LAC on LAC warfare

cthia wrote:[

I don't think Murphy depends on insider information. Murphy is inherent in the Universe, he's built-in. That's why LACs did close with SDs in storyline.

Besides, why wouldn't an overwhelming horde of Katanas NOT drive into knife range of SDs in a Saganami style last stand? After all, they are named after the two-handed Japanese sword.

Katanas don't have weapons which can pierce modern SD sidewalls. The PDLCs might be able to pierce SD sidewalls - at literally point blank range (<<50,000 km), and the Vipers have a single 3m DD laserhead, which would have a difficult time penetrating SD sidewalls, and at best would just strip the SD's outer armor.

Katanas are mostly defensive systems, with offensive ability against LACs, DDs and CLs. Against anything bigger, they are mostly non-effective unless the ship already has extremely heavy damage.

At best, a Katana could keep an SD distracted. Katanas would be MORE effective against SLN SDs, but not sufficiently so that it would make sense to use them that way.

Theemile wrote:

cthia wrote:[

I don't think Murphy depends on insider information. Murphy is inherent in the Universe, he's built-in. That's why LACs did close with SDs in storyline.

Besides, why wouldn't an overwhelming horde of Katanas NOT drive into knife range of SDs in a Saganami style last stand? After all, they are named after the two-handed Japanese sword.

Katanas don't have weapons which can pierce modern SD sidewalls. The PDLCs might be able to pierce SD sidewalls - at literally point blank range (<<50,000 km), and the Vipers have a single 3m DD laserhead, which would have a difficult time penetrating SD sidewalls, and at best would just strip the SD's outer armor.

Katanas are mostly defensive systems, with offensive ability against LACs, DDs and CLs. Against anything bigger, they are mostly non-effective unless the ship already has extremely heavy damage.

At best, a Katana could keep an SD distracted. Katanas would be MORE effective against SLN SDs, but not sufficiently so that it would make sense to use them that way.

OOPS says Shannon. I was thinking the Katana has the massive graser. The wiki informant told me it is the Shrike which has the graser. Would hordes of Shrikes wielding BC sized grasers more than dent an SDs paint?

Also, do LACs act separately, or in pairs, like always having a wing man. Two LACs could coordinate their maneuvers.

cthia wrote:\OOPS says Shannon. I was thinking the Katana has the massive graser. The wiki informant told me it is the Shrike which has the graser. Would hordes of Shrikes wielding BC sized grasers more than dent an SDs paint?

Also, do LACs act separately, or in pairs, like always having a wing man. Two LACs could coordinate their maneuvers.

I believe they normally mount at least squadron level attacks - 12 LACs working together. Since they are more small ships than aircraft analogs I don't know if it makes sense to operate as 6 pairs of wingmen within the squadron. (They're hardly able to be maneuvering around like fighters would in a dogfight - so the squadron is far less likely to lose cohesion once the fight is joined))

And a horde of Shrikes would at least be cratering the armor of an SD; enough cratering and they'd cripple, if not destroy, it. But it's still a very much last resort type of attack - because getting into an energy range fight with even a little SLN SD means a lot of those LACs aren't coming home.

Though I'm not sure the hundred odd LACs of a single CLAC would be enough to cripple a single SLN SD before being effectively wiped out.



SDs are designed to survive prolonged energy range slugging matches against other SDs; so that's repeated hits from roughly 20 significantly heavier graser mounts of an SDs broadside; plus roughly that many heavy lasers too. A flyby of just 2-1/2 times that number of lighter weapons is unlikely to score a killing blow - but any square hit on a Shrike's bow wall from any of those heavy mounts is very likely to kill the Shrike. So you're likely to lose 5 - 10 LACs on each pass from the SD's energy weapons along. More if the SD gets the bright idea to try laserheads up the LACs' backsides while hitting them from the front with grasers and lasers.

If an RMN CLAC absolutely had no choice but to go toe-to-toe with a SLN SD, I'd deploy the LACs as extra anti-missile screen against any Cataphracts it might fire at you, and then use the Minotaur or Hydra-class's chase armament of 9 or 12 MDM tubes (respectively) to play long range sniper. They should be able to use off-axis firing to engage with both chase armaments at once. And the SLN ship's point defense is so outdated it's going to have a hell of a time stopping even just twenty odd MDMs screaming in at 0.7c. (Even harder if the CLAC goes for delayed activation and doubles up their salvos) (Unfortunately the GSN can't play the same trick because their Covington-class CLACs omitted all offensive missiles. That's part of what let them carry 12 more LAC bays than a Hydra on just 90,000 more tons)
Even if the SD survives every missile in your magazines at least you've softened it up some before you're forced to throw your LACs at it.

I always wanted to know, does textev give a LAC's complement, ship's company? And what are their duties? A tactical section? Guns? A CIC? LOL

cthia wrote:I always wanted to know, does textev give a LAC's complement, ship's company? And what are their duties? A tactical section? Guns? A CIC? LOL

I don't know if it's been given as an exact number, but I always figured a dozen or less. The 124 LACs of a Covington-class CLAC would be carrying then 1486 crewmembers for the LACs alone, plus engineering crews for each. They are DN- and SD-sized, so they have room for 6000 people if needed, but it's a lot already.

Also, remember that a Wolfhound-class DD only needs 87 crewmembers, a Roland no more than 62, and they weigh 6x to 9x more than a Shrike.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

cthia wrote:I always wanted to know, does textev give a LAC's complement, ship's company? And what are their duties? A tactical section? Guns? A CIC? LOL

I don't know if it's been given as an exact number, but I always figured a dozen or less. The 124 LACs of a Covington-class CLAC would be carrying then 1486 crewmembers for the LACs alone, plus engineering crews for each. They are DN- and SD-sized, so they have room for 6000 people if needed, but it's a lot already.

Also, remember that a Wolfhound-class DD only needs 87 crewmembers, a Roland no more than 62, and they weigh 6x to 9x more than a Shrike.

Actually, it does in EoH and HoS. a RMN LAC has a complement of 10 ( all 3 variants). So losing the 100 ish LACs on a RMN CLAC is just the manpower of an old CA.

The actual jobs were given, but it's not enough for 24/7 shift sharing - like 2 engineers, 1 commander, 1 helmsman, 1 nav, 2 tactical, 2 sensors - sorry, I don't remember them all


RHN LACs carry a crew of 20 - even though they have much shorter endurance than RMN LACS (18 hours), so much less automation and much more manual control.

Jonathan_S wrote:

cthia wrote:\OOPS says Shannon. I was thinking the Katana has the massive graser. The wiki informant told me it is the Shrike which has the graser. Would hordes of Shrikes wielding BC sized grasers more than dent an SDs paint?

Also, do LACs act separately, or in pairs, like always having a wing man. Two LACs could coordinate their maneuvers.

I believe they normally mount at least squadron level attacks - 12 LACs working together. Since they are more small ships than aircraft analogs I don't know if it makes sense to operate as 6 pairs of wingmen within the squadron. (They're hardly able to be maneuvering around like fighters would in a dogfight - so the squadron is far less likely to lose cohesion once the fight is joined))

And a horde of Shrikes would at least be cratering the armor of an SD; enough cratering and they'd cripple, if not destroy, it. But it's still a very much last resort type of attack - because getting into an energy range fight with even a little SLN SD means a lot of those LACs aren't coming home.

Though I'm not sure the hundred odd LACs of a single CLAC would be enough to cripple a single SLN SD before being effectively wiped out.



SDs are designed to survive prolonged energy range slugging matches against other SDs; so that's repeated hits from roughly 20 significantly heavier graser mounts of an SDs broadside; plus roughly that many heavy lasers too. A flyby of just 2-1/2 times that number of lighter weapons is unlikely to score a killing blow - but any square hit on a Shrike's bow wall from any of those heavy mounts is very likely to kill the Shrike. So you're likely to lose 5 - 10 LACs on each pass from the SD's energy weapons along. More if the SD gets the bright idea to try laserheads up the LACs' backsides while hitting them from the front with grasers and lasers.

If an RMN CLAC absolutely had no choice but to go toe-to-toe with a SLN SD, I'd deploy the LACs as extra anti-missile screen against any Cataphracts it might fire at you, and then use the Minotaur or Hydra-class's chase armament of 9 or 12 MDM tubes (respectively) to play long range sniper. They should be able to use off-axis firing to engage with both chase armaments at once. And the SLN ship's point defense is so outdated it's going to have a hell of a time stopping even just twenty odd MDMs screaming in at 0.7c. (Even harder if the CLAC goes for delayed activation and doubles up their salvos) (Unfortunately the GSN can't play the same trick because their Covington-class CLACs omitted all offensive missiles. That's part of what let them carry 12 more LAC bays than a Hydra on just 90,000 more tons)
Even if the SD survives every missile in your magazines at least you've softened it up some before you're forced to throw your LACs at it.

Just prior to the battle of Spindle, the LAC commander mentions that her Shrikes have an updated bow wall with a better grav lens for the graser - upgunning it, and was looking forward to what they could do to a SLN SD.

But you are right, a Graser fight is one the SL SDs are built for, and the Scientists carry modern 450cm Grasers, - a 9x+ upgrade over the 150cm Graser in the Shrike. So nothing a Shrike can belt out is beyond what the Scientists and Vegas are designed to take.

The new bow wall, however, probably means that the Shrike is much more survivable against a SLN SD than the earlier variants, making a battle between the 2 closer to anther Hancock station.

Theemile wrote:Just prior to the battle of Spindle, the LAC commander mentions that her Shrikes have an updated bow wall with a better grav lens for the graser - upgunning it, and was looking forward to what they could do to a SLN SD.

But you are right, a Graser fight is one the SL SDs are built for, and the Scientists carry modern 450cm Grasers, - a 9x+ upgrade over the 150cm Graser in the Shrike. So nothing a Shrike can belt out is beyond what the Scientists and Vegas are designed to take.

The new bow wall, however, probably means that the Shrike is much more survivable against a SLN SD than the earlier variants, making a battle between the 2 closer to anther Hancock station.

Thanks for the info. I'm not sure which battle gives us the "LACs were never meant to close with SDs," but they did, and they caused significant damage. Albeit, the enemy SDs certainly may have already been damaged. However, I remember a significant factor that the enemy had a hard time targeting such a small ship. SLN SDs are built for energy battles, but they never foresaw battling bees coming at them from all angles. Also, at Hancock Station, the Peep SDs were taken on by LACs and taken out one by one because they were isolated as a result of scattering. So, perhaps one unsupported SD against a swarm of bees seems to be a different matter altogether.

cthia wrote:

Theemile wrote:Just prior to the battle of Spindle, the LAC commander mentions that her Shrikes have an updated bow wall with a better grav lens for the graser - upgunning it, and was looking forward to what they could do to a SLN SD.

But you are right, a Graser fight is one the SL SDs are built for, and the Scientists carry modern 450cm Grasers, - a 9x+ upgrade over the 150cm Graser in the Shrike. So nothing a Shrike can belt out is beyond what the Scientists and Vegas are designed to take.

The new bow wall, however, probably means that the Shrike is much more survivable against a SLN SD than the earlier variants, making a battle between the 2 closer to anther Hancock station.

Thanks for the info. I'm not sure which battle gives us the "LACs were never meant to close with SDs," but they did, and they caused significant damage. Albeit, the enemy SDs certainly may have already been damaged. However, I remember a significant factor that the enemy had a hard time targeting such a small ship. SLN SDs are built for energy battles, but they never foresaw battling bees coming at them from all angles. Also, at Hancock Station, the Peep SDs were taken on by LACs and taken out one by one because they were isolated as a result of scattering. So, perhaps one unsupported SD against a swarm of bees seems to be a different matter altogether.

LACS were used in the 8th Fleet final campaign in the 1st war, but were used in sneak attacks, catching entire squadrons of DNs and SDs without wedges, by firing on their un-armored ventral and dorsal hulls.

The only other LAC on SD battle was Manticore, and the Manty LACs were broken apart by the Havenite Screen, even as the LACs destroyed the entire screen and LAC force in a single pass. The surviving Shrikes were unable to do any damage to the SDs as they passed.

The DD scale missiles RMN LACS carry are great against anything up through CAs, and the Shrike's Graser can rip apart BCs and BBs, and a land some solid, but light, blows on Wallers.

On Wallers, a Shrike's Graser will do damage to the armor, and Vipers and LAC missiles will erode the outer armor and everything outside of it.

So can enough enough, well piloted LACS kill or mission kill an alert SD? Yes, but in a straight up fight, you would want to challenge the SDs on something near a wing:SD ratio, and even then, many LACs will not be coming home, and most likely the SD will be limping home as well.

cthia wrote:Thanks for the info. I'm not sure which battle gives us the "LACs were never meant to close with SDs," but they did, and they caused significant damage. Albeit, the enemy SDs certainly may have already been damaged. However, I remember a significant factor that the enemy had a hard time targeting such a small ship. SLN SDs are built for energy battles, but they never foresaw battling bees coming at them from all angles. Also, at Hancock Station, the Peep SDs were taken on by LACs and taken out one by one because they were isolated as a result of scattering. So, perhaps one unsupported SD against a swarm of bees seems to be a different matter altogether.

At Hancock Minotaur's LACs were up against battleships; not dreadnoughts or SDs.

EoH Ch 33 specifically has the Peep commander, Admiral Kellet, mention that she wishes her force had any ships of the wall. "Thirty-plus battleships [33], ten or twelve heavy cruisers, and a half-dozen destroyers"

And even so, taking the Peeps by complete surprise, and for most of the engagement having the support of the Hancock squadron built around 5 SDs plus Minotaur sniping away with the first combat use of MDMs, the RMN lost a fair number of the 96 LACs involved (enough that they were about to break off before the Peeps scattered)

But the LACs biggest contribution was wiping out the vast majority of the Peep towed pods before they could be used to wipe out the Hancock squadron.