Planetoid vs. Culture ship

[HRogge]

1. the Culture could not prevent the Imperium to reach any orbital they want, they are unable to hit the ships of the Imperium during FTL travel.

But they have to drop out of FTL to hit their targets.

Yes, but for an insane short amount of time... might be even too short to hit them for a culture weapon system.

2. Who cares what has happend at home ? The 4th Imperium designed it's planetoids to start a new civilization if necessary.

Only if the Culture doesn't hunt them down. They'll only make good lifeboats if they can't be intercepted. Some might get away but their civilization would be destroyed in a war they can't win.

The same would happen to Culture... it would some time, then Culture would stop using orbitals and spheres...

3. How do Culture plan to HIT the planetoid ? The FTL engines are just too fast for them. In addition to this they can use the hyperdrive.

But not inside the hyperlimit. If they have to enage they'll die. If they run the Culture will win.

Enchanach drive work pretty well inside the hyperlimit. They can just make a star go nova by flying near the star...

[Stormbringer]

Enchanach drive work pretty well inside the hyperlimit. They can just make a star go nova by flying near the star...

and die screaming as it takes them out with it. You do know that trying Colin's trick with a single ship would mean the planetoids destruction right?

[HRogge]

Enchanach drive work pretty well inside the hyperlimit. They can just make a star go nova by flying near the star...

and die screaming as it takes them out with it. You do know that trying Colin's trick with a single ship would mean the planetoids destruction right?

They did it with a couple of ships and lost NO ship. And they never said it would be dangerous for a single planetoid. They even mentioned that Dahaks "bad" flight into the Sol system messed up Plutos orbit... and if Dahak would have been flying a little more into the system the star would have gone nova.

[Stormbringer]

Enchanach drive work pretty well inside the hyperlimit. They can just make a star go nova by flying near the star...

and die screaming as it takes them out with it. You do know that trying Colin's trick with a single ship would mean the planetoids destruction right?

They did it with a couple of ships and lost NO ship. And they never said it would be dangerous for a single planetoid. They even mentioned that Dahaks "bad" flight into the Sol system messed up Plutos orbit... and if Dahak would have been flying a little more into the system the star would have gone nova.

They lost planetoids when they sent the star up in Armegeddon Inheritnace you moron. Read the books. Some of them couldn't get away. They got destroyed. Or did you miss that?

[HRogge]

They lost planetoids when they sent the star up in Armegeddon Inheritnace you moron. Read the books. Some of them couldn't get away. They got destroyed. Or did you miss that?

Will get my 2. book back in two days... perhaps you can provide a quote for your "statement"...

[The Nomad]

Herm... gentlemen... did you forget that low-tech Cultureverse civs had a warp drive, apparently operating in realspace in CP ? And since they're no threat to the Culture I don't think a realspace FTL drive is going to be much of an advantage against Culture warships ...

And Orbitals are enhanced to resist to supernova level events by sheer structural resilience ( note that this doesn't apply to the inhabitable surface, according to LTW ).

Do hypermissiles enter hyperspace within the launching device, or do they need to travel some distance, then enter hyperspace ? In the second case they're fucked. Effectorize them

You don't need to hack the thinking parts of the planetoid eitherway, just hack the separate more classical components or fry them with the "blow" setting, paralyzing the planetoid, and penetrating any defence shield by using built-in shield disruptors or hyperspace wormhole .

[Stormbringer]

They lost planetoids when they sent the star up in Armegeddon Inheritnace you moron. Read the books. Some of them couldn't get away. They got destroyed. Or did you miss that?

Will get my 2. book back in two days... perhaps you can provide a quote for your "statement"...

If you have ony read one book why the hell are you debating in ignorance of the facts?

[FBHthelizardmage]

this is incredible one sided unless the culture ships a module.

really all the culture ship has to do is hide in hyper space and throw CCAM bombs.

also there's effectors even if they don't work on the planetiod's energy field computer (which they will) the culture ship can just flip the switch that activates the backup wire and cable computers.

finally since culture craft have FTL reflexes even if a hyper missile did get inside them they could both trap door it out or put a field round it to contain it before its explosion did any damage. [/url][/list][/list][/code][/quote][/u][/i][/b]

[consequences]

HRogge, you might want to consider the fact that Stormbringer is usually one of the Dahakverse's strongest supporters, and he is arguing against it.
In any case, analysis of capabilities of both sides:
4th Empire, 998,000 Planetoids built over a period of thousands of years, 5000 planets important enough to be mentione in the Emperor's official list of titles. A planetoid has been shown to suffer shield failure after probably 6-10 hits getting past the shields, which could have been anywhere from 10-100 gigatons in magnitude. max speed 3000C
Culture: One GSV built over a hundred thousand offensive units over a period of less than 40 years in absolute secrecy. One offensive unit is described as being able to "fuck a solar system." An effort to destroy one offensive unit involved "a thousand hidden devices of a dozen different types", and despite the fact that the target had zero warning, it was able to fire back before being destroyed, and that was just a module deployed by the unit, not the unit itself. Unknown total quantities of vessels, beyond "lots" Max speed, about 200,000C

[The Nomad]

There were an excess of 50 000 Murderer-class GOUs, and Quilan mentionned in Look to Windward that the Culture had many millions of vessels, and he surely wasn't aware of the "sleeping" OUs ( see Excession ), and it doesn't reflect the numbers of vessels which could be built in a full scale war.

And if the Empire has 5000 planets worth mentionning, about 14 000 Orbitals were lost during the Idiran-Culture war, and each Orbital is equivalent to 20 planets ( from A few notes about the Culture ). Do the math, technically the Culture was barely hampered in its expansion by the loss of 280 000 planets...

[Admiral Valdemar]

There is no telling what The Interesting Times Gang had up their sleeve either.

[HRogge]

If you have ony read one book why the hell are you debating in ignorance of the facts?

Ever heared that some people borrow books to friends ? No ?

[HRogge]

HRogge, you might want to consider the fact that Stormbringer is usually one of the Dahakverse's strongest supporters, and he is arguing against it.

In any case, analysis of capabilities of both sides:
4th Empire, 998,000 Planetoids built over a period of thousands of years, 5000 planets important enough to be mentione in the Emperor's official list of titles. A planetoid has been shown to suffer shield failure after probably 6-10 hits getting past the shields, which could have been anywhere from 10-100 gigatons in magnitude. max speed 3000C

The Empire have built hundreds of billions ( 100+ * 1E9 ) crafts.

Culture: One GSV built over a hundred thousand offensive units over a period of less than 40 years in absolute secrecy. One offensive unit is described as being able to "fuck a solar system." An effort to destroy one offensive unit involved "a thousand hidden devices of a dozen different types", and despite the fact that the target had zero warning, it was able to fire back before being destroyed, and that was just a module deployed by the unit, not the unit itself. Unknown total quantities of vessels, beyond "lots" Max speed, about 200,000C

A single grav-warhead can fuck with a solar system too.

[HRogge]

this is incredible one sided unless the culture ships a module.

really all the culture ship has to do is hide in hyper space and throw CCAM bombs.

And the Planetoid could hide in hyperspace or use the enchanach drive and just stop long enough to throw a few hypermissiles... both would not hit the other side, so the combat is a draw...

also there's effectors even if they don't work on the planetiod's energy field computer (which they will) the culture ship can just flip the switch that activates the backup wire and cable computers.

finally since culture craft have FTL reflexes even if a hyper missile did get inside them they could both trap door it out or put a field round it to contain it before its explosion did any damage.

For the last time, where do you get the idea that there are electrical backup systems in a planetoid ? The 4th Imperium used crystaline cabled an molecular computers, the 4th Empire ( and the 5th Imperium ) used forcefield computers and old ( thousands of years old ) 4th Imperium tech as a backup. No electrical computer at all.

Hypermissiles detonate fast enough to prevent being destroyed materializing inside a planets core. This is nearly instantly too, and maybe too fast for a Culture weapon to hit it. It depends on the sum of the reaction speed of the sensor system, the speed of the Mind AND the reaction time of the weapon system.

[The Nomad]

For the last time, where do you get the idea that there are electrical backup systems in a planetoid ? The 4th Imperium used crystaline cabled an molecular computers, the 4th Empire ( and the 5th Imperium ) used forcefield computers and old ( thousands of years old ) 4th Imperium tech as a backup. No electrical computer at all.

It doesn't need to be electrical, just nucleonic or optical, or even force field - shield disruptors and "blow" settings, you know ? ( have you read Consider Phlebas or Use of Weapons ? )

Hypermissiles detonate fast enough to prevent being destroyed materializing inside a planets core. This is nearly instantly too, and maybe too fast for a Culture weapon to hit it. It depends on the sum of the reaction speed of the sensor system, the speed of the Mind AND the reaction time of the weapon system.

Nothing indicates that trapdoor shields have a need for sensors, or reaction times at all. It's like a knight hanging up his shield. Once the trapdoor is deactivated, the vessel is defenseless against such attacks unless it hides in hyperspace, and it can "strafe" - can a planetoid strafe by other means that the Enchanach drive ? Because Cultureverse has realspace FTL too ( warp drive, can reach speeds beyond kilo-c ) , and it doens't prevent the Culture from blasting such ships into oblivion. Enchanach drive -> useless, apparently. Have you an order of magnitude for the detonation speed of hypermissiles, except "its damn fast" ? Picosecond, femtosecond ?

[XaLEv]

And the Planetoid could hide in hyperspace or use the enchanach drive and just stop long enough to throw a few hypermissiles... both would not hit the other side, so the combat is a draw...

The only way the Planetoid is going to become invulnerable is going into hyper. It will be a sitting duck under Enchanach drive. Let's say it's an Asgerd, moving at 850 c. That's barely 250 meters per nanosecond. An Asgerd is 4000 km in diameter. It would take it sixteen microseconds to travel it's own width. In Excession, the ROU Killing Time fought an entire battle against hundreds of opponents in eleven microseconds.

For the last time, where do you get the idea that there are electrical backup systems in a planetoid ? The 4th Imperium used crystaline cabled an molecular computers, the 4th Empire ( and the 5th Imperium ) used forcefield computers and old ( thousands of years old ) 4th Imperium tech as a backup. No electrical computer at all.

It need not be electrical, merely electromagnetic.

Hypermissiles detonate fast enough to prevent being destroyed materializing inside a planets core. This is nearly instantly too, and maybe too fast for a Culture weapon to hit it. It depends on the sum of the reaction speed of the sensor system, the speed of the Mind AND the reaction time of the weapon system.

A Displace can be completed in a few nanoseconds. That is enough time for an EM radiation blast to travel all of about a meter.

[Stormbringer]

If you have ony read one book why the hell are you debating in ignorance of the facts?

Ever heared that some people borrow books to friends ? No ?

If you don't have the facts don't fucking debate you dumb ass!

[Stormbringer]

HRogge, you might want to consider the fact that Stormbringer is usually one of the Dahakverse's strongest supporters, and he is arguing against it.

In any case, analysis of capabilities of both sides:
4th Empire, 998,000 Planetoids built over a period of thousands of years, 5000 planets important enough to be mentione in the Emperor's official list of titles. A planetoid has been shown to suffer shield failure after probably 6-10 hits getting past the shields, which could have been anywhere from 10-100 gigatons in magnitude. max speed 3000C

The Empire have built hundreds of billions ( 100+ * 1E9 ) crafts.

But only 998,000 planetoids. A planetoid is the only thing that stands even a remote chance of threatening the Culture. So really what do a all those fighters, destroyers, and battleships matter?

Culture: One GSV built over a hundred thousand offensive units over a period of less than 40 years in absolute secrecy. One offensive unit is described as being able to "fuck a solar system." An effort to destroy one offensive unit involved "a thousand hidden devices of a dozen different types", and despite the fact that the target had zero warning, it was able to fire back before being destroyed, and that was just a module deployed by the unit, not the unit itself. Unknown total quantities of vessels, beyond "lots" Max speed, about 200,000C

A single grav-warhead can fuck with a solar system too.

If they survive long enough to fire one it will fuck up a solar system. The problem is they can't do that from hyperspace and in real space they're horribly vulnerable.

And if they some how succeed the Imperium will be annihilated so really what's the point except to piss of the Culture?


There's a reason you don't fuck with the Culture.

[Stormbringer]

this is incredible one sided unless the culture ships a module.

really all the culture ship has to do is hide in hyper space and throw CCAM bombs.

And the Planetoid could hide in hyperspace or use the enchanach drive and just stop long enough to throw a few hypermissiles... both would not hit the other side, so the combat is a draw...

The time it takes to fire the missles is certianly long enough for the Culture ships to nail them. The cycle time of the E-drive might be too short but that doesn't mean they can fire a missle in that time.

also there's effectors even if they don't work on the planetiod's energy field computer (which they will) the culture ship can just flip the switch that activates the backup wire and cable computers.

finally since culture craft have FTL reflexes even if a hyper missile did get inside them they could both trap door it out or put a field round it to contain it before its explosion did any damage.

For the last time, where do you get the idea that there are electrical backup systems in a planetoid ? The 4th Imperium used crystaline cabled an molecular computers, the 4th Empire ( and the 5th Imperium ) used forcefield computers and old ( thousands of years old ) 4th Imperium tech as a backup. No electrical computer at all.

You're right about that but the Culture should be able to mess with them anyways. They can manipulate forcefeilds easily.

Hypermissiles detonate fast enough to prevent being destroyed materializing inside a planets core. This is nearly instantly too, and maybe too fast for a Culture weapon to hit it. It depends on the sum of the reaction speed of the sensor system, the speed of the Mind AND the reaction time of the weapon system.

In other words, that missle isn't getting through. A hypermissle and it's baby brother the warp grenade don't detonate instantly. It's an appreciable fraction of a second.

[consequences]

When exactly have we seen a hypermissile detonating in a planet's core, anyway? All of the impacts noted on earth's surface during the Siege were surface detonations.

[Stormbringer]

When exactly have we seen a hypermissile detonating in a planet's core, anyway? All of the impacts noted on earth's surface during the Siege were surface detonations.

Iapetus (sp?). And even then it was inside it not necessarily the planets core.

[HRogge]

If you don't have the facts don't fucking debate you dumb ass!

If you cannot read you should not shout like a troll... ( just got the book back from my friend )

QUOTE from "The Armageddon Inheritance" Page 277 and 278:

"Executing, Your Majesty," Dahak said once more, and the Enchanach Drives of eight Imperial planetoids roared to life. In one terrible, perfectly synchronized instant, eight gravity wells, each more massive than Zeta Trianguli's own, erupted barely six light-minutes from the star."

Fact: eight ships were used... and they were SIX lightminutes away from the star ( Earth is 8.5 lightminutes away from the sun for example )

"A twelve of greater twelves of Sorkar's ships disappeared, torn apart and scattered over the universe, as the impossible happened. For an instant his mind was totally blank, and then he realized.
He was dead, and every one of his nestlings with him.
Had it been intended from the outset that the nestkillers should suicide ? Destroy themselves with some inconceivably powerful version of the warheads which had ravaged his ships ?"

Fact: The Achuultani commander thinkt ALL enemy ships have destroyed themselves, especially the one NEAR his fleet.

"He heared Battle Comp using his voice, ordering his fleet to turn and flee, but he paid it no heed. They were too deep into the gravity well; at their best speed, even the outher sphere would need a quarter-day segment to reach the hyper threshhold."

No real useful informations for us.

"His FTL scanners watched the tidal wave of gravitonic stress reach Zeta Trianguli Australis, watched the star bulge and blossom hideously.
He bowed his head and switched off his vision panel."

Fact: The nova happenend definitely later than the activation of the Enchanach drives.

"The sun went nova.
Dahak and his surviving companions fled its death throes at seven hundred times the speed of light, and Colin watched through fold-space scanners in sick fascination. Dahak had filtered the display's fury, but even so it hurt his eyes. Yet he could not look away as a terrible wave of radiation lashed the Achuultani... and upon its heels came the physical front of destruction. But those ships were already lifeless, shields less than useless against the ferocity of a sun's death.
The nova spewed them forth as a few more atoms of finely divided matter on the fire of it's breath."

Fact: Oh, surprise... the Achuultani commander was WRONG ! Dahak and the other planetoids survived ( at least the one that survived the combat with the Achuultani ).

Conclusion: The planetoids which made the star go nova had more than SIX minutes to escape the radiation of the star. There is not a single line that says something about planetoids being destroyed by the sun, except from the Achuultani commander which does think ALL have been destroyed because he doesn't know the abilities of the Enchanach drive.

Either you only remembered the first part of the text or you have lied to me ( I think it's the first one )...

I will be waiting for you to apologize.

[Stormbringer]

Those ships six minutes out were the interdictor force not the ships that actually made the star go nova. Or did that fact escape you?

And did you miss the fact that it took a while (in real space) for them to make the star go nova?

[Stormbringer]

And do you really think the Imperium would stand any sort of chance if the Culture retalitated by destroying Imperium systems?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The time it takes to fire the missles is certianly long enough for the Culture ships to nail them. The cycle time of the E-drive might be too short but that doesn't mean they can fire a missle in that time.

It's an unknown quantity. Since hypermissiles are FTL weapons, you could maybe fire them on a pre-planned trajectory (since course changes at Enchanach would require the same level of calculation as preparing for a launch in the dwell time), if they have the speed to clear the tube in the dwell time. That might be possible if you initiate launch beforehand.

A weapons launch in Enchanach of hypermissiles, based on Imperium computer capacity, would be theoretically possible - but it would have to be carefully pre-planned, like an airstrike or firing artillery in WWI - and we've never seen one so it's just idle speculation and I don't propose to seriously debate that they could do it.