- Location
- USA
Hmm...
That's a pretty good point.
...
I don't think this will change the potential project order but it does make It more likely we will do microfusion immediately when we get more STUs. Helping orbital is a good motivator.
Attempting to Fulfill the Plan: GDI Edition
That's a pretty good point.
...
I don't think this will change the potential project order but it does make It more likely we will do microfusion immediately when we get more STUs. Helping orbital is a good motivator.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Orbital's going to remain important and we should keep having ambitious plan goals- not necessarily promises, but goals- for it after this current upcoming Plan is over. The tools are no small thing- but STUs are very precious, so we do have to be careful.
- Location
- Outside the Box
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Any kind of application like that would take time to get, though. We can only fund Microfusion Cell Laboratories, for now. We completed Suzuka in Q4 2061, first got the option for developing 2nd gen repulsorplates in Q3 2062, and did that project last turn in Q1 2063. We still have yet to do the 6-7 dice project to actually implement repulsorplates yet, and we likely won't finish those until at least three turns from now, in Q1 2064, or 9 turns since we finished Suzuka. (Suzuka being equivalent to the current microfusion project.)
If we did the microfusion labs next turn, 9 turns after that would be Q4 2065, meaning we'd finish the deployment on the last turn of this 4-year Plan. If we really focused on microfusion starting next turn, and it follows a similar timeline to repulsorplates, we maybe could be able to cut that down to 5-6 turns afterwards, or finishing in Q4 2064 at the earliest. And we'd likely still need to do a follow-up project to gain said astronaut power tools.
Doing all that for some unknown discount or other bonus for space projects seems like a heavy investment for what might be only a small or modest benefit. We'd likely gain much more just from finishing the U-Series Alloy's 5th phase next turn instead of trying to pivot to get microfusion in time to help with our space colonization goal. Also: We'd be down 2 STUs for the next two years and down even more STUs to actually deploy microfusion. And we're going to gain even more potentially-useful STU-devouring techs soon enough.
- Location
- Wall Gazing
I'll freely admit my biases with regards to STUs in that of the options we have, I'd rather they go into improving our economy then into the military. The GDI is not NOD, with a few wunderwaffen, it is a global superstate and is at its best when it can leverage its immense economy. Thus I think most of our STUs should go into our economy, something that will allow us to expand our military quicker. The main exception to that in my mind is our defenses against the Visitors as we don't really have any other then Pathfinder and turning our ASAT arrays outward instead of inward. This, plus us not really having a lot of industry in space (compared to on Earth) puts us in the position of needing to go for quality over quantity as we won't be able to mass produce things in orbit for a bit. That time is sooner then latter as we've finished the Fusion and Gravitic Bays, but they're only now starting to build our fleet of Conestogas and Fusion tenders.
What are people thinking about the Refit Department in Military? It provides 30 Progress per turn for each Refit project, and we currently have 3 (Electronic Countermeasures Improvements, Ferro Aluminum Armor Refits, and Infernium Laser Refits). Thats 90 automatic progress (compared to our current average Military roll of 81.5) every turn for at least the next 7 turns. Given we are likely to have additional refits as better weapon systems come online (Military Particle Beam, Combat Laser, etc), and given that we have mostly finished SADN, it seems to me that it might be time to hand off that mil die in exchange for the reliable rollout of various upgrade packages.
What are people thinking about the Refit Department in Military? It provides 30 Progress per turn for each Refit project, and we currently have 3 (Electronic Countermeasures Improvements, Ferro Aluminum Armor Refits, and Infernium Laser Refits). Thats 90 automatic progress (compared to our current average Military roll of 81.5) every turn for at least the next 7 turns. Given we are likely to have additional refits as better weapon systems come online (Military Particle Beam, Combat Laser, etc), and given that we have mostly finished SADN, it seems to me that it might be time to hand off that mil die in exchange for the reliable rollout of various upgrade packages.
- Pronouns
- He/It/Argh!
Eh, I doubt there would be any STU option that didn't give a decent return for STU investment. We tend to get given options that are vetted by qualified engineers and economists, except that Mad Science options.
2 STUs for a Lab is either producing useful outputs now, or is going to produce big returns later.
2 STUs for a Lab is either producing useful outputs now, or is going to produce big returns later.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
I'd say to give it one more turn, maybe two, but yeah, the time for Department of Refits is coming up soon.
I'd like to get that "big five" tranche of high-priority but relatively low-cost Military projects out of the way (Orca wingmen, stealth disruptors, the Islands, the Seattle yard, and one other I forget right now, oh right, infantry drones), then spin off that bureau.
- Location
- Wall Gazing
That is fair. SADN 4 should be about 3 dice, assuming the pattern of Phase 1-3 repeats, Infantry Drones, Orca wingmen, Stealth Disruptors, and the Islands are 2 dice each, and the Seattle yard is 3 dice, so a total of 3+2*4+3=14 dice + 2 for Steel Talons = 16 dice over the next two turns. which is completely reasonable.
- Location
- USA
We also need to research and deploy the Governor-As and research unmanned drones, and the new support and combat vehicle designs. Edit: And transorbital fighters.
I'd wait on the refit department until we finish the military plan goals.
But that's just my thoughts on it. Shrug.
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Nottheunmaker
Altman be praised
- Location
- USG Ishimura
Finishing plan goals before spinning off refits sounds good to me. Maybe do a few other research projects to see of it unlocks other refit projects. Like Inferno Gel.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
I dunno, the vast majority of those are research projects. They take one die each. Us having only six Military dice per turn to play with instead of seven isn't going to meaningfully disrupt our ability to do those projects when and as we see fit. Nor will it stop us from completing the needed Set 2 zone armor factories in, hopefully, 2064.
I don't think we'll need the seventh die with SADN out of the way, not really, not urgently enough that it demands that we continue to delay.
Creating the Department of Refits is also a Plan goal. And fulfilling it isn't going to meaningfully impede our capacity to fulfill the rest. Even counting our Talons commitment, we'll have something like five dice per turn for eight or nine turns to play with, so about 40-45 dice. That's far more than enough to do what we need.
Maybe, but we're not somehow better off for unlocking refits before the department becomes available than we are for doing it afterwards.
- Location
- USA
Well, we've got the ps to burn. Might as well. We might get something interesting out of it.
Honestly, when we get the refit department we should make a point of doing every tech project we can so we have as many refits and munitions things going as possible.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
It'll be something to do with our extra Military dice, yeah.
- Location
- Wall Gazing
Statistically speaking we currently have 70 military dice until the end of the Plan. 10 of those are earmarked for the Talons. 14 on average are going to go to the (as of last turn) currently available projects. Probably 8 dice are going to SADN 4 (3) and the rollout of the Governor-A (5). If we got the Department of Refits now that would be 10 dice. We also likely need at least 1 or 2 RZ MARVs for the RZ Abatement commitment, or between 2 and 7 dice depending on Tiberium investment and rollover. That works out to 21 extra mil dice, with between 5 and 15 more Military dice on top of that depending on how the Department of Refits and the RZ MARVs play out. Even with Simon's wish list there are still at minimum 10 military dice to throw at a project (like deploying the Transorbital Fighters).
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
The catch is that we have so many fragmented mini--projects in Military that it's quite possible that we'll work through the entire rest of our Plan requirement project docket in Military without the AEVA saving us any real mileage except, possibly, on the zone armor plants where there's rollover.
- Location
- Wall Gazing
Tiberium and Heavy Industry seem like a better place to put an AEVA with our limited Capital Goods then Military, though admittedly its not a bad place per-say, just not as good as Tib or HI in my opinion.
- Location
- USA
We will probably do all the AEVAs at some point. But, at the moment the benefits do not seem to outweigh the costs.
Once we clear out the plan goals and have flexibility I'd be fine with doing them.
Once we clear out the plan goals and have flexibility I'd be fine with doing them.
Strunkriidiisk
THE LEGEND
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Funny, that got floated as an idea in the lead-up to this plan. Instead what won was... 20,000 people in space.
Agreed. Additionally, I don't think we should be devoting the lion's share of our STUs to military equipment (i.e. stuff that is one way or the other intended to be disposable and replaceable) outside of a few applications or where quality is non-negotiable (i.e. our space forces, which are going to be expected to engage Visitor remnants at some point while also being manpower-limited) - trying to plan for extensive use of STUs on regular forces may as well be directly tossing them into the trash*. Economic use, I think, should be our primary focus there. We're already seeing the enormous benefit of civilian/industrial-side STU usage with U-steel, which in my opinion is wildly more useful than any equivalent military-side investment of the same resources.
*I exaggerate, but I don't think it's wrong to assume that, say, a hover-tank factory is going to use more STUs than a similar-output general hover-vehicle factory, because the tanks are going to get shot at and destroyed and the repulsors may not be salvageable.
Basically this.
- Location
- his hidden lair
I think it's rather clear an abundance of STU will open up options to use our abundance. And I think idea of designing the next generation fighting vehicles without next generation technologies because of short term concerns over supplying the STUs is shooting ourselves in the foot. These are machines that will last us for decades after being designed- they're going to wind up with STU using overhauls regardless, it remains to be seen if we build the platform to use them or are stuck racing to install them on a platform that was never intended for them after the fact.
And bluntly speaking, we need the Next Generation vehicles to fully leverage these STU technologies because NOD is already ahead of the curve on us in that regard. They can produce a higher fraction of STUs to their Tib income than we can, they have more extensive experience fielding STU tech than we do, and they are increasingly reliant on that high end technology to make up for the fact they lack the manpower base they used to have.
The next decade is going to see the increasing proliferation of plasma weaponry that can defeat any protection scheme not using shields, heavily armored antigrav fighters in the vein of the Barghest immune to fragmentation based warhead, and more. Any Next Gen Fighting Vehicle without some extensive utilization of STUs in its design is rapidly going to be outcompeted in the fast changing technological developments we're liable to see as Scrin tech only sees broader and broader deployment. Does this mean every design needs to use as many STUs as humanly possible? Hell no. But it means we have to make our designs with the expectation they will be operating in a combat environment where STU based technology is widely deployed. This is a call to action to say we need a reasonable supply of STUS beyond the visible demand of actions we can see in order to face that looming environment. For instance, if we don't design a repulsor plate novahawk now- we have to accept we are completely ceding the field in next gen aircraft propulsion to NOD for decades. That's not something to take lightly. We can always overhaul and replace power plants, we can save weight by using new alloys in new air frames, we can install better laser systems when production meets demand so long as we're planning for it. But we can't casually swap the entire propulsion method of a plane when the opportunity arises.
Today it's Barghests, but tomorrow it could be the anti-grav successor to the Armageddon strategic bomber or Vertigo stealth bomber. Now is not the time to get penny wise and pound foolish.
And bluntly speaking, we need the Next Generation vehicles to fully leverage these STU technologies because NOD is already ahead of the curve on us in that regard. They can produce a higher fraction of STUs to their Tib income than we can, they have more extensive experience fielding STU tech than we do, and they are increasingly reliant on that high end technology to make up for the fact they lack the manpower base they used to have.
The next decade is going to see the increasing proliferation of plasma weaponry that can defeat any protection scheme not using shields, heavily armored antigrav fighters in the vein of the Barghest immune to fragmentation based warhead, and more. Any Next Gen Fighting Vehicle without some extensive utilization of STUs in its design is rapidly going to be outcompeted in the fast changing technological developments we're liable to see as Scrin tech only sees broader and broader deployment. Does this mean every design needs to use as many STUs as humanly possible? Hell no. But it means we have to make our designs with the expectation they will be operating in a combat environment where STU based technology is widely deployed. This is a call to action to say we need a reasonable supply of STUS beyond the visible demand of actions we can see in order to face that looming environment. For instance, if we don't design a repulsor plate novahawk now- we have to accept we are completely ceding the field in next gen aircraft propulsion to NOD for decades. That's not something to take lightly. We can always overhaul and replace power plants, we can save weight by using new alloys in new air frames, we can install better laser systems when production meets demand so long as we're planning for it. But we can't casually swap the entire propulsion method of a plane when the opportunity arises.
Today it's Barghests, but tomorrow it could be the anti-grav successor to the Armageddon strategic bomber or Vertigo stealth bomber. Now is not the time to get penny wise and pound foolish.
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- Location
- USA
Yeah, exactly.
Design for the future tech where we can. If we can't supply the highest tech stuff now then have a adjusted design that we can use until we can supply the highest tech stuff.
That's what happened with the sharks. It was designed for the Infernium lasers but till they got supplied they could use the crystal beam lasers.
As long as they are taking future tech into account and design in the ability to function with lower grade stuff as well we should be fine.
Design for the future tech where we can. If we can't supply the highest tech stuff now then have a adjusted design that we can use until we can supply the highest tech stuff.
That's what happened with the sharks. It was designed for the Infernium lasers but till they got supplied they could use the crystal beam lasers.
As long as they are taking future tech into account and design in the ability to function with lower grade stuff as well we should be fine.
- Location
- his hidden lair
I fully expect NOD to make us nauseous by using their technological developments in ways that ruin our day. It's not hard to combine a reactionless antigrav system and their stealth to make a space capable platform that could launch strikes on our orbital infrastructure. Up to and including trying to induce a Kessler syndrome cascade- potentially while we have tens of thousands of people in unhardened orbital habitats. Probably as a means of reestablishing MAD as we foot the bill on a defensive grid NOD can't hope to directly compete with.
I get how the current status quo can make us feel confident enough that we don't need to deploy a lot of military STU technologies to fight NOD, but that just means NOD will try and use its military STU tech advantage to try and change the game- because anyone can see with the current rules we have a winning hand. We are now in a very dangerous period where we have to ensure our current gains are swept out from under us when NOD tries to reset the gameboard to a more favorable state. That could be as simple as them trying to put a gun to our head to make sure they get off this rock too, and it could be as dangerous as them trying to make the orbitals as unnavigable as possible to deny us our advantage of space exploitation. Or any other crazy idea they come up with to try and give them more leverage lest they be left in a scenario where they have to watch all their leverage drain away over time.
I get how the current status quo can make us feel confident enough that we don't need to deploy a lot of military STU technologies to fight NOD, but that just means NOD will try and use its military STU tech advantage to try and change the game- because anyone can see with the current rules we have a winning hand. We are now in a very dangerous period where we have to ensure our current gains are swept out from under us when NOD tries to reset the gameboard to a more favorable state. That could be as simple as them trying to put a gun to our head to make sure they get off this rock too, and it could be as dangerous as them trying to make the orbitals as unnavigable as possible to deny us our advantage of space exploitation. Or any other crazy idea they come up with to try and give them more leverage lest they be left in a scenario where they have to watch all their leverage drain away over time.
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Strunkriidiisk
THE LEGEND
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Okay, but Nod aren't wizards. They technically have better refinery tech (the APK process) than we do in regular circulation, with regard to STU extraction, but that comes at the risk of significant hazards to themselves and their still-limited amounts of safe/habitable territory. GDI can also leverage economy of scale in a way they can't, and I would be surprised if they are ahead of us in overall STU production by much, given our frankly enormous scale of operations there.
Which is to say that Nod is also limited in their access to STU applications - they can't afford to make every bit of hardware for everybody a wunderwaffen, and they don't unilaterally share new developments with each other, so we're not going to see universal deployment of any new technologies in any type of rapid timescale.
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BoSPaladin
The Paladin
Nobody tell him about Hermione Granger.
- Location
- his hidden lair
My point is that they are increasingly proliferating it nonetheless. Barghests are never going to be less common than they are now, and we've seen entire formations using large amounts of Scorpions using plasma. We can talk about how the economy of scale inevitably swings things in our favor (while in the same breath talking about using this STU production on our proportionately much bigger economy lol) but we have objectively seen them make wider use of STUs than we could have managed. We sure as hell couldn't afford to spend STUs on the Predator, and they've managed for the Scorpion of all things- a platform intended to be on the low end of their high low spectrum.
NOD may not be wizards, but our current gen methods to produce STUs are notably inferior to their last generation of STU production- and given we've updated our methods since, I see no reason to assume that NOD hasn't made any progress further optimizing production. Moreover, with their new methods of biologically exploiting Tiberium they can move direct humans ever further from the process. Especially since India is at the heart of NOD's tiberium research as well as biology, while still being close to an intelligence blackhole.
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