Most Intimidating Spaceship.

[Somebloke]

Actually, I never watched BSG past somewhere in the first season, so I never saw that part. I merely looked at the design and observed its massive and glaring structural weaknesses.

Escorting convoys? If there's decent fighter coverage, they're going to have to be spread out, meaning that its real easy to blow them up as they come in, or if they regroup before engaging, waste as much of the convoy as possible before jumping out. And why is the convoy in realspace anyway?

Delivering ordnance from closer? Let's think this one through. A missile is a notably small projectile that does not have a human in it and can thus accelerate faster than a fighter can. A fighter is a much larger projectile carrying a human, which limits its acceleration, and also makes it a bigger and easier target. Again, if that fighter gets scragged before it launches its missile, all of those missiles were wasted. In addition, a missile only needs to carry enough fuel to get it to the target, a fighter carrying a missile needs enough fuel to get out, launch the missile and then get back. It requires more fuel, risk and resources to do the same thing. So technically yes, it a fighter could launch missiles from closer, but getting the missiles closer is probably more dangerous and inefficient than just launching from a long distance.

Getting ahead of, and cutting off a pirate? That's what ftl is for. Just jump next to the sucker, then start shooting stuff of the enemy ship until the crew decides that they would like to keep their life support intact, thank's very much. Fighters have to make a long approach through realspace, getting shot at the entire way.

Breaking a blockade? How about standing off from the base starts, and shooting stuff at them until they were forced to launch fighters to deal with you, then as soon as they close, jump to the other side of the star, away from the fighters and continue the bombardment while the fighters reverse and move towards you again. Works just fine and is way less risky.

The other problem is, that as I pointed out, fighters need time to deploy, making the carrier hidieously vulnerable to being ambushed. Roughly like a modern carrier and a submarine- only this is submarine with battleship armor and guns. Fighters without ftl capability only make this worse. Finally, there's the problem of armor. Most settings I've seen have the general warships being ~ 1 kilometer long. You can pack a darn lot of armor onto a kilometer of warship and still have room for guns on the outside. Enough armor to completely ignore the sort of guns that can be put on a fighter. Since the fighter is not bringing anything useful to the table beyond its dubious ability to launch missiles, they can simply be written off as threats and mopped up with point defense at leasure. A carrier type ship meanwhile has to store all of its fighters (read weapon systems) internally when not in use. This takes space from being used for things like, say armor and heavy guns, making it a very vulnerable ship.

Three things a carrier can do that a capital ship cannot:

a) Be in two places at once. A capital ship cannot, for example, guard a convoy and assault an enemy fleet some distance away. It will need to decide between assaulting the enemy (leaving the fleet vulnerable) or guard the fleet, leaving the enemy to escape or plot an attack. For that matter, the capital ship cannot even effectively defend the large fleet from two attacks in two simultaneous directions (recall the away fighters tying up the raiders in '33' before a jump). It could not set up the multiple-pronged assaults used in the series (such as the assult on the mines, whereby some fighters drew away the enemy fleet and others attacked). It could not engage several fleets at once (such as when the pegasus and the galactica engaged the two basestars, leaving the fighters free to attack the Ressurection ship in series 2). It cannot recon an area properly either- imagine the outcome of Water, where the survival of the fleet dependend on a quick survey of the surrounding systems- without a fleet of raptors to investigate, the Galactica would have had to investigate each planet on it's own, dragging the fleet with it for the sake of protection. End result- everyone would have died from dehydration.

b) Assault enemies from a safe distance. Assume you have a missile capable of attacking the enemy over, say, 20km of distance. So does the enemy. Only you, having a fighter fleet capable of flying up to 30km away, can simply equip the fighters with said missiles and then attack from 50km away with absolutely no risk to your own ship- this is precisely why carriers dominated during WW2- they were able to project ordinance from far greater distances by means of planes.

c) rely on a greater depth of versitility. Engaging in ship-to-ship action? Load up with fighters. Preparing to bombard the surface? Make sure you have plenty of bombers. Being used as a transport? Time to stock up on helicopters/heavy raiders. With a little foresight you can quickly match the carrier to the job- something that just cannot be done with a capital ship.

As to your problems mentioned above:

- Fighters only need to get within missile range to be a threat to another ship. While this is risky for the fighter, it is just as risky for the capital ship, and you only have one of them.

- Fighters do need time to launch. That's why BSG always had fighter patrols and standby fighters in case of emergencies.

- dealing with spread out fighters might be easy, but firing on unarmed convoy ships is easier. At the very least the fighters can tie up the enemy fleet long enough for a jump to be made- and if the enemy fleet is dividing their forces, doesn't this make it even footing again?

[warty goblin]

Three things a carrier can do that a capital ship cannot:

a) Be in two places at once. A capital ship cannot, for example, guard a convoy and assault an enemy fleet some distance away. It will need to decide between assaulting the enemy (leaving the fleet vulnerable) or guard the fleet, leaving the enemy to escape or plot an attack. For that matter, the capital ship cannot even effectively defend the large fleet from two attacks in two simultaneous directions (recall the away fighters tying up the raiders in '33' before a jump). It could not set up the multiple-pronged assaults used in the series (such as the assult on the mines, whereby some fighters drew away the enemy fleet and others attacked). It could not engage several fleets at once (such as when the pegasus and the galactica engaged the two basestars, leaving the fighters free to attack the Ressurection ship in series 2). It cannot recon an area properly either- imagine the outcome of Water, where the survival of the fleet dependend on a quick survey of the surrounding systems- without a fleet of raptors to investigate, the Galactica would have had to investigate each planet on it's own, dragging the fleet with it for the sake of protection. End result- everyone would have died from dehydration.

b) Assault enemies from a safe distance. Assume you have a missile capable of attacking the enemy over, say, 20km of distance. So does the enemy. Only you, having a fighter fleet capable of flying up to 30km away, can simply equip the fighters with said missiles and then attack from 50km away with absolutely no risk to your own ship- this is precisely why carriers dominated during WW2- they were able to project ordinance from far greater distances by means of planes.

c) rely on a greater depth of versitility. Engaging in ship-to-ship action? Load up with fighters. Preparing to bombard the surface? Make sure you have plenty of bombers. Being used as a transport? Time to stock up on helicopters/heavy raiders. With a little foresight you can quickly match the carrier to the job- something that just cannot be done with a capital ship.

As to your problems mentioned above:

- Fighters only need to get within missile range to be a threat to another ship. While this is risky for the fighter, it is just as risky for the capital ship, and you only have one of them.

- Fighters do need time to launch. That's why BSG always had fighter patrols and standby fighters in case of emergencies.

- dealing with spread out fighters might be easy, but firing on unarmed convoy ships is easier. At the very least the fighters can tie up the enemy fleet long enough for a jump to be made- and if the enemy fleet is dividing their forces, doesn't this make it even footing again?

A) I really don't see why a dedicated and heavily armored cap ship can't guard and engage an enemy fleet- just take a position between the convoy and the enemy fleet, and use weapons with long effective ranges like high powered railguns and point defense on any incoming missiles. Projecting force over long range is not a problem for a ship when there's unlimited line of sight. And again, why the hell isn't the convoy moving ftl?

A cap ship with sensible weapons placement can fire in multiple directions at multiple targets without a problem. The assault on the mines would be a piece of cake for a heavily armored capital ship- jump in over the mines and waste the defenses from a distance and suck up their puny anti-fighter attacks. I never denied that a complement of scout craft were essential for recon- but the Raptors are not fighters, they are small support ships, which I agree are very useful. There's no reason that a pure battleship shouldn't have a few on board anyway, being able to launch a couple of recon ships does not a carrier make.

B) Engage at long range: Missiles really shouldn't have a maximum range in space if they are intelligently designed with onboard targeting and guidence. All that they are limited by is the amount of fuel you put on them (limiting the total acceleration they are capable of) and how patient you are about them reaching the target. Even if this is the case, while the carrier is pulling its "launch fighters and pepper the cap ship from long range" the battleship, which can mount weapons vastly superior to the carrier, like say a railgun 3/4 its own length integrated into the hull, can blow the carrier out of the sky.

[factotum]

I'd have to go with the Vorlon Planet Killer from Babylon 5. As the name implies it can destroy a planet with a single shot. At 45 km. in length, it's more efficient than the Death Star, but not as efficient as the Lexx.

Er, no it can't. Dialogue in B5 indicates that they were actually getting survivors off worlds that had been hit with a Vorlon planet-killer, so if it doesn't even kill everyone on the surface, it can hardly be destroying the entire world. In this respect the Shadow planet-killer is actually more efficient, since NOBODY gets off a world that's been hit with one of those!

[warty goblin]

Er, no it can't. Dialogue in B5 indicates that they were actually getting survivors off worlds that had been hit with a Vorlon planet-killer, so if it doesn't even kill everyone on the surface, it can hardly be destroying the entire world. In this respect the Shadow planet-killer is actually more efficient, since NOBODY gets off a world that's been hit with one of those!

huh, I always thought that those survivors were people who had evacuated the planet before it was hit. Shots of the planet-killer moving through a large number of really quite big chunks of rock indicated at least to me that they basically reduced the planet to rubble. Of course I could be wrong...

[Somebloke]

A) I really don't see why a dedicated and heavily armored cap ship can't guard and engage an enemy fleet- just take a position between the convoy and the enemy fleet, and use weapons with long effective ranges like high powered railguns and point defense on any incoming missiles. Projecting force over long range is not a problem for a ship when there's unlimited line of sight. And again, why the hell isn't the convoy moving ftl?

A cap ship with sensible weapons placement can fire in multiple directions at multiple targets without a problem. The assault on the mines would be a piece of cake for a heavily armored capital ship- jump in over the mines and waste the defenses from a distance and suck up their puny anti-fighter attacks. I never denied that a complement of scout craft were essential for recon- but the Raptors are not fighters, they are small support ships, which I agree are very useful. There's no reason that a pure battleship shouldn't have a few on board anyway, being able to launch a couple of recon ships does not a carrier make.

B) Engage at long range: Missiles really shouldn't have a maximum range in space if they are intelligently designed with onboard targeting and guidence. All that they are limited by is the amount of fuel you put on them (limiting the total acceleration they are capable of) and how patient you are about them reaching the target. Even if this is the case, while the carrier is pulling its "launch fighters and pepper the cap ship from long range" the battleship, which can mount weapons vastly superior to the carrier, like say a railgun 3/4 its own length integrated into the hull, can blow the carrier out of the sky.

A) "Admiral Tarkin, the rebel base will be within line of sight of the death star shortly. In the meantime, they've launched fighters at us..."

As for the fleet example-

The convoy is spooling up their FTL drives- and the enemy fighters are using your own fleet as cover, as any sensible fighter would. And in case you're thinking about maneuvering closer, the base-star is still bearing down on you. Sure, you're superior weaponry will deal with that, but in the meantime...

Sure, FTL can mean that the ship can move distances quickly, but it cannot be in two places at once- and with fights like the escape from New Caprica, being in two places was essential. Someone had to hold off those five base-stars, and someone else had to deal with the ground defences below.

b) When you consider the possibilities inherent with FTL, it's entirely possible to have your fighters engage when you carrier is in the next star system- like the cylons regularly do.

And a capital ship does not automatically trump a fighter assault- again, look at WW2 examples. Sometimes all the dedicated anti-aircraft weapons in the world will not protect you from a lucky shot, especially if the fighters are dedicated ship-killers.

Look at it this way- think of a capital ship as a ship with weapons platforms attached. Think of a carrier as a ship with weapons platforms that can detatch themselves and fly around independantly of the ship. Your options multiply tenfold.

[warty goblin]

Sorry, my above response is incomplete, I had to dash halfway through writing it.

Anyway, I decided that this topic deserved its own thread, found here:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...22#post3502022

[factotum]

huh, I always thought that those survivors were people who had evacuated the planet before it was hit.

Doesn't make any sense to assume that--the Vorlon ship would presumably jump out of hyperspace very close to the target world and wouldn't hang around before firing, so the chances of anybody getting off the ground before the ship did its job are miniscule.

[Dervag]

I'm going to have to go with the Sa-Matra.

If you've played Star Control 2, you know why.

That's one interpretation of the book. Ie, yours. Other people may interpret it differently, and without the author's personal word on what his work means, we can't say that they're right or wrong, as long as they have well-reasoned evidence.

However, in this case, we do have the author's personal word. Nor does the reader in question have well-reasoned evidence, since by his own admission he did not try to understand or even completely read the book.

Sometimes, an opinion really is foolish and ill-informed. It happens.

I have not read the book myself, but I think that a case could be made that Heinlein was glorifying martialism and militarism.

But how do you know that without reading the book?

Any time a five mile long ship can be destroyed by one single fighter crashing into it, I maintain its time to go shoot the entire engineering department responsible. Makes the others more motivated. Could have been done with a missile anyway.

Keep in mind that this was the same Galactic Empire that gave the world "a small exhaust port, just below the main port."

[Talkkno]

Keep in mind that this was the same Galactic Empire that gave the world "a small exhaust port, just below the main port."

Mostly Palatine's arrgonace, since in Heir to the Empire I think Peallon complains on how Paply countinued with the project despite the weakness.

[Lord Zentei]

Any time a five mile long ship can be destroyed by one single fighter crashing into it, I maintain its time to go shoot the entire engineering department responsible. Makes the others more motivated.

Over eleven miles, actually (eleven miles, because one can take screencaps of the action and see that the Executor is at least 11 times as long as the Star Destroyers in front of it -- consistently so). The "five mile fallacy" is a result of West End Games basically pulling numbers out of their collective butts.

In the Executor's defense, Admiral Ackbar said "concentrate all firepower on that super star destroyer", and the novelization made more meat out of that sentence... though the movie obviously did not. <sigh>

Could have been done with a missile anyway.

Indeed.

[Talkkno]

Indeed.

Jamming good enough to distort space time was running down that port...

[Lord Zentei]

Jamming good enough to distort space time was running down that port...

And Star Wars AIs are pretty much human-level. Unless the human can use the Force.

[warty goblin]

Keep in mind that this was the same Galactic Empire that gave the world "a small exhaust port, just below the main port."

I maintain that somewhere when Palpatine was signing stuff to become Emperor, he accidentally signed a contract obligating the placement of small weaknesses on all major weapons systems. The "Contractual Plot Failure" if you will.

[Talkkno]

And Star Wars AIs are pretty much human-level. Unless the human can use the Force.

"Luke! Use the force!"

[Lord Zentei]

"Luke! Use the force!"

Aye. Though the A-wing pilot who crashed into the Executor was no Luke Skywalker.

[Kojiro Kakita]

While I do agree with LordVader that The ships of the Necrons and the Tau are formidable, he forgets the greatest ship ever made

Vaul's Hammer, aka Black Stone Fortress.

(It took down a C'tan permanently).

[Dervag]

Mostly Palatine's arrgonace, since in Heir to the Empire I think Peallon complains on how Paply countinued with the project despite the weakness.

Would it have been that hard to design the thing with some internal baffles that would stop an incoming torpedo from blasting right through? Gaaah!

Then again, real-life warships have been designed with similar weakenesses, such as the British battlecruisers with no flash protection on the magazines- so a hit that penetrated the (very thin) deck armor, as long-range artillery fire is prone to do, and reached the magazine, would spread to all the magazines, and ignite any spilled powder in the turrets, causing the entire ship to be blown to bits with 99.9% casualties.

It happened. Three times. In the same battle.

[Dave Rapp]

Hmm. I nominate THIS:



Yes, that's a LEGO set. Over 5,000 pieces and about a yard long when finished.

I also wish to nominate the ship that is described during the following story:

"Dude, I got an idea."
"What's your idea?"
"A black hole gun."
"A black hole gun?"
"A black hole gun."
"How does its ammo not destroy itself?"
"Antigravity."
"Dude."
"Yeah, I know."
"But dude, black holes are too small."
"Black holes are too small?"
"Black holes are too small."
"What beats a black hole?"
"Two black holes."
"Or three."
"Wait. Let's use one of those really big supermassive black holes in the middle of galaxies."
"Oh snap."
"Yeah."
"You know what beats a supermassive black hole?"
"What beats a supermassive black hole?"
"Two of them."
"Wait. You know the big bang and how the universe was all a singularity thing before that?"
"Yeah?"
"Let's fire that thing."
"zomfg."
"Yeah."
"But where will we get one?"
"Alternate dimensions that haven't big banged yet."
"zomfg again. Also nerdgasm."
"Yeah."
*based on an actual conversation I once had while trying to figure out a way to win a god-modding contest. (long story, don't ask)

Okay... technically what was described there was a weapon, not a ship. But, well, stick it on any ship and...

[Nerd-o-rama]

Well, based on a conversation I just had with a friend regarding your post:

Perhaps. But that can be countered!
LAZENGANN
OVERLOAD

(PS: Studio Gainax wins at godmodding contests)

[factotum]

Would it have been that hard to design the thing with some internal baffles that would stop an incoming torpedo from blasting right through? Gaaah!

Well, this port was a secondary port--presumably the "main" port WAS protected in some way or they would have dumped the torpedoes straight down that. Even the secondary port did have some sort of protection--note that the briefing said the shaft was race-unitted (or something like that) so the fighters would have to use proton torpedoes, e.g. standard turbolasers wouldn't work.

The other point, of course, was that the Death Star designers weren't considering that anyone would be insane enough to attack a 120km armoured battlestation in fighter craft!

As for the British battlecruiser problem, even after they fixed the design issues, the things still blew up (see the Hood for an example). Why? Because the Royal Navy prized speed of fire above all else, and to this end the gunners would often leave the installed baffle doors OPEN in order to speed up transport of ammunition from the magazines. See also the case of the Britannic, which was running in mine-infested waters with all its watertight compartment doors open; had they been shut, the ship would easily have survived its encounter with a mine. In short, humans make mistakes all the time, but you only tend to hear about them when they cause a disaster of some kind.

[SDF]

The rebels weren't even supposed to know about it, many Bothans died bringing them the information ;P

[Destro_Yersul]

I found something pretty awesome.

This site has size comparisons for all the spaceships you could ever want, as well as the original source of each ship. People running IE even get to move the ships around on the page in order to compare individual ships.

[Emperor Ing]

"Dude, I got an idea."
"What's your idea?"
"A black hole gun."
"A black hole gun?"
"A black hole gun."
"How does its ammo not destroy itself?"
"Antigravity."
"Dude."
"Yeah, I know."
"But dude, black holes are too small."
"Black holes are too small?"
"Black holes are too small."
"What beats a black hole?"
"Two black holes."
"Or three."
"Wait. Let's use one of those really big supermassive black holes in the middle of galaxies."
"Oh snap."
"Yeah."
"You know what beats a supermassive black hole?"
"What beats a supermassive black hole?"
"Two of them."
"Wait. You know the big bang and how the universe was all a singularity thing before that?"
"Yeah?"
"Let's fire that thing."
"zomfg."
"Yeah."
"But where will we get one?"
"Alternate dimensions that haven't big banged yet."
"zomfg again. Also nerdgasm."
"Yeah."
*based on an actual conversation I once had while trying to figure out a way to win a god-modding contest. (long story, don't ask)

Okay... technically what was described there was a weapon, not a ship. But, well, stick it on any ship and...

There is no question that you won that contest.