Stupid idea that David is going to hate.

Theemile wrote:The real point of my exercise was to come up with a "feasible" ultralight escort unit to replace the LACS everyone tries to stuff into hyper escorts to get expanded coverage.

Yet none of them rallied to my side (sniff). People ask for fighters and I supplied - for nothing! I give manna and they shun me.

Ahem

Everyone is right - for the RMN this is a stupid design. It's something that a third rate navy would do if faced by the Silesian pirate threat and needed a force multiplier for their limited # of hyper combatants available for use on convoy duty.

Unfortunately, to be even 1/2 way decent, it requires 1923 Manty technology, at a time when the Manties are no longer facing the pirate threat and would never field such a design.

True, the Manties and by extension Graysons and their allies the Andermani and Haven don't face a serious pirate threat in Silesia any longer.

However (isn't there always one of those) how about independent worlds who will no longer have "protection" from Frontier Security or have only fledgling SDFs?

I suspect a market could be found for a "super sting" or "space fighter" among them by Hauptmann or one or another cartels or manufacturer. These things might serve to protect orbital infrastructure and or supplement older style LACs in that duty.

Theemile wrote:Everyone is right - for the RMN this is a stupid design. It's something that a third rate navy would do if faced by the Silesian pirate threat and needed a force multiplier for their limited # of hyper combatants available for use on convoy duty.

Well, I learned a long time ago not to make "stupid" suggestions, because somebody will take you seriously and see if it works.

If it's stupid and it works, the it's not stupid.

Weird Harold wrote:

Theemile wrote:Everyone is right - for the RMN this is a stupid design. It's something that a third rate navy would do if faced by the Silesian pirate threat and needed a force multiplier for their limited # of hyper combatants available for use on convoy duty.

Well, I learned a long time ago not to make "stupid" suggestions, because somebody will take you seriously and see if it works.

If it's stupid and it works, the it's not stupid.

Well, it was a viable idea - just not a GOOD viable idea.

A workable design probably wouldn't be exactly what my original idea was, but with the viper missile, you could build a parasite that fits in a standard boat bay, that could actually threaten a pirate ship and screen against it. It wouldn't be worth a fart in the wind against a Naval commerce raider, and you'd need well over a dozen to take on an old Destroyer with any chance of "winning."

once again, a viable idea, just not a good viable idea.

I know how we could make it feasible!

1) Take a giant three dimensional printer, put it in a giant robot,
2) Add underwater mining/refining systems so our robot can refill itself.
3) Get the assembly process simple enough a robot could do it, and get the individual parts small enough to be printed by our giant printer.
4) Go have the robot reproduce for a couple decades.
5) Use your absurd number of printers to print an absurd number of giant-sting ships. You'll probably need to give them some sort of AI pilot.
6) Have the military with the most firepower, the least power projection, and the most absurdity.
7) Turn the printers to commercial projects. Possibly selling giant sting ships for less than the cost of scrap elsewhere in the galaxy.
8) Profit!

Cost: 1 giant robot, 1 giant printer, 1 underwater refinery, 1 planet, and one top tier R&D team. Slight risk of robot rebellion.

Theemile wrote:
Well, it was a viable idea - just not a GOOD viable idea.

A workable design probably wouldn't be exactly what my original idea was, but with the viper missile, you could build a parasite that fits in a standard boat bay, that could actually threaten a pirate ship and screen against it. It wouldn't be worth a fart in the wind against a Naval commerce raider, and you'd need well over a dozen to take on an old Destroyer with any chance of "winning."

once again, a viable idea, just not a good viable idea.

Silesia has about the end of wildcat pirates, It was the "Silk Road" of pirates, where they went to unload taken ships and their cargoes. As the league breaks up, those FF ships may go the way of the State Sec ships at the end of the PRH. Independent or small flotillas of ships probably taking over their basing planet and issuing themselves Letters of Marque.

Verge planets still lack the money to buy much system defense, and those LAC Lites won't do except for customs patrols and a sting ship, or a pinnace would work for that. Pirate attacks in hyper would be beyond their capabilities, financially. The Shell worlds could do it but their resources would be better served with real warships, probably CAs.

With the breakup of the league and the question of what FF and BF unit cohesion will be like and where their loyalties will go will create the threat environment of future shipping endeavors.

Yes, [drool all over their keypads] 1001 uses for obsolete SL POS: "sell it to all those worlds." its not like the former Sl is going to file a protest in SL courts.

You might try an export version of either RMN or RHN LACs but if you don't want to give away the cutting edge tech you might arm them with SLN weapons -except no auto cannons, just go with the energy and CM sized missles.

The challange of taking them along as convoy or just merchant anti-piracy in intersteller travel is that effective LAC tactics ususaly require several to gang up on a warship to have any true effect. That means being able to throw enough missiles and/or energy weapons at the target to at least hurt it enough to break off or be unable to continue to chase your merchant(s).
Then there is the seperate problem of recovering said LAClites. Sort of like putting Spitfires or Hurricanes on merchant ships in WW II to be launched by redemtary catapults to 1) try to at least drive off attacking bombers or 2) shooting up a U-Boat or keeping it submerged so it can't get a torpedo off at the merchant. Then you need to recover the pilot- in the North Atlantic, in a hot war zone, where slowing down (especialy stopping) makes you the easiest target of any group you are with.

Using full-up LACs out of Wayfairer as a Q-ship or the CW with 8 of them and the offensive & defensive capability of a CL makes much more sence and better chance of surviving. And I don't think RMN is intendint to send any FSVs out alone to guard merchants.

Brigade XO wrote:You might try an export version of either RMN or RHN LACs but if you don't want to give away the cutting edge tech you might arm them with SLN weapons -except no auto cannons, just go with the energy and CM sized missles.

The challange of taking them along as convoy or just merchant anti-piracy in intersteller travel is that effective LAC tactics ususaly require several to gang up on a warship to have any true effect. That means being able to throw enough missiles and/or energy weapons at the target to at least hurt it enough to break off or be unable to continue to chase your merchant(s).
Then there is the seperate problem of recovering said LAClites. Sort of like putting Spitfires or Hurricanes on merchant ships in WW II to be launched by redemtary catapults to 1) try to at least drive off attacking bombers or 2) shooting up a U-Boat or keeping it submerged so it can't get a torpedo off at the merchant. Then you need to recover the pilot- in the North Atlantic, in a hot war zone, where slowing down (especialy stopping) makes you the easiest target of any group you are with.

Using full-up LACs out of Wayfairer as a Q-ship or the CW with 8 of them and the offensive & defensive capability of a CL makes much more sence and better chance of surviving. And I don't think RMN is intendint to send any FSVs out alone to guard merchants.

The GA is not going to be putting SLN surplus [aka scrap metal] back out into the 'verse. There may be SL corporations willing to sell them and the missiles, etc. they need, but the GA will not.

Has it occurred to anyone else that this topic is a sure sign that we NEED another snippet.

Theemile, just how cheaply could they be made? 2-1 per LAC? And what are the crewing requirements, did I miss that? And how fast can they be laid down?

Why won't they be just what the doctor ordered to police planets in the Verge and those worlds that will seek to split from the League? I think there'll be a state of unrest when word gets out that the corrupt police are gone. And the SEM can't keep spending money like the junctions are spitting it out for the hell of it.

Operating in pairs with a mutual offensive/defensive doctrine could make these babies formidable.

It's not likely they're habitually going to be up against any first rate navies.

cthia wrote:Theemile, just how cheap could they be made? 2-1 per LAC? And what are the crewing requirements, did I miss that? And how fast can they be laid down?

Why won't they be just what the doctor ordered to police planets in the Verge and those worlds that will seek to split from the League? I think there'll be a state of unrest when word gets out that the corrupt police are gone. And the SEM can't keep spending money like the junctions are spitting it out for the hell of it.

Operating in pairs with a mutual offensive/defensive doctrine could make these babies formidable.

It's not likely they're habitually going to be up against any first rate navies.

We're talking about upsized space optimized assault shuttles without any cargo capability - the vipers they would carry would probably cost more than the ship itself. Essentially this would be the biggest thing you could carry in a standard warship Boatbay berth.

These would be cheap... especially if made in bulk. I really don't know the hard costs, but one would assume ~15-20 per Shrike (without the missiles). Crew would be minimal (probably 2-4).

As you mentioned and I posted before, in number, these would be nasty to small hyperships; but even more than the LACs, these are shere attrition units, with more bark than bite. But it wouldn't even take a "warship" hit to take these out - they would be vulnerable to PDLCs and CMs, and I doubt they could even mount sidewalls - or effective ones, at any rate. Even worse, their best offensive weapon has 1/2 the range of weapons that all pirates carry.

However, most warships would probably only carry 1 of these at a time - they displace a pinnance or shuttle after all, and even CAs carry only 3. However, they could also be housed in Merchie boatbays with no mods.

The biggest problem is the Viper - it is expensive and I don't know if it will be exported. and without it, this is just a hopped up shuttle on steroids.