To Nuke or Not to Nuke

[LORDPrometheus]

so its only about 5 years into the game and I have come into the possession of 10x GR Hellraisers equipped with 1MT fission warheads. Is it worth saving them or should I just use them? Will other nations get upset if I use them?

[solops]

Nuke 'em.
Till they glow.

[Twotribes]

they dont do all that much damage.

[zgrssd]

ORIGINAL: LORDPrometheus

so its only about 5 years into the game and I have come into the possession of 10x GR Hellraisers equipped with 1MT fission warheads. Is it worth saving them or should I just use them? Will other nations get upset if I use them?

As I understand the weapon:
- If you use them on the attack, they vanish after. They are a one-combat pony
- If however you use them on the defense, they just use up nuclear material as ammo - they are still around afterwards
- a 1 MT warhead is not nearly enough to hurt the whole hex, or even the population. 1 Megaton is more of a tactical weapon

[Soar_Slitherine]

Make sure to thoroughly recon the hex you're going to nuke for the best effect.

[varangy]

ORIGINAL: zgrssd

ORIGINAL: LORDPrometheus

so its only about 5 years into the game and I have come into the possession of 10x GR Hellraisers equipped with 1MT fission warheads. Is it worth saving them or should I just use them? Will other nations get upset if I use them?

- a 1 MT warhead is not nearly enough to hurt the whole hex, or even the population. 1 Megaton is more of a tactical weapon

Might I add in this game anyway. In reality 1MT makes a huge blast. Hiroshima was 0,02 MT.

[LORDPrometheus]

I mean the realistic blast radius of a 1MT bomb is 19.8km before it won't even break windows and since hexes are 200km across this does not surprise me. As it stands I now have 2 units of 10x of these launchers so do I have 20 nukes or 2?

[zgrssd]

ORIGINAL: varangy

ORIGINAL: zgrssd

ORIGINAL: LORDPrometheus

so its only about 5 years into the game and I have come into the possession of 10x GR Hellraisers equipped with 1MT fission warheads. Is it worth saving them or should I just use them? Will other nations get upset if I use them?

- a 1 MT warhead is not nearly enough to hurt the whole hex, or even the population. 1 Megaton is more of a tactical weapon

Might I add in this game anyway. In reality 1MT makes a huge blast. Hiroshima was 0,02 MT.

I realized it is actually more impressive later.

ORIGINAL: LORDPrometheus

I mean the realistic blast radius of a 1MT bomb is 19.8km before it won't even break windows and since hexes are 200km across this does not surprise me. As it stands I now have 2 units of 10x of these launchers so do I have 20 nukes or 2?

I fear we can not use the Blastwave in the formula for one reason: It needs a Atmosphere. And those are not a given on SE planets.
As the developer of "Children of a Dead earth" put it:
"A final surprising effect is caused by the lack of atmosphere in space: explosions are pitifully weak. Without an atmosphere, conventional explosives simply blast a thin layer of gas on their targets, nuclear weapons are reduced to nothing more than glorified flash bulbs. Of course, the amount of light released by nuclear weapons is still great enough that they can melt through thick armor at very close ranges, so nuclear missiles are still viable for combat. But their effects fall off so quickly in space that they are almost contact weapons rather than area of effect weapons. If a salvo of nuclear missiles can connect with their target, though, they can be quite devastating. Conventional explosives also only tend to be effective when used to detonate a payload of shrapnel at high velocity at the target."
https://childrenofadeadearth.wordpress. ... e-warfare/

But if you detonate it on the moons surface, you might actually hit yourself more then the enemy - by causing moon quakes and radioactive debris:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEfPBt9dU60

[Pawsy]

I used nukes then followed up with my robot army 🤣 Saving the human soldiers from radiation ☢️ My results were it wiped out whatever hex it hit the fallout over 1 - 2 more hexes. Think it was 5 or 10 megaton?

[zgrssd]

ORIGINAL: Pawsy

I used nukes then followed up with my robot army 🤣 Saving the human soldiers from radiation ☢️ My results were it wiped out whatever hex it hit the fallout over 1 - 2 more hexes. Think it was 5 or 10 megaton?

Here is a list with some common yields just to put the insanity into perspective.

~5 Megaton was the expected yield of Castle Bravo, the first Hydrogen Bomb.
I call them "fake fusion bombs", as they would not work without using a nuclear bomb as detonator.
However they miscalculated a bit. See they had stored the hydrogen to fuse in Lithium and had asumed lithium would be innert. It was not. They ended up with 15 Megatons.

And then the russians made teh "Tsar Bomba". ~50 Megatons. The shockwave travelled around the earth 3 times. the explosion was visible in Norway, Greenland and Alaska. They needed a special parachute just so the bomber and observer had a 50% chance to make it out to safety.
It was a nuclear bomb.
Being the detonator for a 2nd, bigger nuclear bomb.
Which itself was a detonator for a 3rd stage hydrogen bomb.
Oh, and they could have doubled it to 100 MT by adding at 4th layer nuclear bomb to the mix. They choose not to.

However both designs turned out to heavy to be practical. Hydrogen has only been used as a "booster" or intermediate stage in smaler bombs.
The biggest thing humanity has ever deployed, would be the 25 Megaton B-41. It was a boosted Nuclear/Hydrogen/Nuclear bomb.

The biggest currently in arsenals, would be the B83 for 1.2 Megatons.

[Cavgunner]

The 1MT warheads on the Hellraiser about about equivalent to a solid round of bombardment from an artillery regiment, with the additional downside that they create radiation. Not worth it except perhaps in an absolute emergency.

[Sieppo]

ORIGINAL: Cavgunner

The 1MT warheads on the Hellraiser about about equivalent to a solid round of bombardment from an artillery regiment, with the additional downside that they create radiation. Not worth it except perhaps in an absolute emergency.

Yeah 1MT does not do much. In addition to the aforementioned, 200rad in hex I think.

[DrakeD]

I almost always scrap GR Hellraisers. Early in the game, the metal and machines can be very useful.

[laagamer]

Hey! New player here.

How did you get nukes so quickly?!

Also, what's ya'll average game lengths?

I'm at 23 years in, but I'm playing like a turtle, learning the game with only 2 other Majors and 2 minors on the map. Huge open spaces.

[zgrssd]

ORIGINAL: laagamer

Hey! New player here.

How did you get nukes so quickly?!

Also, what's ya'll average game lengths?

I'm at 23 years in, but I'm playing like a turtle, learning the game with only 2 other Majors and 2 minors on the map. Huge open spaces.

The first major to get a unit next to a Ruin, Free Folk town or Hex assset can find some goodies. It works similar to Civilisation Style "Goodie Huts".
Machines and various Galactic Republic gear are the better outcomes. Including the "Hellraiser", 10 single-attack 1 MT tactical nuke launcher vehicle.

Turtling is generally not a viable strategy in this game. You need to expand to grab as many minors and Free Folk towns as you can manage.

[DeltaV112]

ORIGINAL: zgrssd

I fear we can not use the Blastwave in the formula for one reason: It needs a Atmosphere. And those are not a given on SE planets.
As the developer of "Children of a Dead earth" put it:
"A final surprising effect is caused by the lack of atmosphere in space: explosions are pitifully weak. Without an atmosphere, conventional explosives simply blast a thin layer of gas on their targets, nuclear weapons are reduced to nothing more than glorified flash bulbs. Of course, the amount of light released by nuclear weapons is still great enough that they can melt through thick armor at very close ranges, so nuclear missiles are still viable for combat. But their effects fall off so quickly in space that they are almost contact weapons rather than area of effect weapons. If a salvo of nuclear missiles can connect with their target, though, they can be quite devastating. Conventional explosives also only tend to be effective when used to detonate a payload of shrapnel at high velocity at the target."
https://childrenofadeadearth.wordpress. ... e-warfare/

But if you detonate it on the moons surface, you might actually hit yourself more then the enemy - by causing moon quakes and radioactive debris:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEfPBt9dU60

This is generally overstated for non-hard targets. A nuclear weapon detonated outside of atmosphere releases a massive x-ray pulse that is lethal for kilometers to tens of kilometers in every direction(normally x-rays are absorbed by atmosphere). Fusion weapons will also release considerable neutron radiation. Even rad-hard electronics have limited survival radius unless protected by considerable radiation shielding.

[Zanotirn]

The immediate radiation from nuclear explosion tends to only be a serious factor in single-digit kilometer range. Generally for larger bombs if you're at the distance at which ionizing radiation is a danger for you, then thermal radiation is going to be a much bigger danger. And if the user wants to avoid line-of-sight limiting the range of thermal radiation in low-atmosphere world, they'd need to detonate the bomb higher in the air, which would further increase the effective distance.
On another note, with little atmosphere the area affected by fallout will be significantly smaller.

[Pawsy]

Just been Nuked! [:@] It’s interesting that the AI country is quite backward militarily. I’m stomping them. I’m minus 1 hex, not found the launcher despite a good recon level. Good to see the AI using it sensibly. I’m a long way off from nukes.