[The E]

For anti-warship firepower? You're right, adding some shorter ranged green beams wouldn't do much for their ship-to-ship. But even green AAAfs would be pretty damn useful vs fighters. Much more useful than flak or blobs anyway, as they penetrate shields and have a very strong kinetic effect that can punt bombers around and even break their lock.

Which would contravene a lot of UEF fighter doctrine. UEF pilots are trained to stay close to the ships, to use the flak as cover. Beams, with their tendency to cause blue-on-blue incidents, would not help.

[FrikgFeek]

Well maybe if they had beams they wouldn't even need so much cover. AAAs are much better at shooting down bombs than flak is, since the AoE from flak guns doesn't kill bombs.  Just look at Forced Entry in AoA. Even on Insane the warships hardly need any cover(aside from killing them beam cannons), your biggest problem are the Solace and the Sanctuary.
And even if beams are too advanced, maybe they can at least reverse engineer STerPulses. It has more range and 70% higher DPS than the UEF Point Defense Turrets. The shots also travel faster, making it easier to hit targets at maximum range.

[Aesaar]

The UEF Point Defense Turret (the Khatvanga) is already better at shooting down bombs than STerPulse and AAA.  UEF ships don't really need much help with point defense.  Not in terms of weapons, anyway.  Burst Flak and Point Defense Turret are both very good weapons.

And something you should note: the GTVA does fit STerPulse on a few Capella-era ships, but it's still not commonplace and it isn't the easiest thing to do.  Why would the UEF would have an easier time of it?

[Colonol Dekker]

Less resupply needed long term. Less effective to implement short term.


Buntuscum stick to what they're good at

[crizza]

I always hoped to see the UEF turn up with shivanised beams, since the forward part of the Lucifer ended up in Sol and they've backengineered the shield tech.
But then again, we would've seen this already, because a single ship with Lucifer grade beams would've been deployed early on in the war.

[An4ximandros]

You mean the part with two beam cannons that exploded themselves after exploding the second time?

[crizza]

Didn't everything simply explodes in the vid?
Haven't seen it in a long time, just thought it would be possible, because of the Custos X shields.

[azile0]

Unfortunately there wasn't much left of Lucy after it popped. In the ending scene of FS1 we see it get cut in half, but that front half does explode and the beams cannons are wrecked.

Additionally, something  I just remembered. When you encounter Al'Fadil's squad in WiH, what's the context there? Unfortunately I didn't make the connection until just now so I can't remember much about that mission. Do we ever find out why he wanted that transport?

[An4ximandros]

AlF was a PoW in that ship.

[azile0]

Oh, I remember now. I thought he was in space trying to capture it (shows how closely I was paying attention) and now i feel bad for re-playing the mission until I was able to beat it without getting my ass kicked.

[FrikgFeek]

It exploded TWICE. I don't think anyone's going to do much research on that wreck.

[Aslandor11]

Hi guys. I have been lurking on the Blue Planet boards for a few months now, and after playing (and replaying) WiH, I have been blown away. Everything, from mission difficulty to music, is spot on and I cannot think of a way the team could have done better. I feel that retail Freespace 2 was filled with fun, engaging missions but lacked story line or character development. BP totally outdoes retail by providing more unique gameplay, greater immersion, an indepth story, and characters that feel real. My sincere thanks to every member of the team for creating a work of art that keeps drawing me back.

That said, I have a few questions (why can't we put blue beams on deimoses )
1) Why was the 14th BG so small? After looking at the GTVA orbat, the 15th BG is significantly larger, with quite a few deimos and diomedes corvettes supplementing the Atreus, Imp, and Serkr. Was the 14th at full strength, and if not, why was the 15th not sent as the Sol Expeditionary force?

2) Do SSMs care about the limits of the Atreus's missile batteries? In Collateral Damage, we see the Akula cut to pieces by 36(?) Eos SSMs, but the all of the launchers on the Atreus are only capable of 12 warheads every 30 seconds.

3) Why is there the Bellerophon class corvette? It occupies almost the same role as the chimera, with a slight increase of warship firepower with a slight decrease in anti-fighter power. It seems that there is no real need to commission a warship that is as similar as an already existing one. (I am assuming that the Chimera came first, based on the MBlue techroom description)

4) What is stopping the UEF from replacing the gauss cannons on the Karuna to the mass drivers? It seems that it would be a tactical step down from gauss, but the sheer killing power of the mass driver seems like it would be worth the drop in range and subsystem damage. The techroom seems to suggest that the mass driver is simply a gauss with a stronger penetrator and a larger explosive. This retrofit would not work and the Narayana class for obvious reasons, but the size mass driver rounds compared to gauss rounds we see in mission from Karunas seem to suggest it would be possible.

5) Why do we see so many GTVA bombers? The bomber corps of the GTVA is often seen dropped into combat situations unescorted, with minimal support. This is pretty dumb, as often times bombers do not even get to launch their warheads before the get thrashed by UEF fighters. In Delenda Est, it is pretty easy to intercept all of the bombers before their cyclops even exit the missile bays. The Indus still takes a lot of damage, almost all of it from the Maxims the bombers are carrying. Why don't we see more devoted Maxim strikes, such as the ones in Aristeia, replace the hordes of flunky bombers the GTVA throws at the UEF?

6) Is the Sanctus refit even that effective? The Sanctus's anti-warship weakness has been done to death on this forum, but looking at the refit, it doesn't seem to improve that much. We see the Warhammers replaced by really weak Hydra launchers, and the Sanctus's forward mass drivers replaced by gauss cannons. Granted, the AA potential of the Sanctus goes through the roof with 6 PDs and 6 Burst Flaks, but it seems that the core problems with the Sanctus are left unaddressed.

7) Why do we still see Myrmidons flying in the Sol Theater? We know they are out of production, but can't we just ship the Myrmidons from all of the Sol Battlegroups and replace them with Perseus fighters from border systems? It is clear that they are easy to kill in just about anything, and wasting resources replacing them when they get destroyed must be costly.

8) How many GTVA ships have sprint drives? I know the Atreus, Carthage, and Serkr have them, but does the Imp and the Hood have sprint drives? Are there various kinds of sprint drives? The Atreus bugs out almost as soon as it is engaged in Darkest Hour, very shortly after it enters. The Carthage also jumps within 2 minutes of its entrance in Pawns. In Collateral damage however, Serkr waits around and gets attacked by a few gunships and bombers before it jumps. Why did it wait around?

[AdmiralRalwood]

I'm (obviously) not on the BP team, but I think I can address at least one point:

The Atreus bugs out almost as soon as it is engaged in Darkest Hour, very shortly after it enters. The Carthage also jumps within 2 minutes of its entrance in Pawns. In Collateral damage however, Serkr waits around and gets attacked by a few gunships and bombers before it jumps. Why did it wait around?

How fast the sprint drive charges depends on how much energy the ship is diverting to other things, like weapons or ECM. The Atreus in Darkest Hour and the Carthage in Pawns aren't spending energy on weapons; they're putting it straight into getting the ability to jump back out ASAP (this is also why the Atreus doesn't beam the station before running for it). In Collateral Damage, Serkr had just fired their frontal beams; they weren't focused solely on jumping back out. That's why it took them more time.

[Aesaar]

Hi guys. I have been lurking on the Blue Planet boards for a few months now, and after playing (and replaying) WiH, I have been blown away. Everything, from mission difficulty to music, is spot on and I cannot think of a way the team could have done better. I feel that retail Freespace 2 was filled with fun, engaging missions but lacked story line or character development. BP totally outdoes retail by providing more unique gameplay, greater immersion, an indepth story, and characters that feel real. My sincere thanks to every member of the team for creating a work of art that keeps drawing me back.

That said, I have a few questions (why can't we put blue beams on deimoses )

This question was probably a joke, but I'll answer it anyway.  Power requirements.  Blue beams require a lot more power than green beams do, and Capella era ships (to say nothing of Great War ones) just don't have the power grids to handle them.

1) Why was the 14th BG so small? After looking at the GTVA orbat, the 15th BG is significantly larger, with quite a few deimos and diomedes corvettes supplementing the Atreus, Imp, and Serkr. Was the 14th at full strength, and if not, why was the 15th not sent as the Sol Expeditionary force?

The plan the 14th BG was supposed to carry out didn't require them to really fight a war at all.  You can read more about it in the techroom.  The short version is that they were supposed to enter the system under a flag of peace, take orbital bombardment positions over Earth, then demand UEF surrender.  That plan was (obviously) scrapped when Admiral Bei defected.

2) Do SSMs care about the limits of the Atreus's missile batteries? In Collateral Damage, we see the Akula cut to pieces by 36(?) Eos SSMs, but the all of the launchers on the Atreus are only capable of 12 warheads every 30 seconds.

The Atreus has 48 individual torpedo tubes.  They just take a long time to reload and it doesn't fire a full volley as a result.  There's also the Imperieuse, which has another 16 tubes.

3) Why is there the Bellerophon class corvette? It occupies almost the same role as the chimera, with a slight increase of warship firepower with a slight decrease in anti-fighter power. It seems that there is no real need to commission a warship that is as similar as an already existing one. (I am assuming that the Chimera came first, based on the MBlue techroom description)

The Bellerophon is a lot tougher than the Chimera is, and it has much more comprehensive command and control systems.  It's specifically meant to be a flotilla leader.

4) What is stopping the UEF from replacing the gauss cannons on the Karuna to the mass drivers? It seems that it would be a tactical step down from gauss, but the sheer killing power of the mass driver seems like it would be worth the drop in range and subsystem damage. The techroom seems to suggest that the mass driver is simply a gauss with a stronger penetrator and a larger explosive. This retrofit would not work and the Narayana class for obvious reasons, but the size mass driver rounds compared to gauss rounds we see in mission from Karunas seem to suggest it would be possible.

  Gauss cannons are really good at killing subsystems.  They're nice to have.  Not really sure the UEF would want to replace them.

5) Why do we see so many GTVA bombers? The bomber corps of the GTVA is often seen dropped into combat situations unescorted, with minimal support. This is pretty dumb, as often times bombers do not even get to launch their warheads before the get thrashed by UEF fighters. In Delenda Est, it is pretty easy to intercept all of the bombers before their cyclops even exit the missile bays. The Indus still takes a lot of damage, almost all of it from the Maxims the bombers are carrying. Why don't we see more devoted Maxim strikes, such as the ones in Aristeia, replace the hordes of flunky bombers the GTVA throws at the UEF?

This is a failing the GTVA is aware of.  Do note that in Delenda Est, Lopez didn't really have many options.  She threw the Carthage's entire air wing at the Wargods.

6) Is the Sanctus refit even that effective? The Sanctus's anti-warship weakness has been done to death on this forum, but looking at the refit, it doesn't seem to improve that much. We see the Warhammers replaced by really weak Hydra launchers, and the Sanctus's forward mass drivers replaced by gauss cannons. Granted, the AA potential of the Sanctus goes through the roof with 6 PDs and 6 Burst Flaks, but it seems that the core problems with the Sanctus are left unaddressed.

The Sanctus is a cruiser killer.  The refit can handle a Deimos, but it rips GTVA cruisers to pieces.  It's a good counter to GTVA raiders.

7) Why do we still see Myrmidons flying in the Sol Theater? We know they are out of production, but can't we just ship the Myrmidons from all of the Sol Battlegroups and replace them with Perseus fighters from border systems? It is clear that they are easy to kill in just about anything, and wasting resources replacing them when they get destroyed must be costly.

They're used because they're available.  If you ship in a Perseus to replace a Myrmidon, that's something else you're not shipping in instead.  There's a finite amount of materiel the GTVA logistics train can move.

8) How many GTVA ships have sprint drives? I know the Atreus, Carthage, and Serkr have them, but does the Imp and the Hood have sprint drives? Are there various kinds of sprint drives? The Atreus bugs out almost as soon as it is engaged in Darkest Hour, very shortly after it enters. The Carthage also jumps within 2 minutes of its entrance in Pawns. In Collateral damage however, Serkr waits around and gets attacked by a few gunships and bombers before it jumps. Why did it wait around?

AdmiralRalwood isn't wrong about this, but I'm pretty sure Serkr doesn't take much longer to leave in Collateral Damage than the Atreus does in Darkest Hour or the Carthage does in Pawns On a Board of Bone.

[-Norbert-]

There are also two places of ingame chatter that migth explain it. The first in AoA when the pilots comment about the engineer of the Duke having to be a genius for keeping the jumpdrives operable under such strain. That would indicate that a skilled deck-crew can get more performance out of their ship and/or reduce the risk of catastrophic equipment failure by quite a bit margin.

With the Atreus being the Flagship I'm sure that the best personel of the entire battlegroup would be stationed on her.

Then there's also what the people say in Darkest Hour. There they say that Steele is taking a very high risk with the way he jumps the Atreus around. Maybe Serkr were just not riding their hardware as close to it's limits as the Atreus did. Considering how they shredded the gunships they weren't really in that much of a rush to bug out anyway, so no need to risk burning out their drives or something similar in their situation.

[crizza]

Don't forget the GVD Shepseskaf, which had a dedicated secondary reactor ready to flash the jump drive so it could leave.
Or was it a reactor normaly used to power a beam cannon?
Since we don't see much of the Vasudans I have asked myself many times: After the disater with the Typhoons and beams, are ships like the Hatshepsut designed with future upgrades in mind or do the Zods simply say "Hey, our economy is still up and running, we simply build new ships"

[Aesaar]

The Typhon's difficulty in mounting beam weapons is because Vasudan beams were not designed with retrofits in mind.  Terran beams were, which is why they're so much weaker.  If the GTVA had tried throwing BVas and VSlash onto an Orion, they'd have run into the same kind of difficulties.

Ships are always designed with upgrades in mind, there's just a limit to how much you can upgrade a ship before the spaceframe's age just makes it unfeasible.

[Scotty]

There's also the possibility of a discovery that enacts a full paradigm-shift in terms of ship capabilities and building.  Beams are absolutely, unarguably one of these shifts.  It's utterly laughable to think that the Orion's original engineers could have conceived of mounting massive beam cannons as a potential future update.

[crizza]

Interesting point...
I wish we would know more about the Zods in the BP timeframe...
If it is true, that in the next release you play as a Vasudan, I'll be a happy man

[Mars]

lol, not the next release. If we're lucky BP3 will happen someday. BP2 4 & 5 will probably still be UEF.