[MatthTheGeek]

those HP-regenerating nanomachines found on the UEF ships?

err... wut ?

I remember damage control teams, but nothing about nanomachines. Are you mistaking with Inferno or something ?

the UEF should be nothing more than a short-term disturbance.

A faction able to face the full might of the battle-hardened GTVA for 18 months, with a third of their forces, crews that have never seen real battle and a budget that wasn't focused on warfare at all compared to their foe, sounds a little more than a short-term disturbance to me.

[Regent]

Just checked The Blade Itself... it was some damage control sealant, not nanomachines. Silly me.

About the UEF - maybe not a minor disturbance, but it isn't what the GTVA is 'meant' to fight. The Alliance probably expected them (the UEF) to fall much easier and underestimated them, but they are still (technically) a short-term enemy - The Threat Exigency Initiative is meant to counter the Shivans.

[Destiny]

Matt, if the GTVA was fighting at 'full might' the UEF would fall in a week, if not a day. Committing every single ship, pilot and marine in the Terran arm of the GTVA. That, is half might. If you toss in the Vasudans at total war, that is full might.

[-Norbert-]

Also do Shivan ships have active armor or those HP-regenerating nanomachines found on the UEF ships?

So far there is no instance of the Shivans using something like that.
But the thing with the Shivans is, you can never tell what they really are capable of. Every time you think you have seen the worst and have the upper hand, they bring up something new and devastating to beat you back into the dirt.
Also there would be the tech room entries on their weapons. They all seem to have some limiters installed, preventing them from using the full power they could have. Wether this is a self-imposed measure on part of the Shivans or a case were they are using conquered/gifted technology they don't fully understand is anyones guess for now.

Matt, if the GTVA was fighting at 'full might' the UEF would fall in a week, if not a day. Committing every single ship, pilot and marine in the Terran arm of the GTVA. That, is half might. If you toss in the Vasudans at total war, that is full might.

While you are correct in this, the GTVA did send battle hardened veterans and their very best ships against the UEF. While they could theoretically send a whole lot more forces into Sol (practically they can't muster much more than they already did, due to reasons discussed at length in other threads), they already got their elite in that conflic and lost many veteran pilots to the superiour UEF fighers early on untill they changed their tactics.
So while you are correct, the intent of Matts post (that the UEF is far more than just a small annoyance) is also correct, even though the wording was off.

[Regent]

Anyway the GTVA was fighting with its hands tied by avoiding a total war situation. If they really wanted the Sol system at any cost, they could have jumped straight to Earth and Mars orbit with 10, or 20 destroyers and blasted every logistical installation and planetside settlement larger than a village. If the UEF doesn't surrender outright they (the GTVA) could then retreat to the node and blockade it until the UEF metaphorically bleeds to death.

[-Norbert-]

The GTVA really can't do that. To mobilize all those forces means weakening the "anti-shivan garisons". Now couple that with the strained relations with the Vasudans, the economic and political situation back in GTVA home terretory and they'd have massive riots all over the place and an end to the alliance with the Vasudans. And if they aren't damn carefull in the negotiations maybe even a new terran vasudan war.
Also they wage this war to aquire the industrial capacities of the Sol system. To blow it all to hell is the last thing they'd want to do.

And that is, if the ship crews even go along with that "plan" rather than refuse or outright defect. There've got to be several ten thousand of civilians or more on those stations after all and the GTVA knows that.

[Snail]

Not to mention it'd be utter chaos with the UEF shoving Durgas down every GTVA destroyer's throat. It'd win the war militarily, but there would be massive losses and who knows what the political fallout on the GTVA side would be. So that wouldn't achieve much at all.



It'd make a beast series of missions though. :3

[Destiny]

I've a feeling Durgas don't like bunched up GTM Trebuchets...for some reason.

[MatthTheGeek]

All pilots have been through counter-Treb training, at least by the time of WiH. Especially elite pilots flying rare and critical ships like Durgas.

[Dilmah G]

Mate, every pilot goes through counter missile training. It's a matter of A) chance, B) experience, and C) training. And hell, we've all been through counter-missile training in the TSM before you join the 107th yet I guarantee every one of us has been hit by a missile at some point after that in our FS careers.

I mean, every pilot gets training in landing yet we still have instances where pilots mess it up every now and again. Bottom line being that training isn't insurance.

[MatthTheGeek]

Yeah, but Durgas aren't Uhlans or Artemises. Contrary to the GTVA, the UEF doesn't build masses of bombers and throw expendable pilots with a third the training of their fighter pilots in their cockpits.

Given the number of Durgas in service and their tactical weight, we're talking here about elite pilots, probably among the finest of the UEF. I don't think they fear a few trebs.

[Commander Zane]

Plus in missions that currently use the Durga don't they have Plot Armor?

[Regent]

The ones that attacked Serkr team were cut to pieces, so not all Durgas have plot armor.

Then again Serkr has plot armor even thicker than that of most destroyers. They won't go down without a (really impressive) bang and plenty of pent-up UEF emotion, and Durga's aren't spectacular enough nor can they put up enough fireworks to destroy them.

[Dilmah G]

Yeah, but Durgas aren't Uhlans or Artemises. Contrary to the GTVA, the UEF doesn't build masses of bombers and throw expendable pilots with a third the training of their fighter pilots in their cockpits.

Given the number of Durgas in service and their tactical weight, we're talking here about elite pilots, probably among the finest of the UEF. I don't think they fear a few trebs.

You'd think so, but as I said before,  chance plays a great role. Remember that Scott Speicher was an Lt. Cmdr at the time of his death, undoubtedly an experienced operator in the F/A-18, yet he was shot down by a surface to air missile, a threat that these pilots often trained day in and day out on in their training 'blocks'. The same applies to pilots of any aircraft, a potent missile is a potent missile.

[General Battuta]

The ones that attacked Serkr team were cut to pieces, so not all Durgas have plot armor.

Then again Serkr has plot armor even thicker than that of most destroyers. They won't go down without a (really impressive) bang and plenty of pent-up UEF emotion, and Durga's aren't spectacular enough nor can they put up enough fireworks to destroy them.

Don't you think that's kind of a big assumption to make?

Anyway the GTVA was fighting with its hands tied by avoiding a total war situation. If they really wanted the Sol system at any cost, they could have jumped straight to Earth and Mars orbit with 10, or 20 destroyers and blasted every logistical installation and planetside settlement larger than a village. If the UEF doesn't surrender outright they (the GTVA) could then retreat to the node and blockade it until the UEF metaphorically bleeds to death.

This, too?

[-Sara-]

It's all a matter of when (or if) the GTVA makes a Trebuchet successor which explodes NEAR it's target.

Anyway the GTVA was fighting with its hands tied by avoiding a total war situation. If they really wanted the Sol system at any cost, they could have jumped straight to Earth and Mars orbit with 10, or 20 destroyers and blasted every logistical installation and planetside settlement larger than a village. If the UEF doesn't surrender outright they (the GTVA) could then retreat to the node and blockade it until the UEF metaphorically bleeds to death.

Heared this more than once, it's been answered more than once also. You cannot draw away the whole armada of the GTVA from their positions (they don't have a 100 destroyers to spare). There's no use conquering Sol at the cost of destroying every large settlement, not even the GTVA can cover up genocide on such a scale. They'd not want to as they probably intent to bring the Solarian terrans back into the fray against the Shivans once those return. If they would destroye massive settlements It'd devastate the GTVA terrans politically, heck the Vasudans may jump them out of moral considerations or otherwise pre-emptively fearing that if the Terrans would destroye whole cities of their own kind, they are an insane danger that may at any moment repeat the same trick on Vasudankind (probably with even fewer reservations) if the alliance destabilizes. Besides, the GTVA doesn't know when the Shivans will be here and if they're watching. For all they know the Shivans may be waiting until the GTVA has hole in it's defense. We all saw what happened when that occured in Freespace 1. They won't be surprised a second time, as we saw in 'Lion at the Door' in Freespace 2, where the GTVA immediatly sent in two ships to secure the gate pronto, by having sufficient forces at hand and nearby.

[General Battuta]

Given the GTVA's emphasis on emulating Shivan shock-jump tactics, why does the Titan do -just- enough damage to not kill a standard enemy destroyer at 100,000 HP in a single salvo, like the Ravana? A Hyperion could tag along to finish off the job, but it seems like a liability to have to take additional ships that could be useful elsewhere. In the 25 seconds it takes for the Titan to reload (or recharge) its beams, the enemy could have jumped out or counterattacked.

You're assuming that beams could somehow magically be made to do more damage in the setting.

If you look at the way Titans and Raynors actually engage in offensive combat everywhere they're seen in BP, you'll have your answer.

Game balance or to allow plot development without needing to make new beams that'll have that particular ship survive, I guess. Well my theory is rubbish. For me, I think the idea is that the beams and their damage potentials were created first.

Then after that, they thought about what the beams were supposed to be fired at.

The way the blue beams are designed creates a tactical dynamic which helps support one of BP's main combined-arms themes. Why do you assume it's some kind of mistake?

[Destiny]

It certainly isn't a mistake if combined arms actually works properly. There's always a reason for the SBlue to have 6k+ range, and a recharge time of 40secs, and the BBlue of 8k+ range, and a recharge time of 30secs.

In FS2, capital ships were usually deployed alone, even the pilots called the two-ship Mentu-Sobek 'fleet' Command sent  on the mission before the Bastion mission "You call this a fleet?!". In BP it's more different. A corvette can be supported by a cruiser or two to complement it's anti-warship firepower, instead of having to drag another corvette along which could be put to better use elsewhere in the system. I don't see any mistakes here.





...well the Serkr team is a more extreme version...

[Commander Zane]

I'd complain if there was a Mentu covering anything in the battlezone too, they're nothing more than cannon fodder; ineffective against most anything.

[Destiny]

I suppose the Vasudans would've outfitted Mentu cruisers with Vasudan pulse weapons, light ones to serve as escorts from incoming bombs. They're good meatshields too (60k!).




Oh yeah, technology-wise, how feasible is it to incorporate blue beams into ships from the green beam era? Putting TerSlashBlue and TerSlashBlueAAA on Deimos corvettes was quite a light show. Would it take a lot of reconfiguring? Changing the beam emitter themselves only (Changing the beam cannon itself is a given...)?