Shattered Empire: A Noble Warlord Quest (CKII)

Once again, apologies for the wait. However, I do have something nice to make up for it as well as the update; a friend of mine who read some of my writing did a drawing of the Tsarevna, in what I imagine is the Rurikovich uniform:

Spoiler: Tsarevna Anastasia Ekaterinovna (big picture)

Now that I'm home permanently, I should hopefully be able to write more regularly. Thanks!
___

[X] Commit the fleets you have. It will almost certainly lead to casualties, but Ivan won't be able to do as much damage to the planet. (+2 PR with Dame Egonova, -2 PR with Baron Vladimir; once you have the throne back, the fleet will have fewer ships.)

"While I understand your point, Uncle, if our attempt to retake the capital fails, the fleet we have now won't have much more function than an honor guard for our flight out of Rurikovich space. If it succeeds, we'll have plenty of ships - but perhaps not the resources to crew, supply, and repair them." You frown at Vladimir, further making your displeasure with his decisions certain. "And furthermore, I don't intend to risk Ivan killing thousands of innocent people out of spite - these are still my citizens, and I don't intend to let them die."

There is silence for a second. The various uniformed personages glance at each other around the table, between you and the Baron. For his part, Vladimir doesn't frown or complain - he merely rolls his shoulders back, folds his arms, and says, "As Your Ladyship commands."

You keep your eyes on him for a couple more seconds, but he shows no more signs of complaint. Satisfied, you turn to Lord Kiril, who has for all intents and purposes come to lead your space forces. "Now, what can we do from space to make sure the ground forces succeed?"

Lord Kiril grimaces, his usual bluster absent. "I'm afraid it doesn't look particularly promising. We will be going up against the Home Fleet, which, while weakened, still outnumbers us. In a straight fight, we won't last."

"We don't need to defeat the fleet," you point out. "We simply need to keep it occupied long enough for the army on the surface to put down the coup." You bring up a 3-D representation of the Mir system (not to scale, of course) and point out the blue-green marble second from the red star. "Can that be done with… acceptable casualties?"

He nods grimly. "It can, but that's no guarantee that it will. Standard tactics for this kind of engagement are simple - come out of slipspace in the system's outer planets, which gives several minutes of light delay for us to calculate firing solutions, then make in-system warp jumps in a random pattern to draw them away and distract them. With a reasonable degree of accuracy, we can hit ships in drydock, the orbital facilities themselves, and any other targets whose position we can calculate. Our heavier ships - battlewagons, cruisers, and the like - should be able to get a couple of shots off before we jump to a new position." He indicates the Mir system's outermost planet, a frozen iceball locally known as Bogatyr. "Lighter ships can neutralize the Bogatyr listening post with torpedoes and plasma lances, and if necessary we can land a few Mikhaili Marines to seize any surface facilities."

He sits back down, folding his hands on the table. "The problems will start once we begin jumping. I took the liberty of running some calculations, which should explain our limits." He sends something to the conference table, and opens a new file that pops up on everybody's devices. You glance at it: it is indeed a long list of calculations, and your eyes feel the sudden urge to cross in horror as you try to parse it.

"I can explain the details to Your Ladyship, if necessary," Kiril offers.

[Learning check, difficulty 60; 55+11=66, Success]

You stay his explanation with one raised hand. "No need, Lord Kiril." You recall, dimly, the advanced mathematics lessons your astrophysics tutors would give. They never were your favorite "classes," but right now they seem to be paying off, as the jumble of figures and diagrams actually makes some modicum of sense to you after a moment of reflection.

"These are… shield power draws for the microjumps, yes? The number of jumps we'll be able to make in-system before the ablation effect strips down the shields on most of our ships."

Ah, the dreaded ablation effect - the main limiter on warp travel aside from fuel. The longer a starship runs at FTL, the more it exerts its shields, as even in interstellar space it is smashing through at least some forms of matter (even if it's only one atom per cubic centimetre). Warships, armed with military-grade energy shields, can withstand warp jumps several days long in the interstellar medium, although it is not recommended when one is about to enter a combat situation. Shield strength is already lowered, and the apocalyptic heat created as the atoms of the interstellar medium fuse to the shield can sometimes damage the hull.

If a shield fails in mid-jump, the effects are catastrophic. At the warp speeds of the average ship, a tiny piece of space dust can rip the core out of even a dreadnought. And in your case, this is the Mir system - an area that, by vacuum standards, is positively choked with particles and debris from billions of years of planetary activity.

You make out that Kiril's simulations have predicted a maximum of five jumps in total, assuming that your fleet takes minimal shield damage from enemy action and assuming that nothing unexpected gets in the way.

"Five jumps… Is there no way to prolong this?" Egonova glares at her datapad as if it has personally challenged her to a duel, the poor lighting of the holographic display throwing the lines of her ancient face into stark contrast.

Kiril grimaces. "Warp drives have failsafes. Once shield strength goes too low, most ship AIs will simply refuse to jump or push acceleration beyond what is safe." He grits his teeth, clearly perturbed by the words he forces out next. "We can, however, disable these failsafes, giving us at least a couple of extra jumps - in theory, the failsafes are built to account for some margins of error."

"This is all very nice," puts in Vladimir, "but it doesn't answer one important question - how shall we arrange the fleet for a jump? Do we keep the fleet coherent, or do we split up, try to confuse their defenses and split their attention?"

As usual, the table's eyes slowly start to turn towards you. Your knuckles whiten as you grip the table. Hopefully, your military training, when put to the test, will give you the right answer.
___
This decision will be counted by plan rather than by individual question.

How should your fleet make the jumps?
[ ] Keep the fleet together during the jumps. If they are forced into combat, it would be better to have your ships in a coherent formation than scattered across the system where they can be picked off one by one.
[ ] Divide the fleet after the opening volley. This will be a more effective tactic for its intended distractive purpose, and it also prevents you from losing all of your ships at once to an ill-placed jump into the middle of an enemy formation.

AND

Do you agree with Lord Kiril's suggestion to disable jump failsafes?
[ ] Are you insane, man? Keep the failsafes on, ships are too valuable to risk like that. (Ships will be more likely to come out of the battle intact, although it will give your ground forces less time.)
[ ] Disable the failsafes. Fortune favors the bold, and you need to buy as much time for Egonova's army as possible. (The ground forces will have more time to defeat the rebels on Moskva, but some smaller ships will likely be lost to the ablation effect.)

AND

Which ship will you be aboard for the battle?
[ ] The only battleship, the Gromoverzhets, which is simultaneously the best-protected and the biggest target. As Lord Kiril's flag, it also puts you close to the command center of the battle - and the center of the battle itself.
[ ] Return to the Varyag. It's your ship - and if you're being honest with yourself, its fast speed and smaller profile gives you the best chance of escape if the plan goes sideways.
[ ] Do not participate in the battle, and remain on Mikhail. This will be seen as cowardly by most nobles across the Empire even if you win, and makes it harder to watch the progress of the battle; however, this option poses no risk to you physically.