Quest Deep Periphery Quest (Battletech Sandbox Empire Builder)

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
It would make more sense if we're constantly reinventing the wheel by designing new ASF, Mechs, and dropships from scratch. I'd believe a year for taking a known design and changing the weapon load out, or a minor redesign for a XL engine. A year for step one is kind of insane.

It's not insane when we have a full, undamaged Star League grade educational system at the base of our rebuilding. We're basically the opposite of the Inner Sphere -- they have the physical infrastructure but not the knowledge, so they can produce large numbers of existing designs but it's incredibly difficult for them to make new designs. We have the full knowledge base but only have as much physical infrastructure as we build/rebuild for ourselves.

In effect, the Inner Sphere is the tattered zombie remnants of the Star League; we're the last uninfected bastion standing. So yes, *we are* that much more capable than they are.

The 2nd Succession war, and Holy Shroud ended in the early to mid 2800s. Even if the snakes showed up decades before the 2930 start of the quest they shouldn't have SHIT to bring with them.

We already know they showed up decades before start of quest, because the Quest literally started with their first major attack on us.
 

Lancelot

Well-known member
It's not insane when we have a full, undamaged Star League grade educational system at the base of our rebuilding.

Haven't we only recently returned to SL level education I remember seeing those options picked over the years and hitting SL level was pretty recent.

We already know they showed up decades before start of quest, because the Quest literally started with their first major attack on us.

So in that case they set off while the Inner sphere was still cannibalizing everything from mechs to jumpships. There were a hand full of new mech and ASF a year and they were horribly downgraded compared to standard IS tech.

Shouldn't we have gotten some idea at this point how they have all this metal to throw at us? Coming from the combine is insane when they'd have to cross most of the Inner sphere.
 

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
Haven't we only recently returned to SL level education I remember seeing those options picked over the years and hitting SL level was pretty recent.

We've had Improved Education 1 and 2 since Year 6 and 7 respectively, Improved Education 3 was Year 14.
 

Lancelot

Well-known member
We've had Improved Education 1 and 2 since Year 6 and 7 respectively, Improved Education 3 was Year 14.

So for the century or so before the start of the quest and after the KF accident Education on the world was kind of shit is what I'm getting at. That doesn't support the idea that we'd have the full knowledge base. Hell our best educated people are just entering their forties.

But these problems(plot holes?) are distractions. At this point in time how the fuck does a small group from a crippled Inner sphere have access to this much metal? Whatever the answer is why don't we know about it from interrogations?
 

Jarow

Well-known member
[X]Can be a royal yacht and also open to the public!

Kinda want to go the other one for story reasons, but I'm still too much a mechanics-focused person to make any other choice.


At this point in time how the fuck does a small group from a crippled Inner sphere have access to this much metal?
Two possibilities: first, Nowy Warszawa (the planet we know they conquered) already had some factories before it was conquered. Not unbelievable, any they had wouldn't have gotten destroyed in Holy Shroud given how far out we are. Second, the Inner Sphere is in better shape than canon, at least as far as manufacturing goes. They're probably about the same in terms of technological collapse, but maybe thy have more lines on more planets, or are better able to build/repair existing ones. This is possible, but hard to tell. It would make things work better from a quest perspective though, making the IS closer to the power they're supposed to be.

As for our research speed, I'd guess part of it is story-gameplay segregation - there's probably a lot of theory work going into everything we're not working on in the background, with the research actions being more "put everything together" than "figure out how this works."
 
Last edited:

Lancelot

Well-known member
Second, the Inner Sphere is in better shape than canon, at least as far as manufacturing goes. They're probably about the same in terms of technological collapse, but maybe thy have more lines on more planets, or are better able to build/repair existing ones. This is possible, but hard to tell. It would make things work better from a quest perspective though, making the IS closer to the power they're supposed to be.

Nowy from their POV posts didn't have anything but tanks and jets from the sound of it.

That could be true I suppose they'd still be irreplaceable. Also doesn't change by this point the interrogations/Canopus agent should have given us a straight answer. How their pulling dozens of dropships out of their ass, among other things, is going to make a massive difference in how we'll counter attack when our jumpships are ready.
 

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
OK, I'll give a longer essay later on on this.

However, the canonical extreme shortage of dropships and jumpships is completely nonsensical and incompatible with the continued existence of interstellar states. In short, it's pure FASAnomics of the most annoying kind.

For perspective, here are the maximum cargo capacities for cargo hauling dropships.

Mammoth - 37,815
Mule - 8,145
Behemoth - 75,120
Buccaneer - 2,329

Now let us compare this to one small slice of Real World shipping requirements for a single industry in a single region. Namely the Great Lakes Iron Trade.

In one year, 2019, in iron ore alone on the Great Lakes alone in US flagged vessels alone (therefore excluding all of the Canadian-flagged vessels in the trade) there was a total of 49.7 million tons of iron ore carried from port to port.

If we assume we are only using Behemoth's (the most efficient option) to handle this, there would need to be a total of 662 full Behemoth loads in a single year. And this is for *one* commodity along *one* trade route in *one* market. And the Behemoth is supposedly the *rarest* of the cargo vessels in BTech.

Using the most common hull, the Mule, it would require 6,102 full Mule loads in a single year.

So, let's go with the Mule's, since they are the common hull. To transport 49.7 million tons of a commodity 1 jump away, assuming 1 week transit times inbound and outbound, and eliding out loading/unloading times, maintenance requirements, etc, would require a minumum of 59 Mules in continuous service. At an average of 4 collars per jumpship, this would require 15 jumpships exclusively devoted to this trade.

Now multiply this out for multiple trades, multiple systems, etc, and you see just how bad FASAnomics is for shipping.
 

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
More to the point, it's literally what the SS United States was built to do. It would, in so many ways, be a betrayal of her spirit to keep her all for ourselves.
 

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
More on FASAnomics, Dropships, and Jumpships.

For the purposes of this quest, we are trying to ignore FASAnomics wherever possible. Therefore, civilian grade dropship production (see above post) is still quite possible throughout the Inner Sphere and there are sufficient numbers to support the nation states. Moreover, Jumpship production is also not nearly as badly constrained as canon, because if it were none of the Successor States would still exist.

Now, *military* dropship construction is a different story, they require different construction techniques to begin with. A shipyard that can produce a 1000 ft Great Lakes Ore Carrier cannot build a mere 200 ft frigate without massive renovations and upgrades. Different techniques are required, different tools, different training. Extend that to dropships, which are far more specialized.

The Great Houses *do* suffer from shortages of the major combat dropships, between relatively low production rates and continual loss rates.

So therefore, in DPQ.

Civilian Dropship production and numbers are adequate to sustain current economic activity, even now at the height of the 3rd Succession War.

Jumpship production is barely able to keep up with demand, with the Great Houses having to rob Peter to pay Paul in order to engage in offensives by taking important resources away from economic activities. The moratorium on destroying Jumpships is slowly correcting this problem for everybody.

Military Dropship production is barely keeping pace with losses. Every Great House is trying to build new military dropship capacity and ComStar continuously leaks the intel to rivals in order to sabotage it.
 

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
This makes a lot of sense. It's entirely logical that the targeting and destruction of vital infrastructure in the First and Second Succession Wars almost exclusively targeted military infrastructure; civilian infrastructure would generally only be targeted when "scorched earth" tactics were specifically called for, and this was rare.

So the Inner Sphere lost all of its ability to produce and maintain WarShips, most of its ability to produce and maintain combat DropShips, and some of its ability to produce and maintain dual purpose DropShips, but in fact retained most of its ability to produce civilian-grade DropShips. The ability to produce JumpShips was impacted but not nearly to the absurdly tiny production levels of FASAnomic canon, and there was also a *much* bigger pool of surviving JumpShips as well.
 

Lancelot

Well-known member
More on FASAnomics, Dropships, and Jumpships.

For the purposes of this quest, we are trying to ignore FASAnomics wherever possible. Therefore, civilian grade dropship production (see above post) is still quite possible throughout the Inner Sphere and there are sufficient numbers to support the nation states. Moreover, Jumpship production is also not nearly as badly constrained as canon, because if it were none of the Successor States would still exist.

As for FASAnomics keep in mind that the vast majority of even inner sphere worlds have low populations. Beyond named worlds like Solaris, sector, and nations capitals that are in the billions. The majority of the rest of those worlds have populations in the low millions, with more than a few worlds that edge the periphery only being six digit.

As far as I can tell these lesser worlds are mostly self sufficient, because the ones that weren't have been abandoned, and only see rarely see trade jumpships.
 

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
Laughably unrealistic planetary populations are the first stage of FASAnomic absurdity, not an excuse for it. No habitable, developed, and established world should have a global population that is not in the billions. Earth today is already at over 7.5 billion, and that's for what is by BTech standards a lightly populated low-tech backwater.
 

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Note that my numbers were for *one* trade in *one* section of the planet. That tonnage requirement is the minimum needed for a single system to be supported in any meaningful way, and no, most worlds are not autarkies, except for the very poorest and most marginal.

Stop trying to justify FASAnomics, simple growth curves would have the populations of any habitable planet capable of supporting life growing into the 7 to 10 digit level over the centuries. A sparsely inhabited world, without FASAnomics, would be in the millions, the vast majority of Terrestrial worlds would be in the hundreds of millions to billions.

The numbers of FASAnomics are simply absurd and we will not be bound by them.
 

Lancelot

Well-known member
Laughably unrealistic planetary populations are the first stage of FASAnomic absurdity, not an excuse for it. No habitable, developed, and established world should have a global population that is not in the billions. Earth today is already at over 7.5 billion, and that's for what is by BTech standards a lightly populated low-tech backwater.

You don't get billions on a out of the way world that has only been colonized for five to ten generations and started with a five digit population. Those rare perfect Garden worlds, or national important worlds get the high starting populations and the constant immigration to put them in the billions. Put those worlds with billions are still a minority in each start nation, or at least they should be.
 
Turn 40 - I Am Whole Again

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Turn 40 - I Am Whole Again

You’d been dreading finding out what the ‘commemoration of 40 years of rule’ art installation would be, especially since everybody was conspiring to keep you away from it until it was opened. Knowing some of the people involved, including your children, and Willis, you were expecting something totally embarrassing, at least at first.

To your pleasant surprise, however, it is extremely tasteful. A large art gallery dedicated to the entire dynasty, with areas dedicated to each of your ancestors and a central gallery dedicated to your reign. When Jeremy takes over the family business your display would be moved to a dedicated gallery and one for him would take over the central gallery.

Of course there was the comedic image of the ‘evolution of the Imperial uniform’ showing concept art of just how ridiculously long the swoopy point would be for Empress. Any piece of clothing that requires counterweights and scaffolding to support is too big. One that requires you to be followed around by one of the Ultra-Light Mechs to hold it up is just too much. The point had to be a good thirty meters long!

From the smirks you are almost certain that Sarah and Willis are to blame for that particular piece of art. So you cheerfully start speculating on appointing your darling daughter as the official Imperial Historian and requiring her to wear an official Imperial Historian Uniform based on the most outre and downright over the top Baroque looniness you’d ever seen in any fashion history book.

You shouldn’t have been surprised when Jane suddenly piped up “Great idea, boss, I’ll get right on it’ and ran off before you could stop her, accompanied by the horrified groans of Sarah.

Oh well, you wouldn’t have to wear it.

In your opinion the nicest thing about the gallery was that each exhibit wasn’t simply of artwork and photographs, but there was also historical information and displays including related artifacts and listings of other museums and historical sites of interest. Whoever had designed this place had done an extremely good and thorough job.

Ever since internal immigration to Nowy Gdansk had been opened up a steady stream of people had headed there despite the horrific weather conditions. As a consequence economic activity had picked up tremendously, showing the great benefit of having more markets for commercial purposes. However there is a downside, the people on Nowy Gdansk are demanding more dedicated defensive forces to be assigned there.

[]AgreeCommit to producing either 1 Planetary Defense Wing to be stationed on Nowy Gdansk or 3 Standard Armored Regiments to be stationed on Nowy Gdansk or the construction of a Star Fort in Nowy Gdansk orbit within 5 turns.
If successfully completed within that time:
+10 POP growth on Nowy Gdansk for 5 turns
+10 GDP growth on Nowy Gdansk for 5 turns
[]Disagree-10 Politics
-10 Stability
-10 Stability Change

With the completion of the surveys on Griffin IV and the pending completion of the various ongoing DoME projects you attend a meeting where representatives of DoME and the nascent Bureau of Colonization go over the possibilities and requirements for colonizing Griffin IV.

Before starting, efforts would be made to gather specimens of surviving life forms of the planet and transporting them to controlled environments in order to preserve the various species, although it is feared that in the short years since you’ve first landed there several of them have gone extinct as they were so close to the edge.

Then the actual process of colonization would begin.

First order of business would be deorbiting the ice comet so that it impacts on the surface. Within a year the various after-effects of the impact would have calmed enough for a proper colonial expedition to be landed and colonization to officially begin.

Then the next priority would be resculpting the terrain around the existing oceans. There is plenty of water there, it is just far too alkaline and ‘dead’. Massive dredging operations of the land surrounding the deep oceans and dumping the fill into the oceans would simultaneously allow the water to spread out, encouraging evaporation and contributing further to the water cycle of the planet while slowly filling in the depths and, hopefully, buffering the alkalinity of the water with far more acidic sediment.

It is expected that the chemical reactions from this process may produce poisonous fogs of chlorine gas and other, equally unpleasant, chemicals. Therefore large air filtration systems based off of those used in dropship life support systems would be deployed to scrub the atmosphere.

Agronomists would then begin introducing hardy grass species that are capable of surviving with minimal water in an effort to prevent excessive soil erosion. Specially modified small craft and aerodyne dropships would be used to broadcast the seed and spray fertilizer and mist water during this process.

Once the pH levels of the oceans reach levels where water purification equipment can be used for more than 5 minutes before corroding into uselessness, said equipment will be installed.

When the initial tranche of ocean widening projects are complete an evaluation will occur to determine the best steps forward at that point. It is believed that several iterations of terrain modification will be required to produce a healthy water cycle on the planet, including the potential for at least one and possibly two more ice-comet bombardments.

So, at minimum, it would be at least 5 years before we started to see the first minimal return on investment from the colonization project, returns would be very small for the next decade or so, certainly beneath the costs required for the project, but by year 20 or so the project should begin paying for itself and become a net positive for the Imperial economy.
 

Knowledgeispower

Ah I love the smell of missile spam in the morning
[X] Argee

Well due to the massive production facility we're building on Nowy Gdansk the kind of defences they want where on my to do list anyways so we might as well get a reward for it
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Top