Sigh. This keeps coming up. Who said the Orions would be on a suicide mission assaulting Tholian fixed defenses? I did not. I mentioned Orions as in essence) auxiliaries operating the "siege" not hurling themselves valiantly onto the Tholian Spearpoints. You are (forgive me) fixated on the attackers having to lay themselves before your defenses with no recourse but to be slaughtered by your carefully thought out defense. No matter how many phaser-4s the base has, it is surrounded by a wedding cake, the Klingons can be within 18 hexes of it and be immune to phaser-4 fire. Ships can run in closer on occasion, gambling on Tholian die rolls, and pulling out to 18 hexes to conduct shield repairs, but not REAL DAMAGE, and shield repairs only cost energy. Sooner or later the Tholians must come out to fight. I do not have to "assault" a webbed defense if I can besiege it. You are fixated on the defense. I am conceding that any given Tholian base can probably stand up to any given assault. But given the small size of the Holdfast, and of its fleet, and the fact that Ito does not have any allies, it can be worn down. I am not losing ships trapped in web because I am not throwing them into the web. You will have to send ships to fight in open space to have a chance of destroying my ships. And my Siege Train supporting them. I can run a mauler in close and let you empty phasers into it, counting on its battery banks to absorb the damage and then running out. Sure, Klingons had easier enemies to deal with before closing on you (The Hydrans, the Kzintis), the Feds would more likely watch you get conquered than get involved. If the Romulans rattle you cage from their side ..... I am just not concerned. Now, those Andromedans are another matter.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Monday, April 01, 2024 - 04:52 pm: Edit

I don't have time at the moment to address your latest post. I will try to get to it this evening. For now, though, I still don't see how putting web casters on Tholian bases improves this situation for the Tholians.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Monday, April 01, 2024 - 05:30 pm: Edit

Alan Trevor:
In simple terms, a base with multiple phaser-4s surrounded by a wedding cake is susceptible to a close in siege. A siege is of course not possible while the Klingons are in an "unstable" relationship with their neighbors (Lyrans, fine, LDR, Probable, Federation, Queasy, Kzinti, volatile) and the other possibilities (Jindarians, meh) (Andromedans, an enigma). And so on. Suffice to say the Tholians need to plan for war with the Klingons, they beat them twice (the first time established the Holdfast, the second time was a long war that the Klingons actually reached the Dyson sphere. What would a third time bring when they were not at war with "disposable fellow belligerents?" Perhaps a base able to caste web afar to support a battle fleet? I am NOT saying this is the case, but I am saying that it is perhaps something that should be looked at. From a Tholian point fo view. It avoids the close in siege and perhaps allows them to win? I do not know, I do know that siege of the bases is possible, and Klingon allies (Romulans, Orions (paid), Lyrans, Fickle Federation (diplomacy) can occur. The real shape of the universe the Tholians are living in. and what they need to think about.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Monday, April 01, 2024 - 11:38 pm: Edit

As Alan pointed out before, even zero-strength web would block a web-caster. The Tholians would need to completely dismantle (not just depower) the base's webs if they wanted to use the webcaster to "caste web afar to support a battlefleet". Can't imagine that being a good idea in any circumstance.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Tuesday, April 02, 2024 - 02:35 pm: Edit

Well, getting to it "this evening" turns out to really mean getting to it "tomorrow".

SPP, I think your close in siege will have to be slightly further out than 18 hexes, because you are focusing on the wrong phasers. The phaser-4s are devastating against an actual assault against a wedding cake because the webs mean they will get many turns of short range fire. But against ships hanging back at moderate ranges, the phaser-1s on the Tholian ships and PFs are more important. At 18 hexes the Klingons are immune to the base's phaser-4s but are only 14 hexes from the Tholian ships and PFs hiding behind the outer ring. So how much damage can those ships/PFs do?

If I'm running the Tholians at the strategic level, I will generally (acknowledging exceptions can occur) deploy "standard" Arachnid flotillas with my warship-based PF tenders and Arachnid-P flotillas on bases and auxiliary tenders (which are more likely to be assigned a specifically defensive mission and therefore fight behind established webs). Also, subject to availability, regular warships committed to defense of a wedding cake (mostly PCs and PCXs but including the occasional destroyer or cruiser, especially the CPA (Heavy Phaser Cruiser), would tend to have Arachnid-Ps on any refitted mech links.

The "Assault on the Holdfast" scenario included 4 actual warships in the Tholian starting forces, a CA and 3 PCs. Updating that to the period under discussion here, let's say the CA is now a CPA and one of the three PCs is a PCX. That's 24 phase-1s. Also, the base can be presumed to have an Arachnid-P flotilla. That's another 22 phaser-1s, of which the flotilla can effectively use 21. (Two of the phaser-1s are on the PF scout. It powers up both EW channels but only one is allocated power to generate EW points. The other channel is specifically powered in order to be "blinded" when the scout fires one of its phaser-1s. Finally, the CPA has two mech links with Arachnid-PWs; 8 more phaser-1s but with no efficient way to lend them additional ECCM. That's a total of 53 phaser-1s, of which 29 are limited to 15 hexes range. Ignoring for the moment any ECM shift (but also ignoring any phaser-3s, and the phaser-2s on the base's Spider-IIPs) I can do 53 points of damage every turn to a target within 19 hexes of the base, with no return fire from the Klingons.

So 20 hexes, rather than 18, would be the minimum "safe" distance for the besieging Klingons. (I did say it would be "slightly" further out.) And that's with only 4 warships, only one of which is a cruiser. If I can get more warships to the base (or if more of the PCs are actually PCXs), I can push that minimum distance out further.

More later (not sure when), in which I intend to discuss "blockade running" and what techniques I might use to get ships into and out of a besieged wedding cake.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, April 03, 2024 - 04:29 pm: Edit

The Klingons are trying a "close siege" of Tholian bases, to try to starve them out. The need for the Tholian base and supporting ships to spend power to maintain the webs means that these units are using fuel at a higher rate than they would during "ordinary" operations. I am not aware of any "hard numbers" that have been published to enable us to determine how long the Tholian base could hold out in this situation. (For one thing, it depends on factors such as "How long since the last time the base was resupplied?" If the Klingon besiegers invest the base the day after the last Tholian resupply run "topped off" the base's fuel and spare parts, that base will obviously hold out for a lot longer than if the Klingons invest the base two months after the most recent resupply.) In general, I believe that the bases will be able to hold out, even at the higher fuel expenditures, for weeks or even months. Partly I believe this based on extrapolation from F&E (though since I don't actually play F&E, I must acknowledge that I may misunderstand some of the rules). And partly I believe it based on some tricks the Tholians can use to reduce their fuel expenditure while maintaining defensive webs.

This whole discussion is predicated on considering whether deploying web casters directly on Tholian bases is a good idea. So we are in the period during which reinforcing energy "counts double". Maintaining 54 web hexes (6 in the inner ring, 18 in the middle ring, 30 in the outer ring) would cost 27 points of energy per turn. But that's not the appropriate number for a siege situation. Per G10.43, a web that decays to zero strength will dissolve in seven turns if not reinforced to strength one. So... the Tholian base detects a large approaching Klingon force. They start powering up the webs, previously "kept at strength zero (using low-power generator buoys which do not function during combat) until a threat appears." (G10.8) But it soon becomes clear the Klingons are planning a siege rather than an assault. The Tholians allow the inner and middle rings to decay to zero, while maintaining the outer ring at full strength. I'm assuming this siege is enough of a combat situation that the "low-power generator buoys" can't keep the middle and inner rings from dissolving after seven turns. So every six turns the Tholians put three energy into the inner ring and nine into the middle ring, raising them to strength one. At the end of the turn those webs decay to strength zero. The Tholian ignore them for another five turns (I don't want to wait till the absolute last minute, just in case something unexpected happens) and then power them up to strength one again. So the outer ring costs the Tholian ships 15 energy each turn but the inner and middle rings together cost them 12 energy approximately every six turns, or an average of two points per turn. The appropriate energy expenditure figure, specifically for web maintenance, during the siege portion of the operation, is actually 17 points per turn (averaged out over a long period) rather than 27 points. (If the Klingons start an actual assault, the defenders bring the middle and inner rings up to strength. The fact that the outer ring is already at full strength ensures they will have time to do this.)

That 17 points per turn is still more than the Tholians would pay during peacetime, but divided among 4 ships which collectively generate 78 per turn, it seems like a posture they could maintain for a substantial time if needed, especially since they are in the immediate vicinity of a base. I note also that there are other tricks the Tholians could use that would save even more energy, but that come with greater risks. In general, I think the additional energy savings isn't usually enough to justify the risk, so I would be reluctant to use them. But the technique described above would be my SOP for Tholian web maintenance in case of a "close siege", assuming I had sufficient ships (and/or Arachnid-PWs) to use it. And "sufficient ships really isn't very many. I could certainly pull it off with fewer ships than I have here.

Still, it's obvious that, absent resupply, the base will eventually fall. It's equally obvious that ordinary freighters will not be able to accomplish that resupply. I had intended to use this post to discuss how I would attempt to carry out those resupply operations but the above discussion about reducing web maintenance energy requirements during a siege took longer than I intended (succumbing to old age, I guess...), so I will post more later.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Wednesday, April 03, 2024 - 04:36 pm: Edit

A glance at the Phaser-1 table shows that you can score two points of damage per phaser IF they all rolled "1"s, and IF there was not your own web in the way if they fired at 16 to 25 hexes. The web is limiting them to only scoring one point of damage at most, and each phaser is not fired as a single shot so they are not combined into a massive narrow salvo. So you are rather unlikely to score 53 damage points in any given turn, unless you enter your own web to fire and have a chance of two points then. Will the Klingons not be charging their phasers on the chance that you will enter web? How about those Range 30 disruptors? The Klingons can still pull back if they had to. And with their special sensors to detect the approach of any relief force to allow it be intercepted in deep space before the base can be resupplied, and numbers to allow them to intercept any force sent out from the base under siege? Again. Space is unsettled. And the Tholian penchant for making enemies and few allies (actually, none). If there were ever a time when the Klingons could attack the Tholians, say after a Federation surrender?

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, April 03, 2024 - 05:07 pm: Edit

SPP,

But wait a minute... Note the diagram under G10.62. Tholian phaser damage is reduced by intervening hexes between the Tholian and furthest web through which it is firing. If the Tholian is immediately adjacent to the outer ring (in the ring of empty hexes between the outer and middle rings) it is immune to Klingon fire but suffers no web-caused damage reduction. If the Klingon is at 18 hexes from the base (14 hexes from Tholians immediately behind the outer ring), I believe an average of one point per phaser-1 is the correct figure.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 03:42 pm: Edit

Alan Trevor:
If the Klingons (or Lyrans, or Orions, or Romulans, or Jindarians, or Vudar, or etc.) are at Range 16, and generating three ECM while performing erratic maneuvers, they can stay there forever and the Tholians cannot damage them from behind a single strand of web. They will have to enter the strand of web with six points of ECCM to have a chance of hitting. The Klingons would then drop EM and unleash their own phasers (and their disruptors) at the inviting Tholian targets at optimum range (15) for the disruptors. The next turn the Tholians can pull back to make repairs and the Klingons can make repairs, and then repeat. Siege tactics work.

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 04:44 pm: Edit

Also, sieges can go on for a VERY long time. IF the Tholians are not able to put ships in the Web to reinforce it (i.e.: the besieging forces have the base surrounded), it may take a VERY long time, but eventually an unreinforced web WILL collapse.

Mind you, I can't imagine anyone wanting to play two HUNDRED turns worth of siege, BUT given how historical sieges turned out (months, if not years of brinksmanship), it's not an impossible situation.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 05:22 pm: Edit

Jeff Anderson: I do not see a siege as very possible. As I have indicated frequently in my replies, it is somewhat dependent on the other powers attitudes. If the Klingons got more allies (at least the Romulans), and those allies were not involved in watching their borders, and other powers were not interfering on the Klingon borders, then the Tholian penchant for isolationism (Holdfast) makes sieges very possible. In a campaign where the above conditions are met, you would have the Tholians sending out their fleet to try to raise the siege, the Klingons (and allies) intercepting the fleet, and numbers of freighters trying to make it through.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 06:33 pm: Edit

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Quote:

If the Klingons (or Lyrans, or Orions, or Romulans, or Jindarians, or Vudar, or etc.) are at Range 16...

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Quote:

... generating three ECM while performing erratic maneuvers...

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By Stewart Frazier (Frazikar3) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 06:41 pm: Edit

Casters on bases - legacy/tradition (that's how those room were labeled) …

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 06:51 pm: Edit

Stewart Frazier,

Yeah... but rational beings are generally capable of realizing that a tradition that was harmless, or even beneficial, in one context, may become harmful in another, and therefor needs to be (reluctantly, perhaps) modified or jettisoned.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 07:50 pm: Edit

Technically (R7.72) "Web Caster Refits" states that only "some" starbases and battle stations had web caster refits. So we might assume that the refit was actually quite rare, maybe just a "prestige" refit for the home system starbase since the threat of a capital assault had largely passed by the time web casters became available.

The YIS for BATSW and SBW might be tied to the earliest year the refits COULD have been made (given the availability of webcasters) regardless of when the first refits actually occurred (assuming they were done at all).

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 08:11 pm: Edit

Douglas Saldana,

Yes, but the Tholian SBX has six webcasters. There is no "only phasers version". So if the Tholians, in an X-tech era campaign, have an SBX, they are depriving the mobile elements of those casters.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Thursday, April 04, 2024 - 08:20 pm: Edit

I agree, there should be an option for X-Bases without webcasters.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, April 05, 2024 - 12:54 am: Edit

Nothing exists in a vacuum. Saying "change A to B" and showing the list is one thing, saying that and also showing the corresponding Klingon and Fed bases is another matter.

I am willing to let the discussion about web casters continue but this stuff about changing ph3s to ph1s and ph4s to ph1s doesn't interest me. Steve Petrick may support it and if he does then I'll reconsider, but I'm really only concerned about the casters. Which is NOT to say that I agree that casters are a problem, or that the refit is wrong.

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Friday, April 05, 2024 - 11:27 am: Edit

Bad thoughts...

In SFU Canon, the Will had control over the galaxy for countless generations, possibly even centuries. Yeah, when The Will rose to power, they developed Dyson Spheres, but after that, no more "Miracle Tech;" just the same tech as we see among the powers in the main time period of the SFU. If their technology hadn't stagnated, might they have just naturally evolved to "X-Tech," if not having developed it before they developed their Dyson Spheres? Back before The Will established absolute control over their galaxy?

Also, as has been established as SFU Canon, when the Archaeo-Tholians crossed the Galactic Barrier, they lost most of their engineers. Those few who survived, and also those new engineers from their schools who showed great promise, were all tasked with maintaining the Dyson Sphere.

MAINTAINING the Sphere.

This is, of course, just my opinion, but that so strongly suggests to me that the Tholians would be very Hivebound; they'd be extremely reticent to change much, if anything, engineering-wise. Yes, I know they did do the PC+, DPC, and PPC, but even with those, there was an "Implied Technical assistance" (from the Federation).

Since they were making bases based on data from their Home Galaxy, WOULD the Tholians be willing to change out what was listed as "Web Casters" in their schematics?

IF I'm right, would that not imply that their earlier bases ought to have the (post 312th arrival) Web Caster boxes identified as "Void?"

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Friday, April 05, 2024 - 07:01 pm: Edit

I would disagree with Jeff's assessment of the Tholians, I think they were actually quite aggressive about acquiring foreign technology and keeping pace with technological developments in the Milky Way. The examples are almost too numerous to mention (suicides shuttles, wild weasels, transporter bombs, photons, disruptors, fighters, gunboats, x-tech, etc.). Not to mention the ingenuity they showed in creating dozens of ship classes from the lowly patrol corvette.

By Terry O'Carroll (Terryoc) on Saturday, April 06, 2024 - 05:05 am: Edit

It's canon that the Tholians who arrived in the Milky Way didn't have many engineers, IIRC it's stated in the rule that's why Tholians can't have Legendary Engineers.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Saturday, April 06, 2024 - 06:16 am: Edit

Terry O'Carroll,

I don't think that's quite correct. I believe it would be more accurate to say the Tholians' best engineers were committed to keeping the sphere itself operational, without which nothing else would matter.

Also, note that Tholians can have Legendary Engineers in two circumstances; Neo-Tholian ships (even in this galaxy) and Tholian X-ships (G22.46).

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Sunday, April 07, 2024 - 04:21 pm: Edit

I wanted to discuss how I think the Tholians might try to resupply besieged bases. I want to stipulate again that I think the siege tactics described by SPP are in fact the Klingons' best bet. I think my "quarrel" with SPP on this topic hinges on two other factors. One, I don't believe having web casters on bases is very useful if the Klingons are trying to besiege the Tholians. And two, I think there are things the Tholians can do that will increase the chances the Tholians hold on long enough for "other factors" to change (relative to what they were at the start of the siege) enough that the Klingons decide it is costing too much to continue.

Consider, for example, the question of Allies. It's true that the Klingons have allies and the Tholians do not. But I believe the longer the siege continues, the greater the greater the chances of something occurring that may force the Lyrans and/or Romulans to pull out.

Consider first the Lyrans. If they are heavily engaged against the Tholians, the Kzinti will notice. As the siege drags on, with major Lyran fleet elements thousands of parsecs from Lyran space, the Kzinti could decide the balance of forces is favorable for settling some old scores; destroying some border BATS, raiding commerce, maybe even devastating Degomark, Foremark, or Byrantan. And none of this is because the Kzinti are Tholian allies. It's because the Kzinti hate the Lyrans. The Lyrans can minimize this risk by sending only limited forces to help the Klingons. But this also minimizes how much help they will be to the Klingons.

For the Romulans the issue is Great House rivalries. It is, I believe, well established that the various Great Houses, in the course of maneuvering for position and prestige against each other, have taken actions that objectively hurt the Romulan Empire as a whole. This may not happen in a war seen as "existential", such as the Andromedan invasion. But an invasion of Tholian space, while existential for the Tholians themselves, would not be seen as such by the Romulans. And if one Great House were seen to be more likely to gain advantage, I don't think it out of the question that some of the other Houses might undermine the advantaged House's efforts.

And the Federation? They are not Tholian allies, but note that they first provided photon torpedoes to the Tholians in Y170. The GW had started but the Feds were not yet in it. They clearly provided the photons based on "balance of power" considerations, realizing there was a risk of them becoming involved in the war, and that a stronger Tholia would be useful to the Federation by hindering Klingon/Romulan cooperation. Depending on the course of the siege, they might make a similar decision, allies or not.

Now, none of these are guaranteed to happen and presumably the Klingons wouldn't invade in the first place if any of these seemed imminent. But I claim that the longer the siege drags on, the more likely it becomes that something happens.

Dragging the siege out means resupplying the bases, which I believe (extrapolating from F&E, but recognizing I may be misunderstanding some of the rules) can hold out for a relatively long time. More on how the Tholians resupply the bases in a later post. But briefly, freighters will play only a very minor role. The primary resupply effort will be based on the ability of most Archeo-Tholian ships to carry cargo packs (at increased movement cost and, in some cases with some weapons blocked). Now this is a very expensive way to move cargo and the amount they can carry this way is small compared to ordinary freighters. But this is nothing new in wartime. Consider the convoys between the U.S. and Britain, so important during both World Wars. That would be a crazily inefficient way to move stuff in peacetime but was vital during the wars. In my next post I will address how I believe the Tholians might implement this approach.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Sunday, April 07, 2024 - 04:23 pm: Edit

I really do not understand what siege has to do with any of this. If someone can give me the 25-word explanation I would appreciate it.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Monday, April 08, 2024 - 04:31 pm: Edit

In simple terms, a Tholian webbed base is very close to invulnerable with a small contingent of ships to support it. The proposed solution is to take advantage of the small number of Tholian ships and the Tholians Penchant for not having allies to besiege the bases and run them out of supplies.

Alan Trevor proposed a defense force and I have adjusted my siege accordingly. Currently Alan is relying on ECCM (12 points per ship using the four special sensors of the BATS at the core of the wedding cake, Alan, I am going to counter by deploying a Cruiser Scout (D5S) and PFTender (D5P) and lend each of your ships six points of ECM. This gives the Besieging force 6 points of generated ECM, four points from Erratic Maneuvers, and six points from the Offensive ECM. Even if your four ships have 6 ECCM and are lent 6 ECC, the are still firing at a +2 EW modifier and are firing through an additional +1 from the web. They cannot hit. Your PFs Would be able to hit. And the weakness would be to try to pound the scouts (not erratic) but shield reinforcement against your weakened (web interference) should buy time to turn more shields to face.

And, yes, I said from the start that maintaining such an alliance would be difficult for the Klingons, it is however possible and only made more possible by the Tholian penchant for not having allies. Did not happen in the history of our space per se, but perhaps they (the other empires) would recognize in time how dangerous the Tholians are, before they begin conquering our Galaxy when their population gains enough and they recover more of their lost technology.