Replacing PDCs

[Hazard]

Steve, what's the development cost?

I don't see it in the pictures of the various unit types, but it shows up in the formation building pictures.

[Barkhorn]

Can we get some info on boarding combat in the new version?  What units might be good?  Only infantry?  What about light static weapons?  I'm thinking of something like a Browning .50cal machine gun guarding an important hallway.  They're small enough to easily fit inside a ship, but too big to really be considered an infantry weapon.

What about automated internal defenses?  I'm imagining turrets on the ceilings that kill anyone not wearing an ID transponder.

Will space-ship crews have a fortification level?

And a related suggestion:
Knowledge, or lack thereof, should affect the stats of combatants inside ships.  Defenders during boarding combat should have some kind of combat bonus or attackers should take penalties.  These penalties should decrease as more ships of that class are salvaged, and should immediately be removed if any ships of that class are captured.

[alex_brunius]

Ground units don't automatically upgrade. They will stay with the technology at the level they were created. If you want improved ground units, you will have to replace them. I'll create some form of cadre system though so you can retain high morale units.

Maybe something like missile series could be used but for ground equipment instead here if you want to include that in the future?

If a new ground equipment model is designed it's connected to the same "series" as the previous , and then you simply want enough equipment/vehicles available to fill the formations ( latest type drawn first ).

The Guard Infantry Regiment would have the following types defined:
600 INF - PW
12 INF - HCAP
24 INF - CAP
12 INF - LB
12 INF - LAV

Upgrading in such a situation would simply push obsolete equipment from active formations into reserve ( where it could either be used as spares in case of combat losses, or dismantled, or used to train some second rate units for suppression or other needs ).

That all depends on how complex and detailed you want to go with production of equipment & vehicles though.

[Hazard]

Can we get some info on boarding combat in the new version?  What units might be good?  Only infantry?  What about light static weapons?  I'm thinking of something like a Browning .50cal machine gun guarding an important hallway.  They're small enough to easily fit inside a ship, but too big to really be considered an infantry weapon.

A Browning would be a Heavy Crew Served Anti Personnel team.

That all depends on how complex and detailed you want to go with production of equipment & vehicles though.

'Cadre and retrain' fits the current Aurora system for upgrading lower tech ground units to higher tech ground units though; it's how you go from Newtonian tech units to TN tech units.

I think it'd be sensible if there's 3 ways to replace lower tech units with new ones, in descending order of cost; Disband and replace with a new unit from a GFTF, Cadre and retrain with that Cadre at a GFTF, and finally shipping the entire unit to a GFTF (or ship a GFTF to them, if the planet warrants it) and get a greater discount on training a new unit than going with a Cadre would've been.

The major issue with cadres in the free form unit design that we're working with is that there's no guarantee that a future unit will be the same size, so shifting cadres around for training can get odd. OTOH, going ultradetailed with every unit being a specifically researched unit that has to be designed, researched and then build in a GFTF or construction factory from minerals before shipping them to their designated unit is a micro management mess that HOI4 gets away with by automating, but would result in madness in Aurora.

[alex_brunius]

The major issue with cadres in the free form unit design that we're working with is that there's no guarantee that a future unit will be the same size, so shifting cadres around for training can get odd. OTOH, going ultradetailed with every unit being a specifically researched unit that has to be designed, researched and then build in a GFTF or construction factory from minerals before shipping them to their designated unit is a micro management mess that HOI4 gets away with by automating, but would result in madness in Aurora.

I don't think it would be especially hard to add automation of similar ( or even superior) level as HoI4 to Aurora.

For example a button in production that would queue up all needed equipment/vehicles for X amount of a specific template for production. With some clever coding you could also re-use it to add a function for your factories to build all needed components for X amount of a ship that they can build.

And it would IMHO make sense if your fighter factories became generic "small vehicle/equipment" factories instead, especially now that there will be ground combat airplanes too.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

The major issue with cadres in the free form unit design that we're working with is that there's no guarantee that a future unit will be the same size, so shifting cadres around for training can get odd. OTOH, going ultradetailed with every unit being a specifically researched unit that has to be designed, researched and then build in a GFTF or construction factory from minerals before shipping them to their designated unit is a micro management mess that HOI4 gets away with by automating, but would result in madness in Aurora.

Formations will be built as a whole, not as individual units. Once the formation template is created, the total cost and mineral requirement will be used by a GFTF to build a formation based on that template, complete with all formation elements and individual units.

I haven't decided how to handle cadres yet (although see last para). Morale will be handled at the formation element level, not the formation level. So you could have an elite group of tanks and conscript infantry in the same formation.

You will be able to transfer individual units between elements in different formation, so the easiest way to replace casualties will be to create 'Replacement Formations' with a mixture of common unit types and use these to fill in any holes in Formation OOBs. You can also add extra (or different) units beyond the OOB - Formations are not restricted to their original template. In fact, once created every formation will be unique. The templates are just for the original build. Just as in real life, formations will evolve over time and two formations with the same original template could end up quite different.

For the 'cadre' mechanic, I am leaning toward an option where two units exchange formation elements but the morale rating remain with the original formation:
1) You have a formation element of sixty Mark 1 Heavy Tanks with high morale.
2) You build a replacement formation with an element of sixty MK II heavy tanks.
3) The two elements are swapped between the different formations but the element with the high morale transfers that morale to the newer tanks. I will base the morale on size, so if the new tanks are larger the morale will be diluted (but smaller size will not mean higher morale). The older tanks can either be used in a lower morale formation or stored for emergency use (I'll add a way to mothball old equipment at low maintenance cost).

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Can we get some info on boarding combat in the new version?  What units might be good?  Only infantry?  What about light static weapons?  I'm thinking of something like a Browning .50cal machine gun guarding an important hallway.  They're small enough to easily fit inside a ship, but too big to really be considered an infantry weapon.

What about automated internal defenses?  I'm imagining turrets on the ceilings that kill anyone not wearing an ID transponder.

Will space-ship crews have a fortification level?

And a related suggestion:
Knowledge, or lack thereof, should affect the stats of combatants inside ships.  Defenders during boarding combat should have some kind of combat bonus or attackers should take penalties.  These penalties should decrease as more ships of that class are salvaged, and should immediately be removed if any ships of that class are captured.

All very interesting ideas. Only infantry units will be allowed in boarding combat and they will be able to use all normal infantry weapons. I agree there should be some form of natural fortification for defending units. I really like the concept of a shipboard module that adds defence against boarding combat. Could also have infantry units (marines) stationed aboard ships for defensive purposes. Also, the lack of knowledge would be important so probably should also be built in.

[Hazard]

Formations will be built as a whole, not as individual units. Once the formation template is created, the total cost and mineral requirement will be used by a GFTF to build a formation based on that template, complete with all formation elements and individual units.

That's reasonable. Do they get a discount if there's excess materiel on the planet already? Like if you shrink a template so you can make more formations with the same amount of equipment (this actually happened to let Germany in WW2 field more armoured divisions on the Eastern Front)?

I haven't decided how to handle cadres yet (although see last para). Morale will be handled at the formation element level, not the formation level. So you could have an elite group of tanks and conscript infantry in the same formation.

Fairly realistic, especially if a hard fight ended up with most of the infantry in the formation dead.

You will be able to transfer individual units between elements in different formation, so the easiest way to replace casualties will be to create 'Replacement Formations' with a mixture of common unit types and use these to fill in any holes in Formation OOBs. You can also add extra (or different) units beyond the OOB - Formations are not restricted to their original template. In fact, once created every formation will be unique. The templates are just for the original build. Just as in real life, formations will evolve over time and two formations with the same original template could end up quite different.

Ah, micromanagement hell. Please tell me there's a way to return formations to template (which is really handy when you design your formations and transportation on the basis of as little wasted space as possible), ways to link evolving templates so you can update multiple formations quickly, and to rebuild damaged formations at a GFTF. Also important due to the frontline and backline mechanic, is there a way to designate a formation as a Replacement Formation that should be kept on the backline if possible?

For the 'cadre' mechanic, I am leaning toward an option where two units exchange formation elements but the morale rating remain with the original formation:
1) You have a formation element of sixty Mark 1 Heavy Tanks with high morale.
2) You build a replacement formation with an element of sixty MK II heavy tanks.
3) The two elements are swapped between the different formations but the element with the high morale transfers that morale to the newer tanks. I will base the morale on size, so if the new tanks are larger the morale will be diluted (but smaller size will not mean higher morale). The older tanks can either be used in a lower morale formation or stored for emergency use (I'll add a way to mothball old equipment at low maintenance cost).

Or scrapping old equipment. Please make that an option.

Mothballing ground equipment is going to make mothballing ships a desired option though. And this is micromanagement demanding. Please make it possible to just shove a formation into a GFTF for a while for it to be refitted. We can already do that with ships.

All very interesting ideas. Only infantry units will be allowed in boarding combat and they will be able to use all normal infantry weapons. I agree there should be some form of natural fortification for defending units. I really like the concept of a shipboard module that adds defence against boarding combat. Could also have infantry units (marines) stationed aboard ships for defensive purposes. Also, the lack of knowledge would be important so probably should also be built in.

We already have that module; infantry with the Shipboard Combat skill (that is, marines) stuffed into a transportation bay.

With these changes to the ground forces system, consider letting ground force transportation equipment either add to life support or to draw life support depending on Size. Probably both is better, but with lower efficiency than extra crew space does. Also please consider creating a ground forces personnel pool the same way there's a crewmen pool. Or let navy and army units draw from the same military personnel pool.

I'm still curious about the 'Development Cost' we see in the Formation Design window. What does it mean?

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Scrapping old equipment will be possible. I can also add some way to 'refit' a formation to a given template in the GFTF (not just the original one), although I think the more flexible system will be more interesting. Real world formations rarely correspond to their original OOB. As a result of combat, changing to match enemy capabilities and availability of equipment, formations will evolve over time. I'll see how it works out in play test.

Development cost is the research cost for a new Ground Unit Class (like researching a new missile).

[Hazard]

Scrapping old equipment will be possible. I can also add some way to 'refit' a formation to a given template in the GFTF (not just the original one), although I think the more flexible system will be more interesting. Real world formations rarely correspond to their original OOB. As a result of combat, changing to match enemy capabilities and availability of equipment, formations will evolve over time. I'll see how it works out in play test.

Oh, there's no reason I think not to also make the more flexible system available for things like consolidating units on the battlefield or shifting unit capabilities to where they are needed, for example if the enemy is fielding a lot of vehicles you need more AT units in the front lines.

But there's a difference between a Table of Ordnance & Equipment and the Order Of Battle. The latter describes how a formation is organised in personnel and capability, the former describes what it's got in specific weapons. And the TO&E is a lot more flexible as weapons are more likely to be swapped around than the organisation of the formation is. Once out of combat the OOB at minimum will be rectified prior to redeployment by removing units not on the OOB and replenishing units that got removed due to losses.

Well, if possible. That's an important constraint, if possible.

But on the whole nearly every military formation will be kept as close to its OOB and TO&E as possible with little divergence, and with little divergence between formations with the same roles. Mostly because there's an optimization sweet spot that a formation is meant to hit that gets you a formation that's flexible enough to meet expected problems with speed and skill, and meets unexpected problems well enough to get reinforced or otherwise supported by those who specialize in dealing with those problems. While not getting buried in logistics snarls.

Development cost is the research cost for a new Ground Unit Class (like researching a new missile).

I figured, but I wanted confirmation. Some of those things are expensive, Research point wise.

Which is rather realistic, given that the two that stand out are a super heavy tank and a shipscale 25cm laser.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

it could work like class missile loadouts: formations have priority ratings like ships do, the system checks formations by priority ratings, fills them up with missing equipment til it hits their rated size and then swaps out the most common vehicle with the highest xp in the formation that's not in the template and replace it with the least common vehicle that is for as long as it has a supply of vehicles that should be in the formation's template.  I believe that should work without requiring vehicles to be assigned a 'series' or requiring the game to assume that two vehicles with equivalent configurations but different tech are in the same series. Elements could also be assigned priorities so that cadres tend to gravitate towards the best available equpment, perhaps with the caveat that infantry has to stay infantry.

I am not sure how lethal combat is but given the timeframes involved in a combat round it seems like it'll be less WW2 and more Battle of Hoth.  Wars will be relatively short and incredibly violent.  I dont know how much time there is for a formation to adapt, loot, reconfigure, etc. in that environment.  Fortunately it also means that logistics are not a real concern.

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It just struck me that dropship design is under question since now ground unit size is highly variable.  Combat drop bay size will have to be modular or players will design to breakpoints.  Went and looked up real life equivalents out of curiousity:

the C-130 transport plane has an empty weight of 33 tons and can seat 64 paratroopers/72 combat troops or 2 APCs. Call that 64 guardsmen, or 2 hellhounds.  In terms of Aurora that would work out to 320 space, or 84.  It would take ~13 c-130s to transport a Guard Regiment using the infantry approximation, or 47 using the hellhound approximation. This works out to 430 tons of c-130 or 1551 tons of c-130 using the the respective approximations.  If you prefer to use the full weight of the aircraft for the tonnage equivalent, you about double the aircraft tonnage used.

an alternative figure might be based off the LCAC, a beach landing hovercraft used by the US navy.  This is not as similar to a spacecraft, but is a more military craft designed with more expectation of being shot at. It's (as best as I can find) 140 tons empty, and 200 tons full.  It can carry 180 ground troops or 4 APCs of a similar weight as the c-130 or 1 heavy tank .  The approximations work out to 900 space (infantry), 168 space (Hellhounds), or 104 space (Leman Russ).  For carrying a Guard Regiment this equates to 5 LCACs  (infantry), 24 LCACs (hellhound), or 39 LCACs (Leman Russ):  700, 3360, and 5460 tons respectively.  The full weight version is about 40% heavier.

note that the above assumptions are based off 1 guardsmen in a regiment = 1 man. Since Aurora is arbitrary you could easily say 1 guardsmen = 1 guardsmen fire team, in which case the infantry figures could easily be 4-5 times as heavy when judging based off IRL equivalents.

also p.s. im not actually sure if Aurora warship tonnage are intended to be dry weight or full load weight..?

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

It just struck me that dropship design is under question since now ground unit size is highly variable.  Combat drop bay size will have to be modular or players will design to breakpoints.  Went and looked up real life equivalents out of curiousity:

the C-130 transport plane has an empty weight of 33 tons and can seat 64 paratroopers/72 combat troops or 2 APCs. Call that 64 guardsmen, or 2 hellhounds.  In terms of Aurora that would work out to 320 space, or 84.  It would take ~13 c-130s to transport a Guard Regiment using the infantry approximation, or 47 using the hellhound approximation. This works out to 430 tons of c-130 or 1551 tons of c-130 using the the respective approximations.  If you prefer to use the full weight of the aircraft for the tonnage equivalent, you about double the aircraft tonnage used.

an alternative figure might be based off the LCAC, a beach landing hovercraft used by the US navy.  This is not as similar to a spacecraft, but is a more military craft designed with more expectation of being shot at. It's (as best as I can find) 140 tons empty, and 200 tons full.  It can carry 180 ground troops or 4 APCs of a similar weight as the c-130 or 1 heavy tank .  The approximations work out to 900 space (infantry), 168 space (Hellhounds), or 104 space (Leman Russ).  For carrying a Guard Regiment this equates to 5 LCACs  (infantry), 24 LCACs (hellhound), or 39 LCACs (Leman Russ):  700, 3360, and 5460 tons respectively.  The full weight version is about 40% heavier.

note that the above assumptions are based off 1 guardsmen in a regiment = 1 man. Since Aurora is arbitrary you could easily say 1 guardsmen = 1 guardsmen fire team, in which case the infantry figures could easily be 4-5 times as heavy when judging based off IRL equivalents.

also p.s. im not actually sure if Aurora warship tonnage are intended to be dry weight or full load weight..?

This is exactly what I am looking at right now

I don't think the current troop transport and combat drop modules will work any more because they are based on number of battalions and that concept no longer exists. Formations now have a transport size in tons.

My current thinking is to have three types of troop transports bays: standard, orbital insertion and ship-to-ship boarding, all of which have capacities in tons. Standard is similar to the current troop transport bays, where loading and unloading takes several hours or days. Orbital Insertion Bays have abstract drop-ships built into the transport bays (significantly more expensive and a little larger than standard bays). Orbital Insertion Bays can be used as normal troop transport bays, with normal load and unload times, or they can be used to instantly drop troops on to a planetary surface from orbit, in which case the bay is damaged and has to be repaired by a shipyard (replacing the abstract drop-ships). Ship-to-ship boarding bays can also function normally, but have a secondary function for launching infantry units (with boarding capability) against  other ships. This doesn't damage the bay. Standard Bays would be commercial, while the other two would be military systems.

There are some additional considerations. This effectively removes the concept of short-duration troop transport modules (combat drop modules) as units are now a specific size, which means any FAC-sized troop carriers would be carrying very small numbers of troops (platoon-size). In VB6 Aurora, the ground warfare concept was very much Starship Troopers (the book, not the film) using highly capable individual troopers. C# Aurora ground combat is more like Warhammer 40k, with large varieties of different troop types, including very large vehicles. To land a substantial force against hostile fire, troop ships could become large and heavily-armoured. Smaller and numerous would still be possible but you would need more ships than in VB6. In fact, one of the objectives of the new ground combat system is to require a much more significant investment in naval planetary assault capabilities.

However, because the individual troopers can still be very capable, you could try (for boarding):

Space Marine
Transport Size (tons)  12     Cost  1.44     Armour  30     Hit Points  10
Crew-Served Anti-Personnel:      Shots 6      Penetration 10      Damage 10
Vendarite  1.44    Development Cost  72

A force of 25 Space Marines would only be 300 tons and cost 36 BP and would be a formidable foe for the average ship's crew. Those could be sent in FAC-sized ships for boarding if needed (named Stormbirds or Thunderhawks probably).

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

the C-130 transport plane has an empty weight of 33 tons and can seat 64 paratroopers/72 combat troops or 2 APCs.

On this specific point. The sizes for the units in C# Aurora (for example, a Guardman being 5 tons) includes living space, life support, etc. for months at a time. A better comparison might be the US Navy Wasp class (40,000 tons), which has an air wing and carries about 2000 troops, or the America class (45,000 tons, 1700 troops). The transport requirement for vehicles are much closer to their actual size, because they have minimal numbers of personnel.

2000 troops for C# Aurora requires 10,000 tons of capacity (more than that for the proposed drop-ship equipped bays), so they are in the same ball park once you add the rest of the transporting ship.

[jonw]

. . .  Orbital Insertion Bays can be used as normal troop transport bays, with normal load and unload times, or they can be used to instantly drop troops on to a planetary surface from orbit, in which case the bay is damaged and has to be repaired by a shipyard (replacing the abstract drop-ships). 

Repaired by shipyards in addition to be docked in hangars? I'm thinking that since commercial hangars now exist, one function of large commercial hangar ships would be to act as forward repair bases for invasion fleets, sort of like current amphibious dock ships.

Regarding boarding - what type of defense strength are you anticipating? Are you boarding with a whole division, or with just your 25-guy team of specialists? I think the FAC-size boarding vessel is both cool and still makes sense, so the boarding module would need to be quite a bit smaller than the drop-a-whole-diviision-to-a-planet one.  This could also be fielded by hangars, and if done that way I think it makes sense for the boarding module to be damaged too.  It could then be repaired in the hangar. 

This all looks very cool and I'm really looking forward to it!

[Hazard]

Another option; break with the VB6 method of handling cargo transfers and go with the munition/fuel handling mechanics. A transport ship has a load capacity expressed in tons drawn from its troop transport bays, and a transfer rating expressed in tons per (time unit), which would probably be the same time unit as munition/fuel handling mechanics or the smallest time unit relevant to planetary combat rounds. Yes, this probably means they are getting shot at while loading/unloading from point blank range and while at 0 speed, this should probably get covered in the rules somehow to prevent transport ships getting slaughtered while (un)loading by STO units.

A dropship comes in Infantry and Other, and has a drop and load capacity expressed in tons as well as a maximum unit size, which is often smaller than the drop capacity. Infantry dropships can drop infantry on planets or act as boarding ships, while 'other' rated dropships can drop every unit type including infantry but up to a maximum size of the unit. Larger units need a normal transport ship.

Dropping troops 'consumes' the drop bay because there's no more drop pods/ships available, but they can be rebuild with maintenance supplies at a Maintenance station, or a hangar.