Oh, the Humanity: A story

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

Dedicated ship designs thread is here.

It's August 13, 2095. We've been in contact with alien civilization calling itself Duchy of Trif for 35 years now. Our first contact wasn't great - they destroyed our peaceful exploration vessel when it was investigating their home system. Which is understandable, now that I think about it... But after that, we've had no difficulties, respecting each other's borders and having limited diplomatic communications. Trif even wanted to expand our friendship by exchanging goods and information, but we simply ignored them ever since.



The distance between Sol and their Eta Cassiopeiae is just 4.3b km. Which is practically nothing compared to the vastness of space around us. There's so many star systems and planets to live on. Humanity, after the initial scare, felt there was no threat. Yes, we've built some hundred fighters for system defense, and even managed to get some actual warships afloat. But we've stopped being afraid of the aliens. And there was nothing else found out there that could be potentially harmful. We've explored a lot of star systems and found very little of interest, actually. Space is enormously big and... almost void of life? Why would anyone try and harm the tiny beings that are so lonely?



To this day, Humanity settled four additional star systems. But most of them are kinda, if I may say so, worthless, not-much-producing, mismanaged, mining colonies. The Dragon system, on the other hand, is a mineral rich jewel, with potential to surpass Sol in terms of production capacity and strategic importance just in the next hundred years! The Sol is running out of critical TN materials, while Dragon system would be able to sustain itself for centuries to come!

But where were we... Ah, yes. The aliens!

Today is the day when the aliens, the Trif, have come to our system. They've come to Sol. It's just one ship, but it's fast, and we suspect it to be a destroyer. There's plenty of Jump Gates to move through in our part of the galaxy, so there's no need for dedicated jump drives to travel between systems. What do they want? We've warned them to stay away from our systems! Here's Human Navy's most important part of the OOB:

Dragon
1x CA Challenger: Cab
1x DD Defender: Dainty

Sol
11x CA Challenger: C. C. N. Y. Victory, C. Francis Jenkins, C. H. M. Jones, C. J. Jones, C. K. McClatchy, C. W. Post, Ca Ira, Cabana, Calliope, Calypso, Challenger
5x EX Discovery: Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, Giovanni da Verrazzano, Hernando de Soto, Jacques Cartier, Jacques Marquette
31x DD Defender: D Artagnon, d Entrecasteaux, D. W. Harrington, Da Nang, Dabra-Markos, Dacca, Dace, Dachhound, Dachs, Daclau-Sar, Dadao, Dade, Dade County, Daedalus, Daemon, Daerwood, Daga, Dagger, Daggett County, Dagon, Dague, Dahan-i-Kasha, Dahan-i-Kusna, Dahlgren, Dahlia, Daikyu, Daimler, Dai-Mon Taar, Dai-Mon Tag, Dairen, Defender
96x LAC Avenger
12x FTR Fearless

That's it! 12 cruisers, 32 destroyers and 108 really outdated fighters. That's everything humans currently have to wage war with. The Trif have MUCH, MUCH more ships than we do. And there's mineral crisis looming. How can we defend our system from intruders and not spark a war? Do we ignore it? Do we allow it to scout our defenses (or lack thereof)? It's time to make the call.

[nuclearslurpee]

I'd say the first thing to do is to call up the Trif ship and politely request that they vacate the system. Naturally, we've already done this.

I suppose the next step is to follow their ship around and see what it does. I've found out that destroyer-size vessels can be diplomatic ships mistaken as warships, because they use military engines (there may have been one or two, um, unfortunate incidents in past playthroughs...), so they may just be trying to deepen the bonds of friendship between your peoples.

Otherwise, the listed tonnage of ships should be sufficient to defend Sol especially if we defend at the jump point. The struggle will be a lack of strategic reserve or any response force to deal with a sudden problem in an outlying system.

[TheBawkHawk]

(there may have been one or two, um, unfortunate incidents in past playthroughs...)

An alien race I am currently blockading have experienced - let me count - 37 unfortunate incidents, as of 5 years ago. I only recently discovered that they were diplomatic ships, and that 2 jumps further past their homeworld they had been desperately fighting a losing war with the buggy boys... I kinda feel bad.

I vote that since the aliens have attempted friendly relations, or at least proposed them, they be given 15 days after receiving the leave request before they are forced out. Call me paranoid but I never like letting the aliens peek at the cards in my hand, even if they're acting friendly. I agree with nuclearslurpee, the listed tonnage should be more than sufficient to maintain the security of Sol. A blockade of further jump points however, may prove more difficult.

Ultimately if push comes to shove you'll want to blockade right on their doorstep, on the Delta Carinae - Eta Cassiopeiae jump. Maintaining a sufficient force on a hostile jump point is no small feat. I've found luck with large anchorage stations with maintenance and recreational facilities towed directly onto the point to support a fleet of beam combatants. Alternatively, very good sensor nets and a sizable quick reaction force have worked well for me for distant blockades. I find passive sensor buoys and tracking stations combined with fast carrier forces to be effective. Either you need to be able to stop anything coming through dead in its tracks, or be able to quickly respond to any incursions and win the battle in open space.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

August 17, 2095

As the intruder vessel had known active sensor capabilities and was approaching Humanity's vital areas which they were not allowed to scout, a group of warships and a squadron of (very outdated) gauss cannon fighters was sent to intercept.

We had no exact intel on its radar capabilities aside from strength (16560 GPS), which I realized could be attributed to a general purpose long range radar. Due to the presence of the intruder very deep inside the inner system, where one radar ping could provide the aliens with insane amount of critical defense intelligence, I gave the order to the fighter squadron to fire upon the intruding vessel using small caliber Gauss Cannons, which should not be able to destroy the ship outright, but still provide a strong message to its occupants.

As a result, the vessel was damaged, then shot down its engines and surrendered. Senior naval officer on the scene, Lieutenant Commander Cui Ying Shi quickly took control of the ship and started directing investigation and recovery activities. The vessel in question turned out to be a fast military scout. Not a destroyer, as suspected, but still, a spy. Who knows how much information they've managed to gather up to this point?



nuclearslurpee, TheBawkHawk

Unfortunately, I'm not as optimistic as you. TRIF Navy is far superior and I do not wish to provoke them, because even defending a single system would most likely result in a failure on Humanity's part. To make things worse, the intruder most likely came from Proxima Centauri direction. Yes, Delta Carinae is the most likely approach, and I've identified several small alien colonies past that system, but that's not the only way they use to travel around.

Mineral storage of Corbomite and Uridium in Sol is dangerously low (21 and 16k respectively). Every other system, except Dragon, produces too little of such minerals, and I'm trying to improve the situation, while avoiding taking away anything from Dragon, which I want to be able to sustain itself independently and build up its own production capacities in near future. I wish to establish one or two more independent colonies far out from Sol and Trif to ensure future survival of Humanity, but most of the resources are currently spent on reinforcing Umi, Harrington and Rubino mineral production to allow Sol factories, shipyards and maintenance facilities to function and sustain existing fleets.

Bottom line is, war is very undesirable. But, obviously, TRIF wanted to send a military scout to our homeworld. This was not some survey ship on a routine exploration mission.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

August 20, 2095

So, Trif did not appreciate response.
Let's hope they won't retaliate with force.





Humanity have identified three new star systems to settle, all of which can become self-sustainable, given enough time and effort.

Heintz 299-A I is quite a striking discovery (and there's no official planet name yet, so we're open to suggestions!). Although not a habitable world, but it does contain 857m units of minerals, with EVERY possible mineral present. The lowest ones are Neutronium (3.5m), and Gallicite (4.1m). Every other mineral is much more abundant. Their accessibility is 0.1 for the most part, but it's all in ONE place. Another planet in that system, Heintz 299-B I is small, cold and barren, but pretty habitable (CC rating of 2.0). Max population capacity is just 85m. We can deploy automated mining facilities on Alpha 1 and settle Beta 1 to live and have modest production capacities there. Heintz 299 is 13b km away from Sol.



Zeta Sextansis (3.5b km from Sol) would be the sixth Human settlement to date. It's already connected via Jump Gate network and the orders are given to deploy the main settlement on Alpha 2, now called Zen (CC rating of 2, 3.1b max population). More than 400m+ units of minerals have been identified within this system, with every mineral present in abundance. Neutronium and Sorium are lacking (1m and 3.6m respectively), but even that amount should last for quite a while.

Fomalhaut (22.4b km from Sol) would be a bit harder to reach, but Jump Gate network is almost complete in that region, so it should not take long before the colony would be open. Alpha 6, now called Lem, is an icy 2.2 CC rated world that would be able to allow 22 billion humans to live there, given sufficient infrastructure. 600m units of minerals were discovered in the system so far. Tritanium is the least available here, at 2.7m, but 0.8 accessibility. Everything else is abundant.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

December 17, 2095

Since the "Solar intruder incident" in August, Umi, Rubino and Sol were visited by various Trif ships. Even after they've acknowledged our sovereignty there and requests (which later turned into demands) to leave. We've seen scout vessels all over the place, even in Sol, not willing to leave. And they sent a Survey ship to Rubino, backed up by what seems to be a heavy cruiser!





Task Force 4 originally comprised 1 cruiser squadron and 2 destroyer divisions (3 CA 8 DD), but 1 CA and 4 DD were detached to guard Dragon's Eye (TG 4.2), and  TF 4(-) became the smallest unit in Sol that could be dispatched to deal with the intruders in nearby systems. On December 17th, 2095, TF 4 made contact with Trif CA Cormyr 001. Or, at least our intelligence suggests that this is a heavy cruiser. I personally think that there's a pretty good chance it could be another type of survey ship - a gravitational one, for example.

TF4 had to be divided, again, because the destroyers were in the middle of refueling, with some of them being completely out of fuel. So only two cruisers were sent after Trif ship.

There was also a Trif diplomatic ship in the system. That's totally fine. But all this complete disregard to our demands to leave Human space? We never agreed on this!

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

January 9, 2096

Back in December, TF4 fired a warning shot against suspected Trif heavy cruiser in Rubino system, after countless communication attempts to make them leave on their own. Just one shot from 200mm FUV laser was enough to persuade the crew of what actually was a Survey Ship Cormyr 001 to surrender right on the spot.

Code: [Select]

SS Cormyr 001  (Cormyr class Survey Ship)      12 146 tons       197 Crew       1 093.1 BP       TCS 243    TH 789    EM 0
3247 km/s    JR 3-50      Armour 1-47       Shields 0-0       HTK 65      Sensors 16/24/1/0      DCR 6      PPV 0
Maint Life 1.55 Years     MSP 337    AFR 197%    IFR 2.7%    1YR 161    5YR 2 409    Max Repair 200.8 MSP
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   SCI   
Intended Deployment Time: 36 months    Morale Check Required   

J12350(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 12350 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3

Magneto-plasma Drive  EP394.40 (2)    Power 788.8    Fuel Use 39.12%    Signature 394.4    Explosion 8%
Fuel Capacity 5 350 000 Litres    Range 202.7 billion km (722 days at full power)

Thermal Sensor TH2-16 (1)     Sensitivity 16     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  31.6m km
EM Sensor EM3-24 (1)     Sensitivity 24     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  38.7m km
Gravitational Survey Sensors (1)   1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Survey Ship for auto-assignment purposes


To summarize:

- Trif did recognize our sovereignty over Rubino system, as well as Sol, Umi and Harrington.
- We've made it abundantly clear that Trif ships need to leave Rubino and other Human systems and gave enough time and warnings for them to do so.
- So far, we've applied minimal force against ships that were using military hardware (mil-spec engines and electronic systems, such as size2+ sensors that could compromise the security of Humanity) in our sovereign space and refused to leave.

On January 9th, 2096, Exploration Ship Henry Hudson was returning to Sol via Delta Carinae system, where military forces of Trif ambushed it on approach to Umi Jump Gate. Three destroyers, traveling at more than 9k km/s intercepted EX Henry Hudson and opened fire with str 18 particle beam weapons, destroying the ship and many of its crew. We've detected no permanent presence of Trif population/stations in Delta Carinae so far and thus consider it to be a neutral system (there's only one planet, and it's a gas giant), but, obviously, Trif think they can retaliate regardless.

All human vessels are to exercise extreme caution and stay clear from any Trif ships or installations. Temporary withdrawal of all outbound ships is ordered. Humanity will NOT seek conflict outside of its borders and will not be escalating this situation further unless vital assets or human lives will be threatened. That's all for now.

[nuclearslurpee]

This is one of those...quirks, let's say, of the Aurora C# diplomacy system. Any damage dealt to an NPR ship no matter how little or for what reason immediately sets them to a hostile status. Fortunately, if we remain out of contact they can soon recover to a merely chilly and suspicious state of relations, and them blowing up our ship while perhaps a bit excessive will not negatively influence this mechanism.

Time will tell of course, it may be that the Trif have been plotting a war anyways and will take this provocation as the casus belli they wanted.

[El Pip]

This has got escalation due to miscommunication leading to war written all over it.

Or as my colleague has suggested there is no miscommunication and the Trif are looking for war but want Humanity to start it.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

December 1, 2097

It seems that the war is already here, Humanity is just not ready to accept it.

Since our last report, we've stopped trying to force Trif scouts out of our systems and ignored their presence in critical areas. Exploration ships deep behind Trif borders were put into hiding, waiting for a chance to get back to Sol, once we can get a truce to hold.

On November 8, 2096, we had word from Trif saying that we're no longer considered hostile and that we're back to neutral stance. We've waited a bit longer and then given our distant exploration ships an order to return.

Yet, on March 10, 2097, exploration ship Francisco Pizarro was destroyed on its way back to Sol, without any provocation.

There was no direct, ongoing contact between our Diplomatic Corps fleet and Trif, so on April 22, 2097, Diplomatic vessel Humanity 001 was sent from Umi jump gate to Delta Carinae system, where it was immediately attacked and miraculously avoided destruction thanks to fast reaction of its crew, able to send ship back to Umi the next second it was fired upon.

On December 1, 2097, another human exploration ship was destroyed by Trif. I banned all kinds of access for Trif systems on my end, but auto orders still sent the ship to Trif space, so it's kinda my fault, I guess.

To summarize:

- Trif confirmed that we went back to neutral status;
- Trif then destroyed two more human exploration vessels in their space;
- Trif attacked known human civilian-grade diplomatic vessel with transponders turned on without warning.

Well, that's not "neutral", isn't it? I can understand attacking exploration vessels, even if it's a far stretched reason, sure, but attacking the diplomatic one? We've used the very same ship for years with Diplomatic Corps to maintain active communications with Trif. There's no way they did not know what kind of vessel it was.



The problem is, Sol is still very low on minerals. The link between Sol and Dragon system is rather fragile. Other mineral sources are still underdeveloped - we've been using manned mines, but had difficulties finding enough miners. Trying to import additional infrastructure turned out to be too time consuming so far. From now on, Humanity will be using automated mines exclusively, but putting them out there also takes time.

Human military ships were slightly refit with new ECM packages (now using ECM 40), updated armor and new anti-ship missiles. Saved weight allowed for installing 5 more ASM cells on cruisers and 1 additional one on destroyers, for a total of 35 size 6 ASMs on Challengers and 16 ASMs on Defenders.

[El Pip]

War has come! But a very low grade and low effort war so it only technically counts.

Will the Trif give Humanity the time to build up the Dragon system? Probably, though many more border incidents seem likely in the coming years.

[nuclearslurpee]

Well, that's not "neutral", isn't it?

The Trif admiralty is very neutral on the subject of shooting human ships, they do not care and will let their captains do whatever they want. 

Human military ships were slightly refit with new ECM packages (now using ECM 40)

I continue to be confused as to why the Human admirals are not confident in winning this war...

It does seem that the Trif are, for now, happy not to invade Human space, but are very insistent that we stay out of their space. This would be fine, however they seem to have a double standard and think they can do whatever they want in our space. Not sure if we should tolerate this as the Trif seem to be acting like bullies about it.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

I continue to be confused as to why the Human admirals are not confident in winning this war...

According to intel, Trif have more than 1.4m tons of combat vessels that we've actually seen:

10 BCs / 7 BCJ
10 CA / 1 CJ
25 CLE
12 DD / 9 JD
24 DE

From what we know, ALL their BC, CA, DD and their jump versions are armed with str-18 lances. Escorts are armed with GCs turrets. We have not seen any missile capability, but there's probably more where that come from.

Humanity, on the other hand, has barely 400k tons of combat vessels, and almost no auxiliaries yet to support them.

It does seem that the Trif are, for now, happy not to invade Human space, but are very insistent that we stay out of their space. This would be fine, however they seem to have a double standard and think they can do whatever they want in our space. Not sure if we should tolerate this as the Trif seem to be acting like bullies about it.

Yeah, it's humiliating, frankly. People are dying and we can't do anything about it. They don't even bother to rescue the survivors! They leave them there to die!

[nuclearslurpee]

I continue to be confused as to why the Human admirals are not confident in winning this war...

According to intel, Trif have more than 1.4m tons of combat vessels that we've actually seen:

10 BCs / 7 BCJ
10 CA / 1 CJ
25 CLE
12 DD / 9 JD
24 DE

From what we know, ALL their BC, CA, DD and their jump versions are armed with str-18 lances. Escorts are armed with GCs turrets. We have not seen any missile capability, but there's probably more where that come from.

Candidly, with NPR fleets the total tonnage is usually a poor measure as they are not able to effectively combine their fleets into a larger offensive force, so you can usually defeat an NPR by wiping out 200,000-300,000 ton fleets one at a time at your doorstep. Meanwhile, ECM 40 is a big advantage against the NPRs which do not really rush the ECCM techs as it means you can sit around at about 2/3 maximum range with decent hit chances and shoot them with impunity. Overwhelming tactical superiority makes up for a quantitative disparity in total forces.

[L0ckAndL0ad (OP)]

October 21, 2099

We've had the usual rounds of Trif diplomatic messaging saying they consider us being cool ("neutral"), followed by attempts of our Diplomatic Corps vessels reaching out and getting attacked, barely escaping, snoopers wondering about human star systems, etc. There was also an increase in Trif activity around Rubino area, ~6bn km away from Sol. Reports indicated that Trif sent geo survey vessels and Jump Point stabilization vessels there, but we still wanted to be reasonable and ignored this.

Then, in the early days of October, a Trif heavy cruiser was identified in the outer regions of Rubino, ~650m km away from the primary star, when it, apparently, switched from EMCON Alpha to do a brief radar ping to check its surroundings. Given recent attacks on our diplomatic vessels in border systems, having Trif heavy cruiser present in our settled space was the last straw.

Duchy of Trif was declared hostile. Humanity was officially at war.

Planet of Fand, orbiting Rubino-A M2-V star, is the main settlement in the system, but has no facilities to support spaceships. No maintenance, refueling, rearming, no nothing. It's just a mining settlement with a population of 15m people (out of 22m in the entire system). Under current circumstances, a single heavy cruiser was stationed at Fand to provide protection, and was to be rotated annually. CA Calypso of Challenger R2 class, under CPT Werner Windisch, was standing watch at Fand, alone.

Off-Topic: show

Challenger R2 class Cruiser      15 926 tons       450 Crew       3 291.8 BP       TCS 319    TH 1 920    EM 750
6028 km/s      Armour 6-56       Shields 25-300       HTK 97      Sensors 14/14/0/0      DCR 29      PPV 91.26
Maint Life 2.30 Years     MSP 1 662    AFR 225%    IFR 3.1%    1YR 427    5YR 6 405    Max Repair 480 MSP
Magazine 210    Cryogenic Berths 200   
Captain    Control Rating 4   BRG   AUX   CIC   FLG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Morale Check Required   

Magneto-plasma Drive  EP960.00 (EP120/FC0.5) (2)    Power 1920    Fuel Use 35.27%    Signature 960    Explosion 12%
Fuel Capacity 950 000 Litres    Range 30.4 billion km (58 days at full power)
Delta S25 / R300 Shields (1)     Recharge Time 300 seconds (0.1 per second)

375mm FUV Spinal Laser (1)    Range 320 000km     TS: 6 250 km/s     Power 37-5     RM 50 000 km    ROF 40       
200mm FUV Laser (4)    Range 320 000km     TS: 6 250 km/s     Power 10-5     RM 50 000 km    ROF 10       
Mk 33 Gauss Cannon (6x4)    Range 30 000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 0-0     RM 30 000 km    ROF 5       
Mk 55 Mod 1 Gun FCS (1)     Max Range: 80 000 km   TS: 20 000 km/s     88 75 62 50 38 25 12 0 0 0
Mk 55 Mod 2 Gun FCS (1)     Max Range: 320 000 km   TS: 6 000 km/s     97 94 91 88 84 81 78 75 72 69
Tokamak Fusion Reactor R13 (2)     Total Power Output 25.1    Exp 5%

MSL-6A Missile Cell (35)     Missile Size: 6    Hangar Reload 122 minutes    MF Reload 20 hours
Mk 5 Missile FCS (5)     Range 60.4m km    Resolution 120
ASM-62 Spike Anti-Ship Missile (35)    Speed: 40 467 km/s    End: 20.6m     Range: 50.1m km    WH: 12    Size: 6    TH: 202/121/60

MDR-5M Missile Defense Radar (1)     GPS 63     Range 16.8m km    MCR 1.5m km    Resolution 1
ASR-5LR 6K Search Radar (1)     GPS 11760     Range 103.1m km    Resolution 120
EM Sensor EM1.0-14.0 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  29.6m km
Thermal Sensor TH1.0-14.0 (1)     Sensitivity 14     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  29.6m km

ECCM-3 (1)         ECM 40

A full-size task force (3 CA 8 DD) was sent from Sol to Rubino, but it was going to take a while. More than 10 days. So CA Calypso went solo to intercept the intruder, CA Mallorea II 003. Enemy CA was traveling slowly, at just 1492km/s, allowing it to be easily found on long range radar, after getting another course correction from active sensor signature intercept. At 0700 on October 4th, 2099, CA Calypso identified two more ships traveling with enemy CA. It was a CLE and a civilian JP stabilization ship.



We've met these types of cruisers before. Intel records showed that Trif CA was armed with str-18 particle lances, and CLE with Gauss Cannons. So far, there was no indication that the enemy used any type of missiles at all. Str-18 lance was the major threat to CA Calypso, so it was decided to start the engagement with missiles. The initial volley of 14 (2x7) standard size 6 ASM missiles was fired from 40m km, with 10 of them hitting enemy CA and 4 being intercepted by PD fire. The enemy group continued moving as if nothing happened.

Second missile volley was fired (21 missiles in 5 salvoes), but also made no effect.



At this point, CA Calypso began to close into beam fire range. Given the inferior speed of enemy warships, it was decided that we could disengage and move outside of enemy particle lances range if needed. Trying to stay within 300,000 km of the enemy, Calypso opened fire with its laser weapons against enemy CA. In the following attack, the distance jumped between 270 and 310 thousands km, and so only 375mm Far UV Spinal Laser was making any good damage (str 6 hits), with 200mm lasers making occasional str 1 glances.

After enduring our fire for six minutes and not firing anything in return, CA Mallorea II 003 surrendered!



The rest of the enemy ships were chased and gunned down just as easily, but neither decided to surrender. The entire close range beam battle was resolved in just 11 minutes. Two life pods with ~100 Trif were rescued.

It turned out that CA Mallorea was actually far more deadly to Calypso than previously thought. On paper, it had a significant speed of 7807 vs 6028 km/s of our Challenger class. Thankfully, it was traveling with slower ships and did not break formation, limiting its main advantage, which resulted in total defeat. On Humanity's part, a complete uselessness of size 6 ASM missiles against enemy cruiser was made quite obvious. Humanity was looking into creating a much larger missile before, but the number of missiles in the salvo was given higher priority, so nothing was actually built to this point. Now Humanity was interested in size 20+ missile, at least, in order to deal with heavy armored ships.