Originally posted by Swamp_Thing
Sorry, but that is wrong. Cruisers are fast, not slow. A cruiser has a top speed of 30+ knots, while a battleship can reach 25, tops. The "cruiser" expression was first made to represent a fast moving vessel, that could "cruise" the oceans stalking its prey, usually heavier and slower battleships.
Destroyers are even faster, with speeds of up to 35 knots or more (the navy never discloses their top speed).
Generally speaking, "cruise" means the average or usual speed at wich a vessel travels, i.e "cruise control", "cruising speed".
It is usually wrongly associated to the expression "cruise liner", wich is a heavy, slow moving passenger ship. There is nothing slow about a navy cruiser, it´s built for speed and firepower.
With the advent of rockets and guided missiles, the cruiser was set aside, and the new type of cruiser/destroyer emerged, the Aegis cruiser. It´s the size of a destroyer, but carries the punch of a cruiser. It is also more focused as an anti-aircraft triple-A platform for aerial warfare, while the destroyer is more focused in submarine warfare.
The battleship itself hasn´t disappeared yet, from modern navy. Allthough the US scuttled its big battleships in exchange for carriers, there are still other countries that maintain them in active duty. Not for much longer, i´ll grant you that...
The carrier is the wave of the future. One carrier can obliterate an entire fleet of battleships, without even setting eyes on them.
The same would and will happen in space.
Well yes, cruise isn't really slow. Cruiser were actually fast for their size, and they combined speed with firepower, alltough they really couldn't counter a battleship.
In Fs2 terms, no ship calss is obsolete - the FS2 destroyer, a carrier or a battleship. They would just have different duties.
Carriers would have a freaking huge number of fighter/bombers - surely twice that of a destroyer. Given the power of fighter/bombers in FS2, that is a power indeed. However, it's weak hull and shielding and low firepower would limit it to support roles, acting more as mobile fighterbases and less as front-line warships. Thus they wouldn't be used for blockades or direct assault, but would be kept in the rear to swarm the enemy.
they would be very usefull in guarding home systems, since their speed and large number of wings can cover a lot of are for partoling.
Battleship would be all armor and firepower - no fightercapacity whatsoever. Since no other warship can match it's abitiy to dish out and take punishment, it would allways be in the front lines. Naturaly, given the fact that it is designed to stand alone, it AA armament would be terifiyng indeed, alltough it would still require help from smaller warship dedicated to fighterdefense in case of a large assault.
FS2 Destroyers (Cruisers by my book) are a blend of those two. They can't matck a battleship in armor or firepowr, nor can they match the carrier in fightercapacity, but they would still be a valubale unit. Having the power to defend themselves and beeing resilliant, while still carrying enough bombers/fighters to cause havoc if used correctly, they would also be in the fron lines and would be very usefull at blockading nodes.
Naturally ships should move in battlegroups. No stupid missions in which a single(important) warship is sent to dangerous missions. There should allways be escorts.
Naturally, such a fleet setup creates a interesting battlefield. A constant game of cat and mouse where the hunter and the hunted constantly change, depending on the fleets.
