New Manty ship ideas.

Rakhmamort wrote:I don't think so. Fearless took out an SD with just a couple of ETorp salvos. I sincerely doubt the same number of graser hits would have done the same.

That's a fair point, we know ETorps are supremely destructive weapons if they can be brought to bear (as can be witnessed by Fearless taking out a Superdreadnought in the beginning). But, the targets you want to use these weapons against, Destroyers and Cruisers and Battlecruisers, these are already very vulnerable to the weaponry carried onboard LACs (except maybe for the LAC missile vs BC matchup), and by the time a shot knowcks out their sidewall, any hit from the LAC's graser will be enough for a killing blow. Given that LACs never operate alone, delivering that killing blow will be easy, sidewall or no sidewall. Adding in capability specifically to deal with already mostly dead enemy targets is not an efficient use of ressources, it's the equivalent of taking an M16 and mounting an underbarrel 9mm in case you need to dispatch a wounded enemy.

As for new gunports, this is grasping at straws time. Why would there be new ones? Can't the ETorp launchers use the ones the missile launchers they've replaced were supposed to use?

This is going off of what we know about how the tech operates. Every gun has its own port in the sidewall, and given that the missile gunports would be closed by the time the LAC enters graser range (except for the occasional snapshot), this would appreciably weaken the LAC's defenses.

Potato wrote:

I don't think so. Fearless took out an SD with just a couple of ETorp salvos. I sincerely doubt the same number of graser hits would have done the same.

Because the sidewalls were down. As shown in both SoS and FiE, the damage from graser fire can be quite terrible without a sidewall to interdict.

There is no argument that the sidewalls have to be down. Are you seriously saying that a majority of SHrike LACs targets will be destroyed without any of their sidewall generators going down? Seriously? I'd bet my @ss it's more likely for such targets to retain 100% propulsion power up to the point of destruction than to retain 100% sidewalls up to the same point.

Your LACs grasers are pounding on the area where the sidewall generators are installed, where their power connections are, etc. The damage your LAC graser is dealing to the target is going to take out its a sidewall generator and leave an area vulnerable to ETorps.

As for new gunports, this is grasping at straws time. Why would there be new ones? Can't the ETorp launchers use the ones the missile launchers they've replaced were supposed to use?

The bow wall drops in order to fire the missiles, as described in EoH.

Thank you for pointing that out. Seems using them standard LAC missiles when its up close and personal is going to leave them Shrikes very vulnerable.

If I'm going to choose between additional gunports vs dropping the bow wall totally to fire my weapons, guess which one I'll choose?

And yes, I'm ok to open up gunports if it means I'm going to be delivering a whole lot of damage rather than the medium amount I'm dishing out when I'm only opening 1 gunport. Fire away!!!

There is no argument that the sidewalls have to be down. Are you seriously saying that a majority of SHrike LACs targets will be destroyed without any of their sidewall generators going down? Seriously? I'd bet my @ss it's more likely for such targets to retain 100% propulsion power up to the point of destruction than to retain 100% sidewalls up to the same point.

Your LACs grasers are pounding on the area where the sidewall generators are installed, where their power connections are, etc. The damage your LAC graser is dealing to the target is going to take out its a sidewall generator and leave an area vulnerable to ETorps.

Perhaps you did not get the point. The point was that under conditions when the sidewall is down, graser fire will kill a superdreadnought dead same as energy torpedo fire. And since graser fire is effective from both a longer range and against a shielded target, the graser is a better weapon for a LAC, period.

EDIT: Speaking of SoS...

"At that range, unopposed by any sidewall, Hexapuma's energy weapons could have disemboweled a superdreadnought. What they did to a mere heavy cruiser was unspeakable."

EDIT2: Oh yeah, also Fearless versus Thunder of God. No sidewall = very quick death by standard energy fire. Energy torpedoes are superfluous.

Thank you for pointing that out. Seems using them standard LAC missiles when its up close and personal is going to leave them Shrikes very vulnerable.

If I'm going to choose between additional gunports vs dropping the bow wall totally to fire my weapons, guess which one I'll choose?

If you bothered to read anything about LAC doctrine, you would know that the missiles would be fired off bore, and not while pointed at the target. And you certainly would not be firing missiles while pointed bow-on at the target and in energy range.

Corrected the number of Etorps needed to take out an SD. One broadside, 7 ETorps plus of course the remaining standard weapons of a light cruiser.

Potato wrote:Perhaps you did not get the point. The point was that under conditions when the sidewall is down, graser fire will kill a superdreadnought dead same as energy torpedo fire. And since graser fire is effective from both a longer range and against a shielded target, the graser is a better weapon for a LAC, period.

Graser fire from LACs? How many hits would it take? I know it took less than 10 ETorps to take out an SD. I also know SDs are rated to take over a hundred capital ship missile X-ray laser hits (which probably deal more damage than a BC graser).

Seems like the damage potential is worth a lot.

Thank you for pointing that out. Seems using them standard LAC missiles when its up close and personal is going to leave them Shrikes very vulnerable.

If I'm going to choose between additional gunports vs dropping the bow wall totally to fire my weapons, guess which one I'll choose?

If you bothered to read anything about LAC doctrine, you would know that the missiles would be fired off bore, and not while pointed at the target. And you certainly would not be firing missiles while pointed bow-on at the target and in energy range.

And while the LAC is turning 'off bore' to fire it's teeny weeny missiles, is the graser doing any damage? Oh wow! I'll fire off the remaining 8 missiles in my tubes. Turn! Turn! Turn! Drop the bow wall! Release the firecrakers! Put up the bow wall! Turn back! Turn back! Turn back!

Instead of doing such an evolution, why not continually blast the enemy with your graser and open 2 additional ports for your ETorps. Open all the ports at the same time, synchronize your weapons fire, if you really are concerned about being hit while you are firing. It wouldn't matter if you one or 3 gunports open. If a LAC gets hit with a gunport open, chances are, it's dead.

Rakhmamort wrote:Graser fire from LACs? How many hits would it take? I know it took just around 50 ETorps to take out an SD. I also know SDs are rated to take over a hundred capital ship missile X-ray laser hits (which probably deal more damage than a BC graser).

Not that many. Shrikes carry BC grasers, which are individually way more powerful than even the biggest laser head. So a group of two or three LACs can kill anything up to BC size in one or two firing runs without much issue.

And while the LAC is turning 'off bore' to fire it's teeny weeny missiles, is the graser doing any damage? Oh wow! I'll fire off the remaining 8 missiles in my tubes. Turn! Turn! Turn! Drop the bow wall! Release the firecrakers! Put up the bow wall! Turn back! Turn back! Turn back!

Now you're just being silly.

Instead of doing such an evolution, why not continually blast the enemy with your graser and open 2 additional ports for your ETorps. Open all the ports at the same time, synchronize your weapons fire, if you really are concerned about being hit while you are firing. It wouldn't matter if you one or 3 gunports open. If a LAC gets hit with a gunport open, chances are, it's dead.

Because the vectors rarely work out to allow you to operate in such a way. Given the fragility of the LAC, you want to minimise your exposure to enemy fire, which means building up a crossing vector, turning towards him, activating the bow wall and blast away once or twice before your momentum carries you away, then turn to engage again. In other words, there is usually plenty of time available to launch a few missiles while you're getting back into an attack run.

The E wrote:Not that many. Shrikes carry BC grasers, which are individually way more powerful than even the biggest laser head. So a group of two or three LACs can kill anything up to BC size in one or two firing runs without much issue.

Are you serious? It took a squadron each of LACs to take out PARKED DNs with no wedges up and you are claiming you need only 10 shots from BC grasers to take out an SD?

Honor must have been dumb sending her damaged SDs into BB energy range in the Battle of Yeltsin.

Please tell me you are joking. 10 shots of LAC grasers will destroy an SD with no sidewall and firing at the armored sides, not thru the unarmored top or bottom.

And while the LAC is turning 'off bore' to fire it's teeny weeny missiles, is the graser doing any damage? Oh wow! I'll fire off the remaining 8 missiles in my tubes. Turn! Turn! Turn! Drop the bow wall! Release the firecrakers! Put up the bow wall! Turn back! Turn back! Turn back!

Now you're just being silly.

Not being silly at all. Isn't that how it's going to be done? Turn a bit, drop the bow wall, turn back? I dunno how long that will take. For sure the weapons officer has to give some sort of firing solution to the missiles prior to launching. The ship must be at a certain angle, certain relative speed etc.

Instead of doing such an evolution, why not continually blast the enemy with your graser and open 2 additional ports for your ETorps. Open all the ports at the same time, synchronize your weapons fire, if you really are concerned about being hit while you are firing. It wouldn't matter if you one or 3 gunports open. If a LAC gets hit with a gunport open, chances are, it's dead.

Because the vectors rarely work out to allow you to operate in such a way. Given the fragility of the LAC, you want to minimise your exposure to enemy fire, which means building up a crossing vector, turning towards him, activating the bow wall and blast away once or twice before your momentum carries you away, then turn to engage again. In other words, there is usually plenty of time available to launch a few missiles while you're getting back into an attack run.

Again, how many times can you fire off missiles? How many missiles do you have in your tubes? I'm going to be very generous, you have full magazines when you start your runs. You fire off 1 missile per 'pass'. After 5 passes, your launchers are USELESS. And this is the part where the chances that one or two sidewall generators might have gone down from the damage your graser has been dealing to your target. ETorps would have been handy right now.

Are you serious? It took a squadron each of LACs to take out PARKED BCs with no wedges up and you are claiming you need only 10 shots from BC grasers to take out an SD?

Honor must have been dumb sending her damaged SDs into BB energy range in the Battle of Yeltsin.

Please tell me you are joking. 10 shots of LAC grasers will destroy an SD with no sidewall and firing at the armored sides, not thru the unarmored top or bottom.

Edit - Derp, misread.

Not being silly at all. Isn't that how it's going to be done? Turn a bit, drop the bow wall, turn back? I dunno how long that will take. For sure the weapons officer has to give some sort of firing solution to the missiles prior to launching. The ship must be at a certain angle, certain relative speed etc.

No, you are being completely silly because you would have fired your missiles outside of energy range. You use your ranged firepower at range. Shocking, is it not?

Again, how many times can you fire off missiles? How many missiles do you have in your tubes? I'm going to be very generous, you have full magazines when you start your runs. You fire off 1 missile per 'pass'. After 5 passes, your launchers are USELESS. And this is the part where the chances that one or two sidewall generators might have gone down from the damage your graser has been dealing to your target. ETorps would have been handy right now.

10 missiles are hardly better than no missiles at all. BuShips felt that the Shrike's 20 missiles is the minimum level they felt they could accept on a vessel which is supposed to augment destroyers and cruisers. If you are using LACs against anything heavier and when you actually want that firepower, then you are either using them wrong, or are in the midst of a catastrophe where it would not matter what weapons you are carrying.

Rakhmamort wrote:Are you serious? It took a squadron each of LACs to take out PARKED DNs with no wedges up and you are claiming you need only 10 shots from BC grasers to take out an SD?

If you're not going to bother reading what people write in their responses to you, why should we respond to you? I never said anything about SDs (or DNs, or BBs, for that matter).

Also, it was several squadrons, none of which had more than one firing pass (assuming you're referring to what happened at Barnett during AoV).

Honor must have been dumb sending her damaged SDs into BB energy range in the Battle of Yeltsin.

Relevance?

Please tell me you are joking. 10 shots of LAC grasers will destroy an SD with no sidewall and firing at the armored sides, not thru the unarmored top or bottom.

What's your point?

Not being silly at all. Isn't that how it's going to be done? Turn a bit, drop the bow wall, turn back? I dunno how long that will take. For sure the weapons officer has to give some sort of firing solution to the missiles prior to launching. The ship must be at a certain angle, certain relative speed etc.

LAC attack runs are usually strafing and crossing passes. In other words, the LAC will spend a considerable amount of time with its bow away from the target anyway, might as well use that time to get off a few missiles.

Again, how many times can you fire off missiles? How many missiles do you have in your tubes? I'm going to be very generous, you have full magazines when you start your runs. You fire off 1 missile per 'pass'. After 5 passes, your launchers are USELESS. And this is the part where the chances that one or two sidewall generators might have gone down from the damage your graser has been dealing to your target. ETorps would have been handy right now.

If, after 5 passes against light enemy forces, there are still enemy forces there, it's time to relieve the LAC commander of his duties because he's clearly incompetent.

If, after 5 passes against an intact wall, there are still LACs left, any survivor must be called back immediately to act as training cadre, because such badassery has to be spread around a lot.

Misread the Rak's first paragraph, so ignore that.

Anyhoo, everyone else's right, Rak's trying way to hard to make ETs a thing again.

[returns to lurking]

Rakhmamort wrote:I don't think so. Fearless took out an SD with just a couple of ETorp salvos. I sincerely doubt the same number of graser hits would have done the same.

No, Fearless did NOT take out an SD with a couple of etorp salvos. Fearless took out an unarmoured freighter with continuous fire from seven etorp launchers, and that was only necessary because her missile armament had been gutted.