Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 18, 2011 Report Share Posted January 18, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. This depends on the genre. In a hard sci fi game, there will be no star fighters for PCs. In a space opera? totally. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted January 19, 2011 Report Share Posted January 19, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I was reading this and it reminded me of Schlock Mercenary. The heroes wanted a way to monitor a star system. They created a sensor net made of AI missiles. I'm not quite sure now, but at one point I think one of their enemies dropped in system, and realized too late that he was in the center of a bunch of missiles that hated him. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlHazred Posted January 24, 2011 Report Share Posted January 24, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. The way this discussion is turning out puts me in mind of Keith Laumer's BOLOs -- autonomous AI-guided supertanks. As time went by, they got more and more independent. There's one story ("Ploughshare" by Todd McCaffrey) where there are several deployed as communications satellites around a planet for hundreds of years until the enemy shows up, they come out of long-term hibernation, and blow the bejeezus out of him. The Bolo stories kind of point to where such craft would be most useful -- in an arena where the enemies are nonhuman (and therefore can be killed with moral impunity) and the distances are great (thus malfunctions have little chance of rebounding on the generals). Ultimately, I think it's going to come down to a lack of preferred resources. Sure, I'd love to have remotely-controlled drones in LEO under a human command; but, up in Titan orbit, you might need to make use of multipurpose autonomous robotic craft, just because you lack other options. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sundog Posted January 25, 2011 Report Share Posted January 25, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. This depends on the genre. In a hard sci fi game' date=' there will be no star fighters for PCs. In a space opera? totally.[/quote'] I'd call that an assumption. I could see fighter-type craft being deployed in hard settings for a variety of reasons, from technological advantages to there being small craft in battle to purely economic reasons. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 25, 2011 Report Share Posted January 25, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I'd call that an assumption. I could see fighter-type craft being deployed in hard settings for a variety of reasons' date=' from technological advantages to there being small craft in battle to purely economic reasons.[/quote'] To be clear, we are talking about: http://www.rocketpunk-observatory.com/spaceguideS-Z.htm#space_fighters right? Another link for your perusal: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/spacegunexotic.php#Space_Fighters In a space war, why deploy a manned fighter craft instead of an unpiloted drone? And said drone doesn't need to be light speed lag controlled by a mothership, you can have an advanced algorithm for piloting it. If you don't want to have it be just one missile, have the AI (really an advance algorithm, no need for it to be sentient) deploy smaller missiles then return to base. The fleshy bag of meat-water that is a PC has no place on unmanned space drones. If your PC is a massless AI I can see a reason though. There’s my economic reason against fighter-type craft in a hard sci-fi game. Tech-wise, I cannot imagine a hard reason you could not scale up the tech for a larger ship, and you’d be better off with a ship that can perform deep space operations by itself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megaplayboy Posted January 25, 2011 Report Share Posted January 25, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. Power projection and multitasking--one ship, plus a hundred smaller craft, can perform more tasks than one ship without any supporting craft. Suppose you have two different targets 10 million km apart, or even just one opponent within field of view and the other behind a planet or moon or somesuch. If you have drones, fighters or intelligent missiles, you can send them around to engage the target on the other side of the planet, while directly engaging the target in your field of view. If you don't, then the other craft may slip away or maneuver itself into an advantageous position. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 25, 2011 Report Share Posted January 25, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. That is an argument to have multiple ships, which in a hard sci-fi setting means drones. In a soft sci-fi setting it means fighters with PCs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megaplayboy Posted January 25, 2011 Report Share Posted January 25, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. That is an argument to have multiple ships' date=' which in a hard sci-fi setting means drones. In a soft sci-fi setting it means fighters with PCs[/quote'] Well, an argument to have one large ship that can launch and retrieve said drones to maximize their firepower(otherwise you are looking at drones which are mostly engine/fuel and some ordnance). If weapon power is proportional to ship size, then multiple smaller ships will carry less powerful weaponry than one big ship--and likely be less durable as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Markdoc Posted January 26, 2011 Report Share Posted January 26, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I have two problems with drones 1) I don't think that people will ever totally trust truly intelligent AI's enough to allow them the kind of weapons that should be on a fighter/drone craft They (in this case the RAF) is building testbeds for drone fighters designed to operate autonomously right now. The first versions have already flown. 2) Remote control drones face issues of jamming the control signals' date=' hacking the controls, speed of light issues if drones missions take place too far away from the control transmitter.[/quote'] Autonomous drones don't need a link home and thus can't be jammed. They are not designed to have an operator guiding them - that's the whole point of the autonomous part. They're designed to "Go over there and kill anything that matches your built-in target parameters." There may be really good reasons that 1-2 seat fighters are used in a SciFi setting. Cultural reasons might overcome 'rational" reasons. They might indeed - even if only briefly Basically, I'd go with what was said earlier: it's pretty hard to come up with a reason for manned fighters in space. In a hard science setting, forget 'em. In space opera .... well, it's space opera. Of course they have space fighters. I don't think we need a better reason cheers, Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 26, 2011 Report Share Posted January 26, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. Low-albedo drones will still radiate in the IR. The task will be making sure their emission/reflection signature is close enough to that of a natural meteoroid (or, possibly, long-dead artificial junk fragment) that it takes extended observation and tracking to determine that it's not following a purely inertial trajectory. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megaplayboy Posted January 26, 2011 Report Share Posted January 26, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. A heavily armored drone that launches a very large number of maneuvering warheads might be a pretty good delivery system--especially if the mother ship launches a whole bunch of them at relatively moderate range--assuming the target has a finite number of beam/projectile weapons to train on the drones(and a relatively short time to do so), maybe they can't shoot enough down to prevent getting whomped. Electromagnetically accelerated out of the mother ship, then with short burn acceleration of dozens of gees, they get to their launch point and release 30-50 warheads apiece. Launch a couple hundred drones that are hard to quickly destroy, and if half of them get to launch point, you now have to try to destroy 3-5000 warheads that are homing in on you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hopcroft Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. Makes it sound like a manned space station is a really bad place to be in wartime. Massive human-filled space habitations have no adequate defense and no way to get out of the path of the death and destruction swarming their way. It's hard to imagine a manned platform that can't be destoryed by a single atomic warhead -- now imagine 3,000 super-fast homing drones all armed with nukes.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phookz Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I agree. The real trick is getting the 3,000 super-fast homing nuclear drones within range before the base's point defense can destroy them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Markdoc Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I agree. The real trick is getting the 3' date='000 super-fast homing nuclear drones within range before the base's point defense can destroy them.[/quote'] Right. The base has the advantage that it can pack (presumably) more super-fast homing nuclear drones into equivalent mass than a space ship, because it doesn't require drives, so it becomes a question of attrition. If your opponent has 3000 drones and you have 5000, you might be able stop his attack and have enough left over to vaporise him. If it's the reverse ... you're hosed. You could end up with the sort of battle scenario you get in Ian Bank's Culture novels where space battles go like this. AI1. "I have scanned your fleet. Here's my battle projection, with 2 million different scenarios, graded in order of probability." AI2: " I scanned your fleet and projected 1.6 million scenarios. We have 6 decimal places of concordance. Transmitting surrender orders now." AI1. "GG" cheers, Mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. I agree. The real trick is getting the 3' date='000 super-fast homing nuclear drones within range before the base's point defense can destroy them.[/quote'] If the habitat can't dodge, you can just accelerate them to near light speed from very far away. If the hab. isn't using laser-based point defense it will need to hit a .99c object with a much slower one. Not only that, but the drones are much cheaper than the habitat. Planets are of course, death traps (unless they can move). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmjalund Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. If the habitat can't dodge' date=' you can just accelerate them to near light speed from very far away. If the hab. isn't using laser-based point defense it will need to hit a .99c object with a much slower one. Not only that, but the drones are much cheaper than the habitat. Planets are of course, death traps (unless they can move).[/quote']that would take a LOT of fuel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hopcroft Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. AI1. "I have scanned your fleet. Here's my battle projection' date=' with 2 million different scenarios, graded in order of probability[/i']." AI2: " I scanned your fleet and projected 1.6 million scenarios. We have 6 decimal places of concordance. Transmitting surrender orders now." AI1. "GG" /reminds me of the Doctor Who episode where the battle computers of two massive fleets were so busy working out the logical consequences of every conceivable action they and their opponent could take that they never bothered to actually fight. The stalemate lasted centuries. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. that would take a LOT of fuel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_thruster Low acceleration doesn't matter because you have a vast region of space to accelerate because they cannot dodge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Carman Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. They (in this case the RAF) is building testbeds for drone fighters designed to operate autonomously right now. The first versions have already flown. Autonomous drones don't need a link home and thus can't be jammed. They are not designed to have an operator guiding them - that's the whole point of the autonomous part. They're designed to "Go over there and kill anything that matches your built-in target parameters." Yeah well, that's kinda the problem, now isn't it? We're all far more willing to trust (our own) military's target parameters on the assumption that (our own) autonomous drones won't be actively deployed anywhere near where we are. Remove that assumption and everyone gets a whole lot more antsy about trusting those well-armed AIs. For an alternate bit of space opera fun, try this: AI-controlled space fighters, only the AI is a copy of a human's (or other type person's) mind. It's ever so much nicer that the "just put someone's brain in the fighter, it's much easier to protect from G-forces that the whole body" trope. Lots of possibilities there: fly a mission and then get wiped, with maybe a memory packet returned to the source-pilot; crippled pilots vicariously "living" through their AI duplicates; survival instincts kicking in when a drone gets damaged and disconnected instead of destroyed, or if the carrier gets hit and the source-pilot killed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manic Typist Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. Planets are of course' date=' death traps (unless they can move).[/quote'] No, they're HOME. Prime real estate. The stuff that you fight over. The "if I hit this with an object going .99c then I lose" noncombatants. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kraven Kor Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. No' date=' they're HOME. Prime real estate. The stuff that you fight over. The "if I hit this with an object going .99c then I lose" noncombatants.[/quote'] Yeah, I love all the talk of FTL Death Fleets glassing a planet. For all intents and purposes, and even using the most generous of models for how many habitable planets exist, habitable planets are still exceedingly rare. Glassing one would be the absolute last option, I would think. Now surrounding them with automated ordinance meant to take out anything that flies to or from it, sure Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roy_The_Ruthles Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. No' date=' they're HOME. Prime real estate. The stuff that you fight over. The "if I hit this with an object going .99c then I lose" noncombatants.[/quote'] I agree in a limited warfare scenario. OTOH if you have no way of communicating with the enemy (say they are aliens), you may need to go for the KE kill. It's important to remember that you only have the enemy's sensibilities protecting you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmjalund Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_thruster Low acceleration doesn't matter because you have a vast region of space to accelerate because they cannot dodge Doesn't reduce the amount of energy required to accellerate something to near the speed of light. It would be more effective to use anti-matter bombs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xavier Onassiss Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. No' date=' they're HOME. Prime real estate. The stuff that you fight over. The "if I hit this with an object going .99c then I lose" noncombatants.[/quote'] That depends on what you consider "prime" real estate. Two species who don't live on the same types of planets could very well consider this no great loss. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xavier Onassiss Posted January 27, 2011 Report Share Posted January 27, 2011 Re: Space fightercraft in RPGs. Doesn't reduce the amount of energy required to accellerate something to near the speed of light. It would be more effective to use anti-matter bombs Yeah, the wiki article's best estimate for specific impulse from ion thrusters is around 30,000 seconds. Tried to figure out what kind of mass fraction that would result in for a relativistic vehicle, but got an error due to the fact that my calculator doesn't go that high! Something with a higher SI, like fusion or antimatter, I might consider feasible. My personal choice would be a bussard ramjet-type vehicle which carried a non-orientable wormhole on board, to convert half the fuel it 'scooped' into anti-matter: a total-conversion drive which gathers its own fuel en route would probably do the job. And if it has a surplus of anti-matter when it hits its target, so much the better.... ...cause if you're gonna destroy a planet, why screw around? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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