help with ship clasifications

[Toadmaster]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

You can look at the present and can see the writing on the wall, the manned fighter is on the decline. Drones are being used for recon, guided missiles are largely replacing aircraft for anti-ship work and quite a bit of ground attack as well. Really the only reason you even have manned fighter / attack aircraft is so a human is making the final decision on whether the target should be attacked, well that and fighter pilot is a glamourus position, the Navy and Air Force would probably lose a lot of potential recruits if their options were cut back to ship scraper, mechanic and flying school bus driver.

 

For any fairly hard science campaign missles and drones will serve the role of the modern fighter, space fighters are very pulp sci-fi.

 

The idea of smaller attack craft supported long term by a "mothership" actually does make sense and actually is perfect for a group of PC's.

[megaplayboy]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Well, also, what constitutes a "fighter" might be a bit different--it might be akin to an F-12 or one of those giant Tupolev interceptors--large enough to actually carry some dangerous firepower, with an advantage in terms of short-term combat acceleration/maneuver over larger combat vessels. Or, if you wanted to use a naval analogy, a fighter might be something akin to a gunboat or torpedo/PT boat, faster and more maneuverable than larger ships and carrying enough disposable firepower to threaten them when deployed en masse.

[Spence]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

You can look at the present and can see the writing on the wall, the manned fighter is on the decline. Drones are being used for recon, guided missiles are largely replacing aircraft for anti-ship work and quite a bit of ground attack as well. Really the only reason you even have manned fighter / attack aircraft is so a human is making the final decision on whether the target should be attacked, well that and fighter pilot is a glamourus position, the Navy and Air Force would probably lose a lot of potential recruits if their options were cut back to ship scraper, mechanic and flying school bus driver.

 

For any fairly hard science campaign missles and drones will serve the role of the modern fighter, space fighters are very pulp sci-fi.

 

The idea of smaller attack craft supported long term by a "mothership" actually does make sense and actually is perfect for a group of PC's.

 

Well' date=' also, what constitutes a "fighter" might be a bit different--it might be akin to an F-12 or one of those giant Tupolev interceptors--large enough to actually carry some dangerous firepower, with an advantage in terms of short-term combat acceleration/maneuver over larger combat vessels. Or, if you wanted to use a naval analogy, a fighter might be something akin to a gunboat or torpedo/PT boat, faster and more maneuverable than larger ships and carrying enough disposable firepower to threaten them when deployed en masse.[/quote']

 

Exactly,

 

In one of the older threads I used WW2 PT Boats as my example too. The term Battleriders comes to mind, but I can't recall where from.

 

Nyrath has some really good info that talks about the science of it.

[megaplayboy]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

I might suggest a few novel ways to make fighters/small more viable in some sci-fi settings:

1. fighters are equipped with "Heisenberg thrusters" which randomly vary the acceleration/decelaration/direction by minute amounts, sufficient to increase the difficulty of plotting their moment-by-moment trajectory.

2. they could similarly have some sub-system which requires any system which targets by sensor-lock to have to continuously re-acquire them, with consequently reduced accuracy.

3. most combat AI have a limited capacity to deal with new/unexpected variables, and therefore manned craft are preferred.

4. they carry a "big boom"(1-4 shot anti-capital ship weapon) and a "little boom"(multi-shot anti-fighter weapon)

5. they might fit well into a quasi-feudal ethos, with prominent lords seeking to prove their valor by charging into battle in sleek fighters

6. they might be testbeds for new tech, ergo more advanced than some older capital ships(which take much longer to build)

[Outsider]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Depending on how pricey FTL drives are, (and assuming you're playing a game with FTL), parasites might well be the standard for combat ships. even if they are dreadnought sized parasites.

[Spence]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

I might suggest a few novel ways to make fighters/small more viable in some sci-fi settings:

1. fighters are equipped with "Heisenberg thrusters" which randomly vary the acceleration/decelaration/direction by minute amounts, sufficient to increase the difficulty of plotting their moment-by-moment trajectory.

2. they could similarly have some sub-system which requires any system which targets by sensor-lock to have to continuously re-acquire them, with consequently reduced accuracy.

3. most combat AI have a limited capacity to deal with new/unexpected variables, and therefore manned craft are preferred.

4. they carry a "big boom"(1-4 shot anti-capital ship weapon) and a "little boom"(multi-shot anti-fighter weapon)

5. they might fit well into a quasi-feudal ethos, with prominent lords seeking to prove their valor by charging into battle in sleek fighters

6. they might be testbeds for new tech, ergo more advanced than some older capital ships(which take much longer to build)

 

For me I am actually happy to have the single or two man "fighter" whither away. In RPG's at least. It is much easier to have the PC's all on one ship, instead of them all haring around on their own. I can also keep the non-pilots fully engaged easier in the battle (if there is one).

 

Good ideas though.

[Spence]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Depending on how pricey FTL drives are' date=' (and assuming you're playing a game with FTL), parasites might well be the standard for combat ships. even if they are dreadnought sized parasites.[/quote']

 

Now there is an idea

[Curufea]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

They won't be.

 

In the space environment, fighters make no sense militarily nor economically. I list the scientific reasons here:

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3x.html#fighters

 

However, there is obviously a deep-seated need in the minds of SF fans for space fighters. I get more angry email about that one section of my website than almost any other (the exception being there ain't no stealth in space).

 

The logical thing to do is let your players have what they want and allow space fighters. Heck, you have FTL starships and that's even more improbable.

 

I was brought around to the view of no stealth in space when the obviousness of it was brought to my attention in Attack Vector:Tactical.

 

Andromeda taught me the silliness of beam weapons over missiles.

[Nyrath]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Depending on how pricey FTL drives are' date=' (and assuming you're playing a game with FTL), parasites might well be the standard for combat ships. even if they are dreadnought sized parasites.[/quote']

Yes, this appeared in the Traveller RPG as the "Battle-rider concept".

 

The mothership is nothing more than a frame and an FTL drive. It carries two to ten non-FTL battleships.

 

In theory in a battle between a fleet of battle-riders vs a same-cost fleet of FTL battleships, the battle riders will win. This is because each rider can replace the tonnage usually devoted to an FTL drive with tonnage devoted to more weapons.

 

However, if the enemy manages to flank you and destroys your mothership, the entire squadron of battle riders is now trapped in the star system.

[Outsider]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

It could be even more extreme, if the parasites are not expected to be seperate from the carrier for more than a few days. Most of the crew facilities could be removed as well. (quarters, recreation facilities, major medical, etc)

[Markdoc]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Yes' date=' this appeared in the Traveller RPG as the "Battle-rider concept".

 

The mothership is nothing more than a frame and an FTL drive. It carries two to ten non-FTL battleships.

 

In theory in a battle between a fleet of battle-riders vs a same-cost fleet of FTL battleships, the battle riders will win. This is because each rider can replace the tonnage usually devoted to an FTL drive with tonnage devoted to more weapons.

 

And if your battle riders are just big enough to take a spinal mount, then the advantage swings massively in their favour. Much cheaper than a jump-capable battleship but equally likely to kill it. When we were playing Billion Credit Squadron, every fleet started to look like this, because .... um.... the ones that didn't, weren't around any more. In a way it's merely upsizing the carrier concept: your fighters are now 10 kTon+ (maybe I got the size wrong .... it's been 20+ years since I last played:doi:) ships with a fairly large crew. Their only purpose is to carry the largest weapon and shield they can: analogous to WW2 fighter-bombers. Your carrier is the mother ship. We still deployed "fighters" - these were the smallest ships capable of mounting a weapon bay and were the only ones we ever bothered to streamline any of, so they could operate as planetary support.

 

That gives you a hierarchy with jump-capable carriers at the top, cruiser-like battle riders, which in turn mounted the smallest warships which had a crew IIRC of about a half dozen or less. But those are specialised battlefleets, with a crew roster in the thousands (tens of thousands if you count all the marines stored as corpsicles).

 

There's still a role for jump-capable warships, but that role is scouting, patrol and anti-piracy: frigates, if you like. These need to be tough, fast and long-ranged but not very large or heavily armed: they have no chance against even the smallest elements of a battle fleet, regardless. 100-1200 ktons seemed to be the sweet spot, IIRC.

 

That's a reasonably sensible set-up, which just happily seems to fit well with roleplaying: your PCs can be the whole crew of a fighter in a battlefleet, or of a frigate doing patrol/scout duties.

 

cheers, Mark

[Spence]

Re: help with ship clasifications

 

Traveller! That is where the term Battlerider came from. Thanks Nyrath.

 

 

Markdoc you describe pretty much the game I played in as far as ship combat goes. I wasn't in it long and only had a "guest" character for a few sessions. But you describe the composition of the "fleets" pretty closely.