[mr.WHO]

In many of the David Weber books series he put emphasis on stellar recon/cartography with the assumptions:
- the space is big, so out there is a definetly someone who will want to kill us
- if there is someone who might want to kill us, it's better to find him first rather than wait for him find us

The stellar cartography corp responsibility is to map all route into home territory, preform thread assesment and first contact. If a race seems hostile dangerous cartography unit should ideally rereat without beign noticed or at worse case scenario to scuttle so that enemy don't know where to look.

I remember that in FS2 node map there are several mapped nodes that lead beyond GTVA space.

We can assume that whatever lies beyond Ross 128 might be off limit for safety reason (did the even found out FS1 Shivan entry point)?
Considering that FS2 Cappella was something intentionally orchestrated by Bosh I wouldn't consider it a backfired exploration efford as GTVA was not prepared for the operation.

I think it's logical that, if there was no Shivan invasion from the other directions (and suprisingly from Ross 128) for such long time, then whatever systems lies there must be very far from Shivan territory.


IMO it would be waste for GTVA not to explore and develop these system, especially if they had Cappella refugees all over GTVA. However even if GTVA lost it's mind and decided to go full turtle then, for defensive purpose they should:
- chart these systems (for node bottlenecks that could be cut outside of GTVA economy)
- deploy picket ships (some kind of light stealth corvette with fighter hangar for stealth recon figters would be ideal solution) that would give a heads up before Shivans enter the GTVA space - more time to actually contain the situation.



What is the BP GTVA policy for exploration and expansion in these directions? What ships would be useful for this? The ones that we already know or maybe something else not present in Sol front?

[General Battuta]

I will comment more when able but this is a good question and a good thread.

[General Battuta]

And I believe the Lucy entered through the N362 Knossos device discovered in AoA (though I might be wrong).

[AdmiralRalwood]

And I believe the Lucy entered through the N362 Knossos device discovered in AoA (though I might be wrong).

"Might be wrong" as in "I haven't consulted my notes" or "I haven't talked it over with the rest of the team"? Because I thought this was pretty heavily implied by the shot of the Lucifer going through a Knossos in UT2.

[Phantom Hoover]

Yeah but that shot is just of a Knossos. Personally I assumed it was the one in the binary system, or beyond. Plus, he's talking about the Lucifer's entry point during the Great War, whereas the cutscene was during the Ancient holocide.

[MatthTheGeek]

It is likely the GTVI has sent recon teams to map nodes out of GTVA space, if only to identify and keep an eye on potential Shivan entry points, and/or map potential escape routes in case **** really hits the fan and they need escape routes for a BSG-style exodus away from Shivans (what do you think they designed Anemoi for).

The extent of that recon and whether there has been subsequent colonization/expansion efforts has not been determined afaik, nor whether those outside nodes are at all open to GTVA public. The difference in approach between Tevs and Zods to exploration could also be something to look at.

[AdmiralRalwood]

he's talking about the Lucifer's entry point during the Great War, whereas the cutscene was during the Ancient holocide.

Are you suggesting the Lucifer left this area of space after the Ancients got wiped out and then came back later for the T/V war? I thought it was pretty much a given that the Lucifer fleet was there the whole time, just dormant...

[Phantom Hoover]

From what we know I'd guess that the Lucifer emerged from the binary system and continued through what is now GTVA space to N362, went to ground there after the Ancients were dead, then came back from that direction when the holocide trigger was tripped again.

Of course there are a bunch of other ways it could have happened, and it's complicated by the fact that in BP canon the Ancient empire was vast and largely built through slowboating.

[Mammothtank]

From what I remember didn't Shivan's enter GTA space from both Ikeya and Ross? Also I was under the impression that they also entered the Altair system too. But maybe I am wrong. I dunno if that jump line from the map is saying that there is a a jump point leading to some unknown system in Altair but I bet the Vasudians would check down that way first for colonizable planets.

If I was the Terran's I'd probably shy away from the Ross and Ikeya jump nodes and go down to Dubhe looking for jump points. Also is the Ikeya system populated by the GTA? I got the impression that it wasn't. No doubt both would be very cautious of using Great War Shivan entry points in case they call the down the Shivan pain train.

I wonder what ship the BP team would use as a colony ship.

[Nohiki]

Is a 'colony ship' really good concept in FreeSpace? It would be a big hulking thing that would need to be protected form bombs and fgod forbid if it ever needed to go through an asteroid field. They seem to have tritons in the plenty, and if you throw in the logistics ships + civvie designs that don't appear 'on screen'... Not to mention that the first order of business when establishing presence in a system seems to be building an Arcadia anyhow.

Would a picket ship left in a system one jump away even be enough? The shivans show the nasty potential to deploy overwhelming numbers very quickly. This is basically what the Vigilant was, and it got sliced. It seems to me than a sensors station akin to a Comm node along with remote controlled tritons with meson bombs ready on each side of the node seems like a better solution. If you are going to blow up the node eventually anyway, don't wait for the shivans to pour in, drop the hammer at the first sight.

[Snarks]

I was under the impression large population movements were done using freighters like the Elysium. In BP, we saw several civilian type ships used to evacuate refugees from Jupiter as well. Subspace makes it pretty easy to travel without specialized ships. As for terraforming, that seems like something that would depend on the particular type of planet.