[CT27]

For the sake of argument here, assume the GTVA wins the war.

The GTVA will probably want to use some of the military technology of the UEF to either enhance their own stuff or combine it with their own to make an entirely new product.


How do you see the GTVA using UEF technology in the following areas?:

Fighters

Bombers

Cruisers

Corvettes

Destroyers (for instance, let's say 10 years down the road a new destroyer class is created, what would a new destroyer class look like?  Whether the GTVA uses UEF stuff to improve Hecates/Raynors/Titans etc. of creates a whole new class)

[MatthTheGeek]

Well you'll probably see much more antimatter warheads once they seize the Mercury farms, for one.

I doubt they'll ever follow the high-performance/low-duration/high-cost philosophy we see in UEF fighters, for obvious reasons (not reduced to a single system, better more fighters than better fighters to fight endless waves of poorly-defended shivan bombers). Most of the fighter-grade tech will probably be studied but not adapted to the current or even next generation of fighters.

Beam jamming might be further developed, assuming it actually has any effect on Shivan beams (which is far to be guaranteed).

That's about it. Tevs already have superior warship firepower (beams), about equivalent armor and ECM tech, they have sprint drives.

[headdie]

Short of WiH ptII radically changing the order of things, which given AoA is entirely possible, I have to agree with MatthTheGeek on this one.  The biggest UEF advantages are ones that don't translate well into the GTVA military.

The design of the GTVA organisational and asset structure is based on battling the Shivans which have in the past proven to be high intensity, often chaotic, high casualty events so the high cost of UEF fighters would push up the material cost of the war while not providing significant increase in survivability for the pilots, also UEF designs are built to the numbers needed for one system, the GTVA has to provide fighters for a considerably larger area.

As for their capital ships, widespread use of the UEF weaponry would increase the logistics demand of the warship as no rounds means useless guns and given the shivan love for smashing logistics convoys.  Personally I see an application for UEF weapons on a small number of ships to be used in hit and run strikes on Juggernaut and above scale threats prior to a main strike hitting.

[The E]

UEF ships do one thing very well, and that is patrolling a fortified system. And while the addition of Sols' economy base would alleviate some of the cost-cutting measures the GTVA armed forces operate under, the main weapons of UEF ships just do not fit into the mission profile the GTVA fleet is built against.

That being said, while primary weapons may not be a big factor, the story is somewhat different when it comes to secondary ones. I would not be surprised if the GTVA were to adopt the Burst Flak/PD combo instead of or in addition to their AA beams.

As for fighter concepts, well, some of them, like the Kentauroi or the Uriel, may be of interest to GTVA planners.

[Aesaar]

Weapons wise, the UEF has a few things to offer the GTVA:

The UEF's strikecraft missile lineup is generally superior.  The only GTVA missiles that compare favorably to their UEF equivalents are the Harpoon and the Trebuchet.  And that last one really depends on whether you prefer an extra km of range or extra damage.  Slammers and Paveways are a given. The UEF's diverse bomb loadout is also worth looking at.  The Jackhammer's a good replacement for the Cyclops, but it's entirely possible that it wouldn't fit in the internal bays of GTVA bombers.  Same goes for the Sledgehammer.  Warhammers seem more easily adapted, and it might even be possible to equip a modified version on fighters.

As for the primaries, it's hard to say.  The Kayser and Rapier are almost identical, and the UEF doesn't really have an equivalent to the Balor, which appears to be the future of GTVA primary weapons.  The heavier UEF primaries; the Archer, Redeemer, and Vajra, all have one big flaw: Ammo.  More ammo-reliant weapons means more ammo to be carried by the support ships, which either means less ammo overall or bigger (and more vulnerable) support ships.  Their sheer effectiveness might be worth it, or it might not.  Like I said, it's hard to say.

Strikecraft.  The low endurance of UEF fighters means they wouldn't integrate all that well into GTVA doctrine.  As defensive craft, maybe.  The exception to this is the Lapith.  Bombers are already low endurance craft, and unlike the overly heavy Durga and Vajradhara, the Lapith wouldn't be quickly swarmed and torn to pieces by Shivan fighters.  I don't think it would replace the Artemis, but used as an offensive escort for capital ships, striking at targets of opportunity in a capital ship battle, it could be very effective.  The same could be said of the Uriel.  As purely offensive tools, hitting Shivan capitals in big formations, though, I don't know.

The Kentauroi might have potential as a short range interceptor for installations and destroyers, but it doesn't have the endurance to do much else.  The Uhlan has no chance whatsoever of replacing the Perseus.  They're already near identical in a straight up fight, but the Perseus has the advantage of already being completely integrated into the fleet.  The Uhlan just isn't worth the trouble.


Most of the UEF capital fleet is well suited to being system monitors, acting in defensive operations where logistics matter less.  A Solaris could make an excellent fighter base and command center for a system.  Throw a sprint drive on one, and it could also be useful to deliver a hammer blow when you urgently need more firepower, like the Toutatis in Aristeia.

On weapons, the Khatvanga (UEF PD turret) is a natural choice.  It's better than the TT2, and doesn't rely on ammunition.  Burst flak less so, mainly because Standard Flak exists (if you're like me and try to look at Standard Flak as some sort of newly developed rotary flak cannon that still has issues to work out.  Ignore that it was on vanilla FS2 ships).  For non-PD weapons, the UEF doesn't have that much to offer.  GTVA torpedoes are tertiary weapons, and the Eos is generally better than the various Apocalypses except the Narayana's (which is bigger than a Supernova).  Mass Drivers might work as heavy turret-mounted tertiary weapons for destroyers, and/or as replacements for every SGreen in existence.  But again, ammo.

[Dragon]

Don't forget that there are Mass Drivers that have a range advantage over beams. A good artillery unit is something GTVA lacks, and SSMs are expensive. In general, they could be long range tertiary weapons, supplementing torpedoes.

[headdie]

the only issue I personally have with the GTVA deploying UEF based ammo weapons on a large scale is that with the implementation of the large logistics vessels I get the impression that the GTVA is trying reduce logistics chain dependency at the Battlegroup level and with beam cannons apparently not requiring ammo introducing additional ammo dependant weaponry means you you have to compensate for this by either:
1.) reduce the other types of ammo a battle group takes into the operation.
2.) reduce other supplies carried by the battle group
3.) split the difference between the different supply types
4.) increase the frequency that supply ships rendezvous with the battle group

all scenarios I imagine look unattractive to both the logistics planning and strategic planning elements of the fleet

[Col.Hornet]

The gauss cannons and mass drivers require ballistic ammo, and their supplying cycle may cause some problems, but they have one HUGE advantage. They can easily snipe the beams on enemy capital ships. Of course the logistic difficulties may not allow a big scale usage of them( For example it could be carried by special forces and the vital units of the fleet to minimize the supplying problems.), but in my opinion beam cannons supported by several long range guns is a deadly combination. Gauss cannons disarm the enemy and the beams could finish the job.  That could relieve escorts a little bit.

[Klaustrophobia]

IIRC, beams in fact DO use ammo in the BP continuity, because they are actual streams of plasma.  "kilotons" of it according to one tech room entry i think.  seems to me that projectiles might actually be MORE space/weight efficient than beams.  it's at least explainable in the fluff if the writers want to go that way.

i also think the uriels would be a great asset to the GTVA as cruiser-killers.  and then you could scale back (or just get rid of) the cruiser classes that aren't fighter-supression, since cruisers aren't really effective against anything bigger.

[headdie]

IIRC, beams in fact DO use ammo in the BP continuity, because they are actual streams of plasma.  "kilotons" of it according to one tech room entry i think.  seems to me that projectiles might actually be MORE space/weight efficient than beams.  it's at least explainable in the fluff if the writers want to go that way.

i also think the uriels would be a great asset to the GTVA as cruiser-killers.  and then you could scale back (or just get rid of) the cruiser classes that aren't fighter-supression, since cruisers aren't really effective against anything bigger.

Beams look to use Reactor plasma, also I can only find reference to Kilotons of plasma in the Sathanas main beams, "Winter King" beams use metric tons of coolant and a dedicated reactor but no mention of plasma volume is mentioned so it depends on the plasma output of a meson reactor per volume of fuel used

[yomi]

no one mentioned slammers? they would make any GTVA pilot an Alpha 1

[Alex Heartnet]

UEF bomber technology is a dead end.  The GTVA is moving in the direction of making bombers into fighters, if the deployment of the GTB Rhea is any indication.  Soon we might be looking at anti-capship weapons being fired off of heavy and even medium fighters.  The Lapith just won't fit within GTVA bomber doctrine.

Additionally, bombers are far more economical to use against capital ships then other capital ships are.  This alone doesn't make snubcraft the end-all-be-all against everything (especially if your fighter complement is running low), but surely it would be cheaper to restock a fighter squadron then it would be to repair a capital ship.

And of course, the GTVA don't have an equivalent of the Custos.  We haven't seen it in action yet, but since cruisers are only good in an anti-fighter role at this stage, perhaps we will start seeing cruisers becoming lighter and lighter.

It goes without saying that GTVA researchers will benefit greatly from the UEF's slightly different techbase.  The end result of this research might be a piece of technology totally different from what the UEF OR the GTVA currently have.  Beam jamming technology?  If you can jam a beam, then you might also be able to change the shape of the beam or somesuch.  Imagine a trio of corvettes combining their beams into one stupidly powerful weapon.  Or an offensive shield based on beam technology, for ramming, anti-fighter, or point defense purposes.

As for using UEF technology, just because the GTVA might publicly declare the technology of the defeated UEF as 'inferior' doesn't mean that they can't be a hypocrite about it and implement UEF technology anyway.  In fact, that might be the most sensible approach the GTVA could take - they get all the associated propaganda benefits while not neglecting a major opportunity to improve their capabilities against the Shivans.

[Scotty]

I forget exactly what the name of it is, but there's a very, very large GTVA bomber that's popped up around this board before that's supposed to coordinate drone flights of older bombers.  It's massive.

I wouldn't say that UEF bomber development is a dead end.

[An4ximandros]

That was a modified (Old) Diomedes with it's fighter squadron replaced by the drones.

As far as the logistical chain goes... the GTVA is essentially cheating the system with beams, since these would produce heat which would raise the internal temperature of the ship to melting point and disable them since GTVA ships have no radiators (at least canonically [same for the shivs... unless those giant claws actually had a point other than looking scary]) but we overlook that and simply say beams are better, essentially giving them unlimited ammo, as they don't have a need for radiators that would need to be cooled down or replaced by others after heavy beam usage.

[Scotty]

No, it was not.  You're thinking of something entirely different.  I want to say it was called the... Stheno, or something like that.  It was a really ****ing big bomber, not a Diomedes.

[Droid803]

No, it was not.  You're thinking of something entirely different.  I want to say it was called the... Stheno, or something like that.  It was a really ****ing big bomber, not a Diomedes.

The only Stheno bomber i know of is the one that esarai made with the 4 turrets. It's not that big (56m, the same as the Vajradhara).
Or maybe it's because I've been staring at the Inferno Uberbombers a bit too much.

[Alex Heartnet]

As far as the logistical chain goes... the GTVA is essentially cheating the system with beams, since these would produce heat which would raise the internal temperature of the ship to melting point and disable them since GTVA ships have no radiators (at least canonically [same for the shivs... unless those giant claws actually had a point other than looking scary]) but we overlook that and simply say beams are better, essentially giving them unlimited ammo, as they don't have a need for radiators that would need to be cooled down or replaced by others after heavy beam usage.

The Age of Aquarius techroom states in the description for the Shivan Juggernaut Beam that the Shivans might be outright violating the known laws of thermodynamics, suggesting that they might be doing something like dumping the waste heat into subspace.

[Droid803]

The Shivans are dirty cheaters!

[Aesaar]

UEF bomber technology is a dead end.  The GTVA is moving in the direction of making bombers into fighters, if the deployment of the GTB Rhea is any indication.  Soon we might be looking at anti-capship weapons being fired off of heavy and even medium fighters.  The Lapith just won't fit within GTVA bomber doctrine.

The Lapith is pretty much the UEF version of the Artemis.  It's a bit on the large side, but it's both fast and maneuverable.  It might actually work.

And of course, the GTVA don't have an equivalent of the Custos.  We haven't seen it in action yet, but since cruisers are only good in an anti-fighter role at this stage, perhaps we will start seeing cruisers becoming lighter and lighter.

Yes they do: the Cretheus.  We haven't seen either in action, so we can't say which is better.

As for using UEF technology, just because the GTVA might publicly declare the technology of the defeated UEF as 'inferior' doesn't mean that they can't be a hypocrite about it and implement UEF technology anyway.  In fact, that might be the most sensible approach the GTVA could take - they get all the associated propaganda benefits while not neglecting a major opportunity to improve their capabilities against the Shivans.

When did they declare UEF tech was inferior?  It is in a lot of cases, but that's a conclusion drawn from observation, not propaganda.

As far as the logistical chain goes... the GTVA is essentially cheating the system with beams, since these would produce heat which would raise the internal temperature of the ship to melting point and disable them since GTVA ships have no radiators (at least canonically [same for the shivs... unless those giant claws actually had a point other than looking scary]) but we overlook that and simply say beams are better, essentially giving them unlimited ammo, as they don't have a need for radiators that would need to be cooled down or replaced by others after heavy beam usage.

We overlook that because most science-fiction has magic heat disposal tech.  Mass Effect is pretty much the only popular universe that doesn't.

[TwentyPercentCooler]

The biggest thing that I can think of is that the GTVA would be a bit silly not to take a good, hard look at the Archer and Paveway. It always surprised me that they never developed any better anti-subsystem weapons than the energy-hogging Akheton and the short ranged Stiletto/Stiletto II. Despite relying on ammunition, the Archer is superior to the Akheton in almost every way. Much longer range, much more accurate. The Uriel is basically like an Athena with everything turned up to 11. And the Paveway beats the pants off of the Stiletto II.

Also, it's already been mentioned, but the Slammer. Dear god the Slammer.