Re: Underwater Rules

G'day,

>Okay, let's take a look at this.  I don't own (yet) Dirtside II but I
>think I can ask a few questions/make a few observations:

They were pretty good thanks, just a couple of things.

>Drives:
>
>Tracked, wheeled - no go.

Just to be picky, why not? Yes they'd definitely be out for abyssal
plains
(too silty) and stuff where there's sharp drops and stuff, but the
flatbeds
of much of the continental slope, especially if they avoid reefs
shouldn't
be that difficult terrain-wise. Or has it got more to do with how you'd
get
the propulsive force in the first place??

>Hovercraft - no go unless you can produce a bubble effect under the
ship
>for the fans to push off of.  Or 'fly' at a ninety degree tilt?

I take it you need something of a much higher density to push off with
hovercraft (??) thus even this last idea wouldn't wrok becuase you'd
still
be surrounded by a medium equally dense on all sides.

>Gravetic drives - why not?  Gravity is the same under water, right? 

I'd agree with that one.

>Screw, paddles (oh yeah, right!) and propulsors (like the neat RN subs
>use.) - designed to be there.

Guess would include the new 'fish-like' propulsion system the Japanese
are
working on??

>Okay, lasers could ba attuned in advance for underwater operations, 
>would missiles and mass drive system weapons be reduced significantly
(guessing
>yes), 

The lasers would still have vastly reduced ranges anyway though. Heat
loss
from plasma weapons would also be an issue I'd say as would be the
attenuation of the range railguns etc. 

>and how would you design 'torpedoes' that would work underwater and
>be carried by craft not originally designed for underwater combat
>(assumes not using underwater specific designs.)

Well I was thinking that things from 'sealed' vessels would be OK, but I
hadn't really thought about how water would gum up the parts or anything
of
the firing chambers.

>Assuming battalion style combat, how would off-table weapons be
>reflected? Same? Different? would Arty on land firing into water in
>support suffer any penalty?  

Hadn't even thought about that, though I would assume ortillery to have
similar effects regardless of the medium, maybe.

>What about 'aerospace' support craft? 
>Replaced by surface skimmers acting like upgraded FF's?  Or would they
be
>airborne assets like today's ASW Heli/planes?

Guess it depends on what they're firing and how well it copes with the
atmospheric-water interface etc.

>Assuming an archipelago (only underwater, mostly at least)
>nation/planetary force is defending, what about the trade off with
>tri-phibious versus amphibious (air/sea or land/sea) versus 'submarine'
>craft - where you penalize the multi-environment craft over the
>specialized 'purely naval' forces of the attuned/designed defense
forces?

Well I'll have to go back and see what are the impacts of amphibious on
current DS, but gut reaction would be yes unless the owning force has
ploughed a lot of effort in (i.e. rich nations triphibious may still be
better than rag-tag pure naval).

>Lights 'swimming' with normal human abilities and re-breathers;  

If you really were playing it out in an archipelago or other shallow
water
body I'd even be tempted to allow non-assisted dives for the ultimate
stealth (very short range, but may be away fo taking out perimeter
defense
monitors etc unnoticed)

>Artmor, Air strike, Artillery blending into and with submarines - Whoa,
>were do I sign up for this ga,e?

Well I'll try and do some more thinking about it this weekend and get it
back to you next week.

Cheers

Beth

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Elizabeth Fulton
c/o CSIRO Division of Marine Research
GPO Box 1538
HOBART 
TASMANIA 7001
AUSTRALIA
Phone (03) 6232 5018 International +61 3 6232 5018
Fax 03 6232 5053 International +61 3 6232 5053

email: beth.fulton@marine.csiro.au