A medley of missiles

[DFW]

As currently used yes. But it's possible something like this could be adapted for use on space based missiles. Some sort of cooling unit perhaps.

Not to the point where it would be low enough temp to not stand out against the background of almost absolute zero. Just one of those areas of physics you can't get around. Even with the hull coating you will eventually have to shed the IR or, melt your whole ship into molten slag.

 

[DFW]

The rules state that intelligent missiles can follow their targets until they hit or are destroyed, and to me this does not look like missiles using normal reaction drives and fuel, because such missiles would have to either be very large (which they are not) or to have a limited propulsion time
(which, according to the rules, they do not).

Hmm, I searched the core and HG rules and couldn't find anything called "intelligent missile". Are they called something else?

 

[rust]

Hmm, I searched the core and HG rules and couldn't find anything called "intelligent missile". Are they called something else?

I use the German version of the rules, and there they are mentioned
twice.

In the chapter on starship design is a box about three types of missi-
les, normal, intelligent and nuclear, and in the chapter on space com-
bat they have a paragraph under the heading concerning the use of
missiles.

In both cases it is stated that these missiles will continue to attack un-
til they hit or are destroyed - which would imply that they can continue
to maneuver for several hours at least.

 

[DFW]

In both cases it is stated that these missiles will continue to attack until they hit or are destroyed - which would imply that they can continue to maneuver for several hours at least.

I see it. Missiles rules were updated/corrected in High Guard. Lists thrust duration now.

Changes to core rule book:

Missiles are capable of thrust 10, with the turns ... However, missiles have limited endurance of 60 minutes ...

 

[rust]

I see it. Missiles rules were updated/corrected in High Guard. Lists thrust duration now.

Yep, found it, thank you.

I have to admit that I am beginning to find the many differences between
the core rules and the supplements slightly annoying ... :roll:

 

[rinku]

Yes, the missile system is, umm, well, bad in Traveller. It always has been, but again I think its a legacy from the original design...

Aargh! Don't remind me! They didn't even give a thrust rating!

Now... as far as the damage delivery goes, you pretty much HAVE to get a kinetic impact in space to cause damage with a non-nuke. There's NO concussion to speak of, so what you're seeing with that 1D6 is really a rating of how many impactors manage to connect, or similar. Depends on the delivery strategy, really; the "explosion" could be a focussed plasma jet, for example, or a number of steel balls. Given this, I have no problem with the multi-warhead one being the same size as the standard one.

My take on the medium size one is that commercially it would make sense to sell a product that would fit into a standard missile. How about a variant on the multi-head one that simply does 2D6 damage (with the same thrust limitations?). 3D6 is to me excessive and might be better used as a reduced warhead torpedo (long range version).

 

[locarno24]

I would think it would only apply to the missile if the missile itself was increased, thus costing more for ammunition as well.

Inevitably. Essentially, I would think that the TL can almost be 'split' - provided the two are physically compatible you could have a +1 TL missile relative to the launcher (you regularly get Mk2 or Mk3 weapons developed and fitted to the same pylons on an aircraft - I dread to think what version the AIM-9 Sidewinder is at these days)*. As noted, some traits belong to a launcher, whilst others to the ammo.

As currently used yes. But it's possible something like this could be adapted for use on space based missiles. Some sort of cooling unit perhaps.

Not exactly. You have to radiate heat, BUT you don't have to radiate uniformly - provided there's a direction a heat sink can dump heat in that's 'safe' you can have a positive effect if you cool the opposite face (although it's going to take a lot of effort). A certain amount of ballistic flight can help - although that's not of much help against a manouvring target, there are circumstances where it might let you do something nasty (attacking an orbital installation?)

What you can't do, as said, is anything about a 'gas exhaust' - if you're firing hot reaction mass out the back end, you are creating a readily visible line along your velocity vector, essentially a big arrow saying 'shoot here'.

A gravetic drive missile would potentially not have this problem to deal with, but then you have some possible limitations on performance or cost - there has to be some reason the Imperial Navy uses reaction drive missiles, doesn't there?

Hmm, I searched the core and HG rules and couldn't find anything called "intelligent missile". Are they called something else?

Smart missiles.

And I think a TL15 missile would be better than a TL14, and better than a TL13, etc. Higher tech levels should give you fun stuff like smaller, longer-duration drives, bigger warheads, but keeping the missile the same size. It's like today you have a Standard Missile -3 (SM-3) that can hit targets in low earth orbit. Didn't have that capability or technolgy with SM-1. So why don't Traveller missiles get better with TL? (don't answer.. I know!).

Hmm.....low-tech missiles....

Now... as far as the damage delivery goes, you pretty much HAVE to get a kinetic impact in space to cause damage with a non-nuke. There's NO concussion to speak of, so what you're seeing with that 1D6 is really a rating of how many impactors manage to connect, or similar. Depends on the delivery strategy, really; the "explosion" could be a focussed plasma jet, for example, or a number of steel balls. Given this, I have no problem with the multi-warhead one being the same size as the standard one.

As noted, the conventional torpedo claims it's a 'fragmentation' weapon - after a 10g acceleration for several minutes, a cloud of chunks of casing are pretty much all you need for a lethal strike.

My take on the medium size one is that commercially it would make sense to sell a product that would fit into a standard missile. How about a variant on the multi-head one that simply does 2D6 damage (with the same thrust limitations?).

Hmmm.....I have a thought forming here. Thanks.



* Out of curiousity, just checked. AIM-9S. That's one loooong-running bit of hardware.

 

[Captain Jonah]

Aim-9x block 2

Not bad for something designed before I was born.

Gravatic missile drives, how small can you make them, how expensive are they going to be. Probably not very small and very expensive. Plus reaction drives do the job and are capable of huge accelerations.

Detecting missiles, yes they leave a thermal trail which can be tracked, bit hard to hide that. You can conceal the actual burn inside the missile shell making it a bit harder to detect from the front but that is why you have escorts and ships co-ordinate tracking

To get missiles anywhere near something acceptable to all the wargamers out here you need a much better system and Traveller is too simple. You need a design system which is consistant and allows for all the variable missiles to fit into a single system of size, performance and cost.

For example. We need a missile shell, small, medium, heavy, torp. Each shell has so many spaces 4, 8 , 12, 20. Into that you fit drives, warheads, EW, special sensors etc. Tech improves the components.

I.E. Light Missile warhead 1D, 1 space, guidance 1 space, drive 5G one hour one space so 2 drives, a warhead and guidance makes up our light missile. Or give it a double warhead and only 5G. Or replace the warhead with a sensor or EW box.

Tech changes the effects so tech 10-12 as is, tech 13-14 add +1G to drive speed, tech 15-16 +2G etc. Higher tech gives homing guidance rather than dumb one try units and so on.

Much as Gurps or the earlier versions of SFB.

Besides once we sort missiles we then need to rewrite the entire MonT traveller space combat system to match the new missiles and to make sense. Sugestions for the name of this new book

 

[DFW]

Sugestions for the name of this new book

The Special Theory Of Traveller Space Combat, Codified
Unabridged Edition

:mrgreen:

 

[phavoc]

Sugestions for the name of this new book

The Special Theory Of Traveller Space Combat, Codified
Unabridged Edition

:mrgreen:

Would that be the Block1 version?

 

[locarno24]

Detecting missiles, yes they leave a thermal trail which can be tracked, bit hard to hide that. You can conceal the actual burn inside the missile shell making it a bit harder to detect from the front but that is why you have escorts and ships co-ordinate tracking

Not if you're ejecting hot reaction mass.

For example. We need a missile shell, small, medium, heavy, torp. Each shell has so many spaces 4, 8 , 12, 20. Into that you fit drives, warheads, EW, special sensors etc. Tech improves the components.

Sort of a shorthand version of shipbuilding. I'd had the same thought.

Missile sizes are rated by payload. The payload corresponds to the space available for the warhead (or equivalent), which may be increased or reduced by the additional options fitted - payload being sort of equivalent to the 'drive' values in starship construction. A current missile is payload/1, whilst a heavy missile is payload/4. Payload determines dTonnage, although a higher-than-required TL allows you to take a size reduction as normal for weapons.

Launchers are based off payload as well - so a bay can punch out a maximum payload of 12 (12 missiles or 3 torpedoes), a barbette mounting can punch out a maximum payload of 4, and a turret can throw a maximum payload of 3 (hence a heavy missile turret is impossible). High TL can take a size reduction, but the size reduction can be no greater than the lowest size reduction of any missile you intend to fire through it.

I was thinking of running up to payload/9 - firstly that corresponds to the biggest non-spinal weapon currently in the basic rules (the particle beam large bay mount), and secondly because (under the quick mathematical model I mentioned earlier) that corresponds to a nice round size of a 20 dTon missile. Given that that's starting to compete with small craft, that's probably big enough!

I think at that point you're into pre-deployed installation defence weapons, not carriable weaponry. Unless you want to try for a spinal missile launcher....

 

[phavoc]

I think at that point you're into pre-deployed installation defence weapons, not carriable weaponry. Unless you want to try for a spinal missile launcher....

Actually that's not quite a bad idea. Of course it's only going to work for certain settings, but if you have a big enough launcher, you can impart a great deal of velocity to a missile from the very start.

And using a mass driver to accelerate the missile from the very beginning would give it a speed boost. Without getting too far into the physics of delta-V and maneuvering, it could make for some interesting missile attacks, as well as creating a sort of "stealth" missile swarm capability.

For example, if you had a "spinal" mass driver equipped to fire missiles, you could launch missiles at different velocities so that they all closed on your target and arrived at a point nearby at the same time. In transit they would have no signature since they aren't generating any thrust (and maybe they even had an integrated cooling system that kept their IR sig to whatever temp space is around them). At the "ignition" point they activated their thrusters to maneuver/close to the target. This would reduce the reaction times for the target to maneuver or defend agains them.

The one problem with adding all this stuff in is that its starting to take away from the simplicity of the game. Don't get me wrong, I think the rules for starship combat are kinda mucked up to begin with, but maybe we are making them worse instead of better? Personally I'd like to see starship combat to be a little bit more deadly... who armors a merchant ship to protect against military-grade weapons? Merchies are fat targets waiting to be raided! They always have been. Even commerce raiders/Q-ships didn't really carry armor like a true warship. Trav merchant ships need to have some stronger hulls and structures for landing and the like, but really the average ship should just be strong enough to do its job, to keep it cheap to operate.

Bah.. enough of the thread hijack... I now return you to your regular thread.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

What about missiles with stronger warheads than nukes?

Antimatter - should be possible at TL14 or 15, after all it shows up in Power Plants at TL16 or so.

Plasma Warheads (see CSC for Plasma Grenades and their effect).

Things like that.

Also, I REALLY don't like the size of the missiles in MGT. Original CT has missiles at 0.2 tons, which seems much more reasonable for a weapon that is flying across tens of thousands of kilometers. The missile size in MGT is more like anti-missile missiles and should not have the range listed in the books.

 

[DFW]

What about missiles with stronger warheads than nukes?

Antimatter - should be possible at TL14 or 15, after all it shows up in Power Plants at TL16 or so.

Actually, the ability to have nuke power came before the tech for the "bomb".

Plasma Warheads (see CSC for Plasma Grenades and their effect).

Fusion is more powerful than plasma.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Are you sure?

First Nuclear Explosion 1944

First Nuclear Powered vessel (The Nautilus, a submarine) 1954 (authorized in 1951)

 

[rust]

The first documented nuclear reactor began to operate in 1942:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Pile-1

There have always been rumours about even earlier successful experi-
ments in Germany, but there is no documentation, and I really doubt
that there has been more than a discussion and a couple of laboratory
experiments.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

OK, but it was a stationary unit, not something mounted on a moving vessel.

Perhaps Anti-Matter reactors could be built at TL15, but cannot be used on starships until TL16+?

Also, there are always "prototypes" at 1 TL below when they become generally available.

We could argue this to death, but I was just trying to present other options for warheads and an anti-matter warhead seemed like a logical High Tech option.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

I forgot to mention that there is a Special Supplement to CT on Missiles available on the CT CDROM

While I don't agree with some of their assumptions (missiles only have 6G etc), it might give you some ideas for how to build your article.

There is a nice section on how to build your missiles, with Warhead/Payload, Fuel (endurance) and Motor (thrust) sections with options and TL guidelines.

Hope that helps!

 

[rust]

We could argue this to death, but I was just trying to present other options for warheads and an anti-matter warhead seemed like a logical High Tech option.

Of course, and I think if we really wanted to build one, we would already
be quite close to the technology required to come up with a prototype of
the sophistication of the Chicago reactor.

In the end all you need for a primitive antimatter warhead would be the
antimatter, a way to store it comparatively safely and the most easy part,
a way to break that safe storage.

We have the means to produce antimatter, also currently only in really
tiny amount, and we can build a Penning Trap to store it. Setting it free
on impact with something does not seem to be a serious problem.

 

[dayriff]

In the end all you need for a primitive antimatter warhead would be the
antimatter, a way to store it comparatively safely and the most easy part,
a way to break that safe storage.

I think safe storage would be the issue, myself. Since each missile has to have its own storage unit, each missile is a potential point of failure. Just one failure prior to successful launch will probably destroy your ship.

Way more dangerous than a mere nuke, as making a nuke explode is hard. Making antimatter explode is just a matter of an interruption in your magnetic and/or gravitic containment system for a fraction of a second.

I mean a gravitics failure on your air car will kill you too, but it's still worrisome.