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Microwaves can't touch engines, they only fry electronics. Mesons can theoretically hit engines pretty early if they roll lucky, but there's no way to intentionally target a ship's engines beyond just shooting it a lot and hoping you hit them. Boarding as a combat method instead of a post-battle cleanup of crippled ships basically requires dedicated boarding shuttles, and the need to go super crazy fast means they're usually flimsy enough to get swatted by light/PD weaponry. With an engine tech advantage and some armor techs they're not impossible to make, you just need a bit of a tech edge to make something that's fast enough to board in combat but sturdy enough to not instantly die to the ship's PD.
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Nov 16, 2020 02:30
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Crazycryodude posted:Microwaves can't touch engines, they only fry electronics. Mesons can theoretically hit engines pretty early if they roll lucky, but there's no way to intentionally target a ship's engines beyond just shooting it a lot and hoping you hit them. Boarding as a combat method instead of a post-battle cleanup of crippled ships basically requires dedicated boarding shuttles, and the need to go super crazy fast means they're usually flimsy enough to get swatted by light/PD weaponry. With an engine tech advantage and some armor techs they're not impossible to make, you just need a bit of a tech edge to make something that's fast enough to board in combat but sturdy enough to not instantly die to the ship's PD. Yes, but would frying their electronics before sending the shuttles make a difference?
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Nov 16, 2020 02:36
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I'm not opposed to dedicated Boarding Cruisers as a mop-up squad, but as a primary tactic it seems... designed to kill as many of our comrades as possible.
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Nov 16, 2020 02:36
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Rhjamiz posted:I'm not opposed to dedicated Boarding Cruisers as a mop-up squad, but as a primary tactic it seems... designed to kill as many of our comrades as possible. Hence my question if using microwaves first would make it safer for the boarding shuttles.
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Nov 16, 2020 02:48
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Nov 16, 2020 02:49
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Rhjamiz posted:I'm not opposed to dedicated Boarding Cruisers as a mop-up squad, but as a primary tactic it seems... designed to kill as many of our comrades as possible. Hey, it's a strategy endorsed by our greatest minds in space warfare 
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Nov 16, 2020 02:49
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Antilles posted:Yes, but would frying their electronics before sending the shuttles make a difference? Yes-ish. You could have a heavy beamship that plows through missile fire into microwave range, then endures enemy beam fire while microwaving all fire controls away. Enemy ship presumably starts running away at this point. A friendly boarding carrier closes to 0km, then launches shuttles that are mostly engines to get a big speed advantage and reduce transit losses. Microwaving the fire controls first means the shuttles wouldn't need to worry about point defense shots, only being fast enough to reduce crossing losses. Then marines blow a hole in the enemy armor over the next ten minutes or so (30s/belt), board, and fight the enemy crew. Generic crew aren't particularly good soldiers, but they get some defensive bonuses and there'd be a couple hundred depending on ship size, so there will be friendly casualties. Overall, compared to just blowing up the enemy ships, friendly casualties will be higher, enemy casualties may or may not be (surrender wasn't in C# 1.0, don't know if it was ever added). The main reason to do it is you get a (mostly crippled) ship at the end, plus full knowledge of the ship design. Foxfire_ fucked around with this message at 02:55 on Nov 16, 2020 |
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Nov 16, 2020 02:52
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Antilles posted:Hence my question if using microwaves first would make it safer for the boarding shuttles. Technically yes because they fry targeting controls so point defense weapons can't fire. They don't make it any more likely for the boarding party to succeed, and they're among the shortest-ranged weapons in the game.
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Nov 16, 2020 02:55
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Hmm, so a point ship loaded with microwaves and point defense to soak damage and blind the enemy (maybe a few mesons, space permitting, to gamble on hitting the engine) combined with a fast low-armor unarmed assault troop ship could work? Are the boarding troops just generic crewmen, or do we get to design them like ground troops (f.ex. giving them power armor)? Edit: Also, if point defenses are down, what is killing the assault shuttles? Just the vagaries of high-speed maneuvers? Antilles fucked around with this message at 03:03 on Nov 16, 2020 |
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Nov 16, 2020 03:00
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I'll be honest, a naval tactic that we KNOW will lead to heavy friendly casualties and who's only point is for us to be greedy about enemy tech and taking ships.. seems like a better fit for the capitalists, not us. Every comrade's life is precious.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:12
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It's guaranteed to generate political ill-will and unless we start conscripting, I doubt we're getting many volunteers for suicide missions. Gift-wrapping propaganda for capitalists and counter-revolutionaries to paint us as uncaring monsters who view people as disposable seems like a bad plan.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:16
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zanni posted:I'll be honest, a naval tactic that we KNOW will lead to heavy friendly casualties and who's only point is for us to be greedy about enemy tech and taking ships.. seems like a better fit for the capitalists, not us. Every comrade's life is precious. Also yeah this would be a more appropriate and funny tactic if we were playing as some kind of Cartoonishly Evil Libertopian DRO.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:18
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Personally I'm hoping for stealth-oriented naval doctrine. Once we get Luna and Venus producing TNEs we'll have a surplus of Corbomite and Gallicite for cloaking and reduced thermal signature on our engines. Plus the Klingons were always the Soviet analogues, might as well lean into that and get ourselves a Bird of Prey or two.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:23
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Antilles posted:Hmm, so a point ship loaded with microwaves and point defense to soak damage and blind the enemy (maybe a few mesons, space permitting, to gamble on hitting the engine) combined with a fast low-armor unarmed assault troop ship could work? Are the boarding troops just generic crewmen, or do we get to design them like ground troops (f.ex. giving them power armor)? Try docking with something that can reach speeds of thousands of kilometers a second with nigh inconceivable acceleration. I'd be amazed if anyone survived the docking attempt. Frankly the stealthy torpedo bomber model seems the most practical one suggested so far.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:24
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Antilles posted:Hmm, so a point ship loaded with microwaves and point defense to soak damage and blind the enemy (maybe a few mesons, space permitting, to gamble on hitting the engine) combined with a fast low-armor unarmed assault troop ship could work? Are the boarding troops just generic crewmen, or do we get to design them like ground troops (f.ex. giving them power armor)? You can do it, but if your only goal is to neutralize enemy ships its less effective than just shooting them. Any ground formation that is infantry-only can try to board, but if they don't have special boarding training/equipment they have half chance to cross safely (so 10x speed needed to guarantee it). Heavy armor and better weapon are a good idea for them. Generic defending crew are infantry with light personal weapons and extra light armor, but always fortified. Without point defense, nothing is killing the shuttles themselves. I think the fluff is that the marines are individually crossing with jetpacks or something and faster shuttles can get closer to an erratically evading target. Each individual marine has a chance to bounce off and be lost, the shuttle always survives. For other stuff, point defenses are less efficient than armor unless you have a tech or tonnage advantage. If two equal fleets meet, one using PD will lose to one using armor. A stronger fleet using PD can beat up a weaker one without taking any damage though while an armor fleet will take damage. Mesons also work better as an addition to other beam weapons than microwaves. They're low dps, but ignore some layers of armor. They're bad vs thicker armor if they're your only gun, but good in combination with another weapon that is doing armor damage since you get to ignore the last few layers.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:25
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Antilles posted:Hmm, so a point ship loaded with microwaves and point defense to soak damage and blind the enemy (maybe a few mesons, space permitting, to gamble on hitting the engine) combined with a fast low-armor unarmed assault troop ship could work? Are the boarding troops just generic crewmen, or do we get to design them like ground troops (f.ex. giving them power armor)? Remember that point defence is only going to stop missiles, if an alien ships is packed full of plasma cannons or something (or their own mircowaves!) your microwave ship has to facetank that too.
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Nov 16, 2020 03:49
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I suppose at this tech level you could theoretically design two ships like you suggested but to be quite honest that would be a hilarious waste of research, minerals, and shipyard space and time given that boarding just isn't worth investing that much into. It's also likely going to get a poo poo ton of people killed. In my experience most folks keep a few spare boarding ships around that sweep into combat at the end or near the end to board cripples. I don't think I have ever heard of someone going full in on boarding before. Telsa Cola fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Nov 16, 2020 |
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Nov 16, 2020 06:30
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Quote is not edit, comrades.
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Nov 16, 2020 06:32
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The idea behind my part of JR-20 was that we should be space coast guard, not a space navy (at least not until it's necessary) so I figured disable and board would be on theme. Also figured getting a 'warship' past JR-20 would be doable if it was 'disable/capture' rather than 'blow up', not to mention if things take a turn and our first space battle isn't against some alien space empire but against GLADIO or some other nation that manages to bootstrap themselves into an armed spaceship then capture rather than destruction would be better. But it seems like the technological cost is too high, not to mention the high chance of death even under good conditions, makes combat boarding a pipedream. I guess traditional pew-pew is the way to go...
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Nov 16, 2020 08:42
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NewMars posted:You know, I've been wondering: with India, Japan and other capitalist holdouts, what's their view on how the Comintern claims to be the legitimate world government? How is the comintern portrayed in media and pop culture? I'm not sure the Comintern HAS been declaring itself the government of Earth? If so then that'd probably be recieved very coolly, especially for post-colonial countries who could arguably see the whole thing as just a method for Russian/Soviet dominance replacing the British and American hegemonies. Fortunately, our timeline split before the period where USAID managed to thoroughly poison the well on foreign aid by acting as just a straight up arm of US regime change and international dominance, so the Socialist Aid Program can almost certainly be taken on its face. So if the Comintern is just the world's dominant power, the response in countries that aren't Rhodesia and South Africa and other white settler nations is probably "thank God these ones aren't doing the same old bullshit, but we're still gonna stay over HERE."
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Nov 16, 2020 09:18
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Redeye Flight posted:I'm not sure the Comintern HAS been declaring itself the government of Earth? The Statutes of the Communist International (2nd World Congress, 1920) posted:The Communist International sets itself the aim of fighting with all means, also with arms in hand, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and the creation of an international soviet republic as a transition to the complete abolition of the state. The Communist International considers the dictatorship of the proletariat an essential means for the liberation of humanity from the horrors of capitalism; and regards the Soviet form of government as the historically necessary form of this dictatorship. e: Stalin dissolved that one during WWII though, so I guess it depends on what our identically-named successor organization says its principles are Foxfire_ fucked around with this message at 03:56 on Nov 19, 2020 |
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Nov 16, 2020 17:03
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On a lighter note: Mad Max: A gripping documentary on GRW-era Australia. Released a scant three years ago in it's home nation of the UAWR, but only seeing global distribution across comintern territories today, Mad Max is a fictionalized portrayal of the Main Force Patrol, one of the attempts to stop insurrectionism and banditry that became rife as the federal collapse of the Australian Commonwealth occurred. The Main Force Patrol were created by the short-lived liberal coalition government of Sydney as they attempted to stop the fracturing of New South Wales into the dozens of polities it would end up as before reunification, charged with ruthlessly enforcing order between towns that were separated by dozens to hundreds of miles of road. A harsh critique of the methods employed by capitalist holdouts like the coalition, the movie demonstrates the brutality and horror of their methods by the gradual degradation of it's main character over the course of the movie, as officer Max Rockatansky begins just barely ahead of the criminals he pursues in terms of brutality, eventually capitulating to them in methods after the loss of his child and disfigurement of his wife. In the end, after subjecting the last of the bandits to death by torture, the movie closes with him driving off into the Australian outback, away from civilization. The movie became notable for it's bleak realism, both in terms of the high-octane driving stunts and the scenes of civilization as they demonstrate the sometimes slow, sometimes swift collapse of society that was occurring in those years. Although the creator, George Miller has been critical of reception towards the former. In interviews he has said that the movie was formed from a combination of the childhood automotive accidents that were common in his hometown, his experience as an emergency room doctor in Sydney and his role as a medic during the rapid changes of power that became rife in urban areas during the GRW. His goal, as laid out in the interview, was to demonstrate the horrors of automotive accidents, the folly of pre-TNW dependency on oil and the brutality and insanity that resulted when the infrastructure of society broke down. Part of what makes the movie so true-to-life is that most of the vehicles provided were in fact, ones that dated from that period, as the extras and actors often provided their own. When asked about this, Miller replied: "everyone pretty much agreed to do it for beer, and it wasn't like I had much of a way to get my hands on anything modern, after all." Referring to the scarcity of automotive vehicles since the cooperative infrastructure projects of the Union Cities and the Mianjin Commune that focused entirely on mass-transit infrastructure. "Also, it's hard to show the effects of a crash back then when everything these days will stop dead at an impact." He later added, echoing comments that abound in the renascent movie-making industries of the post-GRW era on how TNE-based vehicles make for unsatisfying stunts due to their force-ablating effects. As of this writing, production is finishing on the sequel, tentatively titled "Max Max 2: The Road Wars" NewMars fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Nov 16, 2020 |
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Nov 16, 2020 19:09
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It looks like voting has concluded anyway, but voting is now officially closed! I'll compile the results and start work on an update shortly.
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Nov 17, 2020 08:00
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History of the Protectorate of the Outer Banks The Protectorate of the Outer Banks was formed following WWIII. While nuclear strikes on the US were limited, large strikes on the major cities of North Carolina saw a belt of radiation extend down the state, cutting the interior off from the coast. Surviving polities coalesced into a decentralized confederation based off prewar county governments. As most of the economy in the area was based off tourism and fishing, the Collapse hit the area hard. With the revival of global travel and trade networks, life is slowly beginning to return to normal and tourists return to the beaches and fishing of the Outer Banks. One especially heartwarming story is the survival of the Banker horses, feral horses descending from Spanish shipwrecks during the age of colonization. During the terrible winters, effort was made by the populace to protect these animals despite the hardship it imposed on the population. Today, conservationists recognize it as one of the few bright spots on the North American continent.
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Nov 17, 2020 18:51
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When relevant I would like to snag a position as a Xenoarchaeologist, so I can bitch about sifters and people breaking unit lines...IN SPACE.
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Nov 20, 2020 04:18
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Me too please if there is a post to spare
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Nov 20, 2020 08:24
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https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/13Xvzd-VkUzdHorTF_fJ1aoX_FMaHFgTrVecsqbHyNxE/edit#gid=0 The sign-up sheet for getting your name in the game, sign up if you haven't yet.
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Nov 20, 2020 09:08
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTf4bIfM46w
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Nov 21, 2020 04:46
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We're still alive! Last week was extremely hectic at both work and school, particularly with COVID-related chaos. Let's get back into our rhythm. All proposals pass except for the Venera Initiative, which fails by only one vote, with one abstention. Plot update coming, but first let's answer a question. NewMars posted:You know, I've been wondering: with India, Japan and other capitalist holdouts, what's their view on how the Comintern claims to be the legitimate world government? How is the comintern portrayed in media and pop culture? The official state position on the Comintern, in the UN and in the various holdout states, is mostly 'silence'. Officially they generally do not recognize it as a unified entity, and formal diplomacy between it and the non-member states is mostly through unofficial channels. Officially recognizing the Comintern as a sovereign entity is something only states fairly friendly to you have done, such as Hawaii. The rest of them seem to be holding on to an increasingly-vain hope that it's a temporary aberration and that you'll go away if they just ignore you long enough - officially. Unofficially there's a growing resignation that this is just the state of things now, and they need to adapt to it somehow. Exactly what form this will take, who knows. In popular culture in the remaining capitalist nations the Comintern often portrayed as an all-powerful boogeyman bent on world domination. There are popular conspiracy theories that they dropped the first nukes (objectively false), that they somehow goaded the Joint Chiefs into doing so, or that they caused (insert catastrophe here) in order to foment chaos. Communist guerrillas or agents are common villains in Bollywood productions, which generates some controversy there because there is actually a sizable legal, above-ground communist movement in the country, in addition to the armed underground. There's another take on the Comintern in the media in capitalist countries, less common and generally confined to more subversive underground art, that sees it as humanity's savior - maybe a flawed, imperfect savior, one that still has issues to work out and problems to address, but a savior all the same. There's a trend in Japanese cinema of independent, zero-budget sci-fi films portraying a utopian socialist future, and the aesthetics of Soviet, and later Comintern, space exploration have permeated street culture the world over, on both sides of the Red Line. Cosmonauts, rockets, and, recently, the flag of the Lunar Socialist Republic are frequent subjects for graffiti. EVA sign language is already starting to catch on among Earthbound youth. American popular culture remains a divided mess because the country itself still is, but what art and mass media is being produced in the Americas is generally fairly Comintern-friendly, simply because most of the existing resources once used to make it are now controlled by Comintern member polities. There remain a few television and radio stations controlled by anti-communist elements, and some which are independent and neutral. The former include the Voice of America, which is controlled by the Joint Chiefs and has very limited coverage from a few repeater stations in territory controlled by forces loyal to them; its programs are recorded in Okinawa for rebroadcast, and, like most such networks that remain, consists of a combination of patriotic/nationalistic content, promises of peace and prosperity in a restored America, and right-wing propaganda. The latter include Radio Kiloton, a pirate radio station which broadcasts from a former refugee ship anchored in international waters in the Gulf of Mexico. It's independent but has grown increasingly pro-Comintern as the political situation on the continent has stabilized and more and more refugees have returned to their homes; such positions are typical among most remaining independent media on the continent. The war, and especially the nuclear war, is an extremely common subject in art and media the world over. Not just war stories, either - films about the civilian experience in the war, metaphors about the war, stories about recovering after the war or trying to find meaning in the experience of the war. It's still very fresh in everyone's mind, and frequently a very raw subject. Mister Bates fucked around with this message at 07:32 on Nov 23, 2020 |
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Nov 23, 2020 07:26
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Good to see you're back! I hope this week is better for you. Although now that you've answered that question, now I have one for you, and I think, maybe everyone? What is the flag of the comintern?
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Nov 23, 2020 07:35
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a big red star on a black background, with multiple white stars in a geometric pattern around it
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Nov 23, 2020 07:51
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NewMars posted:Good to see you're back! I hope this week is better for you. Although now that you've answered that question, now I have one for you, and I think, maybe everyone? There isn't one officially! In practice at most events it's either the Soviet flag or a plain unadorned red flag, but that's just a temporary arrangement on account of no one having been able to agree on a design up to this point. If you wanted to look into designing and adopting an official flag that'd be something to propose at the next legislative session.
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Nov 23, 2020 08:46
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sebmojo posted:a big red star on a black background, with multiple white stars in a geometric pattern around it  So this basically. Cept probably without the faint white borders etc but eh, paint x lazy
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Nov 23, 2020 08:50
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I've an idea for one. The circle in the centre is the earth, united under socialism and beneath it the flag of the moon. The wreath can be read as a laurel or as grain. A laurel, representing the triumph of socialism and humanity over the old order and it's near-destruction, or a wreath of grain, representing the plenty that the comintern brings. There's also space to add the emblems of future colonies around the earth.
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Nov 23, 2020 10:13
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NewMars posted:I've an idea for one. Nice!
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Nov 23, 2020 10:38
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I like them both, but I think NewMars' takes the lead for me because it incorporates the classic hammer and sickle. The advantage of Veloxyll's is that it can be shunted off to the upper left of any given flag easily, to indicate that they have their own nation and sovereignty, but are nonetheless members of the Comintern alliance. Might be time to update the classic hammer and sickle for the new age, though. I always felt that our timeline's flag of Mozambique got something right there. Book, hoe and gun. Science/education, labour and the arms that protect them.
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Nov 23, 2020 10:46
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Members could use the star pattern that's in both, couldn't they?
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Nov 23, 2020 10:54
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PurpleXVI posted:I like them both, but I think NewMars' takes the lead for me because it incorporates the classic hammer and sickle. Maybe there could be two flags, one for official full flag purposes, and a second simpler design for the upper left shunting.
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Nov 23, 2020 11:07
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64bitrobot posted:Maybe there could be two flags, one for official full flag purposes, and a second simpler design for the upper left shunting. Well, for that purpose, you could just use the hammer-and-sickle-in-a-globe, I think. Most of them already have the hammer and sickle anyway... Or equivalent tools. The blue circle is there to represent earth.
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Nov 23, 2020 11:51
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Found the perfect image for the thread. 
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Nov 23, 2020 14:39
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