Starfighter Squadron

[GrievousKhan]

Hmm, this does look interesting.

[Jinxlynx]

Not arguing this at all but I find it strange labelling a carrier, that never sees battle, as the flagship of your fleet. They may be the core of battle fleet doctrine in the contemporary military but in space fleets, I figure the big giant ship with the matter accelerator cannons that can perform orbital bombardments to be the big fish in the pond and keeps the space carrier safe hiding behind it safe.

I guess it all depends on the technology structure and pseudo-science. If ships "teleport", jumping into and out of theater, then a specialized carrier with little armour makes sense. If not, you'd need it armoured up to survive long enough to recapture the fighters.

Actually in the W40k book "Cadian Blood" there is a ship just like the one you described, it's hull is mainly made up of 3 mile long cannon, and it is known as the bastard of the fleet, why? because it is utterly useless. The big gun cannot bombard a planet because it takes half hour to reload a single shell, and if it is to be doing any ship to ship combat with a thing like that it will have to be on the offensive and the captain better be praying they do not miss because a second shot might not be possible.

Now we are also making an argument on ship we have little information on but a carrier would not have any need for big guns when it has fighters and bombers on board that can deliver a much larger payload at a MUCH longer distance than a cannon, plus fighters are harder to intercept than dumb missiles and if shields are present they can probably fly past them or exploit a weakness on a part of the enemy ship that is always kept faced away from their attacker.
All the carrier really needs is a defense system, turrets to intercept incoming fire and enemy bombers, shields, and armor like you said, but other than that it has smaller ships to do all the major attacking for it, like the protoss carriers in Starcraft.
Oh and do not fail to remember that this is not a lone ship, the carrier will also be accompanied by other ships of smaller or similar size, Gunships, smaller carriers, even mining ships as it is a lead exploration vessel.
Do not base the value of a unit on the size of it's gun, because in the end it is only one gun, using the Protoss carriers as an example again I am pretty sure that anyone who has played Starcraft knows how annoying it was when it launched all the fighters, all of a sudden your battle cruiser with all it's power had 8 targets and not enough DPS to survive a prolonged attack.

[GrievousKhan]

How would a carrier deliver more payload then a cannon? Even if it's not a rail gun, space is empty, you can fire from basically the other side of a system, distances which would be beyond the reach of a basic fighter. Though I imagine even the most basic ship would have Anti fighter guns, and if they use laser technology good lock avoid those.

My two cents anyway. >.>

And why does it take so long to reload my I ask?

[Azena]

Two questions: -Are there more human colonies than just the ones you listed?
-Do we decide the call-signs, or you?

1) Nope. We're going to operate under the assumption that there were no worlds naturally capable to sustain human life so planets had to be terraformed which is very expensive and time-consuming so we've only managed the few we have.
2) I tried to stay in character. By Commanding Officer, I meant me. Since call-signs are given to a pilot by their squadmates, I'll let the other players decide yours and then add it to your file.

Not arguing this at all but I find it strange labelling a carrier, that never sees battle, as the flagship of your fleet. They may be the core of battle fleet doctrine in the contemporary military but in space fleets, I figure the big giant ship with the matter accelerator cannons that can perform orbital bombardments to be the big fish in the pond and keeps the space carrier safe hiding behind it safe.

I guess it all depends on the technology structure and pseudo-science. If ships "teleport", jumping into and out of theater, then a specialized carrier with little armour makes sense. If not, you'd need it armoured up to survive long enough to recapture the fighters.

Perhaps carrier was the wrong word, but the Zermic is not strictly a cruiser or destroyer either. The exterior visual is pretty much exactly what I had in mind. It's a heavily armored, well-armed assault vessel with a hangar in the rear for a few fighter squadrons. Just like our squad and the fighters we'll be using, it was designed to be as versatile as possible. So it can hold its own against Nevoan destroyers as well as deploy against enemy fighters and lead exploration and recon operations. Flagship was also the wrong word to use. Like the Normandy of Mass Effect, the Zermic is a unique vessel that is more of a gem in the fleet.


Guys this is great! I'm taking these into my notes and it will improve the RP experience for all of us. I'll continue to work on the OOC over the weekend so keep your thoughts coming. I'm taking everything into consideration. Hopefully we can get this finalized and ready for sign up by Monday.

[Jinxlynx]

How would a carrier deliver more payload then a cannon? Even if it's not a rail gun, space is empty, you can fire from basically the other side of a system, distances which would be beyond the reach of a basic fighter. Though I imagine even the most basic ship would have Anti fighter guns, and if they use laser technology good lock avoid those.

My two cents anyway. >.>

And why does it take so long to reload my I ask?

Space is a vacuum however and with recent testing it has been found that a vacuum has friction, while according to newtons law theoretically if you spin a ball in a vacuum it would spin forever, this however is not true, it was explained in a lot of big words but basically a vacuum has forces that act upon the ball to stop it's movement eventually, this means that a shell fired from a railgun would eventually lose it's momentum, self propelled weapons also can only be launched so far with limited fuel, a star fighter can coast and regulate fuel much better.
Space is also not empty, black holes, stars, comets, meteorites, planets, dust, ice, etc occupy space, if something was to be fired from point A to point B in place it would have to overcome the potential of gravitational forces from objects larger than it or the possibility of hitting debris.

as for the gun, the class of ship was a Dominator, I had the dimensions of the gun wrong however, the gun is called a Nova cannon, it is just over half a kilometre in length and the reason the ship is so undesirable is because of it's size, it has to be so big because the recoil of the gun would destroy any other ship smaller than it if the gun was mounted to it. Basically it if slow to move and is a huge target.
Now the actual gun fires a variety of different shell types and uses a series magnetic accelerators to launch the shell from ship at a speed that is a fraction of the which light travels, then it is accelerated even further with gravmetric coils as it travels through space. The actual shells themselves are all 50 meters in diameter, teams of slaves and slave drivers work to reload this weapon using cranes and work vehicles while the generators of the magnetic accelerators charge up.
An explosion the size of a small planet, blah blah blah.
Nobody likes it though because despite the power of the gun it is slow, clumsy, inaccurate, sucks at close range and paints a huge target on your forehead when your in the ship with this thing mounted on the front.

Also the Moonstone cannon from Skies of Arcadia ain't got nothing on a gun that rips temporary black holes into space.

[Assallya]

Well, for one, giant mass accelerator cannons are practically useless against fighters. That's what interceptor class fighters and point defense systems are for. Interceptors are lightly armed, with limited fuel supplies, are incredibly agile and quick fighters meant to hunt other fighters.

Regular fighters are the spearhead. Unlike interceptors they carry more fuel and armament for extended engagements in enemy theaters. They often lead in your bombers, fighter bombers, or dropships. They protect these other ships until they get their jobs done.

The question of course is, what types of these are we using? Personally, I'd go with Battlestar Galactica's concept of just using Interceptors for your standard fighter and a jack-of-all trades larger vessel that can be a gunship, communications/recon ship, or dropship depending on how it's outfitted. It keeps the variety of ships down. Personally, I'd call them Rapiers and Broadswords

[GrievousKhan]

Space is a vacuum however and with recent testing it has been found that a vacuum has friction, while according to newtons law theoretically if you spin a ball in a vacuum it would spin forever, this however is not true, it was explained in a lot of big words but basically a vacuum has forces that act upon the ball to stop it's movement eventually, this means that a shell fired from a railgun would eventually lose it's momentum, self propelled weapons also can only be launched so far with limited fuel, a star fighter can coast and regulate fuel much better.
Space is also not empty, black holes, stars, comets, meteorites, planets, dust, ice, etc occupy space, if something was to be fired from point A to point B in place it would have to overcome the potential of gravitational forces from objects larger than it or the possibility of hitting debris.

as for the gun, the class of ship was a Dominator, I had the dimensions of the gun wrong however, the gun is called a Nova cannon, it is just over half a kilometre in length and the reason the ship is so undesirable is because of it's size, it has to be so big because the recoil of the gun would destroy any other ship smaller than it if the gun was mounted to it. Basically it if slow to move and is a huge target.
Now the actual gun fires a variety of different shell types and uses a series magnetic accelerators to launch the shell from ship at a speed that is a fraction of the which light travels, then it is accelerated even further with gravmetric coils as it travels through space. The actual shells themselves are all 50 meters in diameter, teams of slaves and slave drivers work to reload this weapon using cranes and work vehicles while the generators of the magnetic accelerators charge up.
An explosion the size of a small planet, blah blah blah.
Nobody likes it though because despite the power of the gun it is slow, clumsy, inaccurate, sucks at close range and paints a huge target on your forehead when your in the ship with this thing mounted on the front.

Also the Moonstone cannon from Skies of Arcadia ain't got nothing on a gun that rips temporary black holes into space.

Interesting, though I knew of course there were debris in space.

Though pin-point defense cannons (likely energy based) would still be the biggest threat to fighters.

[Lupus]

Color me interested.

[Cpt Toellner]

OOC?

[Azena]

You ask and you shall receive.

The OOC!

I am satisfied with this to get sign-ups started and we will continue to improve the lore and build the world from their. As it says in the OOC post, I'm looking for help with this to improve the experience so hop on over and lets get this grueling cut-throat sign-up underway!