Re: FT: Thought on Orbital Bombardment...

--- "Imre A. Szabo" <ias@sprintmail.com> wrote:

> The worst was Flanders in World War 1, but I notice
> that your examples are
> cities, not islands in the Pacific drive.

true.  My point is, that different situations render
different results.  Comparing a whole planet to just
either a city OR an island is faslling short.

> If you read and understood my original post, you
> would realize that the
> weapons on frigates, destroyers, and light cruisers
> are ineffective against
> terran planets.  

OK, point taken there.

Secondly, cruiser and destoyers
> were used for shore
> bombardment in World War II quite a bit by the U.S. 
> And those 4" to 8" guns
> did a good job.  So if anything, my suggustions are
> too restrictive on
> orbital bombardments...  

No.... because the whole comparison between naval guns
and beam weapons has some obvious flaws. Beam weapons
are precise, directed beams of energy with very
focused points of damage.  Naval guns sling shells
that explode, scattering their fun around.

> > Well, even Ortillery, which is designed for
> hitting
> > the ground, isn't guaranteed to hit on the first
> try.
> > And how much area does that grid coordinate cover?
> 
> Nor is friendly, dirtside artillary.	

Yes, it is.  Read your DSII -- artillery missions
AUTOMATICALLY hit where you designate.

Grid
> coordinates vary, from kilometers
> to a meter.  Depends on what map you are using. 
> With computerized fire
> control you zoom into the level of detail you need.

And hit that spot on the grid with a beam.  Assuming
you were spotted for by a FO, depending on how quickly
he can designate and call you in, will there still be
anything in that spot? How far from the actual opoint
of impact would a beam do it's damage?
 
> Individually, insignificant, but if you control the
> orbitals and have a half
> dozen battleships up there...

You might have enough beams to fill a grid section
with enough points of damage to simulat 1 ortillery
battery.

 
> The reason it doesn't please me is because it is an
> extrapolation that is
> inconsistent from what we know from history. 

And your extrapolation is based on assumptions on how
weapons deliver damage that don't apply to FT weapons
the same way they do to historical weapons.

 Less
> effective does not mean
> ineffective.	Milan Anti-Tank Gided Missiles are not
> made to take out
> machinegun nests.  But they were used for just that
> in the Falklands Wars.
> Less effective then a specialized missile, yes. 
> Ineffective, no.  Another
> good example is larger caliber naval guns made to
> take on dreadnoughts.
> They were less effective then a specialized weapon
> when used against
> destroyers.  There are cases where they puched holes
> straight through them
> and never detonated.	But they still sank
> destroyers.

Both good points, except they have no bearing on FT
Beams.	they may not have been specialized for those
tasks, but by nature of HOW they did WHAT they WERE
specialized for, there was some natural carryover that
allowed them to fulfill those other missions, even if
not optimized for it.  But that doesn't mean that ANY
weapons system will be just as cross-applicable. 
Consider the sniper rifle - deadly in it's chosen
role.  Would I take a sniper rifle into a bar brawl,
in a windowless bar, when I was inside it?  I'm not
saying that's a parallel to using beams for
bombardment.  My point is, just because an axiom is
true, doesn't make it applicable to all situations.

> > Uh-huh.  And what scale of conflict does Harpoon
> > simulate?  I've never played it, so I can't
> comment on
> > the applicability. to this discussion.
> 
> Individual ships, aircraft, and missiles.  In larger
> battles you have
> multiple taskforces of these running arround.  It's
> much more detailed then
> Full Thrust and I don't recommend running multiple
> carrier battle groups
> except on the computer version.  But it is a lot of
> fun on the computer...

I'll look into it.

=====
Qui me amat, amet et canem meum.

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com