Pod Launchers

[jseah (OP)]

After reading some of the Harrington series (I say some, but I've read nearly all of it by now, except some of the later books), I am contemplating using the so-called pod-superdreadnought idea in the books.  With some adaptation of course. 

The idea is to have a carrier with a tractor beam.  Inside the carrier is 1 ship that is nothing but box launchers and 1 MFC. 

Operational doctrine:
Carrier meets enemy, Scout fires up active sensor
Carrier launches Missile Pod, Carrier uses tractor beam on 'Pod. 
Missile Pod dumps it's missiles into space. 
Missiles hit. 
Carrier recovers 'Pod.  'Pod reloads. 

Stick in 1 engineering space and forget about maintenance since the clocks don't go up in a hangar.  You gain the ability to use box launchers, 15% size vs 25% reduced size, netting 10% savings while losing 5% to hangars. 
Well, you do slow down when you deploy the pod and even hangar reload is pretty long.  Well, I won't turn up my nose at the ability for a 16 kton ship to throw 145 missiles... although the insanely long reload is giving me the shivers. 

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GhoulB class Light Carrier    16,000 tons     868 Crew     2713.5 BP      TCS 320  TH 2500  EM 0
7812 km/s     Armour 3-56     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 11     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 186%    IFR: 2.6%    Maint Capacity 1166 MSP    Max Repair 100 MSP    Est Time: 3.07 Years
Hangar Deck Capacity 6000 tons     Magazine 960    Tractor Beam     

Magnetic Confinement Fusion Drive E7.5 (16)    Power 156.25    Fuel Use 75%    Signature 156.25    Armour 0    Exp 20%
Fuel Capacity 575,000 Litres    Range 86.2 billion km   (127 days at full power)

'Perceval' Size 5 Anti-ship Missile (192)  Speed: 69,400 km/s   End: 14.4m    Range: 60.1m km   WH: 6    Size: 5    TH: 277 / 166 / 83

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

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Pod class Missile Boat    6,000 tons     46 Crew     597 BP      TCS 120  TH 0  EM 0
1 km/s     Armour 1-29     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 108.75
Annual Failure Rate: 576%    IFR: 8%    Maint Capacity 31 MSP    Max Repair 63 MSP    Est Time: 0.09 Years
Magazine 725   

Size 5 Box Launcher (145)    Missile Size 5    Hangar Reload 37.5 minutes    MF Reload 6.2 hours
Missile Fire Control FC83-R16 (1)     Range 83.2m km    Resolution 16
'Perceval' Size 5 Anti-ship Missile (145)  Speed: 69,400 km/s   End: 14.4m    Range: 60.1m km   WH: 6    Size: 5    TH: 277 / 166 / 83

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

[Gidoran]

Have you considered, instead of doing one really big 'pod', doing a lot of smaller pods? Part of the HH advantage was that even if they destroyed one pod, there were so many that it could just suck up the loss with ease.

Something you could consider doing is a 'launcher' which consists of literally a fire control, a command module, and then only a couple of launchers. . .  You'd end up reducing your overall throw weight slightly, but you'd gain in redundancy significantly.

Here's an example of my thought:

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PodTest class Cruiser    500 tons     7 Crew     72.5 BP      TCS 10  TH 0  EM 0
1 km/s     Armour 1-5     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 7.5
Annual Failure Rate: 100%    IFR: 1.4%    Maint Capacity 0 MSP    Max Repair 34 MSP    Est Time: 0 Years
Magazine 50   


Eridani Arms LAC Launch Tube Mk. 2 (10)    Missile Size 5    Hangar Reload 37.5 minutes    MF Reload 6.2 hours
Serrana Industries Missile Guidance Computer (1)     Range 80.6m km    Resolution 100

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Calculated up, with your current hangar capacity this would give you 120 missiles, which is only about 25 less, while letting you maintain endurance better by breaking up the fire.  Or alternatively, up the missiles per pod to 23 (1000 ton pod) and you get 138 total missiles, and 23 size 5's isn't a bad throw weight per pod.  Mind you, I'm not really sure if you can use a tractor on more than one thing at a time, so this is all pure hypothesis on my part.

[Brian Neumann]

you can only tractor 1 thing at a time.  You could however use something like this for static defense setups around planets or at jump points.  You could also use this to get a really heavy salvo in for a jump point assault.

Brian

[Aldaris]

Don't tractors work both ways? It'd cost some mass, but you could put the tractors on the pods.

[sloanjh]

Don't tractors work both ways? It'd cost some mass, but you could put the tractors on the pods.

No (they don't).  Some people were making tractor chains a while back by doing this sort of thing.  Steve ruled it an exploit and "fixed" the code so it shouldn't be doable.  The rule is 1 tug with 1 tow.  If you figure out how to get anything other than this with the current mechanics then it's a bug.

John

[Aldaris]

Huh, so there go modular ships, then. What a shame.