Nuclear Gas Core Engine speeds

[Tavik Toth (OP)]

Hm, in my current game I've started with Nuclear Gas-Core Engines, but I'm not really sure what kind of speeds are expected from that tech level. Does anyone have advice?

[nuclearslurpee]

Anywhere from 3,000 to 4,000 km/s works. Slower for missile or carrier fleets, faster for beam fleets.

The general rule of thumb is 30% to 40% of ship mass as engines with 1.0x boost will give you ship speeds roughly comparable with NPR fleet speeds at the same tech level. You can aim for higher speeds, usually through higher boost modifiers, but this comes at the cost of high fuel consumption which can become a problem during extended military campaigns/operations.

[Tavik Toth (OP)]

I'm also trying to design a 30,000 ton warship with a particle lance and four lasers, and I'm having trouble getting the AFR under 200%.

Here is the design currently.

Code: [Select]

Shayou class Heavy Cruiser      29,028 tons       604 Crew       3,334.5 BP       TCS 581    TH 2,100    EM 0
3617 km/s    JR 3-50      Armour 7-84       Shields 0-0       HTK 145      Sensors 5/5/0/0      DCR 31-10      PPV 32
Maint Life 4.11 Years     MSP 2,225    AFR 217%    IFR 3.0%    1YR 210    5YR 3,157    Max Repair 500 MSP
Kontr-admiral    Control Rating 2   BRG   FLG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Morale Check Required   

Soraesh-Nam J30000(3-50) Military Jump Drive     Max Ship Size 30000 tons    Distance 50k km     Squadron Size 3

Lupaetz-Sarrg Nuclear Gas-Core Engine  EP150.00 (14)    Power 2100.0    Fuel Use 73.48%    Signature 150.00    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 3,650,000 Litres    Range 30.8 billion km (98 days at full power)

Stikkzorrg-Vaeku Armaments Particle Lance-12 (1)    Range 200,000km     TS: 3,617 km/s     Power 37-4    ROF 50       
Stikkzorrg-Vaeku Armaments 15.0cm C4 Visible Light Laser (4)    Range 120,000km     TS: 3,617 km/s     Power 6-4     RM 20,000 km    ROF 10       
Greth Electronics Industries Beam Fire Control R224-TS1250 (SW) (1)     Max Range: 224,000 km   TS: 1,250 km/s    ECCM-0     30 28 27 26 24 23 21 20 19 17
Nuup & Grog Beam Fire Control R128-TS1250 (2)     Max Range: 128,000 km   TS: 1,250 km/s    ECCM-0     29 26 24 21 19 17 14 12 9 7
Neemith Turbines Gaseous Fission Reactor R11 (2)     Total Power Output 22.6    Exp 5%

Greth Electronics Industries Active Search Sensor AS26-R100 (1)     GPS 2000     Range 26.2m km    Resolution 100
Troth Sensor Systems Thermal Sensor TH1.0-5.0 (1)     Sensitivity 5.0     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  17.7m km
Troth Sensor Systems EM Sensor EM1.0-5.0 (1)     Sensitivity 5.0     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  17.7m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Warship for auto-assignment purposes


[Zap0]

AFR isn't really a stat you need to look at. It's simply going to be twice as big for a ship that is twice the mass, all other things equal.

Your ship looks fine. There's one major problem in that your beam fire controls are too slow - your ship moves at 3.6k, which gives your hull-mounted guns a tracking speed of 3.6k. But your beam fire controls can only track 1.25km/s! You want to have their speed match the speed of the guns (which in this case is equal to your ship). If you don't, you'll get a reduced to-hit chance when shooting at things moving faster than 1.25km/s.

The other notable consideration about your ship is that it has a built-in jump drive, which takes a lot of the internal space. This means this ship is rather lightly armed for a dedicated warship of this size. People often use dedicated jump ships that act purely as support for their warships. Or you could build some additional warships of this size without a jump drive to act together in a squadron that gets jumped by this vessel. Or you could decide you're only looking to fight in areas with stabilized jump points and skip the jump drive entirely :-)

[nuclearslurpee]

I'm also trying to design a 30,000 ton warship with a particle lance and four lasers, and I'm having trouble getting the AFR under 200%.

AFR isn't really a stat you need to look at. It's simply going to be twice as big for a ship that is twice the mass, all other things equal.

Specifically, according to this mechanics post the AFR will be 0.04 * total_tonnage / fraction_of_engineering_spaces. This means that if two ships of different sizes have the same fraction of engineering spaces, the AFR will be proportional to size.

Note that while a ship twice as large has twice the AFR, it also has twice the capacity to carry MSP. In practice, from an engnineering and maintenance perspective this ship is basically the same as two smaller ships each half the size (in practice, the average MSP use per failure goes up due to larger sizes and costs of certain components, like engines or jump drives, but this is usually much less than a proportional effect).

The other notable consideration about your ship is that it has a built-in jump drive, which takes a lot of the internal space. This means this ship is rather lightly armed for a dedicated warship of this size. People often use dedicated jump ships that act purely as support for their warships. Or you could build some additional warships of this size without a jump drive to act together in a squadron that gets jumped by this vessel. Or you could decide you're only looking to fight in areas with stabilized jump points and skip the jump drive entirely :-)

Since the jump drive changes in 2.4+, mounting jump drives on every ship has become feasible as they take up much less space once you have a few levels in the basic efficiency tech. See Steve's current Gothic AAR for examples of this. Of course, ships without jump drives will always be able to mount more guns and/or armor and thus will perform better in a straight fight, but often the strategic flexibility is worth it especially for larger ships.

[Tavik Toth (OP)]

AFR isn't really a stat you need to look at. It's simply going to be twice as big for a ship that is twice the mass, all other things equal.

Your ship looks fine. There's one major problem in that your beam fire controls are too slow - your ship moves at 3.6k, which gives your hull-mounted guns a tracking speed of 3.6k. But your beam fire controls can only track 1.25km/s! You want to have their speed match the speed of the guns (which in this case is equal to your ship). If you don't, you'll get a reduced to-hit chance when shooting at things moving faster than 1.25km/s.

The other notable consideration about your ship is that it has a built-in jump drive, which takes a lot of the internal space. This means this ship is rather lightly armed for a dedicated warship of this size. People often use dedicated jump ships that act purely as support for their warships. Or you could build some additional warships of this size without a jump drive to act together in a squadron that gets jumped by this vessel. Or you could decide you're only looking to fight in areas with stabilized jump points and skip the jump drive entirely :-)

For the beam fire control, I just kinda ran out of instant research points. I could fix it by SM'ing the tech to correct it.

[nuclearslurpee]

Also:

Code: [Select]

Lupaetz-Sarrg Nuclear Gas-Core Engine  EP150.00 (14)    Power 2100.0    Fuel Use 73.48%    Signature 150.00    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 3,650,000 Litres    Range 30.8 billion km (98 days at full power)


You can gain a lot more fuel efficiency here by using larger engines. Using Size-40 engines (an easy 2k RP tech to get) would let you reduce fuel use by almost 40%, providing more tonnage for useful things like guns. A few levels into the fuel efficiency tech line would also be good.

I would probably not have tried to get Particle Lances with the default allocation of starting RPs. Either use more than the default (or SM mode), or just use basic particle lances beams at the start of the game. The required investment is quite a lot and leaves you without other important techs like fuel efficiency and BFC tracking speed.

[Tavik Toth (OP)]

Also:

Code: [Select]

Lupaetz-Sarrg Nuclear Gas-Core Engine  EP150.00 (14)    Power 2100.0    Fuel Use 73.48%    Signature 150.00    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 3,650,000 Litres    Range 30.8 billion km (98 days at full power)


You can gain a lot more fuel efficiency here by using larger engines. Using Size-40 engines (an easy 2k RP tech to get) would let you reduce fuel use by almost 40%, providing more tonnage for useful things like guns. A few levels into the fuel efficiency tech line would also be good.

I would probably not have tried to get Particle Lances with the default allocation of starting RPs. Either use more than the default (or SM mode), or just use basic particle lances at the start of the game. The required investment is quite a lot and leaves you without other important techs like fuel efficiency and BFC tracking speed.

Oh, that is a basic particle lance I'm using. And thanks for the advice on the engines and research.

[nuclearslurpee]

Oh, that is a basic particle lance I'm using.

I screwed up, I meant to say particle beams, not lances. Save yourself the extra 45k+ instant RPs at the start of the game.

[paolot]

You can also use turrets for lasers (and gauss and mesons), to increase a lot the tracking speed (having capable enough BFCs), with the cost of a bit more mass vs. a single laser.

[Michael Sandy]

To have significant combat at relatively low tech levels, you kind of have to have reduced research rate enabled.  Otherwise, with a balance of industrial expansion, shipyard building and research facility building, you rapidly get beyond Nuclear Gas Core before you have built a generation of warships.

Another reason you aren't likely to have significant combat at nuclear gas core is that the cost for researching jump technology is higher than that of researching a better engine.  So to go into other star systems, you are already dealing in research level comparable to better engine tech.

If you have a single system multi-empire start, that is a different matter, of course.