[Quest_techie]

fighting a war against one enemy and dividing resources is a waste, the development of two seperate stealth ships was foolish, the resources should have been pooled into one better stealth fighter with greater payload and havier armour

bombers with turrets, if only advanced flak turrets to keep missiles off their bombs

bombs in the conventional shockwave sense are wasted in an environment without the ground, cluster bombs on a larger scale to deal with entire systems of fighters, mine fields, DEW bombers <small beam weapons on bombers, long range, same damage as their bomb payload, directed so as to not waste the energy, use the space regularly devoted to ammo for componentry>

node buster missile, no reason to waste a cap ship every ime you are closing a node, create a giant cruse missile to be launched from a cap ship using meson tech to close the node for you

mobile knossos, reopen and reclose meson closed nodes for hit and run strikes against the shivan forces, including equipment captures, intelligence gathering, and weapons testing

[TrashMan]

Lot's of AAF defences on ships...sh**loads. I'm talking gattling lasers, heavy flaks, anti-fighter beams galore.

Development of long-range weapons - hit the shivan bastards from a distance.

And last but not least - shivans are a offensive species.
They are not used to defend themselves but to attack - and their ships have that weakness. GTVA should have sepecific hunter groups of capships designed like shivans ones - as much anti-cap firepower as humanly possible concentrated at one point. These smal lgroups would be supported by carriers and scouts who would fins shivan targets. The hunters would then jump in fro the rear and BOOOOM....

[asyikarea51]

I'm talking gattling lasers

I tried your Hecate fully decked out with weapons similar to these. Capital ship-only, damage is roughly around the PromS per shot I think - I haven't checked the entry in a while. To simulate a Gatling effect I used "same turret cooldown".

None of the Shivan bombers got through, and only five or six bombs made it. Seraphim, Nephilim, Nahema, whatever. They all got trashed. I wouldn't want to fight a Hecate like that on my own...

I admit this is mod-related though (plus there's still the "not-very-good" AI to consider), so it might not completely apply to the topic. But I do think that Gatling lasers would do wonders in keeping the heavily-shielded Shivan fighters at bay...

[TrashMan]

Put  Mehku lasers on a Fenris and you'll have a hard time killing it.

I made a science vessel that had nothing but Subach lasers (10 turrets). I barely killed it....

Now imagine something bigger with more guns with a bigger rate of fire

EDIT: If you D/L my models or campaign you should find a gattling turret in the tables..I used it only on the Excalibur in the campaign and only on two turrets. Try them out

[spartan_0214]

So Turey wants to go the Shivan way. Build as many ships as you can as terribly as you can. Throw them at your enemy and hope they run out of secondaries.....

We really need ships that'll last long....

[AlphaOne]

I believe one ideea to the future ships and fleets of the GTVA could be taken from the gremans in WW2. I mean they had ships with the firepower of a battleship and with the tonnage of a cruiser. Sure they had to sacrifice some armour but they were superb warships and a real threat to even the most powerfull of battleships. So go poketsize huge firepower.

Downsize the Orion lets say a byt get rid of some of its fighters not all just a squadron or 2 or more it depends add some more aaaf firepower to it get rid of some armour while maintainin the engines.

And there you have it  a very fast warship with huge firepower good manouverabilaty. It will be cheaper and faster to produce.

[Turey]

So Turey wants to go the Shivan way. Build as many ships as you can as terribly as you can. Throw them at your enemy and hope they run out of secondaries.....

We really need ships that'll last long....

I'm simply saying that there's no need to build six different types of ships when the Vasudans get away with three. Reducing the number of designs makes it easier to find replacement parts, and if the bombers are versatile enough, you'll suffer little to no performance hit. I'm not advocating increased fleet size, just a streamlining of the current large number of fighters/bombers that aren't needed. No one needs a Herc II when you can build a better Ares.

[spartan_0214]

Sure there's need. Some ships are tilted differently than others. The Orion doesn't carry as many fighters than the Hecate. If you were to go up against a capship with a significant fighter escort, you'd want to use the Hecate. If you wanted to take out a lot of capships that have little fighter escort, you'd use the Orion. You can't ever perfectly balance a ship, so you have different designs for different purposes.

[Polpolion]

You can't ever perfectly balance a ship

You can get pretty freaking close. Give the myrmidon a bigger missile capacity and possibly more armor and that is pretty close.

[TopAce]

...and make it compatible with Harpoons.

[wtf_cl0vvn]

...and make it compatible with Harpoons.

Amen to that.


I think the pocketsize idea is the way to go. Also more more powerful engines...the fact that a shivan juggernaut can move at 20-30 km/s while our cruisers barely go that fast is appalling.

Basically just have a few classes, each specialized to excel at one thing while capable at others, and then have them all support each other. The Vasudan fleets are excellent, and they DO have a drasticallly smaller number of ship classes. Plus the idea of NOT retrofitting and building new ships, and just building new ones was a good idea too...to me the Hatshepsut is an excellent example of this. Just about as capable as the Orion at ship-to-ship, and just about as capable as the Hecate at AF. Not as good at either category as either of the Terran destroyers, but i would give a hatshepsut better survivability than a lone Orion or a lone Hecate.

Plus, its supported well by the Sobek corvette, for flanking attacks on enemy destroyers, and perhaps an AF screen of two/three mentus. Perhaps.

A capable battlegroup of say, 5 ships, maybe 3 if you scrap the mentus

While a Terran battlegroup would be an Orion battlegroup, which needs a lot of fighter/corvette cover, supporting cruisers which need fighter cover themselves, (except for the sadly discontinued aeolus), bombers to lessen the anticapship load placed on the orion, more fighters to cover the bombers, which are a mix of Great War Ursas and modern Boanerges, both almost incapable of dogfighting (not that the Ursa CANT defend itself, it just has a hard time doing so)....

which is a lot less concise (and im guessing a lot more expensive), than a few modern capships supported by modern fighters/bombers. Sekhmet, anyone?

[IceFire]

I believe one ideea to the future ships and fleets of the GTVA could be taken from the gremans in WW2. I mean they had ships with the firepower of a battleship and with the tonnage of a cruiser. Sure they had to sacrifice some armour but they were superb warships and a real threat to even the most powerfull of battleships. So go poketsize huge firepower.

Downsize the Orion lets say a byt get rid of some of its fighters not all just a squadron or 2 or more it depends add some more aaaf firepower to it get rid of some armour while maintainin the engines.

And there you have it  a very fast warship with huge firepower good manouverabilaty. It will be cheaper and faster to produce.

Thats a very good idea.  It worked very well in WWII and I think given the context of how this game works it could work very well.  It'd be a pocket "destroyer" in the FreeSpace sense.  Smaller than a Hecate but with perhaps similar or greater firepower to an Orion.  You'd probably have to sacrifice the hit points and big fighter bays to make it work but thats a good idea.  Have the corvettes operate in a supporting anti-cap role and cruisers for your defense screen and you've got quite the fleet!

[Quest_techie]

it'd be nice to see mjolnirs onevery jump node

[Flipside]

Heh, that wouldn't be a bad idea as such, but it smacks of Eve Online.

[S-99]

Some obvious things for the warships is at least crazily long lasting beams, or normal beams that recharge faster.  The gtva will be sticking with what they do best in AAA defense (probably be leaning towards subach turrets instead of blob turrets, i believe the subach was a cheap weapon to produce).  Also what the gtva was good at doing fighter and bomber deployments, not to mention the gtva has much superior fighters, and superior weapons for those fighters.
The gtva might put its interest in shielding warships like the lucifer, but probably not since that sounds like something that would suck up too much money and time.  Warships would most likely have better armor since the gtva is studying shivan armor and other shivan tech that was readily captured during both wars (not to mention shivan debris).  The one major plus side to the gtva actually being able to shield a warship in the way that the lucifer was is that you could completely reduce the amount of flak and laser turrets and antifighter beams (why have all that antifighter power on a warship like a destroyer if you have something as impervious as a lucifer which it's only weakness was beam fire).
Shielded destroyers would be a nice thing, it would just release fighters, be impervious to enemy bombs and projectiles, and pretty much just have an anti-capship armament.  That's only if the gtva managed to shield warships.

What i really wanted to go after was the fact that the gtva should still go after juggernauts when the time permits them to do so.  The thing that i think was really the flaw in the colossus was how long it took to build it.  It was one whole complete ship. My idea for juggernauts is to compartmentalize them. Do like what one dude did in the modding forum. Have a huge mounting aparatus, and then build a whole bunch of chunks to attatch to it. It'd be a lot cheaper and faster to build, and certainly would get the economy going by having a ton of contractors building chunks for the juggernaut.

[Quest_techie]

What i really wanted to go after was the fact that the gtva should still go after juggernauts when the time permits them to do so.  The thing that i think was really the flaw in the colossus was how long it took to build it.  It was one whole complete ship. My idea for juggernauts is to compartmentalize them. Do like what one dude did in the modding forum. Have a huge mounting aparatus, and then build a whole bunch of chunks to attatch to it. It'd be a lot cheaper and faster to build, and certainly would get the economy going by having a ton of contractors building chunks for the juggernaut.

many aircraft companies do that, wouldn't be too far a leap to believe military contracters in the freeality <I'm so sorry, it was just so cheesy I HAD to do it> would follow suit

[Qwer]

Mekton's Battle-Guerrilla GTVA Armada after 70 years:

In first years after IIGW GTVA should spend most resources on rebuilding and modernising economy. The rest should be spent on technology developement and only few on building new forces. After 20 years GTVA should have around 2 carriers (modified Hecate with removed beams and added second hangar), around 5 AC destroyers (modified Orions and Hatshepsuts with removed hangars and boosted AC firepower), around 15 corvettes (Deimoses and Sobeks) and around 40 cruisers (Mentus and modified Aeoluses without SGreens).
Second part involes building first prototype GTVA fleet using new technologies in next 10 years. More resources are spent on tech developement. Forces built in first 20 years are transferred to reserve. Here are new GTVA desings:
- Supercarrier (4km long with 800 fighters stationing in 8 huge hangars and very weak AF defence, but 3 separate jump drives allowing it to constantly change position, flagship of all future fleets, it's supposed to stay away from dangerous zones and battles hiding in locations where it's hard to locate it)
- Tactical Carrier (2km long with four hangars for 250 fighters and 3 jump drives, it's smaller supercarrier with better weaponary as it works closer to dangerous zones, both good AF and defense AC)
- Light Carrier (1,5km long with two hangars for 100 fighters and 2 jump drives, even smaller version of supercarrier, low stats (0,5 km smaller than tactical carrier but 150 fighters less), but cheap to produce)
- Escort Destroyer (2km long with both strong AF and AC and two jump drives, used to escort supercarriers)
- Assault Corvette (1km long with very weak AF, but huge AC including two medium beam cannons and two torpedo bays with special torpedoes, there are only two of them in each bay due to their huge size, but they're very devastating, two jump drives, used in hit&run against large targets like Sathanases)
- Escort Corvette (1km long, modified version of Assault Corvette, medium AF and AC, two jump drives, used in everything, from escort duties to attacks on small enemy groups)
- Escort Cruiser (400m long, powerfull AF and weak defence AC, two jump drives, used mainly in escort duties).

There are also gunboats. They're basicly larger Seraphims with powerfull weaponary. There are three versions of them: Space Superiority in dealing with multiple fighters, Assault with 16 gunmounts in froward used in dogfights (but rather crappy when fighting with agile fighters), wiping out cruisers and anti-subsystem attacks on larger capships and Torpedo, some kind of hyper-bomber able to take down juggernauths or even superjuggernauths in large numbers. They're repaired and rearmed by Logistics, 400m support ships without any weaponary, but able to repair four gunboats at the same time. Gunboats doesn't need carriers and can stay in space for few days without need of restocking supplies.

Count of vessels in the end of second phase (around):
- 2 Supercarriers
- 10 Tactical Carriers
- 30 Light Carriers
- 5 Escort Destroyers
- 10 Assault Corvettes
- 75 Escort Corvettes
- 150 Escort Cruisers.

Third phase involes building final armada that's able to destroy forces much larger than Sathanas' Armada from IIGW (it ends 70 years after it). Count of capital ships from second phase (around):
- 25 Supercarriers
- 100 Tactical Carriers
- 250 Light Carriers
- 80 Escort Destroyers
- 180 Assault Corvettes
- 600 Escort Corvettes
- 1500 Escort Cruisers
New Capships classes:
- 20 Battleships (3km with 2 jump drives, very weak AF, but huge AC concentrated in front able to take down even Sathanas single-handely)
- 3 SuperJuggernauths (15km, 2 jump drives, powerfull AC, mainly concentrated in 4 powerfull front beam cannons, large AF)
- 4 Stealth Carriers (modified Tactical Carriers, 50 fighters less and stripped down AF defence, but impossible to hit by capships unless tagged, owned by SOC, carries only stealth fighters and bombers)
- Kamikadze Juggernauth (this unique desing has got no armament and only one jump drive, but it's filled with antimatter and devices to hold it, its explosion is like minature Supernova, its impact on planet's surface could completly destroy it, Gargant could be taken down even from distance of 200km)
- Wave Juggernauth (the most powerfull ship in GTVA armada that costed horrendous amount of cash, but it was finally finished, it's quite like Kamikadze Juggernauth, but insted of antimatter, it's armament is mighty Wave Cannon that creates huge shockwave that spreads through whole space, 10km warship can be taken down from distance of 35km, fire rate of that cannon is however one shot per 24 hours, it has smaller firepower than Kamikadze Juggernauth, but it's one use ship).
From smaller desings there are also stealth gunboats (three version similar to ones from phase II, but weaker) and Logistics.

Weaponary involes upgraded beams using new technology, Dristruptor Beams (something like normal beams, but does no damage to hull, instead it creates large EMP explosion on impact that can destroy several subsystems ant turrets on enemy capships, used mainly on ships that are AF/Carrier dedicated like Tactical Carrier or Escort Cruiser), Supression Turrets (MSes for capships, used mainly on AF/Carrier dedicated), upgraded AAA beams (two types, one sniper-like with low fire rate, but long range and power enough to take down gunboat in single shot, second more like standard AAA, but constantly shots following target) and upgraded flaks (both conventional and energy).

[Titan]

........... wha? and again, .......................... wha? and also, huh? and, of course, 






 

[Ace]

Hybridized fleets, focus on strategic weapons, specialized and generalized warships.

To elaborate, the GTVA may have a handful of vessels nearly Colossus sized as deep range explorers to scout out potential Shivan invasion points. (similar to the "mighty ships exploring the nodes of the ancients" bit some of the earliest FS2 previews hinted that the plot was going to be)

The actual main fleet however would be built around anti-fighter and bomber cruisers (Aeolus), anti-cruiser corvettes (think a Deimos but with fewer antifighter defenses and a small hangar), carriers (somewhat like the TCS Midway in WC: Prophecy, lots of fighters heavilly armored but few defenses so it relies on cruiser escort), and anti-juggernaut destroyers. (golgotha type)

Similarly fighters and weapons would be more focused. Fewer hybrid classes.

One of the largest changes I would make in a sequel is having shield projectors on capital ships, turrets that create shield arcs. Shielded shivan ships instead of projectors would have the shield integrated with the hull structure but reactors power shield integrity. Fighters and bombers can fly inside of the shielding, but generally the best thing is for interceptors to disable shields with a followup bombing run and then beam strike.

[Titan]

PLZ tell me, WTF did you spend hours writing that up?