The Minovsky-Ionescozex Effect and the Technological History of the Humanx Commonwealth

The technological histories of the Earth Alliance and of the Thranx Hive Federation were set in the late 22nd century, Terran reckoning. It was at this time that Human engineers in the Jovian colonies (one of the 5 major power groups in the Sol system at that point, which was prior to Earth's acquaintance with Hyperspace travel) developed a hydraulic frame for a large, human-shaped, agile mecha and a short ranged but ferociously destructive weapon, called a "plasma lance", which it could use; and Thranx engineers at Hivehom, working for the war effort against the Thranx's perpetual enemies, the AAnn, developed an very effective ECM system which was optimized for smaller craft, along with a short range, ferociously destructive, weapon which could only safely deployed from a smaller craft, called a Severely Concentrated and Catastrophicly Accelerated Motion projectile. These twin sets of similar discoveries would set the tone for Earth-Human and Thranx Naval Technological progress for the next three centuries.

The tactical consequences of the Thranx ECM / SCCAM combination and the Earth-Human Exo-Armor / Plasma Lance team-up were, in each case, to put a considerable premium on relying on small, agile subcraft as the main combat arm of each fleet. Larger ships were relegated to the smallcraft carrier / support, fleet defence, drone / missile / ROV carrier, ground assault / Marine support, and fleet support / tender roles. Each fleet did maintain a few "Battleship" class vessels, but these, in practice, functioned as carrier / support vessels that emphasized the "support" role, rather than the "carrier" role.

Smallcraft "fighters" of approx. 10 - 70 tons, depending on class, were used by each fleet, supplemented in the Earth-Human case by humanoid or semi-humanoid mecha called Exo-Armors of about the same mass, and, in the Thranx case, by slightly larger "fighter" class mecha ranging into the 5-10 ktons mass range, called "sting-ships". These smallcraft were called upon to preform the primary combat roles in each fleet: preforming anti-ship strikes and reconnaisance, in the Thranx case (vs. the AAnn) and split between strike / recon and interceptor / pursuit, in the Earth-Human case (vs. other Earth-Humans).

The role of larger craft, after they had released their carried mecha / stingships, was to retreat into stealth and ECM cover, remaining at a considerable distance from any probable enemy location, and to support the smallcraft with drone / ROV launches. If and when a fleetcraft got a solid lock on an enemy fleetcraft, whether by it's own passive sensors, or by relay from a reconnaisance drone / ROV / mecha, it would release one or more volleys of long-range railgun, laser or Missile fire, after which it would release two or more Drone Decoys, and attempt to retreat back into stealth / ECM.

By the middle of the 24th century (Earth calender) (when the Centauri were introducing the newly minted Earth Alliance to the galactic stage, and the Thranx Association was taking its first steps into a Galactic policy that was not tightly focussed on the AAnn) these doctrines had hardened, for the officers of both race's militaries, into the status of iron-bound natural law.

Over the next hundred years little revolutionary change occured, though both polities kept up a regular upgrade schedule. The primary item of interest was the development, independently, by scientists of both races, of a modestly efficient small-craft inertial compensator, allowing smallcraft accellerations of around 10-15G. In both cases, these compensators were found to be inherantly and increasingly inefficient as craft masses increased, ending in complete uselessness in craft massing larger than 25-30 Ktons.

A minor item of interest was the abandonment, by both polities, of attempts at artificial gravity generators, when it became apparant to Naval architects of both races that the emmisions profile of the generators would seriously compromise their fleetcraft's stealth profile. It was noted that rotating crew rings, generating psuedo-gravity by centrifugal force, have no emissions profile; and while a ship mounting a crew ring cannot make stressful accelerations without risking structural damage, even with the ring locked down, it was also noted that EDF and TAN ships were not equipped to make stressful accelerations anyway, as they would void their stealth with too active a thrust plume. Artificial Gravity Generation research has remained an underdeveloped topic in the Commonwealth to the present day.

By the time the Dilgar erupted out of the Galactic South, the navies of the Earth Alliance and Thranx Association felt that were fully equipped with solid Galactic-level technology, able to give and take on a tactical level with anyone. The flashy heavy cruisers of the Dilgar fleet provided a perfect target for proto-Humanx smallcraft tactics, and the Stingships and Exo-Armors swarmed the Dilgar under.

It was, at least partially, arrogance resulting from the EDF's strong showing against the Dilgar that caused the Mimbari War. The EDF had thought that it was capable of holding it's own against any Galactic opponent, but the Mimbari decisively proved it wrong; demonstrating for all to see that relatively small differences in technical proficiency could, and would, lead to catastrophic military inequality.

With the surprise ending of the Mimbari War, the rush to Amalgamation was as much due to a profound insecurity on the part of both races as to their growing friendship, or the actions of the yet new-born Universal Church.

One of the first priorities of the newly formed Humanx Commonwealth was the pooling of technical data and scientific research. With the memories of the Mimbari War still fully present in the forefront of everyone's mind, this project was carried out with frantic energy, and provided surprising, indeed, near miraculous, results.

Drive researchers under Dr. Alex Kurita and Second-Philosoph Kinoshizsa tackled the Human and Thranx jump and reaction drive systems and, with almost miraculous quickness, combined the better features of both sets (adding some impressive improvements to the resulting hybrids along the way), creating the soon-to-be-galactically renowned Kurita-Kinoshizsa (KK, or "Doublekay") plasma verniers, Jump drives and smallcraft inertial compensators. Similar teams working in other disciplines developed the famed "Orbital Tritanium" armor matrix; the magnetic flexor buffer system that radically improved the responsiveness of Humanx Exo-armors and Exo-suits; the "Zero System" full immersion, impressed ACI coupled neural interface; the neurally organized, quantum "bio" computer; and the Full Mobility Action Control attitude vernier system, which improved smallcraft space-agility response time by a factor of three.

But the biggest boost to the Humanx tech base came from the power generation research group of Dr. Alexander Minovsky and First Philosoph the Eint Ionescozex. Working on a compact variant of a He3 fusion reactor, Minovsky and Ionescozex noticed an odd, massive spin-off particle, produced by a sub-process of the 2He3 + 1H2 -> 2He4 + P reaction. This particle, which they named the Minovsky particle, had two interesting properties. First, when allowed to scatter into its environment it naturally formed itself into controllable seperated matrixes, which then generated a field of force, which they named the Ionescozex Field, or I-field. In effect, a natural, particle based forcefield. Second, it absorbed electromagnetic energy all across the spectrum, although with particular efficiency in the long-wave frequencies (albeit that there were certain irregular intervals of severely diminished effectiveness; one of which, by coincidence, lay across the frequencies of "visible" light.)

Minovsky and Ionescozex discovered that a sufficiently compressed I-field would not only improve in the efficiency with which it absorbed electromagnetic energy, but would become opaque, and eventually even reflective, to physical force as well. They quickly proved that a compressed I-field could be used to replace the majority of the shielding in the new style of He3 Fusion reactor, leading to a power system that created the very particles that shielded its fierce energies from the outside world. It was also proven that a Minovsky-Ionescozex "Micro"-Fusion-Breeder reactor could not only be made much more compact and low-mass for a given power output, but that it would produce _considerably_ more Minosky particles than were needed to form it's own shielding. With the quick development of a system called an E-cap, for storing charged Minovsky particles until they were needed, a whole new universe of technological possibility opened up before the stunned researchers.

The I-field could be bent into all kinds of complex shapes, more or less at whim, so a spherical, or even conformal, field that blocked electromagnetic Sensors and turned the ship or mecha carrying it into an active sensor black hole was an easy win, developmentally speaking. When compressed and made more dense, a similar field could absorb electromagnetic beamfire as well, although this, of course, worked both ways. An even more compressed field coud be projected that would, if a standing wave pattern was induced in it, block, reflect or destroy most known weaponry impacts: the original generator could only project a field 10 meters in diameter and could only be carried by a capital ship, but it was a start. A different generator produced an I-field that could provide enough thrust against the ground to lift the generator and another 30% of its mass as much as 10 meters in the air.

But the _real_ bonanzas came in weapons technology. Utilizing fragmentary technical data acquired from the Taiidani and the Birak by Commonwealth Combined Intelligence's precursor organizations, the brilliant researchers developed the ability to create an I-field "rod", much longer than it was thick, and spin it on it's longitudinal axis at a rotational speed of .92c. The resulting energy "blade" possessed enough virtual mass to "feel" and spun off virtual photons all down its length, forming a fiercely glowing bar, or pole, with an average aspect ratio of 36:1.

When this "blade" was brought into contact with a material object it began "stripping" atoms out of the structural matrix of the object it had contacted, producing a thin cut, and a great deal of heat and free ions. Curiously, it was discovered that the "blade" had certain properties of a material object: the harder you swung it, the more momentum it picked up, and the farther it penetrated / the more damage it caused.

Testing established an effiiciency factor for this weapon at _five times_ the penetration / damage caused per joule of power used, vs. a plasma lance. The researchers dubbed this weapon the "beam saber" and engineered it to fit into the form factor of a "standard", 90 MJ, plasma lance. They succeeded in shoehorning in a 180 MJ capacitor and an E-cap big enough to run the blade for three minutes. This "size" of emitter proved to produce a ten meter long blade, with a damage coefficient an order of magnitude greater than that of its predecessor.

Further testing, after a bit of mathematical tinkering by the Eint Ionescozex, established that if, subsequent to igniting the blade, you induced a standing wave pattern similar to that used in the reflecting beam shield and then dumped the remainder of the E-cap at once, the blade would undergo what Dr. Minovsky dubbed a "hyperinduction effect"; growing in width by a factor of one point four, in length by a factor of ten, and in penetrative ability by a factor of two. Alas, this increase in capability was matched by a considerable decrease in duration; the enhanced blade lasting not more than one one-hundred-fiftieth of its previously predicted span. Researchers dubbed this function of the device the "Nova saber".

It was also found that the blade could be formed into complex shapes in a similar, though somewhat more restrained, fashion to that of an "ordinary" I-Field, and plans for a "beam axe", "beam spear", "beam naginata", "beam hawk", and "beam mace" were soon underway.

Power feeds and Minovsky Particle link-ups were engineered into the housing for the handle, so that whenever it was returned to it's holder it would immediately begin to recharge.

Further work into "beam" physics discovered the effect produced by inducing a slight "pear-shape" into one end of the rod-shape used in a "beam saber": the "blade" this procedure produced accelerated _violently_ in the direction the "pear-shape" was pointing. Experimentation with the newly dubbed "beam gun" established that the size of the "pear" vs. the size of the "rod" determined the beams balance between velocity / range / penetration and spread / explosive damage, with certain experiments noting a "flak burst" explosive effect.

Effectiveness testing established an optimum penetration / damage factor approximately equivalent to the long-sought, but never achieved "perfect laser", a maximum velocity of .6c, and a theoretical maximum range of .06 ls.

Experiments with "pushing" the beam-field established that a sufficient compression of the field while it was "spinning up" would cause a "phase collapse", wherein the Minovsky Particles inside the I-field underwent a dimensional collapse into a single entity, which the researchers immediately dubbed a "mega-particle". In this state the "beam blast" reaction was even more violent, and the resulting "Mega-beam" did damage even more efficiently.

The machinery necessary to "compress" the beam could not be immediately engineered into a size practicable for a mere 70 ton Exo-armor, but a 4-8 kton Stingship could use one as a spinal mount, along with the necessary "tank" of "pre-compressed" Minovsky particles. While smaller ships would find the "ammunition" requirements troublesome, it was a godsend for capital ship main battery designers.

In fact, the whole "set" of technologies were so attractive that there was nothing else to do but build some prototypes to use them. And so they did.

Four development projects were set up:
Jovian Armor Works began development of the RGM-79 "GM" Exo-armor.
Lockheed-Orion began production of a competing Exo-armor, the MS-05 "Zaku".
Hivehom Military Production began work on the Astrofighter ZM-A05G "Recarl".
and Longtree Shipyards began work on a stingship prototype, the "Garuda Alpha" class.

Work on the MS-05 prototype was completed in less than two years, with the RGM-79 following in less than two months, and six months after that the ZM-A05G prototype was in the final pre-flight testing phase with work on the "Garuda" not far behind when fate intervened in the form of two new developments.

The first was the announcement, by the "doublekay" team of Kurita and Kinoshizsa, that the vernerable SCCAM had been re-engineered with new technology. Now driven by a greviously overdriven gravatic burst engine, an artifact of a failed Human experiment with controllable Grav-drive, the new SCCAM still could maintain no more than a 2 second useful lifespan past launch, but for those two seconds it radiated _massive_ Brute-force-and-Ignorance ECM, and accelerated at 50kG. When it reached the end of its lifespan, or impacted a material object big enough to destabilize its drivefield, its target would suffer not only the wracking stress of the overloaded grav-field and the 1 ton mass of the missile, impacting at 1000 kps, but also the destruction of the grav-drive and its powercell, a force estimated as equal to a 50 Megaton nuclear blast.

The altered form factor and launch requirements for the new SCCAM required a re-design of the Garuda class's SCCAM launcher, a process which would require 6 months. The redesign folowing the next revelation would take almost a year.

It had long been known that certain psychotropic drugs would induce in humans a state of ferocious and uncontrolled killing frenzy called, in one human language, berserkergang. No practical combat use for this stae had been found in the modern era, owing to the total lack of discrimination displayed by the subject involved. Now, the research team of Hodges, Isvetzerzum, and Peters revealed that a similar state, of retreat into a totally ruthless and remorseless calculator, could be caused in Thranx by certain drugs which were physiologically similar, but chemically distinct.

The researchers demonstrated, moreover that a previously impressed pair of Human and Thranx, each under specifically engineered Heightened-Instinct-Perception, or HIP, drugs, could be linked together _with_ their impressed ACI by a Zero System full immersion neural link, the result being a temporary _fusion_ of the abilities possessed by each member of the triad into a single sentience. Testing preformed on such temporary sentiences revealed the "HIPnosis" fusions to be superior in space warfare to all other known groupings: being faster in tactical / piloting decision making than the nearest known competitor by a factor of three; and more correct / precise by a factor of five. The research team predicted that a HIPnosis piloted Garuda class stingship would be the deadliest vessel of it's size class anywhere in the Galaxy.

Full immersion combat training exercises, conducted after acceptance of the prototypes, bore out all the hopes of their developers, while revealing remarkably few defects. The HIPnosis combat control system, in particular, exceeded all reasonable expectations and a contract was granted to Jovian Armor Works to produce an Exo-armor with a HIPnosis control center. JAW produced a version of its RX-79 in just less than a year, the RX-78A "Gundam".

The Gundam went on to full immersion testing even more successfully than it's predecessor and within two years final versions of all five mecha were in full production as the:
RGM-79 GM,
MS-06A Zaku II,
ZM-A05H Recarl Perfect Type,
RX-78NT-1 Gundam NT-1, and
Garuda Production Model Stingship

Direct lineal and radial descendants of these five combat smallcraft still serve the Commonwealth today.

Eric Hallstrom
http://www.kawaiikunee.com/slp/
--
Nothing speeds up a heart rate like seeing the tax bunny putting on
rubber gloves. -James Nicoll, rasfw

- if it lets you accellerate at 10-15 gravs, that's a bit better than modestly efficient, for Spiral space. Most ships don't have compensators at all. Most of the ships that do are Silesian gravships, who can parasite them off of their impeller nodes, and thus not pay the same space premium. compensator tech isn't terribly advanced here, and if I'm remembering my benchmarks correctly, 10-15 Gs is about the upper max for Known Tech with either a) redlining a catastrophic failure compensator or b) a tough crew and a percentage compensator. I might not be.

percentage compensator: cuts but does not eliminate the sensation of accel. For example, a straight 50% percentage compensator (they pretty muchnever have flat curves,but ignoring that for the moment) would turn an outward accel of 3 gravs into an inside sensation/effect of 1.5 gravs.

Catastrophic failure compensator: eliminates accel effects entirely, right up to the point where it begins to break. Usually, the first symptom of breakage is a complete cessation of function. This is when you suddenly realize that you're accellerating at 15 Gs and perhaps redlining things wasn't such a plan after all. Usually, this realization is a brief one.

- Is it just me, or is there anyone else who cringes slightly at the double-meaning of the HIP acronym?


Other than that, looks pretty good to my eyes, even if I don't know all of the places you're grabbing this from.

Fibula

The Doublekay Compensator is a percentage compensator, fibula, good eye. It's a very good example of the variety, too, except it only works for very small masscurves and has a vicious breakoff. E.g. it's smallcraft only.

In a fighter-sized (up to 100 tons or so) mecha, you'll be pulling 6 Gs (which is what Commonwealth G-suits, bio-clips and training will let you function in, mission-term) when your mech is pulling 35. It should be noted that Doublekay Plasma Verniers are efficient, but not _that_ efficient: being _able_ to pull 35 Gs means you are 50% drives and powerplant. (It also means you have to _watch_ your re-mass, cause you're burning the stuff like you were a Saturn 5.)

For a stingship: if you mass up to a kton, you're feeling 6 Gs at 28. If you mass 2-5 ktons, you're feeling 6 Gs at 20. If you mass up to about 10 ktons, you're feeling 6 Gs at 14-15. Above that, forget it: you get no benefits.

Most Civvie ships accellerate at a constant one G, and like it. Most Military ships lose their stealth curves if they boost at more than .3 Gee, or so. So they don't. (Stealth really _is_ a religion for Peaceforce fleetcraft.)

(This is the big, not really hidden weakness of the Commonwealth Peaceforce: their Capital Ships are _slow_. This effects how fast they go in Hyper, how fast they re-deploy in-system, how fast they can get _out_ of the way, if you breach their stealth, all that. _No_ current Peaceforce Capship or escort can top out at higher than about 1.8 G. Even if it wants to, and, as poited out above, usually, they don't use more than .3. .5 if they go to "Flank" speed. They make up for it with the best small ships in the Galaxy that aren't Juraian. And nobody's really all _that_ sure about the qualifier: the question has never been tried in real life. (And _nobody_ disputes the Peaceforce's title as _Sneakiest Bastards In The Galaxy Who Are Not Vorlons_.(Okay: Shadows, Sith. Nobody knows about them, shut up.)))

Eric Hallstrom
http://www.kawaiikunee.com/slp/
--
<meri> Hrm. This is a quandry. I need to go to the bathroom. There is
a maintenance man in our bathroom.
<AB> meri: Act nonchalant.

>Most Civvie ships accellerate at a constant one G, and like it. Most Military ships lose their stealth curves if they boost at more than .3 Gee, or so. So they don't. (Stealth really _is_ a religion for Peaceforce fleetcraft.)<

They're spiritual submariners?

>(This is the big, not really hidden weakness of the Commonwealth Peaceforce: their Capital Ships are _slow_. This effects how fast they go in Hyper, how fast they re-deploy in-system, how fast they can get _out_ of the way, if you breach their stealth, all that. _No_ current Peaceforce Capship or escort can top out at higher than about 1.8 G. Even if it wants to, and, as poited out above, usually, they don't use more than .3. .5 if they go to "Flank" speed. They make up for it with the best small ships in the Galaxy that aren't Juraian. And nobody's really all _that_ sure about the qualifier: the question has never been tried in real life. (And _nobody_ disputes the Peaceforce's title as _Sneakiest Bastards In The Galaxy Who Are Not Vorlons_.(Okay: Shadows, Sith. Nobody knows about them, shut up.)))<

Hmm. So, by adding a Centauri-type gravdrive, as aquired from the Brakiri, they gain strategic speed but no real tactical benefits? Because they can't use it without being detected?

Anyway, the fact that Humanx ships are slow should not be taken to indicate that they are inferior or vulnerable. They invariably have excellent armor and truly amazing passive sensors. Their weapons can begin to hit at long range, and, if closed with, do a startling amount of damage.

Humanx doctrine keeps them out of combat for the simple reason that fighters are much cheaper than capships.

Blessed be.
-n

>>Most Civvie ships accellerate at a constant one G, and
>>like it. Most Military ships lose their stealth curves if
>>they boost at more than .3 Gee, or so. So they don't.
>>(Stealth really _is_ a religion for Peaceforce fleetcraft.)<
>They're spiritual submariners?

Commonwealth Peaceforce Naval Command: We Hide With Pride!

Commmonwealth Combined Protective Fleet: We Don't Even Officially _Exist_; _That's_ How Stealthy We Are!

I should note the minor fib in my "_most_ military ships", above: somewhere between 1/3 to 1/2 the total* Commonwealth** Naval strength is contained in the CCPF, which is, technically, a part of the Commonwealth Combined Merchant Marine, the "official" Commonwealth** merchant/utility fleet. The CCPF hides the old fashioned way: they fly ships which were designed in lockstep with (certain of) the "Civilian" ships flown by the CCMM and which, externally, look and behave to all detection _exactly_ like them.

Except for, you know, the military grade armor and sensors, the pop-out weapons, the cargo space having been converted to hold Exos, ect. But none of that shows on the surface, and the CCMM plays this little game where they sometimes don't end a trip with the same transponder codes they started it with.

*"total" is spelled "not anything near total"

**For "Commonwealth", read "Belonging to the Commonwealth Central Government Adminsitration". As opposed to belonging to one of the "National" Governments, or to a Mega-Corp, or to a Nest-Corporation, or to a Merchant Lord, or to some random, patriotic private citizen.

>>(This is the big, not really hidden weakness of the
>>Commonwealth Peaceforce: their Capital Ships are
>>_slow_. This effects how fast they go in Hyper, how fast
>>they re-deploy in-system, how fast they can get _out_
>>of the way, if you breach their stealth, all that. _No_
>>current Peaceforce Capship or escort can top out at
>>higher than about 1.8 G. Even if it wants to, and, as
>>poited out above, usually, they don't use more than .3.
>>.5 if they go to "Flank" speed. They make up for it with
>>the best small ships in the Galaxy that aren't Juraian.
>>And nobody's really all _that_ sure about the qualifier:
>>the question has never been tried in real life. (And
>>_nobody_ disputes the Peaceforce's title as _Sneakiest
>>Bastards In The Galaxy Who Are Not Vorlons_.(Okay:
>>Shadows, Sith. Nobody knows about them, shut up.)))<

>Hmm. So, by adding a Centauri-type gravdrive, as
>aquired from the Brakiri, they gain strategic speed but
>no real tactical benefits? Because they can't use it
>without being detected?

Right. Ask any Peaceforce Officer, that's what he'll tell you. Now. Do you _believe_ it? That Peaceforce ships are slow is the one weakness they have that people other than the Taiidani / Juraii might be able to exploit.

Worse, having a Grav-drive would free them, _including their combat smallcraft_, from remass dependence.

And then there's the CCPF, who everybody "knows" about, but nobody knows exactly how many there are. Plus, nothing says that Commonwealth _merchies_ have to stay with Plasma-spurters, if there's a better alternative: does anyone _really_ want to cut the CCMM or the MMG _another_ break by making their ships faster, and cheaper to run?

And then there's the fact that MMG and CCMM (and, really, _all_ Commonwealth cargo haulers) are effectively auxilliary naval vessels, anyway: they're normally much heavier defended, stealthed and sensored than is usual for a merchant ship (because of liberal, not to say libertarian, Commonwealth "private personal defence" laws, and because in the Commonwealth business environment Getting The Drop on your competion can be a matter of how well you can see what they're doing), and all of them _can_ carry, and many of them _do_ carry, a small group of Exos, for security and cargo-manipulation purposes. And all the bulk carriers could be refitted for _lots_ more easily enough, and as for the container ships, which outnumber everything else by three to one, well ... there's a _reason_ why the "standard" commonwealth cargo container will just fit a "standard form factor" Exo-armor and its transport rack. Does anyone _really_ want to find out how many Gelgoog-Ms the MMG could fly _and maintain_ off of an Inari VI if they used _all_ the "outside" cells for exos and _all_ the "inside" ones for support?

The correct answer, by the way, is "No."

>Anyway, the fact that Humanx ships are slow should not
>be taken to indicate that they are inferior or vulnerable.
>They invariably have excellent armor and truly amazing
>passive sensors. Their weapons can begin to hit at long
>range, and, if closed with, do a startling amount of
>damage.

Anecdote: back about thirty years ago, an AAnn battlegroup happened to spot, by accident, a Peaceforce taskgroup coming out of Hyper. (This, by the way, is one of a Peaceforcer's special nightmares, and why they all carry lots of Decoy Drones.) They got good, solid locks on it, and identified one Omega "Heavy" Destroyer, and one eight-place Stingship Jumpring. The admiral in charge decided to have an "incident".

One Omega HDD, 8 Callisto class Stingships, 12 "Delicate Blossom of Silver" Interceptors, 6 "Fluttering Insvesia Petal" Assault Fighters, 18 AMX-011 "Zaku III"s, 12 RGM-81-b "GM-Gun II"s, and 6 MS-14A "Gelgoog"s

vs.

2 AAnn "Sand Nest" class BBs, 2 "Stinging Wind" class CAs, and 8 "Biting Fly" class DDs , plus appropriate subcraft thereunto.

An hour and a half later the Omega had gotten its paint scratched, one Callisto was crippled and two more needed serious repairs, 3 Delicate Blossoms, 2 Zakus, 3 GM-Guns and 1 Fluttering Petal had come back to the barn in sad enough shape that their Crew Chiefs said "Sack 'em. Break out the spares", and one Zaku wasn't coming back at all (Compounded Rookie Error Effect.)

Meanwhile, the Omega was lauching transfer tugs, to move the three remaining (badly crippled) AAnn sips together so the engineers could fix them up enough life support for them to hold on until a MMG or CCMM JumpTug could come and pick them up, and her shuttles were busily engaged in rounding up the 2,000 or so AAnn who'd ditched in lifepods.

The Commonwealth returned the wrecks and survivors to the AAnn, along with a Mild Diplomatic Note.

4 months later, a similar AAnn battlegroup attacked a CCMM Cargo Transhipment Waypoint Station. That time nothing came back at all. And the Commonwealth sent the AAnn a Mild Diplomatic Note.

And the AAnn haven't tried to match fleetcraft with the Commonwealth since.

>Humanx doctrine keeps them out of combat for the
>simple reason that fighters are much cheaper than
>capships.

And much faster to build, if you lose them. And much easier to move around. Or hide. Or lock up in giant vaults.

Eric Hallstrom
http://www.kawaiikunee.com/slp/
--
<meri> Hrm. This is a quandry. I need to go to the bathroom. There is
a maintenance man in our bathroom.
<AB> meri: Act nonchalant.

>The Commonwealth returned the wrecks and survivors to
>the AAnn, along with a Mild Diplomatic Note.

***

To: AAnn Imperial High Command
From: Humanx Commonwealth Ministry of State
cc: Humanx Commonwealth Ministry of Defence, Galactic Council - Centauri Sector Committee
Subject: Incident of 26 July 2459 CE

Recovered personnel will arrive on your border in the next 100 hours. Please do not do that again.

<attached files: AAnn warship flight recorder logs, recovered; CPNC debriefing logs (declassified); flight recorder logs, CPS _Odysseus_ (declassified)>

---
Mr. Fnord
GCU _Another Victim Of The Ambient Morality_
http://fnord.sandwich.net/

Commonwealth Mild Diplomatic Notes involve expressions of the deepest sympathy for the unfortunate individuals caught up in an action obviously not their own and the profoundest best wishes for the success of the grief counselling and reintegration into normal society of the survivors, and also the investigation into what terrible villian or malfunction of procedure could have caused such an awful difficulty; closely coupled with the gentlest possible reminders that Commonwealth assistance with any or all of the above will be forthcoming upon the slightest wish of the said polity, at rock-bottom prices and on the most advantageous of possible terms.

Eric Hallstrom
http://www.kawaiikunee.com/slp/
--
<meri> Hrm. This is a quandry. I need to go to the bathroom. There is
a maintenance man in our bathroom.
<AB> meri: Act nonchalant.

...and they mean they mean every word, too. After all, the Commonwealth really does just want to Help.





Side notes:

You can't get any real benefit out of grav-drives without sacrificing your stealth... but there are those times where your stealth has been compromised so badly that you cannot possibly get it back, and at those times, having a grav drive can come in really handy.

Question: I'm guessing that Brakiri grav drives don't involve either light-hawk wings or impeller nodes and wedges. How, then, do they work? What are they good at? What are they bad at? This could be important.


Thought: some day, someone's going to design a semistealth craft that looks like a destroyer or battleship, but carries (say) hidden graser banks, heavily optimized toward anhillating fightercraft by the busload. The first commonwealth battlegroup that runs into it is going to have a Really Bad Day (tm)

Also, I'm guessing that the Humanx never really developed cap-ship torpedoes all that much. Why would you, when the same space could give you another exo-suit?

Remember: Everyone is cool here, somehow. By the same token, if you're having any effect on the galaxy at large at all, at some point in the narrative, your life should suck. Just thematic that way.

that is all.

Fibula

>Question: I'm guessing that Brakiri grav drives don't involve either light-hawk wings or impeller nodes and wedges. How, then, do they work? What are they good at? What are they bad at? This could be important.<

The Juraiian type gravdrive has nothing at all to do with the LHW, and is, in fact, used by the Centauri, the Mimbari, and most of the more advanced races in the Centauri Sector. (although the machinery used to achieve the effects that characterize it all operate on the same math, they often vary wildly in actual execution.)

What they're good at: Straight line speed, acceleration/decelleration, hairpin turns at low velocities. Thus, a Centauri Primus class wishing to turn 90 degrees will first come to an almost complete stop, then ramp back up to cruising speed.

What they're bad at: Taking battle damage. If their generating sails/vanes/wings/whatever are damaged, the drive don't work no more.


>Thought: some day, someone's going to design a semistealth craft that looks like a destroyer or battleship, but carries (say) hidden graser banks, heavily optimized toward anhillating fightercraft by the busload. The first commonwealth battlegroup that runs into it is going to have a Really Bad Day (tm)<

Lancer Frigate. What, you didn't think that Lionstone would order a ship based on its utility against a pack of filthy rebels, did you?

>Also, I'm guessing that the Humanx never really developed cap-ship torpedoes all that much. Why would you, when the same space could give you another exo-suit?<

No, such things aren't so much their style.

>Remember: Everyone is cool here, somehow. By the same token, if you're having any effect on the galaxy at large at all, at some point in the narrative, your life should suck. Just thematic that way.<

Mmmhmm. ^_^

>You can't get any real benefit out of grav-drives without
>sacrificing your stealth... but there are those times where
>your stealth has been compromised so badly that you
>cannot possibly get it back, and at those times, having a
>grav drive can come in really handy.

Yup. This is currently the Big Commonwealth Naval Weakness. But putting _two_ main drive systems into the same hull might kind of ... uh .. suck.

By the same token, though, the rest of the Galaxy can't be sure that the same research teams that worked the "Doublekay Miracle" won't work another, can they?

This could very well become a plot issue, at some point, if we need a new, especially efficient \ stealthy \ otherwise weird drive system to show up out of nowhere.

On the other hand, the Brakiri are _considering_ it. They may continue considering it for the next several decades. Brakiri don't like to rush into decisions.

And this, of course, is another plot point generator, should someone need one, in the future.

>Question: I'm guessing that Brakiri grav drives don't
>involve either light-hawk wings or impeller nodes and
>wedges. How, then, do they work? What are they good
>at? What are they bad at? This could be important.

Brakiri use "Standard" Mimbari style Grav-drive, as far as I know. They have a better command of it than most, though, as they use grav-fields for weapons technology, which is generally considered to be quite hard.

In "official" Bab5-land, they're the only "younger race" outside the Mimbarii and the Vree to have Grav Drives at all.

In Spiral, apparantly, the Centaurii and others have Grav Drives, too, so it's not as big an issue, but still, the Brakiri are supposed to be really good.

>Thought: some day, someone's going to design a
>semistealth craft that looks like a destroyer or battleship,
>but carries (say) hidden graser banks, heavily optimized
>toward anhillating fightercraft by the busload. The first
>commonwealth battlegroup that runs into it is going to
>have a Really Bad Day (tm)

It's been done. Mimbari *Eshanta* Fighter-killers and Centaurii *Sullust* Escort Destroyers make good examples.

The problems, outside the usual tactical and design problems, are two-fold: From a strategic / economic standpoint, your problem is that sub-mecha are _much cheaper_ weight-for_weight than ships, because all the support systems are back home on the carrier, and the Commonwealth has a bigger economy than you do, so to (try to) match the Commonwealth economically you have to use sub-mecha of your own, but the Commonwealth has an enormous advantage in effectiveness sub-mecha wise, so to try to match the Commonwealth's effectiveness, you have to use ships. This is what is known as a catch 22.

Meanwhile, from a tactical / operational standpoint you have the problem of what percentage of fighter-defence do you put in your fleet. If you put too much, your fleet is ineffective vs. other targets than fighters, and you have little defence against, for instance, the Commonwealth _ships_ that are still lurking around out there. Meanwhile, if you put in too little, it will get manuvered out of position and bypassed, regardless of how good it is. The fact that no-one has any really solid numbers on how many exo-armors and fighters might be in a given battlegroup just makes this job a little harder.

>Also, I'm guessing that the Humanx never really
>developed cap-ship torpedoes all that much. Why
>would you, when the same space could give you
>another exo-suit?

No, they haven't. Commonwealth Drones are not much faster (often less fast) than a fighter, and serve as remote sensor platforms, sub-mecha communications and data transfer relays, remote ECM decoys, and movable mines, in roughly that order.

>Remember: Everyone is cool here, somehow. By the
>same token, if you're having any effect on the galaxy at
>large at all, at some point in the narrative, your life
>should suck. Just thematic that way.

The Commonwealth gets, I think, Diplomatic and Internal problems. You can't really solve those with exo-armors.

Eric Hallstrom, Speaker-to-Dreamworlds
--
* AB finds a file on his computer named "susceptible.doc"
* AB opens the file.
* AB finds the single word "susceptible" in the file
* AB eyes the Universe warily