The plan does mention lasers as the primary armament.
Traveller, The Rise of Empire: A Naval Design, Procurement and Command Quest
- Thread starter 4WheelSword
- Start date
- Original Art Quest Sci-Fi
Rat King
Izutsumi-pilled
[X] Plan Lander
-[X] Yes, go ahead.
-[X] A dedicated FLIF assault craft based on the MMV chassis: strip down particle beams for mass drivers for ortillery and replace torpedo mounts with missile racks. Strip weapon mounts for carrying capacity and if possible add a command section for coordinating landings (new computers etc). (3k tons).
-[X] An assault landing craft that can carry a platoon or company of FLIF from orbit to ground.
Let's get the lander handled, since we've been talking about it.
Also approval voting:
[X] OPLAN: Tsavo
-[X] Yes, go ahead.
-[X] A dedicated FLIF assault craft based on the MMV chassis: strip down particle beams for mass drivers for ortillery and replace torpedo mounts with missile racks. Strip weapon mounts for carrying capacity and if possible add a command section for coordinating landings (new computers etc). (3k tons).
-[X] An assault landing craft that can carry a platoon or company of FLIF from orbit to ground.
Let's get the lander handled, since we've been talking about it.
Also approval voting:
[X] OPLAN: Tsavo
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- Location
- Somewhere in the stacks
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- She/Her
[X] Plan Lander
Don't forget the vote on what our focus on doctrine / development is next.
This set of construction is happening in S'Taxu. Once our yards at Home are freed up I think that would be a good time to design / build our marine assault / landing ship. I would humbly submit my previous design for consideration at that point.
The below design is envisaged as being tailored as an assault carrier to form and secure the initial 'orbital head' and planetary assault prior to this being consolidated by subsequent troop transports. The mass drivers and missile or/and torpedo bays are predominantly for ortillery to support landings by providing fire support to the troops.
*Insert Heroic Name Here* - class Planetary Assault Carrier - Approx 6000 tons.
Fitted with:
Comprehensive PD network
Limited Particle Barbettes
Mass Driver Bays
Missile / Torpedo Bays
Rapid Launch/Retrieval Hangar
Drop Pod Launcher*
2 Jump + 2 Drop tanks (To maintain pace with rest of fleet).
Complement:
Berthing and facilities for an expeditionary battalion of City Militia / Landing Infantry
Drop Infantry Troop*
Squadron of streamlined fighters
Squadron of streamlined fighter bombers / gunships
Multiple squadrons of streamlined landing craft to land embarked troops and equipment / vehicles
* Regarding drop infantry, I've seen these mentioned on various Traveller websites and they seem like they would be ideal for our purposes to rapidly secure an initial landing site, but I'm not sure whether they are a capability / tech we have at our current TL.
*Insert Heroic Name Here* - class Planetary Assault Carrier - Approx 6000 tons.
Fitted with:
Comprehensive PD network
Limited Particle Barbettes
Mass Driver Bays
Missile / Torpedo Bays
Rapid Launch/Retrieval Hangar
Drop Pod Launcher*
2 Jump + 2 Drop tanks (To maintain pace with rest of fleet).
Complement:
Berthing and facilities for an expeditionary battalion of City Militia / Landing Infantry
Drop Infantry Troop*
Squadron of streamlined fighters
Squadron of streamlined fighter bombers / gunships
Multiple squadrons of streamlined landing craft to land embarked troops and equipment / vehicles
* Regarding drop infantry, I've seen these mentioned on various Traveller websites and they seem like they would be ideal for our purposes to rapidly secure an initial landing site, but I'm not sure whether they are a capability / tech we have at our current TL.
[X] Plan Bulking out the Fleet, 500 tonne version
-[X] Yes, with the following modifications: Include deep scans of neighbouring hexes conducted from 03.-02.
-[X] Something Else: Lay down the hulls for two additional Interstellar Cruisers, a block IIa design incorporating recent technological advancements acquired from Xyri.
-[X] Something Else: Draft a new design and dedicate the remaining yard space to it. Point-defense frigate, with lasers as its primary armament as well as cutting edge targeting computers and sensors. The ship is envisaged as an anti-fighter ship to escort other vessels, with a secondary role of a patrol vessel for protecting trade routes and policing. Keep the weight at 500 tonnes, allowing one pilot to control the ship.
-[X] Let us consider small attack craft that could be carried aboard our ships.
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[X] Plan Bulking out the Fleet, 500 tonne version
Getting more ships to post will be good, and the 500 ton frigate should still work as a system patrol vessel.
Getting more ships to post will be good, and the 500 ton frigate should still work as a system patrol vessel.
4WheelSword
The original N-body Problem
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A deep scan from 03,-02 is going to require redirecting a DSS to replace or accompany the IS's. That means losing the DSS elsewhere unless you want to also send the 'spare' DSS that is busy not being on active duty when the other two are.
I think sending the spare DSS should be pretty ok? Anyone else disagree? Do we need to modify the vote to include that?
0t4n1z3r019
Member of the HAFPTG
- Location
- Philippines
[X] Plan Lander
We should build the Lander first, since we got this project up and running for a few snippets now, so better get this done now than later.
We should build the Lander first, since we got this project up and running for a few snippets now, so better get this done now than later.
Coyote Niff
the most transbian obligate scavenger on the 'net!
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- Misery!
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[X] OPLAN: Tsavo
-[X] Yes, go ahead.
-[X] A second MMV (3k tons, 1084.55MCr.)
-[X] A Fast Attack Craft (500 tons, circa 250MCr.)
-[X] Let us consider the potential for MMV variants.
-[X] Write-In: Produce a testflight example of the Bodkin Long Range Escort (850 tons, rotary missile-focused BVR striker for defending convoys and Scout missions.)
With the obvious martial fixture of the Aslan's clan society clear to us after diplomatic contact, the Space Warfare Service and our leadership must assume that peace and trade with one Tao', regrettably, does not mean peace with all. As such, it is more crucial than ever that we produce light attack craft to counter the Aslan's own preference for the type, preferably armed with guided atomics mounted on missiles or torpedoes for decapitation strikes against the larger "carrier" vessels that make up the core of their combat fleets. In the example of the ancient war-scholars Nimitz and Horner, strike craft with no bases or carriers to return to are as good as dead. Furthermore, we must work to expand the work of the Multispectrum Warfare Office on the Lancer program into a dedicated troop-landing orbital supremacy variant-"coring out" its exploratory and space-to-space capability for the dozens of dropshuttles and reams of cargo space and orbit-to-surface munitions necessary to land a full battalion of FLF drop troopers and their mechanized support or, if needed, regular army or naval forces from the City Militia.
Additionally, we must fine-tune and begin test production on the long-iterated Quarrel program's latest offering, the 850-ton Bodkin escort. As we expand our scouting into deep space and our trade routes into foreign territory, we must have a ship more nimble than our Block II cruisers, but with more bite than the long-serving Interstellar Scout. The Bodkin, with its proposed high-beam search and tracking radar, laser point-defense arrays, and bays of rotary BVR missiles, can and will punch holes in anything from a strike craft to something as massive as the S'taxi Military Council's Castle-class asteroid behemoths or even, briefly, our own Defense Monitors, given atomics are in play. Additionally, it will have space for a squad of FLF marines and their drop infrastructure, enabling anti-piracy boarding, convoy defense, and other "light duties" to which the Lancer, while bearing a similar mission protocol, would appear as "overkill".
Regardless of next steps, any plan following this first contact must keep in mind this axiom: to the predator that lives long enough, everything starts to look like prey.
-[X] Yes, go ahead.
-[X] A second MMV (3k tons, 1084.55MCr.)
-[X] A Fast Attack Craft (500 tons, circa 250MCr.)
-[X] Let us consider the potential for MMV variants.
-[X] Write-In: Produce a testflight example of the Bodkin Long Range Escort (850 tons, rotary missile-focused BVR striker for defending convoys and Scout missions.)
With the obvious martial fixture of the Aslan's clan society clear to us after diplomatic contact, the Space Warfare Service and our leadership must assume that peace and trade with one Tao', regrettably, does not mean peace with all. As such, it is more crucial than ever that we produce light attack craft to counter the Aslan's own preference for the type, preferably armed with guided atomics mounted on missiles or torpedoes for decapitation strikes against the larger "carrier" vessels that make up the core of their combat fleets. In the example of the ancient war-scholars Nimitz and Horner, strike craft with no bases or carriers to return to are as good as dead. Furthermore, we must work to expand the work of the Multispectrum Warfare Office on the Lancer program into a dedicated troop-landing orbital supremacy variant-"coring out" its exploratory and space-to-space capability for the dozens of dropshuttles and reams of cargo space and orbit-to-surface munitions necessary to land a full battalion of FLF drop troopers and their mechanized support or, if needed, regular army or naval forces from the City Militia.
Additionally, we must fine-tune and begin test production on the long-iterated Quarrel program's latest offering, the 850-ton Bodkin escort. As we expand our scouting into deep space and our trade routes into foreign territory, we must have a ship more nimble than our Block II cruisers, but with more bite than the long-serving Interstellar Scout. The Bodkin, with its proposed high-beam search and tracking radar, laser point-defense arrays, and bays of rotary BVR missiles, can and will punch holes in anything from a strike craft to something as massive as the S'taxi Military Council's Castle-class asteroid behemoths or even, briefly, our own Defense Monitors, given atomics are in play. Additionally, it will have space for a squad of FLF marines and their drop infrastructure, enabling anti-piracy boarding, convoy defense, and other "light duties" to which the Lancer, while bearing a similar mission protocol, would appear as "overkill".
Regardless of next steps, any plan following this first contact must keep in mind this axiom: to the predator that lives long enough, everything starts to look like prey.
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- Location
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Well. Pilots are technically only needed for ships that conduct Jumps right? Why not just make parasite corvettes instead of jump capable escorts? The reality is that these will probably be blown out of the sky rather quickly so we're going to want a large number of them, I don't fancy the idea of simply relying on their small size for increased production when every lost ship also means potentially a lost pilot.
Hmm. While I support parasitic corvettes in the future when it is viable, I don't see why you consider this to be a given. A 500 tonne ship is not small, it's half the size of our cruisers. Why would we lose more of these ships than we lose Cruisers? Sure, armor will likely be lower, but being a smaller target with lots of point defense can make up for that.
Hmm, missiles. Anyone more familiar with the rules who can explain which one is actually better for hitting a small target, missiles or lasers?
That said, I still personally prefer 500 tonnes with one pilot. Especially if there is a risk we lose some of these ships.
Notice that scanning from 03.-02 requires 3 hexes worth of effort and 4 jumps total. 6 jumps, including the two alongside an FSS. It's a long mission and it ties down the FSS, so it wouldn't be remiss to send two DSSs there to finish faster and forgo some of the northern scans. But, I don't think that requires an amendment to the vote, the flotilla commander should be able to decide how to finish the mission most effictively.
I think it was said once that it depends on the gunners? In this case, I'm in favour of lasers.
- Location
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The the average that while it might get hit less often than a cruiser it's less likely to survive being hit than a cruiser given it's smaller size and the fact that it's going to be a tactical target for elimination if the Aslan are as fighter heavy as we assume them to be.
Coyote Niff
the most transbian obligate scavenger on the 'net!
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Missiles are all about terminal tracking-so in theory they should be as good as the tracking systems onboard and better than thing they're trying to hit-unless the target gets lucky, has flares, etc. Even a straightforward heat-seeker is nasty in space-nothing to lock onto but engine plumes.
I only stocked the Bodkin with p-beam PD to appease the doctrinal fetish for the things-I'm more than happy to swap to a full laser-and-missile complement. @4WheelSword is that too much a wrench to the plan to throw in as an edit?
- Location
- Somewhere in the stacks
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- She/Her
[X] Plan Lander
[X] OPLAN: Tsavo
[X] OPLAN: Tsavo
The Bodkin has the same problem of being too large to compete with 500 tonnes and too small to compete with the 1K tonnes we've talked about earlier. Plus, we've heard from reliable experts that missiles and torpedoes are unreliable.
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Hmm, I am not fully convinced. Compared to light speed, missiles are slow, allowing for an enemy to see them coming and start evasive action. Flares might be a thing, or fighters may even have a point defense turret of their own for missile defense.
That said, you can counter lasers with sand casters, although that is likely not very practical on a fighter due to weight and having to deploy the sand before being fired upon.
Hmm, there is a huge sun radiating in most systems of interest. Could you maybe lose a heat (radiation) seeking missile by turning towards the Sun and cutting the engine power? We really should run some War Games and exercises, is that something we can do?
Exactly. Especially if we are worried these craft will be targeted abd destroyed, we should either go 500 tonnes (to include just one pilot) or 1000 tonnes (for maximum survivability for pilots).
- Location
- Somewhere in the stacks
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- She/Her
Yeah. It's a lot of assumptions.
4WheelSword
The original N-body Problem
- Pronouns
- It/She/They
Yeah. It's worth writing something in about it because I'm liable to forget elsewise.
Hmm, maybe in the future, once we have prototype fighters/frigates to play with.
- Location
- Here, there, everywhere.
So, some observations.
1. Human-Speak is apparently a common trade language, implying a massive amount of cultural influence even if it's just one of many common languages.
2. Humaniti is understood to exist currently given the lions think we are part of them and are recognizable enough to be part of their group.
3. There has been a large language shift in the last 3 centuries given the lions seem shocked that we consider the trade language to be our spoken dialect.
This raises some questions.
1. What happened to the other colonists sent out.
2. How credible is what we know about our own history?
1. Human-Speak is apparently a common trade language, implying a massive amount of cultural influence even if it's just one of many common languages.
2. Humaniti is understood to exist currently given the lions think we are part of them and are recognizable enough to be part of their group.
3. There has been a large language shift in the last 3 centuries given the lions seem shocked that we consider the trade language to be our spoken dialect.
This raises some questions.
1. What happened to the other colonists sent out.
2. How credible is what we know about our own history?