OBT Forum
General BattleTech => Virginia War => Alternate Universe => Designs & Tech Info => Topic started by: Trace Coburn on June 16, 2011, 09:22:55 AM
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I don't really know if this is going to become relevant to the stories or not, but it wouldn't leave me alone and I figured if I put it up here for you folks to look at and critique, maybe I can start moving back towards the main theatre of action. :D The attached .pdf contains the livery, rank-insignia, deployment-doctrine, and some of the unique combat units of the Taurian Defence Force as of the end of the (First) Succession War in the AU of The Virginia War. There are a lot of influences and semi-borrowed ideas in there, including some stuff from these very boards that caught my notice, so if you see anything you recognise and want proper attribution for your work, please sing out about it!
Also, if anyone reading this has artistic skills and is willing to do some work for The Virginia War, especially anyone who's been doing stuff for TRO3063 or possibly even professionally, I'd welcome your assistance. I can't afford to pay my power-bill, much less commissions to artists, but if you're willing to work for free, or modify and donate some discards from other projects.... ;) As much as most BT art tends to be depictions of combat-units, and I'd eagerly accept such, I'd place a slightly higher priority on artwork of folks in the appropriate uniform(s), as a visual reference for the fic-readers.
Well, long rambling spiel over; file attached below. The layout's functional at best, it's mostly unadorned, and the little art included is mostly canonical pics or depressingly low-res Paint.Net re-edits of such because I don't have a vector-graphics programme or the artistic talent to use one, but let's see what else you think. ;)
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This is a great PDF. Well done Trace.
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Nice Work
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Interesting but French and Spanish are wrong ;D
I don't know yet how I would translate Taurian in both languages (from Taurus?) but it would be
Armée/Flotte du Concordat "Taurien"
Ejercito/Armada del Concordato "Taurien"
I also didn't find the fleet organisation apart from the few words on flotillas and squadrons.
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Interesting but French and Spanish are wrong ;D
I don't know yet how I would translate Taurian in both languages (from Taurus?) but it would be
Armée/Flotte du Concordat "Taurien"
Ejercito/Armada del Concordato "Taurien"
I don't quite recall when or how I came up with those translations, but I strongly suspect I made a deliberate choice to use feminine grammar in reference to the Concordat, much in the way the French shout "Vive la France!" or Russians refer to "Mother Russia". ;)
That said, the corrections on the other words are welcome. ;D
I also didn't find the fleet organisation apart from the few words on flotillas and squadrons.
I haven't yet delved into the details of the TCN's equipment or strength, so the interim assumption was that it was more or less as it was in canon as of the Periphery SB (1e or 2e, there's little difference), and if/when I hash out an exact TO&E and/or Order of Battle for the TCN, I'll update the document accordingly. I just felt that the note about terminology was an important element in characterising the Taurian Navy's mindset... and letting people know that hearing a TCN officer refer to a 'squadron' would be cause for leadership types across all the Rimward Successor States to hear blaring alarm-klaxons, if not lay in a supply of Browne PantsTM. :D
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I don't quite recall when or how I came up with those translations, but I strongly suspect I made a deliberate choice to use feminine grammar in reference to the Concordat, much in the way the French shout "Vive la France!" or Russians refer to "Mother Russia". ;)
That said, the corrections on the other words are welcome. ;D
Except that Concordat is masculine in French.
I am still puzzled by the right translation from Taurian: perhaps I should look for the "official" translations.
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I checked in BattleTech Compendium in Spanish and it is Concordato de Tauro.
Since Tauro is the constellation name, my guess for French would be Concordat du Taureau.
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I don't quite recall when or how I came up with those translations, but I strongly suspect I made a deliberate choice to use feminine grammar in reference to the Concordat, much in the way the French shout "Vive la France!" or Russians refer to "Mother Russia". ;)
That said, the corrections on the other words are welcome. ;D
Except that Concordat is masculine in French.
I am still puzzled by the right translation from Taurian: perhaps I should look for the "official" translations.
I checked in BattleTech Compendium in Spanish and it is Concordato de Tauro.
Since Tauro is the constellation name, my guess for French would be Concordat du Taureau.
Corrections applied in my .doc version, ready for inclusion in the next .pdf. Happy now? :P
Of course, looking at that has me wanting to do a full OOB for the TCA and TCN, but that would involve a lot of work on what's really a fringe topic to the rest of The Virginia War - unless I rip off whole chunks of lrose's Shattered Dawn TDF Field Manual, which would not only be plagiarism and/or lazy, but also rather disconnected from some of the base assumptions behind The Virginia War. :-[
For instance, if the Taurians are churning out Toros at multiple sites as fast as they can (as I've already assumed) and refuse to sell them on the open market (because it is to the TDF what the Commando is to the Lyrans), why the heck aren't they forming entire new Toro regiments every year, and where are all those shiny-new 'Mechs going? Even if the canon nations have populations two orders of magnitude smaller than canon says they do (as I'm assuming), that's still more than enough manpower and economic output to pull a 'Sherman Swarm' on their enemies.... :-\
Goddamn FASAnomics. :(
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Corrections applied in my .doc version, ready for inclusion in the next .pdf. Happy now? :P
:P
and Fasanomics rule!
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Okay, here's version 1.1 for everyone's inspection and dissection. I've redone the enlisted insignia and expanded a lot of the material, but I've also trimmed out some of the battlefield units in favour of others, revised some of the terminology, and included gameplay rules for 'XO rockets' on ground-units. They're nasty in ambushes or sucker-punches, but you don't want to still have them attached when the other guy starts shooting back.... :o
I'm a little torn on the matter of the Taurian Navy, though. As much as I'm drooling over the Concordat-class frigate from Historical: Reunification War and want to give the TC a couple of 'hidden' hulls, and maybe even a 'hidden' shipyard to build said frigates(!) as well as transport JumpShips, my munchkin-meter pegs every time I consider the idea. ::) Hell, given that the TC just spent fifty-odd years evacuating dying worlds and dealing with the attendant economic implosion, not to mention undergoing a godawful house-cleaning after Semyon's War, I'm not sure I haven't overplayed my hand as things stand.... :-\
And for the record, this is the sort of readout I want/hope to eventually do for every factional military, though the final versions will include full TRO sections with record-sheets, Renegade Tech SSDs, and the rules for each faction's unique weaponry.
(Art would be great, too, but it'd have to be done by someone who actually knows which end of a pencil (or stylus) to hold.... :-[ )
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(Art would be great, too, but it'd have to be done by someone who actually knows which end of a pencil (or stylus) to hold.... :-[ )
Then I am out.
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I can really only kitbash.
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I'm a little torn on the matter of the Taurian Navy, though. As much as I'm drooling over the Concordat-class frigate from Historical: Reunification War and want to give the TC a couple of 'hidden' hulls, and maybe even a 'hidden' shipyard to build said frigates(!) as well as transport JumpShips, my munchkin-meter pegs every time I consider the idea.
You can actually justify the warships fairly easily using HB:MPS and H:RW. From H:RW we know the TC had 9 warships left in 2600 - 4 years after the end of RW!! (Really the SL let the TC keep warships- that's what the book said even though a rabid Taurian fan like me would be the first to say the TC had no warship left after the RW- well at least operational ones- the Vandenberg doesn't coun) From the Concordat fluff we have a statement that while no Concordats were built after the war the last few survived until the 1st Succession War (really that's what says -don't believe me you can check the book) - it doesn't say with whom they served but seeing as the TC had 9 Warships in 2600 you could argue it was with the Concordat. (The only other logical choice would be the AFFS - and since when do logic and BT go together?). It is unknown what happened to these that they were lost during the 1st SW- I would chalk it up to maintenance issues (seeing as the TC lacks any major shipyards) or Comstar (why not?- they seem guilty of everything, even if they didn't do it) rather then combat. Now even more interesting is the fluff from the Tigress gunboat in HB:MPS- it specifically says the Tigress, which was introduced in 2790, "was initially planned as a Dropship of Warship escort craft" Really a warship escort- why would design a warship escort unless you have warships. So there- by using 2 very recent publications you can easily justify the TC having some warships during the 1st SW (and keep in mind according to the fluff the last Concordats were destroyed/lost during the 1st SW not the Uprisings.)
You could theoretically have a shipyard- at one point I created the Norfolk Naval Shipyard for yet another Taurian AU I did which was basically a naval base hidden in a giant asteroid that the SLDF never located and which survived until the 3060s- but a hidden shipyard may be pushing it (then again I am convinced that the writers lost a huge opportunity with the Badlands Cluster - once we learned it had been a part of the TC I assumed it was the ideal place for a hidden shipyard.)
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I'm a little torn on the matter of the Taurian Navy, though. As much as I'm drooling over the Concordat-class frigate from Historical: Reunification War and want to give the TC a couple of 'hidden' hulls, and maybe even a 'hidden' shipyard to build said frigates(!) as well as transport JumpShips, my munchkin-meter pegs every time I consider the idea.
You can actually justify the warships fairly easily using HB:MPS and H:RW. From H:RW we know the TC had 9 warships left in 2600 - 4 years after the end of RW!! (Really the SL let the TC keep warships- that's what the book said even though a rabid Taurian fan like me would be the first to say the TC had no warship left after the RW- well at least operational ones- the Vandenberg doesn't coun) From the Concordat fluff we have a statement that while no Concordats were built after the war the last few survived until the 1st Succession War (really that's what says -don't believe me you can check the book) - it doesn't say with whom they served but seeing as the TC had 9 Warships in 2600 you could argue it was with the Concordat. (The only other logical choice would be the AFFS - and since when do logic and BT go together?). It is unknown what happened to these that they were lost during the 1st SW- I would chalk it up to maintenance issues (seeing as the TC lacks any major shipyards) or Comstar (why not?- they seem guilty of everything, even if they didn't do it) rather then combat. Now even more interesting is the fluff from the Tigress gunboat in HB:MPS- it specifically says the Tigress, which was introduced in 2790, "was initially planned as a Dropship of Warship escort craft" Really a warship escort- why would design a warship escort unless you have warships. So there - by using 2 very recent publications you can easily justify the TC having some warships during the 1st SW (and keep in mind according to the fluff the last Concordats were destroyed/lost during the 1st SW not the Uprisings.)
Yeah, I caught that in Reunification War; I'm still ambivalent about the idea, though. I'm trying to keep a firm rein on my munchtastic impulses, and as lovely an image as it is, a squadron of Concordats (or even a couple of your own excellent Bulldogs from the Taurian Initiative AU!) holds the potential to disrupt the fine balance I'm trying to strike. ::)
You could theoretically have a shipyard - at one point I created the Norfolk Naval Shipyard for yet another Taurian AU I did which was basically a naval base hidden in a giant asteroid that the SLDF never located and which survived until the 3060s - but a hidden shipyard may be pushing it
Which is another idea I was/am fully prepared to yoink from you and from canon, by the way - Ruins of Gabriel, anyone? - but the economic catastrophe that was the post-Coup loss of TH supplies and components, as well as the general destruction that was 1SW, combine to make it implausible for the yard to keep operating when the TC had a whole slew of other problems that didn't involve 'throwing money down a pit' (to borrow a phrase from those inevitable domestic opponents of WarShip construction).
Of course, the way my backstory's internal logic is evolving it looks like at least the FedSuns' WarShip construction facilities actually came out of 1SW in fairly decent shape, at least by the standards set by the post-REVIVAL era, so the TC would probably need to do something to offset the threat of WarShips, and delivering nuclear-tipped Arrow-IV ASEWs through the heart of a WarShip's defences is asking a bit much of the TC's ASF pilot-corps in the face of my assumptions about the threat-environment. I don't doubt their courage and patriotism, but there's a difference between a forlorn-hope and committing outright suicide-by-futility. :D
(then again I am convinced that the writers lost a huge opportunity with the Badlands Cluster - once we learned it had been a part of the TC I assumed it was the ideal place for a hidden shipyard.)
QFT. I know they were rushed for time and all, and they certainly didn't want/need to 'borrow trouble' by writing something that could be misconstrued (or outright twisted) the way so many other loose-ends have been in BT fandom, but the way they brushed off the Badlands as 'the Taurians never went there, because it was too hard, so there was never anything important there' really was just a shame. :'(
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Yeah, I caught that in Reunification War; I'm still ambivalent about the idea, though. I'm trying to keep a firm rein on my munchtastic impulses, and as lovely an image as it is, a squadron of Concordats (or even a couple of your own excellent Bulldogs from the Taurian Initiative AU!) holds the potential to disrupt the fine balance I'm trying to strike. ::)
Considering how easy it is to justify the availability of Taurian warships by using several canon sources I would not consider it munchy. To me munchy is when you suddenly say without justification that the Concordat found/hid hundreds of warships and now has the largest fleet in the IS, full of Destroyers, Cruisers and Battleships. (say sort of like the Ruins of Gabriel...)
Which is another idea I was/am fully prepared to yoink from you and from canon, by the way - Ruins of Gabriel, anyone? - but the economic catastrophe that was the post-Coup loss of TH supplies and components, as well as the general destruction that was 1SW, combine to make it implausible for the yard to keep operating when the TC had a whole slew of other problems that didn't involve 'throwing money down a pit' (to borrow a phrase from those inevitable domestic opponents of WarShip construction).
The approach I took was that the shipyard was shut down from the RW through the 3060s. It was maintained, and more importantly the knowledge needed to design and build the ships was maintained but there was no production, just routine maintenance on the last remnants of the Taurian fleet (which was secretly mothballed at end of the RW in that particular setting). Actually I used the TCW Albatross as cover for reactivation of the yard- the bulk of the money spent on the Vandenberg actually went to reactive the Shipyard and start production of new ships for the Concordat...
QFT. I know they were rushed for time and all, and they certainly didn't want/need to 'borrow trouble' by writing something that could be misconstrued (or outright twisted) the way so many other loose-ends have been in BT fandom, but the way they brushed off the Badlands as 'the Taurians never went there, because it was too hard, so there was never anything important there' really was just a shame. :'(
I know they did not want to do something silly like put a shipyard there (unless they intended to give it to the WOB) but the whole there's a planet there that the Taurians controlled and no one went there during the war is just stupid. It sounds like the perfect place to tie down the SLDF -keep them hunting the remnants of the fleet, which keeps them from say attacking the Hyades Cluster.
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Considering how easy it is to justify the availability of Taurian warships by using several canon sources I would not consider it munchy. To me munchy is when you suddenly say without justification that the Concordat found/hid hundreds of warships and now has the largest fleet in the IS, full of Destroyers, Cruisers and Battleships. (say sort of like the Ruins of Gabriel...)
Point. :D
My working premise, assuming I'd given the TCN its WarShips again, was that the Concordat had managed to retain perhaps half a dozen hulls, all frigates or smaller, probably all of the Concordat class - it made up almost a third of the TCN in canon, and simple logistical realities would mean they'd almost have to be of the same class, so the Concordat class becomes the logical choice. A single WarShip yard would have remained operational to produce parts for the few operational vessels; during the League years it would have been microscopically overseen (to make sure the Taurians didn't get any funny ideas), and in the post-Coup era production of new WarShip hulls would have been politically and economically untenable.
- Additional thought: perhaps the TC in the Virginia War universe were trying to set up their own construction programme for regular JumpShips, but couldn't do it for lack of money/resources/foreign expertise. (Ironically, having that Concordat yard mentioned above means they've retained the skill-set to build WarShips, but are starting from scratch when it comes to 'civilian-core' designs. There are many paths to a 'technological backslide', after all. ;D)
- Additional thought: perhaps I'll put a single Concordat class into the FSNS, taken as part of the Concordat's 'reparations' after the war but which quickly became a white elephant to the Feddies for lack of commonality and the difficulty/expense of obtaining parts. Given his response to Ilsa Liao's offer of 'I'll trade you: I get Chesterton, you get my endorsement of your claim to the First Lordship' was a crushing military offensive, how d'you think Paul Davion would react to a Taurian offer of 'we'll trade you: you get our captured (and long-hidden) Davion-II destroyer, we get your Concordat frigate'? :P
I know they did not want to do something silly like put a shipyard there (unless they intended to give it to the WOB) but the whole there's a planet there that the Taurians controlled and no one went there during the war is just stupid. It sounds like the perfect place to tie down the SLDF -keep them hunting the remnants of the fleet, which keeps them from say attacking the Hyades Cluster.
Unfortunately, it looks like they were trapped, partly by the limitations of word-count and the book's size:price-point ratio, and partly by the fact that TTBOMK, the previous descriptions of the Reunification War didn't mention anything about fighting in the Badlands region. :'(
And again, that sucks, but filling in those kinds of holes in canon ios why we all congregate at OBT to start with, right? ;D
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My working premise, assuming I'd given the TCN its WarShips again, was that the Concordat had managed to retain perhaps half a dozen hulls, all frigates or smaller, probably all of the Concordat class - it made up almost a third of the TCN in canon, and simple logistical realities would mean they'd almost have to be of the same class, so the Concordat class becomes the logical choice.
That makes sense- according to TR3057R all of the Winchesters were destroyed and the only other canon vessels larger then the Concordat that we know are the Wagon Wheel and Dart.
A single WarShip yard would have remained operational to produce parts for the few operational vessels; during the League years it would have been microscopically overseen (to make sure the Taurians didn't get any funny ideas), and in the post-Coup era production of new WarShip hulls would have been politically and economically untenable.
I don't think that you need a "warship yard" to maintain the ships- a drydock would do the job and from the SLDF's view the drydock would not be able to build new warships. Actually we know the TC had a number of jumpship repair facilities even in the 3020s- it's mentioned somewhere in HB:MPS but I don't have my notes handy to cite the reference right now.
- Additional thought: perhaps the TC in the Virginia War universe were trying to set up their own construction programme for regular JumpShips, but couldn't do it for lack of money/resources/foreign expertise. (Ironically, having that Concordat yard mentioned above means they've retained the skill-set to build WarShips, but are starting from scratch when it comes to 'civilian-core' designs. There are many paths to a 'technological backslide', after all. ;D)
Now that would be an interesting twist- able to build warships and compact core jumpships but not conventional ones.
how d'you think Paul Davion would react to a Taurian offer of 'we'll trade you: you get our captured (and long-hidden) Davion-II destroyer, we get your Concordat frigate'? :P
What do you expect from Davions....
partly by the fact that TTBOMK, the previous descriptions of the Reunification War didn't mention anything about fighting in the Badlands region. :'(
But all of those books were written before we knew the Badlands was part of the TC- with all of the raiding going on by the Concordat Navy it just makes sense that they would use the badlands as a hiding spot. But oh well....
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I don't think that you need a "warship yard" to maintain the ships- a drydock would do the job and from the SLDF's view the drydock would not be able to build new warships. Actually we know the TC had a number of jumpship repair facilities even in the 3020s- it's mentioned somewhere in HB:MPS but I don't have my notes handy to cite the reference right now.
For my purposes, dockyards and repair facilities like on the Olympus can do field-repairs and minor fixes; certain critical components and assemblies used in KF-drive WarShips mean that battle-damage repairs or full-scale SLEP overhauls of armed capital hulls can only be handled by a full-blown construction facility. So Sayeth the Author. ;D
Now that would be an interesting twist- able to build warships and compact core jumpships but not conventional ones.
It's actually the same situation the Salernans have been in for a long while. Their naval architects were working from the old compact-core ships like the Aquilla class and never developed the 'standard' JumpShip KF-core. They later acquired its technical secrets from Taurian expats and started building a clone of the Star Lord in the Salerno system, but not in large numbers and only for the use of the Prince. As a 'precaution' against his Dukes being able to move large amounts of troops quickly and cheaply, the Principality's only other shipyard (Acadia) is only permitted to build Visconte-class frigates and Graziani--class compact-core freighters, including their 'merchant carrier' and 'landing-ship' variants.
The problem is that the Salernan yards have been building by 'pick from the menu', rote memorisation, and automated assembly for so long that only a handful of their people actually understand what's going on anymore (c.f. the Valkyrie factory in TRO3025). The Acadians bother to educate their people better, so they can go off-script if they want, but that comes with its own caveats - like Royal suspicion of their intentions.
how d'you think Paul Davion would react to a Taurian offer of 'we'll trade you: you get our captured (and long-hidden) Davion-II destroyer, we get your Concordat frigate'? :P
What do you expect from Davions....
... that his concern for the welfare of the FS would override his irritation at being bartered with by 'unwashed Periphery neobarbs'? :-\ The Chesterton thing was the only precedent I could find, but you're right: without knowing the exact details of his domestic situation then, and what would be different when/if the Taurians made the offer, it's not an especially encouraging precedent. :-X
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When you say the graziani has a landing ship variant, you don't mean they have the ability to land on planets, do you?
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I know they did not want to do something silly like put a shipyard there (unless they intended to give it to the WOB) but the whole there's a planet there that the Taurians controlled and no one went there during the war is just stupid. It sounds like the perfect place to tie down the SLDF -keep them hunting the remnants of the fleet, which keeps them from say attacking the Hyades Cluster.
That always bothered be about the Badlands after reading H:RW. The single counter I can think of that "might" explain the Badlands away post-Reunification War is that the technologies required to maintain colonization of the world were no longer available during the long years of the Succession Wars.
Then again, my counter is that's the planet - not an orbital shipyard.
It's a matter of explaining how a shipyard or repair facility was placed in the Badlands after the Reunification War. I hate to lean on them, but using Amaris's Periphery build up as a working example, it's possible the TC could have constructed the facility prior to the New Vandenburg Rebellion. That could give you the facility and the location.
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When you say the graziani has a landing ship variant, you don't mean they have the ability to land on planets, do you?
Ha! ;D No, more like the Robinson or Kyushu class: they carry large parasite complements, which deliver their embarked troops to the planet's surface while the transport itself remains in orbit. Infantry are delivered by assault shuttles; reflecting the archaic design of this model of compact-core vessel, 'Mechs are delivered by internally-carried parasite-craft of the Tigersnake class, essentially 'DropShips' without actual KF booms.
There's always been a very lively sort of dynamic going on between the Salernan Prince and his 'vassals' the Dukes. On the one hand, the Salernan Crown is 'supreme' over the Dukes only because they let it be; the Council of Dukes approves the accession of each Prince, and they generally select for Princes who leave them alone to run their estates as if they were more-or-less independent nations. By the same token, long-standing ironclad laws and ancient traditions that are almost as binding mean that the Prince has a monopoly over certain military technologies (including modern JumpShips and 'Mechs), and the Princes have always done their best (often successfully) to limit the Dukes' access to modern equipment and keep them focused on squabbling with each other, in order to forestall a full-blown overthrow of the Cavaretta Dynasty.
Thus, instead of the cheap and modular JumpShip/DropShip paradigm, which would be far more efficient from a logistical and economic point of view, even their civilian JumpShips are in fact compact-core freighters (and each hull costs them a fortune!) that still use a design-principle that died out everywhere else centuries ago.
Feudal dynastic politics, folks. What are you gonna do? ::)
I know they did not want to do something silly like put a shipyard there (unless they intended to give it to the WOB) but the whole there's a planet there that the Taurians controlled and no one went there during the war is just stupid. It sounds like the perfect place to tie down the SLDF -keep them hunting the remnants of the fleet, which keeps them from say attacking the Hyades Cluster.
That always bothered be about the Badlands after reading H:RW. The single counter I can think of that "might" explain the Badlands away post-Reunification War is that the technologies required to maintain colonization of the world were no longer available during the long years of the Succession Wars.
Then again, my counter is that's the planet - not an orbital shipyard.
It's a matter of explaining how a shipyard or repair facility was placed in the Badlands after the Reunification War. I hate to lean on them, but using Amaris's Periphery build up as a working example, it's possible the TC could have constructed the facility prior to the New Vandenburg Rebellion. That could give you the facility and the location.
Interesting point. Of course, the counter-argument would draw its strength from Amaris' readiness to throw the Taurian Freedom Army to the wolves Kerensky in furtherance of his own agenda: given the way 'rogue' Taurian WarShips kept cropping up throughout the Star League era, Aleks K would have made destroying such a facility one of his primary objectives during the Periphery Uprising, and Amaris would've been quite happy to oblige him in order to keep him out of the way.
Still, I'll let the idea stew in the back of my head for a while and see what happens. :D
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There's also the example of the Belt Pirates/Star's End, which in Periphery (1st Ed) is cited as having "several starship construction facilities fully capable of repairing and building new vessels at a modest annual rate." Yes, it's on the opposite side of the Inner Sphere, but it shows that some Star League-era JumpShip facilities did survive the Succession Wars in the Periphery. Star's End is listed as a Rim World's planet in HB:MPS (in the SLSB it was merely "on the Lyran/Rim Worlds border" when Simon Cameron died there under mysterious circumstances). If a place with that kind of history can survive, I think the Taurians can afford a hidden shipyard or two.
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Also depends how you spin it.
Amaris supposedly provided training and material support. That doesn't necessary mean he was privy to everything. Even when the SLDF was starting to make major headway against the TFA thanks to Amaris's intel, they still managed some success. This leads me to believe he wasn't involved in everything, but enough. So a Badlands facility or other types is/could be possible.
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Talk to the Republicans they are experts at spin control.
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Well, here's the latest iteration of the .pdf. I've improved the layout a little and expanded several topics, including a full listing of the TCN's capital-ship OOB and a summary of their military industry, but the main reason I put this together was nailing down their ground-forces deployments, specifically which regiments were posted where (so I know what sort of holes will be made if certain things happen).
For the record, I've pegged the end of the TC's economic 'slide' to about 2805 or so, broadly similar to how things went in the BTSD universe; up to that point, Nicoletta and then Semyon Calderon were trying to save as many 'cows' as they could, with mixed success, and worrying a little less about 'guns and/or butter'. It's taken two generations of Taurian leadership for the Concordat's situation to come back onto an even keel, and more than ten years to bring the TDF back into a more-or-less fighting trim after Semyon's War proved how catastrophically rusty they were, but they're finally there. ::)