MGT Only: Leytenant Shestakov-class Destroyer

[TheDark]

One of the ideas I've been kicking around for a while is using old real-world naval ships as the basis for Traveller designs. I decided to start with something relatively small from the early 20th century, the Imperial Russian Navy's 1906 design for a 605-tonne destroyer (that crept above that tonnage during construction). Actual armament was originally six 75mm guns and three torpedo tubes, although one of the 75mm guns was quickly replaced by a 120mm gun, which is the version I used for this design. This is a 1st edition Mongoose Traveller design, with the Core Rulebook, High Guard, and Trillion Credit Squadron available (but not necessarily all used) for components.

This was built to TL11 to make it slightly inferior to Imperial standard ships. High Guard was used for armament, but none of the advancements for higher TL were applied to systems in order to keep cost down. Someone not on a budget could shrink 7 tons from the M-drive and 12 tons from the torpedo bay, along with adding modifiers to the beam weapons.

In-universe, the original Leytenant Shestakov was armed with just the torpedo bay and two triple pulse laser turrets. Fleet maneuvers showed this was inadequate, as the 600-dTon ship couldn't carry enough reloads for the torpedo bay for sustained combat, and it was quickly reduced to a point defense ship. The turrets were made larger and two more were added along with a particle beam barbette, and a set of five pulse lasers was distributed across the four triple turrets, with the remaining slots filled with sandcasters. There's talk of refitting them again with an armament of a small torpedo bay, 2 particle beam barbettes, and 2 triple turrets each with 1 beam laser and 2 sandcasters, sacrificing 3 tons of sandcaster ammunition to make up the difference in armament volume.

The destroyers are now seen primarily as self-deploying system defense boats, using their Jump engines only to get to their defensive stations. With their fuel processors, they're able to refuel in roughly a week after Jumping, and using Jump fuel for their reactors gives them 10 weeks of endurance maximum (120 tons Jump fuel + 30 tons reactor fuel, 30 tons used per 2 weeks), although they refuel more frequently whenever possible. Their relatively high M-drive acceleration and P-beam barbette usually allow them to dictate the range of engagement against raiders. In the event one somehow winds up in a fleet action, they're intended to hang back at first, using the P-beam to harass opposing light vessels while screening the fleet with sand, then dash in against weakened foes with torpedo runs.

TL11 ​	​	​	Tons​	Price (Cr.)​
Hull​	600 tons​	Hull 10​	​	52,800,000​
​	Streamlined​	Structure 10​	​	​
Armor​	Crystaliron​	4 points​	30​	10,560,000​
Jump Drive​	F​	Jump 2​	35​	60,000,000​
Maneuver Drive​	Q​	Thrust 5​	29​	60,000,000​
Power Plant​	Q​	​	46​	120,000,000​
Bridge​	​	​	20​	3,000,000​
Computer​	Model 2​	​	​	160,000​
Electronics​	Basic Military​	​	2​	1,000,000​
​	​	​	​	​
Weapons​	Hardpoint #1​	Torpedo Bay​	50​	12,000,000​
​	Hardpoint #2​	Particle Barbette​	5​	8,000,000​
​	Hardpoint #3​	Triple Turret (PL, PL, SC)​	1​	2,250,000​
​	Hardpoint #4​	Triple Turret (PL, SC, SC)​	1​	2,000,000​
​	Hardpoint #5​	Triple Turret (PL, SC, SC)​	1​	2,000,000​
​	Hardpoint #6​	Triple Turret (PL, SC, SC)​	1​	2,000,000​
Fuel​	150​	1 Jump-2 and 2 weeks operation​	150​	​
Cargo​	​	​	70​	​
Staterooms​	20​	​	80​	10,000,000​
Low Berths​	0​	​	​	​
​	​	​	​	​
Extras​	Fuel Processors​	40 tons/day​	2​	100,000​
​	Escape Pods​	​	10​	2,000,000​
​	Ship’s Boat​	​	30​	16,000,000​
​	12 Basic Torpedoes​	​	30​	60,000​
​	120 Sandcaster Barrels​	​	6​	60,000​
​	20 Pebble Barrels​	​	1​	10,000​
Software​	Maneuver/0​	​	​	​
​	Fire Control/2​	​	​	4,000,000​
​	Jump Control/2​	​	​	200,000​
​	​	​	​	​
​	​	​	​	​
Maintenance​	​	​	​	36,387​
Life Support​	​	​	​	40,000​
Totals​	​	​	600​	368,200,000​

 

[TheDark]

My design rules (so far) going into this project:

Tonnage is tonnage. A wet navy ship designed to displace 1000 tons should become as close as possible to a 1000 dTon spaceship. Some ships may need their size slightly bolstered in order to have enough hardpoints. Any ships with a size increase probably have a corresponding drop in tech level so that their hull/structure aren't improved.
Generally, guns of under 100mm in size are turrets, 100-200mm are barbettes, and over 200mm are bays. Really small stuff (20mm and under) becomes sandcasters. There's some wiggle room in this if something's a borderline case. I'm also not keeping totally precise counts on sandcasters, but using them to fill in turrets. This is intended to make it so that for beam weapons destroyers have turrets and maybe a barbette or two, cruisers rely on barbettes with turret secondaries, and battlecruisers and battleships have primary bays, probably secondary barbettes, and tertiary turrets.
Torpedoes are torpedoes, not missiles. It changes the feel both because of potential damage and the tonnage needed for torps. Ships don't usually have the same ability to ignore torpedoes that they do with many missiles, but carrying them takes up a lot more volume.
Approximately 5 knots is a point of thrust.

On the rules side, I assumed Maintenance costs include everything above the Extras and the Fuel Processors, Escape Pods, and Ship's Boat in the Extras, but not the ammunition or anything in Software.

 

[whartung]

Tonnage is tonnage. A wet navy ship designed to displace 1000 tons should become as close as possible to a 1000 dTon spaceship.

But the difference is what that tonnage is designed for. Specifically, water ships are as big as they are because they HAVE to be as big as they are. It's simply a a buoyancy thing. There's also the stability (i.e. the keel) and maneuverability in water "thing". Simply, "Ach, ya can't change the laws of physics.".

Consider the Yamato:

I think it's fair to argue that in terms of surface area, there is some "free space" that one might want to bolt another large turret on, or sprinkle around some more smaller guns. I submit that those were left off not because the designers wanted to, but because they had to for some mechanical, physical reason related to having to operate in water.

Also, half of this ship is underwater. There's an entire other half of the ship that can potentially be used for guns and weapons.

"Bristiling" is the term of art.

The overall point being consider what the tonnage is for, it's not necessarily just drag and drop moving a water ship to space.

 

[Grav_Moped]

I think it's fair to argue that in terms of surface area, there is some "free space" that one might want to bolt another large turret on, or sprinkle around some more smaller guns. I submit that those were left off not because the designers wanted to, but because they had to for some mechanical, physical reason related to having to operate in water.

Also, half of this ship is underwater. There's an entire other half of the ship that can potentially be used for guns and weapons.

"Bristiling" is the term of art.

The overall point being consider what the tonnage is for, it's not necessarily just drag and drop moving a water ship to space.

Consider deleting the part below the waterline, then cloning the part above the waterline three times around a triangular prism, warping the fore and aft ends of each inwards, to converge. (This is a 3D take on simply mirroring the upper hull on the waterline, and yes that means bridges and smokestacks in triplicate...)

 

[Hairy Jim DeGriz]

They could do an anime series about a Yamamto in Space @whartung.

 

[mike wightman]

Since you are talking about the real world ship I think you need to look at a cutaway to understand how much space those guns take within the hull.

Back to the OP - I like it

 

[Grav_Moped]

They could do an anime series about a Yamamto in Space @whartung.

Then they could do a revival/remake several years later...

 

[kilemall]

There is a classic Freelance Traveller article comparing real world objects’ size with their translated dtonnage. The article includes wet ships. It’s definitely not 1:1.

 

[coliver988]

From my understanding, nautical tonnage is based on 1 ton is 100 cubic feet. This is 2.831685 cubic meters, and when dividing by 13.5, gives you .2098 Traveller tons per 1 "standard" ton. So simply multiply tonnage by .2098 and you get Traveller displacement.

At least that is what I've been using to translate deck plans I get that have the volume based on tons. My counting squares never matched up, and the guy's 3D program gives him the actual volume. Close enough for me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_register_tonnage

 

[AnotherDilbert]

There are quite a lot of different ways to do ship's tonnage, GRT is just one of them:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonnage#Tonnage_measurements

Make sure you use the right way of converting into a standardised volume. Often the way of defining a "ton" is noted, e.g. 10 000 DWT versus 10 000 GT, two entirely different things...

 

[TheDark]

There is a classic Freelance Traveller article comparing real world objects’ size with their translated dtonnage. The article includes wet ships. It’s definitely not 1:1.

I've read Ken Pick's system a few times and it was part of my inspiration for wanting to use historical ships as a basis for Traveller ships. It's very good at what it does in converting ships from the WW2 to early Cold War era, but it doesn't work for the time frame I'm looking at and the universe I'm trying to build. The largest warships would end up being 4,700 ton New Mexico-class battleships, which could probably work. However, the Leytenant Seydlitz would be limited to 1 weapon mount as a 120-ton ship. His examples for heavily armored ships go from TL4 to TL6, but for unarmored ships he doesn't start until TL6 because the massive growth of unarmored warships during TL4 and TL5 means that if he went back further they would be impossibly tiny - the 1905 Cricket torpedo boats would be ~55 dtons with either four weapons (three torpedo barbettes and a double turret) or 51 tons of weapons (a small torpedo bay and a double turret). Both violate the rules and, while I haven't worked them out, I'm pretty sure both would also be physically impossible within the rules, since I don't think all the other necessary ship systems can be made to fit.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

I agree real ships were very small on the Traveller scale; they didn't have jump drives and fuel requirements to worry about. Making the recreations bigger makes it much easier to put together.

I would scale the guns differently. A bay is something like a dreadnought main turret, or perhaps main gun, not a few torpedo tubes.

A real torpedo tube could be a torpedo barbette.


The destroyers armament would become something like:

Main gun: Particle turret. (give some space for BB secondaries?)
Torpedo tube: Torpedo barbette.
Torpedo tube: Torpedo barbette.
Torpedo tube: Torpedo barbette.
Peashooters: 5 lasers in two turrets (later replaced by another main gun and a sandcaster turret?)


This would allow the HMS Dreadnought to be something like 18000 Dt with 5-10 bays for main armament, 5 torpedo barbettes, and 27 single laser turrets?

 

[TheDark]

For beams, certainly, a bay is something that a battlecruiser or battleship would use. For torpedoes, barbettes are used by preference, but if the 1 hardpoint per 100 tons becomes an issue, then bays become useful for fitting multiple tubes onto a single hardpoint, even though they're woefully inefficient from a tonnage perspective.

For the real-world Shestakov, its 120mm main gun basically is a BB secondary or cruiser primary. The Andrei Pervozvanny-class battleships carried 12 of them (as a tertiary, but they were pre-dreadnoughts with a 12" and 8" primary and secondary, which would probably both be bay weapons if I worked that ship out fully). Shestakov's total armament was the 120mm gun, five 75mm guns, four Maxim machine guns, and the three torpedo tubes. The 75mm guns were battleship tertiaries or cruiser secondaries. To be most accurate, I could remove one turret and have three triple, two with two lasers and a sandcaster and one with one laser and two sandcasters (the other option would be a mix of triples and doubles).

And yes, Dreadnought would be somewhere around 18000 tons with 10 bays (I count barrels when converting naval guns, but that's just personal preference so that weird things like the French quads don't end up being terrible), 27 turret weapons, and 5 torpedo tubes, probably as barbettes since it won't run up against hardpoint limits. The lasers might end up combined into fewer turrets depending on how much space there is for crew, since fewer turrets mean fewer gunners, but without working the ship out I'm not sure if that'll be necessary.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

For beams, certainly, a bay is something that a battlecruiser or battleship would use. For torpedoes, barbettes are used by preference, but if the 1 hardpoint per 100 tons becomes an issue, then bays become useful for fitting multiple tubes onto a single hardpoint, even though they're woefully inefficient from a tonnage perspective.

Quite, the tonnage is a problem. A Bay should represent a major weapon system.

The destroyer should also carry mines, which could be cargo space or additional magazines?

 

[Condottiere]

Mongoose has introduced turret based bay weapons, but require minimum tonnage.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Mongoose has introduced turret based bay weapons, but require minimum tonnage.

Dear God, there is such a thing as too much detail, too many options...

 

[Spinward Flow]

Mongoose has introduced turret based bay weapons, but require minimum tonnage.

Wha ...??

 

[whartung]

The destroyer should also carry mines, which could be cargo space or additional magazines?

Magazines. You don't just toss explosives in to hold. While loader equipment and other such mechanical things may be part of a magazine, the design is also part of the magazine as a space designed to contain explody things. A simple example is the magazine on the M1 tank, there's a dividing blast door and pop off panels to help redirect a potential explosion away from the crew.

I don't know how a magazine would manifest on a large ship, but at a minimum, it probably has a NO SMOKING sign.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Magazines. You don't just toss explosives in to hold.

Yes, but IIRC there is no mechanical difference between the two except the name in MgT1.

 

[kilemall]

Yes, but IIRC there is no mechanical difference between the two except the name in MgT1.

Should be. Most any magazine would have internal bulkheads to limit damage in case of hits.