SD.Net World Redux Comment Thread VI

[PeZook]

Goddammit, Frank The Elephant was my idea!

Raj just wrote him when you let him run Shroomania for some time.

[Shroom Man 777]

Oh, right. Man, we're so awesome. Ryan must be totally jealous.

[CmdrWilkens]

Without trying to prempt Seige and Steve's writing here a bit of an idea of the timegframes wewoudl be dealing with:

Day 0, Mid-day: Shootdown occurs, Sidney and Garret escape into the hills with one bodygaurd sacrificing himself

Day 0,1-2 hours later: Notificaiton would make it to SD and Cascadian sources from their ground teams

Day 0, 3-4 hours: Coilerburg and assets in nearby territories would begin picking up increased police/military activity

Day 0: Evening: FTO nations would find out if San Dorado releases the infromation within channels.

Day 1 Morning: San Dorado press release about aid being accepted in the search for the Presidents.

Day 1 Mid-day: THIS would be about the earliest that any non-FTO nation could begin moving forces that aren't pre-positioned into place.

So in other words Baerne needs to slow his roll a bit (I can see a single Helo squadron if they get landing rights and an okay to refuel in Coilerburg) but only in terms of numbers. He certianly can get a small force in place by early in the first day, a full armored column would need permission from other naitons to operate and even then would take 18-24 hours toorganize from roughly late evening on Day 0. This means mid-day on Day 1 is abotu the earliest you could hope to have an armored column MOVING (and then it still has several hundred miles to cross with an average speed of advance in the 20-30mph range if you are lucky).

For everyone else early to mid-day on Day 1 when Baerne is getting his helos in place is about the earliest we could begin moving assets. Even a small strike team (which is easy to alert and get moving) woudl still take half a day to actually GET to the location so nobody on the non-FTO list should be able to mount an operation before early on Day 2.

[Steve]

Another thing to consider is that this shootdown occurred near the Sabikan-Coilerburger border, where the FTO maintains a troop presence under the terms of the San Magdalena Accords; probably close enough that the border guards were among the first to know of it. I believe the troops are Indhopali primarily, though there may be contingents from other FTO states.

Therefore their reaction would probably be underway very quickly.

[Ryan Thunder]

Shit. I just invaded Minoy. Not that it'd even get me much closer, anyways. Assume they're actually in Sabika, rather than Minoy.

Fine. I'll call off the OP. I've already posted it and there's been a response, so I'll call it a distraction for inserting a few teams of my specOps in the north. They'll be parachuting in from one of my tactical transports, which I believe has the range to make it there and back. If not in one go, then with refueling from an Echelon. One of my military freighters is nearby (no, really, I figured a 1% chance and well, yeah.) I'll use them as a launch pad for some heavy gunships and Longbows for support.

Say the message to the King or whatever didn't make it there until after his initial reaction to the land op. My forces will retreat to the boats and head home.

[RogueIce]

Without trying to prempt Seige and Steve's writing here a bit of an idea of the timegframes wewoudl be dealing with:

Day 0, Mid-day: Shootdown occurs, Sidney and Garret escape into the hills with one bodygaurd sacrificing himself

Day 0,1-2 hours later: Notificaiton would make it to SD and Cascadian sources from their ground teams

Day 0, 3-4 hours: Coilerburg and assets in nearby territories would begin picking up increased police/military activity

Day 0: Evening: FTO nations would find out if San Dorado releases the infromation within channels.

Day 1 Morning: San Dorado press release about aid being accepted in the search for the Presidents.

Day 1 Mid-day: THIS would be about the earliest that any non-FTO nation could begin moving forces that aren't pre-positioned into place.

So in other words Baerne needs to slow his roll a bit (I can see a single Helo squadron if they get landing rights and an okay to refuel in Coilerburg) but only in terms of numbers. He certianly can get a small force in place by early in the first day, a full armored column would need permission from other naitons to operate and even then would take 18-24 hours toorganize from roughly late evening on Day 0. This means mid-day on Day 1 is abotu the earliest you could hope to have an armored column MOVING (and then it still has several hundred miles to cross with an average speed of advance in the 20-30mph range if you are lucky).

For everyone else early to mid-day on Day 1 when Baerne is getting his helos in place is about the earliest we could begin moving assets. Even a small strike team (which is easy to alert and get moving) woudl still take half a day to actually GET to the location so nobody on the non-FTO list should be able to mount an operation before early on Day 2.

Another thing to consider is that this shootdown occurred near the Sabikan-Coilerburger border, where the FTO maintains a troop presence under the terms of the San Magdalena Accords; probably close enough that the border guards were among the first to know of it. I believe the troops are Indhopali primarily, though there may be contingents from other FTO states.

Therefore their reaction would probably be underway very quickly.

Allow me to add to the list of concerns for our growing cluster fuck...I mean, rescue operations.

There is, of course, the issue of coordination. Yes there is the FTO JNAC and San Dorado's Regional Command, but how are they set up for all of this? You've got an air cav unit here, a bunch of special ops there, a Crimson battalion over there, etc. That should be interesting, to say the least.

Your intentions are noble, but there is too much of a good thing, you know.

Plus, there is the issue of communications and all of that. Who has worked together before? Well the FTO has, although I don't know the extent of what they do. Then there's me, who has had a base and worked with the Vineyards for a very long time, and we've even started working with the rest of the FTO, though that is a relatively recent development. And then there's everybody else. Who probably have different radio procedures, different ways of doing things, that aren't at all familiar to our poor, rapidly going to be overworked FTO joint command people.

And of course there is the threat of blue-on-blue incidents. Probably not a concern with fast movers and helicopters, other than the airspace getting very crowded; since these bad guys probably don't have air support, I don't think the choppers and planes will be shooting at each other (hopefully). It's when you get on the ground that things get tricky. If you've got Crimsons, Indhopalis, Miratians, Baernes, etc all down there, what are the odds someone doesn't mistake another for the Bad Guys and start shooting. What are your recognition signals? What radio frequencies are you using? Are you going to have assigned areas or all be mingled about?

Finally, how is the Downed Party going to know you're the good guys and not just start shooting at you? Do you have recognition code words for them? If not, do you have any way to identify yourselves to the DP? How do you even know it's even the DP and that you're not going to be suckered by the Bad Guys?

These aren't things you just ignore and go charging in blindly, unless you want some screwups and possibly worse. And, of course, the more people in general you have blundering around out there, and even worse when they're multinational and just thrown together ad hoc like they are.

Hence, you know, why I only have one P-3 up at a time. They are at least somewhat familiar to the FTO, it's only one unit so it won't be too bad on the overload, and they're not wandering around in the jungle where someone could panic or get jittery and open fire. It should be fairly unobtrusive...assuming the air space doesn't get stupidly crowded, which from the looks of things it could.

[PeZook]

This is precisely the reason why I didn't load an extra paratrooper company and send them over in a strategic transport: it would do more harm than good at this point

[CmdrWilkens]

As an addendum I probably should have a MEU out in the Pacific that would be reasonably close but I'm not even going to do the percentage chance that its actually in range to begin action. Without that kind of support base myself (and really anybody who isn't FTO) is going to have a week long headache just getting permission to operate troops in country let alone the coordination nightmare. So yeah I decided that moral support is the best way to go as all I do have available is limited HUMINT/SIGNIT assets. I'm not about to tip that hand to anybody.


Total aside but IRGT the Caymans. Wilkonian prescence is down to less than a BN of troops. IRT police forces are also on the island 'helping' out (there were quite a few excessively drunken speeches, mysteriosu illnesses, and cars hitting low level political movers) but the island itself is now in the midst of trying to resolve its divided government. Phong and I leaned hard on the right wingers and got them to support the centrists outside of St Andrews Island, then we leaned on the centrists to remind them that our pockets are deeper than the psuedo-commies. So the vote put a pro-communist President in power but he is gonna be crippled by the fact that the center and right have a majority in Parliament and can basically block any move he makes. So, and I'm leaving this a bit up in the air, either the whole island stays centrist with a bit more money staying local (the price Wilkonia and the IRT are willing to pay to keep the commies from ruining the nice little game we play on the islands) OR the President overplays his hand and the next election shifts things back to the conservatives and centrists.

[Ryan Thunder]

Finally, how is the Downed Party going to know you're the good guys and not just start shooting at you? Do you have recognition code words for them? If not, do you have any way to identify yourselves to the DP? How do you even know it's even the DP and that you're not going to be suckered by the Bad Guys?

My guys will be marked by radio strobes and tracked by an overhead Echelon's ELINT systems. It also also tracks infrared signals. To minimize casualties, they will be approaching with stealth and attempting to temporarily subdue the VIPs and their bodyguards if they don't figure out who we are soon enough to avoid friendly fire. I'm putting 24 pairs of boots on the ground, so they shouldn't have too much trouble flanking and taking them. I can't think of any other way to do it, unfortunately, that doesn't involve needlessly wasting my men while their bodyguard guns them down with impunity.

We'll pay and apologize for damages and what not, should any be incurred.

Alternatively, we could try to cover for them without actually making direct contact until somebody more easily recognizable comes to rescue them.

[Shroom Man 777]

If it's any worth, we've commandeered FreeCom stratellite assets to aid inter-group communications.

[PeZook]

Frankly, Siege needlessly cleared everyone. There should be an overall FTO command in charge of the operation, and all assets contributed by people should be subject to them. The commander would only allow ground forces if necessary, in order to minimize the probability of a clusterfuck.

[Shroom Man 777]

What, no mention of the wretched faux pass?

[Siege]

There should be an overall FTO command in charge of the operation, and all assets contributed by people should be subject to them. The commander would only allow ground forces if necessary, in order to minimize the probability of a clusterfuck.

There is an overall FTO command in charge of the operation, or at least it's coordinating with the SDA's regional command. It even says so in my post on the matter- it's just that no-one chose to actually talk to it. We can simply assume that they actually have, and that the situation is therefore not nearly as preposterously chaotic as it looks.

And frankly although it's really heart-warming to see how much attention we're getting, it doesn't really matter how much assets you send, because Steve and I are going to write the story however we want to anyway .

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Worse come to worse, my Varangian Guards will just indulge in killing some rabble that just happened to "be in the way".

[Shroom Man 777]

Worse come to worse, my Varangian Guards will just indulge in killing some rabble that just happened to "be in the way".

Mushroom Marines do that all the time to "rowdy" protesters in San Dorado.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Worse come to worse, my Varangian Guards will just indulge in killing some rabble that just happened to "be in the way".

Mushroom Marines do that all the time to "rowdy" protesters in San Dorado.

We mow them down with Greek Fire.

[PeZook]

Well, I redid Beowulf's maths, and he's right. I will now have to re-estimate all lift capacity for every single rocket in FASTA's inventory

Incidentally, 60 tonnes to LEO is probably alot more than we actually need to replicate Apollo.

But, speaking concretely:

NOVA TERRA PHYSICAL

Basic
Circumference: ~24 000 kilometers
Radius: 3819.71 kilometers
Surface acceleration: 9.02 m/s^2 (0.92 G)
Orbital velocity for 200 km circular orbit: 6.02 km/s
Escape velocity: 8.515 km/s

What does this mean for spaceflight?

A Saturn V could carry 118 metric tonnes to LEO. In an environment where orbital velocity is so low, a bog-standard Saturn V would be able to carry about 180 tonnes to LEO.

That means a 52% payload increase over original Earth rockets.

I used this to estimate the new payload for a Saturn V, btw.

If I am correct, this would mean that FASTA can currently loft:

11K59: 16 tonnes to LEO
Lucrelance III: 52 tonnes to LEO

And projected:
Saturn I: 91,2 tonnes to LEO
Saturn/Energia: 183 tonnes to LEO
Energia/Vulkan: 380 fucking tonnes to LEO

===================================================

I'm either wrong, or this planet is awesome. Especially since it's way denser than Earth, which probably means a lot more uranium

P.S.

FASTA's Saturn is not Earth Saturn: it's basically an Energia core. The Energia configuration has four boosters, the Vulkan has as many as we can strap without exploding.

[Coyote]

Are we using the three moons, or the one moon + 2 asteroid-moons for our planet?

And what about the rest of the planets? In version 1 we had a whole new solar system plotte dout for exploration; are we re-using that or taking everything else (Mars, Pluto, Jupiter, etc) and dragging it in with us?

[PeZook]

This is up in the air ; We called two of the planets Mars and Venus, but they weren't precised.

BTW, the above figures are dirty estimates. They don't include the effect of lower gravity on Isp, for example.

[Siege]

65 tonnes?!

Sweet Lady the people at the Rocketfields will have a field day when they hear that .

[PeZook]

65 tonnes?!

Sweet Lady the people at the Rocketfields will have a field day when they hear that .

Quite franky, they should know that already

Don't get excited, though. Such awesome results are almost always wrong, so I'll double and triple check it all.

[Ryan Thunder]

If you're not opposed, I'd like to launch a Land Battlecruiser into orbit for that 65-tonne test. They weigh in at around 60 tonnes or so anyway.

I'll subsidize the launch if you do it.

[PeZook]

If you're not opposed, I'd like to launch a Land Battlecruiser into orbit for that 65-tonne test. They weigh in at around 60 tonnes or so anyway.

I'll subsidize the launch if you do it.

Uh...no

I'd prefer to do actual technical tests rather than the equivalent of drunken frat-boy pranks with bigger firecrackers

[Beowulf]

Well, I redid Beowulf's maths, and he's right. I will now have to re-estimate all lift capacity for every single rocket in FASTA's inventory

Incidentally, 60 tonnes to LEO is probably alot more than we actually need to replicate Apollo.

But, speaking concretely:

NOVA TERRA PHYSICAL

Basic
Circumference: ~26 000 kilometers
Radius: 4138.02 kilometers
Surface acceleration: 8.49 m/s^2 (0.92 G)
Orbital velocity for 200 km circular orbit: 6.07 km/s
Escape velocity: 8.58 km/s

Differences:
I came up with a radius of ~3850 km, as opposed to ~4140 km. Circumference is about 24000 kilometers.
Surface acceleration is 9.02 m/s^s (in what universe is 9.81 * .92 = 8.49?)
You still need to compensate for gravity losses et al with your required delta-V. It amounts to an extra ~1-1.5 km/s.

Isp is Isp. The actual exhaust velocity won't change, just the values quoted in game will (to reflect the lower gravity we use as the value of g).

[PeZook]

Yeah, I just caught those. I'm retarded

EDIT: Calc post updated. Yeah, the figures are roughly what Beo cited earlier. Errors were mostly caused by my epic multiplication fail.

Still, this gives us a lot of leeway anyway.