New Manty ship ideas.

Of course if none of this is weight based one wouldn't know if the follow up ships to the prototype, the "Wayfarer", where armoured. Nor would that mean they couldn't be. Although it would be unlikely that the civilian caravan merchies would be armoured.

The AMC with armour military wedge and automation with excess crew space given over to marines and with end to end, just like the CLAC has LAC docking, With 12 Shrike and 12 Katana's and 180 Apollo pods. Keyhole 2 and new EW, electronics sensors and the like...

It would have more offensive non LAC punch than a CLAC

More flexibility than a Pod BC or SD-P. And a bigger marine compliment than any other ship.

It would make the perfect Armoured Marine Cruiser.

One might keep 12 LAC and add 12 Marine Transports.

It would also make a great inspection craft for merchies, terminus enforcement, freighter transport escort, and system enhancement.

6 of these with max LAC (24 x 6) and (180 x 6) missile pods, would offer more firepower than than a CLAC and a SD-P and 10+ times as many Marines.

And be in 3 times as many places.

Plus with full sensors each ship could control 200 missiles per salvo (1200) vs 400 from a SD-P and CLAC assuming a CLAC can control any missiles.

3 to 6 times the hitting capacity.

1 AMC - Armoured Marine Cruiser would have 16% of the ammunition Missile pods of an Invictus SD-P but would be able to control the same number of missiles 200. 8 instead of 48 waves. Plus the LAC missiles another 288 to 576 per wave. Double launch (576). The AMC would have 65 to 85% of the defensive capability. counter missile and point defense. Less armour on the 24 LAC bays but a similar amount else where.

Unlike an SD-P. An AMC can be in 25 as many places. While the SD-P can be using Ghost rider platforms, unless they are armed, they can't do much. AMC can also use ghost rider.

While the AMC is not a front line unit it would overwhelm any lesser pre pod or non CLAC unit. DD CL or CA let the shrike tear it apart. BC BB Dreadnaught or SD besides being Shrike targets the Apollo pods will take care of or anything less than a SD the SD AMC weapons can blast away.

Internal Armour around the LAC bays, hey why not.

Operating with SD-P and CLAC the AMC would be a great asset, and on its own it would be great to.

A War and peace machine.

Lord Skimper wrote:0.25 multiplier is based on a 320 cubic metre ship.

14 x 4.78 x 4.78 metres. Maybe a single stage sized missile.

No--the 0.25 multiplier is based on what David Weber and Ad Astra Games agreed would be an appropriate value for ships in David Weber's universe. While the concept is similar to that used for current ocean vessels, the multiplier was not based on ocean vessels, but on what David wanted for ships in the Honorverse.

Lord Skimper wrote:A Shrike B for instance

Would only displace a mass of 8,328 tons.

With a gross ton multiplier of 0.28918...

Although one does see that with the multiplier at 0.25 the invictus would mass 13,234,636 tons but being a tube would give the books 8,768,500 tons
Assuming it is totally round with out any flat sides.


2/3 of 13,234,636 ....

But why settle for 0.25 which is always going to wrong?

The Ratio doesn't work with the new LACs because they are not designed for internal maintenance. There are much fewer crawlways, hallways and maintenance areas, because the ship is designed to be maintained in a specialized docking hanger. Also, the cew size is much smaller than previous ships (The Highlander had a crew of 25), and is not designed as the crew's berths - they live on the CLAC/base and work on the LAC, so the Crew space also doesn't have many ammenities (large crew rest spaces/gym, full med bay, etc.) because the crew will only be embarked for a period of days at a time, not weeks.

Older LACs were designed more like starships, with internal maintenance, larger crews and more crew spaces for deployments measured in the weeks. The optimization of space allowed by the doctrine of basing maintenance allows a ship where almost all of it's mass and cubage is for fighting, not Berthing or upkeep.

In addition, Shrikes have different geometry than normal warships - they do not have hammerheads - they only have the center spindle, so their shape gives them a different volume equation than other ships.

You cannot pack twice the number of LACs into the same space, period. The Trojans had cargo holds 3 and 4 converted into LAC bays, hold 1 as the pod hold, and hold 2 was used for additional crew spaces. There is no way to fit twice the LACs, Keyhole, Marine battalions, armor, and a whole slew of other crap.

And if you are trying to fit all this equipment onto a freighter and rebuilding the drives and armoring the hull, then you are building an entirely new ship. That being the case, just build the brand new ship from scratch.

Duckk wrote:You cannot pack twice the number of LACs into the same space, period. The Trojans had cargo holds 3 and 4 converted into LAC bays, hold 1 as the pod hold, and hold 2 was used for additional crew spaces. There is no way to fit twice the LACs, Keyhole, Marine battalions, armor, and a whole slew of other crap.

And if you are trying to fit all this equipment onto a freighter and rebuilding the drives and armoring the hull, then you are building an entirely new ship. That being the case, just build the brand new ship from scratch.

For that matter with the personnel he's calling for his AMC(P/CLAC) its going to be more expensive to operate than a BC(L) which is already too expensive to deploy everywhere. So its an, at least near, capital ship expense without the ability to stand toe to toe with tech equivilent SP(P)s.

Cost being no object a proto-battlestar would be a fun ship to rampage solo around the universe in. But that doesn't make it practical <grin>

I was thinking how to extend CM engagement time how about smaller highly stealthed units that are pod layers but they control counter missiles. These ships hyper or shipbased scouts would be out in front ouf Ships of the Wall to engage incoming missiles. I was also fond of one large missile or unmanned recon platform with improved AI that would piggy back CM into the no man space between fleets.

Duckk wrote:You cannot pack twice the number of LACs into the same space, period. The Trojans had cargo holds 3 and 4 converted into LAC bays, hold 1 as the pod hold, and hold 2 was used for additional crew spaces. There is no way to fit twice the LACs, Keyhole, Marine battalions, armor, and a whole slew of other crap.

And if you are trying to fit all this equipment onto a freighter and rebuilding the drives and armoring the hull, then you are building an entirely new ship. That being the case, just build the brand new ship from scratch.

The new LAC are almost half the size of the old LAC. With a smaller crew compliment. The Armed Merchant Cruiser did not have the crew reducing automation which will free up space for Marines and Armour and EW...

The old series 282 LAC could not be parked in the nose in on both sides end to end. The Shrike Ferret Katana can. The old AMC was 200 metres wide. The series 282 was 121 metres long end to end 6 per side launch bays couldn't have lined up on each braid side as the series 282 LAC would stuck out 21 to 25 metres like an odd looking porcupine.

While Shrike and their ilk would easily clear 50+ metres on linear broadsides parked nose to nose, totally inside the 200 metre width.

Presumedly the old LAC were parked off linear broadsides (the hatches don't line up in each broadside) or they were angle parked. Nose to nose at an appropriate angle. I assume the former and as such by extending the docking tube, by miniaturizing and automating what functions the tubes perform. Likely re arming and damage repair one could fit such ships in.

Would a full on Armoured Marine Cruiser be better purpose made, yes it would. But one wouldn't necessarily need to if converting any remaining Old AMC's or Caravan freighters. It wouldn't be as pretty and using Sollie tech and weapons it wouldn't be as automated first off, but one could start on such a project, particularly using Sollie techs to do this work, either prisoners (unlikely) or Beowulfers.

Prisoner labour, volunteer's, would not get a look at too much Manty tech with a civilian to AMC conversion, or with taking there old SD's apart. They also represent a work force that is available, but can't be used anywhere else and couldn't be taken to bolt hole ever. Such, work, could expedite the return to Sollie space or somewhere nice like Erewon or Torch or Silesia of those that take part.
Adaption of Sollie to Manty tech could and would be done by Beowulf techs. Who would be doing the very same thing for themselves in the not to distant future.

Marines could be onboard to maintain prisoner cooperation and to familiarise themselves with the construction of their new ships.

No you don't need a yard to do this, you do what the Grayson's do, just backwards. Now obviously no missiles or powered energy weapons would be on ships with prisoners. One wouldn't want them getting ideas.

Once you have the parts armour and launch tubes dis-assembled you remove to SD hulls or join them together to form new yards. Park you Caravan freighter in the space and start mounting the sub structure and weapon mounts. Space for the automation mountings but without the actual mountings themselves. Leave that for the Merchie Engineers and cargo hands. And Beowulf techs. With Armour and Sollie SD wedges and engines one can have 200 Armoured Marine Cruisers. Or perhaps the should be called MAMC or AMC (M). One would also have parts and weapons for lightly armoured and civy wedged AMC (E) -Trojans. More missile tubes more counter missile and point defense no Grazer's or very few, for the less armoured civy wedged ships. Freighter escorts which will rely on Shrike Bs for their in close engagements.

AMC - Marine and AMC - Escort.

WebFan47 wrote:I was thinking how to extend CM engagement time how about smaller highly stealthed units that are pod layers but they control counter missiles. These ships hyper or shipbased scouts would be out in front ouf Ships of the Wall to engage incoming missiles. I was also fond of one large missile or unmanned recon platform with improved AI that would piggy back CM into the no man space between fleets.

Basically this is what the LAC does particularly the Katana. Most battles try not to take place in hyper able n-space as ships that get caught can just leave the battle. It takes time to enter hyperspace but presumedly one could do a micro jump as presented in Elizabeth Moon's books and avoid directed missile fire. Especially at long range. This might as be a good tactic for a non pod SD fleet. Wait for the Manties to fire at extreme range then hyper in very close to the ships that fired the missiles. Engage point blank with energy weapons.

Such tactics might see the comeback of the grav lance and energy torpedo's.

All that would be very interesting, but it's completely irrelevant. A cursory examination of the lineart in HoS indicates that just forward of the midline is all twelve docking bays.

http://i42.tinypic.com/2q3dopz.png

No you don't need a yard to do this, you do what the Grayson's do, just backwards. Now obviously no missiles or powered energy weapons would be on ships with prisoners. One wouldn't want them getting ideas.

Once you have the parts armour and launch tubes dis-assembled you remove to SD hulls or join them together to form new yards. Park you Caravan freighter in the space and start mounting the sub structure and weapon mounts. Space for the automation mountings but without the actual mountings themselves. Leave that for the Merchie Engineers and cargo hands. And Beowulf techs. With Armour and Sollie SD wedges and engines one can have 200 Armoured Marine Cruisers. Or perhaps the should be called MAMC or AMC (M). One would also have parts and weapons for lightly armoured and civy wedged AMC (E) -Trojans. More missile tubes more counter missile and point defense no Grazer's or very few, for the less armoured civy wedged ships. Freighter escorts which will rely on Shrike Bs for their in close engagements.

What is with this fixation on using the SDs as a source of parts? Seriously, why? I cannot conceive of a single reason why this would make more sense than using Haven produced parts. It would be inconceivably cheaper, faster, easier to maintain, easier to supply, and better performing than the crap the SLN uses. By every possible metric - tactical, strategic, logistic, economic - it makes far more sense to use anything but the SLN ships to arm your Q-ships.

And if you think it is easy to disassemble a SD with no yard support, I invite you to try to remove the USS Missouri's triple 16" turrets, without the use of any of the naval shipyards at Pearl Harbor, Portsmouth, Norfolk, etc. That's the level of support that's required to even think of pulling weapons from the SDs. Even with a shipyard it is a massive undertaking to try and yank weapons from a superdreadnought's hull.