Re: [SG/DS] Orbital assault was RE: Troop Quality was RE: [SG2] weapons

--- Adrian Johnson <adrian.johnson@sympatico.ca>
wrote:

> Australia? Going further how would you do it for an
> entire planet,
> especially one settled for a century or more? Or is

Depends on the population levels.  As I have mentioned
in the past, there are four kinds of planet in my
interpretation of the GZGverse:

Planets with many millions of population, popularly
considered to be unconquerable on a practical level. 
New Moscow, etc.

Planets with small populations who are vital for some
sort of reason, either location or resource
extraction, which are fought over by high-tech
expeditionary forces and defended by permenant
garissons.  This is where most DSII scenarios take
place.

Planets of low value overall, with multiple
settlements who fight among themselves with low-tech
weaponry (Los's Epsilon Eridani, fer instance).

Planets with low value and single settlements, who
pretty much have police and some militia who never
have to do their job.

> this a case of "in
> reality you just bomb them into submission and send
> in troops to pick off
> what you want later", which makes for a boring game
> so we ignore that and
> pretend the much more dramatic beach-head style
> thing can happen?

I'm going to assume that given an entire planet to
choose from, they are going to live relatively near
the high-value items that the invading force is going
to want intact.  Besides which, if the ESU starts
nuking colony planets clean, then the NAC is going to
start nuking colony planets clean, and who the hell
wants that?  You end up with a lot of sterile little
ex-colonies.

> Agreed we're pretending we don't have HonorVerse
> assumptions (if you
> control the high-orbitals, the planet is obligated
> to surrender to prevent
> massive civilian casualties, because everyone
> accepts that once you lose
> the high orbitals, you can't defend against orbital
> bombardment).  That

Which is simply because David Weber isn't interested
in ground combat and can't write it worth a damn.

John

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