Need Info/Help With Earth Fleet

[rook111]

In the Minbari Factbook there is agood deal of information about how the Minbari deploy thier fleets but the same type of information is lacking in the EA Factbook.

I have never played B5 Wars and cannot find any of thier material at my game store. I also don't really know if they have the kind of information I need, so I am asking for help form this community.

What I am in need of/Looking for are;

1)How big is the Earthforce Fleet in 2258/59? Number of ships total and a break down if possible of each type by number. (note that I am not looking for "official"/"canon" numbers cause I doubt that they exist but I will make do with any kind of consensus from the knowledgable gamer base)

2)What would be the average fleet size/composition of Ships found in the Sol System?

3) As above but for Proxima?
4) As above but for any other EA world if anyone has an idea?

5) What would a Carrier Battle Group consist of In 2258/59 assuming that the Carrier were a Posidon?

6) How about an Avenger?

7) Any links or web Sites with information of this nature?

Any help will be appriciated.
:shock:

 

[LoneStranger]

1) The fleet is probably around the level it was before the Earth/Minbari war. Now I will grant that won't help much but remember Earth Force was able to out-do the Centauri in number of ships. As for how numerous the different hulls are this is about the best guide I personally can offer:

Omega Destroyer
Hyperion Cruiser
Olyumpus Corvette, Artemis Frigate (tied)
Oracle Scout Cruiser
Poseidon Supercarrier
Nova Dreadnought
Orestes System Monitor
Avenger Heavy Carrier
Sagiterius Missile Cruiser

That list is done from most numerous to least numerous (although the Hyperions probably outnumber the Omegas), another thing I've seen is that the only classes in production on this list are the Omega, Hyperion, and Poseidon. For some reason the Sag, Olyumpus, Artemis, Nova, Avenger, and Oracle aren't being built after 2250 so they're all ships that are becoming increasingly rare. Part of that is due to the fleet decimation and part of it I'm not sure about.

2) The average fleet composition would depend on the year and the security issues involved. Times of peace would warrant fewer ships but Clark's buildup would mean more ships to defend against the "evil alien threat". As for what hulls would be present probably Omegas, Hyperions, possibly a Nova, an Orestes more than likely, and whatever else you see fit (if your running a game).

3) The Proxima fleet would probably wouldn't be as big but would still fluctuate depending on security concerns, however the hulls present would work out roughly the same

4) Each world would flucuate based on strategic importance, fleet maneuvers, and (again) security concerns. Some planets may only have an Orestes present (which is bad enough for raiders) while some may have a Hyperion or two, maybe an Omega, and the worlds with shipyards around them would rate a Nova as well. Oh don't forget the fact there will be starbases and defense satellites present around most of these worlds.

5)&6) It wouldn't be completely unreasonable to assume that an EF carrier group would be based off of modern day carrier groups. About 11 ships with some ships geared towards anti-ship work while others are better at anti-fighter work.

7) I don't know of any sites specifically but some good modern day naval sites would be something to check out. Also some sites on World War II naval battle groups would help since you'll probably be able to get actual info on how they were composed.

Hope some of this helps.

 

[Judge Walker]

Also don't forget that, IIRC, there is only one Poseidon around in 2260. And that it may be a super carrier, but was planned as a Sector Defense HQ, so this hull would be quite rare and not see too much actual combat duty.

 

[Agent One]

Once, when we were still working on the Earth Wars book for B5W, we actually asked JMS how many Omegas the EA had in their fleet. He said something like (don't quote me): "I don't know. Hundreds."

About that same time, we were still reeling from our printing of actual physical stats for ship sizes in the 1st edition B5W. When we did that, all we got were complaints ("that can't be right because in this obscure reference over here it says..." and so on). So we decided not to actually print any hard numbers of anything that might later be contradicted by any other material, or by the show (which at the time was still coming out with new episodes).

So...if you want to get any official answer from B5W or AOG, don't bother looking. However, I'll be happy to speculate on the Poseidon carrier group question.

A Poseidon is meant as a sector command ship, i.e., the fleet flagship for a very large force. As a minimum, the ship would have a half-dozen small escorts (Tethys class vessels optimised for anti-fighter work), a few Artemis class ships to blow away anything small that tries to flank the squadron, several Omegas placed strategically around the Poseidon to head off inbound capital ships, and at least a few long-range missile ships like the Sagittarius or anything else with a missile variant (Hyperion, etc.) for "keep-away" fire. Novas and other heavy gunships would be nonexistent, as they would be off commanding attack groups of their own.

An Avenger group would be organised similarly, but would be only half the size.

Hmm...perhaps an article along these lines should be drawn up for Signs & Portents.

 

[rook111]

Thanks for the advice guys it gives an idea or two and a direction in which to go.

 

[LoneStranger]

Not a problem rook111, just glad to help.

And Agent One if you still have any of the notes on ship sizes from when you were working on B5W I'd be more than happy to see them. Send them to me in a private message so I can have some type of idea how big some of the ships are.

 

[rook111]

I echo that Agent One I would like to see them and any fleet notes you would like to share as well.

 

[rook111]

Here is a first proposal on EA Total Fleet size as of 2258/2259 Take a look and let me know what you all think

Artemis Frigate, Beta Model - 6
Artemis Frigate, Zeta Model - 11
Avenger Heavy Carrier - 8
Condor Troop Transport*- 48
Cotton Tender*-843
Explorer Deep Survey Ship – 17 (24)
Hermes Priority Transport - 217
Hyperion Cruiser, Gamma Model* – 26
Hyperion Cruiser, Epsilon Model – 47 (50)
Hyperion Cruiser, Eta Model – 112 (150)
Hyperion Cruiser, Theta Model – 276 (300)
Hyperion Cruiser, Kappa Model*– 24
Hyperion Cruiser, Lambda Model – 18 (25)
Myrmidon Light Combat Vessel – 85 (125)
Nova Dreadnought* - 82
Olympus Corvette - 17
Omega Destroyer, Alpha Model – 118 (150)
Omega Destroyer, Beta Model – 76 (100)
Omega Destroyer, Gamma Model – 18 (50)
Oracle ELINT Cruiser* - 47
Orestes System Monitor - 22
Perseus Minesweeper – 33 (55)
Poseidon Supercarrier, Alpha Model – 1
Poseidon Supercarrier, Beta Model – 4 (12)
Sagittarius Missile Cruiser - 8
Tethys Frigate, Eta Model* - 16
Tethys Frigate, Iota Model* - 7
Tethys Frigate, Kappa Model – 32 (42)
Tethys Frigate, Theta Model* - 26
Tethys Frigate, Zeta Model* - 18
Aurora Starfury -74,000 (80,000)
Thunderbolt Starfury – 500 (60,000)
Badger Starfury – 240 (300)

Numbers in parentheses are projected Class totals and are still being produced, those without Numbers in Parentheses are no longer being produced.
Those production models marked with an asterisk are produced only as need to replace Lost or decommissioned vessels.

 

[LoneStranger]

The fleet looks good but here's the changes I'd make:

The Nova and the Oracle would be out of production, any hulls lost wouldn't be replaced. Also I seem to remember hearing that there were fewer Explorers than you list, both the current and maximum numbers.

Other than that I'd say it looks good, at some point I'll post the operational lives of EA ships at some point.

 

[Enlightened Bystander]

I'd halve the number of Omega Gammas and Explorers, and drop the Poseidons to 1(4). 1 in ten sounds good for a command ship, whilst explorers and poseidons are a big investments

 

[qstor]

7) Any links or web Sites with information of this nature?

Any help will be appriciated.
:shock:

You might try any number of Traveller Supplements. There's tons of stuff written about Imperial Navy units and tactics. There's a lot of stuff in the Traveller mailing list archive.

Mike

 

[Sundog]

I don't agree that the Oracle would be out of production. It's the only fleet scout EA has until the Delphi, and that's years off. They'd keep the ship in production until the replacement was close to being available.

 

[frobisher]

I don't agree that the Oracle would be out of production. It's the only fleet scout EA has until the Delphi, and that's years off. They'd keep the ship in production until the replacement was close to being available.

Just because something is out of production doesn't mean it's out of use. If you have enough of them, why build any more?

The USAF B52's might just be a case in point.

Yes, they don't have a Fleet scout in production for that period, but then if the need arises, they can call upon the Explorers to perform that roll, and they bring two squadrons of 'Furies to the party. Before you say, "You can afford to lose an Explorer" this is equally true of a fleet scout - you can't afford to lose that either.

Of course I do recall the Fleet Action supplement "My Enemy, My Ally" stats that they are out of production after the EM war

 

[Anonymous]

The Explorer is too big to be a good Scout. Because if the Explorer drop out of Hyperspace it is spotted instandly.
And the Oracle is smaller and more manouverable.

And for the Omegas. In one of the Babylon 5 Wars Supplement I read, that after the Minbari War the Omega was pushed to mass production and in 2258 there are more Omegas in space as Hyperions.

 

[Morgan_Keyes]

The Explorer is too big to be a good Scout. Because if the Explorer drop out of Hyperspace it is spotted instandly.
And the Oracle is smaller and more manouverable.

And for the Omegas. In one of the Babylon 5 Wars Supplement I read, that after the Minbari War the Omega was pushed to mass production and in 2258 there are more Omegas in space as Hyperions.

Well this can also be chalked up to building priorities. As you pointed out, production of Omega hulls sky-rocketted. Well each of those is pretty big and resource intensive. In the grand, well-thought out, panicky 'Ohmigod we just got our butts handed us with interest' policies at the time the highest priority was to produce new combatants. Until those were up, everything else was secondary. Some sense in that since it does no good to have a great ELINT platform if 1) you can't protect it; and 2) there's nothing out there to make use of it's info.

Certainly a Cortez-class Explorer is big and not very agile, but then it may not need to be. E-3 Sentry and E-2 Hawkeye AWACS aren't. Neither are Commando Solo, Rivet Rider, or other aerial EW platforms. Now understanding it's not the same as space, but some parallels are there still. The doctrine of most races is to have the scout hang back out of weapons range to do it's magic. So, EarthForce may have decided that with plans for the Delphi-class in the works, it wasn't worth it to make more of a ship that'd been found wanting and simply make do with the existing Oracle hulls and supplement them with Cortezs if they really needed to. Is it an ideal solution? Not a chance in Hell! Are the folks in the fleets happy about it? Are you stoned? No way! Is it what they are stuck working with? Yep. The ideal is just that, an idea, which rarely has much bearing on the cold reality. Suppose EarthForce was crossing their fingers and hoping to not get into a major shooting war long enough to the point they could finally afford to field the Delphi-class, as well as the Apollo-, Cronos-, and Warlock-classes.

 

[frobisher]

The Explorer is too big to be a good Scout. Because if the Explorer drop out of Hyperspace it is spotted instandly.
And the Oracle is smaller and more manouverable.

Perhaps it's my B5Wars background biasing me here, but the role of a Fleet Scout is not the same as the role you're describing.

A Fleet Scout is there to provide electronic warfare support for the fleet, not to nip ahead and spot - a role that the Oracle is just as bad in by the way.

Any ship dropping out of hyperspace is incredibly obvious to anyone with sensors, it's just not something you can do covertly (even the Shadows cause a sufficent disturbance that can be picked up on by the younger races).

Now for a scouting role as you're invisiging, I'd not risk a unit with ELINT capabilities - they can rarely defend themselves adequately, but something like a Hyperion or Omega would do the job and be able to put up a fight before withdrawing.

 

[Elizar]

Once, when we were still working on the Earth Wars book for B5W, we actually asked JMS how many Omegas the EA had in their fleet. He said something like (don't quote me): "I don't know. Hundreds."

About that same time, we were still reeling from our printing of actual physical stats for ship sizes in the 1st edition B5W. When we did that, all we got were complaints ("that can't be right because in this obscure reference over here it says..." and so on). So we decided not to actually print any hard numbers of anything that might later be contradicted by any other material, or by the show (which at the time was still coming out with new episodes).

So...if you want to get any official answer from B5W or AOG, don't bother looking. However, I'll be happy to speculate on the Poseidon carrier group question.

That's very interesting. In one post on the newsgroups he mentions there are hundreds of Omega's between Sheridan and Earth during the civil war. Although by this point most had either joined Sheriden or were abstaining from the war.

I don't think JMS has ever been that good on the more technical aspects of the show, I assumed he left that to George was it? And in the foreword in AOG, doesn't he defer writers to the technical aspects of AOG as a source for consistency? So I kinda think he would of used whatever you guys came up with.

Its also worth mentioning that some 240 Omega's were destroyed in ACTA and that the EA had absolutely no turmoil from it. In fact, almost no emphasis was put on the loss. And this was also a fleet they managed to round up on short notice for what they thought was a training excersize.

There's also the quote of 20,000 ships and fighters from ITB. With canon visuals putting a roughly 110:5:3 ratio on capships, shuttles and fighters. With fighter capacity capping a low end of some 3,000 hyperions. That was also at the end of a 2 year war where the EA got its arse handed to them at every turn.

There is also ITF, where 8,000 ships managed to survive the battle. With it stated that the shadows alone clocked up a 2 to 1 kill rate even after the teep introduction. The younger races actually being outnumbered by the shadows alone as well. With the Vorlons being superior ship to ship than the shadows, but with an equal fleet size (10K). So it could easily be argued that only a 1/4 of the younger race fleet managed to survive, giving 32K as the original fleet size. Which of course didn't include the EA, Centauri, and the Minbari warrior caste as well as many of the younger races holding back. I mean the Shadows had over 10,000 at that battle which is stated as coming from just of of their outposts. The younger races would need to have outnumbered the Shadows by a significant amount to have lasted as long as they did.

Then there is the 1,000 whitestar fleet as stated in the short story by JMS at the end of the EA civil war, so their original fleet size would no doubt be far larger.

Also the latest derived colony figures would ramp up the needed defence ships (as worked out in the Minbari factbook thread). Add to that the EA shipyard build times, and it should be quite sizeable.

 

[frobisher]

Its also worth mentioning that some 240 Omega's were destroyed in ACTA and that the EA had absolutely no turmoil from it.

That's incorrect. It's mentioned that losses sustained by the Alliance (it wasn't just Earth that showed up...) amounted to 240 destroyers. If it's just Omegas why no mention of the other ship types?

Now remember how fast and loose jms played with that term, and remember the source - ISN. In "reality" we're talking the loss of of 240 ships worthy of the designation, and that would include the destroyed Minbari, Narn and Vree vessels we see in "Warzone".

Why were the loses not mentioned again..? I guess they were rather distracted by the plague.

 

[Elizar]

That's incorrect. It's mentioned that losses sustained by the Alliance (it wasn't just Earth that showed up...) amounted to 240 destroyers. If it's just Omegas why no mention of the other ship types?

Now remember how fast and loose jms played with that term, and remember the source - ISN. In "reality" we're talking the loss of of 240 ships worthy of the designation, and that would include the destroyed Minbari, Narn and Vree vessels we see in "Warzone".

Why were the loses not mentioned again..? I guess they were rather distracted by the plague.

No, it mentions just the EA destroyers as being lost. There were also no other ship type visible at Earth. Hyperions I believe are cruisers anyway. It doesn't mention the ISA ships as there weren't that many anyway, with only a Vree and Brakiri ship as I recall showing up in the wreckage. EA are still xenophobic to quite a degree, which later turns into fanatical hatred. So ISA ship losses would be rather moot.

If the losses were in anyway significant then they would fear the Drakh coming back to steamroll them, and wouldn't be able to spare two omega's to tow an alien ship back to port (crusade) or a couple for a mining operation. Neither of which is befitting a role of a destroyer in peacetime let alone after an 'apparent' major loss and wartime efforts.

 

[frobisher]

No, it mentions just the EA destroyers as being lost.

To quote from the Crusade episode "Warzone" which is actually where the ISN report is given...

"With over 240 destroyers lost in the battle, list of casualties are still being drawn up, but current estimates place the death toll at between six and seven thousand killed in action."

No mention of these being Earth's loses alone. The death toll is also quite light compared to the ships lost - a "mere" 29 or so per "destroyer" lost. Now given that we know from a later Crusade episode ("Path of Sorrows"?) that an Omega has a crew of at least 300 this is extraordinarily light, especially given how most Omegas we see lost on screen go down (big fireball time so no chance for escape).

There were also no other ship type visible at Earth.

Certainly not the infamous Warlock, and see further down...

Hyperions I believe are cruisers anyway.

Yes, but Omegas are "destroyers" and one of those is refered to as a "cruiser" in another episode.

It doesn't mention the ISA ships as there weren't that many anyway, with only a Vree and Brakiri ship as I recall showing up in the wreckage.

Just after Sheriden orders a flying wedge set up, Minbari Sharlins and Whitestars, Drazi Warbirds and at least one Brakiri Avioki are clearly visible and (with Earth full screen behind (about 1 hr 18 into the film) - oh, and there's at least one EA Olympus present to the front of the two Victory class destroyers (and those are classed as destroyers...).

The reason you get the impression that the entire fleet fighting the Drakh is formed of Omegas is the fact that the two Victory destroyers are leading the flying wedges formed of said Omegas which are the forces concentrating on the planet killer; they aren't the entirety of the forces present at the battle (a rewatching of the film makes that quite obvious) and the other forces are off doing the non hero stuff (like taking out the Drakh capital ships).

EA are still xenophobic to quite a degree, which later turns into fanatical hatred. So ISA ship losses would be rather moot.

In a couple of hundred years time, yes.

If the losses were in anyway significant then they would fear the Drakh coming back to steamroll them, and wouldn't be able to spare two omega's to tow an alien ship back to port (crusade) or a couple for a mining operation. Neither of which is befitting a role of a destroyer in peacetime let alone after an 'apparent' major loss and wartime efforts.

The mining operation is important to the EA's efforts to defeat the Drakh plague, hence a couple of destroyers is at the very least prudent as a defence force. And as to the salvaged Drakh ship, if that's not important I don't know what is...

Yes, nominally using a pair of Omegas as tugs seems demeaning, but think about it. That's 48 fighters that they can put in the air in addition to theirt own fire power, they are jump equipped, and they have the engine power to tow a substantial mass at a reasonable rate. Even if you had a dedicated tug (which we've seen no evidence of) you'd still need to send an escort, and that would be the ubiquitous Omega anyway.

Yes, the loses would be significant; A couple of hundred from a fleet of several thousand would in fact still be significant, but it is likely that the EA fleet is smaller than that.