Honestly, I don't exactly disagree. Sending big fleets around should have reactions and consequences, like we and the Council will be reacting to the HoH taskforce. Sending 30 ships to some newly met nation out of nowhere could be seen as an invasion. It's just, I don't think any limits were crossed here and feel a bit of general distaste for the circumstances from which those concerns has risen.
To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)
- Thread starter OneirosTheWriter
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I think part of the problem some people have with this is the primary Star Trek media have focused on, usually, a single vessel. When we see fleets in those media is almost always in a war context. So we are primed to think that if we see 10+ ships on the screen, we 'know' there is high chance of fighting.
Shard
One and Many
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If I may say, I think the appropriate solution is that tags should generate events if a Task Force is set on them: But only up to a point. There are only so many opportunities to resolve a problem or demonstrate an issue, and the benefit of 'More Ships' would be to better-handle such issues. This is of course different in the case of tags relating to exploration, where ships might roll to progress exploration, or war, where more ships phasering a single target scales effectively indefinitely.
Of course, most tags are diplomatic in nature, and the remainder usually have a diplomacy component as well. But in either event, there are only so many opportunities - Think of if we have a 10-ship garrison in Sol. We'd be able to respond to all events in Sol sector, but we aren't exactly going to cause more events to happen by virtue of having more ships there.
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This change, of course, favors larger and more individually capable ships as compared to smaller and less capable ships (but in aggregate more capable), but I think it is in line with how Starfleet seems to have a persistent case of large, inefficient ships as opposed to the smaller, war-capable ships preferred by militaristic powers (see the Bird of Prey, for example).
Of course, most tags are diplomatic in nature, and the remainder usually have a diplomacy component as well. But in either event, there are only so many opportunities - Think of if we have a 10-ship garrison in Sol. We'd be able to respond to all events in Sol sector, but we aren't exactly going to cause more events to happen by virtue of having more ships there.
/
This change, of course, favors larger and more individually capable ships as compared to smaller and less capable ships (but in aggregate more capable), but I think it is in line with how Starfleet seems to have a persistent case of large, inefficient ships as opposed to the smaller, war-capable ships preferred by militaristic powers (see the Bird of Prey, for example).
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I mean, diplomacy is exactly the place where you can create your own opportunities. Sending ships to talk with different persons of importance, organizing trade summits, submitting live presentations, etc, etc.
Well, do you really need dozens of P2's with limited independence around in addition to your already sizable fleet? Just, say, 15 is not enough?
My thoughts here. I don't see anything outside of normal action of HoH in an area where they have influence. Yes it is an aggressive "geopolitical" move but that is it. No one starts actual hot wars because of that. I expect that, at the very least, Romulans and Breen will react to that in some way. We are already reacting by changing task force beyond orders.
While half of thread goes like: We need a state of emergency! This is an act of war! Arcadian Empire, Bolians, OSA and Felis should declare war on HoH, too!
I would understand call for a state of emergency f HoH force was something that could smash us in a blitzkrieg attack. But we actually have a comparable force in the general area including garrisons (with starbases), member fleets, task forces and allied fleets
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I don't think anyone really fully understood we were operating under Conceit 2. Like, I even recall you making that correction that more ships are purely better to someone with the idea that there were diminishing returns, but despite that no one really realized we could indeed make a problem go away by throwing 50 ships at it. And believe me deployment can scrape more than 50 ships together if we had to, if we had understood that not only would it do anything, but it would in fact do anything incredibly well. We just didn't know.
This has become quite clear.
Quite aware of that.
Random Member
Gardener of Human Happiness
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Well, I'm curious to see what options the Council offers in the snakepit to deal with this. I heard the Hawks had some 
interesting ideas.
interesting ideas.
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What is the problem with Simon's proposal? Basically he said to tie the task force size into the narrative. Star goes supernova in about 7 months? Send everything with a warp core and the best science ships you got.
Diplomance 1-planet race just into space? Send, at most, one explorer, because anything more is threatening.
All that'd need to be done is to look at the task force and its mission through the lense of those effected by said task force.
And if a diplomatic war escalates, more and more ships are sent that should also have consequences - evict all or some of said ships, smugly grin and invite still more to reap the benefits of the majors woeing the minor, ...
I mean, you GMs already do that kind of stuff, and that's what makes this game interesting for me - the simulation aspect where you don't game a dumb AI.
You must have read another thread. Most of the people commenting on the issue were going in the direction of "sending enough ships to conquer a nation at the drop of a hat should generate an appropriate response, like heightened readiness and a denial for some of said ships to enter their space, not a 'shrug, it's in the mechanics, they won't do anything bad'".
Enerael
We Shall Wake to Sanity
...Always?
I can not enjoy a story if it keeps screaming at me that this could not possibly happen. One can suspend their SoD to a degree to accept the premise of, say, magic existing, but if you stretch it too far and it breaks, enjoyment is gone.
I always assumed that is the case for everyone?
I like to think that this exists, but is taken care of by players of the FDS quest.
Not really? They are not the only ones with propaganda. Sure, they have some more ammunition now, but far from enough for that. That are still plenty of reasons to believe that we would help, such as our rather publicic interest in those minor powers.
We are demonstrably expending resources and effort on them, so protecting our investment is just pragmatic, whatever they believe of our policy and morality.
Christovians were far away and had minimal contact with us. Significant differences.
I disagree with this, and anyone from SDB would too, for multiple reasons.
It would be both simpler and make far more sense to put a cap on the combined C score of a given TF anyway. And/or some kind of penalty.
While I do not know enough about the TF mechanics to make an informed judgement, this proposal makes sense to me.
...if sending a warfleet powerful enough to conquer the Romulan or Klingon (or both?) empires to our borders to conduct diplomacy with minor powers, enough ships than even a fourth of them is several times the strength of any of those nations navy is not crossing the line, then, well...
I would really like to know where you think that line is.
I doubt that. We have been throwing fleets around for a while now with the TF mechanics.
And we are far more concerned about the SoD breaking then HoH preparing for conquest and war currently.
Not really? Mutual response. Two Starfleet ships can respond to a single event (TF events too) currently, and that number can be increased further with tech.
We (or at least I) dont know how those ships stats stack though.
Following the trend of Swarm doctrine being overpowered, parts diminishing returns, and the combat engine favoring the side with more ships strongly, I suspect that they just add their stats.
I might be cynical though.
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From experience, assuming one's own desires and preferences1 are those of others, too, works well, but it's almost guaranteed it won't work always. And I find it interesting to find out about the differences. And sometimes disturbing.
1For stuff like 'doesn't want to be hurt', 'likes to keep living', 'will react badly when cheated'
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Well, it's also just that we know, intellectually, that a force of a dozen or so capital ships and cruisers plus frigate escort can probably wipe the walls with most minor national navies if they put their minds to it.
Enterprise alone isn't going to conquer an entire species, so the Enterprise can go places and resolve crises by itself. But if we send ten or twenty ships of the same class as Enterprise, it starts to look like an intimidation thing. Even if we don't have this expectation of "oh shit, we only gather this many ships for war," it's still a big and powerful force, and a potential threat if it turns hostile.
You don't need to have watched Star Trek to see this, you just need to know what the ship statlines are, and know how to count.
Half of thread.
Half of thread.
You know what? Just... please, stop lying about what other people are saying. It's offensive.
In large part this. Plus, as SWB knows and I'm expanding on, we have a lot of different things going on at once.
I think a lot of us just tacitly assumed that if you throw thirty, forty, or fifty ships at a situation, the neighbors' jaws will hit the floor and they will react. Because IC, our neighbors may know that a visit by any one Starfleet (or Harmony) vessel is just neighborly and well-intentioned... But that doesn't mean they won't worry when we have enough ships zipping around their space to put a nice thick tritanium overcast over their skies and blot out their suns.
Nobody EVER guaranteed that to us, nobody EVER mentioned it as a rule, and if it had ever been spelled out I'd have called it into question because of how strongly it blurs the lines between what we know about our task forces OOC and what various aliens know about them IC.
I even remember pointing out in the runup to the Laio-Licori-OSA war that the Laio and Licori could reasonably say "well gee, you've had over a dozen ships flying around our region of space for several years as part of this task force, why didn't you make suppressing the piracy a priority?" *
Because the Licori and Laio don't see those ships as a pure exercise in diplomacy that does one and only one thing. They just see "Starfleet vessels" doing, y'know, Starfleet stuff. If we pour enough ships into that region that their combined strength could credibly do a better job of policing the area than the entire Laio navy, the Laio may reasonably ask why we're not helping them out with their pirate problem. But conversely, if the Laio had been an unfriendly species during that time, they might worry that we were trying to intimidate or manipulate them. And that would be reasonable.
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*[There are good answers to that in OOC terms, but in IC terms it's a good question based on what in-character beings in the game actually know about their world]
Well, personally I prefer the idea that very large (and heavily armed) task forces tend to get in their own way by creating fear or resentment, or by causing the host nation to place artificial restrictions on their movements for security reasons. Like, when our task force of five (seven?) explorers gets to the Alupii, I wouldn't be at all surprised if one of the first problems they encounter is that the Alupii government initially refuses to allow more than two of the ships to assemble in any one system at any one time. Because they want to be sure this isn't some weird sneak attack where we form a battlegroup strong enough to blow through a respectable chunk of their navy. That's a hypothetical case, but I hope you get the idea.
Likewise, if someone like Halkh (that is, a semi-Vimesian 'really suspicious bastard' who's seen enough betrayals and ugliness to be keenly aware of the potential for it) were running the Licori foreign policy... You might see the Arcadian Empire insist that only a few of the Harmony ships can actually physically enter Licori-claimed space at a time, or only sail to a few specified port destinations that can be monitored for signs of infiltration.
Okay, that's fair. What I'm getting at is...
...this is taking matters a little far. Firstly, it wasn't made clear to us that there was a 'no limits' situation regarding just how much force we could throw at things to resolve them faster, and it was sometimes implied that we couldn't.
Secondly, and this is important, this result, even if mechanically consistent, impacts suspension of disbelief. It's hard to believe that a race like the Ittick-ka will react favorably to an overwhelmingly large fleet on their doorstep. It's hard to believe they just won't care, that it won't even increase the difficulty of the task force's mission. That's not how real militaries that are actually trying to secure their countries against prospective external threats behave.
Because...
Assumption 2 works a lot better as a 'soft limit' than a 'no limit' scenario. Like, in the situation with the gray goo continent, I'm sure the Yizgisi (?) would have been perfectly happy if we'd sent 100 ships to clean up their gray goo continent in a matter of days. That wouldn't have registered on them as a threat, but as a form of salvation. Sending more ships to explore the Adrazzi Gulf probably wasn't going to hurt. Sending more ships to intimidate the Hishmeri into no longer actively raiding the Federation would probably have straight-up accelerated our progress.
But sending dozens ships to, say, end the Licori's slavery tag? That might well be interpreted by some factions of the Licori as an attempt by the Federation to take over Licori domestic policy. And they might react in ways that complicate our progress on the tag.
Well see, most of us don't mind the Harmony just being strong and having lots of ships.
It's just... if the Harmony can visit the capital worlds of independent (proudly independent, even) species with large naval forces, while having other even larger forces scattered around their space, without the leaders of those species being somewhat worried about a sneak attack from these guys ... Well. In that case I start looking for mind control rays, because in real life this exact thing is why it's very rare to send, say, entire squadrons of capital ships or army divisions on a well-wishing tour.
Well, I think the best solution is to in some way place Conceit 2 on a sliding scale. One ship can do as it pleases. Four or five ships spread out in a task force all over some species' space can do more or less as they please. Ten ships start to exert intimidation and cause the host species to wonder if this is a prelude to conquest. Twenty or thirty? Yeah, at that point the intimidation racks up to a level where you're creating more problems for yourself than you solve by adding "just one more ship... one more ship..." Unless you're in a position to just avoid those accommodation issues and coerce everyone, as say the Cardassians might.
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One other thing to keep in mind different powers will respond to this in different ways. The OSA might be a bit worried but repercussions would be low while the licori might flip their shit. So one thing going forwards is probably to keep in mind how each power would react to something like this and not just group them up into the same reaction.
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Yeah.
My take on it is that the Felis are fractious enough that the Harmony will find people willing to welcome them. The OSA are trusting enough that swarms of Harmony ships in their space may well be tolerated. The Bolians are standoffish and may resist too much contact at first, but are likely to be worn down quickly. The Licori will be suspicious of the Harmony's motives in sending so many ships and are likely to try to limit things.
Of the surrounding major powers, the Romulans will mostly grumble because the war with the Klingons has left them too beaten-up to do much about it. The ISC will flip their shit in some way, shape, or form.
As to the Federation's reaction, well that's largely on us.
The point isn't "oh, the Harmony is cheating by using so many ships, they should be punished." It's that people will react to a fleet this big diving into the pool with a big cannonball splash.
My take on it is that the Felis are fractious enough that the Harmony will find people willing to welcome them. The OSA are trusting enough that swarms of Harmony ships in their space may well be tolerated. The Bolians are standoffish and may resist too much contact at first, but are likely to be worn down quickly. The Licori will be suspicious of the Harmony's motives in sending so many ships and are likely to try to limit things.
Of the surrounding major powers, the Romulans will mostly grumble because the war with the Klingons has left them too beaten-up to do much about it. The ISC will flip their shit in some way, shape, or form.
As to the Federation's reaction, well that's largely on us.
The point isn't "oh, the Harmony is cheating by using so many ships, they should be punished." It's that people will react to a fleet this big diving into the pool with a big cannonball splash.
NHO
Dumb is a state of existence
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One shall also point out that nine mothers won't birth in one month.
And so tag can be cleared fast, but there's objectively, as part of simulation, needs to be a soft cap on how hard you can change someone's opinion without some kind of reaction or some brainwashing involved.
And so tag can be cleared fast, but there's objectively, as part of simulation, needs to be a soft cap on how hard you can change someone's opinion without some kind of reaction or some brainwashing involved.
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i live in holland. fairly small country in the grand sceme of things and ally to the US.
if say the US suddenly parked a carrier group of our coast pretty sure even my goverment would be like WTF are you doing.
and that would be ally`s
now we are talking neutral powers?
i`m pretty sure all of them would have some really strong feeling about someone parkiing a fleet 4 or more time there own next to them.
just because someone can do something doesn`t mean it is the best idea that they do.
if say the US suddenly parked a carrier group of our coast pretty sure even my goverment would be like WTF are you doing.
and that would be ally`s
now we are talking neutral powers?
i`m pretty sure all of them would have some really strong feeling about someone parkiing a fleet 4 or more time there own next to them.
just because someone can do something doesn`t mean it is the best idea that they do.
I actually find this bit quite interesting. I mean I can certainly understand it but I'm a bit surprised that you would think people would complain about Harmony's ability to do this. I, and from what I've seen so far a lot of other people, think you and the other GMs have done a good job at establishing Harmony as a full peer to the 24th century Federation, much like how the Klingons and Romulans were a peer to the 23rd century Federation, so them having so many ships to throw at the problem isn't unrealistic. After all we currently have 68 starships spread across our various Task Forces and Harmony have a number of reasons (Tender focus and fleet layout being the biggest) why they would be able to spare even more ships then us.
It's certainly a monumental commitment since with 23 ships on the anti-ISC Task Force and SWB's estimated 96* on the anti-Federation Task Force come to a total of 122 ships. By my estimates I'd say that is probably pretty much every ship they can spare. So while Starfleet is focused on a dozen fronts simultaneously Harmony have decided, either due to having no other fronts or simply different priorities, to pour everything into this one front.
*Personally I'd guess closer to 78 with the following break down:
3 Sanctuary-class Tender
12 Alerts
12 Virtuosos
3 Choreographer-class Tender
6 Alerts
6 Dancers
23 Scientist-class Vessels
10-12 Believed to be Solace variant.
13 Liberator-class Cruisers
12 Alerts
12 Virtuosos
3 Choreographer-class Tender
6 Alerts
6 Dancers
23 Scientist-class Vessels
10-12 Believed to be Solace variant.
13 Liberator-class Cruisers
That said I will admit to being a bit sympathetic to the OOC argument that this is tad unfair since as things currently stand we're solidly into "which races do you want to lose" territory and with us only being allowed to change deployments once per year we don't even have a choice to sacrifice/delay our other fronts for these two. Still despite being sympathetic I don't actually think this is unfair. Harmony have been sufficiently built up that them being capable of going all in like this is well established and in hindsight them decided to do so in the wake of our decision regarding the Chrystovians is perfectly in character. So long as they are actually facing opportunity costs for doing this, like we would, then it's perfectly fair to have the Harmony do this.
Star trek ships are very different to the real world navy. They are tools of diplomacy, science, trade. You can't compare pure military thing like a carrier group to explorers.
In real world US can't say, "hey we want to cooperate with you more in economic and scientific international projects and that's why we sent our navy closer to you and they'll sporadically visit your ports" It would be absurd. It is not absurd for HoH to say that.
Enerael
We Shall Wake to Sanity
It is not, but as I have said before, that your fleet is capable of diplomacy does not change the fact that it is capable of violence also.
And when that fleet is large enough to conquer you in a week, its other qualities pale in significance.
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One more thing that just occurred to me. Part of the reasoning behind people not having an issue with Harmony dropping this large fleet is that, like the Federation, they are somewhat trusted. This is something we've all more or less taken on good faith however I'm not questioning that. After all it can be argued that Harmony regularly practices perfidy.
How? This:
Article 37, Section 1 (e) of the Geneva Convention clearly lists "The feigning of civilian, non-combatant status;" as an act of perfidy. Now you could argue that since even the Scientist-class is armed that it's technically not a non-combatant and so it's not actually perfidy or even that Harmony never agreed to the Space Geneva Convention. However I suspect most nations would be quite wary of a nation that disguises clear cut warships as simple scientific/diplomatic vessels. It is the sort of thing that says "I'm shady and shouldn't be trusted". That is the reason the Council forbids Starfleet from using cloaking devices after all; because they prevent/limit trust as they mean anyone dealing with you will always have that little niggling bit of doubt about your intentions.
How? This:
The Scientist-class is a ship with C2 S7 H4 L5 P7 D7 making it about as non-combatant as deep space ships get. The Solace-class meanwhile are C6 S6 H4 L5 P6 D6 marking them as clear heavy combatants. The problem is the Solace-class looks more or less identical to the Scientist-class on sensors until they open fire.
Article 37, Section 1 (e) of the Geneva Convention clearly lists "The feigning of civilian, non-combatant status;" as an act of perfidy. Now you could argue that since even the Scientist-class is armed that it's technically not a non-combatant and so it's not actually perfidy or even that Harmony never agreed to the Space Geneva Convention. However I suspect most nations would be quite wary of a nation that disguises clear cut warships as simple scientific/diplomatic vessels. It is the sort of thing that says "I'm shady and shouldn't be trusted". That is the reason the Council forbids Starfleet from using cloaking devices after all; because they prevent/limit trust as they mean anyone dealing with you will always have that little niggling bit of doubt about your intentions.
My problem is this is basicly The Cuban Missile Crisis on crack. While Harmony can say that 'It's a peacefull and diplomatic effort' all they want, we know for a damned fact that those ships compare favorably to anything we've got. They've basicly sat a significant fleet in our backyard, in striking distance of a good number of Federation Targets, to the point where I'm not sure we can stop them before some catastrophic damage is inflicted if they decided to throw that doom stack at us(and it is a doom stack, what they 'say' they're using it for is irrelevant).
I hope that the next update won't be like.
Your task force arrived to Allupii. They decided that it is an invasion force and destroyed every ship in the task force.
Your task force arrived to Allupii. They decided that it is an invasion force and destroyed every ship in the task force.