Armor values

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BattleRaptor
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Re: Armor values

Post by BattleRaptor »

Rosen_Ritter_1
I didnt post what you are responding too...

I couldnt be bothered after your claim about weapons.. despite the fact Terran ship specs show the cruisers carry mostly railguns.. while the Heavy cruiser carries 2 more heavy lasers then heavy railguns, but the railguns shoot 8 times faster.

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Rosen_Ritter_1
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Re: Armor values

Post by Rosen_Ritter_1 »

BattleRaptor wrote:Rosen_Ritter_1
I didnt post what you are responding too...
Whoops. My bad.
BattleRaptor wrote: I couldnt be bothered after your claim about weapons.. despite the fact Terran ship specs show the cruisers carry mostly railguns.. while the Heavy cruiser carries 2 more heavy lasers then heavy railguns, but the railguns shoot 8 times faster.
But you felt bothered enough to say you couldn't be bothered? :?


And cruisers don't carry *mostly* railguns.

Centaur Class cruiser
04 Heavy Laser
04 Heavy Mass Driver
04 Point-Defense Laser
02 Missile Tubes
01 Anti-Missile Launchers

America class cruiser
08 Heavy Laser
06 Heavy Mass Driver
08 Point-Defense Laser
04 Missile Tubes
02 Anti-Missile Launchers

Even if you discount the point defense lasers, it seems that only a couple of the lighter classes carry more mass drivers than they do laser batteries.



Though I'm not sure what your point about the railguns rate of fire is. Yes. That's quite useful, but that doesn't really make the weapon all that more effective at the ranges these engagements are happening in. Not when even an Umiak battle group can camp out at a hundred thousand kilometers away from you, kill all your ships, take a four hour nap and still have over half an hour to evade your incoming rail gun salvo.

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Ktrain
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Re: Armor values

Post by Ktrain »

Rosen_Ritter_1 wrote:Not when even an Umiak battle group can camp out at a hundred thousand kilometers away from you, kill all your ships, take a four hour nap and still have over half an hour to evade your incoming rail gun salvo.
Umm (digression)? I thought Umiak went weeks without sleeping, would they even be capable of napping? :)
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Rosen_Ritter_1
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Re: Armor values

Post by Rosen_Ritter_1 »

Ktrain wrote: Umm (digression)? I thought Umiak went weeks without sleeping, would they even be capable of napping? :)
Ok, that was a lie. They're really watching episodes of My Little Pony Friendship is magic. The philosophy of friendship being magical greatly suits their collectivist friendship valuing mentality.


The Loroi will soon be seeing some rather strange markings on newly constructed Umiak warships.

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Re: Armor values

Post by icekatze »

hi hi

The power of friendship, humanity's greatest weapon cannot be stopped by armor or screens. :P

BattleRaptor
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Re: Armor values

Post by BattleRaptor »

95-98.5%(besides missiles) of the damage output of Terran ships comes from Mass Drivers.

Railguns are Terran ships Primary Weapon

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Ktrain
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Re: Armor values

Post by Ktrain »

Image

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Rosen_Ritter_1
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Re: Armor values

Post by Rosen_Ritter_1 »

BattleRaptor wrote:95-98.5%(besides missiles) of the damage output of Terran ships comes from Mass Drivers.

Railguns are Terran ships Primary Weapon
95-98.5% of the theoretical damage output of a Terran ship comes from it's Mass Drivers. In practice I severely doubt there'd be many conditions where a Terran ship could get close enough (even against another Terran ship) to manage a hit with a Mass Driver round.
Ktrain wrote:Image

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NOMAD
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Re: Armor values

Post by NOMAD »

Ktrain wrote:Image

(I should be studying real analysis right now but naaaa.)
Ktrain, you just made my day, thx mates :lol: :P
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TrashMan
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Re: Armor values

Post by TrashMan »

You shouldn't really put any values under too much scrutiny.
Blaster (beam cannons) should have just as big range/damage problems as lasers, but the description mentions the Loroi found a way around it. If he chose to, he could have just as easily written that humans found ways to get rid of all friction in mass drivers...or something.

While Arioch has demonstrated he has ample knowledge of physics, he IS writing a story about hot space-elves. His story is sci-fi, so certain liberties will be taken here and there. Nothing major tough.
I'd rate Outsuder to be somewhat harder than most sci-fi comics/stories out there. So relax and enjoy the story...which just got VERY interesting.. :mrgreen:

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Rosen_Ritter_1
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Re: Armor values

Post by Rosen_Ritter_1 »

TrashMan wrote:You shouldn't really put any values under too much scrutiny.
Blaster (beam cannons) should have just as big range/damage problems as lasers, but the description mentions the Loroi found a way around it. If he chose to, he could have just as easily written that humans found ways to get rid of all friction in mass drivers...or something.
No. Not as easily. Since the premise for the story is that humanity is technologically inferior to the Loroi/Umiak.

That's one reason why I DO like sitting down and thinking about the Outsider background extensively. Because Airoch HAS managed to achieve a high level of consistency to his partially realistic tech.

dfacto
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Re: Armor values

Post by dfacto »

Arioch wrote:The "baffles" created by the engine exhaust extends well behind the ship; putting the turrets out on stalks won't solve this problem.
I don't see how this matters. You won't shoot your own engines, and with the extreme ranges we're talking about you would still be able to put all three turrets on targets within a wide cone (past a certain intersect point of the fire arcs.

As for the engine disturbance, unless that's an implicit way engines work in outsider, I see no reason why you would have any significant particle/EM backscatter in a vacuum, especially backscatter so intense that it would blind your sensors even if they are placed well away from your engines.
by moving the engines closer together you reduce the maneuverability provided by differential thrust of the engines.
The current Loroi configuration would mainly give rotational (and translational) mobility around the y axis and, assuming the baffles can thrust vector, rotation around the z axis. A 30g acceleration for that kind of limited maneuverability is extreme overkill and not a serious design consideration. You could get more than enough thrust, and in all necessary directions, from attitude jets placed around the hull.

I assumed that the engines were placed wide apart to prevent the destruction of both engines in case of explosion, but the Wintertide's fate seems to make that a moot point.
It's not that hard to momentarily change the heading of the ship to bring your weapons to bear without significantly affecting your acceleration.
I would agree with you if it weren't for the massive missile spam the Umiak employ. That makes it impossible to just fire off a few shots and get away clean, so having the ability to run and gun would ensure very low/nonexistent hit ratios.
there are very few circumstances in which the Loroi would want to present their vulnerable tails to the enemy.
And I have to ask for the specifics of why. Is this table canonical? http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/6957 ... 937078.gif

If so the Loroi can cruise outside of Umiak range with absolute impunity, and pick them off without worrying about their engines being vulnerable. The maximum range of the Umiak weaponry is under 300,000 km, while the Loroi pulse cannon's effective range is 300,000 km. The Umiak can only hope to chase the Loroi away with missile spam and then run. If they don't the Loroi kill them. HARD.

The fact that the Loroi have been going back and forth with the Umiak for years, sustaining heavy losses, shows that either A) They aren't too bright, or B) The weapons ranges aren't canonical.

discord
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Re: Armor values

Post by discord »

dfacto: in a run and gun scenario you are depicting you are correct, the loroi would be able to inflict massive amounts of damage that way, BUT(and as some say, everything before the 'but' in a sentence is pointless) the loroi would run out of gas before the umiak would, leaving them dead in space, so if they could not annihilate the entire umiak taskforce, the loroi would lose the engagement...

that is also not considering that you would have to match velocities, something that is a non trivial task if the other side is not cooperating, keeping a specific range(in this case 300 thousand km give or take ten thousand, to stay outside the umiak range while staying inside reasonably effective range of their own guns) which might sound easy....it's not.

and again, this would leave the support ships in a bad situation, since they have lower acceleration....which removes the loroi ability to refuel....meaning that even if the loroi kill ALL the enemy ships, the taskforce doing it would be lost due to fuel problems.

as the old saying goes, amateurs talk about strategy, professionals talk about logistics.

and just to poke YET another hole in the 'run and gun' theory, umiak gunboats are just as fast as loroi ships(or in some cases faster), which creates a 'outrunning a pack of dogs' situation, volleys of umiak torpedoes would damage and slow down loroi ships, giving the command crew the choice of either leaving the damaged ships defenseless, or stopping the run and gun tactic, neither very palatable, and the more armored and gunned side is the front, so the ships would have to flip rather often to engage with defensive fire against torpedoes AND actually shooting back at the hostile ships, that lowers acceleration....

basically, the theory is sound and simple, but actually doing it is not so easy.
or to quote clausewitz.
“Everything in war is simple, but the simplest thing is difficult. The difficulties accumulate and end by producing a kind of friction that is inconceivable unless one has experienced war.”

dfacto
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Re: Armor values

Post by dfacto »

Fuel: The task force has been operational in the Naam system for some time, has already engaged the Umiak once, is currently engaging them again, and will have enough spare to leave the system. Whatever the Loroi fuel reserves are, they must be enough to implement hit and run tactics effectively or else they wouldn't be able to implement any tactic effectively.

Logistics: So the Loroi will be hamstrung by the logistics of refueling, but the Umiak will not? The Loroi can outrun the Umiak heavies at partial acceleration, while the Umiak will need full thrust, thereby expending more fuel. Yes, the Loroi may need full thrust to stay ahead of torpedoes and gunboats, but then again considering the perfect kill ratio in the last panels they may also simply accelerate away just fast enough to stay ahead of the heavy hitters.

Maneuvering: Yes, it's a tall order to stay at just the right ranges and at just the right location, but the ranges we're talking about here are up to 100,000 km, and the Loroi have a clear edge in positioning due to the Farsensing device.

Are your observations valid? Absolutely. Are they absolute? No way. As with all things, the truth would probably lie between both extremes. And if it did the Loroi should still be in better shape than they currently are. (By which I mean in the meta-story, not the last few panels. I know that's a strategy taken of necessity)

EDIT: Actually, checking the max acceleration again it looks like the Loroi and Umiak are more or less even. This makes it harder or impossible to outrun the Umiak, but accelerating away from the enemy at the same speed as them would still greatly increase the time in which you can engage them at beyond their maximum range.

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Rosen_Ritter_1
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Re: Armor values

Post by Rosen_Ritter_1 »

dfacto wrote:Fuel: The task force has been operational in the Naam system for some time, has already engaged the Umiak once, is currently engaging them again, and will have enough spare to leave the system. Whatever the Loroi fuel reserves are, they must be enough to implement hit and run tactics effectively or else they wouldn't be able to implement any tactic effectively.
That doesn't necessarily mean they can afford to base their entire strategy around non stop 30G acceleration away from the enemy.
dfacto wrote: EDIT: Actually, checking the max acceleration again it looks like the Loroi and Umiak are more or less even. This makes it harder or impossible to outrun the Umiak, but accelerating away from the enemy at the same speed as them would still greatly increase the time in which you can engage them at beyond their maximum range.
This is only a useful tactic if the Umiak strategy is purely to destroy Loroi ships. The Umiak are on the offensive, and the Loroi are defending. A Loroi raiding force can't afford to just boost away at 30G
dfacto wrote: Logistics: So the Loroi will be hamstrung by the logistics of refueling, but the Umiak will not? The Loroi can outrun the Umiak heavies at partial acceleration, while the Umiak will need full thrust, thereby expending more fuel. Yes, the Loroi may need full thrust to stay ahead of torpedoes and gunboats, but then again considering the perfect kill ratio in the last panels they may also simply accelerate away just fast enough to stay ahead of the heavy hitters.
It's not as big of a deal since Umiak warships have about twice the max acceleration time as the Loroi. And as you noted earlier, there's only actually a 4-6 G acceleration difference between the two sides ships. Loroi ships don't outrun the Umiak by that large of a margin and they're still at a significant fuel economy disadvantage.


Here's the problem with this completely evasive strategy.

-Loroi fleet Approach's Umiak
-Umiak attack Loroi fleet with skirmishers
-Loroi accelerate away at 30G to gain more time to gain more room to shoot at the Umiak
-The Main Umiak fleet carries on their objective to attack static Loroi positions
-The Loroi now have to burn an equal amount of fuel to stop as they did to speed away from the skirmisher screen. They need to burn even more to catch up with the Umiak.
-If the Umiak turn around, the Loroi have to again cancel their velocity and start accelerating in the other direction

This is a VERY fuel intensive process. And while the Umiak are certianly going to take casualties, their ships are very tough and they have allot of them. And the Loroi will have to stop maneuvering like this at some point. Either when they run out of fuel, or that gigantic horde of Umiak warships starts descending on a target that can't run away.

dfacto
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Re: Armor values

Post by dfacto »

Instead of doing point by point, let me just break down the way I'm thinking of theoretical engagements.

Keep in mind that this would only be workable for the Steppes where interdiction fleets intercept the Umiak. If you have to defend a world, then you just have to put your big guns forward and duke it out.

-Head on: This would be the worst possible way to meet the Umiak. With an initial velocity vector towards the also moving (and possibly accelerating) Umiak, the Loroi would have to turn their ships around and accelerate at full burn in the opposite direction. Considering engagement ranges are far shorter than detection ranges (except in systems like Naam) the Loroi would probably still be able to stay out of Umiak range, but would burn massive amounts of fuel. Once they match velocity with the Umiak, they would not need to accelerate further to avoid gunboats and torpedoes since we've already seen that Loroi defenses are formidable even when meeting accelerating forces head on. With matching velocity vectors they would be even better.

The Loroi would heavily damage the Umiak forces, but they would greatly drain their fuel reserves, and might be in real trouble if the Umiak brought a lot of ships and missiles to the party.

Chasing: The Umiak could accelerate and run immediately, and the Loroi would be unable to catch any but the largest and slowest ships. A Umiak attempt to turn around and close would be futile since the Loroi could just as well turn around and fly away while shooting. Sending missiles and gunboats to disrupt the closing Loroi would be futile, since the whole concept of that strategy is to allow the heavies to close, not for the missiles and gunboats to do any real damage. We've already seen that they can't do much. All in all a good way to meet the Umiak if you want to chase them away from something, but in terms of battle just not an effective scenario.

Perpendicular approach: The best scenario. Initially accelerate towards the Umiak from the sides. They can choose to change course and run, in which case as above they will lose their heavies and abandon their course. They can choose to turn and intercept, which would allow the Loroi to also turn away and take a parallel course to the Umiak (out of range) and rake them with fire. Or the Loroi could choose to run away while matching speed with greater efficiency then meeting the Umiak head on. If the Umiak maintain course the Loroi can pull up short, assume a parallel course, and harass them with impunity.

Ideally you would use your farseeing device to detect the enemies rough direction of travel and send two task forces to close from each side. If the Umiak run towards any one flank they open themselves to raking fire from one flank, and lose their heavies to the other flank. If they maintain course or take a course away from both flanks they take fire from both sides.


Is this the end all be all victory strategy? No, the Umiak have a big advantage in numbers, and this is all somewhat theoretical, as discord said. But what it does illustrate, and to me quite clearly, is that having the ability to fire in all directions would be a huge boon to the Loroi, and would expand their tactical repertoire while reducing their losses. Space is 3d; having a 360 firing arc is a huge advantage. You can chase, you can close, you can broadside, you can do a whole lot more than if you have to turn your entire ships and break acceleration in order to fire.

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Re: Armor values

Post by bunnyboy »

Turret is only expensive weak point, if you only need to point your vehicle to enemy.
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Re: Armor values

Post by Tash »

Based on observation of the Naam battle, it appears that turreted weapons- blasters and possibly pulse cannons- do have a wide field of fire.
It hardly seems to be a matter of having to turn about and point straight at the enemy to fire; in fact, based on visual evidence and what I'm reading from Arioch, it just seems like they can't fire aft, which seems reasonable. They can outrun the enemy, and the enemy has relatively short ranges; they don't need to stop the enemy setting their tail on fire because, given any kind of warning, it doesn't seem likely the Umiak could set it on fire unless the Loroi let them.

EDIT: Okay, already stated earlier. Still, it seems to need being said again.

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Re: Armor values

Post by Arioch »

Tash wrote:Based on observation of the Naam battle, it appears that turreted weapons- blasters and possibly pulse cannons- do have a wide field of fire. It hardly seems to be a matter of having to turn about and point straight at the enemy to fire; in fact, based on visual evidence and what I'm reading from Arioch, it just seems like they can't fire aft, which seems reasonable.
Yes. The Loroi turrets have pretty decent overall coverage, just not directly aft. Most are oriented toward the forward 60 degree arc, because that's the 90% contingency, but the pulse cannon turrets you see on the GCS, BC and CW have 180 degree forward coverage (occluded of course by the body of the ship itself). The pulse cannons on the CA were a late addition, and have only a forward 60 degree arc, but the heavy blasters on the sides of the CA nacelles have full 180+ degree coverage on their respective sides, and can fire directly aft if necessary. A Loroi force with situational freedom to maneuver can easily accelerate on a perpendicular vector to the enemy and bring full firepower to bear with only minimal momentary roll and pitch adjustments.

The Umiak vessels have more complete coverage, but this means having some weapons that are always unable to fire on a given target. This provides the Umiak with advantages in some tactical situations, and disadvantages in other tactical situations. The intent is to present two different, yet viable doctrines in how to design ships and employ them in combat. The Umiak doctrine is to get their ships in close contact with the enemy, in which fire arc is more important, and the Loroi doctrine is to keep their heavy-weapon ships at a distance. In the simulations I have run, I don't think either doctrine is dominant.

The Loroi doctrine allows them to concentrate their defenses and weapons forward. If the Loroi are in range to fire at the Umiak, they do not want to show their vulnerable tails to the enemy; I can't stress this enough. The above posted weapons table is out of date, though I have nothing better to show you, but it gives a basically accurate view of the damage potential of the various weapons at range... against normal defenses. Umiak plasma weapons are quite capable of hitting Loroi ships at 1 LS range, but are not effective at penetrating Loroi forward defenses at that range. If a Loroi ship turns its vulnerable rear quarter to the enemy at that range, this changes the equation considerably. Even a gunboat can cripple a Loroi battleship if it gets a shot up the tailpipe.
Tash wrote:Okay, already stated earlier. Still, it seems to need being said again.
So it would seem. To elaborate further, a "baffles" is a sensor blind spot, not something literally blocking weapons fire. In naval warfare, it's the sonar blind spot caused by the engine noise in the rear quarter of the ship. Many submarines have rear-firing torpedo tubes, but their ability to acquire targets in the rear quarter (unless they are not running their engines) is severely limited. The situation is similar for Outsider starships: the engines emit a hot, glowing trail of high-energy plasma that extends for kilometers behind the ship and is not an ideal medium through which to optically acquire targets. Putting turrets or sensors on stalks does not prevent this problem, any more than putting sonar on a stalk helps a submarine see past the baffles. This occlusion is not total, and some ships do have point-defense weapons oriented aft, but these are intended for close-in threats such as torpedoes or gunships that are easy to track and have a real possibility of getting in a Loroi ship's rear quarter. If there's an Umiak cruiser sniffing up a Loroi ship's tail, that Loroi ship is in a world of hurt regardless of how its weapons are situated.

In the simulations I have run, what I have found is that built-up pre-battle velocities often rule the engagements; situations in which the two forces slug it out at matched velocities are very rare. System-transit velocities take hours to build up and cancel out, so in the few minutes in which two crossing fleets are in firing range of each other, momentary facing and acceleration is really not that important. Even in the Naam example of a fixed-defense battle, the Umiak had a signficant run-up at the Loroi formation; twenty minutes of acceleration takes twenty minutes to cancel out, during which time your fleet's momentum carries them well past the enemy.

Finally, evasive maneuvers need to be considered. When you are within beam weapon range of the enemy, especially at longer ranges, constant change of acceleration vector is important to attempt to avoid being hit. This means you can't reliably accelerate 100% in your intended direction, or you make yourself an easier target.

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Re: Armor values

Post by dfacto »

Umiak plasma weapons are quite capable of hitting Loroi ships at 1 LS range, but are not effective at penetrating Loroi forward defenses at that range.
There we go, it turns out B was the correct answer, and that changes everything. Max range at which the beam hits for any damage at all, and max range to hit for damage on heavy armor are two very different things.
To elaborate further, a "baffles" is a sensor blind spot, not something literally blocking weapons fire.
I thought you meant the vanes extending from each side of the engine, but I see you're using the submarine related term.
Turret is only expensive weak point, if you only need to point your vehicle to enemy.
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