[X] Plan First we take Nusakan
Just realized I never vired
Just realized I never vired
Inner Sphere Outcast
- Thread starter Cloak&Dagger
- Start date
- Sci-Fi Alt. History
- Location
- Fort Worth, TX
[X] Plan: Multistrike
[X] Plan: Multistrike
Nusakan Triple Threat
Cloak&Dagger
Definitely Insane
If Rummolo is surprised by the boldness of the proposal, he doesn't show it. Well-trained soldiers are known for being aggressive to keep momentum, and the SLDF produces the best trained soldiers anywhere. He agrees to assist the attacks and points out where he can best do so.
It's quickly agreed that the covert attack is best sent to Nusakan and the warship force sent to Nirasaki. The active combat and nearby loss of Zebebelgenubi means Nusakan has had its garrison reinforced. Instead, Rummolo explains he can use existing contacts with within the Hegemony's civilian fleet to get a valid excuse to be in the Nusakan system, substituting the actual ships assigned to supply runs. Once SDS systems are subverted, the SLS Wales will join the attack on Nusakan with dropships full of elite SLDF troops, hopefully enough to relieve the the planetside Castle Brian and split Amaris forces between defending the planet and remaining SDS stations.
Nirasaki meanwhile is a wildcard with an unknown defending force and drone arrangement. The warship force will strike directly, having the firepower and expertise to adjust to whatever situation presents itself.
A few more weeks pass before the fleet and manpower are finally organized. Green Zebebelgenubi volunteers make up for their rushed training and limited equipment with enthusiasm, which will have to be enough. Kearny's researchers as well as Ulsop Robotics staff do their best to make up for manpower and equipment deficiencies with Zebebelgenubi's excellent and widespread robotics and electronics production. Automated systems are installed haphazardly across ships systems to fill in for novice crew, while both assembly line and hand-crafted combat robots of all varieties are loaded alongside infantry to serve as distractions, mobile cover, pack mules, heavy weapons platforms, and suicide attackers. Rushed local weapon production and civilian donations often aren't enough to arm the robots in addition to the infantry, so blades, armored fists, and claws powered by inhumanly strong myomer muscles are made to serve as substitutes.
Soon enough the majority of craft above Zebebelgenubi depart, including the M-8 SDS Control station which is swallowed whole by the M-11 Yardship for transport. Yet the fearsome M-9 Battlestation, several small SDS drone dropships, and multiple warships remain behind, all staffed by local Zebebelgenubi forces. Both Zebebelgenubi's population and volunteers now serving on Kearny's ships express their gratitude for the defense left for their home, especially since they, 'Aren't being abandoned while Keresnky fucks off to the Rim Worlds'.
The fleet takes the first jump as one to empty void thirty lightyears in the direction of Nirasaki. Here the forces split themselves up between a predominantly military fleet and a smaller infiltration force. Though the military fleet has three jumps yet to go until reaching Nirasaki, the infiltrators are well within range of their target. After quick-charging their drives, the military fleet jumps away to the next interstellar void along their journey.
The remaining ships prepare for their attack.
Arriving first at Nusakan's zenith jump point is a standard Merchant class Jumpship carrying an Aqueduct and Union dropship, as scheduled.
Clearance is given without trouble for the unassuming dropships to head deeper in the system to the planet of only a few million. Despite the presence of Amaris warships and a small region under siege, the economy must go on to provide war materials, especially for a productive supplier of electronics like Nusakan. The dropships start their 5 days of travel towards the planet at a comfortable 1g while the Merchant takes a position in empty space to unfurl its jump sails and recharge its drive.
During the wait, the ships get a clear view of the state of the system. Both standard jump points have fleets of twenty-seven Amaris warships on standard patrol duties, with a full seventy-two Caspar drones and smaller escorts shutdown in space nearby, the two M-9 Battlestations at each jump point remaining offline except for their manned sections performing space traffic control. Nusakan itself has another dozen Amaris warships clustered directly over the besieged Castle Brian, with only a single M-9 and ten more Caspars quiet at the pirate point.
A few days later, both the dropships and jumpship are assigned timeslots for inspection. A regular customs station orbiting Nusakan for the dropships, and a visit from a RWR dropship for the Merchant. The messages are acknowledged. Up first is the Merchant, as the slow rate of jumpship arrivals leaves a short backlog.
Soon enough, a Rim World Republic warship announces the jumpship is next in line for inspection after teams are done with the current Invader jumpship. The Merchant's Captain replies with a dutiful acceptance of the command. The reply is unencrypted and unfocused, getting a harsh verbal reprimant from the warship for cluttering comm traffic in the system. A hasty apology is made using the 'proper' broadcasting method, but about twenty-five minutes later, the unencrypted message reaches the Aqueduct dropship.
Several things happen at once, or at least relatively close. Or at least as relatively close as things are in a Relative universe that also happens to have FTL travel.
Over Nusakan, the Aqueduct fires an HPG burst from a tiny, fragile, overpriced, and arguably useless ground-mobile HPG transmitter. The exceptionally low EM emissions barely even get past the Aqueduct's hull, and automatic KF signature detection on ships and stations in the system are confused by the extremely small emergence wave coming from outside of a jump point and automatically ignore the radiation.
Instantly, the Infiltration Fleet waiting in space gets the HPG message, and the Tracker, in its disguise as a standard Merchant class Jumpship, begins charging for a precalculated jump.
Another twenty-five minutes later, the Merchant, whose computers were specifically programmed NOT to ignore the ultra-compact KF emergence signature from the Aqueduct, knows that the message was sent and that the Tracker is on its way. So the Merchant finally starts charging its own jumpdrive for a precalculated jump.
By this point, the Tracker had completed its own jump and was now at the nadir jump point of Nusakan, and had been there for fifteen minutes, though due to light lag it would not be until another ten minutes that this would be reported to Nusakan, and another twenty-five after that until it reached the zenith jump point. As expected, the warships at the nadir point were not pleased to see an unplanned guest, yet alone one detaching dropships without authorization and requesting immediate medical assistance for all three vessels due to running out of supplies after a misjump. The warship patrol wasn't about to vaporize ships in distress without investigation, but it was a suspicious enough to send two warships, a Pinto corvette and Riga Frigate, just to be on the safe size.
Back at the zenith point, forces on board the Aegis class heavy cruiser Tadeo Amaris took their time inspecting the Invader jumpship, still waiting another ten minutes for their teams to finish. Their sensor operator barely had time to process that the nearby Merchant launched four low-visibility small craft. No one else would either, because the Merchant jumped immediately after.
Making fully automated jumpships is hard. Removing all safety features on a KF drive and evacuating a ship is easy. So when four prototype M1 stealth drones, based on the Ares assault craft and with a hold full of marines and jumpship crew, flew out of the Merchant in a high gee launch before going dark and relying on special low temperature propellant tanks to direct them slowly towards the two M-9 Battlestations, it was easy to overlook.
Not because stealth in space is easy, but because the Merchant, its sails still deployed and imploding into a wall of debris, jumped directly to the location of the Tadeo Amaris, obliterating both ships instantly in a catastrophic explosion of screeching metal.
At the nadir, the Tracker's captain carefully watched both the time and the two approching two warships. Despite technically being a warship itself, the Tracker barely counted. In fact, given it's extreme age placing it before initial standard KF core vs compact KF core divide that is now used to seperate jumpships and warships, it could be reasonably argued the Tracker isn't a warship at all. While technically armed and armored, the single naval laser in its nose and two anti-fighter Barracuda missile launchers in the rear couldn't even be expected to penetrate the armor of the Pinto corvette ahead of it, one of the lighest warships to still be used.
Apparently the Tracker's previous owners agreed with the assessment and had taken their own measures to rectify the situation. The moment the two Amaris ships entered optimal range, each Barracuda missile launcher began emptying its magazines in their direction. The surprised ships didn't have time to react before nuclear explosions ripped them apart.
The Mammoth and Monarch dropships the Tracker brought start their own efforts at the signal. The Monarch and NL-42 Battle Taxis from the Tracker head towards the nearest M-9 Battlestation while the Mammoth launches its own Battle Taxis towards the other, as well as opening its cargo holds wide to shove entire squadrons of drones at a time into space. The Tracker wastes no time after the bombardment and takes off at full thrust deeper into the system, hoping to divide and distract the shocked Amaris patrol around them. As soon as the Mammoth finishes unloading, it takes off as well, with remote control systems directing it from the Tracker's large cargo bay, alongside an ATAC overseeing the smaller drones.
Simultaneously over Nusakan, the Aqueduct and Union play their own part, both burning engines and launching boarding craft at the pirate point SDS stations. But where the Union goes full speed to board, the Aqueduct instead stays at 1g and begins dumping water from the internal storage tanks. Confused military forces assume the Aqueduct is a direct threat like the Union, but before aerospace fighters arrive the cargo ship launches away at massive acceleration. Almost completely empty tanks cut the ship's weigh by over half, allowing its engines to push it to a blistering five gees with no signs of slowing down. The acceleration makes it not only impossible to catch with sheer speed, but even the few fighters that can muster the speed don't have the endurance, both fuel and physical. Remaininig liquid on board the Aqueduct is devoted to engines, but also to liquid immersion for safer operation under high gees.
The Aqueduct's 'diagonal' course towards no planet and no jump point would leave it alone in the battlespace, but perfectly able to observe the results and keep up communications with its HPG, if at a delay. Before long, the Aqueduct starts to see the results.
Near Nusakan, boarding is going poorly. Preexisting damage, likely from the coup, activated internal station defenses and reinforcement is needed. Meanwhile Amaris forces are on alert and are moving towards the still disabled SDS assets to execute them.
The zenith point SDS stations send a tightbeam transmission with drone codes to the Aqueduct reporting they have successfully taken control, but are keeping drones offline to confuse the Amaris garrison, who are unaware of the boarding and still investigating the jump collision. If an attack force was sent to the zenith, the drones could stab the defenders in the back and wipe them out.
The nadir point is currently in a pitched battle as Amaris forces understood what was happening as soon as drone fighters deployed, and began attacking SDS assets. The M-9 Battlestation and its drones were activated and codes sent to the Aqueduct, but was destroyed soon after, along with many drones. Now 30 Caspars and smaller drones, lead by the ATAC on the Tracker, face off against 25 Amaris warships and dropship support. Losses are expected to be heavy without support.
The Aqueduct reports the situation to the infiltration fleet, letting them interpret it.
The SLS Wales awaits the signal and location for it to jump to. When the message arrives, it jumps to:
[] The Nusakan pirate point, to bypass the locals and deploy dropships planetside to the Castle Brian
[] The Zenith point, to distract the garrison and let the drones strike
[] The Nadir point, to protect the Tracker and swing the battle
[] The Nusakan pirate point, to save the planetary SDS by assisting the boarders and facing the defending force head on
[] Other
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- Location
- Nice try
You know I kinda want to go back to Elysium, really tired spending all this time in the Inner Sphere.
Saturnus Ouranos
Giant Ringed Ball of Hydrogen and Helium
- Location
- Middle of the Solar System
You forgot to threadmark. Again, lol
Ah yeah, I remember this ship. It's the one that fought a McKenna Battleship in that Binary Brown Dwarf system, that a Niops Hegemony Warship has found, lol
So, based off this we know the Zenith fight went ok.
Nadir fight is going to be a slog. BUT! as long as the Tracker stays back and lets the drones fight and die, they should be fine.
The planet needs backup to grab the M-9 and get the drones online.
[X] The Nusakan pirate point, to save the planetary SDS by assisting the boarders and facing the defending force head on
- Location
- Three feet to the left
- Pronouns
- He/They
Think it's about time to grab the loot and head home.
Takareer
Words and feathers
- Location
- Ontario, Canada
Wait... is the Aqueduct equipped with liquid immersion by default? Does the Inner Sphere even have that technology? I ask because there is no way we could just "rig it up".
So since GM is doing fleet battles in 3 locations, that means a Amaris fleet attacked Zebebelgenubi, so that means that ships had to be taken from defending somewhere else, so it might be good to take all the droids ships we gain from this world, after leaving some behind to defend the world and the fleet we have in Nirasaki, leave some droids ships behind to keep it safe, and use both fleets to rush to Terra, all the best loot should be there
- Location
- Three feet to the left
- Pronouns
- He/They
I don't think we got the numbers or firepower for that. It feels a lot like pushing our luck.
Cloak&Dagger
Definitely Insane
You had weeks of prep time with access to yard space and an entire industrialized planet. Some fancy chairs and plumbing are the least of the things you got.
The 3 locations were the three timezones at Nusakan for the simultaneous attack. Don't read too deep into it.
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So if we are gonna keep taking worlds, we are gonna need grounds forces, and at this point most we have are green with a core of eilte SLDF, it might be worth looking into hiring mercenaries, and after this and the other fleet taking a other world, we are gonna have 3 worlds sort under our control/allied, so we could get the money to hire them
Cloak&Dagger
Definitely Insane
I actually can't seem to find the specific lore document for Tadeo in particular, but as far as I can tell from the summary it should be in the Hegemony at this time so it's available for this game.
The same series of a document I did find does detail the single noted Tracker class the Rim Worlds used, but it was actually in the Rim Worlds during the war and not the Hegemony, which I didn't realize when I added it to the game.
Fortunately, the RWR force estimates were from an official Star League document, which by that point was reliant on guesses because they'd been legally removed from the RWR proper, and the RWR fleet was much bigger than expected in reality.
So we can say the player's current Tracker is one the Star League didn't know the RWR had in service. And it's an ancient design, so it's understandable how it would be particularly easy to hide by registering it as lost or scrapped.
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- Location
- Three feet to the left
- Pronouns
- He/They
Alternatively, we go steal that terraforming stuff we found out about a few turns ago. Then we don't have to fight anyone for planets, we can just make our own.
Unrelated, what mechs do we have? And are we gonna develop our own, or steal schematics and build facilities for already existing ones?
We are not gonna keep any worlds we take in the Terran Hegemony, and yes we are gonna take that terraforming stuff for worlds we are gonna control
- Location
- Three feet to the left
- Pronouns
- He/They
Then why should we bother? We won't get this lucky again, the Hegemony is doomed no matter what, and we're trying to stay a secret. Let's take the win, grab all the scientists and loot we can take carry with us, and bail. We've done more than enough.
- Location
- Fort Worth, TX
If I may. Right now we are involved in a situation similar to maybe 1918-1919 Imperial Russia. The empire is collapsing, various states are emerging along with factions waging a brutal civil war. Trying to claim or restore the Hegemony is foolish since the various Houses will aim to claim as much territory as they can. It is best in my opinion to take or pay for any resources, technologies or equipment that would be useful for a Periphery world. Later on we can use those for research, industrial development and trade, forget the Gravity wells, let us take the space between the stars.
That is what we are doing, we are going to Nirasaki and Nusakan as they also have a lot to do with droids, so we are taking those scientists, and after we have taken those worlds and we get offer new worlds where there are scientists worth taking or something else of worth, then we are going for those, and if we dont get offer any worlds of worth for us, then we should leave, and give the SLS Wale a fleet of SDS droids, and let them do what they want and we take the rest back with us
- Location
- Three feet to the left
- Pronouns
- He/They
Fool! That's the trap! That's the mindset our characters went off into the void to get away from! There will always be more tech or people to take. There will always be more than we can safely get away with or absorb. We gotta pick an amount and say "That's enough".
If we just keep going, we'll fall into the same pitfalls as the great houses. Then someone is gonna remember we were here, and start wondering where we came from, and start looking for where all this nice stuff we stole went.
[X] The Nusakan pirate point, to save the planetary SDS by assisting the boarders and facing the defending force head on