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[3_14159]

So, turn.

Helmet

Quite well-done, and it's extremely cheap at .05pp each - meaning a single 300pp production line can produce 6000 per turn.

Shells

Also well-done. Not having smoke (and no explosive-filled AP) is a bit of a disappointment, but the rest is really nice. Making it cheaper is just the icing on the cake.

Gasoline engine

Well. That happened. Holy crap. I'm not sure what I like more - 55hp in an extremely light package, or 1pp (!) each. Or the extreme acceptance of fuel. Where they build large trucks, we can probably afford to spam smaller ones.

Mortar

Ammo - again.
Aside from that, it's really, really nice. Weight isn't really an issue - I assumed it'd travel in three parts anyway. And the accuracy seems extremely nice during trench combat.

Swordfish B

Well, the turret turning slower was to be expected. The only question is if it's too slow - while they'll probably no longer be able to manoeuvre extremely and fire, they have the ability to attack using their main guns.
@Aseaheru: How expensive is refitting a Swordfish into a Swordfish B?


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Edit: The reaction: 

Yes.

So the two areas I see as necessary redesign are Pattern of 807 80mmM shells and the Swordfish Type B. Granted, the Swordfish is operating unopposed at the moment, but we don't want to leave gaps in it.

Agreed on the mortar shells. I'm having second thoughts on upgrading the Swordfish, though - I'd rather wait another turn and roll it in with radio upgrades and possibly small-arms upgrades.

So we set about to make an electric motor and ended up with a gasoline fueled efficient beyond belief motor.

Actually, the motor was planned to be gasoline-fueled.

Relisting things that have been suggested for (with some expansions for specific aspects of the end design) this design phase:

Actually, I believe most of those components are (luckily) subsumed into others, and it'll look more like this:
  Radio:
    Portable radio set
    Encoder/Decoder
    Radio Tower
  Truck:
    Chassis/Axle/Wheels, etc
  Train:
    No clue either.

------------

Rumours:

While their main rifle is probably better than ours, combat isn't really decided by rifles. Besides, we've got the Trench Broom (which seems to work out extremely nicely) for close combat.
Our machine gun seems better, as do our pistols (easy, looking at their design). Their artillery has a longer range and higher throw weight, but ours is more accurate and can probably fire faster.
The body armour's not really an issue - it's shrapnel protection at most, for a high weight.
Their truck, on the other hand, is interesting. While it is higher-powered and has a powerful engine, I'm convinced our engine is far superior. At slightly over half the power, it's also far lighter, and it's extremely cheap.

As for the ship they want to design... they probably want to design a gun-equipped ship (since torpedoes won't be able to reliably catch the Swordfish), which is fairly manoeuvrable (to avoid torpedoes) and able to withstand the armament we have demonstrated, either through range or armour.
Therefore, my prediction would be a 600-1000t ship mounting two or three of their field guns, a bit of armour, and a few smaller-calibre guns.
In my opinion, there's a nice counter for that, and that's what we already did: Mounting the Ratio onto the Swordfish. We're superior in direct-fire accuracy (which is what counts in this engagement), they can't both armour against it and stay manoeuvrable, and we can mass them.

-------------

That engine tho. Diesel powered, almost double what we just made in HP, and weighs as much as an adult male giraffe.

Actually, the truck appears to be 2.5t, not the engine.

-------------

Now, for things I definitely, absolutely, want to do this turn:
- Radio
- Truck
- Truck factory
- Infantry equipment

Radio Set, man-portable
This radio set consists of a total of four chests/backpacks (with straps to to transport them on the back) in the man-portable variant.
Two chests contain the actual radio, and have to be linked to transmit and receive. One chest contains a battery and a hand-powered generator for recharging the battery on longer operations. The fourth chest contains a multi-part pole, which can be raised to increase the range of the radio through a longer (and higher) antenna.
In a fixed role (with electricity available through an engine or the electrical net, for example), only three of the chests are needed. If the antenna is fixedly mounted, only the two radio itself is needed.
Range should be about 20-30km with extended antenna, up to ten km without. It uses morse code for communications.

This is inspired by the US pack set.

"Mule" Truck
The Mule Truck mounts two Pattern 807 Gasoline engine, one for the front and one for the rear wheels. They are used together when carrying load, but can be disengaged if one is defect or the truck is travelling empty. It also mounts a towing attachment for towing field guns.
In an attempt to reduce cost, only the critical parts are made of steel, with the cabin and loading area made of wood. The target weight of the truck is 2-2.5 tons, with a maximum targeted load of four tons.

Infantry equipment would be a camouflaged uniform, a standardized mess kit, and a shovel. @Aseaheru: Would that be one action?


Questions for Aseaheru:
- How expensive is refitting a Swordfish into a Swordfish B?
- Would a camouflaged uniform, a standardized mess kit and a new shovel be one action?

[somemildmanneredidiot]

Three comments because I was distracted by the Star-Com game.

Quite well-done, and it's extremely cheap at .05pp each - meaning a single 300pp production line can produce 6000 per turn.

We have several 250pp factories on loan. 500pp is enough to get us 10,000 helmets. If every longarm in equipment represents 1 soldier, that leaves 1,400 helmets left to distribute, which should be enough for the rest of our troops I should hope. So for minimal investment, we can have all of our soldiers wearing helmets yesterday.

Actually, the motor was planned to be gasoline-fueled.

Then I completely misunderstood the 40kw measure that I saw (or thought I saw) earlier when talking about the engine.

Actually, the truck appears to be 2.5t, not the engine.

What I meant but not what came out. Still, if they had made an engine of that weight, wouldn't we have been lucky then?

Edit: Fourth comment:
@Swordfish: That's basically what I was thinking, only with the addition of seeing if we can resolve the slower turning without it being especially expensive. If that is possible, then after the results from this design turn, we can start refitting our older model Swordfish into radio equipped, harder hitting, but just as able models. So a direct upgrade in all aspects.

[Amperzand]

Just spitballing here, but if we were worried about smaller vessels/hypothetical future aircraft, welding some of our HMGs' tripods to the deck rails of the Swordfish should be both extremely easy and fairly effective.

[Aseaheru]

Questions for Aseaheru:
- How expensive is refitting a Swordfish into a Swordfish B?
- Would a camouflaged uniform, a standardized mess kit and a new shovel be one action?

Two actions. Camo uniform is one, rest is another.

 It would tie up a drydock for a time(im going to say for a month in this case) and would eat up a field gun. It also would not give back the two guns it currently has in that spot.

 It may also be worth it to note that the ships are currently armed with six HMGs on the rails.
 Oh, and the number of troops, what with recruiting in wartime, there are probably alot of extra soldiers showing up wanting stuff. In addition, some areas of the military would still issue helmets without issuing a gun. Namely, the navy.

[3_14159]

We have several 250pp factories on loan. 500pp is enough to get us 10,000 helmets. If every longarm in equipment represents 1 soldier, that leaves 1,400 helmets left to distribute, which should be enough for the rest of our troops I should hope. So for minimal investment, we can have all of our soldiers wearing helmets yesterday.

I have assigned a 550pp total to them. That should give us 11k per turn. Be advised, though, that it's possible we actually have about 40,000 soldiers. See below.

@Swordfish: That's basically what I was thinking, only with the addition of seeing if we can resolve the slower turning without it being especially expensive. If that is possible, then after the results from this design turn, we can start refitting our older model Swordfish into radio equipped, harder hitting, but just as able models. So a direct upgrade in all aspects.

Agreed. Until then, I'd produce the B model.

Just spitballing here, but if we were worried about smaller vessels/hypothetical future aircraft, welding some of our HMGs' tripods to the deck rails of the Swordfish should be both extremely easy and fairly effective.

Definitely. That's why the Swordfish B already allows us to mount up to six of them 
I'd still like to design a 20mm or 40mm fast-firing cannon this turn, if we've got the space and time.

The current proposal list:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Design:
- Radio-Set, Man-portable
- Mule Truck
- Camouflage uniforms
- Infantry equipment

Industrial
- Training program
- Truck factory
- General-purpose factory
- artillery factory

For now, here's a preliminary

@Aseaheru: The stocks of 805 list about 33k Pattern 782 rifles, while the last turn lists only 3k. Did you drop a digit somewhere?


A first production proposal, mostly reorganizing things to keep as many General lines as possible open:
    On-Site factory complex
        - General (300pp): Torpedo (18.75 launchers/turn)
        - General (300pp): Jupiter Pattern 803 Automatic Pistol (600/turn)
        - General (300pp): 75mm field gun Ratio (30/turn)
        - General (300pp): Helmet (6000/turn)
        - Small-Arms (600pp): M1 HMG (120/turn)

    On-Site Artillery Complex
        - Artillery (300pp): 75mm field gun Ratio (30/turn)
        - Artillery (300pp): 75mm field gun Ratio (30/turn)
        - Artillery (300pp): 75mm field gun Ratio (30/turn)

    Off-site (dispersed)
        - 2x General (250pp): 80mm mortar (total 200/turn)
        - 1x General (250pp): Helmet (5000/turn)
        - General (250pp): Pattern 803 Trench Broom (~180/turn)
        - 3x Small-arms (300pp): Revolving Rifle (total 1500/turn)
        - 1x Small-arms (300pp): M1 HMG (60/turn)

    On-site Naval
        - Dockyard (300t): Swordfish B TBD: 1.3/turn
        - Dockyard (300t): Swordfish B TBD: 1.3/turn
   
    Off-site Naval
        - Dockyard (300t): Swordfish B TBD: 1.3/turn


Produces:
    75mm Pattern 806 Field Gun Ratio: 120/turn
    M1 Pattern 806 HMG: 180/turn +5/turn
    Swordfish B TBD: 4/turn +1.3/turn, changed to B model
    Revolving Rifle: 1500/turn +250/turn
    Trench Broom: ~180/turn
    Torpedo: 18.75 launchers/turn
    Jupiter Pattern 803 Automatic Pistol: 600/turn
    Helmet: 11,000/turn +11,000/turn
    80mm mortar: 200/turn +200/turn

Alternatively, we can drop one of the helmet lines and produce an additional hundred mortars per turn.

[Aseaheru]

 The base swordfish also mounts six HMGs.

 As for the gun stocks... I dont think I lost a digit. But in any case, there have been significant losses of gear, yes.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

So right now we have 30 staff of various proficiencies and specializations. It seems that 4 staff can make 4x300pp factories over the course of a turn, plus expand an additional facility a bit.

We could assign 16 staff to make those factories and develop the training program (we might want to have our good engineer involved in the latter project) leaving 14 for any designs and refinements we want to do this turn.

I would like to see if we can hammer out a more refined Swordfish this turn to resolve the mounting, but I think that might leave us a bit too spread out. We COULD delay the uniform and the infantry equipment a turn, but the war right now is being fought on land, not sea. Once we've shored up our land forces we can look into resolving the sea. Plus I get the feeling that we'll want to make a specific radio for our ships, so we can spend next turn expanding upon radio technology and refining the Swordfish and come out of it stronger on every front.

@Aseaheru: Do we have an approximate head count of how many troops we are fielding at the moment and how many we expect to have total?

[Aseaheru]

 At the moment, there are roughly 55k in the armed forces, of all branches.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

At the moment, there are roughly 55k in the armed forces, of all branches.

So when you say signficant loses of gear, does this mean that we have more soldiers than firearms for them at the moment?

[Aseaheru]

 Yep. Also, guns are being lost at slightly higher rates than soldiers.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

Is there any specific reason why, or do our soldiers just like shooting them so much that they break, as has happened without our prototypes in the past?

[Aseaheru]

 Well, most of the time dead soldiers guns cant be reused, and then guns sometimes get destroyed when a soldier survives. Which mostly happens during retreats.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

Which mostly happens during retreats.

Which have been happening when we clear a trench but don't have the logistics to move into the gap so the troops who survive end up falling back. And in other places I suppose.

Do we have any idea if our enemy has been having a similar problem?

[Amperzand]

So with regard to the smoke rounds thing, we could totally just use white phosphorous. The horrible stuff is nice and burny, throws hot shit everywhere when a shell full of it blows up, and then makes massive amounts of white smoke. You can even use it in rifle-caliber weapons for crude explosive/incendiary rounds.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

I like that conceptionally, but practically, we'd have to invent white phosphorus, an efficient way to make it, safe ways to contain it and transport it, and a safe way to deploy it. If we weren't working on sorting out side projects while dealing with a supply problem (roughly 1 in 5 troops are properly armed right now), I'd say go for it, but the enemy probably isn't going to give us the time we'd need to get it sorted out.

Reviewing our current information, our biggest problems are both logistics. We're unable to deploy troops and artillery effectively and we're running out of rifles. As Pi said, wars aren't won with rifles, but they do prevent wars from being lost. Our current plans will resolve the first problem, and the second problem will be resolved once we establish more factories. Unfortunately, both require time and resources that will prevent us from working on more special projects like white phosphorus. We should definitely keep it in mind for when we surmount the challenges in front of us though. Being able to hit their ports and other coastal targets with barrages of white phosphorus will be quite destructive, not to mention the effect that direct firing them into enemy trenches will have.