Fighters - they're just too good

[themink]

Once high gaurd came out, each time we wargamed with traveller rules, the Fighter seemed to do remarkably well.

We tried again recently with GURPS and it still kicks arse.

It seemed that they have always been able to swarm the larger ships and give you a good bang for your buck - even if you knock a couple down, the carrier is still there and fighters are quick to build.

The way I ended up justifying larger craft was to improve Nuclear Dampers - otherwise fighter missiles have enough punch to seriously hurt big ships and to downgrade the avionics for cockpits. I also used "external volume" when storing the craft in a carrier - otherwise turrets were too tempting.

Has anyone else had any difficulty with them?

 

[Liam Devlin]

Yes, but only in shooting them down lad!

 

[tjoneslo]

Interestings. We always found fighters, particularly in GT, to be completely useless. The fighter's can't carry weapons large enough to hurt any reasonably armored ship. Unless they are carrying nuke missiles, in which case the dampers and point defense could stop them. And the laser batteries used for missile defense were usually strong enough to kill fighers as well.

 

[phydaux]

Massed missile fire of KKMs seems to be the way to go. Overwhelm point defence with numbers, and it really only takes a 2-3 hits with high Delta Vee missiles.

IMG:TU, we even replaced the nuke warhead with another battery, so missiles could get 6 Space Combat Turns of accel rather than just 3. After 2 hours of 10G acceleration, the missles would swarm in at ~2,000,000 MPH, more if the targets were closing. Just one hit could seriously dammage a Heavy Cruiser.

That's why Space Stations make NO SENSE in Traveller. Sitting Ducks.

 

[Bob Weaver]

Mink,
I'm curious. Against exactly what did fighters "kick arse", and how many did you need? Also, what was your rate of loss for the fighters? High Guard was always pretty hard on small craft in combat, from my experience (since it was written to model massive fleet actions). The reasons why are aptly described by TJoneslo just above. As an example of what I mean, over on the Yahoo CT-Starships list, we batted around a match-up between a lone battleship and an "equivalent cost" mob of fighters. It required around 500 fighters to off 1 battleship, and that was at the cost of almost half the fighters being shot down in round one. The BB, by the way, was a firepower/mobility kill, not destroyed. If it could be towed away, it could be returned to service pretty quickly.

Now, I'm going on memory here, so my numbers may be a little off, but I think you see why I raise the question.

Please let's not turn this into a TML-style flamewar, just a nice friendly discussion.

Thanks,

Bob

 

[gardclan]

I'd be rather interested in this as well. A buddy of mine and I have been playing a hybrid book-2/HG game for a while now. We're using the "fighters are a big battery" rule, which lets 'em get off a good couple of hits, but they tend to go away in a puff of logic as soon as the counterbattery fire comes screaming in.

 

[themink]

Near the end of my traveler lifespan, we tended to play small ship traveller so the Kinunir was an opponent to tough for most everyone it met.

The bulk of combats were between converted Merchants/scouts. True military weapons were a serious advantage (The basic split was that mil craft were all TL12 manufactured nearer the core vs TL10 local craft - many of whom had TL12 "retrofits"

Any time fighters raised their head, they swamped the equivalent dollar value of large mil craft (ie Gazelle) - They put out nearly the same firepower, were harder to hit, more tactically flexible. Any time things went badly they normally had the Accell to pull away and even if they didn;t, splitting up minimised loses.

When we played with large fleets as pure wargame, things were a little different, but that wasn;t where we spent most of our time.

I suppose reducto ad absurdo, local governments should have been fielding 20-30 ton long range fighters in anti-pirate/Coastgaurd role (Yes, we had lot's of pirates/smugglers etc - an effect of allowing people to salvage badly damaged craft - the total hull numbers didn't go down they just spent more time getting fixed up then a connonical game would normally suggest).

I think the issue was that they packed as much punch as a much larger ship(20 ton fighter vs 100 ton Scout), could muster blistering accel and were much harder targets (both from size and agility).

The areas were they lost out (time on station for example) weren;t those that effected us much.

One of the few reasons why I kept justifying Larger craft was the repairability of them - if a large craft takes a couple of hits, it can fix itself given a little time, the fighter squadron abrades. Even in a fight against a weaker opponent, the fighter squadron is quite likely to take a casualty - so the squadron wears out whereas a larger craft can doesn;t wear out until you actually destroy it - the quanta of power reduction is much higher.

Just in case you thing I'm being paranoid about it - on one occassion they went a bucaneering with a free trader that had three launches - each with a laser turret - The orgional rationale was so that each player could have a ship of their own - but it was seriously dangerous to all it's credible opponents (they took down a gazelle when the mother ship couldn't outrun it - my cunning plot line took a sharp turn)

If you carry the Fighter/Aircraft carrier analogy, we were playing in an area where no serious warships went so the helicopter parked on the back of your ship was a credible threat - even if it wasn't a purpose built gunship.

 

[stormcrow]

Any of you guys ever play a PC game called Homeworld? To me this was the best modeling of large fleet battles I have ever seen in a game and really points out that fighters have a LOT of bang, but they go boom too quick.

You create a fleet of 20 bombers vs. 4 frigates.. about the same resources if I remember correctly to build each.. the 20 bombers will take out the 4 frigates, but you will lose most of them in the process (unless you are sneaky).. and of course this assumes they don't have any 'anti-fighter' ships along for the ride such as multi-gun corvettes.. just 2 multi-gun corvettes (lots of point defense type guns, ineffective against anything else) and your 20 fighters are history and all 4 frigates would most likely survive.

Just my $0.02.

-] Crow

 

[tim_manley]

Yeah, I used to play homeworld. You're totally correct -- fighters were bigger bang for the buck, but required you to keep producing them. And, it would get to the point where they'd need escort protection if your target was set to defend against them.

Also, I played a PBEM called Fire on the Suns. Here fighters were an incredible punch, but went pop instantly.

I always measured it against the life expectancy of a fighter pilot and why *anyone* would volunteer for such a suicide mission.....

IMTG I have fighters as 'torpedo boats' mostly. They are useful for getting in, launching all their ordinance, and then trying desperately to get out without getting hit. I figured that anti-missile batteries do just as well against fighters.

We also tended to design fighters that grew larger and larger (in fact, 100 tons for the 'heavy fighter-bomber').

I recall that we made missile rules so that you could design missiles with different aspects -- speed, wearhead power, durations, etc... (ala SFB Drones). So it was possible to have a missile with 32G acceleration but a tiny bang -- these tended to be anti-fighter missiles.

This fit pretty well in our butcher-paper/vector-match combat system where phase 0 was sensor lock, phase 1 was movement, phase 2 was firing and phase 3 was all the other stuff (damage control, communications, etc).

 

[Tom Schoene]

Originally posted by phydaux:
That's why Space Stations make NO SENSE in Traveller. Sitting Ducks.

Militaily, yes, stations are pretty pointless (Though at high TLs, repulsors and sand can fend off small attacks).

For other purposes, space stations are still important. They're like airports, harbors, and oil rigs. They're all vulnerable militarily, but people keep building them becuase they are too valuable in their main functions to not have them.

 

[FlightCommanderSolitude]

Any of you guys ever play a PC game called Homeworld?

Homeworld is a gorgeous game, and the space combat is cool except for the utterly ridiculous way the larger ships decide it's neccessary to move right up against enemy craft in order to attack them. I mean, hey, if you've got a particlar beam weapon, do you really need to be 10 feet away to use it?

I found myself spending a lot of time trying to keep my own ships from doing stupid stuff like that as well. But it's otherwise a very cool game.

 

[stormcrow]

On space stations: Well how big you want it? A one million ton station (think Babylon 5) is gonna take more than a few fighters to make a dent in it..

On the other hand, a 5000 ton station would need to be protected by other ships.. but that is a pretty darn small space station.. perhaps a small science outpost in the middle of nowhere researching local phenomena..

I would think that most high ports would be pretty darn large if they are serving a Mid-intersteller tech world with medium pop or higher.. I would also think such a world if it had high-pop would tend to have large orbital cities at the lagrange points. These would have some armament methinks (although they would rely upon SDBs mostly). A high port would be pretty decently armed.

-] Crow

 

[tjoneslo]

Originally posted by The Mink:
Near the end of my traveler lifespan, we tended to play small ship traveller so the Kinunir was an opponent to tough for most everyone it met.

This is where the difference lies. If YTU is using the Book 2 size limits but with book 5 designs (i.e. 5,000 dtons and 50 turrets max), then yes, a mob of fighters is cabable of easily ovwheliming a "Battleship". The difference is a matter of scale. IYTU the ratio is 50:1 to make parity. In the OTU, the ships can mount the armor to make them invulnerable to the turret weapons.
Use the whole book 5 range of ship sizes and the fighters go from a swarm of deadly fire to a swarm of annoying and ineffective gnats to be put to the torch.

 

[tim_manley]

Well, here are the missile rules we had from back in the 80's.

This is from memory, so bear with me

We used vector math movement rules (per above post)
1 mm = 1 G

Ships start out at set speed determined by game/scenario. This system was used primarily in the role-playing aspect and was up to the GM to set 'releative' velocity.

Missiles have internal space capacity based on their type. Cost was directly related to their type as well (don't have the Cr breakdown....can't remember it).

What you did was to buy the missile chasis and then fill it up with components: engine, burn (fuel), avionics and warhead.

Each turn was the Book2 combat turn (1 minute? -- don't fully recall).

I also allowed engine grouping to increase thrust.

And, a hit was a hit that destroyed or downgraded a component.

Mk-I 6 spaces
Mk-IA 8 spaces
Mk-II 12 spaces
Mk-IIA 14 spaces
Mk-IIB 16 spaces
Mk-III 24 spaces

Engine
L-1 -- 1G
L-2 -- 2G
L-3 -- 3G
L-4 -- 4G
L-5 -- 5G
L-6 -- 6G

Burn
L-1 -- 1T
L-2 -- 2T
L-3 -- 3T
L-4 -- 4T
L-5 -- 5T
L-6 -- 6T

Avioics
L-1 -- direct fire
L-2 -- Ship Controlled
L-3 -- target lock
L-4 -- fire'n'forget

Warhead
L-1 -- 1 hit
L-2 -- 2 hits
L-3 -- 3 hits
L-4 -- 4 hits
L-5 -- 5 hits
L-6 -- 6 hits

So, to build a MkII missile means you had 12 spaces
1 taken up by avionics
8 taken up by 2 4G enignes (for 8G)
1 for 1 turn burn
2 for 2 hit warhead

This means that the target ship had to be within range for this missile to hit it in it's fire turn.

We had missiles go on the fire turn; so ship would move, then you'd fire and missile velocity would be modified (+/-) by ship velocity.

 

[StrikerFan]

Originally posted by tjoneslo:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by The Mink:
Near the end of my traveler lifespan, we tended to play small ship traveller so the Kinunir was an opponent to tough for most everyone it met.

This is where the difference lies. If YTU is using the Book 2 size limits but with book 5 designs (i.e. 5,000 dtons and 50 turrets max), then yes, a mob of fighters is cabable of easily ovwheliming a "Battleship". The difference is a matter of scale. IYTU the ratio is 50:1 to make parity. In the OTU, the ships can mount the armor to make them invulnerable to the turret weapons.
Use the whole book 5 range of ship sizes and the fighters go from a swarm of deadly fire to a swarm of annoying and ineffective gnats to be put to the torch.</font>[/QUOTE]That and the size of computers: HG fighters have a hard time mounting the larger computers needed to even HIT the big ships, who also mount Mod 9/fib computers. Against small, HG DD-size and smaller (a Kinunir is a corvette, approximately), fighters are useful. Against 50,000 dton+ cruisers or larger, they're not very useful, and especially not against 200,000+ ton battleships.

StrikerFan

 

[Capt. Blacklight]

Originally posted by StrikerFan:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by tjoneslo:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by The Mink:
Near the end of my traveler lifespan, we tended to play small ship traveller so the Kinunir was an opponent to tough for most everyone it met.

This is where the difference lies. If YTU is using the Book 2 size limits but with book 5 designs (i.e. 5,000 dtons and 50 turrets max), then yes, a mob of fighters is cabable of easily ovwheliming a "Battleship". The difference is a matter of scale. IYTU the ratio is 50:1 to make parity. In the OTU, the ships can mount the armor to make them invulnerable to the turret weapons.
Use the whole book 5 range of ship sizes and the fighters go from a swarm of deadly fire to a swarm of annoying and ineffective gnats to be put to the torch.</font>[/QUOTE]That and the size of computers: HG fighters have a hard time mounting the larger computers needed to even HIT the big ships, who also mount Mod 9/fib computers. Against small, HG DD-size and smaller (a Kinunir is a corvette, approximately), fighters are useful. Against 50,000 dton+ cruisers or larger, they're not very useful, and especially not against 200,000+ ton battleships.

StrikerFan</font>[/QUOTE]But if you look at FSOTSI you will see that fighters are not really part of the main line of combat. Fighter doctrine calls for use again small craft, fighters and auxilleries. If you get a fighter group in the fleet train it's going to clean house.
What you are going to have to do to use fighters in fleet actions is build Mitchners Task Force 77 or Halsey's Third Fleet. Because, callous and cold blooded as it is, Fighters are cheaper the capital ships.

 

[StrikerFan]

Originally posted by Capt. Blacklight:
But if you look at FSOTSI you will see that fighters are not really part of the main line of combat. Fighter doctrine calls for use again small craft, fighters and auxilleries. If you get a fighter group in the fleet train it's going to clean house.
What you are going to have to do to use fighters in fleet actions is build Mitchners Task Force 77 or Halsey's Third Fleet. Because, callous and cold blooded as it is, Fighters are cheaper the capital ships.

Heh, well, the original poster was talking about High Guard rules, not MegaTraveller (which FSotSI was for). Now, under MegaTraveller rules, fighters were more effective than they were under HG rules (because computers were relatively smaller and less power hungry, and because extremely heavy armor was less common). Anything getting in amongst the auxilliaries would commonly have a field day, anyway.

StrikerFan

 

[Antares Administration]

If I remember correctly, there were two reasons that fighters didn't work well (from a campaign-based resource perspective like "Trillion Credit Squadron" or similar):

a. they're very uncomfortable to man for any extended period of time and have very short operational "legs". Therefore, they really only work when they have a mothership/carrier or operate in orbit, and

b. each fighter requires a pilot. The flight crew on a battleship/rider can be counted on the fingers of two hands, but a hundred fighters require a hundred trained pilots. Then, when you get into battle and loose a large share of your fighters, you've just lost a large share of your trained pilots.

Comments?

Paul Nemeth
AA

 

[Bob Weaver]

The number of trained pilots is a significant consideration if you're playing a Trillion Credit Squadron campaign, or a coherent series of battles, as opposed to a set-piece battle. The published campaign rules (in the TCS book) put specific limits on the number of pilots a squadron can have, which in turn limits the number of hulls that can be built. Also, in a campaign, the attrition rate of fighter pilots would have to have a negative effect on your side's morale (however that's applied). The comparison has flaws, but in ground combat, a unit may break and run if it takes even 10% casualties, and a unit down by 30% can be considered combat ineffective.
Your fighter-jocks may be a little less gung-ho about going out on patrol if they know most of them won't be coming back.

 

[themink]

If you are playing a rule set that places an arbitarily high value on pilots then this vastly reduces the effectiveness of smaller craft.

From a military point of view, a fighter pilot is a reasonably expensive component to create and has a fairly long lead time, so give it a value based on that ie 100,000Cr. It is likely to be negligable compared to the value of the craft itself.

For a campeign game, Fighters can churn off the slips at a huge rate of knots whereas any larger ship has a much longer lead time. They can also be built in much smaller docks.

As for it being uncomfortable to fly - I also disagree - As long as the endurance is limited to 6 hours ish - which means that they do need a carrier somewhere. However 6 hours means you can have "Combat Space Patrols" spreading the detection envelop of the carrier by a huge amount -