HMS Duke of Cromarty

SharkHunter wrote: My assumption is that the "limpeted pod count" has to do with "before those pods start interfering with your sensors", as a Sag-C or Roland, for example is presumably ALWAYS carrying those pods AND is configured for independent operations AND needs full sensor and comm links. The command officer can also chose whether or not to use them, also an indicator that the pod count is part of an unimpeding design framework.

Relative to this thread though and the HMS Duke of Cromarty, half the Aggie hull is no longer part of the fighting section of the ship, so my next wondering is whether or not they could add more limpeted pods or potentially have a version of Keyhole "1B" plus perhaps Lorelei decoys if they are small enough. Given that this ship's job is to run away, I'd assume the Lorelei or the RMN's best decoy versions that can be used to generate the same "shell game" strategy that Honor used for HMS Nike (BC-413) at the end of aSVW (a Short Victorious War).

Your assumption is wrong. Ships do not routinely fly around with pods limpeted to their hull. Pods can stay on the hull for only a limited time, because they have limited power supply. They only put pods on the hull when they are about to go into battle. Pods limpeted to the hull always obstruct something--sensors or comms or launcher systems or something. The maximum number of limpeted pods mentioned in the text is the absolute maximum that can fit.

SWM wrote:

SharkHunter wrote: My assumption is that the "limpeted pod count" has to do with "before those pods start interfering with your sensors", as a Sag-C or Roland, for example is presumably ALWAYS carrying those pods AND is configured for independent operations AND needs full sensor and comm links. The command officer can also chose whether or not to use them, also an indicator that the pod count is part of an unimpeding design framework.

Relative to this thread though and the HMS Duke of Cromarty, half the Aggie hull is no longer part of the fighting section of the ship, so my next wondering is whether or not they could add more limpeted pods or potentially have a version of Keyhole "1B" plus perhaps Lorelei decoys if they are small enough. Given that this ship's job is to run away, I'd assume the Lorelei or the RMN's best decoy versions that can be used to generate the same "shell game" strategy that Honor used for HMS Nike (BC-413) at the end of aSVW (a Short Victorious War).

Your assumption is wrong. Ships do not routinely fly around with pods limpeted to their hull. Pods can stay on the hull for only a limited time, because they have limited power supply. They only put pods on the hull when they are about to go into battle. Pods limpeted to the hull always obstruct something--sensors or comms or launcher systems or something. The maximum number of limpeted pods mentioned in the text is the absolute maximum that can fit.

Considering how much the RMN has come to love pods as a force multiplier, I suspect that the newer ships were designed in such a way that they could limpet some pods with very little to no loss of capability. It is probably not a lot of them, but some. Aside from that, yah, SWM is right. Pods will drain their internal power over a relatively short term, and probably be a hindrance rather than a help to the ship at that point.

SWM wrote:

SharkHunter wrote: My assumption is that the "limpeted pod count" has to do with "before those pods start interfering with your sensors", as a Sag-C or Roland, for example is presumably ALWAYS carrying those pods AND is configured for independent operations AND needs full sensor and comm links. The command officer can also chose whether or not to use them, also an indicator that the pod count is part of an unimpeding design framework.

Relative to this thread though and the HMS Duke of Cromarty, half the Aggie hull is no longer part of the fighting section of the ship, so my next wondering is whether or not they could add more limpeted pods or potentially have a version of Keyhole "1B" plus perhaps Lorelei decoys if they are small enough. Given that this ship's job is to run away, I'd assume the Lorelei or the RMN's best decoy versions that can be used to generate the same "shell game" strategy that Honor used for HMS Nike (BC-413) at the end of aSVW (a Short Victorious War).

Your assumption is wrong. Ships do not routinely fly around with pods limpeted to their hull. Pods can stay on the hull for only a limited time, because they have limited power supply. They only put pods on the hull when they are about to go into battle. Pods limpeted to the hull always obstruct something--sensors or comms or launcher systems or something. The maximum number of limpeted pods mentioned in the text is the absolute maximum that can fit.

Last sentence first. No it is not. It is a happy medium. They can carry more, but we do not know what happens when they do. It is rather easy to extrapolate though. The assumption is that this number is for full sensor/CM tube availability. You do not need the backups especially with RD's around.

EDIT TIME: cube for mass square for surface area not cubic!

600 8M tons
2.5Mton of BCL by surface area is roughly 2X smaller so ~300 pods
SAG-C ~500k tons is roughly 3X smaller by surface area, so carry 100 pods
Roland is ~200kton is roughly 2x smaller by surface area so carry 50 pods.

CHOPPED dumbo part of old post
Book is 80 for BCL, 40 for SAG-C, 15 for Roland. Above is via surface area alone. *****Not included are the hammerhead ends. *****

Now said ships Power systems might have a problem accelerating all that extra mass compared to the quoted numbers. If a Roland truly could run around with 100 due to surface area alone, the pod tonnage would exceed the ship tonnage outright by just about everyone's guesstimate for pod tonnage. So, your Fusion rooms, impellers, compensators, probably hyper generators, W-sails all have to be able to handle all that extra stress. Somehow...

And someday, Manticore will reinvent the powercord...
so said ships certainly can run around with pods 100% of the time.

Of course the other argument not delineated in the books for limpetted pods is: How long can said tractor work before it burns up? Personally, that will be the limiting factor, not power. I can easily see that on a pod, the tractor would be severely underpowered/engineered for extensive extended limpetted operations. How hard would it be to tractor the pod behind the ship using the ships tractor and install a new tractor in the pod while underway? Of course this drives up spares required etc. No free lunch.

SharkHunter wrote:Relative to this thread though and the HMS Duke of Cromarty, half the Aggie hull is no longer part of the fighting section of the ship, so my next wondering is whether or not they could add more limpeted pods or potentially have a version of Keyhole "1B" plus perhaps Lorelei decoys if they are small enough. Given that this ship's job is to run away, I'd assume the Lorelei or the RMN's best decoy versions that can be used to generate the same "shell game" strategy that Honor used for HMS Nike (BC-413) at the end of aSVW (a Short Victorious War).

I don't know about that. But from model BuNine member Maxxq rendered of HMS Duke of Cromarty we can see that the keyhole 'bay' was moved aft and up compared to the 'stock' Agamemnon class BC(P). That should eliminate the armor 'thin spot' near the fusion reactor and make it a bit more survivable.

(In the stock Aggies it gets displaced forward and below the centerline because there isn't width abreast of the pod bay for the Keyhole. But when they shortened the royal yacht's pod bay it let them restore the Keyholes to a better position)

Relax wrote:And someday, Manticore will reinvent the powercord...
so said ships certainly can run around with pods 100% of the time.

If Manticore really wants every ship to have pods available, they can simply borrow the Andermani idea of "external stores" racks for whole or half pods. Presumably those Andermani external stores racks charge their capacitor-drive missiles, but it shouldn't be that difficult to provide a jump-start for fusion-drive pods/missiles.

Weird Harold wrote:

Relax wrote:And someday, Manticore will reinvent the powercord...
so said ships certainly can run around with pods 100% of the time.

If Manticore really wants every ship to have pods available, they can simply borrow the Andermani idea of "external stores" racks for whole or half pods. Presumably those Andermani external stores racks charge their capacitor-drive missiles, but it shouldn't be that difficult to provide a jump-start for fusion-drive pods/missiles.

Notice we never saw those again? And no one in the RMN ever stated - "hey, that's not a bad idea!" I wonder if they turned out to be a 1/2 baked scheme (like pods of DD sized missiles), that in the long term were more trouble than they were worth.

Or David decided that was too powerful, damaged the plot, and abandoned the idea due to "handwavium" issues.

Theemile wrote:Notice we never saw those again? And no one in the RMN ever stated - "hey, that's not a bad idea!" I wonder if they turned out to be a 1/2 baked scheme (like pods of DD sized missiles), that in the long term were more trouble than they were worth.

Or David decided that was too powerful, damaged the plot, and abandoned the idea due to "handwavium" issues.

Yup, fixed pods, do block sensors up top. Not gotta, gotta, gotta have sensors, but backups etc. Honor always figured in WoH that those fixed half-pods would jettison once used. "Issue" got solved with self-tractored pods.

Relax wrote:

Theemile wrote:Notice we never saw those again? And no one in the RMN ever stated - "hey, that's not a bad idea!" I wonder if they turned out to be a 1/2 baked scheme (like pods of DD sized missiles), that in the long term were more trouble than they were worth.

Or David decided that was too powerful, damaged the plot, and abandoned the idea due to "handwavium" issues.

Yup, fixed pods, do block sensors up top. Not gotta, gotta, gotta have sensors, but backups etc. Honor always figured in WoH that those fixed half-pods would jettison once used. "Issue" got solved with self-tractored pods.

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Both Michelle (New Tuscany) and Abagail (exercise) have used limpited external pods. This provides (like the Andermani example) a heavy, first wave, throw weight, but limited follow-up if needed. That's the main reason for not relying on external / tractored pods. The Andies used them as an interim while they were building BC(p)'s

-- Stewart

"A Rising Thunder" spoiler alert, re: limpeted pods.

stewart wrote:--------------

Both Michelle (New Tuscany) and Abagail (exercise) have used limpited external pods. This provides (like the Andermani example) a heavy, first wave, throw weight, but limited follow-up if needed. That's the main reason for not relying on external / tractored pods. The Andies used them as an interim while they were building BC(p)'s. -- Stewart

I was thinking of those plus Saltash, where Commodore Zavala took out the SLN battlecruisers having made the choice to only use his squadron's tube launched missiles. In all cases, it seems to a "choice available" upon arrival in system, not a "gee, let's line the hull with pods this time not that time". Anything else would presumably require an ammunition ship with each formation just prior to a battle sequence.

By the way, that furthers my argument about "normal pod capacity" aboard the new ship types not creating any tactical sensor impediments. One of the arguments was that the pods tractors use power which would burn out, but I'd assume that to be a bad argument, once limpeted into the "normal" positions, it would be rudimentary to power the tractors from the shipboard side, which fits the Roland, Sag-C, and BC(L) "cruiser" mission parameters. (even 'though the Roland is a DD, with 10th fleet they are being used more like a light cruiser).

SharkHunter wrote:"A Rising Thunder" spoiler alert, re: limpeted pods.

stewart wrote:--------------

Both Michelle (New Tuscany) and Abagail (exercise) have used limpited external pods. This provides (like the Andermani example) a heavy, first wave, throw weight, but limited follow-up if needed. That's the main reason for not relying on external / tractored pods. The Andies used them as an interim while they were building BC(p)'s. -- Stewart

I was thinking of those plus Saltash, where Commodore Zavala took out the SLN battlecruisers having made the choice to only use his squadron's tube launched missiles. In all cases, it seems to a "choice available" upon arrival in system, not a "gee, let's line the hull with pods this time not that time". Anything else would presumably require an ammunition ship with each formation just prior to a battle sequence.

By the way, that furthers my argument about "normal pod capacity" aboard the new ship types not creating any tactical sensor impediments. One of the arguments was that the pods tractors use power which would burn out, but I'd assume that to be a bad argument, once limpeted into the "normal" positions, it would be rudimentary to power the tractors from the shipboard side, which fits the Roland, Sag-C, and BC(L) "cruiser" mission parameters. (even 'though the Roland is a DD, with 10th fleet they are being used more like a light cruiser).

You can haul pods using the ship's internal tractors for a "limitless" amount of time, just like the standard practice in the first war - but that number of tractors is than the max number that can be limpeted using the pod's internal tractors.

The Pod's limit is the internal reactor, not the tractor - I'm looking for the Posts from David on the subject and will post them when I find them. Essentially, some of the sacrifices in making the microfusion reactor involves some parts eating themselves up in the use of the reactor, in addition to a limited fuel supply. refreshing the reactor is necessary after every 30-45 days use as a system defense pod or a period of ~100-150 hours as a tractored pod.