nBSG Cylons vs 40K Space Marines (Non-Chaos)

[Batman]

It's a pity then that they NEVER use it on WEDGELESS targets. Whenever they go up against space stations, forts, or even warships 'at anchor', they use...laser heads. When the KE of the missile ALONE (nevermind the wedge) should give them MASSIVELY more damage potential than the actual warhead does. Even in situations where they DON'T have to worry about the thing being blown to bits by point defense before it hits. Mistletoe? If the wedges are oh so deadly why did they even BOTHER with the warheads?

Their space station forts actually have either 360 degree spherical sidewalls or low-grade wedges. The only time we see ships attacking non-military space stations is The Honor of the Queen, and it's the Masadans doing it to Grayson asteroid mining facilities using their shit space navy which still uses chemical reaction drive missiles.

I must have imagined the wrecking of the Basilisk orbital infrastructure in 'Echoes Of Honor' then. Or the attack on Lovat in 'At All Costs'. The wrecking of Zansibar's infrastructure. TWICE. Or numerous OTHER attacks on a system's INDUSTRIAL infrastructure, what with a war going on and all. Oh, and when Therenkov attacked Monica in 'Shadows of Saganami'.

As for attacking warships at anchor, either the construction facilities have some sidewalls or they are using stand-off weaponry out of fear that the ships might be able to get their wedge up by impact.

Where are their shipyards EVER said to have sidewalls? NTM that that would be quite a challenge for the freefloating Grayson-style construction or something like Hephaistos which keeps growing. The ONLY stationary space installation to explicitely have sidewalls are the forts...yet EVERYTHING is attacked with either laser heads or contact nukes.
And given it takes minutes to bring your wedge up WITH impellers on standby and about half an hour from a cold start vs MAYBE a second's flight time saved by using a laser head...

The only time I can remember a shipyard really getting blown the hell up, it was scuttled by the RMN, not destroyed by enemy fire, in War of Honor. Is there another shipyard I'm forgetting?

Not that shipyards are ever mentioned to have sidewalls but I was talking about powered-down starships parked in orbit and there are actually several destroyed during the war (again, Lovat comes to mind, as does Monica). It just usually happens off-page and is only referenced.

The wedge's distortion is a volumetric effect: the area contained within the wedges is affected, not just areas directly covered, and wedges extend for kilometers past covering the volume of the ship in question.

So? Kill the missile's wedge 10000 kilometres out. Boom-no more wedge interference to worry about. Still GT and up of kinetic energy vs what was it? <15 MT for a Mk 16?

[Batman]

The wedge's distortion is a volumetric effect: the area contained within the wedges is affected, not just areas directly covered, and wedges extend for kilometers past covering the volume of the ship in question.

Then how come pod combatants can toss missile pods out the stern of their own wedge without having them ripped to shreds by the wedge?

If missile pods can drift out through the back of the wedge, relativistic kill vehicles can come in through the back of the wedge.

Nevermind missile pods, the ONLY concern for small craft traffic to and from a ship with its wedge up is NOT to bring up their own until they're a safe distance away. As long as they stay on thrusters until they clear the wedge they are perfectly fine.

I DO think he's talking about wedge interference between the missile and the target ship. As I said, no biggie. Kill the wedge a couple 1000 kilometres out. Given the missile speeds and relative lack of maneuverability involved the target is not getting out of the way between the missile going ballistic and time of impact, and besides, missiles DO have thrusters so it's not like they're TOTALLY ballistic without their wedge.

[remus2]

Nice stats.
Now do some calculations.

Come on, whats's the matter? Afraid of numbers?
You have the volume and the mass of the damn thing - a high-school kid can do it.
If you don't remeber the formulas, look them up.

And do what? I am no shipwright, nor am I a ballistics expert to deduce armor resistance nor structural integrity-for those even they would need, I suppose, detailed schematics and the chemical composition and properties(if unknown materials) of many if not all major parts.
Sure it has the density of water, but any spacefaring ship will be in the same range, if not smaller; maybe some more dense but they would be The exceptions.

Can you at least provide some similar half-useless stats for atleast a Warhammer combat vessel, so I can run them in a my very faulty way for my very personal comparison please?
Thank you very much

Nonsensical statement is nonsensical,
Join the Tautology club today. Free gifts will be free.

I am an honorary member as far as I remember. If you have any gifts I am very pleased.
-The thing with the logic is that most sci-fy/ fantasy settings have some faulty (mostly very) assumptions inherited in them, and characters therefore must abide by them. Sould you be in such a in-universce observer, you should also abide by them. That is at least how I see it-

[Serafina]

Can you at least provide some similar half-useless stats for atleast a Warhammer combat vessel, so I can run them in a my very faulty way for my very personal comparison please?
Thank you very much

Various extensive analyses of Warhammer 40K.

[Terralthra]

The wedge's distortion is a volumetric effect: the area contained within the wedges is affected, not just areas directly covered, and wedges extend for kilometers past covering the volume of the ship in question.

Then how come pod combatants can toss missile pods out the stern of their own wedge without having them ripped to shreds by the wedge?

If missile pods can drift out through the back of the wedge, relativistic kill vehicles can come in through the back of the wedge.

In order: missiles pods can be ejected out the rear of the SDs' wedges because they have no wedge of their own. The volumetric effect is destructive wedge interference. Worth noting that ships under dreadnaught-size couldn't tow pods inside the wedge to begin with, so there's a lower limit on the size of ship that can safely eject pods out the stern aspect.

And sure, an RKV could come in the front/back aspects of a wedge, but that's a really hard shot. Most of the time, these combatants are not facing their fore/after aspects anywhere close to towards each other. More often, they are strafing in space, facing their broadsides across their base course (which can typically be measured in tenths of c) with fore and after aspects faced to the side, with the formation arranged so that ships tend to have their sterns and bows in a plane.

Now, with the wedge up, you have to aim your RKV (with wedge active) way off to one side of the engagement envelope (necessarily increasing their point defense time to engage), then have them turn back towards the target at a shallow enough angle to miss the sidewall/wedge of the target but steep enough to actually hit the ship inside it (sure to be an extremely narrow window, with the wedge:ship sizes given). Now, as you approach the enemy ship, which by now might have yawed slightly or accelerated a bit toward or away from you, you have to adjust your course on final as best you can (missiles are obviously homing-smart, but they aren't anywhere near as good as even on-board battle computers; if they were, Apollo would be a worthless development), and then shut down your wedge before you get too close to the target's (and its cohorts') wedges to blow yourself up through wedge interference. Now you're on ballistic, and have to hope the target hasn't noticed you (point defense on a ballistic target has excellent performance, stated and shown several times), and doesn't maneuvre again before you impact.

The alternative to this is to tell your bomb-pumped laser head to aim near the bow/stern aspect and explode as soon as it is abeam of the enemy ship, hopefully getting some lasers into the enemy when it does.

Even if you could make the former into a practical weapon, the advances in drives, guidance, and ECM would apply just as well to making stand-off weaponry even more deadly than it already is. Why bother with RKVs and the moderately impossible shot?

[Batman]

Who said anything about making the KKV their STANDARD weapon especially when we already KNOW sidewalls can shrug off ridiculous amounts of KE/momentum (ref The Honor Of The Queen), nevermind wedges? We're talking EFFECTIVELY (up the kilt/down the throat) or ACTUALLY (orbital installations, starships 'at anchor') unwedged/sidewalled targets here yet they NEVER DO IT. Nor do they use wedgekill in ANYTHING but interceptors even when wedge interference or point defenses are a nonissue.

[Terralthra]

Who said anything about making the KKV their STANDARD weapon especially when we already KNOW sidewalls can shrug off ridiculous amounts of KE/momentum (ref The Honor Of The Queen), nevermind wedges? We're talking EFFECTIVELY (up the kilt/down the throat) or ACTUALLY (orbital installations, starships 'at anchor') unwedged/sidewalled targets here yet they NEVER DO IT. Nor do they use wedgekill in ANYTHING but interceptors even when wedge interference or point defenses are a nonissue.

Changing the missile firing queue on the fly must be done 30-40 seconds ahead of when you expect to fire (cf. The Honor of the Queen, Fearless v. Thunder of God (Saladin)). Bomb-pumped laser heads are still effective when fired up the kilt or down the throat, whereas RKV are useless if not fired in such a manner. Even for an up-the-kilt/down-the-throat shot, RKVs are still less likely to hit, because they have 0 stand-off range and therefore must close a longer distance in the same time, against increasingly good point defense. Oh, and laser heads work equally well at all ranges up to max range, RKVs need a minimum range to come up to speed.

In short, you want to devote limited magazine space to a weapon with extremely niche usage (in fact, see below, half the usage you cite, we almost never ever see in the entire canon of Honorverse war). The times it would be combat-effective, the weapon they do use is still effective, and in situations where both is effective, the weapon they do use is more likely to work, if not as damaging in the case of a hit.

You keep bringing up this "orbital installation" and "starships at anchor thing." Can you point out for me when one of the modern space navies actually does any such thing? I can't recall a single instance of bombarding non-sidewall/wedge-capable targets between the modernized powers offhand. The closest is when Manticore blows up their own shipyard, using scuttling charges and contact nukes. Offhand, I'd say they used explosives to make sure there was less possibility of enemy salvage and reverse-engineering, since that's why they were nuking them in the first place. Actually, two instances, but the second is a bunch of LACs whose missile loads are tiny and spitballs. They carve up SDs at anchor with their spinal grasers instead.

In fact, the only times he's mentioned combat between orbitals and a fleet, Weber (through the characters) says simply that orbital stationary platforms automatically lose to a mobile force if those are all the combat units, because (paraphrasing) the enemy fleet can retreat to the outer system and send in c-fractional strikes that were impossible to defend against. Which pretty much sounds exactly like what you're talking about, except it hasn't ever come up. Weber also mentions orbital platforms over Masada using RKV strikes against Masadan resistance bases.

Also, Honor uses wedge-kill herself, in my example already cited. The reason it isn't used more often is that bigger ships tend to have lesser acceleration (consistently throughout the canon), despite having more powerful wedges. Accordingly, it's difficult to force wedge interference on a ship that won't just be able to run away faster than you could approach. The few times that guideline is broken...the smaller ship is blown clean out of the sky well outside of wedge-kill range, or surrenders.

So, what is your problem again? Point out a few battles in which RKVs would have been enough of an advantage to justify having to cart their worthless asses around for months beforehand instead of laser heads.

[Batman]

Who said anything about making the KKV their STANDARD weapon especially when we already KNOW sidewalls can shrug off ridiculous amounts of KE/momentum (ref The Honor Of The Queen), nevermind wedges? We're talking EFFECTIVELY (up the kilt/down the throat) or ACTUALLY (orbital installations, starships 'at anchor') unwedged/sidewalled targets here yet they NEVER DO IT. Nor do they use wedgekill in ANYTHING but interceptors even when wedge interference or point defenses are a nonissue.

Changing the missile firing queue on the fly must be done 30-40 seconds ahead of when you expect to fire (cf. The Honor of the Queen, Fearless v. Thunder of God (Saladin)).

And why would I have to DO that, pray tell? Reconfiguring a laser head missile (OR a contact nuke) to act as a wedge/kinetic kill missile is a simple REPROGRAMMING issue. Which is something they routinely do AFTER launch.

Bomb-pumped laser heads are still effective when fired up the kilt or down the throat, whereas RKV are useless if not fired in such a manner.

Given that EVERY missile they fire can be turned into an RKV/wedge killer by SIMPLY TELLING IT TO DISARM THE WARHEAD/KILL THE WEDGE, this is a problem why again?

Even for an up-the-kilt/down-the-throat shot, RKVs are still less likely to hit, because they have 0 stand-off range and therefore must close a longer distance in the same time, against increasingly good point defense.

The time in question being at worst a second and likely far less.

Oh, and laser heads work equally well at all ranges up to max range, RKVs need a minimum range to come up to speed.

So do laser heads. WITHOUT sufficient range to come up to speed they're easy picking for countermissiles and PD lasers.

In short, you want to devote limited magazine space to a weapon with extremely niche usage (in fact, see below, half the usage you cite, we almost never ever see in the entire canon of Honorverse war).

Would you kindly stop pretending we'd need to actually REPLACE any missiles with dedicated kinetic/wedge kill versions when ALL of them can be used that way with a bit of reprogramming?

The times it would be combat-effective, the weapon they do use is still effective, and in situations where both is effective, the weapon they do use is more likely to work, if not as damaging in the case of a hit.

IT'S THE SAME DAMNED WEAPON, only used differently. You want a wedge kill, disarm the warhead, you want a kinetic kill, switch off the wedge too. Either would (or allegedly would in case of the wedge) get you a lot more oomph out of the SAME DAMNED MISSILE.

You keep bringing up this "orbital installation" and "starships at anchor thing." Can you point out for me when one of the modern space navies actually does any such thing?

Do I need to repeat myself? Basilisk. Lovat. The ships that got raped by LACs in Ashes of Victory. Monica. Numerous offhand mentions of things that happened elsewhere.

I can't recall a single instance of bombarding non-sidewall/wedge-capable targets between the modernized powers offhand.

I ALREADY GAVE YOU A LIST.

In fact, the only times he's mentioned combat between orbitals and a fleet, Weber (through the characters) says simply that orbital stationary platforms automatically lose to a mobile force if those are all the combat units, because (paraphrasing) the enemy fleet can retreat to the outer system and send in c-fractional strikes that were impossible to defend against. Which pretty much sounds exactly like what you're talking about, except it hasn't ever come up.

EXACTLY. They NEVER EVER DO THAT even when they DO kill defenseless orbital installations. It's ALWAYS laser heads or nukes. NO KINETIC/WEDGE KILLS ANYWHERE.

Weber also mentions orbital platforms over Masada using RKV strikes against Masadan resistance bases.

So?

Also, Honor uses wedge-kill herself, in my example already cited. The reason it isn't used more often is that bigger ships tend to have lesser acceleration (consistently throughout the canon), despite having more powerful wedges. Accordingly, it's difficult to force wedge interference on a ship that won't just be able to run away faster than you could approach.

And this is relevant-how? Even a measly dispatch boat has a massively stronger wedge than any missile so the interference would kill the MISSILE, not the ship. We're talking about wedge kills on targets that don't HAVE one.

The few times that guideline is broken...the smaller ship is blown clean out of the sky well outside of wedge-kill range, or surrenders.

Which is irrelevant when they STILL don't use it on plenty of targets that don't HAVE a wedge.

So, what is your problem again? Point out a few battles in which RKVs would have been enough of an advantage to justify having to cart their worthless asses around for months beforehand instead of laser heads.

Every single one where they were up against wedgeless unsidewalled targets or could get up the kilt/down the throat shots on ships that did given that YOU CAN DO IT WITH THE MISSILES THEY CARRY ANYWAY.

[Terralthra]

Who said anything about making the KKV their STANDARD weapon especially when we already KNOW sidewalls can shrug off ridiculous amounts of KE/momentum (ref The Honor Of The Queen), nevermind wedges? We're talking EFFECTIVELY (up the kilt/down the throat) or ACTUALLY (orbital installations, starships 'at anchor') unwedged/sidewalled targets here yet they NEVER DO IT. Nor do they use wedgekill in ANYTHING but interceptors even when wedge interference or point defenses are a nonissue.

Changing the missile firing queue on the fly must be done 30-40 seconds ahead of when you expect to fire (cf. The Honor of the Queen, Fearless v. Thunder of God (Saladin)).

And why would I have to DO that, pray tell? Reconfiguring a laser head missile (OR a contact nuke) to act as a wedge/kinetic kill missile is a simple REPROGRAMMING issue. Which is something they routinely do AFTER launch.

Yeah, I can just imagine that one being passed down from the CIC. "Hey, gunny, skipper wants us to TURN OFF THE EXPLOSIONS. Says it will make the missiles better." This is ignoring the larger point I made, which is that doing so reduces the chance to hit in the first place, because it increases the engagement envelope for point defense during the time it has the best chance of a successful intercept.

The time in question being at worst a second and likely far less.

So? More time is more time.

You keep bringing up this "orbital installation" and "starships at anchor thing." Can you point out for me when one of the modern space navies actually does any such thing?

Do I need to repeat myself? Basilisk. Lovat. The ships that got raped by LACs in Ashes of Victory. Monica. Numerous offhand mentions of things that happened elsewhere.

I can't recall a single instance of bombarding non-sidewall/wedge-capable targets between the modernized powers offhand.

I ALREADY GAVE YOU A LIST.

Your list notably included a lot of not-described events. You have evidence that they didn't actually use the kinetic/wedge kill on that infrastructure? Other than that for most of them, energy weapons would be much less wasteful of materiel. The LAC attack in particular is damning, since the Shrikes have a big honking graser and six missiles that a real warship wouldn't even call a counter-missile. You think they should've turned off the graser and used their spitballs as KVs?

In fact, the only times he's mentioned combat between orbitals and a fleet, Weber (through the characters) says simply that orbital stationary platforms automatically lose to a mobile force if those are all the combat units, because (paraphrasing) the enemy fleet can retreat to the outer system and send in c-fractional strikes that were impossible to defend against. Which pretty much sounds exactly like what you're talking about, except it hasn't ever come up.

EXACTLY. They NEVER EVER DO THAT even when they DO kill defenseless orbital installations. It's ALWAYS laser heads or nukes. NO KINETIC/WEDGE KILLS ANYWHERE.

You think, based on off-page described events. It's never happened on-page, and when it happens off-page, you assume it's not done. For no reason besides having something to bitch at, as far as I can tell. At least, I don't remember Admiral White Haven saying "They trashed all the orbital infrastructure at Basilisk, and oh yeah, they used laser and nuke heads."

Weber also mentions orbital platforms over Masada using RKV strikes against Masadan resistance bases.

So?

Just pointing out that they do use kinetic strikes.

Also, Honor uses wedge-kill herself, in my example already cited. The reason it isn't used more often is that bigger ships tend to have lesser acceleration (consistently throughout the canon), despite having more powerful wedges. Accordingly, it's difficult to force wedge interference on a ship that won't just be able to run away faster than you could approach.

And this is relevant-how? Even a measly dispatch boat has a massively stronger wedge than any missile so the interference would kill the MISSILE, not the ship. We're talking about wedge kills on targets that don't HAVE one.

Which happens exceedingly rarely.

The few times that guideline is broken...the smaller ship is blown clean out of the sky well outside of wedge-kill range, or surrenders.

Which is irrelevant when they STILL don't use it on plenty of targets that don't HAVE a wedge.

So, what is your problem again? Point out a few battles in which RKVs would have been enough of an advantage to justify having to cart their worthless asses around for months beforehand instead of laser heads.

Every single one where they were up against wedgeless unsidewalled targets or could get up the kilt/down the throat shots on ships that did given that YOU CAN DO IT WITH THE MISSILES THEY CARRY ANYWAY.

When they have direct up the kilt and down the throat shots, they typically use those funny energy weapons that don't involve expending missiles and are also way faster.

[Batman]

Yeah, I can just imagine that one being passed down from the CIC. "Hey, gunny, skipper wants us to TURN OFF THE EXPLOSIONS. Says it will make the missiles better."

Which it WILL against targets that are unwedged/sidewalled and don't have much in the way of point defense.You know, like orbital warehouses, asteroid belt smelters and such. When EVERY SINGLE TIME they engage those targets or even THREATEN to engage those targets they do so with-either laser heads or contact nukes.

This is ignoring the larger point I made, which is that doing so reduces the chance to hit in the first place, because it increases the engagement envelope for point defense during the time it has the best chance of a successful intercept.

The time in question being at worst a second and likely far less.

So? More time is more time.

A negligible amount of time (they DO manage to land hits with contact nukes and before Apollo pod combat doctrine relied on saturation rather than precision anyway) and we're talking about several orders of magnitude MORE damage delivered. Fractions of a MT vs GT low end for CRUISER SIZE missiles. Yet they don't even TRY.

You keep bringing up this "orbital installation" and "starships at anchor thing." Can you point out for me when one of the modern space navies actually does any such thing?

Do I need to repeat myself? Basilisk. Lovat. The ships that got raped by LACs in Ashes of Victory. Monica. Numerous offhand mentions of things that happened elsewhere.

I can't recall a single instance of bombarding non-sidewall/wedge-capable targets between the modernized powers offhand.

I ALREADY GAVE YOU A LIST.

Your list notably included a lot of not-described events.

And a goodly number of described ones too.

You have evidence that they didn't actually use the kinetic/wedge kill on that infrastructure?

Since EVERY LAST DESCRIBED one didn't I'll worry about that when I see evidence for that.They use wedge kill in interceptor missiles and nowhere else. Even when the expect to get hits with contact nukes (Monica, anyone?)-they USE contact nukes when the wedge/KE impactor would give them massively more damage potential.

Other than that for most of them, energy weapons would be much less wasteful of materiel. The LAC attack in particular is damning, since the Shrikes have a big honking graser and six missiles that a real warship wouldn't even call a counter-missile. You think they should've turned off the graser and used their spitballs as KVs?

As they would have been massively more powerful than the grasers-yes? Especially as they DID exactly that? The Shrikes don't have six missiles, they have six LAUNCHERS. Are you sure you actually READ the series?

In fact, the only times he's mentioned combat between orbitals and a fleet, Weber (through the characters) says simply that orbital stationary platforms automatically lose to a mobile force if those are all the combat units, because (paraphrasing) the enemy fleet can retreat to the outer system and send in c-fractional strikes that were impossible to defend against. Which pretty much sounds exactly like what you're talking about, except it hasn't ever come up.

EXACTLY. They NEVER EVER DO THAT even when they DO kill defenseless orbital installations. It's ALWAYS laser heads or nukes. NO KINETIC/WEDGE KILLS ANYWHERE.

You think, based on off-page described events.

And EVERY TIME THEY DO, and YES there ARE several examples of it, they use laser heads or contact nukes.

It's never happened on-page

It HAS. REPEATELY. I gave you examples of it. REPEATEDLY.

and when it happens off-page, you assume it's not done. For no reason besides having something to bitch at, as far as I can tell.

That'd be the part where WHEN it happens on page, and they do so on several occasions, THEY DON'T DO IT. It's ALWAYS laser heads or contact nukes EVEN WHERE THE ERIDANI EDICT IS A NONISSUE.

At least, I don't remember Admiral White Haven saying "They trashed all the orbital infrastructure at Basilisk, and oh yeah, they used laser and nuke heads."

Give me the quote saying they used KK/wedgekill when every time they DO mention what they used (or threatened to use) it's laser heads/contact nukes.

Weber also mentions orbital platforms over Masada using RKV strikes against Masadan resistance bases.

So?

Just pointing out that they do use kinetic strikes.

So? They DON'T do in ship-to-something-else-in-space combat even when that would massive amp up their firepower.

Also, Honor uses wedge-kill herself, in my example already cited. The reason it isn't used more often is that bigger ships tend to have lesser acceleration (consistently throughout the canon), despite having more powerful wedges. Accordingly, it's difficult to force wedge interference on a ship that won't just be able to run away faster than you could approach.

And this is relevant-how? Even a measly dispatch boat has a massively stronger wedge than any missile so the interference would kill the MISSILE, not the ship. We're talking about wedge kills on targets that don't HAVE one.

Which happens exceedingly rarely.

Yeah. Nobody ever blows orbital or deep space infrastructure to smithereens at all.

The few times that guideline is broken...the smaller ship is blown clean out of the sky well outside of wedge-kill range, or surrenders.

Which is irrelevant when they STILL don't use it on plenty of targets that don't HAVE a wedge.

So, what is your problem again? Point out a few battles in which RKVs would have been enough of an advantage to justify having to cart their worthless asses around for months beforehand instead of laser heads.

Every single one where they were up against wedgeless unsidewalled targets or could get up the kilt/down the throat shots on ships that did given that YOU CAN DO IT WITH THE MISSILES THEY CARRY ANYWAY.

When they have direct up the kilt and down the throat shots, they typically use those funny energy weapons that don't involve expending missiles and are also way faster.

Yeah. Never any of that in missile combat. Oh wait. We got those as early as 'On Basilisk Station'. Getting an up the kilt/down the throat shot with missiles is something that ROUTINELY happens in the Honorverse.

[Terralthra]

I will need to get my copies of the series out of storage to quote various passages. Hold on for a couple days?

[Simon_Jester]

In order: missiles pods can be ejected out the rear of the SDs' wedges because they have no wedge of their own.

And if I kill my own missile's wedge, neither does it. Problem solved, see?

And sure, an RKV could come in the front/back aspects of a wedge, but that's a really hard shot. Most of the time, these combatants are not facing their fore/after aspects anywhere close to towards each other.

This is specifically intended as a tactic to be used when a missile has a clear approach path to the target's bow or stern aspect. Obviously, that will not always be true; it doesn't have to be. At long missile ranges, this turns each individual missile from a destroyer-killer (about the largest ship you can reasonably take down by hitting it with one capital ship-grade laser head from ahead or astern) into a dreadnought-killer (because nothing in the Honorverse can shrug off gigaton-range kinetic impacts).

But if the missile guidance computer has any brains at all, it should always be programmed to do this when it has an approach vector to the target that gives it a good chance of success. All it has to do is not detonate the warhead and just keep diving in for a ballistic kill. The fact remains that Honorverse missiles aren't programmed to do that. Remember that missiles do make down-the-throat or up-the-kilt shots; we see this as early as On Basilisk Station.

Why not? I don't know. But whatever the reason, it makes me very skeptical that they will suddenly pull kinetic-kill capability out of a hat fighting new opponents when they don't ever use it against each other.

Now you're on ballistic, and have to hope the target hasn't noticed you (point defense on a ballistic target has excellent performance, stated and shown several times)

The target has something on the order of a tenth of a second to react to your approach, compared to a point defense cyclic rate of roughly one shot per cluster per two seconds.

Realistically, of course, point defense will always prioritize missiles coming in on this approach vector over missiles that are "only" going to set off a laser head... because laser heads are pathetically ineffective compared to taking a direct kinetic impact from the missile bus. Also note that the missile doesn't need a warhead to do this: you can order ECM buses to do it too.

Yeah, I can just imagine that one being passed down from the CIC. "Hey, gunny, skipper wants us to TURN OFF THE EXPLOSIONS. Says it will make the missiles better."

If the gunny (or Terralthra) is too innumerate to do the math and realize the skipper is right, the gunny (or Terralthra) is too damn stupid to serve in this man's navy!

This is ignoring the larger point I made, which is that doing so reduces the chance to hit in the first place, because it increases the engagement envelope for point defense during the time it has the best chance of a successful intercept.

You're trading hit probability for vastly increased punch, though; that was your entire point earlier about how these missiles are so deadly as kinetic-kill weapons against 40k type ships. You're taking a missile that would annoy a superdreadnought and turning into one that can turn a superdreadnought into confetti.

As for the reduced hit probability/ Well, it's not like you could compensate for that with volume of fire, no sirree, not like they ever have that in the Honorverse... I mean really, who ever heard of firing a large number of missiles at once?

Seriously, I don't think you're thinking this through.

[Batman]

Update on military space installations and sidewalls: In 'A Short Victorious War ' Hancock Station (a fairly important repair if not construction facility) DOES have a bubble sidewall so while I STILL don't remember any of their ever-growing shipyards (leave alone the Grayson-style 'let's just float everything to some random convenient point in space and get going' 'yards') having such, I'm conceding that it is possible, and likely PROBABLE, that their MILITARY installations are thusly protected, making wedge or kinetic kills impossible (I'm not sure how that works for the wedge kills if the blasted things are oh so dangerous but I ALSO don't know how an impeller drive works to begin with so...).
Doesn't, once more, change the fact that they STILL don't use it on effectively/actually wedge/sidewall-less targets.

And while I'm going to stick around for the Honorverse tangent of this I'm perfectly happy to give Terralthra a few days to get his bearings.