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[SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor

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[SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Wed Feb 08, 2023 2:10 pm

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On the first story in What Price Victory?, "Traitor", I was trying to figure out where in the timeline it is. We aren't given any dates, but we have a few characters in common with the later Manticore Ascendant books, especially Cutler von Tischendorf / Gensonne and Andrew Anderman. The Admiral Riefenstahl we see in the story is a Gottlieb Riefenstahl, whereas the later Graf von Basaltberg from the MA books is a Gotthold Riefenstahl, so likely a relative of the former (possibly son, but more likely be just a brother or cousin).

Andrew Anderman is the best source for timeline. In this story, he's only 5 T-years old; when we later meet him in ACTI, he's 23 in 1546. That places his birth in the year 1523 and thus this story takes place in 1528 or thereabouts, or shortly before we meet Travis Long and his enlistment into the RMN.

We know Cutler Gensonne started his own mercenary company just after this story ends. This also ties neatly into the attempt to steal two Havenite warships from the Secour Conference in 1533 and the fact the conference was called at all, because of the rise in piracy in the region. He wouldn't have had many ships yet at this time, but he would have had the credits to pay the hijackers.

Given travel times in the era and region, I'd have placed his company's start several years earlier, but Andrew's age was already decided by ACTI and he couldn't be younger in this story.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Wed Feb 08, 2023 2:24 pm

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The other two tidbits in this story are the missile launchers. Cutler von Tischendorf muses that "rail launchers are the future" and indeed that's what HMS Casey is refitted with. Her refit was authorised in 1535, with King Michael's goal of expanding the local shipbuilding industry.

The other tidbit is that the Solarian League has made progress in creating gunports in the sidewall to fire missiles through. The lack of such gunports explains why ships of this era all fire missiles from their fore or after aspects (smaller ships only forward) and don't have broadsides.

What I don't remember right now is if the sidewalls are opaque to the ship inside of them. We know the wedges are, because ships perform turnover with a yaw manoeuvre instead of pitching, so continuous sensor watch can be maintained. But I do have a vague recollection of the sidewalls not coming up until after the turnover for this reason too. More importantly, Cutler's musings are that the missiles can't be controlled, not just fired, by the mothership while the sidewalls are up.

So the gunport technique must allow continuous missile control through the sidewalls too.

Anyway, this SL top secret report is from before 1528. I'm guessing it's going to be important for the HMS Nike (BC-01) and the HMS Manticore (BB-01) designs later on, in the 1580s and 1590s. Manticore must've built a class of modern heavy cruisers between Casey and Nike, so there's a chance those incorporate this technique too and we get to see this in the series.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by Robert_A_Woodward   » Thu Feb 09, 2023 2:34 am

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ThinksMarkedly wrote:On the first story in What Price Victory?, "Traitor", I was trying to figure out where in the timeline it is. We aren't given any dates, but we have a few characters in common with the later Manticore Ascendant books, especially Cutler von Tischendorf / Gensonne and Andrew Anderman. The Admiral Riefenstahl we see in the story is a Gottlieb Riefenstahl, whereas the later Graf von Basaltberg from the MA books is a Gotthold Riefenstahl, so likely a relative of the former (possibly son, but more likely be just a brother or cousin).

Andrew Anderman is the best source for timeline. In this story, he's only 5 T-years old; when we later meet him in ACTI, he's 23 in 1546. That places his birth in the year 1523 and thus this story takes place in 1528 or thereabouts, or shortly before we meet Travis Long and his enlistment into the RMN.

We know Cutler Gensonne started his own mercenary company just after this story ends. This also ties neatly into the attempt to steal two Havenite warships from the Secour Conference in 1533 and the fact the conference was called at all, because of the rise in piracy in the region. He wouldn't have had many ships yet at this time, but he would have had the credits to pay the hijackers.

Given travel times in the era and region, I'd have placed his company's start several years earlier, but Andrew's age was already decided by ACTI and he couldn't be younger in this story.


I don't believe that Gensonne had anything to do with the attempted hijacking at Secour (the rise in piracy on the other hand ...).
----------------------------
Beowulf was bad.
(first sentence of Chapter VI of _Space Viking_ by H. Beam Piper)
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Thu Feb 09, 2023 2:42 pm

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Robert_A_Woodward wrote:I don't believe that Gensonne had anything to do with the attempted hijacking at Secour (the rise in piracy on the other hand ...).


Actually, this is established that he did have a hand in that. In the second book, Jeremiah Llyn infiltrates the Haven prison to extract information from the captured hijackers on who their clients were. That's how he found out about the Volsungs.

The hijackers had also been given modern Solarian missiles by their benefactors, which presumably means that Gensonne at this time already had enough funds to bribe Solarian officials to sell him export-restricted items.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by Theemile   » Thu Feb 09, 2023 5:41 pm

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ThinksMarkedly wrote:
Robert_A_Woodward wrote:I don't believe that Gensonne had anything to do with the attempted hijacking at Secour (the rise in piracy on the other hand ...).


Actually, this is established that he did have a hand in that. In the second book, Jeremiah Llyn infiltrates the Haven prison to extract information from the captured hijackers on who their clients were. That's how he found out about the Volsungs.

The hijackers had also been given modern Solarian missiles by their benefactors, which presumably means that Gensonne at this time already had enough funds to bribe Solarian officials to sell him export-restricted items.


We could assume that Cutler leaned on some of his mother's old contacts. There are people in power who probably owed his mother from the pre-imperial days, who remembered a young Cutler, and waxed nostalgic enough to allow him to call his mother's favors.

Spin the story just right, especially for any of those contacts that weren't favorable to Anderman, and they might have helped him get on his feet with favorable contracts and hardware concessions.
******
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: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Thu Feb 09, 2023 9:32 pm

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Theemile wrote:We could assume that Cutler leaned on some of his mother's old contacts. There are people in power who probably owed his mother from the pre-imperial days, who remembered a young Cutler, and waxed nostalgic enough to allow him to call his mother's favors.

Spin the story just right, especially for any of those contacts that weren't favorable to Anderman, and they might have helped him get on his feet with favorable contracts and hardware concessions.


Ah, those are good points actually. It does indeed help explain how he went from one frigate in 1528 to stealing cruisers and battlecruisers in 1535, to four battlecruisers and a dozen other ships by 1543, at a time when battlecruisers were top-of-the-line for everyone except the IAN and SLN.

Of course, despite his ruthlessness, he and his crews were actually very good at their jobs working as mercenaries.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by Robert_A_Woodward   » Fri Feb 10, 2023 2:41 am

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ThinksMarkedly wrote:
Robert_A_Woodward wrote:I don't believe that Gensonne had anything to do with the attempted hijacking at Secour (the rise in piracy on the other hand ...).


Actually, this is established that he did have a hand in that. In the second book, Jeremiah Llyn infiltrates the Haven prison to extract information from the captured hijackers on who their clients were. That's how he found out about the Volsungs.

The hijackers had also been given modern Solarian missiles by their benefactors, which presumably means that Gensonne at this time already had enough funds to bribe Solarian officials to sell him export-restricted items.


All Jeremiah Llyn discovered was a clue on who the hijacker's client was. The client knew about the Volsungs. Perhaps, the client was acquiring ships for Cutler (as part of Cutler's fee), but that is the only possible connection.

I don't believe the missile that the hijackers had was modern (the hijacker leader might have implied he had access to top-of-the-line Solarian League design, but that was a mistake that revealed his phoniness).
----------------------------
Beowulf was bad.
(first sentence of Chapter VI of _Space Viking_ by H. Beam Piper)
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Sat Feb 11, 2023 1:25 pm

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When reading the story, I thought the fire itself in the fireplace would turn out to be a distress signal.

Since that was in his private apartments, most people wouldn't have known if Gustav Anderman ever used the fireplace. Any infrequent visitor may simply think it wasn't lit on their handful of times they'd been there. So when Anderman insists on the fire being lit, I thought that the smoke coming out of the chimney, possibly augmented by some material hidden in there, would trigger a security response from off-site. He had already known that comms were blocked (that would need to be part of any conspiracy anyway), so having a secondary and secret means of communication would make sense, especially for someone as paranoid as he was.

I am left unsure whether his presentation as a reincarnation of Frederick the Great and his eccentricities are an act or not. That definitely made his enemies underestimate him, considering him nothing more than a lunatic. That includes the conspirators but also the neighbouring systems. But the conspirators only had to conspire because they thought he was a lunatic, so it would have saved him a lot of grief if those had thought he had all screws in place. And in interstellar matters, if he really had no expansionist goals, then presenting himself and his government as squarely sane and experienced would have deterred any attacks that he'd have to respond to.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by Daryl   » Mon Feb 26, 2024 2:40 am

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Perhaps that is RFC's oblique reference to Putin acting as if he is the reincarnation of Catherine the Great?
ThinksMarkedly wrote:When reading the story, I thought the fire itself in the fireplace would turn out to be a distress signal.

Since that was in his private apartments, most people wouldn't have known if Gustav Anderman ever used the fireplace. Any infrequent visitor may simply think it wasn't lit on their handful of times they'd been there. So when Anderman insists on the fire being lit, I thought that the smoke coming out of the chimney, possibly augmented by some material hidden in there, would trigger a security response from off-site. He had already known that comms were blocked (that would need to be part of any conspiracy anyway), so having a secondary and secret means of communication would make sense, especially for someone as paranoid as he was.

I am left unsure whether his presentation as a reincarnation of Frederick the Great and his eccentricities are an act or not. That definitely made his enemies underestimate him, considering him nothing more than a lunatic. That includes the conspirators but also the neighbouring systems. But the conspirators only had to conspire because they thought he was a lunatic, so it would have saved him a lot of grief if those had thought he had all screws in place. And in interstellar matters, if he really had no expansionist goals, then presenting himself and his government as squarely sane and experienced would have deterred any attacks that he'd have to respond to.
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Re: [SPOILERS] WPV: Traitor
Post by ThinksMarkedly   » Tue Feb 27, 2024 12:58 pm

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Daryl wrote:Perhaps that is RFC's oblique reference to Putin acting as if he is the reincarnation of Catherine the Great?


He wouldn't have known about Putin's expansionist or mental state when he made Gustav Anderman say he believed to be the reincarnation of Frederick the Great. When that came out, Boris Yieltsin was still president of Russia, back in the 1990s.

The description of Anderman's actions in WPV are much more recent of course. So yes, he, Tom and Tim could have expanded the background based on real-life events, but even then the timeline stretches. WPV was released on Feb 2023, so the stories must have been written in 2020-2021 before being submitted to David for his final touches and then to the editors. Back then, Putin was only having cabinet meetings with the hilariously long tables, but hadn't actually launched the invasion.
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