[Titan]

What's the best way?

I would send an armada of bombers to disable it and take out the Lred, then crash a meson-filled orion into the rear. Or just get a couple destroyers and beam it to death from the rear, after it's disabled. But crashing mesons into it is safer, since you don't have to really worry about the rest of the shivan fleet coming before you're done.

[Droid803]

Screw disabling it, just take out the four front beams and the LRed, and then crash something into it from ANY angle.

[redsniper]

Why crash anything? Just disarm and disable, then pick it off with whatever.

[General Battuta]

Is this going to be another one of those threads where we pretend that the Sathanas will just putter along without launching fighters, maneuvering, receiving reinforcements, jumping, or taking any kind of counter-action? Those are silly!

I don't think there's any really reliable and realistic way to kill a Sath. If you pull it off, what's the point? They've got dozens, maybe hundreds more!

[Rodo]

how to kill a sathanas??? don't really know, FS retail campaign does not explode any weakness on the sathanas, command just deals with it with force not with brains.

and what general battuta says is right, we can pretend it does not have any escorting ships but.. hey a sath with the entire compliment of fighters/bombers is just impossible to destroy.

[Enismirdal]

Notes: I'm operating under the assumption that TAGged ships can be precision-targeted.  If not, well...that's silly.  Please point out flaws, and I'm also assuming the firepower I suggest would be sufficient.  If not...feel free to up the required ships accordingly.  I totally forget all of the exact values involved.  I'm more discussing a potential strategy rather than precisely how much force would be required to execute it.

I suppose ideally speaking - assuming only one Sath "problem", with no capship escorts - I would use an operation requiring precision timing.
First wave, surprise attack of five wings of bombers with light fighter escort , jump in close and fire off enough warheads to take out the four forward beams and the LRed. 
Upon stage one completion, initiate stage two, two wings of interceptors jump in, armed with TAG missiles, as well as a pair of Orion destroyers, precision-jumped into position to have firing lines on the Fighterbay and Engine systems of the Sath, respectively.  LoS on both at once if possible (not sure if it is, I forget..).  Destroyer escorts also jump in at this time, a pair of Deimos' and a few Aeolus', if we can get them, as well as some Leviathans for good measure and/or distraction.  Those don't have to be too precise as long as they're close enough to cover the destroyers.
Stage three, interceptors TAG the fighterbay as soon as the Orions jump in, and all available capships with LoS, as well as all available bomber wings, attack it.
Upon stage three completion, stage four, interceptors TAG the comms subsystem, and it's taken out as quickly as possible, by the same method.
Upon stage four completion, interceptors proceed to TAG the engine and navigation subsystems, same as previous.
Stage five, all remaining weapons methodically destroyed (TAGged or just fired upon manually) and all remaining subsystems attacked until destroyed.
...Then just have everything available shoot it til it explodes and run away if reinforcements arrive.
Ideally you'd have extra forces on standby in order to deal with Shivan reinforcements...but that's a fair deal of firepower required just to blow up a Sath, even being intelligent about it.
Also...if another Sath arrives?  Give it up and run away.  Don't be stupid.

[Enigmatic Entity]

Notes: I'm operating under the assumption that TAGged ships can be precision-targeted.  If not, well...that's silly.  Please point out flaws, and I'm also assuming the firepower I suggest would be sufficient.  If not...feel free to up the required ships accordingly.  I totally forget all of the exact values involved.  I'm more discussing a potential strategy rather than precisely how much force would be required to execute it.

I suppose ideally speaking - assuming only one Sath "problem", with no capship escorts - I would use an operation requiring precision timing.
First wave, surprise attack of five wings of bombers with light fighter escort , jump in close and fire off enough warheads to take out the four forward beams and the LRed. 

*snip*

Why not just send in a wave of bombers to attack the fighterbay (and the comm. system so the Sath can't call for help) first? By the time the bombers attacking the BFReds (in your plan) had finished, the Sath would have launched some of its fighters in case other enemies arrived. Attack the beam cannons second.

[Enismirdal]

This is a good point.  If you took out the fighterbay you could take the beams out at...reasonable leisure.  Hadn't thought of that.  Excellent idea, bombers for the fighterbay, comms, then beams, then capship support...

[General Battuta]

Notes: I'm operating under the assumption that TAGged ships can be precision-targeted.  If not, well...that's silly.  Please point out flaws, and I'm also assuming the firepower I suggest would be sufficient.  If not...feel free to up the required ships accordingly.  I totally forget all of the exact values involved.  I'm more discussing a potential strategy rather than precisely how much force would be required to execute it.

I suppose ideally speaking - assuming only one Sath "problem", with no capship escorts - I would use an operation requiring precision timing.
First wave, surprise attack of five wings of bombers with light fighter escort , jump in close and fire off enough warheads to take out the four forward beams and the LRed. 
Upon stage one completion, initiate stage two, two wings of interceptors jump in, armed with TAG missiles, as well as a pair of Orion destroyers, precision-jumped into position to have firing lines on the Fighterbay and Engine systems of the Sath, respectively.  LoS on both at once if possible (not sure if it is, I forget..).  Destroyer escorts also jump in at this time, a pair of Deimos' and a few Aeolus', if we can get them, as well as some Leviathans for good measure and/or distraction.  Those don't have to be too precise as long as they're close enough to cover the destroyers.
Stage three, interceptors TAG the fighterbay as soon as the Orions jump in, and all available capships with LoS, as well as all available bomber wings, attack it.
Upon stage three completion, stage four, interceptors TAG the comms subsystem, and it's taken out as quickly as possible, by the same method.
Upon stage four completion, interceptors proceed to TAG the engine and navigation subsystems, same as previous.
Stage five, all remaining weapons methodically destroyed (TAGged or just fired upon manually) and all remaining subsystems attacked until destroyed.
...Then just have everything available shoot it til it explodes and run away if reinforcements arrive.
Ideally you'd have extra forces on standby in order to deal with Shivan reinforcements...but that's a fair deal of firepower required just to blow up a Sath, even being intelligent about it.
Also...if another Sath arrives?  Give it up and run away.  Don't be stupid.

This is one of those awesome plans that would never, ever work.

The Sath could jump out at any time. The Sath could launch dozens of fighters before the fighterbay ever got hit. And this is all assuming that you could ever get that number of forces in place and get them into position on time.

[Enismirdal]

Oh, I know it's really, really touchy, and far from a good shot.  But I will revise that with having the first bomber attack focus all fire on the fighterbay, then the comms, finally beams, then calling in capship support, thanks to an earlier comment that made me realize I was sucky at plans.

[General Battuta]

It's not an awful plan, by any means, and coming up with these elaborate tactics is fun.

But the whole lesson of FS2 is that, well, plans don't really work on the Shivans. Maybe in the short term. Maybe you'd get lucky and catch one Sath without escort and disable it with huge numbers of Helios warheads and then kill it. We can pretend that the Shivans wouldn't tear the bombers to shreds, or that we have enough Helios warheads to do it, or that the concentration of Allied forces wouldn't bring an equally massive swarm of Liliths and Ravanas to bear.

And then, well, God alone knows what hits you next.

[Enismirdal]

Oh...I know.  We kill one Sath perfectly, they bring in 27 simultaneously next time.  Or one, then ambush with 48 more.  Or just nuke the GTVA planet-by-planet.   But it's still fun to try to invent a plan to take out a single un-escorted sath.

I don't even want to know what happens after Saths.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

If you know it's coming and where put a large object right in front of it as it jumps in.  When it hits it doing nearly 999 by by Sath.

Park a support ship and a wing of bombers in the fighter bay

Dock a drone to a Meson and send it into the fighter bay.  

[General Battuta]

It does seem likely that the Shivans would use scouts. We've never seen a Sath jump in without fighters or other Shivan forces coming in first.

[eliex]

The thing about the Sathanas is that to get the internal fighter escort to manageable levels, the fighters/bombers numbers must be drained over a long-term period like in FS2 or hit the fighterbays quickly in which time the Sathanas would escape.

However, it is viable to hit the engines and the fighterbay in a short space of time as if Shivan ships follow Terran or Vasudan launching rules, it would take some time for a massive Shivan fighter force to emerge from the fighterbay once the initial escort is taken down.
That said, it only works if the Sathanas admiral assumes that it won't be directly assaulted any time soon and won't prepare defensive fighters in advance.

[Scotty]

Maybe someone could test the efficacy of the above plan by fredding something?   

Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, it would still be fun to find out.

[Flipside]

I'm wondering if you could achieve the same effect if you collapsed an inter-system jump as you do when you collapse an intra-system jump? If it were, you could come up with some interesting weapons

[ShadowGorrath]

The original Sath-killing plan should work quite well. Maybe only in a nebula enviroment, but still. That's sending a diversion to lure the sath into a trap, tag its beam cannons so that 3 friendly destroyers take out the main beam cannons. Then it's only a matter of time.

[esarai]

Are we allowed to engineer new weapons to aid our strategies?

Because if so, follow Sun Tzu's art of war: The victorious warrior only seeks battle after the victory has been won.

Use a massive stealth fighter deployment to target and destroy the weapons subsystems aboard the Sathanas and her escort. Have them warp away, and begin bombardment with Nuclear Railguns (imagine harbingers being fired out of the Orion's main guns, except with 40 times the velocity) and Long Range Assault Missiles (FS equivalent of an RIM-161 Standard Missile 3), targeting the anti-fighter weapons, and then deploy bombers to declaw the Sathanas. Summon your legions to finish the job. The initial stealth attack only targets weapons subsystems so that fighters can stay on the move, not get slowed down working on multiple turrets, and finish the job as fast as possible. I'm sure they all have families who would like to see them again. This sets the stage for the second bombardment: without weapons control, the Sath fleet won't be able to intercept the missiles (which are traveling so fast only ship-board defenses can stop them). The Nuclear railguns pulverize shipboard defenses, clearing the way for the bombers and final assault.

Of course, if the Railguns and missiles are that accurate, why not just pwn the sath's main beams then and there? Because this is FreeSpace: THERE MUST BE BEAMS.

[Killer Whale]

Or something like that awesome GVD Apothess, a ship that concentrates on one, cool, beam. A couple of those at long range could do some serious damage.

Alpha 1 in an ursa would also work very well. If the two armadas were so powerful and quickly launched that they negated each other so in-game only the Sath and Alpha 1 appear.

Amazon kamikaze fighters would own a target quickly.

Alpha 1 in an ursa attacks with several (maybe 3) bomber wings and target the beams with heavy escort (say, 6 wings). Hatshepsut follows and jumps in front of the sath and batters the sath with it's beams. A wing or two of Amazons could charge in and kamikaze the fighter bays, bombers continue in and periodically take out fighter bays, weapons, communications, engines, defensive turrets. If there are (most likely) corvettes and cruisers escorting, the hattie could concentrate on them first and maybe a couple of corvettes as back up. If a destroyer jumps in, decide wether you can possibly win and if you thinks you can, find a way to withdraw if you need to, if another juggernaut jumps in, bug out. Or send in something like the icanus.