Gazelle Class Close Escort

[Condottiere]

It's a legacy design; in the meantime, the rules and game concepts have evolved, so I'm sure someone could figure out a more optimized configuration. It felt compromised in it's initial iteration, and time hasn't done it any favours.

What is it supposed to do, what are the minimum performance perimeters, and how much do you want to spend?

 

[Linwood]

I’m picturing this as a proposed successor to the original Gazelle design, intended for better survivability in high-threat environments. Maybe a small production run before the bean counters shut the project down for cost reasons, or maybe just a few prototypes put into service for trials while the Navy debates whether to go into full production.

 

[Old School]

Another Dilbert, A more thoughts before I post my iterations:
- I disagree with your rules interpretation regarding advanced technology drives. You're saying because the drive tonnage decreases, the effective price increase isn't as high as it is for all other technology increases. I use the same price increase regardless of which advantage you use. Yes, this means the cost per ton increase is more than 25%, but it stays consistent with the other advantages. While I understand your interpretation, I think mine makes more sense.
- Three of your Gazelles would likely defeat three standard Gazelles in combat due to their armor and radiation shielding. What your three Gazeles can't do is be in four places at once, protecting four convoys, or hunting pirates in four systems. They are also a little on the slow side for chasing down pirates or other ships, especially with the drop tanks installed. So while superior in combat, they are inferior for in the task for which they were designed. Bad ass ship though, I'll give you that.

The Standard Gazelle, in Mongoose version 2 High Guard, like most ships in High Guard is a mess:
- the Bridge is the wrong size. Should be 20 tons, not 10.
- Didn't include the cost of the drop tank, whihc is MCr2
- gig is priced at MCr6.257. Should be MCr6.732. Also Appears to have given the 10% standard design discount to the Gig as well. You already got 10% off the Gig in the Gig price. You don't get it again.
- Nothing about the Ship is actually TL15. The jump drive and computer are TL14. Everything else is 12 or below.

Whoops, just realized I can't post an image unless I upload it somewhere first, which I can't do from my work laptop. Will have to wait until I get back home. Sorry.

I've got:
- what I think should be the standard Gazelle, with the corrections above
- Gazelle improved
- Gazelle reworked as a Jump 4 vessel, instead of the weird 3/4/5 combo that it has always been.

Will upload them when I can.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

Minor nitpick, but I wouldn’t say the Gazelle has the wrong bridge, it is flagged as “small” in High Guard, so it’s a conscious choice.

Why and how a warship is designed with a built-in -1DM to everything bridge-related is another issue...

Looking forward to see those alternate gazelles!

 

[AnotherDilbert]

- I disagree with your rules interpretation regarding advanced technology drives. You're saying because the drive tonnage decreases, the effective price increase isn't as high as it is for all other technology increases.

It's not just my interpretation, it's confirmed by the author here: http://forum.mongoosepublishing.com/viewtopic.php?p=916516#p916516
and used in e.g. the Donosev (HG, p140).

- Three of your Gazelles would likely defeat three standard Gazelles in combat due to their armor and radiation shielding. What your three Gazeles can't do is be in four places at once, protecting four convoys, or hunting pirates in four systems.

Agreed, but that is not the Gazelles original job:

Naval tactics in the Imperial Navy call for large ships to be accompanied by well-armed, small fighting craft capable of engaging the enemy at long range, before they approach the principle ships in a task force or convoy. These small ships may be fighter craft carried by the larger ships, or they may be independent close escort vessels.

The Gazelle is a Close Escort, i.e. a fleet escort, not a patrol corvette. It is later editions that have degraded it to uselessness.

As far as I understand it the original Gazelle is a warship, as opposed to the Coast Guard-type Patrol Corvette.

The Standard Gazelle, in Mongoose version 2 High Guard, like most ships in High Guard is a mess:
...
- Nothing about the Ship is actually TL15. The jump drive and computer are TL14.

The HG'80 version is TL14, so the current version is probably supposed to be TL14 too. I believe the original was TL15.

Will upload them when I can.

Looking forward to it!

 

[Geir]

Minor nitpick, but I wouldn’t say the Gazelle has the wrong bridge, it is flagged as “small” in High Guard, so it’s a conscious choice.

Why and how a warship is designed with a built-in -1DM to everything bridge-related is another issue...

Probably because it was originally designed with a small bridge because that's all that fit on the smaller hull (320 dT?) with the Classic High Guard rules. That's the problem with carrying designs forward when the design rules change. Things that made sense no longer do, but to keep the "feel" of the ship the same, they've been brought forward.
Pretty sure you could design an X-boat with a power plant and a manuever drive, too, though I haven't tried. But that's not the way it was in the OTU c. 1980.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Why and how a warship is designed with a built-in -1DM to everything bridge-related is another issue...

Especially as it has 33 Dton cargo left unused...

Probably because it was originally designed with a small bridge because that's all that fit on the smaller hull (320 dT?) with the Classic High Guard rules.

There is no option for smaller bridges in CT, and the CT Gazelle builds show no signs of any such extracurricular miniaturisation.

 

[Geir]

Probably because it was originally designed with a small bridge because that's all that fit on the smaller hull (320 dT?) with the Classic High Guard rules.

There is no option for smaller bridges in CT, and the CT Gazelle builds show no signs of any such extracurricular miniaturisation.

My bad. Maybe it was MegaTraveller? I remember it from somewhere, but it might just be dementia setting in. I 'll have to dig through some old storage boxes and check...

 

[Old School]

If Andrew says that's what is meant in the rules, then so be it. Did he also intend to write rules that completely obsolete the TL15 Fusion power that is standard in almost Every imperial Warship? Because that's what the High Tech rules have done, as shown in your Gazelle Spreadsheet. I'm with bluekiernan (who's wonderful Google Doc spreadsheet I waste WAY too much time fiddling around with). I'm looking at conflicting rules and deciding what makes the most sense. If you disagree, that's cool, it's your game.

Agreed, but that is not the Gazelles original job:

The Gazelle is a Close Escort, i.e. a fleet escort, not a patrol corvette. It is later editions that have degraded it to uselessness.

As far as I understand it the original Gazelle is a warship, as opposed to the Coast Guard-type Patrol Corvette.

I'm pulling my interpretation straight from the book:

The close escort, even when new, was not intended to stand up to combat vessels; rather it was envisioned as an anti-piracy and revenue patrol ship.

 

[Old School]

So Here's what I think the Gazelle in MgT2 High Guard is supposed to be:

- Corrects the Bridge Size
- Adds the Drop Tank
- Corrects the Pricing

Comes in at about MCr252.8

 

[Old School]

Well crap, now the image won’t load. I’m going to bed.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So Here's what I think the Gazelle in MgT2 High Guard is supposed to be:

You mean this?

(You need to copy the Direct Link to the picture in Imgur. It should end with ".png" or some other image format.)

 

[AnotherDilbert]

If Andrew says that's what is meant in the rules, then so be it. Did he also intend to write rules that completely obsolete the TL15 Fusion power that is standard in almost Every imperial Warship?

Most ships don't use tech advantages. Obviously performance is better if you use tech advantages.

A TL12 power plant with max tech advantages might be better than a regular TL15 power plant, but at higher TLs a TL15 plant with some advantages is smaller than a maxed out TL12 plant, so I would not agree that the TL15 plant is "completely obsolete".

If you disagree, that's cool, it's your game.

Of course, we all play our own games as we see fit.

Agreed, but that is not the Gazelles original job:

The Gazelle is a Close Escort, i.e. a fleet escort, not a patrol corvette. It is later editions that have degraded it to uselessness.

I'm pulling my interpretation straight from the book:

Agreed that is what the Gazelle has degenerated into. The original Gazelle from JTAS4 was a fleet escort, a proper small warship. That made it very different from the Patrol Corvette, and hence interesting. Now it is more or less the same as a Patrol Corvette, and far less interesting.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So Here's what I think the Gazelle in MgT2 High Guard is supposed to be:

Oh, yes, that is what the Gazelle is in MgT2.


My design was just trying to answer the question:

How much armor could be added while keeping its performance the same?

A lot?

 

[Old School]

Hey, that's it. Thanks for fixing the image link. Knew it couldn't be that hard. MCr252.8 for a standard issue Gazelle.

I’ll agree that as written its got the same function as a Corvette. I look at it as the imperial navy (i.e. high priced, more capable) version. The corvette itself is a little underpowered. Subsector fleets would likely use the Corvette. I think the best bang for the buck is somewhere inbetween. Unfortunately, I am suddenly incapable of posting a link. Have to hit the road again tonight, but I will try to find atime/way to upload.

I dont think realistically a 400 ton ship ever has a fleet battle role in the universe of 500,000 ton dreadnaughts. Something several thousand tons and up with lots of beam lasers to screen light fighters and missles, maybe. 400 ton just doesn't bring enough firepower or hullpoints to make a difference.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

I might be completely wrong, my knowledge of the ancient days is poor (anything before
Mongoose) but isn’t the Gazelle one of the early designs from when Traveller was a small-ship universe, where the Kinnunir was considered an imperial cruiser and the two 1,000 ton escorts were proper destroyers? From the time before battleships of up to half a million dtons?

If so, it made more sense as a naval escort back then, but in today’s Traveller the role as a proper naval escort has been taken over by far larger ships, like the P F Sloan and Ritchey.

 

[Old School]

My knowledge of the olden days of the little black books is fuzzy as well, but that sounds about right.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

I might be completely wrong, my knowledge of the ancient days is poor (anything before
Mongoose) but isn’t the Gazelle one of the early designs from when Traveller was a small-ship universe, where the Kinnunir was considered an imperial cruiser and the two 1,000 ton escorts were proper destroyers? From the time before battleships of up to half a million dtons?

The original Gazelle was one of the first published designs using the HighGuard system that also brought us megaton ships, contemporary with the Kinunir.

This was before Fighting Ships that established much of the conventions of the Imperial Navy, such as 200 - 500 kDt dreadnoughts, 50 kDt cruisers, and 1000+ Dt destroyers. Note that 1000 - 2000 Dt ships were blessed by the system (large enough for a bay, small enough to be hard to hit) and made excellent screens.

So the Gazelle was contemporary with both the small ship convention and the new large ship convention. It was probably designed to be close to most PC ship scale, regardless of the rest of the universe. It was still well armoured and could easily destroy civilian (LBB2) ships like the then 400 Dt Patrol Cruiser, now Patrol Corvette.

 

[Old School]

So here's my modification of the Gazelle design:
- Added the missing Drop tanks
- corrected the bridge size
- doubled the armor
- cut back on the power plant- the Gazelle is massively overpowered as designed. this is still 20% above max usage
- added Holographic Controls
- reduced computer from 30 to 25
- increased sensors from military to improved
- swapped one of the laser turrets for missiles
- added a medical bay
- reduced Fire control software from /4 to /3

Result:
- This ship comes in MCr10 below the cost of the published design, and is in my opinion a more capable vessel. More armor, more firepower, better sensors and controls, with the only real cost being a one point reduction on the fire control. And a med bay for your medic.

If you wanted to keep the cost more or less the same, you could put the computer and fire control back, add firepower, add armor, or add radiation shielding.

 

[Old School]

So here, an attempt at a straight up J-4 Gazelle. It's hard to make a capable vessel this small at J-4, and I resisted the urge to go advanced tech on the jump drive, although you could and gain 6 tons more room. This has the advantage of being a full 10% cheaper than the published standard design. It is also M-6 and j-4 at the same time, if that matters: with the 80 ton drop tank, the standard Gazelle is really M-5 due to the extra load.

Many of the same changes as the prior modification, but:
- cut the fuel by 4 tons, shortening the operating time
- cut the power a little more, but still 10% above need
- lose the medical bay I just added in the last one. Ain't no room.