[Singh]

With all the mods and new ships and stuff out there, I was just wondering about the new ships people have created and stuff.
Has anyone attempted creating a pure Gunship?
i.e. A vessel with no laser turrets (1 or 2 flak turrets might be there) and large amounts of anti-capital ship beam weapons?
I could see this being created as a cheap and effective alternative to Colossus-sized ships, as 6 of these ships might be able to engage a juggernaught and win, out of sheer firepower (although they might not, since they would probrably not have much shielding system- not to mention vulnerabilities to bombers)

[TopAce]

Well, I think everyone imagines a gunship a different way: I think a gunship is a ship which has many weapons despite its size. So if a 300 meters long cruiser has at least 20 turrets and the ship itself has acceptable firepower to fight both another cruiser or corvette and fighters/bombers.

[Tiara]

I see a gunship as the smallest capital with only one gun, a big capital beam. Mainly a large flying Mjolnir

[TopAce]

Originally posted by Tiara
I see a gunship as the smallest capital with only one gun, a big capital beam. Mainly a large flying Mjolnir

I have made a ship like that, that's a Vasudan cruiser with one BVas.

[kasperl]

i think of someting about 100M long, and heavily armored, crew of 4 or 5, couple of turrets, and lot's of fighter weaponry up front.

[Singh]

Ok. before i go into anything deeper, i must ask- what kinds of beam weapons are their and where can i find statistics on them?

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Singh
Ok. before i go into anything deeper, i must ask- what kinds of beam weapons are their and where can i find statistics on them?

ZB's Beam FAQ

[Spicious]

You're all wrong. This is as gunship.

[Tiara]

Originally posted by Spicious
You're all wrong. This is as gunship.

No, thats a cannonballship seeing those two barrels at the front.

[Singh]

Nah, that can't be a gunship- it's too Tiny!
A gunship should be around 200/250 Meters long, packed with power plants and Beam arrays, it's only purpose to move as fast as possible and give a knock out punch to larger Cruisers, corvettes, and yes, even destroyers. Absolutely minimum crew and almost no other weapon systems ensures power for such a purpose.

Weapons compliment would be 4 Anti-Cap beams, 2 turrets on the forward nose and one turret to each side, LRBGreen beams to be precise. It would also include 2 AAA Beams (the smaller variety). This is meant to deal with the larger slower capital ships,  at the edge of the beam range - this range is 8K while the Shivan's maximum range appears to be 7.5k- and to stay at that range. The lack of systems and the somewhat small size/crew would make it economical to produce and somewhat effective against...anything when used in large enough numbers.

[Spicious]

Originally posted by Singh
A gunship should be around 200/250 Meters long, packed with power plants and Beam arrays, it's only purpose to move as fast as possible and give a knock out punch to larger Cruisers, corvettes, and yes, even destroyers. Absolutely minimum crew and almost no other weapon systems ensures power for such a purpose.

Weapons compliment would be 4 Anti-Cap beams, 2 turrets on the forward nose and one turret to each side, LRBGreen beams to be precise. It would also include 2 AAA Beams (the smaller variety). This is meant to deal with the larger slower capital ships,  at the edge of the beam range - this range is 8K while the Shivan's maximum range appears to be 7.5k- and to stay at that range. The lack of systems and the somewhat small size/crew would make it economical to produce and somewhat effective against...anything when used in large enough numbers.

Then they all get nuked by a fleet of Lilths from behind.

Do you know how big LRBGreens are?

[Spicious]

Originally posted by Tiara
No, thats a cannonballship seeing those two barrels at the front.

Go blame LtNarol, it's his design.

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Singh
Nah, that can't be a gunship- it's too Tiny!
A gunship should be around 200/250 Meters long, packed with power plants and Beam arrays, it's only purpose to move as fast as possible and give a knock out punch to larger Cruisers, corvettes, and yes, even destroyers. Absolutely minimum crew and almost no other weapon systems ensures power for such a purpose.

Weapons compliment would be 4 Anti-Cap beams, 2 turrets on the forward nose and one turret to each side, LRBGreen beams to be precise. It would also include 2 AAA Beams (the smaller variety). This is meant to deal with the larger slower capital ships,  at the edge of the beam range - this range is 8K while the Shivan's maximum range appears to be 7.5k- and to stay at that range. The lack of systems and the somewhat small size/crew would make it economical to produce and somewhat effective against...anything when used in large enough numbers.

That's suffering far to heavily from uber-disease. As far as I'm concernered a gunship slots in between the bomber and the cruiser. It has a similar role to the bomber in combat but unlike the bomber relies on beam cannons to provide it's weaponary. So a gunship can pack a bigger punch than a bomber but pays for that by being slower than a bomber.

Gunships shouldn't even pack the same punch as a cruiser until they start getting close to the size. A gun ship a couple of hundred meters across should have much lighter armour than a fenris but in return should have a top speed large enough to keep them out of trouble in a way a Fenris can't.

 Gunships certainly shouldn't have anywhere near the power of a corvette or else the entire corvette class becomes pointless. Why build a corvette when you can build three or four of these uber-gunships instead?

As for fitting BFGreens or LRGreens remember that the Colossus was the only ship the Terrans ever built large enough to fit one of those cannons. I doubt you could even fit one inside a 200m craft let alone wrap enough of the ship around it to allow it to move.

[Singh]

True, quite true indeed.

[Singh]

After re-thinking this, i just realized what a gunship could really be: an Anti-fighter/Bomber weapon rather than an anti-capital ship vessel. Stuff it with AAA and Flak Cannons and you've got a nice intercept capital ship ^_^

[Nico]

to be, a gunship is a very heavy bomber, or a very tiny ( but slowish ) capship with heavy weapons. something that rocks for attacks, but can hardly defend itself.

edit: missed Sin,gh post, his first definition is what i think a gunship is. not the second one ( anti fighter ship ).