Likewise, I see no reason to change from "Great Justice".
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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[META] [RFC] Militarization around the 2022 period
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1st Autobot Space Cavalry
The combat-capable members of the 2022 Gnarlycurl crew are Wave Convoy, Tigre, Hotseat (wing one, Wheeljockeys) and newcomers (Needs A. Name) with her YF-24 Prophesy w/Paladin pack, Van Hamil with his Escaflowne, and the duo of A'son (Alison Winters) and Seventh (mecha dragon, pronounced sev-ENTH now despite originating from the numerical designation of the dragon mecha design) (wing two, Steelhearts.) Per PEPPER they are also part of the $GJ (number) Squadron, the other members of which fly BAT VF-1J Valkyries with Gnarlycurl-built full variable armored packs, who are stationed aboard since with the addition of Castle Borealis the 'curl tends to have about a hundred crew/residents and up to a thousand visitors aboard at any one time, and is a strong defensive point as well as a minor population center. (three Wild Raspberries and three Green Bananas pilots to be named later - Raspberries livery is HotPink, GhostWhite and MediumSeaGreen, Bananas is Chartreuse, LemonChiffon, and SaddleBrown - see a list of HTML names for color chips. Yes, these are two of my usual Macross ____ Frontier game color schemes, together with Sunbirds in Gold, Orange, and GhostWhite, and Wreckers in Crimson, Gold, and Black If anyone has name suggestions, I need two gals and four guys to balance numbers when combined with with the 1st ASC) Basically, though I joke about Taupe Squadron or Beige squadron, no one in a Macross style ride would fly anything with brown as a major color any more than Trekkies wear red shirts. So, if you have a story where you need the cavarly to come in for a save, you can have it. The Autobot Space Cavalry, because flying giant transforming robots with swords and lasers (in the lack of a reliably functional laser sword, so far) are a ninja, a dinosaur, and a monkey away from being the coolest thing ever, and a couple of the GJ pilots have obvious biomods... and another is seconded from Hidden Asteroid. Posted for comment before being put in the GC2022 reference thread. -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows  ClassicDrogn Wrote:Per PEPPER they are also part of the $GJ (number) Squadron,May as well just call then 1st Mecha - IIRC, it's not as if some other fictional mechs don't have air-support. ClassicDrogn Wrote:(three Wild Raspberries and three Green Bananas pilots to be named later ... If anyone has name suggestions, I need two gals and four guys to balance numbers when combined with with the 1st ASC)Sheryl Dorf. Okay, okay... Here are lists of http://www.behindthename.com/]given names and http://surnames.behindthename.com/origin.php]family names - using both lists, you can make up names that at least sound right... -- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
1st $GJ Mechanised Aerospace Squadron it is then. Also, that should be YF-_25_, the single shot seen of the 24 has a delta wing while the Prophecy in Macross the Ride has the nostalgic variable swept design. My tastes run more to rhomboid or forward swept these days... shorter/wider swept wings at least. Boo on Kawamori for a huge step backward in mecha design...
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows 
Hmmmm, I clearly need to adjust my timeline again slightly, Drogn. Let me poke at a few things.
2011: VF-1 Valkyrie deployed by GSS, based on rebuilt F-14 hulls 2013: After the attack on SerenityCon, FAST pack refits made available to GSS squadrons 2016: VF-1 production licensed to BAT. 2019: YF-4 prototype tested. 2020: VF-4 and FAST packs for it deployed to GSS. GSS as of 2020: First Space Legion (assignment: Home Defense) * 2x Eagle class Frigates (GSS Belisarius, Cincinnatus) * 1x Acquila class Destroyer (GSS Acquila) *-* VFS-105 Lancers (base: GSS Belisarius) *-* VFS-106 Cavaliers (base: GSS Cincinnatus) *-* VFS-109 Eagles (base: GSS Acquila) *-* VFS-110 Falcons (base: GSS Acquila) *-* VFS-201 Spartans (base: Greenwood) *-* VFS-202 Dragons (base: Greenwood) *-* VFS-203 Sharks (base: Greenwood) *-* VFS-204 Hammerheads (base: Greenwood) Second Space Legion (assignment: Colony Expedition) * GSS Artorius (Eagle-class Frigate) *-* VFS-104 Knights (base: GSS Artorius) *-* VFS-205 Firedrakes (base: GCAS Prydwen) *-* VFS-206 Jotuns (base: GCAS Prydwen) Third Space Legion (assignment: Convention Security/Great Justice) * GSS Scipio Africanus, Gaius Marius (Eagle-class frigates) *-* VFS-107 Punishers (base: GSS Scipio Africanus) *-* VFS-108 Gladiators (base: GSS Gaius Marius) -- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
Ooh, ooh, does this mean I can upgrade the Wild Raspberries and Green Bananas to the VF-4? Awesome! They're still getting Variable Protect Armor, though - the Lightning is actually easiest Macross design to armor up out of all the variable devices but the Feios. As for Nona Meisset and her YF-24, the electromagnetic quick-change system and inertia control are heavily 'waved one offs that defy reproduction on a production line basis. The 4's VPA is just slabs of foam base cybertronium plus some plumbing
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
and fire control hookups for fuel and missiles, so that can go into general supply if desired. One of the conformal missiles on each leg is covered and usually not mounted for safety reasons when the VF-4 VPA is equipped - a cookoff due to spalling inside an armor plate being decidedly unhealty for the craft in question.
Tech wise, do the GSS VF's have actual energy conversion armor or just use wavepaint? ETA - I see you've listed a VF-4 FAST on second read - do you have a design in mind? -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
One more question, how many planes are you putting in a named unit? I know doing it by wing elements is unrealistically small, but it's more fun that way, and these are still Fen.
A final note, I'm thinking something like the VF-25 Armored system with less wing clutter so it still has a vague pretence to aerodynamics. -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
What I'd like to do is keep GSS Variable Fighters one step ahead of what's on the 'public' market -- Stonewell-Bellcom is the primary design/research team looking into them. I plan on following fairly close to the canonical Macross timeline for deployment, with some exceptions (I may skip straight from VF-11 to VF-171, the VF-17 is just UGLY IMO. Or it might be a competing product from BAT?)
The VF-4 will have an early version of energy-conversion armor. The first wave of VF-1's were heavily-waved F-14's, as mentioned previously, and the second were basically hand-built by SBA technicians. A total of 75 airframes were built in this manner. 32 were destroyed in the Boskone War and 21 more in Vorax's War. (Most of the VF-4-equipped squadrons were forward-deployed with the Great Justice/UN fleet, Greenwood home defense had mostly VF-1's.) FAST-equipped VF-1's had a notable maneuverability advantage over Vorax's aerospace fighters and battlemechs but had difficulty penetrating their armor with the weapons available. Their own armor, while effective enough against the light missiles and smaller-caliber lasers employed by the pirate forces, had serious problems with heavier weapons such as PPCs, Large Lasers, and heavier-caliber autocannons. The VF-4 had better armor (with an early-generation handwavium energy-conversion system) that stood up better but was still not equal to Spheroid armors. Its weapons were considerably more effective, however, designed for use against armor equivalent to its own. Shortly after the incursion and the opening of contact with the Inner Sphere, SBA designers began work on incorporating Spheroid technology into the next-generation fighter. The VF-11 would begin deployment to GSS squadrons in (not-yet-finalized) with VF-4 licensing to other manufacturers shortly thereafter. (I plan to have the VF-171 as the GSS standard with the VF-25 hitting elite squadrons around the time of the Clan Invasion, in the Candle timeline.) BAT is the only company to mass-produce the VF-1. A GSS squadron is composed of 14 airframes, of which 12 are on active flight duty with two in reserve stores for replacements. An Eagle-class frigate can support a single squadron under normal operating conditions, an Acquila-class destroyer carries two. Tempted to increase the squadrons assigned to the Eta Cass expedition and home defense, but not sure. Acquila visual reference: http://ptn.home.xs4all.nl/Naval/Banshee.html -- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.
BAT might make the VF-17 - it's good to have a dedicated stealth-unit on the production lines. Definitely gonna build the VF-27 Lucifers. That's gonna be Mayonaka's upgrade.
Really, I can see BAT being fully in cooperation with SBA, to the point where all (or most) Veritechs pretty much wind up being branded SBA-BAT. As it is, looks like I'm gonna have to retcon a post or two in Shinji Ikari Raising Project to include Chris Marsden's involvement on the VF-4. And speaking of which... ClassicDrogn Wrote:"All the angles for the (VF-4) fit together (..) in robot mode itDear God, man! Where did THAT come from!? It's perfect! It's beautiful! I love it! It's going into the official BAT-SBA brochure! XD On another note.... Really, I think that BAT's factory lines are gonna be the scary-awesome aspect of Ben's genius that people underestimate. Think about it... these are fully automated factories that require very little in the way of human intervention (read: none at all). And the scariest part about it is that the whole kit-and-kaboodle functions as one big Von Neumann machine and can not only create fully assembled aerospace ships and craft from nothing but raw materials (or even wrecked machines)... it can build itself up and break itself down to fit production needs. Scary stuff indeed. Good thing it seems to really like Ben because he comes up with all kinds of cool stuff for it to build. (Don't forget, I already detailed all this before.) And Chris Marsden just gave it a fully mobile and self-sufficient platform to operate out of. Fenspace now has a mobile factory that can build just about anything you have plans and raw materials for. Chuck that into Candle in the Dark and watch as the Inner Sphere starts shitting itself in horror. This is, for practical purposes, a weapon unto itself... With this I think Ben would actually be reasonably satisfied - no need to actually build armies (yet). In the mean time, Ben would continue to improve upon existing designs and come up with more fun toys. 
Meanwhile the smaller garagiste builders who cater for the niche markets, mixing and matching parts from the various big concerns, or occasionally coming up with things thatre just a little bit far out there in the hopes of getting noticed and picking up a license fee. On the whole the smaller builders using customer parts might find themselves being sbout a generation behind, but better able to mix and max from various suppliers.
In general they consider themselves lucky to cover their operating costs through the end of the year. Some of them dont even have a full production capability and contract out under the HAP. ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
.... And then Ben look at that, and smiles as he goes, "Hmmmmm...."
"Hey Jet! Wanna cook up some custom accessory modules for the Outlaws? You prototype 'em, we build 'em. IP is all yours."
Meanwhile, Noah Scott looks on in horrified fascination, wondering why there needs to be an arms race now that the Boskone War is over (and completely ignoring the fact that his private yacht is armed). "Whatever happened to the 'peace dividend'?" he wonders to himself. "Why can't this brainpower be diverted to the Terraforming Projects or the Nikaido Foundation or the Blue Blazers? Or to space exploration?" Then he remembers the Fen live-and-let-live policy, and goes back to making money...
-- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
The price of peace is eternal vigilance.
The Boskone never stop thinking of ways to attack our way of life, and neither should we ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig? 
*looks in*
![[Image: emotpsynuke.gif]](http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/9834/emotpsynuke.gif) God. Fucking. Dammit. What is wrong with you people? Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information "I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
Boredom on con staff
Anyway, the upgrades to the outlaw class offered by Jet are a fusion booster system for the main engines to increase top speed to. 12c. A carrier rack allowing Havoc-sized spacecraft to be transported as parasites on both horizontal nacelle Pylons. And a systems retrofit that enables one to be piloted without a shipmind AI. Armaments wise, the OEM defences are replaced a 75mm autocannon setup, which has almost zero sensor signature compared to an EM weapon, and an initial charge time of however long it takes to flick a switch from 'Safe' to 'Arm'. It has less hitting power than coilguns, but under the armed guns of a pirate ship, it'll buy time and surprise to turn and burn At least thats the theory behind the Dragon Wagon..... Gotta run... ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
... Don't look at me, I just wanted an equal number of outside GJ members to legitimize my half dozen mecha as an aerospace squadron - and the VF Whichever pilots are presumably using hardware on PEPPER loan as well as being assigned to it themselves. They fly patrols and do live fire excercises with drones and the occasional uninhabited asteroid because that's what mecha fans enjoy (and the streamcast ratings are high to prove it) as much as for real readiness, but the readiness aspect is there... even in
-- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
a 'nice universe' like Fenspace there are nasty people. It's hardly any different than the Warsie's 'endless fleet maneuvers.'
The .sig came from the Macrossworld forums, on p22 iirc of the thread in Overtech Think Tank - Toys on the forthcoming Yamato web-exclusive VF-4. There's time to preorder one if you haven't, Nippon Yashan apparenty has the best price on offer from what I've seen, but it's still too rich for my blood. ç_ç The bit about wearing a plane as a pelt turned out to be itself paraphrased -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
from someone else's review of the recent LEGIOSS Alpha toy, but NeoverseOmega did write that, in a doublepost followup to the rest, and I was out of entry box space on the .sig, hence two dot elipsises.
Anyway, my point is that having time to play with their toys, build better ones, and hold combat EXCERCISES or just Vanquish races without the real threat of deadly violence IS a peace dividend as far as some people are concerned. (points out that my 2 primary fandoms add up to ~250 million years of war) -- "Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
Mal... where the hell did you get that emote? It is freaking killing me here. No, seriously, it may be just the lack of sleep but I've been laughing like a loon at that damn thing for the last ten minutes.
Anyhow... I guess this is the part where I tell you to relax, I've come to my senses, and the Roughriders won't have a huge buildup. Instead, they'll just keep abreast of the demands set forth by Great Justice. (And Ben will make sure his voice is heard regarding how stringent those demands be. Alien space bats? NIMBY!) The fact that Ben has a mobile Von Neumann factory... that'll keep me warm at night. Sure, it can produce a metric frack-ton of mecha with a push of a button... but for now, we'll be pushing the buttons that say "Construction-kitted Outlaw" and "Courrier-kitted Blackbird" and "Cargo-kitted Peacemaker". The various blue-collar factions will probably be very happy with products like those. Hmmmm.... If BAT starts making Corellian YT-series ships, how well do you think they'd sell?
People want their toys to play with, and in Fenspace the toys can be really cool.
One of the problems I see with the Roughtrides is that they're a Mercenary Force. That's how BA has set them up, and Ben is written to be part of that. As such they need an industrial base to support that. In a combat situation like the Boskone War it's all well and good, in the peace afterwards? Not so much. Yes, I can see the general De-Milling of Fenspace is a good thing. As is the formalisation of Great Justice (under the PEPPER treaties). How do we get round this problem of Factions wantingto build up mil-tech, and the others wanting to scale down? One way I see handling this is CONSTANT upgrades. The peace faction gets to dismantle the older hardware for recycling, the military-industrial complex gets to develop and build the new stuff (according to GJ specs). And GJ mothballs a percentage for emergencies. With the industrial base constantly advancing to both recycle the old stuff and build the new stuff, if there comes a need to step up (due to something like an invasion) the advanced weaponry of the Fen (and reserves in mothballs) should give them enough time to switch/expand the production lines to deal with it. Once it's over, they recycle the old/unused/unwanted hardware. Of course, this is all my opinion. Use only where recommended by your Doctor, not to be used while skydiving, etc...
BA: All in favor of partnership. I can see demilled VF-1's being a popular civilian item in mid-late Season 2. Fast, versatile, and cool.
YT-hull freighters... yeah, those'll sell like hotcakes, especially to Warsies who don't already have one.  Now I just have to figure out a way to fit the VF-9 Cutlass into my timeline somewhere, because it's cool. I've already settled on the VF-14 Vampire as an export model built by an eventual Gwynedd-based competitor of SBA... VF-9 might be their early product. If you want the -17 it's yours, at the appropriate point in the timeline. -- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode. Dartz Wrote:The price of peace is eternal vigilance.That doesn't require an arms race, though. Take a look at what the average police officer is issued nowadays, compared to what he was issued two decades ago or five decades ago - the improvements are in communications and defence, not in offense. (And, yes, that is the correct comparison - Boskone is a collection of organized crime cartels, not an enemy nation.) -- Rob Kelk "Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of the same sovereign, servants of the same law." - Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
My brain is running out my ears a l ittle bit but it was a half-joke based on the famous George
Bush quote with a certain ring of truth. Its also an attitude that would be endemic among some of those who mightve been involved in OGJ who are deeply fear having to go through the whole thing all over agaun. Theres also the fact that most of our favourite shows are of the 'combat' variety and some of the most compelling series with dedicated fandoms are based around vehicles that are essentially weapons. The vast majority of replicas are probably sold to the civilian market who just want sonething 'cool' like their favourite hero. It might be a weapon on paper but its never going to be used for anything but showing off or letting someone indulge their inner macross ________________________________ --m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Do we need a Weapons Otaku Limitation Ban? [grin]
Seriously, one of the things that I thought particularly attractive about Fenspace was the way it swung the balance between offence and defence firmly over towards "defence". There hasn't been much science fiction that explores this; the force shields in "Dune" are one example (and I think those were cribbed from an older novel). Guns mean you can injure or kill at range with little risk unless the target is alert and also has a gun - a gamble no one who isn't desperate or an adrenaline junkie would want to take. Fenspace armour and force fields that mean you can ignore most guns are a novel and refreshing idea. Sort of a cross between a super hero and a science fiction theme. -- "It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind |
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