Internal HtK

[Michael Sandy (OP)]

I was thinking about ways to boost the Internal HtK of a ship.

It started from thinking about an Aegis type cruiser.  It would be very bad if the expensive, 16 HS fire control system was damaged.  So how does damage get alloted, anyway?  Does it randomly go by category, then by system?  Perhaps an Aegis cruiser should have a bunch of 1/4 range, x4 speed fire control systems.

Something like:
50% Accuracy at Range: 20k km     Tracking Speed: 12800 km/s
Size: 1    HTK: 1    Cost: 64    Crew: 5
Materials Required: 16x Duranium  48x Uridium

Development Cost for Project: 1600RP  if you want the system to actually be effective, or:

50% Accuracy at Range: 10k km     Tracking Speed: 1000 km/s
Size: 1    HTK: 1    Cost: 4    Crew: 5
Materials Required: 1x Duranium  3x Uridium

Development Cost for Project: 200RP
If you just want randomly alloted internal damage that goes to Fire Control to go somewhere else.

Perhaps there could be a system, "Internal bulkheads" or some such, that acts at internal hit points.  Of course, the Internal bulkheads would only absorb the damage some of the time.

It would be a good complement to an armor design, but not such a good complement to a shield design.

[Steve Walmsley]

If you look at the Damage Control tab for a ship, you can see the damage allocation chart for that class.

Steve

[Michael Sandy (OP)]

Ouch.  That makes an Aegis targetting system (x4 tracking speed, x4 range), rather likely to be damaged in battle.  And it doesn't take much to damage it.

Makes a bit of a conundrum:
Do you double up on the Aegis system, spread the Aegis systems through the fleet, make the Aegis cruisers very fast, heavily shielded, or just rely on lots of firepower?  The Aegis system can be protected a bit by having a large mass of non-shield, non-armor systems.  Like lasers.  More firepower means less chance of the Aegis system being hit.  And more firepower means less chance of losing the Aegis system to a missile hit.

I expect that Aegis cruisers would be effective both versus missiles and versus fighters.  I expect that fighter missiles with 10 second flight times would be developed in order to have the maximum possible bang for the fighters.  But at that range, Aegis systems would rip the fighters apart.  Missiles designed to engage outside Aegis range, or even designed to give the Aegis systems the least time to engage would be significantly less capable.