As part of my CT/HG hybrid I've been looking hard at the missiles and think I've got a working system, including bay missile buys and TL effects and the like.
But it involves altering a long-standing bit about missiles, at least since the Missile Supplement.
I'm allowing for faster missiles then the ships can go. This achieves two things, I can factor in kinetic impact effects that can go up for the faster missiles, and the missiles 'clear the board' faster since I'm actually having them move just like the ships.
However, it DOES affect the interaction of missiles and ships.
With a 6G limit on the missiles, the slower ships can be run down even if they have some delta vee away from the shooting ship, but a faster 5-6G ship will likely escape impact entirely and even a 4G ship at some distance may be out of a reasonable engagement envelope.
But if you have 10G, 12G or higher missiles pretty much nothing escapes at anything medium or shorter (500000 km or less).
IYO how important is it to have that 'fast as ship' missile speed?
Second opinion, lately I've been visualizing missile warheads as delivering an optimized to-hit pattern of solid AP penetrators accelerated the last few 1000km with an explosive charge.
However, it occurred to me that like PA fire or plasma/fusion guns, missiles could fire off several HEAT bolts that do not dissipate quickly in space due to no atmosphere or charged particles. Is that reasonable?
But it involves altering a long-standing bit about missiles, at least since the Missile Supplement.
I'm allowing for faster missiles then the ships can go. This achieves two things, I can factor in kinetic impact effects that can go up for the faster missiles, and the missiles 'clear the board' faster since I'm actually having them move just like the ships.
However, it DOES affect the interaction of missiles and ships.
With a 6G limit on the missiles, the slower ships can be run down even if they have some delta vee away from the shooting ship, but a faster 5-6G ship will likely escape impact entirely and even a 4G ship at some distance may be out of a reasonable engagement envelope.
But if you have 10G, 12G or higher missiles pretty much nothing escapes at anything medium or shorter (500000 km or less).
IYO how important is it to have that 'fast as ship' missile speed?
Second opinion, lately I've been visualizing missile warheads as delivering an optimized to-hit pattern of solid AP penetrators accelerated the last few 1000km with an explosive charge.
However, it occurred to me that like PA fire or plasma/fusion guns, missiles could fire off several HEAT bolts that do not dissipate quickly in space due to no atmosphere or charged particles. Is that reasonable?