Honorverse ramblings and musings

SharkHunter wrote:... around 6MM-8mm Km, ...
... across 3.1MM Kmm ...
... 10-12mm KM ...

Ack. There's a reason God invented more than one metric prefix.

One million kilometers (e6 km)
= 1 billion meters (e9 m)
= 1 gigameter (Gm)

Bill Woods wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:... around 6MM-8mm Km, ...
... across 3.1MM Kmm ...
... 10-12mm KM ...

Ack. There's a reason God invented more than one metric prefix.

One million kilometers (e6 km)
= 1 billion meters (e9 m)
= 1 gigameter (Gm)

Oops. gotta keep my capitals in order. obviously my mm should be MM or millions. No mea culpa... I should probably you know, go to sleep?

SWM wrote:

cthia wrote:But do you really think there could have been a stand-up fight at knife range, 17 BCs against 4 destroyers? Remember, in the context, the destroyers were parked in orbit. Not much chance to maneuver.

A stand-up fight? That would have been a stand-up massacre, unless of course the destroyers were at least mobile. (IMO)

17 to 4, is too much of a mismatch while pinned in a corner unable to maneuver.

As 17 men against 4 in a cage unable to maneuver. IMO

Yes, I do. Look up the definition of stand-up, in the context of fight. For instance, at http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/standup. You will see:

4. (of a fight) characterized by the rapid exchange of many blows with little attention given to defensive maneuvering.

So a battle where the ships are maneuvering defensively is not a stand-up fight. A battle where both sides just open fire without dodging is a stand-up fight. That's the definition.

I think you are thinking of a fair fight, not a stand-up fight.

My apology again. From within the context, I would have thought that the idiomatic expression, and meaning, was at hand.

-stand-up:

idiom
stand a chance /show to have a chance or possibility, especially at winning or surviving.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/stand%20up

But even as you said, the slang meaning of standup fight, is a fair fight.

JeffEngel wrote:

cthia wrote:While walking around my home, cameras track me, or anyone on the property. It occurred to me that certain technological security measures are conspicuously missing from the Honorverse.

There are disruptors. Disruptor systems that track people could have been installed all over Protectors Palace. Every single person could be painted. During the Maccabeus coup, they could have been easily eliminated via computer control from a main security room.

Same system would have been effective aboard ship with Lt. Meares.

Too much power and responsibility for silicon brains?

Is there a stun setting to disruptors?

Or perhaps some advanced variation of tracking stun guns.

I'm very surprised Gustav Anderman doesn't deploy its equivalent.

There's a reference to stun rifles used by the RMMC. And StateSec and Mesan security forces have neural whips. I don't think being continuously tracked by such things anywhere would give me a high opinion of the people who refuse to see people under any other condition.

Putting much responsibility on silicon brains - or emphasizing it when it happens anyway - isn't really a part of the Honorverse. And the silicon brains Grayson had at the time of the Maccabeus Coup attempt were, well, up to playing Pong - not really a comforting thing to have controlling whether or not your five year old daughter's boisterous hug is categorized as an assassination attempt and leads to permanently crippling neurological damage on the merciful setting.

If any silicon brain is making that kind of call, I'd want it to be flippin' Dahak, not a Commodore 64!

Now, now, don't be badmouthing Commodore 64s...

Don

A thought just occurred to me. With Haven supplying Manticore with hardware now, they stand to make a fortune in loot. That is going to boost their economy accordingly. Yes?

Same goes for Grayson, most probably they will ramp-up production and share the loot too?

Which brings me to another thought. Or thoughts.

Why wouldn't the MAlign not wish to attack at the production facilities of the GA, Bolthole and Grayson?

Another related thought being, have we seen sleeper agents of the MAlign activated within Haven yet? Perhaps the MAlign may find the Havenite Bolthole before theirs is discovered.

Then it loosely comes down to a strategy akin to the American/Japanese Great Pacific War - of carriers.

He who strikes first strikes last.

cthia wrote:...

Same goes for Grayson, most probably they will ramp-up production and share the loot too?

Which brings me to another thought. Or thoughts.

Why wouldn't the MAlign not wish to attack at the production facilities of the GA, Bolthole and Grayson?

...

Grayson has no production to ramp up, thanks to Oyster Bay.

Haven was a target for the original "Oyster Harbor" plan that was scaled back into "Oyster Bay." Bolthole wasn't targeted because the MAlign doesn't know where it is any better than Manticore does (did). Haven was dropped from the target list because they don't have enough Sharks and Ghosts and the Lenny Dets intended for the full "Oyster Harbor" plan aren't complete and won't be complete in adequate numbers for a year or two, IIRC.

SharkHunter wrote:cthia, Roland vs. 2nd tier or less BC...

Let's say Byng had opened fire at around 6MM-8MM Km, just for conversation. Per the Wikia, 3 fully armed and fighting Rolands would have been able to launch up to 750 total missiles, call it 675 attack/ 75 ECM depending on how long they survived. If they had limpeted pods, IIRC add around another 5 pods x 3 ships x 14 Mark16's = 180 shipkillers + ECM or so, so let's call it 850 total.

Based on later battle usage, the's 6-7 BCs mission killed, but if you drop the likely mission kill to say 80 missiles... they're handing out alot of hurt.

To counter that, Byng has 17 BC x 58 tubes times maybe two salvos before the -16G's return fire starts to arrive. For the sake of conversation, let's say that each BC (16 CM tubes + PDLC) stops four missiles in each of the first two stacked launches, so the Rolands have launched 120 ish shipkiller missiles. Likely that's a mission kill on Byng's flagship and probable hits on 3-4 more. Then the Rolands start independently maneuevering shooting stacked salvos to damage as many remaining BC's as they can.

Meanwhile the Rolands have (20 CM tubes + 30PDLC) x multiple CM launches across 3.1MM Kmm with relatively small targetable aspects.

So in SLN range, it would depend on how many launches the Rolands get off before they are mission killed. Outside of SLN range? say even at 10-12MM KM at New Tuscany, until they shoot themselves dry.

http://honorverse.wikia.com/wiki/Roland_class
http://honorverse.wikia.com/wiki/Indefatigable_class

Edited to make the MM's stand for millions instead of millimeters (mm)

Very nice effort, Sharkhunter, but if I may quibble a bit...

Per Torch of Freedom, the Rolands have 240 missiles (or 20 broadsides from twelve tubes), and as this was a diplomatic mission doubt that they would have been packing pods.

Let's say (just for argument's and alternative history's sake), that Asimovna triggered the nuke and blew the space station when Chaterjee was still 5-7M km away and decelerating for planetary orbit. Bing leaps to the conclusion that the Manties had sent in a missile balistically and orders his ships to bring up wedges and sidewalls and prepare for battle.

Chaterjee sees this, tries (futilely) to dissuade Byng, and is now confronted by a choice of either (1) Opening fire on the Sollies before they bring their wedges up, which would probably destroy most of them but would not play well in either the SL or probably Manticore or (2) pile on the acceleration and try to stay out of Byngs missile envelope. I would expect him to take option 2, but YMMV.

If Byng does come out after him, Chaterjee probably has the acceleration advantage to stay out of his range (math like that is not my strongpoint), but for argument's sake, let's say Byng manages (for at least a little time) to get into range (Chaterjee is still trying to avoid conflict, which is why he is not using his range advantage).

So, then what happens? Remember, this is Pre-New Tuscany and Pre-Spindle, so the SEM does not know about Halo or how effective the Mark 16G's are against SLN BC's. So if Byng lauches with everything he has (and SLN ships can't fire off-bore, so each BC will fire a broadside of 28 missiles, or 476 missiles, approximately 158 per Roland.

Chaterjee, who is still trying to negotiate a stand-down (he's on a diplomatic mission, dammit, not a war-fighting one), now returns fire with double-stacked broadsides, or a total of 24x3=72 missiles per, each concentrated on one ship (and surely Byngs' would be first). Since he doesn't know how effective that will be, he probably allots two stacked broadsides per BC, so he can effectively attack only 10 SLN ships with his missile stores. A total of 144 missiles, as we have seen in Shadows of Freedom, will be more than enough to take out any SLN BC, so if he has the time to launch that many, then 10 out of 17 SLN BC's are going away.

As for the Rolands, their missile defense is superior and they have all those CM tubes and PDLC's SharkHunter mentions, but ~500 missiles (and at least a couple of follow-up broadsides) is a lot of missiles for three ships to deal with and 1-2 hits on a Roland by BC-level missiles is going to hurt them.

So it becomes a race--can Chaterjee get his ships out of missile range of the remaining SLN ships before they are damaged or crippled enough to keep them from running out of range?

And that we'll never know, since RFC didn't write it that way. Which doesn't mean we can't have fun with cthia and speculate...

IMHO as always. YMMV

PS--If you want to quibble about distance and acceleration rates and missile rnages and stuff like that, be my guest...just don't make me employ the Ray Bradbury response....

cthia wrote:My apology again. From within the context, I would have thought that the idiomatic expression, and meaning, was at hand.

-stand-up:

idiom
stand a chance /show to have a chance or possibility, especially at winning or surviving.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/stand%20up

But even as you said, the slang meaning of standup fight, is a fair fight.

"Stand a chance" is not the same as "stand-up fight". "Stand-up fight" derives "standing still"

A stand-up fight is one where two people stand in front of each other and try to hit each other. No clever tricks, no weaving or dodging, no tactics. They are standing still. A pistol duel is a stand-up fight. A showdown between two gunslingers is a stand-up fight. Two boxers flailing at each other in the center of the ring with no footwork is a stand-up fight. A punching match where each person takes turns giving his best shot is a stand-up fight. Two armies firing in formation on an open field is a stand-up fight.

A stand-up fight is not a fair fight if one guy is much bigger than the other. It is purely a test of how much damage you can give, and how much you can take.

A graser duel at point-blank range is the epitome of stand-up fight. And the context you gave was Byng's incident, and specifically the possibility of the Manticorans getting their weapons and defenses ready, which would have been a stand-up fight if the Manticorans managed to fire back. So your context supported my assumption that you meant "stand-up fight" in the sense I am talking about. Then you started talking about attacking the Manticorans while they were still approaching the system, which is why I said you changed the question. I should have figured out a lot faster that you were using "stand-up fight" with a different meaning, but I didn't, so I got very confused.

SWM wrote:

cthia wrote:My apology again. From within the context, I would have thought that the idiomatic expression, and meaning, was at hand.

-stand-up:

idiom
stand a chance /show to have a chance or possibility, especially at winning or surviving.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/stand%20up

But even as you said, the slang meaning of standup fight, is a fair fight.

"Stand a chance" is not the same as "stand-up fight". "Stand-up fight" derives "standing still"

A stand-up fight is one where two people stand in front of each other and try to hit each other. No clever tricks, no weaving or dodging, no tactics. They are standing still. A pistol duel is a stand-up fight. A showdown between two gunslingers is a stand-up fight. Two boxers flailing at each other in the center of the ring with no footwork is a stand-up fight. A punching match where each person takes turns giving his best shot is a stand-up fight. Two armies firing in formation on an open field is a stand-up fight.

A stand-up fight is not a fair fight if one guy is much bigger than the other. It is purely a test of how much damage you can give, and how much you can take.

A graser duel at point-blank range is the epitome of stand-up fight. And the context you gave was Byng's incident, and specifically the possibility of the Manticorans getting their weapons and defenses ready, which would have been a stand-up fight if the Manticorans managed to fire back. So your context supported my assumption that you meant "stand-up fight" in the sense I am talking about. Then you started talking about attacking the Manticorans while they were still approaching the system, which is why I said you changed the question. I should have figured out a lot faster that you were using "stand-up fight" with a different meaning, but I didn't, so I got very confused.

OK.

I yield.

I did indeed mean "fair fight."

And standup fight has a slang meaning of fair fight.

The slang form was even used in Streetfighter, the movie with Jean-Claude Van Damme, I think, when the newcomer was being explained the nature of the fights. "It'll be a standup fight. No gang banging ten to one shit."

Used again in one of the Streetdance movies, although the battles weren't actually fights, rather dance battles. Standup, one on one.

In street slang standup fight means no sucker punching, no hidden weapons, no friends assisting or ganging up.

The almighty English language.

But. My bad. My intention wasn't clear. I think my apology has already been tendered.

Weird Harold wrote:

cthia wrote:...

Same goes for Grayson, most probably they will ramp-up production and share the loot too?

Which brings me to another thought. Or thoughts.

Why wouldn't the MAlign not wish to attack at the production facilities of the GA, Bolthole and Grayson?

...

Grayson has no production to ramp up, thanks to Oyster Bay.

Haven was a target for the original "Oyster Harbor" plan that was scaled back into "Oyster Bay." Bolthole wasn't targeted because the MAlign doesn't know where it is any better than Manticore does (did). Haven was dropped from the target list because they don't have enough Sharks and Ghosts and the Lenny Dets intended for the full "Oyster Harbor" plan aren't complete and won't be complete in adequate numbers for a year or two, IIRC.

Probably the most used/needed sentiment on the forum. "Oops." Shannon would be rich if she'd patented that one word.

I was under the impression that Grayson's facilities were simply damaged. But this site indeed emphasizes what you said.

http://honorverse.wikia.com/wiki/Catego ... Casualties

Thanks again Harold.

Question. Was any of Grayson's orbital farms destroyed? I remember mention of it, but don't remember the specifics.

Anyone recall right off hand?

Which, if they didn't attack the Orbital Farms, and could have, then wouldn't that argue against the MAlign being the type of heartless killers that carry out planetary strikes?