Grav Tanks

[wbnc]

. . . No matter ow fast the Tank/gunship is it will spend a good bit of time at ground level moving no faster than the advancing infantry.

Turrets give an advantage in that role. The driver has a much more simplified role and the gunner can fire independent of the vehicle while the driver can concentrate fully on maneuver and postioning the vehicle.

One way to combine the goals of a driver who faces in the direction of travel and a gun that faces in the direction of the target is to put the driver in an internal, motorized swivel chair that's designed to face travel-forward, surrounded by video screens that show the view from each external camera, and put the gunner in a fixed seat that faces gun-forward. Streamline the grav tank so that it travels just as well in any direction, and the entire thing becomes the turret, with no body-turret joint to make a soft spot in the armor and a hot spot in the radar profile.

that's an interesting concept will probably add a vehicle commander to the mix...so there is always someone available to scan the area identify targets and coordinate with other vehicles while the driver and gunner are doing their thing.

that's one of the big problems with any guided munition getting the seeker down in size and cost. However, if you spend 200,000credits to destroy a 20Mcr tank...its a huge cost vs return win.currrently a Hellfire missile costs around 70,000 per unit. But they can reliably and effectively destroy multi-milion dollar tanks a fully loaded reaper drone costs around 320-350 thousand dollars. even if you loose two of them in an attack that destroys an enemy tank yous till come out way ahead.

Indeed. So as soon as the homing sensors can fit into the missiles, point defense -- and possibly stealth or sensor spoofing -- become critical.

there are already developments in bot vehicle point defense and stealth systems underway. they are still fairly ineffective but they are first generation toys. they will definitely get better.

I'm getting some Renegade Legion vibes from those tank designs. For me, that's not a bad thing, I loved that game.

As far as appearance goes, I think the tan one seems more "real" than the green one.

Tanks of that period are going to spend a lot of time engaging things higher-up than them - I'd imagine they'd all have what we call high-angle or "anti-aircraft" mounts. The tan one's main gun looks like it could at least elevate high enough to engage air threats. This isn't the 21st century, where the trade-offs of mass to our current poor mass-to-thrust engines mean that aircraft are thin-skinned and can have effective hits scored on them by lighter weaponry. At the same time our targeting devices and gun stabilization are poor enough that if we want to use shells to shoot things down we need to spam them.

By this time, the gunship or even other grav tanks are going to be able to take the air, so light cannon aren't going to cut it to shoot down air threats - unless you're "skinny popping" (eg; bullying opponents who are lower TL than you), so I think the age of "anti-aircraft autocannon engagement" is over - people are going to be shooting their tank's biggest guns at the enemy in the air and vice versa. "Aircraft" are going to be as heavily armored as tanks, if not moreso (here we go with the issues with the "big ship" universe of Traveller).

I may have played a session or two of renegade legion
The tan one is my personal favorite. The green one is more of an assault vehicle than and MBT...so I went with a heavier more boxy build. It isn't designed for fast reaction to mobile threats..its the sort fo vehicle that walks up to the front door and blows it off the hinges, as well as shattering the wall to either side and seriously damaging portions of the building behind the one it's shooting at. Hopefully, it also reduces anyone behind the door to a fine red paste applied in a thin coat to all exposed surfaces.

As For using the main gun to shoot down air targets.,.that's a possible capability that would be developed. but secondary weapons for lighter threats would be added. Using your main gun to pop a scout or APC is a major waste. it might not be an auto cannon it could be a plasma gun, or laser..but secondary weapons ae not going away at any reasonable level of advancement.

In theory, yeah you could get high performance, all environment aircraft that are as heavily armed and armored as a tank.But military designers often build to the "Just good enough" standard. they could armor a fighter to the same standards as an MBT...but I am sure every bean counter and oversight committee between the imperial capital and the galactic core would be howling at the wasted resources and overruns. a vehicle would get just enough armor, just enough speed, and just enough weaponry to carry out its assigned task with acceptable reliability. anything beyond that gets axed for the sake of Per Unit costs...saving 20k per unit is not a huge savings but if you're going to buy thousands of units it adds up quick.

Since a ground force has to control a wide area of operations instead of discrete points from which they can sortie to counter discrete threats... you need many more ground vehicles. Especially if you are trying to occupy an area. The only real way to secure and control a particular piece of real estate is to put a guy with a rifle on it. the only way to take it way from someone is to kill their "guy with a rifle" and replace him with one of your own.

Now the imperium can cheat, it can put a fleet in orbit and threaten the locals, or lay siege until the locals give up the fight. But that leads to little things like insurrection, resistance groups, open rebellion f the fleet has to move on to the next objective. So they have to have a LARGE number of men, rifles, vehicles and hardware. even if it's a smaller portion of their military than the fleet.

which means they have to buy a lot of hardware. and the ground forces. Being a secondary concern actually greatly increases the need to save money/resources. all those billions saved can be redirected to the more vital Fleet arm. which means they won't get an entire stable of vehicles built to maximum possible armor and protection troop transports, scouts, fast strikers, will all be built with lighter armor. And heavier vehicles will get lighter secondary guns to deal with them.

 

[phavoc]

The problem with our theories here is that we are missing some key points. First how does the grav vehicle even work? Is there a separate lift and drive, where they are related but distinct? Is there some sort of field that is projected that pushes the vehicle? Pulls it?

Then there is the question of crews. Having driven armored vehicles I don't think the crewmember in the 52nd century is going to be much different than the soldier today. They don't like doing all their operations buttoned up. Combat is different than peacetime. So just screens is not always going to work well. Plus there is the unspoken idea of having crew is good, and even necessary, when it comes to daily maintenance. Having an extra person is extremely helpful, especially when you are deployed. I would imagine there would be some sort of future equivalent to csmo nets, and treads would be replaced with something else that requires lots of care and feeding.

The RL tanks did deploy from orbit, and they mounted both turrets and body mounted weapons (plus missiles, digging charges, flew NOE, etc). They lived in an environment that did NOT meld space fighters and tanks together. Space fighters were very fast and capable, and if they ran it a tank would get shredded because they did not mount as heavy of armor. That's something Traveller does a poor job at, making it possible for even small craft to carry the equivalent of dreadnought level of armor.

 

[steve98052]

One way to combine the goals of a driver who faces in the direction of travel and a gun that faces in the direction of the target is to put the driver in an internal, motorized swivel chair that's designed to face travel-forward, surrounded by video screens that show the view from each external camera, and put the gunner in a fixed seat that faces gun-forward. Streamline the grav tank so that it travels just as well in any direction, and the entire thing becomes the turret, with no body-turret joint to make a soft spot in the armor and a hot spot in the radar profile.

that's an interesting concept will probably add a vehicle commander to the mix...so there is always someone available to scan the area identify targets and coordinate with other vehicles while the driver and gunner are doing their thing.

If I had time to both model such a vehicle and animate it, I'd do an advertising video for it. First a close-up of it showing features. Then a flight past a fixed target in cut-away view to show the pilot in the spinning seat, the main gunner in a fixed seat, maybe a secondary gunner or two in seats like the pilot's, and a commander in a swivel chair. Third maybe something showing the point defense weapons blasting a missile. All narrated by a cheesy advertising voice touting combat power, crew accommodations and protection, efficient controls, and the manufacturer's financing offers available to approved planetary governments and licensed mercenary forces.

 

[Epicenter]

In theory, yeah you could get high performance, all environment aircraft that are as heavily armed and armored as a tank.But military designers often build to the "Just good enough" standard. they could armor a fighter to the same standards as an MBT...but I am sure every bean counter and oversight committee between the imperial capital and the galactic core would be howling at the wasted resources and overruns. a vehicle would get just enough armor, just enough speed, and just enough weaponry to carry out its assigned task with acceptable reliability. anything beyond that gets axed for the sake of Per Unit costs...saving 20k per unit is not a huge savings but if you're going to buy thousands of units it adds up quick.

This is where I think I'd have to disagree with you. I feel your thinking is entirely too "modern day" - where the threats are all poorly equipped insurgencies and the biggest problem is identifying who you can shoot and the major drive is to prevent overkill because overkill is wasted money when "just enough" is cheaper (both in money and in PR).

Assuming you're developing for the 3I universe, technological advancement is pretty slow, and things remain in production with only small changes for decades at a stretch. I feel this is probably the Vilani bias of the Imperium - they like things that are going to last because things don't get outdated (that's a Solomani thing). So you have a kind of "bloc endurance" as opposed to bloc obsolescence. This means that a standardized tank will have a stupid long (by our 21st century standards) production run, going through various marks of improvement but all the basic same design sharing most of the same components.

In addition, it appears that the Imperium has type standardization across the Imperium - Illiesh is using the same tank as the Spinward Marches who use the same tank as Capital.

This is going to result in an insane economy of scale. The Imperial Marines would order literally hundreds of millions of the same tank over the course of its lifetime. While nothing is ever going to achieve "one size fits all" they're going to try and minimize the number of variants and subtypes as much as possible. And they're going to need it.

The Imperium is vast and it takes time to travel between stars. Without fast communications to quickly learn about problems to move forces around, a force is going to have to deal with any and all problems themselves, likely for months (weeks for the news to get to a place where forces can be raised, weeks for that force to get organized, weeks for the force to arrive). That force is going to need to take all comers for an extended period of time. While most of the time that little podunk insurgency is just that, all it takes a few cases where the Marines get overrun because that low TL world somehow has a lot of credits to buy TL14 equipment and kill the Marines to a man for the public to start seriously questioning the power of the Imperium. So I don't think the Imperium can afford to be sending in the cheapest "just enough" vehicle into a situation where "oops, they actually had a lot more than we thought." While I do believe the Imperium probably has a lot of stereotypical British Empire era "lions led by asses" arrogance and complacency, over time, I think they'd accept overkill as being better than underkill. It's likely they'd have a standardized tank with the minimum equipment necessary to do frontline combat, along with some thought for more low-intensity situations; they'll still want it as cheap as possible after that and no, it won't always be the best vehicle for a job but it'll have to be good enough. However, I doubt the Imperium would have, say, a dedicated assault tank, a main battle tank, and a counter-insurgency tank.

 

[wbnc]

The problem with our theories here is that we are missing some key points. First how does the grav vehicle even work? Is there a separate lift and drive, where they are related but distinct? Is there some sort of field that is projected that pushes the vehicle? Pulls it?

Then there is the question of crews. Having driven armored vehicles I don't think the crewmember in the 52nd century is going to be much different than the soldier today. They don't like doing all their operations buttoned up. Combat is different than peacetime. So just screens is not always going to work well. Plus there is the unspoken idea of having crew is good, and even necessary, when it comes to daily maintenance. Having an extra person is extremely helpful, especially when you are deployed. I would imagine there would be some sort of future equivalent to csmo nets, and treads would be replaced with something else that requires lots of care and feeding.

The RL tanks did deploy from orbit, and they mounted both turrets and body mounted weapons (plus missiles, digging charges, flew NOE, etc). They lived in an environment that did NOT meld space fighters and tanks together. Space fighters were very fast and capable, and if they ran it a tank would get shredded because they did not mount as heavy of armor. That's something Traveller does a poor job at, making it possible for even small craft to carry the equivalent of dreadnought level of armor.

the exact nature of Grav systems is a persistent snag in a lot of ways. But we ca work around it most of the time.

]If I had time to both model such a vehicle and animate it, I'd do an advertising video for it. First a close-up of it showing features. Then a flight past a fixed target in cut-away view to show the pilot in the spinning seat, the main gunner in a fixed seat, maybe a secondary gunner or two in seats like the pilot's, and a commander in a swivel chair. Third maybe something showing the point defense weapons blasting a missile. All narrated by a cheesy advertising voice touting combat power, crew accommodations and protection, efficient controls, and the manufacturer's financing offers available to approved planetary governments and licensed mercenary forces.

That would be a abitious piece of work But I'd love to see it

In theory, yeah you could get high performance, all environment aircraft that are as heavily armed and armored as a tank.But military designers often build to the "Just good enough" standard. they could armor a fighter to the same standards as an MBT...but I am sure every bean counter and oversight committee between the imperial capital and the galactic core would be howling at the wasted resources and overruns. a vehicle would get just enough armor, just enough speed, and just enough weaponry to carry out its assigned task with acceptable reliability. anything beyond that gets axed for the sake of Per Unit costs...saving 20k per unit is not a huge savings but if you're going to buy thousands of units it adds up quick.

This is where I think I'd have to disagree with you. I feel your thinking is entirely too "modern day" - where the threats are all poorly equipped insurgencies and the biggest problem is identifying who you can shoot and the major drive is to prevent overkill because overkill is wasted money when "just enough" is cheaper (both in money and in PR).

Assuming you're developing for the 3I universe, technological advancement is pretty slow, and things remain in production with only small changes for decades at a stretch. I feel this is probably the Vilani bias of the Imperium - they like things that are going to last because things don't get outdated (that's a Solomani thing). So you have a kind of "bloc endurance" as opposed to bloc obsolescence. This means that a standardized tank will have a stupid long (by our 21st century standards) production run, going through various marks of improvement but all the basic same design sharing most of the same components.

In addition, it appears that the Imperium has type standardization across the Imperium - Illiesh is using the same tank as the Spinward Marches who use the same tank as Capital.

This is going to result in an insane economy of scale. The Imperial Marines would order literally hundreds of millions of the same tank over the course of its lifetime. While nothing is ever going to achieve "one size fits all" they're going to try and minimize the number of variants and subtypes as much as possible. And they're going to need it.

The Imperium is vast and it takes time to travel between stars. Without fast communications to quickly learn about problems to move forces around, a force is going to have to deal with any and all problems themselves, likely for months (weeks for the news to get to a place where forces can be raised, weeks for that force to get organized, weeks for the force to arrive). That force is going to need to take all comers for an extended period of time. While most of the time that little podunk insurgency is just that, all it takes a few cases where the Marines get overrun because that low TL world somehow has a lot of credits to buy TL14 equipment and kill the Marines to a man for the public to start seriously questioning the power of the Imperium. So I don't think the Imperium can afford to be sending in the cheapest "just enough" vehicle into a situation where "oops, they actually had a lot more than we thought." While I do believe the Imperium probably has a lot of stereotypical British Empire era "lions led by asses" arrogance and complacency, over time, I think they'd accept overkill as being better than underkill. It's likely they'd have a standardized tank with the minimum equipment necessary to do frontline combat, along with some thought for more low-intensity situations; they'll still want it as cheap as possible after that and no, it won't always be the best vehicle for a job but it'll have to be good enough. However, I doubt the Imperium would have, say, a dedicated assault tank, a main battle tank, and a counter-insurgency tank.

generally I tend t look at history to predict possible future events...


and looking at several hundred years of decision making on military affairs paints a pretty grim picture.

The British had breech-loading rifles at the time of the Revolutionary war..they even fielded nd tested them in the hands of marksmen...they were fairly effective. They were abandoned since they were too expensive for use by the military.


in the 1780-90s the Austrian army fielded a repeating air rifle that was sufficiently powerful for the job, it could fire 30 times before it needed to be reloaded and could be powered by detachable air canisters....it was also expensive and required that troops be trained more heavily than soldiers using muskets After 30 years or so it was abandoned for cheaper more easily manufactured flintlocks.

The repeating rifle was discouraged by accountants and higher ups because it would let soldiers "waste" ammunition. this would make it more expensive to supply the military.

The Krag rifle was considered perfectly suitable for the needs of the US army. Until it came up against Spanish Mausers...

The Imperial Japanese army knew it has bad weapons but they kept them. since replacing the would be expensive, and They believed that soldiers could make do with poor weapons since they had superior fighting spirit.

Semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines were discouraged because soldiers would loose or drop detachable magazines. and the military would have to constantly replace them.

The Sherman was powered by highly flammable gasoline..and caught fire easily when hit...But it was a cheaper engine, and it did not complicate supply systems to use gasoline.

With these fine examples of reasoning showing up across centuries and radically different social and political situations...I tend to think such thinking will endure until someone rounds up every bean counter and politician looking to make a name for himself b saving taxpayer dollars..and shoot them into the nearest star.

 

[Condottiere]

I've been introduced to the single shot bolt action thumb trigger; it's so simple, I'm rather surprised that they didn't manufacture fire-arms between sixteen and nineteen hundred for the military with that installed, because it looks really simple to make, maintain, and operate.

It's likely that advanced combat rifles will have electronic triggers.

As for the tanks, Hammer's atomic air cushioned variants have a crew of two; current experience says that's too few. The Russians prefer three, using an autoloader.

Since our tanks are very much groundbound, and need to cross common obstacles and civilian infrastructure, there's an optimum and/or maximum size and weight.

 

[steve98052]

If I had time to both model such a vehicle and animate it, I'd do an advertising video for it. . . ..

That would be a abitious piece of work But I'd love to see it

I think I have the skills to do it. I have even written instrumental music that doesn't completely stink. But I don't have the time.

If the late Andrew Boulton were still around he could probably work wonders with the idea.

 

[wbnc]

I've been introduced to the single shot bolt action thumb trigger; it's so simple, I'm rather surprised that they didn't manufacture fire-arms between sixteen and nineteen hundred for the military with that installed, because it looks really simple to make, maintain, and operate.

It's likely that advanced combat rifles will have electronic triggers.

As for the tanks, Hammer's atomic air cushioned variants have a crew of two; current experience says that's too few. The Russians prefer three, using an autoloader.

Since our tanks are very much groundbound, and need to cross common obstacles and civilian infrastructure, there's an optimum and/or maximum size and weight.

Generally, the current wisdom says, one person to drive, one person to shoot, one person to make sense of what's going on. With the growing use of electronic warfare and defensive systems you might even add one guy to keep everyone else from getting blown up.

If I had time to both model such a vehicle and animate it, I'd do an advertising video for it. . . ..

That would be a abitious piece of work But I'd love to see it

I think I have the skills to do it. I have even written instrumental music that doesn't completely stink. But I don't have the time.

If the late Andrew Boulton were still around he could probably work wonders with the idea.

yeah that's the way of it. ou have the skills but not the time I have the time but not the skills...

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

You think grav tanks would be more like the snow speeders shown in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back in the Battle of Hoth? I always wondered why they used these instead of X-wing fighters. They seemed to have no trouble using X-wing fighters within an atmosphere above another snowy planet, Starkiller Base in The Force Awakens.

How come they didn't use snow speeders here?

Well The First Order could have used then instead of their decidedly unaerodynamic Tie Fighters, but they used Tie Fighters.

 

[wbnc]

You think grav tanks would be more like the snow speeders shown in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back in the Battle of Hoth? I always wondered why they used these instead of X-wing fighters. They seemed to have no trouble using X-wing fighters within an atmosphere above another snowy planet, Starkiller Base in The Force Awakens.

How come they didn't use snow speeders here?

Well The First Order could have used then instead of their decidedly unaerodynamic Tie Fighters, but they used Tie Fighters.

IF remember right the X-wings were having trouble with the environment. The speeders had already been adjusted for local operations. Most likely the X-win were icing up even if a craft is partially gray powered it's going to pick up layers of ice that will screw up aerodynamics block flight controls etc. the X-wings design had a lot of places to trap ice on the engines and intakes forward of the engines.

The X-wings were a later version of the design...Icing issues were probably addressed.

Speeders are not cable of exo-atmospheric flight or Hyperjump...theyhave to be delivered by a transport craft. Getting a transport close to Starkiller base would be tricky. theX-wings could simply outrun intercept, a large transort...not so much.

 

[phavoc]

I would see a grav tank being more like it used in the first trilogy (time scale wise), except instead of making them walkers, they would be grav-based.

The problem with snowspeeders being equivalent to grav tanks is that they are far too puny to take on the defined role of tank. Even the first tanks in WW1 didn't have to fear infantry weaponry. Their only real fear was artillery guns firing in direct-fire mode. And terrain.

 

[wbnc]

I would see a grav tank being more like it used in the first trilogy (time scale wise), except instead of making them walkers, they would be grav-based.

The problem with snowspeeders being equivalent to grav tanks is that they are far too puny to take on the defined role of tank. Even the first tanks in WW1 didn't have to fear infantry weaponry. Their only real fear was artillery guns firing in direct-fire mode. And terrain.

the speeders were meant for scouting and fast attack roles rather than getting into a standup fight. The Empire made use of heavy grav tanks but Rebels didn't have the resources or the pressing need for heavy armor since they operated in small cells and specialized in hit and run tactics.

 

[Condottiere]

Tanks and the Imperial Army were an afterthought in the Star Wars universe.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

Tanks and the Imperial Army were an afterthought in the Star Wars universe.

The problem is in the Traveller Universe grav vehicles can fly, they don't just hover a certain distance above the ground. In the Traveller Universe, you can deploy grav tanks from orbit, grav tanks can also reach orbit, they are not like the landspeeders of the Star Wars universe.

The A10 Warthog is the closest thing in real life to a flying tank. An actual grav tank would be even more heavily armored than this.

 

[wbnc]

Tanks and the Imperial Army were an afterthought in the Star Wars universe.

The problem is in the Traveller Universe grav vehicles can fly, they don't just hover a certain distance above the ground. In the Traveller Universe, you can deploy grav tanks from orbit, grav tanks can also reach orbit, they are not like the landspeeders of the Star Wars universe.

The A10 Warthog is the closest thing in real life to a flying tank. An actual grav tank would be even more heavily armored than this.

I have no doubt that there will be grav vehicles along the lines of the A-10 on steroids. I would hate to have one coming in on my position.

 

[Epicenter]

The British had breech-loading rifles at the time of the Revolutionary war..they even fielded nd tested them in the hands of marksmen...they were fairly effective. They were abandoned since they were too expensive for use by the military.

in the 1780-90s the Austrian army fielded a repeating air rifle that was sufficiently powerful for the job, it could fire 30 times before it needed to be reloaded and could be powered by detachable air canisters....it was also expensive and required that troops be trained more heavily than soldiers using muskets After 30 years or so it was abandoned for cheaper more easily manufactured flintlocks.

The repeating rifle was discouraged by accountants and higher ups because it would let soldiers "waste" ammunition. this would make it more expensive to supply the military.

The Krag rifle was considered perfectly suitable for the needs of the US army. Until it came up against Spanish Mausers...

The Imperial Japanese army knew it has bad weapons but they kept them. since replacing the would be expensive, and They believed that soldiers could make do with poor weapons since they had superior fighting spirit.

Semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines were discouraged because soldiers would loose or drop detachable magazines. and the military would have to constantly replace them.

The Sherman was powered by highly flammable gasoline..and caught fire easily when hit...But it was a cheaper engine, and it did not complicate supply systems to use gasoline.

I think a lot of your examples are a bit suspect.

The Girandoni Air Rifle was not just expensive, it was fragile. It was less effective than firearms with the advantage of being quieter and being able to fire repeatedly. But the unreliability and expense was what removed it from service. The Austrians simply didn't have the money to train huge numbers of troops for the weapon and the logistical burden proved backbreaking.

The Krag-Jorgensson Rifle was inferior to the Mausers they faced in many ways, but: 1) They were replaced quickly. 2) Analysis of the "inferiority" of the rifle were overblown and sensationalized by the media with the troops believing it; they weren't as good but they weren't that much worse. However, I think point one is the important one here - once it was considered deficient, it was replaced quickly.

The Sherman was not the deathtrap it seems to be believed to be. The weaknesses of the tank have been overstated, in no small part to sites like War is Boring and the controversial book "Deathtrap" and so on. "Brewing up" (ammunition detonation) is a common danger in all tanks. The comparisons between Shermans and German tanks are inevitable with comparisons between the Shermans and Tigers or Panthers being typical. However, tank vs. tank engages were pretty rare - just the ratio of shells carried on the average tank will tell you that - they carried more explosive shells used vs. infantry than armor piercing vs. tanks. The Sherman's opponent was more likely a Panzer IV or a StuG if it ran into armor at all - opponents that the Sherman was equal of.

The IJA was indeed well-aware of its lackings in many areas. Replacing them would indeed be expensive. But the replacements weren't done because they wanted to save money. The reality was that was no budget - Japan at the time was in the grip of militarists so it's not like the "bean counters" were denying the military money. There literally was no money to spend. The IJN took up the lion's share of military budget (and even then, it wasn't even enough for them and the nation couldn't actually afford the ridiculous budgets). The fighting spirit thing was more of a "making do" situation than anything else. It wasn't like the officers were dining on caviar while the men went without weapons - there simply was no money at all and other areas were earmarked as desperately requiring that money, like improving aircraft.

You are correct about the detachable magazines, however, I suspect that's more to do with idea that "dumb conscripts" couldn't be trusted with detachable magazines - not so much a matter of expense, but more than men wouldn't have them when it came to battle because they had lost them.

As for the evils of "bean counters" - when the military gets everything it wants ... it still doesn't actually have the right equipment for the job because the money often vanishes into corruption (particularly between generals who have a say in procurement and companies making the equipment, the so-called military-industrial complex), ridiculous short-run equipment, and logistical nightmares.

This is all a roundabout way of saying the 3I isn't going to have two different tanks. They're going to have a single tank to handle the combat. It'll probably be overkill for a lot of the missions it is assigned where a cheaper vehicle could probably do it. But I do think there'd be a profound difference in the equipment with the slow rate of technolgical development in Traveller.

 

[wbnc]

The Sherman was not the deathtrap it seems to be believed to be. The weaknesses of the tank have been overstated, in no small part to sites like War is Boring and the controversial book "Deathtrap" and so on. "Brewing up" (ammunition detonation) is a common danger in all tanks. The comparisons between Shermans and German tanks are inevitable with comparisons between the Shermans and Tigers or Panthers being typical. However, tank vs. tank engages were pretty rare - just the ratio of shells carried on the average tank will tell you that - they carried more explosive shells used vs. infantry than armor piercing vs. tanks. The Sherman's opponent was more likely a Panzer IV or a StuG if it ran into armor at all - opponents that the Sherman was equal of.

I first heard of the fire problem way back in the 80s.The choice of fuel made sense when looking at the bigger picture of logistics and ease of manufacture/expense. It wasn't a crippling deficiency, but it was a significant one. It was also one decision that was looked at closely in subsequent designs and led to tanks designs being developed to deal with internal fires after the war was over.

The tanks itself was a pretty damn good tank, fast, flexible, nicely effective in support and anti-armor roles (unless it was facing the elite tanks of the German stable.) It could have had better armor, it could have had a stronger gun, but it served very well when used properly, If I had to pick any tank as a general purpose tank the Sherman would be right up there.


The Sherman and its Soviet cousin the T-34 were probably the best examples of a tank that was designed to be "Just enough" to get the job done and the concept was carried out with incredible success. They are both legendary vehicles...with good reasons. They worked. Even if they both had flaws and shortcomings they did what they were supposed to do and did it reliably.

The IJA was indeed well-aware of its lackings in many areas. Replacing them would indeed be expensive. But the replacements weren't done because they wanted to save money. The reality was that was no budget - Japan at the time was in the grip of militarists so it's not like the "bean counters" were denying the military money. There literally was no money to spend. The IJN took up the lion's share of military budget (and even then, it wasn't even enough for them and the nation couldn't actually afford the ridiculous budgets). The fighting spirit thing was more of a "making do" situation than anything else. It wasn't like the officers were dining on caviar while the men went without weapons - there simply was no money at all and other areas were earmarked as desperately requiring that money, like improving aircraft.

You are correct about the detachable magazines, however, I suspect that's more to do with idea that "dumb conscripts" couldn't be trusted with detachable magazines - not so much a matter of expense, but more than men wouldn't have them when it came to battle because they had lost them.

As for the evils of "bean counters" - when the military gets everything it wants ... it still doesn't actually have the right equipment for the job because the money often vanishes into corruption (particularly between generals who have a say in procurement and companies making the equipment, the so-called military-industrial complex), ridiculous short-run equipment, and logistical nightmares.

This is all a roundabout way of saying the 3I isn't going to have two different tanks. They're going to have a single tank to handle the combat. It'll probably be overkill for a lot of the missions it is assigned where a cheaper vehicle could probably do it. But I do think there'd be a profound difference in the equipment with the slow rate of technolgical development in Traveller.

I can see your particular vision of how things might go. I just have that nagging feeling that it would never be that clean and neat. I can see the Imperium wanting a nice neat system with standardized units and vehicles. I would have to believe that vehicles would share systems and components as often as possible to further reduce logistics and procurement issues.

I dont doubt tat they would have one primary Vehicle for each role. MBT/Battlespace Superiority, Close Support, Assault etc...but the outside pressures on procurement, and the greatly differing requirements for each role make a single "one size fits all" just seems like it would be unlikel.

it might even be a case of modular systems swapped out to allow for a single base vehicle to be optimized for each particular role. I just don't see a single Vehicle in a single configuration being the likely choice.

 

[Condottiere]

Training counts, and as you could see in Fury with Brad Pitt, the Americans lost so many tankers they started assigning anyone to them, so performance tended to suffer.

Also, in most encounters, every German tank was identified as a Tiger. The Americans and the Soviets could afford to lose five tanks to every one the Germans did, combined with total command of the air, and the German lack of reserves, spares and fuel, should have made it a walkover.

The Ronson lighter seems a little mythological, not that the Shermans didn't blow up, more that it seems to have been a collective memory added after the war was over. The Sherman was great machine, reliable, fast, versatile, as long as it didn't come across a late war panzer, of which there were a lot fewer than is generally assumed.

Training and doctrine also play a part, the German elite tankers crewed the Tigers, and Wittmann casually moving down the road of a British column and practically wiping them out is legendary, but there's a pretty good chance he might have done something similar on a smaller scale with an assault panzer. Arguably, the French lost in nineteen forty despite having more powerful tanks and numbers, because they spread them out, had bad command and control, and the Germans concentrated theirs and had radios installed.

 

[phavoc]

The Sherman was not the deathtrap it seems to be believed to be. The weaknesses of the tank have been overstated, in no small part to sites like War is Boring and the controversial book "Deathtrap" and so on. "Brewing up" (ammunition detonation) is a common danger in all tanks. The comparisons between Shermans and German tanks are inevitable with comparisons between the Shermans and Tigers or Panthers being typical. However, tank vs. tank engages were pretty rare - just the ratio of shells carried on the average tank will tell you that - they carried more explosive shells used vs. infantry than armor piercing vs. tanks. The Sherman's opponent was more likely a Panzer IV or a StuG if it ran into armor at all - opponents that the Sherman was equal of.

I first heard of the fire problem way back in the 80s.The choice of fuel made sense when looking at the bigger picture of logistics and ease of manufacture/expense. It wasn't a crippling deficiency, but it was a significant one. It was also one decision that was looked at closely in subsequent designs and led to tanks designs being developed to deal with internal fires after the war was over.

The tanks itself was a pretty damn good tank, fast, flexible, nicely effective in support and anti-armor roles (unless it was facing the elite tanks of the German stable.) It could have had better armor, it could have had a stronger gun, but it served very well when used properly, If I had to pick any tank as a general purpose tank the Sherman would be right up there.


The Sherman and its Soviet cousin the T-34 were probably the best examples of a tank that was designed to be "Just enough" to get the job done and the concept was carried out with incredible success. They are both legendary vehicles...with good reasons. They worked. Even if they both had flaws and shortcomings they did what they were supposed to do and did it reliably.

The Germans weren't the wunderkinds of armor like everyone made them out to be. Their tanks were crap until the Pzkw IV, and even then that couldn't stand against modern British and French tanks. The early Tigers had many teething problems, including leaking fuel into the crew compartment. Later tanks got better.

The comparison is not always fair because different nations' tank designers had different sets of design desires. The Sherman wasn't meant to be an uber tank - it was built to be an adequate tank built in numbers. It COULD have been upgunned, or redesigned to be a Tiger equivalent - but that would have not necessarily helped the allies out.

I would see a grav tank being more like it used in the first trilogy (time scale wise), except instead of making them walkers, they would be grav-based.

The problem with snowspeeders being equivalent to grav tanks is that they are far too puny to take on the defined role of tank. Even the first tanks in WW1 didn't have to fear infantry weaponry. Their only real fear was artillery guns firing in direct-fire mode. And terrain.

the speeders were meant for scouting and fast attack roles rather than getting into a standup fight. The Empire made use of heavy grav tanks but Rebels didn't have the resources or the pressing need for heavy armor since they operated in small cells and specialized in hit and run tactics.

I was referring to the clone wars (that's what I meant by time-scale wise). One has to remember that what you see in movies is meant for cool visual effects. So walking tanks look cooler than grav tanks flying by at 400-500kph. Even Imperial Walkers are sitting ducks to X-Wings in the SW universe. Proton torpedoes would make quick work if the essentially sitting targets. But that would not make for cool cinematics.

Check out the Peter Rice book Damned If We Do... it's a tankers story set in the RL universe. The tanks deploy from space but also operate in NOE mode for reasons explained in the book. Besides that it's actually a pretty good tank combat book.

 

[steve98052]

. . . This is all a roundabout way of saying the 3I isn't going to have two different tanks. They're going to have a single tank to handle the combat. It'll probably be overkill for a lot of the missions it is assigned where a cheaper vehicle could probably do it. But I do think there'd be a profound difference in the equipment with the slow rate of technolgical development in Traveller.

I would agree that the Imperium isn't going to have an assortment of different tanks for each combat niche. However, there are a lot of combat niches, each served by different types of weapons.

One category of variation is planetary environment. A tank that relies on aerodynamic control surfaces for part of its maneuverability will be at a disadvantage in a vacuum or trace atmosphere world. A tank that is completely gravitic will be at a disadvantage on a world where there's enough atmosphere to use aerodynamic control surfaces for added maneuverability. Unusual atmospheres will make some weapons more or less effective, and may change sensor performance. High gravity worlds may require different gravity compensation equipment. And so forth.

Another category of variation is opposition weaponry. Enemies who use nuclear weapons may be the targets of extreme response -- but that response is likely to include tanks with nuclear dampers, which are so bulky that they're impractical against any opponent that isn't using nuclear weapons. Some enemies may favor kinetic kill weapons, others shaped charge explosive warheads, some lasers, others plasma or fusion guns; each is stopped best by different types of armor.

Yet another category of variation is political nature of the conflict. Is the goal conquest without regard to collateral damage? Is it support of an occupation force or allied infantry? Is it counterinsurgency? Is the Imperium giving tanks to another government?

Finally, there's the question of delivery from production worlds to conflict locations. Is a conflict best served by lots of small tanks or fewer big ones?

There's no such thing as an ideal weapon for every role, so more than one model will be found even in fairly static technology.