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Post by princesskibble on Jun 5, 2017 19:58:25 GMT
Then maybe that's the reason not to use drones -.- I just can't imagine any sensible future society would use something that even us savages from a thousand years ago thought was wrong. Besides boarding isn't just about efficient enemy incapacitation, you need to find any non-combatants and talk to them, or negotiate with combatants who might want to surrender. Nobody is going to talk to or surrender to a piece of metal covered in guns without a face, using drones might create more enemies than it incapacitates. Most boarding will probably go off without a bullet fired! There already is precedent for people surrendering to a drone. And if you manage to board someone, they probably already surrendered through radio, and have their weapons and propulsion disabled or they are vastly outmatched. Letting humans board gives them hostages or means you lose people if they blow themselves up. Such behaviour is not unprecedented. Warfare is utilizing force to achieve your strategic goals. While countries (occasionally) attempt to minimize unnecessary harm, pragmatism tends to triumph, and many 'cruel' weapons get outlawed only after they lose most of their effectiveness. Boarding is indeed not about effective incapitation of the enemy, blasting them away with missiles is easier, both now and then. Terror is outlawed but is still a effective weapon, so is chemical and nuclear weaponry. Anyway, boarding is about arresting people, and a robot can't really do that, especially with people resistant enough to need to have physical strength to deal with, but not so resistant that you need to murder them.
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Post by apophys on Jun 5, 2017 20:28:52 GMT
Then maybe that's the reason not to use drones -.- I just can't imagine any sensible future society would use something that even us savages from a thousand years ago thought was wrong. Besides boarding isn't just about efficient enemy incapacitation, you need to find any non-combatants and talk to them, or negotiate with combatants who might want to surrender. Nobody is going to talk to or surrender to a piece of metal covered in guns without a face, using drones might create more enemies than it incapacitates. Most boarding will probably go off without a bullet fired! It's not the drones that are wrong - killing is wrong. And unfortunately, human history hasn't been very peaceful, regardless of this well known fact. Combat drones are just one of many weapon platforms, and in fact have the potential to take all humans out of the line of fire entirely. Surrender is universally recognized: dropped weapons, hands up (best if holding a white cloth). Any enemy combatant who does not surrender clearly and unconditionally is a valid military target; there is no "might want to." Even then, surrender has not always been accepted, and combatants instead opted for a massacre (this is currently a violation of regulations though). Drones change nothing here. Yes, people will surrender to a piece of metal covered in guns. Combatants in Iraq surrendered to helicopters (more than one occasion, feel free to google; there's video).
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Post by RiftandRend on Jun 5, 2017 22:29:47 GMT
Response to 3, wires can't be jammed. yep wires can't be jammed, they can be cut, spliced into and hacked, run out of length, torn, among other things Kilometer long wires can be easily stored in small payloads, look at TOW missiles. Wires are millimeter sized targets and would be nearly impossible to hit with a ranged weapon. Additionally, any effort spent attempting to disable the wire is time under fire from the drone it's attached to.
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Post by Enderminion on Jun 5, 2017 22:32:36 GMT
yep wires can't be jammed, they can be cut, spliced into and hacked, run out of length, torn, among other things Kilometer long wires can be easily stored in small payloads, look at TOW missiles. Wires are millimeter sized targets and would be nearly impossible to hit with a ranged weapon. Additionally, any effort spent attempting to disable the wire is time under fire from the drone it's attached to. so you mean my own chesse wire won't cut through it?, since wires are millimeter sized targets it would be impossible to shoot down, and if it's moveing a kp or two it will slice through battleships
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Post by RiftandRend on Jun 5, 2017 22:47:56 GMT
Drone boarding vehicles are bad for the same reason any kind of military drone is evil! It doesn't matter that it's more efficient, when the drone pilot is behind a computer screen they are detached from the situation and much more merciless. They have said horrible things about dispassionate they are toward human lives in interviews all the time, and it would be the same for people piloting the boarding machines. You have forgotten one of the main points in this game, ethics don't exist. Read the "doctrine" sections within the documents portion of the infolinks. If boarding drones are bad, then what about anti-ship drones? The alternative is using manned boarding teams and attack craft, which seems far worse to me. Or weapon gunners? I don't see how melting an enemy from 10 Gm is much better than piloting a drone. War is bad, yes. But as long as there is human conflict there will be war, and the intelligent will use the most effective weapons to fight it. In this case those weapons seem to be drones.
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Post by RiftandRend on Jun 5, 2017 22:51:44 GMT
Kilometer long wires can be easily stored in small payloads, look at TOW missiles. Wires are millimeter sized targets and would be nearly impossible to hit with a ranged weapon. Additionally, any effort spent attempting to disable the wire is time under fire from the drone it's attached to. so you mean my own chesse wire won't cut through it?, since wires are millimeter sized targets it would be impossible to shoot down, and if it's moveing a kp or two it will slice through battleships I assume you are talking about cheese wires, and in general using edged tools to cut the wires. This sounds effective, but the drone could simply put itself between the user and its wire. And no, a cheese wire moving at what I assume you meant as a few km/s will not slice through a battleship.
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Post by apophys on Jun 6, 2017 0:58:17 GMT
Wires are millimeter sized targets and would be nearly impossible to hit with a ranged weapon. Which also makes them easy to melt with wide-beam lasers.
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Post by RiftandRend on Jun 6, 2017 1:10:26 GMT
Wires are millimeter sized targets and would be nearly impossible to hit with a ranged weapon. Which also makes them easy to melt with wide-beam lasers. These wouldn't be for long range use. A boarding ship would close to within a few hundred meters of the target and then deploy them. Anyway, why would you attempt to board the enemy if you are under long range laser fire? Edit: God status achieved!
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Post by Enderminion on Jun 6, 2017 11:11:11 GMT
so you mean my own chesse wire won't cut through it?, since wires are millimeter sized targets it would be impossible to shoot down, and if it's moveing a kp or two it will slice through battleships I assume you are talking about cheese wires, and in general using edged tools to cut the wires. This sounds effective, but the drone could simply put itself between the user and its wire. And no, a cheese wire moving at what I assume you meant as a few km/s will not slice through a battleship. if the drone is between the cutting wire and its control wire then its not boarding and I, have won
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Post by RiftandRend on Jun 6, 2017 12:43:16 GMT
I assume you are talking about cheese wires, and in general using edged tools to cut the wires. This sounds effective, but the drone could simply put itself between the user and its wire. And no, a cheese wire moving at what I assume you meant as a few km/s will not slice through a battleship. if the drone is between the cutting wire and its control wire then its not boarding and I, have won Ships interiors have hallways or corridors. The drone can be blocking LOS to its wire while still advancing.
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Post by Enderminion on Jun 6, 2017 12:53:28 GMT
if the drone is between the cutting wire and its control wire then its not boarding and I, have won Ships interiors have hallways or corridors. The drone can be blocking LOS to its wire while still advancing. well how did the drone get to the ship? also if my ship is a maze with very short LOS, then I can sneak behind the drones and slice the wires with no threat of contact, unless you leave mines, or have a metric excrementload of drones to leave one at every conner
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Post by bigbombr on Jun 6, 2017 13:49:34 GMT
Ships interiors have hallways or corridors. The drone can be blocking LOS to its wire while still advancing. well how did the drone get to the ship? ... Frying external sensors and weapons with lasers. And autonomous drones perform better than wire guided drones.
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Post by Easy on Jun 7, 2017 13:28:30 GMT
Ships interiors have hallways or corridors. The drone can be blocking LOS to its wire while still advancing. well how did the drone get to the ship? also if my ship is a maze with very short LOS, then I can sneak behind the drones and slice the wires with no threat of contact, unless you leave mines, or have a metric excrementload of drones to leave one at every conner The logical response would to have more than one drone to explore several areas at once and attempt to secure cleared areas. Perhaps there are meat-drones following behind to secure and exploit the areas the boarding drone has already explored. The ship is lost, I don't know why you're being a hero just to temporarily disable one boarding drone. Plus how big could your crew quarters really be? Seems mass and volume inefficient to have a veritable maze, not to mention that it might be less than ergonomic for your crew under normal circumstances.
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Post by Enderminion on Jun 7, 2017 13:39:47 GMT
well how did the drone get to the ship? also if my ship is a maze with very short LOS, then I can sneak behind the drones and slice the wires with no threat of contact, unless you leave mines, or have a metric excrementload of drones to leave one at every conner The logical response would to have more than one drone to explore several areas at once and attempt to secure cleared areas. Perhaps there are meat-drones following behind to secure and exploit the areas the boarding drone has already explored. The ship is lost, I don't know why you're being a hero just to temporarily disable one boarding drone. Plus how big could your crew quarters really be? Seems mass and volume inefficient to have a veritable maze, not to mention that it might be less than ergonomic for your crew under normal circumstances. mostly I'm buying time for the intel and comms codes to be destroyed and allowing time for the intel and comms officers to find their cyanide pills. you wouldn't board any ship, you'd board the flag ship as that has the most HVTs (and the largest crew quarters) so a maze could be far less granular then you think, there just has to be a way to get around the drones
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Post by bigbombr on Jun 7, 2017 13:49:36 GMT
The logical response would to have more than one drone to explore several areas at once and attempt to secure cleared areas. Perhaps there are meat-drones following behind to secure and exploit the areas the boarding drone has already explored. The ship is lost, I don't know why you're being a hero just to temporarily disable one boarding drone. Plus how big could your crew quarters really be? Seems mass and volume inefficient to have a veritable maze, not to mention that it might be less than ergonomic for your crew under normal circumstances. mostly I'm buying time for the intel and comms codes to be destroyed and allowing time for the intel and comms officers to find their cyanide pills. you wouldn't board any ship, you'd board the flag ship as that has the most HVTs (and the largest crew quarters) so a maze could be far less granular then you think, there just has to be a way to get around the drones Between surrendering through radio and being boarded are dozens of minutes, if not several hours. There is no reason to stall.
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