Aurora 4x
VB6 Aurora => Bureau of Ship Design => Topic started by: Stardust on February 08, 2014, 11:20:06 AM
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For 50 years, we've produced no scientists that excel in missile systems. Expertise in energy weapons and defensive systems though has allowed us to confidently invest our resources in warships that must rely on close range engagements.
The Tennessee is designed to deploy to developed extrasolar colonies that have the necessary facilities to maintain these 15000 ton vessels.
Tennessee class Cruiser 15,000 tons 534 Crew 4340.3 BP TCS 300 TH 180 EM 0
5000 km/s Armour 16-54 Shields 0-0 Sensors 16/16/0/0 Damage Control Rating 4 PPV 112.44
Maint Life 0.89 Years MSP 723 AFR 450% IFR 6.2% 1YR 813 5YR 12188 Max Repair 625 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 3
500 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (3) Power 500 Fuel Use 40% Signature 60 Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 1,500,000 Litres Range 45.0 billion km (104 days at full power)
20cm C5 Ultraviolet Laser (5) Range 192,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 10-5 RM 4 ROF 10 10 10 10 10 8 6 5 5 4 4
Quad R9/C3/16 Meson Cannon Turret (4x4) Range 90,000km TS: 16000 km/s Power 24-12 RM 9 ROF 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Beam Targeting Computer S03 96-4000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 4000 km/s 38 36 33 31 29 27 25 23 21 19
Beam Targeting Computer S06 48-16000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (14) Total Power Output 70 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Missile Detection Processor MR1-R5 (1) GPS 40 Range 1.4m km Resolution 5
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
Thermal Sensor TH2.75-16 (1) Sensitivity 16 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 16m km
EM Detection Sensor EM2-16 (1) Sensitivity 16 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 16m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This is my first beam weapon based design and I found it to require quite a bit more work than the missile based designs of my first campaign.
What do you all think?
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It looks pretty good, just make sure that you keep your ships faster than any enemies you find.
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For a magnetoplasma beam ship, I would make it faster. I don't have the possibility to calculate here, but I do not think you're using a high multiplier on the engines, from memory.
You could increase the multiplier it in order to increase speed. 45 billion kilometers is wayyyyyy too much range for a serious battleship of this kind. I'd use tankers instead when needed, and ditch them when it's time to shoot.
As for maintenance life and deployment time, I suppose you intend this ship as a response vessel, basically intercepting hostiles that enter the system where it is deployed, right?
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Thanks.
Trevor Hoague (PP60%) is currently working on improving the fuel efficiency of our engines, but he's all about speed and is not a happy camper. He's been told that as soon as he completes his current assignment to our satisfaction, he's free to hook us up with more powerful engines. Trevor seems to have a substance abuse issue, so we're keeping a close eye on him.
Sometimes I wish that I had not quit my job as quantum laser engineer in hopes of ruling an interstellar empire.
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For a magnetoplasma beam ship, I would make it faster. I don't have the possibility to calculate here, but I do not think you're using a high multiplier on the engines, from memory.
You could increase the multiplier it in order to increase speed. 45 billion kilometers is wayyyyyy too much range for a serious battleship of this kind. I'd use tankers instead when needed, and ditch them when it's time to shoot.
As for maintenance life and deployment time, I suppose you intend this ship as a response vessel, basically intercepting hostiles that enter the system where it is deployed, right?
I haven't yet gotten comfortable with the new engine mechanics, but I'm getting there; so much fun.
Instead of focusing on range like I should have, I was focusing on fuel consumption. Noted.
Yes, the Tennessee will be exclusively reactionary and assigned to defend a specific star system.
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Missile Detection Processor MR1-R5 (1) GPS 40 Range 1.4m km Resolution 5
Three thoughts,
1. Speed, speed, speed. As previously mentioned you cannot hit what you cannot catch.
2. Since your Missile Detection Processor has a resolution of 5, a Size 6 missile (0.33 HS) will only be detected at 6100 km, and you will never fire at it unless it's speed is less than 1000 km/s.
Range for objects less than the sensor resolution = (target HS/Resolution)2
Detection has to occur at 6 seconds to allow the beam fire control to fire in the next 5 second impulse.
For my beam armed ships I use a single active sensor, resolution 1 and range of 2mkm which lets me see everything I can take a shot at. As a reaction ship I would strip off the passive sensors and use DSTS's at my colony, or a dedicated senor ship.
3. Your beam fire control for you 20cm lasers has really poor accuracy, you might be better off dropping one laser and having a fire control that has range and accuracy.
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Agree with the others on speed and the active sensor. Res one, 2mkm is a good sensor for that ship.
I do disagree a bit with passives though. Every single one of my military ships gets at least the smallest EM and TH sensor. Wasted space? Maybe but it gives you some flexibility to move away from planets with ground tracking stations and not relying on scouts. Without having a large powerful active scanner, passives are a must.
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Agree with the others on speed and the active sensor. Res one, 2mkm is a good sensor for that ship.
I do disagree a bit with passives though. Every single one of my military ships gets at least the smallest EM and TH sensor. Wasted space? Maybe but it gives you some flexibility to move away from planets with ground tracking stations and not relying on scouts. Without having a large powerful active scanner, passives are a must.
Thats my philosophy with passives. (Almost) every ship I have has at least one passive. A few who will always be a part of a battle fleet do not but the majority do. I find them just too useful to not have.
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Thank you for all your input.
I've engineered more powerful engines, but I'm not happy with the range.
Tennessee II class Cruiser 14,450 tons 554 Crew 5009.3 BP TCS 289 TH 240 EM 0
6920 km/s Armour 16-52 Shields 0-0 Sensors 16/16/0/0 Damage Control Rating 4 PPV 112.44
Maint Life 0.86 Years MSP 867 AFR 417% IFR 5.8% 1YR 1002 5YR 15037 Max Repair 1250 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 0
1000 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (2) Power 1000 Fuel Use 226.28% Signature 120 Exp 20%
Fuel Capacity 2,000,000 Litres Range 11.0 billion km (18 days at full power)
20cm C5 Ultraviolet Laser (5) Range 192,000km TS: 6920 km/s Power 10-5 RM 4 ROF 10 10 10 10 10 8 6 5 5 4 4
Quad R9/C3/16 Meson Cannon Turret (4x4) Range 90,000km TS: 16000 km/s Power 24-12 RM 9 ROF 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Beam Targeting Computer S03 96-4000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 4000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam Targeting Computer S06 48-16000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (14) Total Power Output 70 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
Missile Detection Processor MR1-R5 (1) GPS 40 Range 1.4m km Resolution 5
Thermal Sensor TH2.75-16 (1) Sensitivity 16 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 16m km
EM Detection Sensor EM2-16 (1) Sensitivity 16 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 16m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Maybe three 750EP engines would do the trick. I'm also working on a beam fire control for the 20cm lasers that have a tracking speed of 8000 km/s. Next up is a Resolution 1 sensor to replace the inadequate Resolution 5 sensor. This kind of oversight is not acceptable.
Maybe more armor would be a better use of space than the passives.
Almost there.
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Note that 3 750 power engines would be even more powerful and have significantly more fuel use than the 2 1000 EP ones. If that kind of thing floats your boat. Your maintenance life would go up though.
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Note that 3 750 power engines would be even more powerful and have significantly more fuel use than the 2 1000 EP ones. If that kind of thing floats your boat. Your maintenance life would go up though.
My initial design consisted of 3 500EP engines (no power modifier) resulting in a speed of 5000 km/s and fuel expenditure of 720 liters/hr. A 50 day mission would expend 864000 liters of fuel.
The second consisted of 2 1000EP engines (x2 power modifier) resulting in a speed of 6667 km/s (assuming 15000 tons) and fuel expenditure of 3394 liters/hr. A 50 day mission would expend over 4 million liters of fuel.
If I were to slap on 3 750EP engines (x1.5 power modifier), I would achieve a speed of 7500 km/s and fuel expenditure of 2480 liters/hr. In this case, a 50 day mission would expend 3 million liters of fuel.
This all assumes that I'm understanding the new engine design rules correctly.
I'm also considering increasing the size of my engine design to improve efficiency.
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Don't assign more than 40% of your engine weight in fuel unless you want to reful other craft, or you have weird design constraints and know exactly what you are doing. Past this point, you typically waste performance as well as fuel. I use 30% as my aiming point for performance-critical craft, lower if efficiency matters.
Individual engine size, and hence number, is a judgment call. I like 2 for medium-sized warships as a single engine can cause undue maintenance concerns and is a single point of failure.
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What is the reasoning behind your weapon choice? The way I see it, you have long-ranged weapons that will carve deep gashes into armour but aren't quite powerful enough to deliver devastating single hits. Your short-range weapons don't take advantage of damaged armour, and bringing them up to par in a point defense role was expensive (bulky turrets, sophisticated fire control).
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my guess would be because it's neat, but also Mesons can start inflicting internal damage right away, reducing the amount of damage taken while the lasers beat down the armor, Mesons take to long to make kills against large targets anyway.
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What is the reasoning behind your weapon choice? The way I see it, you have long-ranged weapons that will carve deep gashes into armour but aren't quite powerful enough to deliver devastating single hits. Your short-range weapons don't take advantage of damaged armour, and bringing them up to par in a point defense role was expensive (bulky turrets, sophisticated fire control).
Very little. I've not been able to advance my missile tech hardly at all due to lack of expertise. We have significant expertise in energy weapons and defensive systems. Our defensive systems experts are performing their research on a colony that boosts their skills by 60%. So, at this point, my plan is to go exclusively with very well protected energy based warships.
The mesons are primarily meant for point defense, but are available to help out offensively. Once I get to the point of expanding my navy, I hope to get very creative with tactics. I'm thinking of eventually going on the offensive with large numbers of stealthy meson fighters.
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My initial design consisted of 3 500EP engines (no power modifier) resulting in a speed of 5000 km/s and fuel expenditure of 720 liters/hr. A 50 day mission would expend 864000 liters of fuel.
The second consisted of 2 1000EP engines (x2 power modifier) resulting in a speed of 6667 km/s (assuming 15000 tons) and fuel expenditure of 3394 liters/hr. A 50 day mission would expend over 4 million liters of fuel.
If I were to slap on 3 750EP engines (x1.5 power modifier), I would achieve a speed of 7500 km/s and fuel expenditure of 2480 liters/hr. In this case, a 50 day mission would expend 3 million liters of fuel.
This all assumes that I'm understanding the new engine design rules correctly.
I'm also considering increasing the size of my engine design to improve efficiency.
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If you can do one huge engine, you can get better fuel use for the same power modifiers. It'll also be harder to blow up (more HTK) but of course it's really bad if it does.
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The ship already has a low repair capacity in comparison with the largest component, which I assume is the engine. So if an engine receive a maintenance failure on the ship as is right now you can't fix it and will have to return to a naval yard and repair it. Battle damage also cost twice this so you would need a capacity of 2500MSP repair to fix an engine that is damaged. If you make the engine even bigger then you will just need even more engineering facilities.
If you also consider the very low maintenance cycle for this ship you can soon find yourself in a big trouble.
I think you should think about this before building the ship.
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So many variables. Now maintenance costs enter into the picture.
OK, we'll go with this for now. I think.
Tennessee II class Cruiser 15,000 tons 546 Crew 3631.7 BP TCS 300 TH 2250 EM 0
7500 km/s Armour 15-54 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 3 PPV 106.44
Maint Life 0.63 Years MSP 454 AFR 600% IFR 8.3% 1YR 726 5YR 10886 Max Repair 375 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 1
750 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (3) Power 750 Fuel Use 110.23% Signature 750 Exp 15%
Fuel Capacity 1,850,000 Litres Range 20.1 billion km (31 days at full power)
20cm C5 Ultraviolet Laser (4) Range 192,000km TS: 7500 km/s Power 10-5 RM 4 ROF 10 10 10 10 10 8 6 5 5 4 4
Quad R9/C3/16 Meson Cannon Turret (4x4) Range 90,000km TS: 16000 km/s Power 24-12 RM 9 ROF 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Laser Targeting Computer S06 96-8000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam Targeting Computer S06 48-16000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (14) Total Power Output 70 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Missile Detection Processor MR2-R1 (1) GPS 32 Range 2.6m km MCR 279k km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
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Im still new to this game but two of each of your targeting computers strikes me as odd why not remove the excess ones and possibly a meson to two add in extra MSP
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Im still new to this game but two of each of your targeting computers strikes me as odd why not remove the excess ones and possibly a meson to two add in extra MSP
While my scientists work on delivering a larger more fuel efficient engine, I'm considering doing just as you suggest.
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It is better to have more fire controls, you can shoot on more targets, in case of 4 FCs you can target 4 different targets. If one of your fire controls is destroyed in battle you will still be able to shoot. Ships with only one fire control will be helpless when that fire control is destroyed.
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Using two 30HS engines instead of three 20HS engines saves some fuel.
Tennessee II class Cruiser 15,000 tons 557 Crew 3562.7 BP TCS 300 TH 2250 EM 0
7500 km/s Armour 15-54 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 4 PPV 112.44
Maint Life 0.79 Years MSP 594 AFR 450% IFR 6.2% 1YR 749 5YR 11239 Max Repair 562.5 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 1
1125 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (2) Power 1125 Fuel Use 96.45% Signature 1125 Exp 15%
Fuel Capacity 1,750,000 Litres Range 21.8 billion km (33 days at full power)
20cm C5 Ultraviolet Laser (5) Range 192,000km TS: 7500 km/s Power 10-5 RM 4 ROF 10 10 10 10 10 8 6 5 5 4 4
Quad R9/C3/16 Meson Cannon Turret (4x4) Range 90,000km TS: 16000 km/s Power 24-12 RM 9 ROF 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Laser Targeting Computer S06 96-8000 (1) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam Targeting Computer S06 48-16000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (14) Total Power Output 70 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Missile Detection Processor MR2-R1 (1) GPS 32 Range 2.6m km MCR 279k km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
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Not a bad revision.
Personally, I would still ditch one of the beam fire controls and add a thermal sensor.
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Not a bad revision.
Personally, I would still ditch one of the beam fire controls and add a thermal sensor.
They will primarily be used as reactionary system defense vessels at first and most of these systems will have deep space scanning stations for passive surveillance.
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Still wasteful. Try this:
25 HS fuel (1,250,000l)
2 size 35 engines, at 86-90% of your current power multiplier - depending on whether you want better speed or better range. Total tonnage will stay the same, and you'll need 29% less fuel.
Edit: If you need to adjust crew quarters/engineering spaces because of the larger engines, do so at the expense of fuel. My example is about as close to the performance-optimal fuel:engine ratio as I care to go, dropping a little lower in the name of fuel efficiency is quite ok.
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Still wasteful. Try this:
25 HS fuel (1,250,000l)
2 size 35 engines, at 86-90% of your current power multiplier - depending on whether you want better speed or better range. Total tonnage will stay the same, and you'll need 29% less fuel.
OK. Note that we've increased our fuel efficiency from 0.5 to 0.4 l/eph.
Tennessee II class Cruiser 15,000 tons 562 Crew 3575.95 BP TCS 300 TH 2362 EM 0
7873 km/s Armour 15-54 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 4 PPV 112.44
Maint Life 0.69 Years MSP 596 AFR 450% IFR 6.2% 1YR 865 5YR 12969 Max Repair 590.625 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 3
1181.25 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (2) Power 1181.25 Fuel Use 55.06% Signature 1181.25 Exp 13%
Fuel Capacity 1,250,000 Litres Range 27.2 billion km (40 days at full power)
20cm C5 Ultraviolet Laser (5) Range 192,000km TS: 7873 km/s Power 10-5 RM 4 ROF 10 10 10 10 10 8 6 5 5 4 4
Quad R9/C3/16 Meson Cannon Turret (4x4) Range 90,000km TS: 16000 km/s Power 24-12 RM 9 ROF 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Laser Targeting Computer S06 96-8000 (1) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam Targeting Computer S06 48-16000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (15) Total Power Output 75 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Missile Detection Processor MR2-R1 (1) GPS 32 Range 2.6m km MCR 279k km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Thank you.
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Almost double efficiency, nice.
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Almost double efficiency, nice.
Thanks.
The new engine design mechanics add a lot of flexibility. Iranon's treatise on fuel/engine weight ratio is a good read (http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php/topic,6762.0.html (http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php/topic,6762.0.html)). I've added a tab to my Aurora spreadsheet so that I don't drive my engineers crazy. I understand that researching new propulsion concepts is more rewarding than tweaking power modifiers.
Does it bother anyone else that there's no distinction between science and engineering in Aurora?
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Thanks for the kind words, but byron deserves a lot more credit there than I do. He had this mostly solved before I even looked into it, and greatly helped me understand the trade-offs for cases where we want efficiency as well as raw performance.
t's easy to shoot ourselves in the foot with overly stressed engines. We should also look hard whether fuel efficiency is worth the RP - that line needs to be judged against a higher concept and lower power multiplier.
Another thing to keep in mind: build cost scales linearly with power for engines of 1.00 power multiplier and above, below that it scales quadratically with the power multiplier.
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Lack of division between science and engineering doesn't bother me much, although I suppose we could have that as its own speciality field.
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I see two primary weaknesses of this design.
first is range. Given the tech level of your other components, 192kkm beam range is rather short. A 256kkm fire control is within your reach, although this could easily be handled via a refit.
Second is dat MSP. The damn thing might break on the way to its assigned sector or on the way back. I would sacrifice an armor layer or some of the fuel to add additional engineering spaces.
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Still not convinced about that weaponry, not just the FC aspects.
Using 4x4 Meson Cannons 'mostly for point defence' is suspect when Railguns are so efficient on a moderately fast ship. Little or no additional research is required, and volume of fire instead of high tracking speed means we don't need sophisticated fire controls to be effective.
4x4 Meson Cannons make more sense as general purpose weapons - only mediocre point defence, but reliable damage dealers. But that's tricky too, as then we need to consider synergy with our long-ranged weapons.
If someone crosses into Meson Range, our firepower is split between medium-sized lasers that'll scratch the paint badly but can't be expected to burn through defences in a single shot, and peashooters that ignore defences.
This is wasteful. Equal-sized laser turrets would take better advantage of existing armour damage, and have considerably longer range so we could slave them to the long-range fire control for enhanced capabilities at range. Since unturreted and turreted guns are only one size apart and the larger cannons have the same RoF with your capacitor tech, unifying everything including fire control would be better still.
Getting truly long range with Mesons is expensive and we don't gain damage potential in the bargain. Fitting lasers to a primarily-Meson ship for cheap shots is fine in principle, but I struggle to find an implementation that wouldn't be better as something else.
I see the main appeal of Mesons mainly for things other than mainline combat vessels: fighters, fast snipers (especially against certain spoilers), support for boarding actions, PDCs where other beam weapons would be ineffective...
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Whether the MSP situation is a problem depends on many details... as it is, it seems a serious limitation but not an unreasonable one given the intended use.
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I see two primary weaknesses of this design.
first is range. Given the tech level of your other components, 192kkm beam range is rather short. A 256kkm fire control is within your reach, although this could easily be handled via a refit.
Second is dat MSP. The damn thing might break on the way to its assigned sector or on the way back. I would sacrifice an armor layer or some of the fuel to add additional engineering spaces.
My unimaginative scientists have been chided and have been tasked with improving the range of our laser weaponry.
These 1st generation warships are meant only for local defense of systems that contain colonies able to maintain and resupply them. With that said, I don't doubt that it's meager MSP allotment will create some problems until addressed.
Still not convinced about that weaponry, not just the FC aspects.
Using 4x4 Meson Cannons 'mostly for point defence' is suspect when Railguns are so efficient on a moderately fast ship. Little or no additional research is required, and volume of fire instead of high tracking speed means we don't need sophisticated fire controls to be effective.
4x4 Meson Cannons make more sense as general purpose weapons - only mediocre point defence, but reliable damage dealers. But that's tricky too, as then we need to consider synergy with our long-ranged weapons.
If someone crosses into Meson Range, our firepower is split between medium-sized lasers that'll scratch the paint badly but can't be expected to burn through defences in a single shot, and peashooters that ignore defences.
This is wasteful. Equal-sized laser turrets would take better advantage of existing armour damage, and have considerably longer range so we could slave them to the long-range fire control for enhanced capabilities at range. Since unturreted and turreted guns are only one size apart and the larger cannons have the same RoF with your capacitor tech, unifying everything including fire control would be better still.
Getting truly long range with Mesons is expensive and we don't gain damage potential in the bargain. Fitting lasers to a primarily-Meson ship for cheap shots is fine in principle, but I struggle to find an implementation that wouldn't be better as something else.
I see the main appeal of Mesons mainly for things other than mainline combat vessels: fighters, fast snipers (especially against certain spoilers), support for boarding actions, PDCs where other beam weapons would be ineffective...
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Whether the MSP situation is a problem depends on many details... as it is, it seems a serious limitation but not an unreasonable one given the intended use.
A missile research expert has finally joined our academic team so railguns may be an option in the near future. Since I'm concentrating on defense at the moment, she's currently working on gauss cannon related research.
The meson cannons were chosen for a number of reasons. I want to experiment with beam based weaponry and the expertise exists to do so. They are more for additional offensive firepower, especially when multiple targets exist, than for missile defense at this time. They can also be used for planetary defense. Research into meson based fighters is in full swing and will likely be a focus in our tactical planning.
I really appreciate the feedback you all are providing.
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An entry-level 10cm Railgun with its associated power plant gets you 4 shots on 3.3HS with your current reactors, very respectable for point defence even without turrets.
The Gauss line has important options (turrets, reduced size), but for fast craft it needs serious research investment before it can compete. The improved accuracy is desirable, but the bulk from weapons (6HS), turret gear and faster-tracking fire control adds up. Reduced size eats into their accuracy advantage.
As usual, there are other considerations and I'm not arguing that prioritising Gauss weaponry is wrong... but I'd need a specific reason to go for Gauss from the start instead of fielding Railguns as a stop-gap until my Gauss tech is actually good.
Considerations between weapon lines don't remain the same: I see Railguns as the low-tech option for point defence, but the high-tech option for secondary artillery (more compact than an equivalent laser loadout, but requiring more research and throttled harder by capacitor tech. I don't like investing heavily into Railguns, too limited).
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The meson cannons were chosen for a number of reasons. I want to experiment with beam based weaponry and the expertise exists to do so. They are more for additional offensive firepower, especially when multiple targets exist, than for missile defense at this time. They can also be used for planetary defense. Research into meson based fighters is in full swing and will likely be a focus in our tactical planning.
Getting some Meson capacity is also good for planetary point defence. PDC's armed with Meson's can defend your homeworld fairly well from missile attack.
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Getting some Meson capacity is also good for planetary point defence. PDC's armed with Meson's can defend your homeworld fairly well from missile attack.
Mesons will be the backbone of my planetary point defense.
The Adamant class replaces the meson point defense of the Tennessee classes with railguns.
Adamant class Cruiser 14,950 tons 509 Crew 4195.85 BP TCS 299 TH 2362 EM 0
7899 km/s Armour 15-54 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 5 PPV 106
Maint Life 1.12 Years MSP 877 AFR 357% IFR 5% 1YR 705 5YR 10574 Max Repair 590.625 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Spare Berths 0
1181.25 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (2) Power 1181.25 Fuel Use 55.06% Signature 1181.25 Exp 13%
Fuel Capacity 1,500,000 Litres Range 32.8 billion km (48 days at full power)
25cm C6 Ultraviolet Laser (7) Range 256,000km TS: 7899 km/s Power 16-6 RM 4 ROF 15 16 16 16 16 12 10 9 8 7 6
12cm Railgun V3/C6 (10x4) Range 60,000km TS: 7899 km/s Power 6-6 RM 3 ROF 5 2 2 2 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
Rail Targeting System S04 64-8000 (2) Max Range: 128,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 92 84 77 69 61 53 45 37 30 22
Laser Targeting System S08 128-8000 (1) Max Range: 256,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 96 92 88 84 80 77 73 69 65 61
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor S.5 (21) Total Power Output 105 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Missile Detection Processor MR2-R1 (1) GPS 32 Range 2.6m km MCR 279k km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR25-R100 (1) GPS 5000 Range 25.0m km Resolution 100
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Sometimes I think that I still have no idea what I'm doing with regard to warship design.