Legend of Galactic Heroes vs. Honorverse

[Vympel]

EDIT: just going over the Battle of Vermilion, I noticed that battleships still fire beams forward from their port and starboard nacelles - from the same holes come the photon torpedo ripoffs - from the same ship (Sindur/Sindri). That's ... interesting. Looks like it wasn't "its a pilot" syndrome after all!

[takemeout_totheblack]

Also from the battle of Vermillion we see them tracking enemy movements at a distance of 84 lightseconds without any apparent lag.

[Connor MacLeod]

What are you questioning here? That they melted the ice period or that they placed the Hydrometal on the water because it's liquid? A possible explanation for the hydrometal on the water could be 1). to prevent it from freezing while the ships are resting in it and 2). provide stability for the ships resting in it.
Why are they resting their ships in it? I dunno, conserve fuel and try to stay out of sight? Also judging by the potential volume of the ships dispensing the hydrometal and the quickness with which it spread leads me to believe that the hydrometal laid down was just a thin sheet to stabilize the water more than anything.

That they melted the ice. If they detonated nukes close or on top of solid ice I'd expect to see some vapour, if not som eindication at least some of the water was still boiling. Not to mention half of the energy of the nuclear fireball will be dumped into the atmosphere (so however much energy goes into melting/evaporating the ice will also be in the atmosphere. If they go with airbursts, most of the energy will be in the air. Quite possibly we're talking at least some of said air turning to plasma, or localized firestorms at least.)

that's as good a theory as any. Looking at most LoGH ships, they appear to be one half engine, one third gun, and the rest goes to whatever else. It's not much of a stretch that weapons have their own power-plant so the main reactor can keep the ship moving/keep everyone alive.
I'm not sure, but I don't think there are any examples of the tried and true Sci-fi staple of 'divert power from X to Y' there's just 'shoot', and 'go that way', and 'shoot harder', and 'go that way faster'. Don't hold me to that though.

It will depend on the evidence. But if that's the case, then it could lead to other problems (what kinds of reactors, and keeping fuel onboard for them.) That won't neccesarily preclude insane yields, as we still have plenty of nuke based oddities.

Walking into the mine field of 'denser fuel' isotopes could solve the fuel storage problem you bring up, but raises the mass problem in turn (stoopid physics).

ultra-dense hydrogen has already been proposed, although there are (IIRC) stabilisty issues for that. Of course, if they have to keep hydrogen fuel under intense pressure that might explain one reason why ships might explode if the fuel tanks rupture.

There's always the slim possibility that their ships run on huge capacitors that use future magic to store absurd levels of energy for extended periods of time, (would explain why they a'splode so often too) Like a U-Boat, charge up the battery, go into battle, recharge, repeat. I don't have much to base this on other than the fact that they never seem to refer to onboard fuel supplies directly, just calling it 'energy' instead.

Possibly, but its unlikely they could store significantly more energy than the reactors pump out that way. I mean if the ycould, then you'd probably be better off speculating they have antimatter or some antimatter like material anyhow (it would come out to roughly the same thing.)

[Connor MacLeod]

Oh yeah, hydrometal is permeable to ships, but AFAIK its opaque, not transparent. This is why we can never see through to Iserlohn's core, it just reflects the surrounding starfield.

Good point. That means (oddly) there is another layer of.. something between the hydrometal and the base. Frankly you get into these interesting problems of how they keep the entire thing intact. It's like Shadow Deathcloud technology

I don't think it actually has water in it, I just think those ships are setting the hydro-metal down on top.

That's.. still interesting. That would tend to suggest hydrometal probably isn't very dense, else it would be displacing the water (unless they have some magic forcefield method ot keep it floating above the water...

Yeah - its just a guess of course.

Maybe. But like I just pointed out, one would expect atmosphere heating effects and general indications of steam and water vapour if you just detonated several large nukes nearby such large volumes of ice.

Part of the problem will be to scale the area involved. I suppose we could use those blocky ships as scaling benchmarks if we know how big they are. Just on a guess, depending on depth, its maybe high megaton/low gigaton, at least.

Weapons may not be tied to the power plants, depending on how you interpret the consistent quotes in the show that ships are running out / have run out of "energy and missiles" (i.e. clearly in the context of ammunition).

I suppose they might have dedicated reactors. Or that could mean the capacitors run dry (they may just require long periods of time to recharge them.) The thing is, if the reactors run out of fuel, then how do they run other systems (light, life support, computers, etc.) A third, separate power system? Possible, but then things are getting complicated.

One idea I had was that, since we know hydro-metal is great at absorbing explosives, setting down a hydro-metal foundation means that any artillery / missiles etc that land in the base perimeter will fail to do any great harm. Oh, and beam shots will bounce off too.

I find that a bit odd actually. When you detonate explosives in water, it actually enhances the effects of the blast, IIRC. Beam weapons - depends on the damage mechanism.

EDIT: just going over the Battle of Vermilion, I noticed that battleships still fire beams forward from their port and starboard nacelles - from the same holes come the photon torpedo ripoffs - from the same ship (Sindur/Sindri). That's ... interesting. Looks like it wasn't "its a pilot" syndrome after all!

I'll be surprised if that's the only exampel of stuff like that in the series. 100+ eps is alot of frame by frame analysis however, so its easy to miss stuff.

[Connor MacLeod]

As far as the FTL goes. Again, it depends on the context and circumstances.

[takemeout_totheblack]

That they melted the ice. If they detonated nukes close or on top of solid ice I'd expect to see some vapour, if not som eindication at least some of the water was still boiling. Not to mention half of the energy of the nuclear fireball will be dumped into the atmosphere (so however much energy goes into melting/evaporating the ice will also be in the atmosphere. If they go with airbursts, most of the energy will be in the air. Quite possibly we're talking at least some of said air turning to plasma, or localized firestorms at least.)

Is it possible that they were in some way directed? A shaped warhead of some kind?
Also, the visuals tell us that a significant portion of the ice was likely vaporized and dispersed since they launched missiles at what is said to be a polar glacier and then when we see them laying down the hydrometal we clearly see mountains and other formations next to the liquid water. Since it gave us a nice long look at the ice/snow covered area before the nuking*, we know that these formations were not clearly visible as such before.

It's also possible that they waited for the after affects of the nuking to wind down before depositing the hydro metal. As such conditions would not be something you'd want to land your starship in.


*note that we do not actually see the nuclear fireballs dissipate, rather we see them on a screen which is then turned off, making calculating their yield in that fashion impossible.

On the subject of weapons behaving strangely, in episode 53 the Beowulf fires some kind of weapon at Alliance Headquarters. It looks to be some kind of energy-ball weapon and it pretty well obliterates the military building along with a sizable chunk of the surrounding area, but without causing much in the way of splash damage to the the rest of the planet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igZnce_W ... re=related

it's at 9:01-9:15

Just what the hell is that thing?

[Vympel]

Yeah, I mentioned that unknown weapon to Connor some pages ago

Good point. That means (oddly) there is another layer of.. something between the hydrometal and the base. Frankly you get into these interesting problems of how they keep the entire thing intact. It's like Shadow Deathcloud technology

I could've sworn I mentioned it (I didn't, doi), but underneath the hydro metal there's a solid metal "outer wall" on which it rests. The attacks on Iserlohn we see appear to depend on exposing the outer wall so they can attack the fortress. Basically, Iserlohn is a hollow sphere upon which hydro-metal is set, with the fortress proper in the centre.

That's.. still interesting. That would tend to suggest hydrometal probably isn't very dense, else it would be displacing the water (unless they have some magic forcefield method ot keep it floating above the water...

Well there's that time when Geiersberg Fortress uses its mass to cause 'high tide' on Iserlohn, pulling the hydro-metal away from the far-side of the fortress (allowing the Muller Fleet to bombard the outer wall dirctly) ....

Maybe. But like I just pointed out, one would expect atmosphere heating effects and general indications of steam and water vapour if you just detonated several large nukes nearby such large volumes of ice.

Part of the problem will be to scale the area involved. I suppose we could use those blocky ships as scaling benchmarks if we know how big they are. Just on a guess, depending on depth, its maybe high megaton/low gigaton, at least.

Yeah. Unfortunately don't have any idea of how big those ships are. Also, given the nuke detonation is seen from orbit (and then it cuts to the briefing), by the time we see the ships moving down to lay hydro-metal, a lot of time could've passed.

I suppose they might have dedicated reactors. Or that could mean the capacitors run dry (they may just require long periods of time to recharge them.) The thing is, if the reactors run out of fuel, then how do they run other systems (light, life support, computers, etc.) A third, separate power system? Possible, but then things are getting complicated.

Well we know that the huge supply ships are responsible for refilling the ships with "energy" and missiles, explicitly.

I find that a bit odd actually. When you detonate explosives in water, it actually enhances the effects of the blast, IIRC. Beam weapons - depends on the damage mechanism.

True that. The narrator claims explosives are merely absorbed (we see though that sufficient firepower will disrupt the surface of the hydro-metal and cause damage to the outer wall if sustained long enough) and we see beam weapons bounce off a few times - however those same beam weapons, when the hydro-metal is disrupted, won't bounce. Its very hard to pin this stuff down by the qualities of anything we can compare it to.

I missed this:-

That's one option, but the thing is we don't always see them in the distance as pintpoints and there isn't always magnification. That's why I think it might be some sort of emissions much of the time. either it's visible (like when the engines fire) or the screens display it in a fashion discernable to the naked eye.

That's true. Its important to note that the explicit range being called out for engagements to begin is rare. So if those lights (which are often seen outside from any ship) are naked eye emissions of ships (maybe clusters of ships?) it may very well be the range is closer in those circumstances. LOGH engagements may begin at multi-light-second ranges a lot of the time, but they rarely if ever stay that way.

"Electric" (Which I assume they mean electromagnetic) wave interception could be jamming, or it could be some device that keeps them from radiating towards opposing ships (EG a form of stealth.)

They appear to be seperate from jamming. The relevant bits in the episode are (here and here. Yang also refers to dropping off recon satellites so they're not surprised again. Its worth noting that Imperial reconaissance ships basically look like giant telescopes with engines. On the other hand, Alliance recon ships are specially modified Spartanian fighters.

Well its kinda silly they'd rely JUST on axes either. Spears would be useful (you don't need as much room to swing but can be just as lethal) or knives. Hell, knives would be quite useful as thrown weapons (or javelins) if you're gonna contrive that. But air or gas compressed weapons are another option (Range doesn't matter there either.) Hell depending on how their magic forcefield tech goes (They seem to have gravity at least) they probably could use force fields to propel projectiles (I know no beams or heat/explosions/electricity, it would set off the zephyr particles as I recall.)

Oh, they don't just have axes, though they're the most commonly seen weapon. We also see knives, longswords and maybe halberds.

Well, that's going to cause some real problems with fusion powerplants and hundred/thousand gee multimegaton starships. Mass lightening is starting to look more attractive all the time.

it also says something about the attirtion rate. Ships cant be THAT fragile against hits, unless thy're shields are really just that good. Alternately, its a consequence of ranges closing ovevr time, and more shots starting to penetrate.

Although if that were the case you'd think they'd go for fewer, bigger weapons, at least in some dedicated starships. Sort of a Homeworld Ion cannon frigat.e I believe they do have guns that big.

I guess its a question of how much fuel / "energy" those supply ships carry. Re: the bigger weapons, they seem to be restricted to the flagships. Fahrenheit's personal ship Asgrim had one, and looking at Barbarossa (Kircheis ship) and Tristan might have had them as well. Wish I could read the damn fluff.

[Vympel]

Got my FFC10 in the mail yesterday. So awesome. Barbarossa (finally!), Shiva, Pergamon, and some standard FPA and GE ships (including Hermodr and Theodoricus).

Fuck Shiva has a lot of guns. *84* forward facing cannon.

[Connor MacLeod]

Is it possible that they were in some way directed? A shaped warhead of some kind?
Also, the visuals tell us that a significant portion of the ice was likely vaporized and dispersed since they launched missiles at what is said to be a polar glacier and then when we see them laying down the hydrometal we clearly see mountains and other formations next to the liquid water. Since it gave us a nice long look at the ice/snow covered area before the nuking*, we know that these formations were not clearly visible as such before.

By "shaped" I assume you mean "going in one direction, but still spread over a wide area?" I dont think that would be quite consistent with the fireball we saw. A directed warhead won't really create an omnidirectional explosion, it would be skewed depending on how its shaped (you can't direct 100% of it of course, but I'm still pretty sure it wouldn't look spherical.)

Moreover, they would have to have tremendously fine control over the distribution of the energy, enough that they can melt it but not boil any of it. If it were beam weapons, I could understand it, but why not the missiles? Which kind of begs the question why they bothered with 3 missiles, but not thousands of ships firing lower-yield beam weapons.

There are also other, more long term considerations. Is this a habitable planet? Then you don't want to be just setting off high megaton/low gigaton nuclear warheads. That will have some adverse affects on the enviroment, nevermind potentially higher yields.

In any case, you probably DON'T want nukes getting much into the gigaton range anyhow, since that would carry implications for weapons firepower in and of itself. This is all inter-connected.

It's also possible that they waited for the after affects of the nuking to wind down before depositing the hydro metal. As such conditions would not be something you'd want to land your starship in.

Perhaps, but you have to account for the fact that the fireball glow dissipates visibly during the conference being held - when Reinhard (I assume that's a shorter-haired Reinhard) is talking. You could probably fudge the fireball duration based on that, but you'd have to assume the rest of the event is not occuring at the same time as the conference, or something.

*note that we do not actually see the nuclear fireballs dissipate, rather we see them on a screen which is then turned off, making calculating their yield in that fashion impossible.

We see the glow fading off while Reinhard is talking here. It's pretty obvious unless we're talking about some sort of stasis-effect kicking in.

On the subject of weapons behaving strangely, in episode 53 the Beowulf fires some kind of weapon at Alliance Headquarters. It looks to be some kind of energy-ball weapon and it pretty well obliterates the military building along with a sizable chunk of the surrounding area, but without causing much in the way of splash damage to the the rest of the planet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igZnce_W ... re=related

it's at 9:01-9:15

Just what the hell is that thing?

No idea. It probably is described in the novels/fluff but we clearly don't have access to them (or if we do I haven't checked). Frame by frame it emerges from amidships although there is no obvious weapons port. It takes a few seconds to propogate and its a sphere of white light. It looks to have an omnidirectional blast effect but I dont think its quite a nuke. I didnt bother to quantify the damage but I'm betting its alot less than gigaton range (gigaton range anything in or on a habitable planet is always iffy for variable reasons) could be megaton range, which is not trivial or without its own dangers, but if its an energy weapon it may not be as efficient as a nuke, which is why it may lack some collateral effects.

Other possibilities exist, but I'd have ot have a better grasp of the universe to do more than guess, without inventing shit out of thin air.

[Connor MacLeod]

I could've sworn I mentioned it (I didn't, doi), but underneath the hydro metal there's a solid metal "outer wall" on which it rests. The attacks on Iserlohn we see appear to depend on exposing the outer wall so they can attack the fortress. Basically, Iserlohn is a hollow sphere upon which hydro-metal is set, with the fortress proper in the centre.

It has to be held in place somehow. Otherwise any sort of blast, impact, explosion, or whatever would disrupt the outer hydrometal covering. What's more it has to be some mechanism that allows it to be selectively permeable to matter.

There's really just alot of oddities about the station now and the hydrometal in particular. It''ll require far more in depth analysis than I can give it here. Assuming anything can be figured out.

Well there's that time when Geiersberg Fortress uses its mass to cause 'high tide' on Iserlohn, pulling the hydro-metal away from the far-side of the fortress (allowing the Muller Fleet to bombard the outer wall dirctly) ....

*sigh* Yet another oddity. That'll have to be filed away for later thought, since my mind is drawing a total blank. But if they can do that, you wonder why it's not a more common tactic...

Yeah. Unfortunately don't have any idea of how big those ships are. Also, given the nuke detonation is seen from orbit (and then it cuts to the briefing), by the time we see the ships moving down to lay hydro-metal, a lot of time could've passed.

I take it you mean "there is no fact file entry for that particular ship." Are they ever seen again? Are they parasite craft (EG does a bigger ship carry them) or do they travle under their own power.

I already mentioned the other issues about the nuke, including time, so I won't repeat that.

Well we know that the huge supply ships are responsible for refilling the ships with "energy" and missiles, explicitly.

That really doesn't help much by itself. It could mean they have to recharge the capacitors separately, or they have reactor fuel. Or maybe they have some ammo component they have to stock up on (the way TLs were supposed to run off on tibanna.) The thing about "energy" is ists so often misused in sci fi.

That's true. Its important to note that the explicit range being called out for engagements to begin is rare. So if those lights (which are often seen outside from any ship) are naked eye emissions of ships (maybe clusters of ships?) it may very well be the range is closer in those circumstances. LOGH engagements may begin at multi-light-second ranges a lot of the time, but they rarely if ever stay that way.

That may hold true if you don't incorporate the novels very heavily. I suspect more numbers are given there and that wouldn't work out here. You'd probably be better off just assuming the "viewscreen" idea you alluded to earlier (or at least that theri windows double as viewscreens and have magnitifcation/vision altering qualities.) Given the size of the ships noted, we're probably looking at thousands of km or less tops for a range at "edge of human vision" (an ISD would be a tiny speck at some thousands of km range, IIRC) If they're facing bow on (like they usually do) the range will shrink even further.

And in LOGH terms, thousands/hundreds of km is going to be "suicidally brutal knife fight range" (missiles and beams).

They appear to be seperate from jamming. The relevant bits in the episode are (here and here. Yang also refers to dropping off recon satellites so they're not surprised again. Its worth noting that Imperial reconaissance ships basically look like giant telescopes with engines. On the other hand, Alliance recon ships are specially modified Spartanian fighters.

Jamming as a capability can and probably would encompass multiple systems, depending on what sorts of emission sthe ships give off. And "electric" is hard to explain unless they're shooting off electrons (and how do you intercept them if they do? It probably isn't thrust or engine related - "intercepting" that would sort of defeat the purpose of engines.

Oh, they don't just have axes, though they're the most commonly seen weapon. We also see knives, longswords and maybe halberds.

Looks mostly like its all swinging weapons. Might make sense if they use strength-enhancing power armor (crossbows might make sense in that regard, if they aren't self-cocking as well.) but I'm not holding my breath. It's just as possible that they'be been fighting space battles for so long their ground combat capabilities have atrophied in some ways.

I guess its a question of how much fuel / "energy" those supply ships carry. Re: the bigger weapons, they seem to be restricted to the flagships. Fahrenheit's personal ship Asgrim had one, and looking at Barbarossa (Kircheis ship) and Tristan might have had them as well. Wish I could read the damn fluff.

I'm starting to get the impression weapons use is a purely artistic choice out of universe, which is why we have such a wacky setup. For example, unless the missiles/torpedoes are stupendously big yield, I'm hard pressed to think why they wouldn't be longer ranged (and more accurate) than beam weapons, especially given the salvo densities and accelerations/speeds they can apparently pull off.

I was browsing over the battles thread too, I noticed that some fighters/gunships get hit by beams. No perceptible thermal effects. Another peculiarity to consider (and possibly proof of "multiple types" of beam weapons.) One of which is funny because I'm sure you coudl actually see the pilot thrown some distance out of the fighter by the beam. He doesn't even look like he was pulverized, even though the fighter goes up like a bomb.

Edit: I also suddnely feel like rewatching/rereading Banner/Crest of the Stars.. I need to see if they've released any more english translated manga for that or anime

[takemeout_totheblack]

Moreover, they would have to have tremendously fine control over the distribution of the energy, enough that they can melt it but not boil any of it. If it were beam weapons, I could understand it, but why not the missiles? Which kind of begs the question why they bothered with 3 missiles, but not thousands of ships firing lower-yield beam weapons.

There are also other, more long term considerations. Is this a habitable planet? Then you don't want to be just setting off high megaton/low gigaton nuclear warheads. That will have some adverse affects on the enviroment, nevermind potentially higher yields.

I think you're assuming that they land their ships almost immediately (a few hours after the initial bombardment) when really it likely isn't the case. The whole situation is being explained in the briefing room and likely isn't actually happening in real time. Rather they talk about what they're going to do while the audience is shown the act for narrative reasons rather than a purely chronological interpretation. The fact that there is non-boiling liquid water at all seems to suggest that at least some time has passed and has allowed for cooling/condensation.

As an answer to your other question, no, this is not a surface habitable planet. It is a large moon of a gas giant. In fact, this planet was picked specifically because it was far away from the system's star in order to keep the incompetent old admiral from fucking up the battle. This moon is likely very cold (thus facilitating the condensation/cooling of the landing water) and appears to have a very rarified atmosphere, another factor to consider when looking at the explosions.

Also, thermonuclear and fusion warheads are banned from use on habitable planets by both sides as an after affect of World War III. So even if this was a habitable planet, the Imperials would not have used this method at all.

[Vympel]

It has to be held in place somehow. Otherwise any sort of blast, impact, explosion, or whatever would disrupt the outer hydrometal covering. What's more it has to be some mechanism that allows it to be selectively permeable to matter.

There's really just alot of oddities about the station now and the hydrometal in particular. It''ll require far more in depth analysis than I can give it here. Assuming anything can be figured out.

It may be the station's artificial gravity system that keeps it in place. In relation to the "high tide" thing I referred to, Iserlohn is eventually able to adjust its field to normalize the hydro-metal layer again.

*sigh* Yet another oddity. That'll have to be filed away for later thought, since my mind is drawing a total blank. But if they can do that, you wonder why it's not a more common tactic...

Fortresses with engines don't grow on trees (the battle was the first time engines had ever been fitted to a fortress, and Geiersberg is as far as we know the only fortress approaching Iserlohn in power the Empire had at the time)

I take it you mean "there is no fact file entry for that particular ship." Are they ever seen again? Are they parasite craft (EG does a bigger ship carry them) or do they travle under their own power.

Never seen again. They're exclusive to that once scene in the Gaiden, with no basis for comparison to anything else.

I already mentioned the other issues about the nuke, including time, so I won't repeat that.

That may hold true if you don't incorporate the novels very heavily. I suspect more numbers are given there and that wouldn't work out here. You'd probably be better off just assuming the "viewscreen" idea you alluded to earlier (or at least that theri windows double as viewscreens and have magnitifcation/vision altering qualities.) Given the size of the ships noted, we're probably looking at thousands of km or less tops for a range at "edge of human vision" (an ISD would be a tiny speck at some thousands of km range, IIRC) If they're facing bow on (like they usually do) the range will shrink even further.

And in LOGH terms, thousands/hundreds of km is going to be "suicidally brutal knife fight range" (missiles and beams).

Sure. Note none of the windows on the bridges aren't actually windows - the bridges are enclosed. A cool effect when a ship is damaged is that sections of the screen might fuck up, showing the wall behind or otherwise malfunctioning. I've not checked, but I'm pretty sure if you counted those twinkly lights, you wouldn't get anywhere near the count of ships that make up a given fleet, hence my speculating they represent clustered formations of ships (we know LOGH fleets take up various patterns - lines, crosses, etc).

Looks mostly like its all swinging weapons. Might make sense if they use strength-enhancing power armor (crossbows might make sense in that regard, if they aren't self-cocking as well.) but I'm not holding my breath. It's just as possible that they'be been fighting space battles for so long their ground combat capabilities have atrophied in some ways.

Even though their ground troops are wacky in that way (they still use guns a lot) I'm quite fond of their AFVs. One of the Gaiden goes through the features of one of them, it looks sensibly designed and has a lot of cool features. Their firepower is pretty decent too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErpdoJSI8mA#t=5m24s

(not the same as the Gaiden Alliance / Imperial vehicles)

I'm starting to get the impression weapons use is a purely artistic choice out of universe, which is why we have such a wacky setup. For example, unless the missiles/torpedoes are stupendously big yield, I'm hard pressed to think why they wouldn't be longer ranged (and more accurate) than beam weapons, especially given the salvo densities and accelerations/speeds they can apparently pull off.

Well, we've seen they can be decoyed en masse, that might explain it.

I was browsing over the battles thread too, I noticed that some fighters/gunships get hit by beams. No perceptible thermal effects. Another peculiarity to consider (and possibly proof of "multiple types" of beam weapons.) One of which is funny because I'm sure you coudl actually see the pilot thrown some distance out of the fighter by the beam. He doesn't even look like he was pulverized, even though the fighter goes up like a bomb.

Yeah, the chances of seeing thermal effects goes up the closer and longer the relevant shot is (animation being what it is). Alternately to different types of beam weapons, the weapons have different firing modes?

Edit: I also suddnely feel like rewatching/rereading Banner/Crest of the Stars.. I need to see if they've released any more english translated manga for that or anime

I've grabbed it all, but have only seen like 4 episodes or so. Got distracted, need to go back to it!

EDIT: re hidden guns on Imperial battleships, I was mistaken in thinking we see them pop out of hatches. When Poplin is skimming the surface of a battleship, in the area where the crest is, there's small very small ports which shoot at him. They're imperceptible at typical distances, that episode (52) is the only one where we see them.

[Connor MacLeod]

I think you're assuming that they land their ships almost immediately (a few hours after the initial bombardment) when really it likely isn't the case. The whole situation is being explained in the briefing room and likely isn't actually happening in real time. Rather they talk about what they're going to do while the audience is shown the act for narrative reasons rather than a purely chronological interpretation. The fact that there is non-boiling liquid water at all seems to suggest that at least some time has passed and has allowed for cooling/condensation.

No, I'm saying that I don't know how much time would be required for the energy input to dissipate away completely. There's a good chance we're talking about gigatons worth of energy. That just doesn't vanish, but I don't know how long it would take to radiate away. and I'm not just talking about the fireball, I'm talking about the secondary effects (atmospheric heating, potential ejecta, etc.) Moreover I don't know how LONG it would take the water to cool down (something that will only add to the atmospheric cooling issue, btw) There's even condensation issues with whatever water vapour/steam IS created - as that cools would it come down as rain? You might be able to argue hours of the scene elapsing, but how likely is it an entire fleet sat around doing nothing for DAYS just so they could stick some liquid metal over the surface of some melted ice? Like it or not you have to consider these factors, lest the details come back and bite you in the ass. Because they do.

In any case, if you have a very large volume of water affected, you risk some ludicrously high yields (and consequently, ludicrously massive missiles, since as far as we know they only use fusion warheads.) Vympel explictly noted he'd prefer NOT going into ludicrous territory yield wise.

As an answer to your other question, no, this is not a surface habitable planet. It is a large moon of a gas giant. In fact, this planet was picked specifically because it was far away from the system's star in order to keep the incompetent old admiral from fucking up the battle. This moon is likely very cold (thus facilitating the condensation/cooling of the landing water) and appears to have a very rarified atmosphere, another factor to consider when looking at the explosions.

Then we need to know the composition of the planet to do the calcs. MY assumption of a habitable planet was completely false.

Also, thermonuclear and fusion warheads are banned from use on habitable planets by both sides as an after affect of World War III. So even if this was a habitable planet, the Imperials would not have used this method at all.

That only creates more questions than it solves. For all we know its a technobabble mechanism (and if the yield is big, someone IS going to suggest something exactly like that.)

[Connor MacLeod]

It may be the station's artificial gravity system that keeps it in place. In relation to the "high tide" thing I referred to, Iserlohn is eventually able to adjust its field to normalize the hydro-metal layer again.

To keep it contained against explosions (epspecially against potential nuclear explosions) is going to require a fairly substantial gravity well. and evne then it wouldn't keep it "down" per say. Hard to say if that's possible without knowing how it looks when dissipating such things.

Fortresses with engines don't grow on trees (the battle was the first time engines had ever been fitted to a fortress, and Geiersberg is as far as we know the only fortress approaching Iserlohn in power the Empire had at the time)

YEah but that introduces some rather interesting and rather simple ways to bypass the defense. (of course if ships can bypass it, why can't fighters or missiles or such things?) It also suggests you can blast holes in it to shoot through.

Never seen again. They're exclusive to that once scene in the Gaiden, with no basis for comparison to anything else.

*shrugs* we can guess. At a bare minimum its probably blasting out an area at least several kilometers or more in diameter (depends on how high the ships are above the surface and suchnot) Probably more, since the affected area stretches to the horizon. However, unless we know how big the moon is, we can't really judge that distance.

One can make guesses as to the size of the ships too, for conservative estimates. (EG comparable to small craft, or destroyers or something like that.) I gather that there aren't many ships much smaller than a fighter, so it would (for example) be at least several tens of meters in length.

Even though their ground troops are wacky in that way (they still use guns a lot) I'm quite fond of their AFVs. One of the Gaiden goes through the features of one of them, it looks sensibly designed and has a lot of cool features. Their firepower is pretty decent too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErpdoJSI8mA#t=5m24s

(not the same as the Gaiden Alliance / Imperial vehicles)

I haven't bothered checking much of the ground stuff, except that they apparently use tanks with CPBs, railguns, and their troops carry some sort of laser weapon. (and the lasers, while they overpenetrate human bodies like hell, punch bullet-sized holes through the target with little or no cauterization.)

Well, we've seen they can be decoyed en masse, that might explain it.

I find it a bit hard to believe that they could decoy missiles, yet still manage to hit them at multipe light seconds, even with human gunners involved. hell those gunners need sensor/computer assistance just to find stuff BVR (you need to know where to look, after all.) What's more, I don't find it unlikely that if the lag for energy weapons fire is acceptable, lag involved in telemetry-guidance (or updates) for missiles probably isn't objectionable either.

Yeah, the chances of seeing thermal effects goes up the closer and longer the relevant shot is (animation being what it is).

That only makes the scene odder. I mean the pilot is thrown out, but he's not torn apart by the beam at all, much less incinerated. Hell, if there's a delay you couldn't know if the thermal effects are from teh weapon or from volatile ship components.

Alternately to different types of beam weapons, the weapons have different firing modes?

If they're running particle beams, it is possible they can fire different kinds of particle "ammo". Or, it oculd be the already hypothesized "diffrent weapons" weapons. My first instinct for the above was to say "force beam", but that's somewhat nonseniscal (what sort of "force" and how does it inflict damage?)

I've grabbed it all, but have only seen like 4 episodes or so. Got distracted, need to go back to it!

Last I remember is that Jinto got left behind on some prison planet they tried to evacuate, and they found him, and he was going to try to visit his conquered homeworld, or something. That was years ago and they're slow as fuck in bringing more of it over to America, it seems.

EDIT: re hidden guns on Imperial battleships, I was mistaken in thinking we see them pop out of hatches. When Poplin is skimming the surface of a battleship, in the area where the crest is, there's small very small ports which shoot at him. They're imperceptible at typical distances, that episode (52) is the only one where we see them.

I dont know what sort of weapon it is. Maybe its a different kind of munition (something akin to the mine things Yang dropped into the star, perhaps), or like I said, they either fire different kinds of particles or they can re-arm their ships as needed.

Frankly I get the impression the Empire doesn't really fully exploit its shipbuilding potential (building bigger and heavier battleships than they could). The FPA doesnt, but they may have logistical reasons rather than corruptio or such.

[Vympel]

To keep it contained against explosions (epspecially against potential nuclear explosions) is going to require a fairly substantial gravity well. and evne then it wouldn't keep it "down" per say. Hard to say if that's possible without knowing how it looks when dissipating such things.

Earlier there was a video posted of a mass missile attack which actually damaged Iserlohn's walls, might be helpful. Other times, when its really disrupted, it basically acts like a stormy ocean (including hilariously a battleship getting dumped like a surfer). Heck, the Thor Hammer was fired whilst inside the hydro metal in that same episode, on purpose.

YEah but that introduces some rather interesting and rather simple ways to bypass the defense. (of course if ships can bypass it, why can't fighters or missiles or such things?) It also suggests you can blast holes in it to shoot through.

Do you mean the ships simply descending through it? In that case, they can only safely do that if landing beacons are put up, to show them how to get in (some sort of doors? never seen). Otherwise you just have to blow a hole through the wall to get inside, which is what Muller tried to do.

*shrugs* we can guess. At a bare minimum its probably blasting out an area at least several kilometers or more in diameter (depends on how high the ships are above the surface and suchnot) Probably more, since the affected area stretches to the horizon. However, unless we know how big the moon is, we can't really judge that distance.

One can make guesses as to the size of the ships too, for conservative estimates. (EG comparable to small craft, or destroyers or something like that.) I gather that there aren't many ships much smaller than a fighter, so it would (for example) be at least several tens of meters in length.

Yeah at the very least.

I haven't bothered checking much of the ground stuff, except that they apparently use tanks with CPBs, railguns, and their troops carry some sort of laser weapon. (and the lasers, while they overpenetrate human bodies like hell, punch bullet-sized holes through the target with little or no cauterization.)

Infuriatingly, very few times, the energy weapons they use act and sound like a machine gun

I find it a bit hard to believe that they could decoy missiles, yet still manage to hit them at multipe light seconds, even with human gunners involved. hell those gunners need sensor/computer assistance just to find stuff BVR (you need to know where to look, after all.) What's more, I don't find it unlikely that if the lag for energy weapons fire is acceptable, lag involved in telemetry-guidance (or updates) for missiles probably isn't objectionable either.

Maybe the guidance systems for missiles rely on active systems that are easier to jam?

That only makes the scene odder. I mean the pilot is thrown out, but he's not torn apart by the beam at all, much less incinerated. Hell, if there's a delay you couldn't know if the thermal effects are from teh weapon or from volatile ship components.

If they're running particle beams, it is possible they can fire different kinds of particle "ammo". Or, it oculd be the already hypothesized "diffrent weapons" weapons. My first instinct for the above was to say "force beam", but that's somewhat nonseniscal (what sort of "force" and how does it inflict damage?)

I was speaking from an OOU perspective then - i.e. where the animation is detailed and lasts for more frames, the animators are more likely to go to the trouble of adding the hull melting effect - its not like there's a delay. A lot of it is mixed up with animation quality, which is why you see more melty effects in say, Overture to a New War, Season 3 and Season 4 in comparison with Season 1 and Season 2 (though they're still prsent a lot) made years earlier.

(we see a Spartanian get smacked by cruiser fire in Episode 15 too, btw. A lot closer up. Its completely bathed in blue, but it seems like the front is disintegrated completely away)

Last I remember is that Jinto got left behind on some prison planet they tried to evacuate, and they found him, and he was going to try to visit his conquered homeworld, or something. That was years ago and they're slow as fuck in bringing more of it over to America, it seems.

Ah k, I just downloaded fansubs.

I dont know what sort of weapon it is. Maybe its a different kind of munition (something akin to the mine things Yang dropped into the star, perhaps), or like I said, they either fire different kinds of particles or they can re-arm their ships as needed.

They look like mini versions of the beams all ships fire, really.

Frankly I get the impression the Empire doesn't really fully exploit its shipbuilding potential (building bigger and heavier battleships than they could). The FPA doesnt, but they may have logistical reasons rather than corruptio or such.

Well the biggest battleship in the series is Galga Farmr (or Garga Falumul according to the Japanaese). Lennenkampt's flagship, she's 1.2km long, and massive (420m wide, 320m high, no antennae). They definitely can build them bigger.

[takemeout_totheblack]

YEah but that introduces some rather interesting and rather simple ways to bypass the defense. (of course if ships can bypass it, why can't fighters or missiles or such things?) It also suggests you can blast holes in it to shoot through.

Maybe that landing strip thing that the ships have to follow every time they land alters it somehow? Makes it less dense or whatever so they can pass through? And when it's off that area becomes just like the rest of the armor.
This is possible because we see a few of Reuental's ships getting destroyed when being forced to submerge in the hydrometal during an attack, while ships landing on the strip pass through unhindered.

[Vympel]

That's a pretty cool idea.

[Simon_Jester]

Hmm.

I think the Empire (and probably Alliance too) build their standard battleships to a smaller scale than is physically possible because they're most concerned with getting the maximum number of heavy beam weapons to the front. The sheer size of the fleets and the relative balance of firepower and defense means that any battle will be to some extent attritional; you will lose a certain tonnage of your ships when engaging a certain tonnage of enemy ships.

Building bigger and costlier ships doesn't necessarily pay off past a certain point, because all that happens is that when the battle starts you lose 4000 five million-ton ships with 500-man crews instead of 5000 four million-ton ships with 400-man crews.*

So they concentrate on building their ships to a scale that makes them individually well-armed and yet cheap and reliable enough to be mass-produced in the thousands, because building smaller numbers of superships wouldn't pay on a battlefield dominated by thousands of well-armed, cheap, and reliable ships.**

The exception to this rule, I further speculate, is flagships. Flagships are made bigger so that they're more resistant to a catastrophic kill- statistically speaking, the admiral is more likely to survive a prolonged action than the crew of a random battleship, because his ship is more durable and can survive in environments where the standard battleships around them suffer steady attrition. This doesn't make them immune, of course, they can still be killed quite easily if the enemy rolls the dice and wins, but it does help to maintain command and control during battle as long as the flagship doesn't stand out as an especially obvious target to enemy fire.

Another role for flagships is suggested by the fact that they're made in small numbers, and are in many cases unique one-off designs. This suggests that they are to some extent testbeds- will this experimental armor scheme work? What if we alter the geometry of the ship? Can this massive fuckoff beam weapon the engineers just developed actually work as main armament for a battleship?

Of course, this has obvious logical drawbacks- but if the equipment fails you haven't lost that much more than the cost of a standard battleship, and if it succeeds you further contribute to the survivability of the admiral on board. It's also a common theme in Japanese fiction, the super prototype weapon, so hardly a surprise there.
__________

*Numbers are arbitrary and might as well have been pulled out of a hat. Pay them no heed whatsoever except as illustration of the principle.

[takemeout_totheblack]

I always felt that flagships were designed around the fact that on the battlefield the most important person (ostensibly) is the admiral/other flag officer due to their training to coordinate ships and think strategically/tactically. Basically these are the people you want to keep alive at all costs for The Greater Good of the fleet. As such, certain things like mass-production/practicality are sacrificed for the sake of keeping the brain-center of any given fleet alive.

For the Imperial side's flagships, I think it's less 'OMG l337 soopah weppinz' anime cliche and more 'we're the most important people here, we deserve to have the cool stuff' Nobility-First nature of the Galactic Empire. Just like only medieval knights were permitted/could afford the full plate armor that effectively made them Robocop on the battlefield, the hierarchical nature of the Empire allows admirals to forgo production costs for the sake of keeping their 'valuable' asses safe.
It's thematically fitting, see?

[Vympel]

An interesting thing about the Galga Farmr is that even though its the biggest ship in the Imperial fleet (I believe, the Brunhild might have more volume) its crew isn't out of whack with the rest of the unique flagships, and Brunhild still has the largest crew. Maybe its carrying a shit-ton of fighters.

(Alliance ships as a rule have larger crews, in terms of flagships)

[Connor MacLeod]

Earlier there was a video posted of a mass missile attack which actually damaged Iserlohn's walls, might be helpful. Other times, when its really disrupted, it basically acts like a stormy ocean (including hilariously a battleship getting dumped like a surfer). Heck, the Thor Hammer was fired whilst inside the hydro metal in that same episode, on purpose.

How much earlier? I must have missed it. And acting like an ocean does not improve my confidence in this thing. It sounds almost as bad as the solar winds.

Do you mean the ships simply descending through it? In that case, they can only safely do that if landing beacons are put up, to show them how to get in (some sort of doors? never seen). Otherwise you just have to blow a hole through the wall to get inside, which is what Muller tried to do.

I thought the FPA forces that took over Thor's cannon managed to infiltrate without blowing a hole in it. They just seemed ot land on it (like landing in water) and then somehow pass through (and manage to look like they're underwater.)

Yeah at the very least.

Then its probably somewhere megaton to gigaton range, with all the variables and cautions I put in mind. Maybe I can do a scaling on it sometime making some guesses. I dunno.

Infuriatingly, very few times, the energy weapons they use act and sound like a machine gun

That could just mean they actually do use projectile weapons (no reason not to. Even if chem propelled there's nothing wrong with a slugthrower) or that the lasers work on some odd chemical reaction (chemical energy actually tends to have better energy density than RL batteries so far.)

Maybe the guidance systems for missiles rely on active systems that are easier to jam?

Jamming would help make it hard to home in on them, to an extent, but at long long ranges the jamming is more likely to act as a beacon (it will tell you in what general vicinity they are in, but you probably can't pick out individual ships.) They'd probably have to rely on stuff like infrared (engine exhaust) or optical once they get closer - telementry would help GREATLY there. And while you probably can jam the telemetry signals, I doubt they do it to a significant degree. And evne then that only affects accuracy or effective range - there's still nothing physically preventing the missiels from outranging beams (and they have the tech and ability, eg scout ships relaying telemetry, probes, etc.) to offset possible problems anyhow.

having huge numbers of missiles spoofed would also suggest that they rely on a very small number of missiles taking out multiple ships with a blast (which would need large yields. Nukes suck in space when it comes to damage.) Rather wasteful (Honorverse style of doing things). I gathered missiles (like most weapons) relied on impact.

I was speaking from an OOU perspective then - i.e. where the animation is detailed and lasts for more frames, the animators are more likely to go to the trouble of adding the hull melting effect - its not like there's a delay. A lot of it is mixed up with animation quality, which is why you see more melty effects in say, Overture to a New War, Season 3 and Season 4 in comparison with Season 1 and Season 2 (though they're still prsent a lot) made years earlier.

(we see a Spartanian get smacked by cruiser fire in Episode 15 too, btw. A lot closer up. Its completely bathed in blue, but it seems like the front is disintegrated completely away)

You can tell the fighter is getting blased apart, but the pilot is intact. It's not brute force. Whatever it is doing to the ship is some other damage mechanism. Not EMP I think. Maybe its getting bathed in radiation of some kind, or it blew up the reactor.

Ah k, I just downloaded fansubs.

I borrowed them from my library. They really didn't have a great deal of technical info though. The manga had alot more.

They look like mini versions of the beams all ships fire, really.

The shot that destroyed the STrategic defence center?

Well the biggest battleship in the series is Galga Farmr (or Garga Falumul according to the Japanaese). Lennenkampt's flagship, she's 1.2km long, and massive (420m wide, 320m high, no antennae). They definitely can build them bigger.

I was referring more towards the fact we know supply ships can be bigger, and the fact they were able to outfit a multi-km ice asteroid (which must mass many hundreds of millions if not billions of tons) asteroid with a multi-km engine.

There could be lots of drawbacks to building bigger (more crew, more complex logistics, more expensive to build - they'd certainly require more resources which could quite possibly cut down on fleet sizes to compensate for the increased tonnage) but its still worth noting simply for the tactical options they have as far as vs debating goes. It is always generally assumed for some silly reason that opposing sides would somehow continue to build the same ships they always and already possess (EG Empire building only ISDs) rather than trying to adjust or adapt tactics to suit the situation.

In the HV vs LOGH case, for example, we might reasonable expect if the smaller fleets simply didn't match up, they'd opt for either smaller and more numerous warships (more beams on target) or they might build bigger, more specialized, and more beam heavy ships reminisicent of the flagships, but in fewer numbers. Hell given the freighter/asteroid example it seems quite likely the ycould build a pretty DAMN big warship, ignoring the issue of other tradeoffs that it might require as mentioned.

An interesting thing about the Galga Farmr is that even though its the biggest ship in the Imperial fleet (I believe, the Brunhild might have more volume) its crew isn't out of whack with the rest of the unique flagships, and Brunhild still has the largest crew. Maybe its carrying a shit-ton of fighters.

We already commented on the fact that crew complmenets likely involve soldiers/marines or ground forces (to initiate or defend against boarding actions.) Quite likely the flagships have larger crews to have more soldiers onboard (especially Reinhard's ship.)

The Galga probably shows too that automation on the heavy battleships/flagships tends to be better. AFter all, if the weapons, defenses are better, why not the computers?

(Alliance ships as a rule have larger crews, in terms of flagships)

Don't they have a much smaller population than the Empire though? That seems like a spectacularly bad idea, unless their automation is far inferior and that forces them to go with bigger crews to compensate.

[Connor MacLeod]

Maybe that landing strip thing that the ships have to follow every time they land alters it somehow? Makes it less dense or whatever so they can pass through? And when it's off that area becomes just like the rest of the armor.
This is possible because we see a few of Reuental's ships getting destroyed when being forced to submerge in the hydrometal during an attack, while ships landing on the strip pass through unhindered.

I doubt they alter the density. What they'd need to do is alter the solidity/rigidity of the hydrometal. Basically get it to behave like a solid in some cases, and a liquid in others. As I pointed out a number of pages back WRT hydrometal, simialr such materials exist today (like shear thickening fluids) and have been considered for use in body armor. It still basically means a forcefield effect of some sort (probably magical) is involved. Whatever lattice the hydrometal rests on may be the generating/conducting medium for that field.

[Connor MacLeod]

I think the Empire (and probably Alliance too) build their standard battleships to a smaller scale than is physically possible because they're most concerned with getting the maximum number of heavy beam weapons to the front. The sheer size of the fleets and the relative balance of firepower and defense means that any battle will be to some extent attritional; you will lose a certain tonnage of your ships when engaging a certain tonnage of enemy ships.

The one problem with this is, they tend to have alot of (rarely used) broadside beam mounts too. I'm kinda wondering why they evne bother with that if "bow on" weapons were more important. You'd think they wouldn't bother with broadsides at all.

As for the rest of it, I agree with you. The "building bigger" is mainly interesting for the potential options it gives them facing other sorts of foes. And like in many things, simply having the capability doesn't mean you need to exercise it, for practical (cost or resource saving) or impractical (stupid) reasons. Hell, how many RL matters tend to get fucked up by human stupidity, military or civilian?

Another role for flagships is suggested by the fact that they're made in small numbers, and are in many cases unique one-off designs. This suggests that they are to some extent testbeds- will this experimental armor scheme work? What if we alter the geometry of the ship? Can this massive fuckoff beam weapon the engineers just developed actually work as main armament for a battleship?

Vympel noted this happening, IIRC. It also occurs to me that if they're paranoid they probably don't want the most advanced tech proliferating too extensively, and thus save it for themselves. (the rest of you can just deal with the average shit.)

[Simon_Jester]

I think the Empire (and probably Alliance too) build their standard battleships to a smaller scale than is physically possible because they're most concerned with getting the maximum number of heavy beam weapons to the front. The sheer size of the fleets and the relative balance of firepower and defense means that any battle will be to some extent attritional; you will lose a certain tonnage of your ships when engaging a certain tonnage of enemy ships.

The one problem with this is, they tend to have alot of (rarely used) broadside beam mounts too. I'm kinda wondering why they evne bother with that if "bow on" weapons were more important. You'd think they wouldn't bother with broadsides at all.

Ah, excuse me, I was unclear. When I say "to the front" I am speaking in the strategic sense, as in "the Western Front," not the front of the individual warship.

A battleship is designed to put as much firepower into combat as possible, consistent with the need for a reasonably cost-effective, reliable platform that lends itself to mass production.

Again, there's not much practical difference between losing four ships of five million tons and five ships of four million tons, and given the relative ease with which even powerful ships die on the battlefield in LoGH, the four million ton ship could easily be a better choice. Building them bigger by a large enough margin to make them impractical to kill with existing weapons would probably require great expense and the development of new hardware (bigger engines, etc.), along with replacing the existing tooling for producing existing ship classes.

The issues of tooling and logistics can be an important concern when building military hardware at the maximum practical rate- consider how the maximum weight of medium tank the Allies could use in Europe during World War II was fixed at around thirty tons by the need to ship the things over the beach in landing craft, or how often the physical length of the available drydocks and building slips affected the design of capital ships.

Which would apply here too- if the main Imperial docking facilities for the thousands of battleships of the fleet on Odin and at Iserlohn are only 700 meters long, it would be folly for the Imperials to design a fleet of 750-meter battleships that can't land anywhere. Not unless they gained a really significant increase in combat potential, which arguably they wouldn't, since even flagships much larger than the standard battleship don't seem to be able to take on more than one or two battleships on their own (unless I am much misaken).

But since both sides seem to have converged on about the same size for their standard battleships in terms of scale and tonnage, my bet is that this represents a "sweet spot" in ease of construction with the available technology, allowing the maximum tonnage of warships armed with the maximum amount of firepower to be fielded at something like the minimum cost. Relative to the scale of the war effort, a handful of superheavy flagships on each side are irrelevant to the costs, but since each side builds battleships by the thousands or tens of thousands, they don't have so much luxury in that department.

[Vympel]

How much earlier? I must have missed it. And acting like an ocean does not improve my confidence in this thing. It sounds almost as bad as the solar winds.

Check out Episode 46, thats the relevant episode.

I thought the FPA forces that took over Thor's cannon managed to infiltrate without blowing a hole in it. They just seemed ot land on it (like landing in water) and then somehow pass through (and manage to look like they're underwater.)

Yes, but they had hacked the fortresses computers (they left a backdoor when the Empire recaptured it). The first time they captured Iserlohn, they couldn't just charge it (even though its defences and the Thor Hammer were locked out), the landing beacons went up. This time, the beacons didn't go up - but in the episode, one of the command centre crew says they've "lost control of the magnetic structure". Maybe this goes back to takemeout's idea that the landing beacons denote where the hydrometal has become permeable?

Yeah at the very least.

Then its probably somewhere megaton to gigaton range, with all the variables and cautions I put in mind. Maybe I can do a scaling on it sometime making some guesses. I dunno.

That could just mean they actually do use projectile weapons (no reason not to. Even if chem propelled there's nothing wrong with a slugthrower) or that the lasers work on some odd chemical reaction (chemical energy actually tends to have better energy density than RL batteries so far.)

Yeah. Its just frustrating that the guns look exactly the same

Jamming would help make it hard to home in on them, to an extent, but at long long ranges the jamming is more likely to act as a beacon (it will tell you in what general vicinity they are in, but you probably can't pick out individual ships.) They'd probably have to rely on stuff like infrared (engine exhaust) or optical once they get closer - telementry would help GREATLY there. And while you probably can jam the telemetry signals, I doubt they do it to a significant degree. And evne then that only affects accuracy or effective range - there's still nothing physically preventing the missiels from outranging beams (and they have the tech and ability, eg scout ships relaying telemetry, probes, etc.) to offset possible problems anyhow.

having huge numbers of missiles spoofed would also suggest that they rely on a very small number of missiles taking out multiple ships with a blast (which would need large yields. Nukes suck in space when it comes to damage.) Rather wasteful (Honorverse style of doing things). I gathered missiles (like most weapons) relied on impact.

Yeah it seems that way, missile kills we see are from direct hits.

You can tell the fighter is getting blased apart, but the pilot is intact. It's not brute force. Whatever it is doing to the ship is some other damage mechanism. Not EMP I think. Maybe its getting bathed in radiation of some kind, or it blew up the reactor.

Maybe. We see the same guns melting shit just fine too, so its hard to say what the explanation is.

The shot that destroyed the STrategic defence center?

Nah, just the standard blue beams:-

Don't they have a much smaller population than the Empire though? That seems like a spectacularly bad idea, unless their automation is far inferior and that forces them to go with bigger crews to compensate.

Well in truth I'm overly generalizing. Though yes they do have a smaller population than the Empire (25 billion to 13 billion). A standard FPA battleship crew is 660, whilst for a standard GE battleship its 726, so thats a point in the Alliance's favour, though their standard battleship design is smaller in every way. Its the flagships that have the bigger crew than Imperial flagships, but thats easy to explain considering how much extra broadside armament they have (for example Imperial flagships average in the ~900 men range, whereas most Alliance flagships are in excess of ~1100.