Honorverse ramblings and musings

Actually, I think that having them turn on just as they enter the CM envelope is far better then having them for the whole run as far as EW goes. The longer the Dragon's Tooth missiles are broadcasting the fake signals, and the more looks they get at them, the more likely it is for the enemy to see through the deception, and be able to disregard some of the phantom targets. You want to maximize chaos in the time where your missiles are most vulnerable.

It would seem that optimal use would be to wait until they have absolutely solid locks on your missiles, then hit them with the Dazzlers, to make the sensers "blink," and once they come back up, the Dragons Teeth are up and running, giving the enemy almost no time to discern the real from the fake.

crewdude48 wrote:Actually, I think that having them turn on just as they enter the CM envelope is far better then having them for the whole run as far as EW goes. The longer the Dragon's Tooth missiles are broadcasting the fake signals, and the more looks they get at them, the more likely it is for the enemy to see through the deception, and be able to disregard some of the phantom targets. You want to maximize chaos in the time where your missiles are most vulnerable.

It would seem that optimal use would be to wait until they have absolutely solid locks on your missiles, then hit them with the Dazzlers, to make the sensers "blink," and once they come back up, the Dragons Teeth are up and running, giving the enemy almost no time to discern the real from the fake.

No question when they would have the maximum effect. The point I am making is to try to overwhelm the enemy computers and give them problems. Not suggesting to have fake missiles all the time or even during the first salvo when the enemy computers are practically still having it easy. Fake a double or triple broadside maybe 3 or 4 launches into the fight, right when the 1st broadside is already giving the enemy problems.

Note: I am floating this 'tactic' if and only if the Dragon's Teeth module has the endurance to keep up the false images for a long long time. It is useless if the images can only last a couple of seconds (just enough to confuse the enemy during the terminal attack phase)

Another 'musing'.

Why do the ships in Honorverse have to 'flip'? Can't they just 'adjust' the geometry of the wedges they are generating?

Rakhmamort wrote:

crewdude48 wrote:Actually, I think that having them turn on just as they enter the CM envelope is far better then having them for the whole run as far as EW goes. The longer the Dragon's Tooth missiles are broadcasting the fake signals, and the more looks they get at them, the more likely it is for the enemy to see through the deception, and be able to disregard some of the phantom targets. You want to maximize chaos in the time where your missiles are most vulnerable.

It would seem that optimal use would be to wait until they have absolutely solid locks on your missiles, then hit them with the Dazzlers, to make the sensers "blink," and once they come back up, the Dragons Teeth are up and running, giving the enemy almost no time to discern the real from the fake.

No question when they would have the maximum effect. The point I am making is to try to overwhelm the enemy computers and give them problems. Not suggesting to have fake missiles all the time or even during the first salvo when the enemy computers are practically still having it easy. Fake a double or triple broadside maybe 3 or 4 launches into the fight, right when the 1st broadside is already giving the enemy problems.

Note: I am floating this 'tactic' if and only if the Dragon's Teeth module has the endurance to keep up the false images for a long long time. It is useless if the images can only last a couple of seconds (just enough to confuse the enemy during the terminal attack phase)

I just think that having them run for the entire run time of even a single drive would give the enemy too much time to spot some flaw in the projection and would render the Teeth useless for the most important part of their job.

Now, if you had two divergent enemy formations, maybe you could do something weird by running the Teeth concurrent with the first drive, to make it look like you are splitting your fire between the two formations; but aside from that, I can't really see a time when it would work.

If the computer is having problems keeping track of salvo one and salvo four, it will disregard four until one has finished, and then try to figure out what is what for four. Having flight times measured in minutes does not bode well for any sort of EW at the beginning of a slavo.

Rakhmamort wrote:Another 'musing'.

Why do the ships in Honorverse have to 'flip'? Can't they just 'adjust' the geometry of the wedges they are generating?

I tried to look it up, but couldn't find it, and I have to go to bed soon, so I could't spend to much time finding it. I seem to remember that RFC has stated that there are some miner differences between the fore and aft impeller rings, requiring the nodes to be in slightly different positions. They can use node power to alter wedge geometry to a point, being as that is how they change accelerations, but they are currently unable to generate an acceleration vector in any direction but the positive x access.

I suppose, depending on how different the exact arrangements are, they might be able to mount the nodes on some sort of rams, and allow them to move between the two positions. However, it would be a liability on a warship, and an extra unnecessary cost on a merchie.

crewdude48 wrote:I just think that having them run for the entire run time of even a single drive would give the enemy too much time to spot some flaw in the projection and would render the Teeth useless for the most important part of their job.

True enough. That's why I said having a ballistic phase however short would help keep the illusion up since the enemy has to 're-analyze' again which image is a real missile and which is not. And lastly, resetting the images in conjunction with triggering the dazzlers would be the last stage. It still takes computer processing power to tag an image as something to ignore. If the images that are re-generated changed something in their profile(from the previous images) to negate automatic filters that has been set for that salvo, then the EW has to spend time again to re-tag them and set the system to ignore them.

Now, if you had two divergent enemy formations, maybe you could do something weird by running the Teeth concurrent with the first drive, to make it look like you are splitting your fire between the two formations; but aside from that, I can't really see a time when it would work.

Now that is another use for the capability. Or throwing a fake salvo at ships that are not your salvo's target just to keep them busy.

If the computer is having problems keeping track of salvo one and salvo four, it will disregard four until one has finished, and then try to figure out what is what for four. Having flight times measured in minutes does not bode well for any sort of EW at the beginning of a slavo.

It will still use processing power to keep track of them. The priority will be much lower but precious computer power will still be used up.

crewdude48 wrote:
I tried to look it up, but couldn't find it, and I have to go to bed soon, so I could't spend to much time finding it. I seem to remember that RFC has stated that there are some miner differences between the fore and aft impeller rings, requiring the nodes to be in slightly different positions. They can use node power to alter wedge geometry to a point, being as that is how they change accelerations, but they are currently unable to generate an acceleration vector in any direction but the positive x access.

I suppose, depending on how different the exact arrangements are, they might be able to mount the nodes on some sort of rams, and allow them to move between the two positions. However, it would be a liability on a warship, and an extra unnecessary cost on a merchie.

It has been done before at Basilisk Station.

I don't see why it would be a big liability. Looks to me 'flipping' while in formation is very very dangerous because you have to watch out for all the huge planes of concentrated gravity fields flipping around. Simply adjusting the wedges and making the ends near the nose be the shallower end would be much much safer.

If they don't flip with the wedges up, then it is much dangerous because that makes the ship vulnerable...

Rakhmamort wrote:Another 'musing'.

Why do the ships in Honorverse have to 'flip'? Can't they just 'adjust' the geometry of the wedges they are generating?

No, they can't. The impeller rings are set up to create a particular arrangement of wedge. The fore impeller ring cannot act like the rear impeller ring, and vice versa.

SWM wrote:

Rakhmamort wrote:Another 'musing'.

Why do the ships in Honorverse have to 'flip'? Can't they just 'adjust' the geometry of the wedges they are generating?

No, they can't. The impeller rings are set up to create a particular arrangement of wedge. The fore impeller ring cannot act like the rear impeller ring, and vice versa.

I figured it could be done, but nobody does because it would involve a cold shutdown and restart of the wedge, which takes ~45 minutes(or more). Given that a SD can complete a 180 degree turn in 25 or so minutes, you can see why it doesn't happen - NTM, no wedge means no protection, including sidewalls.

SWM wrote:

Rakhmamort wrote:Another 'musing'.

Why do the ships in Honorverse have to 'flip'? Can't they just 'adjust' the geometry of the wedges they are generating?

No, they can't. The impeller rings are set up to create a particular arrangement of wedge. The fore impeller ring cannot act like the rear impeller ring, and vice versa.

Which is really weird. In Basilisk Station we saw nodes installed in telescoping arms/piston so we know they can be moved around. I don't see any reason why their physical placements (if that is what is required) cannot be changed.

If the fore and aft nodes are truly different from each other, then they shouldn't even all be called beta nodes. There should be a clear differentiation between front/back beta nodes.

We sure know that whatever it is these nodes do, their output can be adjusted. Battle damage to a node does not stop a ship completely so that means whatever field they are generating is still being generated albeit with a weaker/smaller effect.