Manticorian Alliance vs UFP/Klingon/Romulan Alliance

[Stormbringer]

The Manticorian Alliance as of the end of Ashes of Victoy versus UFP/Klingon/Romulan Alliance as of the end of Deep Space Nine.

Both sides are connected via a wormhole; the manty end is the seventh terminus and the trek end replaces the Bajoran wormhole. Boths drives work as usual under wormhole transit. There is no tonnage limit on the wormhole.

Neither side has to worry about enemies in their own universe.

It's a fight to the death; the victor and the dead. Who wins?

[MagicHateBall]

I don't remember many of the details of the Manties' tech, but I do remember that missiles had a range that trekkies could only *dream* of and that their firepower was pretty damn good too, comparatively.
Not to mention the invunerable drive wedges.

[willburns84]

The Manticorian Alliance as of the end of Ashes of Victoy versus UFP/Klingon/Romulan Alliance as of the end of Deep Space Nine.

Both sides are connected via a wormhole; the manty end is the seventh terminus and the trek end replaces the Bajoran wormhole. Boths drives work as usual under wormhole transit. There is no tonnage limit on the wormhole.

Neither side has to worry about enemies in their own universe.

It's a fight to the death; the victor and the dead. Who wins?

Ummm, what is the Manticorian Alliance?

[MagicHateBall]

A group of nations, the foremost being the Kingdom of Manticore, in David Weber's Honor Harrington universe.

[willburns84]

Ah.
Questions.
1) Are they militaristic?
2) Are they expansionistic?
3) Do any of these allied nations/kingdoms/whatever resemble even in passing any present day countries, etc or those from history?
4) Their space fleets, rely on fighter craft more than capital ships, or vice versa or a good blend of the two?
5) Do any of them have any retarded members - similar to say the Federation?

etc?

[MagicHateBall]

1) Quite. They've been engaged in a long war with The Republic of Haven, another large interstellar nation, and there's nothing like a war to crank up military expenditure and recruitment.
2) Don't remember (it's been more than a year since I read the novels, and some details have slipped).
3) Yes. The Republic of Haven politically resembles France, just before and during the French Revolution, while the Kingdom of Manticore strongly resembles Britain -- Parlimentary system, nobility, royalty with not much political power but sway over the hearts and minds of the people, and such.
4) Their fleets strongly depend on capital ships, with more traditional fighter-type craft being relegated to system patrol duties due to not being able to fit armament with enough punch to make it worth the expenditure, but in more recent books, the fighter-carrier system is being introduced after successful combat trials.
5) There's retarded PEOPLE... but no retarded member nations as such.

[Stormbringer]

1) Are they militaristic?

They're havily armed if that what you mean. They don't go around looking for fights bu for the purposes of this debate it will be a fight.

2) Are they expansionistic?

A few factions within are, but they are not expansionist. Most are still relatively new colonies (last five-six centuries at most) and don't have the kind of population pressure that would force expansion for the sake of elbow room. Some want to expand for economic reasons but they're a minority.

3) Do any of these allied nations/kingdoms/whatever resemble even in passing any present day countries, etc or those from history?

The whole thing is basically the Napoleonic Wars in space. Manitcore is Great Britian (and it's very much resembles 19trh century england), Haven is France. Grayson (a key Alliance member) is a mormon-ish america type country. There are of course influences from both world wars and some jus plain made up stuff. The stories themselves are a kind of Horatio Hornblower in space; the resemblance is intentional.

4) Their space fleets, rely on fighter craft more than capital ships, or vice versa or a good blend of the two?

Strickly warships. Ships of the Wall (superdreadnoughts, Dreadnoughts) are the top of the food chain; they can slaughter any lesser ships with ease. Massive numbers of smaller capital ships can take them but it rarely happens. Next are non-wall capital ships (Battleships, Battlecruiser), again they can destroy anyhing smaller. The Manticorian Alliance don't have battleships; they'retoo small for the wall, good only for raiding or system security. Next are the light warships (Heavy and Light Cruisers, Destoyers, Frigates). These are used primarily for scouting, escort of the wall, and anti-piracy duties. Frigates are genrally considered obsolete by 1st and 2nd rate navies though the third world equivalents still keep them for commerce raiding. The requirements for a worthwhile warship mean fighters are impractical. They have a rough analogue of a WW1 torpedo boat, the LAC (Light Attack Craft). They have to be ferried system to system by carriers (dreadnought -> superdreadnought size) but aren't really fighters. Manticorian LAC are light years ahead of anyone else as of AoV. They can take out anything short of a Ship the Wall in battle and a ship of the wall if it's suprised.

5) Do any of them have any retarded members - similar to say the Federation?

Nope, although some of the politicians on both sides are real dumb fuckers. But they don't really do much aside from annoy our conquering hero.


As far as weapons, their energy weapons are the X-ray laser and the graser (a gamma ray laser), ship of the wall grade batteries have a 400,000 km range against a target with sidewalls, double that for a targetithout. There is also the energy torpedo, a .99c ball of plasma, and the grav lance, a weapon designed to burn through sidewalls. They aren't used outside of a few experiments, e-trps it can't penetrate sidewalls and grav lance have short ranges(100,000 km) compared to the usual combat range. Their missles are bomb pumped laser, the missile flies out, when it's in range it detonates a nuclear weapon producing a pin cushion of megaton x-ray lasers. The latest have a range of one AU or so.

A ships defenses come in three layers. The outer most are the wedge and side/bow/stern walls. The wedge is effectively an impentrable black hole; a ship has one plane above and below it. These are the primary drive sysytem. The walls are defensive versions of the wedge, less powerful though. A ships generates two sidewalls to port and starboard. Newer ships can generate a bow- or sternwall. They can't generate both a bow and sternwall at thesame time and generating one kills acceleration. Inside that are some pretty hefty shield, standard weapons however blow threwthese with ease, they are primarily to protect the crew during normal operations. Last is armor, it's meant more to limit damage than preven it entirely.

As for accel, ships of the wall make about 420g's. Escort mae up 510 or so. LACs pull just short of 600.

Do yourself a favor and check out the books. Excellent reads.

This has been a public service message from the Cult of Weber. If you wish to join let me know and just put it in your sig.

[consequences]

don't forget the missiles with a range measurable in light-minutes with a 25,000 km standoff attack range.
Their only real limitation is a lack of tactical ftl, which star trek ships will use to close the distance, even if they can not warp strafe.
By the way, a better candidate psychologically would be the Andermani, or the Republic of Haven during War of Honor, the next book.

[Lusankya]

By the way, a better candidate psychologically would be the Andermani, or the Republic of Haven during War of Honor, the next book.

I agree. Manties aren't expansionist, and any alliance that includes the Feds would just be too anal to do anything except dick around with scouting missions.

As an aside, with what army would the UFP/Klingon/Romulan alliance take the manticore planets?
Look at the various assets
UFP: diddly-squat
Klingons: ferocious warriors, except they always drop their ranged weapons in preference of melee weapons.
Romulans: buggered if I know. Does anyone else?

Manties: Highly trained marines corps (who are trained for various climates). Projectile guns (ones that can't be ruined by isobaric radiation, or whatever it is that ruins phasers.) They don't have transporters, but really, that's no big loss, unless you want to board a federation ship.

[willburns84]

::reads the various replies::

Holy crap. 400,000 km to 800,000 km range for main batteries (depending on target)?! Gah!

[Stormbringer]

Holy crap. 400,000 km to 800,000 km range for main batteries (depending on target)?! Gah!

And that's nothing compared to the range for missles. And keep in mind honorvers are only a little less powerful than the guns for the same class of ships.

[HRogge]

::reads the various replies::

Holy crap. 400,000 km to 800,000 km range for main batteries (depending on target)?! Gah!

Wait until you see a ghostrider missile.

X-Ray Laser warhead or Fusion warhead ( 25-50 megatons ), range 56 MILLION km with constant acceleration.

[Sokar]

Lets not forget the Harrington and Medusa-class pod SD's Also, missile salvos tend to number into the thousands of missiles, usually a mix of live ammo, jammers and decoys. ST ships would have to wade through a wall of incoming fire , and if they dart in under warp they then enter into energy range

Treks only advantage is their rapid sub-light acceleration, Honor-verse ships accelerate relativly slowly(as compared to ST ships)

[Ender]

sorry for the bump

Something everyone here has missed is the ST tech. All their weapons have a physical part to them. Phasers are particle beam weapons, and torps are torps. They couldn't even darken the paint on the ships!

[Howedar]

Their missles are bomb pumped laser, the missile flies out, when it's in range it detonates a nuclear weapon producing a pin cushion of megaton x-ray lasers

This implies laser power at least into the hundred megaton range, if each missile fires probably dozens of megaton-equivilent lasers. Are there any harder numbers on the power of wallship lasers?

[starfury]

don't forget the missiles with a range measurable in light-minutes with a 25,000 km standoff attack range.
Their only real limitation is a lack of tactical ftl, which star trek ships will use to close the distance, even if they can not warp strafe.
By the way, a better candidate psychologically would be the Andermani, or the Republic of Haven during War of Honor, the next book.

Stormbringer Posted: Fri Jul 26, 2002 9:40 pm Post subject:

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quote:
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1) Are they militaristic?
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They're havily armed if that what you mean. They don't go around looking for fights bu for the purposes of this debate it will be a fight.


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quote:
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2) Are they expansionistic?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



A few factions within are, but they are not expansionist. Most are still relatively new colonies (last five-six centuries at most) and don't have the kind of population pressure that would force expansion for the sake of elbow room. Some want to expand for economic reasons but they're a minority.


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quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3) Do any of these allied nations/kingdoms/whatever resemble even in passing any present day countries, etc or those from history?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



The whole thing is basically the Napoleonic Wars in space. Manitcore is Great Britian (and it's very much resembles 19trh century england), Haven is France. Grayson (a key Alliance member) is a mormon-ish america type country. There are of course influences from both world wars and some jus plain made up stuff. The stories themselves are a kind of Horatio Hornblower in space; the resemblance is intentional.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4) Their space fleets, rely on fighter craft more than capital ships, or vice versa or a good blend of the two?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Strickly warships. Ships of the Wall (superdreadnoughts, Dreadnoughts) are the top of the food chain; they can slaughter any lesser ships with ease. Massive numbers of smaller capital ships can take them but it rarely happens. Next are non-wall capital ships (Battleships, Battlecruiser), again they can destroy anyhing smaller. The Manticorian Alliance don't have battleships; they'retoo small for the wall, good only for raiding or system security. Next are the light warships (Heavy and Light Cruisers, Destoyers, Frigates). These are used primarily for scouting, escort of the wall, and anti-piracy duties. Frigates are genrally considered obsolete by 1st and 2nd rate navies though the third world equivalents still keep them for commerce raiding. The requirements for a worthwhile warship mean fighters are impractical. They have a rough analogue of a WW1 torpedo boat, the LAC (Light Attack Craft). They have to be ferried system to system by carriers (dreadnought -> superdreadnought size) but aren't really fighters. Manticorian LAC are light years ahead of anyone else as of AoV. They can take out anything short of a Ship the Wall in battle and a ship of the wall if it's suprised.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
5) Do any of them have any retarded members - similar to say the Federation?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Nope, although some of the politicians on both sides are real dumb fuckers. But they don't really do much aside from annoy our conquering hero.


As far as weapons, their energy weapons are the X-ray laser and the graser (a gamma ray laser), ship of the wall grade batteries have a 400,000 km range against a target with sidewalls, double that for a targetithout. There is also the energy torpedo, a .99c ball of plasma, and the grav lance, a weapon designed to burn through sidewalls. They aren't used outside of a few experiments, e-trps it can't penetrate sidewalls and grav lance have short ranges(100,000 km) compared to the usual combat range. Their missles are bomb pumped laser, the missile flies out, when it's in range it detonates a nuclear weapon producing a pin cushion of megaton x-ray lasers. The latest have a range of one AU or so.

A ships defenses come in three layers. The outer most are the wedge and side/bow/stern walls. The wedge is effectively an impentrable black hole; a ship has one plane above and below it. These are the primary drive sysytem. The walls are defensive versions of the wedge, less powerful though. A ships generates two sidewalls to port and starboard. Newer ships can generate a bow- or sternwall. They can't generate both a bow and sternwall at thesame time and generating one kills acceleration. Inside that are some pretty hefty shield, standard weapons however blow threwthese with ease, they are primarily to protect the crew during normal operations. Last is armor, it's meant more to limit damage than preven it entirely.

As for accel, ships of the wall make about 420g's. Escort mae up 510 or so. LACs pull just short of 600.

Do yourself a favor and check out the books. Excellent reads.

This has been a public service message from the Cult of Weber. If you wish to join let me know and just put it in your sig.

damm, it is like throwing a person into a storm of arrows for the ST forces, the Manticorans and their allies will rip the feddies/klingons/Romulans to shreds without even their paint job being scratched at best for the ST forces.

[consequences]

unfortunately, even in his essays Weber has yet to give us hard power figures for heavy energy weapons, simply saying they are "very destructive."

[HRogge]

unfortunately, even in his essays Weber has yet to give us hard power figures for heavy energy weapons, simply saying they are "very destructive."

Fusion bomb warheads are 25-50 megatons...
X-Ray warheads for missiles are worse than fusion bomb warheads.

Wallship grazers are worse than X-Ray warheads...

[Stormbringer]

Their only real limitation is a lack of tactical ftl, which star trek ships will use to close the distance, even if they can not warp strafe.

All that'll do is put you under the main guns quicker. And you DON'T want to be in energy range of a ship of the wall.

Are there any harder numbers on the power of wallship lasers?

No, not really. I've seen a few calculations that put the absolute low end at 60 megatons per shot for the smaller broadside batteries. The chase armament has heavier weapons do to the fact they mount less. That's the amount of damage done not taking into account sidewallls (which deflect the majority of energy even on a shot that goes through), shields, and armor.

Given that a single broadside from a Dreadnaught can "shatter a small moon". I'd say that calculation would be an extreme low end.

Fusion bomb warheads are 25-50 megatons...
X-Ray warheads for missiles are worse than fusion bomb warheads.

The standard warheads (for a HEavy Cruiser anyway) are 78 megatons not 25 megatons. Fearless used a pair of those on the Thunder of God in Honor of the Queen. Those were for a pair of stealth missile used to kill a YATCH. They were well below the level usually used on warships.

[HRogge]

The standard warheads (for a HEavy Cruiser anyway) are 78 megatons not 25 megatons. Fearless used a pair of those on the Thunder of God in Honor of the Queen. Those were for a pair of stealth missile used to kill a YATCH. They were well below the level usually used on warships.

Ups, didn't remembered THIS quote...

okay...

~ 100 Megatons for a dreadnough fusion bomb missile... maybe more.
XRay Missiles are nastier than fusion bombs...

grazers are much nastier than XRay missiles...

[Stormbringer]

grazers are much nastier than XRay missiles...

The guns of any ship have a much greater firepower than the missles for a ship the same class.

[consequences]

and all we know about energy torpedo yields is that 7 on a light cruiser can rapidly obliterate a superdreadnought

[Erinyes]

Trek ships have far lower (effective) ranges than Honorverse ships, and whilst individual weapons may (I stress may) have similar yields, Trek ships can't pump 'em out as fast. However, Honorverse ships have a horrible, horrible pitfall that could actually give this to the Trek side. Honorverse sensors are limited to light speed outside of systems containing special probes and buoys. Not only that, their primary method of passive detection is the signal given off by a ship's wedge. There's also a mass sensor, but it is lightspeed and can't be detect objects at long ranges. A good and patient Trek captain* in a large Trek ship (I'm talkin' Sovies and Neg'Vars here) could conceivably take out a Ship of the Wall. It would be fairly easy for a decent commander to use a Trek ship's superior STL acceleration and tactical FTL ability to make "down the throat" and "up the kilt" shots at Manty ships.

Honorverse point defense might have a difficult time dealing with Trek torpedoes, too. Honorverse missiles are rather large and use their own wedges for propulsion. Torpedoes, however, are small and use an impulse engine/warp sustainer. Though there wouldn't be as many of them to worry about, they'd be hellatough, if not nearly impossible, to hit.

[HRogge]

Trek ships have far lower (effective) ranges than Honorverse ships, and whilst individual weapons may (I stress may) have similar yields, Trek ships can't pump 'em out as fast. However, Honorverse ships have a horrible, horrible pitfall that could actually give this to the Trek side. Honorverse sensors are limited to light speed outside of systems containing special probes and buoys. Not only that, their primary method of passive detection is the signal given off by a ship's wedge. There's also a mass sensor, but it is lightspeed and can't be detect objects at long ranges. A good and patient Trek captain* in a large Trek ship (I'm talkin' Sovies and Neg'Vars here) could conceivably take out a Ship of the Wall. It would be fairly easy for a decent commander to use a Trek ship's superior STL acceleration and tactical FTL ability to make "down the throat" and "up the kilt" shots at Manty ships.

unfortunately ther will be a few problems.

1.) Manty ships can shoot front/aft too... combined with their higher range it might be a suicide mission for a treck ship to get there.
2.) the passive graviton sensors might detect ST artifical gravity, maybe even their shields ( they involve subspace AND gravity )
3.) Modern Manty ships have front/aft shields too...

Honorverse point defense might have a difficult time dealing with Trek torpedoes, too. Honorverse missiles are rather large and use their own wedges for propulsion. Torpedoes, however, are small and use an impulse engine/warp sustainer. Though there wouldn't be as many of them to worry about, they'd be hellatough, if not nearly impossible, to hit.

[consequences]

Honorverse missiles may be large, but they are capable of evasive manuevers, something we have never seen from photon torpedos. Also, a photons observed speed is pathetic compared to the terminal attack velocities achieved by Manticoran missiles.