Do Umiak Ever React This Way Or Is It Unusual?

[Bamax]

I remember Stillstorm said how the Umiak kept coming down to the last (implying she wiped them out) but the Stray actually fled the scene.

Does that mean it is rare for Umiak in battle to flee the battle?

So in a scenario were a Umiak commander sees his entire fleet get ripped to shreds save his own vessel, is it likely he will react like Caleb here and call for a general retreat, or is he more likely to just get his ship blown up in a futile attack?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z8WsygwTiLU

I reckon the Loroi have enough sense to act like Caleb here... the Umiak? I am not so sure.

[Demarquis]

Well, obviously I'm no expert on Umiak combat doctrine, but my sense is that each individual attack isn't expected to stand on it's own. The idea is to wear down the Loroi in a war of attrition, so sacrificing yourself is acceptable, so long as su/tdsu < su/tdsl, where su="sacrificed unit", tdsu = "Total deployed strength of Umiak forces" and tdsl = "Total deployed strength of Loroi forces".

That Loroi ship is more important to them than your ship is to your own side, so self-sacrifice it is.

[Bamax]

Well, obviously I'm no expert on Umiak combat doctrine, but my sense is that each individual attack isn't expected to stand on it's own. The idea is to wear down the Loroi in a war of attrition, so sacrificing yourself is acceptable, so long as su/tdsu < su/tdsl, where su="sacrificed unit", tdsu = "Total deployed strength of Umiak forces" and tdsl = "Total deployed strength of Loroi forces".

That Loroi ship is more important to them than your ship is to your own side, so self-sacrifice it is.

Which means the stray is viewed by the Umiak as more important than the average bug. Otherwise he would neither be fleeing nor talking for the fleet. He appears to be a fleet commander.

[QuakeIV]

I thought the idea was that he was kindof unfashionably self-interested as compared to his peers, which was one of the reasons why they shoved him onto the front to get murdered in the first place.

[Bamax]

I thought the idea was that he was kindof unfashionably self-interested as compared to his peers, which was one of the reasons why they shoved him onto the front to get murdered in the first place.

That would be hillarious if so. But I doubt he is hailing Stillstorm without authorization from higher ups.

The Umiak do not strike me as the type to tolerate such actions unauthorized... especially given that he straight up revealed the Umiak have an advantage because he is so confident they will win. And the fact that he was trying to negotiate.

No way the Umiak give that job to a bug they fo not trust.

[QuakeIV]

In fairness he is apparently now attrition fodder so he may as well talk to the enemy without permission.

[Arioch]

Kikitik-27 didn't "flee the scene." He attacked, achieved his objective, and withdrew with a substantial portion of his fleet intact. The reason that Umiak attrition missions often lose the majority of their ships is that a) much of the force is in deteriorating states of readiness, and b) as long as there are Loroi to kill, the commander will usually continue to spend his ships trying. However, if he has killed all the Loroi in the area, there's no reason not to head home. The main difference between Kikitik and the typical Umiak commander is that Kikitik is better at his job; he is also a little more creative.

Umiak aren't suicidal, but they do follow orders, and they are occasionally given suicidal orders. However, attrition fleets aren't (usually) specifically ordered to commit suicide; their orders are to expend "maximum effort" to inflict damage on the Loroi line. In these cases the forces the commander has been given are mostly considered expendable, and the commander keeps this is mind, but even though these attrition attacks are frequent, that's not the "normal" situation; most Umiak fleets are not attrition attack forces. Although Umiak are generally not afraid to take losses (even Kikitik threw away much of a division just to test Stillstorm's intentions), their objectives usually require having sufficient force to achieve them, and this means not throwing your whole fleet away for no good reason.

(And yeah, Umiak don't have a gender to speak of, but it's confusing to write "it" that many times in the above paragraphs.)

It would be extremely unlikely that the fleet commander's ship would be the only one to survive an action, and if it happened, that would be a bad look in any navy, not just among the Umiak. But I doubt that has ever happened. Umiak flagships usually don't sit back and watch the action unless they are part of a whole reserve that's not engaged.

In fairness he is apparently now attrition fodder so he may as well talk to the enemy without permission.

The force Kikitik-27 is currently commanding is most definitely not attrition fodder. Superheavies are expensive. Kikitik's job was rather important; draw out the Loroi raider groups and tie them up so that they couldn't intercept the main crasher force. I don't think you give a job like that to a commander you don't have confidence in.

The whole crasher force is very unlike a typical Umiak attrition attack... for one thing, they have supply ships with them.

[QuakeIV]

Eh fair enough, I'm not really intimiately familiar with the visual aspects of their ship classes (I could be since there is a section on the site for that, I'm just not). So I saw ships in the general sci fi bug dude style and was like 'aha sci fi bug dudes, surely they are also doing the attrition attack thing as i read somewhere on the forum, very bug like sacrificing many of their own heartlessly like that'.

I could of sworn I saw somewhere that he was kindof in hot water though? Was that in regards to a different Umiak? (it was probably in the misc. Umiak questions thread)

[QuakeIV]

Just posting the continuation here so it isn't completely missed

Seems I mainly misinterpreted this when I originally read it: https://well-of-souls.com/forums/viewto ... 817#p22817

Upon re-reading it, he was relegated to rear line and then sent on an attrition attack, but it went well for him so they de-queued him for attrition duty? Assuming I read it correctly this time, then fair enough. I was kindof skimming at the time to catch up with past posts on the thread, which appears to have lead to some kind of major comprehension failure.

[Arioch]

Don't worry, there isn't going to be a test later.

A brilliant, unconventional officer is sometimes appreciated by his superiors, but I think at least as often not. That Kikitik was sent a second time on an attrition assault might have been a bureaucratic oversight, or it may have been that someone was hoping he wouldn't come back this time. However, once you pull off that kind of feat more than once, word gets around and you become expend-proof even among the brass that don't like you very much.

[SaintofM]

From what I understand, The Umiak view everything as a tool: Their ships, their people, and their allies. They want to get the most bang for their buck, and in the cases of tools of destruction that is often quite literally. It would seem most are essentially nails that are one adn done. Kikitik-27 is the nail gun.

[QuakeIV]

Heh. "You are the nails and I am the nail-gun" >nukes planet

[Arioch]

"To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail."

[Bamax]

"To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail."

So you take away his hammer and... I was going to say give it to someone else... but that just repeats the cycle don't it? Because man + hammer= hammer time. And destroying the hammer is pointless because man can always build another hammer.

So two solutions are obvious

1. Destroy the man... this is not desired because we are talking genocide and what does that lead to? Genociding every problem is risky because it invites others to target whoever is doing the genocide with genocide.

2. Make nails the hammer cannot hammer easily if at all. Making the cost and sacrifices for hammer time so high that it serves as a deterrent... essentially the nuclear truce between the superpowers of our time.