Outsider Ground War

Discussion regarding the Outsider webcomic, science, technology and science fiction.

Moderator: Outsider Moderators

Post Reply
Just a Crazy-Man
Posts: 89
Joined: Sat Sep 22, 2012 2:10 pm

Outsider Ground War

Post by Just a Crazy-Man »

What are the ground armies, aircraft, marine, armor, sea ships (If they got them), or troops of the races ground war capabilities like in Outsider.

User avatar
Arioch
Site Admin
Posts: 4486
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:19 am
Location: San Jose, CA
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Arioch »

All of the major combatants will have some version of:
  • Armored infantry armed with the high-tech equivalent of assault rifles. Very heavy weapons will mostly be self-propelled.
    • Loroi infantry units will often be led by Teidar officers with dangerous psi abilities.
    • Umiak have elite heavy infantry units called Hardtroops that have extensive cyborg modifications.
    • Barsam, as you may imagine, make fearsome infantry soldiers.
  • Armored Fighting Vehicles can fly, and can serve as armored personnel carriers, close air support, artillery, anti-armor, limited air to air and in some cases orbital dropships. Though there will also always be dedicated variants for each of these roles, I think flexible multirole AFV's will have a lot of appeal. Some AFV's may have multiple components (similar to the dropship/APC combo in Aliens).
  • Dedicated atmospheric combat aircraft used for air-to-air and close air support will often have trans-atmospheric capability, both so they can be used against orbital targets and so that they can be deployed from orbit. Many of these will be unmanned (especially among the Umiak, whose pilots do not tolerate G-stresses well).
  • Orbital warships play an important role in ground combat, being able to provide on-demand bombardment capability. The side that wins the space battle for orbital superiority will have an immense advantage in ground combat over the side that lost.
Naval combat vessels are primarily useful against an opponent on the same planet that also has naval vessels. They don't have much specific use against off-planet attackers, and naval units (including submarines) are vulnerable to airborne and orbital threats, so most armed naval vessels will be for internal patrol and security.

gh88
Posts: 1
Joined: Mon Nov 26, 2012 7:11 am

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by gh88 »

Are submarines vulnerable to airborne and orbital threats? I'm not sure...

During the Cold War, part of the appeal of nuclear submarines was their immunity to detection and their ability to launch a devastating strike even after one's home country had been completely wiped out by a surprise nuclear attack. Part of what makes them impossible to detect is that deep salt water, will scatter and attenuate all electromagnetic waves quite strongly, especially at radio frequencies and higher. That's why military communication with submarines is limited to very low bandwidths at very low frequencies (below 100 Hz). The wavelength of a 100 Hz wave underwater is over 2,000 km, so a radar system running at low enough frequencies to penetrate deep salt water wouldn't really be able to pick up targets smaller than a large island, and that's being very generous with assumptions about technology. It would probably be bordering the impossible to detect a submarine especially from orbit, and more difficult to destroy than ground targets. The submarine could easily be unmanned and dormant until needed, and launch missiles without needing to surface.
Last edited by gh88 on Mon Nov 26, 2012 7:33 am, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
bunnyboy
Posts: 543
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:21 pm
Location: Finland

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by bunnyboy »

Everytime when someone describes a multipurpose vehicle, it reminds me from this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXQ2lO3ieBA
Supporter of forum RPG

Dragoon
Posts: 131
Joined: Wed Nov 07, 2012 8:28 pm
Location: US North Carolina: Eastern standard Time Zone
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Dragoon »

what your describing seems to be intended for fast strike missions.From what I've read in the comic that seems to fit with Loroi tactics. I'd assume there are heavier units tasked with garrison and defense operations.

the addition of something with a bit of punch. Similar to a tank that can assault heavily defended positions or repel heavy counter attack could be useful. With access to anti-grav it'd be possible to manufacture a fast reasonably mobile tank. Perhaps not capable of true flight but heavy enough to take a beating and dish one out in return.

My second suggestion would be lots of artillery. Mobile if at all possible. It makes large numbers of hostiles a lot more manageable if someone is raining high explosives on their heads from long ranges.

User avatar
Smithy
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Nov 06, 2012 6:10 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Smithy »

Arioch wrote:Armored Fighting Vehicles can fly, and can serve as armored personnel carriers, close air support, artillery, anti-armor, limited air to air and in some cases orbital dropships. Though there will also always be dedicated variants for each of these roles, I think flexible multirole AFV's will have a lot of appeal. Some AFV's may have multiple components (similar to the dropship/APC combo in Aliens).
I'm not sure what to think about this one, I guess I'm stuck still really in the mentality of modern warfare. I'm assuming from your description you're describing what is essentially a core chassis which is fitted out with the required essentials for its task, ie, weapon systems, heavy armour plates, and so ad infinitum. So logistically you have only one vehicle to manufacture, and then you glue whatever toys on it depending on your mission. Kind of like modern multirole aircraft, in that the air-frame will be allocated to a close support squadron, were it's always equipped with laser guided bombs, and it's pilots train pretty much solely on skills such as Toss bombing and the like, but the same aircraft could be sent to an air superiority squadron and have totally different load out and a different kind of Pilot. Correct me if I'm looking at it the wrong way.

The three main issues I have with a super multirole platform equipped to do absolutely everything on the battlefield is as following. One it puts a huge amount of pressure on the crew/pilot/driver as he/she requires a colossal skill set to be effective in all roles during combat. Two if you're ok at everything it means you can't be great at anything. Take for example a tank/self propelled artillery hybrid. Tanks require heavy armour, and a low profile. Artillery requires a large amount of turret space (basically a high profile) to operate a very large caliber cannon which can be elevated. It also helps to have light armour to allow it to carry more shells without stressing the engine. As you can see these specifications don't exactly match, and would make for a very over-sized under-armoured over-gunned vehicle. (though you could point out assault guns [And modern tank destroyers], which are artillery guns mounted in direct fire on a light chassis. But in actuality they're a totally different beasty). Thirdly, your opponent only has one asset to learn to counter, and a flaw in it's design could be heavily exploited on all fronts.

User avatar
Arioch
Site Admin
Posts: 4486
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:19 am
Location: San Jose, CA
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Arioch »

"Armored Fighting Vehicle" is a broad classification that includes MBT's, APC's, IFV's, tank destroyers, self-propelled artillery, armored AA, etc. As I mentioned, there will be specialized designs for particular roles (as well as more general multirole craft), so your main battle tank can be as big or as small as you like. Just be aware that in a world of hovercars, your tank can fly.

And folks can make jokes about Bradley IFV's all they like, but those things killed a lot of tanks in Iraq (more than the vaunted M1).
gh88 wrote:Are submarines vulnerable to airborne and orbital threats? I'm not sure... During the Cold War, part of the appeal of nuclear submarines was their immunity to detection and their ability to launch a devastating strike even after one's home country had been completely wiped out by a surprise nuclear attack.
Submarines have never been "immune" to detection, and in particular aircraft have always been their most dangerous opponents. Any submarine that comes close enough to the surface to engage in combat can be detected from the air (and, presumably, from orbit). A submarine that goes very deep might avoid detection, but it won't be able to engage in combat at the same time -- if they can't see you, you can't see them, and launching missile attacks from extreme depths is problematic. If what you want is a guerrila weapon to hide and launch popup raids, it seems to me that there are land-based alternatives that are much cheaper and much more effective.

Dragoon
Posts: 131
Joined: Wed Nov 07, 2012 8:28 pm
Location: US North Carolina: Eastern standard Time Zone
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Dragoon »

AFV...yeah they do include tanks :oops:

Okay since we are talking a science fiction setting here...and since the military is working on them. Do the Loroi make use of Powered armor or humanoid combat vehicles/robots. in their forces.

I could see where they would be a good squad or platoon fire support platform. a few added to a standard infantry unit would give them on site heavy firepower. Having a trooper with an anti tank gun in her "hands" might mean a huge difference.

User avatar
Smithy
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Nov 06, 2012 6:10 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Smithy »

For some reason, I seemed to read it as one multirole platform, performing all roles. Strange mind at work I guess.

On a separate note. I assume both sides use dedicated troop carrier/assault platforms. Now would these hold in a Low or medium orbit to facilitate troop landing? Because if they do, I could see possibly a huge Umiak ballistic missile barrage launched from the surface from armoured sites in a last ditch effort to thin out landing forces.

User avatar
Arioch
Site Admin
Posts: 4486
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:19 am
Location: San Jose, CA
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Arioch »

Really large-scale battles between ground forces don't usually happen in Outsider, because in order to land troops, the invader must have space superiority, and if you have space superiority, you can annihilate a large portion of the defender's forces safely from orbit before you land. There have been planetary invasions in the Loroi-Umiak war by both sides, but in pretty much all cases (at least between the major combatants) these were mopping-up exercises in which the defender had already retreated most of their forces and evacuated as many civilians as possible, or else the planet had already been treated to bombardment that took out most of the defenders. To leave a large conventional ground force on a planet that your starfleet can't hold is to basically throw them away.

The exception that I can think of would be a Guadalcanal type of scenario where the space battle for the system is still contested (your fleet might have to retreat but could conceivably be back within a few weeks, or maybe the enemy fleet's hold on the system is tenuous and you can Tokyo Express reinforcements in), and there's something on the planet that both sides want intact that is worth risking a large land force to try to secure from the enemy. I don't think that scenario has happened in the war to this point.

In some of the asymmetrical invasions, such as the recent Umiak invasion of Orgus worlds, the goal was to take the population and infrastructure intact, and so large numbers of Umiak ground forces would have been involved. This kind of action could have been opposed by large scale Orgus ground forces, but doing so risks having the Umiak change their mind about wanting to take you alive (as they did when the Loroi resisted effectively on Seren and the other Steppes colonies), so unless you're willing to commit mass suicide, once you've lost space control of the system you're probably better off just surrendering and hoping that your side eventually retakes the system.
Dragoon wrote: Okay since we are talking a science fiction setting here...and since the military is working on them. Do the Loroi make use of Powered armor or humanoid combat vehicles/robots. in their forces.
A few ground-based Loroi army units use armor that's heavy enough to require hydraulic/power assist in the legs to ease movement, but there are no examples of "powered armor" in the sense of Starship Troopers style battlesuits. The Loroi do use combat robots, primarily as self-propelled squad heavy weapons, but I don't see any advantage to these robots being humanoid.

Just a Crazy-Man
Posts: 89
Joined: Sat Sep 22, 2012 2:10 pm

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Just a Crazy-Man »

I wonder what about surface to space Mass Drivers like the UNSC Super MAC on the ground?

User avatar
Smithy
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Nov 06, 2012 6:10 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Smithy »

That concept makes perfect sense, I'm just trying to think what would could cause a dedicated land conflict. I keep thinking about the Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, and the flag over the Reichstag. That quintessential Moral victory, something a little bit more resonating that simply burning your enemy to ashes. Now I'm not sure how a fanatically selfless race and a honour bound warrior culture would react to that kind of concept. Or how two nations would react to finally holding orbit over each others Homeworlds when they have been at total war with each other for so long. I can't help but feel in those situations the land invasion would be a more intrinsically total victory. The final Coup de grâce. It's not logical or sane, but neither in many respects is fighting total war.

Dragoon
Posts: 131
Joined: Wed Nov 07, 2012 8:28 pm
Location: US North Carolina: Eastern standard Time Zone
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Dragoon »

Yeah, odds are combat robots will look more like Wall-E than "Arnie".

Nice to know I'm not the only one who sets around arming and equipping my fictional forces. Of course Mine are for gaming scenarios. :geek:

Much fun! just less wadding up sketches and tossing them at the trash can...wait..looks at the trash can next to his desk and reconsiders that possibility.

Just a Crazy-Man
Posts: 89
Joined: Sat Sep 22, 2012 2:10 pm

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Just a Crazy-Man »

Smithy wrote:That concept makes perfect sense, I'm just trying to think what would could cause a dedicated land conflict. I keep thinking about the Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, and the flag over the Reichstag. That quintessential Moral victory, something a little bit more resonating that simply burning your enemy to ashes. Now I'm not sure how a fanatically selfless race and a honour bound warrior culture would react to that kind of concept. Or how two nations would react to finally holding orbit over each others Homeworlds when they have been at total war with each other for so long. I can't help but feel in those situations the land invasion would be a more intrinsically total victory. The final Coup de grâce. It's not logical or sane, but neither in many respects is fighting total war.
They have to launch a land invasion far away from the anti-orbital guns because we focus our defenses around them as they are the only thing keep the fleet over head from striking the planet. A Invasion force depends on tactics one work your way around knock out the defenses protecting the guns and take out or capture the guns which most do due to the need to protect their conquer a world and time to build orbital guns.

As for the buggers they rush the guns taking extreme losses in capturing or destroying the guns or falling short. Planetary warfare is center around these guns and air defense is strong forcing a land invasion to land a safe distance after securing a beach head which can still be stop with the use of WMD's.

Karst45
Posts: 785
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:03 pm
Location: Quebec, Canada
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Karst45 »

bunnyboy wrote:Everytime when someone describes a multipurpose vehicle, it reminds me from this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXQ2lO3ieBA
dont know if i should laught or cry...

Absalom
Posts: 718
Joined: Sat Sep 24, 2011 4:33 am

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Absalom »

Just a Crazy-Man wrote:I wonder what about surface to space Mass Drivers like the UNSC Super MAC on the ground?
Just a Crazy-Man wrote:They have to launch a land invasion far away from the anti-orbital guns because we focus our defenses around them as they are the only thing keep the fleet over head from striking the planet. A Invasion force depends on tactics one work your way around knock out the defenses protecting the guns and take out or capture the guns which most do due to the need to protect their conquer a world and time to build orbital guns.

As for the buggers they rush the guns taking extreme losses in capturing or destroying the guns or falling short. Planetary warfare is center around these guns and air defense is strong forcing a land invasion to land a safe distance after securing a beach head which can still be stop with the use of WMD's.
Except that those guns will be much more effective if mounted on a self-propelled platform in space, since they can target more of the enemy, while simultaneously losing less destructive potential to drag and the planet's gravity.

Big MAC units could make sense on a planet, but they would be used for generalized launch purposes (e.g. satellites and other transatmospheric objects) instead of as an actual combat facility.

At least in Outsider.

User avatar
Arioch
Site Admin
Posts: 4486
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:19 am
Location: San Jose, CA
Contact:

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Arioch »

Just a Crazy-Man wrote: They have to launch a land invasion far away from the anti-orbital guns because we focus our defenses around them as they are the only thing keep the fleet over head from striking the planet. A Invasion force depends on tactics one work your way around knock out the defenses protecting the guns and take out or capture the guns which most do due to the need to protect their conquer a world and time to build orbital guns.
I would expect inhabited planets to have ground-based weapon systems around population centers for catching stray missiles from a nearby space battle, or discouraging cheap raids by small starships, but it's hard to imagine such weapons being able to repel a major bombardment. Ground bases have a fixed field of fire, can't dodge, are detectable the moment they fire, and have no protection except armor (defensive screens don't work in atmosphere and are of limited use against kinetic attacks anyway).

Even if you have a supergun and a defensive shield powerful enough to protect it from orbital bombardment (the "Hoth" scenario), there has to be a compelling reason for the enemy to attack it rather than just avoid it. It would be relatively easy for space forces to stay out of the supergun's limited arc of fire while they glass the rest of the planet, and wait for the fires to consume everything.

daelyte
Posts: 75
Joined: Tue Mar 27, 2012 3:53 am

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by daelyte »

I think this is relevant:
http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/200 ... -well.html

"In general the advantages of high ground are obvious, and the image of fighting from the top of a gravity well versus fighting from the bottom is vivid. But it is also very likely wrong."

"In a rock throwing contest at the gravity well, holding the high ground means no concealment, while the low ground means being able to take cover in the underbrush."

"Laser cannons are less expendable than a truck launcher, but surface-based lasers are still likely to be much cheaper than similar lasers in space that need a spacecraft to carry them. Power supply and waste heat disposal are also easier to arrange on the surface than in space."

"Instead, space forces engaging a planetary surface defense face disadvantages comparable to those historically faced by naval forces engaging coastal batteries. They are both exposed and vulnerable, far more so than the defenders. Their one strategic advantage is that they can change their mind and leave, an option not open to surface/shore defenses."

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/r ... tactic.php

"The most effective way to destroy planetary installations is not by using warships, but by using the warships to clear out enemy space forces so you can bombard the planet with asteroids or mass nuclear assault. Conventional invasion is effectively impossible, since the defenses will destroy your invasion force if they are still functional, and the only reliable way to take out the defenses is with mass bombardment. A successful planetary assault will not allow you to capture any installations intact except those that are deep underground, and to capture those you have to send in ground forces that were very expensive to transport across space. This means capture of installations isn't really a viable alternative, unless you get the enemy to surrender upon the threat of destruction."

Thus ground forces would only be useful in cases where :
1. the enemy can't stop your invasion force from landing, and
2. you want to capture what's down there rather than destroy everything

Therefore ground forces should be designed and organized for counter-insurgency vs guerrilla warfare.

The role of orbital bombardment is limited to striking targets that stay out of cover for too long. It does mean massive engagements between large vehicles is unlikely, as those would be too visible and obvious targets for bombardment.

Loroi mental abilities would be very useful, but unmanned vehicles and drones could still be problematic.

With antigrav, the line between air, land and surface naval forces can get pretty blurry. Unless there is a significant cost difference, everything would be equipped to hover including armored infantry. There is also less reason not to armor everything as heavily as possible. How high can antigrav go? Can vehicles and personnel just float down from orbit?

Staying "under the radar" is still advised even if you have orbital superiority, since you are an easier target if you are visible. Keeping a low and narrow profile, combined with armor and high mobility would be good.

Submarines are so far undetectable form space, and difficult to detect at all. There is a reason why all the major powers have a lot of them. Planetary forces should to be able to adapt to a variety of environments, including underwater and other liquids for that matter. A multirole unit equipped with sensors, propulsion and weapons that can handle (and take advantage of) high pressure liquid environments should be sufficient.


Orbital bombardment make artillery and bombers somewhat obsolete.

Antigrav possibly makes AA and antitank a general role of basically any serious combat unit.

The main advantage of tank destroyers is low cost, so they would likely be unmanned.

I would expect:
1. Orbital Bombardment of any clear, uncovered target
2. Aerospace Fighters for some atmospheric combat roles
3. Dropships to transport vehicles and infantry to the surface, and maybe move them around too
4. Armored Infantry because they're very adaptable (with power armor if possible)
5. IFVs that can transport infantry and provide AA, antitank, ECM, and other support
6. Heavy Tanks for assaults on entrenched positions when orbital bombardment won't do
7. "Submarine" AFVs for underwater and other dense "stealthy" environments
8. Cheap disposable Unmanned Drones for various roles like patrol, tank destroyer, etc

The guerrilla side would use whatever they have (likely similar to above), but probably heavier on infantry, subs and drones in the long run since those are cheaper and/or stealthier.

fredgiblet
Moderator
Posts: 983
Joined: Mon Mar 21, 2011 4:02 pm

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by fredgiblet »

Arioch wrote:And folks can make jokes about Bradley IFV's all they like, but those things killed a lot of tanks in Iraq (more than the vaunted M1).
True, but I think that reflects as much on the quality of Iraqi forces as it does on the quality of the Bradley.
Any submarine that comes close enough to the surface to engage in combat can be detected from the air (and, presumably, from orbit). A submarine that goes very deep might avoid detection, but it won't be able to engage in combat at the same time -- if they can't see you, you can't see them
I disagree. Surface ships usually don't have much in the way of noise stealthing, so I would expect submarines to be able to passively "watch" surface ships with ease while remaining undetected. Passive sonar has a long range.
I disagree significantly. I think he's stacking the deck by assuming the ships will be in low orbit (why?) and in the process unfairly dismissing the cost of producing sufficient munitions to strike and orbiting target, he's handwaving the cost of firing a laser through atmosphere, and he's ignoring CIWS-style defenses whose range is vastly increased when it's working with gravity and without air friction and anti-missile nukes which could wipe out an entire wave of incoming attackers.

User avatar
Smithy
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Nov 06, 2012 6:10 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Outsider Ground War

Post by Smithy »

daelyte wrote:Orbital bombardment make artillery and bombers somewhat obsolete.
I would disagree, especially if you're fighting asymmetrical warfare. If enemy forces are holed up in a compound 50 metres away, a laser guided bomb or artillery/ mortar shell will do the job. I'm not entirely sure on this, but I'm confident that you probably don't want to be 50m away from anything falling out of space. Basic Kinetic bombardment I think produces energies like a tactical nuke. So a huge gigawatt laser might leave quite a big hole in the ground. So i'm not entirely sure you could support combat units directly with an orbital bombardment. And if you have combat aircraft, it makes sense for them to be able to drop a couple of bombs if needed. And the use of mortars is really useful in a fire fight, as I think I mentioned once before. Though that equipment will probably resemble something like the Dragon II fire system.

Well I guess if you could build spacecraft capable of resisting one or two weapon hits, it would be comparatively easy to do it on land, though I'm not convinced how useful that would be considering you can't move and you would just be continually battered from space. Better to be hard to find, rather than heavily armoured.

Though once these British guys finally finish in about 2020 they reckon, it will become dirt cheap (£5mil as opposed to £150mil) to throw stuff into space. http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/. The ESA has confirmed the project will work. And I meet the Company chairman, and he told me NASA secretly told them it would work in principle as well (then asked if they could tell them how). The main sticking point is the pre-cooler, but apparently the tests on that this year have been successful!

Post Reply