Canon conflict, "Ideal War" by Christopher Kubasik

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LordBludgeon
06/11/21 12:31 AM
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I just started "Ideal War" and I'm confused... in the appendices in the back of the books so far there is a rough timeline of the Battletech eras. It's set out there that nuclear weapons weren't reintroduced until the Blake Jihad starting @3067. In Chapter One of Ideal War Captain-General Thomas Marik and Paul Masters are discussing the Clan invasion and allude to their use of nuclear weapons... This conversation takes place in 3054, 13 years before the Jihad. Is this a misstep by the Author, or just anti-Clan propaganda the Marik conspirators mistakenly believe?
"You can have Peace. You can have Freedom. Don't ever count on having Both at once..."

R.A. Heinlein
Requiem
06/11/21 02:03 AM
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Yes they would be discussing nukes as both are aware of the incident that took place on 3055, upon the planet of Gibson – Paul Masters was upon this world and participating in the battle to which a tactical nuclear warhead, was deployed by the apparently by the Freedom League – and which brought the fighting to a swift conclusion.

They both should also be aware of the March 3050 – Turtle Bay Massacre.

Any sane person at this time would have come to the undeniable conclusion that Takashi Kurita would either via dropship “fire ships” or aerospace fighter Kamikaze fighters - would have nuked every Clan Warship from here on out … as the IS at this point in time were not allowed to have warships or even dropships with Naval weapons acting as PT Craft – thus leaving the only one operational weapon remaining – nukes to engage the biggest gun on the battlefield the warship! ie. now the primary target upon every battlefield from that point onward …

And even when a Falcon warship threatened a Lyran unit with an orbital strike we see again that the IS forces would just capitulate rather than initiate a nuclear war!

Which, in my opinion, proves quite convincingly the entire Clan invasion has lost the plot …. Just look at the bombing during WW2 as an indication as to the extent empires will go when vengeance is demanded as well as a means of striking back when cornered!

Why the first nuke was used upon mass during the Jihad and not during the Clan invasion is beyond understanding and can only be discerned by those that wrote it.
Get thee to Coventry … Now is the winter of our discontent, made glorious by this daughter of Tharkad … Our army shall march through. Well to New Avalon tonight.
ghostrider
06/11/21 03:04 AM
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The book is incorrect on the nukes.
Or maybe the reintroduced should have been used in quantity. For the most part, the end of the 2nd succession war had nukes shelved until the Jihad.
It was finally realized that a nuked glowing world did no one any good.

As the rant by Requiem missed the entire point, especially the date of the conversation verses the time he suggested. The discussion taking place in 3054, could not have been discussing the 3055 issue. Unless time machines have been introduced, which to my knowledge hasn't been.

To my knowledge, the clans did not use any nukes during the invasion, though I can see where an orbital bombardment might appear as a nuclear strike.
It has been a while since I read the book, so somethings are not that clear.

One fact Requiem got right, was the use of 'Davy Crocketts' that were tactical nukes used on Gibson. I want to say the locals used them against WOB, as they were really horrible to the people that lived on that world.

The IS had nukes ready to go, just didn't use them.
So a misstep by the author would be basically correct.
Karagin
06/11/21 11:12 AM
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Ideal War wasn't one of the better-written books, it was as one review stated "Vietnam dropped into Battletech"

The locals not liking the WoB on Gibson is the main issue and what we are supposed to be seeing is the heavy-hand approach to deal with them. It was also the chance to add in the next group of uber-heroes that would give more hmm, shiny brightness to everything in other words another group that was going to do over-the-top insane stuff and not suffer the penalties for doing so. That would be the Knights of the Inner Sphere, a precursor to silliness we see later in the Paladins and such of the ROTS.

Personally, I ranked this novel as the third worse Battletech novel written to date. I place FAR COUNTRY higher on the list than this one.

The issue with the date could be a typo, depends on which version of the book you are reading, I don't have the paperback handy at the moment, but I do know that later PDFs that came out through BATTLECROPs had typos and were different drafts of the novel. Why that was ever thought to be a good idea or given the nod to go head with is one of those things that still continue to plague the game.

The Inner Sphere had nukes, they also didn't throw them around freely anymore as they did in the Frist and Second Succession Wars. Having them and not using them doesn't mean that they are only reintroduced by the silliness of the Jihad. It means just what it says, they had them, they didn't have the willingness to use them. That is a large difference.

The Clans had/have nukes as well, but even they won't throw them around without a valid reason. Their warships can do the same amount of damage to a planet without the side effects of radioactive fallout. So Marik and Masters talking about them would not be an uncommon conversation.

As for Requiems's ranting, he hates the canon setting of the game and feels his take and ideas are, so take his comments as opinions.

As for nukes in use, tactical or strategic, the results are the same, the locals suffer, the planet suffers and you are stuck controlling an area that is worthless and costly to repair and recover.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
CrayModerator
06/11/21 06:05 PM
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Quote:
The book is incorrect on the nukes.
Or maybe the reintroduced should have been used in quantity. For the most part, the end of the 2nd succession war had nukes shelved until the Jihad.



There were a handful of other cases, like Gibson (3055) and Skye (2895, Third Succession War.)

Quote:
It was finally realized that a nuked glowing world did no one any good.



Correct.

Note that nukes were not outlawed or formerly banned after the Second Succession War. There were simply unwritten rules of war that said, "don't use them because of Mutually Assured Destruction."
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer

Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
ZekeCrane
06/14/21 12:31 PM
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Quote:

Personally, I ranked this novel as the third worse Battletech novel written to date. I place FAR COUNTRY higher on the list than this one.


What was your worst? Even with Far Country incorporating aliens, at least it had the good grace to do so 'off the grid' and could be safely ignored.


Quote:
The Inner Sphere had nukes, they also didn't throw them around freely anymore as they did in the Frist and Second Succession Wars. Having them and not using them doesn't mean that they are only reintroduced by the silliness of the Jihad. It means just what it says, they had them, they didn't have the willingness to use them. That is a large difference.

The Clans had/have nukes as well, but even they won't throw them around without a valid reason. Their warships can do the same amount of damage to a planet without the side effects of radioactive fallout. So Marik and Masters talking about them would not be an uncommon conversation.



You would think after practically 1000+ years of advancement they'd have come up with better WMDs than nukes which aren't functionally dissimilar from nominal 20th-21st century devices...
Karagin
06/14/21 01:23 PM
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Quote:
[
What was your worst? Even with Far Country incorporating aliens, at least it had the good grace to do so 'off the grid' and could be safely ignored.



Ghost of Winter would be number one for worst.


Quote:

You would think after practically 1000+ years of advancement they'd have come up with better WMDs than nukes which aren't functionally dissimilar from nominal 20th-21st century devices...



Nukes work, why not keep making them? They are the ultimate weapon of terror. Most sci-fi, well most military sci-fi that isn't written on a fifth-grade reading level, some of the BT books do seem to hit that level, especially the Dark Age novels, nukes are the final weapons brought out when everything else has failed. These books make it out that the use of the nukes is the final card thus here is your enemy now a glowing cinder on a dead world that is only good for strip mining in about a thousand years or so.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
ghostrider
06/14/21 03:35 PM
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Keeping nukes is a bit easier then keeping things like gunpowder after even a few hundred years. Not sure about the half life of nukes, so this is subject to further information.
It is very possible that the nukes in storage were made back in the Star League era, and not have to have been changed out. The biggest thing they might have to do is check to see if they are still there or if someone stole them.

And according the the rules, nukes were passed up with other anti capital weapons. This is going by game damage, not some real life statistic, so keep that in mind.
The issue with nukes is the game is not consistent with them. They don't do as much damage to a warship, yet the devastation done to a world, not the radiation left over, just pure destruction, doesn't match each other. Let's not forget the annihilation of stations with nukes, that use the same armor as the warships did. The way the game describes the carnage to stations is complete melt down, not the loss of integrity of the hull.
The radiation makes it more dangerous in the long run over bombardment with normal naval weapons.

Also, the game being stuck behind real world advancements means things that were found to be true after even the 90s are not really in the game.
To avoid posting issues, I will stop with the WMDs part of this and move into normal combat.
Drones are not really in the game, even though they are extremely powerful in a universe that can't detect a mech over a klick out. Not even talking shooting combat, but just recon would be invaluable. Spotting for artillery being a major point.

But back to the topic. Given how 'easily' the clans tore up the FC and DC, it would be likely the FWL would see their main way to survive would be nukes. Not sure if the Knights of the Innersphere had changed Masters mind when they went to the clan home worlds for destruction of the Jaguars. But story does show most of the people in the IS were horrified with the thought of using nukes.
Karagin
06/14/21 04:12 PM
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Think about it, Amaris used them against the Hegemony and the SLDF, if you recall he tossed them around like party favors, or as some will point out his commanders. The SLDF wasn't above using them either.

Then during the Age Of War, EVERYONE used them as the ultimate weapon, oh look our fleet's routed, our forces on Planet X are about to be wiped out and we can't afford for those Dragon loving (fill in your choice of insults) have the Impossiblenite mines so let's nuke the planet and go home. BOOM dead world.

The use of nukes to me always was the way to end something for good. And the fear would be the same fear that came in the 1950s of what it could do or couldn't do. We all know fire is a good thing, but we also know it will burn us if we touch it. Nuclear fission (aka the heart of a nuke) is wonderful in that it can be harnessed to make power, but even then that can hurt us if we don't handle it right. And folks still fear fire to this day and in the game's universe the worse fear of any MechWarrior regardless of who they fight for or under, is fire.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
CrayModerator
06/15/21 08:34 PM
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Quote:
You would think after practically 1000+ years of advancement they'd have come up with better WMDs than nukes which aren't functionally dissimilar from nominal 20th-21st century devices...



As noted in JHS:Terra, most BT nukes are laser-imploded, pure fusion devices and can be as small as grenades. Nothing of the sort has actually worked as a weapon in real life. (The basis for the comment in JHS:Terra was that the use of "salted" weapons was particularly appalling because otherwise there'd be very little fallout from modern BT weaponry.)

More generally, yes, BT is anomalously low in technology compared to what it could be. ATOW p. 365 addresses this point by saying simply, "BattleTech is the future of the 1980s..." Or, to quote in more detail:

Quote:
Trying to imagine
the evolution of today’s technology through to the 23rd or 28th
century may prompt players to arrive at technological miracles far
beyond what BattleTech actually portrays.

BattleTech is the future of the 1980s, and has been kept so
deliberately. This universe is about human drama and “giant,
stompy robots” (to quote a Time of War writer who shall remain
nameless). BattleTech is not a world of nanotech, AIs, gravity
control and genetic engineering; the miracles of the future
envisaged in the 1990s and 2000s are generally absent, underdeveloped
or treated as tabloid rumors because they do not fit
the setting. BattleTech does have some miraculous technologies,
like its fusion rockets, Kearny-Fuchida drives, BattleMechs and
nigh-magical materials, but these are the (mostly) minimum
needed to make stories of latter-day knights in BattleMechs
possible without losing the story line in a deluge of teleportation,
nanotech cornucopias and virtual realities.

To that end, if players need to determine the capabilities of
technology not addressed in the rules (such as the features of
personal civilian communicators, what we’d call cell phones),
it would be would not be far wrong to stop at the real-world
capabilities of technology in the mid-1990s and apply 31st century
trimmings like holograms, superficially faster microelectronics
and futuristic styling. The mid-1990s is a convenient cut-off date
to avoid the high technologies that BattleTech has not broadly
incorporated into its setting.




Going a thousand years into the future with some realistic assumptions about technological progressions could lead to wars fought by teleporting black hole cannons rather than something fun like brawling 'Mechs.
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer

Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
Karagin
06/15/21 09:23 PM
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Part of the issue is HOW nukes were used in the Jihad storyline, they were OVER used, yes I know things got retconned from the original WizKids version of events, and the claims of FAE (Fuel Air Explosives) being used in place of nukes, etc... the point is they had to retcon it because fans didn't want to nukes tossed around like candy.

The second part of the issue, we the players should have NEVER gotten rules for nukes. Period. End of story. Those plot devices should have been left to the writers.

The third issue, is that somewhere along the way post 3052 and the push forward, the game changed, instead of all sides being a dirty and bad as the other guys, this trend started that we had to have a good guy or good group, I think that hurt things story-wise and let the remake of the Amaris Coup come about.

As for the game being the future of the 80s, sure, but at the same time new stuff can be mixed in, that was very much a possibility with the Clans, squandered now though. And there is a game system out there that will allow anyone who wants more realism in their games, and you can even port the BT setting right into these two games, one is called TRAVELER and the other is called GURPS.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
ghostrider
06/16/21 01:07 AM
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The good guy/bad guy mentality was in the game before the invasion. Most people likes one house over the other for some reason or another. The original books hinted that house Davion, then Steiner, Marik, were the top three with Liao and Kurita being the evil that lived past Amaris. The latter two being the ones most likely to use dirty methods regularly to gain advantages, such as poisoning water sources or using gangs to cause uprisings. Yes, Davion was doing something like this against the FWL, but for the most part it was scaled back to just having the 'states' in the FWL refuse to cooperate with Marik. And yes, that is watering it down a little.

Now a response to Cray's post.
Some of the tech that is missing from the game was around when the game was made. The inability to hit much is a big one. The developers made particle projection cannons and K-F jumping, so having some sort of stretch is already there. The ability to track and shoot down fast moving particles, such as asteroids around the jump point should be enough to say the horrible shooting on the ground wars is a bit off.
The IBM PC was starting to become a house hold item, and it was more then capable of targeting things. The Commadore 64 and even PET/VIC could do so. And when you add in the Lasers needing time to focus on one spot on a mech, yet they don't have the time to do so is off as well.
I do understand some things had to give way to make the game playable, and be different enough from Robotech to avoid more issues, but this is akin to saying the computers should have been scrapped and just add in iron sights to hit anything.
And the fact that the SL tech declined because of the succession wars was blown apart when the clans invaded. They had SL plus tech, and it was no better then the IS in 3025 for targeting. And ER lasers put to rest the need to stay focused on a spot to work.
LordRuthermore
09/09/21 10:49 AM
87.139.207.25

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There is a big difference between using nukes on-planet and using them in space against Warships. The latter is not a violation of the Ares conventions, if it's not within 75,000 kilometers of a planet.
Cf. "Article I forbade the use of nuclear weapons against all civilian targets and planets and military targets within 75,000 kilometers of a planet."


Edited by LordRuthermore (09/09/21 10:49 AM)
Karagin
09/09/21 03:28 PM
70.118.172.64

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If folks haven't noticed NO ONE follows the Ares Convention anymore, they do what they want and then cry when it's done to them in return, JUST like real-life nations do when someone breaks or doesn't follow the Geneva or Hague Conventions in a war, after all, who wants to fight a war with their hands tied behind their backs?
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
Requiem
09/09/21 08:20 PM
1.158.137.81

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What are the 11 War Crimes against Humanity?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/war/overview/crimes_1.shtml

Quote:
If folks haven't noticed NO ONE follows the Ares Convention anymore ... JUST like real-life nations do when someone breaks or doesn't follow the Geneva or Hague Conventions in a war



and when it comes to those in the above article?
Get thee to Coventry … Now is the winter of our discontent, made glorious by this daughter of Tharkad … Our army shall march through. Well to New Avalon tonight.
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