Aurora 4x
VB6 Aurora => Bureau of Ship Design => Topic started by: Rich.h on February 04, 2016, 08:13:34 PM
-
I had an unpleasant encounter in my current game recently where my nice stealthy recon ship got a little too close and was escorted out of an NPR home system. The event turned out quite well as the NPR in question were not hostile and are now good trading partners. But it did highlight the total vulnerability of my stealth designs, since my doctrine for such ships always leans towards the idea of see without being seen and make a get away rather than fight. I find this method means I don't waste space on things such as big pew pew things that in turn mean needing bigger engines which in turn destroy my TH signature.
So trying to think outside of the box my ship engineers came to me with a possibly radical idea, the use of decoys. The way a decoy is meant to work is that we have very high powered sensor probes that will give out a large EM signature and thus hopefully be of more interest than the recon ships own TH signature. Once a decoy is dropped the recon ship can reduce engine power to a point where it can make a very quiet yet slow maneuver away from the decoy position, with luck if an enemy focuses on the decoy EM output then by the time they arrive in scanning range the recon ship is already well out of range for it's now much reduced TH signature. The possible side advantage of this being the decoys can also be used as standard sensors in space to cover places with an active scanner to save on the cost of a ship being there.
MIL 403 Hermes MK2 class Recon Frigate 20 000 tons 459 Crew 7172.1 BP TCS 40 TH 211.2 EM 1560
4400 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 5-65 Shields 52-300 Sensors 360/360/0/0 Damage Control Rating 31 PPV 36.18
Maint Life 0.12 Years MSP 2224 AFR 3200% IFR 44.4% 1YR 18463 5YR 276945 Max Repair 1250 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 18 months Spare Berths 0
Troop Capacity: 1 Company Magazine 463
Powedll Class 3 Hyperdrive Max Ship Size 20000 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3
Powedll Class 4 Fusion Drive (2) Power 880 Fuel Use 22.4% Signature 105.6 Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 1 300 000 Litres Range 52.2 billion km (137 days at full power)
Alterman Theta Shields (13) Total Fuel Cost 260 Litres per hour (6 240 per day)
Chambers-Foster Gauss Turret (2x4) Range 40 000km TS: 40000 km/s Power 0-0 RM 4 ROF 5 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
Chambers-Foster Phalanx (1x8) Range 1000 km TS: 25000 km/s ROF 5 Base 50% To Hit
Muravyov Fire Con MR-48 TS-25k (1) Max Range: 48 000 km TS: 25000 km/s 79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0
Chambers-Foster Size 50 Buoy Launcher (1) Missile Size 50 Rate of Fire 5000
Muravyov Probe Targeting (1) Range 19.4m km Resolution 100
Muravyov Search Sensor MR-102m R-10 (1) GPS 1800 Range 102.5m km Resolution 10
Muravyov TH Sensor 360 (1) Sensitivity 360 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 360m km
Muravyov EM Sensor 360 (1) Sensitivity 360 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 360m km
Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 10% of normal
ECM 30
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Missile Size: 49.97 MSP (2.4985 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 0 km/s Engine Endurance: 0 minutes Range: 0.0m km
Active Sensor Strength: 47.34 Sensitivity Modifier: 180%
Resolution: 1 Maximum Range vs 50 ton object (or larger): 8 520 000 km
If I am understanding EM sensors correctly then a sensor buoy like this should be spotted by the recon ship at a range of around 17m km or is that wrong? Also note that I am currently playing on a game without overhauls, in addition it is mandatory that all naval vessels are capable of repairing at least twice over the most complex component and are required to carry security personal at all times. This is why the ship has such a large amount of MSP and troop capacity. So has anyone ever tried anything like this before and if so how did it work out?
-
I'm a newbie but I like the idea.
How do you deploy it? Since its a missile with no engine do you just target their home world and fire?
-
Several ways. 1; Set a waypoint, fire, then delete way point (all in the same increment). 2; Order to "fire missile at" a target.
-
EM signature of a sensor scales linearly with resolution, if you mostly want a decoy you can have the same effect with a size-1 buoy.
-
EM signature of a sensor scales linearly with resolution, if you mostly want a decoy you can have the same effect with a size-1 buoy.
Ok I am a little confused by this, I was under the impression that an EM sensor picks up EM from colonies, shields, and active sensors. This being the case then is it not the actual active sensor strength that generates the EM rather than simply the resolution?
-
He is saying you can get the same affect with a smaller sensor with a larger resolution. GPS = Size (in hs)* tech lv * resolution. Passive em sensors will detect a higher gps at a longer range.
-
Ok I am a little confused by this, I was under the impression that an EM sensor picks up EM from colonies, shields, and active sensors. This being the case then is it not the actual active sensor strength that generates the EM rather than simply the resolution?
Pretty much. For reasons that I don't understand, low-res sensors are detectable much further away than equivalent-size high-res ones. So the best decoy is a Size 1 missile with the lowest resolution (highest detection size).
Another way to implement this would be to mount the decoy as the second stage of a missile, which is then fired at a waypoint. That way, the decoy doesn't start broadcasting right on top of you, and you can position it to better distract the bad guys. (Obviously, this probably won't work with the massive decoy you have here.)
If you want to be really clever, then build a missile that has ship-level speed and decent endurance, with an appropriate sensor. This can either be fired directly, or used as a second stage, with appropriate settings during building. (This will be tricky to set up, as you have to measure range to the target waypoint rather precisely to get it to come on when it's supposed to.)
-
Ok it seems then I have totally misunderstood how EM works to start with, so going back to the board on this one slightly with some basics the wiki states that.
GPS is range * resolution, and after some checking I also found that GPS is what is classed as the signature strength (EM) in the detection formula. So if that is correct then am I right with this example below.
A resolution 10 sensor that has a detection range of lets say 5000km will produce a GPS(EM) of 50,000. If you have an EM detection strength of 10 then this sensor would be detected at 500m km (10*50,000*1000)
If that is correct then taking it a step further with the idea above about having it as a running decoy I came up with this.
Missile Size: 2 MSP (0.1 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 5000 km/s Engine Endurance: 72.1 hours Range: 1 297.0m km
Active Sensor Strength: 1.026 Sensitivity Modifier: 180%
Resolution: 2 Maximum Range vs 100 ton object (or larger): 260 000 km
Cost Per Missile: 1.7666
Am I correct in thinking that with just an EM 11 sensor this missile would appear on scopes from somewhere in the region of 3.9bkm away?
-
No. A very small size-2 active isn't going to be picked up several AU away by a strength 11 sensor. I'm not sure exactly how many GPS it will have, but it's going to take a very high resolution to make it detectable at long range.
-
GPS = Size (in hs)* tech lv * resolution. Passive em sensors will detect a higher gps at a longer range.
-
Exactly. I worked it out separately, and that's the correct formula.
So the notional resolution-2 decoy could have a GPS of 2.052, and a detection range (EM 11) of 22,572 km. Yes, in theory it can detect anything with an EM 11 sensor before it is detected. This is obviously bad in a decoy. Now, if we made the sensor resolution 100, it could be picked up by our notional sensor at 1,128,600 km, and would itself have a range of 1,838,477 km. The detection range is still above the intercept range, but not as much as before. I can't recall what the resolution cap is. If it's 500, then you have an EM intercept range of 5,643,000 km and the sensor itself would have a range of 4,110,960 km. (The intercept range scales linearly with resolution, the active range with the square root of resolution.)
I plan to test decoys in one of my games before too long, to see how the AI behaves around them.
-
GPS = Size (in hs)* tech lv * resolution. Passive em sensors will detect a higher gps at a longer range.
Can you link to where you found this formula? The wiki glossary states "Gravity Pulse Strength - A measure of the strength of an active sensor. GPS is range * resolution." Unless this is badly written I read that to mean the resolution of the sensor * the range of the sensor? Also what tech level are we talking about, the EM detection tech or active sensor tech? Does that mean a staright 1,2,3,etc for the tech level beyond the TN age, or is that a number as defined by the exact strength given by a tech level for example EM/Active strength 36.
-
Can you link to where you found this formula? The wiki glossary states "Gravity Pulse Strength - A measure of the strength of an active sensor. GPS is range * resolution." Unless this is badly written I read that to mean the resolution of the sensor * the range of the sensor? Also what tech level are we talking about, the EM detection tech or active sensor tech? Does that mean a staright 1,2,3,etc for the tech level beyond the TN age, or is that a number as defined by the exact strength given by a tech level for example EM/Active strength 36.
The wiki is often wrong (or, more accurately, out of date). Look at a few ships, and you'll see that it's clearly not range*resolution. I derived the same formula he gave from ships posted on the forum and a bit of math. (There were pairs of active sensors on some ships where the GPS differed by res1/res2 and the range differed by sqrt(res1)/sqrt(res2). I assumed similar techs, which meant that the sensors were the same size (and thus the same strength) and the range differences were down entirely to resolution. Thus, GPS must be proportional to resolution. There were other cases where two sensors of the same resolution had GPS values which differed as range1/range2, and thus active sensor strength was range1/range2. Assuming that all sensors involved had similar EM tech, the obvious equation is GPS=sensor strength*resolution. Yes, I'm an engineer.)
Active sensor tech is the controlling tech here. EM sensor tech on the part of the person building the sensor just means that he gets more range for a given active sensor strength. (Actually, this is true even to the point that making a bigger active sensor with low active sensor strength tech provides no benefit in terms of counterdetection probability.) Active sensor strength is defined as active sensor tech*active sensor size.
-
I see so the actual correct formula then is GPS= sensor size (in H.S) * Active sensor tech level * sensor resolution. So my only confusion now is the tech level part, does this refer to a tech "level" as in 1,2,3 etc like ruins provide. Or is it an exact copy of the number given by the Active sensor research project. For example if you have just researched the very first active sensor tech which of the following would give you a correct GPS figure?
1. GPS = size * 10 * resolution
2. GPS = size * 1 * resolution
-
I see so the actual correct formula then is GPS= sensor size (in H.S) * Active sensor tech level * sensor resolution. So my only confusion now is the tech level part, does this refer to a tech "level" as in 1,2,3 etc like ruins provide. Or is it an exact copy of the number given by the Active sensor research project. For example if you have just researched the very first active sensor tech which of the following would give you a correct GPS figure?
1. GPS = size * 10 * resolution
2. GPS = size * 1 * resolution
The exact number given by the research project. I don't know of any cases where the numerical position of a tech in a tree is used (as opposed to the number on the front of the tech.)
-
Ah that helps a lot more in understanding things and I have done a revision to the decoy.
Missile Size: 2 MSP (0.1 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 5000 km/s Engine Endurance: 72.1 hours Range: 1 297.0m km
Active Sensor Strength: 1.026 Sensitivity Modifier: 180%
Resolution: 500 Maximum Range vs 25000 ton object (or larger): 4 120 000 km
Cost Per Missile: 1.7666
So using the correct formula then the GPS of this missile should be as follows (my current active sensor strength tech is 36)
GPS = 0.1 * 36 * 500 = 1800
Using that to work out it's detection range am I correct with this formula (working on the assumption of an EM sensor component with an EM 11 rating).
11 * 1000 * 1800 = 19,800,000 km
So am I correct then in thinking that if I fired this missile off at a target any ship with an EM sensor with a rating of 11 will detect the missile at 19.8m km?
-
Not quite, because the .1 HS isn't correct. It's a missile, so only a portion of it is allocated to the sensor. The active sensor strength (HS*tech) is 1.026 (it's in the stat block), so your GPS is 1.026*500=513 and the counterdetection range is 513*11*1000=5.643 mkm. (Working backwards, the actual size of the active component is 0.57 MSP, or 0.0285 HS.)
I'd look at turning up and shrinking the engine. (See http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php/topic,5659.0.html (http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php/topic,5659.0.html) for how to make better engines.) And then make the active bit as big as you can.
-
So after a lot of shouting and academic debates my engineers have returned with a revised plan they assure me is now functional.
MIL 403 Hermes MK2 - Copy class Recon Frigate 20 000 tons 491 Crew 7604.42 BP TCS 40 TH 211.2 EM 1560
4400 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 5-65 Shields 52-300 Sensors 560/180/0/0 Damage Control Rating 31 PPV 21.66
Maint Life 0.11 Years MSP 2238 AFR 3200% IFR 44.4% 1YR 19676 5YR 295141 Max Repair 1250 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 18 months Spare Berths 1
Troop Capacity: 1 Company Magazine 156
Powedll Class 3 Hyperdrive Max Ship Size 20000 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3
Powedll Class 4 Fusion Drive (2) Power 880 Fuel Use 22.4% Signature 105.6 Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 1 500 000 Litres Range 60.3 billion km (158 days at full power)
Alterman Theta Shields (13) Total Fuel Cost 260 Litres per hour (6 240 per day)
Chambers-Foster Gauss Turret (2x4) Range 40 000km TS: 40000 km/s Power 0-0 RM 4 ROF 5 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
Chambers-Foster Phalanx (1x8) Range 1000 km TS: 25000 km/s ROF 5 Base 50% To Hit
Muravyov Fire Con MR-48 TS-25k (1) Max Range: 48 000 km TS: 25000 km/s 79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0
Chambers-Foster Size 6 Buoy Launcher (1) Missile Size 6 Rate of Fire 600
Chambers-Foster Probe Targeting (1) Range 388.8m km Resolution 100
Size 6 Decoy Buoy (16) Speed: 5 000 km/s End: 691.2m Range: 207.4m km WH: 0 Size: 6 TH: 16/10/5
Size 6 Watcheye (10) Speed: 0 km/s End: 0m Range: 0m km WH: 0 Size: 6 TH: 0/0/0
Muravyov Search Sensor MR-102m R-10 (1) GPS 1800 Range 102.5m km Resolution 10
Active Search Sensor MR144-R500 (1) GPS 18000 Range 144.9m km Resolution 500
Active Search Sensor MR1448-R500 (1) GPS 180000 Range 1 449.0m km Resolution 500
Muravyov TH Sensor 560 (1) Sensitivity 560 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 560m km
Muravyov EM Sensor 180 (1) Sensitivity 180 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 180m km
Cloaking Device: Class cross-section reduced to 10% of normal
ECM 30
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
This design carries 16 decoy missiles as below.
Missile Size: 6 MSP (0.3 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 5000 km/s Engine Endurance: 11.5 hours Range: 207.4m km
Active Sensor Strength: 4.0734 Sensitivity Modifier: 180%
Resolution: 500 Maximum Range vs 25000 ton object (or larger): 16 390 000 km
Cost Per Missile: 6.8928
My engineers inform me that even a lowly strength 11 EM sensor should pick up this decoy at a little over 22m km away. Since it also moves just slightly faster than the actual vessel, hopes are that when fired at a distant point at a tangent to a current course then it may appear to oncoming vessels as though the ship has light up sensors and made a sharp turn and burn to flee. In the meantime the actual ship can lower engine power and sneak off in the opposite direction to a safe distance where it can take stock of the situation and decide to either continue the mission or escape the system. In addition to these decoys the ship also carries 10 watcheye probes designed to be left at close (100-200m km) range to any colonies we happen to come across. With their EM and TH sensors they would act as a semi permanent spy on what is going on with he colony and any passing ships.
Missile Size: 6 MSP (0.3 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 0 km/s Engine Endurance: 0 minutes Range: 0.0m km
Thermal Sensor Strength: 1.8612 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 1 861 200 km
EM Sensor Strength: 1.863 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 1 863 000 km
Cost Per Missile: 5.9586
Since this class of ship is likely to be operated solely by those working in the intelligence division it has been proposed that a test run be made. A few volunteers will be found who are dedicated to their naval service and have no family ties, these brave few will take a prototype of this class into an NPR home system to first attempt to close within launch distance of the watcheyes. The second stage will be to deliberately provoke a response from the NPR naval forces by allowing the ship to be detected, when conformation of an interception has been made then the decoy will be deployed while the tangent maneuver will be enacted before the ship attempts to escape the system back home. Since the NPR in question are currently on friendly terms with us and these new ship will be of a radical look and always fly without any form of transponder there has been deemed a high chance the NPR could see this as a hostile craft and open fire. In that situation the intelligence division will deny all knowledge of the existence of these craft and those on board will activate a highly effective self destruct device should there be a danger of capture or disablement.
One final question I have about detection with this design is about TCS. The wiki states that "TCS or Target Cross Section, which is the exact class size rounded up to the next whole number and is the value used to detect the ship with active sensors". Does this then mean if you have a ship with zero engine emissions, and is also giving off zero EM emissions, then any ship using an active sensor to detect it will use the TCS value as a replacement for the normal EM/TH value?
In this ships example trying to detect itself with engines powered down, will it be detected at 102m km regardless? It is above the 500 ton amount for the resolution 10 sensor and it has a maximum range against such of 102m km.
-
Your engineers speak correctly this time.
Active sensors always rely solely on TCS for detection. TH is totally irrelevant. I believe EM is as well, although I'm not 100% positive of that. It will detect itself at 102 mkm regardless. However, it has a much lower cross-section than normal ships of its type, and good enough EM sensors should allow it to avoid most active sensors.
Also, one tip. Fit a resolution 1 missile defense active. Otherwise, your gauss turrets are not very useful.
Also, during my own investigation of this, I discovered that missile sensors are capped somewhere around resolution 40000000 by an overflow error.
Missile Size: 1 MSP (0.05 HS) Warhead: 0 Armour: 0 Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Speed: 12000 km/s Engine Endurance: 111 minutes Range: 79.8m km
Active Sensor Strength: 1.6 Sensitivity Modifier: 400%
Resolution: 40000000 Maximum Range vs 2000000000 ton object (or larger): 4,047,710,000 km
Cost Per Missile: 2.71
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 120% 3k km/s 40% 5k km/s 24% 10k km/s 12%
Materials Required: 0.96x Boronide 1.6x Uridium 0.15x Gallicite Fuel x250
Development Cost for Project: 271RPBy my math, the detection range for a strength 11 EM sensor is 704,000 mkm. Yes, that's right. 704 billion km. 27 light-days. Or, to put it another way, if you fire one of these off in Sol, a moderate-sized DSTS in Alpha Centauri should see it. Yes, I have a very high-tech game which lets me cram that in to a size 1 missile, but even the most basic tech should be able to build a very good decoy indeed.
(On the other hand, regular actives are capped at resolution 500, so it's better to build a ship that fires decoy missiles than to build a ship that is itself a decoy.)
-
Rich.h: I thought you claimed they would "always fly without any form of transponder"? (Meaning, why did you mount screamers on the vessel itself? Remember that you can't control sensors below the level of an individual ship, so either all its actives are on, or all of them are off.) For a stealth ship, being unable to get exact scan details of enemy shipping, or even to shoot down missiles, without announcing your presence to the entire universe could be a slight handicap.
Okay, examining it more carefully, at least you appear to carry a single CIWS, which mitigates one issue slightly (since that doesn't require a separate AS lock). On the other hand, not only do you mix CIWS with gauss turrets (duplicating support systems without exploiting the independence of CIWS), the tracking speed of your FC looks to be crippling your turrets (and presumably does the same for your CIWS). And you have substantial shields as well - generally, trying not to be noticed is best done by not making lots of noise! Not to mention that all that deadweight slows you down, requiring stronger (hotter) engines, and bloats your TCS. On the whole, I'd say that either your engineers are trying to conduct history's most expensive assassination of an intel weenie, or they haven't quite grasped what you're asking for.
-
Ah yes well spotted on the missing missile detection sensor, well it wouldn't be Aurora if at least one essential component was missing from a design before it launches. Also interesting information about the missile resolution, I wrong assumed that since a ship based sensor was limited to a resolution of 500 so would be a missile sensor. With that in mind I have managed to reduce the missile to size 1 and vastly increase it's detection range along with speed. Hopefully it will work to keep ships chasing it now for far longer and thus further away from the actual recon vessel.
To address the other issue about some parts of this design, the CIWS, gauss turrets and shields are not there with the intention of being used ever. In the same way you do not slap on armour to a ship with the intention of getting shot, but it is there as a backup should you get hit. The systems on this ship are what has been deemed as the bare minimum it might need to survive a combat situation against a small number or lightly armed foe for just long enough to make an escape through a jump point. If the situation arrived where this ship was detected and it was clear the decoys had failed then and only then would shields be raised, and the active sensor be activated (afterall by that point the game is up so you may as well get all the information you can). The ship will make for the nearest escape point at full speed and if anyone got close enough the gauss turrets would be deployed.
Since the design spec for this craft was a 20k ton vessel then the engines required to reach this speed at my current tech level will always give a TH signature of around this figure. The 20k ton figure was chosen as I needed a small stealth ship that could carry the required sensor package, be able to self jump, cloak, and carry both decoy and defensive armaments. The problem around the FC speed is one that at this time cannot be resolved as my current TS tech is 6250km/s, so using the maximum possible X4 on design will only ever let me track at 25,000km/s. Unless there is a bug in my current game then the same issue applies to the CIWS as it is using that TS base.
-
CIWS is its own self contained unit. It does not rely or use any other component. It could be classified as a passive defense (like armor) as it doesn't produce detectable emissions and will function normally. And any speed above a FC's or turret's (CIWS included) tracking speed is taken off in the chance to hit, it can still hit but at a reduced chance to. So in a fleet doctrine like this, I would honestly forego most of the sensor and the FCs/gauss in favor of more CIWS and armor (more or less shields is debatable so should be decided class by class).
-
CIWS is its own self contained unit. It does not rely or use any other component. It could be classified as a passive defense (like armor) as it doesn't produce detectable emissions and will function normally. And any speed above a FC's or turret's (CIWS included) tracking speed is taken off in the chance to hit, it can still hit but at a reduced chance to. So in a fleet doctrine like this, I would honestly forego most of the sensor and the FCs/gauss in favor of more CIWS and armor (more or less shields is debatable so should be decided class by class).
The biggest issue there though is that would mean I only have any offensive capability against missiles with CIWS. The two gauss turrets are there to either allow this ship to properly attack a very small number of FAC that get too close, or to try to strike against a larger craft that gets in range also. Now I fully understand how that might seem futile at this time since the gauss only have a 40k range, however there I am stuck with a tech limitation. When my tech has moved on a little these turrets will be switched out for most likely a meson based system or perhaps even a small laser one. For the current time though things like defensive turrets are the last addition to this design after all other considerations have been put in place. Sadly using anything other than gauss pushes the craft over the 20k ton spec limit unless I make it so they are totally useless against missiles, which then leaves me with just armour, shields and a single CIWS.
-
intriguing concept.
You could do a TH decoy using a small ship built entirely out of maximum multiplier engine. A fighter perhaps, although a fighter probably cant generate enough signature to compare to a 20kt ship.
-
intriguing concept.
You could do a TH decoy using a small ship built entirely out of maximum multiplier engine. A fighter perhaps, although a fighter probably cant generate enough signature to compare to a 20kt ship.
I did consider that as my first idea but as you say getting a fighter to generate enough TH compared to a stealth 20kt ship is hard. In addition the detection range is far and below the distance these decoys are picked up at. Finally there is the issue of size, since this vessel currently carries some 20 odd decoys would mean probably increasing beyond the 20kt limit if I used fighters, and each of the decoys would be far too valuable in terms of ship resources to use until the last minute.
-
I've attempted similar designs on and off for a while but mine are usually much smaller. It's a really cool idea, and I hope it works when you take it out for trials!
I'm curious though what the intention is of the multiple active sensors. It's a stealth ship right? So it shouldn't need any actives except for anti-missile work (and it doesn't even need that if you only use CIWS). IIRC you can dumb-fire your missiles at waypoints without an active sensor, you just need a fire control.
I presume that you're playing with maintenance off? The maintenance life is much too low if not.
The company is cool, and I like to put one on myself for ships that are on extended detached duty, but it's not a great design choice.
-
you can dumb-fire your missiles at waypoints without an active sensor, you just need a fire control.
The missiles would need built in actives for that to work. (not criticizing, just expanding)
-
I've attempted similar designs on and off for a while but mine are usually much smaller. It's a really cool idea, and I hope it works when you take it out for trials!
I'm curious though what the intention is of the multiple active sensors. It's a stealth ship right? So it shouldn't need any actives except for anti-missile work (and it doesn't even need that if you only use CIWS). IIRC you can dumb-fire your missiles at waypoints without an active sensor, you just need a fire control.
I presume that you're playing with maintenance off? The maintenance life is much too low if not.
The company is cool, and I like to put one on myself for ships that are on extended detached duty, but it's not a great design choice.
The bigger active sensor is there partly as I had space for it after meeting all other design demands, and also as a last ditch system. From an RP standpoint that sensor is an entire intel suite, it includes an advanced sensor net along with space magic subspace narrowband communications, along with an advanced AI. Should it ever become obvious that the decoys have failed and one of these ships are going to get some very close company with a guarantee of hostilities, then this sensor pack is turned on. It quickly scans all ships in ranges and makes a deep analysis of the details of them, it then encrypts and compresses all data before firing it off towards the nearest receiver beacon so that HQ will at least have some idea of what happened and the capabilities of the vessels in that area.
Part of my design doctrine for this game is to include things that mechanically don't make much sense as I like ships that can handle a few different roles to some degree. You are correct about the maintenance though as I find it a micromanagement nightmare sometimes, so I am playing without it until 7.2.
-
Well the intended test run of this design has been a total failure, somehow a senator who has constantly opposed all intelligence missions and detests anything approaching black operations got wind of the design. After tracing some data logs it seems this senator sent full details of the both the entire ship design and missions it was intended for over to a diplomat from the Worrell Commonwealth. This leak was not discovered until the prototype of this class was already in Sirius and had gone communications dark. Upon returning the ship captain reported that the vessels of the Worrell Commonwealth paid no attention at all to them, they fired off a couple of decoys with no luck, to make matters worse it seems a virus had got into the sensor suite and shortly after the second decoy had been launched the entire sensor pack activated lighting up the vessel for all to see. However it was still totally ignored and so the captain brought her home to report.
Well it seems that once you reach a certain friendly status with an NPR they no longer seem to mind you buzzing a 20kt ship around their home system for a couple of weeks. I can only guess that is why they ignored me as I tried everything I could to make sure I was spotted and they simply did not react. Seems this concept is just going to have to wait until I find a new NPR or a spoiler.
-
I made a brief test last week with a spoiler (the one that tends to swarm everywhere). The issue was that I had quite a few ships in the system, including one with an active sensor that dwarfed even my decoy in power. I had a couple of vessels operating near one of their motherships, and had one of them fire a decoy off. It didn't go for the decoy, and ended up heading home instead. I'll have to try again later.
-
Your ship looks unnecessary large. Stealth ships work best if stealth is all they do. No shields, no armor, no weapons. Shrink it down, reduce engine size and give it more speed.
Small and fast is way more important for stealth ships used for scouting purposes.
-
Your ship looks unnecessary large. Stealth ships work best if stealth is all they do. No shields, no armor, no weapons. Shrink it down, reduce engine size and give it more speed.
Small and fast is way more important for stealth ships used for scouting purposes.
All depends on your perspective, when you consider I tend to normally play with multi 100kt vessels and am currently looking towards getting a first million ton ship then these are small. In addition at my current tech level this is about as small as I can make this type of ship while meeting all the design requirements placed on it.
-
I had another idea on this front about how to make it something of a more offensive weapon too. By taking advantage of missiles with sensors I can effectively do away with a needed active sensor which is often a primary give away of your position (assuming you have already taken steps to reduce TH and the like). After seeing in another thread that you can just fire a missile at a way point I figured why not combine it with missile sensors. A quick play about gave me this concept for a bomber.
Hunt class Fighter-bomber 1 000 tons 3 Crew 554.9 BP TCS 20 TH 34.56 EM 0
14400 km/s Armour 1-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 11.25
Maint Life 11.9 Years MSP 347 AFR 8% IFR 0.1% 1YR 5 5YR 68 Max Repair 180 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 0.1 months Spare Berths 1
Magazine 75
Powedll Class 3 Fusion Drive (2) Power 144 Fuel Use 106.92% Signature 17.28 Exp 15%
Fuel Capacity 30 000 Litres Range 5.1 billion km (4 days at full power)
Law Foundation Size 15 Box Launcher (5) Missile Size 15 Hangar Reload 112.5 minutes MF Reload 18.7 hours
Hellmann Missile Targeting R-100 (1) Range 172.8m km Resolution 100
Size 15 Spacial AST (4) Speed: 24 600 km/s End: 93.1m Range: 137.5m km WH: 13 Size: 14.967 TH: 90/54/27
Each bomber is armed with 5 of the following missiles in box launchers.
Missile Size: 14.967 MSP (0.74835 HS) Warhead: 13 Armour: 1 Manoeuvre Rating: 11
Laser Heads: 3
Speed: 24600 km/s Engine Endurance: 93 minutes Range: 137.5m km
Active Sensor Strength: 2.4 Sensitivity Modifier: 240%
Resolution: 50 Maximum Range vs 2500 ton object (or larger): 4 070 000 km
ECM Level: 4
Cost Per Missile: 14.14
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 270.6% 3k km/s 88% 5k km/s 54.1% 10k km/s 27.1%
My thinking is that a wing of these can launch from around 1bkm away from a potential target, then make their way instantly off to one side for a couple of 100mkm before then turning to the target. While the missile ranges are not that great the bombers themselves do not give out that large of a TH signature and so should be able to get within maximum firing range without detection. A single missile can then be launched at a way point located near the target vessel, while the missile is in motion the bomber wing then moves away and off to a second firing position, they repeat this for all five missiles before finally moving off in a random pattern before finally coming back to their home carrier. The bombers themselves have enough range to ensure they can enact a nice little dance around half of Sol before needing to come home and so the carrier should be able to always remain hidden.
The second part of the concept is in the missiles and their sensors package, once they reach a way point the missile activates it's own on board sensor and locates a target nearby (4mkm in this case). Since they do not move terribly fast by missile standards and the fact there is only a small salvo size, a careless captain could be fooled into letting their short range and CIWS defences deal with the threat. But then the laser warheads kick in meaning such defences are rendered useless and a vessel is left venting atmosphere unless it has a large amount of armour. Since there was no active sensor ping to locate, then all a ship captain has to look at is a number of small missile salvos coming at them from various directions that also happen to keep putting small holes in their ship.
Now granted unless I was to field a large or multiple wings of these bombers then they are not going to be bringing down battleships and the like all by themselves. But my main thinking is that they will turn smaller forces into a soft target that will likely have lost many of their internal systems, or in the case of larger ships a lucky hit may just cause secondary explosions. But most importantly of all is that with careful flying all of this can be accomplished without the enemy having an idea of my location. Thus my own ships can maintain the initiative in combat.
I am also toying with the idea of putting reduced size launchers instead of box launchers onto a stealth boat equipped with sensor buoys and cloaking abilities. This way it can simply act like a lone wolf in a system being able to both spy on the general forces, and make occasional strikes on high value targets. However I think this will need some work for both very high deployment times, along with large magazines which in turn will mean a bigger ship and so perhaps be limited with much weaker engines to keep the TH down.
-
There's a couple problems here. First, laser warheads, IIRC, don't actually work. At all. I experimented with them once, and they're basically just worse as currently implemented. (It's been a while, though.)
Second, the missiles fire off their sensors as soon as they are launched. If you want to activate near the WP target, you'll need to make them 2-stage, with the sensor in the second stage. (This may not be a bad idea for other reasons, as you can make the second stage much faster than the first.)
I tried something similar a couple times, and even used it in battle once or twice. In that case, they were essentially submarines instead of being fighters, with lots of stealth and sensored missiles. I'd jump them in to a system I was planning to take over before hostilities broke out and have them hide, then fire off their 'torpedoes' to open the JP. But it wasn't really worth the work, because I had to be able to force JPs anyway.
The easy way to keep them from knowing about the launching force is to put your active sensors on specialized vessels that are separated from the missile units. Build those as small as possible, and then scatter half a dozen around the enemy fleet. I'd go with 2-stage missiles, as the current rules make them quite effective. Switch between active platforms to keep the enemy from hunting them down.
-
Ah I see I was under the idea that missiles with sensors when fired at a waypoint would not activate until they reached said waypoint. Also can you be certain about laser warheads, everything I have read including recent posts said that they function in a way that means they fire at a short range, but outside of CIWS range and so they effectively skip CIWS, part of the balancing being that they also do less damage?
-
Laser warhead skip all final fire defenses so can only be engaged by AMMs or area defense.
-
Ah I see I was under the idea that missiles with sensors when fired at a waypoint would not activate until they reached said waypoint. Also can you be certain about laser warheads, everything I have read including recent posts said that they function in a way that means they fire at a short range, but outside of CIWS range and so they effectively skip CIWS, part of the balancing being that they also do less damage?
I looked a bit, and it seems you're right. I'm a bit disturbed that I didn't know that. That said, they were so weak when I last tried to use them that I gave up in frustration. But against the right enemy, it could be very useful...
<frantically starts redesigning missiles>
-
After looking at the damage template and how they laser warheads work I have found a flaw in this design though. Due to how they have their damage split it means these missiles will only punch into 2 layers of armour with 3 hits from each missile. So they will work more like railguns that appear to come from nowhere and skipping past close range defences. Not ideal for a lone wolf type craft as I would have to heavily increase the missile size to ensure it was able to do large amounts of single hit damage. but I think this bomber idea still has merit if it was instead use to target smaller craft that were likely acting as escort vessels. They should have less armour layers on them and so it could be viable as a means to strip away the defensive capabilities of an opposing fleet before moving in to strike at the larger craft.
-
After looking at the damage template and how they laser warheads work I have found a flaw in this design though. Due to how they have their damage split it means these missiles will only punch into 2 layers of armour with 3 hits from each missile. So they will work more like railguns that appear to come from nowhere and skipping past close range defences. Not ideal for a lone wolf type craft as I would have to heavily increase the missile size to ensure it was able to do large amounts of single hit damage. but I think this bomber idea still has merit if it was instead use to target smaller craft that were likely acting as escort vessels. They should have less armour layers on them and so it could be viable as a means to strip away the defensive capabilities of an opposing fleet before moving in to strike at the larger craft.
I think laser heads are probably a bad choice for the role you're looking at here, actually. You're talking about hitting soft targets, which means that they won't have heavy point defenses by definition. Their PD efficiency is almost certainly going to be capped by their fire control situation. Having, say, half a dozen of these fighters, all firing together would overwhelm the PD systems, and you'd almost certainly deliver more total damage, even after losing a missile or two, than you would if you used laser heads and none of them got shot down.
Or, if you want to be really tricky, use another kind of decoy. Build a size 1 missile that's 100 km/s faster than the big one, and fit it with its own tiny sensor. Then, replace 1 MSP of warhead with that, and set it to release at close to the target. You'll have to be careful when doing this so you don't fire it at the WP you initially target, but it will end up ahead of the incoming missile, and draw off the PD fire. You've just doubled the number of FC systems it takes to stop your salvo.
-
Now I'm really confused. I decided to try laser heads out again, so I fired up my 6.4 test game (I haven't bothered to update it all the way) and shot at one of my target platforms with laser-head missiles. The CIWS was impotent, but the gauss turrets on final fire took out all of the missiles. Clearly, something is wrong here.
Edit:
I decided to try again, this time turning off the gauss turrets, and discovered that the CIWS being impotent was bad luck. It took out one of my two missiles, leading me to conclude that I was right and laser heads are basically useless at the moment. I'm going to verify in 7.1, but I think we have a bug here.