too bad for those Colonials that I've parked my ships so that jumping into the rear arc of THS Dreadnought means you just jumped into the broadside arc of THS Monsoon. Yes, you'll shoot up the rear of one of my ships, and I'll smack the crud out of one of yours. Which one of us can afford that exchange rate?
Tell me more about the hyper reflex augmented Manei Domini that the SL has as its standard warship crew to instantly react perfectly to an attack that can come at any time, from any vector.
Meanwhile, the formation you described really can't be maintained within close proximity to the planet, and would be a massive mess to sort out in the event you had to book for the closest pirate point in a hurry. Also, a Battlestar is rather more likely to weather an attack than a SL ship taking alpha strike(s) to its most vulnerable locations.
Not really. Time is *not* on their side, and competent SLN commanders will avoid situations where everything is committed one way or another.
You'll have to pardon me while I scoff. A ground war on Taurian ground, where Colonial drived transports can resupply the defenders at will, and time
isn't[/i[ on their side? The SL deployments have to be perfect, all the time.
Other than structural damage to the jumping ship (IIRC you can see pieces of Galactica tearing off as she's falling), the risk of an orbit to surface NPPC strike, and the fact that Adama only did that stunt because he was both crazy and desperate. Colonial jump tech is not "Godmode hax" in this situation.
I was mostly thinking raptor missile strikes to inspire control rolls and lawndarting. If that doesn't work, then naval fire to the dropships from out of atmosphere works, if they are landing on a location the taurians don't want used as a backstop then they are morons who are going to lawndart due to defensive ground fire
anyway.
Colonial jump tech isn't godmode hax, what it is is something that makes every single option the SLDF has potentially disastrous and invalidates their entire normal tactical and strategic playbook.
Capital beam weapons strike at the speed of LIGHT. Those scenes from the series where the Colonials jump away as Cylon missiles pass through where they used to be? Yeah, HNPPC fire will *still* hit before the jump.
Capital beam weapons track slowly enough that they don't have any appreciable range or accuracy benefit over projectile weapons. So yes, if the Colonials are in arc, and if the crew reacts quickly enough, and
if the weapon physically gets a lock, then it can shoot a Colonial ship. If only superficial armor damage from uncoordinated rapid reaction fire was faster to repair than structural integrity and engine damage from a half dozen alpha strikes.
Except for the fact that BT aerospace fighter have loiter times in multiple days. It might be uncomfortable and stinky, but they can stay their. CAPs also operate in a relief basis, which means both are on station before the old one leaves.
Uncomfortable and stinky, not to mention human needs for sleep, are things that are detrimental to combat pilots. Especially when an attack can come from any direction, at any time.
The relative differences the firepower and armor of a Missile Raptor vs a heavy or assault fighter is frightening. And the colonials don't have very many of them.
Yet. The time it took the SL to frantically refit their new force and get them into position to attack means that Adama's initial report back and any reinforcements that Adar sends have had at least 20 weeks knocked off the lengthy round trip.
The above would be true if this wasn't BT. Hit and fade tactics only work if your weapons outdistance the enemy or you have total surprise. NLs, NPPCs, Capitol Missiles all have the same range or better of the weapons of the colonials. And half of the above mentioned are speed of light, ss pointed out by a previous poster. Until they can get the Bulldogs on line, every engagement with the SLDF will entail some source of loss, because the Targeting computers/ Fire control systems of warships are capable of targeting high percents of C vectored targets(look up the rules for high speed passes).
So the SLDF has developed Naval C3 and HPGs, and perfectly meshed them together to concentrate fire instantaneously to achieve meaningful damage on massively armored targets appearing with zero warning? ::)
Battletech fire control starts suffering penalties at 300 kps. I am in fact
quite familiar with the High speed engagement rules, you might want to consider the implications of such an engagement against an enemy that can launch all of its capital missiles and then
leave before the Meeting Engagement phase.
I don't believe it's ever going to be that one sided again. The SLDF knows about the Jump drive and they can make contingencies plans even with just wild guesses. The admirals of the SLDF are mostly competent, with a few geniuses in their midst( Shandra Noruff Cameron anyone?) I came up with a few ones offs and I'm not a tactical or strategic genius. All it would take is one very good day with the SLDF or a couple of bad days with the colonial alliance and their would be a few to a lot of dead Raptors, gun cruisers, and battlestars.
Understood, put the penalty for shaving 4 days of that time is not that bad. I believe +3? for just over 76 hour?
Oh, you want to shave off
more/i] than a single day? You can in fact shave off 100 hours with a +3 roll. Of course that means that only 42% of your fleet is going to make the first rendezvous presuming Regular crews. 10% of the kf drives involved in the operation are complete writeoffs, hope that wherever you were jumping from was important enough to justify the presence of a flotilla of massively overpriced system defense monitors. Much of your fleet can probably limp back to a friendly yard eventually if they take things slow.
My copy says that you can jump anywhere in system as long as its not affected by a planet gravity or if acts as a lagrange point. If it doesn't you take a penalty on your control roll. Also it doesn't say that you can't preplot and save multiple locations along your known rout. Its actually a little vague on saving the Jump coords, but minimum preplot time is 1 minute (2d6-Mos)+ 10m for jump.
Page 89 under Jump Process(Outside of Gameplay)
"However, routes plotted to or from other non-standard and transient points are only valid for 20 minutes."
As long as you are jumping outside the star's influence, you're golden as long as you occasionally check the calendar if jumping onto or near the orbital plane. Anywhere else, and you've got major problems barring a
much needed upgrade to BT nav computers.
It now depends on if the author thinks that will happen and what type of KF/colonial drive inter action. And it might slready be in that stage right now anyway. If I was taurus, I would definitely be considering ramming tactics anyway.
Why? Right now is the time for commerce raiders to capture every poorly escorted hull they can, so
they can be used for ramming attacks if the situation gets desperate. Resorting to ramming means losing hulls the Taurians can't afford to lose, and any demonstration of resolve is likely canceled out by the appearance of desperation such tactics tend to project.
I'm actually thinking of quick jumps as a tactical maneuver to get point blank with NACs and unleash hell at point blank range on capital ships(say about 2-6 hexes). Or launch aerospace fighter to catch me some unsuspecting Raptors. Can you imagine heavy and assault fighter at point blank range? Is it something they are going to all the time? NO. But it is a tactic in their repertoire.
Practical realities make it a never to be used tactic in their repertoire. Even in the vanishingly rare situation when it would be possible, it just means that you've exchange the ability to withdraw from combat for a momentary and easily countered tactical advantage.
I'm curious how the folks on the planet would be telling the out of system Colonial Ships what's going on, as Adama doesn't have any form of FTL communications. That's going to require Raptors within comm range of the planet, which likely puts them in sensor range which will keep the SLDF folks on the look out for guests popping.
Actually if the Raptors(or the entire Colonial fleet for that matter) are just quietly lurking at 10 AU out the SL will have no way to know that they're there. They can certainly advertise their presence if they want though, keeping the enemy at perpetual battle stations after the SL gets its first clue is in fact an entirely useful means of slowly attritioning SL combat capability.
Also once again remember these are Colonial jump drives with Colonial computers running them, no Cylon extras packed in that allowed all of those really hinky jump stunts seen used.
As the author says, this is the case. So in a worst case scenario the Colonials will have to jump battlestars outside the atmosphere to smash the dropships with not quite orbital bombardment. This is
still not a good thing for being able to conduct troop landings with any expectation of survival.
Hmm so I wonder what it is..when did the SLDF start working on AI's I assume thats still a century or so off?
Black Box KF fax device. Hopefully the author is allowing some fudging of what can be sent on the earliest model, otherwise 'we got our butts whooped' is likely to be the extent of the message.
And I didn't know that B-tech space sensors were that bad.
Battletech space sensors are so incredibly bad that I have to this point been silent on the subject in the hopes that the author will upgrade them to something less miserifically
awful, and more importantly less conducive to an effortless Colonial curbstomp of the SL.
Nelson's a traditional space naval ship name, the Black Lions are a century from entering service.
