Author Topic: Astral Rebublic Showcase  (Read 8661 times)

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Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Astral Rebublic Showcase
« on: November 21, 2014, 11:19:41 PM »
I am currently running secondary game because I got inspired by some browser games art I saw. I thought about posting something in the "what is going on in your empire"-thread, but then ran into more trouble, so better not pave it full.

This is the race I chose:


And I went for a custom start with custom system. A nice thing I didn't notice about Aurora so far is, that the generated systems for a custom start race also become named after that race's theme. Any start system I would roll up was thus nicely named "Athens", and all the discovered systems after also kept such theme.(have yet to run into a system that carries a number instead of a name)
I started conventional as I always do, with no enhancements or handicaps in the generation, but I did not give my home planet the starting resources and instead left it random without looking. Of course, this could have easily crippled my to non-playable, so I gave myself around 2k units of everything into the storage just in case. Then I spread around 8 'start planet resource spawns'-packages over 8 of the larger planets or moons in the system, one of them being my home planets moon, another something like Mars, and then only distant moons around gas giants comparable to Jupiter and Saturn in positioning (but further of, as my start system was rather large). I also deployed 4 different ruins, one of which at my home (...and it spawned robot soldiers before I had my own to defend myself *bites into table*). Got no interesting tech out of any of those though.
The idea was that my race should be the far offspring of some distant gigantic human empire machine. Something happened that left this ancient military out-/ and ward-post destroyed though, and only after intelligent life recovered were they able to dig out some of the ancient technologies and designs and become space faring again. This distant empire may be huge, but due to bureaucratic devolution and paid(+some talent sponsoring) education system only manages to hold up a tech grade of 6, so magnetic containment fusion and all around that, with some higher developed regions being possibly one grade higher.
I love the tech 5-6 time the most, because there you are strong enough to be on pretty much equal or just slight above terms with most that you encounter, so you still have to think about tactics or bringing in enough mass to achieve victory. In later ages, you normally tend to have the deadly combination of range+speed advantage right away, and thus just kill everything. Thus I set myself an artificial limit of TL6, as this is the maximum that the people can dig out from ancient times, but allow myself to go one level higher on planets that grant a research bonus in a field, making those more desirable to catch. Of course it is allowed to deserve further tech improvement through conquering, which is what I will mainly do. The offspring republic is quite militaristic still, and looks on strangers with heavy xenophobia.
Having such a tech limit makes the game more exciting I think, because you really get to lust over the cherries in neighbors garden and finally crack that pinata. When you can get the same by sitting at home, conquering is just a bonus, and after maximizing even just a mere vanity task.

So my first mission was to use my meager means to get a simple geo survey probe, and a 1 cargo hold freighter into orbit somehow, so I could tap on the moon as my first and primary source. My home planet turned out to have massive amounts of duranium and neutronium, but sadly both with poor 0.2 and 0.1 access, some mercassium and uridium with 0.1 too, then basically infinite supplies of vendarite at good 0.6 (jay for the carrier industry), and 38 million of galicite at 0.4 - a real treasure, as this is needed the most in mid to end tech eras. After spending some years to get trans-newtonian and basic techs, I barely got a conventional engine probe and freighter, having no access to boronide, and manufactured a couple auto-mines from my start budget too, which slowly set me free as income from the moon rose. Then I went to nuclear thermal engines, and finished the system survey, losing a probe due to inadequate range, and repeatedly exhausting fuel supplies. I set up two more mining sites and paired them with mass drivers, got to ion tech and finally saw my own system fully cruisable, though still short on fuel. It took forever to get around 300 auto-mines spread with the harsh fuel limit, and often my few freighters were grounded.
However, then came magneto-plasma age, and since fusion tech was the interstellar race entry tech after my custom lore, I now set out for the neighborhood with my first survey frigate, the Gemini, an 100kt inefficient multi-role design with 5 fighters, 5 bombers, 2 long range geo and grav survey FACs, and a 2kt boarding boat. Weapons were 12 size 6 missile launcher that used ammunition which could be freely interchanged with what the bombers used (5 size 6 box launchers - their custom ammunition variant had more agility for drastically shorter range), then 5 calibre 3 quad laser turrets as area PD (not a good choice, but accurate in terms of the flavor needed), and 4 up to date CIWSs. No shields, 10 armor, high range, only about 1900 speed or so. Also 2.5kt missile and long range sensors, but only most basic passive sensor ability. The fighter and bomber designs were cut out to make it exactly to the edge of the frigate's sensor range and back, needing no reconnaissance craft of their own.

Art from the game I mentioned:
Frigate:


Fighter:


Bomber:


In the game a frigate could carry 4 squadrons of either fighters or bombers, which were formations of 5 each. I only took one squadron of each (2.5kt in hangar space per squadron), and filled the remaining 5kt with the four survey crafts , but then had to cheat and took an extra kiloton, because the boarding boat could not be smaller than 2kt to be able of transporting a battalion.
The original frigate size was around 460meters x 120m x 70m, so 3.864m cubic meters. Steel is 8 tons per cubic meter, so estimating a fill of 12.5%, we would land at a mass of 3.9mt.(in comparison, the Nimitz Carrier has a steel fill equivalent of 6.25% - so only half -, but it also doesn't have so much armor and the shield against space and its high velocity travel hazards) 4mt is clearly too much for a mere frigate. However, Aurora plays on skewed scales when it comes to mass, as can be seen on its tonnage per man ratio. 10 tons per man is the absolute maximum here that allows missions with at least 8 years secure supply, and potentially more with poor conditions. These ratios are insane for spacecraft. I know it is all oriented on official U.S. navy manning numbers, where 100kt ships are manned with 3000 to 5000 people, but in space there is more to care about. The ISS arguably has lots of extra tonnage that doesn't really work for the crew, but also no engine of a real ship and such which would have taken away, and she supports 6 people for 3-6 months with her 450t weight; Around a 1:50 ratio I would assume.
So if 3-6 months is 1:50, then 2 years is around twice as much (following Aurora calculation here), and the planned 6 years should be around the 1:150 range, compared to the mere 1:4 that Aurora suggests.(..can you survive on a spaceship for six years without resupply with 4 tons of equipment around you? ok, in a big ship people can throw together and share a lot of needed infrastructure, but I dare to say that even recycling water and growing food would take up way more than that. How much does a person's farmland weight? Count in your share on corridors, waste and medical treatment, and oxygen refinement as well.)
So there is around a factor 40 disparity, and that is how I came to fit the frigate in a 100kt shell, as that is Auroras equivalent of a truly (by realistic standards perhaps insanely) big ship. In other words, depending on the game, I consider Aurora ships to be either 40 times the size they are displayed (Star Wars Scale), or divide the crew count by forty, so a mere destroyer would not run with 400, but 10-40 people.(/factor may change with deployment time)
...All very vague and lots of per feeling 'measurement'.

Sadly, all that over-thinking never got into action early as it should, as the very first alien contact I had in this game... was a swarm mothership. No, not only a swarm mothership, but a swarm mothership in a nebula, which reduced my detection range and rendered my missiles and bombers useless + my cut-to-be-blazing fighters slow crawlers. When I saw it, it was too late, as my frigate could not get back to the jump point in time against the with 5kps closing foe. It is not a good idea to fight a mothership in close combat, but a nebula forces you to do so, which means, unprepared, it becomes one of the most deadly encounters. The frigate blew up eventually, and only two grav survey drones survived (geos were the first victims - they didn't even see what killed them, and I fool set course to the incidents curiously). The wrecks mysteriously disappeared soon after, but clearly the mothership just used their resources to breed even more terrors.


Before this incident I however found 4 other systems, 3 of which so incredibly lucky that this became easily the best starting position I had so far. First there was a system with a planet that had nearly every resource except neutronium with top acc. and amounts to around a million and then some. Neutronium could be easily found on another body in the system too, that also had enough other sources to be a viable investment. This securely finances my fast beginner civilization's growth currently. The second was the exact opposite. At least one planet of insane 80-210m+ resources of every kind, but nearly all sources at 0.1 acc, which is natural for those big ones. Some other bodies with alot too, but not the full spectrum at once. This system will be the treasure chamber of my Republic, as any late game civilization will strongly rely on heavy exploitation of 0.1 worlds, once the duranium and corundium flows freely. This one planet will finance all I will ever need once I reach the auto-mine spam stage (that only 0.1s can endure to take). Both these systems are direct neighbors, so no need to explore space to find sources. Only if I find an extraordinary corundium or gallicite source will I ever have to consider opening trade some place else.
The third system solved my last problem elegantly: Fuel. Two close orbiting white dwarfs and a 51m acc1 sorium gas giant form the Delphi system, so I kept the flair and opened up the Oracle of Delphi, first one 1.4mt harvester-platform, later 3, which immediately solved all the fuel shortage I always had, despite owning already 700+ auto-mines on start world quality sorium sources. In some games good gas giants are not found easily, or may be very distant, but this one will likely carry me through nearly the whole game, all basically to the next door of my capital.

However, I was out to take revenge on the mothership, and since I already had reached internal fusion when this incident happened, I decided to skip a tech grade and go directly for my goal level of TL6, and use that to build a objective engineered 20kt nebula diver, which would basically be a short range high speed weapon platform that I would deploy via carrier. It should be faster and outrange the enemy with particle beams - a secure win if not for commander errors.
I built a special shipyard just for this, and coined the plan as Pharsalos Project (the name of the proto-star in the nebula).

So this is how it went. The mothership took notice and was the only one at first to approach me, while the new 2 carriers it seems to have built stood back in the system. I dispatched the diver, but left the carrying cruiser there for illumination and lure. Then the Facs appeared, one around 80 units squadron from the mothership first, then in the distance another wave of 160+ more that must have come from the backyard carriers.


The Facs took the bait and followed the diver to be slowly diminished by around one every half minute. Some would get destroyed instantly, some only became immobile and fell back. The "ion-cannon" particle beam was able to pierce 4 layers, so exactly prepared for the proven to be armor 3 facs.


There is a display error for ships in nebula by the way. The enemy speeds are always exact, but for some reason your own race's velocities are only every displayed as increments of the smallest possible increment, which is 1250k per armor layer in this nebula. I would only ever see 2.5k or 5k for example, but I could definitely fly at any other speed too if I wanted. Often I let enemies come closer by just taking 10 or 50 kps of my speed, and it worked.
A second error comes with the targeting speed, which is apparently still considered to be the Facs' maximum velocity, even so the nebula reduced them to mere 3.75kps, which I could easily track. This error reduced my hit chances to about half of what it should be, which is crippling in a dust that already halves to begin with.(ended up with 14% through this... one statistical hit per interval thanks to 7 cannons)
It took one real time day to resolve those 240+ facs. It was very time consuming to fly the lane back and shoot the remaining ones down too, and one time one of those bastards only played dead/ came back to life and actually landed a shot, but it damaged only a crew quarter without inhabitants.

Then it was on to take revenge, but the mothership must have watched what happened and tried to evade my diver at first, only going after the cruiser.


After 'persuading' it by landing a few shots from the sides anyway (speed and range is still superior), it started to follow me finally and made the shooting process relaxingly automatic. I had to watch to be slightly slower than my enemy though, as otherwise it would always lose interest in the diver again, and either fall back or start to target the cruiser, which meant more management burden for me.


It took very very long to take it out, and I could honestly not guess how much damage I had already done. It slowed down gradually, but after hours it still only lost about 20% of its speed, despite the constant "fuel leak observed" messages that I would now get every increment after shredding enough of its thick armor. Then it surprisingly exploded without much of a fuzz when it was still at 60% of its engine capacity. I though I was only half way done, but maybe the whole thing just performed under a huge jurassic adrenaline rush and was actually more heavily hurt.

Then I went in to take out the carriers who hid behind an asteroid in very close proximity to the star. As a surprise, there were some ships that my long range scanner didn't see yet. They looked like escort destroyers, but were too slow. So maybe support carriers? That would explain the high numbers


One thing I always seem to forget about swarm carriers is that they keep a reserve of facs around. Even after a wave of 240, they will still have more. It was good for story though, as the Republic couldn't possibly have known. Those extras get released as soon as the carrier receives direct damage, so I had to deal with two more waves for a grand totale of 289 units.







...But wait, there is more! Ok, first I took out those support designs and the carriers, which was not much of a challenge. The carriers were cowards that always tried to retreat to the asteroid and ruined my laid back auto-turn/auto-shoot tactic, so I eventually flew around them and waited for them at the asteroid. But when it was all done, the diver docked back with the cruiser, went home and the commander was being welcome with a parade, promotion to captain and 6 different medals total. ...Did you know that swarm ships never leave behind wrecks. Not only other ones wrecks, but also their own ones don't spawn any. ..Did you also see that there was a wreck of their ships, lying there the entire time?
Yepp, I didn't know what to make of that It hadn't been there the first time I visited, and I was not responsible, but I definitely hoped for interesting scientific discovery. So in order to finish the survey, I first sent the new frigate of the fleet the "Gemini Twin" there to continue where its older sister left of. ..Aaand its survey crafts got promptly destroyed, just like the last time.
It was a trap. Apparently those support designed can be sacrificed and salvaged just like they do with enemy craft, except that they 'digest' themselves. The Diver had already hovered over the wreck, as he claimed the asteroid for some time, but when my probes got close, the wrecks mechanism triggered, and it vanished to make space for 7 facs of an entirely new breed. They blew up the first probe promptly and quickly hunted down the other one, which was again just too slow too attempt escaping.


In shocked retrospective to the last encounter of this kind, the Gemini Twin immediately turned around and left the system for good. The celebrations were blown off and the diver had to return for one more run. I closely examined the places where they spawned again, but could not find anything that could topple the 'spawn from wreck' hypothesis, so the system was again declared free.
All in all the one 20kt diver platform had managed to kill of over 600kt of enemy tonnage, but that is no accomplishment for a purpose built superiority design. Some wars are won with mere information if the enemy is too slow to adapt. The spoils included a small ruin of 7 buildings (nothing worthwhile came out of it), and also a 80% propulsion bonus place close to the star, where I will eventually deploy a research station once I get terraformers and colonizers. Quite a good catch with my rule, as propulsion is the most important upgrade of them all. Also very stylish to have dedicated engine studies at the closet planet to proto-star in a nebula. You can imagine that being a thing, and a respectable anomaly. This game really worked out good in terms of odds so far.


Anyway, so the story is now that the ancient military ward-post that this Republic sprouted from, was made to watch over and study those nearby Nebula monsters, as they meant a serious potential threat to the empire with its mainly missile/ or shell based weaponry.
A funny thing is that I actually perceived the presence of the swarm before going to this nebula, as the time did slow down often after I entered the adjacent system. I flew patrol with my lacking sensor range, but at some point the slow down stopped, which meant whatever was there flew away. Through an accidental click on the race instead of the system dropdown, I then figured out that the swarm was listed, so they had been there. I flew back to investigate the adjacent jump points, landed in the nebula, and the rest was history.
This fits perfectly into the story, as the nebula demons must have had the tendency to come out sometimes, and since my home world is only 2 jumps afar, it was at one time victim to a full assault of what ever may lie even deeper. I now have a 100 tracking stations outpost in the in between system, and plan another monitor on the science outpost close to the proto-star. The in between one will also get a 200 tubes LR Torpedo base, while I will manufacture a smaller planetary hangar in Pharsalos to be able to maintain the diver craft directly there, where it is most effective. (outside of the nebula, facs would be faster for example, but here it outranks them by factor 2)
« Last Edit: November 21, 2014, 11:35:04 PM by Vandermeer »
playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy
 
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Offline 83athom

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #1 on: November 22, 2014, 12:54:57 AM »
Dude, which universes do you roll in. I'm mostly in Omega and Pegasus. And good luck with the demons.
Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life.
 

Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #2 on: November 22, 2014, 09:49:11 AM »
I am in Andromeda. :) I don't play very seriously though, also joined to late to be competition. Currently I only have two planets (which are also the home planet and the "Mars" in my Aurora game), and I look out for a third settlement as an asteroid base. My focus was so far only to tech as much as possible, so that the different ship types can be unlocked and seen. I can build Fleet Carriers and Battleships at max, which I calculated to be around 5-10 megaton designs in aurora, and I think that will be my maximum. I may consider this sleek looking 'Leviathan' as capital ship if the game really goes far, but it will not be original size, because that would be like moon mass or something.^^
My favorite design is the heavy cruiser so far. So long and noble, and turrets, and little hangars on the side. Cannot wait to get one in Aurora once I have the resource.
playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy
 

Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #3 on: November 30, 2014, 02:29:06 PM »
Correction to the above: the diver was actually just 10kt size. Specialized 'pest control' replaces any serious navy for swarms.


So the first survey+combat exploration carrier Gemini got destroyed, but I was not about to drop the design idea, since I liked the artwork very much. Thus I created the refitted Gemini Twin version with such statistics:
Code: [Select]
Gemini Twin class Frigate    100,000 tons     2299 Crew     17440 BP      TCS 2000  TH 7500  EM 0
3750 km/s     Armour 12-191     Shields 0-0     Sensors 14/14/0/0     Damage Control Rating 200     PPV 175.05
Maint Life 6.33 Years     MSP 21827    AFR 399%    IFR 5.5%    1YR 937    5YR 14049    Max Repair 1400 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 72 months    Flight Crew Berths 140   
Hangar Deck Capacity 9000 tons     Cryo Drop Capacity: 5 Battalions    Magazine 2232    Cargo Handling Multiplier 10   

625 EP Lifter Magnetic Fusion Drive (12)    Power 625    Fuel Use 2.65%    Signature 625    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 4,290,000 Litres    Range 291.4 billion km   (899 days at full power)

4xCalibre 6 sX-Ray Laser Phalanx (5x4)    Range 320,000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 24-24     RM 6    ROF 5        6 6 6 6 6 6 5 4 4 3
CIWS-200x8 (4x8)    Range 1000 km     TS: 20000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit
Tactical Control System (r.160k-20kps) (1)    Max Range: 320,000 km   TS: 20000 km/s     97 94 91 88 84 81 78 75 72 69
Magnetic Fusion Reactor r.60-300t (2)     Total Power Output 120    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Size 12 Torpedo Launcher r60 (6)    Missile Size 12    Rate of Fire 60
Torpedo Fire Control (r.499m-900t) (1)     Range 498.9m km    Resolution 18
Critical Fusion LR Torpedo "Cobalt-Flare" (72)  Speed: 52,100 km/s   End: 154.5m    Range: 483.1m km   WH: 36    Size: 12    TH: 295/177/88
"Thunderbolt" Shell (1330)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 2.6m    Range: 10.9m km   WH: 4    Size: 1    TH: 446/268/134

Long Range Radar (r.2.23g-6.5kt) (1)     GPS 182000     Range 2,234.7m km    Resolution 130
Collision Perimeter (r.21.3m) (1)     GPS 1400     Range 196.0m km    MCR 21.3m km    Resolution 1
Thermal Wake Receiver TH14 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  14m km
EM Wake Receiver EM14 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  14m km

ECCM-4 (2)
The components are around TL 5 for most, but TL 6 for engines and all the missile tech.

Through some means of destiny, it was also the Gemini Twin that would again trigger the next big encounter, which was quite the nice three sided battle.

It began with making my first contact with the robotic race.



Since this was also my very first enemy encounter outside of the wretched nebula, I took up the opportunity to finally test my fighters and bombers. (the first generation design exploded in their hangars without ever starting)


The designs for the parasite craft:
Fighter
Code: [Select]
Kanjiu F57 class Fighter    500 tons     4 Crew     233.5 BP      TCS 10  TH 250  EM 0
25000 km/s     Armour 3-5     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 3
Maint Life 2.13 Years     MSP 29    AFR 20%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 9    5YR 128    Max Repair 125 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 0.1 months    Spare Berths 6   

250 EP Magnetic Fusion Jet Turbine "Firestar" (1)    Power 250    Fuel Use 284.6%    Signature 250    Exp 25%
Fuel Capacity 40,000 Litres    Range 5.1 billion km   (56 hours at full power)

Calibre 3 sX-Ray Gatling Laser (1)    Range 80,000km     TS: 25000 km/s     Power 3-3     RM 6    ROF 5        3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 0 0
Kanjiu HUD Controls (r.40k-25kps) (1)    Max Range: 80,000 km   TS: 25000 km/s     88 75 62 50 38 25 12 0 0 0
Imperial Issue Fusion Cell r.3-15t (1)     Total Power Output 3    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Bomber
Code: [Select]
Mifune B41 class Fighter-bomber    500 tons     4 Crew     185.5 BP      TCS 10  TH 250  EM 0
25000 km/s     Armour 2-5     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 2
Maint Life 2.06 Years     MSP 23    AFR 20%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 7    5YR 109    Max Repair 125 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 0.1 months    Spare Berths 6   
Magazine 38   

250 EP Magnetic Fusion Jet Turbine "Firestar" (1)    Power 250    Fuel Use 284.6%    Signature 250    Exp 25%
Fuel Capacity 40,000 Litres    Range 5.1 billion km   (56 hours at full power)

Conventional Turret Barrel (2)    Missile Size 1    Rate of Fire 5
"Raikan" Plasma Shell Turret (r.11.1m-500t) (1)     Range 11.1m km    Resolution 10
"Thunderbolt" Shell (38)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 2.6m    Range: 10.9m km   WH: 4    Size: 1    TH: 446/268/134

Both designs use power factor 2.5 engines and just make it to the frigates long range scanner range and back. The former bombers had 5 size 6 missile box launchers instead of the size 1 bomb spam, but I changed my frigate to not use missiles anymore, and size 12 torpedoes were really not an effective option for bombers, so now they pretty much have turrets. Their maximum damage potential received a serious upgrade through this, but of course at cost of salvo density. ..It works out, but it sure is not optimal.
Those "Plasma Shell Turrets", the "Shells" and the turret barrels btw. were meant to simulate heavy battle turrets for my cruisers and larger craft. I wanted something that really felt like the ancient ginormous battleship turrets (railgun and gauss simply don't do the trick..), and that would actually exhaust its ammunition too, so I put one fire-control for each 'turret' I fantasize to have, and add the number of barrels to that which I want.(like 4 per 'turret' on my cruiser design)
They perform quite nicely since they outrange any possible beam weaponry. If you can live through enemy missile fire, you got yourself some considerable long-"beam" dps.
The "shells" are 0.4 warhead, 0.47 engine, some maneuver and the 0.04 fuel, the minimum possible amount that brought me the tiniest fire control I could build.(-my requirement for counting as a shell is that they have nearest possible range, but that is as can be seen still a lot) There is also a minimum sensor on it with 10km range, which I experimented with. Since those shells only travel around 350k km per round, it is likely that you exhaust more ammunition on an enemy than needed, so I hoped with such sensor they might re-target on spot, and I can just spam out my magazines like a flak barrage, and they would still hit. It does however only work for the same salvo with that little range, and not the salvos coming after that. The other ones will only detonate over the wreck where likely no enemy is near anymore. Works like a charm with stationary targets though. No bomb is wasted.


Going on, the bombers worked good, and one full bombing run was pretty much exactly enough to blow one of those 19kt ships up. The next one I wanted to try to cripple with lasers.



That worked very well too, but only because the enemy just wouldn't shoot anything back. I recognized that those were probably just troop transports, but this played no role in my next step to board the crippled ship.



Despite heavy loses in the boarding attempt, it still worked and as spoils I indeed got a combat transporter.




I sent that transporter back home, but wait, the reason why I first discovered this little target practice was that the frigate flew further into the system. Normally survey carriers just wait on the jump point they came from, but in this system I discovered something distant that seemed worth the investigation: a graveyard.



Those wrecks were all hovering over a single planet, which made it appear as if there had been some ancient battle, potentially with an NPR. Now that the robot invader troops have been spotted, I was almost sure, and indeed great was the joy when I found them unconquered yet.
It seems they dispatched their military, either to hunt those transporters which might have partaken in a recent attack on this world up there, or just to investigate my frigate. Since I didn't know about their intentions, I decided to test it and not risk my capital ship for it, so I sent fighters close, weapons disarmed, but having bombers in shooting range to instantly take retaliation in case something went wrong.




The first diplomatic test was passed, as they clearly did not care about my fighters flying directly in syncro with their ships.



I called the fighters back and kept my route towards the graveyard. Yet they still continued on their course towards my frigate, so I couldn't be sure if it wasn't some tactic to take out the only serious threat first, and there was a critical moment where they even made a warning target lock.



They however never fired, which gave me confidence that they were struggling with their decision to classify me as threat after watching me taking out their enemies. Through my mistake I missed for the entire time and a bit more to hit the "initiate communications" button though, which might be why there is still suspicion and wariness. Even after not acting on their target lock, they still came closer, and I again couldn't be sure if they didn't try to bring beam attackers closer to get a devastating alpha, so I decided for some "diplomatic maneuver" quite literally and evaded their forces contact with my slightly superior engines.



Then I flew about a month towards the second star to close in and investigate the graveyard which I suspected to be their (former?) home planet. The small navy escorted directly behind, being nearly as fast as Gemini Twin. As it turned out, it was likely just a colony, and their true home was revealed to be the also inhabitable BI. I wanted to move in a bit to maybe discover some smaller ships and probe their reaction again.



I however decided against that after seeing some of their freighters flee when I was still hundred millions kilometers away. -They were afraid I was just an exchange, one enemy for another.
So I set course again to the graveyard to take a look, but nothing of special interest was there. Unexpectedly however, they dispatched 3 more ships from their home world as soon as I arrived at their former colony. Could I have triggered some sort of offense?



Any sane leadership however would not take aggressive action against completely unknown alien life, based on a mere border or manner infringement about which we couldn't even know. On top of that, they could not even guess who those newcomers are and what they are capable of, so even if they themselves had shady intentions, it would be very unwise judgement to go into potential war with a foe you know nothing about.
In hindsight analysis I however see that the Republics problems into initiating the first contact must have looked to them like they were potentially just another robot race. They never saw us out of uniform, we didn't answer in any way, just like machines, and being such a offshoot race distant from any jump point, they probably never left their system to discover how the galaxy truly is.

The captain of Gemini Twin let them come closer to prove trustworthiness, yet when they were only around 100m km afar, the communications officer felt a disturbance in the morse: Their attempts for contact stopped and made place for a strange repeated pattern of signals. It was quickly considered, that those might have been emissions coming from firing locks.



At the thought that they might just have launched missiles at the Gemini, red alert was issued, and so took of disaster.
The ship was pulled back to take away from eventual missile range, and the fighter and bomber squadron were launched. The captain quickly made contact with the headquarters and phoned in cruiser support; the Artemis would be on her way, bringing with it also two quick destroyers for strategic maneuvers.
When trying for distance revealed that the Jinza ships would close in and make up to exactly the same distance, it was obvious that they were assuming tactical and aggressive position. ..Well, at least it was confirmed enough to justify a counterattack out of unwise pressuring. So reasoned the captain, and issued to make use of the twelve salvo torpedo arsenal. Two salvos of 6 were then shot at each ship of the Jinza, hoping not to destroy but just cripple them, so they would retreat.



The ship under the classification Taragiri had however surprisingly little to offer in terms of defenses and suffered hull breaches already at the second impact, making it impossible to survive for even just the second salvo. The whole formation of Taragiri and Ranvijay did not make it through the assault.



It was later judged that those first 3 ships must likely have been missile destroyers, designed for offensive alone, as the Tabar and Godavari performed far better. In fact, they were impenetrable by the Gemini's torpedo salvos, and all in all 75% of the magazine was wasted.



Thus the bombers were ordered closer to hopefully overwhelm such defense with tight bomb carpets. With accurate timing, the five Mifune units could deliver 20 bombs in 10 second increments, and it worked out well, as 60% did find their target.



One bombing run was however not enough to incapacitate the larger Tabar ship, so the bombers flew back and the Kanjiu tried to do the rest. A crucial mistake, as the ships possessed as expected considerable short range point defense firing power. No Kanjiu unit was left intact, though some pilots survived.
The whole time it was kind of gnawing on the captains nerves if the attack even was justified, since despite all the carried out counters, no hostile missile has yet been showing on the radar, or been spotted by the fighters. Finally it was confirmed however, as a relatively slow moving barrage appeared on the displays.



The timing was quite unlucky, as it fell together with the return of the bombers from their first run, so they had to be rearmed in a spectacular maneuver in midst a firing storm. No missile made it through Gemini Twin's defenses however.



The (now official) enemy saw the disastrous failure of his offense and urged to move his remaining navy back, but was of course no match for the engines of the chasing bombers. The next run dispersed their formation and got rid of the Tabar class ship - likely their commanding vessel. The third run would destroy their forces completely.



The 3 additional Jinza ships had laid their course back as well, which meant the encounter around the graveyard was resolved, and the frigate went to pick up any survivors.



The Jinza crews were probably shocked and surprised when they were saved by a living species. Some managed to make contact and established rough communications, which is how it was learned that they called themselves the Odell Alliance.



At this time it was when the Gemini Twin should have concentrated to guard the graveyard for the incoming Recycler ship, and the survey teams, but the captain turned out to be vindictive about the few lost Kanjiu pilots, and turned his ship towards the Odell home world. Being still the C.O. in the system, and being technically at war, it was free for him to do anything in his judgement, as long as it didn't include harm for civilians. He set out to scare away the freighters and other support crafts of the remaining Odell navy again, and managed to apprehend the 3 ships that fled the last encounter distant from their home. They provided no resistance to the Gemini's superior ranged laser weaponry, and were all incapacitated.
The prison cells on the Gemini Twin were now overflowing, making it difficult to maintain normal operation, but the captain was a glory hound and turned back to the planet again. This time the support ships did not flee immediately -likely learning from they had seen-, so in a rush of hubris the captain flew even closer. Too close.
She should have waited for the cruiser support to arrive, as only these ships were outfitted in the Republic's doctrine to eventually handle planetary assault. Underestimating the range of the enemies defenses, she unleashed a barrage of 2x40 missiles every 10 seconds - far too tight for even the advanced systems of Gemini Twin to handle.



The Mifune squadron was launched and tried to land some hits on the planetary defenses, yet had to retreat as counter fire started raining down on them too. These missiles were small, and the combined laser and CIWS defense systems could fend of roughly half on every salvo, yet being so many, they slowly corroded the capital vessel's armor. The Gemini Twin tried to get away, but seeing their chance, the prisoners had started a revolt, and the ship would not respond well with only bridge commands.



The prisoners were then ordered to be shot by the remaining garde soldiers, but it was already too late. The Artemis just entered the system when they saw the Gemini Twin blow up in a fusion boosted fireball. No ship was close and crazy enough to attempt to rescue her survivors - a total defeat.



The captain of the Artemis, Asuhara Kino (now Admiral of the fleet since 17 years) was furious. Shortly before being promoted to Senior Captain and assigned to the cruiser, the Gemini Twin was his ship for many years. Being unable to take the humiliation, he ordered the fleet's Base Barque to mobilize and deploy the Gotai army forces on the Odell. Later it was found that he made false report about the danger-grade of the enemy threat by affirming the Gemini Twin had been blown up by an incomprehensible planetary weapon. He attested that such weapon needed to be found an destroyed, before the aggressor race Odell could master them, and set the Artemis on course with B I.


Code: [Select]
Artemis class Cruiser    300,000 tons     6469 Crew     45221 BP      TCS 6000  TH 30000  EM 27000
5000 km/s     Armour 12-399     Shields 900-300     Sensors 700/700/2/2     Damage Control Rating 615     PPV 302.1
Maint Life 6.82 Years     MSP 57946    AFR 1170%    IFR 16.3%    1YR 2168    5YR 32526    Max Repair 1400 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 72 months    Flight Crew Berths 275   
Hangar Deck Capacity 18000 tons - 10 Fighters, 10 Bombers, 4x1kt survey vessels for Geo and Grav
Cryo Drop Capacity: 5 Battalions    Magazine 7656    Cargo Handling Multiplier 50   

625 EP Lifter Magnetic Fusion Drive (48)    Power 625    Fuel Use 2.65%    Signature 625    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 15,015,000 Litres    Range 340.0 billion km   (786 days at full power)
Theta R300/288 Shields (225)   Total Fuel Cost  2,700 Litres per hour  (64,800 per day)

4xCalibre 6 sX-Ray Laser Phalanx (10x4)    Range 320,000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 24-24     RM 6    ROF 5        6 6 6 6 6 6 5 4 4 3
CIWS-200x8 (12x8)    Range 1000 km     TS: 20000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit
Tactical Control System (r.160k-20kps) (2)    Max Range: 320,000 km   TS: 20000 km/s     97 94 91 88 84 81 78 75 72 69
Magnetic Fusion Reactor r.60-300t (4)     Total Power Output 240    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Size 12 Torpedo Launcher r60 (6)    Missile Size 12    Rate of Fire 60
Conventional Turret Barrel (24)    Missile Size 1    Rate of Fire 5
"Raikan" Plasma Shell Turret (r.11.1m-500t) (6)     Range 11.1m km    Resolution 10
Torpedo Fire Control (r.499m-900t) (1)     Range 498.9m km    Resolution 18
Critical Fusion LR Torpedo "Cobalt-Flare" (120)  Speed: 52,100 km/s   End: 154.5m    Range: 483.1m km   WH: 36    Size: 12    TH: 295/177/88
"Thunderbolt" Shell (5960)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 2.6m    Range: 10.9m km   WH: 4    Size: 1    TH: 446/268/134
"Oroborus" Radiation Shell (240)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 1.9m    Range: 8.1m km   WH: 1    Size: 1    TH: 235/141/70

Collision Perimeter (r.21.3m) (1)     GPS 1400     Range 196.0m km    MCR 21.3m km    Resolution 1
Long Range Radar (r.2.23g-6.5kt) (1)     GPS 182000     Range 2,234.7m km    Resolution 130
Thermal Observatory TH700 (1)     Sensitivity 700     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  700m km
EM Observatory EM700 (1)     Sensitivity 700     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  700m km
Improved Gravitational Sensors (1)   2 Survey Points Per Hour
Improved Geological Sensors (1)   2 Survey Points Per Hour

ECCM-4 (3)

Having intelligence data on the enemies defenses after Gemini's failure, Kino knew they had nothing to dish out that the cruiser couldn't take, so he did not even try to weaken the Odell positions with torpedo fire and moved to bring the turrets in range instead.



It turned out that the Odell had apparently nearly completely exhausted their ammunition supply when taking out the Gemini Twin, and could only fire 2.5 more salvos. Even those however were erased by Artemis' superior point defenses before even hitting the shields, proving the captain's judgement right. Already being unchallenged, the cruiser assumed position and started firing its 6 main turrets to destroy any planetary defense. The shells hailed down and, even though at first largely intercepted, slowly flattened any entrenchment under heavy plasma fireballs.



When the Odell had nothing left to defend themselves with, Kino demanded to prepare the way for the incoming Base Barque, and loaded the Oroborus shells. Only ten salvos later, in a mere minute the planet of the Odell had been rendered uninhabitable.



spy information


After the deed was done, the cruiser flew into orbit, destroying any shipyards with short range laser weaponry, and remained there waiting, while the Barque was closing in, and the fast destroyer escort took out the fleeing support ships.

Code: [Select]
Cerberus class Destroyer    20,000 tons     487 Crew     5090 BP      TCS 400  TH 4860  EM 0
12150 km/s     Armour 8-65     Shields 0-0     Sensors 14/14/0/0     Damage Control Rating 21     PPV 40.92
Maint Life 2.97 Years     MSP 3340    AFR 152%    IFR 2.1%    1YR 565    5YR 8475    Max Repair 810 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 6 months    Spare Berths 0   
Magazine 1090   

1620 EP Magnetic Fusion Destroyer Drive (3)    Power 1620    Fuel Use 33.03%    Signature 1620    Exp 13%
Fuel Capacity 3,040,000 Litres    Range 82.8 billion km   (78 days at full power)

4xCalibre 3 sX-Ray Laser Phalanx (2x4)    Range 180,000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 12-12     RM 6    ROF 5        3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 1
Tactical Control System (r.160k-20kps) (1)    Max Range: 320,000 km   TS: 20000 km/s     97 94 91 88 84 81 78 75 72 69
Small Magnetic Fusion Reactor r.30-150t (1)     Total Power Output 30    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Conventional Turret Barrel (10)    Missile Size 1    Rate of Fire 5
"Raikan" Plasma Shell Turret (r.11.1m-500t) (5)     Range 11.1m km    Resolution 10
"Thunderbolt" Shell (1090)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 2.6m    Range: 10.9m km   WH: 4    Size: 1    TH: 446/268/134

Short Range Radar (r.24.8m-500t) (1)     GPS 560     Range 24.8m km    Resolution 10
Thermal Wake Receiver TH14 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  14m km
EM Wake Receiver EM14 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  14m km

ECCM-4 (1)

Then the Base ship was there and unfolded the might of the Gotai planetary army forces by deploying its main force with the five divisions Yamamoto, Sui-Feng, Gin, Unohana and Aizen



The Odell's last defences were so quickly overcome, that the military needed transporters from orbit to get to capture points quickly enough. The only unit that suffered any loss of manpower at all was the heavy tank company Kyoka Suigetsu. When the population was subdued, all riches and technologies were claimed and robbed. For the coming years, the Republic's clippers would fly back and forth between both home worlds, taking everything that once was theirs away, while the Odell home slowly died under the doom of coming centuries of irradiation. Such is the punishment of those who shoot first at peacefully trespassing strangers, and such is the punishment who would further attack even those that showed mercy on their wounded.




[suddenly some story appears :P:]
Asuhara Kino was regarded to be a war hero, and his mistakes and crimes forgotten. So began the shift of the Republic into a military dictatorship, as the now prestigious astral navy could on the wave of public approval assemble the power to eradicate and conquer entire worlds. Few years after, not even a potential civil revolt could have stopped them anymore. The last resort against oppressors and corruption, the swaying power of the many through revolution, had forever been stripped away from them, as the astral navy overcame the need to care.

playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy
 

Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #4 on: December 08, 2014, 01:40:30 AM »
The next major encounter is probably the best I had so far in any game. But first the up to date starmap for explanation purpose:



As can be seen, the nebula didn't expand so much more after Pharsalos, but the second system was interesting too, as it contained a pre-starfaring NPR which I started sponsoring to work for me until they have about 200 auto-mines. The second and last planet in there then came up with a powerful civil mine too, so a pretty good delivery service.

The Rhodes system was the scene of the last incident, but I only figured out later how nicely it was placed.
Then I have fuel bases with 3200 modules each around gas giants in Delphi, Ephesos (both my main supply delivery for the home world), and then Mytilene, and on fly in currently Massilia. (an amazing 568m giant there - the highest concentration I have ever seen in any resource, but only acc.0.4)

There is a propulsion lab in Pharsalos, a Missile tech lab currently being towed towards Plataea, and two more lab locations planned for energy and defenses. The design here:
Code: [Select]
Akropolis Sanctum class Orbital Research Station    39,850,000 tons     15975 Crew     177380.7999 BP      TCS 797000  TH 0  EM 0
1 km/s     Armour 5-10392     Shields 0-0     Sensors 18/18/0/0     Damage Control Rating 234     PPV 0
MSP 651    Max Repair 60.8 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Spare Berths 3    
Cargo 2500000    Cryogenic Berths 7050000    Habitation Capacity 7,050,000    Cargo Handling Multiplier 2000    
Recreational Facilities


CIWS-250x10 (127x10)    Range 1000 km     TS: 25000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit
Thermal Wake Receiver TH-18 (1)     Sensitivity 18     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  18m km
EM Wake Receiver EM-18 (1)     Sensitivity 18     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  18m km
...or slightly older ones can exactly carry and then run those 5 research labs at 100% capacity at any place.

(here a second lab had just arrived, but not yet unloaded the population and extra labs)
In theory those stations could of course also run 100 factories instead of any kind, but I think I will build something different for that later.

So I traveled around a lot and discovered my surroundings, but besides a couple droids here and there not much to report. I realized that my fighters are useless though, as the only time they get not shot down themselves is when being deployed against helpless troop carriers, which the bombers could take down as well. I stopped replacing them, and consider updates to both designs.

Now, the only system that I avoided for long, even though it is directly adjacent to my home Athens, is Sparta. Sparta is a completely empty system, which is not nice to have in the neighborhood, because it makes it difficult to monitor. I normally like to have a big sensor post in every system next to my capital, to be warned early enough, yet here it didn't work. What you could normally do then, is just placing more outposts into systems behind this one, but Sparta is not only empty, but also has 7 other connections. Too much.

I finally decided to investigate those systems for safety reasons then. And when my second cruiser "Atlanta" was doing his final survey mission in Becvar before returning to the docks, the first cruiser stumbled -also on his last objective- across this beautiful but also dangerously close vicious neighbor, Louisburg.

The system has full 4 suns, which is nice. Three of them have planet satellites, and there is an asteroid belt akin to the Oort Cloud... far too way out.(I think it was 5trillion km...)
Shortly after entering I got unmistakable static of life.


...which was indeed from 3 different races at once. :o Well, probably just two, as the first ones share the same characteristica:



The double race is indeed seated on the same planet A I, so it seems to be an offspring or different political region... . We don't know yet.
So this was already very promising, but a split second later it was revealed what hell's kitchen this was. There was an active invasion going on.



So droids were also present, and they were attacking + being attacked by the other races. So far the Republic only ever found ruins of TL1-3 civilizations with the ancient invaders often still nearby, and the only ones that ever exceeded this level was that Jinza race, which still fought them.
It is natural to assume that also other races like this one would attract the same aggressors. The only reason that the Republic ever was spared after all, was because it wasn't. It was destroyed, but not completely, by another enemy, and then grew up on unsuspicious small population unnaturally quickly advancing in technology thanks to all the TL6 relics from their past they could study.

The droids had been my enemy ever since I saw how they squashed civilizations everywhere they go, so I decided to help the natives out to defeat their ancient nemesis and set course to assist in the assault on the fortified droid base on B II.



There was also some droid ship currently approaching the main colonies.



Since they had survived for so long, the captain was confident however that they would be able to repel the assault. One might only wonder how many ships the three factions truly have, since only those with active sensor could currently be seen, and those were already a lot of ships.
Nothing to the levels of our cruiser or frigate designs though.

The captain sent the bombers ahead to test their conditioning.


The ship of the natives that was in its bombing run was receiving counter fire. That gave us the intelligence that 52 size 1 missiles was likely the capacity of the enemies defences. The CIWS on the cruiser could alone block 48 missiles, or more like 32 after considering boni and estimated speed. To that come 15 shield regeneration per 5 seconds, so it seems the cruiser would be immune and could securely assault the installation.

Then some explosions happened over the installations, leaving me in puzzles.



I thought for some time that there was some sort of FAC assault going on, even though that would be very unconventional for NPR. The fire clearly came from twin turrets of strength 3, and there were anti missile explosions too.
I should have looked for atmosphere on the planet, because that would have made clear that this was actually PD laser fire which completely negated to bombing assault of the natives. Would have saved me a slight mistake later on. (me?...uhhh, I mean "the captain", yes  :P)

So this attack went for quite a while, and meanwhile my bomber squadron was struggling with two droid ships that had positioned themselves exactly between the colonies and the attack ship of the natives, blocking of his retreat. The droid ships had sizes of 19.5kt and 9.75kt, and they could detect my bombers at around 15m km since the old models still had no thermal dampening. 15m was still times 2.5 as far as the weapons would reach under ecm influence, and they started firing back at around 10m km already. I came to test a similar situation in another system (except against two 9.75kt destroyers), and lost 3 of the 10 bomber squadron in the assault - still winning, but losses are not acceptable in this situation.
This time I tested their range a bit more, let them fire 5 times, and then flew out with apparently superior speed, killing the missiles (which I never saw). The squadron commander hoped to exhaust the targets ammunition supply this way, and flew multiple such fake close ins. Even after quite a couple of those, there was still no end in sight, so a new tactic was derived: Dive bombing. The captain ordered to use supreme initiative and afterburners to get directly in touch with the enemy during the enemies short retargeting window of opportunity, and then use the natural supreme speed to fly away from missiles while deploying the bombing. In short, the complete inverse opposite of what was done before. The tactic worked, and the two enemy ships were destroyed without leaving a scratch on the bombers, so the natives retreat was secured.




Suddenly a new problem unfolded. The two different races were apparently not only afraid of the droids, but also fighting against each other, as they started exchanging broadsides.



Also the larger colony on A I was probably currently blocking inter planetary missiles strikes from the A II race.



The staff has to consider the probability that these sudden attacks were triggered by the Artemis' appearance, which might have seeded mistrust, or even philosophical crisis (aliens..) in a way that can not possibly be guessed.

With the words of the current C.O. in Louisburg. "A beautiful battlefield unfolds". The single ship of 8900 tons managed to destroy one of equal tonnage through heavy missile barrages, despite being severely outnumbered.



Then both sides got to some distance from each others ships, only to start raking each other with smaller missiles shortly after.



This little skirmish was held non lethal, and both parties retreated to regroup after some exchanges. However, somewhere distant yet invisible ships were under fire too.



Strategic intelligence shows so far, that even though the aliens of A II are performing much wiser in battle, and seemed to have slight technology advantage that allowed them tricks like the interplanetary missile strikes, they were likely largely outnumbered. At least if they didn't have a small fleet of yet undiscovered ships in silent running mode.

They leave battles with small victories, outranging the enemy, but eventually that will not be enough.


Only a couple of hours after the war supposedly started, the home world of the A II race started to get bombarded by nuclear missiles. The defenses seemed to stop incoming strikes before they arrived.



Parallel the Artemis was nearly in range of the droids defences, and close enough to attract their attention. The captain send out the bombers in order to probe if they were possible, or those PDCs had up to date ecm too.



It turned out they had ecm, so remembering the Gemini Twin incident, it was better to keep bombers save in hangars until defences had been overrun.

Then the defensive fire impacted, and as expected couldn't dent the artemis. The enemy TL5 niveau technology only allowed a salvo every 10 seconds, meaning advantage for the lasers and in theory a shield regeneration of 30 even between impacts. The lasers however reduced salvos to a mere third by themselves, while the rest would fall on the dense CIWS perimeter, never even reaching the shields.



Eventually the station's ammunition reserves were exhausted, and the Artemis could assume position. Instead of firing from the cruiser's own turrets though, the captain judged that in all this turmoil that happened in the system, it might be wiser to preserve ammunition, and after a small atmospheric analysis decided to move into orbit to threaten the entrenchment with laser fire.
What he overlooked was of course that if he could use lasers, so could the droids, and actually evidently did, following the intelligence of the recent assault by the natives.

Just when he assumed firing position, a huge salvo was fired from the planet, reducing Artemis' shields to 78% in a single assault.



Obviously such heavy fire could not be endured for long, and so the cruiser retreated to respectable distance. Luckily, Artemis was outfitted with larger calibre lasers of double the power, and could thus fire from positions where the enemies defenses were becoming ineffective. Only two broadsides were necessary to destroy the first complex, and another two got rid of the other one too.



The ancient droid threat that these races probably had been suffering under for many years, was thus suddenly ended by an outside force. Since the captain rightfully felt some reward was in order, he phoned in the recyclers, a base barque with expedition troops to deal with the remaining ground forces, and issued a full scan of the planetary facilities to map anything of worth.




--{Juchhee, and that is where firefox crashed, throwing my writing back by a good hour. Of course it happened shortly before finishing, because Muphey is god, and a lunatic jester one in that.}--


After few relatively insignificant skirmishes, the game seemed to change. The defenses of A II had been doing a good job so far in holding of the enemies barrages, and even recently managed to take down two larger ships in the distance. Yet, it appeared their ammunition supply was all too soon exhausted, rendering the planet helpless before the nuclear holocaust that was raining down on.



The race of A II had long since stopped its counter-attacks, being forced to concentrate on defense. Know, only a mere day after the eruption of the war, it was facing extinction.



Even amidst this personal chaos, the aliens did not seem to forget about their ancient enemy, and often tried to approach the remaining straying droid ship in formation.



Due to insufficient engine technology they however always had to abort.


When the ruined droid base had been fully mapped and Artemis was moving in to fulfill its last objective target, it was also found that the alien races apparently maintained further outposts even this far out.



Setting up such bases in proximity to the droids without being noticed is a respectable achievement.


To better apply the new found dive bomb tactic, maneuvers were carried out to get a better contact vector, and bring the bombers in line with the enemy ship's trajectory.




Probing indicated however that the ship was either not capable of longer ranged missile strikes, or had exhausted its ammunition. No risk was taken, and the bombers flew in, but could indeed finish their job uninterrupted.


Now having finished all common objectives, the Artemis was ordered to maintain respectable distance from the alien colonies, but monitor the battlefield at the edge of her sensor range, as well as identify any larger craft around the central two inhabited planets.




Then, while still being relatively far off, the aliens for the first time recognized the Republic openly when a few ships set course on the Artemis.



Reminded of alarmed by the experience of the last incident of this kind, Asuhara ordered the cruiser to retreat as far out as  the sensors would barely keep the colonies in sight, and even further should the pursuit continue. Instead, a geo probe should be launched to analyze the other inner planets for potential further outposts.

The Artemis could however not fast enough reposition, so the dominating alien species fired a single warning salvo and retreated right after.



[OOC: I assume that happened because I coincidentally went over a distance of 1.5 billion km to their colony just at this moment, and that is maybe the AI trigger for aggression or not. Just a theory though.]

For a few days Artemis could now rest at position and peacefully observe what was happening. There weren't any battles between the races anymore, as all of the A II race's navy had been defeated, but many strange patrol routes were still being flown - maybe in search of hidden craft.

Then the pattern changed, and a huge part of both of the A I races set course on the Sparta jump point. This behavior was alarming to the headquarters, as the ships might try to seek out the Republic's home world in Athene. Undoubtedly they were at least investigating were we came from.



Though the location of Eden Ende would not have long been hold secret if relations started out, it was preferable to first at least being able to talk to the races and understand the reason behind the alarming genocide they just commited.[..said hero Asuhara] Having the same very same war fleet setting course on another living world would at least be considered strange etiquette, so Artemis was first ordered to cross the path and test the reaction, and after that didn't cause any trouble, peacefully escort the ships to the jump point.



For safety measures though, the captain of Artemis went through some calculations and found out that the for fast reinforcement response order designed destroyers of Eden Ende would make it just in time to the jump point too before the alien fleet could pass. The whole situation would be a lot less tense to handle if there was some backup besides the Artemis as the only current representation of the fleet, so the support was called.

After the cruiser started escort leading the alien fleet, their commanders didn't seem to take the gesture too kindly and fired another warning shot.



At this point their behavior was definitely to be considered rude, but not hopeless, so a bit more distance was given.

The mood and picture of them changed further to the negative however only shortly after, when they used the same warning salvo threatening on our peaceful recyclers by the very distant B II.




They seemed satisfied when the salvage missions were canceled and the recycler fleet turned to retreat from the system. Again a race that seems very ill advised in political matters, trying to intimidate a foreigner they know nothing about and potentially making him an enemy. The wrecks that were salvaged there were the result of the Republics fortunate interdiction, but still one faction just laid claim on them.(One wonders if the other two factions know of this as well)
It can not be known what they truly though of the interdiction with the droid problem, but if the Republic can keep wise distance, then shouldn't they also carry some responsibility?

Then one of the nations finally managed to achieve a breakthrough in the communications that went beyond mere morse and prime numbers, so simple information could be shared. It was the insectoid and more alien looking one, which had all its power destroyed in the recent events. A professional team of translators was assembled to exchange intelligence between us and them. Sadly the first signals indicate message about that they are dying already and may only be saved by evacuating them to another world.


The Republic may now be their only hope, and they know that too.


When the destroyer pairs had just arrived on the other side in Sparta and both Artemis and the Recycler Task Force were nearly evacuated from the system, a detachment of the alien fleet separated itself to seemingly intercept the recyclers. Could they really go after unarmed and unarmored civil ships that were retreating anyway, or do they just intend to escort them too. Bad feelings.



...And indeed they went to attack them. Not only that, but completely mercilessly destroyed them all.



In no jurisdiction or by any sane judgement can such act be seen as a misunderstanding. Not a single shot has ever been fired from our side, despite several provocations. The giant needs to be wise and endure the ill temper of the weaker ones, but everything has its reasonable limit. These aliens was in engaged in fights with literally every faction that wasn't them, first the droids, then their own neighbors, and now we, the passive watching surprise guest alien life forms. They shoot before knowing their enemy, and clearly feel no moral issues in attacking the unarmed just because they can, and even obliterate whole species under atomar fire. - Overall, they have proven to be dangerously aggressive, and in that light their last action was considered to be a declaration of war.

While they further bomb the remaining outposts of their neighbors in their system...



..Artemis and the destroyers have taking tactical position directly behind the jump point, ready and authorized to alpha strike and blast into pieces everything that comes through. Another two days went by, and it seemed like they may have revoked their plans, but then the first came.






//OOC// So far so good. The situation is gold I think. The kind of stuff you wait for to happen. I am really indecisive in how to handle the situation from here. Obviously I have to fend of attackers, and since I can escape nearly every ship that they have, it is no harm trying to get rid of them in relative distance from the planet already. But what after that?
I played with the idea of developing mine layers and secure every of their jump points to trap them (a thing I definitely have to do to avoid the game slowing down). Then I would spy on them with some stealth craft network with passive sensors maybe.
I would just besiege every jump point, but I fear even when the other cruiser comes back, I simply don't have enough military for that, as 5 jump points have already been identified, and every point essentially needs defenses to repel their whole remaining fleet.
I definitely don't want to kite in and weed them out partly or something like that. Only fight back when they attack in the beginning.
The bigger endgame plan looks like that I deploy either my first real carrier or heavy cruiser when they are finished (still quite some research to do here), and then engage in total annihilation if they keep their attitude, which is very likely. No enslaved survivors this time then, 40000 radiation directly to the capital area.
The other guys I will indeed try to rescue though, but I have no idea how yet.(on their planet they will die, but I cannot personally carry them away, so how do I help them to help themselves?)
« Last Edit: December 08, 2014, 02:29:42 AM by Vandermeer »
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Offline 83athom

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #5 on: December 08, 2014, 07:29:27 AM »
Good job and keep up the good work. I think you should go for the mine and watch approach like you said. Maybe you could design skirmisher ships that don't have the best tech, but have a little more than what they have in order to give them a little boost to enrich the gameplay a little.
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Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #6 on: December 08, 2014, 11:39:17 AM »
Mhm, I want that mine thing to happen, but I have no design or shipyard ready yet, so I will have to siege their system for probably up to two years.
Skirmisher ships, hmm, maybe it is time to start building the heavy bombers. I have a 25 slipways 1kt heavy bomber factory ready without a design yet. If I use my cruisers to carry them to Louisburgs jump points, and then add a recreational module, they might just make acceptable guards for the time in between.

Though I think I will just come up with more destroyers (they are at around their highest tonnage) and draw a guard circle around their inner worlds until the mining has been done. *sigh* I am really lacking ships for this.
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Offline 83athom

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #7 on: December 08, 2014, 11:54:33 AM »
Btw, the pictures of the ship (and ones talked about between us ie heavy bomber, fleet carrier, battleship) all have full 3D models.
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/fighters_v1.1_5gv4cfb8jh/fighters_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/bombers_v1.1_hf456hfdcv/bombers_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/heavy-bombers_v1.1_bg5gt5rfvb/heavy-bombers_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/ion-bombers_v1.0_jcsdcjfvbk/ion-bombers_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/corvette_v1.0_jfvck08df/corvette_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/destroyer_v1.1_lm8uh3dvyg/destroyer_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/frigate_v1.1_6h5g4f3dgb/frigate_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/ion-frigate_v1.1_b5gh6hgtgb/ion-frigate_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/recycler_v1.0_fckgfcng/recycler_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/scout-ship_v1.1_5g3dfbtghy/scout-ship_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/outpost-ship_v1.0_kjkwsxx12v/outpost-ship_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/cruiser_v1.2_8kujhtc3nh/cruiser_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/carrier_v1.1_dfg98gcwy7/carrier_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/heavy-cruiser_v1.0_jkloasdcv4/heavy-cruiser_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/battleship_v1.1_dfr4gfdbny/battleship_low.ogv http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/fleet-carrier_v1.1_6h5g4f3dbg/fleet-carrier_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/dreadnought_v1.1_hb5gf4bjuh/dreadnought_low.ogv
http://cdn.astroempires.com/videos/items_html5/titan_v1.1_5gnhy7ujnh/titan_low.ogv
Note; I do not have Leviathans or Death Stars unlocked so I could not provide the video link of the models. And in game your able to view a larger size and manipulate the model.
« Last Edit: December 08, 2014, 11:56:44 AM by 83athom »
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Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #8 on: December 08, 2014, 01:16:41 PM »
Of course I know that. This is why the game got me so inspired, because those models look really good, and a have solid believable style.(in comparison to some other "high fantasy" sci-fi where ships get edges spikes, and strange shapes altogether)
This is why I also only played to tech and unlock more ships, as written above. Because I downloaded these videos myself, and that is where those pictures came from.^^

The dreadnought and titan are new for me though, so thanks for that. It is two days late, but I am currently starting a new game in the fresh Centauri server. Depending on how the beginning works out, I might even play it for real.
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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #9 on: January 03, 2015, 09:26:55 AM »
So to continue the report: The enemy came in, and it was mostly the destroyers who would open fire.



Roughly 5 salvos of 20 shells a 4 damage were needed to bring down one of their 7kt destroyer designs, and roughly 9 salvos for the the 14kt frigates. They never had chance to return fire in the short time window, and tried to flee away in the opposite direction. The republic destroyers tried to save on ammunition often though, which is why sometimes a ship survived after only 4 or 8 salvos. In such cases the Artemis cruiser would serve to correct this little imbalance by firing only one or two of its turrets later.



Just a couple of enemy ships came through at that time, and hours of waiting time followed. At some point it was too much, and it was decided to take another peek into the Louisburg system in order to illuminate whether the enemy had been scared away from their attack plans or not. Indeed they have been found in a retreating stance.



Just at the same moment as the cruiser was gathering the information though, another incident happened. While some more bombing on the former droid base occurred...


...one of the survey drones that had been left in the system was surprisingly shot down over the planet A VI on which no life had been detected before.


Only 14 days were left to rescue the surviving officer, which no less was one of the most promising newcomers. Woefully was the reminder to the Pharsalos incident where once the best new officer that the fleet had ever seen was killed amongst the first victims. (side fact: this was no kidding the best young officer I ever had. he came with 30% survey, 30% fighter operations, some other skill too, and then over 200 in both initiative and training rating. ...and literally the first fire and alien contact I had in this game instantly killed him on his first mission when he was in charge of a geo survey probe )
This time was different though, as it was possible to help. So it was decided to gather the destroyers and the Artemis in one tight battle group formation in order to unite their anti missile capacities, and move in to the rescue. When looking on the route they would have to take... (older picture)



...it was like destiny, as the jump point, the rescue target, as well as the enemies home world were directly aligned, so that the shortest course would mean direct confrontation. The distance was just as such, that it could barely be crossed in 14 days by setting direct course. Yet, since the Artemis was not sufficiently equipped to close in with the alien homeworld's defenses, at least a slight detour was to be flown, making the operation a precision maneuver.

After gathering the little battle group together, also the enemies' forces reacted. Now, the aliens have been shown to posses very poor judgement in military matters, which lead to theories that some extremist group might have recently taken over, or something in that direction. Whoever was currently in command of their sizable and potentially more than equally powered war fleet, somehow saw it fit to not only fail to retreat and assemble into a battle line as soon as possible, but also thought it was a good idea to engage the much more capable Artemis-class Cruiser with split up forces.



Some units seemed to retreat, but some others engaged, and would, given their underwhelming speed, ultimately have to face the cruiser individually, being not only outclassed in technology, but also severely in mass.
Well, the first part of every war strategy was to split up the enemy forces and always take them out with superior power. It appears the enemy admirals (if they even have organization as such) were polite enough to take this part over for the Republic, so no clever maneuvering -the design purpose of the escort destroyers- would ultimately be needed.

It was soon that the first encounter happened, and since it was rated to be so massively underwhelming that the main weaponry wouldn't even be needed, it was judged that saving ammunition could be of long term strategic importance in this campaign, so some ships as those were better to be taken out by laser fire alone.
Since the non-artilleristic laser fire puts any ship into a threat distance of potential enemy counter fire, only ships with shields could be allowed to not risk any losses. The escort had to be left behind for this very first encounter.



This turned out to be a wise decision as the enemies ships not only identified themselves as beam attackers, but also surprisingly featured superior range to the cruiser's own weaponry.


Firing back quickly diminished their forces, as they were under the constant threat of 40 calibre 6 laser cannons. Their firepower on shorter distances was remarkable though, but required long loading times, on which the Artemis with its only rapid firing turrets could profit. Some maneuvers were flown that increased range on enemy firing times, and closed in whenever there was a pause.





In the end, the small group of only 1/10th of the mass of the Artemis had managed to bring down her shields to 50% - a respectable achievement.

Any wise commander would at the latest from this little skirmish have learned that the enemy had to be faced with larger collected force. Yet something seemed to be very wrong about them, as they appeared to conclude the opposite and started to send us even those who previously fled the approaching battle group.



Either they are not taking this seriously, or maybe there was some sort actual corruption going on, about which the intelligence knew nothing yet. ..But the safety of the own forces and people was to go first, so no worrying about motives now. The next enemy battle group was too dispatched by the same strategy, which, now after tests, worked even more effectively and left almost no dents in the Artemis' shields this time.



The following group then had shown to be the first missile capable craft in this assault, and greeted the Artemis and the destroyers from greater distance. The superior laser defenses of the combined battle group however was easily capable of repelling anything that those 3 destroyers could throw out. While a single strong artillery salvo from the destroyers' turrets managed to take them out, the bombers of Artemis had been sent in advance to fly around the enemies detection radius and engage the singular Taranto class vessel, so it wouldn't bother the fleet in its path.




In the distance a new surprising foe appeared that hadn't been registered yet, and was the first (military design) of the alien's vessels to fly faster than the Artemis cruiser.



It seemed the Republic saw for the first time some kind of heavy bomber or fighter design on alien side too. Since it was just manufactured and started, likely even a recent invention after witnessing what the Republic's fighter designs could do.
Dealing with this find was priority, so to be able to set collision course instantly, a torpedo salvo was expended to quickly dispatch of the other approaching ship. Intelligence never even learned its purpose...


Short range radars then confirmed the theory and indeed identified the ship and two others in silent running mode as heavy bombers.


Since the point defense couldn't possibly be pierced by those few wasps however, it was again plan to move in to artillery distance. Yet, after the bombers got a solid scan of the Republic ships, they immediately turned around in fear and flew...


Once again it seemed there was no plan behind the enemies actions, and this incident delivered a lot of evidence towards the theory that in fact there was no higher command on the enemies side. Those bombers clearly did not receive any communications of the scans that all the other previously encountered ships had already made, as otherwise they would have known they were no match. So the reason why they also didn't posses foresight to bundle together in one overwhelming line was possibly that their society existed either in total anarchy, or maybe separated clans of little sub groups (some ships worked together after all). Possibly the nations also just don't trust each other yet to share military efforts, who could know from this far yet.

As the bombers turned around and were actually faster, it was an obvious reaction to fly under their underwhelming radar capacity and hunt them down with interceptors, whose prime role was exactly this situation. After closing in to 60-70k kilometers with those, they still didn't show any kind of reaction, making them helpless to what was to come. Their armor was thin as papyrus, and one simple volley fire from the 10 Kanjiu on that distance already took care of one of them each time.


[...] Some similar little encounters later, the Artemis battle group had already achieved to take out most individual operators in the system by just eliminating what it faced on its path. The aliens were driven back to their core planetary system, and had no actively flying presence beyond left.



The constant escapades however took its toll on the time management, and as it was clear that the Artemis could not reach the valued life pods in the remaining one and a half day, it dispatched a flight of two little Kanjiu fighters to take a risky route around the enemy core worlds and through their remaining fleet, so that they could refill and tow away the life units.
The action was successful -though a near last minute salvation-, and since the fighters could now also scout out the base installation that was responsible for the whole maneuver, the pilots decided without consultation to fly lower and shred the outpost with laser fire.




Sanctioned or not, the action was successful, and the base destroyed.

The primary goal was now nearly achieved, leaving only open for the fighters to successfully return to the Artemis. No risks should be taken, and so the fighters where to remain on position for a while, as the battle group would work to make the territory saver.

The next encounter that the forces had to face was then a coordinated assault of both of the identified main alien groups. While the much larger group with its basically dominating amount of ships was the one that was fought on all previous skirmishes, now for the first time there was one of the second, and it surprised. Instead of strength through mass, it seemed that the smaller alien nation(?) focused on technological invention instead, and fielded a somewhat larger frigate with in comparison much more competent engines. -the second ship that could at least match the cruiser's speed- However, after seeing its missiles to be impressive, but also still not up to own standards, the technology was likely still behind the Republics customs, so no boarding attempts were ordered for now.




The command then decided to deal with this combined attack in a multi-task kind of way too, and sent bombers to the one and a probing torpedo salvo to the other. Simultaneously the remaining fighters were started to join the others mid-flight on a more secure position, as they were approached by enemies and needed reinforcements.



Then the two strikes landed. While the bombers successfully destroyed all their targets before the enemies missiles could even get to the Artemis group, the torpedo salvo was to some astonishment intercepted. Normally those enemy ships that are proven to be missile attackers, never performed well enough in point defense to not being overwhelmed by one of such salvos, but technology really seemed to yield them competent advances.




After this change of events, the bombers flew a detour and took care of the advanced target nonetheless, and it was found that their defense capacity was still not as great so that they could fend of an overwhelming bomb rain.

With the battle group having now come this close to their home world, some of the aliens seemed to become nervous enough to attempt evacuation -their first smart move to this date-. Too late though, as Admiral Kino had ordered that the whole system had to be sealed of for some time until an investigation revealed what really happened. The Artemis's next priority target was thus to move around their planet and use all forces available to prevent the fleeing civil freighters and person transports from retreating to other systems, and also pick up the retreating fighter flight in that path.
As the plans became obvious to the enemy, some for now unique demonstration of collaboration and compassion stirred up further combatants, who left the security range of their planet to come to the freighters aid.



...not to much success of course.


The slow freighters were no match and easily caught, but for the others, there were simply too many of them around to hunt them down individually with the bulky cruiser alone, so two of the destroyers left the group to hunt them down much faster and efficient than the cruiser could.
At the same time there was also an individual concerning target, which appeared to be another frigate of the technically advanced alien faction. Since bombers had worked well with those the last time, the otherwise too fast enemy would be prey to them once again.



...Things turned out different with this model though, as it did not only prove capacity to detect the bombers ahead by itself and move in bravely, but also that it was capable of artillery fire similar to that of the destroyers and cruiser, but with a trade of most of the power for increased range...


Further reinforcements were not easily available, so as in this lengthy campaign, again, no losses could be risked, the bombers returned immediately after receiving damage. One of them also seemed to be bugged by the new android-ultimate-redundant-operation-repair-autosoft service system and needed a extra slap on the chassis from the master of space (/chief engineer) to function properly again.


A change in plans was made, and after the quick repairs, the bombers were sent out again, together with the now secured fighters - the first to hunt a singular fleeing military destroyer, the second to take over the duty of eliminating the escaping civil craft. The destroyers were instead issued to follow the frigate which would otherwise be at risk of escaping.



Since only fighters, bombers and destroyers could catch a ship this fast, and the first two didn't perform well against this type of enemy, it was now for the destroyers as the only leftover effective tool to take over the job. The enemies weapons had been proven to outrange Republics artillery though, and the destroyers had no shields and only medium armor, so the encounter was perceived as necessary trouble -damage expected-. The Republic faced a gap in their strategic fleet doctrine for which they had no efficient counter...

[ - pause - ]


///edit: various typo fixes
« Last Edit: January 04, 2015, 12:45:19 AM by Vandermeer »
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Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #10 on: January 04, 2015, 05:27:29 AM »
When the Chile-class's counter fire started, it provided to be much more devastating than anticipated. Due to a crucial design flaw in the Cerberus-destroyers sensor phalanx, the small and fast artillery fire could not be before impact, leaving entire salvos to hit without being first diminished by the laser turret defenses. As it was too late to turn back so deep in the enemies firing range already, there was no other way than hoping for the best, yet soon severe damage had accumulated.




As a desperate last resort, the senior officer of the system, and Sn. Captain of the "Heike", attempted to use the inherent flak capability of the standard issue Thunderbolt ammunition, and fired concussion barrages in the deep space in hope of lucky hits.



None of these maneuvers were successful however, and as the enemies ammunition reserves provided to be very deep, both destroyers eventually faced a catastrophic end before even being able to fire.



While the commando structure adapted and counseling about the continued strategy started, it became evident that the other race of the system had been conquered, as person transports and freighters were seen performing emergency missions in-midst war. The homeworld of the second race was to be freed however, and so the fighters flew around the star and took the freighter fleet out to cut of the economic connection.




The new command went through a couple calculations and found that after the destruction of the two Cerberi, and the ammunition lost through the short bomber approach, the Chile-class frigate should not have much ammunition left. Certainly not enough to repeat the feat that it had done once more, and so it was decided that in revenge the remaining two destroyers should be dispatched to finally catch the ship.
Things went as expected, and the impacts suffered were already considerably thinner, weaker, and soon stopped after barely scratching the armor of both ships. Being stripped of its ammunition, the Chile was an easy target.




..And with the Chile also the last mobile member of the enemies military fleet fell, leaving only unarmed ships behind. A worthy last target.

Through all the mess and due to some misunderstanding in communications, the other captain of the two lost destroyers, Kanagaki Hitoshi, was already promoted post mortem, despite not actually being dead. To some surprise he was now however found amongst the life pods, and could -not without grudges from his colleagues- celebrate his advance by stepping up to local command.



Meanwhile the Artemis flew closer circles towards the inner system with the goal of testing the range the enemy was able to defend, and also setting up fortified position over A II, the other races conquered homeworld. While doing so, another hostile outpost was found on A III at closer sensor range, and ground bombardment was considered priority.



The ground forces on both worlds, A III and A II were left intact to test out their performance nearby parked and ready Barque. After another good day or so, the fighters finally succeeded in taking out every last of the fleeing civilian ships, completing the isolation requirement part of the fleet command's orders.



The aliens were now stuck on their homeworld, and officially under siege. The Artemis could not move in, but they also could not move out. They however tried, and after a short while started further heavy bomber designs from the surface that were out to target the battle group on the position they had assumed over A II.
Fighters worked well the last time, but the enemy must have adapted its strategy, as this encounter did not go without some small losses.



Obviously this was unacceptable in a lengthy siege again, which is why further heavy bombers would now be engaged by the Republic's own bomber designs out of targeting range.

Then the Barque arrived to finally achieve the last objective: freeing A II the other alien's planet. The enemy ground forces provided to be so thin and weak though, that it barely seemed worthy all the effort, and probably the marines on board of the Artemis could have already achieved the victory.



A quick survey and damage reports now revealed the catastrophic state that the alien planet had fallen into. Anything had been either bombed or robbed away, and literally no installation was left after the occupation. The planet was irradiated to a degree that would secure the species' demise in just two generations. The only things left were some sparse minerals, and a small supply storage in fuel and tools.



The sabre aliens gratefully provided the supply to the orbiting cruiser in exchange for further protection, though on long term, military shields were not the option. This species was beyond saving.
To discuss the situation and what was to do, the 12 leader-admirals of the Sabre folk were invited and flown to Eden Ende via one of the present Leonidas Shuttles, where a meeting decided conditions and learned about the situation.


It was revealed that both species used to live together and developed individually in the system. For around two centuries and due to insufficient space-faring technology, all the communication between the two used to be a (funky?) exchange of electronic signals, trading cultural information such as media, art, and even scientific discourse. Then a breakthrough happened that advanced the population of A I towards dimension bending, actual space travel, and in hindsight of the good relations, the first exploration ship visited A II to share this new technology, and also finally meet in person.
Some decades of fruitful synergetic existence went by in which the travel technology was refined. Though since nobody had yet figured out how to traverse to other stars yet, all the efforts were focused on exploring and building outposts around their own system. ...With the exception of the Divinity Endeavor, a project that sent a singular unmanned probe with revolutionary technology out, which could use one of the systems Lagrange Points to be flung towards other stars in superluminal motion. The project succeeded to a good degree, and the probe flew around multiple stars, curving its trajectory until it would face back to its origin. However, some unknown incident must have happened while it was underway, as soon after the probe was caught and disassembled, the people on A I would undergo rough changes, first in behavior, and then even on the outside, where they developed an exoskeleton and a thick moistly epidermis.
Following the communication block from the Jafari side and the nightmarish observations of physical corruption, the Sabre were quick to issue pandemic alert, immediately followed by preparations for defense and eventual war.
The energy levels of the interstellar flight had however also attracted the attention of the droid invaders, who now awakened from their ancient base in the system and started to manufacture a strike force. Interestingly, achieving interstellar flight capability could actually be the trigger that startles their suspicion and summoned the doom of many of the other civilizations whose ruins were found. Come to think of it, the Jinza race probably only was ready to fight, because their homeplanet existed in great distance of any jump point, so they were naturally concealed long enough to develop weaponry. ..And here the existence of two sizable civilizations at once, and the already impending war preparations likely served to overcome the limited resources of the singular droid base, so they too could withstand.
Although the Jafari did despite already overwhelming fleet size not act out in any threatening way for long, and military efforts were turned against the new enemy instead, they also did not care to further explain the situation. Then, when the Republic arrived, some unknown reason caused them to berserk. Whether there is some relation to the Republic directly that is not known by the Sabre, or simply the illumination of a jump point, and with it possibility of other interstellar travel speeded up their plans, ... it must be learned from the Jafari directly.

The decision of the council was now to give back any control to the planet to the Sabre (*), and provide support to make their suffering as little as possible. For those who would survive the already irremovable radiation dose, a new planet with adequate conditions would be seeked out, though the chances for one to be found in time were slim.

*= That did not work btw. . There is no way to give away control of a whole colony to another race. You can give them ships, and with that officers I believe, but the "transfer" button in the colony window doesn't seem to work, or does something different to what I thought.

[...] Some time went by in which new measurements were starting development, that could make it possible to approach the central planet A I, or maintain the siege more efficiently. The naval defeat and paralysation of the Jafari only took less than 3 weeks, but the siege was now maintained for more than a year. Artemis and the remaining two destroyers had readily waited around the A II world and constantly maintained the sensor surveillance from there. The Jafari were not entirely beaten, and frequently sent out newly build ships in foolish attempts to escape the planet, but only to be hunted down by the fighter squadron every time and again. Soon more than 20 additional civil transporters had been lost due to their feeble organization, yet none of the more advanced faction.
The fleet command started to capture and interrogate the survivors of such transporters by sending the shuttles with especially equipped quarantine bays. Their behavior was that of savages however, or even less, as not even the most basic communication was possible. How they were able to assemble and then operate actual space ships in this state is beyond understanding, but further investigation might show more.
Amongst all the wreckage however was at least one useful information, and that was the analysis of the enemies artillery missiles:



The intelligence on the missile provided essential information towards planning a new siege approach. Currently, only mines were in development, in order to automate the concealment, yet an even better method would be to at least temporarily destroy their means of achieving any kind of space travel. For this, obviously, their large shipyard complexes had to be destroyed. Since the current torpedo weaponry could not hope to get through defenses, and the artillery was simply to short ranged, purpose designed ammunition would be needed to deliver the necessary strike with current ship designs. Since now the range of the enemies defenses was exactly known, it would be easy to come up with something just slightly better, and send them swarms of deception flares along with a few actual payloads.


Amongst all the civil ships that frequently left the planet A I were occasionally also further units of the enemies new bomber design. Those usually were taken out without trouble by the own bombers of Artemis, but at one time there was a surprise: The technically more advanced Harsawa faction of the Jafari had developed a bomber design too, which was expectably quite a bit more capable, though still no match due to its lacking sensor range.



When the plans and designs of the first feint flares were just finished, the intelligence should discover further details that could have thrown back the plans by another month. Of course the more advanced faction also featured a slightly superior version of artillery missiles, and exceeded the previously determined range. Thanks to some design foresight though, the zone of safe fire had been extended in advance, and the flares were still usable.




*The shields are actually just 33% stronger, but still.
Code: [Select]
Artemis rev.2 class Cruiser    300,000 tons     6478 Crew     49309.6 BP      TCS 6000  TH 30000  EM 36000
5000 km/s     Armour 14-399     Shields 1200-300     Sensors 900/900/3/3     Damage Control Rating 615     PPV 302.1
Maint Life 6.93 Years     MSP 63185    AFR 1170%    IFR 16.3%    1YR 2299    5YR 34485    Max Repair 1800 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 72 months    Flight Crew Berths 281    
Hangar Deck Capacity 18000 tons     Cryo Drop Capacity: 5 Battalions    Magazine 7656    Cargo Handling Multiplier 50    

625 EP Lifter Magnetic Fusion Drive (48)    Power 625    Fuel Use 2.65%    Signature 625    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 14,800,000 Litres    Range 335.1 billion km   (775 days at full power)
Xi R300/360 Shields (240)   Total Fuel Cost  3,600 Litres per hour  (86,400 per day)

4xCalibre 6 sX-Ray Laser Phalanx (10x4)    Range 360,000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 24-24     RM 6    ROF 5        6 6 6 6 6 6 5 4 4 3
CIWS-250x10 (12x10)    Range 1000 km     TS: 25000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit
Tactical Control System (r.192k-25kps) (2)    Max Range: 384,000 km   TS: 25000 km/s     97 95 92 90 87 84 82 79 77 74
Magnetic Fusion Reactor r.60-300t (4)     Total Power Output 240    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Size 12 Torpedo Launcher r60 (6)    Missile Size 12    Rate of Fire 60
Conventional Turret Barrel (24)    Missile Size 1    Rate of Fire 5
"Raikan" Plasma Shell Turret (r.11.1m-500t) (6)     Range 11.1m km    Resolution 10
Torpedo Fire Control (r.499m-900t) (1)     Range 498.9m km    Resolution 18
Critical Fusion LR Torpedo "Cobalt-Flare" (120)  Speed: 52,100 km/s   End: 154.5m    Range: 483.1m km   WH: 36    Size: 12    TH: 295/177/88
"Thunderbolt" Shell (5720)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 2.6m    Range: 10.9m km   WH: 4    Size: 1    TH: 446/268/134
"Oroborus" Radiation Shell (480)  Speed: 70,500 km/s   End: 1.9m    Range: 8.1m km   WH: 1    Size: 1    TH: 235/141/70

Collision Perimeter (r.35.2m) (1)     GPS 1800     Range 324.0m km    MCR 35.3m km    Resolution 1
LR Gravity Echolot (r.3.4g-5.5kt) (1)     GPS 198000     Range 3,398.1m km    Resolution 110
Thermal Observatory TH-900 (1)     Sensitivity 900     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  900m km
EM Observatory EM-900 (1)     Sensitivity 900     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  900m km
Advanced Gravitational Sensors (1)   3 Survey Points Per Hour
Advanced Geological Sensors (1)   3 Survey Points Per Hour

ECCM-5 (3)         ECM 50



As soon as the revision design was finished, the Atlanta and 6 destroyers would show up carrying a full bay of the specialized siege ammunition, ready to lay waste to the enemies shipyard complexes... .
« Last Edit: January 04, 2015, 05:38:49 AM by Vandermeer »
playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy
 

Offline MarcAFK

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #11 on: January 09, 2015, 05:00:41 AM »
Where's your resolution 1 fire control for those AMM's ?
" Why is this godforsaken hellhole worth dying for? "
". . .  We know nothing about them, their language, their history or what they look like.  But we can assume this.  They stand for everything we don't stand for.  Also they told me you guys look like dorks. "
"Stop exploding, you cowards.  "
 

Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #12 on: January 09, 2015, 07:36:02 AM »
Not needed. You will see why when the maneuver starts. ;)
playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy
 

Offline Bryan Swartz

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #13 on: January 19, 2015, 02:11:21 AM »
I am in awe of this thread. 
 

Offline Vandermeer (OP)

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Re: Astral Rebublic Showcase
« Reply #14 on: January 19, 2015, 01:55:35 PM »
Thank you. Nice to hear some approval once in a while.

Where's your resolution 1 fire control for those AMM's ?
Well, the thing did not work out as I thought it would. I was thinking I could aim at my own missile salvos, because there is this hit-box in the targeting window that lets you display friendly targets. This way I would have sent a long ranging torpedo first, and then all the flares after it until the next torpedoes are fired, leading to a constant and still long ranging stream. I should have tested it with my previous weaponry though, because this check-mark really just enables friendly contacts, but no own ships or missile salvos.
Would have been a great plan, because since these flares were really just there to distract enemy AMM, then who cares who targets who if they still end up destroying each other.(actually it is even better to not target yourself here, because the enemy loses way more AMM's trying to intercept just one of mine than the other way around, even if I had 100% to hit one them)
I ended up cheating me a 110RP turret into the designs of cruisers and destroyers though (but the other way around - less resolution, more range). Not the best solution, but I really didn't want to wait another year over this tiny blooper.
playing Aurora as swarm fleet: Zen Nomadic Hive Fantasy