Ship Boarding Squad Design

[DFNewb]

Having 20% of formation tonnage to HQ seems questionable even for surface combat, where commanders seems to outlive their HQ units frequently, and, in addition, they and their reserved HQ units are indispensable to transfer superior commander's bonuses.

For boarding combat with such small one-level forces it's questionable twofold, because boading drop HQ casualty will be fatal for commander, if it was the unit where unlucky commader was deployed, so absolutely no advantage in doubling full-sized HQ units to increase commander's survivability during drop, and, in the same time, there will be no surerior-level commander bonuses transfer, because there is no superior level HQ in your boarding OOB.

I think there will be at all very small percent of juniur commaders, worth their 20%-tons load in boarding squads; they are to have more than 20% of relevant bonuses (Training, Offence and, with ~twice lesser efficiency, Defence and Logistics bonuses are relevant during boarding combat; Training must be used long time before combat to raise squad's moral at max to be truly efficient).

There is never any source that this is a thing. Read the posts for changes, Steve never mentioned this is a thing.

[serger]

I had included 2 HQ units based on my understanding of the boarding action phase, where if a HQ unit is destroyed, the commander still has a 50% chance of surviving if another HQ unit is present.

That's counterintuitive, but you'll have no advantage from this chance, because that (empty) HQ's loss and this (commander's one) HQ's loss are independent events. Probability of any HQ unit's loss during boarding drop is set by boarding drop safety multiplier (~ ship velocities ratio). Alloting some size of formation to another HQ unit, you are not changing this probability at all - in that way you just doubling probability, that some HQ unit will be lost during boarding drop. That's not what you want. With current mechanics, as it described by Steve, there is no way to decrease commander's loss during boarding drop besides increasing relative velocity of dropship. You can use 1x10t HQ for 100 tons of drop formation, or 1x10t HQ for 5000 ton battalion, or 10x10t HQs for this 5000 ton battalion - there will be one and the same probability of commander's loss during drop.

[liveware (OP)]

I had included 2 HQ units based on my understanding of the boarding action phase, where if a HQ unit is destroyed, the commander still has a 50% chance of surviving if another HQ unit is present.

That's counterintuitive, but you'll have no advantage from this chance, because that (empty) HQ's loss and this (commander's one) HQ's loss are independent events. Probability of any HQ unit's loss during boarding drop is set by boarding drop safety multiplier (~ ship velocities ratio). Alloting some size of formation to another HQ unit, you are not changing this probability at all - in that way you just doubling probability, that some HQ unit will be lost during boarding drop. That's not what you want. With current mechanics, as it described by Steve, there is no way to decrease commander's loss during boarding drop besides increasing relative velocity of dropship. You can use 1x10t HQ for 100 tons of drop formation, or 1x10t HQ for 5000 ton battalion, or 10x10t HQs for this 5000 ton battalion - there will be one and the same probability of commander's loss during drop.

I'm talking strictly about boarding in this thread. Planetary assault is a separate issue. That said, if what you say above is true and applies for boarding also, then there really is no reason to bring redundant HQs. One HQ per formation should always be sufficient and optimal and instead the commander's survival chance is more closely related to the relative speed difference of the boarding ship and the target ship.

I was under the impression that each HQ in a formation with multiple HQs would get a separate commander. That doesn't seem to be the case.

[serger]

I'm talking strictly about boarding in this thread. Planetary assault is a separate issue. That said, if what you say above is true and applies for boarding also

It is for boarding only.
Fire hits are another case - there is a chance of commander's death in case of HQ unit destruction, but this chance's mechanics is not described in Steve posts. In this case HQ redundancy can be useful. My testing battles showed no significent usefullness, but it can be caused by different details of mechanics.

[serger]

I was under the impression that each HQ in a formation with multiple HQs would get a separate commander.

No! One formation - one commander. There is no mechanics for reserve commanders in current version.

[liveware (OP)]

Here are my new company sized formations. They will be deployed from a 11k km/s boarding ship, which is slower than my previous 15k km/s squadron sized boarding ships.

Code: [Select]

Light Boarding Company
Transport Size: 1,000 tons
Build Cost: 4,918.9 BP
1x Light Company Command Mech
9x Light Supply Mech
100x Light Automatic Rifle Mech
25x Light Pulse Rifle Mech
############################

Medium Boarding Company
Transport Size: 1,000 tons
Build Cost: 4,919.2 BP
1x Light Company Command Mech
9x Light Supply Mech
50x Light Automatic Rifle Mech
50x Light Pulse Rifle Mech
############################

Heavy Boarding Company
Transport Size: 1,000 tons
Build Cost: 4,919.2 BP
1x Light Company Command Mech
9x Light Supply Mech
30x Light Rocket Mech
21x Light Pulse Cannon Mech

Some of my notes on these new formations:

1. I have reduced HQ numbers to one HQ per formation for all formations based on the discussions in recent posts and replaced the HQs with more Light Supply Mechs.

2. The Light company focuses on having a relatively large number of Automatic Rifle Mechs relative to Pulse Rifle Mechs, in the interest of reducing Pulse Rifle Mech attrition rates. This formation fires 250 shots per combat round and hits about 25 targets per round. I expect this would normally translate to an average of 20 - 30 kills per round. I believe the formation has enough GSP to support at least 5 rounds of combat (maybe more if troops do actually carry 10 rounds worth of GSP with them). This would result in a minimum of 100 - 150 kills expected before GSP depletion.

3. The Medium company focuses on having a relatively large number of Pulse Rifle Mechs relative to Automatic Rifle Mechs compared to the Light company in the interest of maximizing damage against lightly armored targets. I expect there is room for further optimization of this ratio once I have combat tested these formations. This formation fires 350 shots per combat round and hits about 35 targets per round. I expect this would normally translate to an average of 30 - 40 kills per round. I believe the formation has enough GSP to support at least 3 rounds of combat (maybe more if troops do actually carry 10 rounds worth of GSP with them). This would result in a minimum of 90 - 120 kills expected before GSP depletion.

4. The Heavy company focuses on providing anti armor support. I expect these formations will be used much less frequently than the Light and Medium companies, however I expect them to be useful if hostile power armor troops are present (or if armored forces in transport bays engage boarding parties, still haven't gotten a definitive answer about this). This formation fires 156 shots per combat round and hits about 15.6 targets per round. I expect this would normally translate to an average of 10 - 20 kills per round. I believe the formation has enough GSP to support at least 3 rounds of combat (maybe more if troops do actually carry 10 rounds worth of GSP with them). This would result in a minimum of 30 - 60 kills expected before GSP depletion.

[serger]

There is never any source that this is a thing. Read the posts for changes, Steve never mentioned this is a thing.

This phrase implies, that if you have an HQ - you can pass on higher-formation bonuses:

you can't pass on higher-formation bonuses to formations without an HQ.

[liveware (OP)]

So, some more of my amateur maths%u2026

Using my company formations posted above, I would be interested in targeting enemy ships with tonnages of 5k, 10k, 15k, 20k, 25k, and 30k tons, based on my scouting intel. Based on the crew numbers for my own ships, I come up with the following expectations for hostile crew numbers for each hostile ship size:

5k tons: 100-200 crew
10k tons: 300 - 400 crew
15k tons: 400 - 600 crew
20k tons: 600 - 800 crew
25k tons: 800 - 900 crew
30k tons: 900 - 1000 crew

Using my company formations, to be able to capture an enemy ship, I expect to need the following minimum number of each formation to successfully complete a boarding action based on the number of expected crew:

5k tons: 2x Light Companies, 3x Medium Companies, or 4x Heavy Companies
10k tons: 3x Light, 4x Medium, or 10x Heavy
15k tons: 4x Light, 5x Medium, or 14x Heavy
20k tons: 6x Light, 7x Medium, or 20x Heavy
25k tons: 8x Light, 9x Medium, or 27x Heavy
30k tons: 9x Light, 10x Medium, or 30x Heavy

Mixing and matching formation types may lead to improvements in the above estimates. I expect that I will need at least 4 times as many of each formation to ensure enough survive hostile point defense fire to actually breach a hostile hull.

[DFNewb]

So, some more of my amateur maths…

Using my company formations posted above, I would be interested in targeting enemy ships with tonnages of 5k, 10k, 15k, 20k, 25k, and 30k tons, based on my scouting intel. Based on the crew numbers for my own ships, I come up with the following expectations for hostile crew numbers for each hostile ship size:

5k tons: 100-200 crew
10k tons: 300 - 400 crew
15k tons: 400 - 600 crew
20k tons: 600 - 800 crew
25k tons: 800 - 900 crew
30k tons: 900 - 1000 crew

Using my company formations, to be able to capture an enemy ship, I expect to need the following minimum number of each formation to successfully complete a boarding action based on the number of expected crew:

5k tons: 2x Light Companies, 3x Medium Companies, or 4x Heavy Companies
10k tons: 3x Light, 4x Medium, or 10x Heavy
15k tons: 4x Light, 5x Medium, or 14x Heavy
20k tons: 6x Light, 7x Medium, or 20x Heavy
25k tons: 8x Light, 9x Medium, or 27x Heavy
30k tons: 9x Light, 10x Medium, or 30x Heavy

Mixing and matching formation types may lead to improvements in the above estimates.

Is this taking into account loses from boarding a moving ship?

Honestly these don't look so bad seeing as you get +1 ship at the end of the day. In my current campaign my bombers fire a volley of missiles at 4 spoiler ships, 3 get destroyed and 1 is slowed. If I had some boarding craft on my carrier fitted with similar to your companies that ship could be mine now instead of it being turned into a wreck (and in turn I lost a railgun fighter) in the ensuring clash.

When commercial hangars get fixed in 1.10 I will definitely take a look at boarding combat more as it seems really cool.

[liveware (OP)]

Using my company formations, to be able to capture an enemy ship, I expect to need the following minimum number of each formation to successfully complete a boarding action based on the number of expected crew:

5k tons: 2x Light Companies, 3x Medium Companies, or 4x Heavy Companies
10k tons: 3x Light, 4x Medium, or 10x Heavy
15k tons: 4x Light, 5x Medium, or 14x Heavy
20k tons: 6x Light, 7x Medium, or 20x Heavy
25k tons: 8x Light, 9x Medium, or 27x Heavy
30k tons: 9x Light, 10x Medium, or 30x Heavy

Is this taking into account loses from boarding a moving ship?

With this round of calculations I am trying to determine how many troops need to survive boarding action in order to successfully capture a ship (i.e. how many troops need to successfully breach an enemy hull to have a chance of successfully capturing the ship). So it does not account for boarding losses, it is my attempt to determine how many troops need to survive boarding action to ensure success.

[liveware (OP)]

FWIW, here are the ships I intend to use to deploy my boarding parties.

First, my microwave destroyer which carry one boarding ship each:

Code: [Select]

Artemis III class Destroyer      16,000 tons       505 Crew       4,257 BP       TCS 320    TH 875    EM 0
7812 km/s      Armour 8-56       Shields 0-0       HTK 73      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 20      PPV 24
Maint Life 2.20 Years     MSP 6,022    AFR 205%    IFR 2.8%    1YR 1,668    5YR 25,019    Max Repair 2187.5 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 2,500 tons     Tractor Beam     
Captain    Control Rating 3   BRG   AUX   CIC   
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days    Flight Crew Berths 80    Morale Check Required   

Aegis Ion Drive  EP2500.00 (1)    Power 2500    Fuel Use 107.33%    Signature 875.00    Explosion 20%
Fuel Capacity 1,001,000 Litres    Range 10.5 billion km (15 days at full power)

Aegis R200/C4 High Power Microwave (4)    Range 192,000km     TS: 7,812 km/s     Power 10-4    ROF 15       
Aegis CIWS-160 (1x6)    Range 1000 km     TS: 16,000 km/s     ROF 5       
Aegis Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (50%) (4)     Max Range: 192,000 km   TS: 8,000 km/s     95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Aegis Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor R8-PB30 (2)     Total Power Output 16    Exp 15%

Aegis Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (50%) (1)     GPS 3     Range 2.7m km    MCR 244k km    Resolution 1

ECCM-1 (4)         ECM 10

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Artemis is carrier based which allows shorter range, higher speed, and lower MSP than would otherwise be possible.

Each Artemis carries one Jackson V:

Code: [Select]

Jackson V class Boarding Assault Craft      2,500 tons       63 Crew       621.1 BP       TCS 50    TH 197    EM 0
11251 km/s      Armour 4-16       Shields 0-0       HTK 7      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0
Maint Life 1.22 Years     MSP 558    AFR 200%    IFR 2.8%    1YR 390    5YR 5,846    Max Repair 492.1875 MSP
Troop Capacity 1,000 tons     Boarding Capable   
Lieutenant    Control Rating 1   BRG   
Intended Deployment Time: 1 days    Morale Check Required   

Aegis Ion Drive  EP562.50 (1)    Power 562.5    Fuel Use 441.94%    Signature 196.8750    Explosion 25%
Fuel Capacity 35,000 Litres    Range 0.6 billion km (14 hours at full power)

Aegis Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (50%) (1)     GPS 3     Range 2.7m km    MCR 244k km    Resolution 1

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Each Jackson V can carry one boarding company as described above. These ships are supported by several other carrier-launched destroyers which provide covering and breaching fire while the Jacksons close on their targets.

[liveware (OP)]

Lets see if I can work out how many extra boarding ships I will need to account for expected boarding action losses.

According to the wiki:

5. The percentage chance of each individual unit (soldier) conducting a successful boarding attempt is equal to 10% x (Boarding Ship Speed / Target Ship Speed). So if the boarding ship is 10x faster than the target ship, success is automatic.

In my situation, I expect worst case speed ratio of boarding ship speed / target ship speed to be approximately 11/7 ~= 1.57. So I expect only about 15 - 16% of my troops to survive a boarding action. For a more common target ship speed of 5k km/s, I get 11/5 ~= 2.2, so in that case I would expect about 20 - 24% of my troops to survive boarding action. So for my company sized formations, I need about 5 - 10 times the number boarding ships compared to my expectations regarding the number of boarding companies required to actually take over a ship.

With this in mind, I think I will attempt to design a larger boarding ship with my destroyer engines to see if I can improve this high casualty rate.

[liveware (OP)]

The largest, fastest, boarding ship capable of fitting inside one of my carriers that I can design with my existing technology maxes out at 19.5k km/s top speed. At this speed, the speed ratio between my boarding ship and the target ship is 19.5/7 = 2.78 so only about 27.8% of my troops will survive boarding action. So I need about 4x the number of troops needed to actually capture the ship to be sent to attempt boarding if I want any chance of success.

I should note at this point that I believe my boarding troops get a 0.2 modifier instead of a 0.1 modifier for boarding action since they are all equipped with the 'boarding combat' modifier, so it is possible that my troops using my new destroyer sized boarding ship would have a boarding action success rate as high as 55.6%, meaning that I only need about twice as many troops to initiate a boarding action as I expect to be needed to capture. That's not quite as hopeless as my previous calculations indicated.

For example, to capture a 5k ton ship moving at 7k km/s, I should need 4x of my 19.5 km/s boarding ships with one Light Boarding Company each to succeed at capturing the target ship. Slower targets would require less boarding ships per target.

[liveware (OP)]

After reviewing the wiki and re-assessing my boarding ship performance, I have designed a new boarding ship capable of transporting squadron sized formations and also redesigned my squadron formations. The new boarding ship has the highest possible success rate for boarding action that I believe is possible with my existing technology, at about 60% success rate against the fastest expected hostile target. This means I need to send about 2x as many boarding ships as I expect are necessary based on enemy crew and my own boarding squad combat statistics would require. Unit designs are unchanged from earlier posts. My new troop boarding transport design is below:

Code: [Select]

Jackson VII class Boarding Assault Craft      1,000 tons       40 Crew       409.5 BP       TCS 20    TH 148    EM 0
21102 km/s      Armour 3-8       Shields 0-0       HTK 3      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 0      PPV 0
Maint Life 1.73 Years     MSP 425    AFR 80%    IFR 1.1%    1YR 173    5YR 2,593    Max Repair 369.1450 MSP
Troop Capacity 100 tons     Boarding Capable   
Lieutenant    Control Rating 1   
Intended Deployment Time: 1 days    Morale Check Required   

Aegis Ion Drive  EP421.88 (1)    Power 421.9    Fuel Use 510.31%    Signature 147.6580    Explosion 25%
Fuel Capacity 17,000 Litres    Range 0.6 billion km (7 hours at full power)

Aegis Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (50%) (1)     GPS 3     Range 2.7m km    MCR 244k km    Resolution 1

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
My new boarding squadron formations are below:

Code: [Select]

Light Boarding Squadron
Transport Size: 100 tons
Build Cost: 447.4 BP
1x Light Squadron Command Mech
9x Light Automatic Rifle Mech
3x Light Pulse Rifle Mech
#############################

Medium Boarding Squadron
Transport Size: 100 tons
Build Cost: 447.4 BP
1x Light Squadron Command Mech
3x Light Automatic Rifle Mech
6x Light Pulse Rifle Mech
#############################

Heavy Boarding Squadron
Transport Size: 100 tons
Build Cost: 447.4 BP
1x Light Squadron Command Mech
1x Light Supply Mech
4x Light Pulse Cannon Mech

My notes on the new formation designs:

1. Light squadrons now carry no GSP capability. I am assuming that the 10 rounds of GSP per unit works as described on the wiki. Light squadrons maintain an Automatic Rifle / Pulse Rifle ratio of 3:1 to minimize Pulse Rifle attrition. They shoot an average of 27 shots per combat round, killing an average of 2.7 targets. I expect average performance of 3 or sometimes 2 kills per round of combat. After 10 rounds of combat, this results in 30 - 20 kills expected.

2. Medium squadrons now carry no GSP capability. I am assuming that the 10 rounds of GSP per unit works as described on the wiki. Medium squadrons maintain an Automatic Rifle / Pulse Rifle ratio of 1:2 as a compromise between offensive damage and Pulse Rifle attrition. They shoot an average of 39 shots per combat round, killing an average of 3.9 targets. I expect average performance of 4 or sometimes 3 kills per round of combat. After 10 rounds of combat, this results in 40 - 30 kills expected.

3. Heavy squadrons are the only squadrons which carry GSP capability. I am assuming that the 10 rounds of GSP per unit works as described on the wiki, however if resupply is required, it can be provided by Heavy squadrons. Heavy squadrons utilize Pulse Cannons exclusively for offensive capability, and are intended for defeating targets equipped with power armor. They shoot an average of 24 shots per combat round, killing an average of 2.4 targets. I expect average performance of 2 or sometimes 3 kills per round of combat. After 10 rounds of combat, this results in 20 - 30 kills expected.

Additionally, the Artemis class has been re-designs to allow for 3x Jackson VII's to be docked in her hanger bays. As a result, she has lost her tractor beam capability which would have been helpful when recovering recently captured ships.

Code: [Select]

Artemis III class Destroyer      16,000 tons       502 Crew       4,196.5 BP       TCS 320    TH 875    EM 0
7812 km/s      Armour 8-56       Shields 0-0       HTK 69      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 20      PPV 24
Maint Life 2.29 Years     MSP 6,519    AFR 205%    IFR 2.8%    1YR 1,679    5YR 25,189    Max Repair 2187.5 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 3,000 tons     
Captain    Control Rating 3   BRG   AUX   CIC   
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days    Flight Crew Berths 60    Morale Check Required   

Aegis Ion Drive  EP2500.00 (1)    Power 2500    Fuel Use 107.33%    Signature 875.00    Explosion 20%
Fuel Capacity 1,001,000 Litres    Range 10.5 billion km (15 days at full power)

Aegis R200/C4 High Power Microwave (4)    Range 192,000km     TS: 7,812 km/s     Power 10-4    ROF 15       
Aegis CIWS-160 (1x6)    Range 1000 km     TS: 16,000 km/s     ROF 5       
Aegis Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (50%) (4)     Max Range: 192,000 km   TS: 8,000 km/s     95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Aegis Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor R8-PB30 (2)     Total Power Output 16    Exp 15%

Aegis Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (50%) (1)     GPS 3     Range 2.7m km    MCR 244k km    Resolution 1

ECCM-1 (4)         ECM 10

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes


[liveware (OP)]

So, some more of my amateur maths:

Using my company formations posted above, I would be interested in targeting enemy ships with tonnages of 5k, 10k, 15k, 20k, 25k, and 30k tons, based on my scouting intel. Based on the crew numbers for my own ships, I come up with the following expectations for hostile crew numbers for each hostile ship size:

5k tons: 100-200 crew
10k tons: 300 - 400 crew
15k tons: 400 - 600 crew
20k tons: 600 - 800 crew
25k tons: 800 - 900 crew
30k tons: 900 - 1000 crew

I will now calculate how many of my boarding squadrons are required to capture ships of the tonnages listed above. These calculations assume the squadrons listed below have already survived boarding action:

5k ton ship: 4x Light Squadrons, 3x Medium Squadrons, or 5x Heavy Squadrons required to capture ship following completion of boarding action
10k ton ship: 10x Light, 8x Medium, or 15x Heavy
15k ton ship: 14x Light, 10x Medium, or 20x Heavy
20k ton ship: 20x Light, 15x Medium, or 30x Heavy
25k ton ship: 27x Light, 20x Medium, or 40x Heavy
30k ton ship: 30x Light, 23x Medium, or 45x Heavy

Finally, I will consider the impact of boarding action. A Jackson VII has a top speed of 21k km/s and the fastest NPR ship I have observed has a top speed of 7k km/s. So, the speed ratio is 21/7 = 3, and 3 * 0.2 = 0.6, so I have a boarding success rate of 60% for each boarding unit. So if I bring 2x as many boarding ships as my calculations above indicate that I need, I should be able to capture a target ship of each of the above sizes, accounting for the effects of boarding action. This is not terribly unreasonable given that each squadron is only 100 tons. I can fit 1x squadron on each Jackson VII and 3x Jackson VIIs on each Artemis. So now I will calculate how many fully loaded Artemis's should be adequate to capture a ship of each of the tonnages listed above:

5k ton ship: 9x Jackson VII on 3x Artemis III
10k ton ship: 21x Jackson VII on 7x Artemis III
15k ton ship: 30x Jackson VII on 10x Artemis III
20k ton ship: 42x Jackson VII on 14x Artemis III
25k ton ship: 54x Jackson VII on 18x Artemis III
30k ton ship: 60x Jackson VII on 20x Artemis III

Considering that each Artemis is accompanied by a compliment of particle beam and plasma carronade destroyers in equal numbers, I think these formations stand a chance at capturing some ships and that my fleet overall may be approaching a final workable configuration for my upcoming encounter with my local hostile NPR.