Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

[Nyrath]

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2009/06/space-warfare-iii-warships-in-space.html

[matrix3]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Some good points there. Now, how about space pirates? Would they follow a similar convention?

[Nyrath]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Some good points there. Now' date=' how about space pirates? Would they follow a similar convention?[/quote']

 

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2009/04/pirates-in-spaaace-reconsidered.html

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2009/04/yo-ho-ho-and-bagful-of-khat.html

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2007/06/and-bottle-of-rum.html

[tkdguy]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Some good points there. Now' date=' how about space pirates? Would they follow a similar convention?[/quote']

Space pirates are passe. We're fighting the Space Taliban now!

[Nyrath]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Space pirates are passe. We're fighting the Space Taliban now!

I beg to differ

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somali_pirate

 

There is an interesting analysis here:

Cutthroat Capitalism: An Economic Analysis of the Somali Pirate Business Model

http://www.wired.com/special_multimedia/2009/sp_cutthroatcapitalism

 

We will have piracy, as long as it pays. It's just that it might not look like Captain Jack Sparrow or Captain Hook.

[Markdoc]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Interestingly, this pretty much mirrors my own biases. And it also mirrors my all-conquering fleet from the days we played Trillion Credit Squadron - a carrier/repair facility that was basically just a big jumpdrive with a huge cargo capacity. That carried a bunch of ships (I called them cruisers) just big enough to take a spinal mounted weapon, and backed as much computer and in-system engine as I could cram into them. That was it, basically, (apart from a few steamlined refueling ships for skimming hydrogen off gas giants). You jump into a star system (preferably far from any expected enemy) and then unleash a horde of cruisers. The computing power available and their lighter weaponry rendered them essentially unkillable by smaller craft, the spinal mount was big enough to kill anything, even much bigger and more expensive ships, and they were fast and (relatively) cheap.

 

The first campaign of trillion credit squadron we played they ate up everything in their path. The second campaign (natural selection, you know) featured only navies built up along precisely the same lines.

 

It amuses me that an ancient rule set produced such eminently logical results, suggesting (if it wasn't blind chance) that some thought went into it.

 

cheers, Mark

[Clonus]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Fundamentally there's no good reason to ever build space warships without a cheap method of interstellar travel. If you want to kill people on another planet in the same system, shooting missiles at them is the way to go.

[Kristopher]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Fundamentally there's no good reason to ever build space warships without a cheap method of interstellar travel. If you want to kill people on another planet in the same system' date=' shooting missiles at them is the way to go.[/quote']

 

Unless circumstances dictate otherwise.

[matrix3]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2009/04/pirates-in-spaaace-reconsidered.html

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2009/04/yo-ho-ho-and-bagful-of-khat.html

http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2007/06/and-bottle-of-rum.html

Thanks!

[Yansuf]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

The basic breakdown of capital ships (battleships, ships of the wall, whatever), cruisers (or frigates, or corvettes, or gunboats, etc.) to do patrol and other duties, and fighters (see next paragraph) was used in GURPS Space. (I have forgotten what they called the cruiser category.)

 

If we consider fighters as small, special purpose combat vessels (closer to PT boats or missile boats than 20th century aircraft called fighters) this makes some sense. Of course craft closer to what the air force calls fighters that are unmanned are also possible, and in my view likely.

 

Basically capital ships are designed to fight to control space, against whatever the enemy can muster. Cruisers run a large range of sizes; in WWI wet navy cruisers ranged from less than 2000 tons to almost 10,000 tons (which was as large many older, largely obsolete battleships.) Torpedo boats and destroyers (fighters) were generally less than 1000 tons (standard) at the start of WWI, but increased to about a max. of 1400 tons by the end. (This was a rapid increase in size from the first torpedo boat destroyers at the end of the 19th century, which started around 300 tons.)

 

Most SF breaks cruisers into several classes, cruisers being the largest, frigates being smaller, etc.; but they are really all cruisers, just of different size. They are designed to patrol, show the flag, scout, intervene on colony worlds, etc. Compared to capital ships, they have a much higher proportion of their mass and volume devoted to landing forces (marines, naval infantry, space force security, whatever) and small craft to land and supply them. They are also probably either "faster" or have a higher fuel/remass mass fraction than capital ships.

 

Interestingly, although battlecruisers are common in SF, all the ones that I can recall were just larger, more heavily armed (and protected) cruisers, not fast, lightly protected battleships.

 

Of course, the technological assumptions that we make do determine a lot of this.

[Nyrath]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

The basic breakdown of capital ships (battleships' date=' ships of the wall, whatever), cruisers (or frigates, or corvettes, or gunboats, etc.) to do patrol and other duties, and fighters (see next paragraph) was used in GURPS Space. (I have forgotten what they called the cruiser category.)[/quote']

 

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3as.html

especially

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3as.html#analogies

[tkdguy]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

I beg to differ

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somali_pirate

 

There is an interesting analysis here:

Cutthroat Capitalism: An Economic Analysis of the Somali Pirate Business Model

http://www.wired.com/special_multimedia/2009/sp_cutthroatcapitalism

 

We will have piracy, as long as it pays. It's just that it might not look like Captain Jack Sparrow or Captain Hook.

 

I know; I was just being a wise-acre. I've been waiting to use that line for a while, although I was hoping someone would mention Space Nazis.

 

Fundamentally there's no good reason to ever build space warships without a cheap method of interstellar travel. If you want to kill people on another planet in the same system' date=' shooting missiles at them is the way to go.[/quote']

 

Realistically, yes. But from a roleplaying perspective, that option isn't as interesting.

[Clonus]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

 

Interestingly, although battlecruisers are common in SF, all the ones that I can recall were just larger, more heavily armed (and protected) cruisers, not fast, lightly protected battleships.

 

 

In general I'd say the distinction between the labels is that battleships usually seem to work as central elements of fleet groups, with the assumption that they will be constantly surrounded by lighter battle vessels, other battleships and auxiliary tenders who keep them supplied and in repair. Battlecruisers are designed to be the largest vessels that operate as solo vessels carrying out exploration, patrol and gunboat diplomacy. This is perhaps the Star Trek influence. Historical BCs were intended to eliminate enemy cruisers and destroyers in fleet action, but these guys are intended to trump any other patrol/exploratory vessel and to stay away from the fleet actions entirely.

[Yansuf]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

In general I'd say the distinction between the labels is that battleships usually seem to work as central elements of fleet groups' date=' with the assumption that they will be constantly surrounded by lighter battle vessels, other battleships and auxiliary tenders who keep them supplied and in repair. Battlecruisers are designed to be the largest vessels that operate as solo vessels carrying out exploration, patrol and gunboat diplomacy. This is perhaps the Star Trek influence. Historical BCs were intended to eliminate enemy cruisers and destroyers in fleet action, but these guys are intended to trump any other patrol/exploratory vessel and to stay away from the fleet actions entirely.[/quote']

 

David Webber's "Honorverse" doesn't seem to follow this.

At the start of the Haven War CBs are about 2.5 times the "displacement" (I do not recall it ever being specified if he is using mass or volume measure) of CAs which are about 2.5 times CLs.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

In the SF novels that I've imagined writing, and will never, ever write --like most other people on the Boards, I suppose-- I had ships of the line for contesting deep space jump points, frigates for looking at stuff, and armies for controlling solar systems.

The latter would have whatever worked. Mines, missiles, asteroid fortresses, sensor webs, planetary pop-up DEWs (Put it on a Saturn V bus, attach an orbital length power-cord, launch, shoot, recover), spacesuit infantry in shuttles for taking asteroid fortresses. Basically, any warship that entered a solar gravity well was like an old time 72 under the harbour fort's guns.

Now, I'll admit that I got here through wanting to include a real army along with a navy, C. J. Cherryh's Tripoint vibe, and because I wanted a universe in whichanyone who arrived in system thinking he was going to convert an asteroid into a Hammerfall turned out to be as stupid as I think the trope actually is. ("Hey, let's throw a rock at this global economy that they will see coming for an entire year." People: not stupid.) But I don't suppose that it's completely unrealistic.

[Clonus]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

David Webber's "Honorverse" doesn't seem to follow this.

At the start of the Haven War CBs are about 2.5 times the "displacement" (I do not recall it ever being specified if he is using mass or volume measure) of CAs which are about 2.5 times CLs.

 

Honorverse uses slightly modified Starfire game mechanics, so there BCs have no specialised role. It's just a size of hull. And "displacement" means "the amount of water you'd displace" if you submerged the ship in a really big tub.

[Yansuf]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Honorverse uses slightly modified Starfire game mechanics' date=' so there BCs have no specialised role. It's just a size of hull. And "displacement" means "the amount of water you'd displace" if you submerged the ship in a really big tub.[/quote']

 

In Traveller displacement for spaceships meant the equivalent mass of an equal volume of liquid hydrogen.

 

Since in the Honorverse the efficiency of inertial compensators, despite being given in "tons" really means volume, I stand by my statement that what units of real measure are being used for a 300,000 ton CL is unclear.

 

Regarding the Starfire game system, I don't see how that applies.

 

Not to mention that as I recall the Starefire system, it was non-newtonian in the sense that it ignored the inertial/momentum vector of a ship from the point of view of stopping and turning. While the Honerverse uses non-newtonian drive in that it has reactionless drive, it does use vector movement.

[CorpCommander]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

The article is good and so is the discussion on your website. There seems to be a bit of talk about all-eggs-in-one basket vs. having a dispersed fleet of drones. The problem with the drone concept in my mind is that it is fairly easy to ruin the communication spectrum. The drones would have to be autonomous and make life or death decisions in order to compensate.

[ajackson]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

The problem with the drone concept in my mind is that it is fairly easy to ruin the communication spectrum.

In space, not really.

[Peregrine]

Re: Space Warfare III – 'Warships' in Space?

 

Interestingly, this pretty much mirrors my own biases. And it also mirrors my all-conquering fleet from the days we played Trillion Credit Squadron - a carrier/repair facility that was basically just a big jumpdrive with a huge cargo capacity. That carried a bunch of ships (I called them cruisers) just big enough to take a spinal mounted weapon, and backed as much computer and in-system engine as I could cram into them. That was it, basically, (apart from a few steamlined refueling ships for skimming hydrogen off gas giants). You jump into a star system (preferably far from any expected enemy) and then unleash a horde of cruisers. The computing power available and their lighter weaponry rendered them essentially unkillable by smaller craft, the spinal mount was big enough to kill anything, even much bigger and more expensive ships, and they were fast and (relatively) cheap.

 

The first campaign of trillion credit squadron we played they ate up everything in their path. The second campaign (natural selection, you know) featured only navies built up along precisely the same lines.

 

It amuses me that an ancient rule set produced such eminently logical results, suggesting (if it wasn't blind chance) that some thought went into it.

 

cheers, Mark

 

Based on what I know of the folks at GDW back then, a lot of thought went into it.