Hello all,
After looking into it more the weight efficient anti piracy corvette seemed like a unnecessary expense and I have seen a lot of people pushing for carriers armed with FAC to counter these types of threats so I decided to give that a whirl with some pretty good results:
The Watchman escort carrier is deigned to carry 4 Thunderbolt Anti Piracy FAC and one Thunderhead Detection FAC to fry and overcome the stealth tech I am encountering. The Watchman is slightly faster then my fastest merchant ship and is built to follow my government freighter and tanker formations around escorting them as they go about the business I tasked them for. Fuel and maintenance supply values are to allow for the ship to operate as long as possible without resupply or refueling in areas I have seen lots of raider activity and will allow me to leave the carrier on station for extended periods of time in trade lanes protecting civilian merchant traffic as well.
Watchman class Escort Carrier 40,000 tons 385 Crew 2,138.4 BP TCS 800 TH 3,200 EM 0
4000 km/s Armour 1-104 Shields 0-0 HTK 67 Sensors 1/14/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 13,508 Max Repair 400.0000 MSP
Hangar Deck Capacity 5,000 tons
Commander Control Rating 4 BRG AUX ENG PFC
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Flight Crew Berths 100
Maintenance Modules: 2 module(s) capable of supporting ships of 5,000 tons
Foster-Wheeler CMFD HS160 P.5 EP1600.00 (2) Power 3200.0 Fuel Use 1.77% Signature 1600.00 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 3,000,000 Litres Range 763.7 billion km (2209 days at full power)
FURUNO Civilian Grade Navigational Sensor (1) GPS 2100 Range 39.8m km Resolution 100
FURUNO Civilian Grade Thermal Navigation Sensor (1) Sensitivity 1.4 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 9.4m km
FURUNO Civilian Grade EM Navigation Sensor (1) Sensitivity 14 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 29.6m km
Strike Group
1x Thunderhead Early Warning Craft Speed: 10501 km/s Size: 20
4x Thunderbolt FLT II Fast Patrol Craft Speed: 10503 km/s Size: 19.99
This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Carrier for auto-assignment purposes
The Thunderbolt FLT II was a direct upgrade from a earlier craft I was utilizing that was equipped with a 15cm Laser which allowed the ship to attack raiders outside their range to return fire but the damage I was doing was so low that often they would need to resupply before dispatching a entire formation of anything more then 2-3 ships. The FLT II uses particle beams to allow for more damage per shot across the range. While untested as of now I suspect these will be far superior given the low armor values of the enemy ships allowing each shot to penetrate. The range was chosen to allow for these ships to deploy form orbital hangers in some of my more developed star systems to act as a defense force. I might lower the "caliber" of the particle beam if I find I need more maintenance supplies to sustain combat as I just went with the largest "caliber" I could field but 6 I think is overkill against most of their ships.
Thunderbolt FLT II class Fast Patrol Craft 1,000 tons 31 Crew 329.3 BP TCS 20 TH 210 EM 0
10503 km/s Armour 1-8 Shields 0-0 HTK 8 Sensors 0/0/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 8
Maint Life 7.03 Years MSP 382 AFR 23% IFR 0.3% 1YR 14 5YR 203 Max Repair 105.00 MSP
Lieutenant Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required
Isotta Fraschini SMCD HS6 P1.75 EP210.00 (1) Power 210.0 Fuel Use 209.21% Signature 210.00 Explosion 17%
Fuel Capacity 60,000 Litres Range 5.2 billion km (5 days at full power)
CERN Naval Grade Particle Beam (6) (1) Range 200,000km TS: 10,503 km/s Power 15-5 ROF 15
Kratos Defnece "Star Burst" Fixed Naval Laser SBFC (1) Max Range: 384,000 km TS: 10,625 km/s 97 95 92 90 87 84 82 79 77 74
General Electric ICFR P5 (1) Total Power Output 5 Exp 5%
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a FAC for auto-assignment purposes
The Thunderhead was used as the pusdo FAC leader of each formation with sensors that are designed to target the average tonnage of a raider craft letting me pick them up and hold tracking on them from further away. They can also be deployed alone without the other FACs to let the carrier check its surroundings if it is operating outside my normal sensor web. it was for this reason I gave it a much longer deployment time for when the carrier is operating in a stationary position in a trade lane to give it the chance to use its sensors which are far better then what I can throw on the carrier.
Thunderhead class Early Warning Craft 1,000 tons 33 Crew 410.6 BP TCS 20 TH 210 EM 0
10501 km/s Armour 2-8 Shields 0-0 HTK 5 Sensors 90/0/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 0
Maint Life 3.41 Years MSP 139 AFR 23% IFR 0.3% 1YR 18 5YR 273 Max Repair 180 MSP
Lieutenant Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Morale Check Required
Isotta Fraschini SMCD HS6 P1.75 EP210.00 (1) Power 210.0 Fuel Use 209.21% Signature 210.00 Explosion 17%
Fuel Capacity 68,000 Litres Range 5.9 billion km (6 days at full power)
Lockheed-Martin "Thunderhead" SASS (1) GPS 1800 Range 69.2m km Resolution 10
Raytheon "Bond" Class Stealth Ship Thermal Sensor (1) Sensitivity 90 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 75m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Scout for auto-assignment purposes
As always feedback is appreciated. I have declared a war against the larger empire that is my neighbor to allow me to expand a bit so I expect I will be posting some new designs here soon. Thank you for all the help and feedback so far and hopefully someone else can benefit from these designs.