Possible new type of warship

darrell wrote:In one of the early books it went through energy weapons combat in detail. A BC graser will be effective against a BC at 400K range. The range is longer against smaller ships, shorter against heavier ships.

Although I don't believe that actual ranges were given, a BC graser might be effective against a DD at 600kKM-700kKM and a SD graset at 1MKM So the advantage of the SD graser in a light warship would be the ability to attack with energy weapons beyond your opponents energy weapons range.

I had the impression that the range variation was much less than that. I'd have guessed an SD might be able to smash through a DD's sidewall from maybe 475,000 km - while a DD's would be ineffective against the SD's sidewalls until down to maybe 325,000-300,000 km. 600-700k km seems much to far out for even an SD vs a DD...

But I admit this is just the impression I had; can't think of where I might find text-ev to support that impression

A million kilometers worth of energy range is still only a few light seconds. And, it's important to remember that the longer the range gets, the less accurate the shots will actually be.
Besides, missiles will blow your ship to pieces long before you get anywhere near any sort of energy range.

I could potentially see a new 'Cruiser' type ship with a single bow mounted SD-class graser. Especially if they could still fit at the very least a fair amount of cm-clusters around it.

The positives of the design would be the ability to, in close quarters, deal a lethal amount of damage with one shot to any comparably sized vessel. And, it could deal extreme damage to anything below the wall if it can get 2-3 shots off. If it doesn't take up too much internal room (and, seeing as they can be crammed into a Shrike they could fit in a Cruiser with room to spare), it wouldn't hamper much in the way of CM platforms or Missile tubes.

Beyond that I don't see any real purpose for the concept.

Erls wrote:I could potentially see a new 'Cruiser' type ship with a single bow mounted SD-class graser. Especially if they could still fit at the very least a fair amount of cm-clusters around it.

The positives of the design would be the ability to, in close quarters, deal a lethal amount of damage with one shot to any comparably sized vessel. And, it could deal extreme damage to anything below the wall if it can get 2-3 shots off. If it doesn't take up too much internal room (and, seeing as they can be crammed into a Shrike they could fit in a Cruiser with room to spare), it wouldn't hamper much in the way of CM platforms or Missile tubes.

Beyond that I don't see any real purpose for the concept.

Don't forget, currently Sag-Cs carry spinal grasers larger than what was traditionally carried in RMN BC spines. That's how Terekhov disembowled a Mars with one shot. All current RMN designs carry spinal weapons >1 size larger than the RMN traditionally carried, and the RMN carried more powerful energy mounts than the Havenites or Silensians did on a type by type basis (RMN destroyers could match or outgun Silly CA'S in energy range.) Also the gravitational lens technology behind the mk-16g is also designed into the bow wall lens of all new RMN construction (so much so that a LAC wing commander really wanted to see what her upgraded BC grade Graser would do to Solly SDs.)

So a Sag-C is probably toting bigger spinal energy weapons than most Battleships carry, and it probably can do the damage of what other navy's DNs or SDs can do.

Theemile wrote:

Erls wrote:I could potentially see a new 'Cruiser' type ship with a single bow mounted SD-class graser. Especially if they could still fit at the very least a fair amount of cm-clusters around it.

The positives of the design would be the ability to, in close quarters, deal a lethal amount of damage with one shot to any comparably sized vessel. And, it could deal extreme damage to anything below the wall if it can get 2-3 shots off. If it doesn't take up too much internal room (and, seeing as they can be crammed into a Shrike they could fit in a Cruiser with room to spare), it wouldn't hamper much in the way of CM platforms or Missile tubes.

Beyond that I don't see any real purpose for the concept.

Don't forget, currently Sag-Cs carry spinal grasers larger than what was traditionally carried in RMN BC spines. That's how Terekhov disembowled a Mars with one shot. All current RMN designs carry spinal weapons >1 size larger than the RMN traditionally carried, and the RMN carried more powerful energy mounts than the Havenites or Silensians did on a type by type basis (RMN destroyers could match or outgun Silly CA'S in energy range.) Also the gravitational lens technology behind the mk-16g is also designed into the bow wall lens of all new RMN construction (so much so that a LAC wing commander really wanted to see what her upgraded BC grade Graser would do to Solly SDs.)

So a Sag-C is probably toting bigger spinal energy weapons than most Battleships carry, and it probably can do the damage of what other navy's DNs or SDs can do.

Thanks. I had forgotten the exact specs but knew that first gen ships had stronger spinal mounts. Hence, it would be much more likely that the RMN could outfit the new Light Cruiser/Destroyer class ship (whatever it ends up being) with a SD class graser just for that additional punch for the 'rare' circumstance that warrants it.

If you are just going to scale up a ship scale up a Roland to Bellerophon size. With 96 Mk16 tubes plus 16 SD Grasers on each Hammerhead, with 3x the number of missiles per tube and 1040 crew or less, Broadside mounting SD Grasers and Lasers mixed in with 2 Keyhole-1 (4 total) Add in 60 CM and 60 PD. 60 salvos of 192 MK 16 missiles fast firing.

If it fits in a Roland it fits in a Bellerophon sized Dreadnaught.

Bellerophon Dreadnaught also has marines and much better armour, plus the 16 SD Grasers are going to be as good as a spinal mount Graser. bit of an oddball ship but solves all sorts of problems.

Lord Skimper wrote:threadjack

Go away.

Lord Skimper wrote:bit of an oddball ship but solves all sorts of problems.

Perhaps you could provide examples of the problems it supposedly solves?

Lord Skimper wrote:blah blah my Bellerophon idea, blah blah blah

You had your chance with that horrible monstrosity that everyone told you to shut up about.... but why don't you just go bump that topic since it's not in the top 5. Let's see if you can't get one of the moderators here to just lock your posting ability.

What's being notionally considered here isn't even close to what you thought, for starters it's either already been done (upsized chasers), or it's viable (changing the weapon mix slightly)

Maybe it is time to come with something new.

Honor Harrigton had some LAC´s on her Q-ship Wayfarer. The manticorian battle cruiser have reach the size of battle ships. So, wouldn´t it be a good idea to design a battle cruiser with space for 2-4 LAC´s? If the engeneers design the LAC bay so, that you can use them also to carry pod´s it would be a very Multi functional space ship.