Argument Thread OOC Future Tech Only

[SquareDisc City]

Now, someone try and convince me I'm wrong about tanks being obsolete in the face of orbit to surface weaponry?

The best thing I've come up with so far is that ground vehicles can have their shields "backed" by the ground beneath them, and thus have a much tougher shield on the same size vehicle compared to an aircraft or spacecraft. It's a bit handwavey, but if I want to have a relevant army it's an option.

[Yes Im Biop]

Modern tanks can move as fast as a armored truck if not faster, BY your logic any armored vehicle is now obsolete. Troops move slower so I guess they are to... How exactly will you fight a defense game?

Troops generally aren't worth expending orbital strikes on; tanks are. To be honest, I believe that pretty much all ground vehicles would be obsolete in the age of orbital supremacy; none of them can ever reliably dodge a Rod from God, but tanks are the worst offenders simply due to being such high priority targets.

So you are gonna waste a Multi dozen ton slug, on a Tank that's probably a drone and are in the Dime a Dozen to build? As well as the second that orbital gun charges you are now a shining target, as is the White hot slug for interceptors, as well as if you fire and manage to hit a tank square, The others are a few dozen feet away (AT lest) And will simple shift into reverse or forward to avoid the crater it makes.


Just use a Laser Guided missile and be done with it. More accurate, Cost's less, And like a Magnetic Cannon, Doesn't make tanks Obsolete.

[Ularn]

Do gunships and aerofighters still need some place to land every now and then or do they have effectively infinite endurance complete with infinite ammo?

Yes; they would still be vulnerable when landed, although all the USN's designs are capable of operating in space as well (though they don't actually do any fighting up there, because that would be suicide) so will often just return to one of the capital ships in orbit for refueling.

Troops generally aren't worth expending orbital strikes on; tanks are. To be honest, I believe that pretty much all ground vehicles would be obsolete in the age of orbital supremacy; none of them can ever reliably dodge a Rod from God, but tanks are the worst offenders simply due to being such high priority targets.

So you are gonna waste a Multi dozen ton slug, on a Tank that's probably a drone and are in the Dime a Dozen to build? As well as the second that orbital gun charges you are now a shining target, as is the White hot slug for interceptors, as well as if you fire and manage to hit a tank square, The others are a few dozen feet away (AT lest) And will simple shift into reverse or forward to avoid the crater it makes.


Just use a Laser Guided missile and be done with it. More accurate, Cost's less, And like a Magnetic Cannon, Doesn't make tanks Obsolete.

Although I did say "Rods from God", what I'm talking about applies equally regardless of the precise method of orbital bombardment being used by a navy, be it orbit-to-surface missiles, kinetic strikes or beam spam. The USN actually uses missiles and lasers more than RfGs; I just talked about them as the ubiquitous example of an orbital bombardment weapon.

But yes; I would 'waste' a purpose-built missile in order to slag a slow yet dangerous enemy unit. I'll then 'waste' a couple more to slag the rest of its armour squadron While it might be that in the future a soldier's training will cost more than a tank (I'm skeptical) the amount of raw material involved in building that tank versus equipping an infantryman would dictate the they will never actually be cheap to build - even if you're putting drones inside them.

As for the bombarding ship becoming a target; it's a gorram starship. in orbit. It's not exactly going to be hiding in the first place. If there was anything nearby which could be shooting at it, it wouldn't be bombarding the surface, because we wouldn't have put troops on the ground until we'd dealt with the enemy's space borne assets and acquired complete orbital supremacy.

Now, someone try and convince me I'm wrong about tanks being obsolete in the face of orbit to surface weaponry?

The best thing I've come up with so far is that ground vehicles can have their shields "backed" by the ground beneath them, and thus have a much tougher shield on the same size vehicle compared to an aircraft or spacecraft. It's a bit handwavey, but if I want to have a relevant army it's an option.

My nation doesn't really have shield technology - not on anything smaller than a starship, at least.

[Yes Im Biop]

Do gunships and aerofighters still need some place to land every now and then or do they have effectively infinite endurance complete with infinite ammo?

Yes; they would still be vulnerable when landed, although all the USN's designs are capable of operating in space as well (though they don't actually do any fighting up there, because that would be suicide) so will often just return to one of the capital ships in orbit for refueling.

So you are gonna waste a Multi dozen ton slug, on a Tank that's probably a drone and are in the Dime a Dozen to build? As well as the second that orbital gun charges you are now a shining target, as is the White hot slug for interceptors, as well as if you fire and manage to hit a tank square, The others are a few dozen feet away (AT lest) And will simple shift into reverse or forward to avoid the crater it makes.


Just use a Laser Guided missile and be done with it. More accurate, Cost's less, And like a Magnetic Cannon, Doesn't make tanks Obsolete.

Although I did say "Rods from God", what I'm talking about applies equally regardless of the precise method of orbital bombardment being used by a navy, be it orbit-to-surface missiles, kinetic strikes or beam spam. The USN actually uses missiles and lasers more than RfGs; I just talked about them as the ubiquitous example of an orbital bombardment weapon.

But yes; I would 'waste' a purpose-built missile in order to slag a slow yet dangerous enemy unit. I'll then 'waste' a couple more to slag the rest of its armour squadron While it might be that in the future a soldier's training will cost more than a tank (I'm skeptical) the amount of raw material involved in building that tank versus equipping an infantryman would dictate the they will never actually be cheap to build - even if you're putting drones inside them.

As for the bombarding ship becoming a target; it's a gorram starship. in orbit. It's not exactly going to be hiding in the first place. If there was anything nearby which could be shooting at it, it wouldn't be bombarding the surface, because we wouldn't have put troops on the ground until we'd dealt with the enemy's space borne assets and acquired complete orbital supremacy.

The best thing I've come up with so far is that ground vehicles can have their shields "backed" by the ground beneath them, and thus have a much tougher shield on the same size vehicle compared to an aircraft or spacecraft. It's a bit handwavey, but if I want to have a relevant army it's an option.

My nation doesn't really have shield technology - not on anything smaller than a starship, at least.

Except tanks aren't slow, and Honestly they aren't all that big if you have a drone. It can all be compressed with less wasted space.

[Arthropoda Ingens]

Do gunships and aerofighters still need some place to land every now and then or do they have effectively infinite endurance complete with infinite ammo?

Yes; they would still be vulnerable when landed, although all the USN's designs are capable of operating in space as well (though they don't actually do any fighting up there, because that would be suicide) so will often just return to one of the capital ships in orbit for refueling.

If they get the opportunity to resupply in space, then presumably orbital bombardement is unlikely to occur, whether it's on them or on tanks.

If they don't get that opportunity, take out airbases, done.

[Ularn]

Yes; they would still be vulnerable when landed, although all the USN's designs are capable of operating in space as well (though they don't actually do any fighting up there, because that would be suicide) so will often just return to one of the capital ships in orbit for refueling.


Although I did say "Rods from God", what I'm talking about applies equally regardless of the precise method of orbital bombardment being used by a navy, be it orbit-to-surface missiles, kinetic strikes or beam spam. The USN actually uses missiles and lasers more than RfGs; I just talked about them as the ubiquitous example of an orbital bombardment weapon.

But yes; I would 'waste' a purpose-built missile in order to slag a slow yet dangerous enemy unit. I'll then 'waste' a couple more to slag the rest of its armour squadron While it might be that in the future a soldier's training will cost more than a tank (I'm skeptical) the amount of raw material involved in building that tank versus equipping an infantryman would dictate the they will never actually be cheap to build - even if you're putting drones inside them.

As for the bombarding ship becoming a target; it's a gorram starship. in orbit. It's not exactly going to be hiding in the first place. If there was anything nearby which could be shooting at it, it wouldn't be bombarding the surface, because we wouldn't have put troops on the ground until we'd dealt with the enemy's space borne assets and acquired complete orbital supremacy.


My nation doesn't really have shield technology - not on anything smaller than a starship, at least.

Except tanks aren't slow, and Honestly they aren't all that big if you have a drone. It can all be compressed with less wasted space.

They are slow compared to fighters. They are slow compared to starships. They are slow compared to almost any other piece of military hardware that I would consider a worthwhile target for a starship's weapons. They are only fast compared to infantry, and I'm still not convinced a starship would waste its ammo on individual soldiers.

[Arthropoda Ingens]

[...]and I'm still not convinced a starship would waste its ammo on individual soldiers.

Depends on the soldier, really.

[Yes Im Biop]

Except tanks aren't slow, and Honestly they aren't all that big if you have a drone. It can all be compressed with less wasted space.

They are slow compared to fighters. They are slow compared to starships. They are slow compared to almost any other piece of military hardware that I would consider a worthwhile target for a starship's weapons. They are only fast compared to infantry, and I'm still not convinced a starship would waste its ammo on individual soldiers.

Fighters are vulnerable to AA, Star ships are bot Vanurable to extreme AA, and are to far away to do much good. Both are extremely expensivce

[Rethan]

They are slow compared to fighters. They are slow compared to starships. They are slow compared to almost any other piece of military hardware that I would consider a worthwhile target for a starship's weapons. They are only fast compared to infantry, and I'm still not convinced a starship would waste its ammo on individual soldiers.

Fighters are vulnerable to AA, Star ships are bot Vanurable to extreme AA, and are to far away to do much good. Both are extremely expensivce

AA is not going to hit a starship in orbit. Ground-to-orbit weaponry certainly, but I would imagine you'd be hard pressed to find a weapon that would serve as anti-fighter AA and surface-to-orbit anti starship. People have also covered the numerous advantages a ship in orbit has over a surface based installation. (And vice versa, but I side with the starship side of the argument)

If your ship, in orbit, is too far away to hit a target on the surface of a planet, then your starship must be hilariously terrible at engaging targets at deep space ranges.

Yes, compared to a tank, a starship is insanely expensive (I wouldn't class a atmospheric fighter as extremely expensive. Slightly more expensive than a tank, maybe) but it's also far, far more capable at doing more things. One starship can, assuming it's equipped to do so, engage entire armoured divisions by itself from a position where said armoured divisions can do less than nothing against it. In such a situation, you should be comparing the cost of the missile (or the kinetic god rod, or the fuel for whatever powers your laser) versus the cost of the target (be it a single tank or an armoured division that's moving into position). That's a far more favourable cost-effect ratio.

[Zepplin Manufacturers]

Any weapon that can lethally service a jinking warship at range from the ground should make an utterly overkill capable anti parasite craft weapon. Said weapon by defintion however is not "AA".

The point of a military force is deterent, attack or defence. In this case against a sanely used starship ground forces trapped at the wrong end of a gravity well and or depths of an atmosphere ultimately lack an ability to do two of these things in any meaningfully effective way with sane cost effectiveness. A logistical nightmare made worse by the fact the moment your high value anti starship deterent / defences fail the static high value facilities your forces protect and indeed exist to protect are in all probability dead and planetary high value mobile objects restricts there movement by persence on a planet.

As for "ammo" against individual targets...drive output just requires in most cases mass consumption and it should in non close combat zones be rather easy to simply CREW the correct 5 metre circle.

Space is big. Planets are small. Ships are in relation pico scale and very mobile and planetary targets ..arent. Better still you in no way need to be close to target save for nonsense like aformentioned CREW servicing of individual infantry ..but infantry platoons? firing low albedo single use bounce focus targeting sats into a hostile orbit? all of these things are possible shield or no shield and in the end you have the ultimate high ground ...if a position is truly too hard to take ..just rock it.

Lase em in the day, Nuke em till they glow then kinetic strike them in the dark and if the operating theatre doesnt end up with an atmospheric general temprature above the melting point of tin your not trying hard enough.

[The Akasha Colony]

But yes; I would 'waste' a purpose-built missile in order to slag a slow yet dangerous enemy unit. I'll then 'waste' a couple more to slag the rest of its armour squadron While it might be that in the future a soldier's training will cost more than a tank (I'm skeptical) the amount of raw material involved in building that tank versus equipping an infantryman would dictate the they will never actually be cheap to build - even if you're putting drones inside them.

You are thinking one-dimensionally about resources, purely in terms of the physical mass needed rather than the scarcity of the relevant resources. In fact, even today a skilled tank crew is considered more valuable than even the multi-million dollar tanks they drive. That crew represents invaluable years of experience and hundreds of thousands of fiscal dollars of investment for training, plus at least eighteen years of investment by the public in raising them before they even don the uniform.

Thus, while indeed a tank will consume more physical resources to build, these resources are more easily acquired. If there's a shortage, build more mines, refineries, and smelters. Build more efficient factories to produce them more quickly with no loss of quality. End-to-end, from digging the metals out of the ground to rolling them out of the factory as finished tanks, the process should last days if not mere hours in an FT setting. And if you're building whole starships, hundreds of meters in length, and can afford to build large planetary defense installations, tanks should be like chump change.

But lose an infantryman or a crewman and you can't simply build a factory to make more. You have to draw from the existing population, and each man drafted represents a loss to the civilian economy. And each soldier killed also represents the loss of all his future economic value to the economy. Replacements would take well over a decade from birth to reach maturity. This is even more problematic in FT where things move even faster yet humans continue to mature at roughly the same rate. Yes, you can 'cheat' with accelerated growth genetic engineering and memory implants, but just about anything in FT can be handwaved, and this assumes fewer things are.

This is before the political and social value is considered. Losing a tank doesn't leave widows and an angry public. No one mourns the loss of even a $20 million tank, no funerals are held, and no caskets are shown on the evening news.

[Yes Im Biop]

Fighters are vulnerable to AA, Star ships are bot Vanurable to extreme AA, and are to far away to do much good. Both are extremely expensivce

AA is not going to hit a starship in orbit. Ground-to-orbit weaponry certainly, but I would imagine you'd be hard pressed to find a weapon that would serve as anti-fighter AA and surface-to-orbit anti starship. People have also covered the numerous advantages a ship in orbit has over a surface based installation. (And vice versa, but I side with the starship side of the argument)

If your ship, in orbit, is too far away to hit a target on the surface of a planet, then your starship must be hilariously terrible at engaging targets at deep space ranges.

Yes, compared to a tank, a starship is insanely expensive (I wouldn't class a atmospheric fighter as extremely expensive. Slightly more expensive than a tank, maybe) but it's also far, far more capable at doing more things. One starship can, assuming it's equipped to do so, engage entire armoured divisions by itself from a position where said armoured divisions can do less than nothing against it. In such a situation, you should be comparing the cost of the missile (or the kinetic god rod, or the fuel for whatever powers your laser) versus the cost of the target (be it a single tank or an armoured division that's moving into position). That's a far more favourable cost-effect ratio.

Extreme AA is a category of it's own. The way I see it most star ships can come in Ammo, Making them aircraft as well. And EAA Sounds better than ASS

[SquareDisc City]

Extreme AA is a category of it's own. The way I see it most star ships can come in Ammo, Making them aircraft as well. And EAA Sounds better than ASS

I expect most FT spacecraft can brute-force their way through atmosphere. It won't be efficient and will wreak havoc on said atmosphere though.

However while it might be reasonable for an "anti-aircraft" weapon in an FT setting to be capable of hitting a spacecraft, doing worthwhile damage is another matter. A weapon designed for shooting down enemy fighters (air or space) or incoming missiles is going to be as effective as a pea-shooter against a large space battleship. Conversely a weapon capable of putting a dent in said large space battleship will be inefficient at dealing with an enemy fighter rush or missile spam.

[Vernii]

That would be why any competent military would have more than one weapon in its inventory. Second, inefficiency isn't a deal killer. Modern militaries routinely expend munitions that cost almost as much (or more) than the targets that they take out.

As for something that can deal with fighter and missile swarms + starships in orbit, nuclear-tipped SAMs (or technically SOM in this case) come to mind.

On the note of orbital bombardment, my own nation has a rather unique doctrine. The Second Proxima Centauri Accords* made bombardments rather legally troublesome, so the IVN doctrine relies almost entirely upon delivering weapons against surface targets via drone bombers (the mach 3-5, nuclear ramjet, kiloton warhead spewing monstrosities like horrible bastard children of Project Pluto and the B-70 type of drone bomber). Smart bombs and such are basically reserved for urban/suburban targets where collateral damage probability is high, otherwise targets that are caught out in the open are going to probably get cluster bombed or nuked.

Ground doctrine is a mix of airborne infantry and air-delivered light mechanized vehicles being dropped in enemy rear-areas (where possible) or flanks, and relying on armor divisions (w/ organic anti-air assets) to bear the brunt of the fighting. Armored divisions are usually mostly MBTs with a regiment of Albions (IVA's Bolo equivalent) as the vanguard. Run into an enemy armor division? Blast them in the face with a few 50 kts and then plow through their melted remains.

*Non-signatories are generally considered protected by each provision of the Accords so long as their own behavior does not violate it. Therefore no orbital bombardments against nations that haven't done it first for example, and even then the other provisions would still be in effect until those were 'broken' in turn.

[Red Talons]

[...]and I'm still not convinced a starship would waste its ammo on individual soldiers.

Depends on the soldier, really.

I have mages that would warrant a precision strike from orbit.

[Auman]

While using orbital weapons to grease ground targets sounds logical, the reality is that it is a dangerous provocation of the enemy and an invitation to escalate force. There are no meaningful conventions of warfare in the Milky Way Galaxy. There is no document that states what is and is not acceptable in a military confrontation. With that known, both parties of an engagement should be aware that their actions have consequences. Personally speaking, I would not use orbital weapons of any size because it encourages scale creep from the enemy. I drop a golf ball, they drop a toilet and eventually we are delivering fusion weapons to each others homeworlds. The question you always have to ask yourself is "Is this skirmish worth risking the extinction of my people?"

If any doubt leaks into your mind, you should probably not have instigated the thing.

If you are defending yourself, you should still ask yourself that question. There is no dishonor in surrendering to the enemy if they can back up their threats with the annihilation of your species.

[SquareDisc City]

That same argument, though, could be applied to a ground invasion, cyberwarfare, or anything else you care to name. If one's nation has intelligence indicating a particular action will prompt either the target or a third party to escalate, that action might be avoided. Otherwise, though, tactics are likely to be based on what's effective and acceptable to themselves. (Which needn't be the same for every nation.)

[Auman]

It's all about action, reaction and the risk of failure. Proportionally, are you willing to lose and how great is the risk of losing? If the stakes aren't high for a given action, then by all means go ahead... But your enemy's reaction to something you believe to be reasonable, may be unreasonable, irrational and extremely violent. Aumanii society is very emotional about the topic of orbital bombardment. They are likely to react very negatively towards it. ZMI, on the other hand, is very casual about the practice and may wave the use of such tactics off as business as usual. ZMI engaging an enemy with similar ideas would probably have a cordial conflict that ends with a negotiated agreement. If a nation with similar ideas to Auman and ZMI were to ever come to blows, however, things could quickly get out of control.

Same goes, as you said, about a myriad of other things... The 12 Colonies of Kobol would go apeshit if they were attacked by robots... The Klingon Empire would be emotionally outraged by a paradrop of Tribbles, etc.

[SquareDisc City]

It's all about action, reaction and the risk of failure. Proportionally, are you willing to lose and how great is the risk of losing? If the stakes aren't high for a given action, then by all means go ahead... But your enemy's reaction to something you believe to be reasonable, may be unreasonable, irrational and extremely violent.

The possibility of an unpredicted over-reaction, though, means that the ICly the stakes are always high, and the only safe course is to not instigate war or even anything that might spark war. That, however, has the OOC corollary of not doing any remotely confrontational with one's nation, which for all but the most die-hard character RPers is not really an option. Getting out there, taking sides, making allies and enemies, and generally poking one's nose into stuff may be dubious from an IC perspective, but it's what your nation has to do if you're to RP it.

(Not that I'm one to talk about not RPing...but my inactivity's for different reasons.)

[Auman]

That's really the point I'm making though. Constantly being at war, in my opinion, cheapens it. It works for some and I'm not on a soapbox arguing for peace in the galaxy... But my personal preference is to keep things out of the open and do all of your killing in creative ways.

[Demigueris]

If you want an RP, you really have to put some sort of skin in the game. Something you're going to lose if you do nothing, and go from a position of safeguarding your nation's strategic interests. If you're interested in a serious conflict RP, it should probably be something that is important enough to risk violence.

[The Flood Collective]

This thread is alive again? Wow.......so what is the main difference with this thread and all that?

[Red Talons]

In this thread we can argue and get red in the face.

[OMGeverynameistaken]

In this thread we can argue and get red in the face.

I disagree!

[Feazanthia]

In this thread we can argue and get red in the face.

I disagree!

Thy mother!