SDN Worlds 4 Commentary Thread IV

[Kartr_Kana]

I guess what I'm trying to say is yeah you'd be a tough nut to take on in a head to head fleet battle with your preponderance of heavy heavy ships of the line. The fact that you've only colonized four systems also means any fleet going to attack those are going to face serious opposition. However any other systems within your four sectors are going to have almost no presence at all, meaning people can pretty much slip past your border patrols and set up shop. As long as they don't stray to close to the hyper routes between the hyper junctions they'll run a very low risk of detection. It would be easy enough to hide a fleet out there and then pounce on patrolling frigates and destroyers, baiting your main fleets from their moorings. Pin those ships down with just enough forces to keep them busy then drop the hammer on the system they came from. Or any of several other methods staging from within your own lightly patrolled sectors and baiting out your forces piecemeal then hitting a now undefended system.

Also one worries about the abilities of the crews on the line ships if they spend most of their time ported in a home system. Large number of defenses means low risk of attack people become complacent and readiness suffers, lots of opportunities to live it up on the planets in system just enjoying ones self also leads to degraded readiness. Honestly fleets need deployments to keep them somewhat ready and sectors need to be fairly well patrolled. Which is why the HCN has a larger number of medium range vessels working in close enough proximity to cover each other and the larger fleet units run patrols through their regions of space.

Often times the larger fleet elements will cover an area for a short period while a pair of smaller squadrons switch places, one coming off of R&R replacing one that's been on patrol for a number of months. Keeps everyone fresh after months of patrolling shoals or the sectors facing the Karlack while the heavy units shift around as the fleet commanders see fit to keep foreign intelligence agencies guessing as to where and when they'll be next.

[PeZook]

The MEH are still pissed at the Necrons for blowing the shit out of their remaining defenses and forcing the core systems to jump without the smaller systems or most of the fleet, so the similarities won't be appreciated. I'll write the prologue for The MEH this weekend.

Wait, what?

Your wiki entry makes no mention of necrons

[Chaotic Neutral]

As I said, I haven't written the prologue, and the wiki page just doesn't have enough detail yet. If you look, it does mention an interversal rift though. The rift and it's other end weren't static though, it flipped from one universe to the other, though the receiving end stayed more or less in place. Some days, The MEH got lucky, and it connected to an Alteran fleet that could be crushed like tissue paper and have it's stargates stolen to transfer energy for the interversal teleporter. Other days, an Ork WAAAAAGGGGHHHH! came through. The Necrons were only the straw that broke the camels back, so to speak, but that doesn't mean there isn't a grudge.

[Shroom Man 777]

More Crab Evil!

[Lonestar]

They don't have names like "blackshell" what the hell.

[PeZook]

They don't have names like "blackshell" what the hell.

Why? And where were you when I made the last six posts about one calling itself Red, huh?

[PeZook]

By the way, who's the Keeper Of The Map?

It could really use direction markers, since I keep getting confused over spinwards and antispinwards and shufflewards and dance dance revolutionwards...

[Lonestar]

Why? And where were you when I made the last six posts about one calling itself Red, huh?

AT WORK FUCKER

[Lonestar]

Wade looked down at the remains of the Great Warlord Hardir.

[PeZook]

Wade looked down at the remains of the Great Warlord Hardir.

Urm, these two (well, 12) guys came from a stone-age tribe. I thought you meant Amplitur didn't have names at all or something...but you're essentially complaining I didn't name a Neolithic hunter-gatherer "John"

[Shroom Man 777]

Ampliturs calling themselves Red and Blackshell are about as stupid as arrow-wielding bead-wearing feather-hat-donning humans calling themselves "Sitting Bull" and "Eagle Ass" or whatever.

[RogueIce]

By the way, who's the Keeper Of The Map?

It could really use direction markers, since I keep getting confused over spinwards and antispinwards and shufflewards and dance dance revolutionwards...

Just use North, East, South and West. And then enjoy the sweet, sweet tears of the hard sci-fi crowd. It's what I do.

[Shroom Man 777]

This must be my most realistic post yet. The only thing not realistic or not hard sci-fi about it was that it actually worked.

[Akhlut]

Wade looked down at the remains of the Great Warlord Hardir.

Urm, these two (well, 12) guys came from a stone-age tribe. I thought you meant Amplitur didn't have names at all or something...but you're essentially complaining I didn't name a Neolithic hunter-gatherer "John"

Especially since the only real differences between, say, a name like "Sitting Bull" or "Blackshell" and "Hardir" and "John" is time and tradition; in European languages, our names are just really old and traditional but come from old languages that means stuff like "Noble Wolf" or "Boar Courage" or something like that.

[Simon_Jester]

This must be my most realistic post yet. The only thing not realistic or not hard sci-fi about it was that it actually worked.

Did it really?

It wouldn't exactly be hard for the Amplitur to abandon its current minion, Mangy, and find a new one. Identifying the minion is only a lead on the target if the target gets sloppy. At which point they have nothing; just a random mang who will believe to his dying day that he bought batteries for his wife's vibrator or whatever.

Nay, I say! This problem will have to be solved by the power of SCIENCE!, not the power of beating the shit out of people. Beating the shit out of people comes after the application of SCIENCE! Not before.

[Darkevilme]

Beating the shit out of people comes after the application of SCIENCE! Not before.

I am shocked and dismayed that the Umerians have yet to master beating the shit out of people WITH the SCIENCE!

[Simon_Jester]

Beating the shit out of people comes after the application of SCIENCE! Not before.

I am shocked and dismayed that the Umerians have yet to master beating the shit out of people WITH the SCIENCE!

...How do you think our particle guns work?

But by the time the shit-beating begins, the real work of the SCIENCE! has already been done, you see.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I say evacuate the important people from the city, and then torch the city from space.

Thoguh I'm rather surprised that the Shepistanis have no technology to detect psychic activity.

[Shroom Man 777]

This must be my most realistic post yet. The only thing not realistic or not hard sci-fi about it was that it actually worked.

Did it really?

In that the suspect gave (somewhat) useful information, I mean.

[Simon_Jester]

I say evacuate the important people from the city, and then torch the city from space.

It's no longer clear which city he's in...

Thoguh I'm rather surprised that the Shepistanis have no technology to detect psychic activity.

They do- the PKEs. Arguably, part of the problem is that they have so many Blitzschlag Generators running all over the place that it jams their sensors: all they can detect at any real distance from the goddamn craboid is their own active anti-psi technology.

In that the suspect gave (somewhat) useful information, I mean.

But is it useful information? I would argue it is not, unless the Amplitur is stupid, which it is not!

[Shroom Man 777]

But it somewhat is. It leads them to Manngy, who is being mind-controlled. So the torture, in this case, worked out! As oppose to reality where torture is shit!

Also, PKEs won't find the Amplitur since it is using a null-field, which protects it from BFGs. Are the emissions of null fields even detectable?

[Steve]

The Amplitur would've been tracked down and caught in most other places by now... Unfortunately, the Sheps' anti-Esper paranoia has made them more susceptible to a clever psionic infiltration. Poetic justice!

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Just strap a damn psyker to a psychic amplifier and radar and have him find all the damn null zones.

Failing that, torch the planet.

[Simon_Jester]

EDIT: It's as if the Sheppoes with the PKE detectors are trying to concentrate on the CRAB BATTLE, while the random Blitzschlag fields are yelling OLIOLIOLIOOO! in the background...

But it somewhat is. It leads them to Manngy, who is being mind-controlled. So the torture, in this case, worked out! As oppose to reality where torture is shit!

By the time they find Manngy, the craboid will already have abandoned him.

Also, PKEs won't find the Amplitur since it is using a null-field, which protects it from BFGs. Are the emissions of null fields even detectable?

Not if they work the way I think they do.

Of course, if they work the way I think they do, there's another way to spot them...

[Force Lord]

Fire sale!

Who wants some Blitzes?