6029 The Importance of Warp Interdiction
While Ves started to dream about designing additional light chs to better cope against the alien phasefighters, Commander Casella ntioned a complicating factor.
"There is one more variable that has led to a positive result against the alien phasefighters. The phasefighters we fought against today were unable to display their full strength. As far as we know, each of them are equipped with small warp drives that enable them to traverse distances much faster than normal. The reason why they were unable to unlock their full mobility was because they were operating in the range of our powerful warp interdictors. This essentially cut down their greatest advantage, aning that our chs only managed to defeat a crippled enemy."
Everyone gathered in the conference room frowned at that. The Sentinel Commander indeed raised a valid point. The warp interdictors that the Larkinsons installed on many of theri combat vessels prevented the alien craft and vessels from deploying their own warp bubbles and thereby moving a lot faster in space.
Warp interdictors were essential to fighting against the native aliens. Trying to start a fight without these gadgets ant that the enemy held all of the initiative. The alien warships could advance and retreat whenever they wanted, and if they chose to fight, their superior mobility enabled them to outmaneuver an opposing ch force with much greater ease.
"So what you are saying that our chs should have a harder ti defeating the alien phasefighters if they are operating outside of the support range of friendly starships?"
"That is indeed what I am trying to convey, sir. Most of our battles so far are fleet-based engagents in space where our ch units are always accompanied by their carriers. These are situations where it is always possible to cover the entire battlefield with powerful enough warp interdiction fields. If our ch units have to fight away from our fleet or on the surface of a planet, then this condition may not apply anymore. In such instances, our second-class chs will struggle to fight against the alien phasefighters. Only our quasi-first-class chs will be able to achieve good results."
That caused Ves to frown even deeper. He understood and couldn't help but agree with Casella's logic.
The quasi-first-class chs that Ves designed for his own clan were all equipped with transphasic flight systems. This allowed them to speed themselves up by forming relatively weak but functional warp bubbles. That should at least allow them to keep up with the speed of alien phasefighters.
The older and cheaper second-class chs did not enjoy this particular luxury. The presence or absence of phasewater technology could make an enormous difference in any confrontation involving alien phasefighters!
The reason why Ves and many of his fellow Larkinsons never took the alien small craft seriously was because they had made great strides in pursuing quality over quantity. Their chs had undergone massive upgrades compared to most other ch forces. They were ahead of the curve compared to the alien phasefighters.
However, as ti went by, this disparity would most certainly reduce. The Larkinsons might not be able to enjoy their head-start for long. They all needed to be ready to treat alien phasefighters with the sa degree of severity as human chs.
Commander lkor decided to share his own opinion on this subject.
"Those phasefighters take a lot of phasewater to build, so they cannot be cheap. The native aliens probably don't care too much. They control most of the territories of the Red Ocean, so they can afford to produce millions if not billions of phasefighters. It still takes a lot of resources to construct warships, but it is much cheaper to build carriers that can transport lots of phasefighters. After all, the carriers of the Tornt Fleet are nothing more than large cargo ships that the orvens have hastily converted into carrier vessels."
The significance of phasefighters was therefore much greater on a strategic level. The Red Cabal and the major alien races all possessed a huge amount of industrial capacity, so they could churn out lots of transphasic small craft once they ca up with adequate designs and retooled all of their production chains.
Ves could already predict that the aliens would probably reduce their dependence on expensive warships and begin to field lots of phasefighters!
This was both good and bad for red humanity.
On the one hand, phasefighters were not as big and intimidating to fight against. Many human ch forces were most comfortable when fighting against other chs. The alien small craft were not exactly the sa, but the similarities were still great enough that the divergences didn't matter.
On the other hand, the aliens already enjoyed an incredible nurical advantage in most aspects. Once they truly began to invest in phasefighters, they could easily field 10 tis as many small craft as red humanity in a relatively short amount of ti!
Additionally, it was much easier to fulfill the manpower requirents of phasefighters. They were inherently simpler than chs so it took less years for an alien with an equivalent degree of intelligence to a human to beco a proficient phasefighter pilot.
The alien pilots also did not have to satisfy an unreasonably restrictive condition such as suitable genetic aptitude either. As long as the alien species possessed good judgnt, decent combat instincts and adequate reaction speed, they should easily be able to supply trillions of eligible pilots to the war effort!
There was no way to overco this incredible disparity in numbers without resorting to other ans!
Perhaps the most important factor that still gave chs an edge over phasefighters was that the pilots of the forr were able to break through and beco much more powerful.
With the strength of expert pilots, ace pilots and god pilots, chs would always maintain a qualitative edge!
There was no way the aliens could co up with similar ans. The native aliens did not possess the ability to create a Kingdom of Phasefighters or whatever, and they were completely clueless about willpower cultivation.
It may be theoretically possible for extraordinary phasefighter pilots to erge, just like how it was theoretically possible for ch pilots to advance without relying on the assistance of the Kingdom of chs.
In practice, there was no way that either scenario could happen. Cultivation was actually a delicate process. If anything went wrong, then that could already ruin a breakthrough!
Ves felt a lot better after making this conclusion. Phasefighters should not be able to dominate chs entirely. His job should not be in danger anyti soon.
"Let's get back to the original topic." Ves said as he cald himself down. "Seeing as alien phasefighters have beco a trend in alien space, our ch community must develop more targeted counters against them. First, chs expressly designed to counter phasefighters must be fast and ideally equipped with phasewater technology. If the latter condition cannot be satisfied, then any fight against these alien small craft will inevitably result in tragic outcos."
Phasewater technology was simply too strong. It made a huge difference in any battle. Hyper technology might be able to reduce the performance gap, but the aliens weren't stupid. They were beginning to embrace hyper technology with almost the sa degree of enthusiasm as red humanity!
"We also need a solution that can reduce our dependence on warships equipped with warp interdictors." Commander lkor said. "It would be great if you can design a ch that can deploy a warp interdiction field to prevent the alien small craft from running circles around our ch units. It would be even better if the ch can suppress phasefighters in other ways as well."
The other two legion commanders at the table nodded in agreent with lkor. Since the aliens were most definitely on track to field enormous quantities of phasefighters in the future, it beca imperative to find effective ways to weaken them wholesale!
However, this was easier said than done. Ves frowned as he considered the issue.
"Warp interdictors are usually installed on starships for good reasons. They are generally large, powerful and require lots of energy in order to generate a warp interdiction field of sufficient strength. While there are smaller models of warp interdictors available, they are usually seen in first-class chs. It is currently not realistic to equip warp interdictors onto second-class chs as far as I know. The modules are too bulky and consu way too much energy. They also generate a lot of heat as well, which is a major problem in any space environnt."
This was a challenging technical problem. It was not an issue to develop first-class warp interdictor chs. At that tech level, it was not challenging to miniaturize warp interdictors to the point where they could be slotted into specialized chs.
It was difficult to design an equivalent ch for the expeditionary fleet. His options as a ch designer was much more limited if he had to design a warp interdictor ch at the second-class or quasi-first-class level.
"Is it too expensive?"
"Partially." Ves replied. "Technology hasn't caught up yet. Second-class warp interdictors cannot be miniaturized to the sa degree as their first-class counterparts. This ans that I will have to design an entire heavy ch around this single function. Such a ch will be large and heavy. It also cannot do anything else as it also has to be equipped with a large power reactor and lots of heat sinks. Such a ch is an awful complent to light ch units that are assigned to go on the attack."
In other words, second-class warp interdictor chs could only effectively be deployed in defensive combat, prepared ambushes and assaults on static locations.
"It is better than nothing." Commander Sendra said. "We are used to working with limitations. Even if we cannot use warp interdictors in most offensive actions, we can at least ensure the aliens will not be able to ruin us entirely if they launch attacks onto our vulnerable chs. My Swordmaidens generally do not pilot light chs, so they are sitting ducks if they have no hope of catching up to alien phasefighters."
The Swordmaidens needed warp interdictor chs the most since they had no effective way of suppressing the fast and agile phasefighters at a distance!
Ves let out a sigh. "I will try to co up with a solution at the second-class level, but I won't lie to you. It will be difficult to design a viable ch with this function. Personally, I am hoping that the Red Association has made lots of progress on increasing the practicality of this tech. They have managed to do so with space suppressors, and it is natural to develop a convenient solution that works over longer ranges. I don't know how many years it will take, so I will try to co up with my own solution in the anti."
That relieved the legion commanders. They did not want their ch forces to beco shackled to their starships on a permanent basis. There were many different scenarios where it was better if chs could operate far away from friendly starships or fortifications.
The Larkinsons talked a bit more about alien phasefighters. They analyzed the approximate performance of different ch types against these expensive but effective craft.
Most other ch types did not perform well against the alien small craft.
"Rifleman chs cannot inflict enough damage to eliminate the phasefighters quickly." Casella noted. "Heavy artillery chs possess the necessary firepower, but with the exception of our Transcendent Punishers, every other ch model will miss most of their shots against these mobile craft. The only dium or heavy ch type that can perform well against alien phasefighters are missileer chs. As long as they are loaded with transphasic missiles, they should be able to take down multiple alien phasefighters, especially if they are accompanied by scout chs that can provide more reliable targeting guidance."
The Sentinel Commander was correct, but her solution was not economical at all. Transphasic missiles were far too wasteful and expensive to be employed by most human ch forces!
The aliens on the other hand…
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