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Title Posted
Kinetic anti-ship attacks Oct 2002
Maneuver, combat and missiles Oct 2002
Marines aboard ship Oct 2002
MetalStorm missile tubes Oct 2002
Post-battle debris concerns Oct 2002
FTL LACs Oct 2002
LACs as parasites Oct 2002
<em>Shrikes </em>and <em>Ferrets </em>are not fighters Oct 2002
Q-ships Oct 2002
Q-ships as convoy escorts/raiders Oct 2002

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Pearls of Weber

A collection of posts by David Weber containing background information for his stories, collected and generously made available Joe Buckley.

Using debris as a 'warp point denial system'

  • Series: Starfire With Steve White
  • Date: October 22, 2002

The problem is you can't do it at all, except on a closed warp point. The instant you dump the material into the space which would be occupied by an emerging starship, it goes through to the other side, where it simply becomes a debris cloud the ships pass through on their way into the warp point. The drive fields will give them plenty enough protection against that sort of normal-space impact on their way in.

Mines are not in the materialization area of the warp point; they are on the periphery, which is as close as they can get without literally making transit (whether they want to or not). To put the material into an area which would present a danger to emerging starships would require dumping it into the transit zone, which is one reason no starship has ever been lost to interpenetration with naturally occurring space junk making transit through an open warp point; the stuff simply can't stay even momentarily in a place where it would pose any danger to emerging ships.