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Traveller, The Rise of Empire: A Naval Design, Procurement and Command Quest

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Quick question @4WheelSword - why is the onboard surface-to-orbit shuttle a standard design element? I notice that only one of these designs includes it, so it can't be completely critical, but I want to know how big of a deal ditching it is.

EDIT: Also, would I be correct in assuming that our total count of weapon bays can't exceed our power plant's rating, based on observed patterns in the designs provided? Or is that just coincidental?
 
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Wiadi said:
Quick question @4WheelSword - why is the onboard surface-to-orbit shuttle a standard design element? I notice that only one of these designs includes it, so it can't be completely critical, but I want to know how big of a deal ditching it is.

EDIT: Also, would I be correct in assuming that our total count of weapon bays can't exceed our power plant's rating, based on observed patterns in the designs provided? Or is that just coincidental?
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1) Why, for getting to orbit from the surface, of course. No, really. It's a ships boat.

2) So, the way it works is you get 1 bay per 1,000 tons per point of power plant. Not a huge issue in terms of limitation until you get into true capital ships, or in this weird exception where we're trying to shove massive firepower into a tiny ship.
 
4WheelSword said:
1) Why, for getting to orbit from the surface, of course. No, really. It's a ships boat.
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Okay, sure, but I meant in terms of like...if we don't have that, how good is our general infrastructure for getting things into and out of space? Can we have the ships rely on external shuttles or similar while in port and just lose out on the ability to land on random other planets we visit, or would this introduce a meaningful logistical chokepoint of some sort?
 
Wiadi said:
Okay, sure, but I meant in terms of like...if we don't have that, how good is our general infrastructure for getting things into and out of space? Can we have the ships rely on external shuttles or similar while in port and just lose out on the ability to land on random other planets we visit, or would this introduce a meaningful logistical chokepoint of some sort?
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Oop forgot to respond to this. In Home, it would only limit police work (boarding merchants for customs inspections) and landings on the weirdest outposts. So not really a big deal at all. More of a concern if you're going out into the wilds.

Could always make a streamlined ship though...
 
Magnificate said:
[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
[X] Armed Scout

This Armed Scout looks good. It's only 700 tonnes, it has the most firepower and it uses prototype parts that will be tested with the previous scout vessel. The only problem is small operational time. 4 weeks, which means 2 weeks after considering jump time. This once again highlights the need to claim nearby hexes and build resupply stations there.
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Hmm, the armed scout is also both the most expensive and most fragile, unless I've misunderstood the system? Do you think the higher firepower makes up for it?

I am particularly worried that it is very suspectible to getting swarmed by enemy small craft, due to having many big guns but a lack of defense turrets and armor. I don't think we should choose a ship with such an onvious weakness, as we don't yet know anything about our enemy and their doctrine.

[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
[X] Minimum Viable Product
 
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If read the numbers correctly, we're now more restricted by tonnage that with money.

Armed Scout is indeed fragile, but it is also small and fast, so evasion might make up for some deficiencies.
 
[X] Write In: Adopt both the MVP and Interstellar Cruiser
[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.


There's no reason we can't adopt both and build both, the MVP is absolutely tiny which helps with our tonnage problems and to be honest I prefer the survivability of the IS.

Being able to deploy and build both would be nice.
 
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Magnificate said:
Armed Scout is indeed fragile, but it is also small and fast, so evasion might make up for some deficiencies.
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I mean, yes, but it is pretty helpless against other small and fast craft, is it not?

I think the Armed Scout could work very well as part of a combined arms approach, but not as a ship meant to operate on its own. Both of the other options are more flexible.
 
The Interstellar Cruiser seems promising, but the shuttle bay seems unnecessary. Could we fill the space with a multi-mission bay that can carry things like torpedoes or jamming equipment instead of the shuttle?
 
I agree with the need for a diversified force, but perhaps we should not go overboard with the number of designs before we don't see what our rivals field and before we get more prototypes to test.
 
[X] Write In: Adopt both the MVP and Interstellar Cruiser
[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
Why constrain ourselves to one design. There is a reason why navy's in our world use more than one design with different strengths. I am with Maxin.
 
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Pinniped said:
Hmm, the armed scout is also both the most expensive and most fragile, unless I've misunderstood the system?
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That is correct. The punch had to come from somewhere.

Magnificate said:
If read the numbers correctly, we're now more restricted by tonnage that with money.
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Also correct. I fully expect several years of tonnage being your choke point.

C_Z said:
The Interstellar Cruiser seems promising, but the shuttle bay seems unnecessary. Could we fill the space with a multi-mission bay that can carry things like torpedoes or jamming equipment instead of the shuttle?
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You can absolutely designate is as a multi-mission bay rather than a shuttle while I work out what that would look like, but more weapons is a no go - a 700 ton hull only has so many hardpoints.
 
[x] Interstellar Cruiser
[x] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
This looks like a very solid option to me. Good armor, good defenses, still pretty cheap.
 
[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
[X] Armed Scout
 
[X] Use an on-off program, building first our offensive ships, then defensive, sequentially.
[X] Interstellar Cruiser

The Interstellar Cruiser is far and away the closest design to my shelved multirole proposals, which means I have a soft spot for it. Also, it excels in soft factors to the point that we can cross-train crews from our current interplanetary fleet onto the new ships.

To put it frankly, both the Armed Scout and MVP proposals smack of the ancient Earth reactionary movement known as Pentagon Reform to me :V:V. The Armed Scout sacrifices survivability and logistical sustainability in the name of firepower, meaning that we'll have a lot of bold, dead heroes once we start a war, and precious little in the way of a veteran officer and enlisted corps when it's finished. The MVP, on the other hand, seems like an attempt to regress our combat systems into the early spaceflight eras of yesteryear, when a six-month interplanetary patrol took 5 years to plan and 10 million credits to get off the ground. Both should be rejected as insufficient to meet our doctrinal requirements.
 
I just think it'd be nice to have a cheap as sin ship in our back pocket. I didn't see any fine print saying we had to build them, even so having expendable pathfinders that can open the way to a system so we don't walk into an ambush would be good practice.


In other news I think we should investigate the use of jump-tugs for moving things like our intrasolar defense ships and possibly swarms of ultra-cheap ships as well. I'm thinking if we can swing it having two jump drives on it, a high power one for moving the whole fleet and a lower power one designed to soely move the ship allowing it to retreat quickly from the combat zone it hot dropped into.

Another thing @4WheelSword I request that whatever proposals we get for intrasolar defense ships are called Solar Monitors in class type because no one uses the term Monitor enough.
 
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