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The fleet stands ready for a Joint Strike! And Trade, I suppose.
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Jul 15, 2021 06:23
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Joint Strike, Bribe, and Trade Not like we can trade without the joint strike.
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Jul 15, 2021 06:31
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Also I see no reason why we can't tell the Agamamenons that we're good with seeking detente with the League. That also presents us as a peacable alternative to them. We just have to make sure not to instigate conflict to back this up and make a show of negotiating. And if the League strikes first then we can say we tried to talk it over - and it puts the rest of the quadrant as willing to work with us too to protect them from the 'Evil League'.
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Jul 15, 2021 06:41
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wedgekree posted:Also I see no reason why we can't tell the Agamamenons that we're good with seeking detente with the League. That also presents us as a peacable alternative to them. We just have to make sure not to instigate conflict to back this up and make a show of negotiating. Honestly my main objection is that dealing with the pirates combined with proper trade will be more than enough to bring them around. Why bother with making promises that would prevent us from having first strike opportunities?
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Jul 15, 2021 06:51
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I'm super down to drop the Trade, Bribe and MAJOR Inspire here. Like this is basically I was arguing to do while we were deciding on the order of visitation. Hunt pirates. Steal their junkers. Turn junkers into power vs the League. I told you dog, I told you about the pirate hunting.
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Jul 15, 2021 09:31
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Gridlocked posted:I'm super down to drop the Trade, Bribe and MAJOR Inspire here. This.
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Jul 15, 2021 09:42
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Yeah I feel like this is where dropping a bunch of resource is going to have the best effect.
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Jul 15, 2021 09:42
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Awkward question here, but what, if anything, do we know of our good friend Pyotr's relations with these particular belt pirates? We kind of need that guy. Barring that I'm totally for a raid into the belt and opening trade. Buying or repairing the fighters is both fine by me.
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Jul 15, 2021 11:42
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I'm going with the Homeworld protocol here. Always get into fights you can win easily because of all that sweet salvage will snowball into a larger advantage. Major Inspire and look to buy the fighters. I would even to go as far as to say we should hog all matériel salvage - any serviceable pirate ships for example. Agamemnon can dibs on any non-ship resources.
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Jul 15, 2021 12:54
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Trade, Bribe, and pirate hunting The bribe to repair their fighters is part of the pirate hunting, if we're going to get in a big slugging match I want it to be as absolutely unfair as possible so we don't take any more damage than necessary. An extra fighter squadron's worth of guns might be the difference between the pirates getting off enough return salvos to just scratch the paint vs. break something important.
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Jul 15, 2021 14:01
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Gridlocked posted:I'm super down to drop the Trade, Bribe and MAJOR Inspire here. Gridlocked's plan is one I support. Let's kick some pirate rear end Maybe we can borrow one of Aggie's salvagers and we can arrange a salvage split too
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Jul 15, 2021 16:42
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I also favour trade and murder the pirates. I do think that their question about us being willing to consider a détente with the League is not a unreasonable thing for them to consider, tho I don't know if it is something A: we want to promise, and B: is practicable considering what colossal loving assholes the League seems to be. I dunno about repairing their Su's for them. We could use them because we have a sort of CV, but can they use them for anything but local defense of the asteroid? The range on them is probably pretty rear end. As for whomst to visit next I dunno if we want to visit Teucer, or start in on the problem twins. On balance I think the problem twins are perhaps our next best choice as we don't want the League to get a foot in the door there by backing one side of the conflict and making peace between them impossible. I'd also propose starting with Odysseus as we basically only know one side of the story atm.
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Jul 15, 2021 17:22
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Alright, trade and the expedition will both happen. Here are answers about the fighters.
You all can discuss that, and I'll present a briefing for the expedition later.
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Jul 15, 2021 18:06
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Even if it looks like the vote is already decided, my military analysis of the joint strike. This is based purely on game mechanics, so if Fray is going to let us do RP stuff like improvise fuel transfers it may not be valid. The closest belt asteroids look to be about 300m away, and the pirates might be a bit further. We only have two ships that can handle a trip of that length; Ashes (with her load of fighters and troops) and Osaka. Paralos would be pushing it extremely close unless we can purchase fuel in the belt, and our corvettes are right out. Including time for a battle, we're probably talking at minimum a 10 day or so mission, so hopefully we could be out and back before the Achilleans could potentially capitalize on our weakness. Ashes herself is extremely valuable since her weapon likely outranges anything the pirates might have mounted on their asteroid, which would force them to come to us rather than hiding under the cover of defensive guns. The risks are... substantial. Not just in having our ships destroyed, but fuel tanks being hit and venting to space is a high risk in Aurora combat. Our fuel margins are already pretty tight, so if any of our ships take substantial damage they may not be able to return unless we can find a friendly asteroid in the belt to refuel at. This goes double for any ships we're able to capture, which will almost certainly have heavy damage. Hopefully Agamemnon can provide enough support that we'd have overwhelming firepower and not take much damage. As for Agamemnon itself, I feel like this is a "go big or go home" situation. They're already being courted by the Achilleans so we definitely don't want a situation where we, say, help repair their fighters and then they join the League and use them against us. Since trade and the expedition have already been decided, this seems like a "go big" moment. If we're already committed I say fix the fighters too. That just leaves the question of whether we want to negotiate with the league and potentially end up in a cold war, or keep the option open to strike first. I think negotiations are probably the best option, and the League would probably eventually attack anyways, but it's also the most boring, so I'm going to vote no to committing to negotiations.
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Jul 15, 2021 19:25
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Joint Strike on Pirates  We want to husband our ships and supplies, but it would be good to see what they can do, along with the rest of the belt. Keep our Only concern is that Achilles would figure out what we're doing and how long we would be away, and try to just knock our home rock out in a surprise attack. We're the second biggest boy, so without us they can just outlast our ships, then loom over every other rock and demand surrender.
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Jul 15, 2021 19:35
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Given the range si there any way that Agamemnon might be willing to provide tanker support? I would think given how far they are out here in the boonies they might have something for it that we would use. So if they even had a couple of military freighters that could go slow and be loaded up with fuel that would make our mission a -lot- better as we'd have a margin of error. So is there any way that we can get some in-flight refueling or we going to be cutting it really close? And agree on leaving Patrocolos at 'home' along with the corvettes. Unless we get long range fueling, in which case having the corvettes along as pickets might help as we could use them for recon in the belt and if they picked up anything they can run. But only if fuel is feasible.
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Jul 16, 2021 00:03
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wedgekree posted:Given the range si there any way that Agamemnon might be willing to provide tanker support? I would think given how far they are out here in the boonies they might have something for it that we would use. As I said, Fray might be willing to handwave something, but in standard Aurora fuel transfers require either a special system on a ship or special installations on a planet. Assuming we're playing standard vanilla rules, our best bet might be to try to find an asteroid in the belt willing to sell us fuel, but given we're a warfleet there on a mission of aggression that might be hard - if your neighbor is a band of pirates you probably don't want to remember you as "that asteroid that sold fuel to the fleet that kicked our asses." If Agamemnon does have a tanker I'm sure it will come up in the upcoming briefing.
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Jul 16, 2021 01:13
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I agree with Breman, this definitely feels like a go big moment. Strategically we absolutely need Agamemnon, otherwise in any hypothetical war with the League we're looking at a 2-front situation. I also think its wise we keep 1 of each action in the tank for Teucer (our other linchpin) if this means we might not get one of the arguing asteroids, or we can't play cute with any Ajax coups for the short term that's a fair trade-off. Start Trade, Bribe Fighters, Joint Strike Also after the fight, when we are examining our loot we can revisit buying their (now fixed) fighters. If they're willing to say trade them for a captured pirate sloop, it might not be a bad deal.
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Jul 16, 2021 02:08
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I agree with all and sundry that we should Fix the fighters, if nothing else they can free up assets from home defence. And I would assume that the Aggies have inflight-refueling capability if they've been planning to take out pirate bases in the belt. -- Also thank you for the kind words re writing, nice to see people enjoyed it! Though Fray deserves a lot of the credit for creating a cool and interesting setting for my imagination to be able to go "Hey, let's depress people, in space!". sebmojo posted:that's a hella tight story, nice work. That is a really cool story, I've read a few bits of Michael Herr but I definitely need to read more after that.
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Jul 16, 2021 11:47
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BwenGun posted:As with everyone else I vote: Agamemnon. Incredible stuff, thank you for sharing. This was a hell of a read.
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Jul 17, 2021 17:52
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 24 March 2154 You responded favorably to the members of the Agamemnese council who approached you about a joint antipiracy operation in the belt, and they left feeling encouraged. A few days later, the full council broached the same subject in a conference with your envoy. After some wrangling an agreement was reached, and you have begun planning the operation with the Agamemnese military leadership. The same clique of councilors have advised you that much of the council still favors the mighty League Navy for a military alliance, so your performance and cooperation will be judged closely.  Your current view of the L4 cluster. You can pick up quite a few population signatures with your DSTS now. You can see the Agamemnese fleet currently consists of two armed merchants, two frigates, and a corvette.  Range diagram from Agamemnon, since fuel endurance is a crucial factor for any belt expedition. Agamemnon is a bit closer to the area of operations, so you have agreed to refuel and launch the joint fleet from there. Since people were wondering, yes we're going to stick with vanilla refueling mechanics, and no the Agamemnese don't have a fleet oiler. That means you don't have capability for underway refueling.  Closeup of the area of operations. The Agamemnese received the demand for tribute via tightbeam from the asteroid Argentina, which neither of you are familiar with. Harmonia is a rock you've heard of before - from an older Martian broadcast it sounds like they have entered the Federals' diplomatic orbit. Vesta is now swinging into reach as well. This is one of the four major asteroids that, together, make up about half the mass of the entire belt. Before the war, these rocks were strategically critical ports and naval bases. These stations got hit hard by the warring nations, but settlements may yet survive in the wreckage. These two locations may serve as supply points if needed, and you may encounter other colonies as well. ---- The Agamemnese ships have ranges of: Armed Merchants: 1 Bkm Frigates: 700 Mkm Corvette: 400 Mkm The armed merchants are useful as troop transports and the Agamemnese are prepared to commit half a battalion to the expedition. Their regulars are better equipped than your militia, but not armored like your assault troops. The downside is that these ships will slow the expedition down (538km/s) if you elect to bring them along. One of their frigates is very similar to your Paralos, and the other is equipped with dual turreted lasers. --- The Agamemnese have dealt with Red Hands before, and you once heard of them in passing from a belt trader. They are believed to be a long-time resident of this slice of the belt. The last time their region spun by the L4 cluster, A show of force by the Red Hands compelled the Agamemnese to pay tribute. The Agamemnese observed a light cruiser sized ship, of approximately 4600 tons, as well as a few smaller vessels. Their leader was a Chinese woman going by the mythical name of Li Ji.  Spanning an enormous volume of space and containing a dizzying spectrum of colonies, the Belt defies categorization. The Uplift saw a mad rush to seize its richest resources, establish hubs for their exploitation, and of course protect it all. Competing claims for a choice rock routinely led to denunciations, then arms buildups, then shows of force. In some provocative cases, one nation’s outpost would end mere meters from that of another. The resulting flow of trans-Newtonian ore to Luna and Earth fueled the Uplift and the rapid expansion of the great powers' fearsome militaries. The winners of this race were undoubtedly NASDT and China. Their colossal GDPs made them early leaders of the expansion, and that vanguardism was richly rewarded in the Belt. Russian and Indian colonies would laggardly join them to claim minority stakes in the region, while UNOP largely preferred Lunar and Martian resettlement over ventures in the belt. Teeming ports such as Ceres, Vesta, Pallas, and Hygeia served as transshipment points for ore, stopovers for Jovian traffic, and critical naval bases. Over time, those same navies found themselves hard-pressed to police the spread of illegal wildcat outposts throughout the Belt.  The hard years since the war culled many of the survivors. Circumstances forced most rocks either to band together with neighbors, or to raid them for supplies with whatever weapons were at hand. Nowadays, the boldest traders and salvagers brave the Belt’s constant dangers in search of riches. Merchants from sunward very occasionally make it through the belt to visit your cluster, bringing valuable manufactures in exchange for your minerals. It seems that the four majors, though surely shadows of their former selves, still serve as hubs for belt traffic. The Martian federals loudly court belter settlements to form commercial and diplomatic ties, and at least a few have accepted their chance to cozy up with a core power. Belt's a hell of a place if you know how to survive there. There’s the pirates with their modded rockhoppers, the navy warlords, folks just trying to get by, and a whole lot of colonies that didn't make it. But you never know if the rock you just tethered to holds something stranger. Like this one time we cracked open an airlock and...
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Jul 18, 2021 03:46
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Well this is a toughie. It's basically a one-way leap of faith where we have to pray we can find fuel somewhere somehow on the other side, and for the Aggie corvettes and our rockhoppers just barely on the edge of theoretical max range. If any unplanned maneuvers or punctured fuel tanks happen then the entire hull is a writeoff, I don't think we can really risk bringing the small ships out to play. The Aggie frigates are a lot more reasonable to bring, if they're willing to let both off the leash then we should take them. We'll still need to get creative with sourcing fuel for the return journey but at least there's a nice wide margin of error instead of running on fumes before the shooting even starts. Same for the Paralos. I think we're definitely going to want to take both the Ashes and the Alexi, if the pirates have a light cruiser I don't want to gently caress around and accidentally not bring enough firepower. Sure it might be 4600 tons of converted industrial barge made up to look scary, but if it's 4600 tons of actual pre-war warship we can't afford to underestimate it or they'll scrap multiple of our irreplaceable hulls. Not sure about the armed merchants, cutting the task force's top speed if they need to run in half doesn't sound like a super good idea. Using them to bring a bunch of extra troops would give us more flexibility for the giant ??? that is the Belt resupply foraging, but I'm not sure it's enough to warrant slowing us down so much. It's probably not a good idea to be doing major ground invasions during our first visit to the place anyways, I think I lean towards leaving the armed merchants at home. Maybe ask one to make a trade run to Hektor on a schedule that just so happens to put it in our neighborhood while the Ashes and Alexi are both away? Just beef up the home defenses that little bit extra so the Achilleans have to go through more than just 2 rockhoppers if they want to get frisky.
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Jul 18, 2021 04:36
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Much as I like the idea of bringing troopships with us, without actually having an idea of whether we'd need 'em or not or for an objective.. They'd cut our operational abilities a bit by having to match thier pace. Our operation here is gonna be limited by our effective fuel range. Also agree on 'no kill like overkill' if the pirates have a capital ship. Also Ashes theoretically outranges anything in the cluster right? Presuming that works in theory then we might wanna go around in a picket style with escorts. When contact the enemy, try and stay at range to bombard them. Rest of the fleet acts as a screen for any oncoming while Ashes does most of the dirty work. Separate possibility is the use of a Q-Ship. Basically old freighter that's of no real use/ready for scrap. Paint her up to be a real appealing target, have her trundle along through the area putting out signs of a ton of damage. Wait for pirates to hit her, ambush them with intent being disable/capture. Hopefully get prisoners/data we can use and then follow up on their main operations. wedgekree fucked around with this message at 04:55 on Jul 18, 2021 |
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Jul 18, 2021 04:49
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Alright, so it looks like the target is within round trip range for 700mkm range vessels, barely. For us, that's the Ashes (with up to 4 fighters, if we take them), the Alexi, and the Paralos. For Agamemnon, two frigates and two armed merchants. Against a potential light cruiser class, we don't want to skimp on the firepower. If we go with the rough tonnage scale I hashed out earlier, the light cruiser is probably a bit more than a match for two frigates, and they have a few smaller vessels as well. Plus we under no circumstances want this to be a fair fight. Let's wargame that they have a Light cruiser, a frigate, and two corvettes (bad, but not unthinkable with the intel we have). Going by the scale, we could say this works out to 16 "points" of warships. Ashes, Alexi, Paralos, and 4 fighters would work out to about 20 points, so would theoretically have a slim advantage. Two Agamemese frigates would add 8 more. So plan "leave the armed merchants behind, take the fighters" gives us 28 hypothetical warship points. Now, you may be asking: Why the hell would we consider leaving the armed merchants behind? The problem is the speed. All of the other ships are fairly fast, even the Ashes' managing an impressive 939 km/s. Speed is king in Aurora because it lets you control the range; if the enemy cruiser is slower than 939km/s, and the Achillean cruiser was, then that would mean we could hold the range open and try bombarding them with the Ashes' heavy laser. Potentially that could even force the pirates to leave their flagship behind and engage with smaller ships only. And even if they have their own heavy laser, we could disengage and run if the fight goes badly. Plus even if the pirates are slightly faster, we could still get a lot of hits in as they slowly close at the few km/s difference. Whereas if we have the transports with us, 538 km/s means the pirates will be able to close the distance quickly and we can't run without abandoning them. The advantage of taking the armed merchants is two fold: More firepower, and the troops they carry. Even without the possibility of boarding disabled enemy ships, if we can raid their asteroid HQ they might have some loot (and we might have to, since unless we menace their base the pirates could just run away from us). Plus taking the asteroid might let us refuel. The Ashes can carry troops as well, but we'll run into hangar space issues here - if we take the fighters, then there's only space for the boarding shuttle (which we absolutely should take) and one landing ship. A third possibility is to take the armed merchants but have them hold way back and not engage in the initial fight - maybe 100mkm or so, hopefully enough that the pirates won't see them. If the Agamemese are willing, this is the option I favor. So, four strategic plans I'll toss out: Fly like a Butterfly: Bring the Alex, Paralos, and the two Agamemese frigates (18 "points"). Our goal is a fast, mobile force, that can hopefully run away if outgunned. The advantage here is they can almost certainly disengage from the light cruiser. The disadvantage is even just the cruiser would probably be a serious challenge. Use the Big Gun: Bring the above plus Ashes (with 4 fighters, a boarding shuttle, and a landing shuttle) (28 points): Hope we have a bigger gun and are faster than the enemy cruiser, try to snipe them with our mining laser until they're crippled or surrender. Worst case, we still have the Ashes and 4 fighters for more firepower. But retreating or rotating out damaged ships will be harder. My second choice. Quantity over Quality: Bring the above plus the armed merchants (total 36ish points). Our force will be slow but also massive enough it can probably overwhelm anything the pirates have. What's the worst that could happen?: Quantity over quality, but after leaving Agamemnon the rest of the ships advance together while the merchants fall behind at their slower speed, but hopefully arrive to secure the pirate base after the assault group deals with the pirate ships. And we hope that nothing happens to the transports or Agamemnon while we're all split up. My first choice if Agamemnon agrees to it Bremen fucked around with this message at 05:54 on Jul 18, 2021 |
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Jul 18, 2021 04:57
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Also we do have the rockhoppers. While we can't bring them far out, they could at least be used for some level of picket duty or recon. We could send them out as far as they had the range to as scouts with the assumption that they would burn out and run if they ran into anything. They could also stay on passive for the duration which could give us some forewarning. If we get -really- good with positioning we could even use them as hammer to anvil or decoy. If it's worth it to bring them along even with the fact they can't go all the way with us.
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Jul 18, 2021 05:10
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I say bring the Merchantmen. While being able to dictate range is handy, being able to potentially take their stronghold is more handy. As well as being able to bring the most important thing, overwhelming firepower.
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Jul 18, 2021 05:35
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I'm erring on the side of Use the Big Gun. Tbh I'm not a fan of bringing along the merchies but leaving them unescorted to follow along. 1. I'm not at all sure the Agamemese won't look askance at it, and 2. It would really sour relations if they got sniped. And I don't think giving up speed to haul them along is worth it, as in space speed is armor, if the entire squadron is limited to their 538km/s we will be very easy to hit, or will be forced to detach them to maneuver in combat. NGL I really hope that isn't a prewar CL they have floating around as that could potentially be a very scary customer, esp as it out tons our own prewar ship. Honestly if it is prewar, regardless of plan I think we will take ship losses, esp as if we bring ashy along into combat she also limits our speed below what can run from prewar boat (in all likelyhood).
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Jul 18, 2021 06:11
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I'm tentatively in favor of Use the Big Gun, but I'm not a great strategic thinker nor have any real knowledge of Aurora, so please don't let this influence your own decisions.
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Jul 18, 2021 06:51
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Boomboomf22 posted:I'm erring on the side of Use the Big Gun. Tbh I'm not a fan of bringing along the merchies but leaving them unescorted to follow along. 1. I'm not at all sure the Agamemese won't look askance at it, and 2. It would really sour relations if they got sniped. And I don't think giving up speed to haul them along is worth it, as in space speed is armor, if the entire squadron is limited to their 538km/s we will be very easy to hit, or will be forced to detach them to maneuver in combat. Prewar as opposed to... I think the big question is to what degree it's been maintained. It's entirely possible that it's just there for show at this point, to be extremely intimidating.
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Jul 18, 2021 06:55
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Love the warplans Breman, lotta good thought there. My big question to the group: what is our strategic objective here? Are we just trying to neutralize Argentina's ability to wage war/raid on the Agamemese or are we trying to counter raid/put boots on the ground on Argentina? If its the former, then the big gun plans sound better, since we're just trying to neutralize the space assets of the pirates. If its the later, then any plan to bring our transports to the AOR is either going to force us to protect them, or have them wait back long enough for the space around and to Argentina to be secure. With the fuel consideration, Quantity over Quality might be our best solution. While we'll be slower in terms of ability to dictate the battle, we can counter that with the ability to put boots on the ground of the Red Hands base and if need be, if they make a break for it, we can chase them while still leaving assets to protect our transports, the ability to deny them the use of their base is going to be helpful. In addition having the ability to transport/seize goods from Argentina will be nice for us to secure war loot, and if need by, trade with any of the neutral belt powers in Harmonia or Vesta to get a fuel top off before returning home. Lets be clear, if we commit to any transports, this is going to be a massive smash and grab, we won't be able to hold Argentina long term due to L4 and the Belt rotating at different times so if we take the marines, lets go big and grab as much poo poo as we can. If we don't want to bring Marines, then the biggest space force we can muster to smash Argentina's space stuff is the next best option. 1. Quantity over Quality: 2. Big Gun Jimmy4400nav fucked around with this message at 07:40 on Jul 18, 2021 |
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Jul 18, 2021 07:09
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Agreeing with 1 Quantity over Quality and 2 - Big Guns Also like the possibility of 'Wha'ts the worst' but given our kinda lack of intel we have no idea what might be after the transports if left to their own devices. If we had more recon then I might consider it. So going with 'bring in the troops' and understand that we can dictate the engagement by virtue of firepower and even if they run, we can hopefully hit their base and loot it. Besides, they have to be able to get fuel from /somewhere/ out here. So if we can find that we can seige it and that will hopefully solve most of the issues. Also while I love the idea of capturing ships, not sure how feasible it is. But nice to have the option available.
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Jul 18, 2021 07:36
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Big Gun Real worried about not having enough ground troops to secure fuel. But this should be enough to at least trade for fuel safely.
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Jul 18, 2021 08:22
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The thing to consider here is, we're being evaluated here. Our conduct and capabilities will determine whether Agamemnon wants to ally with us over the "mighty League Navy" as they refer to it. This is a huuuuuge factor in our strategy, as we should favor any plan that makes us look competent, powerful AND good teammates. To that end, my votes are: 1) Quantity Over Quality 2) Big Gun My logic is that bringing the armed merchants is worth it for a couple reasons:
That being said, this all backfires if we get all of them/us killed like idiots, so Option 2 is the more conservative fallback position.
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Jul 18, 2021 16:11
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So I was asked about my policy on KiteWars on discord last night. If you’re not familiar, Aurora does have the issue that kiting can be cheesed really hard. When done, this tends to result in every battle being an effortless curbstomp for one side or the other. Bremen went so far as to ban it in his LP, and I don’t think saros said anything but you can kinda tell he was setting some limits. I don’t like banning things, so I’ve though it over and here’s my policy: 1) You can do whatever you want. 2) If you do something, I get to do it back to you. I’ll tell you now that there’s a decent number of factions out there who are better at KiteWars than you, and if we’re playing no-holds-barred I won’t stop them from wiping you when the time comes. The alternative is we have a gentlemen’s agreement to pad the gloves like I think saros did. I for one think past LPs have proven the latter is more fun, but we’ll have whatever kind of game you all want. Another example of this is that I take it easy on beam fighters cause they do need a little help to be fun and viable. That’s another policy that only works if it goes both ways.
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Jul 18, 2021 17:58
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My instinct is for quantity over quality, however I'd like to propose a variation of the plan. What do you mean, bait? The idea is that we use the armed merchantment from Agamemnon to try, if at all possible, to set the terms of engagement with the pirates. The first step would be grouping the majority of our combat vessels together, refueling at Agamemnon, and then setting off as if heading to Vesta. Then once beyond the sensor range of Agamemnon cutting speed to approximately 400km/s and heading for Argentina. At the same time the Armed Merchantmen + a small escort, ideally one of the Agamemnon Frigates, leaves at the same speed also heading for Vesta. Whilst travelling the escort vessels and the Merchantmen will be doing random sensor pings with their actives, as if checking the area to see if there are any pirates running quiet to sneak up on them. Which should also have the effect of making it very, very, obvious where they are and where they're heading. Basically imitating a very fat merchant convoy heading to Vesta filled with minerals and other goods for trade. Hopefully the pirates will notice this and take the bait, but thinking they're only facing a single combat ship they won't initially send out their full fleet, ideally just sending the light cruiser, but honestly even if they just leave one of their smaller ships at home that will be helpful. Now when they do jump the merchants they'll no doubt try and sneak as close as possible whilst hoping a random ping doesn't catch them too far out. However as soon as they do get detected, or spot us on their own actives, then they should be in a position where they can't get within range of the Merchantmen without being intercepted by our main combat force. And hopefully the cruiser, if it turns up, will be slower than our own true warships and so we'll be able to close and kill it. Risks are, of course, that they get closer to the merchantmen than we'd like and are able to bring them to range before we can intercept, or soon after, or they just send light units and are able to withdraw. Upsides are the chance we can defeat them in detail and limit damage to our own forces. Fray posted:So I was asked about my policy on KiteWars on discord last night. If you’re not familiar, Aurora does have the issue that kiting can be cheesed really hard. When done, this tends to result in every battle being an effortless curbstomp for one side or the other. Bremen went so far as to ban it in his LP, and I don’t think saros said anything but you can kinda tell he was setting some limits. I don’t like banning things, so I’ve though it over and here’s my policy: I am all for the gentlemen's agreement. Aurora's biggest flaw is that kiting can turn even the smallest range advantage into an overwhelming factor in combat. Far more fun to embrace Nelson and go straight at 'em.
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Jul 18, 2021 18:26
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Volmarias posted:Prewar as opposed to... thing 1; prewar as opposed to post war. IE a proper warship vs something hacked together out of a freighter. All we know is that the ship is CL sized (roughtly 4600 tons) but we do not know if it is actually a CL or if it is a hackjob warship. thing 2: I second the gentlemans agreement. Kiting is boring and for those who lack the belief in their cause to lay their ship alongside the enemy and do their duty to Hektor!
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Jul 18, 2021 19:15
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Boomboomf22 posted:thing 1; prewar as opposed to post war. IE a proper warship vs something hacked together out of a freighter. All we know is that the ship is CL sized (roughtly 4600 tons) but we do not know if it is actually a CL or if it is a hackjob warship. Is there a real limit to how large freighter to warship conversion jobs would be? I would assume that at a certain point the mass works further against you than it helps. In all cases the capabilities have been decreased for everyone. Actually, regardless of that, I'm concerned that if we take the bulk of our fleet as well as Agamemnon's, the Achillean league might pounce on the opportunity to wreak havoc while we're away and unable to bloody their noses about it. How effective are Hektor's defense systems currently? I know we jury rigged them online decades ago to core our current destroyer, but is any of it knocked out? I don't remember if I asked about this before but if I haven't I've certainly meant to.
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Jul 18, 2021 19:40
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Volmarias posted:Is there a real limit to how large freighter to warship conversion jobs would be? I would assume that at a certain point the mass works further against you than it helps. In all cases the capabilities have been decreased for everyone. No idea on the first, other than Ashy is 25,000 tons. And while she is by no means standard in size for the region I don't see why a 4000-5000 ton conversion couldn't exist. As for the League pouncing that is a risk, but unless they nuke us I think we are fairly safe, plus it would totally discredit them with Agamemnon which they seem to care about. As for our batteries I don't think Frey has answered specifics but the first page does show it exists. Shore batteries (STOs in Aurora terms) have the potential to be very effective even in small numbers. They are pretty tough, and the enemy cannot pick them out from our regular ground force tonnage until they fire. So even some 120mm guns can do quite a lot of damage to a warship, esp one trying to invade a orbit.
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Jul 18, 2021 19:52
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Boomboomf22 posted:No idea on the first, other than Ashy is 25,000 tons. And while she is by no means standard in size for the region I don't see why a 4000-5000 ton conversion couldn't exist. As for the League pouncing that is a risk, but unless they nuke us I think we are fairly safe, plus it would totally discredit them with Agamemnon which they seem to care about. As for our batteries I don't think Frey has answered specifics but the first page does show it exists. Shore batteries (STOs in Aurora terms) have the potential to be very effective even in small numbers. They are pretty tough, and the enemy cannot pick them out from our regular ground force tonnage until they fire. So even some 120mm guns can do quite a lot of damage to a warship, esp one trying to invade a orbit. This does assume that they're willing to care about the opinion of other rocks, since they've just rolled up and thrown nukes as their "or else" previously. Also, our freighter conversion is a glorified set of launch tubes and a converted mining drill. I'm extremely here for the Homeworld: Cataclysm overhaul we'll end up with, but we're not there now. Volmarias fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jul 18, 2021 |
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Jul 18, 2021 20:00
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BwenGun posted:My instinct is for quantity over quality, however I'd like to propose a variation of the plan. Um, how do you think Agamemnon is gonna interpret us, in our first big joint naval adventure as we try and prove what valuable and stalwart potential allies we are, if we go "Okay, so step one, you guys send your ships out as pirate bait"? Especially if we gently caress up and they actually get captured? Volmarias posted:This does assume that they're willing to care about the opinion of other rocks, since they've just rolled up and thrown nukes as their "or else" previously. I mean... they sent a diplomatic envoy to Agamemnon, clear on the opposite side of L4, before WE did. They must care at least a little bit.
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Jul 18, 2021 20:04
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