Darrian TL16 fleet

[McPerth]

Define presence. The only hard evidence is the pre 1st FW map which possibly/probably does show two Zhodani worlds and the c500 Spinward marches map which shows Zhodani worlds in Chronor.

I agree it's an ambiguous term, so I refer to Aramis post earlier in this thread about Darrian presence in District 268:

Correction: 4 SYSTEMS - not 4 worlds.
Correction: Presence ≠ Colonized.

On 4 systems: everything we've seen about system colonization patterns makes system exploitation extremely common - and habs appear on almost anything that neither melts the habs nor is melted by the habs. Even Pluto... (9 Pluto F10046C F N Research Lab...) ...According to Bk 6. More than 10 k people!

And in re presence - vs - colonization
We (the US) have no colonial nor permanent resident population in the Minor Outlying Territories. We have a research station on two of the 10+ islands, and we sent warships through routinely, but no one LIVES there.

Likewise, the US maintains a presence in the FSM, which is an autonomous nation... who happens to hire the USN to patrol for them. (And has a higher per-capita rate of enlistment in the US military than any US state or territory. Officers from the FSM are limited to O6...)

It's quite possible that the Pre-Maghiz Darrians patrolled most of the subsector, but only as a boundary patrol.

In any case, the Zhodani probably sent exploratory missions and (based on the reference to an established toehold in the quote) I would not rule out an outpost or two in the spinward part of Chornor subsector.

 

[mike wightman]

Here is everything relevant Darrians has to say about ships:

The Modern Era for Darrian began in -275 when Mire (a recovered colony) rebuilt two starship hulks and began to recontact the worlds of the Darrian Group

Half of Darrian's starships were destroyed by the flares

Darrian's colonies at the time of the Maghiz were still extremely dependent upon Darrian as a source of supply, knowledge, and starships

For about two decades following the Maghiz, Darrian and its colonies tried to continue at the old levels of communication and trade. With fewer ships on hand and no new ones being built, however, it soon became apparent that it was not possible to continue as before. In -905 all of the Darrian colonies agreed that each would have to make its own way. The remaining fleet of ships was divided up among the colonies; each received three, which were then mothballed and stored against some future need. Although each world agreed to try to maintain contact about every ten years, all contact between the worlds ceased in -860.

Communication and trade between colonies can only be conducted by starships therefore the ships in this paragraph is an annoying shortening of starship

A team of researchers investigated the museum-piece starships they had and realized that they had the technology and the industrial base to build new ones.

Thus, survivability and endurance can be inferred to be two of the characteristics that Darrian tech level 16 starships have.

Probably fewer than two dozen Darrian tech level 16 starships survive today.

In addition, a small percentage of surviving Darrian tech level 16 starships were not originally of military design

There is not a single mention of TL16 SDBs, battle riders or monitors.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Here is everything relevant Darrians has to say about ships:

You left out quite a few usages, e.g.:

By -1370 the next generation of starships, complete with jump-2 drives and fuel reserves, was coming off the construction blocks. Certain select ships within this class were equipped with jump-3 drives for even greater range.
Between -1370 and -1270 Darrian ships explored the Marches with a radius of about twenty parsecs.

Either starships and ships are used interchangeably, or the author is just not that careful with the terms used. I couldn't say either way.

There is not a single mention of TL16 SDBs, battle riders or monitors.

Agreed, but neither are they specifically excluded.

There is no reason to believe all surviving ships are the same type or class. As Whipsnade pointed out some are warships and some are civilian designs.

 

[mike wightman]

Why would the Darrians want to be discovered by a large, powerful interstellar empire? That didn't work out all that well for either the Terrans or the Vilani...

What does it matter what the Darrians want - if the Zhodani had sent a single ship in the direction of Darrian space over the course of 600 years they would have found the new jump nation and there is didly squat the Darrians could have done about it.

I disagree, you do not have to make yourself known if you discover someone. Someone fleeing the chaos of a collapsed empire might be a bit careful about whom they are known by?

We are discussing the OTU not MgT - there is no stealth in space. The Itzin fleet would have been detected by the Zhodani if the Itzin could detect the Zhodani. Jump flash, gravitic distortion from drives, thermal radiation - you name it. If an Itzin scout jumped into a Zho outpost system and could detect the outpost then the outpost can detect the scout.

Does the Zho have a shoot to kill or impound all alien vessels encountered policy?

Nope but they can read minds and intent, edit memories and to a limited extend predict future events. There is a secret here that I think we have both spotted.

The Itzin fleet was apparently an exploration fleet from some faction of the Imperium that the Zho knew about since a few thousand years. Why would that upset the Zho?

The Itzin fleet set sail after the fall of the ROM - there was no Imperium which is something that would please the Zhodani no end.

Would it be prudent of the Zho to "disappear" the visible part of an Imperial exploration fleet?

What Imperium? The Zhodani would very quickly learn from the Itzen that the Vilani Imperium has fallen and the RoM has ended too.

How would the Zho know that the Itzin fleet would go on to uplift the Darrian?

How do we know it wasn't the Zhodani that pointed the Itzin in the direction of the Darrians? The Zho may even have received instructions from their precog machine...

So the Zho stopped any (official) scouting in the area just when the Itzin fleet settled? Purely by chance?

Odd coincidence isn't it?

So the Zho had resources within 5 lightyears (<2 Pc) of Darrian, but did not know about the centuries old interstellar state centered on Darrian? That sound a bit far-fetched to me...

Bingo - secrets within secrets.

The Darrians lived around Ancient orchards, they would be of interest to the Zho. Along come the Itzin with no harmful intent so the Zho aim them at the Darrians - for some reason or other. Perhaps they want to foster a client state on the border while they concentrate on their core expeditions.

The Zho stayed away for 600 years and then coincidentally scouted out the Darrian worlds just 5 years into the Maghiz event - another coincidence. For some reason they offered no help...

There is definitely more to this story than we have been told.

 

[mike wightman]

You left out quite a few usages, e.g.:

My interpretation of relevant - there are references to generation ships and sailing ships that I left out too.

Either starships and ships are used interchangeably, or the author is just not that careful with the terms used. I couldn't say either way.

I can because it is a peculiarity of English authors to switch between contractions once the key word has been defined in context. Starship is used often enough to infer that future uses of 'ship' are contractions of starship.

Agreed, but neither are they specifically excluded.

I think something as important as a TL16 monitor, battlerider or SDB wing would have got a mention if they were still there.

There is no reason to believe all surviving ships are the same type or class. As Whipsnade pointed out some are warships and some are civilian designs.

I agree, there could be a range of warship designs and classes, but the quotes make it explicit that they are all starships, as are the civilian relics.

 

[aramis]

[m;]WATCH THE TONE.[/m;]

I've noticed several posts from various posters which push the edge of personal attacks.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

What does it matter what the Darrians want - if the Zhodani had sent a single ship in the direction of Darrian space over the course of 600 years they would have found the new jump nation and there is didly squat the Darrians could have done about it.

The context seems to be drifting:

After the Darrians invented their jump drive they had decades to explore the Marches and yet never encountered the two Zhodani worlds; the Itzin fleet had less time to scout and yet encountered the Zhodani? Nope, don't buy it.

Why would the Darrians want to be discovered by a large, powerful interstellar empire? That didn't work out all that well for either the Terrans or the Vilani...

I believe the Darrians wish to find the Zho have something to do with whether they do find the Zho.

What the Zho do is another question, that suffer from the same problem.

We are discussing the OTU not MgT - there is no stealth in space.

I was not referring to Mongoose.

Isn't Mongoose just as OTU as CT, just a different retconned version?

The Itzin fleet would have been detected by the Zhodani if the Itzin could detect the Zhodani.

CT does not imply unlimited detection range as far as I know. LBB2 detection ranges are very limited.

I assume that an inhabited world can be detected at longer range than a ship, but I can't provide a quote for that.

The Itzin fleet set sail after the fall of the ROM - there was no Imperium which is something that would please the Zhodani no end.
What Imperium? The Zhodani would very quickly learn from the Itzen that the Vilani Imperium has fallen and the RoM has ended too.

There was still a large territory with considerable star-faring resources, as the Itzin fleet proves, even if it was in chaos and collapse, which I agree would please the Zho. Why kick a wasp nest?

There is a secret here that I think we have both spotted.
How do we know it wasn't the Zhodani that pointed the Itzin in the direction of the Darrians? The Zho may even have received instructions from their precog machine...
Odd coincidence isn't it?
Bingo - secrets within secrets.

There is definitely more to this story than we have been told.

There are certainly inconsistencies, and we are both speculating wildly. My main point is that we don't have the information to know exactly what happened.

So I don't know what happened or what TL-16 vessels the Darrian have left, if any, and I can certainly not say that you are wrong.

But neither will I accept that someone else knows exactly what happened...

 

[AnotherDilbert]

I can because it is a peculiarity of English authors to switch between contractions once the key word has been defined in context.

Ok, English is not my first language. To me it sounds deliberately vague.

I think something as important as a TL16 monitor, battlerider or SDB wing would have got a mention if they were still there.

There are probably some TL16 vessels somewhere, unless it's all just propaganda, but where is the type or class of any of them specified?

I agree, there could be a range of warship designs and classes, but the quotes make it explicit that they are all starships, as are the civilian relics.

OK, is a carrier a warship? I would say yes.
Is a carrier a starship? Obviously, yes.
Is a BR tender a warship? By the same logic I would say yes.

McPerth suggests that some of the ships may be tenders complete with riders. I can't find anything that says he's wrong. Or right...

 

[Whipsnade]

Even being military on nature and design, any warship (even destroyers) can carry quite a lot of people...

You're overlooking just when Darrian decided to shut it all down; twenty years after the Maghiz. All the evacuations that could be attempted are long over. Darrian isn't going to be returning even small numbers of people back to a planet whose infrastructure can't even care for the people already on it.

Once again, it wasn't a matter of having the ships. They had enough ship to pass out somewhere around 50 of them when the decision was made to shut down regular interstellar contact. It was a matter of the effort and resources required to operate those ships. The effort made and resources expended were no longer worth the returns.

That's why it's so hard to me to accept those jump-capable ships were ignored in such a desesperate situation.

You need to look at the question from a different angle. It is a desperate time, so desperate that Darrian can no longer afford to worry about anyone not on Darrian.

I keep thinking to be easier...

Easier in one way and implausible in several others. Remember what I told Dilbert? That you need to examine the consequences of your guesses? Making the mothballed warships riders and tenders solves one problem while creating others. The idea is to have fewer problems and not make more.

And I agree with you the pre-Maghiz Darrians saw threats as few and far, and they were unlikely to build large Warships, but IMHO, some spinal armed 15-20 kdton monitors or light cruisers were perfectly posible. OF course, true battleships were out of scale for them...

Possible, not plausible. Thanks to their Terran heritage, the Darrians would have know about spinal mounts. Whether the idea of riders/tenders is part of that heritage is another question. Did the Ziru Sirka, Terran Confederation, or Rule of Man even use such things? Riders and tenders are in HG2 but are they in the Darrians' minds? Were rider/tenders ever part of the military history which would inform their decisions? You need to look beyond the rules.

Then, if you don't accept current canon, I guess this may make you easier to accept my point of view about them, not "compeled" by it .

No it doesn't sadly. IMHO, your guesses and POV create more problems than they solve.

I find it implausible that the Darrians would spend some of their limited capabilities and resources on a one trick pony like a rider/tender combination. They were operating on a very thin margin as the Maghiz shows. A ship like a rider which could only be used for one purpose would have been a great luxury. It's more plausible given the resources available to them that Darrian built multi-role vessels capable of multiple missions. There would be starships which were more warship than courier, explorer, or transport but a "pure" warship would be a very rare bird indeed.

 

[Ulsyus]

Wow, that'll teach me to wait 24 hours between posting...

Regarding contact between and knowledge of the Darrians, Zhodani and any other sophont settlements in the SM, could anyone have picked up transmission signals from another civilisation in the times that are being discussed? If you're only talking distances of 20 parsecs then it's less than a century to locate that sort of thing.

Would advanced survey vessels be searching for those sort of signals when they travel out to do their job? As well as looking at a system the jump in, also hoover up any sort of signals from outside the system that may indicate sophont civilisations somewhere?

 

[Whipsnade]

There are no maps for ~-500.

Yes there are. We have are maps with settlement and membership boundaries for c.300, c.400, and c.500. You can find them in S:11 and TTA among other places.

Once again, you need to look at all of canon and not focus solely on one or two products. The questions discussed here involve many other actors and effect far more history than just what is specific to the Darrians and Zhodani. We need to look at it all to determine the consequences of our guesses.

So despite the Darrian module specifically state that the Zho were present in the Marches a thousand years before the Itzin fleet, they could not possibly have been in the Marches?

After I tried to explain the difference between presence and colonization to you, Wil did the same. Was he successful where I wasn't?

So now the Zho can attack, but the Darrian should trust that the Zho would not want to under any circumstances?

No. While it's physical possible, it's also impossible knowing what the Zhodani knew at the time.

The Zhodani didn't know about the Darrians and the Itzin Fleet nor would they know about them until after the Maghiz. I've tried to explain to why no contact occurred and Mike has also explained why the Itzin Fleet did not contact the Zhodani. Was he successful where I wasn't?

 

[mike wightman]

I think there may be something going on wheels within wheels:
-2500 Zhodani have toehold in Chronor subsector - outposts and bases, no settlements.
-1521 last Zhodani expedition around Darrian space pre Terran contact, it is 600 years before they send a patrol/scouting party this way again
-1513 Terran traders stop at Sacnoth to scout the Marches - how far can they scout in two years?
-1511 Terran traders contact Darrians
-1000 Zhodani consulate reaches 'current' borders (evidence from the SMC 589 map indicates the two worlds that are the likely Zhodani border pre frontier wars but they are probably no more than bases or outposts not settlements, alternatively the Zhodani may have an outpost or base on any of the 10 worlds they will settle in the c400 to c500 window in LD N-Z)
-925 Maghiz
-920 Zhodani scout out Darrian space - coincidence or did they have assets within 5 LY?
-907 Final extent of the Maghiz on Darrian space - Zhodani do nothing to help

 

[Whipsnade]

I think there is something going on wheels within wheels...

Perhaps.

-2500 Zhodani have toehold in Chronor subsector

Toehold, meaning presence, meaning forward support for the Consulate's scouting sweeps through the Marches and further.

-1521 last Zhodani expedition around Darrian space pre Terran contact

Not just "around Darrian space", but the entire Marches. The same passage talks about how the Zhodani explorations concentrated on the Gvurrdon, Provence, and Corridor sectors. Why? Because that's where the Zhodani had met and continued to encounter the Vargr and Vilani.

We know that the Consulate maintains a robust "over the border" policy and we know they've contacted and "uplifted" human minor races beyond their borders in the past. Spotting the Darrians, steering the Itzin Fleet to them, and watching to see what would happen doesn't fit what we know about the Consulate.

-1000 Zhodani consulate reaches 'current' borders

Current borders or present size? Both have been used somewhat interchangeably, but they do not mean the same thing. The oldest source, AM:4, says "present size". It also talks about the Consulate's "slow conservative expansion".

(evidence from the SMC indicates the two worlds are the likely Zhodani border pre frontier wars but they are probably no more than bases or outposts not settlements)

The 589 map with the "fingers" in the upper left? Two worlds along the Marches-Foreven border are shown to not be inside the Imperial border. It doesn't necessarily follow that those non-Imperial "pockets" are part of the Consulate. I'll remind you that SMC also talks about how Imperial and Consulate claims increasingly interpenetrated with each other, how many settlements belonging to one were adjacent to the other, and how the Imperium and Consulate even shared worlds. That scrambled border region is said to have included systems in Foreven, Ziafrplians, and the Cronor subsector.

Apart from those two systems and their questionable status, where are on the SMC map are the Zhodani settlements the SMC text claims exist?

As I've repeatedly explained in this thread, we need to consider all of it. Not one map, not one paragraph, not one book. All of it.

-920 Zhodani scout out Darrian space

Where's that one from? G:Sword Worlds has a Darrian misjump leading to contact with some exiled Aslan on Mithril around -900, but I'm unaware of anyone else moving through the region until the Gram Fleet arrives. Even the Sindalians, if they reached that far, didn't make contact.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

There are no maps for ~-500.

Yes there are. We have are maps with settlement and membership boundaries for c.300, c.400, and c.500. You can find them in S:11 and TTA among other places.

There are no maps for -500 (the time in question), or -2500 for that matter. There are however explicit statements saying the Zho had at least outposts in the Chronor subsector in -2500, -500, and 500.

I do not choose to disregard several explicit statements for an unlabelled map depicting the area a millennia later.

Once again, you need to look at all of canon and not focus solely on one or two products.

I'm open to more input. What specific other canon has a bearing on the specific question of Darrian TL16 ships or the exact borders of the Consulate in -500?

After I tried to explain the difference between presence and colonization to you, Wil did the same. Was he successful where I wasn't?

As far as I recall he tried to explain it to you when you maintained that the pre-Maghiz Darrians had no presence in the Five Sisters and District 268. Was he successful?

But, no, I can't see that you have explained so that I can understand why the Zho had neither presence nor colonies in Cronor in -2500 or -500. I have heard you state it, but I have not seen any explanation as to why.

No. While it's physical possible, it's also impossible knowing what the Zhodani knew at the time.

AM8 states that the Darrians and Zho didn't contact each other, agreed. AM8 also states that the Itzin fleet discovered a few Zho worlds with human population.

The Imperium knew about the Zho. The Itzin fleet found a few Zho worlds. I can't help but come to the conclusion that the Itzin fleet, and later the Darrians, probably knew about the Zho existence.

Had the Zho known about the Darrians they might have attacked. I do not find it impossible to imagine that the Darrians made some effort to prepare for such an eventuality, however slight.

I completely fail to see why the Darrians should consider conflict with the Zho completely impossible, but please, do enlighten me.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Toehold, meaning presence, meaning forward support for the Consulate's scouting sweeps through the Marches and further.

Possibly, but the quote goes on to say:

The Zhodani were present in the Spinward Marches long before any other settlers. They established a toehold in Chronor subsector around -2,500, and that region became the trailing border of the Zhodani Consulate.

So the Consulate extends into the Chronor subector at that time.

Not just "around Darrian space", but the entire Marches.

That is speculation.

I cannot account for every movement of every ship of the Zho civilisation for several centuries, and I rather suspect that you can't either.


“If you want people to believe what you *do* know, you need to be up front about what you *don’t* know.”- Charles Manski
https://www.ipr.northwestern.edu/publications/docs/workingpapers/2018/wp-18-20.pdf

The 589 map with the "fingers" in the upper left? Two worlds along the Marches-Foreven border are shown to not be inside the Imperial border. It doesn't necessarily follow that those non-Imperial "pockets" are part of the Consulate.

Quite. Neither does it show that there are no Zho worlds in Chronor.

I'll remind you that SMC also talks about how Imperial and Consulate claims increasingly interpenetrated with each other, how many settlements belonging to one were adjacent to the other, and how the Imperium and Consulate even shared worlds. ...

Apart from those two systems and their questionable status, where are on the SMC map are the Zhodani settlements the SMC text claims exist?

If they are shared, they are reasonably some of the worlds that the Imperium claims according to the map?

BTW, it's S11 that claims shared worlds:

The settlement of the Spinward Marches proceeded inexorably, with a gradual establishmentof lmperialboundariesfurther and further spinward. By 500, the newly settled areas were adjacent to territories being settled by the Zhodani Consulate in the Cronor subsector. By 550, the two empires had intermingled their settlements, in some cases sharing systems, in others holding neighboring worlds.

The negotiated armistice left the Zhodani in control of the Cronor subsector of the Marches, but established extensive Imperial claims elsewhere in the sector, and was acclaimed an Imperial victory.

This does not really sound like Cronor was firmly Imperial before the war, does it?

As I've repeatedly explained in this thread, we need to consider all of it. Not one map, not one paragraph, not one book. All of it.

Yes, please do consider more than a single unclear map.

 

[mike wightman]

Toehold, meaning presence, meaning forward support for the Consulate's scouting sweeps through the Marches and further.

I agree - outposts and bases, no settlements or colonies.

The 589 map with the "fingers" in the upper left? Two worlds along the Marches-Foreven border are shown to not be inside the Imperial border. It doesn't necessarily follow that those non-Imperial "pockets" are part of the Consulate. I'll remind you that SMC also talks about how Imperial and Consulate claims increasingly interpenetrated with each other, how many settlements belonging to one were adjacent to the other, and how the Imperium and Consulate even shared worlds. That scrambled border region is said to have included systems in Foreven, Ziafrplians, and the Cronor subsector.

We have to look at the maps in LD N-Z rather than the SMC maps. The former show ten Zhodani settlements on the c500 map that are not there on earlier maps, by the time of the 589 SMC map there are only two potentially Zhodani worlds left in the Marches which are common to both maps.

Apart from those two systems and their questionable status, where are on the SMC map are the Zhodani settlements the SMC text claims exist?

According to the Zhodani alien module "The original settlements in Tloql (the Spinward Marches) were minor, and were driven out by lmperial expansion between 200 and 500"

According to the maps of SM settlement in LD N-Z there were no notable Zhodani settlements c300 or c400 - do we put this down to Imperial propaganda, the author getting dates wrong, or some other explanation?

As I've repeatedly explained in this thread, we need to consider all of it. Not one map, not one paragraph, not one book. All of it.

I am (LD N-Z, SMC, Darrian and Zhodani Alien modules), and it has lead me to your next question and the bit I think points to the Zhodani potentially knowing more behind the scenes - the Aslan being a minor race wasn't exactly obvious

Where's that one from? G:Sword Worlds has a Darrian misjump leading to contact with some exiled Aslan on Mithril around -900, but I'm unaware of anyone else moving through the region until the Gram Fleet arrives. Even the Sindalians, if they reached that far, didn't make contact.

Here is the passage from the Darrian Alien module:

It was just chance that Darrian surveys did not reach far enough to touch the Zhodani border, and no Zhodani expeditions touched Darrian space between -1521 and -920.

This to me implies, hints, screams out that the Zhodani did indeed have an expedition to Darrian space c-920, five years after the Maghiz, several years before the effects of the Maghiz would stop damaging Darrian colony worlds.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Whether the idea of riders/tenders is part of that heritage is another question. Did the Ziru Sirka, Terran Confederation, or Rule of Man even use such things? Riders and tenders are in HG2 but are they in the Darrians' minds? Were rider/tenders ever part of the military history which would inform their decisions? You need to look beyond the rules.

We don't know, obviously.

From the Imperium game we know that both the Terrans and the Vilani knew about and used Monitors, Carriers, and Fighters. So they certainly knew of the concepts of non-jump warships and starships carrying other vessels into combat.

That they, for centuries, hadn't even considered combining those concepts into the tender/rider idea seems unlikely to me, but YMMV.

 

[McPerth]

Here is everything relevant Darrians has to say about ships:

Communication and trade between colonies can only be conducted by starships therefore the ships in this paragraph is an annoying shortening of starship

Fully agreed, and that makes believing they ignored two dozen starships hard to believe, while ignoring two dozen monitors/SDB quite easier

There is not a single mention of TL16 SDBs, battle riders or monitors.

Agreed, but neither are they specifically excluded.

Ditto

There is no reason to believe all surviving ships are the same type or class. As Whipsnade pointed out some are warships and some are civilian designs.

Those told "civilian" ships may well be just non-combat ones (be them Tenders, SDB jump frames, Oilers, or other support ships) that could be part of an SDB/monitor squadron in deep reserve, if we go along my initial thesis,..

We are discussing the OTU not MgT

Let me quote your own words

with MgT Darrians being the new primary 3I canonical source.

So, IMHO, and according your own words, if we’re talking about OUT we cannot ignore MgT…

I can because it is a peculiarity of English authors to switch between contractions once the key word has been defined in context. Starship is used often enough to infer that future uses of 'ship' are contractions of starship.

I agree, there could be a range of warship designs and classes, but the quotes make it explicit that they are all starships, as are the civilian relics.

As I said long ago in this same thread, if we go so punctilious with specific wording, we find that Imperial Depots don't support BRs or fighters, as they are referred to Navy Starships or just ships, and we know they do.

And let me point again. To refer to a BT/BR combo, don’t you believe most people will consider them a Starship squadron, no matter being technically incorrect, as they have (as a group) jump capacity?

I think something as important as a TL16 monitor, battlerider or SDB wing would have got a mention if they were still there.

Not necessarily. Neither is intra-system commerce referred at any point, and sure there was some (or much) of it...

In an AM, that were short books, many things are assumed even if not told about, and I guess the fact Darrian had some SDB fleet for system protection (its size, as a fleet or for its individual vessels may be argued) it's a logical assumption, once we agreed the Darrian knew (not only feared, as Terrans do now IRL) they were not alone in space and other fleets could come, no matter how distant they saw the thread.

I agree, there could be a range of warship designs and classes, but the quotes make it explicit that they are all starships, as are the civilian relics.

What we know is they were mostly (except the told civilian ones) warships. If they were starships or not it’s not so clear.

You're overlooking just when Darrian decided to shut it all down; twenty years after the Maghiz. All the evacuations that could be attempted are long over. Darrian isn't going to be returning even small numbers of people back to a planet whose infrastructure can't even care for the people already on it.

Once again, it wasn't a matter of having the ships. They had enough ship to pass out somewhere around 50 of them when the decision was made to shut down regular interstellar contact. It was a matter of the effort and resources required to operate those ships. The effort made and resources expended were no longer worth the returns.

You need to look at the question from a different angle. It is a desperate time, so desperate that Darrian can no longer afford to worry about anyone not on Darrian.

I accept your numbers about 50 ships, though I don't know where you take it. Of those, about half of them where given to the colonies (3 per icolony) and mothballed, and the other half tried to keep contact for a few more years.

Even in this case, two dozens of state of the art jump-capable ships (some of them not military) were forgotten in the outer system... Sorry, I cannot swallow it.

As said, I'll rather believe they were cannibalized for useful parts (mostly computers and Power plants), or just stranded for those same useful parts to be used for other goals (as the power plant to power civilian facilities).

see my earlier posts about why an SDB/Monitor squadron could be so "forgotten" (or more probably just assumed lost in the Maghiz).

Easier in one way and implausible in several others. Remember what I told Dilbert? That you need to examine the consequences of your guesses? Making the mothballed warships riders and tenders solves one problem while creating others. The idea is to have fewer problems and not make more.

Possible, not plausible. Thanks to their Terran heritage, the Darrians would have know about spinal mounts. Whether the idea of riders/tenders is part of that heritage is another question. Did the Ziru Sirka, Terran Confederation, or Rule of Man even use such things? Riders and tenders are in HG2 but are they in the Darrians' minds? Were rider/tenders ever part of the military history which would inform their decisions? You need to look beyond the rules.

You have a strong point here. I have serious doubts about the Vilani, or even the ROM using BT/BR combos, as large BTs are out of picture before TL 12-13, due to computer size limits.

But if you carefully read my posts (since post #4, when I first presented my thesis), I mostly talk about SDB/monitors, that were perfectly possible, and now used as BRs. After all, the main difference among a BR and a Monitor is its deployment and use, not its design, and they may be used interchangeably

No it doesn't sadly. IMHO, your guesses and POV create more problems than they solve.

Wich problems, if you're kind enough to tell me?

I find it implausible that the Darrians would spend some of their limited capabilities and resources on a one trick pony like a rider/tender combination. They were operating on a very thin margin as the Maghiz shows. A ship like a rider which could only be used for one purpose would have been a great luxury. It's more plausible given the resources available to them that Darrian built multi-role vessels capable of multiple missions. There would be starships which were more warship than courier, explorer, or transport but a "pure" warship would be a very rare bird indeed.

And yet we're told they were warships, probably "pure" ones...

And once this is stated, do you think they would spend more money in jump capable ones, that, as you say, require more resources and are mostly offensive/response teams, or on monitor/SDBs, that require less resources and are mainly defensive?

We know they knew there were threats, and to respond them they would need some armed forces (be them starships or SDB/monitor fleet).

We also know building those defenses is not quick, so, if you see a need for them, you build them before you really need them, as you will not have the needed time then.

So I guess we can assume they built them (and we know they built warships, as that's how they are referred in AM8). How many resources and if they were purely defensive or a mobile fleet is the unanswered question in AM8.

 

[McPerth]

About Darrian/Zhodani contact:

AnotherDilbert states his dificulty to believe the Zhodani just stopped their exploration 2 parsecs away from Darrian, but this also happened with the Vilani and Earth...

OTOH, it's posible the Zhodani discovered the Darrian and they just saw a paceful human society with no technological drie, and so dismissed it as a thread. The Itzin fleet arrival was then just a black swan that altered all, and the Zhodani only turned their eyes on Darrian once they could not fail to detect a unexpected sub-nova star flare...

 

[mike wightman]

The Zhodani just happened to go exploring 5 years after the Maghiz event, something they could not learn about for perhaps another fifty five years? It would take the wavefront from the Maghiz sixty or so years to go from Darrian to the nearest potential Zhodani outpost.

To quickly answer a couple of your other points:

"Let me quote your own words" and "So, IMHO, and according your own words, if we’re talking about OUT we cannot ignore MgT…"
I think I should have made the sarcasm explicit, I do not consider MgT 3I as OTU canon anymore than GT - they are both ATUs IMHO. MgT especially the early stuff suffers a lot from poor research, it is much better now.