2300 Rocinante project

[tytalan]

So I’m working on making the Rocinante from the Expanse in 2300. It’s going to be a shutterwarp ship but my goal is a reasonable version of the ship. In the series it’s classified as a Frigate which i think would work well. So here’s my starting point
TL 12 military
Hull 300 dt, composite space frame: Armor 12 pt (-18 dt), Advance, Radiation Shielded, Stealth.
Here’s the first question drive I’m thinking a Advance Nuclear OMS drive what’s everyone thoughts on this

 

[boggo2300]

I thought it was an MCRN Corvette

 

[Condottiere]

The Corvette-class light frigate[1] is a class operated by the Martian Congressional Republic Navy (MCRN).

The most widely known ship of this class was originally called the MCRN Tachi and was carried in the main hangar bay of the MCRN Donnager. Later, after surviving the attack on the Donnager, this same ship was renamed Rocinante by her new captain, James Holden.


I admit I'm also guilty of deliberately screwing with, and double entendreing, class names.

 

[boggo2300]

The Corvette-class light frigate[1] is a class operated by the Martian Congressional Republic Navy (MCRN).

The most widely known ship of this class was originally called the MCRN Tachi and was carried in the main hangar bay of the MCRN Donnager. Later, after surviving the attack on the Donnager, this same ship was renamed Rocinante by her new captain, James Holden.


I admit I'm also guilty of deliberately screwing with, and double entendreing, class names.

if thats the case, I'll yell at James on Bluesky

 

[Condottiere]

Normally, you wouldn't want a dreadnought to sink.

 

[boggo2300]

Normally, you wouldn't want a dreadnought to sink.

submerge<> sink

Submarines also sink, usually with very few to no survivors....

 

[Takei]

So I’m working on making the Rocinante from the Expanse in 2300. It’s going to be a shutterwarp ship but my goal is a reasonable version of the ship. In the series it’s classified as a Frigate which i think would work well. So here’s my starting point
TL 12 military
Hull 300 dt, composite space frame: Armor 12 pt (-18 dt), Advance, Radiation Shielded, Stealth.
Here’s the first question drive I’m thinking a Advance Nuclear OMS drive what’s everyone thoughts on this

My back of a fag packet calculation put it closer to 400 dT.
A quick Google shows the Roci to be about 46m long and from various pictures seems to be about four times longer than it is wide:
11,5 x 11,5 x 46 =6 083,5m3 / 14 =434,536 m³
The grognard in me likes 400 dT as it's the classic SDB size, which also seems to be close to MCRN Tachi's role

 

[tytalan]

My back of a fag packet calculation put it closer to 400 dT.
A quick Google shows the Roci to be about 46m long and from various pictures seems to be about four times longer than it is wide:
11,5 x 11,5 x 46 =6 083,5m3 / 14 =434,536 m³
The grognard in me likes 400 dT as it's the classic SDB size, which also seems to be close to MCRN Tachi's role

It’s also only supposed to have a crew of 20 including its 6 marines. Also it’s only a SDB because in the series they don’t have a real FTL and I definitely am expecting this one to have more than just system legs. Though I do agree that 400 dt might be a viable option I also want to keep the crew down to the 20 if possible.

 

[Bryn the 2300AD guy]

A post of mine from the facebook group from 2021:

I got to watch the latest season of The Expanse the other day, because the previous occupant of our holiday flat didn't log out of Amazon. It got me thinking, in 2300AD terms what sort of ship is the Roccinate?

Scaling of Expanse ships matches 2k3 pretty well, with PDC numbers being in the same range as 2k3 turrets. Expanse battleships have 40-60 PDC's (the Donnager class having the most at 59), whilst torpedo boats and patrol ships have 2. The Roccinate has 6 PDC's, which would equate to 6 lasers.

The number of torpedoes on Expanse ships is a little nebulous. The Roccinate has magazine space for 20, and can fire a pair at once from a side mounted single launcher, of whch she has two (4 torps per max. salvo on screen). The "heavy frigate" has 40. When Donnager took on the stealth ships, she launched 20 torpedoes at them from her 6 very large launchers. The stealth ships fired 2 torpedoes each in every encounter.

The converted belter ships fired many more torpedoes, but it should be noted they weren't Epstein drive torpedoes (cf the yellow rather than blue [exhausts]) and so have far less capability. In the attack on the Ring gate you can see the CL Pella fire ca. 12 blue drive torpedoes, and other ships firing salvoes of yellow drive torpedoes (4, 9, 8, 10, 10 and 8 onscreen) within railgun range. These > 61 torps (since some salvoes aren't seen) were defeated by the BB PDC's. Medina station fired 6 blue drive torpedoes into the Martian BB, killing her. The Laconian torps are difficult to separate, but it looks like the Barkeith (a Donnager) fired 10 blue drive torps at each of the remaining BB's.

In the Zmeya fight, the Zmeya has 24 torpedoes in her forward bay (in six quad packs), and fires 23 yellow drive missiles at the Roccinate, and a blue drive "stealth torpedo" with the protomolecule away from the fight. Drummers ships had 8 torps (Tynan), 17 torps (DeWalt) and an unknown no. (Mowteng, 23 can be counted on the hull of the concept art and she likely had ca. 30-35). All simply strapped torpedoes outside of the hull.

Missiles thus seem to be more common in the Expanse than 2k3.

The other weapons system, railguns, could perhaps be represented by the large lasers the Kafers and a few Terran ships (Piedrabuena) have. This would be especially true if you use house rules that allow large arrays to focus further.

Anyway with 6 laser turrets, and a pair of missile launchers fed by a significant magazine, the Roccinate is roughly equivalent to a Kiev type destroyer in 2k3. No wonder it was missed.

 

[Condottiere]

In theory, you could supplement armament with groundscale weapon systems.