Re: Air Power was: REALITY CHECK TIME!

--- Eric Foley <stiltman@teleport.com> wrote:

> have a real basis in any one game system.  To my way
> of thinking, fortifying
> a planet to this degree just isn't worth it.	You
> can't move the weapons.

OK, take an Ohio SSBN.	Rip out the missles.  Put in
active-homing grav missles with bomb-pumped X-Ray
lasers (SMRs) and voila!  You've got a stealthy,
submerged, mobile platform.  Tie it in with a passive
sensor network (nearly impossible to detect without
getting close and easy to hit) and a good radio
network and you've got something that's a nuisance to
deal with.

You don't have big oceans to hide in?  OK, let's
assume you've got a bulk cargo transport system, the
futuristic equivelant of railroads.  Any planet worth
fortifying will have it.  Now take a specialized
railroad car and mount whatever you please on it. 
Sensors, small beam batteries, SMRs, whatever.

> That's a huge issue by itself.  Not only does that
> mean that the weapons
> have no offensive usefulness at all, but more

Fortifications have offensive usefullness.  Think
large-scale.  Fortifications are safe bases for your
fleet.

> importantly, if the planet is
> presented with a situation where it just can't win
> (and with only one
> planet's resources against interstellar empires,
> that situation _will_ come

Maybe the planet is an outpost of an interstellar
empire that has X amount of ships and X+10 commitments
(typical of large nations, for case in point see US
Armed Forces)

> but that means your defenses in space to keep me
> from the planet will be
> lighter, and once I get to it with enough hardware
> and/or troops to take it
> or blow it out of the stars altogether... guess
> what, you lose all those
> weapons without being able to save a single one of
> them.  Genius move.

Maybe I just need to delay you long enough to get my
space fleet there.  
 
> Then there's the issue of how you're going to supply
> all these defenses.

If a planet is worth fortifying it's got the ability
to produce nuclear warheads.  Missles are the only
expendable ordnance you'd be using.

> length of time.  Which means that if you're going to
> expect to stand off
> that whole fleet with just the one planet, you're

You're creating an artificial situation.  Interstellar
empires vs. single planets is pointless regardless of
what you do.  If it's single planets holding off
interstellar empires for a limited amount of time
until the cavalry comes riding to the rescue, it's a
better idea.  A mix of SD ships, fighters in great
quantity, and fortifications will achieve the mission.

> resources.  Which, in turn, leaves the enemy with
> the beautiful option of
> just interdicting the star system, making sure no
> supply ships at all get to
> the planet, and then come in when their recon drones
> tell them that the
> defenses have rusted to a degree that they're no
> longer such a big threat.

??  If you park your fleet where I can get them
because you're afraid of my fortifications then I win.
 My fleet shows up, smokes yours (or not, but nothing
in life is certain) and my planet is untouched.
 
> Or, if they don't have time to do that, then I guess
> they'll just have to
> blow the entire planet away and move on.

If we descend to that level, then I just have one ship
fly to each of your planets and send an asteroid
flying towards it.  Boom.  

Both of us are extinct.  The big winner is the
Kra'Vak.
 
John

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