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
Eh, the Hermosan use 2k fighting platforms - I think 3k will suit fine with enhanced hull and armor and revised weapons. The main issue is 5.5k or 6k cap ship is going to be very expensive - probably more than half our annual budget.
Az
Where minelayer 🥺
[x] Plan: Lay claim and look further
-[x] Primary: Dispatch the Bá Kim to Hermosa, for the delicate negotiations required.
-[x] Secondary: Dispatch the Bá Kim to the 'Northern' systems, to make proper contact there.
-[x] Develop a ground and space command school with no expense spared - Costs 200Mcr. per annum.
-[x] Construct multiple ground schools for various specialities as well as an on-orbit school - Costs 200Mcr. per annum.
-[x] Other - Establish a dedicated liason office and formal exchange progeam for the Militia, Cassalon ground forces, and various Xyrian ground forces. Host their officers and senior NCOs for better facilitation of HSWS "lessons learned", relevant tactics (orbit to ground, ground to orbit, boarding operations and ground), and ethics, ideals, and goals.
-[x] Scout Flotilla should be refitted with new ships - new large Surveyors and newer FSS ships. Inital Scout flotilla should have two task forces, each of one Surveyour + Supply ship.
-[x] Establish "garrison forces" at Xyri, Nova Refugio, Shambala and Hexos. Each should consist primarily of 1-3 MDS (1 at Shambala, more at others) and possibly of fighters. We would promote them into operational commands or demote them in future, as our situation would become more clear. Command at Heimdall would be responsible for keeping regular contact with Hexos, Shambala and Nova Refugio garrisons. Home - with Xyri garrison and with our presense at Deep Hope.
--[x] Cassalon force should be reformed into more of a garrison one, with most of its jump-capable ships to be moved to Expeditionary force, Home force or some future forces.
Yeah, that's true. Each would also take around 2-2,5 years to build.
-[x] Primary: Dispatch the Bá Kim to Hermosa, for the delicate negotiations required.
-[x] Secondary: Dispatch the Bá Kim to the 'Northern' systems, to make proper contact there.
-[x] Develop a ground and space command school with no expense spared - Costs 200Mcr. per annum.
-[x] Construct multiple ground schools for various specialities as well as an on-orbit school - Costs 200Mcr. per annum.
-[x] Other - Establish a dedicated liason office and formal exchange progeam for the Militia, Cassalon ground forces, and various Xyrian ground forces. Host their officers and senior NCOs for better facilitation of HSWS "lessons learned", relevant tactics (orbit to ground, ground to orbit, boarding operations and ground), and ethics, ideals, and goals.
-[x] Scout Flotilla should be refitted with new ships - new large Surveyors and newer FSS ships. Inital Scout flotilla should have two task forces, each of one Surveyour + Supply ship.
-[x] Establish "garrison forces" at Xyri, Nova Refugio, Shambala and Hexos. Each should consist primarily of 1-3 MDS (1 at Shambala, more at others) and possibly of fighters. We would promote them into operational commands or demote them in future, as our situation would become more clear. Command at Heimdall would be responsible for keeping regular contact with Hexos, Shambala and Nova Refugio garrisons. Home - with Xyri garrison and with our presense at Deep Hope.
--[x] Cassalon force should be reformed into more of a garrison one, with most of its jump-capable ships to be moved to Expeditionary force, Home force or some future forces.
Yeah, that's true. Each would also take around 2-2,5 years to build.
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I think that instead of scrapping all of the escorts that we just spent a decent chunk of money building or refitting, I think we should look for ways to get more pilots. Maybe we can recruit some foreigners (Aslan?), maybe we can get some more pilots out of Home or Cassalon if we try harder.
Then we can use our money to build new capabilities, like the carriers.
Then we can use our money to build new capabilities, like the carriers.
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Rat King
Izutsumi-pilled
I don't propose scrapping immediately; just spitballing the future. Still want to finish building out what we have before we start replacing - but I do want to look at pilot efficiency. Even if we develop a new escort, it'll be years before everything is fully replaced. And I think we are going to want to look at it considering the armor improvements - tonnage savings alone for equivalent or better protection makes them more combat capable.
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- Location
- Here, there, everywhere.
I'm not meaning the rules, I'm meaning having to shuffle around ships of the same type but slightly different armament to get optimal fleet weapons balance when the whole point of the class is to equalize our pilot cap being hampered by having multiple ships that do different things that could be combined into a single hull.
4WheelSword
The original N-body Problem
- Pronouns
- It/She/They
I don't think this is something anyone else is worried about. Strategically, every CFA is treated the same even if tactically they have different war fighting methods.
11-1: Did you even go to basic?
4WheelSword
The original N-body Problem
- Pronouns
- It/She/They
With the return of the Bá Kim, we have the opportunity for additional diplomacy. Select one priority and one secondary target: Hermosa, the 'Northern' systems
How much is the HSWS willing to invest? Develop a ground and space command school with no expense spared, Construct multiple ground schools for various specialities as well as an on-orbit school, Establish a dedicated liaison office and formal exchange program for the Militia, Cassalon ground forces, and various Xyrian ground forces.
What is missing from this list? No new stations at this time.
Available Budget: 3692.649MCr
Current Dockyard Usage: 7,000Dtons
Current Pilot Usage: 79/80
A Year in Time
Most of a year passes with a hundred little changes. New schools are built on the surface of Home, new ships come out of the yards and new administrative structures are put in place to better command and control them. The first classes go into their new schools and the first members of the Cassalon, Xyrian and Militia ground forces meet on Home to establish a curriculum to better unify their various schools of thought on how to conduct ground warfare in an age of interstellar warships.
While the first class are entering a year long officer training program, we must still appoint commanders to various positions even without having the benefits of that learning. We will, as has been the case until this point, have to manage with the officers who have come up through our older, less well invested methods. As such, the following officers of at least Vice-Marshall rank have been short-listed for command:
| Name | Time in Rank | Quality | Traits |
| Vice-Marshall Javier McNeal | <1 year | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Speed Demon, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Isa Burakgazi | 1-2 years | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Well-Connected, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Anisa Mendoza | 3-4 years | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Disciplinarian, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Matxalen Gebara | <1 year | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Jump Expert, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Amir Adabayo | 2-3 years | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Sensor Expert, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Sophea Omarov | 1-2 years | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Carrier Expert, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Amirkhan Kadyrov | <1 year | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Agressive, ??? |
| Vice-Marshall Belinay Celik | 3-4 years | ??? - Estimated: Average to Good | Ordnance Expert, ??? |
We have five stations requiring someone of Vice-Marshall rank, and eight prospective officers who would be suitable for the role. Please select officer and station from the following list:
[ ] X should command the Home station
[ ] X should command the Cassalon station
[ ] X should command the Heimdall station
[ ] X should command the Expeditionary Flotilla
[ ] X should command the Scout Flotilla
We also have a huge void in our yards and not a great deal with which to fill them. Financially we are well off, but our pilot situation is complex. Even if we simply sent the last two non block III cruisers to the reserve, we would only have the capacity for a handful of new ships. As such, it would be appreciated if the HSWS Senior Command would set a schedule for ships to be placed into reserve. Select from the following list in order of priority:
[ ] Article-breaching ships - the Monitor and the MMV
[ ] Flight I Frigates
[ ] Block III Interstellar Cruisers
[ ] Other - write in
Finally, the last point on the Agenda for the coming year; what exactly is the HSWS going to spend its (reduced) budget building? Select ships from the following list up to the yard maximum (11,150 dtons):
[ ] A second Patrol Carrier (5,500 tons, 2,837.595Mcr)
[ ] Additional Interstellar Cruiser Refits (355Mcr each, 2 remain)
[ ] Another CFA (1280-1490Mcr based on variant)
[ ] Enhanced frigates using modern technology (500 tons, 271Mcr each)
[ ] An advanced replacement for the Surveyors
[ ] Other - write in
Please present votes as plans. Voting opens at
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Where immediate replacements are concerned I think that the surveyors are the priority considering their status as the oldest active ships now that the system defense destroyers have been moved to the reserves. A reduction to 500t for more pilots or a increase for more capabilities sounds ideal to me, though I'd prefer a much larger size for the latter. I'd also like to get two more diplomatic cruisers so we actually have enough to rotate through maintenance as well as getting more ability to talk to our neighbors.
As for IC/Frigate replacements, if we're considering increasing in size to 3000t why not make it a CFA variant at that point? Honestly I'm slightly questioning the value of PD escorts right now at the current size of our mainline combatant ships. And against missiles + fighters I think countering them with fragmentation missiles of our own might be more effective than PD, though admittedly those would do nothing against torpedoes. Bit of a tricky question there with us running into pilot, budget and dockyard limits.
As for IC/Frigate replacements, if we're considering increasing in size to 3000t why not make it a CFA variant at that point? Honestly I'm slightly questioning the value of PD escorts right now at the current size of our mainline combatant ships. And against missiles + fighters I think countering them with fragmentation missiles of our own might be more effective than PD, though admittedly those would do nothing against torpedoes. Bit of a tricky question there with us running into pilot, budget and dockyard limits.
to build
[ ] An advanced replacement for the Surveyor x2 3ktons each
[ ] Flight II diplomatic courier x2 1 ktons each
[ ] Flight II MDS 2.5 ktons
this would almost close the Scout flotilla issue and should allow us to replace 2 old Interstelalr surveyors and 4 deep space surveyors. we will free 4 pilots plus each enw Surveyor should be capable of acting on it's own, with a support from a supply ship only.
this would require us to build flight II FSS later, but we also need them so that's not that bad.
diplocouriers could probably keep being at 1 kton, as they do not require some incredile capabilities. Maybe we could build larger "impressive delegation" diploship later, but I don't think it's required for right now.
MDS is always a good thing in our position.
[ ] An advanced replacement for the Surveyor x2 3ktons each
[ ] Flight II diplomatic courier x2 1 ktons each
[ ] Flight II MDS 2.5 ktons
this would almost close the Scout flotilla issue and should allow us to replace 2 old Interstelalr surveyors and 4 deep space surveyors. we will free 4 pilots plus each enw Surveyor should be capable of acting on it's own, with a support from a supply ship only.
this would require us to build flight II FSS later, but we also need them so that's not that bad.
diplocouriers could probably keep being at 1 kton, as they do not require some incredile capabilities. Maybe we could build larger "impressive delegation" diploship later, but I don't think it's required for right now.
MDS is always a good thing in our position.
- Location
- California
We should send the monitor in for a refit if we decide not to send it to mothballs.
Thoughts on the commanders, in no particular order:
Amir Adabayo: Obvious choice for scout flotilla
Anisa Mendoza: Instead of giving her a fleet, we could put her as an administrator of one of the new schools, to use that disciplinarian trait to increase the professionalism of the graduates.
Sophia Omarov: she gets whatever fleet has the carrier
Matxalan Gebara: Jump expert could be useful for the Expeditionary fleet, to have our ships arrive in a system closer together.
Isa Burakgazi: appoint as the official HSWS liaison to the Home government, use those connections to increase funding and lobby for other needs of the fleet
Belinay Celik: one of our two most senior officers, good candidate for home fleet.
Amirkhan Kadyrov: aggressive and new to the position of vice-martial. More likely to cause incidents wherever we appoint him. Would be good in the event of actual war
Javier McNeal: Speed demon could be useful for the Expeditionary fleet.
With the exception of Amirkhan Kadyrov, I don't think any of them would be a bad choice for any of the fleets
Amir Adabayo: Obvious choice for scout flotilla
Anisa Mendoza: Instead of giving her a fleet, we could put her as an administrator of one of the new schools, to use that disciplinarian trait to increase the professionalism of the graduates.
Sophia Omarov: she gets whatever fleet has the carrier
Matxalan Gebara: Jump expert could be useful for the Expeditionary fleet, to have our ships arrive in a system closer together.
Isa Burakgazi: appoint as the official HSWS liaison to the Home government, use those connections to increase funding and lobby for other needs of the fleet
Belinay Celik: one of our two most senior officers, good candidate for home fleet.
Amirkhan Kadyrov: aggressive and new to the position of vice-martial. More likely to cause incidents wherever we appoint him. Would be good in the event of actual war
Javier McNeal: Speed demon could be useful for the Expeditionary fleet.
With the exception of Amirkhan Kadyrov, I don't think any of them would be a bad choice for any of the fleets
- Location
- California
I would argue for complete retirement / scraping of the two classes of survey ships we have. They use two pilots for each ship and have been around for ages. A new more efficient ship class would better serve us.
deep space surveyors use 1 pilot each, so all surveyors use 8 pilots in toto. But yeah, they should be retired (I once again propose to use them up in jump/misjump experiments, with help of SIS)
- Location
- California
Save one as a museum ship.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
From my experience with speed demons in RTW, I strongly distrust them from their tendency to end up damaging their engines from their attempts to eke out just that tiny bit more speed. Considering the fact that Home station is considered the most prestigious posting and would by proximity be the one communicating the most with Home, I would favor putting the well-connected officer there. Sensor expert seems the most obvious choice for the scout flotilla as does jump expert for the expeditionary flotilla given their role of rapid response. I'd have the disciplinarian in charge of the reserves if that was possible, but keeping a by the books officer in charge over Cassalon might be fine too. Finally I think Heimdall should have the ordnance expert in charge given that the primary armament of the MDS and the ships there consists of torpedoes and missiles.
What is RTW?
---
I like that we're starting to get more named characters, thanks QM
I agree with investing in better surveyors.
Here's my plan, even tho the vote isn't open yet. This puts
[x] Plan Judith
We have five stations requiring someone of Vice-Marshall rank, and eight prospective officers who would be suitable for the role. Please select officer and station from the following list:
[x] Isa Burakgazi (1-2 years, Well-Connected) should command the Home station
- least dangerous posting and they can schmooze the most here
[x] Anisa Mendoza (3-4 years, Disciplinarian) should command the Cassalon station
- Experienced commander shows the Cassalon people we take them seriously
[x] Belinay Celik (3-4 years, Ordnance Expert) should command the Heimdall station
- Seems like our best commander to me, so let's put them in the most important post
[x] Matxalen Gebara (<1 year, Jump Expert) should command the Expeditionary Flotilla
- Bit of a wild card, but I'm thinking the Expeditionary Flotilla is more likely to be travelling and jumping in to places to fight or reinforce, and this trait might help, also uses one of our newer commanders
[x] Amir Adabayo (2-3 years, Sensor Expert) should command the Scout Flotilla
- Sensors seems good for scouting.
We also have a huge void in our yards and not a great deal with which to fill them. Financially we are well off, but our pilot situation is complex. Even if we simply sent the last two non block III cruisers to the reserve, we would only have the capacity for a handful of new ships. As such, it would be appreciated if the HSWS Senior Command would set a schedule for ships to be placed into reserve. Select from the following list in order of priority:
[1] Article-breaching ships - the Monitor and the MMV
[2] Flight I Frigates
[3] Block III Interstellar Cruisers
Finally, the last point on the Agenda for the coming year; what exactly is the HSWS going to spend its (reduced) budget building? Select ships from the following list up to the yard maximum (11,150 dtons):
[ ] A second Patrol Carrier (5,500 tons, 2,837.595Mcr)
[ ] Additional Interstellar Cruiser Refits (355Mcr each, 2 remain)
[ ] Another CFA (1280-1490Mcr based on variant)
[ ] Enhanced frigates using modern technology (500 tons, 271Mcr each)
[x] An advanced replacement for the Surveyors
[ ] Other - write in
[x] Another diplo cruiser
[x] Fleet Support Ship
[x] Remaining space and budget for whatever static defences are considered best (MDS or minelayers)
Other business:
[x] Plan for a refit of the monitor into a carrier. It should have 2-jump range and serve fleet command, ewar and strike missions, maybe interceptors (see below)
[x] Look into our point-defence doctrine
-[x] Do war games and sims to see how our current fleets would fare versus a big Hermosan missile launch.
-[x] What are the trade-offs versus other point defence approaches?
--[x] Test if an interceptor design would be good versus missiles, torpedos and/or small-craft.
--[x] Are specialised point-defence escorts a good idea or would we be better with each ship handling its own point-defence?
[x] Test the minefield concept
[x] Try to get more pilots. Pay more, recruit from Aslan, Western systems, etc.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
A game called Rule the Waves which is about managing a nations navy between 1890-1970. The QM had a lets play of it and the officer traits are very much inspired from the ones there. Rule The Waves 3 - A Graphical Experiment - Complete
Yeah, regarding minelayers - we finally have first one built (well, the Modular Merchant that is supposed to fulfill its role).
So we can conduct war games with mines too now
In 2e Traveller mines are in Traveller Companion (update 2024) book. Also there are some rare guns and ship systems (but most guns are memes)
So we can conduct war games with mines too now
In 2e Traveller mines are in Traveller Companion (update 2024) book. Also there are some rare guns and ship systems (but most guns are memes)
Rat King
Izutsumi-pilled
I am not sure refitting the monitor would be worth the expense at this point - we could get a newer, more capable ship of the same rough tonnage. So If support putting it into reserves, along with the MMV - the Perkunas is sadly outdated, with thinner armor and less advanced systems.
As for building - a second diplomatic cruiser (with more advanced armor and hull systems) and three advanced survey vessels to replace our existing mix (freeing four pilots net) and an additional FSS (flight II). They can double as fleet scouts, EWAR, and sensor ships if needed.
With regards to future combat ships, I think we look at Flight II of the CFA and decide if we want to standardize around torpedoes or missiles for this weight class - the LMD is a very good weapon, but suffers from shooting at smaller targets and from not having a turret mount, but our 5k+ heavy can absolutely use them effectively when we get turrets, probably in combination with missiles or torps. We then use weight savings from new armor to increase PD and number of tubes.
Argument for missiles is that they're effective against both larger craft and smaller craft while torpedoes are only effective against 2k+ tonnage. Torpedoes obviously hit harder. So we could return to a mix of torpedo and missile boats (focusing on an A2 and a B2 variant exclusively). Or decide fuck it we ball and go for one or the other.
As for building - a second diplomatic cruiser (with more advanced armor and hull systems) and three advanced survey vessels to replace our existing mix (freeing four pilots net) and an additional FSS (flight II). They can double as fleet scouts, EWAR, and sensor ships if needed.
With regards to future combat ships, I think we look at Flight II of the CFA and decide if we want to standardize around torpedoes or missiles for this weight class - the LMD is a very good weapon, but suffers from shooting at smaller targets and from not having a turret mount, but our 5k+ heavy can absolutely use them effectively when we get turrets, probably in combination with missiles or torps. We then use weight savings from new armor to increase PD and number of tubes.
Argument for missiles is that they're effective against both larger craft and smaller craft while torpedoes are only effective against 2k+ tonnage. Torpedoes obviously hit harder. So we could return to a mix of torpedo and missile boats (focusing on an A2 and a B2 variant exclusively). Or decide fuck it we ball and go for one or the other.
I suspect it could be quicker and (maybe) cheaper to refit the Monitor. Our Patrol carrier would be built 2,5 years from now (and almost half a year have already passed). Its building time is almost 3 years - around 35 months if I am not mistaken.
Refitting the Monitor should definitely happen quicker.
Thing is, if we are putting in reserves unrefitted ships with illegal particle beams, means that when we decide to pull them out of reserve they would still be armed with ilelgal beams.
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Rat King
Izutsumi-pilled
TBF I think the Perkunas should be mostly retired in any case, considering it's essentially a less advanced CFA and will be severely outclassed by the CFA Flight II.
Monitor wise, I suppose so. I think we can fit a lot of torpedoes on it if we want. Or just go full missile massacre.
EDIT: Doing the math, we've got... ~1400 tons of particle beams that can be stripped out, plus smaller, more efficient plant would free up about ~100 tons and there's a cargo capacity of ~240 tons to play with and if we replace the old shuttles with two of the 50 tonners, we can squeeze out another ~100 tons. Total tonnage is about ~1800 that we can play with.
Increasing fuel load for two jumps takes 600 tons out of play immediately (which I think we want to do if we want to make use of it going forward). Down to 1200 tons.
We can either slap a bunch of turreted weapons - 55 tons each, so missile or torpedo bays - or just go for the large bays. Not sure that turreted missile/torps are worth it. We've got 32 hardpoints to play with.
If we go missile massacre, we can replace the existing four missile bays with two large ones and add another 8 for a total of 10 large missile bays (net of 800 tons). Gives a total volley of 240 missiles per salvo. Two hours of sustained fire would be about 400 tons of ammo.
Alternately, we maintain the missile armament and put in 8 large torpedo bays for a volley strength of 48 torpedoes, 48 missiles. This would be slightly more tonnage efficient since the torpedo ammo for two hours of sustained fire would come out to about 320 tons, but would give it a decent anti-capital ship punch and have missiles for assisting with other enemy missiles or smaller ships that torpedoes aren't as effective against.
I think after that we can find enough spare tonnage to add an additional 24 triple turrets to the existing 36 which would make it resistant to missile fire and have a lot of laser fire for smallcraft.
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