Hydran Border Anti-Fighter Gunboat
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R03: KLINGON PROPOSALS:
Hydran Border Anti-Fighter Gunboat
The G1K Anti-Fighter Gunboat (R3PF2) has been a standard Klingon unit for years and it has proven to be a good unit against Kzinti and Federation fighters. It utilizes Type-E Drone racks as a specialized anti-fighter weapons.
There are other anti-fighter weapons available to the Klingons; in particular, there have been quite a few references to using anti-drones against Hydran fighters.
It is with that in mind that I was thinking of replacing the disruptor and drones on a standard G-1 with anti-drones. Tentative thoughts are to replace the disruptor with an ADD-6 and the drones with ADD-12s. The latter is potentially controversial (and I'd be happy to drop them down to ADD-6es), but there is a reason for wanting the larger units.
First: with the larger ADDs, they can remain in the fight a bit longer; to me, this is one of the main reasons why the G-1D has all Type-B Drone Racks, even though the standard G-1 has the smaller Type-A Drone Racks.
(Also, it suggests to me that there IS more physical room at that location for larger ordnance loads.)
Another, albeit secondary consideration is the differrentiation of weapon type hits for the PF DAC; the ADD-6es can be determined to be WPN-A hits (like the existant ADD-6 and Disruptor that the second ADD-6 replaces) while the ADD-12s can be determined to be the WPN-B hits (like the Drone racks on the baseline G-1 that were replaced with the ADD-12s on this variant).
While this may seem like an overly specialized variant, it is useful against Kzinti and Federation drones as well as fighters. Indeed, the potential value in G-1 vs. Federation "Super Fighters" (F-14, F-15, F-111) is significant as well.
As a "Casual Gunboat" assigned as part of the escort group for a Klingon Carrier Battle Group, even just one of these can provide valuable enhancement for their escorts.
Jeff Anderson:
You might try running a Klingon Gunboat to Range 3 of four Stingers and see what happens.
Make sure your life insurance is fully paid before doing so.
An ADD is not a guaranteed kill, or even guaranteed to cripple even a Stinger at Range three (average damage is 3.5, max damage is six, a Stinger requires seven damage points to cripple, which is all that matters (once crippled, it is little more than a weak admin shuttle). So you are trying to arrange things that none of the Stingers will get closer before you get a second shot, and are likely to need a third shot to cripple all of them, and at Range 1 an uncrippled Stinger is likely to cripple you.
Mind you, Stingers are piloted, unlike drones, and if not targeted on the PF, you can easily run with the drones as you shoot them down.
Stingers might kill you at range 3. Also watch out for 3 St-2 and a St-H if trying that.
Assuming no EW shift, I would expect 15 points of damage from fusion beams and another sixteen points of phaser damage, based on average dice rolls from four Stinger-2 at range 3. If my math is right, that ought to gut roughly 3/4ths of the potential hits in the G-1.
SPP, your skepticism over the validity of the design is well founded.
Respectfully, though, due to the T-bomb threat, I've never stacked fighters, nor has anyone else I've ever played SFB against.
(Hmm... What if, instead, this Gunboat were to have the standard G-1 ADD replaced with a mine rack, the two drone racks replaced with ADD-6 or ADD-12, and the phasers and disruptor remain as standard...)
(Nah. The potential of a gunboat flotilla dropping that many bombs is just too nasty. 
)
As far as the potential to cripple Stingers goes, I originally figured that their targets would probably be operating with WBPs. While I know that they can reduce their vulnerability by dropping them, that would severely impede their ability to close with their targets. Sure, they can fire off their Fusion Beams at the Gunboats, probably crippling one, but then they've just got their phasers and can't reach their REAL targets; the ships the gunboats are trying to protect.
In that situation, I feel that the gunboats, having stopped the Stinger overrun, have done their job.
Also, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but won't ADDs either cripple or kill a Stinger-2 under WBP vulnerability about half the time?
(Stingers with Mega-Fighter packs, however, are a different subject; THOSE things are SCARY!!)
Another assumption is that these potential gunboats can operate with packs as well and, with so little power required to arm their weapons, they can maintain speed 31. Even without those, it can still maneuver to keep from being immediately overrun (and to stay at the range where their ADDs have maximum effectiveness for a couple impulses).
At any rate, this is really just a thought for a Gunboat to try and use the concept behind the D5F Anti-Fighter Cruiser (R3.52). If you think it's a bad idea, that's okay. Personally? I still think it has potential.
To what purpose?
The only fighters that your specialized G1 variant gunboats are going to encounter are going to be:
1) planetary defense fighters based on both on map planets of the F&E map, or (if a home player run campaign say) other planet based fighters on planets present along the border but not notated on the F&E map.
2) BAttle station fighter group for on map locations, or
3) patrol fighters based on any of a number of carriers in Hydran Service.
By deleting the Disrupters and drones normally carried on the G1K gunboats, they will be nominally better able to fight any encountered Hydran Fighter... but the G1K variants will be unable to properly fight other possible Hydran ships encountered.
The list includes (but limited to) normal assigned border patrols of the regular Hydran Fleet, the occasional system Defense forces (including the National Guard ships that might be assigned), police ships, Hydran Q ships, Various Skiffs, and ships that the individual planets might have that are garrisoning said planets.
Heck, what, pray tell, will your G1K flotilla do, if they stumble on a Monitor with a SCS pallet and it’s one flotilla of Hydran PF’s?
Worse yet, if you try to attack a Hydran planet in the hopes of encountering its defending fighters, how do you intend to deal with the ground based phaser 4’s of the two assigned planetary defense battalions organized into a PDU?
You talk about ADD6 and ADD-12 but no ADD rounds are going to help silence a phaser 4 ground module.
They probably fare poorly against Harriers, Hellions and Howlers as well.
Good points...
Against other Gunboats. Absolutely they would NOT do well.
Blasting GBDPs. Again, absolutely they would not do well.
Then again, I never did imagine these things as being deployed in full flotillas; thus far, I really have pictured them as "Casual Gunboats" for general fleet defense, particularly for Carrier Battle Groups.
TBH, I understand that one MIGHT be assigned to get an otherwise understrength flotilla up to full numerical strength, but even then, I pictured that as a temporary assignment.
I mean, we know that the Klingons frequently had a Standard G-1 replaced with a G-D in an otherwise standard flotilla, just like the Hyrans frequently replaced a standard Gunboat with a Valkyrie. Why not do the same with an "Escort Gunboat?"
I could see it against Kzintis and Feds, but never against Hydrans.
Kzinti and Federation border areas may still fare well against casual G1Ks... but JGAs latest suggestion of fleet or carrier defense is just nonsense.
If the non Hydran border areas were only defended by Fed F-4 or F-8 fighters...may be they would be successful... right up until they ran into a full B-52 bomber squadron (or TWO of them!)
They might even do okay if they come up against F-16 or F-18 B fighters, but F-18 late war models with more drones, and fast drones should be able to overwhelm JGA’s G1K anti fight gunboats.
Against the Kzinti and Feds, the existant G1K has more flexibility.
At this point, I'm conceding that this design is not likely to exist as anything more than a simulator design study.
Still, it's been fun.