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Guillaume HJ said:
So general thinking I've been doing...

I think we actually want to limit the number of our active military designs, and try to avoid overspecialization.

One reason - keeping a core of ships that can act independently, and don't need each other to survive - has already been given.

The other is one of resources. Not duranium and all that, but another key resources - shipyards. We only have so many of them, and while we can shift retooling them around as needed to face crisises, this can bite us in the (shiny metal ass) if a situation should develop where we face an urgent need for ships of a specific type, and need to wait months to retool the necessary shipyard (which may in turn bite us in the ass if we need two such).

That lead me to conclude that we should build the core of our navy around one multipurpose workhorse - not the three we currently have (Battles, Stars and Attitudes). This ship should be able to carry out operation in small groups or even alone, to provide defense to less critical star systems in the later game.

In addition to this shoudl be what we build into our main battle fleet - I think the consensus is heading toward making that a carrier fleet. This means one standardized model of carrier, as noted above - one role one class one shipyard. The independent combat unit can be used to reinforce the carrier's escort, of course.

Anything beyond these two units should be role-specific, eg our already-designed PD unit (anti fighters/missiles escort for the carriers), monitor (planetary bombardment) and combat direction ship (until we can fit satisfactory detection and fire control equipment on the carriers and main combatants), Spies (recon) and whatnot.

Of course, I'm not criticizing the current division, because that's a necessary effect of our slowly developping capacities - no point keeping our main combatant at 8000 tons when we can reliable build at 12 000 or higher. I'm just proposing what I think should be our aim.
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Yes... one complicating factor is that neither our tech nor our shipyard capacity will remain constant. Tech advances are useless to us unless we translate them into ship designs and then actually build those ships. This, taken together with our desire to retain our experienced crews rather than break up old ships, leads automatically to a variety of designs of different classes.

The situation will grow esaier as we build more shipyards, which is one of the tasks that I intend to undertake once our resource situation is solidly in the black.
 
The Charlies just gave us another tech... Particle Beam Range 200,000 km.
 
Our Combined Fleet has taken aboard the first two batches of Streak Fighters, and has taken them out on exercises while additional Streaks are built.
 
Our scouts just located a perfectly Earth-like moon in orbit around a gas giant in the 10 Tauri system, not far from Wolf 294. A class-0 world, gravity 9/10ths of Earth, Oxygen 20%, Nitrogen 80%, temperature in the 20's Centegrade... looks like a very nice spot. I'm sending the scout in closer, to see if the planet is infested with Prix.
 
:D The first three Constellation class Fleet Carriers have been laid down... they build surprisingly quickly: 20 months. That's only about half as long as it takes to build a Heavy Cruiser, and probably much quicker than it will take to build the Air Groups.

Final design:

Constellation class Carrier 20,000 tons 1292 Crew 3462 BP TCS 400 TH 1144 EM 450
5720 km/s Armour 1-65 Shields 15-250 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 21 PPV 6
Annual Failure Rate: 152% IFR: 2.1% Maint Capacity 2272 MSP Max Repair 66 MSP Est Time: 6.23 Years
Hangar Deck Capacity 8000 tons Magazine 422

Magneto-plasma Drive E8.4 (26) Power 88 Fuel Use 84% Signature 44 Armour 0 Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 107.1 billion km (216 days at full power)
Delta R250/17.5 Shields (6) Total Fuel Cost 105 Litres per day

CIWS-200 (1x6) Range 1000 km TS: 20000 km/s ROF 5 Base 50% To Hit
Size 1 Missile Launcher (6) Missile Size 1 Rate of Fire 10
Missile PD Fire Control 2046 FC14-R1 (70%) (2) Range 14.8m km Resolution 1
Size 6e 2043 ASM (60) Speed: 30,700 km/s End: 23.3m Range: 42.9m km WH: 9 Size: 6 TH: 204 / 122 / 61
Size 1e 2043 AMM (62) Speed: 48,200 km/s End: 3.5m Range: 10.3m km WH: 1 Size: 1 TH: 305 / 183 / 91

Strike Group
47x Streak Fighter Speed: 15588 km/s Size: 3.4

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
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EDIT: Notice that our new Fighters travel at 5% of light-speed...

Tentative names for the first three Constellations are Andromeda, Perseus and Cassiopia.
 
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blue emu said:
:D The first three Constellation class Fleet Carriers have been laid down... they build surprisingly quickly: 20 months. That's only about half as long as it takes to build a Heavy Cruiser, and probably much quicker than it will take to build the Air Groups.

Final design:



EDIT: Notice that our new Fighters travel at 5% of light-speed...

Tentative names for the first three Constellations are Andromeda, Perseus and Cassiopia.
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Whoohoo!

Nice looking ship that is, big hangar deck, nice magazine. Some PD if things go pear-shaped...

Looking forward to escorting these babies around!
 
Our scout exploring the Earth-like moon in 10 Tauri is still alive... the target world was empty of inhabitants, Prix or otherwise. Of course, they could be hiding elsewhere in the system. The moon itself holds millions of tons of eight different minerals... five of them at only 10% concentration, unfortunately, but perhaps our field geologists can improve on that. The scout is now surveying the rest of the gas giant/moon system. It would be nice if he found Sorium in the gas giant's atmosphere... then this spot would be ideal for a forward base.
 
I intend to build six of them, and to give them to my current Carrier captains, while other players take over the Mountain class Carriers.

Tentative names for the other three are Pegasus, Cephus and Cetus. All six names (and all six real-life constellations) are associated with the Perseus-rescuing-Andromeda myth. Cephus and Cassiopia were the parents of Andromeda, who was chained to a rock as an offering to placate the sea-monster Cetus. Perseus, riding Pegasus, slew Cetus and claimed Andromeda... only to dump her later.
 
blue emu said:
Tentative names for the other three are Pegasus, Cephus and Cetus. All six names (and all six real-life constellations) are associated with the Perseus-rescuing-Andromeda myth. Cephus and Cassiopia were the parents of Andromeda, who was chained to a rock as an offering to placate the sea-monster Cetus. Perseus, riding Pegasus, slew Cetus and claimed Andromeda... only to dump her later.
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Sounds good. Just a small point: it's Cassiopeia (with an additional e.) :)
 
Avernite said:
does our new carrier have a jump engine?
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No. I can't fit a jump engine on a 20,000-ton displacement if it must also carry a large hangar, magazine, and enough fuel tankage to support flight operations. The Carriers will require a 20,000-ton Battlecruiser (or similar design) to jump them in and out.

We've found yet another genetic modification center, and another free genetic tech, which increases high-Oxygen tolerance by another +10%
 
Cromelex said:
A planet/moon looking that good must have some dangers hiding nearby...
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Ewoks :eek:

Emu: What's your plan for resources? Just keep piling automated mines onto Moria? Do any of the colonies have enough useful minerals and population to run more regular mines once you have freighters free to ship them there? At what point will you start expanding the shipyards?
Also, what are my stats? :)

Edit: Also, also: How long does it take to build a full load of Streaks for the CVs? With the carriers being quick to build perhaps we can have them and upgraded escort ships ready for a new de-Prixing while the Battles upgrade.
 
blue emu said:
No. I can't fit a jump engine on a 20,000-ton displacement if it must also carry a large hangar, magazine, and enough fuel tankage to support flight operations. The Carriers will require a 20,000-ton Battlecruiser (or similar design) to jump them in and out.

We've found yet another genetic modification center, and another free genetic tech, which increases high-Oxygen tolerance by another +10%
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That sounds good!

After all, I was in the first 3 to get a battle class, so this new 20k ton battlecruiser might end up mine too... :D
 
blue emu said:
The mining world of Moria in the Procyon system is now up to 394 automated mines, and is producing 39,836 minerals per year... more than every other planet, moon, asteroid and comet in Known Space all added together. We continue to build and place mines on the planet as quickly as possible... the ore reserves on Moria are staggering: even at this rate of extraction, it will be literally thousands of years before they run out.
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Who is administrating this planet?
If it's not me - am I still busy on Titan?
 
Darkrenown said:
Ewoks :eek:

Emu: What's your plan for resources? Just keep piling automated mines onto Moria? Do any of the colonies have enough useful minerals and population to run more regular mines once you have freighters free to ship them there? At what point will you start expanding the shipyards?
Also, what are my stats? :)

Edit: Also, also: How long does it take to build a full load of Streaks for the CVs? With the carriers being quick to build perhaps we can have them and upgraded escort ships ready for a new de-Prixing while the Battles upgrade.
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My immediate resource plan is to keep piling mines onto Moria, correct. After it's up to 500 or so mines, we can start developing other worlds, which are more convenient to our Spinward colonies. I will probably start expanding the shipyards within two or three years. I've been shipping Earths's manual-labor mines out to Mars, since they have some ores and no further need of workers in the terraforming stations. Earth itself is nearly out of ores... the last traces of ores will be gone within a couple of years. We cut it pretty close.

Not sure how long it takes to build 57 Streaks. A year? A bit less?

Your stats: Crew Training rating 50, Fleet Initiative 105, History Buff.
 
randakar said:
Who is administrating this planet?
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The administrator with the highest +Mining modifier... +30%. He's an NPC, unfortunately.

A tentative design for our 20,000 ton Battlecruiser:

Hero class Battlecruiser 20,000 tons 2051 Crew 5011.6 BP TCS 400 TH 1144 EM 450
5720 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 7-65 Shields 15-250 Sensors 1/16/0/0 Damage Control Rating 24 PPV 54
Annual Failure Rate: 133% IFR: 1.9% Maint Capacity 3759 MSP Max Repair 1225 MSP Est Time: 1.65 Years
Magazine 422

J21000(3-50) Military Jump Drive Max Ship Size 21000 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3
Magneto-plasma Drive E8.4 (26) Power 88 Fuel Use 84% Signature 44 Armour 0 Exp 10%
Fuel Capacity 870,000 Litres Range 93.2 billion km (188 days at full power)
Delta R250/17.5 Shields (6) Total Fuel Cost 105 Litres per day

CIWS-200 (1x6) Range 1000 km TS: 20000 km/s ROF 5 Base 50% To Hit
Size 1 Missile Launcher (6) Missile Size 1 Rate of Fire 10
Size 6 Missile Launcher (8) Missile Size 6 Rate of Fire 45
Missile PD Fire Control 2046 FC14-R1 (70%) (2) Range 14.8m km Resolution 1
Missile Fire Control 2046 FC83-R100 (70%) (2) Range 83.2m km Resolution 100

Active PD Search Sensor 2046 MR15-R1 (70%) (1) GPS 140 Range 15.4m km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor 2046 MR69-R100 (70%) (1) GPS 6300 Range 69.3m km Resolution 100
EM Detection Sensor EM2-16 (1) Sensitivity 16 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 16m km

ECCM-1 (2) This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
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Seven layers of armor, eight offensive tubes with two long-range fire controls and two ECCM. Good sensors. Jump Capable.

Some tentative names: Agamemnon, Achilles, Ajax, Bryant.
 
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CptJoker said:
Might I also suggest Heracles (or Hercules if you prefer) and Odysseus?
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We've got a Hercules already... the Tugs are named after legendary strong-men. Hercules, Atlas, Sisyphus...
 
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