Stealth Fleet

[dooots (OP)]

I'm looking to make a stealth fleet on a trans-newtonian start with 240,000 rp.  Here is what I have come up with so far.

The attack ship, the missile fire control will probably get its resolution bump up to 80.  I'm fairly happy with it, I would like a larger volley but with 42% of the ship as engines and 26% cloaking device there just is not enough room left.  Oh the extra range on the mfc will counter ecm correct?  Also I hope the small fast missiles will be able to break through point defense.

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Tribal class Destroyer    4800 tons     474 Crew     931.6 BP      TCS 24  TH 240  EM 0
5000 km/s     Armour 1-25     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 4     PPV 6
Annual Failure Rate: 46%    IFR: 0.6%    Maint Capacity 485 MSP    Max Repair 312 MSP    Est Time: 2.12 Years
Magazine 142    

Ion Engine (8)    Power 60    Fuel Use 70%    Signature 30    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 200,000 Litres    Range 107.1 billion km   (248 days at full power)

Anti-Ship Missile Launcher (3)    Missile Size 2    Rate of Fire 15
Anti-Ship MFC (1)     Range 80.6m km    Resolution 60
Anti-ship Missile (69)  Speed: 26,100 km/s   End: 19.3m    Range: 30.2m km   WH: 2    Size: 2    TH: 174 / 104 / 52

Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 25% of normal
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
The primary detection scout, hopefully the large thermal sensor will give me plenty of warning if the enemy does not have there active sensors on.

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Ark Royal class Scout    4800 tons     467 Crew     1095.6 BP      TCS 24  TH 240  EM 0
5000 km/s     Armour 1-25     Shields 0-0     Sensors 110/28/0/0     Damage Control Rating 3     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 61%    IFR: 0.9%    Maint Capacity 428 MSP    Max Repair 312 MSP    Est Time: 1.62 Years
Flag Bridge    

Ion Engine (8)    Power 60    Fuel Use 70%    Signature 30    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 200,000 Litres    Range 107.1 billion km   (248 days at full power)

Thermal Sensor (1)     Sensitivity 110     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  110m km
EM Detection Sensor (1)     Sensitivity 28     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  28m km
Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 25% of normal

This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes
The targeting scout.  I would like a way to deal with fighters, but I guess that will have to wait until the next generation of tech.

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Victory class Fast Scout Craft    500 tons     49 Crew     132.6 BP      TCS 10  TH 60  EM 0
12000 km/s     Armour 1-5     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 4%    IFR: 0.1%    Maint Capacity 83 MSP    Max Repair 45 MSP    Est Time: 9.11 Years

GB Ion Engine (1)    Power 120    Fuel Use 700%    Signature 60    Armour 0    Exp 15%
Fuel Capacity 30,000 Litres    Range 15.4 billion km   (14 days at full power)

AGB Active Search Sensor (1)     GPS 420     Range 5.9m km    Resolution 10
Anti-Ship Active Search Sensor (1)     GPS 1680     Range 23.5m km    Resolution 80

This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes
The Carrier, not much to say I would like it too carry two targeting scouts but it can't be done, maybe in the next generation.

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Illustrious class Carrier    4800 tons     447 Crew     917.6 BP      TCS 24  TH 240  EM 0
5000 km/s     Armour 1-25     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 3     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 61%    IFR: 0.9%    Maint Capacity 358 MSP    Max Repair 312 MSP    Est Time: 1.43 Years
Hangar Deck Capacity 500 tons    

Ion Engine (8)    Power 60    Fuel Use 70%    Signature 30    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 450,000 Litres    Range 241.1 billion km   (558 days at full power)

Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 25% of normal
This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes
The jump ship, I am not happy with it, and may scrap it in favor of a larger, slower jump ship with some defense.

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Resolution class Jump Ship    4800 tons     454 Crew     851.6 BP      TCS 96  TH 240  EM 0
5000 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 1-25     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 4     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 46%    IFR: 0.6%    Maint Capacity 444 MSP    Max Repair 256 MSP    Est Time: 2.25 Years

J4800(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 4800 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
Ion Engine (8)    Power 60    Fuel Use 70%    Signature 30    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 650,000 Litres    Range 348.2 billion km   (806 days at full power)

This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes

For the most part I'm happy with the fleet so far, although the jump ship just seems bad (although it could be nice for moving around my empire).  It is kinda scary that if the enemy can get a missile lock on me I'm toast but its also what should be playing the fleet fun.  Also getting into a large war would probably screw my economy since I will not do any research into beam weapons.

I still need to decide how to handle attacking planets.  I'm thinking probably just a troop transport with some AMM escorts.

Well the scouts and attack ship have went under probably 4-5 revisions each (squeezing all the research in was harder then I expected) so I'm looking for some fresh eyes to catch any mistakes I may have made or possible improvements.

[symon]

The jump ship doesn't have the stealth, so it ideally wants to get the other ships through the jump point, survive if shot at, but detach from the fleet and hold the jump point or go home.

It doesn't need to be able to keep up with the fleet so you can reduce the speed if you need to.

[Charlie Beeler]

You've overlooked an important factor in the stealth concept,  engine thermal signature.  Thermal reduction will help with sneaking around.

From personal experience, cloak and thermal reduction are great for recon/scout role ships in the early game.  But the mass for the cloak leaves you with very little useful offensive punch.  Perhaps you experience will differ from mine.

[dooots (OP)]

I have 50% thermal reduction.

I don't expect the fleet to be overly efficient and it has many flaws, such as blockades at jump points and defending my own planets if I get pushed back to them.  And from trying to do this I would say its probably better and easier to just use fighters/gun boats if you want to be able to hit the enemy without them seeing you.

Edit- Well I think I'm gonna call this a failed experiment.  I had forgot to take into account deep space tracking stations and even with 50% thermal reduction the range at which they could see me is still huge.  Although they may not be able to fire at me all it would take is a fighter or gun boat defense at the planet to totally wipe out my fleet as I probably would not see them until it was too late.  I don't think it would be a huge problem verse npr's as I could just bring them to me with a transponder but exploiting the AI to make a flawed fleet work is no good imo.  Oh well it was a fun exercise and I think I will give the fast small missiles another go as a counter to point defense.

[UnLimiTeD]

It will probably work at higher techlevels.
In 3 or 4 levels, you might be able to equip your ships with triple range sensors, and double the offensive punch, + some armor and speed.

[dooots (OP)]

Yeah I think it could work once you got enough tech, its just not possible as a starting fleet imo.

[UnLimiTeD]

The main problem here is mainly the cloak efficiency, once you reach around 6, and pump that freed space into weapons, you will be ok.
I think it might be an awesome idea to have a cloaked carrier launching fighters.
You can track it down, but you can't target it at long range, from where it will deliver the punch.

I once tried a Stealth ship, it relied on sensor drones to find targets, and mounted a good dozen varieties of different ordnance in multiple delivery systems.
It failed entirely because it is impossible to fire a missile just straight at a waypoint, or even a planet, without actives, as without own sensors, the missile will self-destruct, and if it has some, it will find a diffent target.
I had drones holding sensor buoys just hanging out next to an enemy ship without releasing the buoy, and even though that would probably be sensor covarage, the fired Mirvs selfdestructed without releasing their homing payload because they didn't have sensors on their own.

[sloanjh]

It failed entirely because it is impossible to fire a missile just straight at a waypoint, or even a planet, without actives, as without own sensors, the missile will self-destruct, and if it has some, it will find a diffent target.

I think that either I'm confused by what you're saying (most likely), you're confused about something, or the game is broken (either bug or design error) :-) ) then it might be worth a suggestion that there be a flag on a missile to declare it "non-homing" even if it has sensors.  This would allow a single stage which moved to the wp and then just sat there using its sensors, and wouldn't try to attack anything it saw.

John

[dooots (OP)]

The main problem here is mainly the cloak efficiency, once you reach around 6, and pump that freed space into weapons, you will be ok.

Cloak efficiency was not really the problem.  Most of the problem is I was looking to be able to hit Kurt's zog fleet with out it being able to hit me but the zog's tech was about 2 levels above mine so I used up too much space on engines and limited my ships in size by quite a bit since his zog fleet uses a resolution 60 sensor.  Plus they have an Anti Gun Boat sensor which pushed my missile ranges out further then I would have liked.

More efficiency would help but overall my tech levels where just to low to pull it off.  Although if I just stayed away from planets and used some method of bring the npr's to me I think the fleet would work as is.  But like I said that feels cheap to me.

The biggest weakness I see with a stealth fleet is detecting fighters/facs in time since you don't want active sensors giving away your position.  Well I guess you could give away your position as long as you know you are faster then your enemy and can keep them from getting a sensor lock on you.  Well actually you don't even need to be faster as long as they can't see you with your actives turned off.  Just turn off you actives if they get too close and hide.  Maybe I could make it work for a starting fleet after all.

[dooots (OP)]

Here is what I came up with based on the new ideas I got.

Well by dropping engines and moving tech around to improve cloaking I was able to more then triple my volley size.  I don't think point defense will be an issue anymore.  I also swapped out one point of damage on the missiles for some sensors, although I don't know if 160,000 km of sensor range is enough (my guess is its not).  Also I don't know if I need the anti-fighter fire control or not.

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County class Cruiser    7000 tons     696 Crew     1329.8 BP      TCS 28  TH 147  EM 0
3000 km/s     Armour 1-32     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 7     PPV 20
Annual Failure Rate: 56%    IFR: 0.8%    Maint Capacity 831 MSP    Max Repair 392 MSP    Est Time: 2.26 Years
Magazine 530    

Military Ion Engine (Stealth) (7)    Power 60    Fuel Use 80%    Signature 21    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 250,000 Litres    Range 80.4 billion km   (310 days at full power)

Anti-Ship Missile Launcher (10)    Missile Size 2    Rate of Fire 20
Anti-Fighter Missile Fire Control (1)     Range 10.6m km    Resolution 5
Anti-Ship Missile Fire Control (1)     Range 84.5m km    Resolution 80
Anti-ship Missile (265)  Speed: 25,100 km/s   End: 20.1m    Range: 30.2m km   WH: 1    Size: 2    TH: 167 / 100 / 50

Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 20% of normal
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

I am much happier with the scout, I can now venture close to planets and hopefully pickup fighters and facs before they are a problem, I can also use it for attacking if I am faster then my enemy.  The Anti-ship missiles probably should be replaced with some sort of drone/buoy launcher for scouting planets since I could quickly get into trouble if they have large fast ships at the planet.

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Duke of York class Scout    7000 tons     688 Crew     1546.8 BP      TCS 28  TH 147  EM 0
3000 km/s     Armour 1-32     Shields 0-0     Sensors 110/22/0/0     Damage Control Rating 5     PPV 10
Annual Failure Rate: 78%    IFR: 1.1%    Maint Capacity 691 MSP    Max Repair 392 MSP    Est Time: 1.62 Years
Magazine 265    

Military Ion Engine (Stealth) (7)    Power 60    Fuel Use 80%    Signature 21    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 250,000 Litres    Range 80.4 billion km   (310 days at full power)

Anti-Ship Missile Launcher (5)    Missile Size 2    Rate of Fire 20
Anti-Fighter Missile Fire Control (1)     Range 10.6m km    Resolution 5
Anti-Ship Missile Fire Control (1)     Range 84.5m km    Resolution 80
Anti-ship Missile (132)  Speed: 25,100 km/s   End: 20.1m    Range: 30.2m km   WH: 1    Size: 2    TH: 167 / 100 / 50

Standard Anti-Ship Active Search Sensor (1)     GPS 3840     Range 42.2m km    Resolution 80
Anti-Fighter Active Search Sensor (1)     GPS 960     Range 10.6m km    Resolution 5
Thermal Sensor (1)     Sensitivity 110     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  110m km
EM Detection Sensor (1)     Sensitivity 22     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  22m km
Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 20% of normal

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

The targeting scout was able to drop the gun boat sensors as it will now only be used for targeting ships that are faster then my attacking ships.  It also now has a lot more fuel so I can use it for long range scouting if need be.

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River class Fast Scout Craft    500 tons     44 Crew     109.6 BP      TCS 10  TH 42  EM 0
12000 km/s     Armour 1-5     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 0     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 4%    IFR: 0.1%    Maint Capacity 68 MSP    Max Repair 52 MSP    Est Time: 7.59 Years

GB Ion Engine (Stealth) (1)    Power 120    Fuel Use 800%    Signature 42    Armour 0    Exp 15%
Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres    Range 22.5 billion km   (21 days at full power)

Small Anti-Ship Active Search Sensor (1)     GPS 2560     Range 28.2m km    Resolution 80

This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes

The carrier can now carry two fast scouts and even has some room to spare for something else, I put some missile launchers on it because I don't know what I want to do with the extra space.

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Warrior class Carrier    7000 tons     650 Crew     1416.8 BP      TCS 28  TH 147  EM 0
3000 km/s     Armour 1-32     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 7     PPV 6
Annual Failure Rate: 56%    IFR: 0.8%    Maint Capacity 886 MSP    Max Repair 392 MSP    Est Time: 2.35 Years
Flag Bridge    Hangar Deck Capacity 1000 tons     Magazine 261    

Military Ion Engine (Stealth) (7)    Power 60    Fuel Use 80%    Signature 21    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 450,000 Litres    Range 144.6 billion km   (558 days at full power)

Anti-Ship Missile Launcher (3)    Missile Size 2    Rate of Fire 20
Anti-Ship Missile Fire Control (1)     Range 84.5m km    Resolution 80
Anti-ship Missile (132)  Speed: 25,100 km/s   End: 20.1m    Range: 30.2m km   WH: 1    Size: 2    TH: 167 / 100 / 50

Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 20% of normal
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

The Jump Ship can now use a cloaking device, but I think I will drop that in favor of hanger space for a fac that I can use for probing jump points and just let the Jump Ship stay behind the fleet.

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Audacious class Jump Ship    7000 tons     682 Crew     1605.8 BP      TCS 28  TH 147  EM 0
3000 km/s    JR 3-50     Armour 1-32     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 7     PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 56%    IFR: 0.8%    Maint Capacity 1004 MSP    Max Repair 552 MSP    Est Time: 2.08 Years

J7050(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 7050 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3
Military Ion Engine (Stealth) (7)    Power 60    Fuel Use 80%    Signature 21    Armour 0    Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 700,000 Litres    Range 225.0 billion km   (868 days at full power)

Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 20% of normal
This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes

Overall a large improvement over my last attempt imo.  And I even manage to hit my goal of being able to attack Kurt's zog fleet without it being able to fire back, although they could now easily out run me so I would have to be careful.  The Jump Ship needs some reworking but that is not really in issue for me.  I may give this a go now, I feel much safer attacking planets (well after I get some kind of drone/buoy worked out).  The only issue is the racial techs put me a little over budget on research points, (currently less then 1k but with the mods it would be a bit more) but that is not really an issue for me I'll just have to start playing before I have jump ships or something.

I will note that even after these improvements I still think fighters are a better option for attacking without getting counter attacked but this redesign has done a good job at closing the gap.

[dooots (OP)]

Well I gave this a shot, ran into precursors and they could pick up my thermals, guess I under estimated the size of deep space tracking stations they would have.  So for a fleet relying on stealth for defense thermal output seems to be the limiting factor.  Oh well it was fun to toy around with, guess a pure stealth fleet is just something I would have to do later in the game.