[Sarafan]

What, you mean like a Nimitz class aircraft carrier can?

I dont know pretty much anything about the capabilities of real life navy vessels. But I meant that it should be able to pose a considerable threat to most capital ships and small craft, if its forced to go into battle, it should be able to defend itself against the enemy and come out alive since its role its vital.

[Mars]

In real life that's not really how it works; carriers with heavy cannons =/= good idea.

[Shade]

if its forced to go into battle, it should be able to defend itself against the enemy and come out alive since its role its vital.

It can. It's a far cry from being helpless, it just can't stand up to the likes of an Orion or the Shivan destroyers. Throw a corvette and a couple of bomber wings at it from a non blind spot and see what happens though.

The Hecate's problem is simply that it does not excel at either role. It tries to do everything, and so it is worse than any of the more specialised vessels like the Orion for capship combat or the Deimos for fighter shredding.

[Sarafan]

The Hecate's problem could easily be solved by a better weapons placement and quality (better beams). It doesnt try to do everything, its the counterpart of the Orion. That said the GTVA should focus on building a destroyer more oriented towards combat but with decent craft carriyng capability, something that can actually stand to a shivan destroyer by itself.

[Mars]

You mean an ubership? Naw, those are expensive, the Deimos will take care of everything the Hecate can't

[Sarafan]

No, not an uber ship, just another destroyer dedicated to the role that the Orion has now. The Deimos is a jack of all trades and really good at what it does but sometimes you need something with more firepower, something that when you're overrun by enemy capital ships, you can take them down fast.

[Mars]

The Orion can be taken out by 3 wings of Medusa bombers, which can be launched from a Hecate, the Ravana's main beam turrets are so weak, that I (theoretically) saved the Lysander (the Lysander dies whether or not the Ravana fires its beams). When the Aquitaine is assaulted by the Moloch, it never launches any bombers, something I consider to be a choice by the mission designers, although I don't know why they made that choice.

[aldo_14]

The Orion can be taken out by 3 wings of Medusa bombers, which can be launched from a Hecate, the Ravana's main beam turrets are so weak, that I (theoretically) saved the Lysander (the Lysander dies whether or not the Ravana fires its beams). When the Aquitaine is assaulted by the Moloch, it never launches any bombers, something I consider to be a choice by the mission designers, although I don't know why they made that choice.

Probably so the player would determine the outcome

[Mars]

Imagine that! Yeah, your right.

So basically, the Hecate only sucks because of the mission designers wish to allow the player to determine outcomes.

Just like a Deimos can't actually be taken out by the Ravana in one shot, or at least, not by two beams

[NGTM-1R]

What, you mean like a Nimitz class aircraft carrier can?

The Nimitz needs escort too, particularly against submarines. It needs such escort against the sub's ability to attack without warning. Any naval officer (or player of Harpoon) knows the story of the flaming datum; you first realize there's a sub about when a ship blows up. There's a reason carriers never go anywhere without a battlegroup in attendance. Too, there are also times and situations where your air group will fail you; can't get them off the deck fast enough, or period, overwhelmed, whatever.

...and now your parallel comes back to haunt you, for the Hecate too can be subjected to attack (from subspace) without warning, and is also subject to those same situations where its fightercraft will not avail it. (The logical step isn't to build another destroyer however...they need a better escort craft. Or maybe they should build another destroyer; collapsed-core molybendum armor would be a good idea for something that likely to take fire...)

[Sarafan]

Just fix the already existing problems on the Hecate and that's it, you wouldnt need and escort ship. Also if the destroyer is good enough to stand up on its own it doesnt need escorts (for most of the time) and that would free up any warships to do other missions.

[Mars]

No, that's not how it works, look at the Orion, Alpha 1 took out, what, 3 Orions during the main Campaign? The Hecate, however upgraded it may seem, still has a much lower turret density then say a Deimos, without at least a cruiser and a couple wings of fighters, the Hecate would be easy prey for a squadron of Taurvi / Osiris / Zeus bombers, unless you upgraded its anti-fighter defenses, and even if you improved the beam cannons on the Hecate, the fact remains that they are still essentially large targets that happen to shoot uber-beams of death.

[Sarafan]

Alpha 1 is one thing and I'm not counting him because you always can take down any ship in the game. But against a number of fighter and bombers the Hecate can defend itself well, on the mission that you defend the Aquitaine on the nebula, it make short work of the shivan small crafts there. The only real laking area would be anti cap-ship power and turret placement, but perhaps if the placement of the defensive turrets (against small craft) were changed it would be even better?

[Mars]

My point was that it doesn't take many fighters.

[AlphaOne]

Instead of redooing a flawed design regardless that it looks cool not cooler then an Orion but cool nonetheless is not the solution if you ask me. Simply redo the Orion it has a good fighterbay and super beam firepower. Just redoit add a couple of more AAAF turrets wheter they may be flack or AAAF beams or anithing else. Thats all the Orion only needs a hand full of aaaf turrets to become one of the most impresive destroyers in the game.

At least from mi POW.

the Orion does a too good of a job as a cap-ship-shreader to be retired especialy now after capella.

Given the right circumstances i even think that a uprgraded version of the Orion might come to life.

[Mars]

Instead of redooing a flawed design...

This statement begins with the flawed assumption that the Hecate is a flawed design, it's not, as several of us have been arguing for a while.

regardless that it looks cool not cooler then an Orion but cool nonetheless is not the solution if you ask me.

Was anyone arguing that it looks cooler? The Hecate is designed (fairly well I might add) for an entirely different purpose then the Orion.

Simply redo the Orion it has a good fighterbay and super beam firepower. Just redoit add a couple of more AAAF turrets wheter they may be flack or AAAF beams or anithing else. Thats all the Orion only needs a hand full of aaaf turrets to become one of the most impresive destroyers in the game.

"Super beam firepower"? How can you justify that along with a bigger fighterbay and improved point defense?

At least from mi POW.

For future reference, that is Point of veiw

[/quote]

the Orion does a too good of a job as a cap-ship-shreader to be retired especialy now after capella.

What if they don't need a giant ubership of doom?

Given the right circumstances i even think that a uprgraded version of the Orion might come to life.

I doubt it: a heavy refit of an old ship can often be less cost effective than just buying a new one.

[AlphaOne]

Missed the point. I was just saing that the Orion needs just a few more AAF turretes not more fighter or more powerfull beams. It already has a superb beam firepower. Also keep in mind that the Orion has undergone a refit already.

Edit: The reason I stated that the Hecate is a bad design is because it is ment to be  jack of all trades. without really beeing really really good at something. For example I would of liked to see the Hecate has even more fomidable AAAf defences then it has so that it does not have to worry about incoming fighters or bommbers. that would of made it a much better ship in mi opinion.

[aldo_14]

What, you mean like a Nimitz class aircraft carrier can?

The Nimitz needs escort too, particularly against submarines. It needs such escort against the sub's ability to attack without warning. Any naval officer (or player of Harpoon) knows the story of the flaming datum; you first realize there's a sub about when a ship blows up. There's a reason carriers never go anywhere without a battlegroup in attendance. Too, there are also times and situations where your air group will fail you; can't get them off the deck fast enough, or period, overwhelmed, whatever.

...and now your parallel comes back to haunt you, for the Hecate too can be subjected to attack (from subspace) without warning, and is also subject to those same situations where its fightercraft will not avail it. (The logical step isn't to build another destroyer however...they need a better escort craft. Or maybe they should build another destroyer; collapsed-core molybendum armor would be a good idea for something that likely to take fire...)

That was my point; there are always going to be compromises required.  The Hecate sacrifices close in punch for projection; if you rate it in the latter, it's intended purpose, it's very good at it.  In the former, all it needs to do is survive and escape.

[AlphaOne]

Yes Aldo I do agree with you if you want to rate the Hecate from acarrier perspective then it does the job verry wel indeed. Also I think that further improvement in the future to the Hecate class design will tend to improve on its force projection abilaties and its AAAF defences and NOT its close range punch. However as i said above besides improved aaaf defences the hecate need to have at least the HP of the Hatshepsut. Which is a ship similar to it with similar fighter/bommber carryng abilaties yet has more HP and more heavy weponry on it.


this does tend to confirm to some degree that the Vasudans may in fact be somewhat more adnvanced in this regard to the Terrans.

Edit: and on an offtopic base since today is mi birthday i wanted to anounce that i am oficiali starting work on ship design which I have had in mind for quite some time. Oh and i will require some textures similar to the ones the Deimos or the Hecate has. As soon as i complete work on it to the best that i can i will release it which if nothing goes wrong shoul be in about 3 weeks or so.

[Mars]

Yes Aldo I do agree with you if you want to rate the Hecate from Carrier perspective then it does the job very well indeed. Also I think that further improvement in the future to the Hecate class design will tend to improve on its force projection abilities and its AAA defenses and NOT its close range punch.

Okay

However as i said above besides improved AAA defenses the Hecate need to have at least the HP of the Hatshepsut.

Why?

Which is a ship similar to it with similar fighter/bomber carrying abilities yet has more HP and more heavy weaponry on it.

That's called close in punch, and we don't know anything about the Hatshepsut's fighter carrying abilities, for all we know there could be 2 squadrons in there (obviously not, but that's the thing: we don't know) All we know is that it has two fighterbays, so does the Typhon, and the Typhon has only 2 more fighter squadrons than an Orion.

this does tend to confirm to some degree that the Vasudans may in fact be somewhat more advanced in this regard to the Terrans.

I think we already knew that in a way, however, we don't know what their realitive construction dates are, comparing them is like comparing the Deimos and Sobek, you have to figure, one was build later then the other, and there's a good chance that the newer one will be better.