OBT Forum

Quote from: Dragon Cat on June 18, 2012, 06:36:18 PM

Personally I would have more believed either big killer ship appearing and hitting them with rocks

Isn't that exactly what happened? I thought it was made clear that the asteroid was delivered via Erinyes.

I thought it was an asteroid with engines strapped onto it

this question brings up four great big misconceptions about the Periphery and it's relation to the Inner sphere

1) The Periphery is still part of the Inner Sphere.  so any questions related to holy shroud and Comstars influence in the Inner Sphere extends to the Periphery as well

2) The Periphery was not spared from the Succession Wars- true thier actions were minor, at at various points in history Periphery nations did get involved, usually to try and steal shit from the houses

3) The Star League did NOT have the same reverence for preserving either technology or infrastructure.  after all they could always rebuild when the war was over, unlike the succession wars.

4) The Amaris Coup started with a massive recreation of the Reunifacation Wars, that dropped the SLDF's capabilities by a third.  such actions would have seriously depleted the Peripheries industrial and military capabilities, but when you are fighting for freedom...

1)Holy Shroud was written that it specifically targeted the Houses, using Steiner as an example (they were on the verge of recovering ferro-fibrous armor). Everything published about ComStar points out that the Periphery was treated as separate and different from the IS (better, or worse? that's a different matter). The only change is in 3050 updated, that mentions the WoB using Holy Shroud as an excuse to build a factory in TC space.

2)The Periphery was only indirectly affected by the succession wars. They did not get involved, they were screwed by loss of trade- no more Star League water filters and such- and IS units turning pirate.

3)The Terran Hegemony certainly did- the HRAD setup, to say nothing of the manic stockpiling of equipment and data cores like the Helm and New Dallas cores- but the SLDF, only upon reaching the Pentagon Worlds.

4)The Periphery uprising was very different in character from the Amaris Coup and the Reunification War. You actually understate the damage wrought-the Mechwarrior RPG writes that "the Periphery worlds were brutally beaten by Kerensky's forces" which would explain an inability to produce much in the way of military output. But nowhere is it written that they lost the knowhow completely.

True, the first Periphery sourcebook states that the TC surrendered when the SLDF penetrated the Hyades asteroids. Later sourcebooks have nothing concrete to say, meaning that Kerensky would have had to have seriously targeted the Hyades cluster during the Periphery uprising. Does anybody know of anything in canon connected to this?

With that deployment method Erinyes never has to get near a target it just carry's the "AsteroidShip" into system then lets it do it's thing

That seems to be exactly what happened with some of Erinyes' other possible targets (like the Azami world that was hit, along with the FWL world that I'm totally drawing a blank on right now). As to why the Taurians didn't stop it? No clue. It's not the first time that something has penetrated the Cluster though, as seen by the Urukai's "attack."

Sigh.  Don't mention the freaking Uruk-hai.  A mercenary regiment?  Already with their lead battalion destroyed manages to get through all the space defenses in the Taurus system, avoids getting their DropShips busted by fighters, small craft, and the Vandenberg (which the Taurians definately had at the time), manages to drop inside the capital city, shoot up Taurus Territorial Industries, wreck entire sections of the city before the Taurian Guards (elite troops, mind you) and upwards of 50 armored regiments can respond.

There is NO WAY IN HELL, that the Uruk-Hai should ever have gotten to the surface.

Master Arminas

Also remember that space is big, really, really big, and that using old SLDF charts and jumping in well outside the systems normaly travelled areas, you could lob in a rock from way out.  Still does not account for the rock getting through, or the engine parts surviving impact vaporisation.

According to Handbook:  Reunification War, pg. 92:

"To the uninitated, that seemed an imminently possible challenge.  After all, the Star League army had just laid waste to New Vandenberg in a campaign completed in less than a year's time.  But the Hyades represented a much more difficult proposition.  Interstellar navigation into the cluster required extremely precise calculations--far more precise than practed even by most SLDF naval crews--if a ship was to avoid jumping into a gravity well or being damaged by debris.  And while the coordinates of the most common safe proximity points were programmed into the navigation computers of nearly every captured Taurian ship, those points were also going to be better defended than any experienced yet.  The Star League fleets likely could jump in blind and batter their way through the defenses and blockades, but there was no guarantee of success.
Instead, the corps under General Onaga's command prepared to fight a very different kind of war.  The eight main worlds orbited suns in just five systems within the Hyades; Onaga tasked his Warship fleet with clearing each of the outlying systems of signficant naval presence while his ground troops jump from planet to planet, moon to mon, and asteroid to asteroid within Taurus' system, clearing out the defenders before moving the Concordat's homeworld itself.  The Star League army was no longer a ground force--it would have to become the largest space marine corps ever created."

Sure, the Taurians don't have WarShips anymore (except the Vandenberg), but the astrography of their home systems hasn't changed a bit.  Their SASF is completely rebuilt in the 3025+ eras.  From Sarna.net

"The special Asteroid Support Force or SASF is a special defensive unit unique to the Taurian Concordat. Flannagan's Nebula in the Hyades Cluster is a cloud of gas, dust and asteroids that surrounds the planet of Taurus, capital of the Taurian Concordat.  With the extablishment of the Taurian Concordat a decision was made to enhance the defensive capabilities inherent in this natural feture.  With that in mind the Taurian government established a special forces unit, the SASF to man the bases and defensive platforms that are found throughout the Nebula's extensive asteroid field.

The SASF is a five thousand strong all volunteer force of soldiery and naval personnel that are permanently assigned to the capital world surrounding asteroid fields.  Viewed by many Taurians as the last defensive line betweent he Concordat and the hostile forces beyond their borders the SASF has only failed once in its long and storied history, and it took the combined might of the Inner Sphere to conquer it during the Reunification War.

The core of their defensive capabilities are the numerous AeroSpace bases and the Zero-G defense and assault platforms that are armed with both missile and laser emplacements.  in addition to the assault platforms and Aerospace facilities there are numerous supply caches and operations bases that are built on the bigger asteroids and moonlets throughout the nebula.  With their training and their organizational strucuture the SASF are adept at asymetrical warfare, utilizing hit and fade tactics that are capabile of crippling even the greatest of Warships available to any antagonistic power intent on invasion."

There is simply NO WAY anyone could get a WarShip or JumpShip insystem without the Taurians being aware of it.  Especially since they watch EVERY proximity point.  The defenses of Taurus itself are the next best thing to a full-blown SDS setup.  That's why the story that the TPTB came up with makes no sense.

MA 

Thinking about that description...that has to make trade and merchant convoys an absolute nightmare to get to Taurus. I wonder if that factors into some of the Taurian production hold-up.