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Terminus Quest: A CKII Mass Effect Quest
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
- Location
- Northeast Ohio, United States
[X] Plan Extreme Concentration of Force
Voting for this because I want a chance to push forward and eliminate whatever hive figured out kinetic barriers.
I would also suggest that we recommend the Alliance and Citadel attack, on the theory that multiple hives are probably collaborating on this attack and they might be very weak elsewhere. This could be our best chance to deal a crippling blow and progress towards actually ending the war. Something all the more urgent to do before the Rachni can potentially upgrade all of their forces with kinetic barriers.
Voting for this because I want a chance to push forward and eliminate whatever hive figured out kinetic barriers.
I would also suggest that we recommend the Alliance and Citadel attack, on the theory that multiple hives are probably collaborating on this attack and they might be very weak elsewhere. This could be our best chance to deal a crippling blow and progress towards actually ending the war. Something all the more urgent to do before the Rachni can potentially upgrade all of their forces with kinetic barriers.
- Pronouns
- Reader
Their will be further votes as the battle develops. Once we see how the next phase goes, we can consider strategical recommendations.
Unfortunately, terminus is rather bad at offensives, which is why they want our Raiding fleets. They also haven't recovered enough to take any clusters. Regrettably the tech was likely developed at Suen, their home cluster, so we won't destroy it, but if we go heavy with extreme concentration of force, we do have a shot at wiping out this fleet so they don't recover any data on barrier fleets performance, which could be a boon to us.
Further more, with two of our finest Raiding Fleet admirals present we could follow up a victory by having one of our battle fleets gate crash, allowing our raiding fleets to slip into shadow sea cluster, a cluster we have never raiding before, and put some mass accelerator rounds into it's infrastructure and industry, disrupting Rachni logistics chain, which would go a long way to complicate any future offensives they would aim at Maroon Sea or Caleston Rift.
It would also allow Mordin one last grand mission against the enemy before he retires, and ensure that we are free to focus on military integration the following turn. Again, Attican Beta is at worst 3rd in terms of strategic significance, more likely 4th overall, and our forces would be a single relay jump from reinforcing the 2nd raiding in the event of an attack, which can easily hold for the few hours it would take to reinforce it.
Admiral Suna of the 2st Battle Fleet has 18 martial, Admiral Yi'hun of the 1st Battle Fleet 18 martial, Admiral Beshkar of the 1st Raiding Fleet 19 martial, and Admiral Mordin of the 3rd Raiding Fleet 20 Martial, and is a hero character with a specialization in Raiding
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- Location
- Italy
eh, if we're informing them they'll make their own decisions based on it. The idea they might be weaker while attacking someone else is hardly a difficult thing to guess.
[X] Plan Concentration of Force
[X] Plan Mobile Defense
pbluekan
Somethin's Fucky ...
- Location
- Trumpistan
- Pronouns
- He/Him
To be frank, thats just bananas. The Rachni don't operate independently. And even if they did, assuming they didn't disseminate the knowledge is just absurd.
Aside from denial of assets, the only thing killing this fleet does is limit the data the Rachni can recover. And we would basically have to eliminate all three fleets, no survivors.
- Pronouns
- Reader
This is actually quite possible. Rachni rely on Rachni queens for coordination. Once they are dead, there forces will become disorganized. Between the pressure from two battle fleets and the mobility of 2 raiding fleets, an encirclement becomes possible in the mid term, which would spread there defensive screens thin and raise our likelihood of getting all there dreadnoughts, and then rapping up the survivors. It helps that they will be building distance from the Relay in pursuit of admiral Suna initially, which will give them a greater distance to transverse to reach the relay.
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- Location
- Rockford, USA
- Pronouns
- They/Them
cokerpilot
Here comes the rain.
[X] Plan Extreme Concentration of Force
[X] Plan Mobile Defense
[X] Plan Mobile Defense
Thank you. So our current roster looks a lot like this:
FADM Yi'hun(1st Battle Fleet): Martial 18.
FADM Suna(2nd Battle Fleet): Martial 18
FADM Beshkar(1st Raiding Fleet): Martial 19
FADM Ulannavael Semateth(2nd Raiding Fleet): 17
FADM Mordin(3rd Raiding Fleet): Martial 20.
MinDef Toral K'Sharr: Martial 22
PM Mira T'Vael: Martial 26
So yeah, Im not happy leaving the Martial 17 Admiral watching the front door to Attican Beta alone.
I remember Resurgent Grace, and how we exterminatused a planet because the Rachni left it undefended/underdefended.
Gonna ask the Terminus for a fleet; there is no shame in asking for help in an existential war.
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VOTE
[X] Plan Safety Overkill
-[X] Inform the Alliance?
--[X] Yes. They're impacted by this, and you're a formal member now. This is no longer the time to hold back.
-[X] Call for the Terminus Joint Fleets?
--[X] Yes. You are going to be seriously pressed resolving this yourself, and even then it could get bloody. You want mass.
---[X] Ask for a battlefleet to be deployed into Attican Beta to take over defense posts from Mordin Sentra - hopefully, that'd allow to avoid issues with chain of command.
-[X] Who reinforces Maroon Sea? Check all that apply.
--[X] 1st Battle Fleet. You need firepower, you need it now.
--[X] 1st Raiding Fleet. They will (in part) get there fastest.
--[X] 3rd Raiding Fleet. They're not in a frontline system, and Mordin is one of your greats.
-[X] Who holds Attican Beta? Check all that apply.
--[X] 2nd Raiding Fleet. To be blunt, they offer the least to the actual, ongoing fight in Maroon Sea.
RATIONALE
The Rachni fleets brought 18x capital ships(17x now, since they lost one) to Maroon Sea.
We need to at least match those numbers in capital ships and long range fire if we intend to win this battle without unnecessary casualties or weakening our defenses.
So 1st Battle Fleet provides 6 dreadnoughts, and Beshkar/1st Raiding Fleet is the fastest to respond.
Mordin is our best admiral as well, so since Mira apparently cant be there, he and 3rd Raiding Fleet should be there as well.
1x Battle Fleet + 2 Raiding Fleets + Explorer Corps should give us parity in capital ships and superiority in firepower.
Plus, 2x Raiding Fleets means we have the fast capital ships to run them down if they try to retreat.
Ulannavael Semateth stays behind at Attican Beta.
Because we need someone to mind the store, and the stacked relay defenses should provide sufficient additional bonuses to make up for their relatively lower Martial.
Asking the Terminus Alliance for a battle fleet to help guard Attican Beta is a safety measure.
Attican Beta holds a Virmire colony and fleet base, we shouldnt be fucking around with its safety. And we've already set the example that an undefended/under defended planet can get burned.
The Terminus Fleets use Massalian Doctrine, otherwise known as Territory Defense Doctrine.
They are doctrinally specialized for using strong fleets to hold choke points. Like Relays and Relay defenses.
Putting a Terminus Fleet at a Relay is their jam.
And it avoids any chain of command issues.
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- Location
- South Africa
[X] Plan Safety Overkill
I like this plan, it lets us mass enough warships to press home the advantage and possibly kick the front door to the next system if were in good shape. We do get a bit of egg on our face admitting we need help but we're not exactly a juggernaut and barrier's on Rachni ships means we can weather their complaints. As it stands a terminus fleet in Attican beta will give us the needed security to hopefully scare off any new fleets. While allowing us to match the rachni for firepower and reduce our losses.
I like this plan, it lets us mass enough warships to press home the advantage and possibly kick the front door to the next system if were in good shape. We do get a bit of egg on our face admitting we need help but we're not exactly a juggernaut and barrier's on Rachni ships means we can weather their complaints. As it stands a terminus fleet in Attican beta will give us the needed security to hopefully scare off any new fleets. While allowing us to match the rachni for firepower and reduce our losses.
Essentially this
I normally wouldnt care about the politics anyway, not in a war with the genocidal bugs. Sort politics out later
But with the Rachni deploying barrier-equipped fleets, we have all the political cover to request aid to defend an already fortified relay. Especially since we arent asking them to fight in Maroon Sea.
Might even spin it as a deliberate measure to draw them into exposing precisely this sort of thing early before they could throw a massed fleet of barriered warships as a surprise.
- Location
- Italy
I said from the start I wanted to ask for the terminus to cover Attican (and considering that they ARE mostly defensive fleet suited to relay defense that's the perfect use for them), just as a precaution, while we deal with the actual attack.
"Worst" case, nothing happens there and we lose a bit of political rep for not dealing with this on our own.
Best case, the Rachni actually attack Attican, we come off as properly cautious/prescient.
And if we get a solid enough win on the defense, maybe we'll get a chance to send the raiding fleets to raid.
Also yeah, the barrier surprise gives us some slack, as does the fact we were attacked by THREE fleets.
"Worst" case, nothing happens there and we lose a bit of political rep for not dealing with this on our own.
Best case, the Rachni actually attack Attican, we come off as properly cautious/prescient.
And if we get a solid enough win on the defense, maybe we'll get a chance to send the raiding fleets to raid.
Also yeah, the barrier surprise gives us some slack, as does the fact we were attacked by THREE fleets.
- Pronouns
- Reader
In Regards to the new plan , remember that PoptartProdigy refused to comment on how they would actually respond to this request,or the promptness of their response. It's a pretty big political gamble to take for potentially not what we want. If Rachni forces are going to arrive to attack Attican Beta, it's likely they'll do so ahead of any reinforcements to guard our cluster musters and makes it's way from who knows where in terminus, and we don't know what martial their Admiral will have either. It doesn't seem like a particularly reliable plan for the problems it will bring us in the medium and long term.
In Regards to the new plan , remember that PoptartProdigy refused to comment on how they would actually respond to this request,or the promptness of their response. It's a pretty big political gamble to take for potentially not what we want. If Rachni forces are going to arrive to attack Attican Beta, it's likely they'll do so ahead of any reinforcements to guard our cluster musters and makes it's way from who knows where in terminus, and we don't know what martial their Admiral will have either. It doesn't seem like a particularly reliable plan for the problems it will bring us in the medium and long term.
Worst case scenario is closer to terminus responds differently or is late to arrive do to delays in mobilizing or disagreements in joint fleet command, and we are forced to pull mordin out anyway to reinforce our cluster, and we still take the hit to rep. Better to just commit to leaving the defense to the 2nd Raiding, confident that either our fleets can reinforce in time if a Rachni fleet does arrive, or in the unlikeliness of an attack on Attican Beta, and avoid the political hit, or resolve to bring mordin in after the next update if no Rachni have arrived in Attican Beta.
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- Location
- Greece
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Plan Concentration of Force
Not actually a military problem.
If their reaction is to send us more reinforcements than we asked for? All to the good.
Political considerations are for AFTER we dont have a physical threat to our people and infrastructure.
No, thats not plausible.
Rachni rely on the same FTL comm buoys that we do, and have no way to further bend the laws of physics that we know of.
They cannot coordinate an attack that way.
And the Wrath of the Swarm event showed that Rachni fleets can take several days to show up when working on timed plans
More critically, you dont actually believe this.
Because this is where our current fleets are located
All your plans move the forces stationed at AB to Maroon Sea, leaving the AB relay uncovered until 2nd Raiding Fleet can show up from Kepler Verge.
So your plans obviously dont think its an issue.
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pbluekan
Somethin's Fucky ...
- Location
- Trumpistan
- Pronouns
- He/Him
One consideration is that the Terminus is explicitly using us as an offensive power. We're asking them for a defensive backup so that we can address the problem head on. If we then counter into the rachni, we can alleviate some of the political blowback.
Additionally, I expect any political blowback to be minimized, given the fact that we're looking at a new technological development from the Rachni here. There will be some political issues as we wouldn't have the problem we do if we had put up some defenses in Maroon Sea, but we did defend it with the battle fleet we promised.
[X] Plan Safety Overkill
- Pronouns
- Reader
I should have specified as "Ahead of any reinforcements from terminus joint fleets" as they are unlikely to pull fleets from the more likely target of Caleston Rift, meaning any reinforcements likely have a more convoluted approach, assuming little delay in terminus joint command deciding on a course of action.
The scenario of there being an attack on Attican Beta assumes that the Rachni always intended to attack it, with the Maroon Sea fleets serving as either a distraction or additional forces attacking from another relay. Such a plan is not dependent on comm buoys, just coordination, as we see with wrath of the swarm, where four Rachni fleets arrived simultaneously from three different Relays.
I do not believe A Rachni attack on Attican Beta is likely, but if one is coming, I believe it will happen in the next dozen hours, more likely the latter eight than the first four. I also believe that it could easily be a day for terminus to get us a defensive battle fleet depending on where they called from and how long Terminus spends debating their response. It features several polities with conflicting priotities afterall. I believe it will take an hour or two for our raiding fleets immediately available ships to pass through the KV-AB and NE-AB Relays, and if neccessary make an FTL jump in Hercules to save time reaching the Relay.
Please refrain from making statements on what I do and don't believe in the future.
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1) Thats precisely what they will do.
They will pull ships from Caleston Rift, which is highly fortified, and replace them with fleets from Omega and Pylos, which have less distance to travel. Its just simple logistical reasoning for response times; its the same thing that WE are doing.
2)We have reasonable benchmarks for the transit times for a fleet not engaged in combat.
During Resurgent Grace, it took 2 hours for a response fleet to show up from up-relay to accost Beshkar while he was burning that Rachni planet to bedrock. It took them ten hours or so IIRC to travel the six jumps from Hades Gamma to Nubian Expanse.
If the Terminus send reinforcements, they will be here in hours once they get the order.
3)I dont believe there is any data for you to make any such assertions from.
If you go back and look at Wrath of the Swarm, the 4th Rachni fleet showed up several days after the first three had been committed to Attican Beta. We have no data for comparison one way or the other.
- Location
- Texas
[X] Plan Safety Overkill