Home of Light Defence Fleet

[Brian Neumann]

At your tech level a multirole jump capable solo ship is almost impossible.  I generally just put the jump drive and some extra sensors or passive defenses on my jump ship and have a couple of standard ships of the same size for firepower. 

For the Demon CA I would drop all but 10-15 of the size 1 launchers and put the space into at least 2 more firecontrols and the rest as magazine space.  This will give you a lot more anti-missile firepower as a 54 missile salvo is almost always going to overkill 1 enemy salvo, which is all you can target with 1 firecontrol.  By upping the # of firecontrols you will be able to target more incomming salvo'.  I usually go with 1 fire control for every 5 launchers in pd mode, and 1 firecontrol for no more than 10 launchers in anti-ship mode.  With at least 2 of each so that I have some flexability and redundancy.

Brian

[jseah (OP)]

One fire control for your 54 AMM launchers and one more for your 40 ASM launchers seems inadvisable.

I do have tons of firecons throughout my fleet for smaller targets. 

Still...

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Demon class Cruiser    16,000 tons     1255 Crew     3579 BP      TCS 320  TH 2500  EM 0
7812 km/s     Armour 3-56     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 25     PPV 86
Annual Failure Rate: 136%    IFR: 1.9%    Maint Capacity 2097 MSP    Max Repair 189 MSP    Est Time: 3.53 Years
Magazine 1345   

Magnetic Confinement Fusion Drive E7.5 (16)    Power 156.25    Fuel Use 75%    Signature 156.25    Armour 0    Exp 20%
Fuel Capacity 550,000 Litres    Range 82.5 billion km   (122 days at full power)

Size 1 Missile Launcher (20)    Missile Size 1    Rate of Fire 5
Size 5 Missile Launcher (33% Reduction) (40)    Missile Size 5    Rate of Fire 500
Missile Fire Control FC62-R1 (2)     Range 62.4m km    Resolution 1
Missile Fire Control FC83-R16 (1)     Range 83.2m km    Resolution 16
'Perceval' Size 5 Anti-ship Missile (120)  Speed: 69,400 km/s   End: 14.4m    Range: 60.1m km   WH: 6    Size: 5    TH: 277 / 166 / 83
'Bramble' Size 1 Anti-missile Missile (745)  Speed: 68,500 km/s   End: 1.5m    Range: 6m km   WH: 1    Size: 1    TH: 730 / 438 / 219

Compact ECCM-3 (2)     ECCM-4 (1)         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

At your tech level a multirole jump capable solo ship is almost impossible. 

More like, multi-role solo ship in 16 ktons is fundamentally impossible unless you go lower than 25% engines.  Sensors are always huge and they eat up tons of space. 

For the Demon CA I would drop all but 10-15 of the size 1 launchers and put the space into at least 2 more firecontrols and the rest as magazine space.  This will give you a lot more anti-missile firepower as a 54 missile salvo is almost always going to overkill 1 enemy salvo, which is all you can target with 1 firecontrol.  By upping the # of firecontrols you will be able to target more incomming salvo'.  I usually go with 1 fire control for every 5 launchers in pd mode, and 1 firecontrol for no more than 10 launchers in anti-ship mode.  With at least 2 of each so that I have some flexability and redundancy.

In a precursor engagement prior to this, I swatted all their missiles out of the sky taking no damage at all. 

What I noticed was that my AMM firecons were cycling between their loading tubes and ready to fire ones. 
The same principle can be applied to my AS firecons for targeting tiny targets like FACs and fighters. 

[Narmio]

I just realised your AMM firecon has an order of magnitude more range than your AMMs. That seems a little excessive.  Having really long-ranged anti-missile sensors in the fleet is one thing, but there's no advantage to having a 60mkm fire control range for 6mkm missiles. Up to 1.5x the range of the missile helps to futureproof and offset the effect of ECM, but you have 10x!

Also, against a small precursor squadron you can probably get away with cycling launchers between the firecons, but if you faced an equal-tonnage NPR fleet with an similar missile throw-weight as you, you could not stop it with one fire control.

[Ziusudra]

Except that "Range 62.4m km" for the FC is for 1HS targets, not size 6 missiles.

[jseah (OP)]

The AMM FC was the smallest that gave a 6m range for size 6 targets. 

(6/20)^2 = 0.09
Thus the detection range for a size 6 target is 9% that of the normal. 

ECM on missiles is dealt with by attaching a compact ECCM to the AMM firecons.  AS firecons receive a full size ECCM. 


A similar missile throw weight as my fleet?  I use reduced size launchers.  The amount of AMMs needed to stop one salvo of my missiles is stupidly high. 
Besides, unless the enemy can get their AS launcher cycle time to 10s, they can't saturate my AMM launchers, which will always be lighter and faster firing than their AS launchers. 

Nevertheless, I note that my fleet will not survive even one salvo from itself.  Thus the destroyer escort class (a bigger version of the Wyrm really) will be designed and enter service. 
Guess I found a use for that idle shipyard now. 

[sloanjh]

Except that "Range 62.4m km" for the FC is for 1HS targets, not size 6 missiles.

This is why I always change the name of my missile fire control to include the range, with both ranges give for R1, e.g.

MFC-C S62 R1 6MKm/62.4MKm.

John

[Narmio]

Ah, of course, my bad there on the ranges.  I'd forgotten the difference between 1HS and 0.3HS targets was so pronounced.  On the other hand, keeping your 54 launchers because you have "lots of firecons spread through the fleet" is pretty pointless. If you feel you have enough AMM capability in the fleet, don't put 54 AMM launchers on this ship, put maybe 10 or something. 10 launchers to one fire control is significantly more sensible.

[Brian Neumann]

What I noticed was that my AMM firecons were cycling between their loading tubes and ready to fire ones. 
The same principle can be applied to my AS firecons for targeting tiny targets like FACs and fighters. 

Good catch on this one.  The limit on point defense is going to be based on the setting of how many counter missiles(x) per incomming missile.  The downside to your setup is against single large swarms of missiles like what you put out.  There you can only fire x missiles times the incomming # of missiles in 1 salvo.  If it is a small salvo then every 5 seconds you will be firing 10-15 missiles (at 5 counter missiles per incomming) (ie a fighter launched attack)  If it is a larger salvo then it matters considerably less.  For your offensive launchers you can get away with this as long as you do not mind having to fire on only 1 target per 5 second cycle, and having to manually switch the assigned launchers between firings.  This is okay if you have a well trained crew and task force.  If they are not so well trained then there will be significant time lags between switching assigned launchers.  Having a couple of short ranged fire controls as backup, and to help with shooting at gunboats could make a big difference at that point.  It is mostly I guess a matter of design philosophy and what you are trying to do.

Good luck
Brian

[jseah (OP)]

Hmm, that is a good point.  Now that I think about it, my size 1 launchers have a 5s cycle time when it was 10s.  So I mentally doubled all the launchers per firecon. 

Don't exactly need that now do I?


In any case, I experimented a bit with flood your firecon approach and yeah, a fighter wing from carriers with my fleet's tonnage, will box launch a very large number salvoes with 2 or 3 missiles in each only. 
In those cases, my AMM launchers will have half sitting around not firing. 
Against a reduced size launcher capital ship fleet though, you're looking at 20+ missiles in each salvo so the problem is much less. 

Either way though, I did some calculations and my fleet can throw about 700 missiles.  1k+ after the refit schedules complete. 


With my obsession with training, I have 100% TF training on about 50% of my fleet. =)

[Brian Neumann]

Against a reduced size launcher capital ship fleet though, you're looking at 20+ missiles in each salvo so the problem is much less. 

The training will definitly help alot.  Where you can also see a lot of small salvo's is when they use standard size launchers on smaller warships (5-10,000 tons).  In that case you will see between 5-10 missiles per salvo and each salvo an average of 30 seconds apart.  By the time your amm have actually intercepted the 1st salvo they will have just started to shoot at the second salvo.  Then they will switch to the nearest salvo and fire on that.  Meantime the second salvo gets to sale in for 10-20 seconds before it is really engaged.  The third salvo will do even better.  If you have just a couple extra fire controls then this won't happen anywhere as easily.  It is just easy for 1 fire control to get swamped by different scenarios.  Having 2-3 gives you a lot more flexability, and it won't take up that much space on your ship either.

Brian

[jseah (OP)]

It IS alot of space.  Each firecon is size 9.  That's alot of tonnage. 
And firecon tonnage will have to come out of weapons. 


Nevertheless, I fighting wormhole aliens and the swarm at the same time in Free Haven.  The wormhole aliens couldn't take down the swarm's 600 strength shields and to settle the interrupt loop, I teleported my fleet into the system. 

I'll see how that goes before making any decisions.  Although I'm all too likely to simply blow them away, swarm mothership has a 200 missile salvo bearing down on it and I don't see any gunboats. 
And from the range they were fighting at, I doubt the wormhole aliens have missiles.  There's some kind of energy weapon that generates nuclear detonations however, goodness knows what that is. 

[Brian Neumann]

It IS alot of space.  Each firecon is size 9.  That's alot of tonnage. 
And firecon tonnage will have to come out of weapons. 

That is a lot of tonnage.  Can you get a firecon that is size 1-2 that can shoot at size 6 missiles at 1 mkm?  If you can then that may be a decent compromise solution.  You have one firecon for longer range, and a couple of small ones in case your primary is getting overloaded when the missiles get in close.  If a lucky shot takes out your primary you still have some point defense available.

Brian

[jseah (OP)]

Well, I'm not sure how much lucky shots matter.  My fleet operates in one pack of ~50 ships.  Lucky shots... aren't likely to happen. 

Still, the short range AMM sensor is a good idea.  I'll look into designing one for use. 

[Brian Neumann]

All it takes is one time at a jump point when they are shooting mesons at you to make you think about that lucky hit.  This is especially true when your firecon is so large.  It has a decent chance to be hit individually, and it does not have a high htk to give it a chance of surviving.

Brian