Rise of the Reds Update: There'll always be an England Options

[MARS]

And the USA can just clear the fog with their satelites.............

Those could be taking photos with a high-resolution camera. Like I said: The units under the shroud are still physically there and visible. It just seems to block out things like radar etc. Plus, even if the yanks could theoretically detect the Russians, they're not allied with the ECA at this point. Just because they have the intel doesn't mean they pass it to the Europeans. Heck, that US SEAL team that Thorn called to Berlin is doing military recon IN European and Russian-occupied territory without the consent of either faction. In short, the US are keeping a close eye on what's happening so that their President can eventually come to a reasonable decision against or in favour of an intervention.

[SpiralSpectre]

1.) While they do seem kinda similar, there's a major difference: Zhukov's artillery units (Topol excepted) still work under the usual in-game artillery mechanics whereas Charles gets ECA Howitzers and the Claymore, which have greater range than any other artillery that can be mass produced. Zhukov also gets no special planes whereas Charles will have both the Goshawk and the Harrier. To compensate, Zhukov's artillery will be ultra-splashy and backed up by the ground assault capabilities of vanilla Russia, making him arguably more powerful at forcing a massive breakthrough than Orlov or Aleks. Also, it's worth noting that the ECA is very different from the US in that many of their weapons are also quite splashy. It's basically a western faction without the US precision theme which also adds to their unique feel.

Zhukov's ground assault capabilities are same as vanilla Russia's? Thought he would have slightly more punch from his vehicles. Just making sure - he would get ballistics of all ranges and firing rates, right? Something like - a missile for every situation?

[MARS]

That's basically what it boils down to. When you're up against Zhukov, it's going to be missiles and rockets -everywhere- and when I said 'vanilla', I meant that he can back this up with full-sized Sentinel tanks.

[Dangerman]

Few questions from me:

1. Does Charles get extra artillery units aside from the Tier-2 Artillery in the teaser trailer and the Claymore?
2. Will the UK fall to the Russians? And what is the condition of the ECA and European forces in general?
3. Even though the Grenadiers can't be garrisoned inside buildings, what about transports?

[Planardweller]

Few questions from me:

1. Does Charles get extra artillery units aside from the Tier-2 Artillery in the teaser trailer and the Claymore?
2. Will the UK fall to the Russians? And what is the condition of the ECA and European forces in general?
3. Even though the Grenadiers can't be garrisoned inside buildings, what about transports?

Change the last one to "Can they be transported in vehicles? And what if i have GLA's battle bus? They won't be firing from it, right?"
On the first one - Charles gets Claymore and the Artillery shown in the promo-trailer at 00:25 and everyone gets access to Pandora.

This post has been edited by Planardweller: 6 Dec 2012, 14:17

[Diamondcutter]

Well I'm basing my response purely on logic (trololol) and since I have no knowledge on the answer of no. 1 and 3, I'll only be guessing on no. 2.

It seems that once again (after WWII) the Great Britain becomes the last stand, so if UK falls to the Russian I could only imagine ECA commanding what's left of their military from Ireland, Iceland, Greenland, the Iberia...(Actually I can't picture what they could do)

No matter how great the Russian military might can be, it seems unlikely that at this point (September, 2047) they would've been able to completely taken over the whole western Europe besides UK and IRE. For several reasons (one of them being that many and most strategical ECA facilities like Ciudad del Sol are located on the Continental Europe) I could only hope that there're pockets of ECA and national armies battling the Russians at the time of this update on the Continental Europe, and that the Russian invasions merely had to bypass those strongholds.

This is merely my speculation, and is not the official statement from the ROTR team.

[MARS]

It's pretty accurate though. The main frontline is still somewhere in France (south of Paris at this point) but the UK is the only member nation capable of providing large amounts of air support and with the frontlines now within their range, it'd be important for the Russians to take them out somehow. A massed assault of air forces and missiles seems to be out of the picture now because the ordnance is needed at the front and the element of surprise necessary for a non-nuclear decapitation strike is no longer there. This truly is their darkest hour.

[__CrUsHeR]

In this case if the Russians are sparing their strategic reserves of missiles and munitions for use in front of Continental Europe I imagine that to invade the UK the paratroopers are the best option. What is the main objective of the invasion of the UK, neutralize the air force?

It seems that the main objective of the Russia is to penetrate in Europe to reach the Solaris in Spain, this reasoning is correct? This would be the final blow of the Russians in their European campaign?

[Planardweller]

In this case if the Russians are sparing their strategic reserves of missiles and munitions for use in front of Continental Europe I imagine that to invade the UK the paratroopers are the best option. What is the main objective of the invasion of the UK, neutralize the air force?

It seems that the main objective of the Russia is to penetrate in Europe to reach the Solaris in Spain, this reasoning is correct? This would be the final blow of the Russians in their European campaign?

For all intents and purposes, when the war started, Russians should have attacked all solaris satellites with anti-space missiles to break european power grid and by extension manufacturing. I'm very curious how the team will deal with the issue. One downed satellite before the war is definitely not everything.

[__CrUsHeR]

For all intents and purposes, when the war started, Russians should have attacked all solaris satellites with anti-space missiles to break european power grid and by extension manufacturing. I'm very curious how the team will deal with the issue. One downed satellite before the war is definitely not everything.

You're referring to the satellite that crashed in Alaska? It was not shot down, had a malfunction and crashed (officially).

[SpiralSpectre]

For all intents and purposes, when the war started, Russians should have attacked all solaris satellites with anti-space missiles to break european power grid and by extension manufacturing. I'm very curious how the team will deal with the issue. One downed satellite before the war is definitely not everything.

The Russians probably want to capture the Solaris project as intact as possible so they're refraining from attacking the Solaris satellites. They're winning right now so no need to be rash and blow up something that would make a perfect spoil of war. Not to mention if Alek has any genuine scientific curiosity in him he personally would wanna capture and find out how the Solaris functions instead of destroying it.

You're referring to the satellite that crashed in Alaska? It was not shot down, had a malfunction and crashed (officially).

wasn't it shot down? That would also explain how the Spetsnaz so quickly knew exactly when and where to go to try to retrieve the satellite.

[__CrUsHeR]

The Russians probably want to capture the Solaris project as intact as possible so they're refraining from attacking the Solaris satellites. They're winning right now so no need to be rash and blow up something that would make a perfect spoil of war. Not to mention if Alek has any genuine scientific curiosity in him he personally would wanna capture and find out how the Solaris functions instead of destroying it.

Interesting your analysis makes a lot of sense already that the Alek and the president would have an interest in the technology.

wasn't it shot down? That would also explain how the Spetsnaz so quickly knew exactly when and where to go to try to retrieve the satellite.

It is likely that the satalite has been sabotaged by the Russians but this version has not been confirmed by either side.

[Planardweller]

The Russians probably want to capture the Solaris project as intact as possible so they're refraining from attacking the Solaris satellites. They're winning right now so no need to be rash and blow up something that would make a perfect spoil of war. Not to mention if Alek has any genuine scientific curiosity in him he personally would wanna capture and find out how the Solaris functions instead of destroying it.

wasn't it shot down? That would also explain how the Spetsnaz so quickly knew exactly when and where to go to try to retrieve the satellite.

This all good and well, but when said satellites start raining fiery death on your armies and navy, i think, the damage is too great to warrant such nimble approach. It is better to capture satellites on the ground then try to dismantle them from space.
It goes without saying, that securing solaris power plants and their personnel are very important objectives for RF. Same goes for any manufacturing and research facilities involved in making said power plants, satellites and so on. Though i'm slightly miffed, why RF didn't try to buy the export versions of power plants, if they really wanted to reverse engineer them.
I understand that the basic premise for going to war for Suvorov was that his country was losing its super power status and economic might in the foreseeable future for some time.

[MARS]

It seems reasonable for the Russians to attack the Solaris satellites but the fact that both your in-game power plant -and- the multiple ECA super weapons you can build are explicitely stated to -use- the Solaris suggests that the ECA has multiple of these satellites in orbit. There's the really big ones that could theoretically supply entire countries (the first was the Spanish one which projects power down to Ciudad del Sol but it's been stated in the same update that other ECA countries were also going to activate their own super power plants over the coming years) and the smaller 'lend-lease' models which are also used for the in-game Solar Reactor and Solar Burst. The Russians would obviously be torn between trying to steal the technology intact to use it for themselves in the same way they 'used' the pressure plates and fibre-glass cables mentioned in the Telecom Tower description and destroying them to eliminate their military potential. In any case, Ciudad del Sol would probably be the last major ground station under ECA control. One has to wonder though: Would ESA continue sending power down to reactors that have been taken by the Russians in order to ensure that the population they left behind still have electricity or would they shut them down to deny the Russians said electricity while worsening the humanitarian situation of their own populace? A power plant whose main method of energy generation is basically controlled from the outside raises some interesting questions...

As for the export models, we can easily assume that the ECA flat-out refused to lend-lease Solaris satellites to the Russians who were highly hostile towards the project from the very beginning. The Americans are using their own fusion tech and the Chinese still have enough nuclear and coal power, so the ECA probably leases their smaller satellites to emerging powers that aren't too heavily aligned with either of the others.

[Planardweller]

It seems reasonable for the Russians to attack the Solaris satellites but the fact that both your in-game power plant -and- the multiple ECA super weapons you can build are explicitely stated to -use- the Solaris suggests that the ECA has multiple of these satellites in orbit. There's the really big ones that could theoretically supply entire countries (the first was the Spanish one which projects power down to Ciudad del Sol but it's been stated in the same update that other ECA countries were also going to activate their own super power plants over the coming years) and the smaller 'lend-lease' models which are also used for the in-game Solar Reactor and Solar Burst. The Russians would obviously be torn between trying to steal the technology intact to use it for themselves in the same way they 'used' the pressure plates and fibre-glass cables mentioned in the Telecom Tower description and destroying them to eliminate their military potential. In any case, Ciudad del Sol would probably be the last major ground station under ECA control. One has to wonder though: Would ESA continue sending power down to reactors that have been taken by the Russians in order to ensure that the population they left behind still have electricity or would they shut them down to deny the Russians said electricity while worsening the humanitarian situation of their own populace? A power plant whose main method of energy generation is basically controlled from the outside raises some interesting questions...

As for the export models, we can easily assume that the ECA flat-out refused to lend-lease Solaris satellites to the Russians who were highly hostile towards the project from the very beginning. The Americans are using their own fusion tech and the Chinese still have enough nuclear and coal power, so the ECA probably leases their smaller satellites to emerging powers that aren't too heavily aligned with either of the others.

I just imagined a hilarious way for russia to win the war. They relaunch Buran program or its analog and start stealing satellites...

On more serious note - will there be updates from Suvorov's or russian/european general's perspective on this war?

[SpiralSpectre]

It would definitely be a tough call for ECA command to decide whether they should shut down the ground stations of Solaris plants in Russian occupied territories while worsening the humanitarian conditions of their own people. But given the situation of the war I dunno if they have much of a choice at this point.

In older updates it was said Russia is establishing forward bases in occupied ECA territories, capturing and repairing ECA factories and tech buildings to replenish and supply their own troops. It could be considered suicidal to give Russia the power they need for this operation.

Another more cynical reason would be - shutting down the power would also help to stir up civilian unrest and raise the population even more. That would probably um... encourage the people to stand up against the invaders instead of sitting in their shelters with electricity and listening to Russian propaganda being aired from captured media stations. Yeah this is something you would expect GLA gens or Jin to use but war isn't pretty. You gotta use every possible method to win when your back is against the wall. Right now ECA command is naturally very desperate. And desperate times call for desperate measures.

And can we get any news on Willem's whereabouts now that his country has fallen? Has he fallen back and regrouped with the remaining ECA forces? Or is he continuing his guerrilla style resistance? I have rarely felt this much for a character who hasn't exactly made any real appearance in the story in person.

BTW is the part about Russians stealing ECA tech just storyline fluff or is there any in-game attachment to it?

[Catbert]

Or at least build them with kill switches should the emerging powers prove... unreliable. At least that sounds like a logical thing to do in an age of uncertainty.

Also, I thought ground stations controlled the satellites? True, ECA command may have overrides or something.

This post has been edited by Catbert: 6 Dec 2012, 17:53

[MARS]

On more serious note - will there be updates from Suvorov's or russian/european general's perspective on this war?

Like hell there will be. We're having updates in the style of news updates (e.g. The Fourth Estate), personal accounts (e.g. Swamped), in-universe documents (e.g. It Came from Outer Space) as well as direct accounts involving high-ranking leaders and rank-and-file grunts.

And can we get any news on Willem's whereabouts now that his country has fallen? Has he fallen back and regrouped with the remaining ECA forces? Or is he continuing his guerrilla style resistance? I have rarely felt this much for a character who hasn't exactly made any real appearance in the story in person.

BTW is the part about Russians stealing ECA tech just storyline fluff or is there any in-game attachment to it?

Both Swamped and Willem's MTG basically state that the Dutch Army - as well as the entire population, apparently - escaped the country before hand, which makes sense considering that their plan was to literally flood the entire place and let an army of robots do the fighting.

As for the second thing, that's just story fluff. Although you could technically consider the capture of tech structures to be something akin to confiscating and using civilian infrastructure, although that doesn't extend to literally dismantling and stealing them in-game obviously.

Or at least build them with kill switches should the emerging powers prove... unreliable. At least that sounds like a logical thing to do in an age of uncertainty.

Also, I thought ground stations controlled the satellites? True, ECA command may have overrides or something.

The Risen from Ruins update mentions that the ECA installed killswitches on the military hardware they gave to their North African protectorates and the Solaris satellites are controlled from the ESA space centre in French Guiana which is actually in South America. Kinda puts Russia's intervention in the troubles of Brazil in 'Demons from the Past' into a whole new light, doesn't it?

[Planardweller]

There also can be hydrogen fuel cells and other power sources available for civilians and important installations as back up.

Great use of french space center in Guiana. Can you reveal more about European Space Agency and it's status or we will see it soon (hint "Pandora" /hint) ?

This post has been edited by Planardweller: 6 Dec 2012, 18:07

[MARS]

Well there isn't a whole lot to it but as it stands, ESA is one of the joint European organisations that remained intact even after the EU was replaced by the ECA in-universe, another one being CERN. Even though the ECA is not supposed to be as heavily integrated and centralised as its failed predecessor, it makes sense to pursue such costly scientific projects together rather than having a dozen independent national agencies for space exploration and atomic research.

[SpiralSpectre]

Both Swamped and Willem's MTG basically state that the Dutch Army - as well as the entire population, apparently - escaped the country before hand, which makes sense considering that their plan was to literally flood the entire place and let an army of robots do the fighting.

Okay so nobody is hiding and biding their time or anything, there literally isn't anyone there? I rather thought Willem's MTG meant that the Dutch army escaped guerrilla style planning to come back and assault the Russians once they are bogged down and demoralised. But they actually left it to the robots? Oh my... Swamped did hint that but I didn't think they would actually do that.

That sorta sounds like quite a bit of a gamble though. BTW is there any lore related fluff on how they maintained the power supply of the defenses in those ghost countries assuming intelligent defenses do require power and lorewise Solaris ground station requires quite a few high level techs to be maintained properly?

Now I have a nasty feeling once Zhukov realised there ain't any living people in the country nothing stopped him from ordering a total Topol storm and leveling the whole country, defenses and everything, to an uninhabitable nothingness. And that's how he finally ended the robo resistance. Man I have a twisted imagination.

[tgn89]

Okay so nobody is hiding and biding their time or anything, there literally isn't anyone there? I rather thought Willem's MTG meant that the Dutch army escaped guerrilla style planning to come back and assault the Russians once they are bogged down and demoralised. But they actually left it to the robots? Oh my... Swamped did hint that but I didn't think they would actually do that.

That sorta sounds like quite a bit of a gamble though. BTW is there any lore related fluff on how they maintained the power supply of the defenses in those ghost countries assuming intelligent defenses do require power and lorewise Solaris ground station requires quite a few high level techs to be maintained properly?

Now I have a nasty feeling once Zhukov realised there ain't any living people in the country nothing stopped him from ordering a total Topol storm and leveling the whole country, defenses and everything, to an uninhabitable nothingness. And that's how he finally ended the robo resistance. Man I have a twisted imagination.

YOU sure have a big one but he couldnt bomb the whole with topol m that would be a war crime

[MARS]

Now I have a nasty feeling once Zhukov realised there ain't any living people in the country nothing stopped him from ordering a total Topol storm and leveling the whole country, defenses and everything, to an uninhabitable nothingness. And that's how he finally ended the robo resistance. Man I have a twisted imagination.

Needless to say, I don't want to spoil things yet but let's just say there was a reason why Zhukov did not use those nukes. You'll learn why eventually.

[flyingpancake]

Semi random question. What is happening in Africa during all this? Are the African ECA allies gearing up to help them or are they having trouble with the GLA (seems more unlikely)

[flyingpancake]

Now I have a nasty feeling once Zhukov realised there ain't any living people in the country nothing stopped him from ordering a total Topol storm and leveling the whole country, defenses and everything, to an uninhabitable nothingness. And that's how he finally ended the robo resistance. Man I have a twisted imagination.

Wouldn't it be better just to blow up there weapons and replace them with Russian ones but to keep there bunkers? Because why destroy a perfectly good bunker if you can use it your self?