Author Topic: An early Missile Cruiser  (Read 973 times)

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Offline bdub1 (OP)

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An early Missile Cruiser
« on: February 16, 2024, 04:08:25 AM »
This is my first warship in a decent while (since 2.1 i think?)
Id like some opinions, especially for her missiles.
Im on ion tech, with fairly basic early tech otherwise.
This is mostly a Sol Defence ship, but with more efficient jump drives and engines i may add one on and up her to 20k tons.

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Omaha class Light Cruiser      15,000 tons       402 Crew       2,423.3 BP       TCS 300    TH 600    EM 0
2000 km/s      Armour 5-54       Shields 0-0       HTK 85      Sensors 60/60/0/0      DCR 28-18      PPV 40
Maint Life 2.76 Years     MSP 1,852    AFR 225%    IFR 3.1%    1YR 352    5YR 5,274    Max Repair 704 MSP
Magazine 445 / 0   
Captain    Control Rating 3   BRG   AUX   ENG   
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months    Morale Check Required   

Davidson-Willis Turbines Ion Drive  EP300.00 (2)    Power 600.0    Fuel Use 55.77%    Signature 300.00    Explosion 12%
Fuel Capacity 2,680,000 Litres    Range 57.7 billion km (333 days at full power)

West-Austin CIWS-120 (1x4)    Range 1000 km     TS: 12,000 km/s     ROF 5       
Jarvis Ordnance Size 8.00 Missile Launcher (5)     Missile Size: 8.00    Rate of Fire 25
Winter-Nolan Warning & Control Missile Fire Control FC103-R60 (1)     Range 103m km    Resolution 60   ECCM-1
Trident Anti-Ship Missile (55)    Speed: 21,300 km/s    End: 39.3m     Range: 50.3m km    WH: 8.0    Size: 8.000    TH: 88/53/26

Hargreaves & Daniels Active Search Sensor AS158-R60 (1)     GPS 38400     Range 158m km    Resolution 60
Atkins Electronics EM Sensor EM10-60 (1)     Sensitivity 60     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  61.2m km
Atkins Electronics Thermal Sensor TH10-60 (1)     Sensitivity 60     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  61.2m km

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 is classed as a Warship for auto-assignment purposes


And here's the missile, nothing impressive im pretty sure, id like opinions on it as i haven't designed a missile with the new features yet and probably misunderstand it.

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Trident-1 ASM
Missile Size: 8.000 MSP  (20.0000 Tons)     Warhead: 8.0    Radiation Damage: 8.0
Speed: 21,300 km/s     Fuel: 5,020     Flight Time: 39 minutes     Range: 50.27m km
Active Sensor Strength: 0.24   EM Sensitivity Modifier: 8
Resolution: 100    Maximum Range vs 5000 ton object (or larger): 3,628,623 km
ECCM-1     ATG: 25%     Retarget Capable
Cost Per Missile: 7.444     Development Cost: 431
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 266.3%   3k km/s 88.8%   5k km/s 53.3%   10k km/s 26.6%
 

Offline Pedroig

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #1 on: February 16, 2024, 09:02:59 AM »
General thoughts:

Ship:
1) Slow for Ion Ship, 2k kms is more in line with two techs earlier in my experience.  That said, missile platforms can afford to be slower to a point, but notice the missile to hit chances, one REALLY doesn't want to be below the first number, and ideally is close to the middle number.
2) Deployment time is almost a third of maintainance life, in general I find 150% of max repair fine for "coastal defence" platforms.
3) Deployment time is very long for said "coastal defence" platform.  Is it ever actually going to be patrolling Sol for 12 months or is it going to be staged at a facility and sent out as a QRF in response to a threat (or just sit in orbit somewhere and provide PPV)
4)  A missile platform with no PD?  Bold choice Cotton.  ;)  (CIWS really doesn't count as PD, it is a commercial module afterall)  Think of it this way, the Trident has almost a 95% of hittingan Omaha, meanwhile that CIWS has a total chance of hitting maybe 1 out of the entire 55 the ship carries, as in 2% accumaltive is on the optimistic side.  The Omaha doesn't even have missile detection sensors outside the CIWS.  This should be comparable to what the Omaha could equip (I would suggest more than one Quad Cannon though):
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Gauss Cannon R300-67.00 Quad Turret (1x12)    Range 30,000km     TS: 8000 km/s     Power 0-0     RM 30,000 km    ROF 5       
Beam Fire Control R48-TS8000 (1)     Max Range: 48,000 km   TS: 8,000 km/s    ECCM-0     79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0
Active Search Sensor AS15-R1 (1)     GPS 120     Range 15.1m km    MCR 1.4m km    Resolution 1
note the MCR on that Sensor is 1.4m km which is just about what I make all my AMM's range at this stage, but the ship I'm pulling this from doesn't have AMM's

5)  Range is massive for a "coastal defence" platform as well.  To put this in perspective, my standard "coastal defence" (esp for Sol) at start has this engine for a ship which can cover out to Saturn half the size with 75% the PPV:

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Nuclear Pulse Engine  EP100.80 (5)    Power 504.0    Fuel Use 123.15%    Signature 100.8    Explosion 12%
Fuel Capacity 218,000 Litres    Range 4.2 billion km (14 days at full power)

Missile:
1)  Warhead strength should optimally be a square number, 1, 2, 4, 9, 16, 25 etc. 
2)  MFC and Missile Range should match up, having double range on the MFC is overkill, missiles go 106500 km in a single 5 sec increment, in general going over 30 seconds/6 increments has diminishing returns, in this case MFC of 60m km should suffice.
si vis pacem, para bellum
 
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Offline nuclearslurpee

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #2 on: February 16, 2024, 10:25:31 AM »
1) Slow for Ion Ship, 2k kms is more in line with two techs earlier in my experience.  That said, missile platforms can afford to be slower to a point, but notice the missile to hit chances, one REALLY doesn't want to be below the first number, and ideally is close to the middle number.
...
5)  Range is massive for a "coastal defence" platform as well.

It is extremely slow, although for a system/colony defense ship that is mostly meant to hang out in orbit I guess it could work. The bigger problem here is that not only is the ship so slow with boosted engines, but the ship has two size-20 engines (total size 40) but over 50 HS of fuel?! This is extremely wasteful! First, there is a mathematical rule for propulsion systems in Aurora: the most tonnage-efficient configuration has a 3:1 ratio of engine size to fuel size. Increasing the engines relative to fuel size is often a good idea since it reduces the total cost and amount of fuel needed, but it is almost never a good idea to exceed the fuel side of this ratio, as it only increases the costs (engine cost for a fixed speed remains constant, fuel cost increases) and increases the tonnage used, there is no gain from doing this. Having more fuel mass than engine mass is especially, egregiously terrible.

I would recommend to (1) not use boosted engines recklessly - unless you have a good, clear purpose for doing so, it is better to stick to basic 100%-efficiency military engines as your default; (2) don't add more fuel than needed - why should a slow system defense ship need 57 billion km of range? If you need to deploy so far away, just support the ship with a tanker to reach its destination; and (3) adhere to much larger ratios of engines to fuel, 3:1 should be the absolute minimum and I would say most designs for large warships should aim for higher ratios like 10:1, 15:1, even 20:1 depending on what is needed, it is fine to build a "less efficient" ship in terms of tonnage if that means it is cheaper to build and maintain (and refuel!).

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2) Deployment time is almost a third of maintainance life, in general I find 150% of max repair fine for "coastal defence" platforms.

This depends. I often end up with ratios in the 3:1 region since I will use Engineering Spaces to reach a desired maintenance lifetime and then add some MSP bays to repair weapons failures in battles. The final number on the design screen can be misleading in this case since those ships are clearly not meant to be on-station for three years at a time or however long.

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3) Deployment time is very long for said "coastal defence" platform.  Is it ever actually going to be patrolling Sol for 12 months or is it going to be staged at a facility and sent out as a QRF in response to a threat (or just sit in orbit somewhere and provide PPV)

I agree on this count. Aside from a hardcore commitment to roleplay, sending ships out on patrol patterns is rarely worthwhile as there is not much a patrolling ship can do better than a DSTS placed on a nearby airless rock. Sensor ranges on ships are simply not long enough to have effective coverage. Now, if you plan to deploy this at a jump point then a longer endurance makes sense.

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4)  A missile platform with no PD?  Bold choice Cotton.  ;)  (CIWS really doesn't count as PD, it is a commercial module afterall)

I'd probably not even bother with PD here if I am concerned about an "optimal" ship design. If this ship is meant to be deployed more or less alone to defend a colony (rather than as part of a sizable battle fleet), a bit of PD will not do very much to defend it from a serious opponent and it is probably better to optimize for the pure missile role for shooting down enemy scouts or raiders.

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Missile:
1)  Warhead strength should optimally be a square number, 1, 2, 4, 9, 16, 25 etc. 

In my opinion, this point is vastly overrated. Missile penetration is so poor anyways that optimizing the warhead size is usually not worth it. What matters is getting a large enough number of missiles on-target to deal over 50% of the target's total armor strength in damage, at that point armor penetration doesn't matter as further hits will deal massive internal damage through all of the holes in the target's armor. Thinking "oh, if I have a strength-9 warhead, I might deal a point of internal damage if the target only has 2 layers of armor" is a kind of thinking that doesn't reflect the reality of space combat in 99% of cases (the exception perhaps being anti-fighter/FAC missiles, but these usually have thin armor anyways).

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2)  MFC and Missile Range should match up, having double range on the MFC is overkill, missiles go 106500 km in a single 5 sec increment, in general going over 30 seconds/6 increments has diminishing returns, in this case MFC of 60m km should suffice.

I usually consider that MFC range should be somewhat longer than missile range, as this allows firing and retreating while keeping a target lock. However, 2x range is excessive even for this purpose, though it can be useful for future-proofing to an extent.

Lastly, I do need to point out the most critical, crippling weakness of the OP ship design:
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Omaha class Light Cruiser      15,000 tons
...
Jarvis Ordnance Size 8.00 Missile Launcher (5)

This ship is basically useless. A measly five missiles will struggle to penetrate virtually any point defense screen you could realistically encounter. Even with the 2.2+ changes missile combat still requires large salvo sizes to penetrate enemy defenses, let alone to do respectable damage. How does a 15,000-ton ship only have five guns?!? Especially with such a small and weak engine section?!

I suspect that the problem is here:
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Hargreaves & Daniels Active Search Sensor AS158-R60 (1)     GPS 38400     Range 158m km    Resolution 60
Atkins Electronics EM Sensor EM10-60 (1)     Sensitivity 60     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  61.2m km
Atkins Electronics Thermal Sensor TH10-60 (1)     Sensitivity 60     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  61.2m km

These sensors are much, much too large for practical purposes - I am estimating size 40 active sensors and size 10 passives, and this is too much. A system defense ship should be relying on the colony's passive sensors (at equivalent tech levels, a single DSTS is the same as size-50 EM and thermal sensors together) to find targets, while a battle fleet should be using dedicated scouts or sensor vessels of some kind(s). Most ships, and certainly your system defense ships, should be using as much space as they can for weaponry - your active sensors and MFCs should match your missile range, not be 2x or 3x greater as this added range is not only useless but extremely expensive (a mere size 6 active sensor would have over 60 million km range, more than enough to work with your missiles).

I will also note that for anti-ship missiles, it is usually better to use the reduced-size launchers to generate a greater salvo size, in fact for a system defense ship perhaps even using box launchers is the right decision if you will always be right next to a colony you can reload from. If you have 50 missiles, it is usually more effective to deliver all of them to the target at once, than to deliver them in groups of 5 or 10 at a time - the latter are more likely to be contemptuously swatted aside by modest point defenses than to actually damage anything.
 
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Offline AlStar

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #3 on: February 16, 2024, 11:12:31 AM »
I can't really offer much after the excellent breakdowns by nuclearslurpee and Pedroig, but I'll agree with them that your stated purpose of this ship and the way that you've outfitted it don't seem to match.

2.6 million tons of fuel is a huge amount for something whose purpose is to sit around sit in a defensive roll. Ideally, the ship should have enough fuel to get: 1) anywhere useful in Sol (which really doesn't take much, once you've got LPs up at Earth and the outer gas giants) 2) from Sol to the next colony over (where it can presumably refuel.)

I'll admit that my latest game is beams only, so maybe my feel for the tonnages of missile ships is off, but this ship seems absolutely massive for only being able to fire 5 missiles 12 times before running dry.

I suspect that if you take everyone's advice, you'll probably end up with a ship that's smaller, faster, and more deadly.
 
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Offline bdub1 (OP)

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #4 on: February 16, 2024, 02:39:44 PM »
Thank you for all the feedback- i really appreciate it.
To be honest, i designed this in a different role, with a jump drive first intending this as a regular strike cruiser, but then i remembered i havent left Sol yet and dont really need that capability yet, and my tech is probably a bit too low for a super effective ship in the first place for that role.
I did some adjustments now that its not 3am and half asleep lol.
To adress PD, i need to do some more research with Gauss Turrets first before i make a PD escort ship as im barely above base levels (i prefer specialisation in fleets, i should probably make a sensor-less version of this ship with more armament... hm)
Anyway heres the v2, hopefully adressing many of the concerns, but feel free to give more feedback, been awhile lol.

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Omaha class Missile Cruiser      15,000 tons       339 Crew       2,267.3 BP       TCS 300    TH 1,000    EM 0
3333 km/s      Armour 5-54       Shields 0-0       HTK 104      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 14-9      PPV 72
Maint Life 1.25 Years     MSP 877    AFR 450%    IFR 6.2%    1YR 584    5YR 8,754    Max Repair 250 MSP
Magazine 1,359 / 0   
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   AUX   
Intended Deployment Time: 6 months    Morale Check Required   

Marsden-Norton Turbines Ion Drive  EP500.00 (2)    Power 1000.0    Fuel Use 25.00%    Signature 500.00    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 300,000 Litres    Range 14.4 billion km (50 days at full power)

Size 8.00 Missile Launcher (50.0% Reduction) (18)     Missile Size: 8.00    Rate of Fire 170
Hilton Electronics Industries Missile Fire Control FC79-R60 (3)     Range 79m km    Resolution 60   ECCM-1
Trident Anti-Ship Missile (168)    Speed: 21,300 km/s    End: 39.3m     Range: 50.3m km    WH: 8    Size: 8    TH: 88/53/26

Barker & Lucas Sensor Systems Active Search Sensor AS93-R100 (1)     GPS 16000     Range 93.7m km    Resolution 100

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s
 
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Offline AlStar

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #5 on: February 16, 2024, 03:10:50 PM »
11% of the fuel for 25% of the range seems like a worthy tradeoff.

160% faster, three times the magazine space, and almost four times the missiles fired per volley - looks like a solid upgrade!
 
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Offline nuclearslurpee

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #6 on: February 16, 2024, 04:27:50 PM »
This version is a much more capable ship! One thing I will note is that the mismatch of active sensor and MFC resolutions could lead to some problems, although at least against NPRs I think this is quite unlikely.
 
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Offline Garfunkel

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #7 on: February 16, 2024, 04:28:30 PM »
Remember that as long as the ship is in orbit of a colony, you can get PD from STO units. This is a good alternative if your shipbuilding capacity is limited - use GFCC to crank out PD-STO while your shipyards build missile cruisers.
 
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Offline Ulzgoroth

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #8 on: February 16, 2024, 06:26:32 PM »
And if you need to move it some, you could also build PD fighters. The result is likely less efficient than either STO or full-size warship PD provision, but it does fill a possible gap.

Not so good if you need to use it as a jump point garrison, probably? Not sure how prohibitive long deployment duration is on small craft.
 

Offline bdub1 (OP)

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #9 on: February 18, 2024, 11:38:34 PM »
Tbh with a bit more tech ill probably make some kind of PD destroyer escort for them, probably 10,000 tons or so
Fighter management makes my head hurt lol
I do intend to refit this ship eventually into a more normal warship, once i get more efficient and better engines.
But thank you all for the feedback, it helped a lot
 

Offline bdub1 (OP)

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Re: An early Missile Cruiser
« Reply #10 on: February 22, 2024, 10:03:39 PM »
Sorry to keep adding on, but i tried for an escort
im really pretty sure its too early in relevant tech but itd be a good outline of what i plan it to be.
Would like some feedback for this too as im just as un-knowledgable about missile defence and how its changed as i am for missile design.
What i do know is that my chance to intercept is low, very low.

Code: [Select]
Walker Leader class Destroyer      15,000 tons       335 Crew       2,328.1 BP       TCS 300    TH 1,000    EM 0
3333 km/s      Armour 5-54       Shields 0-0       HTK 73      Sensors 0/0/0/0      DCR 16-10      PPV 78.69
Maint Life 1.66 Years     MSP 1,140    AFR 273%    IFR 3.8%    1YR 491    5YR 7,365    Max Repair 352 MSP
Magazine 848 / 0   
Commander    Control Rating 2   BRG   AUX   
Intended Deployment Time: 6 months    Morale Check Required   

Marsden-Norton Turbines Ion Drive  EP500.00 (2)    Power 1000    Fuel Use 25.00%    Signature 500    Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 521,000 Litres    Range 25 billion km (86 days at full power)

Quad Gauss Cannon R200-100 Turret (1x12)    Range 20,000km     TS: 16000 km/s     Power 0-0     RM 20,000 km    ROF 5       
Gilbert-Robinson Sensor Systems Beam Fire Control R48-TS16000 (SW) (1)     Max Range: 48,000 km   TS: 16,000 km/s    ECCM-1     79 58 38 17 0 0 0 0 0 0

Size 1 Missile Launcher (75.00% Reduction) (38)     Missile Size: 1    Rate of Fire 20
Curtis Warning & Control Missile Fire Control FC25-R1 (2)     Range 25.5m km    Resolution 1   ECCM-1
Claymore AMM (840)    Speed: 54,400 km/s    End: 0.6m     Range: 2.1m km    WH: 0.5    Size: 1    TH: 181/108/54

Dale-Randall Warning & Control Active Search Sensor AS28-R1 (1)     GPS 320     Range 28.5m km    MCR 2.6m km    Resolution 1

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s