Outsider Ground War
Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2012 5:19 am
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.
https://www.well-of-souls.com/forums/
https://www.well-of-souls.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=832
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.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).
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.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.
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.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.
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.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.
dont know if i should laught or cry...bunnyboy wrote:Everytime when someone describes a multipurpose vehicle, it reminds me from this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXQ2lO3ieBA
Just a Crazy-Man wrote:I wonder what about surface to space Mass Drivers like the UNSC Super MAC on the ground?
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.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.
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).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.
True, but I think that reflects as much on the quality of Iraqi forces as it does on the quality of the Bradley.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).
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.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 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.
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.daelyte wrote:Orbital bombardment make artillery and bombers somewhat obsolete.