Advice Thread OOC Future Tech Only

by **Ularn** » Wed Nov 16, 2011 11:37 am

OMGeverynameistaken wrote:
Ularn wrote:Sounds about right.

I remember chatting with some guys from the Royal Navy - somehow the conversation got onto the Nimitz class. Apparently those things are so big that they have their own murder rate distinct from combat casualties. Guys have been declared AWOL even though the MPs know they're still on the ship...somewhere. There are areas below deck which the MPs just don't enter because they've turned into a ghetto and they're likely to get shived by a junkie sailor.

It's possible they were exaggerating a little (I got the impression they had a bit of a low opinion of trigger-happy American sailors) but still, this is a ship that's only 300m long. Imagine the extent to which this sort of thing would become a problem on the size of FT warships we're talking about.

Technology constraints aren't the only ones you have to make. Consider the social side of city-sized spaceships as well.

I recall reading one WH40k book where, due to the large size of a ship and its massive crew, the job of loading the main guns had become hereditary within a 'village' set up in the loading chamber. The people there had never seen any of the other crew for generations except for the occasional tech-priest and, as a result, basically worshiped the guns as gods.

That should happen more often in NSFT

This

by **Ularn** » Fri Nov 18, 2011 8:03 am

Okay guys, I need help.

My ground forces are broken up into legions of ~8000 troops each. Below is a copy of the Chain of Command taken from my factbook:

Unit	Size	Leader
Fireteam	4 Marines	Sub-Leader
Squad	3 Fireteams (12 Marines)	Squad Leader
Platoon	3 Squads (40 Marines)	Sub-Lieutenant
Company	4 Platoons (150 Marines)	Lieutenant
Battalion	4 Companies (600 Marines)	Lieutenant-Commander
Division	3 Battalions (2000 Marines)	Commander
Legion	4 Divisions (8000 Marines)	General

You'll note that the numbers don't actually add up. The discrepancy of about 1,000 marines is mainly to account for the support personnel.

First of all, does this look reasonable to everyone; the number of units per larger unit, and the 1:7 ratio of support personnel to combatants?

Secondly, I'm now working on the table of organisation and I'm wondering what everyone thinks is a reasonably number of tanks to have in an army of 8,000 men, and where best they should fit into the table of organisation. Would it be best to have one company in each battalion be made up of armour, or one battalion in each division?

Help me advice thread; you're my only hope!

by **OMGeverynameistaken** » Fri Nov 18, 2011 12:07 pm

I use this setup:
Army Group ->
2+ Army per army group -> 200,000 men
2+ Corps per army -> 100,000 men (Korpu)
2 Division per corps -> 50,000 men (Diviziya)
5 Brigade per division -> 10,000 men (Brigada)
4 Regiment per brigade -> 2,500 men (Polk)
5 Battalions per regiment -> 500 men (Batallion)
8 Platoon per battalion -> 60 men (Vzvod)
6 squads per platoon -> 10 men (Artel)

With officers organized as such:

An 'army group' is a wartime unit consisting of whatever the field marshal says it does. Although really, the whole thing is very flexible above the regimental level. The Russian army is a strong believer in the manifold uses of ad hoc divisions, corps, etc. But God help you if you try to mess with a long-established regiment. Basically, the regiment is the operational unit of the Russian army, being grouped into larger units as a matter of secretarial convenience.

Each regiment consists of three first-line battalions, a reserve battalion and a logistics battalion. The first-line battalions are standing troops in fighting condition, while the reserve battalions are maintained at 1/3-1/4 strength in peacetime and used to fill out attrition casualties, desertions and suchlike when the unit isn't actually fighting. The logistics battalion handles all of the moving of heavy objects, stacking things, trench digging, etc. Of course, both the reserve and logistics battalion are called upon to fight if the situation requires it, but they often aren't as well equipped or trained as the combat battalions.

In the combat battalions, the first and second platoon constitute an 'elite company'. The first platoon is a grenadier unit, consisting of the tallest and strongest men in the regiment, while the second is a sharpshooter unit consisting of its best shots. These two platoons typically get first priority in terms of equipment, as well as exemption from corporal punishment and manual labor.

In the logistics battalions, the 7th and 8th platoon form the regimental transport company, which deals with the regimental motor pool, as well as the maintenance of any powered armor the unit may have.

So in conclusion, yours looks fine to me. Of course, mine is basically designed to be somewhat archaic and impractical.

by **Zebian Syndicate** » Tue Nov 22, 2011 7:19 pm

Ularn wrote:-SNIPED-

(Nice. I see whut yed did thar. Channeling what's-her-face from SW)

Well, I like your numbers. It's a good structure, however, I do have a slight problem with the very bottom. Your squads.

It's more of a little pet peeve, and I might just be a toot'n mah own horn a bit here. But it seems a little excessive. In a tactical sense at least.
To me, having just 10 members per squad is pushing it. Mainly because as I have observed in real life, groups of more than 8 people tend to be unruly and can be difficult to command in many high pressure situations. Really even more so -ESPECIALLY, actually- when it's a matter of doing a task right and doing it with extreme precision.
Normally, I'd try to go with about 5 people per squad. However, that's usually for dedicated battalions.
Now that changes if you are talking about having your Fire Teams acting on an individual basis. E.I. Team A goes here, while Team B goes some completely other place and Team C just chills until shite gets real.

Personally I believe this should come into play if you have troop specialization. Something which I try to avoid. After all, if that dedicated person dies and you just have to have them, what you gonna do about it? (Then again, I don't just wage outright war in the first place.) I can't really say much in the direction of what you should do since I don't know the roles of your soldiers.
Heck, I don't even use fire teams,...

But looking at it from a strategic point of view, you have the advantage. Each team is a squad in it's own right, allowing them to achieve much more simultaneously. And you also have the advantage of numbers, and replacing fallen troops isn't as hard on the soldiers themselves.

So all I can say is, your numbers look good, (though I recommend 1:10 ratio of support to combatants.)

Now, as for your Armor, that depends entirely upon your needs. As far as choosing either company or battalion, I say that you have two factors to consider.
A single company would allow a much more flexible command structure. Not only that, but each company would be able to have it's own "theme." For example, say you would devote one company to anti-infantry. You could bulk order a crap load of weapons and install them and have a roving death squad.

If you choose an entire battalion, the only difference would be the fact that it would be MUCH simpler than having them in companies. Much, much simpler. Everything else like the specialties would still technically apply, but would not exactly stand out as much. I also imagine the numbers would drop significantly, and that you would do away with the Firing Squad link of the chain of command.

That's just my two cents.

by **Thrashia** » Tue Nov 22, 2011 9:33 pm

IRL US Army advice: Keep the squad level at 10, or at least never go below 8. You have non-commissioned officers to handle the fire-teams with the LT in overall command of the squads. It's really not that hard to handle them. Helps loads if your noncoms know what their doing, which 99.99% of the time they do, and can therefore improve upon the command performance of a squad in coherency with its parent platoon.

by **OMGeverynameistaken** » Tue Nov 22, 2011 11:06 pm

IMO the ideal squad is 8 troopers, a corporal and a sergeant. The corp is there to back up the sarge and, theoretically, so the sergeant can train him to take his place. The corporal can also act as a fire-team sergeant if the need arises to split your squad up. Of course, you might wind up with the occasional two sergeant squad and/or multiple corporals in wartime, and occasionally you may throw a cadet/ensign into the mix so they get some knowledge of how things work at the squad level, but that sort of variation is generally unavoidable.

by **Arteria Zoness** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 7:23 am

Yeah, that's nice and all. Now it's my turn, yay!

Okay so, I'm going to make this short and sweet:
But first a little back ground info!
One of my Home World's primary defensive systems is a massive network of satellites, space meshes, and planetary rings. Naturally, it is just as ridiculous as it sounds.
You ever try driving an 18 wheeler through an obstacle course? Of course not. Because that's stupid. However, that is the problem with having such a defensive strategy. Orbit is crowded enough with junk and ships, but having thousands of satellites does not help.

As such, I have decided to combine two concepts. The Planet Shield, and the Battle Station to come up with a much more compact version of all of that crap. The long and short of it is, their child is an abomination that even I myself am skeptical of.
My solution was to build a shield for the planet. A physical one.

Basically, in a nut shell this thing is a massive battle station big enough to eclipse part of whichever hemisphere it is over. The dimensions are something like 500 kilometers in diameter, and being up to 6.75 km thick. Much of this is hollow space, which is used to house ships and resources within the installation. The rest is divide among engineering, utilities, and habitat.
Of course, the structure will not be one entirely solid block, but instead a number of inter connected blocks, each of which are actually layers of armored plates. While primarily this is to increase surface area to help regulate internal temperatures, it's also an excuse to mount as many weapons as possible aboard without having something as ridiculous as weapons being buried inside the installation that pop out when sections are destroyed. Which is absolutely stupid.
Back on topic, I do believe that with some huge refining this might actually be a worthwhile concept to continue to pursue. However, I have a headache and I'm lazy, so I'll just have NS do it for me.

by **Sertian** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 8:16 am

Alright, lets see... You're going to need some huge ass engines on that thing if its supposed to act like a shield. After all, for all the weapons fire the 'shield' takes, the momentum from that round is going to nudge it closer and closer to your planet. And unless you want to colony drop your shield on your planet, you're going to want to take care of that.

Secondly, lets see how well it'll protect... I assume it'll be in high orbit, so it can defend stuff underneath it, which assuming anything like Earth's orbital patterns is around 35,000km. At that sort of height, a 500km diameter shield isn't going to protect many angles of approach to your city. I could try to do the trig equation to figure out how many degrees of approach it'll protect from... But just scribbling down a triangle with 35,000km and 250km on the other side doesn't indicate a good sign.

So, it fails as a shield. Your best bet, if you don't have shield technology (or the capacity to create a huge shield) is to just create an orbital layer of attack satellites to hopefully blast anything trying to threaten your planet to pieces before it gets the chance. And, given you need to defend against ships which can jump 'close' and attempt to slam into it at several thousand kilometers per second, its going to have to involve 'No Kill Like Overkill'.

by **Ularn** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 8:24 am

In addition to Sertian's comments I can see several big problems.

First up, The excuse is a bit silly. Your orbit is overcrowded so you're going to put another thing in it; the thing in question being a hunk of metal the size of a small continent. I assume you don't need as many satellites as are currently in orbit, so instead shoot them all down (or at least the old ones) and send up a smaller, more manageable number of newer ones instead.

Secondly, where are you getting the raw materials? This thing sounds like it would need all the metal in a planet to build, and all the uranium in two to power. Never mind what Sertian said about keeping it in the sky; how much power will you need to just push it around in orbit? Also, on a purely cost-effective basis, for the same price I imagine you could at least double the size of your current navy (no matter how big it is), giving you at least the same level of protection while also giving you the option of moving that protection to other planets if necessary.

Thirdly, what happens when someone shoots it out of the sky and it lands on the planet? The meteor that's meant to have wiped out the dinosaurs was, IIRC, only about 10 km wide. This thing is fifty times that size; we're talking planet-cracking if it falls. Who would willingly build something like that above their heads?

by **Mu Cephei** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 9:39 am

This is partially asking for advice and partially asking for interest. Since I joined I have been trying to get a cosmic horror feel (think H.P. Lovecraft) in my RPs. The trouble is trying to balance Cthulhu for fair RP is, you guessed it, really, really hard to do. Like really hard. So I gave up and left NS for about 2 years. < lol epic raeg quit

Now I've returned with a new idea of RP'ing as the Mi-Go after having played Cthulhutech for some time. My idea is that the Mi-Go, or Migou (I haven't decided on the spelling yet) came to the Milky Way galaxy with a lolwathuge fleet in order to conquer the crap out of the locals. Everything was going great until they bumped into a dead god. Dead god isn't so dead and proceeds to nom-nom-nom on the invasion fleet. Every~~one~~thing is killed expect for one mining colony based on a dwarf planet, they survived because the dead god decide to leave the Milky Way and eat the Mi-go's home galaxies.

Long story short, my race is going to go from a huge multi-galaxy strong ubersuperpower to a single mining colony that can barely support a skeleton military force. The ultimate Back from the Brink story becomes the focus of my RPs as they both try to rebuild themselves and try to prevent the awakening of more dead gods that shouldn't be awake.

Does this sound good? Would you recommend any changes?

by **Ularn** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 9:43 am

Mu Cephei wrote:This is partially asking for advice and partially asking for interest. Since I joined I have been trying to get a cosmic horror feel (think H.P. Lovecraft) in my RPs. The trouble is trying to balance Cthulhu for fair RP is, you guessed it, really, really hard to do. Like really hard. So I gave up and left NS for about 2 years. < lol epic raeg quit

Now I've returned with a new idea of RP'ing as the Mi-Go after having played Cthulhutech for some time. My idea is that the Mi-Go, or Migou (I haven't decided on the spelling yet) came to the Milky Way galaxy with a lolwathuge fleet in order to conquer the crap out of the locals. Everything was going great until they bumped into a dead god. Dead god isn't so dead and proceeds to nom-nom-nom on the invasion fleet. Every~~one~~thing is killed expect for one mining colony based on a dwarf planet, they survived because the dead god decide to leave the Milky Way and eat the Mi-go's home galaxies.

Long story short, my race is going to go from a huge multi-galaxy strong ubersuperpower to a single mining colony that can barely support a skeleton military force. The ultimate Back from the Brink story becomes the focus of my RPs as they both try to rebuild themselves and try to prevent the awakening of more dead gods that shouldn't be awake.

Does this sound good? Would you recommend any changes?

Sounds awesome - scope for making it very grimdark.

But you lose points for the link. TV Tropes is also a dead god which is now going to nom-nom-nom on the rest of my afternoon!

by **Arteria Zoness** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 9:52 am

TV tropes is internet crack,... CURSE YOU!!!

It's an interesting idea, and I find myself fascinated. So I'll keep a look out and if I find anything useful or come up with something, I'll be sure to get back to you.

by **Vernii** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 12:53 pm

Ularn wrote:In addition to Sertian's comments I can see several big problems.

First up, The excuse is a bit silly. Your orbit is overcrowded so you're going to put another thing in it; the thing in question being a hunk of metal the size of a small continent. I assume you don't need as many satellites as are currently in orbit, so instead shoot them all down (or at least the old ones) and send up a smaller, more manageable number of newer ones instead.

Secondly, where are you getting the raw materials? This thing sounds like it would need all the metal in a planet to build, and all the uranium in two to power. Never mind what Sertian said about keeping it in the sky; how much power will you need to just push it around in orbit? Also, on a purely cost-effective basis, for the same price I imagine you could at least double the size of your current navy (no matter how big it is), giving you at least the same level of protection while also giving you the option of moving that protection to other planets if necessary.

Thirdly, what happens when someone shoots it out of the sky and it lands on the planet? The meteor that's meant to have wiped out the dinosaurs was, IIRC, only about 10 km wide. This thing is fifty times that size; we're talking planet-cracking if it falls. Who would willingly build something like that above their heads?

While the other points are very valid, the raw materials one isn't. The thing could probably be built with the resources of a dozen large metallic asteroids or so.

I think a better solution would be to build a better defense in depth, not just protecting the planet itself. I'll use Gregor, my capital system, as an example: Each of the outer system gas giants has fields of munitions pods dispersed among their ring and moon, then various fortresses and more munition pods in Verniian cislunar space (along with Capital Fleet), and finally massive solar arrays and EW platforms in the inner-system (powered by sheer solar output).

The main strategic issue is that fixed defenses are a stalling tactic, not something that can be trusted to defeat a dedicated enemy attack. For instance, if I were an attacker in this scenario against your plate-fortress, I'd secure the outer system, bring in engineering vessels, and construct a solar array to burn it out of the sky (or at least mission-kill it).

by **Arthropoda Ingens** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 3:46 pm

Vernii wrote:I think a better solution would be to build a better defense in depth, not just protecting the planet itself. I'll use Gregor, my capital system, as an example: Each of the outer system gas giants has fields of munitions pods dispersed among their ring and moon, then various fortresses and more munition pods in Verniian cislunar space (along with Capital Fleet), and finally massive solar arrays and EW platforms in the inner-system (powered by sheer solar output).

These munitions have FTL capability, I hope...? Non-FTL munitions around a gas giant half a billion to five billion kilometres from the combat volume aren't all that scary. Even if not attacking from a 90° angle relative to the system's orbital plane, going for a 2D attack instead, they're fairly easily avoided.

by **Mu Cephei** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 4:35 pm

Let's be honest here folks, outside of any OOC agreements any planet whose location is known to others lives at the sufferance of those others. No battlestation will stop persistent waves of hostile fleets. No satellites will stop a determined assault force. No shield will stop a relativistic bomb.

The only true defense is information. Know more about your enemy's position while keeping yours a secret. Remember, knowledge is power and IIRC from the somewhat olde days when I was most active, power kills in NS FT.

Though the ignore cannon makes a pretty good defense if used correctly, but that's true in any situation.

by **OMGeverynameistaken** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 5:01 pm

I don't know about YOUR planetary defenses, but mine are quite capable of handling the items you listed.

by **Ularn** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 5:43 pm

OMGeverynameistaken wrote:I don't know about YOUR planetary defenses, but mine are quite capable of handling the items you listed.

Ditto - and all I have defending my planets is a fleet of warships and the odd space station with a couple of guns on them. Even a relativistic weapon can be seen coming from far away enough and easily eliminated by shooting something back at it before it gets to you. As for the rest, it's just a case of outfighting the enemy.

by **Mu Cephei** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 6:17 pm

OMGeverynameistaken wrote:I don't know about YOUR planetary defenses, but mine are quite capable of handling the items you listed.

Can you go into detail about what your defenses are exactly? I have trouble believing you can stop an R-bomb. We're talking about something that can make the largest space bodies disappear if fired at sufficient velocity (and has sufficient mass(well, rest mass would be more accurate). This says it best.

Ularn wrote:Ditto - and all I have defending my planets is a fleet of warships and the odd space station with a couple of guns on them. Even a relativistic weapon can be seen coming from far away enough and easily eliminated by shooting something back at it before it gets to you. As for the rest, it's just a case of outfighting the enemy.

Do you know what an R-bomb is? It's an object that is traveling so fast that where it is currently and where you see it are two different locations.₁ The only downside to R-bombs is power requirements and ignore cannons. Once an R-bomb is fired you either get fucked up or get the hell out of its way₂.

1 - Unless the shooter is pants on-head retarded.
2 - Or you can move it out of your way, but that requires serious foreknowledge of the incoming attack before it is launched and an advance tech level.

As to just simply defeating an invasion force. Unless you can completely destroy your enemies they can continue to attack until you lose the planet. Why? Because moving a populated planet is impossible for most tech levels and they can just keep sending wave after wave of forces until either of you die or give up. And don't forget Murphy's law. Eventually your defenses will falter if not by force then by bad luck on your part.

The only absolute defense is information warfare. Fool your enemy's into thinking that your home planet is somewhere where it isn't. So when they waste their time blowing up a random gas giant you can busy yourself with blowing up the crap out of them with empty beer bottles thrown at more than 86% the speed of light.

by **The Fedral Union** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 6:32 pm

right... becuse obviously no one ever is smart enough to build a laser powerful enough to vape the damn rkv..

also your assuming people do not or will not have equivlant tech and power to stop your godly weapon. If i'm not mistaken unless you put a force feild or magnetic feild on that thing just throwing sand in front of it will make it explode..

by **Ularn** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 6:45 pm

Mu Cephei wrote:
OMGeverynameistaken wrote:I don't know about YOUR planetary defenses, but mine are quite capable of handling the items you listed.

Can you go into detail about what your defenses are exactly? I have trouble believing you can stop an R-bomb. We're talking about something that can make the largest space bodies disappear if fired at sufficient velocity (and has sufficient mass(well, rest mass would be more accurate). This says it best.

Ularn wrote:Ditto - and all I have defending my planets is a fleet of warships and the odd space station with a couple of guns on them. Even a relativistic weapon can be seen coming from far away enough and easily eliminated by shooting something back at it before it gets to you. As for the rest, it's just a case of outfighting the enemy.

Do you know what an R-bomb is? It's an object that is traveling so fast that where it is currently and where you see it are two different locations.₁ The only downside to R-bombs is power requirements and ignore cannons. Once an R-bomb is fired you either get fucked up or get the hell out of its way₂.

1 - Unless the shooter is pants on-head retarded.
2 - Or you can move it out of your way, but that requires serious foreknowledge of the incoming attack before it is launched and an advance tech level.

As to just simply defeating an invasion force. Unless you can completely destroy your enemies they can continue to attack until you lose the planet. Why? Because moving a populated planet is impossible for most tech levels and they can just keep sending wave after wave of forces until either of you die or give up. And don't forget Murphy's law. Eventually your defenses will falter if not by force then by bad luck on your part.

The only absolute defense is information warfare. Fool your enemy's into thinking that your home planet is somewhere where it isn't. So when they waste their time blowing up a random gas giant you can busy yourself with blowing up the crap out of them with empty beer bottles thrown at more than 86% the speed of light.

lrn2science

First up, a relativistic weapon is not what you think it is. All it is, is a projectile travelling at a very, very high speed. The reason they are "never where you see them when you see them" is because by the time the light from the projectile reaches your telescope it has already moved another hundred kilometres. However, by looking at where it is, as you see it, and taking its speed, you can calculate it'as actual position and trajectory and fire a load of ball-bearings in that direction. At relativistic speeds, an impact with even something that small will destroy the projectile. Relativistic weapons are not impossible to shoot down. In fact, that very article only describes the task as "hard".

Also, the article you link to is talking primarily about alien civilisations and using relativistic weapons as an example of why they could be dangerous. It is not one to be taken as authoritative on relativistic weapons. This page is better. Relativistic weapons are just regular kinetic kill weapons - only faster.

Secondly, you describe a scenario in which my enemy is sending wave after wave of ships to destroy us. Tell me, if my enemy can build wave after wave of attacking vessels then what is to stop me from building just as many to defend? If anything, I actually have the advantage here, as my ships don't have to travel half the galaxy once built in order to do their job; they're already right on my doorstep, ready to defend. All other things being equal, there is no reason my fleet and resources should not be able to hold off an enemy attack.

As for Murphy's law; it works both ways - the attacker's as likely to mess up as I am.

by **Mu Cephei** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 7:35 pm

Posted response in argument thread.

by **OMGeverynameistaken** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 7:57 pm

The full Russian planetary defense suite consists of two main 'emplacement' layers and several patrol spheres of various craft.

The outermost sphere consists of small stations, basically little more than a sensor package strapped to a modest gun of some sort, designed to deal with raiders, asteroids we dont like, and that sort of thing. They also act as an early warning system for larger attacks and can, in the event of a major attack, be withdrawn into the primary sphere. These are the devices that would deal with a surprise RKV bomb, either with a directed energy weapon of some sort or simply by shooting it, or intercepting it bodily if they have to.

The primary defensive sphere consists of large battlestations, typically four stationed equidistant around the planet in such a way that any two stations can support a given third station. However, really important planets can have as many as two dozen. Typically these are armed with a single large railgun, up to 20km in length, along with a fairly significant 'secondary' armament of standard 12-18" naval guns. Lots of assorted missiles, flak cannons, etc.

There may also be another fortification in the form of any natural satellites the planet might have. For example, the moons of Mars were converted into military battlestations equipped with ultra-heavy guns. We used them to shoot at the Rethast once.

The mobile spheres consist of patrol craft in various formations, but those tend to vary based on planet, how many ships are in the system at the time and all that. However, typically there will be a primary fleet group stationed at the most populous/important body in the system, with smaller craft scattered about with the intent to act as customs and policing agents. During wartime, such small craft are typically condensed into larger groups.

Finally there are, of course, the ground-based defenses. Ground based fortifications with anti-orbital cannons and similar, strategic shields, and what have you.

To respond to your specific concerns:

Repeated, large assaults by enemy fleets:
Russian defenses are conducted in such a way as to delay an enemy attack to the point where the Russian relief fleet can arrive. We are just as capable of reinforcing our system as the enemy is of launching an assault on it.

Assault forces:
Assuming you mean landing forces, anybody who attempts to land without establishing orbital supremacy is on a fools errand. Especially against Russians. God help the poor orbital drop troopers who emerge from their landing pod to find themselves face-to-face with a group of annoyed Russian peasants who's turnips just got carbonized by their descent.

Assuming you mean a group of ships bent on wreaking havoc on the planetside facilities, this would assume a lack of planetary or local shields. As it is, any ship attempting to get below Russia's defensive spheres will just be subjecting itself to sustained attack from both above and below.

RKVs:
Even assuming it isn't simply shot down, our ships mount CFRAC weapons as their primary armament and have defenses quite capable of dealing with multiple impacts from said weapons. Why wouldn't a sufficiently important planet? You don't even have to shield the entire planet, rather than build a shield designed to cover the whole planet at once, just built a shield that projects a very strong block over a few degrees of sky.

by **Arteria Zoness** » Sat Nov 26, 2011 5:50 am

Now, while I appreciate the criticism, I did notice a few missed points and maybe a stupid argument or two. Which I feel the need to address.

by **Mu Cephei** » Sat Nov 26, 2011 6:34 am

Arteria Zoness wrote:-Snip-

Perhaps I'm wording myself incorrectly because at this rate I'm going to get called a troll. lol Also, I'm assuming a baseline, somewhat realistic tech level. To incorporate every NS FT nation's tech level would require aeons to pass and I don't want to get eaten by Cthulhu by I finish my first RP damnnit!

Planets and other large static targets have emissions and those can be detected. Even the smallest amount of radio traffic or heat radiation can potentially be detected at extreme ranges. Scale those up to something a planet would have and suddenly you have the biggest neon "shoot me" sign on this side of the quadrant. The only reason no one actually listens to the sign is because your enemies have yet to realize that it's your neon "shoot me" sign amongst the other billions of similar signs. Your job in defending yourself is to make sure they never realize their error.

The center of my argument is that the attacker has more freedoms in battle than the defender (assuming all things equal). That is just the nature of battle, the one who responds is the one who is losing. That is why information warfare should be the first defense* against attack especially when defending a static target. Even if you have two ships for each one the attacker has he can still do damage because the attack will only come when he knows he can do damage and he can wait because he has time. As the defender you do not. Your stuck defending against every threat both true and false while he is chilling, biding his time to your destruction.

*NOT the only defense, but definitely the first.

As to the invasion thing, I don't literally mean the enemy has an infinite attack force. Only that the attacker has the advantage of being able to constantly pursue you while you're stuck defending. The only true defense against attack is to stop one from happening in the first place by giving them no targets, giving yourself a target and then putting them on the defense.

All said and done I don't really care for this argument. I'm a relaxed RP'er and I don't really care for the details. Good story is good story regardless if the big bad's doomsday device is a R-bomb, an antimatter bomb or a chicken with ADD. It's all the same in the end.

by **Ularn** » Sat Nov 26, 2011 6:43 am

Mu, I'm sorry, but you have a drastically over-simplified concept of strategy which fails at the most basic level. The failing are actually so basic that I'm having trouble articulating how to explain them to you:

For millennia, civilisations have waged war against each other while knowing exactly where their enemy's home was. The fact that I know where my enemy is does not mean that I automatically have some near-insurmountable advantage in being able to destroy him, as you seem to suggest. As an illustration, I can direct you to every single war in history where the defending force was victorious. There is no reason why a space war should be any different.

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