A carrier cruiser

[nakorkren (OP)]

Having just arrived at Ion tech, I am designing the Stoa class Carrier Cruiser. The intent is for the 10cm 4-shot railgun fighters to provide PD as well as general tactical flexibility fighters are known for, supported in the PD role by the twin 8cm laser turrets and small bank of AMM launchers. At this tech level AMMs are pretty... unimpressive, but it helps a bit, and the AMMs can also be used against fighters/FACs before they reach my own fighters. I added cheap (5t each) single-weapon MFCs for each launcher to be able to handle swarming fighters. The Stoa also carries 4 triple 20cm laser turrets (biggest I have researched so far) for range to destroy PD ships which would otherwise be a threat to the fighters, clean out PD STO from out of range or ranged STO while tanking damage on the shields. The Tremor fighter-scouts are primarily for extending the max tracking time on missiles beyond the high-range main sensor, although I may later add fighter-scouts with a passive sensor instead for covert scouting.

Intended benefits of the design include the fact that fighters and missiles can be upgraded as new tech comes along without refitting the ship. I can also build a version with much more hanger space and fewer weapons using the same shipyard without retooling, if I decide in need more fighters in fleet engagements. The twin 8cm laser turrets provide some native PD in case I detach the fighters to chase down another target or engage up close, or want to dock the fighters and tank something on the shields. I intentionally set the 8cm turret tracking speed higher than my current BFC speed to set the stage for updating the BFC when I hit the next tech level.

Yes, I know, there's no such thing as 8cm lasers, that's a house rule I'm testing. Twin 8cm PD Laser Turret Mk2, Cost 10.6   Size 272 tons   Crew 11   HTK 2, Materials Required: Duranium  7.8    Boronide  0.6    Corundium  2. I tried to make them less efficient (per cost and tonnage) than gauss or 10cm railguns, but more efficient than 10cm lasers would be. Once the missile changes come in v2.2, I will probably try the design again with 10cm lasers for PD instead to gain some range to counter standoff warheads and be more useful against fighters/FACs.

I'm looking for feedback both on optimizing the design and on the tactical and strategic utility (or lack there of) of using this as my main combatant. I will likely also build smaller (10 to 12k-ton) ships so I can disperse my fleet to protect colonies, but I'm not yet sure what those ships will look like. Ideally they'd be able to operate independently, otherwise I should just build them bigger, and ideally they'd also add synergy when operating in a fleet with the Stoas. Will probably put a small number of big lasers, heavy shields, and big engines on them to be able to tackle the lightly armored Raiders, which is the main reason to disperse your fleet anyway. Looking for thoughts on what those smaller ships should look like as well, I guess.

Without further ado:

Stoa class Carrier Cruiser (P)      42,681 tons       923 Crew       5,512 BP       TCS 854    TH 2,500    EM 8,520
2928 km/s      Armour 5-108       Shields 284-532       HTK 251      Sensors 16/0/0/0      DCR 26      PPV 143.76
Maint Life 1.71 Years     MSP 4,791    AFR 911%    IFR 12.7%    1YR 1,986    5YR 29,787    Max Repair 625 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 10,250 tons     Magazine 310   
Commander    Control Rating 1   BRG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Flight Crew Berths 205    Morale Check Required   

Ion Drive  EP1250.00 (2)    Power 2500    Fuel Use 22.14%    Signature 1250    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 1,300,000 Litres    Range 24.8 billion km (97 days at full power)
Delta S71 / R532 Shields (4)     Recharge Time 532 seconds (0.5 per second)

Triple 20cm Ultraviolet Laser Turret (4x3)    Range 192,000km     TS: 6000 km/s     Power 30-10.5     RM 40,000 km    ROF 15       
Twin 8cm PD Laser Turret Mk2 (10x2)    Range 30,000km     TS: 20000 km/s     Power 2-2     RM 30,000 km    ROF 5       
Beam Fire Control R96-TS16000 (1)     Max Range: 96,000 km   TS: 16,000 km/s     90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Beam Fire Control R192-TS6000 (1)     Max Range: 192,000 km   TS: 6,000 km/s     95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Magnetic Mirror Fusion Reactor R62-PB30 (1)     Total Power Output 62.1    Exp 15%

Size 1 Missile Launcher (10)     Missile Size: 1    Rate of Fire 10
Missile Fire Control FC4-R1 (10)     Range 4m km    Resolution 1

AS-2.2m-24.7m (1)     GPS 240     Range 24.7m km    MCR 2.2m km    Resolution 1
TH-8s-100t (1)     Sensitivity 16     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  31.6m km

ECCM-1 (1)         ECM 10

Strike Group
20x F47 Fighter   Speed: 10009 km/s    Size: 9.99
7x Tremor Fighter-Scout   Speed: 5483 km/s    Size: 0.68

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Carrier for auto-assignment purposes



F47 class Fighter (P)      500 tons       15 Crew       98.7 BP       TCS 10    TH 100    EM 0
10009 km/s      Armour 1-5       Shields 0-0       HTK 3      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 3
Maint Life 5.32 Years     MSP 52    AFR 20%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 3    5YR 46    Max Repair 50 MSP
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months    Morale Check Required   

Ion Drive  EP100.00 (1)    Power 100    Fuel Use 626.10%    Signature 100    Explosion 20%
Fuel Capacity 15,000 Litres    Range 0.86 billion km (23 hours at full power)

10cm Railgun V20/C3 (1x4)    Range 20,000km     TS: 10,009 km/s     Power 3-3     RM 20,000 km    ROF 5       
Beam Fire Control R48-TS12000 (SW) (1)     Max Range: 48,000 km   TS: 12,000 km/s     79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0
Magnetic Mirror Fusion Reactor R3-PB30 (1)     Total Power Output 3    Exp 15%

RTX Mk 1 AESA (1)     GPS 2     Range 2m km    MCR 181.7k km    Resolution 1

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction
This design is classed as a Fighter for auto-assignment purposes




Tremor class Fighter-Scout (P)      35 tons       1 Crew       10 BP       TCS 1    TH 4    EM 0
5483 km/s      Armour 1-1       Shields 0-0       HTK 1      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0
Maint Life 8.60 Years     MSP 5    AFR 7%    IFR 0.1%    1YR 0    5YR 2    Max Repair 5 MSP
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 8 months    Morale Check Required   

Ion Drive  EP3.75 (1)    Power 3.8    Fuel Use 404.15%    Signature 3.75    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 2,000 Litres    Range 2.6 billion km (5 days at full power)

Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (1)     GPS 4     Range 2.9m km    MCR 256.9k km    Resolution 1

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction
This design is classed as a None for auto-assignment purposes



Advocate AMM
Missile Size: 1.0000 MSP (2.5000 Tons)    Warhead: 1    Radiation Damage: 1    Manoeuver Rating: 11
Speed: 31,000 km/s    Fuel: 52    Flight Time: 60 seconds    Range: 1.88 Mkm
Cost Per Missile: 1.04029    Development Cost: 104
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 341.0%   3k km/s 113.7%   5k km/s 68.2%   10k km/s 34.1%   20k km/s 17.1%   50k km/s 6.8%   100k km/s 3.4%

Minerals Required
Tritanium  0.25005
Gallicite  0.79024
Fuel:  52

[nuclearslurpee]

So first off, while it is of course up to you might I suggest looking into the possibility of using reduced-shot railguns to create smaller fighters? I mention this because, while using the 500-ton limit to its maximum of course yields the most efficient designs per ton, one of the key strengths of beam fighters is the ability to overwhelm enemy BFCs by sheer numbers. To this end, smaller fighters have a key advantage that can make up for their inefficiency, as unprepared enemies simply cannot shoot them out of the void fast enough as they are wasting full broadsides on 1-2 targets per salvo.

Note that using railgun fighters only or principally for PD is not an efficient choice compared to ship-based railguns, at least not in terms of tonnage used or in terms of cost (putting three railguns on a ship is cheaper than putting one railgun on a fighter with pricey boosted engines!). Therefore, IMO you should plan on using your beam fighters as your major offensive arm as well as otherwise you're not really getting much out of them.

As far as the actual carrier design goes:

• At Ion Drive tech level, you should be pulling more than 3,000 km/s speeds even for a fleet carrier. You may not have an urgent need to close the range, but you would like to be able to maintain the range so as not to be shot apart. With 30% of tonnage dedicated to engines you can achieve 3,750 km/s and this is the bare minimum IMO. Note that a better speed means this ship remains reasonable against higher tech levels as you can upgrade the fighters and AMMs, but a ship this slow cannot translate well to higher tech levels.
• ~10,000 tons of hangar space seems a bit light for 42,000 tons of carrier. I think the main culprit is the passive defenses, a ship that shouldn't be getting shot at doesn't need so much armor and shielding. Here I'd probably neglect shields and go for 4 armor layers, since you should get shot at very rarely and thus the strategic cost of repairing armor is not large. Plus, shield EM signatures mean you will be spotted for sure, and a carrier wants to stay hidden.
• You could argue that you need defenses since, as a cruiser, this ship expects to be shot at sometimes. I would argue that is a bit suspect, the 20cm lasers are clearly secondary as you only have perhaps 4,500 tons dedicated to them versus over 10,000 tons dedicated to hangars. The choice of primary weapon is clear, and the rest of the design should reflect it.
• Not sure why you turret the 20cm lasers but it is costing you tonnage. Not a huge amount but enough to mount more lasers instead which should give better combat power on balance.
• I recommend having an EM sensor. Thermal sensors are nice, but often the way to detect enemy ships (without being seen!) is using EM sensors to detect their active sensors from a long distance.
• Your fuel load is probably too little, considering that you will have to refuel fighters at least once, perhaps multiple times, which can take up to 20% of your total fuel per engagement depending on engagement range.

Strategically, I think the cruiser/carrier concept is a bit of a mixed bag. Tactically, you're not getting any advantage in an evenly matched fight, since it's a lot harder to build up a critical mass of fighters if half your payload is dedicated to mounting weapons, and you'll be outgunned in a beam melee. Strategically, however, the first rule of winning battles is to have overwhelming firepower and never pick a fight you can't dominate. In that case, if you can bring up a superior tonnage of these cruiser-carriers, then you can certainly have enough to tank a lot of hits in something like a jump point assault, where the 20cm lasers are the star of the show, and then use fighters to establish control of space. The real question is whether you can generate such localized superiority consistently. If you are in a situation where you can roleplay as the US Navy with more ships than the next dozen NPRs combined, then you have no problems (but then... you can do whatever you want anyways). If you find yourself in three different wars 100 billion km apart and cannot move forces around freely, then you will have more problems since you cannot count on tactical superiority. So overall, I think the cruiser-carrier concept is suspect, at least as a primary doctrine. As a supporting ship to a primary arms-based fleet doctrine, then I think there is more utility.

Finally, your AMM design is crap. At ion tech, you should be able to go faster than this. I've seen NPR designs at Nuclear Gas-Core tech that are faster than this. 40,000 km/s should be achievable. The solution is usually to invest more into the maximum EP boost tech, which many players neglect, and which is cheap enough and has incredibly good returns for missiles that you cannot excuse missing on it.

[nakorkren (OP)]

Thank you for the insightful response!

I'm still processing the majority of the feedback, but yes, the AMM is crap. It's not the fault of the design per se (i.e. balance of propulsion to fuel to warhead etc), it's the fault of me not researching a higher level of boosted engines or other missile techs yet, since I wasn't originally planning to use missiles at all.  I debated just dropping the launchers and magazine from the design until I can get my missile/engine boost tech higher. As you've reinforced that, I think I'll do so.

More feedback on your other points tomorrow, after I've mulled them over further.

[Garfunkel]

Traditional wisdom is that, especially at early tech levels, specialization is the best path forward. That means that Soviet Navy style hybrids are inherently less effective than their American Navy counterparts. So instead of combining a guided missile cruiser and a carrier into a single ship such as Heavy Aircraft Cruiser Admiral Kuznetsov , you should build two separate ships, such as the Guided Missile Cruiser USN Ticonderoga and Nuclear Aircraft Carrier USN Enterprise.

In other words, your carrier should just be engines, hangars, fuel tanks, magazines for missiles if your fighters use them, and engineering. Even sensors can be, aside from emergency stuff, put into dedicated sensor fighters instead. Some players take this principle to maximum by putting large commercial engines on their carriers, which makes them slow but saves a lot on fuel since tactically it hardly matters as your fighters will be zapping around faster than anything your enemies can throw at you. And you can just keep upgrading the fighters as tech progresses, maybe replace the engines once you hit the next level. Cheaper and faster to build than any sort of hybrid, so you can have more of them as well.

And then your cruiser should be bristling with weaponry and have enough engines to be able keep up with enemies since it'll be beam-armed. But with beam armed fighters, you don't have much need for beam armed cruisers, except for the two slugfests that are like to happen - JP assaults and clearing out STO units from planets. Though even in those cases, the fighters might be able to do the job equally well.

Naturally, your RP might require your nation/faction/power to design ships very differently and that's just fine too.

[Bremen]

I've always kind of wished launching ships from a hangar reduced the mothership's mass and therefor increased its speed, like disconnecting a tractor beam. I always thought that would open up interesting possibilities for battle carriers.

But that's not how the game currently works, so lacking that I'd probably suggest dropping the beam armament of the cruiser and having the fighters effectively be its beam weapons. You're stretched thin by trying to be missiles and fighters and beams on one ship, and they don't have much synergy; it's hard to arrange things so both the fighters and the cruiser will be together if it comes to a beam fight. Let the cruiser handle the missiles and the fighters handle the beams and it'll probably be stretched less thin.

[Panopticon]

Echoing the others advice. However I do want to say that this is probably gonna be just fine against NPR's of around your tech level and while it is heavy metal for the task, it's a great supply convoy escort.

If you were designing it for use against players though, a redesign is probably a good idea.

[StarshipCactus]

I agree with the good folks suggesting you ditch the heavy weapons and put them in your hanger. A cruiser with a hanger for support craft or a carrier with an escort fleet is probably a better choice. But it's your fleet of course.

[nakorkren (OP)]

@Garfunkel, well noted on this being a Soviet-style design choice... When searching for a name I considered the "Kiev" class but felt that was too on-the-nose.

The problem I was trying to solve was that unless you have enough fighters to perform highly effective PD, they can be shredded by ships with AMMs and a few spare MFC (only 5 to 10 tons each, why not add 10 or 20 to a large ship as cheap anti-fighter or FAC insurance). Or they can be shredded by ships with beam PD plus extra BFC (not as effective since BFC are much larger to get tracking speed, but still achievable); e.g. enemy fighters or STO weapons. This is not a theoretical problem; it happens regularly when you try to clear out a fleet turtling at a home planet or spoiler defended moon/planet with significant STO units supporting, and in player vs player campaigns would be easy to use as a counter to a fighter-heavy enemy. Hence I wanted some larger ship which could tank the AMM spam (with PD help from the fighters) until the enemy runs out of AMMs and be able to preferentially take out the beam PD ships at range while the fighters are still holding back. I suppose the enemy could then try to close with you, and since the carrier cruisers are so slow they wouldn't be able to hold the range open very long, so at a minimum I'd need to make them faster.

I guess an alternative to this would be to make the fighters longer ranged, i.e. give them reduced shot larger bore railguns, or 10cm lasers, but then they'd be much, much less able to defend themselves from missiles. Or I could split the carrier and cruiser functions apart as suggested, and keep the carriers away from the fight. However, I would almost certainly not be able to build them at the same shipyard, which was one benefit of the carrier cruiser concept, and would need a 2nd large shipyard or to retool in between, which is expensive for large shipyards in both time and resources.

Putting commercial engines on means needing to build even bigger naval shipyards to keep a reasonable speed (although the fuel savings is non-trivial). I already build tugs and cargo/colonist/fuel/harvester/troop pods to be towed, which makes my transport fleet much more flexible... Why not take the idea to the extreme and build hanger-pods that are towed to battle by those tugs? That separates the engines (which you'd like to upgrade every so often) from the hanger moduels, which are expensive and never need to be updated. It also separates the military-only parts (hanger decks, sensors if desired, armor if desired but now likely not needed) from the commercial parts (engines, fuel, MSP, engineering bays, etc), which keeps your naval shipyard size lower and the ships and pods RCS lower.

The problem with any approach where the carriers are lightly defended at any point (transit to battle or once the fighters are deployed to the target) is they are very, very vulnerable to SHTF when your enemy surprises you. You could leave some fighters back to defend, or one or more military ships, I suppose. You should also need to put more fuel on your fighters, to give them enough range to leave the carrier-pods somewhere further back of the fight.

[nakorkren (OP)]

Something like this could be towed to near the fight and left with a small escort. Shields to be raised in the event of an incipient encounter to protect from stray shots or low-frequency missile attacks and buy time for the escort to defeat the attack.

Agora class Hanger Pod      29,058 tons       362 Crew       3,033.6 BP       TCS 581    TH 0    EM 4,260
1 km/s      Armour 3-84       Shields 142-532       HTK 141      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 15      PPV 0
Maint Life 3.77 Years     MSP 3,478    AFR 450%    IFR 6.3%    1YR 384    5YR 5,755    Max Repair 111 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 20,000 tons     
Commander    Control Rating 1   BRG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Flight Crew Berths 400    Morale Check Required   

Fuel Capacity 2,000,000 Litres    Range N/A
Delta S71 / R532 Shields (2)     Recharge Time 532 seconds (0.3 per second)

[ArcWolf]

F47 class Fighter (P)      500 tons       15 Crew       98.7 BP       TCS 10    TH 100    EM 0
10009 km/s      Armour 1-5       Shields 0-0       HTK 3      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 3
Maint Life 5.32 Years     MSP 52    AFR 20%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 3    5YR 46    Max Repair 50 MSP
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months    Morale Check Required   

Ion Drive  EP100.00 (1)    Power 100    Fuel Use 626.10%    Signature 100    Explosion 20%
Fuel Capacity 15,000 Litres    Range 0.86 billion km (23 hours at full power)

10cm Railgun V20/C3 (1x4)    Range 20,000km     TS: 10,009 km/s     Power 3-3     RM 20,000 km    ROF 5       
Beam Fire Control R48-TS12000 (SW) (1)     Max Range: 48,000 km   TS: 12,000 km/s     79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0
Magnetic Mirror Fusion Reactor R3-PB30 (1)     Total Power Output 3    Exp 15%

RTX Mk 1 AESA (1)     GPS 2     Range 2m km    MCR 181.7k km    Resolution 1

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction
This design is classed as a Fighter for auto-assignment purposes

Is there a strategic reason for the 1 month deployment on your fighters? If not, consider reducing the deployment to 3ish days, this will cut down on crew needed (down to 3-5) as well as freeing up more tonnage which you can then use to increase your engine size & speed.

[nakorkren (OP)]

Arc Wolf, for some reason I've always assumed the deployment field only accepted integers! Your comment is now saving me 10 to 15 tons on a 500 ton fighter, thank you!

[Bremen]

Arc Wolf, for some reason I've always assumed the deployment field only accepted integers! Your comment is now saving me 10 to 15 tons on a 500 ton fighter, thank you!

You can also leave the engineering spaces off entirely. Even if it says a maintenance period of a day or whatever, with the way maintenance works it's practically impossible for a maintenance failure to happen within the first 5 days.

Though I suppose having the supplies will help if the gun breaks when firing.

[Garfunkel]

Yeah, I wouldn't remove engineering from a beam fighter for that exact reason. A missile fighter, OTOH, it's an acceptable risk since you're only going to shoot once. Odds of the launcher malfunctioning are minimal.

[nuclearslurpee]

Yeah, I wouldn't remove engineering from a beam fighter for that exact reason. A missile fighter, OTOH, it's an acceptable risk since you're only going to shoot once. Odds of the launcher malfunctioning are minimal.

Do people put engineering spaces on fighters? I usually just put enough MSP bays to repair a breakdown and call it good, unless it's a deep space recon fighter with a longer deployment time.

[xenoscepter]

 - It's a lot of MSP for 5 tons. And it basically makes maintenance failures all but impossible, and routine stuff like FCS / Sensors fixable. A good deal if you can spare the 5 tons.