Aurora 4x
VB6 Aurora => Bureau of Ship Design => Topic started by: Paul Tankersley on November 24, 2012, 11:51:44 PM
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Hi all. This is my first fighter design. I am concerned about the size, but with mesons I don't know how to get it smaller. Also, I went through a bunch of engine designs before finding something that could move this along but wasn't too large. Happy with the speed, but I think my Arc Royal class carrier is going to have to be pretty big. Question: Do I need 5 extra berths for each fighter crew when I design the carrier? I assume the hanger space provides maintenance so long as I bring enough supplies. . .
Shrike class Fighter 410 tons 5 Crew 203.8 BP TCS 8.2 TH 36 EM 0
18292 km/s Armour 1-4 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 3
Maint Life 0 Years MSP 0 AFR 82% IFR 1.1% 1YR 22 5YR 329 Max Repair 150 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 0.1 months Spare Berths 5
Griffon 150-2 Drive (1) Power 150 Fuel Use 381.92% Signature 36 Exp 30%
Fuel Capacity 15,000 Litres Range 1.7 billion km (26 hours at full power)
R9/C3 Meson Cannon (1) Range 90,000km TS: 18292 km/s Power 3-3 RM 9 ROF 5 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Shrike Meson FC S00.7 72-1500 (1) Max Range: 144,000 km TS: 1500 km/s 93 86 79 72 65 58 51 44 37 31
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 (3) Total Power Output 3 Armour 0 Exp 5%
This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and maintenance purposes
Any suggestions as to this design, or what I might consider for the carrier will be GRATEFULLY recieved!
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Well, one thing, if your max range is only 90k for the meson, you can reduce size a little by building a fire control that comes a bit close to max range. Also, is that tracking speed 15k or really 1500?! because that's a HUGE difference, and one that will very likely bite you in the ass when your fighters can't hit the broad side of a barn.(remember that designating a beam fc fighter only automatically gives it a free 4x, so no size increase needed to track targets).
I wouldn't call a 15-20k carrier all that large really, and that's about the size design I usually end up with when designing a fighter of similar size(I usually have 1 strikegroup of 10 fighters, but you can have any size/number of strikegroups, as long as you are prepared to build a carrier to hold them all!)
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And yes, you'll want an extra berth for each fighter crewman on your carrier unless you want them bunking in their cockpits
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I guess I'm a little confused about Fire Control. I thought that for hit chances you got the better of either your craft's speed (assuming no turrets) OR the tracking speed on your FC sensor, and with the high speed of the fighter I'd be OK. Thus I intentionally lowballed the FC sensor tracking speed. I gather this may not be the case?. . .
Thanks!
BTW, I have been improving armour tech and had brought the weight down to 390 Tons so far. That's starting to get expensive though. This in turn allows me to lower hanger size on the carrier, which leads to savings in a bunch of other areas.
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The tracking speed of non-turreted weapon is equal to the speed of the design it's attached to, but this is the property of the weapon itself, not the fire control. The fire control has a seperate tracking speed that you set when in its own component design process - Think of the weapon component's tracking speed as the mobility of the weapon attached to your fighter, while the tracking speed of the fire control is the computer power of your targeting software. From your design:
R9/C3 Meson Cannon (1) Range 90,000km TS: 18292 km/s Power 3-3 RM 9 ROF 5 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0
Shrike Meson FC S00.7 72-1500 (1) Max Range: 144,000 km TS: 1500 km/s 93 86 79 72 65 58 51 44 37 31
You'll notice that the Meson Cannon itself has a TS of 18,292 km/s (equal to your fighter's speed) while the FC only has 1500 km/s. While your fighter is agile enough to effectivly engage targets at a speed of 18,292 km/s, your fire control doesn't provide a firing solution for objects moving faster than 1500 km/s. For the best performance, those two should match as closely as possible.
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Ahhh! Thanks. Back to the Lab then. . .
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Paul,
What tech systems did you actually research for this fighter? And is this fire control a reduced size version perchance?
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Charlie, the main research push was engine technology, meson focusing and lately armour upgrades. My basic plan is always to develop a weapon then build a delivery system, so I have this 144,000 km range meson cannon that is strapped to a fighter which now goes in the 19000 km/h range (thanks to weight reductions through better armour) The sensor research was ignored after I got basic EM strength to 22 or 28- something like that. My confusion over how this actually worked meant that I ignored FC tracking speed, thinking my fast fighter would keep a lock easily. Would have been my REAL bad if I hadn't posted the design for feedback. Now my boffins are cranking out breakthroughs in sensor tracking speed- working on 4000, but I have a way to go naturally. I can't remember if this is a reduced size FC or not, and I'm away from Aurora at the moment. Is this something to consider? I was after a range that worked with my weapons- giving myself some range headroom in case of ECM- and pretty much nothing else. What are the advantages/ disadvantages of reduction in sensor size?
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For beam fire controls, size modifiers map directly to either tracking speed or range. Half the size means halve one of those, halving size to halve both would get you a quarter-sized FC, and so on.
Judging from the TS of 1500 and that you're working on 4000, it's probably a half-sized for halved tracking.
It's a pretty straight tradeoff between space used and sensor capabilities.
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Paul,
If I were to guess, it looks like techs used in this fighters BFC are:
- Beam Fire Control 50% Range 24,000 km
- Fire Control Speed Rating 3000 km/s
From there it looks like you used ship BFC instead of fighter BFC, 3X range and 50% tracking speed. This should net a BFC that is 1.5hs has the characteristics posted.
Here are some things to keep in mind. Tracking speed used is based on which is greater ship speed or BFC tracking speed. BFC tracking speed is limited to base tech tracking speed for non-turreted weapons, with the exception that fighter BFC base tracking speed is 4X racial tracking speed. If weapons are turreted, then BFC tracking speed would only be limited by turret tracking speed.
With that said, the tracking speed actually used by your example fighter should be 18,292kps not the 1,500kps of the BFC. In other words, you had it correct.
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Paul,
the tracking speed actually used by your example fighter should be 18,292kps not the 1,500kps of the BFC. In other words, you had it correct.
Not quite. The tracking speed used when firing is the lower of the weapon tracking speed(turreted applies here) or the fire control tracking speed. In this case the fire control tracking speed is a major limiter. Granted he can change this pretty fast by desiging a purpose built fighter fire control (in the design screen the scroll box at the bottom labeled "Ship Type Limitations. change to fighter only) At the current tech of 4000km/s base tracking speed this would give him a 16,000km/s tracking speed or 8,000km/s for a half sized fire control unit.
Brian
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Brian is correct. The BFC cap is a limiter. doh!!
And I should have remembered that when writing.
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Gentlemen! Well now, 2 upgrades in speed- which should get me a bit past the 19K speed I'm now looking at, and I think I'm away to the races- thanks to that completely overlooked "fighter only" choice in Beam FC. So things continue apace and here is the preliminary design for my Arc Royal carrier.
Arc Royal class Carrier 54,550 tons 897 Crew 13550.6 BP TCS 1091 TH 1440 EM 0
5499 km/s Armour 10-128 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 105 PPV 0
Maint Life 3.82 Years MSP 11091 AFR 366% IFR 5.1% 1YR 1194 5YR 17904 Max Repair 2000 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months Flight Crew Berths 250
Hangar Deck Capacity 19500 tons
2000 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (3) Power 2000 Fuel Use 40.48% Signature 480 Exp 16%
Fuel Capacity 13,750,000 Litres Range 112.1 billion km (235 days at full power)
Active Search Sensor MR43-R100 (1) GPS 7200 Range 43.2m km Resolution 100
ECM 40
Strike Group
50x Shrike Fighter Speed: 19230 km/s Size: 7.8
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Missing are: the triple gauss turrets I'm working up- bad guys I've run into seem to throw salvos of three. . .
FC for same
Longer range search radar- ~150m km for initial search
some AMM Frigates
. . . and?
But, never having gone down this road before, is the premise flawed? I want to be able to find the enemy early, launch fighters and move in to localize and dispatch the target. The fast meson carrier in sufficient numbers looks a plausible system because of the varied armour and shield configurations you get- plus no ordinance manufacturing etc. This allows a shorter supply train and thus more flexibility in deployment. . . so how am I going to get spanked here, other than the ENORMOUS UNENDING research I seem to have to be doing?
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The big Achilles heel to beam only fighter use is that they can and will be engaged at ranges will beyond their ability to reply. your only hope is to have an overwhelming supply of fighters. Much more expensive than the missiles stocks to kill them. YMMV
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The big Achilles heel to beam only fighter use is that they can and will be engaged at ranges will beyond their ability to reply. your only hope is to have an overwhelming supply of fighters. Much more expensive than the missiles stocks to kill them. YMMV
I haven't fielded any fighters yet, but what about if they have good cloaking, ecm, and low-thermal drives? Is it possible to make a stealth beam fighter that can engage without getting toasted by AMM and PD?
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Raptor I class Fighter 115 tons 4 Crew 40.4 BP TCS 2.3 TH 30 EM 0
17391 km/s Armour 1-2 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 0.5
Maint Life 27 Years MSP 22 AFR 1% IFR 0% 1YR 0 5YR 1 Max Repair 25 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Spare Berths 1
FTR 40 EP Magneto-plasma Drive (1) Power 40 Fuel Use 684.83% Signature 30 Exp 25%
Fuel Capacity 10,000 Litres Range 2.3 billion km (36 hours at full power)
FTR Gauss Cannon R3-8 (1x3) Range 16,000km TS: 17391 km/s Accuracy Modifier 8% RM 3 ROF 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
FTR Raptor I FC R8k TS16k km/s (1) Max Range: 16,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 37 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and maintenance purposes
I'm going to try a swarm attack, but I don't think I'll do that often, dealing with wreckage and lifepods is a pain.
Good cloaking still won't let fighters get past the missile defense envelop, which will of course harm beam fighters in most cases.
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Not really. With fighters space is at a premium, they max out at 10 hull spaces(500ton).
Cloak systems are as massive at jumpdrives and don't scaledown to fighters without a very hefty research investment.
Smallcraft EW systems(both ECM and ECCM) are also handicapped. They are always no better than half the effective level of the full size ship systems.
Reduced thermal drives are useful if the OPFOR is relying on that for long range detection. But don't depend on that, active sensors consistently outrange passives for standoff detection.
Even if you have invested enough to field a beam fighter that has the TCS and thermal signature of a missile, systems at the investment level designed to engage missiles will easily kill it from beyond it's range to reply in an open space battle. The only hope is to be able to field them in quantities that exceed to OPFOR's ability to kill them before they can open fire. I haven't fielded any fighters yet, but what about if they have good cloaking, ecm, and low-thermal drives? Is it possible to make a stealth beam fighter that can engage without getting toasted by AMM and PD?
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Just so that everyone understands, this fighter has less than a 3% hit chance per shot at point blank range before another modifier.
Raptor I class Fighter 115 tons 4 Crew 40.4 BP TCS 2.3 TH 30 EM 0
17391 km/s Armour 1-2 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 0.5
Maint Life 27 Years MSP 22 AFR 1% IFR 0% 1YR 0 5YR 1 Max Repair 25 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Spare Berths 1
FTR 40 EP Magneto-plasma Drive (1) Power 40 Fuel Use 684.83% Signature 30 Exp 25%
Fuel Capacity 10,000 Litres Range 2.3 billion km (36 hours at full power)
FTR Gauss Cannon R3-8 (1x3) Range 16,000km TS: 17391 km/s Accuracy Modifier 8% RM 3 ROF 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
FTR Raptor I FC R8k TS16k km/s (1) Max Range: 16,000 km TS: 16000 km/s 37 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and maintenance purposes
I'm going to try a swarm attack, but I don't think I'll do that often, dealing with wreckage and lifepods is a pain.
Good cloaking still won't let fighters get past the missile defense envelop, which will of course harm beam fighters in most cases.
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Are you sure? thats the 8% mod. the 3 is the velocity/ROF. In any event carriers can hold ridiculous gobs of them, hence swarming.
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Are you sure? thats the 8% mod. the 3 is the velocity/ROF. In any event carriers can hold ridiculous gobs of them, hence swarming.
Very. That is 8% of the 37% hit chance that the BFC has at 10k/km not a bonus. The RM of 3 (ie 30,000km in this case) is doing you nothing because you've restricted to BFC to a max range of 16,000km.
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hmm, well I hope the fighter combat bonus works out then. should it be going as high as 1000%?
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Making a cloak that will fit into a fighter requires a LOT of research. And even then they'll probably be detected before they get into firing range unless your opponents have truly crap sensors. (I think you'll still be treated as a size 6 missile for the purpose of detection, so any PD sensors are going to catch you whatever your cloaking strength is.) So you'll have so suffer all of the AMM hits your missiles would and then you'll have to stay in range while your fighters slowly (or not quite so slowly if you use mesons) destroy the enemy fleet, still taking both AMM and PD fire.
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hmm, well I hope the fighter combat bonus works out then. should it be going as high as 1000%?
Update on this: nearly every fighter is hitting, so fighter combat bonuses are definitely going to be tweaked.