Ad Astra! ... an Aurora Forum Game, run by blue emu

[Count Lake]

OK... there's another big decision that we need to make regarding the Wolf 294 system.

We fought hard to destroy those Prix, and I don't want someone else to just waltz in and scavenge those wrecks. They belong to us!

On the other hand, to judge by the field of seven wrecks in orbit around that planet, there might be a pretty nasty ground-based PDC defense system there, and we really aren't equipped to handle it. None of our ships has the sensor range or missile range to take it out from a safe distance, nor the defenses to safely approach it.

So my current trend of thought... after we've repaired our damaged armor, overhauled and re-munitioned... is to go back in escorting a bunch of wreckers and freighters, and dismantle the eight wrecks that we ourselves created in that epic battle. We should be safe enough from the planetary PDC (assuming that one even exists), since it didn't shoot at us last time, and we will just be returning to the same area as before... the volume of space in which our epic battle was fought.

We can leave the other wrecks under the "protection" of the planetary PDC, and only come back for them once we've put together a force that can safely knock it out.

Discuss.

You're confident that we can take minimal civilian damage from the possibly rearmed missle cruiser that gave us lots of trouble?

 

[Polar Mongoose]

Sounds like a plan. Though we should approach the site of the battlefield carefully in case bandit 4 has returned by the time we get back there.

 

[blue emu]

You're confident that we can take minimal civilian damage from the possibly rearmed missle cruiser that gave us lots of trouble?

We can send in the warships first, make a recce sweep that does NOT bring us near the planet, and then stand guard forward of the wrecks while the scavengers go to work.

 

[Amadeus]

While we are discussing the battle and digesting the lessons learned from it, we can hold a parallel discussion on a somewhat broader topic: Fleet Strategy and Tactics, and Ship Design Philosophy.

Well that is a BIG topic, maybe the largest I can think of. This threads will explose all records

I think you exposed the matter very well and I don't see any flaws at all in your analisys.

Simply said, when comes to Strategy and Tactics, missions never changes: recon, strike, PD, supply, refuel, detect, etc. etc.
Then your economy ( minerals stocks, industry & shipyards capacity) and your technology only allow you some designs and force you to adapt your tactics and operational procedures to them.
Finally the enemy you face will determine wether both your procedures and your design were good or not.
You've had meet swarms instead of precursors you would have faced a completly different threat, I means.
And all this is the reason this game is so GREAT.

About ship design personally I think you summed it perfectly, multirole ships are better fitted for indipendent/small size group.
Specialized ships (at least in early games and normal sized empire) have an huge advantage when operated in combined large task force with the drawbacks that you pointed out.

When comes to balance among speed, protection and weapons, I really see this as a blend of: mission focus, operational procedures, technological possibilities and personal taste.

My general feeling is that in Aurora your best blend depend upon the threat you face, ie:
when facing a technologically more advanced enemy, with ships faster then yours, then protection, both active and passive, is the most important factor.
Given the same tech level, speed is an asset you must count on, as it allow you to decide wether you wish to engage or not, also it affect the accuracy of your enemy weapons (and the tracking speed of your beams) thus is tactically relevant.
Weapons is more dependent upon your technological possibilities and industrial capacity (how many missiles you can efford to spend in your next war ?) and once again your enemy (which kind of weapons is more effective, how many I need ?)

Hope this dissertion make sense to you, beg pardon for my english is 2 am here and I'm quite sleepy.

Regards

EDIT: Yes salvaging those wrecks should be your priority.

 

[Count Lake]

We can send in the warships first, make a recce sweep that does NOT bring us near the planet, and then stand guard forward of the wrecks while the scavengers go to work.

So long as you're confident and take the precautions that you mentioned, lets go salvage some Prix! Watch out for my frozen corpse near the last cruiser.

 

[BwenGun]

OK... there's another big decision that we need to make regarding the Wolf 294 system.

We fought hard to destroy those Prix, and I don't want someone else to just waltz in and scavenge those wrecks. They belong to us!

On the other hand, to judge by the field of seven wrecks in orbit around that planet, there might be a pretty nasty ground-based PDC defense system there, and we really aren't equipped to handle it. None of our ships has the sensor range or missile range to take it out from a safe distance, nor the defenses to safely approach it.

So my current trend of thought... after we've repaired our damaged armor, overhauled and re-munitioned... is to go back in escorting a bunch of wreckers and freighters, and dismantle the eight wrecks that we ourselves created in that epic battle. We should be safe enough from the planetary PDC (assuming that one even exists), since it didn't shoot at us last time, and we will just be returning to the same area as before... the volume of space in which our epic battle was fought.

We can leave the other wrecks under the "protection" of the planetary PDC, and only come back for them once we've put together a force that can safely knock it out.

Discuss.

Why not send a scout ship to discover whether or not the planet actually has powerful PDC defences? It's possible after all that there are simply a few missile stockpiles there for the Prix ships and the battle that destroyed so many ships around the planet simply happened to occur there by luck. Once the remaining Prix warship has been taken care of sending an expendable ship to take a look at the planet might allow us, if it is in fact undefended, to retrieve all the tech from those wrecks and, more importantly, all those minerals.

 

[Comrade Chaos]

Is it possible that we're gonna need a surgical bombardment ship for destroying installations on a planet from afar? A sniper so to speak?

 

[Amadeus]

Talking about scout,

this is a fast scout you should be able to produce at you tech level (unarmored and no jumpdrive)

Pegaso tipo A class Scout Corvette 2,400 tons 231 Crew 511 BP TCS 48 TH 126 EM 0
7500 km/s Armour 1-15 Shields 0-0 Sensors 8/40/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 46% IFR: 0.6% Maint Capacity 133 MSP Max Repair 80 MSP Est Time: 2.2 Years

Ion Engine E7 (6) Power 60 Fuel Use 70% Signature 21 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 100,000 Litres Range 107.1 billion km (165 days at full power)

Active Search Sensor MR45-R50 (1) GPS 4000 Range 45.3m km Resolution 50
Thermal Sensor TH1-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 8m km
EM Detection Sensor EM5-40 (1) Sensitivity 40 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 40m km

 

[CptJoker]

6) The actual hands-on conduct of the battle; fire and movement : Here, at least, I feel that I made no obvious tactical mistakes. I think I handled the actual Fleet engagement pretty damned well... each decision on holding course or turning away, target selection, firing and cease-firing, whether to use full fleet salvos, half-salvos or individual ships... I don't feel that I wasted many missiles (perhaps none at all), and we simply couldn't AFFORD to waste any; we returned with our magazines almost empty as it was.

I concur. And the decision to switch to half-salvoes while assessing damage was quite crucial, I think: imagine if we'd run out of ammo just as that last Prix closed in on the Rocks...

We were also quite fortunate, but as they say: fortuna audaces iuvat.

ECM and ECCM in my opinion. I don't know how much they cost to research but I would think they would be among the most cost and time efficient changes we could make right now.

EDIT: Added missing words.

I agree. Even cutting off 10 or 20% of the enemy's effective range could save us from a few additional salvoes before we can strike back, and we should definitely work to defeat their attempts to reduce our fighting range.

While we are discussing the battle and digesting the lessons learned from it, we can hold a parallel discussion on a somewhat broader topic: Fleet Strategy and Tactics, and Ship Design Philosophy.

These two topics are inter-related. Ships should be designed to fill a particular role in your intended tactical use of the fleet.

Designing ships is like designing tanks... it means seeking a balance between Speed, Firepower and Protection... and these three elements are to some extent mutually exclusive. The more armor and PD defense you put on a ship, the slower it will move and the fewer offensive weapons it can carry.

My original philosophy was predicated on the fact that in the early game, we won't be able to afford either the cash or the minerals for very many ships, so I wanted to create a compact fleet of multi-role vessels, rather than a larger fleet of more efficient but more specialized vessels. This necessarily means sacrificing some efficiency... if I equip all of my ships with both offensive armament and PD armament (rather than two separate specialized ship-types), then they all need to carry two types of active sensors, two types of fire control, and so on; which reduces the tonnage available for engines, armor and offensive weapons. On the other hand, it makes my ships better able to operate on their own, either in detached squadrons or to continue fighting even if I lose a few ships. A squadron of specialized ships becomes very vulnerable if they lose their PD ships, or their sensor ships, or whatever... break any link in the chain, and the fleet falls apart.

Multi-role ships avoid that danger, but they have their own drawbacks. I have to make compromises in other areas, such as armor and speed. So I chose to create a homogeneous 4000 kps battle-line, which would not fall apart if one or two key ships were disabled (since all are multi-role), and which all carried at least six PD launchers. This design philosophy naturally dictates my tactics (rather than having it the other way around)... I keep them all in one big mob, so that my Point Defense interlocks and each ship can protect the others; and I tend to fire full fleet salvos at individual enemy ships, rather than each ship picking a target and firing at will.

Are there any comments or criticisms of this design philosophy or its implementation?

Bear in mind that once we have the resource crisis solved and can greatly expand our Navy, I intend to shift from multi-role to purpose-built designs, with specialized PD ships, alpha-strike ships, bombardment vessels, Battle-Management (AWACS) vessels, and so on.

Given the technological and logistical limitations at the time, I think your current multirole policy has been the correct one. Being able to adapt to the unknown situation is ultimately what won the battle. However, this skirmish with the Prix has shown the potency of having specialised craft (the Khan) even though it also exposed obvious weaknesses (the defenceless beam ships.) Overall, I think we should maybe have a class or two which remain multirole - filling in gaps in the fleet's missile defence or offensive capablities should our specialist ships be neutralised - but also augment the fleet with task-specific specialist craft, like an AMM and PD vessel and more robust all-attack craft (decent armor and firepower, but reliant on supporting PD vessels.)

To expand on our current fleet order thus:

Shield Rocks - Forward Point Defence --- Armored Attack Craft - Main Point Defence, Cruisers, and Carriers --- Long-range Boomers

We cannot hope to outpace our enemies at our current tech, even ones who aren't as advanced as the Precursors, so we should focus on the strengths we do have: high amounts of armor and interlinking PD abilities (as we have in the current fleet.) It seems that going all defensive or all offensive is more efficient than mixed types, thus I would have the following types (just off the top of my head): shield craft to soak up damage (ie, the Rocks), defensive PD vessels to intercept missiles with AMM and turrets (if possible), carriers to launch additional fighters, heavy attack craft bulging with launchers and armor (to be the main battle screen) and multirole cruisers for eventualities that cannot be foreseen (rescue missions, for example.) Each vessel should be capable of taking a hit, though only the Rocks and battle-line cruisers need to withstand sustained punishment. Generally I would be more in favor of heavier armor than faster engines, since we cannot hope to outrun light-speed missiles at any tech level. And doubling up on all capabilities for redundancy in case of losses (ideally roles like the fleet jump tug should not be performed by vessels on the line of battle itself.)

We can leave the other wrecks under the "protection" of the planetary PDC, and only come back for them once we've put together a force that can safely knock it out.

Discuss.

Seems reasonable. If feasible, I'd also recommend launching an expendable probe towards the Prix planet to gather intel: see if there are any defences, and if so at what range they engage.

 

[Mattabesta]

what happened to the avian overlord.

 

[blue emu]

Talking about scout,

this is a fast scout you should be able to produce at you tech level (unarmored and no jumpdrive)

Pegaso tipo A class Scout Corvette 2,400 tons 231 Crew 511 BP TCS 48 TH 126 EM 0
7500 km/s Armour 1-15 Shields 0-0 Sensors 8/40/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 46% IFR: 0.6% Maint Capacity 133 MSP Max Repair 80 MSP Est Time: 2.2 Years

Ion Engine E7 (6) Power 60 Fuel Use 70% Signature 21 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 100,000 Litres Range 107.1 billion km (165 days at full power)

Active Search Sensor MR45-R50 (1) GPS 4000 Range 45.3m km Resolution 50
Thermal Sensor TH1-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 8m km
EM Detection Sensor EM5-40 (1) Sensitivity 40 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 40m km

This one is smaller, cheaper, and quicker to build, although the sensors are shorter-ranged. Passive sensors only:

Spy class Scout 2,000 tons 193 Crew 348.4 BP TCS 40 TH 150 EM 0
7500 km/s Armour 1-14 Shields 0-0 Sensors 24/40/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 32% IFR: 0.4% Maint Capacity 109 MSP Max Repair 45 MSP Est Time: 3.39 Years

Ion Engine E7 (5) Power 60 Fuel Use 70% Signature 30 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres Range 64.3 billion km (99 days at full power)

Thermal Sensor TH4-24 (1) Sensitivity 24 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 24m km
EM Detection Sensor EM5-40 (1) Sensitivity 40 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 40m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

EDIT: Jeeze... it will only take me 50 days to retool for it. 200 days is more typical for retooling.

 

[Capt. Kiwi]

Captain's log.

Well, that crap storm could have gone a lot worse. Heads are going to roll in intel when we get home, but at least most of us are coming back. It's probably just as well the whole fleet was on the line, because there's no way high command can ignore our fleet's deficiencies when most of high command was in the line of fire.

The crew did their jobs well, without flinching. They're all getting extended shore leave while the fleet undergoes refit. I'm guessing that we'll be heading straight back where we came from once the holes in Agincourt are patched up. Having gone to all that effort, we're not going to leave those wrecks sitting there for anyone to salvage. So I hope the crew make the most of the R&R - there's at least one Prix ship still in system, and if it's the one I think it is, it could do a fair bit of damage. We may not be so lucky next time.

The captains have all met and analysed the battle, I think we're all in agreement. Better intel, better sensors and fire controls, ECCMs and ECMs, more missile stores. We must dictate the terms of the next battle, rather than have to react. We'd probably need far more tubes, too, if we want to get through the kind of PD screen we saw, rather than hoping the enemy shoots themselves dry. At least high command didn't freeze up, and made their own luck to get us out of that mess.

Captain Rackham
ESN Suspicious

 

[GaiusC]

I assume the whole battle happened quite far from the Prix suspected planet? As in 150m km or more than the planet's orbit? If it is correct, then I suppose we're safe when it comes to salvage.
Of course, we need to know what happened to that big ship. And we definitely need to know if there are still defenses on the planet.
So far, the only really effective way I've found to beat up Precursor PDCs is to force them to launch all their missiles and then be free to destroy them from afar. Of course, you need Rocks, decoys, or a big fleet you'll lose before you can send a 2nd one to finish them

 

[blue emu]

Casualty report:

I have gone through my list of player characters, and compared it to the list of officers still present in-game... and it seems that we lost only three characters in that slaughter of Fighters.

The survivors... both those who avoided being shot down, and those who safely ejected and were picked up before the Prix squadron drove off our Rocks, include:

Trebor57
Felix Sylvestris
Miroslav
Theusje
SA Avenger
Raczynski
Iche Bins
Dublish
Raaritsgodzilla
Galliblaere

Our honored dead are:

Matija (KIA)
BwenGun (KIA)
Count Lake (Friendly Fire KIA)

There were no other casualties among our Forum members.

I assume the whole battle happened quite far from the Prix suspected planet? As in 150m km or more than the planet's orbit?

Correct.

 

[Capt. Kiwi]

Given that 50/60 fighters were hit with 19 nukes each, that's pretty remarkable. Looks like having a name makes quite a difference to your survival rate.

What's the plan for awards and promotions? Perhaps there needs to be an addition to the command postings list to include decorations?

 

[Raaritsgozilla]

I survived! And quite a few others of us did too. Yay.

 

[blue emu]

What's the plan for awards and promotions? Perhaps there needs to be an addition to the command postings list to include decorations?

Everyone who was present will receive a Wolf 294 Battle Star.

In addition, Alice gets an Order of Paradox and jumps a grade (two promotions instead of one) to Captain and is assigned to command that sixth Destroyer, ESN Vega, that finished building after the Fleet had already left on its mission.

I think Billy-Bob (Agincourt) and Iche Bins (one of the Spitfire-II pilots) should both receive a special award, since they both got confirmed kills. It's not possible to determine who got the other six kills, since we were using salvo fire from massed warships.

The two Rock pilots should also get an award.

I'm open to suggestions as to further medals.

 

[Evie HJ]

I humbly propose "Adamant Star" for the Rock pilots's medal. Awarded for unwavering action in the protection of another vessel from enemy fire.

Or maybe Adamant Platypus.

 

[Ming]

So my current trend of thought... after we've repaired our damaged armor, overhauled and re-munitioned... is to go back in escorting a bunch of wreckers and freighters, and dismantle the eight wrecks that we ourselves created in that epic battle. We should be safe enough from the planetary PDC (assuming that one even exists), since it didn't shoot at us last time, and we will just be returning to the same area as before... the volume of space in which our epic battle was fought.

I formally request assignment to tearing some of those alien junks apart. If I recall, I'm pretty good at loading and unloading and as one of only two Commanders in the Auxilliary, I assume I have some seniority.

(If the Auxilliary Fleet Command Structure as listed in the sign up thread is still valid, that is.)

Commander Ming, ESNA Dynasty

In an unrelated note, since Lake was in fact shot down by Prix missiles and then collected by Prix Canad-arms, I think his official record should be killed in action, since as far as sensor logs go, the last time we saw him he was swallowed whole by the murderous alien robots.

 

[Bossemanden]

A question: (which means its not writing as our crazy scientist Bo Mosberg, since he assumes to know all and so doesnt need to ask), hows our Gallicite stock? In my games its a continual problem even with making little or even no missiles.
Dunno maybe weve been lucky to find it here or maybe we are on the verge of drying up, in which case we shall have problems.

In other words: Can we afford our missile heavy strategy?