Rolands actually have plenty of room for Marines

Will anyone mind giving me a recap of the battles the Roland's have been used in and exactly what their intended role entails?

penny wrote:Will anyone mind giving me a recap of the battles the Roland's have been used in and exactly what their intended role entails?

If memory serves (which seems questionable these days), we've only seen Rolands in a primary combatant role in 2 interactions:

1) New Tuscany - destroyed at Anchor in Orbit.
2a) Saltash, 5 Rolands curbstomp 4 SLN Indefatigable BCs using internal launchers.
2b) Saltash boarding actions against Saltash Orbital base.

Rolands are intended for all destroyer roles - Convoy Escort, Strategic Scout, Fleet Escort, Anti-Pirate, "Showing the Flag" Presence missions, Commerce Raiding, etc.

Theemile wrote:

penny wrote:Will anyone mind giving me a recap of the battles the Roland's have been used in and exactly what their intended role entails?

If memory serves (which seems questionable these days), we've only seen Rolands in a primary combatant role in 2 interactions:

1) New Tuscany - destroyed at Anchor in Orbit.
2a) Saltash, 5 Rolands curbstomp 4 SLN Indefatigable BCs using internal launchers.
2b) Saltash boarding actions against Saltash Orbital base.

Rolands are intended for all destroyer roles - Convoy Escort, Strategic Scout, Fleet Escort, Anti-Pirate, "Showing the Flag" Presence missions, Commerce Raiding, etc.

Goosebumps. I gotta reread that curbstomp again!

I was trying to see whether the Rolands would be called upon to take prisoners very often. If so, at least a squad of Marines might be needed to discourage any takeovers.

Is there a treaty that says anything about having to take prisoners? What if there is no room for prisoners?

Theemile wrote:Rolands are intended for all destroyer roles - Convoy Escort, Strategic Scout, Fleet Escort, Anti-Pirate, "Showing the Flag" Presence missions, Commerce Raiding, etc.

Though they did refocus on MDM warfighting at the expense of some of their other roles. They're still expected to carry those other roles as needed - but the designers accepted that they wouldn't be as good at manpower intensive roles as older designs.

For example a Roland simply couldn't do what the old CL Fearless did at Basilisk. She doesn't have the crew to leave some at the terminus for customs inspections, leave some more at the planet to assist the NPA and enforce traffic control regs in orbit, while still remaining combat effective. Where-as a modern (for 1900) DD like a Culverin-class could have. (Jayne's says the DD actually has a few more crew; but fewer of them are Marines)

So Roland's are better at raiding, fleet escort, commerce protection/convoy escort, and "Show the Flag" (at least those that don't require also having an impressive number of crew to show off) type roles than they are at prize taking, boarding actions, ground assault, customs inspection, emergency response.

All that pretty much comes down to small crew size (and its somewhat related lack of Marines)


OTOH even as something of a transitional design they currently punch way above their weight in combat; with more missile defense than a current SLN BC and are the smallest unit to carry MDMs. (Though despite the missile defenses they're still a lot more fragile than a heavy cruiser like a Sag-C; so any hits they take are going to hurt and are likely to knock out much more of their capability)

RFC also had this interesting tidbit in a 2011 post on their potential uses

runsforcelery wrote:Current Manticoran fleet exercises and tactical analysis suggest that even destroyer types as large and robust as the Roland-class may well largely disappear from battle fleet formations. They will continue to have utility as independently deployable hyper-capable units, but there are indications even there that the destroyer will be supplanted in that role by the cruiser and that the destroyer's screening functions will be taken over by LACs transported in company with heavier combatants aboard attached CLACs.

And there's some concern that once MDMs become widespread that even a Roland will be too small to be a survivable combatant and the minimum viable (hyper-capable) warship will be over 50% larger (around 300,000 tons)

That said, now that the RMN isn't involved in active combat ops I wouldn't be surprised to see them evolve a flight II or flight III Roland which isn't quite a ruthless with its crew reduction - it'd have the same combat abilities but now with the ability to assign larger crews when doing detached ops that might need the manpower. (That might be as simple as making a non-flagship variant; or it might be a slightly enlarged design with more crew and possibly more shuttles/pinnaces, etc.)

penny wrote:Goosebumps. I gotta reread that curbstomp again!

I was trying to see whether the Rolands would be called upon to take prisoners very often. If so, at least a squad of Marines might be needed to discourage any takeovers.

Is there a treaty that says anything about having to take prisoners? What if there is no room for prisoners?

The Deneb Accords. For foreign flagged sailors, you have to play nice. Pirates can be handled in different ways depending on what they did, and Slavers can face the airlock (according to the Cherwell Convention).

So yeah, a Roland may be placed in a position where it has to take prisoners. An option often used is to remove the officers of the prize to the conquering ship and leave the crew in the conquered ship, locked down, under the command of a prize crew - that is also a great way to lose a prize crew if it is not large enough and doesn't have sufficient marines to back it up.

Jonathan_S wrote:<snip>
That said, now that the RMN isn't involved in active combat ops I wouldn't be surprised to see them evolve a flight II or flight III Roland which isn't quite a ruthless with its crew reduction - it'd have the same combat abilities but now with the ability to assign larger crews when doing detached ops that might need the manpower. (That might be as simple as making a non-flagship variant; or it might be a slightly enlarged design with more crew and possibly more shuttles/pinnaces, etc.)

If I were designing the latest combatants, I would have designed them to have optionally manning spaces. So War fighting crews would be small and focused, but allowing for a peacetime patrol crew that would be larger, or the allowance to ferry a # of extra passengers.

However, David seems to have baked in the same hubris that was in the LCS planners in real life, giving the ships crews that really are too small for all the possibilities the ship could face.

Theemile wrote:

Somtaaw wrote:<snip>

The crew ratio actually almost doesn't even function based on confirmed numbers of ranks. They barely have enough commissioned officers to stand the watch cycle we got from SI1 and knowing the troubles Hexapuma had. The TACO and ATO take two of the four available watches with I believe it was Communications and Navigation taking the other two, while Engineering was assumed too busy for watch. A Roland barely has enough (confirmed) Lieutenants to put a Senior Grade on the bridge for every watch, and they have exactly one known Lieutenant Senior-grade Engineer (the one that stepped on Wanda O'Reilly because she was in a snit over thinking Abigail was getting preferential treatment).

You're right - based on the text - but that's crazy. I recind my post.

Well, it was before the Battle of Manticore and Oyster Bay blew up BuPers' plans, but those plans were already not very good before that. The RMN was having personnel issues. So the Rolands may shipped out with crew rosters that were not what they were designed for.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Well, it was before the Battle of Manticore and Oyster Bay blew up BuPers' plans, but those plans were already not very good before that. The RMN was having personnel issues. So the Rolands may shipped out with crew rosters that were not what they were designed for.

No, the Tristram and the rest of DesRon 301 were all crewed before BoMa. Remember that Abigail Hearns and Naomi Kaplan are aboard the Roland Tristram, and they were both part of Terekhov's Hexapuma crew. And Terekhov along with Helen Zileicki were turned around in under 2 weeks after Terekhov got back after Monica.

All were transferred super-fast, they hadn't even docked with Hephastus in Manticore orbit when they started getting reassigned. This is also when Aubrey Wanderman, Paulo d'Arezzo and Ginger Lewis all got reassigned to BuWeps as well. Thus sparing their lives when Battle of Manticore, and then Oyster Bay happened, none were assigned to the stationary Hexapuma at the time.


So what we know about how poor the Roland's are for officers is pre-BoMa, they could barely function when BuPers actually had the most officers available.

Drunken wiki ...

Destroyers of the RMN were designed with break-away bulkheads to jettison a malfunctioning fusion reactor.

Oh really? Breakaway bulkheads was what I was after with freighters to insert or unleash a horde of g-torps or cataphracts after exiting a WH. But I assume a DDs reactor is very close to the hull of the ship? Which would seem to make it as dangerous as the gas tank of a Pinto in a rear-end collision.

Anyway, someone unwittingly anticipated one of my questions and stated that the Rolands were designed as a response to BuPers' growing problem of manning the ships.

So, I have always wondered whether there was a drawback to heavy automation. It'd seem to me if something breaks, a lot of other stuff breaks as a result. As opposed to separate discreet systems. If I am correct, there should be a sweet spot that the RMN is nowhere near. Assuming a time when there is no shortage of personnel. My question is whether the RMN will gravitate back to the notion of a sweet spot since war is over? Instead of maximum automation.

penny wrote:Drunken wiki ...

Destroyers of the RMN were designed with break-away bulkheads to jettison a malfunctioning fusion reactor.

Oh really? Breakaway bulkheads was what I was after with freighters to insert or unleash a horde of g-torps or cataphracts after exiting a WH. But I assume a DDs reactor is very close to the hull of the ship? Which would seem to make it as dangerous as the gas tank of a Pinto in a rear-end collision.

Anyway, someone unwittingly anticipated one of my questions and stated that the Rolands were designed as a response to BuPers' growing problem of manning the ships.

So, I have always wondered whether there was a drawback to heavy automation. It'd seem to me if something breaks, a lot of other stuff breaks as a result. As opposed to separate discreet systems. If I am correct, there should be a sweet spot that the RMN is nowhere near. Assuming a time when there is no shortage of personnel. My question is whether the RMN will gravitate back to the notion of a sweet spot since war is over? Instead of maximum automation.

The tops and bottoms of ships are protected by the wedge; but as with any part of the ship, an extremely lucky shot could still hit the reactor. As for the automation to reduce the crew, someone in the books states that no one could run a ship without automation anyway. No human has the microsecond reflexes to recognize a problem with a reactor and correct it, for example.

From The Short Victorious War:

Chapter 6 wrote:"That's the bad news, Milady," Tankersley said more seriously. "You don't have an access way large enough to move the spare through, so we're going to have to open up the fusion room." He put his hands on his hips and turned slowly, surveying the huge, immaculate compartment, and his eyes were unhappy.

"If Nike were a smaller ship, we could disable the charges and take out the emergency panel, but that won't work here."

Honor nodded in understanding. As in most merchantmen, fusion rooms in destroyers and light cruisers—and some smaller heavy cruisers—were designed with blow-out bulkheads to permit them to jettison malfunctioning reactors as an emergency last resort. But larger warships couldn't do that, unless their designers deliberately made their power plants more vulnerable than they had to. Nike was a kilometer and a half long, with a maximum beam of over two hundred meters, and her fusion plants were buried along the central axis of her hull. That protected them from enemy fire, but it also meant she simply had to hope the failsafes worked in the face of battle damage which did get through to them . . . and that there was no easy access to them from outside.