Author Topic: cruisers vs destoryers  (Read 24135 times)

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cruisers vs destoryers
something's been buggin me for the past few days. Why is it in the Free Space universe that cruisers are more lightly armed than destroyers? I do realize first and foremost this is onry a game and also that the term "destroyer" would tend to imply superior fire power, and "cruiser" would tend to imply going out for a stroll.

The reality of cruisers and destroyers are that cruisers are, in fact, more heavily armed than destroyers in the modern navy, especially post WWII.

During the WWII era, cruisers and destroyers were vastly different in that both had very different roles. Cruisers were primarily an Anti-air platform where Destroyers were an Anti-sub platform. Each were armed accordingly, and destroyers had the more advanced sonar system. In today's navy, equipment wise there is very little difference. Both have the same sonar system and have the same radar system. The big differences come in capabilities size and armament.

Modern destroyers have 1 5" gun, fore, while cruisers have 2, 1 fore and aft. Both have 2 VLS launchers, however, 1 of the launchers on the destroyer is only a half launcher. (If you don't know what VLS is, its essentially a grid on the deck where the missiles are housed, 8x8 for a total of 64 missiles per launcher giving Cruisers a max total of 128 missiles and destroyers a max total of 92 as one launcher is 8x4).
Both will typically have 2 CIWS anti-missile gun systems, however some destroyers are being equipped with RAM anti-missile missile system instead of CIWS.

Cruisers also have the capability to house 2 SH-60B (anti sub) helo's where as most destroyers can only land 1 helo, however i believe destroyers are being made now with a hangar, but they can only house 1 helo. And both ships have the exact same engine and are capable of the same top speed.

Also, destroyers are smaller than cruisers and they are designed with a concave hull to deflect radar away, giving it a very small radar profile (along with a special radar absorbent material) where cruisers are not.

And finally, Cruisers will typically have a full bird Captain as CO and destroyers will typically have a Commander as CO. (and for those that don't know Navy ranks, Captain = Colonel and out ranks a Commander)

as the shape of war and the world has changed, no surface ship has any one role any more (big decks excluded, ie carriers and amphibs) all of the frigates have been decommissioned, scrapped, sold and/or used for target practice. The cruisers in service today are no longer being produced and the modern destroyers are being cranked out like they're goin out of style. Cruisers and Destroyers both simultaneously fill the roles of Anti-air and Anti-sub platforms.

So with all of this in mind, why is it that cruisers in FS are portrayed as weaker ships than destroyers?  :p (and yes im a bit biased cuz i served on a Cruiser)

 

Offline Droid803

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
That is because the ship designation system is completely different and no way related to the modern day designations excpet that the terms were probably borrowed.
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Offline General Battuta

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
You forgot to mention the nonsensical placement of corvettes.

I'm guessing it's because the Fenris was designed first and the marketing people were all 'A MAJESTIC SPACE CRUIIIISER.'

Then they started building Orions and they needed something that sounded fearsome, so they were all 'It doesn't cruise, it DESTROYS.'

As for corvettes, I guess they needed something friendly and appealing to the peacetime government. 'We'll be building a line of cheap, effective...corvettes!'

 

Offline dragonsniper

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
I like the description. It seems very fitting.
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Offline Polpolion

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
IIRC WWII destroyers were such because they were "submarine destroyers". Perhaps FS destroyers fill an analogous niche in Freespace?

And as you said, cruisers were primarily AA, which is very similar to cruisers in FS. As for corvettes, I'm pretty sure that it just sounded cool.

EDIT: BTW, what ship do you serve on, Vertigo?

 
Re: cruisers vs destoryers
I was on the Mobile Bay (CG-53). I've been out of the Navy for 2 years

 

Offline MT

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
something's been buggin me for the past few days. Why is it in the Free Space universe that cruisers are more lightly armed than destroyers? I do realize first and foremost this is onry a game and also that the term "destroyer" would tend to imply superior fire power, and "cruiser" would tend to imply going out for a stroll.

The reality of cruisers and destroyers are that cruisers are, in fact, more heavily armed than destroyers in the modern navy, especially post WWII.

During the WWII era, cruisers and destroyers were vastly different in that both had very different roles. Cruisers were primarily an Anti-air platform where Destroyers were an Anti-sub platform. Each were armed accordingly, and destroyers had the more advanced sonar system. In today's navy, equipment wise there is very little difference. Both have the same sonar system and have the same radar system. The big differences come in capabilities size and armament.

Modern destroyers have 1 5" gun, fore, while cruisers have 2, 1 fore and aft. Both have 2 VLS launchers, however, 1 of the launchers on the destroyer is only a half launcher. (If you don't know what VLS is, its essentially a grid on the deck where the missiles are housed, 8x8 for a total of 64 missiles per launcher giving Cruisers a max total of 128 missiles and destroyers a max total of 92 as one launcher is 8x4).
Both will typically have 2 CIWS anti-missile gun systems, however some destroyers are being equipped with RAM anti-missile missile system instead of CIWS.

Cruisers also have the capability to house 2 SH-60B (anti sub) helo's where as most destroyers can only land 1 helo, however i believe destroyers are being made now with a hangar, but they can only house 1 helo. And both ships have the exact same engine and are capable of the same top speed.

Also, destroyers are smaller than cruisers and they are designed with a concave hull to deflect radar away, giving it a very small radar profile (along with a special radar absorbent material) where cruisers are not.

And finally, Cruisers will typically have a full bird Captain as CO and destroyers will typically have a Commander as CO. (and for those that don't know Navy ranks, Captain = Colonel and out ranks a Commander)

as the shape of war and the world has changed, no surface ship has any one role any more (big decks excluded, ie carriers and amphibs) all of the frigates have been decommissioned, scrapped, sold and/or used for target practice. The cruisers in service today are no longer being produced and the modern destroyers are being cranked out like they're goin out of style. Cruisers and Destroyers both simultaneously fill the roles of Anti-air and Anti-sub platforms.

So with all of this in mind, why is it that cruisers in FS are portrayed as weaker ships than destroyers?  :p (and yes im a bit biased cuz i served on a Cruiser)

You should know that the Ticonderoga cruisers and Spruance destroyers share the same hull. Modern destroyers have grown to the size to match cruisers. They just stuff more equipment onto the Ticonderogas and call it a cruiser. In fact it is almost like the Fenris and the Leviathan.

 
Re: cruisers vs destoryers
I know =) the *sprucans are all decomissioned tho... infact i decomissioned the Nicholson before going to the Mobile Bay

 

Offline Mars

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
In contemporary terms

corvettes < frigates < destroyers < cruisers < battle cruisers (only Kirov but oh well) < carriers < super carriers

You'll notice corvettes are at the bottom.
In freespace terms

cruisers < corvettes < frigates < destroyers < super destroyers < juggernauts.

Destroyers are actually an odd mix of a contemporary carrier and a historical battleship (only in space), which makes sense given the strategic problems subspace presents.

 

Offline StarSlayer

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Re: cruisers vs destoryers
Yeah i'd caulk it up to the game developers just going with what sounded cool as opposed to following generally accepted naval designations.   If they actually had a bunch of ex Navy on the dev team they probably would have baulked at the way GTVA Command deploys its naval assets :P 
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Offline eliex

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Good point, but logically  :v: named the classes for implications.

  
lol im sure if the team were all ex-navy they woulda nuked the shivans back to their home world and the game woulda been over on the 3rd mission of FS1 =D

 

Offline Stormkeeper

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I don't think the classes of FS1 caps are related to real world classes, at least in terms of size and weight.
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Offline TrashMan

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Good point, but logically  :v: named the classes for implications.

I think they just named them after the cool factor...that, and they probably had the star wards "star DESTROYER" ringing in their ears.
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Offline Stormkeeper

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I think they just named them after the cool factor...that, and they probably had the star wards "star DESTROYER" ringing in their ears.
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Offline Colonol Dekker

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Offline Wanderer

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Well... even historically...

Destroyers were originally 'torpedoboat destroyers'.. Basically gun armed torpedoboats designed to destroy out the torpedo armed torpedoboats before those could harm the battleship lines in fleet engagements.. That is before the classes (torpedoboat & torpedoboat destroyer) more or less merged into a single ship class commonly known as destroyer capable of handling both of tasks of its predecessors.  In similar way destroyer could just have been something like 'carrier/cruiser destroyer' shortened to destroyer.

On the other hand both corvette and frigate were sailing (and later steam) ship classes, both not heavy enough to serve as man-o-war (ie. battleships) but instead operating as patrol ships, escorts, couriers etc. etc. Surviving steam frigates were actually reclassified as cruisers before WW1 era. The names (and their current usage) were revived by British to describe their small new mainly ASW sloops in WW2.

So given their history you could pretty much define any ship class as having any designation you want. Or then just steal something from the age of sail like British did it, galleons, yawls, and brigantines in space would be kinda cool though.
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FS ship designations actually follow B5 ship designations pretty close.

 

Offline StarSlayer

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Well... even historically...

Destroyers were originally 'torpedoboat destroyers'.. Basically gun armed torpedoboats designed to destroy out the torpedo armed torpedoboats before those could harm the battleship lines in fleet engagements.. That is before the classes (torpedoboat & torpedoboat destroyer) more or less merged into a single ship class commonly known as destroyer capable of handling both of tasks of its predecessors.  In similar way destroyer could just have been something like 'carrier/cruiser destroyer' shortened to destroyer.

On the other hand both corvette and frigate were sailing (and later steam) ship classes, both not heavy enough to serve as man-o-war (ie. battleships) but instead operating as patrol ships, escorts, couriers etc. etc. Surviving steam frigates were actually reclassified as cruisers before WW1 era. The names (and their current usage) were revived by British to describe their small new mainly ASW sloops in WW2.

So given their history you could pretty much define any ship class as having any designation you want. Or then just steal something from the age of sail like British did it, galleons, yawls, and brigantines in space would be kinda cool though.

Well least they didn't stick to the Man-o-War designations in FS2

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Offline Black Wolf

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The best justification I ever heard for it was that Cruisers were launched first and called cruisers because they're roughly the size of naval cruisers. Then destroyers were designed to wipe the floor with cruisers - making them "Cruiser destroyers". That idea falls apart when you consider FS2 designations, but FS2 wasn't as well backstoried as FS1 was, so I can see how things like that snuck in.
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