Essential characteristics of ship squadrons

[robject]

I've been thinking about Fifth Frontier War and Trillion Credit Squadron, and always wanted something "in between". I want enough detail to differentiate between a variety of ship types without requiring the ship's design. I want to know the essentials, in other words.

My mind changes every month, but today I see these essential characteristics:

• Mission code
• Ship size (could be part of mission code)
• Hull configuration
• Movement rating
• Main weapon type
• Main weapon rating
• Defense rating

Last month I included TL and Jump rating, but I think I can handle them flexibly through setting and modifications. For example, in a Fifth Frontier War setting, typical units may be Jump-4, with select codes being higher or lower. In a similar way attack bonuses can be granted, for example if one side have a proportion of meson gun spines while the other largely lacks meson screens. In short, the effects of TL can be approximated by situation modifiers, rather than counter notations.

Other considerations can be handled in other ways. Carried craft, carried troops, crew strength and expertise, and damage can be stacked on the parent card.

For example, Lightning-class cruisers might be characterized as:

(Medium) Frontier Cruiser (CF)
Unstreamlined
Movement 2
Main weapon: Particle Accelerator
Main weapon rating: N
Defense rating: Basic
+Added on: long legs
+Added on: medium fighter wing

 

[mike wightman]

I'm tempted to remind you of this thread

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=12149

 

[jec10]

Have you had a look at the ship counters for the old Victory Games "Fleet" series of modern naval wargames. They pack quite a bit of information onto a single counter allowing reasonable but not needlessly overwhelming differentiation between classes.

 

[robject]

Have you had a look at the ship counters for the old Victory Games "Fleet" series of modern naval wargames. They pack quite a bit of information onto a single counter allowing reasonable but not needlessly overwhelming differentiation between classes.

Haven't seen these, Jec. I'll google them.

 

[robject]

I'm tempted to remind you of this thread

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=12149

Thank you, I stand reminded.

Take-aways from that thread are:

1. Defense is dependent on lots of things, including ship size, which accounts for damage control.

2. Missile usage must be taken into account.

3. Meson spinal mounts are not instant capital ship killers.

4. Units are conglomerates classed by mission, which implies size, suggests defensive and offensive capability, and so on.


So I want to go further than the ATT-BOM-DEF values from the Traveller boardgames. I think three variables is too abstract.

It seems that there ought to be more than three, but fewer than the USP. For example, I took the Lightning-class Cruisers and started by summarizing them down like so:

1. CF (Frontier Cruiser) 60,000 tons Unstreamlined, BCr 34.
2. Armor value 70
3. Sensor Array
4. 50 x Bay Missile
5. Missile Magazine
6. Big Damper-5
7. Big AM Defense-5
8. Standard Wing Fighters (#80)
9. Spine (PA-N)
A. Jump-5
B. Power-5
C. Maneuver-2
D. Fuel Shuttles (4)
E. 40 x B2 Fusion
F. Big Screen-6

From there I boiled that down to:

1. Mission (Cruiser)
2. Mission Modifier (Frontier)
3. TL
4. Cost (BCr 34)
5. Hull Configuration (silhouette should make this quite clear)
6. Primary (PA Spine) - 1 letter
7. Secondary (Missile bays) - 1 letter
8. Defenses (anti-PA, anti-Meson, anti-Missile, ...) - icons
9. Maneuver ("2G")
A. Jump ("J5")
B. Fighter Wing

And thence to:

1. Mission code
2. Movement rating
3. Main weapon rating
4. Main weapon damage
5. Defense rating
6. Hull configuration
7. Ship length

 

[robject]

In a second exercise, I'll try to render down the Plankwell, starting with the text description rather than the USP.

1. It's a battleship.
2. It's 200,000 tons.
3. It's streamlined.
It has...
4. about 1200 crew.
5., 6., 7. J4 M5, Agility 5.
8. Model/9 fib.
9. Factor-T meson spine.
A. 50 ton missile bays (#80).
B. Adequate beam laser, fusion, and PA turrets.
C. Adequate missile and laser defenses.
D. Nuclear damper-9.
E. Meson screen-3.
F. Armor-10.
G. TL 15

I will make the assumption that size can be generalized into the mission code, and further represented by inflating any values which remain.

Several of these are mostly defensive and at most only tertiary offensives (B-F). Assuming we don't design a ship with particularly attractive defensive gaps (like small ventilation ports into which a fighter could deliver a bomb that would blow us up), then the ship's class and size can represent defensive capability.

Let's deal with crew. A large crew can add to a ship's durability. But it makes sense to simply attribute a large crew to a large ship - in other words, a battleship will have a crew sufficient for battle survivability, to a degree that a cruiser or battle-rider cannot have. Once again the Mission Code is critical to represent the strength of the unit. So drop the crew numbers.

1. BB
2. Streamlined
3. J4
4. M5
5. Agility 5
6. Model/9 fib
7. Factor-T meson spine [primary]
8. Big Pile of missile bays [secondary]
9. TL 15

I might just stop there, but as I noted earlier, jump rating and TL can be gotten at via setting and options.

While we're trashing TL, let's deal with the computer. In High Guard the computer is sooo powerful that it is a primary design consideration: you can't not have the best possible computer. Therefore it has only underscored the advantage of technology. Since we can confer technology advantage externally, the computer model can be part of that, and can go away.

1. BB
2. Streamlined
3. M5
4. Agility 5
5. Meson-T spine [primary]
6. Missile bays [secondary]


Pretty darn close to Fifth Frontier War. How does it differ?

1. The mission code is used in combat. A combat matrix, similar to the one in Mercenary, lists attack/defense DMs based on mission code. This flexibly embeds size and strength (and TL) differences between attacker and defender.

2. Configuration tells us several things about the unit: How difficult it is to cripple the jump drive or the jump grid. If the ship can land, submerge, or enter the atmosphere of a gas giant. If possible, if the sensor signature is smaller.

3. Maneuver = Move.

4. Agility might not be needed, but if turning a large ship is different than moving a large ship, then this value is useful.

5 & 6. Having two offensive weapon ratings might or might not be useful. It might not hurt; I could see that a ship without missile bay secondaries might serve a different purpose than one which has them.

 

[robject]

So if I created a Mercenary-like battle matrix, what would my units be?

Ranked defensively, they are:

C Dreadnought
B Monitor
A Sentinel
9 Battleship
8 Assault
7 Cruiser
6 Defender
5 Frigate
4 Ortillery
3 Escort
2 Corvette
1 Fighter Wing

Ranked offensively, they are:

C Ortillery
B Dreadnought
A Monitor
9 Battleship
8 Sentinel
7 Cruiser
6 Frigate
5 Assault
4 Defender
3 Corvette
2 Escort
1 Fighter Wing

 

[mike wightman]

Some quick thoughts.

Monitor is going to trump.

Ortillery is a mission not a class.

 

[mike wightman]

I would have ship classes vs boats as follows

Monitor - the trump

dreadnaught - heavy battle rider
battleship - battle rider
cruiser - light battle rider
destroyer/escort - heavy SDB

anything less than 1000t

fighters

 

[mike wightman]

Mission depends on weapon configuration or vise versa- remember that bays can be swapped.

Main weapon - add (M) for meson, (P) for PAW and (D) for disintegrator

Bay weapons determine secondary designation - ortillery, assault, battle etc.

TL difference is important to shift results on the combat matrix.

 

[robject]

Mission depends on weapon configuration or vise versa- remember that bays can be swapped.

Main weapon - add (M) for meson, (P) for PAW and (D) for disintegrator

Bay weapons determine secondary designation - ortillery, assault, battle etc.

TL difference is important to shift results on the combat matrix.

I'll take it in the other direction: Mission implies weapon configuration, plus more.

And I'm using Ortillery as a 'Mission' a la T5 p.330... and that does indeed imply weapon configuration.

 

[aramis]

Ship size isn't nearly as important as number of hulls; it can be subsumed into a defense DM, while number of discrete hulls is harder to do so.

 

[McPerth]

For strategic games that include dirtside combat, I'd also add cargo capacity (for tropos. I never liked the FFW approach as to give all the Battle and Cruiser Squadrens the same, as there may be some squadrons that carry more tan others), and I'd dissociate the secondary armament rating and the ground support one (I see the bombardment rating in FFW as englobing both).

It could also be useful a sensor rating it you're going to include dispersed SDBs as a means to find/fight them (though that might add complexity to the game).

Setting dependent factors:

If you think some low jump (because of low TL) ships might carry fuel for more than one jump, it could be included in the jump factor (e.g. bold letter).

Also could be indicated in the jump factor if able to use drop tanks (e.g. those ships with red jump numbers may make a jump and remain fueled if they jumped from a friendly base, where drop tanks are assumed to be available).

 

[Vladika]

For strategic games that include dirtside combat, I'd also add cargo capacity (for tropos. I never liked the FFW approach as to give all the Battle and Cruiser Squadrens the same, as there may be some squadrons that carry more tan others)

Why not just design transport squadrons and "stack" counter tiles?

Setting dependent factors:

If you think some low jump (because of low TL) ships might carry fuel for more than one jump, it could be included in the jump factor (e.g. bold letter).

Also could be indicated in the jump factor if able to use drop tanks (e.g. those ships with red jump numbers may make a jump and remain fueled if they jumped from a friendly base, where drop tanks are assumed to be available).

Both good ideas and wouldn't "crowd" a counter tile with to much extra printed data (after all they are only so big!)

 

[McPerth]

Why not just design transport squadrons and "stack" counter tiles?

Those will also exist, of course, I meant for the transport capability for combat ones (e.g. the Lurenti given in SMC could carry a full marine battalion, while in FFW the 154^th Battle Squadron could carry a full division, as a Battle Squadron it is (IIRC, I don't have books/game handy right now)

Both good ideas and wouldn't "crowd" a counter tile with to much extra printed data (after all they are only so big!)

That was the intent. Glad you like it.