Sirius Business - a C# Aurora forum game. v2.5

[blue emu]

The Jerkmobile continues to follow the Freighter at extreme range... actually dropping back a little to just over 230,000 km... and pepper it with long-range shots that each do only a single point of damage.

He hasn't yet scored a solid internal hit... just chip damage to the armor.

EDIT:

The Jerx have been shooting at that freighter for fifteen minutes of game time (from 06:30 to 06:45) and have yet to do more than sandpaper the armor.

Our fleet is ten hours and twenty-four minutes from the jump point into the raided system.

EDIT again, later:

07:00 - They've been shooting at this same ship for half an hour. They'll be scoring their first internal hit soon, though, since they've slowly sandpapered away much of the armor on this side of the ship.

 

[blue emu]

After 48 minutes of steady but badly-aimed bombardment, the Jerx ship finally scores its first internal hit. There is no visible result.

Meanwhile, our fleet is now less than 10 hours from the jump point.

EDIT:

After spending 54 minutes chipping away at the same freighter, the Jerx ship suddenly switches both tactics and targets! Abandoning the long-range fire on the Brooks company freighter, the Jerx suddenly zooms in to point blank range and opens fire on a Woods company freighter instead. At point blank range his Lasers do savage damage, so this won't take long. His first salvo knocks out an engine.

... and after that one salvo, they seem to lose interest and switch back to long-range sniping away at the Brooks freighter.

I think the Jerx are drunk. Seriously.

 

[blue emu]

Prolonged sniping has finally destroyed a component on the Brooks freighter (that destroyed engine above was on the Woods freighter). The Brooks freighter has just lost a cargo hold (and its contents), with three crewmen killed. The long-range sniping continues.

EDIT:

Again the Jerx have changed tactics... instead of trailing the freighter at a quarter of a million km away and sniping at them, the Jerx have closed in enough to raise their damage-per-hit from one point to two. This should speed up the massacre.

The Jerx warship has closed to point blank range of one freighter... but it's actually shooting at a different one instead, considerably further away. Meanwhile, the other two Jerx ships are headed for just about this spot.

Are they planning a boarding action?

A-haar Matey! Avast, ye scurvy dog!

 

[Flockingbird]

I’m really enjoying your descriptions! You’re very good at this. (It feels wrong to hit “like,” given what’s going on in the game, so I use the ‘helpful’ icon to convey my appreciation.)

Except when I get embarrassed because I seem to be the only one hitting the button.

I’m sorry I have to log off at this point of the story!

 

[blue emu]

I’m really enjoying your descriptions! You’re very good at this.

I used to write for TV.

I've shared credit rolls with people like Peter O'Toole (Peter Freaking O'Toole!), Kiefer Sutherland, Megan Followes, Leslie Nielsen...

 

[blue emu]

After a prolonged and savage pounding at medium range (3 damage per hit) the Jerx ship finally immobilizes the Brooks freighter.

The Jerx continue to fire at the immobilized Brooks ship, as they draw further away "escorting" the damaged Woods freighter.

 

[blue emu]

One hour and one minute after opening fire on the Brooks freighter, the Jerx ship finlly kills it.

If the Jerx decide to re-open fire on the Woods company freighter that they've stacked up with, then of course they'll destroy it in a few hits. Point blank range. But so far they've acted as if they intend to board it.

EDIT:

Again the Jerx change tactics and re-open fire on the ship they had previously spared, the Woods company freighter. This won't take long.

LATER: Yeah, they knocked it out pretty quickly, as expected.

 

[blue emu]

The Jerkmobile is once again headed directly toward the closest civvie ship.

Our fleet is nine hours and thirty-five minutes from the jump point into the raided star system.

 

[blue emu]

07:54 - Made bold by his earlier successes, the Jerx ship charged into point blank range of the next freighter and opened a devastating fire.

The carnage continues as the Jerx ship knocks out three ships owned by the Middleton Freight company, one after another.

That's a total of six company freighters, since the Jerx re-appeared.

 

[Iche_Bins]

Exiting

 

[Wagonlitz]

Eleven of our twelve Carriers now have full 35-Fighter Strike Groups.

Unfortunately these are 1970s Ion tech Fighters. We have since then researched a Magneto-Plasma Engine for our Fighters, so these obsolescent craft will gradually be transferred to Airfield Space Stations to guard our colonies and other critical assets. They will be replaced on the Carriers by new Magneto-Plasma tech Fighters.

Once we get even better fighters, will you then scrap the ion tech ones and relegate magneto to space stations.
Also, by space stations you mean the military stations, right?

I fully intend to take them on, yes. More for fun than for any practical reason.

But first I'd like to upgrade the Fleet (especially the Fighters) to Magneto-Plasma tech, and perhaps catch up a bit in sensor and stealth techs.

The Galapagonians were WAY ahead of us, in just about every field.

Does the precursor sysstems usually contain good mineral deposits?

Our 25cm Spinal STO look like the space-cat's meow.

Like the what?

and nearly 250,000 km vs missiles.

As in it can detect them at that range, or that it can shoot them at that range?

Earth and Mars have both received Airfield class Orbital Fighter Bases, each with a full squadron of 35 X-Wings. The Fighter Base is military and requires maintenance support., but that's not a problem on Earth or Mars because there are plenty of pops to run the facilities. In more awkward places, we'll use Gadgets.

Does the gadget or planetary maintenance require TNs to be locally availble for maintenance to be able to be performed?

A third fully loaded Fighter Base Orbital Station is on its way to Nessus in the Alpha Centauri system.

I will be sending a fourth one to Luyten's Star as soon as the population has grown enough to run the maintenance facilities.

How much population is needed for that?
And what's the pop on Luytens atm?

 

[Wagonlitz]

The first four Sauron class Orbital Defense Bases have been launched. These puppies are nasty. Nine layers of armor, twenty-five gun barrels of varying calibre - one 25cm Spinal, two quad-barreled 20cm Anti-Ship Laser turrets, two quad-barreled 10cm PD Laser turrets, and two quad-barreled Gauss Cannon PD turrets.

---

Sauron class Orbital Defence Base 14,866 tons 430 Crew 2,785.3 BP TCS 297 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s Armour 9-53 Shields 0-0 HTK 150 Sensors 8/11/0/0 DCR 8-5 PPV 173.04
Maint Life 4.17 Years MSP 3,436 AFR 221% IFR 3.1% 1YR 317 5YR 4,748 Max Repair 243.8 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 36 months Morale Check Required

Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres Range N/A

Spinal 25.00cm C4 Ultraviolet Laser 1981 (1) Range 192,000km TS: 5,000 km/s Power 16-4 RM 40,000 km ROF 20
Quad 20cm C4 Ultraviolet Laser Turret 1982 (2x4) Range 192,000km TS: 10000 km/s Power 40-16 RM 40,000 km ROF 15
Quad 10cm C3 Near Ultraviolet PD Laser Turret 1978 (2x4) Range 90,000km TS: 20000 km/s Power 12-12 RM 30,000 km ROF 5
Quad Gauss Cannon R300-100 Turret 1977 (2x12) Range 30,000km TS: 20000 km/s Power 0-0 RM 30,000 km ROF 5
Beam Fire Control R192-TS10000 1978 (3) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 10,000 km/s ECCM-0 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam PD Fire Control R96-TS20000 1978 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 20,000 km/s ECCM-0 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Mirror Fusion Reactor R18 PWR-18 (4) Total Power Output 72 Exp 5%

CIV PD Search Sensor AS8-R1 (1) GPS 21 Range 8.6m km MCR 771.7k km Resolution 1
Thermal Sensor TH1.0-8.0 1969 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
EM Sensor EM1.0-11.0 1976 (1) Sensitivity 11 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 26.2m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Warship for auto-assignment purposes

I thoguht it was to have a fighter hangar.

Is it possible to move shipyards? In that case it might be worth establishing a new colony in alpha centauri on a world without minerals and have that be our new manufacturing and shipyard center.

Why would we do that, though?

Our research alone used to make up a third of our expenses. Now it's down to an eighth. Time to build more research labs?

Yes

We could certainly afford a few years of defecit spending. We've built up a bank balance of over a quarter of a million Schmuckers.

I say go deep into deficit. You can always mothball some labs if needed.
Like, you said earlier that you're literally at the money cap.

What's teh Freeman mining and resources sensor limit

Where is Claymore compared to those civvies?

So these really ARE the Aether Raiders, since this ship has obviously been spawned by a script, not built (constructed ships are given sequential numbers, even if they were constructed on different planets).

I'd have said the fact they were able to pop out of thin air in the middle of our sensors was a bigger clue.

He still hasn't moved. Our fleet arrives in four days.

How is it that fast to get tehre, when it took weeks to get to Nessus?

He's gonna shoot up all those civvies on the way in, of course. No big deal. We'll scrounge the wrecks for minerals.

It won't wreck havoc long term for trade?
Also, are civvies always teal? Hence if it's teal its civvies?

Two more of them.

Think both are slive transports, or a slave transport and a defending sip?

Our fleet is about a third of the way to the Jump Point to the Luhman 16 system (where the Jerx are shooting up our civvies).

View attachment 1080040

That's actually pretty good, because once we jump in we only need to get within Fighter-strike range. A couple of hundred million kilometers.

What's teh stellar body between Earth and Mars? A comet?

 

[blue emu]

Once we get even better fighters, will you then scrap the ion tech ones and relegate magneto to space stations. - Typically, yes.
Also, by space stations you mean the military stations, right? - Space stations include all "ships without engines" that need to be towed into place by a Tug. So it includes the military stations like the Airfield Fighter Base, the Sauron Beam Weapon base, the Sentry RADAR base (still under construction)... but also the civilian stations such as the Gadgets, the Terraformers, the Refineries, the Grinders... the context of the sentence will typically tell you which type of station I mean.

Does the precursor sysstems usually contain good mineral deposits? - Often. They sometimes contain useful Alien Ruins.

Like the what? - The cat's meow. The bee's knees... Merriam-Webster Dictionary =>

Definition of THE CAT'S MEOW

—used to say that someone or something is very appealing… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

As in it can detect them at that range, or that it can shoot them at that range? - Both. It won't actually HIT them at that range, mind you, but it can detect and shoot.

Does the gadget or planetary maintenance require TNs to be locally availble for maintenance to be able to be performed? - Planetary maintenance yes, because it produces spare parts as well as maintaining ships. Gadget... I think not.

How much population is needed for that? - Six to eight million. It varies with colony cost, because only a fraction of the pops are available for work.
And what's the pop on Luytens atm? - 2.36 million.

I thoguht it was to have a fighter hangar. - The inhabited planet typically gets a Fighter hanger and RADAR base, the refinery a Beam Base.

Why would we do that, though? - Why move ship construction closer to the source of the minerals it uses?

Yes

I say go deep into deficit. You can always mothball some labs if needed.
Like, you said earlier that you're literally at the money cap.

What's teh Freeman mining and resources sensor limit - A mining base set up by civvies. There are DOZENS of them in total.

Where is Claymore compared to those civvies? - To the right and a bit lower.

I'd have said the fact they were able to pop out of thin air in the middle of our sensors was a bigger clue.

How is it that fast to get tehre, when it took weeks to get to Nessus? - Sol => Luhman 16 is one of the quickest interstellar jumps. It depends on (1) where the jump point is located in the Sol system, (2) where it connects to in the Luhman 16 system, and (3) the scale of the two star systems... a really large, spread-out star system will of course take longer to cross.

It won't wreck havoc long term for trade? - To a degree. We still have 79 civvie ships left. after losing six.
Also, are civvies always teal? Hence if it's teal its civvies? - Yes. and Yes.

Think both are slive transports, or a slave transport and a defending sip? - The Lucan is the one that picked up our life-pod (ie: enslaved the crew) last time, in Alpha Centauri.

What's teh stellar body between Earth and Mars? A comet? - A comet?

 

[Wagonlitz]

One hour and one minute after opening fire on the Brooks freighter, the Jerx ship finlly kills it.

View attachment 1080047

If the Jerx decide to re-open fire on the Woods company freighter that they've stacked up with, then of course they'll destroy it in a few hits. Point blank range. But so far they've acted as if they intend to board it.

EDIT:

Again the Jerx change tactics and re-open fire on the ship they had previously spared, the Woods company freighter. This won't take long.

LATER: Yeah, they knocked it out pretty quickly, as expected.

Wouldn't they get jstu as many slaves by collecting life pods as boarding?

07:54 - Made bold by his earlier successes, the Jerx ship charged into point blank range of the next freighter and opened a devastating fire.

View attachment 1080050

The carnage continues as the Jerx ship knocks out three ships owned by the Middleton Freight company, one after another.

That's a total of six company freighters, since the Jerx re-appeared.

How will that effect our tax income?
Like, can the civvies go bust?

 

[blue emu]

Wouldn't they get jstu as many slaves by collecting life pods as boarding? - Only a fraction of the crew typically reach the life-pods and escape.

How will that effect our tax income? - We've lost about 7% of our civvie freighters.
Like, can the civvies go bust? - as long as they have a ship left, they can continue to earn income and purchase more ships.

 

[Wagonlitz]

> As in it can detect them at that range, or that it can shoot them at that range? - Both. It won't actually HIT them at that range, mind you, but it can detect and shoot.
I thoguht missiles could go further out than energy weapons.
What's the reason they can't in this case?

> Does the gadget or planetary maintenance require TNs to be locally availble for maintenance to be able to be performed? - Planetary maintenance yes, because it produces spare parts as well as maintaining ships. Gadget... I think not.
Won't gadget need supplying of spare parts, then?

> I thoguht it was to have a fighter hangar. - The inhabited planet typically gets a Fighter hanger and RADAR base, the refinery a Beam Base.
The reason inhavited planets get no beam base is due to GTO, right?

> What's teh stellar body between Earth and Mars? A comet? - A comet?
There's some planetary body in the screenshot, to the middle right.

 

[blue emu]

> As in it can detect them at that range, or that it can shoot them at that range? - Both. It won't actually HIT them at that range, mind you, but it can detect and shoot.
I thoguht missiles could go further out than energy weapons.
What's the reason they can't in this case? - Missiles can be fired from tens of millions of km away (for PD missiles) up to hundreds of millions of km away (for A/S milliles). Beams are limited to 1.5 million km or less, even at maximum tech. Usually much less.

> Does the gadget or planetary maintenance require TNs to be locally availble for maintenance to be able to be performed? - Planetary maintenance yes, because it produces spare parts as well as maintaining ships. Gadget... I think not.
Won't gadget need supplying of spare parts, then? - Spare parts are loaded on board ships and used for fixing breakdowns that occur DURING the mission. Not for fixing ships that are sitting in a hangar. If it makes you feel more comfortable, think of it as : they only TRACK the spares that are used as on-board replacements.

> I thoguht it was to have a fighter hangar. - The inhabited planet typically gets a Fighter hanger and RADAR base, the refinery a Beam Base.
The reason inhavited planets get no beam base is due to GTO, right? - Yes. If we had infinite numbers we would put them everywhere... but remember that every MILITARY ship and station requires maintenance in the form of minerals. Already we are paying more than 27,000 minerals per year maintenance on our ships and stations.

> What's teh stellar body between Earth and Mars? A comet? - A comet?
There's some planetary body in the screenshot, to the middle right. - Cruithne? It's a near-Earth asteroid, like Apollo.

 

[Wagonlitz]

> Won't gadget need supplying of spare parts, then? - Spare parts are loaded on board ships and used for fixing breakdowns that occur DURING the mission. Not for fixing ships that are sitting in a hangar. If it makes you feel more comfortable, think of it as : they only TRACK the spares that are used as on-board replacements.
I meant, to maintain stuff the gadget would need to have spare parts from somwehre.

> There's some planetary body in the screenshot, to the middle right. - Cruithne? It's a near-Earth asteroid, like Apollo.
Yeah, that one. Do we have it colonised?

 

[blue emu]

> Won't gadget need supplying of spare parts, then? - Spare parts are loaded on board ships and used for fixing breakdowns that occur DURING the mission. Not for fixing ships that are sitting in a hangar. If it makes you feel more comfortable, think of it as : they only TRACK the spares that are used as on-board replacements.
I meant, to maintain stuff the gadget would need to have spare parts from somwehre. - In real life? of course they would. But the game doesn't TRACK routine stuff. There are hundreds of stars and thousands of planets. The game only tracks stuff that NEEDS to be tracked, like on-board stores and replacement parts.

> There's some planetary body in the screenshot, to the middle right. - Cruithne? It's a near-Earth asteroid, like Apollo.
Yeah, that one. Do we have it colonised? - Not worth it. Too small. It can only hold 50,000 people maximum. Every body has a Pop limit. Not enough to generate worthwhile trade, and we would need to use Low-Gravity Infrastructure, which competes with Refineries and Terraformers for our Boronide minerals.

 

[blue emu]

The Jerkmobile rushes up to the next freighter in line, takes one medium-range shot at it... and then drops back to over 210,000 km and starts sniping again.

This is fine with us... the more time the Jerks waste, the closer our Fleet approaches. Now 9.1 hours away from the jump point.

The Jerx have returned to their extreme range sniping, 1 point of damage per hit tactics. It's as if they are rolling dice to decide on their methods.