Project Phoenix Refits

[Terry Mixon]

With all the talk of Hop Drive 1 being introduced as almost ready for prime time in the Singularity campaign, I've decided that the Imperial Navy would jump all over that, even with the high price tag. They'd be fools not to. There wouldn't be much new construction at first, but I can definitely see some refits happening at the yards at Vincennes. MixCorp would be glad to help the Navy out, so here is the first refit.

The Atlantic-Class 75,000-Ton Heavy Cruiser is behind the power curve and is fast approaching obsolescence. That makes it ripe for a refit as ships of this class wouldn't be missed too badly in the line of battle right now. The High Guard times for a refit don't work well for prototype systems as one doesn't have half a millennium to wait, so I'm ignoring that aspect of the process. Those rules need an overhaul.

I have a before and after spreadsheet for comparison, but I tried to keep as much of the original as possible, though some changes and additions were possible and even desirable with the extra space after the hop drive was taken into account.

First, the J4 drive came out, and the H1 drive went in. That cut the fuel requirement by three quarters, but I only recovered half the space, allowing the ship to have a second H1 on tap for quick in and out operations or to penetrate a border area by up to 20 parsecs. That is, after all, the strategic strength of the drive.

Here is the complete list of changes:

J4 (reduced Fuel x1) -> H1 (prototype with governor at x5 the cost of a TL17 production H1, which is 10 times the cost of a comparable J1 drive)
J4 + 8 weeks operating 29,360 fuel -> H1 x2 + 12 weeks operating 16,135 fuel
M5 -> M6 (reduced size x2 to fit)
TL12 power plant 64,500 power points -> TL15 power plant 75,649 power points)
Bridge -> Added Holographic controls
Comp/90 -> Comp/110
Software: Advanced Fire Control/2 -> Advanced Fire Control/3
Software: Added Basic Fire Control/5 for the meson spinal weapon
Software: Electronic Warfare/2 -> Electronic Warfare/3
Software: Evade/2 -> Evade/3
Software: Jump Control/4 -> Hop Control/1
Sensors: Improved -> Superior
Sensors: Countermeasures -> Advanced Countermeasures
Added 18 Advanced AutoDocs to the 6 medical bays
Weapons: 4x Point Defense Batteries Type II-L -> 20x Point Defense Batteries Type III-L
Weapons: 6x Particle Beam Medium Bays -> 20x Particle Beam Medium Bays (size reduction x3)
Weapons: 40x Small Missile Bays -> 40x Small Missile Bays (size reduction x3)
Weapons: Added 38 Large Meson Bays (long range, energy efficient)
Screens: Added 10x Nuclear Damper
441 Middle Staterooms -> 331 Middle Staterooms
443 common area -> 332 common area
408 cargo (after the 750 tons reserved for supply units) -> 825 tons (after the 750 tons reserved for supply units)
Added High Quality Entertainment System

The value of the vessel jumped from BCr44.820 to BCR196.541 or 4.3x as expensive. The cost of the refit is higher as it is supposed to be 1.5x the cost of the system being replaced, but I'm not mathing that. Also, the fact it is a prototype drive skews the numbers in ways it shouldn't.

Also attached is a zip file with both the original and the new version.

Here is the original version:



And here is the refitted version:

 

[Galadrion]

This would make a pretty good strike cruiser or a suitable platform for a reconnaissance-in-force vehicle. It could also be a reasonable test-bed for something like the Deepnight Revelation, only there are some trade-offs. (The ship has a lot more in the way of legs, but as written it's got a lot less in the way of sensors and long-range independence regarding support. Updating this ship the same way D.R. was would make up a large amount of the deficits.) All-in-all, it's a reasonable update and fairly interesting.

 

[Sageryne]

Refitting is something that definitely needs a rules update. The hull is a very big and expensive component (especially heavily armoured ones). It makes sense to reuse the hull via a retrofit rather than discarding it. The US Navy keeps older ships in mothballs. They refitted WWII battleships before the Gulf War.

Nice example. Hop drive is something I have not included in my own campaign, but for an Imperial Navy prototype, it makes sense.

 

[Condottiere]

Depends on where the bottlenecks are.

Currently, finance and shipyard capacity.

 

[Galadrion]

The more I consider matters, the more I like this idea as a basis for a long-range survey vessel. Since you're already planning on refitting it with a Hop drive (a very good reason for this to be a one-off, as it's going to be expensive), why not push the boat out a bit and add in a collector? That'll leave you with huge amounts of space for a proper survey suite, some proper subcraft, maybe some biosphere, mining and manufacturing capability (to improve the logistics tail situation)... all sorts of useful (or even just nice) modifications.

 

[Terry Mixon]

The more I consider matters, the more I like this idea as a basis for a long-range survey vessel. Since you're already planning on refitting it with a Hop drive (a very good reason for this to be a one-off, as it's going to be expensive), why not push the boat out a bit and add in a collector? That'll leave you with huge amounts of space for a proper survey suite, some proper subcraft, maybe some biosphere, mining and manufacturing capability (to improve the logistics tail situation)... all sorts of useful (or even just nice) modifications.

Mainly because the Imperium now has a canon reference to having the ability to make a hop drive. Not so for collectors. Maybe the Darrians leaked the data, but I've seen no whisper that it is even being researched. The file with refit version is up there. Feel free to make some changes and make it yours.

 

[Terry Mixon]

I was requested to make another few specific refits. First is a battle tender. I selected the Warmonger-Class 1,000,000-Ton Battle Tender as I had already created a version of it. It's mentioned as hauling the Hadrian-Class 50,000-Ton Battle Riders around but isn't designed. I fixed that.

I'm not going to get into listing all the changes, as you can look between the two if you so desire. The big change is that instead of hauling 16 Hadrians, it can haul 54 now. Fuel for 2 hop 1 and 12 weeks of operations. The rest of the changes you'll have to look to find.

The original version:



The refitted version:



And for completeness, my redesigned version of the Hadrian:



All spreadsheets attached for your use.

 

[Terry Mixon]

The second refitted ship I was requested to make was the Azhanti High Lightning Frontier Cruiser. It started out behind the 8 ball because it was only thrust 2. I solved that by adding a backup maneuver drive with thrust 4 to go with it. Since jump drives can work together, I see no reason that maneuver drives can't.

Other than modding the drives and weapons, I doubled the number of light fighters, their launch bays, and recovery bays. A little more punch that way. Once again, you'll need to compare the two versions to see the tweaks.

The original version:



The Pheonix refit:



The files are attached.

 

[WHULorigan]

As an aside, something else to consider:

In T5 (which first introduced most of these technologies - MgT is just porting it to their game mechanics) there are certain technologies that fall under the category of "paradigm shifts", meaning that a culture does not necessarily just discover them because they reach the appropriate TL. Many cultures, if not most NEVER discover them, in many cases well past the introductory TL.

Three that are explicitly mentioned in the T5 technology section (TL 0-33) are:

1. Jump Drive(s)
2. Fusion Plus
3. Realty Manipulation

A culture may reach TL18, for example , and never invent Jump or Hop (but may hit TL 20 and invent Skip, and then Jump and Hop might seem obvious).

 

[mavikfelna]

I was requested to make another few specific refits. First is a battle tender. I selected the Warmonger-Class 1,000,000-Ton Battle Tender as I had already created a version of it. It's mentioned as hauling the Hadrian-Class 50,000-Ton Battle Riders around but isn't designed. I fixed that.

I'm not going to get into listing all the changes, as you can look between the two if you so desire. The big change is that instead of hauling 16 Hadrians, it can haul 54 now. Fuel for 2 hop 1 and 12 weeks of operations. The rest of the changes you'll have to look to find.

The original version:

View attachment 7333View attachment 7334

The refitted version:

View attachment 7344View attachment 7345

And for completeness, my redesigned version of the Hadrian:

View attachment 7341View attachment 7342

All spreadsheets attached for your use.

Just a quick aside, while I realize your Hadrian is just using the Mongoose template, it really annoys me that they don't install them in groups of 5. You need 5 of them, by the rules in HG, to reduce the DD value of nuclear weapons to just D. Less than 5 dampers and you are taking catastrophicly higher damage.

There is no such rule for meson screens, so odd numbers there are fine.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Just a quick aside, while I realize your Hadrian is just using the Mongoose template, it really annoys me that they don't install them in groups of 5. You need 5 of them, by the rules in HG, to reduce the DD value of nuclear weapons to just D. Less than 5 dampers and you are taking catastrophicly higher damage.

There is no such rule for meson screens, so odd numbers there are fine.

I'll tweak that.

Done.