Are fleets too Large in Traveller

[MCEvans]

Are you two having fun, 'cause - with all due respect - I don't see how this is answering the OP's question.

Where's the like button

But really, from a PC pov "Who cares!"
and from a ref's pov this amounts to fluff for encounter tables
if you think they're too big cut back on the navy encounters
if you think they need to be larger add more
if you think they are just right go for it

To me fleet size is a supermetagame tool it really only comes in to play when you need/want to play out FFW, Rebellion or any other multi-fleet engagements to give you a new feel for YTU because if you then impose your played out outcome the OTU becomes an ATU because you changed the OTU outcome.

Sorry, but I just had to get that off my chest.
Now you may go back to your tit-for-tat tonnage exchange.

 

[dean]

The Original Post:

We have all to often debated the size of individual ships. The result says the large ship version of the game reduces the number ships. Yet I have looked at the fleet sizes in 5FW and they are huge and the number of fleets is also huge. In my Traveller game I am for reducing the size of these fleets.

Is not really a question. It's a statement about what the idea that large ship universes tend to have smaller fleets, that 5FW has huge numbers of ships in a huge number of fleets (which are really very relative statements), and that in his TU, he's for reducing the size of the fleets.

Thus, the posts that follow necessarily delve into topics of ship size (as the first statement seems to relate the fleet size to ship size), the rule governing ship design (as this directly affects ship size AND therefore fleet size), some speculation discussion about FFW/5FW, and some opinion pieces about what the OTU seems to do and what they might do in their TUs and why.

Nothing off topic here, if you really look at the OP.

Besides, I like watching old Grognards argue back and forth!

 

[rancke]

wrong. When the setting postdates the rules, dead wrong.

The rules dictate what makes sense in building the setting. Since there are, under bk2, 4 options for what to do with extra space -- cargo, passengers/troops, fuel, and subcraft.

"(Note that there's nothing wrong with people deciding on setting details with a view towards making a specific rules set suitable to emulate it)."​

Hans

 

[LeperColony]

One implication that would seem to arise if you reduce or eliminate the need for large and expensive fleets is that interstellar states of the 3I's size become unnecessary, since you can meet all your defense needs with a smaller population base. It might not even be possible to wage the Pacification campaigns in a small ship/small fleet universe.

Also (not to derail the discussion too far), but wouldn't a small ship universe lead to a far more interventionist Imperium? I get the impression from small ship advocates that they prefer a more diminutive scale because it affords more opportunities for PCs to influence galactic affairs. But if the 3I has the same defense budget but it doesn't waste any on battleships, can't it afford a huge number of humbler vessels, such that it can pretty much be everywhere, thus resulting in much more government interference in PC activities?

 

[aramis]

One implication that would seem to arise if you reduce or eliminate the need for large and expensive fleets is that interstellar states of the 3I's size become unnecessary, since you can meet all your defense needs with a smaller population base. It might not even be possible to wage the Pacification campaigns in a small ship/small fleet universe.

Also (not to derail the discussion too far), but wouldn't a small ship universe lead to a far more interventionist Imperium? I get the impression from small ship advocates that they prefer a more diminutive scale because it affords more opportunities for PCs to influence galactic affairs. But if the 3I has the same defense budget but it doesn't waste any on battleships, can't it afford a huge number of humbler vessels, such that it can pretty much be everywhere, thus resulting in much more government interference in PC activities?

indeed.

If one uses even Cr1 per head per year as the budget, a sector will typically have 520 worlds, and a population of around 8.6E11 people.
Heck, a subsector alone should have 6.5E10 people.
Using Cr1 per person: Cr65,000,000,000 or MCr65,000

In a big ship universe, that's enough to support about 10 cruisers and 10 destroyers right there (using the 10% fudge), plus 20 CE's and scouts.

In a small ship Bk2 universe, with TL15 J4 M4 "Battleships" of 3000Td... those bad boys come in around MCr1,000 each... and can jump twice... And 1000Td Cruisers of J4 M6 are about MCr670 each... but the budget isn't dropping any. So, applying the same 10% fudge we can get 200 BBs, 300 CA's, and 800 Corvettes (Type T). And that's Cr1 per person in an average subsector, with darned near the biggest things you can build at "fleet speed" of J4.

TL 15 "Battleship"
3000 _300.0 Hull
__60 __15.0 Bridge
_125 _240.0 JD Z=4
__47 __96.0 MD Z=4
__73 _192.0 PP Z=4
___4 __30.0 Model 4
1200 ___0.0 JFuel
__40 ___0.0 PFuel
__30 __30.0 30xTriple Turrets
___0 __30.0 30xBLas
___0 __22.5 30xMsl
___0 ___7.5 30xSC
_140 __22.5 45xSR (C X P N M 30xG 7E 3xA)
1281 ___0.0 Cargo.
==== ====== ========
3000 _985.5

TL15 "Cruiser"
1000 _100.0 Hull
__20 ___5.0 Bridge
_105 _200.0 JD V=4
__47 __96.0 MD Z=6
__73 _192.0 PP Z=6
___4 __30.0 Model 4
_400 ___0.0 JFuel
__60 ___0.0 PFuel
__10 __10.0 10xTriple Turrets
___0 __10.0 10xBLas
___0 ___7.5 10xMsl
___0 ___2.5 10xSC
_100 __12.5 25xSR (C X P N M 10xG 7E 3xA)
_181 ___0.0 Cargo.
==== ====== ========
1000 _665.5

 

[LeperColony]

Then it seems like large fleets of large ships not only preserve PC independence, they are necessary for it. At least in anything like the OTU.

 

[aramis]

Then it seems like large fleets of large ships not only preserve PC independence, they are necessary for it. At least in anything like the OTU.

Perhaps, perhaps not.

An average subsector is 40 systems of 80 hexes.
Given my previous estimate of 200 BBs, 300 CA's, and 800 Type T's (as destroyers, and minding that these others are TL15 hulls due to Drive Z)... actually, let's lower move some of those hulls around. We get 5 BB's per system. 7.5 CA's per system. 20 T's per system. That's an AWFUL lot of ships... but...

If we assume 10 ship squadrons... that's 20 squadrons of BB's - 1 per 2 systems. We can presume 1/3-1/5 of the time docked (because that matches pretty closely the averages for late 20th and early 21st C major military powers - US, UK, USSR, Australia, New Zealand) and if we presume a fuel-based mission package in the BBs, that's out week 1, back week 8 weeks 2-6 are in-system patrol, and then maybe 4 weeks dirtside for R&R, we get 1/2 of the squadrons on-station at once, for 10 systems having BB's.

We do likewise with CA's, and get 15 systems getting a squadron at any time... but they're gonna need scoops, since the CA isn't as long legged.
But every system gets a squadron of T's at any given time. And we can halve that by having a squadron of T's accompany every squadron of CA's and BB's.

So we can get it down to the "only 2/3 the systems have a squadron at any given time" but about 1/3 have 3 at once...

Still that's not using the full nominal 0.3% GNP - which for the rather nominal Pop 9 is about 0.003*10000=30x those figures...

As I said, choice of rules determines just how much shy FFW really is... Bk2 universe, massively.

 

[Gray Pennell]

With these comments and those from the fighter/battleship thread has led me to start to dislike HG. Not because of the Large Ship/Large Fleet issue as much as it seems to fall short in ship design and combat. I sincerely hope T5 does a better job.

 

[LeperColony]

With these comments and those from the fighter/battleship thread has led me to start to dislike HG. Not because of the Large Ship/Large Fleet issue as much as it seems to fall short in ship design and combat. I sincerely hope T5 does a better job.

Well, remember, to a certain extent much of this is in the background. Fighters are still dangerous to anything PCs are likely to fly around in, and battleships would stomp them regardless of the fact that they don't make much sense vis-a-vis cruisers.

Fleet size and ship size, however, have clear (though arguably somewhat indirect) implications for the nature of YTU. You can have (as the OTU has) large fleets with large ships and that has a definite impact on the universe despite the fact that the rules imply certain realities of interstellar naval combat that renders some of the vessels suboptimal.

It should also be recalled that not only are military planning and procurement decisions frequently suboptimal, they often evidence a degree of conservatism that could lead to the retention of outdated paradigms resulting in unnecessary battleships.

 

[McPerth]

TL15 "Cruiser"
1000 _100.0 Hull
__20 ___5.0 Bridge
_105 _200.0 JD Z=4
__47 __96.0 MD Z=6
__73 _192.0 PP Z=6
___4 __30.0 Model 4
_400 ___0.0 JFuel
__60 ___0.0 PFuel
__10 __10.0 10xTriple Turrets
___0 __10.0 10xBLas
___0 ___7.5 10xMsl
___0 ___2.5 10xSC
_100 __12.5 25xSR (C X P N M 10xG 7E 3xA)
_181 ___0.0 Cargo.
==== ====== ========
1000 _665.5[/FONT][/B][/SIZE]

I know it wouldn't change anything about what you say, but the highlighted JD should be rated as V, not Z, just for clarity (the numbers you listed are correct for the V one).

 

[Tobias]

So we can increase the cost of navel wessels. Thats easy make big hauls, and military grade weapons, power plants etc cost more. We can also factor in upkeep and support.

I do this, but I still end up with quite large fleets. To be precise, I use price multiplicators for a) Higher TL equipment and b) military-grade equipment, which results in the average TL 15 Imperial warship being about 3 times as expensive as listed.
I also mark the GDP of worlds a little lower than STRIKER would have it. I end up with the average Imperial citizen contributing about Cr 50 to procurement/maintenance of Navy vessels. One ton of Navy vessel costs about MCr 2 in my revised system, or one tenth of that in maintenance. Depending on how much of a percentage I assign to battleships, I still arrive at between 4000 and 20000 first-class battleships for the whole Imperium.

 

[Tobias]

With these comments and those from the fighter/battleship thread has led me to start to dislike HG. Not because of the Large Ship/Large Fleet issue as much as it seems to fall short in ship design and combat. I sincerely hope T5 does a better job.

Ship design is salvageable. Ship combat, not so much. Aside from the fact that it does not sync with the official designs, it is not very evocative and as a game, clunky and uninteresting:
a) Too much in HG2 rests on exploiting various idiosyncrasies and break points of the rule system, which do not really translate into the game universe in a manner that does not break suspension of disbelief. Any example would be damage-soaking multiple weapon types.
b) There is a lot of dice rolling but very little tactics involved, mostly because there are few choices other than which targets to fire on.
c) At some ends of the spectrum, the system breaks down easily and quickly. If, for example, you pit two system defense boats against each other, they will almost never hit each other, and if they do, they likely won't do any serious damage. Basically, at this scale, you pointlessly blast away at each other for ages, waiting for someone to roll a 12 eventually.

 

[McPerth]

If, for example, you pit two system defense boats against each other, they will almost never hit each other, and if they do, they likely won't do any serious damage. Basically, at this scale, you pointlessly blast away at each other for ages, waiting for someone to roll a 12 eventually.

USS Monitor vs CSS Virginia again?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hampton_Roads

 

[mike wightman]

Ship design is salvageable. Ship combat, not so much. Aside from the fact that it does not sync with the official designs, it is not very evocative and as a game, clunky and uninteresting:

Most of the official designs are either broken or just not very good - but then the folks at GDW didn't have 31 years playing around with designing ships and fighting it out...

a) Too much in HG2 rests on exploiting various idiosyncrasies and break points of the rule system, which do not really translate into the game universe in a manner that does not break suspension of disbelief. Any example would be damage-soaking multiple weapon types.

The setting happens to be based around one such break point - namely the jump to TL15 and the massive advantages that are gained at that TL.

Try rolling the setting back to the TL12 early days of the third Imperium and see how different ship design and ship to ship combat at that TL is.

b) There is a lot of dice rolling but very little tactics involved, mostly because there are few choices other than which targets to fire on.

Now this bit I agree with, better maneuver rules would be a godsend, but then you can always use the Mayday conversion rules...

c) At some ends of the spectrum, the system breaks down easily and quickly. If, for example, you pit two system defense boats against each other, they will almost never hit each other, and if they do, they likely won't do any serious damage. Basically, at this scale, you pointlessly blast away at each other for ages, waiting for someone to roll a 12 eventually.

Much like playing rock paper scissors lizard spock if you always pick rock...

 

[Tobias]

USS Monitor vs CSS Virginia again?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hampton_Roads

Not quite. They at least hit each other. Damaged, well, not so much.

Let us take, for sake of argument, two TL 14, 700-ton Zhdoq class Zhodani SDBs, featured in PP:F and assume one was taken over by some intrepid PCs and faced off with its counterpart. These boats have armor 14, meaning they can only be damaged by spinal mounts, nuclear missiles or pulse lasers. They have a factor 6 fusion gun battery which cannot damage the boats but can be used to defend against the other guy's factor 4 missile battery. So assuming long range, the missile battery hits on a 12, penetrates the factor 6 fusion guns on a 7 and the factor 4 nuke damper on a 10, which yields a net chance of ~0.27% of damaging (unless you roll "no effect" on both damage rolls) your opponent's ship. On average this will thus happen about every 370 turns, or in other words every five days. Chances are the battle will have to be called off for lack of fuel at some point.

But wait, there's more! If you use the damage control rules, any damage to the weapons is liable to be repaired far more quickly than it is dealt. That leaves us with fuel hits. You'd have to score about 10 of these to run the other vessel out of fuel. I won't bother you with new calculations but on average, this will take about 1 year. At this point, the battle is actually going to be decided by whose yearly maintenance was earlier.

All of this rests, naturally, on the SDBs' ability to magically produce nuclear missiles out of thin air since HG2 has no ammunition rules.

If this defines "reality", then "reality" is the dream of a madman in that TU.

 

[McPerth]

Not quite. They at least hit each other. Damaged, well, not so much.

Let us take, for sake of argument, two TL 14, 700-ton Zhdoq class Zhodani SDBs, featured in PP:F and assume one was taken over by some intrepid PCs and faced off with its counterpart. These boats have armor 14, meaning they can only be damaged by spinal mounts, nuclear missiles or pulse lasers. They have a factor 6 fusion gun battery which cannot damage the boats but can be used to defend against the other guy's factor 4 missile battery. So assuming long range, the missile battery hits on a 12, penetrates the factor 6 fusion guns on a 7 and the factor 4 nuke damper on a 10, which yields a net chance of ~0.27% of damaging (unless you roll "no effect" on both damage rolls) your opponent's ship. On average this will thus happen about every 370 turns, or in other words every five days. Chances are the battle will have to be called off for lack of fuel at some point.

But wait, there's more! If you use the damage control rules, any damage to the weapons is liable to be repaired far more quickly than it is dealt. That leaves us with fuel hits. You'd have to score about 10 of these to run the other vessel out of fuel. I won't bother you with new calculations but on average, this will take about 1 year. At this point, the battle is actually going to be decided by whose yearly maintenance was earlier.

Or the one with less fuel at the start of the battle...

Even if no fuel hits are taken, it will anly last for 4 weeks in HG (and by this time, according to your numbers, about 5-6 would have been scored by each.

All of this rests, naturally, on the SDBs' ability to magically produce nuclear missiles out of thin air since HG2 has no ammunition rules.

Fully agreed (and posted several times about it) in this point.

So, if you include ammo in this factor, they will end up by firing the FG each other (after closing, as FG may not be used at long range), returning to the Monitor vs Virgina I told about before...:devil:

 

[Tobias]

Or the one with less fuel at the start of the battle...

I don't think there's anything in the rules that stops them from refueling while the battle is still raging.
(Another major flaw: High Guard is named for the allegedly super-important tactical maneuver of protecting your refueling buddies... but there are no rules whatsoever for this.)

So, if you include ammo in this factor, they will end up by firing the FG each other (after closing, as FG may not be used at long range), returning to the Monitor vs Virgina I told about before...

Firing the fusion gun is pointless. It will not result in any damage whatsoever even if they hit. (For which they need to roll a 12, so that happens about twice per day of continuous firing.) Monitor and Virginia could damage each other at least a little.

I was going to write they could switch to their factor-4 pulse lasers. But these cannot hit.

 

[aramis]

I don't think there's anything in the rules that stops them from refueling while the battle is still raging.
(Another major flaw: High Guard is named for the allegedly super-important tactical maneuver of protecting your refueling buddies... but there are no rules whatsoever for this.)

There are in HG 1E

 

[Peter Newman]

Damaged, well, not so much. So assuming long range, the missile battery hits on a 12, penetrates the factor 6 fusion guns on a 7 and the factor 4 nuke damper on a 10, which yields a net chance of ~0.27% of damaging (unless you roll "no effect" on both damage rolls) your opponent's ship. On average this will thus happen about every 370 turns, or in other words every five days. Chances are the battle will have to be called off for lack of fuel at some point.

They'll only _stay_ at long range from one another if at least one of them wants to stay at long range and runs as fast as the other one chases her. After less than five days at least one side should decide to either close or open range.

 

[McPerth]

I don't think there's anything in the rules that stops them from refueling while the battle is still raging.
(Another major flaw: High Guard is named for the allegedly super-important tactical maneuver of protecting your refueling buddies... but there are no rules whatsoever for this.)

I must agree with you here, in both points: there are nothing in the rules stoping it and it's a flaw of the system, as it's hinted in many places that refuelling ships are very vulnerable.

As for myself as a referee, I'd force any fule skipping ship to forsake agility (in atmospheric operations, as skimming are, I guess agility is quite limited), make pilot rolls each time hit to avoid losing control, and forbid using PAs for both sides, as they cannot be used in atmosphere (those would be the minimal restrictions I'd put)