Starship weapons

[boomslang]

I'm not familiar with beltsrike, so what is the mdrive based meteor shielding like?

It's great!



More to the point, it is one of the most useful little background handwaves in the canon: we are told as part of the scenario setting in Beltstrike that operating m-drives create a micrometeroid and cosmic ray shield around the vessel; this shield is not enough to stop much of anything bigger than space dust or sandcaster particles and certainly provides little defense against heavy radiation, but it does keep incidental space junk from beating up on the hull...

 

[aramis]

it's also major handwavium, Boomslang.

 

[boomslang]

it's also major handwavium, Boomslang.

And a credulity-straining thing like the equally-canonical "bonded superdense" is somehow plausible by comparison?

:nonono:

I figure that it is simply a corollary of the general handwavium that is the wonder of gravitics: electricity goes into a black box, and a steerable field of reactionless thrust comes out. C'mon, every schoolchild knows how air/rafts fly; then simply extend the drive field out to the surface of the spacecraft hull, and you have your (again, canonical) inertial dampening field.

But that's OK; there are still players out there who merrily scorch the paint job off their hulls every time they make entry interface to atmo because they don't fully grasp the workings and implications of gravitics technology... so it's par for the course. Either way, it takes a full-on repulsor to swat an intact missile; the m-drive's shielding effect is only for the small stuff (and in practice, the cosmic rays are the more persistent threat). And a flock of shrapnel is too much to be deflected...

 

[Zparkz]

the standard is, per SS3, 10cm diameter, 1m long, 50kg. roughly 7.9L, specific gravity about 6. (which, realistically, means they are about 2x to 3x as dense as a chemical rocket should be.)

As I never have played CT space combat. What ranges and durations do these missiles have?
I as becuase I think a missile at the size of a stinger hardly would work at multiple thousands of kilometers Traveller space combat traditionally have had since MT at least.

 

[Trent]

As I never have played CT space combat. What ranges and durations do these missiles have?
I as becuase I think a missile at the size of a stinger hardly would work at multiple thousands of kilometers Traveller space combat traditionally have had since MT at least.

Well, do recall that in space no one can hear you scream, and missiles don;t have to overcome gravity or atmospheric resistance.

So a stinger class missile could have a hell of a lot more range in space.

BTW, could people not get nasty over which parts of traveller are less made up than others? All I need is for a flame war to break out over a question I asked and the some damn mod to blame me for it. (I seem to have mods as a class enemy. Don't think I got any points for it though.)

As to the drive/shield thingie, I developed that idea in some SF I wanted to write, it was about spatial distortion technology, and how ship[s created a "levity" field behind them, an outward curve of space that was the exact opposite of gravity, and as a result the ship "fell" downhill away from the center of the effect behind them, producing some good speed without G stress.

At first it was considered to create a gravitic field ahead of the ship and fall towards the bottom, but this attracted micrometors and other unpleasant things. The outward curve behind the ship tended to drive away dust motes and the link.

And I still think that fusion engines would work for missiles. Hell, in traveller fusion power is used on everything as is. Just have a fusion core with an open end, run in some liquid hydrogen and leave an opening at the back of the field for the superhot helium to excape and WHOOSH! High thrust, low duration drive, just like god intended for missiles to have.

 

[aramis]

As I never have played CT space combat. What ranges and durations do these missiles have?
I as becuase I think a missile at the size of a stinger hardly would work at multiple thousands of kilometers Traveller space combat traditionally have had since MT at least.

6G for 3 turns of thrust, typically, tho' it varies.

 

[szurkey]

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[Theophilus]

I think someone has been reading my mind as I was going to ask this very question when I came off vacation.

I did some calculations on missile size based on information given in classic traveller, striker and TNE.

In classinc traveller missiles are given two diameters 150mm and 250mm. classic traveller say's missiles are cannistered at 1 meter length. so they are about the size of man portable missiles (as has been previously posted).

In TNE missiles are said to be one half displacement ton. If we use this and have a missile 15cm in diameter I calculate a length of over 300 meters for one missile. Obviously wrong.

The next question is what is the length to diameter ratio? I used 6.6 to 1 to get a missile 1 meter in diameter and six meters long. this displaces one half ton.

Now, some real world missiles. What is the diameter of the SM3 block II (14 inches/35.6cm)
The SM3 Block IIb is said to be 21 inches in diameter (53.3cm), these are closer to TNE missiles than the Hellfire/Milan/Sidewinder.

 

[Zparkz]

Missiles, like lasers in Traveller are very different from version to version. In MT if I am not wrong each missile is 100 liters (I don't have the books here with me so I can't check).

And why do space missiles need to be long? There is no drag to fight, so it may be short and stubby. At home I have a spreadsheet to construct TNE missiles where I also calculate the dimensions using the ratio diameter to length of 1 to 5 or there about.

Personally I have a hard time to bend my head around a missile at the size of a stinger thatr can accellerate with 6g over 1 to 1.5 hour. The smallest missile I managed to put a HePLar on was 0.055DT (770liters) at TL 15 using FF&S.

 

[szurkey]

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[szurkey]

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[G. Fieendish]

It depends on which SLBM you are using...
For example...
Missile: R-39 (SS-N-20 Sturgeon)
Country: Russia
No Of Stages: 2
Length: 16 Metres
Diameter: 2.4 Meters (Stage 1), 2.3 Meters (Stage 2)
Mass (Non Displacement): 84 Metric Tonnes (84,000 Kg)
Payload: Up to 10x100Kt warheads
or
Missile: Trident D-5
Country: United States
No of Stages: 2
Length: 13.42 Metres
Diameter: 2.11 Meters (Stage 1) 2.10 Meters (Stage 2)
Mass (Non Displacement) 60 Metric Tonnes (60,000 Kg)
Payload: Up to 14xW series warheads...

 

[veltyen]

It depends on which SLBM you are using...
For example...
Missile: R-39 (SS-N-20 Sturgeon)
Country: Russia
No Of Stages: 2
Length: 16 Metres
Diameter: 2.4 Meters (Stage 1), 2.3 Meters (Stage 2)
Mass (Non Displacement): 84 Metric Tonnes (84,000 Kg)
Payload: Up to 10x100Kt warheads
or
Missile: Trident D-5
Country: United States
No of Stages: 2
Length: 13.42 Metres
Diameter: 2.11 Meters (Stage 1) 2.10 Meters (Stage 2)
Mass (Non Displacement) 60 Metric Tonnes (60,000 Kg)
Payload: Up to 14xW series warheads...

Thanks for the numbers Fieendish.

dTon approximation
Sturgeon:
approx 18x3x3 = 12 dTon without any packing density minimisation
approx 2.5m tube 16m long = ~6 dTon but any sane storage system would require more space.

Trident:
approx 15x3x3 = 10 dTon
approx 2.2m tube 13.5m long = ~4 dTon
(same caveats as above)

Hmmm. Not bad sizes for missile bay weapons.

 

[BlackBat242]

Actually, a short stubby missile would have a better agility in a vacuum than a long thin one... the shorter length means that there is less inertia to overcome to make the missile body change orientation, and the long thin body will be weaker structurally... there will be greater bending forces to overcome.

 

[Zparkz]

In TNE a three ton turret has about the same height/lenght as the deck height. So a missile needs to fit inside a turret.
I never really understood in MT how many missiles a turret could hold beside the one missile in the launcher. When I think about it, it is very little I understood of the missiles and starship combat in MT.

 

[aramis]

In TNE a three ton turret has about the same height/lenght as the deck height. So a missile needs to fit inside a turret.
I never really understood in MT how many missiles a turret could hold beside the one missile in the launcher. When I think about it, it is very little I understood of the missiles and starship combat in MT.

MT ship combat is just HG using the task system.

 

[szurkey]

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