Specialised Ships

Ben W Bell · May 20, 2003

Okay. I have a list of ship types to do for a TA on Specialised Ships of the Imperial Navy. Have I missed anything off that I'm forgetting about?

Assault Craft
Battle Rider Tenders
Bulk Transports
Combined Fleet Tenders
Command Ships
Fleet Couriers
Fuel Shuttles
Marine Transports
Medical Ships
Mining Ships
Ordnance Transports
Personnel Transports
Prisoner Transports
Prototyping Ships
Repair Ships
Replenishment Transports
Research Ships
Salvage Ships
Search and Rescue Craft
Tankers
Training Ships
Troop Transports
VIP Transports

I'm sure I'm missing something, but can't think what.

Ganidirsii O'Flynn · May 20, 2003

Before I answer Ben, could I kite a couple of questions past you? Pardon me if my ship-geek shows...

1] Are the ships you're discussing specfically Imperial Navy or "in Imperial Service"?

2] Are the ships you're discussing intended to be built to the current TL13 to TL 14 of the Rim War setting, or the 15-16 Imperial Sunset era?

3] Are you going to use the old GDW class-name system or the Rebellion Era "Ships of the Shattered Imperium"?

Thanks,

oldcolt · May 20, 2003

Will there be deck plans for these ships?

Tanuki · May 20, 2003

Originally posted by oldcolt:
Will there be deck plans for these ships?

An interesting list there. I imagine I'll be interested enough to do a deck plan or three.

Don't know if there'll be any in the TA though.

Liam Devlin · May 21, 2003

Ben W Bell (Great Idea for a TA, run with it lad!)

That being said, are ye being redundant with "replenishment ships/Ordnance ships"?
Logistic ships, aye, I agree are needed, but are ye specializing one for materiel, and one for Beans, Bunks, and blankets?

One thing I remember from CT/HG reference, but (alas memory fades where exactly), the Jump-Dock (a jump capable repair drydock-Open frame structure.)?

Ben W Bell · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by Ganidiirsi O'Flynn:
Before I answer Ben, could I kite a couple of questions past you? Pardon me if my ship-geek shows...

1] Are the ships you're discussing specfically Imperial Navy or "in Imperial Service"?

2] Are the ships you're discussing intended to be built to the current TL13 to TL 14 of the Rim War setting, or the 15-16 Imperial Sunset era?

3] Are you going to use the old GDW class-name system or the Rebellion Era "Ships of the Shattered Imperium"?

Thanks,

1. They are actual Imperial Naval vessels, operated by naval personel.

2. Up to the Solomani Rim War era.

3. All my ships have class names rather than just ID Codes, as is Traveller canon other than Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium.

Ben W Bell · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by oldcolt:
Will there be deck plans for these ships?

Sorry. Hadn't planned on it. It will be full enough without deck plans. Maybe a later TA will cover that kind of thing.

Ben W Bell · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by Liam Devlin:
Ben W Bell (Great Idea for a TA, run with it lad!)

That being said, are ye being redundant with "replenishment ships/Ordnance ships"?
Logistic ships, aye, I agree are needed, but are ye specializing one for materiel, and one for Beans, Bunks, and blankets?

When I get round to detailing them chances are they will merge, but I had thought of having ordnance ships being smaller and able to dock with warships during combat and reload their missile supplies on the line.

Originally posted by Liam Devlin:

One thing I remember from CT/HG reference, but (alas memory fades where exactly), the Jump-Dock (a jump capable repair drydock-Open frame structure.)?

Kind of how I'd envisioned some of the repair ships, able to enclose and jump with a smaller ship like a battle rider tender would.

Liam Devlin · May 21, 2003

Hmm smaller munition ships doin the reloading(sand caster/ missile ammo), yeps..KK

The BT- repair ships, Okies! Thanks Ben (thats six agreements..)

Ben W Bell · May 21, 2003

But have I missed anything, or have I covered all bases here?

Liam Devlin · May 21, 2003

Have reviewed yer above list:
Missing
The Jump SHuttle (the clamp on vessel to move SDB from system to system). While not necessarily a "salvage vessel" it could be used to clamp on and JUmp away a damaged 100-1000ktn ship back to say, the repair tender's location...

There ya go!

MJD · May 21, 2003

Intelligence Ships?

Liam Devlin · May 21, 2003

D'OH! the Boss hath gotten that one dead on the nail-head! (Liam the heretic flogs random Orc for forgetting Intel ships!Argh!)

Ben W Bell · May 21, 2003

That's one, though I was always of the impression that the Imperial Navy used the Scout service for most of it's intel, but yes I suppose they would have specialised monitoring and listening ships and the like. I'll add it to the list.

I did have an idea for a giant ship that was basically a massive telescope that had the resolution to sit about a light week outside a system and spy on everything without being seen, but I abandoned it as it didn't seem very Traveller to me.

MJD · May 21, 2003

The Navby has specuialist ELINT and SIGINT ships as well as covert survelliance shps that overlap some Scout funcitons. Scouts do it in general and everyone does it in major wars, but the navy uses theirs for ops where Scouts aren't tasked (ie we're not at war yet,...)

Antares Administration · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by MJD:
The Navby has specuialist ELINT and SIGINT ships as well as covert survelliance shps that overlap some Scout funcitons. Scouts do it in general and everyone does it in major wars, but the navy uses theirs for ops where Scouts aren't tasked (ie we're not at war yet,...)

It's a fine line between whether it's more likely a Navy ship or a Scout ship doing the intel task. I'd suggest the following split:

Scout -
1. Astrophysical intelligence - the futuristic equivalent of an oceanographic vessel, mapping the features and anomolies of space.
2. Sapient Intelligence or 'SAPINT' - Anthropology, sociology that is directed toward sapient species

Navy -
1. Tech Intel - Not a hard and fast NAVY activity, in my books, this is the TECHINT and industrial espionage activity that aims at identifying and ultimately stealing new technologies developed by adversaries.

2. Fleet Intel - This would require a ship capable of monitoring massive amounts of EM noise and analysing the info to identify ships, commanders, fleets, i.e. operational intelligence. Russian trawlers and intelligence ships come to mind.

3. Target Identification, Assessment and Planning - Ships used here would be the equivalent of the U2, or an attack submarine. In fact, one alternative fiction writer, whose name escapes me, had a "sub" that was specifically designed to drift around the solar system, steathily, and gather targeting info while waiting for the order to strike.

I'm sure that there are more, I'll just think about it a bit.

Paul Nemeth
AA

Falkayn · May 21, 2003

Perhaps it's a heretical idea, but what about (Fighter) Carriers? At least at some TLs it makes sense ...

Jame · May 21, 2003

Do you mean very light carriers, if they carry anti-shipping fighters? Well, if it's heretical, I'll love it!

Antares Administration · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by Ben W Bell:

[*]Fuel Shuttles
[*]...
[*]Tankers

I'm sure I'm missing something, but can't think what.

Along the fuel line, what about a refinery vessel, something intended to work with a fleet of Tankers and Fuel Shuttles by acting as a mobile high-capacity refinery.

It's not unlike something I saw on NATO duty. Individual ships drawing fuel directly from the source and processing it takes quite a while, primarily because of the queue while waiting to draw fuel. In a stellar sense, imagine that not all of a fleet would be drawing fuel at one time. Instead, most of the fleet would High Guard for those that are refueling.

But if a 'Tendron' has a Fleet Refiner, the tender could either park itself at the unrefined fuel source, and have tenders ferry refined fuel to a waiting fleet, or split the tenders, with some moving unrefined fuel to the fleet refiner from the source, and others moving refined fuel to the fleet.

Great for parking in those strategic, but undeveloped star systems!

Paul Nemeth
AA

Antares Administration · May 21, 2003

Originally posted by Ben W Bell:

[*]Assault Craft
[*]...
[*]Marine Transports
[*]...
[*]Troop Transports

Here's another one for you. Assault craft takes care of the non-starship interface craft. On the other hand, marine transports and troop transports are essentially the same thing, except that a case can be made that marines can actually operate from one of their ships (i.e. Drop troops). However, the term "transport" traditionally implies "non-tactical".

If that's the case, how about Assault Ships. I can think of two versions:

a. Larger versions would be similar to Fleet Carriers, capable of deploying assault interface craft, assault lighters, and supporting aerospace fighters and gunboats. The modern equivalent would be an Amphibious Assault Ship, like the U.S. Wasp Class, the British Albion class or the Russian Ivan Rogov,
b. Smaller (destroyer or cruiser size) versions would operate like assault landing ships, carrying assault interface craft into harms way, and controlling assault operations. Today's equivalent would be an LSD, or the Russian Ropucha class.

Paul Nemeth
AA

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