"Countering Ortillery" Topic

Ok if we assume a Tech level that allows easy transition to Orbit and above…

How to grounds forces counter Orbital bombardments? From Kinetic bombardment to lasers parked in Orbit.

What is a mass tank formation to do to protect it self.

Thanks

Overhead shielding tech (if Gungans can do it…)

Counter-counter-counter-counter (ad nauseum) measures?

With anti-ship rockets, and beam weapons – both, preferably mobile.

Not to mention all those well-armed, orbital satellites and mines, planetary-based spacefighters and missile and torpedo boats, etc., etc..

Planetary Defense Monitors parked in orbit can be pretty deadly too.

Finally, mobile shield projectors on grav sleds, though their coverage is a bit limited with current tech.

Depending on realism and tech, your ortillery ships may be giant targets with limited manoeuvring options (as resupply costs a lot and they only have so much delta-V) to shift their glaringly obvious and predictable orbits. Meanwhile, sufficiently mobile, dug-in prepared launchers only have to threaten to dump some sand in their path and they'll be forced to burn to evade it, because orbital velocity is rather high. Launch some interceptors from under a giant mountain. Hell, signal out to an old satellite in a distant orbit (or asteroid belt) and have it drop some gravel on the planet from a one-shot launcher a long way off – orbital velocity again, sweeping the board clear if you've got time to wait. Just the threat of that means the invaders couldn't park their ships in orbit full-time – they'd have to fly in, strike, and retreat to somewhere the surface doesn't have extensive preparations for dealing with.

They perhaps could just annihilate everything, but if they're trying to fight you've already ruled that out as an option.

This is, of course, very handwavey, but it's handwavey in a different way to the dominant "the ultimate high ground!" meme. It implies a setting where getting down to the surface matters, and near-planetary space is a danger zone.

Deep meson-gun pits.

The main option is to make orbit a bad place to hang out; ASAT weapons (or more generically surface-to-orbit weapons) to shoot back at the ortillery platforms. If you can get to orbit easily then lofting a missile or torpedo into orbit is also easy. If you need to use some sort of energy weapon yes you'll have to deal with the atmosphere but a planet also makes a really, really big heat sink.

Basically if you have time to prepare then that means whatever weapons the enemy can bring, you can probably mount bigger nastier versions on the ground.

The other method is camouflage. Yea hiding an armored battalion would be hard but recent wars have showed the orbital intel is not infallible and can still be fooled. Work in sci-fi stealth tech and you have to make your enemy work hard to find you accurately enough hit you.

It implies a setting where getting down to the surface matters, and near-planetary space is a danger zone.

This actually is probably the more realistic view anyway. If you hold the planet or part of it then you have lots of options when it comes to contesting orbital space

-Will

From a gaming standpoint this means that I'd just fight out my sci-fi armored clash and have Ortillery be an occasional asset that could be used, same as airstrikes and off-board artillery.

-Will

The main ways for massed tanks formations to survive is to stay on the move, and this is where fast grav armor comes into its own, since it can rapidly maneuver, redeploy, or scatter, as needed.

Mobile shield projectors are used to protect key assets and forces, when they halt in place. Due to technical issues, they generally don't work when on the move, but researchers are working on ways to address that.

Yea Mako11 makes a good point, what is your 'ground' tech-base? Grav Tank formations using 'shoot and scoot' tactics that cover tens or hundreds of miles during a typical advance would be very hard to pin for a tactical strike, for example.

-Will

This sounds like a 'raison d'etre' argument for maintaining the Space Navy….!!

But defence satellites, super ECM abilities and/or anti detection systems and good old spaceships to keep the baddies away……….or 'block ships', keep some 'hulks' in orbit with boosters to steer them into orbital paths of attackers etc forcing them too relocate or ram……….

Personally I rely on the Emperor's decision to build the Death star…….

I think Louie N is looking for reasons to allow ground combat to happen though; which implies the invader has control of orbit at least long enough to drop troops. That also rules out the Death Star approach! :)

-Will

Shoulder launched surface-to-orbit missile launchers.

Hello

I was just trying to imagine the play between Orbit and ground in a sci-fi environment.

If one side has "Space" control would that mean the same as having total air superiority today. The ability to transit large combat formations is impaired given that fact that once you mass up you get the "hammer of the gods" from orbit.

I see an analogy to Rommel's argument in Normandy about staging close to the beaches.

Does ground combat become more "insurgent style" when one side has space assets and the other doesn't

just a though excercise

I would say a planet's defenses (i.e. missiles / gun batteries etc…) could far outnumber the opposing fleet and be more powerful than what you could mount on ships. It would boil down is the planet worth defending and can they afford the defenses.

Hack their system to fire artillery on their own people.

With that level of defense how would ground troops ever land.

Short of diverting a nearby big rock how to you deal with the Atlantic wall of Space.

In the Posleen War series by John Ringo, the Earth powers build surface-to-orbit railguns in mountain ranges. Because the Posleen fleet greatly outnumbers Earth's defenses, any weapons that unmask to fire are destroyed in turn. Ships that remain in orbit are exposed to those hidden ones that remain though, and ships that withdraw into deep space cannot claim their own territory on the planet, so it is in each individual Posleen clan leader's own best interest to land.

Once grounded around the globe, the invaders lose their ability to mass fire against individual targets, so the surviving defenses can leverage their individual superiority against any ships that remain visible. With both sides possessing lethal anti-orbital weaponry, neither can deliver ortillery support or even maneuver above the horizon. Most of the war is fought by more "conventional" forces like anti-grav and superheavy tanks, powered armor troops, and hordes of cannibal lizard-centaurs with only projectile artillery and NoE air- or spacecraft for support.

So if you want a situation where ground forces can mass despite the existence of ortillery in-setting, the attacker's coordination and the defender's patience with equally-capable weapons are both factors you can lever in that direction.

I'm glad I found you guys, because making these points on Nationstates gets you nothing but ire.

Just having fun with imagination…

I keep coming back that the only way to counter a Space forces is a Space force. You have to be the environment to counter the threat.

Even a LEO object is traveling at 7.8 km/s (~Mach 23) and 2000 Kilometers high. That is going to be hard to catch with a ground based interceptor. Lasers are perhaps the key but how powerful would they have to be to achieve kills at that range.

You may be able to defend from the falling "rocks" but I don't know if you will be able to threaten a moveable space object. and if you can't threaten them they can keep bombing the surface until it's cleared for landing.

Thanks

The main option is to make orbit a bad place to hang out; ASAT weapons (or more generically surface-to-orbit weapons) to shoot back at the ortillery platforms. If you can get to orbit easily then lofting a missile or torpedo into orbit is also easy. If you need to use some sort of energy weapon yes you'll have to deal with the atmosphere but a planet also makes a really, really big heat sink.

I'd honestly only make ortillery available in one turn every so often, depending on nominal turn length. Say, a 5-minute game turn would have any given ortillery battery available one turn in 6.

I think the line from Heinlien's "Space Cadet" fits in here:

"When one side holds the high ground of space, any land -based opponent finds themselves in the unenviable position of the man at the bottom of a well in a rock-throwing fight"