[Klaustrophobia]

1) Pick off as many ships as possible (though they should probably Sanctus-class at least); use highly disproportionate force to do it, and be unpredictable.

 Regularly have Pegasus and Aurora fighters do recon and 'vectoring' for potential shock jumps. Even if it's right outside places like a Kumari.

 Lure out a frigate or Sanctus with large numbers of minor, but significant, strikes; always make it seem as if it's a small engagement and that a relatively small force commitment can save the situation. And then, on a good number of these occasions, actually let them succeed. So when you get the right opportunity and a Karuna or a few Sanctus cruisers comes in, you can feasibly vector in a shock-jump with Serkr Team (or just the Atreus herself; her capability and reputation for impossibly rapid subspace jumps would make even Calder hesitant to bring in the cavalry right away, giving the Atreus the time to escape without too much trouble).

this is exactly the sort of long-term attrition war the GTVA means to avoid.  it's completely counter to the overall objective of strengthening against shivan invasion.  they need to absorb sol quickly and as intact as possible, not bleed it dry.

Every time there's a minor engagement, send in a ludicrously disproportionate force to take out the UEF assets present. Given Byrne's passivity, the general friction between Byrne, Netreba, and Calder, Calder's famous aggression and the autonomy between 1st and 2nd/3rd Fleets, they'll be much less responsive to offensively committing a massive force deployment, especially after the events of Delenda Est. For ships with sprint drives, the window of opportunity to counterstrike would be quite limited to begin with.

that plays into the UEF's hands.  committing an unwarranted massive force for relatively little gain WILL open whatever those forces were guarding to counterattack.

2) In major engagements, have a wing or two of Ares fighters be dedicated to warhead intercept and point defense against UEF gunships, bombers, and (depending on the circumstances) Kents. With Maxims in the two-gun slot and Balors or Kaysers in the four-gun slot, they can pick off an impressive number of torpedoes and send a lot of Trebuchets to targets. Even if they're dodged, they've left the heavy strike craft vulnerable and averted their attacks for the duration of the missile salvo. They have very powerful reactors, strong shields and armor, and enough speed and maneuverability to effectively supplement/escort a capital ship. And, of course, at ranges within 5 km, they can use their Trebs to snipe turrets of value (like the Torpedo launchers, mass drivers, etc.). Use Herc-II's as a substitute if necessary.

this is completely ignoring the UEF's own fighters.  having lumbering heavy assault fighters sitting around just for defense is an uhlan/kent pilot's wet dream.  they would be obliterated, just as easily as you say they would obliterate the UEF gunships and bombers.  they are called HEAVY ASSAULT for a reason. 

[SaltyWaffles]

this is exactly the sort of long-term attrition war the GTVA means to avoid.  it's completely counter to the overall objective of strengthening against shivan invasion.  they need to absorb sol quickly and as intact as possible, not bleed it dry.

...which is why this strategy focuses on eliminating key UEF warships as quickly as possible to hasten victory--one that comes about as much through political and morale pressure as it does military. It's also not attrition war. Hard to call 'take advantage of enemy indecisiveness and disunity by frequently deploying massive forces to take out small chunks of assets'. It's basically what Steele did to take the Jovian Rim in WiH's opening cutscene. He just went straight in with an entire battlegroup at once and took advantage of the fact that the UEF never sorties the kind of huge forces required to take that on.

that plays into the UEF's hands.  committing an unwarranted massive force for relatively little gain WILL open whatever those forces were guarding to counterattack.

...that's what the GTVA's been doing the ENTIRE TIME. Seriously, remember Calder's rant at Byrne? Or the Suffron captain's rant to Brie in mission 1? Aristeia was a huge deal because the UEF actually used its assets (well, half of them, anyway) in a coordinated and offensive manner--and when everything but the Carthage was tied up in the battle, 1st Fleet did...nothing. At best, they served as a ludicrously disproportionate deterrant against an attack against Earth by the Carthage (which would leave Artemis Station wide open...which was the whole point of the Carthage being there in the first place).

The UEF has demonstrated, across the board, how little they commit to counterstrikes, and how hesitant they are to do it at all. Their best showing was in Darkest Hour, which was in the context of a blitz on Earth where the UEF could be defeated then and there--and it was Calder who ordered it.

Also remember: this isn't some big, planned out operation we're talking about--most of the time, nothing would happen, and the UEF reinforcements would force the small GTVA force to retreat. But, say, one time out of ten, when the UEF sends out a frigate to protect against a raid of a Deimos and an Aeolus on a shipment of fighters, the Atreus herself jumps in and obliterates it straight away. A Charybdis might be there to jam all long-range comms and warn of (and coordinate) subspace jumps. If Darkest Hour is any indication, any UEF counterattack would have to be done within a couple minutes. The counterattack force would have to be sufficient to take on the Atreus, a Deimos, an Aeolus, and maybe a Charybdis AWACS and the supporting craft. Given the UEF's hesitance, disunity, and dwindling fleet, it's be pretty damn hard to get that force together fast enough. And then, the odds of doing enough damage or disabling the Atreus before it jumps out are slim.

this is completely ignoring the UEF's own fighters.  having lumbering heavy assault fighters sitting around just for defense is an uhlan/kent pilot's wet dream.  they would be obliterated, just as easily as you say they would obliterate the UEF gunships and bombers.  they are called HEAVY ASSAULT for a reason.

...no, not really. I've actually tested this out, both indirectly and directly. The Ares fighters stay close to their designated capital ship--like, say, the Hood or Carthage. The capship's point defenses allow the Ares to avoid a dogfight, and in the event of missiles, they can either dodge, tank, or take cover behind their capship. And since Trebs outrange Grimlers anyway, it wouldn't be an easy thing to try. And you'd be surprised--as maneuverable as an Uhlan or Kent is, an Ares' low maneuverability is not nearly as much a weakness when it's got three Heavy Flak turrets covering its back, along with 1-3 fellow wingmen that can spew 6 Balors each. When the enemy maneuvers to deal with the flak, you get an opening to let loose with your own guns, forcing either further evasive maneuvers, disengagement, or going all-out offensive in the hopes of taking down a highly durable fighter (let alone surviving the ordeal).

This gets even more daunting when there's a wing of Perseus (or even Atalanta!) fighters in the way--far from impossible, I know, but at best it takes a good deal of time and effort to accomplish, not to mention a level of skill, experience, and methodology that the UEF is starting to really run short on in its fighter corps. And god help you if the capship in question is a Chimera. Or if there's a Cretheus nearby as well.

And, perhaps, the Ares might be carrying Tornadoes in one of their banks--dodging one volley is not too much of a pain, but what happens if he follows it up with two more volleys, all while AAAf's and pulse turrets/flak are blasting away at you?

[General Battuta]

Man y'all sound like the GTVA Admiralty

[Scotty]

...that's what the GTVA's been doing the ENTIRE TIME.

No, it's really not.  The first 18 months of the war were characterized by a hilariously low intensity of conflict.  Having engagements where there were even three or four corvettes or frigates taking part were rare, and a ludicrously disproportionate force was absolutely unheard of during anything not named the "Battle of Neptune".

Steele operates different, true, but it's still not to the level you seem to think it is.  If there were ever any real, truly ludicrously disproportionate strike against a UEF asset (aside from perhaps the Blitz, and even that's highly questionable), whatever UEF asset it was would simply cease to exist.  However, and here's why it hasn't happened, so would any GTVA assets committed.  As soon as UEF command learned that there was something like a large concentration of corvettes or a destroyer that actually committed to the field, there would be three or four FrigRons in the area in a matter of minutes.

The GTVA can't afford those kinds of losses, even if they're inflicting similar.

[General Battuta]

'Hilariously low intensity' for warships larger than modern aircraft carriers hurling around bizarro-world yields, mind.

The opening stages of the war are full of the kind of battles that were fun to play in base FreeSpace 2: a couple wings of fighters, a warship or two or three. Nice for multiplayer! Which is not to say there were not larger engagements (there definitely were), but it's a great place to say 'I want to have a mission where a small group of ships goes and fights another small group of ships over a clear objective', which, again, was the mission design philosophy Volition liked to stick to.

[SaltyWaffles]

...that's what the GTVA's been doing the ENTIRE TIME.

No, it's really not.  The first 18 months of the war were characterized by a hilariously low intensity of conflict.  Having engagements where there were even three or four corvettes or frigates taking part were rare, and a ludicrously disproportionate force was absolutely unheard of during anything not named the "Battle of Neptune".

Okay, allow me to reclassify: that's what the GTVA has been doing throughout WiH P1. From Artemis Station to Delenda Est, high-intensity warfare utilizing disproportionate force has been heavily shifting the balance of the war towards the GTVA's favor.

Still, a few examples about moderately sized engagements before WiH:

1) The Reunion. 14th BG obliterates the UEFg Renjian.

2) Calder sends four frigates as a follow-up, but holds back the Toutatis. One frigate gets destroyed (by 14th BG), others retreat.

3) First Battle of Neptune. Hecate destroyer, multiple Deimos-class corvettes, two UEF frigates, four UEF corvettes/Sanctus's, and possibly more in the way of smaller ships (such as Tev cruisers).

4) Second Battle of Neptune.

5) Ambush of the GTD Requiem.

6) At least a few significant engagements involving Narayana heavy frigates driving off Tev ships through artillery fire.

So while your point is largely correct, there were a fair number of larger engagements in the 18 months between AoA and WiHp1.

------

Steele operates different, true, but it's still not to the level you seem to think it is.  If there were ever any real, truly ludicrously disproportionate strike against a UEF asset (aside from perhaps the Blitz, and even that's highly questionable), whatever UEF asset it was would simply cease to exist.  However, and here's why it hasn't happened, so would any GTVA assets committed.  As soon as UEF command learned that there was something like a large concentration of corvettes or a destroyer that actually committed to the field, there would be three or four FrigRons in the area in a matter of minutes.

The GTVA can't afford those kinds of losses, even if they're inflicting similar.

Byrne reiterates how the Tevs can afford destroyer-level casualties. Considering how the Tevs have two dozen Hecates (if Noemi's comment is accurate), it's not entirely unreasonable.

And the dynamic you outlined just doesn't add up, unless I'm misunderstanding. The GTVA can't just do an all-out assault on Mars or Earth because they'd be facing the whole UEF force at once--Byrne's fleet would be in full gear, Netreba and Calder would be all over the action, and the fleet bombers and Durgas would get right into the thick of things. The Tevs can't stand against that, which is why the UEF is so heavily crippled by its lack of cohesion--Byrne's fleet rarely does anything that isn't purely defensive, Netreba is caught between two starkly different philosophies and pressures from Calder and Byrne, and the Solaris won't do anything except defend Earth. Steele's blitz of Artemis Station and the Jovian Rim took advantage of the fact that the UEF wouldn't scramble their assets to save the Rim.

The Blitz was an interesting event, but it makes sense in context--Steele targeted infrastructure and rear-line targets; the very things the UEF had been lulled into thinking were off the table as far as the war went. It put the pressure on the UEF, afterwards, to act decisively to avoid defeat. This lead to the official split between Byrne and Netreba/Calder, allowing Steele to focus on the elements of the 2nd and 3rd Fleets that were on offense. He succeeded spectacularly in his destruction of the Wargods, and now the UEF's total fleet is reaching a level where the Tevs alone have parity. If more assets from the 2nd and 3rd fleets can be picked off (further taking advantage of Byrne's passivity), eventually even the UEF as a whole will be outnumbered.

Of course, if the Vasudans get actively involved, things get dire. Vasudan ships have good beams, mainly due to the fact that their emitters aren't gigantic and as fragile as a Hermes. And within 2km, the dozen-ish Fusion Mortars of the Shepsakaf become quite threatening.

Anyway, the UEF does not act cohesively unless its heart is under attack. So unless you attack Earth, Mars, or Luna, don't expect the First Fleet to do much--Steele took advantage of this many times throughout WiHp1. And as far as counterattacks go, 'a few minutes' is too long. By then, Serkr Team is already gone. The Atreus will be giving you its tail-lights. And do you really think that 1st and 2nd Fleets could organize a large enough counterstrike force to take on the Atreus, Serkr Team, and a few supporting ships in order to avenge the loss of one or two frigates, all in the span of a couple minutes? After Delenda Est, they'll constantly be worrying about something like that being another trap. And knowing Steele, it actually WILL BE, each time, because he has contingencies for the contingencies. And he likes 'dem sprint drives. A lot.

[Scotty]

I'm not going to go through and pick that post apart piece by piece, and the beginning of it is actually fairly well structured, but you miss one important part.

The Second Battle of Neptune was a snoozer.  The 16th BG jumped in expecting a fight to take the planet, and instead found it almost totally undefended.  For whatever its strategic ramifications, it was not a large capital ship fight.  There are a grand total of four canon and explored large engagements before War in Heaven, and three of them happen within days of the 14th arriving in Sol.  Only one that you have listed happens after Admiral Severanti adopts the policy of low-level conflict.

Additionally, Narayanas did not exist as artillery frigates until fairly recently.  As one of the project members for BP:Tev, I would also adore it if you could point me toward any of those incidents you're talking about.

And, if you would, allow me to clarify what I meant in the latter half of my post.

The GTVA can't afford those losses from a public relations standpoint.  They have to be winning the war, not fighting the war, for the support from home to keep coming.  If it dries up, so do they.  Trading ship for ship in brutal, ship-heavy slugfests is exactly what the GTVA cannot afford.

[MatthTheGeek]

And, if you would, allow me to clarify what I meant in the latter half of my post.

The GTVA can't afford those losses from a public relations standpoint.  They have to be winning the war, not fighting the war, for the support from home to keep coming.  If it dries up, so do they.  Trading ship for ship in brutal, ship-heavy slugfests is exactly what the GTVA cannot afford.

Or couldn't afford for 18 months. At which point, the war had gone for far too long and they were ready to loose more ships in order to finish the war more quickly. Which is when Steele comes into the fray.

[Scotty]

Well, that ties in with the reason they couldn't lose many ships.  When Steele came in, it's obvious to any outside observer, and probably made even more plainly obvious to your average GTVA citizen, that Steele is winning, and winning handily.  Momentum confers with itself advantages beyond the tactical.

[An4ximandros]

Steele should wear down the Martians they are, AFAIK, the least affected fleet from casualty reports we see in game, maybe a martian blitz?
While at that, have the Vazods attack earth and pin down Bryne, have Atreus jump on top of Solaris' escape point to deliver the coup de grace.
Once that is done, start purging all the Gaian Effort infidels and dissidents.

After that, Steele should have a victory party on Canada, they named a fort in his honor after all.

[bfobar]

I for one am kind of surprised that steele hasn't been sending in the Atreus and Serkr, seeing that they all have sprint drives, on coordinated shock jumps to try to knock one of the solaris destroyers out of the war. Even if you felt kind with your armor scripting, I think having all those tev ships emerge from hyperspace, beam once, and then jump back out asap would likely at least demand that even a solaris destroyer spend a few months in dry dock getting the holes patched. I guess the counter would be to have all of the Narayanas of a fleet parked around the solaris, but then jumping in and hitting whichever frigate of the screen you feel like on a daily basis would be pretty demoralizing.

[headdie]

I for one am kind of surprised that steele hasn't been sending in the Atreus and Serkr, seeing that they all have sprint drives, on coordinated shock jumps to try to knock one of the solaris destroyers out of the war. Even if you felt kind with your armor scripting, I think having all those tev ships emerge from hyperspace, beam once, and then jump back out asap would likely at least demand that even a solaris destroyer spend a few months in dry dock getting the holes patched. I guess the counter would be to have all of the Narayanas of a fleet parked around the solaris, but then jumping in and hitting whichever frigate of the screen you feel like on a daily basis would be pretty demoralizing.

The issue with that is that the Solari destroyers have pretty much sat at the centre of their escort group at their respective home bases through out most of the war meaning taking one out a monumentally risky operation.  To kill a Solaris with a good chance off victory you would need to lure it away from it's home base somehow, at least then you are only dealing with the federal fleet and not planetary defences  as well. 

It is the kind of operation Steele would jump at on but only if he thought he stood a realistic chance at coming out on top numbers wise and remember you are talking about putting a TEI generation destroyer + his best HK group on the line all at the same time in an operation which while useful is not currently essential to the war effort.

[QuakeIV]

They wouldn't be at risk though, they would just jump in, fire one volley, and jump out is what he is saying.

e:  Which would work quite nicely considering serkr could easily vaporize a karuna in one volley.

[SaltyWaffles]

I'm not going to go through and pick that post apart piece by piece, and the beginning of it is actually fairly well structured, but you miss one important part.

The Second Battle of Neptune was a snoozer.  The 16th BG jumped in expecting a fight to take the planet, and instead found it almost totally undefended.  For whatever its strategic ramifications, it was not a large capital ship fight.  There are a grand total of four canon and explored large engagements before War in Heaven, and three of them happen within days of the 14th arriving in Sol.  Only one that you have listed happens after Admiral Severanti adopts the policy of low-level conflict.

So? Within days or not, they still happened and had a tremendous impact on the next 18+ months. Your point is overall good, though.

Okay, so the one you mentioned is...the ambush of the GTD Requiem, right? The Toutatis is implied to have been deployed at least once before the events of WiH--unless the tech entries for all of the Solaris-class destroyers (and the class itself) only canonically exist *after* the events of Delenda Est?

Additionally, Narayanas did not exist as artillery frigates until fairly recently.  As one of the project members for BP:Tev, I would also adore it if you could point me toward any of those incidents you're talking about.

Eh? Then were they refitted to be artillery frigates just before WiH? Then when did they figure out that the Narayana class just couldn't work as the heavy, close-up brawler that it was originally intended to be? Was it just extrapolation? And if they were only used very recently, then why does their tech entry imply that they'd had major impacts on engagements through their artillery fire alone? And what were those Narayanas doing for the past 18 months, if they never fought in a battle or were under refits?

And, if you would, allow me to clarify what I meant in the latter half of my post.

The GTVA can't afford those losses from a public relations standpoint.  They have to be winning the war, not fighting the war, for the support from home to keep coming.  If it dries up, so do they.  Trading ship for ship in brutal, ship-heavy slugfests is exactly what the GTVA cannot afford.

True, very true. The good news for the Tevs, thus, is that they benefit from being able to tackle the UEF 'piecemeal', and many of their ship designs are extremely well suited for shock-jumping a frigate before jumping back out in a few minutes. Except for a couple Diomedes (heh :/ ) and perhaps a Deimos or two in TBI, the Tevs have not sustained major losses whenever they've made a really aggressive or bold move. Severanti still escaped with the Meridian (and most, potentially all, of his escort ships) after he bombed the crap out of Luna. Serkr Team got off scot-free after obliterating a Narayana. The assaults on the Akula and Ranvir didn't result in a single ship lost, but both of the UEF frigates were destroyed. The blitz on Artemis Station killed 3 Sanctus' and 2 Karunas without a single loss, and the First Battle of Neptune killed 2 frigates, 4 Sanctus cruisers, and paved the way for taking Neptune, at the cost of a Deimos (and a lot of fighters--part of the lessons learned for both sides).

A lot of this is made possible by the UEF's continual failure to respond to threats with adequate or excessive force, especially where First Fleet is concerned. It's hard to treat the Solaris as a sword of Damocles if it's never been deployed and the guy in command of it has an extensive track record of under-committing his ships to anything but strict defensive maneuvers.

Then there was the ambush and destruction of the UEFg Rhineland, too.

By Sunglare, the UEF's 'outer half' has committed fully to decisive maneuvers twice, and the Tevs did not receive a beating. In fact, it's suggested that the UEF came out of that action more bloodied ('gave our artillery a sound thrashing' during Aristeia). While this makes the 2nd/3rd Fleets much more formidable and significant a force, it also gives Steele more opportunities to go all-out aggressive and shock-jump a Solaris or Narayana pair. If the Shepsekaf has joined the fray, things could get ugly very fast.

I for one am kind of surprised that steele hasn't been sending in the Atreus and Serkr, seeing that they all have sprint drives, on coordinated shock jumps to try to knock one of the solaris destroyers out of the war. Even if you felt kind with your armor scripting, I think having all those tev ships emerge from hyperspace, beam once, and then jump back out asap would likely at least demand that even a solaris destroyer spend a few months in dry dock getting the holes patched. I guess the counter would be to have all of the Narayanas of a fleet parked around the solaris, but then jumping in and hitting whichever frigate of the screen you feel like on a daily basis would be pretty demoralizing.

The issue with that is that the Solari destroyers have pretty much sat at the centre of their escort group at their respective home bases through out most of the war meaning taking one out a monumentally risky operation.  To kill a Solaris with a good chance off victory you would need to lure it away from it's home base somehow, at least then you are only dealing with the federal fleet and not planetary defences  as well. 

It is the kind of operation Steele would jump at on but only if he thought he stood a realistic chance at coming out on top numbers wise and remember you are talking about putting a TEI generation destroyer + his best HK group on the line all at the same time in an operation which while useful is not currently essential to the war effort.

A Solaris has 180K hitpoints; I know meta-game factors changes up the dynamic a bit, but just using it as a baseline:

Serkr Team's single-salvo damage output is, using the standard Chimera and Bellerophon loadout, 60K + 60K + 77K - 1600 = 196,500 damage (roughly). Serkr Team has upgraded weapons. As it stands, Serkr Team alone could one-shot a Solaris. They also have sprint-drives, advanced armor, etc. With the incredible point defenses and coordination they have, it'd be a pretty daunting task to kill Serkr Team before they jump back out. The major caveat is that they'd likely need time/AWACS support to calculate the jumps/vectors beforehand, which would require the Solaris to be in the same area for long enough. A challenge, but not unheard of. In a major engagement, this already happens as part of the battle, so it may give a window of opportunity.

A Titan's damage output for its forward beams alone is 99K. Add in the two TerSlashBlue's and pulse turrets, and its capable of two-shotting a Solaris by itself, unless its beams are sniped quickly enough (or jammed quickly enough); definitely doable, yes, but what if you add in Serkr Team?

A Raynor's HBlue does about 41K from something like 9+ km away. It can fire every 30 seconds, I think, too. It also has a BBlue, 4 MBlue's, 2 TerSlashBlue's, and 2 SBlue's to use to fend off other threats until it can jump out again.

Say the Carthage and her battlegroup plays defense and holds the fort at Artemis. Let's say that the Eris is docked at a Kumari instillation orbiting Mars. Also at that station is a Narayana, a Karuna, and a couple Sanctus cruisers. Now, assuming the subspace transits are vectored, with about a minute warning:

Steele jumps in with the Imperieuse, Atreus, and Hydra. The Eris is oneshotted. The rest of the UEF ships turn to engage. They have about 30-35 seconds to do something before they are targets for an absurd amount of firepower. One of those two frigates is going to die no matter what, but either way, a UEF counterstrike force would need to feature a Solaris practically by default, along with a sizable frigate force. Gathering that force would take time, jumping there would take time, but most of all, how exactly would they manage to disable or destroy any of those Tev ships before they jumped out?

Now, in practice, it wouldn't be that easy. And the UEF is probably at least somewhat prepared for such a contingency, or something like it. But it conveys the idea: killing a Solaris itself is easy if you bring a ton of firepower--it's the aftermath that is the challenge, for both sides. Particularly problematic for the UEF is that their ships are bad at doing lots of damage quickly, especially against targets with good point defenses. When you've got 30 seconds to make something happen, that's a really big problem to deal with. Any reinforcements would also be encumbered by that same problem--they have little time to do the needed damage before the targets escape, or the targets can fire back with extreme firepower. Steele is known for his aggressiveness and love of (seemingly) unconventional tactics.

Thus, you have a huge Damocles' Sword that's hanging over the UEF's head all the time, and with every frigate they lose, the more threatening that sword becomes.

Angel Flares are really going to need to work well if they're going to change that dynamic alone.

With a number of AWACS ships and Auroras, you could park them 50km away from Rheza or the normal places of the Solaris and Eris, and have them jump back out before becoming endangered. Again and again. And on occasion, Serkr Team will shock-jump a Karuna and jump back out before taking too much damage from whatever retaliatory force comes up. Even in the meantime for that, they'd have enough firepower between them to oneshot a Solaris--you'd need some pretty damn good reinforcements to take on Serkr Team in the small timeframe you have.

[General Battuta]

180k hitpoints for a Solaris is about as good a baseline as an Orion's HP are for the Carthage.

[crizza]

And there is beam jamming...dun, dun, dun...
"Let's kill us a Solaris"
"Uh, Admiral, our beams aren't working..."
"Well then, we'll repeat this crazy strike jump thing several times a day...I'm pretty sure the UEF can't handle this..."

Sure...that's how it goes...sure...

[Drogoth]

And there is beam jamming...dun, dun, dun...
"Let's kill us a Solaris"
"Uh, Admiral, our beams aren't working..."
"Well then, we'll repeat this crazy strike jump thing several times a day...I'm pretty sure the UEF can't handle this..."

Sure...that's how it goes...sure...

The UEF has oculus' on full readiness standby 24/7 across their entire fleet zone?

I call bull****

[Scotty]

And there is beam jamming...dun, dun, dun...
"Let's kill us a Solaris"
"Uh, Admiral, our beams aren't working..."
"Well then, we'll repeat this crazy strike jump thing several times a day...I'm pretty sure the UEF can't handle this..."

Sure...that's how it goes...sure...

The UEF has oculus' on full readiness standby 24/7 across their entire fleet zone?

I call bull****

The GTVA has full intelligence on the position and readiness of the UEF's Solaris strength 24/7 across their entire fleet zone?

I call bull****.

More seriously, I've noticed lately in a variety of threads that people seem to have fallen into a logical fallacy.  "The GTVA/UEF should do <x> because <y>, and that will give them a huge advantage."  What this line of thinking simply doesn't do is imagine the consequences of the actions beyond the immediate and beneficial, and also anything that might be preventing the actions at any given time.

"The GTVA should go for huge fleet engagements so they can actually destroy some UEF ships."  They can't do that because public opinion would very, very, very quickly make actually acheiving any of their stated objectives completely impossible.

"The GTVA should shock-jump any undefended Karunas or Narayanas or even Solarises, and then jump away just as fast."  They can't do that because operational intelligence like that isn't exactly hanging from the lowest branches of the trees at this stage in the war.  If you know exactly where the enemy is, they are likely either A) too heavily defended to attack or B) attacking you already.  There are precious few exceptions to this, and nearly all of those exceptions become major plot points and intelligence coups in War in Heaven.  The Agincourt is a huge intelligence coup for the UEF.  It's not that they didn't attack it before because it was too defended, they just didn't know where the blasted thing was.  The Ranvir and Akula are both regrouping from the chaotic aftermath of Artemis, and their losses (and situations) are barely the least bit representative of the way the war has been fought up to that point.

The other major problem that's been popping up is "<x>'s table stats show that it can do <y> to <z>."  Forget everything you know about the tables.  They exist as a basic framework.  They are not the final word, or even the first word.  They're general guidelines that can be molded and fit to the mission's needs as they must.  "A full secondary bank of Paveways into the Carthage's engines would leave it easily disabled for the rest of the Wargods."  That statement is 100% factual, going by the table stats.  However, if you try to do this in Pawns on a Board of Bone, you'll find that the Carthage's engine subsystem is guardianed.

In short: There is always a reason to why something that seems simple does not happen.  "Obvious" truths are neither obvious nor truths in all cases.

[Droid803]

The GTVA do shock jump undefended Karunas and Narayanas, then jump away fast. You already talked about the Ranvir and Akula, but I would assume anything isolated frigate they had intel of would be on the hit list. After all, the fact that Serkr team likes paints dead frigates on their hulls enough to be well-known before they toast their latest Narayana.

[MatthTheGeek]

And there is beam jamming...dun, dun, dun...
"Let's kill us a Solaris"
"Uh, Admiral, our beams aren't working..."
"Well then, we'll repeat this crazy strike jump thing several times a day...I'm pretty sure the UEF can't handle this..."

Sure...that's how it goes...sure...

The UEF has oculus' on full readiness standby 24/7 across their entire fleet zone?

I call bull****

You don't need an Oculus for beam jamming. Especially when you're talking about something as big and important as a Solaris-class destroyer, which is perfectly able to take care of itself.