Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
You may want that metre in armour to protect yourself from our current anti tank guided missiles.
I would say it's exactly because the system is part of an RPG, the system is much more detailed than most, and we can worry about the less than perfect details.-Daniel- said:I think this is always been true almost from the LBBs. There has always been a ship to ship game tucked into the RPG just begging to be brought out on it's own.phavoc said:I think the long running issue here is that high guard is a ship combat game bolted on to an RPG. The combat systens dont mesh well because of this. Pure naval combat is something that deserves an entirely different set of rules and concepts.
I do not see any contradiction between large and small warships. BatRons are concentrated power, but we also need diffuse power to patrol space. Even a single star system is vast.-Daniel- said:As for the original topic, I find the whole idea of lowering the expected size of warships can be done, but it has to be across the board. You can't have reduced small ships but still have these moon sized dreads at the same time. Either ships grew or they didn't. Just my opinion of course. :mrgreen:
I am not talking a contradiction between large and small. I am talking about the relationship between then categories. I am going to have a cruiser that is only 50k tons but the very next "size up" is my Battleships at 1 million tons. Traveller has allowed the top end to continue to grow and expand. I think if we want to bring down the size of the destroyer or cruiser then we need to bring them all down in size relative to each other. Why? Because if I have a Battle ship at 1 million tons then the cruisers would also increase to still play their role etc. But like I said before, this is my opinion. :mrgreen:AnotherDilbert said:I do not see any contradiction between large and small warships. BatRons are concentrated power, but we also need diffuse power to patrol space. Even a single star system is vast.-Daniel- said:As for the original topic, I find the whole idea of lowering the expected size of warships can be done, but it has to be across the board. You can't have reduced small ships but still have these moon sized dreads at the same time. Either ships grew or they didn't. Just my opinion of course. :mrgreen:
The relative sizes have to fall out of the system and he local meta. Some ship sizes might not be very efficient, so a navy might not want a continuous spectrum of ship sizes, they might just want a few sizes, e.g. battleship, screen, patrol.-Daniel- said:Why? Because if I have a Battle ship at 1 million tons then the cruisers would also increase to still play their role etc. But like I said before, this is my opinion. :mrgreen:
Quite. Having armour is a losing game for freighters, the pirates will just get bigger guns, e.g. "tachyon" barbettes.PsiTraveller said:Having 15 points of armour makes a ship immune to most weapons except a salvo of missiles that make it through. Beam weapons in turrets will likely not do much damage per round. Then a ship is looking at trying for radiation hits or salvos of missiles to do any damage.
phavoc said:Why do say it's the logical consequence? You totally gloss over that if you revamp the defensive model you have to do more than just pick one area.
And, yes, if we start fiddling with armour, we have to build a completely different system, probably more like TNE.AnotherDilbert said:If a grav tank or fighter can have 0,1 m armour, then a medium ship can have 1 m armour, and a megaton DN can have 10 m armour and hence be immune to puny weapons.
Condottiere said:Anything can be termed a warship, some are partially or mostly converted and/or adapted to perform that role, and some are built from the keel up.
Ye pirate ship seems to average at four hundred tonnes, and you can get the equivalent of a coast guard cutter to chase them down.
Numbers depend on how much ground you have to cover, and size on what threats they face.
PsiTraveller said:WBNC: If a ship is armoured enough to not take damage it saves money over the long term. Each point of damage costs 10 000 Credits to repair. So if a ship has enough protection, even if it costs a couple of million credits to get, will pay for itself in savings on repairs prevented. Lower armour allows more damage, more repairs and more Critical Hits, which increases the cost of repairs.
So that could be an argument for the high armour level. Of course all armour takes a lot of damage when on the receiving end of a missile salvo multiplying 3 or 4 Dice of damage by X number of missiles. But 12 points of damage prevented on a TL 12 ship is 120 000 Credits of armour saved per attack. So the bean counters have to take that into account.![]()
(Which is how a Naval designer would argue the point I think)
Take a 1000 dT freighter. Bolt on 10 fixed mounts with triple missile racks. Go hunt for an unarmoured patrol ship without proper missile defences. Fire a double salvo (60 missiles). Roll for attack on the defenceless "warship". Paint a trophy star on your freighter.wbnc said:A small frigate or corvette can handle anything but another purpose-built warship without a lot of trouble.
AnotherDilbert said:Take a 1000 dT freighter. Bolt on 10 fixed mounts with triple missile racks. Go hunt for an unarmoured patrol ship without proper missile defences. Fire a double salvo (60 missiles). Roll for attack on the defenceless "warship". Paint a trophy star on your freighter.wbnc said:A small frigate or corvette can handle anything but another purpose-built warship without a lot of trouble.
Building defenceless "warships" would be like building a current "warship" without missile or air defences and only armed with machineguns, since that should be enough to scare away the average Somali pirate.
AnotherDilbert said:Max armour is not very expensive, for the ship in the OP it is less than 10% of the total cost. It is also a great defence against most threats a small ship will encounter. Not the first thing to skimp on.
No warship (I design) is only built to police civilians. Small warships should also be able to scout for and screen bigger ships in wartime. And then they will face real warships.
Bolting a few missile racks to a civilian ship is not a strange idea, most pirates will be able to come up with that. Even corsairs have to worry about that...
Will this ship be assigned to a fleet maneuver group?
No, it's for intersystem patrol...
Then why, build it to fleet requirements. Ths system and materials could be put to use on fleet vessels.thats would save 100 Million on just the initial order of vessels alone.....I see here it carries equipment for scouting as we as patrol...will it be used as a scout? I thought we appropriated money for new scoutcraft last session...Oh, why does this intersystem patrol craft carry (insert weapons system) are pirates using armored warships Now?
Occasionally...
so we're spending billions over the program because they MIGHT run into a heavily armed and armored pirate vessel?
That is where we differ; I certainly would.wbnc said:Will this ship be assigned to a fleet maneuver group?
No, it's for intersystem patrol...