Helloooooo Everybodyyyyyyy (I am in a Grover kind of mood): Following the
positive reviews I got about this series on this mailing list, I have started
reading the "Honor Harrington" series by David
Weber. Right now, I am 1/4 of of the way through "On Basilisk Station"
and from what I have read so far Full Thrust conversion will be difficult at
best. I have a rundown of the technology I have seen so far. Feel free to add
on or to correct me if I am wrong.
Movement:
The ships use gravitic proplusion to manuver in both "n-space"
and to enter hyperspace or a wormhole. It would appear that ships follows
realistic vector movment rather than the popular "airplanes-in-space"
style of travel.
Defenses: In the "Harrington" universe a military ship's drive field creates a
"impeller wedge:" an impenetrable barrier above and under the ship leaving the
bow, stern, port and starboard open. The front and rear can not be protected,
but the flanks are covered by a "sidewall" shield. The sidewalls are by no
means as strong as the wedges and can be breached.
Weapons: Missiles: These seem to the primary "long range" weapon of the
"Harrington" Universe. Lasers & Grasers (Gamma Ray Lasers I assume): These
weapons seem to be most effective at short range. Given how energenic gamma
rays are, I
would think that these would be more powerful than a run-of-the-mill
laser. Energy Torpedos: Quick firing, devasting against unscreened targets,
but are somewhat ineffective against sidewalls and they have a very short
range. Grav Lance: Great for bringing down sidewalls, but in takes up a lot of
space, has very limited range, and is slow to load.
Any ideas?
Later,
Mark,
I'm not sure about this, because my brother still has my copies of the books
(*#@!*), but I believe that at the end of the 3d book (?) there is an appendix
that describes the PSB behind the armaments and equipment in the series.
I believe that the only really sticky points to converting the Harrington
universe to FT is the missiles and sidewalls.
The multi-missile launches required have been touched on recently.
For the sidewalls, off the top of my head I would say that they would be like
another system that is declared on or off. In reality would be like another
system that is declared on or off. In reality
> jazz.ucc.uno.edu wrote:
--I'm not sure about this, because my brother still has my copies of
--the books (*#@!*), but I believe that at the end of the 3d book (?)
--there is an appendix that describes the PSB behind the armaments
--and equipment in the series.
The summary is in the Appendix of 'A Short Victorious War' ASVW which contains
some of the better SF big ship battle scenes in any books I have read. It also
contains lots of the isn't 'Honor Wonderful' yucky bits.
One of the conversion issues in the Honor Harrington Universe (HHU) is the
ability of the ships to roll thus using the impenetrable impellor wedge as an
unbreachable shield. As this 3D tactical manoeuvering is the essence of many
encounters as well as the inertia/vector movement it would be nice to
capture that in the FT conversion. The ships all have inertial dampers without
which you could not survive the 500G accelerations. This equipment should be
on the SSD so
that if you loose it at hi-G - yucky (this event is mentioned in ASVW).
As to weapons what you summarise seems fine. In 'A Short Victorious War' the
weapon systems I remember most were, scatter pack missle pods towed behind
ships
on tractor beams. Lots & lots of PDAF/ADAF ability for massive missile
(800+)
swarms.
Also the use of Mines, that use single shot fusion bombs to fire high enery
beams.
Ships of the 'Wall' Massive Super Dreadmoughts that destroy a 3xBC in a single
salvo! The 'Wall' is a formation where Super/Dreadnoughts form a wall in
space as they stack vertically. This is they used to bring massive of
firepower on the enemy.
The other thing is the whole sensors & detection game which really gives the
tension in the HHU, with the Manticore Navy (USA) having FTL sensors while the
Peoples Republic Of Haven (USSR) don't have them, but they do have stealth
platforms (Spy Trawlers).
The HHU cries out for Campaign rules as well as a lot of the bluff & counter
bluff to get more ships against less ships ultimately gets you victory. ASVW
is all about fleet dispositions & strategic bluffing.
Oh yes they have jump points, similar to B5. Jump engines have to cycle.
For ship models - scratch build - ASVW gives a synopsis of what a ship
looks
like but it wasn't that clear to be - ASCII art anyone?
I'd love to know how Mr Wikan does those incredibly cool B5/SW counters,
I
suspect he has a nice solid modeller/renderer somewhere?
Tim
> I'd love to know how Mr Wikan does those incredibly cool B5/SW
While I do have an incredibly solid modeling program (3DSMAX) The counters are
just plain old photoshop drawn art with a couple "leg ups" from captured
images from the series (White Star, Shadows). Thanks for the pat on the back!
BTW, I am working on the Rebel Mon Cal cruisers to add to the SW counter
sheets. Hang in there!
I still have my Harrington books at home, so here goes:
> On Tue, 20 Aug 1996 timj@uk.gdscorp.com wrote:
> One of the conversion issues in the Honor Harrington Universe (HHU) is
OTOH, although many ships are battered to within an inch of exploding (and
many more are utterly destroyed), NONE of them actually suffers damper
failure. Inertial dampening seems to be more a function of speed (and ship
size) rather than of battle damage.
> As to weapons what you summarise seems fine. In 'A Short Victorious
Scatter packs with more than 10 times beam range, in that case... since our
heroes in that battle never entered beam range of those peep DNs. The missile
pods fire ordinary ship missiles.
> Lots & lots of PDAF/ADAF ability for massive missile (800+)
I'd add lots and lots of missiles. Harrington missiles behave much like
MT missiles (but have a pre-set target), but use internal launchers (and
ships tend to have _lots_ of missiles aboard. Beam range is something to
be avoided (... if you have superior missile and point defence tech, of
course) since it is so very deadly. Internal magazines and launchers are
vulnerable to battle damage, though.
> Also the use of Mines, that use single shot fusion bombs to fire high
Pretty similar to FT mines, but cost less compared to ships (I think).
> Ships of the 'Wall' Massive Super Dreadmoughts that destroy a 3xBC in
Correction: On one occasion, a DREADNOUGHT destroys 4 BCs which are
unfortunate enough to leave hyperspace within beam range of it. Had they
dropped out of hyper further away, the DN wouldn't have been able to catch it.
A SUPERdreadnought is 15-20% bigger than a Dreadnought...
...
> Oh yes they have jump points, similar to B5. Jump engines have to
Well... Jump points are like Starfire WPs, instantly transporting you
from one specific point to another, but having some mass/time limits.
'Normal' hyper travel, OTOH, takes measurable time; some speeds I recall
are 1000-1200 times light speed 'effectively' (ie, in normal space).
> For ship models - scratch build - ASVW gives a synopsis of what a ship
Take a hammer head. Flatten the ends out a bit. Punch some marks in along the
side to represent weapon bays...
Regards,
> On Mon, 19 Aug 1996, Mark A. Siefert wrote:
> Movement:
and to
> enter hyperspace or a wormhole. It would appear that ships follows
Grasers are said to be far better mass-wise than lasers, but each of
them uses more mass than a laser; so smaller ships are more or less restricted
to ordinary lasers.
> Energy Torpedos: Quick firing, devasting against unscreened
Totally ineffective against 'military-grade' sidewalls (ie, anything
_any_ military ship, at least down to destroyer-sized ships); but
extremely devastating otherwise.
> Grav Lance: Great for bringing down sidewalls, but in takes up
Range about 25% of normal beam range...
Since long-range missiles are the main weapon, I'd start with slashing
beam ranges to... very low. 12 m.u., maximum? No, that's too long - 6
m.u.?
Missile ranges are some 10 times greater (IIRC, could well be wrong). Also,
missiles 'inherit' the speed of the launch platform, and can go ballistic if
they have to travel far.
Internal launchers and magazines for missiles are a must. A big SD should be
able to carry several broadsides of many missiles each.
Of course, you don't want to track all missiles; in some of the bigger
battles, the initial (pod-enhanced) salvos consist of over 3000
missiles. That even beats SFB <VBG> One way could be to use one missile marker
for
each salvo from a ship, noting down how many missiles are left in that
salvo; but this involves lots of book-keeping. Point defences are
crucial.
Good luck!
> Oerjan Ohlson wrote:
--Take a hammer head. Flatten the ends out a bit. Punch some marks in
along
--the side to represent weapon bays...
What sort of hammer like a hammer head shark head?
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Is this what you have just described?
> On Tue, 20 Aug 1996 timj@uk.gdscorp.com wrote:
> Oerjan Ohlson wrote:
No. A hammer head like the metal part of a hammer with a wooden shaft,
though lacking a goats foot in one end. I meant a _real_ hammer, not a
shark...
> On Tue, 20 Aug 1996 RMMDC@jazz.ucc.uno.edu wrote:
[good suggestions snipped]
> Problem: are impeller wedges truly impervious?
Yes... or at least the chance of anything managing to cause damage through
them is so astronomical we'd need horrendous amounts of D6 to resolve it. You
cannot target anything through the wedges (well, the ship protected by the
wedges have some very limited scanner abilities, but not other ships),
material objects are torn apart if they hit the wedge, and
beams are twisted aside.
> It has been a
No. Re-read 'The Honor of the Queen'; RMNS Warlock (a heavy cruiser)
closed to energy range with the battlecruiser PNS Saladin by interposing its
wedge - only missiles could harm it.
With missiles, you can always fire 'above' or 'below' the wedge -
detonating the missile so it hits the sidewall instead. In FT terms, it could
be something like 'if the missile ends it's move within (reasonable
distance - 3 m.u.?) of its _intended_target_ (remember, HHU missiles are
assigned a single target on launch, and rarely change target in
mid-flight - it does happen, though, as RMNS Circe didn't have time to
notice before it blew up), it hits the sidewall instead', or something like
that.
> Question on the sidewalls: these are like the shields that we are
They aren't exactly ablative; either the sidewall is there, or it isn't,
but it comes in sections. A ship can lose part of its sidewall, meaning that
some stretch of one side of the ship is unprotected.
Regards,
Sorry about that partial message yesterday. I was working on a terminal at the
school's computer center when a bunch of garbage from the central server came
on the screen. Following the wonderful advice of the
oh-so-skilled experts staffing the place, the letter was sent as is
instead of just clearing the garbage off the screen. I suppose that I
have to give them half credit--the garbage was cleared out of the
letter. I didn't even realize the message had been sent until it came back to
me a little while later, and by then I had to go. Oh well. Needless to say, I
hate the school's system, but unlimited internet access for $20 a semester is
hard to beat.:>
Anyway......
Suggestion for the Impeller wedges and sidewalls for the Honor Harrington
universe:
We are fighting in a 2D environment, so IMHO a ship is either flying with it's
wedges or sidewalls engagable by the enemy. Each ship is declared to be either
flying "normally" with the wedges up and down relative to the playing surface;
the ship can fire and be fired at through the sidewalls, which are along the
plane of the playing surface. The sidewalls would be the shields as we know
them.
OR...
The ship is "rolled up" with its impeller wedges interposed on the plane of
the playing surface and can therefore not fire. It also can not be damaged
except down the throat or up the kilt.
Every ship is simply declared to be in one position or the other, and it can
change between the two during the movement phase.
Problem: are impeller wedges truly impervious? It has been a little while
since I read these. If they are, with a 2D system like FT, interposing the
wedges would seem to allow for "suicide missions" like some destroyer running
up on a superdreadnought and being safe from damage at long range. This may
not be a problem because I seem to recall that damage is possible through the
wedges, it's just not easy.
Question on the sidewalls: these are like the shields that we are familiar
with, but would they be like the ones in FT or are they more like the ablative
ones that have popped up here occasionally?
That's my $0.01. (Hey, I'm a poor starving actor. I can't afford as much as
the rest of you.:))
Out here.
-monty
> RMMDC@jazz.ucc.uno.edu writes:
@:)
@:) Suggestion for the Impeller wedges and sidewalls for the Honor @:)
Harrington universe:
@:)
@:) We are fighting in a 2D environment, so IMHO a ship is either flying @:)
with it's wedges or sidewalls engagable by the enemy.
@:)
@:) Every ship is simply declared to be in one position or the other, @:) and
it can change between the two during the movement phase.
This is a good idea. Those of you not recreating the Honor Harrington universe
might want to consider a similar idea that my group has been using, with some
success (I wonder if any real FT rules
are still buried under our system somewhere?) - the roll manouver.
For two thrust points, a ship can roll itself upside down so that its port
weapons now face starboard and vice versa. This rule tends to give somewhat
more flexibility to smaller ships, which hopefully can somehow make up for the
fact that most of them don't ever manage to get off a shot before they get
piffled. Well, actually, I guess rolling won't help that problem but it means
your flaming wreckage sure will look cool spinning off into space....