ThinksMarkedly wrote:Brigade XO wrote: I suspect that Manticore might have sold off some of it's FFs to trading partners as at least SDF and local commerce protection prior to the Havenite War to both support it's partners and raise money in it's buildup of it's own fleet. Used frigates, as then configured, could still have been used in more local settings by systems that were only worried about garden vairity pirates and having something with a lot more teeth and range than the typical LAC.
Just a thought.
Maybe, maybe not. We are told that the garden variety pirate had been creeping up in size. See previous discussion on this thread. I'd put my money on a RMN FF against a pirate FF any day, especially if those FFs are travelling in division strength. But if pirates are getting their hands on destroyers, it starts making sense to use destroyers for projection and commerce protection. It might be cheaper to operate one destroyer than a pair of frigates, with better chances of surviving.
In that scenario, the market for "certified pre-owned" frigates is dwindling to nothing. Especially if the RMN is also selling scores of used destroyers, to free up manpower for the new cruiser construction.
Maybe it would be better to remove weapons and military hardware and instead sell the hull to a civilian VIP transport operator. Larger than a courier, a frigate hull might serve well to transport some 20 VIPs in luxurious accommodations plus crew.
@Theemile: Thanks for looking up the SITS.
@ThinksMarkedly: Size creep among pirates has been happening when the pirates get corporate or government sponsers, and they keep running into the RMN or Andies. Thus, in Silesia, ships are manufactured off the books and sold to pirates and/or secessionists. Also, Manpower, New Hamburg, and other slavers (and smugglers) have been giving heavier ships to the pirates IOT get
some return on the investment. There hasn't been any of that elsewhere that we know of. The only episode of anti-piracy
in the narrative for Talbott was because they were Peeps in Exile, operated by Manpower.
Otherwise, local navies (ie., Rembrandt) takes care of pirates all on their own.
FWIW, a frigate had almost the same crew requirement as a destroyer (pre-war), ~300 or so. So I hope you can put more than 20 people on it in comfort, when you convert it to civilian use.
iirc, the Tankersley would take about a hundred passengers; it massed 55k tons. About the same as the local-built pirate Wayfarer stomped on in Silesia back in 1908? 1909? Losing the timeline, it was HAE, anyway.
A while ago, it you read it new back when.
Rob