OTU Only: Fleet Organization

[CliffBates]

Doing something similar and after reading the various threads my idea of a standard Batron settled on

1 x battleship
1 x escort carrier (80 fighters)
3 x fleet escorts
1 x corvette/courier
2 x auxiliaries (1 tanker, 1 other)

the escort carrier's fighters are the local recon
the fleet escorts are "just in case" anti-swarm protection
the corvette/courier is a courier plus any other odd jobs like admiral making courtesy visits on a planet

pulling directly from supplement 9 fighting ships
- escort carrier is the light carrier (29k)
- fleet escorts are either the destroyers (3k) or fleet escorts (5k)

Why are you under powering your BatRon with only 1 capital ship? Again we are talking about the front line Imperial BatRon in a line active Numbered Fleet and not a reserve BatRon unit correct?

If your putting together a line level BatRons, I would recommend that you have the BatRon with:

4 Battleships [2x Kokirrak class and 2x Tigress class)
24 Fleet Escorts (16 with the BBs and 8 screening the Auxiliaries)
2 Couriers
4 Auxiliaries [3 tankers and 1 Auxiliary/Ordinance-Supplies]
[the two Tigresses will give you 60 squadron of 10 heavy fighters]

And thus the BatRon Could be divided into:
4 Combat Division: each with 1 BB and 4 Escorts
2 Fighter Groups (each with 30 squadrons of 10 fighters)
1 Aux Division [In the rear out of combat zone]: 4 Auxiliaries and 8 Escorts screening for them, and the 2 couriers either offer light recon or message to other units.

This is what I would take to be a Line BatRon. Now if your talking about the Unit that part of the Reserve Fleet that each sub-sector has, then of course it would actually not necessarily be a full BatRon present, but only an element of it perhaps one Battle Division, with an attached Courier unit.

Most system unless they are an Amber or a Red (under an Interdict) would not have a full Squadron (esp BatRon or CruRon) operating from it's Navy Base or Patrolling it.

Its late and I need to grade papers tomorrow...

 

[Redcap]

Thanks. Now its there. I perhaps needed to refresh.

Ah. Yes, refreshments. Mine's a pint of Old Thumper, please

 

[Redcap]

Doing something similar and after reading the various threads my idea of a standard Batron settled on

1 x battleship
1 x escort carrier (80 fighters)
3 x fleet escorts
1 x corvette/courier
2 x auxiliaries (1 tanker, 1 other)

the escort carrier's fighters are the local recon
the fleet escorts are "just in case" anti-swarm protection
the corvette/courier is a courier plus any other odd jobs like admiral making courtesy visits on a planet

pulling directly from supplement 9 fighting ships
- escort carrier is the light carrier (29k)
- fleet escorts are either the destroyers (3k) or fleet escorts (5k)

You missed ONE very important note: Flag Squadron.

As opposed to BATtleship SquadRON, CRUiser SquadRON, etc., which are several times larger, to say the least

 

[Condottiere]

As I recall, Tigress squadrons are assigned one per sector, usually split up and deployed where their presence would have the most effect.

 

[CliffBates]

As I recall, Tigress squadrons are assigned one per sector, usually split up and deployed where their presence would have the most effect.

That refers to a full BatRon of 8 Tigresses. Also the date of CT Fighting Ships is arround 1100. One could sed them replacing older TL 14 battleships that have eirher dumped into reserve or mothballed or sold off.

 

[Matt123]

We now have the final version of the 130th's OrBat, which I present for comment, suggestion, and critique

Enjoyed flicking through that thank you. My 2cr is that it is too heavy - a bit contrary to the others, whom otherwise make points I agree with.

My question really is what systems are you waving the flag at that would not be just as impressed by a heavy cruiser. Most situations requiring a BB is likely best dealt with by BBs en-mass. In addition I do not believe BBs should be placed in front of opponents that are not capital ships, BBs should meet other BBs in top condition. Which really leaves regular flag waving. Most navies will be just as intimidated by a 30-50kton cruiser. Perhaps just send a squadron of BB's on navigation exercises every 10 years or so, just to remind them the BB's are real.

PS. My signature includes a link to an online CT Ship Designer. HGS is good, this one is just a different take and enables use in a web browser. They should both generate the same legal ship designs.

 

[Redcap]

That was my original thinking as well, until I read Sector Fleet; it's an eight quid download from Mongoose, so I won't quote rafts of it here. Instead, suffice to say that it's the Sector fleet that has the BBs etc, and who are tasked with meeting the big bad BEMs intent on gobbling up Imperial Citizens (with a glass of Chianti spspspspspsp), leaving the Subsector fleets to deal with those pesky pirates, gun runners, hoodlums, and suchlike.

The key to identifying which is which, is that the Sector Fleets are the 'named' (and MUCH heavier) fleets, and Subsector fleets being the 'numbered' ones.

This said, Admirals do tend to like sitting in big battlewagons (less of the cardboard walls as you find in Corvettes, and that makes them feel more secure, I suppose), so the flagship squadron for the 130th has a BB as the flagship, which most of the time sits, contemplating it's own armour, at Cyril...!

 

[Condottiere]

The Imperium appears to use a hard crust strategy in the Spinward Marches, to discourage open aggression and buy time for reinforcements to arrive from Corridor.

Normal procedure would be to assign second class battleships and colonial cruisers (optimized for independent long endurance cruises) to quiet subsectors.

 

[Redcap]

Granted, but in the wake of the FFW, most BB classes would, as mentioned earlier in the thread, have been redeployed (read: Someone screamed "TEN-SIX! EMPIRE DOWN! BACK-UP! WE NEED BACK-UP!" :rofl to prop up the forces in the Marches; as a result, most nearby named fleets would have been light on the 'heavies' for a few years thereafter, taking a few of the numbered fleets heavies to shore up their own OrBats in the interim. It makes a certain skewed sense, I think

 

[mike wightman]

In the wake of the FFW the Imperium should wake up and design ships to do the job. They should also invest in outsystem bases and empty hex naval bases.

At TL 15 you can stick a jump 1 drive in the equivalent of a battle rider. This allows you the armour/screens and weapons of a much bigger ship because all you are going to use your jump capability for is to run away to the empty hex/outsystem base where a tender should be waiting for true strategic mobility.

Capital ships can be built with bigger jump engines and small internal fuel tanks for a similar reason. Use drop tanks/tenders for strategic mobility, only have enough fuel reserve for an emergency jump if you lose.

 

[Redcap]

Undoubtedly, but think about how long it takes real-world powers to source tenders, award contracts, and finally actually see, new designs for warships - these things have a huge lead-in time scale, so I'd imagine (the 'rebellion' setting not with standing) that the Imperium might start to see new designs by the beginning of maybe 1117 (seven years after the war isn't bad, considering the complexity of a starship), and see them in service by perhaps 1120 or so. YMMV of course

 

[salochin999]

Why are you under powering your BatRon with only 1 capital ship? Again we are talking about the front line Imperial BatRon in a line active Numbered Fleet and not a reserve BatRon unit correct?

I probably shouldn't have called it a Batron. It's my idea of a base capital unit - a capital ship and it's retainers.

If your putting together a line level BatRons, I would recommend that you have the BatRon with:

4 Battleships [2x Kokirrak class and 2x Tigress class)
24 Fleet Escorts (16 with the BBs and 8 screening the Auxiliaries)
2 Couriers
4 Auxiliaries [3 tankers and 1 Auxiliary/Ordinance-Supplies]
[the two Tigresses will give you 60 squadron of 10 heavy fighters]

And thus the BatRon Could be divided into:
4 Combat Division: each with 1 BB and 4 Escorts
2 Fighter Groups (each with 30 squadrons of 10 fighters)
1 Aux Division [In the rear out of combat zone]: 4 Auxiliaries and 8 Escorts screening for them, and the 2 couriers either offer light recon or message to other units.

We're coming at it from the opposite direction.

You have a big list and make separate units out of it whereas mine is the base unit which are then combined to form fleets.

I think the distinction is a result of whether the naval model is seen as "carrier group" vs "ship of the line" which is more or less determined by how critical the escorts are. I'd always seen the HG model as "carrier group" but some of the comments on here have suggested that at least at TL15 escorts become less necessary in which case the model might gradually shift more to ship of the line.

 

[mike wightman]

Undoubtedly, but think about how long it takes real-world powers to source tenders, award contracts, and finally actually see, new designs for warships - these things have a huge lead-in time scale, so I'd imagine (the 'rebellion' setting not with standing) that the Imperium might start to see new designs by the beginning of maybe 1117 (seven years after the war isn't bad, considering the complexity of a starship), and see them in service by perhaps 1120 or so. YMMV of course

I agree.

These lessons are learned IMTU in the run up to the Rebellion era - and one of the reasons that gets so nasty so quickly is TL15 vs TL15 fleet engagements. Refitted post FFW are a lot more capable than pre-FFW fleets despite the TL being the same.

Again IMTU view of things - one of the reasons Norris was so successful in holding on to the domain of deneb was his insistence that the fleets on the frontier were upgraded first - those Zhos are such a threat you know...

I was always fascinated by the line in the description of the TL 15 Atlantic class cruiser that they are being phased out...

 

[CliffBates]

Enjoyed flicking through that thank you. My 2cr is that it is too heavy - a bit contrary to the others, whom otherwise make points I agree with.

My question really is what systems are you waving the flag at that would not be just as impressed by a heavy cruiser. Most situations requiring a BB is likely best dealt with by BBs en-mass. In addition I do not believe BBs should be placed in front of opponents that are not capital ships, BBs should meet other BBs in top condition. Which really leaves regular flag waving. Most navies will be just as intimidated by a 30-50kton cruiser. Perhaps just send a squadron of BB's on navigation exercises every 10 years or so, just to remind them the BB's are real.

PS. My signature includes a link to an online CT Ship Designer. HGS is good, this one is just a different take and enables use in a web browser. They should both generate the same legal ship designs.

I like https://tca-2014-12.herokuapp.com as well. but you need to be online HGS can be used offline. Also the creation of .hgs format files could be intergrated in a battle simulator as the ship data files, when someone who has the skills are bored enough and goes ahead and does it.

 

[CliffBates]

Right, found a ship design program that works under WINE in Ubuntu Linux (YAY!), it's called High Guard Shipyard, available from Downport.com.

I've re-hashed the Vigilance design with it, increased the hull to 1,500dt, borne in mind the comments above regarding Reft jump issues, and here's the output.

Ship: Vigilance
Class: Vigilance
Type: Pursuit Destroyer
Architect: Roger Stenning
Tech Level: 15

USP
         DP-A1467F3-240200-30003-0 MCr 1,138.323 1.5 KTons
Bat Bear             5     5   5   Crew: 81
Bat                  5     5   5   TL: 15

Cargo: 15 Fuel: 705 EP: 105 Agility: 4 Shipboard Security Detail: 2 Marines: 35 Pulse Lasers
Craft: 1 x 30T Ship's Boat
Fuel Treatment: Fuel Scoops and On Board Fuel Purification

Architects Fee: MCr 11.233   Cost in Quantity: MCr 913.658

With Drop Tanks

         DP-A1242F3-240200-30003-0 MCr 1,138.323 2.205 KTons
Bat                  5     5   5   TL: 15
Bat Bear             5     5   5   Crew: 81
Drop Tanks Cost: MCr 0.705

Comments/thoughts?

Hum... I re-read this.. and get rid of the drop tanks.