In Y175, faced with increasing numbers and deadliness of Kzinti drones, the Lyrans developed this system for fighter defense. It was rarely available in Y175, but became more widespread by Y176. After that, Lyran development shifted to PFs and, while their carriers continued to operate the system, no additional improvements were made.

While nothing smaller than size class 4 could carry a fully-capable ESG device, the Lyrans were able to design a limited version of the ESG that could be carried by a fighter. This system could project an ESG in a very small radius (perhaps 20 meters around the fighter). This radius was too small to encompass a PF, restricting its use to fighters.

The fighter-based ESG was packed into a fighter pod, which was mounted on the fighter's drone or pod rails. Because the Klingon fighters operated by the Lyrans did not have room for this type of weapon internally, its use was restricted to pods only. As fun as it would be, the pod could not be operated by Lyran MRS shuttles.

The pod generates a field that is in most ways as an ESG that is restricted to one point of power and a radius of zero (strength four). It is generally treated as a phaser pod except as follows:
* One full point of power is needed to charge the pod.
* The pod can only generate one ESG field before needing to be recharged. If an announcement is cancelled, the pod remains charged and can be announced again after the normal waiting period.
* The ESG pod does not have a cooling/cycle time but the rearming requirement will tend to create such an effect.
* The ESG pod cannot be activated for eight impulses after launch (i.e. as a direct-fire weapon). This applies to activation, not announcement.
* Cost: 1(?) point.

The ESG field functions as a standard ESG except as follows:
* Multiple ESGs of this type can be active in a hex without interacting with each other. (This is necessary to allow squadrons to operate efficiently AND to limit the offensive potential of the system).
* The ESG WILL interact with a "full-size" ESG generated by a ship, including both (G23.71) and (G23.73). If (G23.712) applies, the fighter ESG always fails and the ship ESG always succeeds.
* The ESG must be deactivated before voluntarily landing (including crash-landing). If pulled into an enemy shuttle bay, an active ESG will score damage to the ship in the same way as a suicide shuttle (that only does damage equal to the strength of the field).
* If a fighter with an active ESG is involved in a dogfight, in a collision, the enemy fighter will hit the ESG first. If this destroys the enemy fighter, the Lyran fighter is not destroyed by the collision. Drones would hit the ESG normally, whether fired from within or outside the dogfight.
* Drones launched by a fighter with an active ESG are inside the field and will tend to hit the ESG as the drones will usually be faster than the fighter. Drones launched by the fighter before the ESG is active must be outside the field.
* No other unit, other than a drone launched by the fighter, can be designated as inside the ESG. (G23.72).
* Except as above, the ESG cannot be used to "ram" other units, even at range zero. It will only hit incoming weapons targeted on the fighter it protects, or possibly launched by that fighter.
* The ESG will interact with a hellbore fired at the fighter it protects. It will not interfere with hellbores fired at other targets in the same hex or downrange.
* An ADD fired at the protected fighter must roll to hit normally. If it hits, it will score its damage first against the ESG, then against the fighter. If an ADD is fired at a drone inside the field, then if it hits, it rolls for damage as it would against a shuttle, and if the damage scored exceeds the strength of the field, the drone is destroyed.
* If the fighter drops chaff, it must deactivate any ESG pod, and cannot activate an ESG pod until the post-chaff restrictions have elapsed. (As with post-launch, this affect activation, not announcement).
* I am not sure if a fighter should be allowed to activate more than one of these at a time or not. I can see both sides of it. In general, I would lean toward yes, but note that there are not usually that many pods to go around and relatively few fighters would actually have that capability.

Tactically, the main use of the fighter ESG was to protect against Kzinti drones. In this capacity it was superior to a phaser pod, which might only do three points of damage and therefore fail to destroy a type-I drone. If hit by a type-VI drone, the one remaining point could protect against a type-I drone that survived a phaser shot. It could also partially protect the fighter from ADD fire. Compared to chaff, it could only destroy a maximum of one drone, but tended to be more reliable, and did not impose the post-use restrictions of chaff. Finally, the fact that it could be carried on a pod rail allowed the fighter to increase its total armament (even if this armament was defensive). Counting against it was the fact that it had minimal offensive value, that it could not participate in defense of other nearby friendly units, and that it cost more power to arm. Against Hydrans, it had the same tactical tradeoff against hellbores as any ESG, in that it reduces damage but eliminates the chance of a miss. Compared to a drone, the main advantage was that it did not count against the fighter's drone launch rate limit. Otherwise, drones are better most of the time. Offensively, the only possible use for the field was to protect a drone launched by the fighter for a very short time in the hopes of getting it past ADD or counter-drone defenses, but this could only be done at very close range as the difference in speeds would tend to cause the drone to impact the ESG.

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I know ESG-like weapons for fighters have been proposed before and never accepted, but maybe this will be the lucky one! I have tried to keep it balanced compared to drones and phaser pods.

By Michael Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 12:22 pm: Edit

1) 20 meters? Try 200+ kilometers if you think this might be able to do a ram. Note that a hex is 10,000 km across.

2) Drones DON'T do direct hits IIRC. They detonate and generate a directed subspace pulse that damages the target. ADD do direct hit IIRC.

3) I DO think this might be a great Anti drone VI &ADD defense.

But even then, it would be useful without being too powerful. I think any RAM ability would be pretty much an auto reject.

Maybe have it be very limited duration (like 6 impulses) and not be able to play the ESG fake game (ie announce & then cancel announcement to influence movement without spending power)...

Basically you are trading a P3 pod ranged shot for a range 0 ESG.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 03:04 pm: Edit

An ESG that does not interfere with friendlies in the same hex opens a can of worms that I do not feel we want opened.

By George Duffy (Sentinal) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 04:11 pm: Edit

Sheap,

I like the idea of a ESG pod, but there are several issues why I don't believe this will work.

1) 20' radius - Any drone targeted on the fighter will detonate the instant it enters the same the as the fighter. Which means it may only reduce the explosive strength of the drone by a factor of 4.

2) If active, must be deactivated before voluntary landing - If the pod must be charged first before mounting onto said fighter, then the active pod must be jettisoned before landing.

3) Size - Your proposing a mini ESG that is 1/50th the size of a standard one but with the same output. Why couldn't the Lyrans have built these instead and activate them sequentially to protect their ships. Giving a 5 to 1 ratio to cover the size of the ship you more than double the strength of an ESG.

Even if you explain such a size could only cover a size 6 class craft it is still basically working as a standard (one-shot) ESG, with the ability to mount four or more (pod and drone rails) on a single seat fighter.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 06:02 pm: Edit

It opens additional cans of worms.

1.) Why couldn't the Lyrans (Lyran Democratic Republic, WYN Star Cluster) also use this system on their defense satellites and captor mines (at least those that are command controlled)? Note that as Defense Satellites and Captor Mines are capable of re-arming heavy weapons (unlike fighters), if such a pod were re-useable surely defense satellites and captor mines would be able to re-arm such a pod.

2.) Since there is absolutely, positively, zero difference between a fighter, heavy fighter, medium bomber, or heavy bomber designed by the Zegurni Design Bureau operated by the Lyran Star Empire, or Lyran Democratic Republic, or WYN Star Cluster, or the Klingon Empire, or the Seltorian Tribunal "Torch of Vengeance" task force, or Orion pirate cartels, why can this pod not also be used by all those other empires?

Other design issues noted only for future reference, not meant to say this would be accepted if these issues were addressed.

1.) Under (G23.82) an anti-drone cannot damage an ESG field. There is no die roll, it is not a matter that a ship cannot be damaged by an ADD, it is a flat "an anti-drone interacting with an ESG field is simply destroyed." The concept that you would use the normal interaction between an ADD and a size class 6 unit to determine if the ESG field is reduced in this case does not make sense.

2.) If you are operating this pod, and drop chaff, I would actually expect that the chaff has zero effect, i.e., is destroyed by the ESG field.

3.) Like it or not, you have to address what happens if the pod is activated inside of a shuttle bay (or while docked externally to a fighter mech-link or to a ship's hatch, or while docked to another fighter or shuttle). Note that this might be an option created by a fighter having crash-landed aboard, or by a fighter on a ship that has been boarded by the enemy (activate the pod to create more damage in an effort to destroy the ship). You might note that an internally docked ship cannot use an ESG (C13.4844) and try to apply that to the fighter, but fighters are already an exception to ships in that ships cannot arm or fire any weapon while internally docked (C13.482), fighters and shuttles can (G7.81). Note that while an externally docked ship protects both itself and the thing it is docked to with its ESG even if the ESG is set radius zero, that is not the case with your ESG pod.

4.) I am unclear why this pod has an eight impulse delay on launch. It does not require the fighter's fire control, and the fighter is able to drop chaff (whether its own or those provided by a pod), go to erratic maneuvers, use its own ECM or ECM provided by pods, and receive lent EW. Why could it not activate an ESG pod if it had one? Ships do not require active fire control to use ESGs, and could activate them after undocking.

5.) A ship cannot use an ESG while conducting erratic maneuvers (C10.521), so how could a fighter involved in a high maneuver environment such as a dogfight (J7.2) or erratic maneuvers use an ESG provided by this pod?

6.) A fighter cannot carry more than one phaser pod. You have placed no restriction on this pod, which creates a situation in which a single space fighter might have two such pods on its pod rails (four such pods on a bomber's pod rails), or a Z-YC might carry as many as 10 such pods (replacing all of its drones in addition to using its pod rails). Note that this matters because a DN with four ESGs can release all of them at the same radius at the same time, so a disruptor-armed fighter (or bomber) can have good shielding versus hellbores while closing in to fire.

7.) By definition, you need to define if having this pod means you cannot also have a phaser-pod on that fighter and vice versa.

8.) You need to define what happens if a fighter operating an ESG drops a cluster munition.

9.) Can a fighter use the ESG while moving in atmosphere.

10.) Frankly, whether an enemy fighter is nominally destroyed by a collision with an ESG field or not while in a dogfight, both fighters would still be destroyed by such an incident. The ESG field may have technically destroyed the fighter, but the mass of material in such a case would still impact with enough force for it to be game over for the ESG fighter.

11.) You need to define what happens if the pilot ejects (J6.6) while the ESG field is active. (Basically, my opinion, if he ejects because he sees a lot of seeking weapons coming and does so voluntarily, the ESG would be shut down, if he is being ejected because direct-fire weapons destroyed his fighter . . . too bad he is fried).

12.) Others have correctly noted that drones are not "direct impact" weapons, they get near the target and then detonate (otherwise a slug drone, all armor and no explosive power) would do considerable damage on impact as a result of all that speed converting its mass to energy), so the radius you have picked would be utterly insufficient to protect the fighter from the detonation of a drone warhead.

13.) A phaser-3 is much, much smaller than an ESG, but the phaser-3 pod could only hold a half point of energy. I find it hard to believe a system as comparably massive as an ESG could be reduced down to fitting in a pod with enough space left over to have a capacitor holding a whole point of power.

14.) The operation of an ESG blinds a sensor channel (G24.1345), while obviously this would have no effect on the fighter's ability to guide drones, I would imagine that an EWF carrying one of these on a pod rail that activates it would no longer be able to lend EW to the other fighters of its squadron for the next 32 impulses.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 07:25 pm: Edit

Note: Several of the above points are tied to the designed short range of the ESG field, which by definition would not protect it from drone detonations. Obviously if the radius of the field were expanded to protect it from drone detonations some of these items (such as ejection and dropping chaff) would no longer be a problem.

Note that range of drone detonation is a factor in why they do less damage under electronic warfare, see (D6.36), and a drone detonation at 21 meters (one meter outside of the proposed 20 meter sphere of protection) would effectively be a Range Zero direct hit. Note that nothing in the game definitively defines (at least as far as I can remember) how far a drone is from its target in a 10,000 kilometer hex to damage it, but that distance is certainly much greater than 20 meters.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, June 06, 2015 - 10:36 pm: Edit

I can't make the engineering on this thing anything other than a game-wrecking disaster.