Solomani Confederation (Military)

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Barbette Mounted Weapon Systems

For both commercial and military vessels are twenty percent larger than their Imperium counterparts.

And of course, the standard barbette that's installed onboard Solomani registered vessels weigh in at six tonnes.

On the plus size, Standard Solomani Barbette Mounted Weapon Systems are twenty five percent cheaper.

That means, ye standard torpedo costs 37'500.00 CrImp equivalent per copy for the Solomani and two tonnes hold five torpedoes.

Not that I see much benefit in equipping any ship with a torpedo barbette.

 

[baithammer]

MGT 2ed has an easy solution, use the budget option for the various systems for Solomani ships.

 

[Condottiere]

I did.

The Confederation can afford to now shoot more ordnance at the Imperium.

 

[baithammer]

Good old Soviet sufficiency.

 

[Condottiere]

Energy is free, bullets cost money.

Traveller is from the Imperium perspective, and at a technological disadvantage, you have to figure out how to give the Confederation edges.

 

[Sigtrygg]

The energy may be free, the powerplant that generates the energy costs a metricfuckton more than the chemicals that move the bullet...

And the Solomani are at a disadvantage - they lost - and remain at least a TL behind the Imperium.

Using HG rules that now appear to be standard for the 3I (if MgT is canon for the OTU) then the Imperial fleet can use fuel efficient jump drives to increase the weapon payload of their capital ships. Or they can build collector equipped tenders to move entire fleets through emprty hexes to the Solomani capital etc.

 

[Condottiere]

The Solomani are well aware they have no strategic depth to trade for time.

Their military is prepped for a pre-emptive war of liberation for the occupied territories.

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Bay Mounted Weapon Systems

I think this pretty much varies across different member militaries, for any number of reasons, whereas standards can be imposed on the smaller turrets and barbettes. Also. making them slightly larger makes very little difference.

Not so with bays, because on reflection they very much impinge on doctrine, that is, how the Confederation Navy plans to fight.

All modern major Solomani warships would be built around a meson spinal mounts, since that's how they kicked the Imperium's butt to begin with; any particle accelerator spinal mounts would be incidental and legacies, but if they're still usable, be installed in large planetoids, as would be technology twelve and thirteen meson guns.

Since Mongoose is deliberately ambivalent on meson bays, they cannot be considered as bay weapons.

For major combatants, bays are secondary weapons, assuming they are built with a well balanced design.

So, how are the Solomani planning to fight?

It's a given, that the Solomani are going to be aggressive, since they will want to recover their occupied territories. They are willing to build more capital ships at the expense of cruisers.

But they'll want the Imperium to be forced to attack their line of battle, while attritioning them at a distance.

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Bay Mounted Weapon Systems

The Confederation would have three basic lines of battle, long distance, where they can bring their meson guns to bear, supplemented with very long distance large particle bays; this is where they would park their modern battleships and other major combatants.

Medium range, where the battle riders and planetoids are to engage the enemy line, with the primary secondary weapon being the large fusion bays. If the situation is dire, older major combatants as well.

Half the fighter complements would be committed to close in with the enemy line.

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Bay Mounted Weapon Systems

In theory, military budgets for super powers tend to be open ended, but we want an overall standardized philosophy. For barbettes and turrets, you want the commercial operators to reduce their cost of operations, and upfront capital outlay; they usually don't arm their ships with bay weapon systems.

However, having started on this, large bays are six hundred tonnes and take six hardpoints.

The Confederation battlewagons not only are tasked to take out their opposite numbers, they also have to take care of the opposing destroyers and cruisers; hence, their large bays are meant to cripple destroyers and cruisers, at a distance, with energy efficient and accurate particle large bay weapon systems.

Attrition has to serve a purpose, and for the Solomani who'd like to preserve their expensive capital ships, scoring lots of hits with these weapon platforms over an extended period, with their faster ships dictating the range, is more important than just a slam dunk.

Therefore, most enemy commanders would either decide to either to withdraw, or close.

You might think a missile and torpedo exchange is the more obvious option, except one reason modern Confederation warships are more expensive is because a good proportion have Romulan cloaking devices.

I mean, their hulls are stealthed.

 

[baithammer]

Missile bays would be the better bet versus smaller warships as missiles don't get the negative dm, but battlewagons should avoid mission creep especially if they have higher volume per weapon system.

 

[Condottiere]

Missiles are expensive but flexible.

I've been carefully trying to assess how the Confederation Navy would use physical ordnance, and in what format.

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Bay Mounted Weapon Systems

Missiles and torpedoes represent a flexibility that other weapon systems do not, but at a cost in terms of space and price, as well as a vulnerability in being able to be intercepted.

For Confederation capital ships, the primary use of large bay missile systems is as anti swarm defence against either fighters, attack ships and missiles; very rarely would they be committed as planetary bombardment though due to their capability to more efficiently lock onto smaller than two kay tonne targets, opposing corvettes and frigates might find themselves receiving their unwanted attention.

Torpedo large bays in major combatants are primarily tasked as ship killers, to overwhelm enemy defences at an appropriate time, since torpedoes and their launching systems are surprisingly cheap, in comparison to their potential effect. More heavily represented in the warships earmarked as brawlers.

You will find that Confederation bombers and bombardment vessels use missile and torpedo large bay weapon systems in preference to pretty much anything else.

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Standard Solomani Bay Mounted Weapon Systems

(And a bit more)

The reason I'd see the Confederation using a large bay missile system is in order to launch and effectively control a large salvo, more as a defensive measure against swarm attacks, and on the other side of the coin, torpedo large bays to swarm a target.

Since missiles and torpedoes effectiveness are essentially independent of their launch systems, they wouldn't bother installing them in medium bays.

I tend to question the cost benefit of barbettes, so I'll presume the Confederation Navy will as well.

That doesn't mean that a smaller launch system is out of the question.

Confederation Navy warships will be equipped with torpedo small bays; personally, I would have preferred a fixed mount variant for that unterseeboot ambiance (it would also save space). While it's not in High Guard, I understand it's an option for the Harrier, though I'm unclear how doing that for barbette weapon systems would work.

Missile weapon systems could be installed in either small bay, turret or fixed mount formats, depending on the space available.

 

[Condottiere]

Confederation Navy: Aerospacecraft Carriers

So I was trying to reconfigure the Prometheus class fast battleships into conforming with my current take on Confederation Navy doctrine, and suddenly found myself running rapidly out of volume, not that easy with a quadrantmegatonne dreadnought.

Basically, couldn't squeeze out the space for a aerospace wing.

So, the line of battle goes back to being specialized for that task.

So I dug out the reference materials again, and noted that modern Confederation aerospacecraft carriers have complements of two to four hundred fighters each, which at eighteen battleships to one carrier tends to lack coverage.

Unless, we redefine heavy fighters into being between a hundred and two hundred tonnes, which makes them really dangerous, if a tad less maneuverable in a dogfight, by about two dice modifiers. On the other hand, they can pick off the opposition at greater ranges.

Personally, I tend to view Traveller fleet carriers as big fat targets, but going by the Midways, the Confederation doesn't shy away from them.

So the new Nimitzes will become not only fast fleet carriers, but super carriers, having the same performance as the line of battle, allowing them to keep up with the Promethii, as well as maintain a buffer behind them.

Escort, pocket and light carriers would carry medium and light fighters.

 

[Condottiere]

Confederation Navy: Destroyer Flotillas and Cruiser Squadrons

I was reminded that Mongoose doesn't permit these, and that most escorts would be smaller than their Imperium equivalents.

That doesn't mean that the Confederation Navy doesn't retain cruisers or destroyers, more that they don't actively build them, and the ones they have aren't organized into homogeneous units.

Likely, the technological level thirteen and below were donated to naval Home Guard units.

Now, it depends on how you define frigates.

 

[Condottiere]

Confederation Navy: Cruiser Gap

Going by the current design rules, I don't really have a problem with the lower end being a two thousandish tonne frigate with two pop up turrets and the upper end a hundred kay tonne heavy cruiser; heavy cruiser being the euphemism for the Confederation equivalent of the Azhanti High Lightning.

But that would be only for the pure combat designs.

Inbetween, you would have tankers, freighters, transporters and carriers, which can be converted to undertake more aggressive naval missions, mobile platform ships, whether for spacecraft or weapon systems.

And planetoids: drill, baby, drill.

 

[baithammer]

Confederation Navy: Destroyer Flotillas and Cruiser Squadrons
Now, it depends on how you define frigates.

Going with the definition of destroyers being smaller anti-small craft ships that tend to act as escorts, a frigate would be a similar size but designed to operate independent of the squadron. ( More endurance and stores, as well as more anti-warship weaponry.)

 

[Condottiere]

Going by the modern interpretation:

1. General purpose

2. Specialized, either anti air or anti submarine warfare

3. Light, by which I assume more punch than off shore patrol

Cruising speed is not going to be an issue, unless you can tie in fuel consumption.

There's intelligence gathering and picketing duty, but with an extended array the frigate would have to drift.

Not too impressive in showing the flag.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Why base it on modern interpretation when projecting to the 57th century?

A frigate used to be a capable warship but not up to line of battle standard, the USS Constitution and her five sister ships were very capable heavy frigates...