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Topic Summary

Posted by: liveware
« on: January 28, 2021, 03:56:01 PM »

The Lance needed improvements, here is a better version:

Code: [Select]
Lance class Strike Bomber (P)      100 tons       1 Crew       11.2 BP       TCS 2    TH 7    EM 0
3500 km/s      Armour 1-1       Shields 0-0       HTK 1      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0.45
Maint Life 11.28 Years     MSP 20    AFR 20%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 0    5YR 4    Max Repair 5 MSP
Magazine 3   
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 3 days    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP7.00 (1)    Power 7.0    Fuel Use 1432.35%    Signature 7.00    Explosion 17%
Fuel Capacity 4,000 Litres    Range 0.5 billion km (39 hours at full power)

Akthenion Size 3.0 Box Launcher (1)     Missile Size: 3    Hangar Reload 86 minutes    MF Reload 14 hours
Akthenion Missile Fire Control FC5-R8 (1)     Range 5m km    Resolution 8
S3M3 SRM (1)    Speed: 4,000 km/s    End: 63.8m     Range: 15.3m km    WH: 4    Size: 3.00    TH: 13/8/4

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 Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

The new Lance can hit a 2666 km/s target from beyond 5m km range, which should allow stealth strikes against targets similar to the Longsword class. Additionally, it has an effective range of about 117m km against targets moving at 2666 km/s, so it should allow the Bastion to remain outside of detection range of ships similar to the Longsword.
Posted by: liveware
« on: January 28, 2021, 11:32:17 AM »

I think I like this scout design better:

Code: [Select]
Spyglass class Scout (P)      250 tons       7 Crew       25.1 BP       TCS 5    TH 15    EM 0
3011 km/s      Armour 1-3       Shields 0-0       HTK 1      Sensors 4/4/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0
Maint Life 0 Years     MSP 0    AFR 49%    IFR 0.7%    1YR 1    5YR 22    Max Repair 7.50 MSP
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 6 days    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP15.00 (1)    Power 15.0    Fuel Use 1460.59%    Signature 15.00    Explosion 20%
Fuel Capacity 29,000 Litres    Range 1.4 billion km (5 days at full power)

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS1-R1 (1)     GPS 1     Range 1.3m km    MCR 113.5k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH0.9-4.5 (1)     Sensitivity 4.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  16.8m km
Akthenion EM Sensor EM0.9-4.5 (1)     Sensitivity 4.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  16.8m km

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

If I did my math right, this should be able to detect one of my Longswords from outside of the Longsword's detection range. Probably worth adding some longer range secondary actives to the Longsword to check for scouts like this...
Posted by: liveware
« on: January 28, 2021, 10:28:05 AM »

The scouts would probably benefit from using smaller engines and larger sensors. A 250 ton scout might be better also. Originally I had only a 125 ton boat bay on the frigate leader so I was aiming for a smaller displacement.

The missiles are probably horrible. They were designed using the most basic of missile tech and use conventional warheads. The size 3 missile design is below:

Code: [Select]
Missile Size: 3.0000 MSP  (7.50000 Tons)     Warhead: 4    Radiation Damage: 4    Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 4,933 km/s     Fuel: 1     Flight Time: 7.3 seconds     Range: 36,013 km
Cost Per Missile: 1.37384     Development Cost: 137
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 49.3%   3k km/s 16.4%   5k km/s 9.9%   10k km/s 4.9%

Materials Required
Tritanium  1
Gallicite  0.37384
Fuel:  1

These are intended to be fast to avoid PD fire and improve chance to hit. Probably could trade some speed for agility and fuel but I want to design the other faction's fleets first so I have a better idea as to what a reasonable target speed should be.
Posted by: Zap0
« on: January 27, 2021, 01:21:16 PM »

My scout ship philosophy is that for smaller a ship you need less speed, as the vessel is less likely to be detected. Lower speed helps reduce thermal signature further, and if it gets spotted a small ship is much more readily replacable. There's definitely a place for fast, short-ranged spotters, like your bombers will need.

I'm a bit confuzzled by the bomber. First, I'm not sure about it's tonnage efficiency, I can fit 10 size 3 box launchers in a 500 ton fighter, that would suggest you should be able to fit at least 2. But what's up with the missiles? You have a short-range fire control, which is a fine decision and all, but the missiles show as 0.1 minutes endurance and 0m range. Their speed is also really bad, even for NTE, but the killer is the lack of engine boost technology. Oh well, missiles are much easier to replace than ships and fighters as tech progresses.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: January 27, 2021, 12:47:47 PM »

The railgun ships look fairly solid. My only major complaint would be that you've gone up the tech tree to 25 cm railguns, which by the way are quite a ways up compared to NTE and duranium armor, but you've not gone very far up in fire control to match this. Your BFCs don't even match the 25 cm railgun range at 128k km which means you have 0% accuracy at a quite reduced maximum range. I would drop down to 20 cm (I think this would be the 120k or 160k range mark depending on how you divvy up your techs) and use those RPs to gain a level or two in BC tech to gain some range past the weapon range so you can fire accurately at longer range - railguns in particular need this as they already struggle for range against lasers, PBs, etc.

I dislike the scout fighter design. On one hand, for recon purposes I'm not sure you need so much speed so maybe that tonnage could be better used. Where? On the other hand, the sensors you have are very weak at only 0.1 HS each which will make it difficult to spot or shadow enemy vessels without being spotted yourself. My standard recon fighter is 250 tons with 1 HS thermal and EM sensors, if you want to keep the 125 ton size you could either have 0.5 HS sensors (even a tick smaller would probably be fine, at 0.4 HS you have double the range of the 0.1 HS sensors) or have two pairs scout classes with one EM and one thermal between them. I would probably prefer the latter here as the detection range really does make a difference. The stronger sensor lets you approach an enemy fleet without being spotted and detect low signatures - notably thermal signatures from smaller ships in a fleet at rest which are not running their actives.
Posted by: liveware
« on: January 27, 2021, 11:54:17 AM »

Thanks for everyone's input, this thread has given me some good reading material and design ideas. After thinking things over, I've decided to remove carronades from the railgun faction and focus solely on railguns (with some missile support for flavor). I worked up some preliminary ship designs for the railgun faction.

All factions will be starting with nuclear thermal engine technology and most likely at least duranium armor as ships with less advanced engines and armor are... really bad.

First up are some frigate designs. These ships will be the 'standard' fleet ships, intended to provide solid PD and DPS. For the most part, 10cm railguns are provided for point defence and larger 25cm railguns are provided to enhance armour penetration capability. Generally, a frigate squadron will consist of at least 1 Longsword and 3 Broadswords. The Longsword provides quite long range sensor coverage for the rest of the squadron. Later on, once jump drives are developed, one Broadsword will be replaced by a jump frigate for jump point exploration and/or for transits into known hostile systems. Additionally, a Broadsword may be replaced by a Bastion in a squadron if missile strike capability (or other carrier support functions) are required for a particular mission. Multiple squadrons will be grouped together to form larger fleets and will be supported by larger fleet carriers and cruisers (once developed).

Code: [Select]
Broadsword class Frigate (P)      7,500 tons       235 Crew       789.6 BP       TCS 150    TH 400    EM 0
2666 km/s      Armour 3-34       Shields 0-0       HTK 62      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 7      PPV 28
Maint Life 4.97 Years     MSP 460    AFR 64%    IFR 0.9%    1YR 31    5YR 464    Max Repair 100.00 MSP
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   AUX   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP200.00 (2)    Power 400.0    Fuel Use 204.80%    Signature 200.00    Explosion 16%
Fuel Capacity 860,000 Litres    Range 10.1 billion km (43 days at full power)

Akthenion 25cm Railgun V30/C3 (2x4)    Range 128,000km     TS: 4,000 km/s     Power 15-3     RM 30,000 km    ROF 25       
Akthenion 10cm Railgun V30/C3 (4x4)    Range 30,000km     TS: 4,000 km/s     Power 3-3     RM 30,000 km    ROF 5       
Akthenion Beam Fire Control R128-TS4000 (2)     Max Range: 128,000 km   TS: 4,000 km/s     92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Akthenion Pressurised Water Reactor R9-PB10 (2)     Total Power Output 18    Exp 7%

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS1-R1 (1)     GPS 1     Range 1.3m km    MCR 113.5k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion EM Sensor EM0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Code: [Select]
Longsword class Frigate Leader (P)      7,500 tons       202 Crew       747.4 BP       TCS 150    TH 400    EM 0
2666 km/s      Armour 3-34       Shields 0-0       HTK 55      Sensors 50/50/0/0      DCR 6      PPV 8
Maint Life 5.56 Years     MSP 733    AFR 75%    IFR 1.0%    1YR 40    5YR 600    Max Repair 100.00 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 250 tons     
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   AUX   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Flight Crew Berths 20    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP200.00 (2)    Power 400.0    Fuel Use 204.80%    Signature 200.00    Explosion 16%
Fuel Capacity 850,000 Litres    Range 10 billion km (43 days at full power)

Akthenion 25cm Railgun V30/C3 (1x4)    Range 128,000km     TS: 4,000 km/s     Power 15-3     RM 30,000 km    ROF 25       
Akthenion Beam Fire Control R128-TS4000 (1)     Max Range: 128,000 km   TS: 4,000 km/s     92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Akthenion Pressurised Water Reactor R3 (1)     Total Power Output 3    Exp 5%

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1)     GPS 10     Range 4m km    MCR 359k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH10-50 (1)     Sensitivity 50     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  55.9m km
Akthenion EM Sensor EM10-50 (1)     Sensitivity 50     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  55.9m km

Strike Group
2x Spyglass Scout   Speed: 4206 km/s    Size: 2.5

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Code: [Select]
Bastion class Carrier (P)      7,500 tons       148 Crew       720.1 BP       TCS 150    TH 400    EM 0
2666 km/s      Armour 2-34       Shields 0-0       HTK 51      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 6      PPV 0
Maint Life 4.53 Years     MSP 600    AFR 75%    IFR 1.0%    1YR 47    5YR 712    Max Repair 100.00 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 1,500 tons     Magazine 225   
Commander    Control Rating 1   BRG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Flight Crew Berths 60    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP200.00 (2)    Power 400.0    Fuel Use 204.80%    Signature 200.00    Explosion 16%
Fuel Capacity 871,000 Litres    Range 10.2 billion km (44 days at full power)

S3M1 SRM (75)    Speed: 4,933 km/s    End: 0.1m     Range: 0m km    WH: 4    Size: 3    TH: 16/9/4

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS1-R1 (1)     GPS 1     Range 1.3m km    MCR 113.5k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion EM Sensor EM0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km

Strike Group
12x Lance Strike Bomber   Speed: 3605 km/s    Size: 2.5

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

Code: [Select]
Spyglass class Scout (P)      125 tons       2 Crew       10.7 BP       TCS 2    TH 11    EM 0
4206 km/s      Armour 1-2       Shields 0-0       HTK 1      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0
Maint Life 0 Years     MSP 0    AFR 24%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 0    5YR 7    Max Repair 5.25 MSP
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 6 days    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP10.50 (1)    Power 10.5    Fuel Use 736.49%    Signature 10.5    Explosion 15%
Fuel Capacity 10,000 Litres    Range 2 billion km (5 days at full power)

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS1-R1 (1)     GPS 1     Range 1.3m km    MCR 113.5k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion EM Sensor EM0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

Code: [Select]
Lance class Strike Bomber (P)      125 tons       2 Crew       11.2 BP       TCS 2    TH 9    EM 0
3605 km/s      Armour 1-2       Shields 0-0       HTK 1      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0.45
Maint Life 8.47 Years     MSP 20    AFR 25%    IFR 0.3%    1YR 0    5YR 7    Max Repair 5 MSP
Magazine 3   
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 3 days    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP9.00 (1)    Power 9    Fuel Use 795.50%    Signature 9    Explosion 15%
Fuel Capacity 5,000 Litres    Range 0.91 billion km (69 hours at full power)

Akthenion Size 3.0 Box Launcher (1)     Missile Size: 3    Hangar Reload 86 minutes    MF Reload 14 hours
Akthenion Missile Fire Control FC2-R1 (1)     Range 2.5m km    Resolution 1
S3M1 SRM (1)    Speed: 4,933 km/s    End: 0.1m     Range: 0m km    WH: 4    Size: 3    TH: 16/9/4

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 Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

Additionally, the Dagger class corvette was designed to provided rudimentary planetary point defence to colonies. Lacking the deployment time and fuel endurance of the larger frigates, the Dagger class maintains a strong array of point defence railguns as well as a single larger 25cm12cm railgun for engaging enemy ships that stray too close to a colony.

Code: [Select]
Dagger class Corvette (P)      3,750 tons       118 Crew       395.9 BP       TCS 75    TH 200    EM 0
2666 km/s      Armour 3-21       Shields 0-0       HTK 23      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 2      PPV 14
Maint Life 5.59 Years     MSP 271    AFR 56%    IFR 0.8%    1YR 15    5YR 219    Max Repair 50.00 MSP
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   AUX   
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Morale Check Required   

Akthenion Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP100.00 (2)    Power 200.0    Fuel Use 289.63%    Signature 100.00    Explosion 16%
Fuel Capacity 301,000 Litres    Range 5 billion km (21 days at full power)

Akthenion 12cm Railgun V30/C3 (1x4)    Range 60,000km     TS: 4,000 km/s     Power 6-3     RM 30,000 km    ROF 10       
Akthenion 10cm Railgun V30/C3 (3x4)    Range 30,000km     TS: 4,000 km/s     Power 3-3     RM 30,000 km    ROF 5       
Akthenion Beam Fire Control R128-TS4000 (1)     Max Range: 128,000 km   TS: 4,000 km/s     92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Akthenion Pressurised Water Reactor R6-PB20 (2)     Total Power Output 12    Exp 10%

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS1-R1 (1)     GPS 1     Range 1.3m km    MCR 113.5k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion EM Sensor EM0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH0.1-0.5 (1)     Sensitivity 0.5     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  5.6m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

With a fleet range of only about 10b km for the frigates and 5b km for the corvettes, these ships will require refueling for longer missions (though the corvettes have sufficient range to reach all lagrange points in the custom starting trinary star system I made for this game). To support long range missions, the Resilience class support vessel has been developed:

Code: [Select]
Resilience class Fleet Support Vessel (P)      20,000 tons       220 Crew       554 BP       TCS 400    TH 400    EM 0
1000 km/s      Armour 2-65       Shields 0-0       HTK 51      Sensors 5/5/0/0      DCR 1      PPV 0
MSP 4,017    Max Repair 25.00 MSP
Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 4   
Lieutenant Commander    Control Rating 1   BRG   
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months   

Akthenion Commercial Nuclear Thermal Engine  EP100.0 (4)    Power 400.0    Fuel Use 8.84%    Signature 100.0    Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 5,289,000 Litres    Range 538.5 billion km (6233 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 50,000 litres per hour     Complete Refuel 105 hours

Akthenion Active Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1)     GPS 10     Range 4m km    MCR 359k km    Resolution 1
Akthenion EM Sensor EM1.0-5.0 (1)     Sensitivity 5.0     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  17.7m km
Akthenion Thermal Sensor TH1.0-5.0 (1)     Sensitivity 5.0     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Resilience is capable of refueling and resupplying up to four ships simultaneously while underway, which will allow for it operate with standard sized frigate squadrons. Not intended for combat operations, this ship class is equipped with high fuel efficiency engines which reduce the ship's speed considerably. However, due to the reduced maintenance costs this is considered acceptable. Additionally, this ship class is provided with 2 layers of armor in order to provide some small amount of protection should it's fleet be ambushed.
Posted by: Jorgen_CAB
« on: January 27, 2021, 06:22:14 AM »

I think that both Laser and Rail-guns are exceptional in that they are so good on their own that you are usually better of just using that weapons system alone and perhaps invest moderately into something else as a secondary weapons type, not counting missile technology that obviously is a branch of its own and don't really compare with the other weapon technologies well.

I think that in general you should not hard-code the factions too rigidly but allow them to choose one or two early on to focus on. If you have a faction that concentrate in Particle beams you should still give them ability to get say 10 or 12 cm rail-guns for PD as it is cheap and effective and pour the rest of their tech into particle beam, they can continue to use rail-guns for efficient PD even later on, no need for developing expensive Gauss-cannons. Everyone should be able to waste 2000RP what is need to get access to 10cm (10kkm) Rail-guns who will be effective PD for the rest of time. It almost is criminal not investing in it even if you intend to go down the Gauss route.

I think that Gauss cannons are best used for someone that concentrate mostly on Missiles and have really good Missile and Kinetic researchers. A really cool combination of weapons are Plasma Carronades, Gauss and Missiles... one really cheap energy weapon, leave you available to research turret technology and the Gauss Turrets you need. This can be your more missile focused faction, perhaps carrier based makes most sense here.

One can be solely focused on Lasers and the other on Rail-guns... they can both invest in Microwaves and or Particle beams as a secondary option. Both factions can also have missiles as a weapons system but not as focused as the first faction, perhaps more on missile cruisers rather than carriers with a focus on more beam combat. The Railgun faction are most interested in fast ships while the Laser side can focus more on reliability, shields and defences.

This will give you three rather different factions with very different doctrines yet relatively competitive overall.
Posted by: Zap0
« on: January 27, 2021, 12:46:13 AM »

I have a faction using primarily particle beams with short-range microwaves as a secondary weapon. The reasoning being that the PBs excel at long-range combat, but have terrible DPS at close range compared to other weapon systems, so if something gets close having a secondary way of dealing damage is nice. They also like non-lethal weapons from an RP perspective. This faction does AMMs for missile defense.

Alternatively I could see them going with plasma carronades as a secondary weapon. Agree that carronades are a bit awkward a fit with railguns, especially smaller ones.
Posted by: misanthropope
« on: January 26, 2021, 11:15:04 PM »

in the VB6 epoch i ran a railgun + microwave composition and liked it pretty well.  you are pretty darn dependent on having initiative superiority, but considering your weapons dont really eat research points, you can pour effort into engine tech.  since you're knife fighting not kiting you don't get hard countered by an ECM advantage- not to say you like fighting into that.  because it takes so little HPM to put a ship out of action, you can lean hard into 10cm rails, and wind up with a shocking level of point defense as a result.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: January 26, 2021, 08:10:06 PM »

Quote from: froggiest1982 on January 26, 2021, 07:42:14 PM
Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
Railguns totally require power plants...

Holy Cow, I just realized that my Railgun Corvettes have no Railguns on them!

So that's why they didn't need any power

 :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o

This one is going on the bulletin board in the officer's mess.  :P

Quote from: liveware on January 26, 2021, 07:58:30 PM
Regarding your itemized points:

1. I want to keep particle beams as a primary weapon for one of the races. So if I am using railguns for one race already that race should not also use PBs as railguns are diverse enough to serve as both a PD platform and a primary weapon system. Of course, that line of reasoning suggests that I should remove plasma carronades from the railgun race, as PCs are at least as much of a primary weapon system as particle beams are. Maybe I should move carronades to the PB race? Bu then the PB race has 2 primary weapon systems (gauss being a secondary PD system) More though required here for me.

2. I considered gauss here but since I wanted to use gauss with something that had weak PD capabilities I decided against it. I went with mesons in order to share the turret tech specialization primarily with the intention of mounting a combination of meson and laser PD turrets along with larger spinal lasers and possibly some large laser turrets. A shortcoming of this combination I see is that both mesons and lasers have good armor penetration, so I think it may be better to combine the lasers with something that has poor armor penetration or some useful secondary ability. So in that sense HPM are a possibility as they could be mounted alongside the spinal lasers. Note also that I have exactly zero C# meson experience... I recall distant memories of VB meson fighters which were probably overpowered but super fun to use :-)

3. I am willing to accept the gauss cannon RP shackles in this case.

Fleet design will be the next exciting chapter in the design of these factions for me. There will certainly be more to follow on that front :-)

I might also suggest just using Railguns as a standalone weapon. They can do PD, act as a primary weapon...you don't really need another one. Steve did this in his last WH40K campaign and it worked pretty well, and the class designs you get more than make up for the lack of weapon variety (although you'll have at least two types of railguns anyways) in just how clean and efficient they are.

The main thing about mesons is that they got nerfed hard after being frankly OP in VB6. Now they do not penetrate armor reliably, instead they have a chance to penetrate each layer of armor which means in practice fairly little of their damage gets through anything with decent armor and when it does you only deal one point of damage anyways. The one thing they have going for them, if this wasn't also changed, is that they can bypass shields, and shielded ships do tend to be more lightly armored, so they can have a niche utility.

PB plus Gauss are expensive but fun, so do enjoy them.
Posted by: Froggiest1982
« on: January 26, 2021, 08:04:21 PM »

Quote from: liveware on January 26, 2021, 07:59:58 PM
Quote from: froggiest1982 on January 26, 2021, 07:42:14 PM
Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
Railguns totally require power plants...

Holy Cow, I just realized that my Railgun Corvettes have no Railguns on them!

So that's why they didn't need any power

 :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o

10cm railguns are easy to mistake for 4 shot gauss cannons if you happen to rename them  :o

Yep, spot on.

Still, I should have questioned that as I should also know that only Gauss is energy exempted.
Posted by: liveware
« on: January 26, 2021, 07:59:58 PM »

Quote from: froggiest1982 on January 26, 2021, 07:42:14 PM
Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
Railguns totally require power plants...

Holy Cow, I just realized that my Railgun Corvettes have no Railguns on them!

So that's why they didn't need any power

 :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o

10cm railguns are easy to mistake for 4 shot gauss cannons if you happen to rename them  :o
Posted by: liveware
« on: January 26, 2021, 07:58:30 PM »

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
If you are going to rely on weapon doctrines to distinguish your factions I think you are going to have a lot of difficulty accomplishing this if you reserve missiles as something all three factions use. Three factions with beam races are frankly going to be fairly similar as the differences between beams are not nearly as large as the difference between beam and missile combat.

You might alternatively consider basing the three factions around the three weapon types that can each be used as a single-weapon fleet basis, which are Railguns, Lasers, and Missiles. All of these are capable of filling anti-ship and PD roles to a serviceable extent but in such a way that you get a "soft" weapons triangle with missiles > lasers > railguns > missiles - as laser turrets are the worst PD, but beat railguns at range unless the railgun fleet has high enough speed, while railgun PD is quite strong especially at low tech levels before Gauss becomes stronger.

Then each faction could use a complementary secondary weapon, e.g. the Laser Faction adds Gauss for better PD, the Railgun Faction adds PBs to cover the long range niche, and the Missile Faction adds HPMs to blind enemies who close in to facilitate their escape. Of course not every weapon type must be used necessarily.

That said, even so a potential problem with limiting weapon choices is that each faction is very limited in how they could evolve their doctrines over time in response to events. This may be acceptable if you're not heavy on RPing and just want to make three different fleets fight each other but is worth noting. For me this is a big reason among others that I would prefer to differentiate factions by other factors and leave the weapon choices more open-ended.

Regarding your specific combinations:
  • Railguns and Plasma don't work well together. They are both short-range weapons and as railguns are quite strong aside from lacking in penetration there is not much that plasma contributes. Railguns are an ideal weapon to combine with a specialized secondary weapon instead as the railguns are so all-purpose.
  • To combine with lasers I think the best choice is something that is specialized, but not in that it has weird mechanics like mesons or HPMs, rather a weapon type that is very good at a specific niche. Gauss is ideal for this as it excels at PD which lasers are a bit weak in despite having access to turrets. Mesons I think are generally just too weak to be useful.
  • PBs and Gauss are a strong combo, but research-intensive. The trouble with PBs is they basically lock you into railguns or Gauss as otherwise you have no good PD, which is why I suggest using missile as the third primary weapon.

It might also be good to think beyond just weapons and ask more questions about how each faction designs their fleet. There are many options here which are even weapon-agnostic, e.g. you can pursue a carrier strike doctrine, capital ships, cruiser fleet, FAC and other smaller ships, even exotic ideas like the tractor beam "block ship" idea Zap0 has used in their fiction universe. Similarly, in terms of design you can have varying philosophies on how to use the tonnage of your ship, e.g. one faction may have more and larger engines, another may go for heavy armor, a third might spend the RPs to develop strong shields and/or cloaking devices. Not only can these effectively differentiate a faction but in fact they can guide weapon choices in a quite organic manner.

Quote from: froggiest1982 on January 26, 2021, 06:55:48 PM
I am using a Railgun Gauss race currently. Railguns are the main guns and Gauss are for Pd.

the interesting thing about this combination is that they do not require any Power Plants leaving more space for payload amending the lesser ductility of the kinetic weapons.

They use variegated missile ranges depending on the situation, if they cannot close in they will use mid to low-range if they are while if they can close in they use Long-range to start weakening the defenses. Because of that, each ship is classified as A, B, or C where:

A has long-range (afar)
B has both (both)
C has short-range (close)

Missiles are usually all size 10 so the bulk ship is fundamentally the same and all is changing are Sensors and Ordnance helping with retooling and production.

Railguns totally require power plants...

Many excellent points! I had not considered the railgun-> laser -> missile triangle, that is a good one but I'm not sure that's the path I wish to take for this venture. The missile / microwave combo is an especially interesting combination. I considered making missiles a faction-specific weapon but decided against it for reasons which I think are similar to your reasons for not specializing specific beam weapons. My plan is to diversify missile design by faction rather than only permitting a single faction to use missiles. Missiles are somewhat unique as they have many more design parameters than any single beam weapon, so putting racial restrictions on beam weapons is less problematic for me in this case.

Recall also that part of my goal is to have similar races... differences are desired to be slight.

Regarding your itemized points:

1. I want to keep particle beams as a primary weapon for one of the races. So if I am using railguns for one race already that race should not also use PBs as railguns are diverse enough to serve as both a PD platform and a primary weapon system. Of course, that line of reasoning suggests that I should remove plasma carronades from the railgun race, as PCs are at least as much of a primary weapon system as particle beams are. Maybe I should move carronades to the PB race? But then the PB race has 2 primary weapon systems (gauss being a secondary PD system) More thought required here for me.

2. I considered gauss here but since I wanted to use gauss with something that had weak PD capabilities I decided against it. I went with mesons in order to share the turret tech specialization primarily with the intention of mounting a combination of meson and laser PD turrets along with larger spinal lasers and possibly some large laser turrets. A shortcoming of this combination I see is that both mesons and lasers have good armor penetration, so I think it may be better to combine the lasers with something that has poor armor penetration or some useful secondary ability. So in that sense HPM are a possibility as they could be mounted alongside the spinal lasers. Note also that I have exactly zero C# meson experience... I recall distant memories of VB meson fighters which were probably overpowered but super fun to use :-)

3. I am willing to accept the gauss cannon RP shackles in this case.

Fleet design will be the next exciting chapter in the design of these factions for me. There will certainly be more to follow on that front :-)
Posted by: Froggiest1982
« on: January 26, 2021, 07:42:14 PM »

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
Railguns totally require power plants...

Holy Cow, I just realized that my Railgun Corvettes have no Railguns on them!

So that's why they didn't need any power

 :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o
Posted by: Jorgen_CAB
« on: January 26, 2021, 07:33:21 PM »

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 26, 2021, 07:12:36 PM
If you are going to rely on weapon doctrines to distinguish your factions I think you are going to have a lot of difficulty accomplishing this if you reserve missiles as something all three factions use. Three factions with beam races are frankly going to be fairly similar as the differences between beams are not nearly as large as the difference between beam and missile combat.

You might alternatively consider basing the three factions around the three weapon types that can each be used as a single-weapon fleet basis, which are Railguns, Lasers, and Missiles. All of these are capable of filling anti-ship and PD roles to a serviceable extent but in such a way that you get a "soft" weapons triangle with missiles > lasers > railguns > missiles - as laser turrets are the worst PD, but beat railguns at range unless the railgun fleet has high enough speed, while railgun PD is quite strong especially at low tech levels before Gauss becomes stronger.

Then each faction could use a complementary secondary weapon, e.g. the Laser Faction adds Gauss for better PD, the Railgun Faction adds PBs to cover the long range niche, and the Missile Faction adds HPMs to blind enemies who close in to facilitate their escape. Of course not every weapon type must be used necessarily.

That said, even so a potential problem with limiting weapon choices is that each faction is very limited in how they could evolve their doctrines over time in response to events. This may be acceptable if you're not heavy on RPing and just want to make three different fleets fight each other but is worth noting. For me this is a big reason among others that I would prefer to differentiate factions by other factors and leave the weapon choices more open-ended.

Regarding your specific combinations:
  • Railguns and Plasma don't work well together. They are both short-range weapons and as railguns are quite strong aside from lacking in penetration there is not much that plasma contributes. Railguns are an ideal weapon to combine with a specialized secondary weapon instead as the railguns are so all-purpose.
  • To combine with lasers I think the best choice is something that is specialized, but not in that it has weird mechanics like mesons or HPMs, rather a weapon type that is very good at a specific niche. Gauss is ideal for this as it excels at PD which lasers are a bit weak in despite having access to turrets. Mesons I think are generally just too weak to be useful.
  • PBs and Gauss are a strong combo, but research-intensive. The trouble with PBs is they basically lock you into railguns or Gauss as otherwise you have no good PD, which is why I suggest using missile as the third primary weapon.

It might also be good to think beyond just weapons and ask more questions about how each faction designs their fleet. There are many options here which are even weapon-agnostic, e.g. you can pursue a carrier strike doctrine, capital ships, cruiser fleet, FAC and other smaller ships, even exotic ideas like the tractor beam "block ship" idea Zap0 has used in their fiction universe. Similarly, in terms of design you can have varying philosophies on how to use the tonnage of your ship, e.g. one faction may have more and larger engines, another may go for heavy armor, a third might spend the RPs to develop strong shields and/or cloaking devices. Not only can these effectively differentiate a faction but in fact they can guide weapon choices in a quite organic manner.

Quote from: froggiest1982 on January 26, 2021, 06:55:48 PM
I am using a Railgun Gauss race currently. Railguns are the main guns and Gauss are for Pd.

the interesting thing about this combination is that they do not require any Power Plants leaving more space for payload amending the lesser ductility of the kinetic weapons.

They use variegated missile ranges depending on the situation, if they cannot close in they will use mid to low-range if they are while if they can close in they use Long-range to start weakening the defenses. Because of that, each ship is classified as A, B, or C where:

A has long-range (afar)
B has both (both)
C has short-range (close)

Missiles are usually all size 10 so the bulk ship is fundamentally the same and all is changing are Sensors and Ordnance helping with retooling and production.

Railguns totally require power plants...

I fully on agree with allowing a campaign evolve dynamically, I always do that in my games too. Initial weapons choices usually depend more on research capabilities than anything. For example most factions tend to have at leas rudimentary railguns as they are the best forms or early defensive weapons in terms of both beam and point defences, especially as AMM is not an option early on at all.

On the issue of plasma I find them to actually be a decent good long range weapon early as they are so cheap to research you get access to pretty powerful ones quite early... I primarily like to use them on planets as planetary guns. Most factions also tend to research plasma because it also provide really good armour penetrating ground combat weapons for really cheap research, this effect should not be understated in how powerful it is.

In my last campaign I did just this... started with some rudimentary railgun technology and spent most time with plasma weapons for ground troops and STO. My plasma did even outrange my planetary fire-controls by quite a fair amount. The goal were to basically focus on Gauss and Missiles with Plasma as a secondary weapon as time went on and then in mid game perhaps tech up in particle beam and lances for a more beam focused fleet, but that was never a sure thing.