Future Tech Advice and Assistance Thread [O.O.C.]

[Northwest Slobovia]

Which comes back to my point; At the point where any side deploys weapons willingly, of any scale, against a civilian population it can then be safely assumed that they are no longer waging war for rational reasons; IE defense, removing a strategic existential threat, or similar. Instead they are waging either a war of conquest or a war of extermination. At that point I would feel free to remove said enemy from the galaxy after a limited time offer.

That said, it is also the responsibility of a rational government to minimize threats to the civilian population by removing the obvious temptations; Locating military facilities outside of civilian areas, keeping a clear delineation between civilian and military activities, and similar. While there will always be some mix, such as people working in arms factories, a rational government will have plans in place to separate those activities and thus only expose people to military activity if they 'signed up for it', as it were.

Those are very ... modern, Western, and somewhat ideosyncratic definitions of "rational". How they might be applied to FT conflict, especially involving non-human or post-human civilizations is difficult to say. I mean, the WW2 Allies bombed the living schnitzel out of Nazi Germany... and then rebuilt it in their own image. And that's recent conflict here.


Off-topic... or perhaps bringing the thread back to the topic? Perhaps the OP should set up an official FT "Advice and Assistance has become Discussion" thread that we can move these discussions to.

I prefer to keep discusions on NS for two reasons. One, NS has a nice search tool, so we can refer to them again. Second, we can refer other FT players to them. Stuff discussed on IRC isn't always logged, and personal logs aren't always available to other people. OTOH, I'm sure where we'd put many random FT discussion threads, since I don't see them quite fitting in anywhere.

[Doppio Giudici]

Cut down their ability to leave or attack your ships, then raise a field every hour on the hour.

Less people die and they face star stop if they don't surrender

[Dubious]

Which comes back to my point; At the point where any side deploys weapons willingly, of any scale, against a civilian population it can then be safely assumed that they are no longer waging war for rational reasons; IE defense, removing a strategic existential threat, or similar. Instead they are waging either a war of conquest or a war of extermination. At that point I would feel free to remove said enemy from the galaxy after a limited time offer.

That said, it is also the responsibility of a rational government to minimize threats to the civilian population by removing the obvious temptations; Locating military facilities outside of civilian areas, keeping a clear delineation between civilian and military activities, and similar. While there will always be some mix, such as people working in arms factories, a rational government will have plans in place to separate those activities and thus only expose people to military activity if they 'signed up for it', as it were.

Those are very ... modern, Western, and somewhat ideosyncratic definitions of "rational". How they might be applied to FT conflict, especially involving non-human or post-human civilizations is difficult to say. I mean, the WW2 Allies bombed the living schnitzel out of Nazi Germany... and then rebuilt it in their own image. And that's recent conflict here.


Off-topic... or perhaps bringing the thread back to the topic? Perhaps the OP should set up an official FT "Advice and Assistance has become Discussion" thread that we can move these discussions to.

I prefer to keep discusions on NS for two reasons. One, NS has a nice search tool, so we can refer to them again. Second, we can refer other FT players to them. Stuff discussed on IRC isn't always logged, and personal logs aren't always available to other people. OTOH, I'm sure where we'd put many random FT discussion threads, since I don't see them quite fitting in anywhere.

I dont think we are advising anyone here so maybe we should move it to a Hypothetical FT war thread, maybe the mentor amongst us can set it up.

[SquareDisc City]

Sure, there are many meanings to "orbital bombardment". People seem to mean "widespread slaughter of civilian populations".

Indeed. That's probably more the "bombardment" aspect, "orbital strike" might be a term to use if you want to imply a more focussed attack, preferably with the target(s) mentioned.

[Feazanthia]

Allow me to point out the roundabout ways of why trying to create a GC in NSFT is problematic at best.

What is the point of trying to ban, say, orbital deployment of WMDs? To protect civilians, of course. But, here's the problem, in FT there are civilizations which prefer to live in, say, orbital habitats.

Simple fix, no? Include a provision that outlaws orbital habitats as viable targets to signatory nations. But what if someone arms their orbital installation despite it being primarily for civilian use? Does it then become a viable military target? If no, then (as some will inevitably argue) what is to stop a nation from simply using its own population as human shields and hiding behind the Space Geneva Convention? If yes, then (as some will inevitably argue) how is that any different from stationing defensive installations and military assets within a city? Does this Space Geneva Convention ban the stationing of military equipment within population centers? Why would people sign it now, when it dictates they must make their forces easy targets for would-be invaders? How is a disarmed civilian habitat supposed to defend itself from rogue nations or non-national forces (pirates, terrorists, revolutionaries, extremists, etc) who have interplantary/interstellar military assets, some will argue?

And then there are nomadic civilizations. If one arms a civilian transport, does it become a viable military target? At what level of armament does a target transition from civilian to military?

Things to consider, and some of the possible reasons why a Space Geneva Convention has not gotten anywhere past the drafting stage.

[Sunset]

I would question the motives of anyone who declares war, in a FT setting, based on some perceived notion of practicality. FT is essentially defined by access to Faster-than-Light travel, which (barring unique circumstances like a natural wormhole) necessitates far ranging advances in power generation, information systems, and other core technologies. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for resources, you're not FT. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for space, you're not FT. I should add the caveat 'and rational' in there as well. In most cases where either of those two reasons is cited but yet an FT level of technology exists, the reasons are usually rooted in something else, such as a Stupid Despot who desires Honor and Glory for himself rather than doing what is right for the people he rules.

It is a valid storyline, and one that we've seen and will likely see until the heat death of the universe. But such a war would simply be hiding behind the facade of practicality.

To keep this on the Advice and Assistance path, if I were in the position of Stupid Despot I would add that to my posts. Interaction between the Despot and his (or her, let's not fail the Bechtel Test) beautiful yet distant mistress could reveal that he is doing it because she doesn't love him as much as she loves her distant country and he, being a Stupid Despot, thinks that killing all of her friends and family will force her to love her. Wrong, since she's going to end up with a steak knife in the ribs, but it makes for high drama. But to sell it to the people, and perhaps other civilizations, it is presented as being a war of practicality; We need their resources or their planets.

Wars cost money, they cost people, and they cost time. The advantage of being a Stupid Despot is that War is Fun, so you don't mind spending ten years pursing it for whatever reason. But for an enlightened government, it is time that can be better spent Making Things Better. So why wage it when you can just send your resource ships a little bit further. It might take a little more time, but the risk of looking like a Stupid Despot and having some Good Guy wipe you off the map is less-so than whatever possible reward a war might bring.

Not to mention that there are always other ways to wage war; The current Russia/Ukraine situation is a good example. You can wage war in the media: These people are from our country, we have a duty to protect them. This land was historically ours. Etc. You can wage war culturally: Encourage the adoption of your culture, by hook or by crook, until the locals (and their factories) might as well be yours anyway. If you want to think long-term, you could go the marriage route. Figure out the power structure, marry your children into it in the key positions that will end up with them being you.

I would personally see these lateral-thinking forms of warfare being far more likely in a FT scenario. Full-scale wars would be highly unlikely in favor of covert actions, proxy forces, and similar. And these would focus on very sharp objectives; Stealing a specific technology, sabotaging a specific line of research. Disrupting elections, eliminating heirs, and similar. If you're going to spend that hundred million to kill one person, you should make sure it's the right person.

[Dubious]

I would question the motives of anyone who declares war, in a FT setting, based on some perceived notion of practicality. FT is essentially defined by access to Faster-than-Light travel, which (barring unique circumstances like a natural wormhole) necessitates far ranging advances in power generation, information systems, and other core technologies. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for resources, you're not FT. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for space, you're not FT. I should add the caveat 'and rational' in there as well. In most cases where either of those two reasons is cited but yet an FT level of technology exists, the reasons are usually rooted in something else, such as a Stupid Despot who desires Honor and Glory for himself rather than doing what is right for the people he rules.

I am not saying the war itself is practical, I am referring to the act of glassing a city as being one of practicality rather than any perceived lack of morals. Once the action has started then that is all there is to it, that is when the issue of whether or not a military should destroy a city or not comes into play. In that moment the action of bombing a city is not one born of hatred, amorality, or stupidity, it is one born of a practical need to lessen your foes strength in the nearby local in the most efficient way possible.

[Novia Soviet Socialist Republic]

So I'm planning for a puppet of mine to advance into a sort of Quantum Age of technology at some point where they upload their minds onto a sort of super computer and leave Earth for a nomadic lifestyle, using robots both nano bots and macro scale robots for combat and working.

And I've been having a hard time trying to figure out what kind of weaponry a race this advanced would use. Can anyone help me out here?

[Sunset]

So I'm planning for a puppet of mine to advance into a sort of Quantum Age of technology at some point where they upload their minds onto a sort of super computer and leave Earth for a nomadic lifestyle, using robots both nano bots and macro scale robots for combat and working.

And I've been having a hard time trying to figure out what kind of weaponry a race this advanced would use. Can anyone help me out here?

Guns go bang, rockets go whoosh-boom. No sarcasm intended.

A little bit more detail is needed though; Are we talking about a truly nomadic civilization with nothing to tie them down? Or are they in search of the MacGuffin, that one very limited resource which allows their civilization to continue. Which would be a cool idea, by the way, as well as give you a reason to interact with those around you. That, to my mind, is the big question as to weaponry.

Do you need to interact? Or is said civilization so fantastically advanced that they spend their time as galactic tourists, going around and taking pictures of the natives? Honestly, I've seen that, and there's a lot of ex-Nations who've tried that concept. Either they end up RPing as Phenomenal-Cosmic-Power-Itty-Bitty-Living-Space, or We're-Better-Than-You-Listen-To-Us! And no one listens to them or accepts their phenomenal power. See the Train Set Analogy.

If you're going to go, and I advise against it, with the Phenomenal Cosmic Power angle, then the sky is the limit. Quantum Foam Conditioners, String Probability Collapsers, and any number of other String-Large-Words-Together weapons.

If one were to go with We're Better Than You and again, I advise against it, then weapons that are similar to what is out there would be more reasonable; Lasers of various shift, particle beams, missiles of whatever type. You're better; You don't want to show them how much or else they might just become your equals! And after all, you know what's good for them!

My advise would be to stick with what's out there, but establish a good reason for said micro-nation to interact with those around them. Finding those small samples of whatever MacGuffin you like to sustain their civilization could be a good method, as could existing connections. Making friends in other words. Or you can meddle, which is a popular activity on a Saturday night for other post-Singularity civilizations. But that takes considerable creativity and writing skill; If you're just going to show up in your GodShip and declare 'We meddle!' then quickly enough everyone is just going to write around you.

[Sunset]

I am not saying the war itself is practical, I am referring to the act of glassing a city as being one of practicality rather than any perceived lack of morals. Once the action has started then that is all there is to it, that is when the issue of whether or not a military should destroy a city or not comes into play. In that moment the action of bombing a city is not one born of hatred, amorality, or stupidity, it is one born of a practical need to lessen your foes strength in the nearby local in the most efficient way possible.

Practical? In the short term, yes. You'll achieve your goal. Medium to long term, however, see previous. In the Middle Ages when, by the time news reached the foreign capitals that had the kind of power to do anything about it (months to years) would have their own concerns, razing a city would be a reasonable action to take. In a FT environment, it's quite possible that people all over the galaxy would be watching live as you did.

A city, unless it is a planet, isn't going to have infinite resources. Rare earths needed for advanced electronics, specific materials that can only be made in space, and other possibly miniscule but very much needed resources are going to get to be harder and harder to obtain. Eventually the city will be tossing out P51's and point defense will swat them down like flies. I would also note that while urban warfare really sucks, it also really sucks for the defender. Sure, you can clear house-to-house, or you can just start using military bulldozers and flattening them. When the city population sees the attacking army leveling every structure within twenty miles, they might just demand a surrender and hang the political leaders who refuse.

Depends on the attacker of course.

[Novia Soviet Socialist Republic]

So I'm planning for a puppet of mine to advance into a sort of Quantum Age of technology at some point where they upload their minds onto a sort of super computer and leave Earth for a nomadic lifestyle, using robots both nano bots and macro scale robots for combat and working.

And I've been having a hard time trying to figure out what kind of weaponry a race this advanced would use. Can anyone help me out here?

Guns go bang, rockets go whoosh-boom. No sarcasm intended.

A little bit more detail is needed though; Are we talking about a truly nomadic civilization with nothing to tie them down? Or are they in search of the MacGuffin, that one very limited resource which allows their civilization to continue. Which would be a cool idea, by the way, as well as give you a reason to interact with those around you. That, to my mind, is the big question as to weaponry.

Do you need to interact? Or is said civilization so fantastically advanced that they spend their time as galactic tourists, going around and taking pictures of the natives? Honestly, I've seen that, and there's a lot of ex-Nations who've tried that concept. Either they end up RPing as Phenomenal-Cosmic-Power-Itty-Bitty-Living-Space, or We're-Better-Than-You-Listen-To-Us! And no one listens to them or accepts their phenomenal power. See the Train Set Analogy.

If you're going to go, and I advise against it, with the Phenomenal Cosmic Power angle, then the sky is the limit. Quantum Foam Conditioners, String Probability Collapsers, and any number of other String-Large-Words-Together weapons.

If one were to go with We're Better Than You and again, I advise against it, then weapons that are similar to what is out there would be more reasonable; Lasers of various shift, particle beams, missiles of whatever type. You're better; You don't want to show them how much or else they might just become your equals! And after all, you know what's good for them!

My advise would be to stick with what's out there, but establish a good reason for said micro-nation to interact with those around them. Finding those small samples of whatever MacGuffin you like to sustain their civilization could be a good method, as could existing connections. Making friends in other words. Or you can meddle, which is a popular activity on a Saturday night for other post-Singularity civilizations. But that takes considerable creativity and writing skill; If you're just going to show up in your GodShip and declare 'We meddle!' then quickly enough everyone is just going to write around you.

Exactly. It's meant to be a truly nomadic civilization. Humans (And other sapient creatures given it's also Fantasy as well) uploading their minds to a super computer and then leaving. They'll fly around to mine resources to keep their ship running and what not. But the reason they are going to be floating around space looking at other planets is because in my nations universe there are ancient Eldritch Temples and artifacts that they would be looking for to further improve their technology as well as a chance to study other races on other planets as a means to improve technology. In summery their purpose is to raid ancient lovecraftian tombs with a possibility of being eaten by something that's just 12 rows of sharp teeth, a mouth and an arsehole and go around collecting information about other species. Oh and starting life on other planets and coming back later to see how well its doing.

So yeah, intergalactic tourists. Lasers and particle cannons are alright and all. Would Dark Matter or Anti Matter based weaponry be on the reasonable side? Assuming Dark Matter could be weaponized.

[OMGeverynameistaken]

Antimatter is powerful, but not terribly efficient. It's difficult to achieve a decent matter-antimatter reaction ratio in a bomb, plus you have to generate and store the antimatter itself, which is fairy energy intensive itself unless you have some way of harvesting it from some magic antimatter dimension.

As an energy source or a more controlled weapon, though, it could have utility. Ensuring the matter/antimatter reacts in controlled conditions where you can wrangle things to ensure you have a suitable number of particles and anti-particles annihilating each other, you could produce a nice chunk of energy with reasonable efficiency (if you have the technology.) In combat you could dump larger amounts together for less efficient but more powerful reactions giving you a handy poor man's graser, with the added bonus of turning your ship's drive system into a weapon, thus enforcing the kzinti lesson quite nicely.

I, personally, use it as an anti capital ship weapon in the form of big scary bomb pumped laser missiles. The Russian Empire doesn't really care about efficiency as long as it gets the job done.

[Sunset]

Having access to several physicists; Weaponizing Dark Matter qualifies as stringing large words together. Not enough is known, even in theory, to make anything about Dark Matter or Dark Energy more than speculative. Again, guns go zap, rockets go boom. You will always be safe with this, especially given the civilization you're describing. Since you're going to end up interacting with a variety of civilizations with a variety of tech levels, a sound notion would be to describe the weaponry as a Variable Pistol, Variable Rifle, Variable Missile. Check your thesaurus if you want something more techno-babble.

With technology this powerful in hand, you'd be then prepared to concentrate on writing a good story instead of worrying about whether your pistol is going to contaminate the local environment with Free Radicals and Hippie Particles.

[Novia Soviet Socialist Republic]

Antimatter is powerful, but not terribly efficient. It's difficult to achieve a decent matter-antimatter reaction ratio in a bomb, plus you have to generate and store the antimatter itself, which is fairy energy intensive itself unless you have some way of harvesting it from some magic antimatter dimension.

As an energy source or a more controlled weapon, though, it could have utility. Ensuring the matter/antimatter reacts in controlled conditions where you can wrangle things to ensure you have a suitable number of particles and anti-particles annihilating each other, you could produce a nice chunk of energy with reasonable efficiency (if you have the technology.) In combat you could dump larger amounts together for less efficient but more powerful reactions giving you a handy poor man's graser, with the added bonus of turning your ship's drive system into a weapon, thus enforcing the kzinti lesson quite nicely.

I, personally, use it as an anti capital ship weapon in the form of big scary bomb pumped laser missiles. The Russian Empire doesn't really care about efficiency as long as it gets the job done.

I was thinking of condensing anti matter weapons down to a small arms level and fire bolts of anti matter that create a small explosion on impact. But now that I think about it, if some smart ass shoots the gun then the robot, and probably everything within about mile of it, would be no more. But for an anti-captial ship weapon I've always felt that a MAC is a solid choice.

Having access to several physicists; Weaponizing Dark Matter qualifies as stringing large words together. Not enough is known, even in theory, to make anything about Dark Matter or Dark Energy more than speculative. Again, guns go zap, rockets go boom. You will always be safe with this, especially given the civilization you're describing. Since you're going to end up interacting with a variety of civilizations with a variety of tech levels, a sound notion would be to describe the weaponry as a Variable Pistol, Variable Rifle, Variable Missile. Check your thesaurus if you want something more techno-babble.

With technology this powerful in hand, you'd be then prepared to concentrate on writing a good story instead of worrying about whether your pistol is going to contaminate the local environment with Free Radicals and Hippie Particles.

Alright I get ya. I'll avoid dark matter and I'll use something like a rifle that fires Gluon or Tau particles or maybe even a weapon that fires extremely concentrated bolts of radiation. Anything that can make big, freakish, insanity inducing, interdimensional monsters stop being alive. And probably any other bad guys. There is a lot of story potential behind such a civilization especially with these temples that can range from tiny shrines in asteroids to artificial planets. Thanks for the help.

[OMGeverynameistaken]

I was thinking of condensing anti matter weapons down to a small arms level and fire bolts of anti matter that create a small explosion on impact. But now that I think about it, if some smart ass shoots the gun then the robot, and probably everything within about mile of it, would be no more. But for an anti-captial ship weapon I've always felt that a MAC is a solid choice.

The trouble with using antimatter as an impact charge is that you have no control over how it interacts with whatever it strikes. It's better to use a warhead that's a mixture of antimatter and some sort of standard matter, with the added bonus that, assuming you use some sort of shaped charge/bomb pumped laser, your missile has to do a lot less 'legwork' to get itself into a position where it can make best use of its payload. It's true that some of your 'boom' is wasted as a result of the device's destruction, but you still have the same issue with an impact based weapon, since half of the energy is still going to fly off into space.

[SquareDisc City]

Thematically, antimatter would be reasonably fitting.

Dark matter is ill-suited as a weapon because the stuff doesn't interact with normal matter. it's like neutrinos, just goes straight through with both bullet and target being untouched. Although if you postulate some way to make unstable dark matter that could work, you'd have a bullet that could fly through even the thickest of armour then explode in its target. (With, mind you, a whole bunch of potential drawbacks).

The other thing that would suit an ultra-advanced themed nation would be some sort of disintegrator ray gun. Nothing obviously flies through the air, there's no explosion, the target just crumbles to dust or even vanishes outright. The main difficulty with this sort of weapon is figuring out what defends against them, since an unstoppable weapon won't go over well in an RP.

Or you could get really ersatz.

PS: Tau particles are actually something I have "on the books" for the UPT. They're not commonly used, but the idea is just in case we encounter an enemy that's immune to regular atomic nuclei for some reason.

[Warhaven]

Now that all the arguing was done while I was asleep...

I was referring to banning orbital bombardment in the sense of protecting the lives of innocent civilians. Why waste resources? True this doesn't stop Military Assets from hiding in civil centers, but that is the context in which I was referring to banning orbital bombardment, thinking of bombs that destroy wide areas of landmass. I hate seeing innocent people suffer.

Also, in the case of FT WMD's, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned Planet Destroying weapons or better.

[The Fedral Union]

Now that all the arguing was done while I was asleep...

I was referring to banning orbital bombardment in the sense of protecting the lives of innocent civilians. Why waste resources? True this doesn't stop Military Assets from hiding in civil centers, but that is the context in which I was referring to banning orbital bombardment, thinking of bombs that destroy wide areas of landmass. I hate seeing innocent people suffer.

Also, in the case of FT WMD's, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned Planet Destroying weapons or better.

Why anyone would need to destroy a planet is beyond me. If any thing just nuke the damn surface, but as sunset said. People would likely be watching. And there will be international consequences.

And seriously, why you would need anything BEYOND planet killing is also beyond me ..

Just because you can doesn't mean you should.. *Hasn't had to use his stockpiles once ever*

[Lubyak]

Now that all the arguing was done while I was asleep...

I was referring to banning orbital bombardment in the sense of protecting the lives of innocent civilians. Why waste resources? True this doesn't stop Military Assets from hiding in civil centers, but that is the context in which I was referring to banning orbital bombardment, thinking of bombs that destroy wide areas of landmass. I hate seeing innocent people suffer.

Also, in the case of FT WMD's, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned Planet Destroying weapons or better.

If it's a large war, targeting civilian economic and political targets can be quite useful. In all honesty, in FT, like in MT, the death of civilians would be nothing but exceptionally excessive collateral damage. It's the classic thing that lots of people think 'nukes' and other WMDs, and interpret them at being aimed at destroying a 'city', an undeniably civillian target. Likely they have images from the large scale bombing raids of World War II in mind, where giant bomber formations carpeted huge chunks of cities in bombs and deliberately tried to reduce them to rubble.

Yet the thing is: you're right. Blindly killing civilians is a waste of resources. However, destroying key economic, military, and political targets is most definitively not a waste of resources, and likely the temporary objective of whatever chunk of your forces is operating. Unfortunately, many of these targets are going to be located near and around civillian population centres, because that's just how things work. People want to live near where they work, and so towns and cities pop up around major mines, factories, infrastructure hubs, etc. And then since the military is supposed to defend those civilian and economic targets, military bases end up near those population centres as well and the same is true of population centres.

So, when Captain Krieg von Deathkill isn't given orders to 'kill civillians' or 'raze the city'. No, he's given orders to 'destroy military facilities in area [X],' or 'destroy factories in area [Y]'. He does so, and succeeds! The factory/base/bunker is now a crater in the ground! And so are the civilians who lived around it!

tl;dr: Civilian deaths are likely not going to be 'just because'. If the goal is genocide things change drastically, but I won't get into that. Civillian deaths are because the important targets that a military will want to destroy tend to be located in and around lots of civilians.

[SquareDisc City]

For anyone thinking of outright destroying planets, I suggest having a look here first: http://qntm.org/destroy

In short: it's hard. And as discussed here, it's hard to see reasons to destroy a planet in bulk rather than just trashing its surface, a task that is child's play in comparison.

[Imperial Nalydya]

...Yet the thing is: you're right. Blindly killing civilians is a waste of resources...

This actually isn't entirely true. The resource expenditure mostly depends on the nature of the technology being used. If you're of the type to say, use large kinetics, it could potentially be cheaper to send a single round planetside and flatten most of the planet than bothering with precision strikes. That's just an example mind you, but I'm sure you get the idea. And additionally, in FT, the targeting of civilians can be extremely useful, because as it turns out, manpower (depending on nation, again, of course), can also be one of the very few resources that's actually limited and can be eliminated.

[Lubyak]

...Yet the thing is: you're right. Blindly killing civilians is a waste of resources...

This actually isn't entirely true. The resource expenditure mostly depends on the nature of the technology being used. If you're of the type to say, use large kinetics, it could potentially be cheaper to send a single round planetside and flatten most of the planet than bothering with precision strikes. That's just an example mind you, but I'm sure you get the idea. And additionally, in FT, the targeting of civilians can be extremely useful, because as it turns out, manpower (depending on nation, again, of course), can also be one of the very few resources that's actually limited and can be eliminated.

I see your point, yes. However, even the 'large kinetics wiping out half the planet' thing is part of what I'm saying. You're going to destroy actual targets, and the civilians just so happen to be in the way.

Yeah, manpower could also be a good sight rarer and more important than mines and what not, but I've always felt that industrial facilities, political leadership, and military bases are rarer and more important still. I guess you could say you're eliminating the civilians to deny the enemy resources, but that's trending a bit towards genocide for me.

[Zeinbrad]

It can work well many ways, sometimes it depends on how the nation fights its wars, which matters just as much as other factors.

I don't really know how to describe it, but the Ragon military loves mobility and being able to usurp the enemy at every turn if possible.

Of course, they still uses swords and melee weapons, but that's mainly the big bad nobles trying to defend their honor and the High Forces.

[Northwest Slobovia]

This actually isn't entirely true. The resource expenditure mostly depends on the nature of the technology being used. If you're of the type to say, use large kinetics, it could potentially be cheaper to send a single round planetside and flatten most of the planet than bothering with precision strikes. That's just an example mind you, but I'm sure you get the idea. And additionally, in FT, the targeting of civilians can be extremely useful, because as it turns out, manpower (depending on nation, again, of course), can also be one of the very few resources that's actually limited and can be eliminated.

I see your point, yes. However, even the 'large kinetics wiping out half the planet' thing is part of what I'm saying. You're going to destroy actual targets, and the civilians just so happen to be in the way.

Yeah, manpower could also be a good sight rarer and more important than mines and what not, but I've always felt that industrial facilities, political leadership, and military bases are rarer and more important still. I guess you could say you're eliminating the civilians to deny the enemy resources, but that's trending a bit towards genocide for me.

"Genocide" is such an ugly term. We prefer "durable peace thoughout the galaxy".

[Northwest Slobovia]

I would question the motives of anyone who declares war, in a FT setting, based on some perceived notion of practicality. FT is essentially defined by access to Faster-than-Light travel, which (barring unique circumstances like a natural wormhole) necessitates far ranging advances in power generation, information systems, and other core technologies. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for resources, you're not FT. If it is practical to wage war on your neighbor for space, you're not FT. I should add the caveat 'and rational' in there as well.

Any time anybody confidently holds forth on the future, I always get this mental image of a caveman saying the same thing around a fire.

But until we get a discussion thread, I'll let it go at that.