclusion; the phrase in the books is "by fishing in troubled waters".
A weak nation that feared a stronger might be able to cause damage to the home world of a stronger nation, but it is ludicrous to think they could "glass" it. The Yawata Strike was traumatic to Manticore, because it happened without warning due to the unconventional means. In the aftermath of the Battle of Manticore it is ridiculous to state that they thought war was something "far away, only for boys in uniform", and that destruction could not rain over them.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by quite possibly a cat   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 6:13 pm

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tlb wrote:A weak nation that feared a stronger might be able to cause damage to the home world of a stronger nation, but it is ludicrous to think they could "glass" it. The Yawata Strike was traumatic to Manticore, because it happened without warning due to the unconventional means. In the aftermath of the Battle of Manticore it is ridiculous to state that they thought war was something "far away, only for boys in uniform", and that destruction could not rain over them.

Stealth weapons can get speeds of up to 0.2c before they become detectable by Honor world tech. Plus they can impact wedge first if they feel like it. A kilogram of matter has about 400kTons of TnT at that point.

Missiles are thousands of kilograms in Honorverse. A single freighter of stealth weapons could unleash multiple dino killing meteors worth of energy on a planet. Plus however much the wedges are capable of adding to the disaster.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by tlb   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 6:24 pm

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quite possibly a cat wrote:
tlb wrote:A weak nation that feared a stronger might be able to cause damage to the home world of a stronger nation, but it is ludicrous to think they could "glass" it. The Yawata Strike was traumatic to Manticore, because it happened without warning due to the unconventional means. In the aftermath of the Battle of Manticore it is ridiculous to state that they thought war was something "far away, only for boys in uniform", and that destruction could not rain over them.

Stealth weapons can get speeds of up to 0.2c before they become detectable by Honor world tech. Plus they can impact wedge first if they feel like it. A kilogram of matter has about 400kTons of TnT at that point.

Missiles are thousands of kilograms in Honorverse. A single freighter of stealth weapons could unleash multiple dino killing meteors worth of energy on a planet. Plus however much the wedges are capable of adding to the disaster.

But they are detectable at some point and the freighter entering the system would set off an alarm. The attack you are describing would be easier for a strong nation to do to a weaker than the other way around.
But are you saying that this would be done outside of a war, therefore making it easier to carry out?
Or are you thinking this could be started from well outside the hyper limit and the missiles would be coasting after burn out (so no wedge)?
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by Galactic Sapper   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 7:02 pm

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quite possibly a cat wrote:True. If the missiles are programed to hit ships capable of doing 2000+ gees that have 100% efficiency of Wedge to Velocity and don't bother conforming to standard ship design. Otherwise, it would be really easy to fire up a decoy, punch your acceleration and watch the missile hit the decoy.

That's a whole separate type of tech you've developed there. All current decoys are deployed outside the wedge and you'd need a convincing SD decoy that could operate inside the wedge.

You're forgetting the travel times. As far as I can tell, the missiles use EM targeting, NOT Grav-based. So at a stand-off of 30,000km the missile is actually aiming at the ship's location 0.1s ago. Then the beams have to travel another 0.1s to hit the target! At 100km/s^2 that's 2km if I mathed right.

Perhaps. If you dared move in a predictable straight line and timed that motion perfectly with the observation-aim-fire cycle of the warhead - and assuming all the warheads are hitting in the exact same few milliseconds.

The real limiting factor the jerk of the drone ships. If they can go from 10k gee to 0 gee or visa-versa in the time it takes a missile to aim, they'll be dodging a lot of shots. OTOH, if they take 0.2 seconds to change their acceleration the missile will have much less problems.


I suspect the "jerk" response time is even worse than that. Otherwise missiles with a slight jitter would be impossible to hit with point defense outside terminal warhead deployment - they only need to displace a couple meters and routinely move at ~100k gee.

Honorverse ships seem to have limited jerk tough. Even at 300 gees, two seconds is enough for 6km!

That's great if you have two seconds. Since you seem to have at best 0.2 seconds, you get 60 meters at 300 gee.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by quite possibly a cat   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 7:36 pm

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tlb wrote:But they are detectable at some point and the freighter entering the system would set off an alarm. The attack you are describing would be easier for a strong nation to do to a weaker than the other way around.
But are you saying that this would be done outside of a war, therefore making it easier to carry out?
Or are you thinking this could be started from well outside the hyper limit and the missiles would be coasting after burn out (so no wedge)?

You start from as far out past the hyperlimit as you need to to avoid detection, then accelerate up to 0.2c, then release the weapons, and only fire the wedges on final approach after it is too late to do anything. You'll probably need to add some weak cold thrusters so you don't miss the planet, but that's ancient tech. In the Honorverse humanity was able to hit Beowulf with tech from year 0 P.D.

Basically its Oyster Bay except you can skip all the careful scouting and you hyper in further out.
Galactic Sapper wrote:That's a whole separate type of tech you've developed there. All current decoys are deployed outside the wedge and you'd need a convincing SD decoy that could operate inside the wedge.
What? Not only are there decoys capable of operating inside a wedge, their are decoys capable of generating their own wedge and operating inside it!

Fire up one of those decoys, let it plug along as a normal SD acceleration, while the drone-SD plugs along far faster than any normal SD could. Unless the programmer anticipated drone-SD the missile will conclude the drone-SD is a drone and the decoy is the only possible target.
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Re: Creating an "interesting" GA v SLN naval battle
Post by tlb   » Fri Sep 07, 2018 9:52 pm

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tlb wrote:But they are detectable at some point and the freighter entering the system would set off an alarm. The attack you are describing would be easier for a strong nation to do to a weaker than the other way around.
But are you saying that this would be done outside of a war, therefore making it easier to carry out?
Or are you thinking this could be started from well outside the hyper limit and the missiles would be coasting after burn out (so no wedge)?

quite possibly a cat wrote:You start from as far out past the hyperlimit as you need to to avoid detection, then accelerate up to 0.2c, then release the weapons, and only fire the wedges on final approach after it is too late to do anything. You'll probably need to add some weak cold thrusters so you don't miss the planet, but that's ancient tech. In the Honorverse humanity was able to hit Beowulf with tech from year 0 P.D.

Basically its Oyster Bay except you can skip all the careful scouting and you hyper in further out.

To make the situation simpler, let me concede that some missiles will get past the defenses and cause major damage.
Let's consider Haven about to take over Toulon in the Gaston System. Toulon has had some warning and has decided to hit the Haven home world if the invasion takes place. The Toulon ship Dague is positioned so it can evade any attackers and strike. Here is my imagined conversation when the Haven task force arrives in overwhelming force.

H: "We have you surrounded, come out with your hands up" (not really, but this part does not matter).
T: "If you don't immediately leave this system, we will send a ship to blow up big parts of your world".
H: "We will soon have control of the space around your planet, so you should reconsider because of the consequences. If you launch an attack on one of our worlds, then we will kill one million of your citizens. Further for every Haven citizen that dies we will kill an extra thousand of yours. You have a lovely little planet, it would be a shame to mess it up".

If you are responsible for Toulon, then what are your next steps?
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