Azhanti High Lightning

[Hemdian]

Hmmm ... this is starting to sound like an expensive refit. Refitting an AHL is one thing, but are these suggested mods cost effective? And who's paying for it?

If this were me I'd remove the spinal mount weapon (leaving the tube intact but plated off) and 50-75% of the secondary weapons, replace the fighters with training variants of the RF-128/2 (someone said RF-128T but I haven't seen a canon reference to this variant), ... and rather than add a bunch of cutters I'd use the 'gunboats' and fuel shuttles already installed (but I'd disarm the gunboats for extra seats and/or cargo capacity). IIRC the fuel shuttles have 15 seats in their standard configuration and can be reconfigured with long-term accommodation in the fuel area if need be. Without checking the figures I'd guess that recycling the spinal mount would cover the cost of the refit, and so you get your school ship for just the cost of the original AHL's write-off value.

Regards PLST

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Hans Vermeylen:
Voyage planing.

Where would you call, with a jump-5 ship, for an interesting round the Marches 6 month middies cruise? What about other sectors (the Solomani Rim?)? By the way, where would you start? Where are the naval academies of the sector located (I mean the imperial ones, not the local ones)? Is there one or many?\

The Regency Sourcebook says (p. 43) that "During the antebellum period Macene was the home of the Spinward Branch of the Imperial Navy Fleet Tactics College (serving the Domain of Deneb area). The system's entire population was connected with either the Macene naval base or the Fleet College." The UPP of Macene in 1117 was B000453-E, population multiplier 9 (And please don't ask me to explain why the government is a type 5 instead of a type 6 and why the TL isn't 15).

So much for canon. That gives you one Fleet College per domain with a population of somewhere under 90,000 (since you have to account for the naval base and any dependents). But is a Fleet Tactical College the same thing as a naval academy? I'd say no. This is pure speculation, but I think each ducal navy (aka subsector navy) will have its own naval academy. I've always assumed that the regular Imperial Navy was roughly the same size as all ducal navies combined, so you might have the same number of regular IN academies, roughly one per subsector (leaving out subsectors with very little population, such as Lanth). OTOH, the IN may get most of its officers by 'raiding' the ducal navies, in which case there may be only one IN academy per sector.

As you can see it depends on a number of factors that has yet to be established for the OTU, so you have to make some assumptions of your own.

(I remember running a short campaign set in a naval academy on Karin once. It was inspired by an article in an early issue of Challenge and it was a lot of fun.)


Hans

 

[The Oz]

The major expense in the refit as I described it is the weaponry being added. I get a total cost of MCr358.996 for the refit, of which MCr334.4 is for the new bay weapons. This does not include the cost for the new cutters or modules.

One way to cut the cost would be to only add one of each weapon type to train with, leaving the ship with one meson gun bay, one particle accelerator bay, one repulsor bay, and 13 missile bays. That would reduce the refit cost to MCr108.196 (MCr83.6 for the weapons) and make the ship look very peculiar....

Your variant is certainly one way to go but Hans really seems to want his cutter squadron.

 

[Glen Allen Mcinnes]

Bhoins mechoned that ther where only 19 AHL cruisers left, i think that this figure is out a tad maby their are only 19 still in active imperial service their maby (and most probaly are) others in storage and in service in client state navys and cont forget the "Emissary" the AHL owend by Oberlindes and opperating (with full orignal armerments) in the Varg extents (and who said merchants don't get out and have fun ) so i think that the AHL class would make a grate training ship that could quickily come to good use in war-time.

 

[mike wightman]

According to supplement 5:
prior to the fifth frontier war there are fifteen AHL class ships in IN service, seven converted to commercial service, five in IISS use, and two Frontier Cruisers - the Imperial Sabreur and Argentine Foray - retired or paid off 1085-1105 (no mention as to their eventual fate).

So that's a total of 27(29?) ships still operational, not bad for ships over one hundred years old

I wonder where the two that were retired/paid off have got to???

 

[Antony]

I'm sorry sir, your security clearance is not sufficient for that information. Now if you would accompany those fine gentlemen in the marine battledress...

 

[Hemdian]

Originally posted by The Oz:
The major expense in the refit as I described it is the weaponry being added. I get a total cost of MCr358.996 for the refit, of which MCr334.4 is for the new bay weapons. This does not include the cost for the new cutters or modules.

I must admit I don't remember seeing in the rules any costs listed for removing equipment during a refit, or costs for remodelling the interior. Now removal costs should be offset by recycling the old stuff, but since the deck floors are bulkhead quality (and therefore structural) I think merging the fighter decks and a gunnery deck together (as was suggested before) might not be a trivial expense.

Regards PLST

 

[The Oz]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:

I wonder where the two that were retired/paid off have got to???

I didn't notice those two: they'd be good choices for the training cruisers.

 

[The Oz]

Originally posted by Hemdian:
I must admit I don't remember seeing in the rules any costs listed for removing equipment during a refit, or costs for remodelling the interior. Now removal costs should be offset by recycling the old stuff, but since the deck floors are bulkhead quality (and therefore structural) I think merging the fighter decks and a gunnery deck together (as was suggested before) might not be a trivial expense.

Regards PLST

I agree, but we have no rules. I suppose it could be argued that rebuilding on such a drastic scale (combining decks together) would be equivalent to rebuilding that part of the ship, costing MCr0.1 per dton rebuilt. That would add MCr260 to the cost of the refit, which is a nice chunk of change.

OTOH, you are allowed to change a ship's drives during a refit in TCS, and the cost of that is based on the cost of the drives, not their size.

In any event, the Imperial Navy would be paying for it, and they should be able to afford it.

 

[savage]

As a side note...I agree its expensive to do this refit...plenty of hidden costs...but as was blatently said, Its just a Game.

Well here is a thought for the gearheads in the croud...what I did with Kinunirs (and a few other designs) in my campaign is a systems refit (or upgrade)...and then facilities familiar with working on them began production of a new class based on the original design.

Here is why. I reduced production and architect costs because it was re-production of an existing product with major re-engineering.

There are two types of refits (major and minor). I generally assume a major refit is no longer of the same class as the original vessel.

Just a thought,

Savage

 

[BetterThanLife]

Actually Sup 5 says 66 15t Fighters and 5 40t Pinaces plus the 4 400t Fuel shuttles. Later information looks like they removed the pinaces to increase the fighters to 80. (Sup 9 and TA7, though chronologically TA7 is before Sup5, it was published after Sup5.) There is only a 10t disparity between the extra fighters and the pinaces. Suplement 5 also has three bridges on the early ships. (Giving you plenty of training opportunity.) In any case you will find that the fighters are 15T not 10T so if you want to swap them out that is quite a bit more space. Further the Fuel shuttles can be fitted with seats to act as a liaison between the Ground and the ship.(Routine operations, calls for one to be fitted for this while the other three are used for fueling operations.) Again this is from Sup 5. With approximately 350T available for seats that is enough to carry everyone onboard to the surface in one trip.

Already having 5 pinaces and knowing about the use of a Fuel Shuttle for trips to the surface is the main reason I objected to such a serious overhaul of the ship. It isn't neccessary to achieve your objectives. But hopefully these sizes and numbers will give you what you need to do the job.

The only place I have ever paid much attention to modular cutters is with a Broadsword class Mercenary Cruiser. For one of those we tended to build a custom module to hold 7.5 staterooms each, thereby virtually doubling your marine complement. (An additional 30 marines.) With this module you could use two Broadswords to transport a Company. (And properly configured a Mech Company with Armor support. But that is for another thread.)

As far as deck plans, they are on this board. Thanks to Mark's kind permission, I uploaded them. Look in the E-Library.

Originally posted by Hans Vermeylen:
Accorting to AV, the Azhanti carries 60 fighters. According to GT:S, she carries 80. I'll stick to 60 for now. 60 figthers, 10 dTon each, that's 600 dTon of space inside the vehicle bays. Meaning I could full one squadron of ten cutters, each with one module plus 3 spare modules (or 10 spares if using GURPS figures).

What kind of module would the ship be carrying? In its school configuration? In its wartime configuration?

Peacetime: I think it should carry enough passenger modules to ferry all the middies to their various visits (not sure yet about how many middies will be aboard, but some 3 or 4 passengers modules with their 50 seats each, should be enough, let's say 5). I'm considering the idea of designing a "captain's yacht" module (mix of a noble state room module and luxury transport): as the captain of the ship will be both lower rear admiral and count (seems logical to put someone like that in command of such a protocole oriented ship), we don't expect him to arrive at the party in the cargo space of a marine cutter, don't we? What about the other modules? They are 7 left. Some cargo? A medical one?

What about wartime? Troop transport, orbital insertion, marine command, marine firebase, vehicle transport, boarding seem all right to me. But in which ones? How many of each?

 

[BetterThanLife]

Actually the 19 included those left in the Imperial Navy and the remaining ones in Interstellar Scout Service circa 1107. The only other armed AHL class ship was the one belonging to Oberlindes Lines cruising through Vargr space. Of the rest, (According to Supp 5) You still have the Merchant ships with the main armament plated over, (Spinal and bays), there were a few transferred to client states, (two to the Darrians and two to the Vegans) and the balance were scrapped by the Imperial navy as no longer space worthy, or destroyed in action.

Of those 19, 15 were in Naval service 5 were serving in the Marches, 4 in the Solomani Rim, 4 in Gateway and 2 in Capital/Core. The remaining were in the Interstellar Scout service. (Who still had 4.) Two as Exploratory Cruisers and Two as Couriers.) (Locations were not revealed in Supplement 5.) That does leave 19 in Imperial Service. I wasn't counting civilian ships or client navies. (Armed a total of 5 and an additional 10 unarmed.) It also doesn't take into account that the balance of the ships that were scrapped, many were Fleet auxillaries before being scrapped and these were similarily disarmed to the merchant vessels. Did I miss anyone? Oh yeah one of the AHL class that was transferred to the Scouts was captured intact by the Zhodani Consulate, fate unknown.

Originally posted by 313:
Bhoins mechoned that ther where only 19 AHL cruisers left, i think that this figure is out a tad maby their are only 19 still in active imperial service their maby (and most probaly are) others in storage and in service in client state navys and cont forget the "Emissary" the AHL owend by Oberlindes and opperating (with full orignal armerments) in the Varg extents (and who said merchants don't get out and have fun ) so i think that the AHL class would make a grate training ship that could quickily come to good use in war-time.

 

[mike wightman]

And the two that were paid off, fate unknown?

 

[BetterThanLife]

Which two? (I missed something.

)(Is this one of those cases where the new version with the Black Globe generator is used for clandestine services? Though Paid off in Naval terms generally, though not always, implies it was sent to the breakers.

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
And the two that were paid off, fate unknown?

 

[Antony]

Well I have one in the Banners sector which is listed as lost in 1103. Seems to be doing quite well though the AI has recently been rewired so that she actually has to obey overrides.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
Which two? (I missed something.

)(Is this one of those cases where the new version with the Black Globe generator is used for clandestine services? Though Paid off in Naval terms generally, though not always, implies it was sent to the breakers.

The two Frontier Cruisers are the Imperial Sabreur and Argentine Foray - retired or paid off 1085-1105 (no mention as to their eventual fate).

Every ship scrapped is listed as scrapped, why suddenly change the expression to retired or "paid off"?

 

[The Oz]

"Paid off" is the old navy term for decommissioning a ship, referring to (theoretically) paying the crew's accumulated back wages as they leave the ship. It usually implied that the ship was either going to be refitted in a dockyard and then recommissioned with a new crew, or put "into ordinary" which we call putting the ship into mothballs these days.

I would expect that a TRAVELLER ship that was "paid off" would be sent to uncrewed orbital storage, i.e., "in ordinary."

TCS confuses the issue by saying that a ship that is "paid off" is being removed from the navy list and is no longer available for the game. At least they have the concept of "in ordinary" correct.

 

[Vargas]

I realize that this is pretty much trivia, but which two went to the Darrians and which two to the Vegans? Just curious . . .

 

[daryen]

Darrians get theirs in 1012.
6332 Vengeance becomes the Mire
6347 Refulgent Thunderer becomes the Darrian

Vegans get theirs a year later.
6373 Arbitrary Remora becomes the Sudden Star
6393 Incomparable Triumph becomes the Accompanist

 

[Durkin]

Neat idea,
Your concept sparked a few thoughts in the "ol'walnut", perhap's you'd like some RP advice?

I took a look through my Traveller libary. The only a handfull of refitted AHL class cruisers
in the core. most are either "in ordinary" (mothballed) or in service as fleet auxilaries. This actually is exactly the place where such a training ship is in service.

one ship that struck my fancy was the "One Thousand Years". It's name would certianly be signifigant to the crew.

As for mods, I'd keep the ship as stock as possible, perhaps even adding som quarters in leu of cargo space, or else displacing troops or pilots. you would want these young officer cadets to experiance every aspect of how a large ship operates.

Another option is to allow Marine Officers to come on board as "3rd L-Ts" (Read Heinlien's "sar ship troopers") MT allowed naval academy grads to become marine officers. Perhaps the revers is also true?

Anyway's best of luck,