What is with the Nephilim?

[Mad Hatter]

I think it would matter less and less as generations pass and people become accustomed to seeing their home planet as the planet they live on and not Earth. Of course Earth would still function as a capital city or planet, but the futher you are away from it, the less you really give a hoot about what happens to it.
That`s, basically, how people saw things in TPOF, isn`t it?

 

[Shane]

I don't think the Clan leaders would refuse to come to Kilrah when the Emperor calls a meeting

. In fact, I'm quite certain they'd be there in a nanosecond... so, that would explain why they were always there when he needed a meeting.

Yeah but how long does it take to get there? Even with Jump Points, it would still take several hours to get from a neighboring system to Kilrah, let alone from another quadrant or sector. Depending on how often the Emperor wanted to meet, the lords would almost spend more time commuting than doing anything else.

 

[Knight]

if you read Titan A.E. (a fairly good book, BTW), you'd get a more in depth description of what I'm talking about. The ending of it's kinda lame, but other than that, it's fairly well rounded, specially if you're in high school or college, because you can almost relate to the main characters, mostly since we're all (well, at least a little bit) accustomed to space travel (space sims

).

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[Wedge009]

Darn, but I feel all left out of this novel talk.

<sigh>

 

[Quarto]

Shane: Well, we didn't really see that many of those meetings. But either way, the time wastage wouldn't make a difference - they had to obey the emperor, end of story

.

 

[Knight]

That was usually the point of an Imperial System, yes

Obey whoever was in charge without question

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[Shane]

Why not obey and not be so inconvienced. That's my argument for them living on Kilrah, at least a good bit of the time, especially during a war.

 

[Penguin]

IIRC after WC1 and the destruction of their imperial base in Venice System the Kilrathi moved their imperial HQ back to Kilrah. From what I've picked up the Kilrathi clan leaders wielded considerable power in military affairs so it would make sense that they would reside on Kilrah to advise the emperor. My only real proof for this is the above statement though.
As for the lose the home planet and perish regardless theory - it's wrong. Just because your capital gets taken out doesn't mean you do. In WC the loss of Kilrah was significant militarily in that much of the Kilrathi fleet was destroyed with it. In the losing path of WC3, considering the damage the Kilrathi had already inflicted to the inner colonies and all the losses that Confed sustained according to the WC3 cutscenes, defeat at Earth would have signified the end of the Confederation as a military power. Due to the crippling losses to the active forces and industrial infrastructure.
Real life example - Chechnya 1995-6. Grozny is captured by Russian forces but the Chechens struggle on, gradually expelling the Russians.

 

[Knight]

Real life example - Chechnya 1995-6. Grozny is captured by Russian forces but the Chechens struggle on, gradually expelling the Russians.

While things like that that happen today, countries get taken over, and the natives lose their heritage, that's fine and dandy. I'm talking massive losses. Think about it. If the Kilrathi Empire made it to Earth, do you think it would have been the first damn target? Hell no! If they got through our defenses, the first thign they'd do is demolish Jupiter HQ and every other military installation. Then you'd move to take out Earth. Now, even if they did Earth first, do you think they'd leave everything else alone? Are you nuts? What I'm saying, is that Earth was destroyed, the shipyards would be gone, and what few ships remained would either be destoryed, or surrender. I agree that if the capital is taken out, it isn't over. They're going to wipe everything in Sol, with little resistance, because anybody with a jump-cabable ship is going to go someplace far away, hoping to regroup and be able to defend someplace else. The thing is, the military losses that would lead up to the destruction, would cause MAJOR, MAJOR disfunctions. When Earth is being attacked, every available ship is going to be sent there, leaving other colonies open to attack. Think about it guys. If they make it far enough to take out Earth, the race isn't going to be gone, Hell no. But if they make it to Earth, who's going to challenge their power after that? Any resistance would be smacked down before it was organized.

Plus, like Earthworm stated, how many colonies are so well established, we could run to them for support? It's like your house burning down and you not having insurance. Put that into perspecitive.

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[TC]

Read Fleet Action.

 

[Shane]

Loved Fleet Action. Always wondered if Forstchen was annoyed with the direction the WCIV story took Tolwyn?

As for the case of Fleet Action, the Cats did pound the hell out of the lunar shipyards, but because they were beaten back we did not get to see the rest of what they would have done. Their philosphy, as I recall, was to drive in take out Earth (and any systems they passed along the way to get there) then deal with everything else. The Cats did believe that if Earth was completely destroyed, Confed would crumble. I don't think Confed would have surrendered had the Cats succeeded, I think it would have hardened the resolve of many people, though (as Knight points out) with the loss of all of Confed's infrastrucutre in Sol (which had the attack succeded would most likely have happened) Confed would have eventually lost. Would be interesting to see what would have happend had the Kilrathi Cruisers launched all their weapons but the Cats would have still been driven back, leaving the other Sol system shipyards undamaged. Probably would have had a complete miltary takeover at that point.

As for colonies that could fill the gap. Again looking at Fleet Action, the impression I got was that some of the planets that could pick up the slack from the loss of Earth were some of the same ones that were nuked by the Cats on their way to the Sol system. Now there probably are some other centers, like New Detroit that could do quite a lot in many manufactured goods, though the impression I got was the only shipyards of note (ones that could push out capships) were in Sol, so Confed is still screwed.

Which leads me to another thought. Even if they take a while to build, I would have thought at some point during the war Confed would have started woking on shipyards in other secure locations. The US for example just doesn't have shipyards on the East Coast near Washington DC (and they are spread out along the coast), but there are some on the West Coast as well. I always wondered if some non-Sol shipyard might be where ships like the Paradigm class came from.

 

[Earthworm]

Now there probably are some other centers, like New Detroit that could do quite a lot in many manufactured goods, though the impression I got was the only shipyards of note (ones that could push out capships) were in Sol, so Confed is still screwed.

Nope, there are the shipyards we see in WC4, in Speradon which can make capships. And I doubt those would be the only ones. Oh, and let’s not forget the Omega ships mentioned in FA, the shipyards for those ships are far away from Sol, ala the Hakaga shipyards.

 

[Knight]

Nope, there are the shipyards we see in WC4, in Speradon which can make capships. And I doubt those would be the only ones. Oh, and let’s not forget the Omega ships mentioned in FA, the shipyards for those ships are far away from Sol, ala the Hakaga shipyards.

Speradon could produce Capships? I'm not going to argue, because I dont' know for sure, but I don't believe that's true.

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[Earthworm]

Didn't you see that huge drydock while in Speradon? It sure as hell wasn't for producing Bearcats.

 

[Knight]

I know that most things from the Navy were carried over in the storyline of WC, but what was the point of "Dry Dock"? Space dock or something. The term "dry" just doens't fit in outer space

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[Wedge009]

I suppose its just following the conventions to keep things consistent. I laughed a bit when I first heard of the 'dry dock' in space.

 

[Quarto]

Say what you want, but a dock in space most certainly is dry. Of course, so's everything else...

 

[Shane]

I remember the Omega from FA, always assumed that is where the Behemoth came from. Speaking of big capships, the WCIV novel ha Blair note the Vesuvius had a "Kilrathi" look to her. Tolwyn makes a comment they incorporated some Kilrathi design elements. I'm wondering, did they use schematics and data from the (drawing a blank on the name) Kilrathi Super Carrier from False Colors in the design of the Vesuvius class? That would seem to run counter to the comments about carriers taking a long time to build.

I had forgotten about Speardon. I'm not sure if they were a full shipyard or if they were there during the Kilrathi war or came on line after. I'm thinking the latter because of the kind of ships they were producing, but I also remember FA or ER talked about how long the process of building carriers took, so it may have been there longer. It could be as well that Speardon may not be equipped to build large capships, but could do large scale repair work.

As a counter to that, the SO documentation (the snippet that was forgtten and included in the CIC's guide) makes reference to the naval yards at Speardon, and the speaker thinking he might be seeing a crusier or even carrier emerging from a Jump Point. Of course that's several years after WCIV so they could have become a full fledged shipyard. How does Wilford refer to Speardon in WCIV? I think he calls them shipyards, but I can't recall.

 

[Earthworm]

I remember the Omega from FA, always assumed that is where the Behemoth came from.

Well, the Behemoth isn’t exactly a stealthy dreadnought-type ship.

Speaking of big capships, the WCIV novel ha Blair note the Vesuvius had a "Kilrathi" look to her. Tolwyn makes a comment they incorporated some Kilrathi design elements. I'm wondering, did they use schematics and data from the (drawing a blank on the name) Kilrathi Super Carrier from False Colors in the design of the Vesuvius class? That would seem to run counter to the comments about carriers taking a long time to build.

The Karga from FA, is a Bhantkara class ship, and it’s the same one as the Kilrathi carriers from WC3. Anyway, I doubt that it could be modeled after that ship, since Kruger would never give up such a ship to Confed. More likely the Ves class, incomporated some of the ideas the cats used in the construction of the Hakaga class carriers.

 

[Quarto]

Well, the Behemoth isn’t exactly a stealthy dreadnought-type ship.

Well, personally I always found the idea of a stealth dreadnought to be laughable (if it was feasible, the Kilrathi would have had it first, since the Strakha were Thrakhath's favourite toy), and the Omega was rumoured to have a super-weapon onboard. So, I like to think that the Behemoth is a cheapened-down version of the Omega. But I guess that's probably not true, since Tolwyn says he supervised the Behemoth for ten years, whereas he wasn't even supposed to know about the Omega (though in a way, one comment doesn't contradict the other).

Shane: Carriers do take a long time to build, but not when you focus all your resources on building them.