Feds as the "Ya know, phasers everywhere" empire does kind of tickle me. Insert handwaving about the Fed tech and economic base being able to support the relatively heavy phaser load for the hulls.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 04:06 pm: Edit

What are you going to call the frigate? No drone means that the FFG will get the extra phaser 1 RH,, keep its two Phaser 3 point defense phasers... but no drone means the FFG designation is a non sequiter.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 04:09 pm: Edit

I like RH rather than RX.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 05:48 pm: Edit

G for "gunned".

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 06:52 pm: Edit

In my opinion, whether the FFG has a drone rack, just phasers, or the proposed CDS, it should be called the FF+. It should always have been the FF+.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 07:24 pm: Edit

Fed DNH: 14 phaser-1s and six Type-G drone racks.

So... 20 phasers-1s?

That's... a lot... of phaser-1s.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 07:37 pm: Edit

Are you gonna get behind it? :D

By Jeff Guthridge (Jeff_Guthridge) on Friday, August 26, 2022 - 08:23 pm: Edit

Woo Hoo! Return of the Federation Phaser hose!! In your face Admiral Kang!

/humor

By Randy Green (Hollywood750) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 08:06 am: Edit

You can never have too many phaser-1s.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 10:04 am: Edit

I feel the same way about Photon Torpedos!

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 11:56 am: Edit

So maybe then, Federation Phaser-1s, have to be powered by Warp......

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 12:42 pm: Edit

Perhaps with the Dreadnaut, in particular an upgrade that's supposed to be a "Drone Free Federation" version of the DNG, we might see an exception to the "RH Rule For Phasers With The Refit" and have two additional Ph-1 FH?

Resulting ship, by contrast to the DNG, lacks the secondary hull battery of four Drone-G and perhaps replaces them with four Ph-1 FH in the saucer (vice two on the DNG) and four Ph-1 RH at the aft end of the secondary hull (again, vice two on the DNG)?

My 0.02 Quatloos worth...

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 01:17 pm: Edit

Note that I said the big ships with lots of drone racks (basically more than two) would have to be evaluated on a case by case basis. It is entirely possible that the DNG could end up replacing its four drone racks with just two Ph-1s and get a BPV reduction to compensate. I don't know. I haven't looked into it. But I do imagine there is a point where the trade stops being one-for-one.

Or ... maybe the DNH and BB get a pair of photons in the trade.

Again, each ship would have to be evaluated individually to find the best balance. And the best balance could be a reduction in overall weapon count.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 02:01 pm: Edit

Additional photons might entail shock, something drone racks/drones usually don’t have problems with.

By Mike Erickson (Mike_Erickson) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 02:11 pm: Edit

As I was reading this thread, I imagined the G rack --> P1 RH proposal was for the case where the Fed ship in question just had 1 (or maybe 2 G racks), and that G rack was primarily defensive.

In the case of a something like a ship with a whole battery of 6 G racks, I agree that an analysis of that specific ship would be needed to strike the right balance of offense/defensive capabilities that a larger number of G racks provide. 6 G racks --> 6 P-1 RH might be weird and/or not that effective for that particular ship.

As we go through this I am liking this alternative Feds without drones more and more. I like how it really hands the drones back to the Klingons and Kzinti, and gives the Klingons a stronger combat identity of their own.

I also imagine the P1 Feds would have to carefully manage how they combat drone heavy Klingon fleets, particularly in later time periods. Historically, Klingon drones could be countered with power free drone-drone firing and/or G racks firing ADDs. I imagine that under this alternative the Feds would need to calculate phaser usage and power carefully to effectively shoot down Klingon drones coming in from various angles in various groupings.

--Mike

By Gregory S Flusche (Vandar) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 06:00 pm: Edit

I would think since the Feds had no drones then the G variants would never have been made. There is no need to even convert them.

By Stewart Frazier (Frazikar3) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 06:14 pm: Edit

Note that although the Feds don't have drones, the Kzinti DO (just as the Gorns give access to plasma tech), there may be a one or two ships with those techs to explore how useful they could be (working with Fed doctrine). [Oh yea, also for training against them (even if mostly sims)!]

They may even import ADD tech (RALADS) from the Kzinti to help deal with Klingon drones (or even other fighters) ...

By Jeff Guthridge (Jeff_Guthridge) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 09:11 pm: Edit

I find myself wondering, especially on some ships were more than one G rack would be replaced with a PH-1, what other effects it might have. The increase in the Phaser Capacitor is one thing, but not directly what I'm aiming at.

FFGs will be impacted some, but escorts on any hull frame will be far worse off.

A pre-refit FFE would go from 3 Ph-1's and two Ph-G's (Phaser Cap of 5) to 5 Ph-1s and a pair of Ph-Gs (Phaser Cap of 7) when it generates 15 points of power from all sources with 2.5 lost for housekeeping, post refit it picks up a reactor but also another Ph-1.
The DE is not any better, from 2 Ph-1's and 4 Ph-G's (Phaser Cap of 6) to 6 Ph-1's amd 4 Ph-G's (Phaser Cap of 10) when it only has 4 more points of power but higher move cost. I'm not addressing the now diminished needs for CARGO boxes on the DE.

No, I'm not advocating for extra reactors or anything. SVC made a good point about the swapping of G-Racks for RX or RH phasers and its a fair one. My opinion is that it will work a charm on cruisers, war destroyers, and NCL/NCAs. It starts to breaks down with size 2 ships, but they offer their own challenges anyway. Its absolutely broken on Carrier groups, raw single volley damage is probably still there, but the ability to manage a large incoming swarm of drones is reduced measurably.

Neither of the above escorts sited as examples address the loss of the escort's potential 16, 24, or 32 ADD shots (pre and post refit FFE, DE). Mind you, in a carrier fight not sure the escort would have their G-racks full of ADDs, so its a matter for debate. Removing a non-powered weapon and replacing it with yet another system that requires power may effect balance in a more subtle fashion, like slowing down the carrier group by having escorts that cannot keep up. The defensive needs for escorts are not well served by more PH-1s.

This goes into why I suggested that without drones in the first place the Federation ship designers would probably lean towards if not opt for more size class 3 & 4 hulls, adopt "war destroyers" and "new cruiser" design philosophies faster, and generally work to cost cut where they could to allow more ships to be made faster and abandoning the notion of carriers until the gunboat era and even then late to the party.

Then there is the way this could be (ab)-used tactically... How many Federation ships have otherwise out-of-arc phasers that can fire down the after centerline? This proposal may end up encouraging an Overload, Turn, and Burn tactic. (Get into overloaded Photon range, fire everything that will soon be out of arc, followed with a 180 HET and aim the phaser hose down the now damaged/down shield while presenting a fresh shield and being on the best heading to open up the distance to start the reload of your photons and phaser cap. Risk of a breakdown with a dreadnought is daunting, but the payoff for a cruiser would be significant I think.

Mind you, anyone that allows a federation ship to get to range 4 (or less) with overloaded photons and a fully charged phaser capacitor receives everything they deserve.

By Jeff Guthridge (Jeff_Guthridge) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 09:13 pm: Edit

MJWest: Has the proposed Federation Anti-Drone-System seen any changes since it was first proposed?

By Dal Downing (Rambler) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 09:16 pm: Edit

I know everyone is drooling over adding Phaser 1s but isn't that too good of an upgrade? How often do Offensive Drones actually hit thier targets? Not very often.

I feel a more balanced replacement would be Phaser-3 and maybe an APR or a Battery. Something like replace every pair of Drone Rack with 2 Phaser-3 and a Battery. If the Phaser-3 is too weak maybe a Phaser-2s.

The other option is Feds would have still created/used ADD racks. So the Escorts would be direct swaps Drone for ADD.

As far as "G" variants. The feds would still probably have a hand full of Drone ships. BCGs yes and DNG that looks more like a Plasma DN. There would still be Drone Bombardment Cruisers like CAD or NCD. And a 2 or 3 DWDs and FFD which would probably be converted to FBD.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 09:28 pm: Edit

@Jeff: The header in the Stellar Shadows proposal is still up-to-date. It really hasn't changed any.

@Rambler: No drones means no drones. No BCG. No drones on normal war hulls. No drone-centric ships. No drones. (And no plasma, either.)

Obviously that is only my opinion, but "reduced drone usage" seems pointless. "No drones" makes a different dynamic.

By Jeff Guthridge (Jeff_Guthridge) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 09:42 pm: Edit

Rambler: Drones that don't land are still part of the battlefield and require effort to mitigate or eliminate. Thus using resources that might be better spent on offensive strikes, or encourages the target to be elsewhere which can be useful too.

Adding power of any sort (other than the included (phaser cap) will be a hard sell for a number of reasons. Simple is the goal though. Even if I'd rather see something like the 1st rack is replaced by a Ph-1 (RX or RH), the second rack by a pair of Ph-3's (180 arc or less) the third rack improves all the added phasers to 360. Past the third rack, mark the design for special attention as it will need it anyway.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Saturday, August 27, 2022 - 10:02 pm: Edit

Re: Escort Ships
The phaser escorts would end up similar to Lyran and Tholian and Hydran all-phaser style escorts. Also, more of them might keep some of their photons, too, so there's that. They would be different, but they still have Ph-Gs, so they'd still be effective.

Re: Phaser boats
At what point is there "too many phasers" on a ship? Well, who knows? But do know that very point was a big part of what caused me to go with the CDS idea instead of simply using phasers. I didn't just pull the CDS out of my @$$ with no thought. It is there for very specific reasons. One of those reasons is to avoid this specific issue.

By Dal Downing (Rambler) on Sunday, August 28, 2022 - 08:20 am: Edit

Jeff absolutely but the damage of an additional Phaser-1 or A couple is going to add up real quick. What is countering this additional damage?

Mike so what would Feds without DB Ships turn to instead, Maulers?

I still feel regardless there would still be a few drone ships like the plasma ships on the Eastern Front. Would they use G Racks? No they would probably be B Racks or even A Racks. Also GSC could argue they would keep their Drone Rack upgrades because they could launch Probe Drones.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, August 28, 2022 - 09:53 am: Edit

Feds with no drones would not have a few ships with drones, by definition.