03-15-2019, 11:15 AM | #411 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: MO, U.S.A.
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
Radar advanced rather quickly in WW II, one or two of the early smallish obsolete Airborne units might have been grabbed for a pattern to use later.
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03-15-2019, 03:28 PM | #412 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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Given the lack of aerial enemies until they got to Kadath, I suspect that there's had to be a sudden period of re-learning how to build and operate radars. So I think they'll have something very basic, capable of warning that there are flying things on the way, but nowhere near accurate enough for gun-laying. Just knowing which way to point the searchlights is a major advantage.
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03-15-2019, 03:49 PM | #413 | ||
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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A gun-laying radar, or even a searchlight directing one, is a different matter. In WWII German radar terms, a Freya search radar is a much easier thing to make than a Würzburg gun/searchlight laying radar. Quote:
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03-15-2019, 03:50 PM | #414 | ||
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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If the ASNs have built radar at all, it was probably for their shiny new Parsifal-class airships, like Amfortas, in fact. Those and maybe whatever even huger model of airship they use to explore Jötunheim, which has monstrous pterosaurs and even scarier monsters.
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03-15-2019, 04:22 PM | #415 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
One thing about airships, is that while they have the same sort of severe issues with excess weight, they can afford large antenna installations without having a huge set of 'horns' sticking out into the air and ruining their streamlining. A terrain avoidance (in the sense of detecting mountains in the dark and in bad weather) and relative altitude measuring set would be fairly easy to design and build into an airship. One suitable for combat operations, especially vs animals (being non-metallic they're much harder to detect, and require much shorter wavelengths than aeroplanes or airships) is a much more difficult thing to design and manufacture.
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03-16-2019, 03:59 AM | #416 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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03-16-2019, 04:45 AM | #417 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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"There were three users of radar in Germany during the war: the*Luftwaffe*(Air Force), the*Kriegsmarine*(Navy), and the*Heer*(Army)." "Requiring only one operator, the*Würzburg*came to be the primary mobile, gun-laying system used by the*Luftwaffe*and*Heer*during the war." "Under an internally funded project, the firm Lorenz AG developed a pulse-modulated set.*The*Heer*contracted for a few sets for*Flak*(anti-aircraft) support, but then this mission was transferred to the*Luftwaffe." In any case, it's relatively unimportant which service was responsible for the radars. At the end of the war, the ASNs clearly had the chance to remove any small radars deployed at places like Peenemünde, Der Riese compound and possibly even close to their bunker in Berlin, as well as any other site under senior SS command or supervision. Though, obviously, they'd only have done so if it was easy and convenient, as I can't see air defence radar as being considered a vital need in their new homes. Well, not unless it worked against the flying monsters of Jötunheim, but was nevertheless beast-portable in easy pieces. It's probably more likely they took a few small sets designed for aircraft to fit into their eventual airships, for navigation in poor visibility.
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03-21-2019, 01:50 AM | #418 | ||
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Antarctic Space Nazis Across the Multiverse
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So they'll have an air-warning radar on the Pillar, but finding a place to put it is a problem, given the crane needs to swing around, and the whole space is only 10 metres diameter. I think the crane has to move to point 1 on the pentagram, which gives it better access to the airship, and the radar's rotating antenna has to go on top of the heated hut. This means that radar coverage will be reduced while the crane is in use, but that can't be helped. A radar antenna which will fit in the space isn't going to be good enough for gunnery control with vacuum-tube technology, but it will do for early warning. The radar on the airship also has a placement problem. The best place to put it on a non-rigid airship is inside a gas cell, but the metal framework of these airships makes that fairly useless. So it has to go on the nose, with fairly limited angular coverage. If there are aerial opponents that are faster than the airship, they'll be able to approach from behind without showing up on radar.
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03-21-2019, 04:48 PM | #419 |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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So... PCs, ha.
Hilariously, the PCs did not fly directly at the gate pillar and neither did they land the Rocinante and walk through tunnels infested with ghouls, nightgaunts and Nazi guard posts.
Obviously, they drew on vast reserves of Cold One derived magic stored in captured diamonds and created an enormous enchanted carapace of burrowing insect shape around the Rocinante and then 'flew' it through the ice of Kadath. This collapsed several tunnels, which did not worry the extremely tough carapace, but was rather harder on some ghouls. And then they hit a ghoul warren, which was an experience rather like driving an industrial harvester into a herd of sheep, if the sheep were Mythos horrors and the industrial harvester was driven by a thousand unearthly furies. Now the Rocinante-cum-ice-horror-insect is skittering across the black stone of a buried monument of sunken Kadath while the survivors of the ghoul warren (and a few dozen nightgaunts) are in hot pursuit. Two PCs are firing MG42s at the pursuing Mythos horrors while two sky pirates with a crash course in Gunner/TL7 are acting as loaders. They are firing through ports in the carapace, cunningly placed somewhere in the rear, likely at some place inviting juvenile humour. And 'Nonc' Morel is working on a 210 energy ritual that will collapse thousands of tons of ice on the pursuing horrors. I guess the ASNs on the surface are waking up to some strange trembles and will soon experience a very hard quake.
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03-21-2019, 05:35 PM | #420 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: So... PCs, ha.
I do believe the PCs are getting the hang of throwing loads of magic around. I wonder if they'll replace the ASNs in the Cold Ones' affections?
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Tags |
antarctic space nazis, bootstrap, industry, ken hite, national socialists, nazis, space nazis, suppressed transmission, weird war ii |
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