Dilgar vs Earth Early Years

[tschuma]

I was reading on the EFNI website about the Dilgar war and notice how over whelming the Earth Alliance defeated the Dilgar.

I know that there is a Dilgar War book in the works, but after looking at the Dilger, has anyone played a game with these forces and what were the results? It looks like the Dilgar over mathc the Early Years Earth forces.

Just thought I would stir things up since it's been a little slow ont he forum!

tschuma

 

[l33tpenguin]

I think its funny that the Dilgar fleet list is far more impressive than the Earth Early Years. While yes, I know the Earth Early years is a powerful list, it doesn't fit to reason that Earth Force, fielding those ships, would be extremely powerful against the Dilgar. I mean, the Dilgar have 3 War level ships.

In terms of realism, swarm tactics in an advanced combat environment never work. Fielding ten times the number of units against an enemy with a dramatic technological edge will not grant a win (It actually makes for just a target rich enviroment...). If the Dilgar were capable of constructing such powerful warships, you would think they would have stood a better chance against Earth.

 

[CZuschlag]

The Dilgar and Early EA forces (I fly Dilgar a lot, and Early EA is my most recent addition to my vocabulary) are both excellent ACtA armies. The importance of EA interceptors should not be underestimated; they can deflect a lot of Dilgar firepower.

The biggest pro-EA level is Skirmish, where the lackluster (at best!) Ochliavita is matched up against the excellent array of EA choices --- Olympus (both versions), the Rail Hyperion, the Artemis, and the ace-in-the-hole, the Saggitarius. The other end is the War priority, where the Dilgar have two very capable options, against EA's .... well, 2 Orestes.

I personally like Early EA a tiny bit better in this matchup, but it's very, very close. If they change the fleet breakdown charts as predicted, I might prefer the Dilgar (you might not have to deal with such a huge wave of excellent Skirmish ships).

I contend that part of the reason Early EA dominated the Dilgar so much is that the Dilgar had already steamrolled through 2 minor races, completely contained the Abbai, taken at least 2 Drazi systems, had already dealt with the main Brakiri and Vree threats and were well on their way to eliminating Markab opposition. Look at the system map to see all the systems that the Dilgar had to go through to get from Omelos to Markab space. Their military had to be stretched very thin, and Earth Alliance was more than sufficient for the task.

Edit: Two dumb typos fixed. Sorry!

 

[Target]

I thought EA threw everything they had at the Dilgar in all or nothing attack which ended up smashing the Digar lines. The Dilgar weren't really expecting EA to attack like that after all it was only one ship they blew up.

 

[locarno24]

The EFNI website tends to be a bit "Earthforce, Earthforce Uber Alles". It's well written, and has very good graphics to support it, but i'd take the content with a pinch of salt.

The Dilgar War novel floating around as a .pdf is kind of the same, with a Hyperion-class cruiser taking out about half a dozen Dilgar ships in a straight fight.

By comparison, in ACTA things are very much the other way around - if the bulk of both fleets is built around cruiser-weight ships, The dilgar have a twofold advantage in fighting power per hull (since their cruisers are raid and battle compared to the EA's skirmish and raid).

In all honesty, I think the EA should be viewed more as 'the straw that broke the camel's back'.

That's a bit of an understatement - Earthforce wading into the fight on the League's side was a long way from a minor contribution (they were, after all, becoming one of the 'big four'), but it was the fact that this fighting power was added to the surviving military forces of the league that swung it, rather than single-handedly taking out the dilgar when they had battered their way through the various league races without really slowing down.

 

[H]

As stated the Dilgar would obviously be spread thin and also war weary, no matter how fanatical you are, several years of war will really take it out of you. The EA were brash, arrogant, and fresh, they could gather larger numbers of ships for clinical strikes, and had backing from the reamining league forces.
Someone said above about warships and using inferior vessels etc. The germans thought that way with the Bismarck, but it was still taken out by the inferior ships of the royal Navy! and that was probably the key for the EA.

 

[Locutus9956]

The thing to bear in mind is that ACTA is a GAME that tries to balance the fights it is NOT necessarily an accurate potrayal of a races military strenght in terms of actual realistic fleet composition.

If you take the Early EA fleet the 'ship of the line' would be the raid level Hyperion in realistic terms wheras the minbari 'ship of the line' would be the War level Sharlin. In a real war (granted were talking fiction still but you know what I mean) the Minbari would be fielding Sharlins on a 1 on 1 sort of ratio with Hyperions. However in a game of ACTA the Minbari would field 1 Sharlin vs FOUR hyperions.

The point I'm trying to make is that even in campaigns the fleets are balanced in gameplay terms but this is not to say in the B5 univers one fleet or another might be vastly stronger. Also remember theres alot more to real war than just fighting battles, perhaps the EA were a much stronger manufacturing base or were much better at logistics or were simply much better strategists, etc etc etc.

The side with the best tech is not necessarily the winner otherwise quite frankly we'd all have been speaking German over here since the 1940s

Oh also if you're interested in the Dilgar War follow ye the link below and for probably the best work of B5 Fiction since the series itself.

http://jl1728.googlepages.com/dw

Disclaimer: I did NOT write it, I'm not even close to that talented at writting as you can tell from the superb grammer in the previous sentence!

 

[Da Boss]

I love the novel but careful with links as didn't MGP have to remove anyhting like fan fiction?

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Someone said above about warships and using inferior vessels etc. The germans thought that way with the Bismarck, but it was still taken out by the inferior ships of the royal Navy!

Don't talk like that in the VaS forum, they'll tear you a new anus... :shock:

 

[tschuma]

Thanks for the replies. I wish that the EA had a better choice at Battle and at least a choice at War.

Thanks

tschuma

 

[Lorcan Nagle]

The thing to bear in mind is that ACTA is a GAME that tries to balance the fights it is NOT necessarily an accurate potrayal of a races military strenght in terms of actual realistic fleet composition.

If you take the Early EA fleet the 'ship of the line' would be the raid level Hyperion in realistic terms wheras the minbari 'ship of the line' would be the War level Sharlin. In a real war (granted were talking fiction still but you know what I mean) the Minbari would be fielding Sharlins on a 1 on 1 sort of ratio with Hyperions. However in a game of ACTA the Minbari would field 1 Sharlin vs FOUR hyperions.

The point I'm trying to make is that even in campaigns the fleets are balanced in gameplay terms but this is not to say in the B5 univers one fleet or another might be vastly stronger. Also remember theres alot more to real war than just fighting battles, perhaps the EA were a much stronger manufacturing base or were much better at logistics or were simply much better strategists, etc etc etc.

The side with the best tech is not necessarily the winner otherwise quite frankly we'd all have been speaking German over here since the 1940s

Oh also if you're interested in the Dilgar War follow ye the link below and for probably the best work of B5 Fiction since the series itself.

http://jl1728.googlepages.com/dw

Disclaimer: I did NOT write it, I'm not even close to that talented at writting as you can tell from the superb grammer in the previous sentence!

I've read about 200 pages of LC's dilgar war story, and while the scope and plot are both very good, the prose and dialogue needs a lot of work, and a proofreader wouldn't have gone astray due to his constant mixing of posessives and contractions. It's a very noteworthy effort, but to say it's the best B5 ficiton outside the show is either hyperbole or damning with faint praise.

 

[captainsmirk]

The fact that the Dilgar have war level ships but the early EA don't doesn't really reflect any massive technological advantage those ships are simple bigger and more heavily armed than any ones the EA builds but are no better protected technologically (worse in fact due to the lack of interceptors...). Those ships are also rare within the Dilgar fleet require large amounts of resources better spent on more smaller ships especially given the large scale of the war the Dilgar were having to fight single handed. Look at the Germans in WW2 all the resources they spent on building large uber-powerful tanks (but unreliable) and developing even larger ones (Panzer Maus anyone?) when building larger numbers of cheaper smaller tanks might of helped (probably not much in this case...).

The original AoG Dilgar War supplement took the view that the league races suffered from a lack of tactical and strategic imagination, the Dilgar became used to facing their unimaginative tactics and when the Ea enters the war bringing a new outlook the Dilgar are taken by surprise.

One of my favorite moments in that book is when after the EA enter the war the Dilgar pull back to a captured world called Mitoc to consolidate their supply lines. They turn Mitoc into a fortress and gather their forward fleet there intending to use it as part of Somme/Verdun style battle intended to drain the enemies strength attacking fortified positions. However the Earthforce commander ignores Mitoc bypassing it and threatening the Dilgar lines of supply forcing them to give up a large swathe of territory without actually having to fight.


Nick

 

[katadder]

thats the thing with space, there are no frontlines, you can bypass pretty much anything you want to.

 

[captainsmirk]

Indeed, and I admit that it seems unlikely that all the involved League races would be unable to realise that but apparently that's what the Dilgar had come to expect...

Admittedly the only League race that had really been involved in offensive action on a strategic scale up to that point (the Dilgar had been doing all the attacking prior to this) were the Drazi who seem all to likely to head straight at where the enemy fleet is...


Nick

 

[Tzarevitch]

thats the thing with space, there are no frontlines, you can bypass pretty much anything you want to.

Not exactly. It isn't that different from modern warfare except it is in 3 dimensions. There are still lines of control but they may not be as distinct. Leaving an enemy strongpoint in your rear usually is a very bad tactical decision as it allows him to attack your rear areas then retreat to an intact strongpoint. There are however times (a la Douglas McArthur) where it is brilliant precisely because it is the last thing the enemy expects you to do. You are gambling that it is cheaper to bottle the enemy up in his strongpoint than it is to assault it. If the gample fails you are screwed.

The EA gambled right bypassing Mitoc, the Dilgar gambled right bypassing the Yolu capital. The Dilgar gambled seriously wrong bypassing the Abbai, Brakiri and Hyach capitals and that helped to do them in.

Tzarevitch

 

[Jal]

I've read about 200 pages of LC's dilgar war story, and while the scope and plot are both very good, the prose and dialogue needs a lot of work, and a proofreader wouldn't have gone astray due to his constant mixing of posessives and contractions. It's a very noteworthy effort, but to say it's the best B5 ficiton outside the show is either hyperbole or damning with faint praise.

grammar, spelling and a near total lack of proofreading aside i found it an extremely enjoyable read (have reread it several times as well).

as for only reading 200 pages of it.... that says it all really.

 

[LC]

Gotta admit I'm a little surprised that story is still doing the rounds, been a while since it left the boards

The copy out on the net is the draft copy, no editing, no proof reading, essentially put in electronic print thirty seconds after I wrote it. Usually each chapter took me 10 to 12 hours which sounds a lot, but is apparently quite fast. Naturally speed tends to throw up little errors

My aim is to work on a 'Perfect' version for the future, there was some 30 months between start and end during which time I think I became a better writer. I'll be adding more at the start, especially with Garibaldi, the Space Race and the main Warmasters.

But thats the future, right now I'm messing around with the last 6 months of the Minbari war

 

[Triggy]

thats the thing with space, there are no frontlines, you can bypass pretty much anything you want to.

Not exactly. It isn't that different from modern warfare except it is in 3 dimensions. There are still lines of control but they may not be as distinct. Leaving an enemy strongpoint in your rear usually is a very bad tactical decision as it allows him to attack your rear areas then retreat to an intact strongpoint. There are however times (a la Douglas McArthur) where it is brilliant precisely because it is the last thing the enemy expects you to do. You are gambling that it is cheaper to bottle the enemy up in his strongpoint than it is to assault it. If the gample fails you are screwed.

The EA gambled right bypassing Mitoc, the Dilgar gambled right bypassing the Yolu capital. The Dilgar gambled seriously wrong bypassing the Abbai, Brakiri and Hyach capitals and that helped to do them in.

Tzarevitch

With the combination of Jump Gates, supply lines and strategic targets there will always be bottlenecks that can be defended but can also be worked around more easily than land-based blockades. As the series pointed out time and time again, the jump gate networks are virtually essential for supply and transport, with only very large and millitary vessels having jump engines on board.

 

[Taran]

For brilliant use of that tactic, think Napoleon.
MacArthur was a fool. But a lucky fool supported by a truly great Navy, Marine Corps and Army (in that order for his wars).

The idea of leavingan intact enemy stronghold behind you relies either on you being lucky or on you having enough troops (ships) in that same general area to give him pause when considering to attack from that position. Can you actually hurt him bad enough when he attacks to be able to break him with your counterattack? Will you ignore his attack and just take his stronghold when he sallies forth? Can he even reach YOUR areas?

That last was the most likely reason the EA would have gotten away with it. After all, how far is EA space at the time from the Dilgar's front lines? The EA would have relied on the presence of the League navies to either take the brunt of any assault from that stronghold or to take it while it was off smashing someone else.

 

[cthol24601]

"In terms of realism, swarm tactics in an advanced combat environment never work. Fielding ten times the number of units against an enemy with a dramatic technological edge will not grant a win (It actually makes for just a target rich enviroment...). "

Well sometimes yes and sometimes no.
The Soviets using sheer grunt, numbers and efficient use of lower level tech worked very well against the Germans once they got their shite together. That sort of thing has happened a few times, particularly when the more high tech side (and usually therefore the one more dependent on supplies and resources and more vulnerable to dirt, grime and maintenance) is over stretched and unable to focus firepower and resources where its really needed along with the lower tech side being tactically astute enough to pick its battles which the EA certainly would be here with the league taking the brunt of the fighting.

The irony I find with the Dilgar war is that because the Dilgar went so mad in their war, attacking everyone and anyone indiscriminately, they over stretched themselves. Furthermore, their tactics when in occupation forced their opponents to fight to the last and made any kind of arrangement impossible. If they'd just picked an enemy like the Drazi and focused all their attention on them they'd would've taken a new home world and forged an empire without little problem.