So I decided early on to not respond to reviews until all chapters were out. And then decided to just have all chapters written before posting the story anyway. So Now I will respond to the reviews I have read as of October 1, 2021.
This story was largely an experiment of mine. I wanted to see if I could write a work of fiction. I had tried doing so before, but never finished any of them. But this story, I decided I would actually finish and put out for others to read. The actual quality mattered little to me, I cared more about getting it done. Of course I wanted it to be good but I think you can see I have a discipline problem when it comes to writing. So getting this done and out was more important than making it amazing. It is after all my first real work of fiction of any kind. Better to make the end goal reachable than not.
I should first say that the story changed a lot as it was written. Originally the gate opened off the coast of Seattle, so It would have been only the US going in. I thought it would be cool if the gate ended up being a major problem logistically. So I decided on a sixty foot width for the gate early on. Which meant only ships with a beam of fifty nine feet or less could enter. I then decided it would be more interesting if the initial battle saw the Empire with an advantage of luck. They just so happened to end up somewhere that made a counter attack harder. So it was moved to the shallow waters of Bimini. That meant the UK would be involved too.
This story tried to focus on realism for the most part. The real world physics and limitations of each piece of tech, or weaponry was taken into consideration. As was the travel time and limits of men, material, and information. For both sides of the conflict. For the most part anyway. Though there are some stretches in there (how did the merchants of Mare-Oppidum know about the supply cache request?) It quickly became apparent that our ability to move large amounts of things over long distances, Or cover vast distances very quickly was our biggest advantage. In the story the allies constantly out maneuver the Empire. The Emperor, nor his commanders, Could fathom how fast we can move things around. They would never be able to fight against it. At Least not before being destroyed themselves. I occasionally throw in some setbacks for the allies though. No plan survives contact with the enemy afterall.
Lastly you may have noticed Rory was different. That's because this story was originally a sequel to another story I was writing. One of my many unfinished works. That story was a prequel/reimagining of Gate. It would have followed Rory before she became an Apostle. It would have ended right before the Empire invaded Japan in the original story. Rory in that story was quite different. Though she would have eventually become more like Rory in the original work. She still would have been a little different to the Rory we see in the original story. A little more distant and melancholy, and most likely quite lonely. The actual mechanics of that unwritten story dictate it. You may have seen the name "Elwie" mentioned in chapter 5. She is also from that unwritten story. She is the apostle Rory replaces. The first act of that story was written so I may return to it one day.
Throughout the story I focused on telling events and rarely focused on individuals. This seems to have given it a telling and not showing feel. Or rather you are being told what's happening, instead of seeing it through a character's eyes. Originally it was more character focused, which is why we follow the same USMC fire team around. But somewhere along the way I found out im shit at writing. But I refused to let the story die. So I decided to shift it to a more chronological telling of events over characters. Looking back that may have been a mistake, But it's too late to change it as I refuse to do a rewrite. This story was rewritten twice already, and this version had something like six drafts. I'm tired of looking at it!
If a better writer wants to use this as a template to their own fanfic involving naval forces, Be my guess. Now let's respond to the reviews.
Tomrichman. on Sep 10
"Things that needed to be fixed here, Jet is fast enough to dodge fireball easily and second the patrol boat 50 Cal AA gun can easily both dragon and rider even if the dragon survives, the rider will belong dead since 50 Cal will shred his body before he makes it back alive."
I'm aware of the capabilities of both the F-16 and M2 used by the HMBS Nassau. Yes the jet could dodge the fireball, MAKO 3 did. But "MAKO4 was too slow". Meaning the pilot took just too long to react. The fire ball hit but did nothing. Also the Nassua has no AA guns. The M2s are anti-personnel. Though they could certainly down a wyvern and its rider. In this case, as in real battels; Sometimes it comes down to dumb luck. The rider happened to only take minor hits, and was able to make it back. He got lucky, that's it. Keep in mind most engaugments in this story are measured in miles, not yards. They're farther away than you may think.
UH-60 NIGHTSTALKER. Sep 11
Okay... first of all... not bad. I would like to see where this goes.
But... you were extremely vauge on just where the imperials appeared and i didnt even know until like half way through the chaptee. Also, a little more detail would have been nice as well.
I responded to your review via PM, But for explanations sake; In the first few drafts the chapters were shorter. Chapter one ended before the Vipers scrambled. So originally the location was vague through all of chapter one, and this was intentional. I wanted the reader to think as they read this story. There are hints as to the gate's location if you know what to look for. The responding ship's name "Nassau", Is the biggest one. In fact it's a dead giveaway. Descriptions of the country, and the fact the Prime minister calls the US before the UK are also hints.
Arixlsmn. Sep 12
Fix your spelling of "Bahamian" you got the rest wrong afterwards
I'm assuming you're referring to my use of 'Bahaminian' instead of 'Bahamian. I've actually heard both used. I did little to no research on which one is the correct one, because I honestly thought it was the fromer. But googling it as of writing this, It seems 'Bahaminian' is used in reference to naval vessels or currency. I think both are fine anyway. Though if I did offend anyone from The Bahamas. I'm sorry. You have a beautiful country that I love. And I really really want to visit if/when COVID is a memory.
Arieg. Sep 13
So like a couple of fics on here this feels like its moving too fast without much development aside from kicking the meta plot along. Its sprinkled with some spelling errors, poor choices of equipment, and a few things that are kinda meh or don't make sense (such as some troop deployments, equipment use, etc.) Overall I'd give this thing C rating, the fic you have so far could be used as an outline for something bigger and better but since your merely transitioning it over... I guess we'll never see that.
It does move fast, but that was kinda how I wanted it to go. I wanted it to be a short story. You are right it's probably better as an outline. I don't think of myself as the best at character writing so I thought it best to avoid it. Also a lot of the time there really is nothing going on through the time skips. The allies were turtling, and the Empire was plotting or moving somewhere. It takes them forever to do anything. But I am curious what you think is a poor choice of equipment or troop deployments. I went with what would make sense given the location of the gate and what would be available.
Tomrichman. Sep 13
You better research more on military hardware man! Modern destroyers, cruisers and aircraft carriers have Phalanx CIWS and RAMs missiles for Anti air defense so there is no way the Naval force scares of the Imperial air force.
THe details of the battle is lackluster at best and you seem to focus on moving the big plot which makes your story starts to get bored!
I know exactly what weapons modern warships have at their disposal. Where do you want them to shoot them? Towards people's houses! Assuming you're referring to the battle for the island, keep in mind there were friendly fighters overhead. Shooting off Anti-Air in close proximity to friendly air assets is DANGEROUS. They're not scared of the Empire, They're scared of hitting a friendly or a non-combatant. And the dragons were not in the air during that battle. They were on the ground. You don't typically shoot anti-air or CIWS at a ground target. Particularly when the people you're trying to save would be in the line of fire. Also the Paul Ignatius was the only ship there that has the weapons you speak of. And it arrived after air superiority was established. The Nassau, and the Paul Clark are both patrol boats. With very similar armaments. They don't have PHALANX or RAM's. If you're referring to the battle for Mare-Oppidum; Then there honestly wasn't much for the navy to do. Once they sunk the ships and destroyed the emplacements on the wall; Their job would have been shooting down any Wyverns that showed up. But only the LCS even has short range anti-air capability. And the petrol boats have a few Manpads. The Portland had to remain near the staging area because that required long range anti air cover. But there were no wyverns in that battle anyway.
Lenny McFace. Sep 17
How large is the gate? Can they get an America/Wasp class Amphibious Assault Ship armed with Harriers as a temporally airfield?
The gate in the story is 60ft wide. Meaning only ships with a beam of 59ft or less can fit through. There is no height stated because it's actually harder to find the height of a ship for some reason. Public information will usually list daught, beam and length, but not height. Just assume all ships that went over could meet the height limit as well. The Wasp class has a beam of 104ft, so almost twice as wide as the gate. Its draught is also 27ft, that's almost too deep for the channel that was dug to reach the gate. As cool as it would have been to send any amphibious assault ship (and as useful), they would not have been an option.
AsSeenInBaybayin. Sep 17
Ouch! RIP mermaids.
Fun fact if you think about it their pod was between the sub and the fleet. Active Sonar on full blast can kill things for miles. That whole pod is fraking dead. Along with any fish within fifty miles or more. Death by Sonar!
overlordwarhammer2019 . Sep 19
Con ayuda de varios países debería ser posible crear infraestructura para lanzar satélites pequeños, para eso se necesitaría un cohete más pequeño si solo quieren un GPS, y que yo sepa con esa puerta abierta podrían tener internet si la señal atraviesa la puerta y podrían aumentar el rango de alcance instalando otra del otro lado o de otras señales de comunicacion, y si esa puerta es más grande que la de la historia original poder transportar helicópteros y aviones el desarmar y volver armas del otro lado de la puerta debería ser más rápido que construir el aedrodomo. Me gustó lo de los huracanes, pero me parece raro que no investiguen sobre apóstoles y como capturarlos si uno los ataca si de enteran que su regeneración superior a Wolverine y deadpool
I had to run this through a translator so I'm sorry if I missed anything. Only two countries are participating, And its doubtful many other countries would really want to participate in anything involving the other side, beyond observers. At least not until hostilities ceased. That 59ft limit along with it being firmly in UK waters kind of put a damper on any economic interest. Private interests are another matter, But this story was focused more on military actions not economic ones. The problem isn't that they can't build a pad or assembly building. The problem is bringing the materials over, and/or building the necessary infrastructure to support that on the Sadaran side of the gate. Remember everything must come by sea, and there's a 59ft limit. Anything you put on those barges for launch facilities, is stuff not put on them for military operations. They could also source materials locally, Some of them anyway. But that requires infrastructure which must be built by things brought over. It's a big run-on problem. And the location also limits them to polar orbits too. They could send SAT's with enough fuel to maneuver onto a stationary orbit from a polar one, but that would require a heavy launch vehicle. How much money would they be willing to spend? And there's still the infrastructure problem. As for the internet; They communicate with their home countries via written letters delivered by ship. Wireless/wired communication of any kind was clearly not possible, or is prohibitively difficult/expensive to implement. The thing is although EM waves did transmit through the gate, you had to be in front of the gate to transmit through and/or receive them. It's also implied that the "meta realm" between the gates has a curvature to it. So it is doubtful any transmissions would make it to the other side. Transporting the aircraft is not the problem. Yes they can be disassembled. But everything has to be transported by ship, or on the barges. And I mean everything. Food, ammo, fuel, materials, vehicles, all of it. They also need a place to store and assemble the aircraft, which means the airfield comes first. But only after they have enough of a surplus to justify cutting their already limited transport capacity. To be honest I think the speed at which things get built in this story is on the fast side. As for apostles. They have little reason to look into Rory or her powers. Rory is the only one they know. It's not outright said in this story because there was little need to. She doesn't actually have to tell them she's functionally immortal either. And most likely didn't. They could simply see her as this world's version of a bishop.
Tomrichman. Sep 21
For Heaven sake! Once again you did not do your research on military hardware! Modern warships have Fire Control system to accurately aim without having the crews to manually aim and what kinds of stupidity is that fucking wooden ships needs to take two shots from a 57 mm to sink! Those ships are woods not steel! Even ships in Napoleon era can be sinked by one shot from the modern 57 mm autocannon!
Why the Imperial force manages to shoot that fucking Balista at the ship! Where the fuck is the Phalax!?
You make a mockery of modern naval force here!
Yes they do have fire control systems. But those systems take inputs from various sensors, chiefly radar or laser. Wooden ships don't reflect either really well. Meaning said sensors will have a hard time tracking the targets. As for the two shots thing; Honestly i'm not sure if the shells fired would largely destroy the ships, or overpenetrate and simply blow a hole straight through them without destroying them. They are designed with metal ships in mind. I decided to split the difference and say it took one to three shots to sink them. The cannons on the freedom class have a fire rate of 200 rounds a minute, or 3 a second. So it's not like 2 or 3 shots really amounts to much. That's a 1 second burst. The imperial ships are screwed either way. Also, it's a Ballista bolt, made of wood. They are several times smaller than a missile, and again wood reflects radar energy poorly. Odds are the radar on a Phalanx would not see it. Not that it matters anyway considering the classes of ships in that battle are the Freedom class, the Cyclone class, and the Seawolf class. NONE OF WHICH EVEN HAVE PHALANX GUNS! The LCS does have RAM's, but they are AFT mounted. Meaning they would not have had a shot on the Ballista bolt anyway. Also their radar would not see it either. And it's not like the bolt did any damage anyway. I've done my research, you need to stop making assumptions. Not all ships have the same capabilities.
Kreuzer. Sep 21
Can we get more Navy chapters instead of chapters on land? I'd like to see what the crew of the submarine is doing, maybe bring in a river monitor or something?
I figured this would be a complaint. Sadly most of the fighting that would win a conflict such as this would be on the land. Once modern warships establish control over the Blue Sea, there really isn't much for them to do. Their enemy is primarily land based. It's just the nature of a story like this. The subs started mapping the underwater topography of the Sea after control was established. Not exactly a riveting tale. There was a plan early in the writing of this version of the story where PT boats would have been brought over. But it became apparent there was little use for them. So they were removed. They would have been more of a resource drain than their worth.
HMS Hood. Sep 21
To tomrichman
Shut up none of the ships deployed have the phalanx ciws. And while a single shot from a 57mm gun would be capable of completely disabling a roman era ship i doubt it would immediately sink/destroy it.
To author
The type 23 does not have the phalanx ciws only 30mm autocannons and i doubt a wyvern would be capable of dodging phalanx ciws fire. And try to show British forces more often. Maybe have the Portland visit their captured town for sometime.
Thank you for telling him before I could. I also responded to your review via PM. But for explanations sake. What happened with the wrong armament on the HMS Portland was I forgot to change it from an earlier draft. As stated earlier it was originally the US alone who entered. And they would have been at a disadvantage with no long range anti-air. So they reactivated one of the Perry class frigates and sent it over. That was the USS Elrod. Of course when the gate was moved to Bimini, I had to get the UK involved. So the Elrod was changed to the Portland. I forgot to change the section involving the Portland to reflect its lack of a Phalanx gun. And I'm just now realising that. I am sorry. I read through the publicly listed armaments for all ships involved. Funnily enough the River class proved to be the most annoying as its publicly listed armament changed a bit depending on the source. I think at range the wyverns probably could dodge the CIWS fire if they were quick enough and opened that range up ASAP. Remember the engagement range most of the time is measured in miles. IIRC (it's been awhile since I last read through that section) They only close to within about 3 miles which is right on the edge of the Phalanx range. So I think it is believable they could dodge them at that distance and only take a few losses. I did try to show the British forces more since the rewrite that added them. But I also felt they were lacking in presence most of the time. But I also eventually reached a point where I decided publishing this story was more important. So it just never happened.
dovah-keen01. Sep 22
Nuuu not the cute blondie
Sorry. I liked her too, but someone had to die. Grey and Pina living through an attack by a gunship is already unbelievable enough. And I thought it would be better to have Grey live since he could be a voice of experience and reason to Pina later.
Masterix. Sep 25
Well all I can say is thank you for choosing to end your story and not let it be half finished for eternity. there are too many great stories that I have read on this site that have been left incomplete. so thanks again for making the call on this tale and I wish you well on future endeavors!
Ending the story was a main concern of mine. There are far too many fanfics that die far too soon. I swore to not be one of them from the very beginning. So for better or worse I was going to complete this story.
HMS Hood. Sep 25
Its a good story. May I suggest making a short sequel where Pina visits Earth. And then maybe how politicians and businesses react to the gate and stuff.
Funnily enough there was more to the epilogue at one point. But I felt it really was not necessary to this story. There was actually business and economic details in the story once too. But when that 60ft size limit was added it basically killed everything. To the point there was little reason to bring it up. That size limit really puts a damper on everything.
FunctionalAlcoholicUncle. Sep 25
Good story, but lasted about as long as I do in the bedroom. Would like to see a sequel following the original characters and their developments.
I'm not sure how a story like that would work. Most of the Original characters in this story don't have much development or backstory. The character writing was axed early on. Most of them just act the way a character in their position should act. I can't help you with your bedroom troubles either. Sorry.
EvilTheLast . Sep 25
It wasn't a bad story. It wasn't a good story. But I kind of hope you do a sort of rewrite were the Empire sends their entire fleet through a much much much larger Sea Gate and they hit multiple island nations. Hell, maybe they even invade parts of the Florida Keys. And then they end up fighting the full force of the US and NATO with their full warship assets.
Given how poorly the Empire performed against the LCS; I think we could all guess what would happen if they went up against even a small task force of main line warships. Even with the tech limitations. Them landing or making it to other islands would not change much either. The story would go down the same way. Just the countries involved would be different.
navyfield858. Sep 26
Stop being too hard on yourself.
Actually I love this story because...it makes sense and very logical.
I'm not being hard on myself, not really. I just talk like this, it's fine. Thank you though.
Coment9 . Sep 27
Different earth?
Only different in the sense that the gate did not open in Japan. Otherwise it's the same Earth.
Guest. Sep 26
Existen las mujeres espoletas de proximidad, pudieron usar algunas mejorando los radares
Holy Frak my translation extension failed! I ran this through multiple online translators and they all failed. I don't know what your saying friend, and I can't even begin to decipher what the translator spat out. Here's what it said. "There are women proximity fuzes, they could use some by improving the radars." Clearly this is not what you wrote, But I don't know how to interpret this. Sorry.
To everyone who left positive reviews; I'm glad you guys liked it. I am sorry it probably left you wanting a longer story, and I'm sorry for all the mistakes I'm sure are peppered throughout the story. Even though it had 6 drafts. When you read the same words over and over. Some just slip by. Anyway thanks for the positive reviews. This was largely an experiment to see if I could write something creative. I think it mostly worked, and it was definitely a learning experience.