SDN Worlds 4 Commentary Thread II

[PeZook]

There's also the problem of physically fitting the landers in a given amount of airspace: command and control could allow you to squeeze a little (well, okay, VASTLY) more than our primitive tech allows, but you can't run the landers bumper-to-bumper, since then a gust of wind wipes out your entire invasion force

So that doctrine puts a strict limit on the amount of forces you can deploy in a given area, because with too many troops, even having enough landers on hand to do the evac doesn't guarantee a lift out in 30 minutes because of space-gridlock

[Steve]

So, Shep, just what is your plan for evading detection on a 20 sector trip (22 if you aren't able to enter anyone's space on the way), which is your only hope for this expedition to work?

Oh, and "Project: Puppy" is awesome.

[Siege]

And do you have at least 60% lift capacity for every single Marine unit? If yes, that's...a lot of resources pumped into landers.

Well, sure. Lucky for me we didn't need to declare, or waste points, on the number of landers (or for that matter troopships) we wanted.

In fairness, of course, a lot of these problems probably are not totally insurmontable for 'low level' operations. I think it's only really gets more problematic the larger scale your operations go. A single-city landing may not be too bad; a full planetary-scale invasion, on the other hand, would be rather taxing on your '30 Minute Evac' doctrine.

A full planetary-scale invasion also calls for a fleet to match. Not that the Sovereignty has ever launched such an invasion to being with, so the question of whether the doctrine holds up under those kinds of circumstances is a stupid one to begin with. The only places the USMC is conceivably going to invade in the near future are Wild Space crapholes with mediocre-at-best defenses, so what would I need such a huge army for to begin with?

A fair enough point, though it helps to point these things out. Plus, there should be some limits to what one can do. I mean, in a Player vs Siege War (if such should happen) the Player might feel a little cheesed if they plan a space counterattack on some Sovereignty invasion but Siege can just lift 'em all out with minimal losses in 30 minutes.

This is a doctrine. Whether it actually holds up under all circumstances is another thing: landers can be shot down (as, it bears pointing out, I've already demonstrated), resulting in stranded forces planetside. Christ, it's not like I'm declaring a "my troops have an invincible pull-back-in-30-minutes" insta-win option here. Cut me some fucking slack.

And honestly, nobody made a peep when it's 10,000p warships, planet-cracker bombs or frickin' Titans being declared, but when a guy toys with faster than average troop redeployment it's suddenly an outrage? Maybe I'm the only one who thinks this is a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about, but I sure as hell think it's a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about.

[PeZook]

I wouldn't describe this discussion as "outrage". SDNW2 had outrages, this is idle chatter by comparison

[Siege]

Then chatter about something worth making a point over.

[Steve]

Aww, and I was getting my cheddar-flavored popcorn ready.

[Shroom Man 777]

If something poses so much resistance that an aerospace-borne force like the Sovereignty Marines can't infiltrate and exfiltrate readily due to the fact that enemy fire precludes them from doing so, or the enemy is so numerous or spread out that to do so would require a crapload of transit assets, then the Sovereignty can just have the Star Force bomb the place from orbit. If the daring do-gooder Marines can't cut it with all their 'hut-hut-hut', then the Sovereignty can always rely on Flash Stalin and the USS Murderous.

[Simon_Jester]

There's going to be a bit more on the whole Council of Technarchs thing, hopefully today. If Magister is reading this, note the bit where First Technarch O'Connell is going to be putting out diplomatic feelers at the state funeral for Jean-Baptiste. He'll be doing so tastefully, obviously, probably approaching officials more than the Emperor directly, at first; his line of approach will revolve around "viewing with alarm" the Prussian threat.

And do you have at least 60% lift capacity for every single Marine unit? If yes, that's...a lot of resources pumped into landers.

Well, sure. Lucky for me we didn't need to declare, or waste points, on the number of landers (or for that matter troopships) we wanted.

Honestly, since this also gives your troops superb ground mobility for things other than evacuation, I'd argue that "has enough landers to go anywhere in thirty minutes" should be part of their kit multiplier. That's how I'd spin it if I were in your position.

A full planetary-scale invasion also calls for a fleet to match. Not that the Sovereignty has ever launched such an invasion to being with, so the question of whether the doctrine holds up under those kinds of circumstances is a stupid one to begin with. The only places the USMC is conceivably going to invade in the near future are Wild Space crapholes with mediocre-at-best defenses, so what would I need such a huge army for to begin with?

Ah. This doctrine works way better against Third Galaxy opponents, so yeah. That makes a lot of sense.

And honestly, nobody made a peep when it's 10,000p warships, planet-cracker bombs or frickin' Titans being declared, but when a guy toys with faster than average troop redeployment it's suddenly an outrage? Maybe I'm the only one who thinks this is a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about, but I sure as hell think it's a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about.

It's a common problem. Posit insanely powerful technologies in an SF setting and people just smile and nod. But when the implications of those technologies are used to do something the audience just can't imagine being able to do... people freak.

You're running up against people who are far more comfortable imagining an army of 20th century troops in space with their spacecopters and spacetrucks... and an army like that wouldn't be able to meet the 30-minute doctrine. Hence the problem. They can imagine ludicrous giant tanks and planet-cracker bombs more easily.

[Siege]

Honestly, since this also gives your troops superb ground mobility for things other than evacuation, I'd argue that "has enough landers to go anywhere in thirty minutes" should be part of their kit multiplier. That's how I'd spin it if I were in your position.

Here's a question for you: why the hell would I, much less anybody else, care about whether or not landers are part of the kit multiplier or not? What kind of a fucking dumb thing to fret about is that? When two armies meet and for some idiot reason the owners can't be bothered to work out a solution between them we look at the point value they represent and multiply it by their kit stats, and then we know who the winner is. I could fight an army of atomic death robots with nothing but hippies wielding pointy sticks and if my kit/point combo is superior, then pointy sticks beat death rays. The clue buried in there? What's part of kit and what isn't doesn't at any point figure into anything. Y'all can go ahead and worry about something as utterly inane as how much 'tail' my ground forces have, or whatever other insane nonsense you (generic you, not Simon-you) can dream up for all I care, I'm not going to bother defending the way I write my forces any further than I've already done.

Posit insanely powerful technologies in an SF setting and people just smile and nod. But when the implications of those technologies are used to do something the audience just can't imagine being able to do... people freak.

Then people should have their imagination upgraded to something more closely resembling, you know, imagination. Their failure to imagine anything other than '1980s army in space' is not my problem, and I'm not about to make it that either.

[Simon_Jester]

Honestly, since this also gives your troops superb ground mobility for things other than evacuation, I'd argue that "has enough landers to go anywhere in thirty minutes" should be part of their kit multiplier. That's how I'd spin it if I were in your position.

Here's a question for you: why the hell would I, much less anybody else, care about whether or not landers are part of the kit multiplier or not? What kind of a fucking dumb thing to fret about is that?

The kind of thing that I spend five seconds thinking about, then don't worry about any more? I mean, it's not like I expend any real effort writing something like this. There's a difference between "talk" and "fret," you see.

But if you resent discussion of the subject that much, I should probably leave you alone just like I should leave Fin alone.

[PeZook]

And...here's my "something outrageous". Well, not very outrageous...just new

[Darkevilme]

And...here's my "something outrageous". Well, not very outrageous...just new

Isn't the Central alliance inactive at the present time though?
Something about Coyote's work cracking down on unauthorized internet use preventing them from posting...

[Simon_Jester]

How is this new? It's just the Collectors up to their usual hijinks... a long way from home.

But yeah, Coyote's pretty much inactive for now. That said, it would hardly be out of character for the Collectors to lurk around on the fringes of Central Alliance space, yoink a few captives, and then run away before the Alliance fleet could do anything about it. That's pretty much how they normally operate in the Koprulu Sector.

[PeZook]

Isn't the Central alliance inactive at the present time though?
Something about Coyote's work cracking down on unauthorized internet use preventing them from posting...

A bit, yes. I'm not expecting this to move very fast.

[RogueIce]

And honestly, nobody made a peep when it's 10,000p warships, planet-cracker bombs or frickin' Titans being declared, but when a guy toys with faster than average troop redeployment it's suddenly an outrage? Maybe I'm the only one who thinks this is a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about, but I sure as hell think it's a preposterously dumb thing to nitpick about.

It's a common problem. Posit insanely powerful technologies in an SF setting and people just smile and nod. But when the implications of those technologies are used to do something the audience just can't imagine being able to do... people freak.

You're running up against people who are far more comfortable imagining an army of 20th century troops in space with their spacecopters and spacetrucks... and an army like that wouldn't be able to meet the 30-minute doctrine. Hence the problem. They can imagine ludicrous giant tanks and planet-cracker bombs more easily.

I'll go out on a limb and say that perhaps some of it is that landers and such are "free" whereas 10,000pt warships and Titans weren't. You could pay for those outlandish things at the cost of potentially putting too many eggs in one basket. With landers and the the other aspects of your "tail" you could just pull it all out of your ass.

I'm not saying Siege would abuse this mechanic; he's a better player than that. Still, I think it's worthwhile to discuss things like these as they pop up. For one, it can help people who just see an idea and go "I like that!"* think it through a bit and maybe help them write a better post (plus, if they do something too outlandish Steve may have to step in and weild Modnir; hopefully a discussion about this topic can prevent that being necessary). Siege may not intend to use it on a planetary scale, but somebody else might. Being aware of the potential difficulties and pitfalls ahead of time is a good thing, I'd think.

Plus, it distracts me from my abysmal writing pace and lack of ideas on where to take my plotlines...

And Siege, buddy, you know we're not ganging up on you. You just brought it up and made us think about it (so yes, it's all your fault ). Just like Force Lord was the first to use a stealth/cloaked ship in an 'active scenario' and had us discussing that.

*As for the "I like it!" people, well, I fear for them. I remember early SDNW2 foreign military procurement went like this:

P1: "I'm looking for XYZ equipment."
P2: "I have this for sale."
P1: "SOLD!"
(those who weren't logged on at that moment in time): "God damn it..."

Which went on until it was pointed out that such was a really bad way to go about things. So yeah, I do worry about people seeing an idea and then running with it before fully thinking it through.

[Simon_Jester]

Hey, Steve:

Is there any problem with my saying that some time a few decades ago, my people sent a scientific expedition to study a supernova in a fairly distant region of space, say a few dozen sector-widths off the map, far enough away that it wouldn't cause any long-term problems for SDNW4 civilization?

This wouldn't be any kind of colony expedition, just some scientists with a boatload of sensor equipment to check out what's going on and maybe get some sweet pics of a newly formed black hole. Things like that.

[Shroom Man 777]

The immediate prelude to Bragulan-Byzantine diplomatic negotiations has been posted!

EDIT:

The vast majority of weapons on Jenova are centuries-old derelict Imperium and Bragulan weapons. Obsolete stuff presumably not mentioned in the OOB because they're practically fossilized.

[Simon_Jester]

Fossilized, eh?

[Digs up Spud missile in ancient rock strata]

Fascinating.

That's one way to handle the superheavy problem: build nukes that are superheavier.

[Lord_Of_Change 9]

I'm going away tomorrow; will be back on Sunday.

[Steve]

Hey, Steve:

Is there any problem with my saying that some time a few decades ago, my people sent a scientific expedition to study a supernova in a fairly distant region of space, say a few dozen sector-widths off the map, far enough away that it wouldn't cause any long-term problems for SDNW4 civilization?

This wouldn't be any kind of colony expedition, just some scientists with a boatload of sensor equipment to check out what's going on and maybe get some sweet pics of a newly formed black hole. Things like that.

Oh, go ahead.

[DarthShady]

The immediate prelude to Bragulan-Byzantine diplomatic negotiations has been posted!

Can't wait to see the negotiations themselves.

[Simon_Jester]

Another Council of Technarchs piece up. Dr. Susie gets a few more scribbles... and the Umerian policy with respect to the extremely remote Emissaries of XylyX gets a one-line summary.

[Siege]

But if you resent discussion of the subject that much, I should probably leave you alone just like I should leave Fin alone.

Siege hates pointlessly burdensome time-wasting ruleset quantifications with a bloody vengeance; film at 11. I mean, I've only railed against this very thing, oh, three games in a row or so...

[Simon_Jester]

Yes, Siege, I remember it well from my days in SDNW2 and SDNW3.

But yes, I was aware of the problem; I just didn't quite appreciate that saying "fold the high mobility into the kit multiplier" would count as pressing that particular button for you. In future, I will be more careful to avoid saying anything along those lines.

[RogueIce]

Hey, Steve:

Is there any problem with my saying that some time a few decades ago, my people sent a scientific expedition to study a supernova in a fairly distant region of space, say a few dozen sector-widths off the map, far enough away that it wouldn't cause any long-term problems for SDNW4 civilization?

This wouldn't be any kind of colony expedition, just some scientists with a boatload of sensor equipment to check out what's going on and maybe get some sweet pics of a newly formed black hole. Things like that.

Oh, go ahead.

Since you're in an agreeable mood, can I borrow that blackhole generator for a couple days? There's a certain out-of-the-way planet that needs to disappear.