Archive through December 23, 2019
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: STELLAR SHADOWS:
Stellar Shadow Journal #3:
Archive through December 23, 2019
The problem with the Battle Tug F-111 pod combo is the finder ships also ideally should be able to reposition at a decent clip. You search an area and do not find anything. Then you need to search a new area and this combo takes about twice as long to get to the new area. Same reason the Auxiliary survey ships built of freighter hulls are suboptimal for the mission.
RTN hunting seems to involve several steps from what I have read and from the scenarios presented:
1. Ship with multiple scout sensors scans area. No other ships can be nearby. Not just 100 hexes or so. It needs room.
2. Scout picks up possible RTN. Moves to new area and scans. Other ships still have to stay away. Repeat step 2 more times as necessary.
3. Scout is now close to the Andro base and has been detected by now. Andro forces are already enroute for defense and/or relocation.
4. Scout finds base. If heavily armed it may now attack. If not it whistles up the cavalry to come wipe out the base.
5. If Galactic forces arrive first the base is toast. If Andro forces arrive first the base is disassembled and moved if possible. If not, it is defended. If both arrive at roughly the same time fireworks ensue.
So the requirements for a finder are:
1. Scout sensors
2. Able to operate independently for extended periods of time.
3. Best if it is fast enough to relocate to new scanning positions in a timely fashion.
4. Ideally can defend itself and/or flee quickly if found.
5. Absolute best case it can wipe out an undefended Andro satbase on its own or better even the bigger Andro bases (rare outside of SCS and BCS ships).
1 and 2 are required, 3 and 4 is probably used in most cases, 5 is nice to have but most hunters will not have this.
For a response force you need:
1. Able to wipe out an undefended Andro base.
2. Ideally can wipe out the base and a small Andro force sent to defend it in case they get there first.
3. Ideally made up of fast ships or (better) X-ships so they can arrive more quickly because they cannot be very close to the finder.
1 and 2 are probably standard. 3 is nice to have but not used in all cases due to simple availability.
There would be exceptions. For example I could see using auxiliary exploration freighters and scout tugs such as the F-111 carrier to hunt for nodes in areas unlikely to have Andro bases or in high density areas near empire capitols or in survey areas just to spook the Andros into relocating and let the real scouts search in more critical areas.
According to the descriptions of the Andro War every major empire except the Feds, Klingons, and Kzinti (Feds and Klingons had their shaky alliance and Kzinti probably benefited from being partially surrounded by the two empires holding on pretty well. It is also likely the Andros were focusing on the weaker outer empires first.
The rest of the Empires were restricted to their capitol hex and a small group of hexes around it being totally in their control so RTN hunting in most of the empires would first focus on a small area around the capitols and slowly expand out.
The others were lucky the Feds found the first RTN node. I have my doubts the Klingons would have shared in the hopes their old enemies would fall and the Klingons could then "liberate" them later. Most of the others may have shared just to get the others fighting back against the network to take some pressure off. The Romulans probably would have kept quiet because they are, you know, Romulans. Kzinti, Lyrans, and Hydrans are a maybe. Gorn would at least share with the Feds. ISC is probably still idealistic enough to share.
Note: This analysis is not official by any means but it is based off of descriptions and the scenarios tied to RTN hunting.
Jon MX: Uh, no, not quite.
There is no particular need to "relocate quickly to a new search area." Moving occupies a very small slice of the hunter's time and being slower doesn't matter much. Battle tug with PFT/F111 pod isn't a bad combo at all.
As for your five-step process...
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1. Ship with multiple scout sensors scans area. No other ships can be nearby. Not just 100 hexes or so. It needs room.
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Correct. More like 10,000 hexes.
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2. Scout picks up possible RTN. Moves to new area and scans. Other ships still have to stay away. Repeat step 2 more times as necessary.
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Uh, not really. It might happen that way more by accident than design, but that's not the normal procedure. You do sometimes find "weak signals" and if you don't follow them up you might collate several such "weak signal reports" but that's probably rare.
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3. Scout is now close to the Andro base and has been detected by now. Andro forces are already enroute for defense and/or relocation.
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Uh, not so much. The base and hunter usually spot each other about the same time.
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4. Scout finds base. If heavily armed it may now attack. If not it whistles up the cavalry to come wipe out the base.
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If the scout isn't heavily armed you're really just wasting your time. The Andros will move the base before the cavalry can arrive. You're encouraging them to move bases which has a minor bad impact on their operations but the point is to kill the bases. One might agree that this was the early (failed) procedure.
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5. If Galactic forces arrive first the base is toast. If Andro forces arrive first the base is disassembled and moved if possible. If not, it is defended. If both arrive at roughly the same time fireworks ensue.
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After the "find and send for help" doctrine failed, you don't generally send a hunter that cannot kill the base on its own. While the above #5 step is accurate, "hunter kills base before Andro reinforcement arrive" is not just the preferred method but the only one that works so you don't use a hunter that cannot kill it before reinforcements get there. Otherwise you just wasted the time spent hunting. Hunting time needs to produce kills, not "forced him to move" which is at best a draw and you're losing planets every day until you kill all the bases so moving a base just means a planet lives a week longer, not that you saved it or ended the war. Are we in this war to win this war?
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So the requirements for a finder are:
1. Scout sensors
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Correct
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2. Able to operate independently for extended periods of time.
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Any ship can do that.
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3. Best if it is fast enough to relocate to new scanning positions in a timely fashion.
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Pretty much irrelevant.
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4. Ideally can defend itself and/or flee quickly if found.
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Not really the point.
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5. Absolute best case it can wipe out an undefended Andro satbase on its own or better even the bigger Andro bases (rare outside of SCS and BCS ships).
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Only case worth bothering with.
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The others were lucky the Feds found the first RTN node.
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By your logic, it's entirely possible that others found nodes earlier and didn't share the info, or that others got the info and didn't believe it. The Feds wrote the history in which the Feds are the heroes so the Feds found the first one.
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Well... as nice as this discussion is, and no doubt others will find it entertaining, it appears that the subject is a possible survey ship or Ron hunter built on any of several ships (CVO, DN, DNH, BB etc. ). (This seems biased in the direction of he Federation, but most empires have designs similar to all but the CVO.)
Since we started with the CVO, let's flesh it out a bit more.
For a SSJ survey ship, even the Federation would only build an expensive CVO version if there were a clear and compelling case. (Something on the order of a single survey ship stumbling on the original home world of the carnivon, (which if I recall correctly, had never been found by the kzinti or lyrans.)
A large ship (CVO or DN size) could take a alpha strike by most any patrol ship (CC or CA or smaller) and still retreat successfully. A GSC or heavy cruise size ship like could survive as well... but it would have a higher chance to be crippled than a CVO or DN would.
Or, perhaps a larger ship has a better chance to navigate near to the energy barriers close to the edge of the galaxy than smaller ships. (Not sure what that would be, unless it's related to total power... smaller ships simply do not have the power capacity of a CVO or a DN.
Or, it could be as simple as a greater chance of getting"lost" and a larger ship has more room to store supplies needed to keep the ship in operating condition than a small ship.
Or it could one or more (many more!?!) other reasons.
Point is, there is an underlying justification to build a larger survey ship for unspecified operational reasons. I think we've at least started the list of changes needed to convert a CVO to a GVO (galaxy flatbed survey ship?)
Those include:
Two probe launchers.
8 admin shuttle craft.
Cargo boxes (8? 10? I have to pull the SSD to check, but I am pretty sure it was at least 8 of them...)
4 special sensors (the CVO has more power to utilize special sensors... such a GVO would surely be a star fleet admirals dream for a better combat scout than a GSC ever could be.)
Room to house enough personnel to staff a full scale Planetary survey.
Transporters capacity to support said Planetary survey at the same or better level than the GSC.
Nice if it could retain four photon tube launchers, but even just two such photons would be sufficient .
Am I missing anything?
SVC: Thanks for clarification. I guess I was leaning too heavily on some of the earlier RTN hunting scenarios as my basis where the scout calls in cavalry or the one where someone phones it in and the two B10s show up at the same time and basically compete for the glory of the kill.
On a personal note I admit I like the idea of the Romulans figuring out the RTN first, telling no one, and starting to take it down hoping the other empires will fail to do so. It would finally give the Roms a win after over a century of being the Alpha Octant's whipping boy.
Jeff: Sorry for that derail.
Actually, a nice "thumbnail" of requirements for a "Survey capable" ship would be helpful.
How many special sensors
How many labs
How many probes (relevant to RTN hunting?)
How many admins (relevant?)
How many cargo needed
Mike, we have the GSC to compare to.
That's why I listed 2 probe launchers, 8 admin shuttles, 8(or possibly 10) cargo boxes (I have to check the SSD still.) not to mention the number of transporters, 4 special sensors and tractor beams to handle shuttles.
A number of survey ships in the Fed proposals topic have been rejected for not having had as many systems as the GSC.
Well if we use the GSC as a base, it will probably eliminate every other races survey ship. What are the other empires using now, before the ne design and how successful are they. Maybe before we design the ship we need to examine what conditions can a Andro base be detected under and what ship can meet those criteria.
Jon Murdock:
I think what you have to bear in mind is that tactics, much like war in general, are not static.
Someone introduces a new technology or simply a new tactical innovation. Eventually, that innovation is countered, perhaps by a new technology or simply a new innovation.
So when RTN hunting began, it might have been enough to use a small scout backed up by a fast reaction force relatively nearby. There were some successes (and for the Andromedans some disasters).
The Andromedans, not having enough ships to strongly garrison all of their bases, or to keep a mothership at a base to rapidly evacuate it, in turn used the RTN itself to keep "mobile reserves" (requiring far fewer ships than trying to garrison every RTN node) which could quickly move to a base under threat.
This eventually results in a "balance point" where the Andromedans would still lose a node here and there, and find their operations undergoing some disruption from having to evacuate bases and keep the mobile reserve, but were picking off more of the smaller galactic scouts (and very rapidly making the point the Exploration freighters were completely inadequate for the mission at all).
The Galactics then countered by basing the hunters on the more heavily armed scouts (PF tenders with PF flotillas, plus Area Control ships, Division Control ships and even Scout Carriers operating without escorts (more commonly with their escorts part of nearby reaction forces for when the base that was found was a base station or battle station rather than just a satellite base).
In the end, the assembled empires simply had too many heavy armed scouts already in service for the Andromedans to respond so. In all seriousness, the Andromedans then made a major mistake in not "cutting their losses" and concentrating on the Omega Octant. Had they simply temporarily abandoned their attack on the Alpha Octant and concentrated on the Omega Octant, they might have successfully defeated the Omegan forces, and not cause the Alpha Octant to initiate "Operation Unity," and could have then strengthened and rebuilt their forces in the Omega Octant and then reinvaded the Alpha Octant after a new war broke out to weaken the Alpha Octant again (the likely future had the Andromedans not kept trying to win).
We might never know what was the real basis for Andromedan "Grand Strategy," and the fact that we do not know exactly why they thought it was necessary to simultaneously attack both Alpha and Omega, and to continue doing so even when they were clearly losing in Alpha after Y195. We can only know that from our viewpoint, it was a serous strategic miscalculation, and the fact that they made it says we do not know all of the factors that were driving the Andromdans' strategic choices.
Weren't they also attacking the Xorkaelians at this time? I remember seeing a comment that their conflict was more even over there.
Eddie:
This current discussion started with the CVO, which is Federation.
If other empires want to convert a BCH or a DN to the Survey mission, then they should do it with respect to the standards of that particular empires existing Survey ships capability (as measured by SSD boxes count of relevant systems (cargo, special sensors, probe launchers, admin shuttles, heavy weapons etc.)).
If one discusses a Federation survey ship, I submit that the GSC is the standard defined by star fleet and Survey command.
The YMMV.
Playing Devil's Advocate, Jeff, the GSC isn't a variant on the CA; it's a unique hull type, purpose built from the keel up and was NOT a conversion of a pre-existing hull type.
Perhaps a better ship for a comparison would be the CL conversion? That one actually IS a conversion from a base hull.
Per the master ship book, it is a heavily modified variant of the CA
Jeff for your purpose the NSR which is a direct conversion of the NCA might be better suited.
Guys, the GSC AND the CVO are larger over loaded hulls that, in a minority opinion, should never have been 1 movement cost hulls at the YIS dates.
The GSC with a YIS in the early 140's was a huge increase in SSD boxes compared to the vanilla CA.
The CVO with unique warp engines, was again oversized with a movement cost of MC=1.0, for the number of SSDs it hauled around.
But I am not in charge of this bus. If the proposals board wants to "dumb down" the requirements of performing Planetary Surveys, fine. But there must be a reason the Federation opted to build the GSC the way they did, otherwise they could just rely on freighter hull Survey ships.
The fact the other empires built expensive Survey ships also would seem to support the idea that the extra systems are necessary for the mission.
The existing background does not refer to the GSC as an overloaded hull.
The CVO isn't a real ship at all.
Jeff, as far as I can tell, the argument isn't that survey units are a bad idea, the argument that the Federation wants four sensor channels on all of their SRs is. Only the GSC has four, most everyone else has two*. Now putting four on a CVO conversion would make sense, but remember you have to take things out.
*Off the top of my head, only the Gorn HSR(4) and Hydran SR(3) start with more, although the Lyran SR can have more, depending on pallet or pod/s.
JSWile,
What Librarian101 said.
You've got all kinds of SR "rated" ships out there.
Off the top of my head, you have the Fed Light SR (based off the OCL), Kzinti SR & SRL, Lyran SR (based off the Tugs), etc,
Not any of these have the brute capabilities of the Fed GSC.
My guess:
2+ Special Sensors
4+ 6 admin
4+ cargo
10+ probes
6+ Labs.
ADM:
I am on board with taking stuff out. We can start with removing two of the four photon torpedo tubes/launchers.
Eddie quoted earlier the number of SSD boxes the CVO has, (132 iirc). He also indicated the BCF had 125 SSD boxes, I think. So to bring the CVO survey variant into compliance with both the GSC and the BCF, we know we have to add 4 external special sensors, delete 2 internal photons, delete 7 internal SSD boxes, (132+4-2-7)=125 SSD boxes (including 4 externally mounted special sensors. (Actually, this mistakes the problem, because 2 SSD boxes need to be moved from the saucer so it has the same number of internal SSD boxes,less 4 to account for the special sensors...so it may be we need to find 11 SSD boxes to remove from the secondary hull...)
Not sure what has to be trimmed off the secondary hull to make it happen, but it's an illustration of the scope of the job that needs to be done.
Ideally, that would bring the CVO/Survey variant into the same movement cost rate as the BCF.
If we are looking fr a base hunter/killer, why not look at the Ranger variant of the Fed BC class?
2 Sen, 8 labs, 6 admin, 1 prob, plenty of hull or other items to convert.
Eddie:
SVC posted twice back on the 17th that a SSJ survey ship is (implied in theory) is publishable.
For a CVO hull, we start with the survey mission, not a DN combat role (SVC, please correct me if I am over stating what you said.)
He did not address the Fed BC, because up to that point NO ONE had talked about the Ranger variant of the Fed BC class.
Just guessing, but My "read" of what SVC posted was a SSJ survey ship mission, that could later, be "pressed" into the RTN hunter mission when needed.
But, I feel that trying to design a RTN base hunter killer BEFORE the discovery of the RTN is back wards. Before discovery, no one knew about the RTN system, so no designs could have been prepared.
Also, the destruction of the RTN nodes happen so quickly, very little time was available to collect reports, start the r&d process, conceive plan, order the components for building a RTN hunter , and then commission, work up the crew complete shakedown cruise, and THEN deploy the ship in time to help complete the killing of the remaining RTN bases.
Of course, you are free to disagree, but there have been a number of ship proposals shot down because of the limited time available between discovery of the RTN, and the destruction of the net work.
Infact, off hand, the only new class of ships I can recall being built to support the final assault on the Andromedan bases outside of the galaxy was the fast freighter type.
Guess I will have to look to see if there are others.
The time frames is a good point, so in that frame you need the simplest conversion possible or just as you always do in war, use what you have. Some other questions and comments. First the first andro was sighted year 166. The invasion began in earnest in 188. The height of of Andro power was 197, Operation Unity was 201. When was the RTN first discovered, I dont remember the scenario. Would that time frame allow any conversions to special ships? First RTN discovered in 195
Ed:
We might be on surer ground by going with the "simplest conversion possible" route. We do know that the GSC and those conversions that carried fighters and heavy fighters were effective in the role.
A SSJ CVO conversion to a survey ship would seem to be a good candidate for a RTN base hunter or killer if it had a Survey version.
The problem is trying to decide exactly what components needed for the survey mission, and those SSD boxes the CVO starts with are surplus. Remove too many shuttle boxes, and you reduce the fighter group to the point it can not complete the RTN mission. If we do not remove enough SSD boxes, it can't complete the survey mission.
Then the issue becomes what fighter group is best. The existing CVO published in SSJ#1 had a single space fighter type and six mech link heavy fighters. A GVO survey version may require 4 special sensors, plus the other systems of a GSC(cargo, 2 probe launchers, 8 admin shuttles, etc.) for planetary survey missions, but for the RTN mission, just keeps the special sensors, the second probe launcher while swapping out the cargo and admin shuttles for a larger fighter group.
There is one other, minor problem for modifying the CVO for survey use; what might that encourage other people to use?
Imagine what a conversion of the B-10 for survey use might be. In my (alleged) mind, I replaced the wing phasers with Special Sensors, the aft hull APR with LAB, and added a half dozen CARGO. To me, this approximates what might be done, based on the Survey conversion of the D7.
The survey ship used by their Lyran allies is a catamaran, so I just imagineered in a third hull and made her a DN sized trimaran. Also, as the base hull for the survey ship was their tug, I'm picturing a ship able to haul three Klingon type pods (but not standard Lyran pallets) and, because military tugs CAN carry civilian type cargo pods, have pictured the ship hauling three pods from the auxiliary survey ships.
For the Hydrans, I know that there are loads of visions out there for modifying their CA type hulls to honor TV legend "Battlestar Galactica." Imagine that done with their heavy survey ship.
While typing this, I also imagined SOMEone slapping the "Survey" label on the Kzinti SSCS.
Romulan Modular Dreadnaughts can make use of the modules from the Sparrowhawk-C; two of them can make use of four modules. Gorn can add a third bubble to their heavy survey ship or hard weld a PFT pod to the back of their CL type survey ship.
As far as giving the ISC a more potent survey ship, I've long pictured their survey ship as the third echelon with two POL as the "Gunline" and a Transport DD as the second. Why I do that is something I haven't a clue about, but there you go. 
Where does it all end?
JGA: I don't think anyone expects this ship or other survey conversions like a B-10 survey ship to be canon in the game universe. It is more a joke ship.
Jeff: You cannot just use survey freighters in place of survey ships. They are, per the ship description, for follow up studies when the real survey ships find something. Maybe in a pinch you can use them but if this were a viable replacement option they would be used in F&E so the survey cruisers could be used as scouts.
In general an RTN hunter and a survey ship would have different requirements. Survey ships need a few scout channels and often have more shuttles and always have more labs with these increases usually at the expense of weapons. They also often have cargo as a way of representing their increased strategic range and ability to operate on their own for more extended periods than a line warship. An RTN hunter needs scout channels and firepower.
Need to work on my delivery...
I never did take the idea of the CVO Survey Ship too seriously, and I honestly thought starting off with the B-10 as a "Survey Ship" would serve as a sort of "SFU Meets 'Larry, the Cable Guy'" sort of thing; get absurd beyond ANYTHING reasonable for a belly laugh.
The others I droned through were mostly to have "SOMEthing" so (hopefully) nobody would feel mistreated IF these "Oversized Survey Ships" became an article for a new SSJ. I mean, in the first SSJ, we met the Heavy Gunboats and in the second, we saw Gunfighter Frigates.
In my opinion, ONLY for the laughts should there be ANY sort of "Super, Ultra, Mega Survey Ship."
Sigh... Sometimes I can tell a joke, other times, I really oughtta keep my oversized mouth shut...