Sheila glances at Arin, "I'm happy, I know where i know you from now.  which helps alot for my comfort level."

"There could be a squad of TIES passing by at the wrong moment, and I think I could list several more.  And if the corp personnel fight back, the boarding party may end up needing to fly the ship".

"If a full TIE squadron shows up, then we're likely dead.  We'd not only have to face them, but whatever capital ship delivered them as TIE's lack hyperdrive.  Furthermore, if it gets to the point the boarding party have to fly the ship, then the civilian crews they brought with them are dead.  To kill them, they'd have to kill the boarding team first."
This message was last edited by the player at 12:35, Fri 10 Aug 2012.

"It is a calculated risk, yes," CC9 says without concern.  "The entire mission is a calculated risk.  If it seems too great a risk then dismiss the suggestion; if not, then we may be able to speed up our capture of the vessels.  This is, after all, a time-sensitive mission."

Mika looks a bit confused.  "Well, if I'm co-pilot on the Nightshrike, that'll pull one less from the boarding party, not that I'm much of a soldier anyway."  It's true that Mika hardly ever let her blaster get far out of reach, but the few times any have witnessed her using it, she hadn't won kudos with her lackluster marksmanship.

"We could try two boarding parties from a single ship", Arin said.

"We would board two ships almost simultaneously, then move on to disabling the rest of them. But in any case, we'll need to disable their comms prior to any other action. If we could manage some sort of ion mines, we could lay and detonate remotely, we might actually be able to disable all enemy ships without getting too close and probably knock out their comms in the process. Jamming would work too, but as far as I know, it works pretty much as a beacon, since the jamming broadcast has to overcome the strength of their broadcast."

"Unfortunately I doubt jamming suites tend to be cheap," Cor says with a frown, "and I doubt any of our fighters have jamming suites built in.  The likelihood of them having Holonet transceivers is very low, luckily, so subspace jamming is likely our main concern.  Short-range comms are less of a threat than long-range; if they can speak to one another but not call for backup the ensuing and spreading panic may actually work in our favour."

She makes a thoughtful sound.  "Laying ion mines would be an excellent suggestion if they emerge from hyperspace at the correct point.  If they make a miscalculation it may put them several dozen kilometres off-course - not much in terms of space travel of course, just a minor deviation from their perspective, but it may make them miss our minefield altogether.  Laying a wider minefield would compensate in part but would cost more to prepare.  What if we had some fighters do a fly-by and drop mines on the way, then disengage and detonate?"

Devon raised a finger.
"uhm, minor point.. but where do we get the ion mines?"
Lowering his hand again, Devon paused for a moment in thought.
"As to boarding?  Although two boarding parties lets us board more ships at the same time... it makes each boarding party smaller - means if anything goes wrong or there's resistance we didn't anticipate - more Stormies on board than we thought or something - then we've got less manpower on the scene to help deal with the situation.  I'd vote for boarding one ship at a time with overwhelming force."

He glances at Arin. "And I certainly wouldn't disable one or two ships, board them, then chase down and disable the rest.  Why give them time to escape or get a distress call out?  why give the crew of the disabled ships hope that the others might come and rescue them?  makes them more likely to fight.  I say disable everything then decide what to board.  As to jamming?  sure, jam them... but also destroy their long range transmitters and rectennas soon as we can."
This message was last edited by the player at 17:10, Fri 10 Aug 2012.

CC9 points at Rann.  "As Talon 9 is away from the Nightshrike, Talon 6 is the ideal person to ask if ion mines can be sourced, and how many.  It may not be feasible but until we understand what our limitations are the suggestion remains potentially problematic but valuable."

Arin nodded slightly. "I wouldn't mind taking all the freighters down, but unless you have several ships with ion cannons available, the only way we're going to get it done is by using ion mines or bombs, if you can obtain them. Any other way it'll take some time to ionize the freighters, not to speak of having to deal with the fighters at the same time."

After a small pause for thinking, he continued. "Yes, boarding the ships with small crews might be dangerous, but if we want to pull this off before they jump in a Star Destroyer, we need to work fast. Anything past ten standard minutes is calling for trouble. And if we disable the freighters, we need someone to get their systems back online after we have boarded, so that kind of narrows the window down. If you ask me, the best way to do this would be taking one or two ships from the convoy and jumping them out before the reinforcements arrive. If we get greedy with them, we might lose them all."

Devon nods cheerful agreement and helps himself to a pastry from the plate.
"Exactly - we get greedy and we might loose everything.  So disable all of them - thats just shooting - but only board one or two.  Only take what we can be certain of getting out with.  I'd say send one big boarding party into the first freighter... secure it and get it up and running and then, if there's time, board a second one."

Devon bit into the pastry, chewed and swallowed. "If there's not time for a second, cut and run with the one we got."

Mark let the conversation flow for a while.  It was good to see the Talons planning, coming up with strategies and tactics, discussing and discarding as appropriate.  It was what he'd trained them for.

"Mr Branden, your idea of a single transport but potentially multiple boarding teams has merit.  It means the starfighters only have to screen a single ship and the boarding team leaders can make on the spot assessments on what each ship requires.  It allows the flexibility we may need.  I think this will be our best option.

"Your idea of ion mines I do not think will be feasible for many reasons.  Firstly, the sheer cost of setting up a minefield is prohibitive.  Secondly, we'd need to set up the Nightshrike with a mine launcher which is time and expense.  I'd also assume we'd need to dismantle existing weaponry to fit it."

Mark activates the holoprojector and a three dimensional view of the Phindar system comes into view.  He narrows it to an area of space between Phindar Prime and Phindar VII.  The area is within gravity wells making hyperspace impossible.  However it is the most direct route for ships without hyperdrive, or in this case a convoy who's escorts lack hyperdrive.  It's position was about as far from military patrols as you could get and response teams could not just hyperspace in, they'd be delayed as the approached the area with sublight drives.

"The final and most important reason against ion mines is tactical.  I hadn't informed you of the planned ambush point until now.  By necessity it will be in civilian spacelanes and I will not mine a location that could potentially kill innocent civilians.  An ion mine isn't designed to kill but it can.  A civilian ship with inadequate crew may not be able to repair an ionised life support, ion weapons can also short out or destroy less robust systems on civilian vessels."

"Civilian spacelanes also mean the risk of civilian vessels which makes jamming all the more important.  We can't disable every ship with a comm, so we'll need some sort of blanket jamming of subspace.  Short-range comms we wont bother jamming, a message will take hours to reach help and it will help with our cover story as we'll be posing as members of the pirates who have plagued this region recently.

"Mr Kismet, disabling of the ships wont be your problem.  The boarding teams role will be simple.  Board, capture if possible, escape it you can't.  As each freighter is neutralised, the civilian crews we bring will reactivate them and escape to a pre-determined hyperspace point.  The Nightshrike will be disabling freighters with support from the fighters.  The ships will disable what we can, destroy anything else.  Our primary objectives are to cut fuel supplies to military vessels and to damage Imperial confidence in Typhon energy.  Anything we capture is a bonus. . .a very large bonus."

"Ms Trake, I merely suggested you may wish to serve on the Nightshrike, it's not set in durocrete, nothing is.  Perhaps Mr Nallis craves a break from command and would rather man a gun turret then lead men into battle.  For now, consider where you feel your talents would be best used.  I don't want to fix personnel assignments until we've determined our tactics.  For now, lets do what we're doing, looking for ways to tighten up the plan."
This message was last edited by the player at 05:36, Mon 13 Aug 2012.

After a pause, CC9 states, "Tactically that is an extremely important point, Commander.  It seems counter-productive to bring it up halfway through briefing."

"When you are in charge of briefings, you may conduct them whichever way you deem tactically prudent CC9.  For now, keep your comments to ones that aid our planning."

"However, I shall go over the plan in its entirety now.  We will have a false flight plan that lists us heading to Phindar Seven, the transport will have its own flight plan.  XO is taking care of that.  The Nightshrike will be running with a pair of escorts, an R-41  and one of our Z-95's.  This will be Flight Team Beta.  The other two fighters, designation Flight Team Alpha, will be attached to the Shrike and powered down so they don't appear on scanners but are ready to fly."

"We'll be travelling at reduced speed so the convoy can overtake us.  We will aim to attack somewhere in this vicinity."  Mark brings up an area on the map, "As it's the furtherst distance from any help and almost centre of the gravity well.  This allows us the greatest time to act should a comm call get out and maximum choice in an escape vector."

"Once ready we converge and attack.  The Nightshrike will attempt to jam communications while trying to disable the freighters.  Flight Team Beta will launch and attempt to disable what they can and destroy what they can't.  They'll primarily target fighters but also assist with the freighters as needed.  Flight Team Alpha's primary role will be to clear fighters and defend the boarding transport."

"The transport will not reveal it's intentions until called in by Alpha Flight.  At that point they are to board any ship they can, neutralise defenders and put our civilian crews in charge.  The boarding team will then move on to other ships or split their forces as they see fit.  The captured freighters will evacuate together under the Nightshrike's covering fire.  All equipment we can't capture, we destroy."

"We will time the attack to minimise the proximity of civilian craft.  We will use pirate callsigns and transponder codes to appear as pirates.  We need to ensure this attack can not be directed back to our allies."

"Now let's continue to plan"
This message was last edited by the player at 00:36, Tue 16 Oct 2012.

CC9 doesn't respond.

"It sounds rather as if there is little more to plan," Cor says quietly, "if so much is already laid out.  Who will be leading each team?"

"There is much left to plan Ms Lambar, and tasks to be assigned."

"I will be in overall command of the mission obviously with the XO my 2IC.  I will fly Alpha 1 with Mr Allen on my wing.  Mr Branden will lead Bravo flight and fly our R-41.  Since I'm such a fan of nostalgia, Ms Masters can be his wing.  Three, be sure to take Mr Branden to the simulators and ensure he can fly."

"Nightshrike shall be led by the XO.  Ms Lambar, you'll be responsible for keeping systems operational.  I also need you to devise a jamming system.  Use whomever you need to get that done."

"I am undecided on who shall lead the boarding team yet as I'm still not sure of whom shall serve on this team.  Mr Nallis has been quiet and Ms Trake needs to decide where she can best serve."

"Ms Trake, I need the Nightshrike at full combat capability, Mr Kismet, the same with our fighters.  CC9, I'd like you to put together a list of ideal ordanance and combat skills for the boarding teams and cross-reference it with those people who have volunteered for that team and our available stores.  We need a team suitably equipped to do their job, especially if we break them in two."

"But lets finish up the plan for now."
This message was last edited by the player at 09:25, Sat 11 Aug 2012.

CC9 nods briefly to the Commander.  "By your command.  As Talon 9 has an assigned task, and considering interaction at the last briefing regarding this unit's ability to calculate and execute a basic battle plan without slaughtering innocent civilians," CC9 says in his standard flat monotone, "I would suggest Talon 4 as the best choice to lead the boarding team."

In reply to Mark Sheppard (msg # 64):

"yes sir"  Sheila said.  We're not even sure he can fly and I'm his wingman?  Men. That hasn't changed.  But aryans dead.

Once they stop talking, she'll pull Arin over to the simulators.

The wookie stood pasivly, and spoke up in his language. His sentence was long, but when he finished, he looked at the Droid as if daring it to act up.

The Droid beeped, and spoke. "Weapon choice is imperative commander. A well placed concussion grenade or stun grenade can take a group of potential enemies out quickly, so i'd recommend that each team member have at least 1 or 2 each if available. judging from the sound of things, their may be little defences in terms of numbers, but my experience is to expect the worst."

He smiled at the fact the Droid worked for him, then he continues in his language, letting it translate once again. "Stealth will be of little use once on the ship, and where the defenders will have knoledge of the ships, they will have limitations in terms of numbers and weapons. we could have one or two members with a heavier weapon...maybe a repeater, which can again dispatch a group effectively and quickly"

CC9 looks at the wookiee, who appears intent on doing his job.  Then he looks back at the Commander.

Arin nodded. "I agree with the big fellow, stun grenades will come in handy in confined quarters. We also need not only to jam the comms between the ships but also their hand held comms if we want to keep them from having any kind of tactical linkage between the ships. And if we do that, we need to modify our own comms to carry over the jamming."

Cor shakes her head, her expression carefully neutral.  "Any jamming signal that can stifle the signal of a ship's transceiver will certainly be more than powerful enough to stop hand-held communicators.  While each line of communication requires slightly different approaches the principles are actually the same; only the scale truly differs."

"What I mean is, we need to cover enough frequencies to block out any attempt to communicate. That has the only unfortunate effect of blocking our comms as well, or am I wrong?"

"It depends on how the matter is handled; there are a few ways to block comms.  I have some ideas that may facilitate their comms being blocked but not ours."  She shrugs.  "A little fore-planning does wonders."

"If you are able to do that, I'll tip my non-existant hat at you, miss. Not an easy feat, though I'm not an electronic warfare specialist."