Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[syvarris]

Spoiler: Sod divisions (click to show/hide)

I do kinda think it'd make more sense, but since I'm not sure, how about we ask pw's opinion on what to add to every 50-man unit? (who in the end decides what works best anyways)? So then, if he says 'elite combat' (eg stevebot) we add one of those to each platoon and then add a few 'elite stealth' to a company for use where needed, and vice versa. Sound ok?

Yeah, that sounds good.  Elite stealth units sound better at a company level anyway, although we're back to the issue of complexity.

If you really want teamwork, then it'll probably be more who you play with in this game. Hmm, ARMA or Red orchestra perhaps? Natural selection maybe?

Very true.  I'm just not in any groups aside from B12 that play these types of games.

I have Op:Flash, ARMA II, and ARMA III.  Good games, but entirely different from a team shooter.  I'll look into those other two though.

In real life, it'd be easier to organize deployment of 1 company of 1000 sods than 20 platoons of 50. Again, it's an organisational thing, though I admit it's not as important here as in RL. Still, there has to be a reason to use the system, because if not, why would militaries all over the world use it? Tough I fully admit that, when you have an enormous brain on your side who could handle all the logistics in a centralized way without efficiency loss, then the difference between 1000 and 20*50 disappears.

Again, I'm against doing things that are done in RL in ER if we don't have a better reason than "That's how real armies do it".  Yes, it's done for a reason, but I'm pretty sure the advanced logistics problems simply don't exist in ER, due to abstraction.  Plus, yeah, Steve.

I don't seem to be able to bring across the point very well about the vehicles... Imagine you one system with 2 platoons, each with 5 vehicles, and one with 2 platoons and a third one grouping the 10 vehicles. you need to deploy to two planets: one is securing a hive city full of small tunnels (aka vehicles useless) and the other is a desert where you need to have a ground war (aka vehicles are good to have). In the second system, the vehicles are easily deployed exactly where needed. In the first, either half your vehicles are useless, or you split up that platoon and give their stuff to the other one, making things more complicated.

Ahh, okay.  I think our disconnect is that in your system, you're taking the complexity of changing deployment of vehicles separately from infantry as a given, whereas I'm on the side of just abstracting it.  Yes, if we definitely split the deployment of vehicles from the deployment of infantry, your system has less hassle.  I just think that it's not necessary, and that the vehicles are just there so that when we have a mission alongside a few sod platoons, they're there for use.

I was gonna have a science crew work on designing a whole bunch of vehicles and stuff for us once one was free. I was hoping that pw wouldn't mind if it was mostly for the background, because it does make sense to have them I think.

Oh.  Well, that's fine too.  Pyro has all the crews tied up, and I think he might continue to give them jobs to minimize downtime, so you should probably directly ask him to save the crew that will finish Nov.26th.

Am I mistaken here, or am I right that in your model every squad gets a QEC? So 7 QEC per platoon/'ARMy'? Also, as far as I know, quantum entanglement is between two computers at a time, no? It works by having two particles that are connected, so each QEC for a squad would have it's 'buddy' system with their commander, no? Fully admit I'm not totally aware on how this works, should look it up when I have the time.

in your model every squad gets a QEC?

Oh god no.  At absolute most, one QEC per platoon, not squad.  If I typed squad or something, that was a typo.  One per seven sods is insane.

I meant that every squad should have one sod with improved comms.  Like, a much better version of the comms that our troops already have.  Something mundane.  They use that to communicate with the QEC device, which actually communicates with the leader.  Since it's just tactical decisions, like "head west, to reinforce squad Delta", the minor lag shouldn't be an issue.

Also, I'm pretty sure that a QEC has a lot more than one particle that's entangled.  It might not have enough to facilitate commands for an entire platoon/planet though, so it is something to look into.

We have everything for growing sods and sod brains, the only thing we need is the correct 'software', something we can ask several people to help with (eg the Doc). Not saying these commanders should be the best tacticians ever, just good enough to lead their team in the field.

I don't really want to enlist the help of The Doctor.  Honestly, even if recruiting human remote commanders was way more difficult, the fact we wouldn't need to deal with him would be sufficient reasoning to use them.

Also, the better tacticians they are, the better they will do.  They might not need to be awesome, but we can clone them, so what's the issue with doing that?  Aside from possible intelligent rebellion, I mean.

Planet isn't sure yet (perhaps our allies don't wanna get actively involved in the war) and getting the training regimen isn't assured to be that easy. Not impossible, but we don't know what pw will ask of us (for the training vids, we did need to write stuff ourselves).

If we can't recruit even armchair commanders for our sods, we're gonna lose this war.  No two ways about that.  Even if we had perfect tactician sods, the UWM by all rights should outnumber us so vastly we have no real chance.

Why wouldn't a research crew be able to design some instructional VR programs as easily as the rest of the stuff they do?  They're basically omnidisciplinary.

I mean using a QEC'd commander to oversee platoon operations instead of squad operations. Makes sense now?

...No?  Again, why is the commander in the field?  You specifically mentioned him being the +1 that brings the sod number up to 50.  Unless only 49 troops are deployed, and the QEC commander is a long distance away... which doesn't account for the commander needing to be intelligent, so he can't draw from the same pool as the other sods.  Did you mean he'd be an "elite" that's guarding the platoon QEC without being intelligent?  That kind of makes sense.

I am confused.

All is mindgames all the time!

Depressingly, yes.

Ok for me, only one thing: specialized units. Perhaps we group aircraft with artillery and use the extra group for 'support and specialized'?

Again, I dislike nonspecific lumping, because I feel like it would just cause problems.  How about just remove Arty, because orbital ships should be able to do that anyway, and replace them?

What is "Support and specialized" anyway?  MK.III troops?  Stealthers?

As I said, it's not that I ever thought the 7*7 system is bad. I do like the 5*10 a bit more, but the nature of compromises means giving a little for getting a little.

Mmn.  For once, I'm somewhat unhappy I won an argument.  I agree though, if we aren't going to see eye-to-eye on this, then just going with the other person's idea rather than arguing pointlessly is smart.

[Nikitian]

I was thinking, and I have a further idea. Can we perhaps have a second commander right there, among the troops? For the cases when QEC wouldn't work - say, alien/eldritch powers at work, or if they ever need to operate in a pocket world, like Samsonite Abyss - it'd be an ideal place for UWM to retreat and make a new base if our troops would lose leadership and cohesion the moment they step through the boundary; and then renewed technological progress, spurred by war, means that, with space magic and all kinds of new physics, they might be able to devise a "jammer". Furthermore, commander in field might have better outlook on the things and so better judgement.
The main problem I see with this idea is how to work out their relationship, seniority and that stuff. We might have to drift even further away from common military approaches here.

[syvarris]

Well, I think we agreed that flesh sods might go with the sod commander model, since they're gonna be different anyway, and they're kinda like an experimental group.  Also, even if we added commanders, the vast majority of the sods are still unintelligent, so any normal platoon could relatively easily be upgraded to an autonomous platoon by adding a couple intelligent commanders.

I think the safest method of 'seniority' would be "Sod commanders are always superior to sod drones, but always inferior to human commanders.  Rank compared to other sod commanders is based on which one is older, and if there is a disagreement between two sod commanders of equal age, serial number decides the winner."  That last bit might not be the best, but I still don't think it would be terribly complex.

[Nikitian]

Uhhh, do you mean 'sod commanders' as 'commanding sods'? Because I remember 'sod commanders' as they were on Hephaestus, and from what I gathered, they were more like humans upgraded with ranged sod-empathy to control and command them, sitting safely away from the front line.
Also, what do you think of AI officers? (For the sake of safety) Stevelings, like Aresteve, only much smaller and geared for tactical command instead of planetary control?

[Radio Controlled]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Depends on what combat forces are going to be used for. I'd say more punch is better then more subtly in the case of the soldiers.

so then syv, Stevebot it is? Or would you prefer a Renen type body or something? Or something else?

Ahh, okay.  I think our disconnect is that in your system, you're taking the complexity of changing deployment of vehicles separately from infantry as a given, whereas I'm on the side of just abstracting it.  Yes, if we definitely split the deployment of vehicles from the deployment of infantry, your system has less hassle.  I just think that it's not necessary, and that the vehicles are just there so that when we have a mission alongside a few sod platoons, they're there for use.

Aha, I see now. Yeah, we seem to naturally be inclined to abstract different things.

Oh.  Well, that's fine too.  Pyro has all the crews tied up, and I think he might continue to give them jobs to minimize downtime, so you should probably directly ask him to save the crew that will finish Nov.26th.

Oh no, don't let that stop you, tinker to your heart's content! Was just gonna ask them to come up with a big database of ideas again, after which (should we want to) we can use that as a basis for designing some of them. My query was also gonna include more mundane stuff like trucks for moving cap or whatever.

Oh god no.  At absolute most, one QEC per platoon, not squad.  If I typed squad or something, that was a typo.  One per seven sods is insane.
I meant that every squad should have one sod with improved comms.  Like, a much better version of the comms that our troops already have.  Something mundane.  They use that to communicate with the QEC device, which actually communicates with the leader.  Since it's just tactical decisions, like "head west, to reinforce squad Delta", the minor lag shouldn't be an issue.
Also, I'm pretty sure that a QEC has a lot more than one particle that's entangled.  It might not have enough to facilitate commands for an entire platoon/planet though, so it is something to look into.

Aha, now this explains a lot! Yeah, this makes much more sense.

Though we should check how much leadership and direction a sod armchair commander needs to give his underlings. If they need constant 'babysitting' in a warzone then this might complicate things.

And yes, i know it's more than 1 particle. But I meant that if I send a radiowave multiple people can pick it up, whereas a QEC is between two parties only. So if you wanna communicate with multiple parties, you need several QEC (who can perhaps share some hardware, but not the QEC fluid).

I don't really want to enlist the help of The Doctor.  Honestly, even if recruiting human remote commanders was way more difficult, the fact we wouldn't need to deal with him would be sufficient reasoning to use them.

He's really rather reasonable, if you know how to handle him. He's certainly been a great source of information for me!

And even if we don't use him, I'm sure (are)steve could also help out with the smart sods. Or perhaps a research crew?

Also, the better tacticians they are, the better they will do.  They might not need to be awesome, but we can clone them, so what's the issue with doing that?  Aside from possible intelligent rebellion, I mean.

So wait, is this about on-the-field commanders, or are you referring to cloning armchair commanders?

Why wouldn't a research crew be able to design some instructional VR programs as easily as the rest of the stuff they do?  They're basically omnidisciplinary.

Hey, if pw allows it, that's a problem less. Though even then, there's this basic question: commanders on the field should have better awareness of the situation, so they could potentially exploit opportunities better. They can die, but are not vulnerable to having comms disrupted. Armchairs make for a bit more difficult logistics issue (where do we put them etc) but might live longer, and might be recruitable (meaning we can save resources). And other factors I'm forgetting.

Hmm. I think both have decent enough merits and drawbacks to warrant checking with pw/steve and see what he thinks. If only as an extra check.

Sorry for bothering again pw, but what is your idea on this specific subject?

...No?  Again, why is the commander in the field?  You specifically mentioned him being the +1 that brings the sod number up to 50.  Unless only 49 troops are deployed, and the QEC commander is a long distance away... which doesn't account for the commander needing to be intelligent, so he can't draw from the same pool as the other sods.  Did you mean he'd be an "elite" that's guarding the platoon QEC without being intelligent?  That kind of makes sense.

I am confused.

The commander isn't on the field, that +1 would be the central dude with a QEC relaying info. Where else are we gonna place that thing? Not on any of the squad leaders, right? Because I'm not sure if we can always just assume we'll have a base/ship decently enough defended so as not to need a mobile one. either way, this point is kinda moot until we decide what system to go for.

Depressingly, yes.

Oh, don't fool yourself, you love it 

Again, I dislike nonspecific lumping, because I feel like it would just cause problems.  How about just remove Arty, because orbital ships should be able to do that anyway, and replace them?

I thought we were going to specify (to some degree) what those were after we agreed on the bigger picture. Cause I do think we could use some form of Artillery, though not a very big amount indeed. We could replace the term with 'mechanized warfare' perhaps? Or do you really want singular categories?

What is "Support and specialized" anyway?  MK.III troops?  Stealthers?

For example, yes. But also, say, units that can repair or replace robobody parts and vehicles and such. Though perhaps these last ones can be abstracted. i know you hate 'nonspecific lumping', but it does serve as a nice barrier should we forget something and pw or somebody else points it out, we can just add it to this category. Or say we want to be able to say that each company has a bunch of nukes or nerve gas bombs, these are all just grouped here without much hassle.

I think the safest method of 'seniority' would be "Sod commanders are always superior to sod drones, but always inferior to human commanders.  Rank compared to other sod commanders is based on which one is older, and if there is a disagreement between two sod commanders of equal age, serial number decides the winner."  That last bit might not be the best, but I still don't think it would be terribly complex.

Yes, that seems a good idea. Would you be amenable to having both (aka smart sods as squad commander, and armchair commanders that can override sod commanders)?


PW, there is a small question for you in the spoiler, would you care to take a look?

[syvarris]

@Nik

I mean normal sods that have been upgraded with improved intelligence.

I think AI officers would be fine, albeit impractical.  We need human gray matter to make those, plus that gray matter needs to be intelligent to begin with, and then it's probably still less intelligent than an equivalent number of humans.  We'd need to do research before we know if it's practical.

@Radio

I have stuff I really should have done awhile ago, so I'm not even going to open that spoiler.  I just know that if I open it, I'll get sucked in.

Expect a reply either Sunday, or maybe Monday.

[Radio Controlled]

@Nik

I mean normal sods that have been upgraded with improved intelligence.

I think AI officers would be fine, albeit impractical.  We need human gray matter to make those, plus that gray matter needs to be intelligent to begin with, and then it's probably still less intelligent than an equivalent number of humans.  We'd need to do research before we know if it's practical.

@Radio

I have stuff I really should have done awhile ago, so I'm not even going to open that spoiler.  I just know that if I open it, I'll get sucked in.

Expect a reply either Sunday, or maybe Monday.

don't worry, was just about to go back to screaming at statistics myself anyway.

[Empiricist]

Is it possible to type out the gist of what a character says, but still use a speech roll to modify it so that they word and deliver it more persuasively? Because right now, I'm pretty much typing what Charles is saying to the prisoner instead of using his enormous speech bonus to try and brainwash the poor sap through a forced speech versus willpower roll since just typing "Charles attempts to proselytize the prisoner (use speech roll, preferably speech versus willpower)" seems a bit lazy along with lacking in direction and roleplay.

Also, how do Hephaestus personnel level up and purchase tokens? Do they just slowly increase the stats that they perform actions related to and become able to request equipment pertaining to that?

[PyroDesu]

Is it possible to type out the gist of what a character says, but still use a speech roll to modify it so that they word and deliver it more persuasively? Because right now, I'm pretty much typing what Charles is saying to the prisoner instead of using his enormous speech bonus to try and brainwash the poor sap through a forced speech versus willpower roll since just typing "Charles attempts to proselytize the prisoner (use speech roll, preferably speech versus willpower)" seems a bit lazy along with lacking in direction and roleplay.

Also, how do Hephaestus personnel level up and purchase tokens? Do they just slowly increase the stats that they perform actions related to and become able to request equipment pertaining to that?

Sure you can, I think.

And while I'm not sure if we level up anymore, we don't bother with tokens. You want a bit of equipment, you get it (just ask Simus first, please, if it's just something for personal use). That's one reason I'm being extremely selective about who gets to come.

[Empiricist]

Oh, I better remember to have Charles request a perfect decomp soon then.

[Parisbre56]

@Empiricist: You level up whenever you go on a Hephaestus specific mission. There have been 0 of those, however, since most people on Hephaestus don't like the idea of participating in missions.

@Radio Controlled: I always imagined QECs like a network. Each one connects to a central backbone and the backbones connect with each other to form the network. That way everyone can communicate with everyone else without much hassle. Like the internet.

[Empiricist]

That way everyone can communicate with everyone else without much hassle. Like the internet.

With or without superluminal cat photos?

[Devastator]

@Radio Controlled: I always imagined QECs like a network. Each one connects to a central backbone and the backbones connect with each other to form the network. That way everyone can communicate with everyone else without much hassle. Like the internet.

That sounds cool, but would be much worse than a real QEC.

A QEC would be a link between two widely disparate points, and be utterly impossible to break or intercept.  There is a caveat, however, that the two points need to be manufactured together, at the same time and place.  You might well have one end be on a network, but that would mean going back to that network when you run out of medium.  Since we don't want to go back to the UWM capitals to recharge our FTL comms, that would be a very bad implementation for us.

[Parisbre56]

I was under the impression that we had our own QEC net now, since we refuelled on Hephaestus. That means that Hephaestus is currently the centre of our QEC net, since it provided us with QEC "fuel". So any new QECs we create will be centred on it and just need a supply run from Hephaestus to be refuelled. Once we have spread enough to have more worlds that can manufacture QECs we can link them to allow communication between the two.

Then again, we still have access to UWM's TV, so I might be mistaken. Maybe Steve is somehow hijacking their QEC shipments.

EDIT: Or Steve could be relaying them thorough the normal comms of another world. Or maybe he still has some control over the network since he was the one who developed it. He did say he was using it to disrupt UWM comms.and make it harder for them to organize themselves last time I asked him about it.

@Empiricist: The cat photos are eternal. They shall outlive humanity like the machines of a quiet world.

[Parisbre56]

@Sean: You can always build smaller pieces of the ship on the ground and assemble them in orbit.