Warship Roles

[flykiller]

Ships could have to allocate agility to either defensive DM or maneuver

's'xactly what I do.

but if you do it that way you'll have to consider range and weapons' effectiveness. if an M3 boat has to jink at A3 to survive then it can't close or run. an M4 boat closing or retreating at M4 has A0, which depending on the ruleset can be rapidly fatal.

the limiting factor here is the loss of agility, which means that once a battle begins vectors tend to remain unchanged. this places a premium on long-range weapons - beams are in, missiles are out. and sand is only useful to an M0 or outgoing ship.

 

[sgbrown]

Originally posted by atpollard:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Scott Martin:
Do people want / expect a role for limited capability attritional combatants (Whether these are "Fighters", "PT Boats", "Gunboats" (AKA "Pinnaces with a 32 Lb Carronade") or "Pink Space Fairys" )

Let me go on record as saying that there will NEVER BE "Pink Space Fairys" In My Traveller Universe!

</font>[/QUOTE]ATp
- I concur - Nix the PSF's

Scott M,
I would expect a role for small spacecraft in combat. Exact nature would be much more of a PT boat / Patrol / Tactical Scout role than an "aircraft" role. Maybe looking more to a WWI style of navy vs WWII or later for parallels.
SGB

 

[atpollard]

Originally posted by SGB - Steve B:
I would expect a role for small spacecraft in combat. Exact nature would be much more of a PT boat / Patrol / Tactical Scout role than an "aircraft" role. Maybe looking more to a WWI style of navy vs WWII or later for parallels.
SGB

Brushing the rules only lightly, a pt boat was fast, lightly armored and its torpedo was able to hurt a "real warship". In HG, a small combat craft (whatever you call it) will probably need a weapon of Factor A power or greater. T5 will need a really big missile or a really small spinal mount to give the attack boat some teeth.

 

[atpollard]

Originally posted by SGB - Steve B:
If you have efficient ECM measures and scrap the notion that huge computers always mean better firing solutions, then lots of fighters with "ship buster" missles or close range fusion guns woul give the game a WWII Naval battle "feel". The fighters would be a lot more like PT boats than airplanes, but other than that....

What EXACTLY do you mean by "scrap the notion that huge computers always mean better firing solutions"? Are you simply proposing that computers not be a DM for attack rolls or do you have something else in mind?

 

[flykiller]

T5 will need a really big missile or a really small spinal mount to give the attack boat some teeth.

and would there be a reason why such a weapon would not be carried by every warship?

 

[robject]

Originally posted by Scott Martin:
Perhaps a more pertinent question would be "What naval era are we trying to emulate?"

IMO Traveller has always struck me as being most consistent with either Napoleonic or WW1 naval doctrine, with CT before spinal mounts being Napoleonic, and after spinal mounts as being more similar to the WW1 (Dreadnaught) era

Scott Martin

Perhaps "naval era per piece of ship"...

Sensors & Comms: Age of Sail
Spinal guns: WW1
Missiles & Torpedoes: WW2?
Agility: Vietnam
Computers: post-9/11

I mean, really...

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by flykiller:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />T5 will need a really big missile or a really small spinal mount to give the attack boat some teeth.

and would there be a reason why such a weapon would not be carried by every warship? </font>[/QUOTE]Even some battleships had torpedo launchers

Back to T5, if the fighter used a short range energy weapon, a one shot meson gun, or a massive torpedo, a capital ship could have the same weapons systems - and lots of them.
But they'd rather carry the longer range bay and spinal weapons that allow them to deal death and destruction at much longer ranges.
Instead of capital ship killing short range weaponry they'd likely carry lots of point defence weapons to try to stop all those fighters, missiles etc.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

Make fighters harder to hit than missiles (they're larger, but more agile and carry ECM gear etc). Now, rather than (or as well as) launching missiles from long range, and risk them being shot down before they reach the target, use fighters to launch them from point blank range.

 

[flykiller]

a really small spinal mount

(laugh) the phrase "a really small 18-inch gun" comes to mind ....

But they'd rather carry the longer range bay and spinal weapons that allow them to deal death and destruction at much longer ranges.
Instead of capital ship killing short range weaponry they'd likely carry lots of point defence weapons to try to stop all those fighters, missiles etc.

well then, at the same cost as a 20k-dton cruiser (say) presumably mounted with some long-range weapons, one could instead build 24 800-dton frigates, each mounted with 8 really small 18-inch guns (as it were). the cruiser has to kill or cripple all 24 frigates before it's safe, while the frigates only have to hit the cruiser once or twice. seems like such a solution would make larger ships outright untenable.

 

[Whipsnade]

Originally posted by flykiller:
(laugh) the phrase "a really small 18-inch gun" comes to mind ...

Fly,

Those steam-driven submarines armed with a single 18-inch gun that Britain tried to build in WW1 immediately came to my mind. They must have come to your's too! :rofl:


Have fun,
Bill

 

[flykiller]

Those steam-driven submarines armed with a single 18-inch gun that Britain tried to build in WW1 immediately came to my mind. They must have come to your's too!

(blink) actually, I had no idea.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_M_class_submarine

 

[Darq666]

Hi folks! My thoughts...

Fighters shouldn't be able to kill capital ships except in vast numbers. If they can why would any Navy bother with capital ships other than carriers?

Ships should be able to kill a ship one class higher then them, that would keep things interesting and provide a use for various classes of ships. A squad of fighters could take out corvettes, transports, supply vesseles and maybe incoming missles. A Couple of Corvettes could maybe take out a destroyer, a couple of destroyers a cruiser and so on.

Smaller ships are cheaper to make and man. That is the main reason they exist - You can't afford to park a capital ship with a crew of 10,000 outside every asteroid...

That said - that the smaller ships have an overall purpose in a Navy AND that in the right application they can affect slightly larger ships, you need the smaller ships to prevent the bad guy from destroying your smaller ships and perhaps your supply chain.

Now defensively a Capital ship should be able to swat a fighter out of the sky at will. relative size difference of a fighter vs a capital ship when compared over distances that space combat would have to happen at would be minimal. Granted a fighter should be able to change heading quicker, but a major heading change for a target at near relativistic distances shouldn't make that a big a difference. Given a fighter is smaller and more nimble than a capital ship, however the ships turrets would be even more nimble.

What will keep smaller ships alive is the big ships are more worried about the other big ships and shouldnt be wasting shots on the little fellers unless they really have nothing better to shoot at, in which case Luke, Han and their friends should run away.

Now though I don't believe a fighter could take out a capital ship, it might be interesting to let them make a capital ship less effective by destroying external sensor arrays, attacking individual turrets (which would be less defended than they main ship hull), communications and landing bays.

 

[Hal]

Thought Experiment time: Let us say for the sake of argument, you have a fighter barrelling down towards your craft. Head on, its profile is such that it presents a target that occupies a 20' diameter cylinder. It has the ability to accelerate towards you at 3G, and jink about at 3G. In one second, how far can it displace itself from shots being fired at it?

First - its frontal area is going to be 314.16 square feet based on the formula of area = pi*r^2 where radius is 1/2 diameter.

Second - area in which the fighter can be is equal to 3x32.16^2 x pi or roughly 28,952.92 square feet. Dividing area of target potential by area of target, you get a roughly 92 potential regions the fighter can be in. This as compared with the fact you have only 10 turrets each firing 3 lasers at the target.

Now, add to the problem that your lasers have to be precisely aimed at the moment of shot as compared with the other batteries involved. Now add to the fact that instead of a 3G circle based on what the Fighter is using at THIS moment, your actual potential area of fire is based on the totality of that fighter's potential region (as he is not going to be nice enough to annouced just how much agility he will be using prior to your taking pot shots at him. So call it 6G's of area that the fighter can displace himself by...

Area of total potential displacement versus actual size of target results in a ratio of:
116,972.7 square feet/314.16 - which is 372.34 times.

This is if you allocated one entire laser battery at the fighter that is coming DEAD on towards you. I didn't even want to get into the prospect of having to allow for deflection shots.

In all, I suspect that if a ship is running away from a target, and it knows that the enemy is trying to at least keep up with them when they use 2 G's worth of acceleration to get away, the firing ship might say "ok, they are likely going to use 2 G's of their manuever drive to keep up with us, or 3G's to close in on us. Tighten your target area accordingly..." Anything beyond that is a matter of rock/paper/scissors as they attempt to guess what is going on.

Size does matter in this game when it comes to trying to hit a target. I'm guessing too, that "accuracy" issues not withstanding, the "To hit" values versus size values really should be dramatically improve where the potential displacement of the target hull is less than its size overall. As potential displacement depends solely upon the manuever drive allocated to agility, larger ships should be easier to hit while smaller ships should be nearly impossible to hit.

 

[sinbadsam]

The defending ship is also masking and unmasking the "point defense" batteries, as the defending ship is maneuvering to make itself a less predictable target. So that means even less time to engage the oncoming targets.

As for the previous iterations of computers and dm's for same, bigger ships are "required" to have larger computers to "run" the ships basic and life support functions. Now would the same computer have excess computer time to devote to fire control.... I would think that a separate computer would be used for fire control solutions under combat conditions.

In previous iterations(MT for one), one could not design a "colonizer" ship that used low births of any quantity, due tech level of the earlier colonizers could not have the needed computer to run the functions of the ship.

I would prefer that T5 not stay in the "rut" of the computer models of previous iterations of Traveller.

As for fighters versus capital ships, yes the fighters more than likely could not cause any major damage to the capital ship, but those "exposed" sensor arrays are a different matter, a blind capital ship is not a threat to anyone.

As for warship types, I have found "Grand Fleet" to have a excellent discussion of the basic ship types and the various functions of such.

 

[Whipsnade]

Hal,

Some thoughts:

- Size is already factored into the 'to hit' roll. A vessel <100dTons gets a -2 drm and <2,000dTons gets a -1 drm while a vessel >20,000 gets a +1 drm and so forth. When you consider that 'to hit' rolls are 2D6 those are healthy drms.

- You cannot equate agility to a gee rating. While agility is limited to your current gee rating, you don't 'install' more m-drive tonnage to gain agility. You install more power plant tonnage.

- Laser turrets are described as firing more than once in any given 20 minute combat turn. Their fire is dealt with as a single volley to simplify game play. TNE modeled RoF modifiers, but TNE also required the player to use a 'slipstick' to keep track of ALL the other modifiers that effected each shot.

- That last bit regarding modifiers is important here. We're dealing with 2D6, that's thirty-six possible outcomes along a 2 to 12 line. BG2 'to-hit' rolls are already heavily modified for things like size, agility, and computer differentials. 'To-penetrate' rolls are modified too, computer differential again and the energy weapon bonus. Then there are the various range mods with no energy weapons at long range, lasers penalized at long range, and missiles penalized at short. IMHO, HG2 combat rolls are already modified enough.

Even if we went to d100 to make more 'room' for possible outcomes, how many additional modifiers do you want to inflict on the players? It isn't the actual adding and subtracting mind you, it's remembering all the applicable adding and subtracting. As much as I liked the ideas in Brilliant Lances, the fact that a 'slipstick' was necessary to keep track of all the diff mods meant the game was burdened with a level of 'detail' that made it nearly unplayable.

I guess the upshot is that you need to let some details slide or model them 'inside' other mechanics.


Have fun,
Bill

 

[aramis]

Size being factored in: yes, but not adequately.

Agility vs Maneuver: Agility is poorly defined (and inconsistently developed) across editions, other than it's combat effects.

Improving agility:

While agility is limited to your current gee rating, you don't 'install' more m-drive tonnage to gain agility. You install more power plant tonnage.

If your agility is equal to the G's of Drive, yes you do....

 

[Scott Martin]

Originally posted by flykiller:
well then, at the same cost as a 20k-dton cruiser (say) presumably mounted with some long-range weapons, one could instead build 24 800-dton frigates, each mounted with 8 really small 18-inch guns (as it were). the cruiser has to kill or cripple all 24 frigates before it's safe, while the frigates only have to hit the cruiser once or twice. seems like such a solution would make larger ships outright untenable.

Well this is where we get into the whole "Warship Roles" part of the discussion. In "knife range" those 24 frigates would be a good bet, but if the light cruiser can keep the range open long enough, it will eat any number of frigates with short ranged frigates for breakfast.

This type of short ranged unit makes sense only in a very limited set of circumstances: where the opponent has no choice but to close to point blank range (the oponnent is invading or atacking a fixed position) or you have some way of getting into close range without getting savaged (really big heavily armoured carriers?)

I just don't see any reason for "capital" units to exclusively arm themselves with weapons that have a lot of punch but no range. Yes, this type of cruiser would be "untenable" in a close ranged engagement with 2 dozen frigates armed exclusively for those circumstances, but on the flip side those same frigates would be in an identically "untenable" position in a closing deep space engagement with said cruiser.

Scott Martin

 

[flykiller]

Yes, this type of cruiser would be "untenable" in a close ranged engagement with 2 dozen frigates armed exclusively for those circumstances, but on the flip side those same frigates would be in an identically "untenable" position in a closing deep space engagement with said cruiser.

well, in a game system with three ranges (long, short, contact, or whatever), just what keeps these frigates from closing with the cruiser? whatever answer is given, it will equally apply to the fighters.

 

[Spiderfish]

Originally posted by flykiller:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />a really small spinal mount

(laugh) the phrase "a really small 18-inch gun" comes to mind ....
</font>[/QUOTE]Actually... If one thinks about it you could have a very small spinal mount, afterall it just has to be part of the vessel's "spine", of course it wouldn't be any more powerful than any other small weapon.

well, in a game system with three ranges (long, short, contact, or whatever), just what keeps these frigates from closing with the cruiser?

The cruiser manoeuvring to keep its distance as best it can and in conjunction with this using it's armament to kill/hurt severely anything which tries to close with it.

 

[flykiller]

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />well, in a game system with three ranges (long, short, contact, or whatever), just what keeps these frigates from closing with the cruiser?

The cruiser manoeuvring to keep its distance as best it can and in conjunction with this using it's armament to kill/hurt severely anything which tries to close with it.</font>[/QUOTE]yes, but could you specify some kind of game mechanic? for example in HG2 the first turn was always at long range, then for each succeeding turn players rolled a die with various modifiers to see who got to choose the range for that turn. what will be the game mechanic here that will determine whether the frigates close with the cruiser or not?