My Very First Fleet, Part 1: Conventional Tech and The Triton Project

[xenoscepter (OP)]

The Triton Project:
----------------------

--- The Triton Project was formed with the mission of bringing cutting-edge technology to the very tip of the spear that would serve as humanity's best, last and only line of defense against the dangers that would be harbored in the void.   To that end, it assembled the best and the brightest, and gave them the task of producing Earth's very first Extra-Orbital Warships.   Formed under the banner of this think tank was the ArcaneTech production company; which would be responsible for the production of a majority components that would be used by the Imperialist Syndicate's earliest forays into the interstellar frontier.   While the Triton Project would go on to become the biggest name in the scientific domain of the Imperialist Syndicate in it's own right, it would also go on to create many of the key players that would lead to the founding of some of the largest companies in what would come to be known as "Imperial Space"

Conventional Ships:
-----------------------

Titan Atlas:
--------------

Code: [Select]

Titan Atlas class Bombardment Cruiser    10,850 tons     272 Crew     674 BP      TCS 217  TH 5  EM 0
23 km/s     Armour 3-43     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 4     PPV 72
Maint Life 1.16 Years     MSP 155    AFR 235%    IFR 3.3%    1YR 117    5YR 1757    Max Repair 96 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Spare Berths 0   
Magazine 72   

ArcaneTech Glidejet (2)    Power 2.5    Fuel Use 13.26%    Signature 2.5    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres    Range 6.2 billion km   (3142 days at full power)

Triton Project "Atlas" Class Missile Launcher (3)    Missile Size 24    Rate of Fire 720
ICBM Launch Control (1)     Range 50k km    Resolution 50
Triton Project "Atlas" Class ICBM (3)  Speed: 200 km/s   End: 12.3d    Range: 212.1m km   WH: 16    Size: 24    TH: 0/0/0

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes


--- Ship Characteristics:

 - The Titan "Atlas" is a Conventional Warship armed with three ICMB Silos modified for use on a spaceship.   Featuring nominal armoring and built with only that which is available at the start, the "Atlas" is an attempt to make some sort of functional warship with Conventional Tech.   To that end it is essentially a flying ICBM Silo, which is better than nothing.  .  .   and worse than everything else.   Both the "Atlas" and the "Regalia" are part of Project Triton. 

--- Ship Doctrine:

 - At any given time, only one "Atlas" should be in  close proximity to the attending "Regalia", with other off somewhere else within it's passive sesnor range.   The "Atlas" farther out fires first, then speeds (lol) away to draw off any attackers.   The second "Atlas" then uses the Pythagorian Theorum to calculate a probable course of the attackers using the far "Atlas" postion, heading, as well as the enemies last reported position to find "C", and uses that to fire on the enemy.   Hopefully, the enemy doesn't notice the second launch, in which case it will not give away the position of the "Regalia" and her attending "Atlas", as the direction of the shots won't be immediately apparent. 

--- Description of Role:

 - The Titan "Atlas" is meant to serve alongside the Titan "Regalia", with the "Regalia" spotting targets.   Two of these ships are assigned per "Regalia" with about three fleets total.   It is an ambusher, designed to operate using Listen / Kill tactics in conjuction with the Titan "Regalia" Otherwise it is merely a flying (floating?) ICBM Silo; a role which the "Atlas" does not supplant, but rather enhances by relegating the ACTUAL Missile Base PDCs to a last line of defense incase the "Atlas" fails. 

Titan Regalia:
----------------

Code: [Select]

Titan Regalia class Cruiser    5,500 tons     64 Crew     223.2 BP      TCS 110  TH 5  EM 0
45 km/s     Armour 3-27     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/50/0/0     Damage Control Rating 2     PPV 0
Maint Life 2.27 Years     MSP 51    AFR 121%    IFR 1.7%    1YR 13    5YR 200    Max Repair 50 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Spare Berths 1   

ArcaneTech Glidejet (2)    Power 2.5    Fuel Use 13.26%    Signature 2.5    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres    Range 12.2 billion km   (3142 days at full power)

Stellar Electronics Ltd. 10EM5 Regalia (1)     Sensitivity 50     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  50m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes


--- Ship Characteristics:

 - The Titan "Regalia" is named after the sensor system she mounts.   Completely unarmed, she is completely reliant on her attending Titan "Atlas" for defense.   As a result it is considered acceptable for her attending "Atlas" to hold one missile in reserve, so as to cover her retreat in the event of discovery during an attack. 

--- Ship Doctrine:

 - The ships doctrine is as simple, straightforward and boring as can be: sit there and listen for something.  .  .   anything that might be considered enough of a threat to nuke.   Then tell the 'Atlas" to have all the fun.   Mundane, but essential. 

--- Description of Role:

 - The "Regalia" is the eyes of her Task Group, and as such, is invaluable.   Although neither her nor her attending "Atlas" are invisible when moving, or in the case of the "Atlas", when it's firing; she CAN survey her surroundings without fear of detection.   As such, the "Regalia", despite her age, would serve for ages to come; seeing several refits and upgrades along the way and would eventually end up being replaced by the Legacy-Class.  .  .   so named for her long-lived and well esteemed career. 

Ordinances:
--------------

Triton Project "Atlas" Class ICBM:
---------------------------------------

Code: [Select]

Missile Size: 24 MSP  (1.2 HS)     Warhead: 16    Armour: 0     Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 200 km/s    Engine Endurance: 294.6 hours   Range: 212.1m km
Cost Per Missile: 4.075
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 2%   3k km/s 0%   5k km/s 0.4%   10k km/s 0.2%
Materials Required:    4x Tritanium   0.075x Gallicite   Fuel x2500


--- Description of Role:

 - The product of the Triton Project's humble beginnings, the "Atlas" Class ICBM is based off of time-tested, war-proven designs and technology, adapted for the rapidly growing needs of the fledgling Imperialist Syndicate.   Twice as powerful as a Conventional ICBM, and outfitted with ArcaneTech's brand-new Solidjet Missile Engine, the "Atlas" Class ICBM was considered a force to be reckoned with when it was first introduced.   Adapted for the soon to be venerated launchers of the then new Titan "Atlas" Class Bombardment Cruiser, this missile would go down in history as an important first for mankind. 

[Father Tim]

Man, why didn't I ever think of yanking some ICBM silos out of my starting missile bases and putting them aboard ship?

I look forward to seeing your "Minuteman II" cruiser designs.

[Garfunkel]

Wow, I've done early game military stuff but never went for pure TL-0 ships. You had to research the first level of Active Sensors though? Would be great to see these in action.

[xenoscepter (OP)]

Nope, no active sensor tech, no you can't make a Missile FCS without it, but you DO have the ICBM Control.  It counts toward the Missile FCS requirement.  These ships were designed by starting up a new game in Conventional Start, switching on the SM Mode, then Instant Researching only the modules I was designing for the ships.  In other words, this is indeed 'Tech Level Zero' with the only techs you research are the "racial techs" for the components.  IIRC, you need two engine techs, one each for your missile and ship engines; then a Passive EM Sensor Tech for your 'Regalia", a launcher tech for your "Atlas" (might be able to do it with the starting ICBM Silo though, haven't tested it. ) and finally a single tech for your actual "Atlas" ICBM.  Technically, you can just use the Conventional ICBMs you get at the start, which will save you a tech.  If you CAN in fact use the starting ICBM Silo on a ship, then you can save two techs; one for the missile and one for it's launcher respectively.  I took the Role-Play aspect that neither the Conventional ICBMs nor their Silo apparatus was designed with extra-orbital use in mind; so the "Atlas" missile and it's launcher were designed by the Triton Project to be used specifically in an extra-orbital environment.  The Titan "Atlas" was built around the launcher which was designed for this missile while the "Regalia" was built of off that hull to be a primitive sensor ship.

[sublight]

Did you remember to put a passive sensor on the Atlas missile?

Ship-guided launches require targets (except possibly populations) to be painted by an active scanner.
Self-guided missiles don't need active scanners, but require targeting a waypoint making them are really tricky to use against a mobile target.

[xenoscepter (OP)]

No, no sensors on the "Atlas" Class ICBM. It is in fact manually targeted. The 'Regalia" finds a target with it's Passive EM Sensors. You the player decide if it's a threat. Upon deciding it IS a threat, you use one of two Titan "Atlas" Cruisers to fire at the location where you first detected the target. If it is not moving, your job just got a lot easier... wait for impact, then listen around for other things to shoot. If it's moving then your job just got a lot harder (unless they are hot enough to track, then you can just manually calculate the lead time and fire the second "atlas" stationed next to your "Regalia") as you need to calculate the lead manually based only on whatever information you could glean from the "Regalia". When you have done that you take the distance from the location of the initial contact from your "Regalia" to your distant "Atlas" at the time it fired, take the target lead calculations, then begin moving your "Atlas" to try and get the enemies attention if they happen to be listening. Use the move vector you set for your distant 'Atlas" as A, it's location at the time of firing as B and the location of your first contact as C. This first triangle forms your Firing Solution.

Use the second "Atlas" Cruise, which should be stationed beside your 'regalia" and fire on C. The alter the move vector of your first "Atlas" so that it intersects the missiles that are in transit on the inside of their firing line... that is to say, from behind them. Now, for the most important step. Cross your fingers and hope. And if you miss, bend over, bite your lip and think of England.

[sublight]

Yah, that's the firing half for passively launching missiles, but you're missing the acquisition half.

Aurora missiles are functionally Casaba Howitzers in space with a narrow plasma carronade beam like blast and zero area of effect vs non-planitary targets, even when such targets are stacked in the same location. A missile without a fire control target and without onboard sensors to search for a new target will just harmlessly self destruct.

Missile sensor don't need to be very large since they don't need to see the target when launched from your ship, they just need to see the target during their closest approach when fired blindly at where you predict the enemy will be or else they'll keep flying.

[xenoscepter (OP)]

Aha! Now this I did not know! Tanks a lot, I'll adjust the design accordingly!

[xenoscepter (OP)]

It DOES have the ICBM Launch Control... it counts as a Missile FCS for construction purposes... does that count as a target lock? Or do you need a separate, Non-FCS Active Sensor System lighting up the target as well?

[JacenHan]

There are basically two ways to get a missile locked onto a target: Using the FC on the ship, or putting a sensor on the missile.

To use the FC on the ship, you need to have an active sensor lock (from any ship) on the target and be within range of the FC (50k km for the ICBM control). This is the simplest way to shoot a missile at an enemy. Firing at a waypoint ignores both of these requirements.

You can also put a sensor of any kind on the missile, which will cause to lock on to any target that comes within range of the sensor. This requires no active sensor or FC lock. The missile can be launched at a waypoint ahead of the enemy, or launched at a place you know they will have to go, like a jump point, where the missile will wait until it runs out of fuel. It is very hard to shoot a missile at the place where the enemy is going, especially as Aurora's waypoint placement system is not very precise even if you do the math yourself.

[Garfunkel]

I would recommend researching the first Active Sensor tech and then designing the smallest ranged active sensor possible since the fire control range is only 50k km, the search sensor doesn't need much more range. That way you don't have to worry about waypoint issues. TL0 passives on missiles will not have any range at all since the basic EM/TH sensitivity is only 5 at 50 tons.

Now I'm kinda interested in trying out a multi-faction Earth start with TL-0 war.