What works? How are ships and vehicles armed?

[AnotherDilbert]

I keep getting wrapped in circles:

It's generally called rock-paper-scissors. There is no single best design or fleet, you can always design a fleet that can beat any specific fleet.

At TL-15 it's, as you have found, a trade-off between meson spinals, particle spinals, and missile bays.
(You can make smaller riders immune to PAs with planetoid hulls, but less armoured meson sleds will chew them up...)

TL-12 is a completely different game: you can choose between armour and agility, you can't have both.

Here you can find the remains of a TCS campaign centered around TL-12, but also a TL-11 and a TL-13 fleet:
https://www.firetree.net/tcs/index.html

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So I seem to be in a spiral of 'If the enemy has X, I should Y, and knowing what an enemy has in a system is absolutely vital to the tactical choices you make about what to bring to a fight.

I would say it's not about having the exact right ship, capable of defeating one specific enemy ship.

It's about having a fleet with a combination of ships that can defeat all other fleets, at least if you have a fleet large enough. You should defend against all attack vectors, at least "good enough"...


Fuel isn't all that serious a problem, you can transfer fuel between ships. It's a long-term attritional problem, unless you have a handy planet or gas giant to refuel from.

 

[mike wightman]

I still maintain that the balanced fleet vs balanced fleet is a silly comparisson.

Build an offensive fleet that has three to five times the credits of the defensive fleet. The offensive fleet must have jump drives to carry the fleet, the defensive fleet doesn't need to be jump equipped. Drop tanks may be used for the jump ship fuel.

 

[Badenov]

Try it and see. Grab a spreadsheet, knock out some ships, contrive a couple of fleets, point them at each other and let the dice fly.

After a few rounds you should have a feeling how it's going to go.

Let us know what you find out.

So, if I had someone I could do that with, I wouldn't be asking here.

It's called TCS = Trillion Credit Squadron, one of the classic Traveller adventures.

Yes, it's been done, many times...

One tournament-winning fleet can be found in JTAS#10.

The TCS tournament fleets don't look very practical to me. They seem weirdly random: TL12, Jump-3, 1G. Who flies that? Why?

It's generally called rock-paper-scissors. There is no single best design or fleet, you can always design a fleet that can beat any specific fleet.

At TL-15 it's, as you have found, a trade-off between meson spinals, particle spinals, and missile bays.
(You can make smaller riders immune to PAs with planetoid hulls, but less armoured meson sleds will chew them up...)

TL-12 is a completely different game: you can choose between armour and agility, you can't have both.

Here you can find the remains of a TCS campaign centered around TL-12, but also a TL-11 and a TL-13 fleet:
https://www.firetree.net/tcs/index.html

Yeah, the rock-paper-scissors thing became apparent to me also. Missile bays can't be stacked up high enough because of the 1 bay per 1000 ton limit, and Nuke Damper 9 making them nearly useless. I can see Missile bays being a factor at lower tech levels.

The Smallest Spinal planetoid SDB I could make was a bit under 40,000T. Cost and mass-wise is wasn't competitive with the 20,000T SDBs, and of course you get only half the weapons, so ignoring missiles and particles, while awesome, doesn't seem to be in the cards.

I would say it's not about having the exact right ship, capable of defeating one specific enemy ship.

It's about having a fleet with a combination of ships that can defeat all other fleets, at least if you have a fleet large enough. You should defend against all attack vectors, at least "good enough"...


Fuel isn't all that serious a problem, you can transfer fuel between ships. It's a long-term attritional problem, unless you have a handy planet or gas giant to refuel from.

Yeah, I'm just trying to work out where the balance is. Fuel isn't a problem if I can tank up after jumping insystem and before engaging their defenses. But I imagine an enemy will try and prevent that if they can, so I don't like to count on it. Transferring fuel to a ship after the fight is fine, if you win the fight. But in the middle of a fight, that's hard.

I still maintain that the balanced fleet vs balanced fleet is a silly comparisson.

Build an offensive fleet that has three to five times the credits of the defensive fleet. The offensive fleet must have jump drives to carry the fleet, the defensive fleet doesn't need to be jump equipped. Drop tanks may be used for the jump ship fuel.

So, this is absolutely the case. Fair fights are for tournaments, warfare should be as unbalanced in your favor as you can make it. That said, I'm still not sure how to compose the fleet to maximize capabilities and shore up any holes.

 

[Spinward Flow]

They seem weirdly random: TL12, Jump-3, 1G. Who flies that? Why?

It creates a bias towards a mix of defenses which removes agility from the design pressures.
You wind up with "lumbering monolith" type craft that have a LOT of weapons and defenses ... so more porcupine than jackrabbit.

 

[whartung]

So, if I had someone I could do that with, I wouldn't be asking here.

Zillions of folks play games solitaire, games vastly more complicated than HG.

HG is pretty much all in the design, once the first round of dice are rolled, the game is almost settled.

Build some fleets, grab some dice, and let fly. See how it goes. With the modern spreadsheets, it doesn't take that long to pound out a combat ship.

The TCS tournament fleets don't look very practical to me. They seem weirdly random: TL12, Jump-3, 1G. Who flies that? Why?

Building against limitations is part of the challenge. Unlimited tech, unlimited budget, a lot of "hard problems" vanish.

Being stuck at TL 12 with ships with no more than AGI 1, ships are gonna get hit -- better design them around that, eh?

Many good ship design games limit tech, notably campaign games. What techs to buy first, random techs, if you get Tech A you can't get Tech B, etc.

I'm sure the German army would have loved to play WW2 without those pesky supply and fuel problems.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So, if I had someone I could do that with, I wouldn't be asking here.

You can do it with yourself, to understand how it works.

The TCS tournament fleets don't look very practical to me. They seem weirdly random: TL12, Jump-3, 1G. Who flies that? Why?

Yes, it's completely arbitrary, but it forces a different designs. It's a minimum, at least it's not always TL-15?

The more interesting part is the campaign, e.g. the Old Islands or the Imperium where different TLs are pitted against each other. A single world has very different priorities from a massive imperium. Building a fleet to fight lower tech fleets is very different to building fleets to fight higher tech.

Yeah, the rock-paper-scissors thing became apparent to me also. Missile bays can't be stacked up high enough because of the 1 bay per 1000 ton limit, and Nuke Damper 9 making them nearly useless. I can see Missile bays being a factor at lower tech levels.

Yes, they are expensive, but spinals are more expensive...
They force the enemy to play honest, otherwise unarmoured (much cheaper) meson riders can be effective. They are also useful to clear out fighters.
They degrade enemy spinals, reducing their hit chances in later turns. PA spinal craft are probably bigger, using less armour, so more vulnerable to missiles.

The Smallest Spinal planetoid SDB I could make was a bit under 40,000T. Cost and mass-wise is wasn't competitive with the 20,000T SDBs, and of course you get only half the weapons, so ignoring missiles and particles, while awesome, doesn't seem to be in the cards.

You don't need all the armour, just enough to avoid size crits from particle spinals, e.g.:

BR-K906D93-G49900-230J9-0     MCr 10 212      19 000 Dton
bearing     H     HH 11                          Crew=204
batteries   H     HH 11                             TL=15
                      Cargo=7 Fuel=2518 EP=2518 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                        7    12 765
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Unstreamlined Custom             K         19 000      
Configuration       Buffered Plane     9          6 650        14
Armour              16                 G          2 090     2 717
                                                             
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     3 230     1 615
Power Plant                           13    1     2 518     7 554
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  2 518      
                                                             
Bridge                                      1       380        95
Computer            m/9                8    1        13       140
                                                             
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          200       400        50
                                                             
Cargo                                                 7      
                                                             
Spinal              Meson J            J    1     1 000       400
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   17        17        17
Single Turret       Plasma             3   17        34        26
Triple Turret       Sand               4   17        17        13
                                                             
Nuclear Damper                         9    1        20        50
Meson Screen                           9    1        40        60
                                                             
Nominal Cost        MCr 12 765,00        Sum:         7    12 765
Class Cost          MCr  2 680,65       Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr 10 212,00                            
                                                             
                                                             
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         204       Engineers    58
                      Low     0                     Gunners    77
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    58
               # Frozen W     0           0          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

Defeats PA spinals, loses to smaller, less armoured meson spinals...

A regular planetoid configuration leads to a smaller and cheaper rider, but offers no defence against mesons, e.g.:

BR-K806G93-G49900-230J9-0      MCr 8 144      11 500 Dton
bearing     H     HH 11                          Crew=163
batteries   H     HH 11                             TL=15
                     Cargo=14 Fuel=1933 EP=1933 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                       14    10 180
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Unstreamlined Custom             K         11 500      
Configuration       Planetoid          8          2 300        10
Armour              16                 G          1 610     2 576
                                                             
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 955       978
Power Plant                           16    1     1 933     5 799
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 933      
                                                             
Bridge                                      1       230        58
Computer            m/9                8    1        13       140
                                                             
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          159       318        40
                                                             
Cargo                                                14      
                                                             
Spinal              Meson J            J    1     1 000       400
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   17        17        17
Single Turret       Plasma             3   17        34        26
Triple Turret       Sand               4   17        17        13
                                                             
Nuclear Damper                         9    1        20        50
Meson Screen                           9    1        40        60
                                                             
Nominal Cost        MCr 10 179,85        Sum:        14    10 180
Class Cost          MCr  2 137,77       Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr  8 143,88                            
                                                             
                                                             
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         163       Engineers    39
                      Low     0                     Gunners    77
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    36
               # Frozen W     0           0          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

Yeah, I'm just trying to work out where the balance is. Fuel isn't a problem if I can tank up after jumping insystem and before engaging their defenses. But I imagine an enemy will try and prevent that if they can, so I don't like to count on it. Transferring fuel to a ship after the fight is fine, if you win the fight. But in the middle of a fight, that's hard.

That is what the reserve is for. Stick a tanker in the reserve, or just transfer fuel between two ships:

TCS, p39:
Streamlined or partially streamlined ships are also capable of refueling from a gas giant during battle. The ship must be part of the reserve during the operation, and if interrupted is considered not refueled. One pass through the gas giant's atmosphere is sufficient to fill all tanks and takes 7 turns. Fuel may be transferred between ships in two turns.

If you are assaulting a fixed position, use drop tanks to arrive with your internal tanks full?

So, this is absolutely the case. Fair fights are for tournaments, warfare should be as unbalanced in your favor as you can make it. That said, I'm still not sure how to compose the fleet to maximize capabilities and shore up any holes.

Build a few fleets with different offensive strategies. Think about how to counter them. Build a few more fleets to defeat the first fleets. Iterate until bored...

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Don't forget about range, and how to control it.

Do you want long range, to hammer the enemy with particle and missiles?
Do you want short range, to let mesons hit a lot more often?

More ships and higher minimum agility decides... Is it worth it to have Agility-2 on your carriers?

 

[Condottiere]

Let me think.

Budget available.

Production lines.

Weapon platforms, the other parts of fire - manoeuvre and protection.

Weapon system customization.

 

[whartung]

I guess the premise is that a tanker can only fuel one ship at a time?

This also doesn't account for fuel shuttles. I would hadwave with that a tanker designed to be fueled by fuel shuttles can transfer from all of them in that 2 turn time frame, otherwise it gets extra crazy.

I'd also say that a Jump tender can refuel all of its riders in 2 turns.

Obviously these are "color" rules not necessarily bound by anything realistic.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

I guess the premise is that a tanker can only fuel one ship at a time?

Undefined, so your guess is as good as any other.

I would be more generous. I would say a large tanker intended to support a CruRon would refuel the entire CruRon at the same time.

 

[mike wightman]

Surely refueling can be at the same rate as fuel is used from drop tanks...

 

[whartung]

Surely refueling can be at the same rate as fuel is used from drop tanks...

Actually, "No".

This is what prevents Fuel Tenders from being like drop tanks.

 

[mike wightman]

So drop tanks can't refuel at the rate of drop tanks...

what stops fuel tenders being like drop tanks is they don't get blown into tiny little bits like drop tanks originally were when dropped. Allowing recoverable drop tanks makes refueling tenders doable.

 

[Grav_Moped]

So drop tanks can't refuel at the rate of drop tanks...

what stops fuel tenders being like drop tanks is they don't get blown into tiny little bits like drop tanks originally were when dropped. Allowing recoverable drop tanks makes refueling tenders doable.

This.
Shredding tanks on ejection cuts each fragment's 100-diameter radius, which kind of makes sense. That said, any fuel tender is going to have at least 10m/sec² acceleration capability, and that'll put the tender outside of either vessel's 100D radius in a matter of seconds*.

Edit 5: Ok, I can't math. Let's try this again. 400Td needle hull Patrol cruiser is 75m long, 100 x that is 7500m.

7.5km takes about 39 seconds to reach at 1G. This shouldn't be a problem. Worst case fuel burn rate during jump is "all jump fuel in 20 minutes(1 turn)" for High Guard. Fuel burn is 5% of all jump fuel used, per minute. So, you need a post-separation buffer of 5% of the jump fuel used in that case and that gives a 50% margin of error... (20 seconds).

 

[Badenov]

You can do it with yourself, to understand how it works.

That's what I've been doing, but I wanted to check my conclusions.

Yes, it's completely arbitrary, but it forces a different designs. It's a minimum, at least it's not always TL-15?

I still don't feel like I have a full handle on TL15, so I haven't moved on yet. Once I have a solid plan, I'll move on to 14 and 13, etc down the line.

The more interesting part is the campaign, e.g. the Old Islands or the Imperium where different TLs are pitted against each other. A single world has very different priorities from a massive imperium. Building a fleet to fight lower tech fleets is very different to building fleets to fight higher tech.

I can see this is the case.

Yes, they are expensive, but spinals are more expensive...
They force the enemy to play honest, otherwise unarmoured (much cheaper) meson riders can be effective. They are also useful to clear out fighters.
They degrade enemy spinals, reducing their hit chances in later turns. PA spinal craft are probably bigger, using less armour, so more vulnerable to missiles.

I agree, and I try to cram in as many missiles as I can, but still keep the size small. Smaller size means I get more spinals with the same budget.

You don't need all the armour, just enough to avoid size crits from particle spinals, e.g.:

I agree, as far as that goes.

<snip>

Defeats PA spinals, loses to smaller, less armoured meson spinals...

It ignores the autocrits from PA Spinals. Still takes plinking damage from the hits. At 19 rolls per hit. That's a lot of weapons worn down and 1 or 2 fuel tank hits.

A regular planetoid configuration leads to a smaller and cheaper rider, but offers no defence against mesons, e.g.:

BR-K806G93-G49900-230J9-0      MCr 8 144      11 500 Dton
bearing     H     HH 11                          Crew=163
batteries   H     HH 11                             TL=15
                     Cargo=14 Fuel=1933 EP=1933 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                       14    10 180
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Unstreamlined Custom             K         11 500    
Configuration       Planetoid          8          2 300        10
Armour              16                 G          1 610     2 576
                                                           
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 955       978
Power Plant                           16    1     1 933     5 799
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 933    
                                                           
Bridge                                      1       230        58
Computer            m/9                8    1        13       140
                                                           
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          159       318        40
                                                           
Cargo                                                14    
                                                           
Spinal              Meson J            J    1     1 000       400
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   17        17        17
Single Turret       Plasma             3   17        34        26
Triple Turret       Sand               4   17        17        13
                                                           
Nuclear Damper                         9    1        20        50
Meson Screen                           9    1        40        60
                                                           
Nominal Cost        MCr 10 179,85        Sum:        14    10 180
Class Cost          MCr  2 137,77       Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr  8 143,88                          
                                                           
                                                           
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         163       Engineers    39
                      Low     0                     Gunners    77
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    36
               # Frozen W     0           0          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

That is what the reserve is for. Stick a tanker in the reserve, or just transfer fuel between two ships:

The Meson J is a decent weapon on the first volley, but it's quickly degraded and it's not as sure of a kill as the N. As far as the field refuelling, I hadn't gotten that deep into TCS that says you can refuel so quickly. I'm used to MgT1, where skimming from a gas giant is a 1-6 hour evolution. If refuelling is that fast, arriving with tanks topped off is no longer an issue.

If you are assaulting a fixed position, use drop tanks to arrive with your internal tanks full?

If they let you, absolutely.

Build a few fleets with different offensive strategies. Think about how to counter them. Build a few more fleets to defeat the first fleets. Iterate until bored...

That's what I've been doing, but as I said, I wanted to check my conclusions. Nothing seems particuarly effective if I divide my fleet up, but I don't really understand planned use cases, I suppose. In my headcanon, I've been imagining response to a Zhodani incursion, which itself is mostly imaginary at this point.



With regard to tankers, if I can afford to bring extra tonnage, I'd rather bring ships that can hit.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Edit 5: Ok, I can't math. Let's try this again. 400Td needle hull Patrol cruiser is 75m long, 100 x that is 7500m.

7.5km takes about 39 seconds to reach at 1G. This shouldn't be a problem. Worst case fuel burn rate during jump is "all jump fuel in 20 minutes(1 turn)" for High Guard. Fuel burn is 5% of all jump fuel used, per minute. So, you need a post-separation buffer of 5% of the jump fuel used in that case and that gives a 50% margin of error... (20 seconds).

Enough editing, let's have at this again for clarity.

LBB5 jump fuel burn rates are that 5% of jump fuel is burned per minute if jump can happen in 1 turn (that is, if Pn=2Jn); half that if it takes 2 turns (Pn=Jn). Assume that since you need, say, 40 seconds to be sure the fuel tender gets away, and add a 50% margin for error (20 seconds)

5% of 10% (10% is the fuel needed for J1) is 0.5% of ship's Td per Jn. As long as you have that margin on board (which is arguably present by default even using HG powerplant fuel allocations), this should work. Otherwise, add 0.5% tonnage * Jn to fuel allocation and we're good.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

That's what I've been doing, but I wanted to check my conclusions.

OK, I would say your conclusions are sound.

I agree, and I try to cram in as many missiles as I can, but still keep the size small. Smaller size means I get more spinals with the same budget.

Yes, that is probably the right call. Missiles gets much more important at lower TLs.

It ignores the autocrits from PA Spinals. Still takes plinking damage from the hits. At 19 rolls per hit. That's a lot of weapons worn down and 1 or 2 fuel tank hits.

Agreed, 19 hits at 7/36 weapon hits and 3/36 fuel hits is average ~3.7 weapon hits and ~1.6 fuel hits. Essentially the spinal is degraded one step, that's all. And it can be repaired in a few rounds.

The Meson J is a decent weapon on the first volley, but it's quickly degraded and it's not as sure of a kill as the N.

Agreed, but you get more of them, so you get more hulls for the same cost, so you can absorb more damage... And decide the range more often.
It's not a trivial choice.

As a general point, I would say compare ships, not individual components.

E.g. MesJ rider vs MesN rider:

BR-G106M93-F49900-250J9-0      MCr 7 736       7 500 Dton
bearing     H     HH 11                          Crew=142
batteries   H     HH 11                             TL=15
               Low=18 Cargo=9 Fuel=1638 EP=1638 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                        9     9 670
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Streamlined   Custom             G          7 500        
Configuration       Needle/Wedge       1                      900
Scoops              Streamlined                                 8
Armour              15                 F          1 200     2 160
                                                               
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 275       638
Power Plant                           21    1     1 638     4 914
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 638        
Purifier                                    1        25         0
                                                               
Bridge                                      1       150        38
Computer            m/9                9    2        26       280
                                                               
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          138       276        35
Low Berths                                 18         9         1
                                                               
Cargo                                                 9        
                                                               
Spinal              Meson J            J    1     1 000       400
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   17        17        17
Single Turret       Fusion             5   17        34        34
Triple Turret       Sand               4   17        17        13
                                                               
Nuclear Damper                         9    2        40       100
Meson Screen                           9    2        80       120
                                                               
Nominal Cost        MCr 9 670,40         Sum:         9     9 670
Class Cost          MCr 2 030,78        Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr 7 736,32                                
                                                               
                                                               
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         142       Engineers    30
                      Low     0                     Gunners    77
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    24
               # Frozen W     1          18          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

BR-K106K93-F49900-250N9-0      MCr 9 768      10 200 Dton
bearing     M     MM 11                          Crew=179
batteries   M     MM 11                             TL=15
          Low=17 Cargo=24 Fuel=1960,6 EP=1960,6 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                       25    12 210
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Streamlined   Custom             K         10 200        
Configuration       Needle/Wedge       1                    1 224
Scoops              Streamlined                                10
Armour              15                 F          1 632     2 938
                                                               
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 734       867
Power Plant                           19    1     1 961     5 882
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 961        
Purifier                                    1        29         0
                                                               
Bridge                                      1       204        51
Computer            m/9                9    2        26       280
                                                               
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          175       350        44
Low Berths                                 17         9         1
                                                               
Cargo                                                25        
                                                               
Spinal              Meson N            N    1     2 000       600
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   21        21        21
Single Turret       Fusion             5   21        42        42
Triple Turret       Sand               4   21        21        16
                                                               
Nuclear Damper                         9    2        40       100
Meson Screen                           9    2        80       120
                                                               
Nominal Cost        MCr 12 209,74        Sum:        25    12 210
Class Cost          MCr  2 564,05       Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr  9 767,79                              
                                                               
                                                               
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         179       Engineers    37
                      Low     0                     Gunners    99
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    32
               # Frozen W     1          17          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

As we only get ~1.3 small riders for the cost of a larger rider, i.e. 13 vs 10, it's a foregone conclusion. The larger rider is also more resistant to particle spinals.

If you want all the armour of a planetoid, the J gun is the only way to keep under size L and a DM+1 to hit, so it's a different scenario.

That's what I've been doing, but as I said, I wanted to check my conclusions. Nothing seems particuarly effective if I divide my fleet up, but I don't really understand planned use cases, I suppose. In my headcanon, I've been imagining response to a Zhodani incursion, which itself is mostly imaginary at this point.

The Zho are TL-14, that is a massive difference. With smaller screens and a bonus to penetrate you might want more smaller missile batteries. Smaller mesons penetrate less badly, so might be preferable.

With regard to tankers, if I can afford to bring extra tonnage, I'd rather bring ships that can hit.

Generally agreed, but any ship can be a tanker, e.g. the tender.

There are a few systems with neither gas giants nor usable water, where dedicated tankers might come in handy. IIRC, that is a factor for the Zho invasion of the Spinward Marches.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

LBB5 jump fuel burn rates are that 5% of jump fuel is burned per minute if jump can happen in 1 turn (that is, if Pn=2Jn); half that if it takes 2 turns (Pn=Jn). Assume that since you need, say, 40 seconds to be sure the fuel tender gets away, and add a 50% margin for error (20 seconds)

One difference is that this isn't a dedicated high-speed drop tank connection, it's any ship refuelling any other ship, even from a different navy.

I.e. something like tossing a generic hose and start pumping, very different from a drop tank...

 

[Badenov]

OK, I would say your conclusions are sound.

Glad I got part of it right.

Yes, that is probably the right call. Missiles gets much more important at lower TLs.

I am beginning to see.

Agreed, 19 hits at 7/36 weapon hits and 3/36 fuel hits is average ~3.7 weapon hits and ~1.6 fuel hits. Essentially the spinal is degraded one step, that's all. And it can be repaired in a few rounds.

I thought the weps degraded about 3 steps each, I must have counted wrong. Still, repair isn't guaranteed, and even a few rounds of degraded is good.

Agreed, but you get more of them, so you get more hulls for the same cost, so you can absorb more damage... And decide the range more often.
It's not a trivial choice.

As a general point, I would say compare ships, not individual components.

I've been doing that as much as I can, but the spinal is so intimately tied with the overall ship. As to 7 Meson N's to 10 Meson J's, that's a tough call, that's pretty close to even in my book. But I think I would prefer the N's because they hit harder and take that much more damage to wear them down.

E.g. MesJ rider vs MesN rider:

BR-G106M93-F49900-250J9-0      MCr 7 736       7 500 Dton
bearing     H     HH 11                          Crew=142
batteries   H     HH 11                             TL=15
               Low=18 Cargo=9 Fuel=1638 EP=1638 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                        9     9 670
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Streamlined   Custom             G          7 500       
Configuration       Needle/Wedge       1                      900
Scoops              Streamlined                                 8
Armour              15                 F          1 200     2 160
                                                              
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 275       638
Power Plant                           21    1     1 638     4 914
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 638       
Purifier                                    1        25         0
                                                              
Bridge                                      1       150        38
Computer            m/9                9    2        26       280
                                                              
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          138       276        35
Low Berths                                 18         9         1
                                                              
Cargo                                                 9       
                                                              
Spinal              Meson J            J    1     1 000       400
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   17        17        17
Single Turret       Fusion             5   17        34        34
Triple Turret       Sand               4   17        17        13
                                                              
Nuclear Damper                         9    2        40       100
Meson Screen                           9    2        80       120
                                                              
Nominal Cost        MCr 9 670,40         Sum:         9     9 670
Class Cost          MCr 2 030,78        Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr 7 736,32                               
                                                              
                                                              
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         142       Engineers    30
                      Low     0                     Gunners    77
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    24
               # Frozen W     1          18          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

BR-K106K93-F49900-250N9-0      MCr 9 768      10 200 Dton
bearing     M     MM 11                          Crew=179
batteries   M     MM 11                             TL=15
          Low=17 Cargo=24 Fuel=1960,6 EP=1960,6 Agility=6

Spoiler:

Dual Occupancy                                       25    12 210
                                     USP    #      Dton      Cost
Hull, Streamlined   Custom             K         10 200       
Configuration       Needle/Wedge       1                    1 224
Scoops              Streamlined                                10
Armour              15                 F          1 632     2 938
                                                              
Manoeuvre D                            6    1     1 734       867
Power Plant                           19    1     1 961     5 882
Fuel, #J, #weeks    J-0, 4 weeks                  1 961       
Purifier                                    1        29         0
                                                              
Bridge                                      1       204        51
Computer            m/9                9    2        26       280
                                                              
Staterooms                                  4        16         2
Staterooms, Half                          175       350        44
Low Berths                                 17         9         1
                                                              
Cargo                                                25       
                                                              
Spinal              Meson N            N    1     2 000       600
Bay                 Missile, 50 t      9    1        50        13
Single Turret       Beam               2   21        21        21
Single Turret       Fusion             5   21        42        42
Triple Turret       Sand               4   21        21        16
                                                              
Nuclear Damper                         9    2        40       100
Meson Screen                           9    2        80       120
                                                              
Nominal Cost        MCr 12 209,74        Sum:        25    12 210
Class Cost          MCr  2 564,05       Valid        ≥0        ≥0
Ship Cost           MCr  9 767,79                             
                                                              
                                                              
Crew &               High     0        Crew          Bridge    11
Passengers            Mid     0         179       Engineers    37
                      Low     0                     Gunners    99
                 Extra SR     0      Frozen         Service    32
               # Frozen W     1          17          Flight     0
                  Marines     0                     Marines     0

As we only get ~1.3 small riders for the cost of a larger rider, i.e. 13 vs 10, it's a foregone conclusion. The larger rider is also more resistant to particle spinals.

If you want all the armour of a planetoid, the J gun is the only way to keep under size L and a DM+1 to hit, so it's a different scenario.

So you can put a Buf Planetoid SDB together at 40,000T with Meson N. It wades through missile boats and laughs very hard at particle spinals. Obviously Meson spinals are the achilles heel, but with agility 6, it's not a sitting duck.

The Zho are TL-14, that is a massive difference. With smaller screens and a bonus to penetrate you might want more smaller missile batteries. Smaller mesons penetrate less badly, so might be preferable.

Yeah, as I said, I haven't looked very far down that rabbit hole. I'm just trying to put together a solid fleet.

Generally agreed, but any ship can be a tanker, e.g. the tender.

There are a few systems with neither gas giants nor usable water, where dedicated tankers might come in handy. IIRC, that is a factor for the Zho invasion of the Spinward Marches.

I am now working out how much fuel my fleets would need to carry with them. Logistics always ties me up.