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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Lit Fleet Junkie Flagship- The technical discussions of the GFFA (Capital Ships thread Mk. II)

Discussion in 'Literature' started by AdmiralWesJanson, Sep 12, 2005.

  1. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    I finally picked up the latest issue of Brian Wood's Star Wars. Alot of cool Rebel Fleet shots (minus the strange choice to make all Rebel ships green, which isn't Wood's fault), including a good shot of what is almost 100% certainly a MC80 Home One-type cruiser. The Alliance Navy appears rather weak at this point (mostly transports, few Mon Cal cruisers, etc), which fits well with established EU canon. One cool shot of a hangar bay on an MC80 that shows a quad barreled laser or turbolaser emplacement, which I thought was rather cool.

    --Adm. Nick
     
  2. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    For you Fleet Junkies that also like real world fleet stuff (as well as the parallels to arguments in the GFFA), check out this interesting article on the future of the aircraft carrier and some possible substitutes:

    http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/03/replacing-aircraft-carriers/

    If one assumes that the modern supercarrier is an real world equivilent of a Star Dreadnought, the arguments in this article for a larger fleet of smaller combatants & missile armed combatants mirror the different miltiary viewpoints we see in the GFFA, as highlighted in the EGTW. It reminds me of the post-FOTJ mindset displayed by the Galactic Alliance Defense Force, which opted for a larger fleet of smaller warships. This article, which a handful of word changes, could read like a discussion at the Anaxes War College. :p

    --Adm. Nick
     
  3. Tzizvvt78

    Tzizvvt78 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2009
    No surprise, the battlefield of the 21st century is becoming too fractured and spread out to be focused around a few large carriers.

    On another note, I like the various concept arts for Star Destroyers that haven't been used somewhere yet. Someone uploaded some designs for the Acclamator on Wookieepedia and I made a collage of old Executor concepts along with them. Wish they'll be used somewhere. The Praetor Mark II is done already, there's two more Executor concepts unused and I'd like two of the three Acclamator concepts to be put to good use. Not the blocky, middle one, though. Too boring, iirc.
    I like the lower one that looks like an illustration out of the Essential Guide to Vehicles & Vessels.
     
  4. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    Yeah, at 15 billion a pop, USN supercarriers are becoming very expensive large targets. Hell, if you reduce the number of them to six, you could dramatically increase the size of the Navy by adding smaller carrier, extra destroyers & cruisers, and attack submarines. The only drawback is that the closest thing we have to a small carrier, the America-class assault ship, lacks nuclear power and therefore the capability to launch conventional aircraft. Designing a brand new standard carrier wouldn't be cheap.

    I don't mind the boxy one as a warship, just not as a KDY design. I would love it if that design was attributed to Humbarine, Duro, or Axum. We need more designs, IMO, outside of the same old Kuati or Mon Cal stuff.

    --Adm. Nick
     
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  5. boomx2sjk

    boomx2sjk Jedi Master star 2

    Registered:
    Nov 9, 2012
    I've said to people for yrs that having 10-11 active carrier battle groups in a time of budget shortfalls is a bit of an overkill. I know the Navy wants to have that "presence" of force in trouble areas, but there are simpler and cheaper ways to do that IMO.

    Something ignored in the article when talking about catapaults is that they did not address how to recover the planes that are launched. Steam catapaults on dock ships and America-class vessels are one thing, but having adequate deck space and equipment to recover conventional aircraft is another.

    A good mix of America-class vessels with sufficient VSTOL aircraft and 6-7 carrier groups would still be a solid force deterrent IMO.
     
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  6. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 25, 2007
    Very interesting article, even though I was a Seabee on land most of the time, the more Navy ships the better:)

    I would believe you would see the same sort of swings in ship building strategies favoring lots of small ships or large ships in the SW Galaxy as well. Though I think its rather silly that it would completely swing one way or the other, which off course goes with my usually caveat that I find the scarcity of large ships and diversity in starship design disturbing :)

    Nice collection of pics, it would be beyond great if some of those got canonized with a back story, and I would also hope for the design diversity on term of manufacturers.
     
  7. Kev Snowmane

    Kev Snowmane Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Jan 1, 2013
    If anyone can help me, I'm guessing this is the place to ask, though it's about an "unofficial" design.

    Does anyone have any good orthos of the Revenge-class heavy carrier, the very few images I can find online are all the same couple of pics.

    The Revenge class, btw, is the feature ship in IMPS: The Relentless.

    Some orthos of the 2-engine "mini" destroyer/frigate wouldn't go amiss either.
     
  8. Tzizvvt78

    Tzizvvt78 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2009
    Oooh, I liked that, even though I thought the ventral bridge was a bit silly at first. I remember seeing I.M.P.S. episode 1 and wishing for a heavy carrier like that in canon. Too bad Fractalsponge didn't finish the one he was working on, so it could be in EGTW. I'll try to look around for anything from the production crew.

    EDIT: Could only find the ones on the series page and an MS Paint sideview. Sorry if that's what you've already come across.

    Double-EDIT: As to the discussion about smaller ships, I assume the Triumvirate in SW might want to spread out their influence as much as possible in the unstable post-war era. Going with Calamari Hammerheads or some such. Small, cheap, easy to produce. I don't count the Scythe as that, given the capabilities we've seen in the comics.
     
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  9. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

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    Nov 25, 2007
    I liked the Revenge design a lot, and if memory serves me right it was nice to see it operating with a battle group. Well here's to hoping fractalsponge can get another outlet to get a few more ship designs into canon. [​IMG]
     
  10. AdmiralNick22

    AdmiralNick22 Retired Fleet Admiral star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 28, 2003
    Hmm, a lower cost Calamari variant of the Hammerhead-class (or a simpler version of the Scythe-class) would be a good bet. Ditto for some lower scale, mass produced Kuati designs as well like the Ardent-class.

    --Adm. Nick
     
  11. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 25, 2007
    I know I will never be happy with the small number of Star Dreadnoughts and other larger ships that exist in the various SW Era's ;), but inspired from the above discussion I wanted to make a list just to see how many are out there, at least for the Imperial Navy.

    I went off wookieepedia, EGTW, and SotG. Some assumptions that I made were:
    - Only looking at the Empire and its successors
    - Assumed all PSF Mandator's survived the Clone Wars and were nationalized
    - I prefer the term Star Dreadnought, but I mean the Anaxes War College System clasification of dreadnought
    - Assumed at least 2 Assertor's and Bellator's exist from the EGTW illustrations, I am guessing one of the pictured ships is the lead ship in the class

    By my count, looks to be at least 46 dreadnought in Imperial Service at one point or the other. Any additions (hopefully :))? Subtractions?

    [​IMG]
     
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  12. AdmiralWesJanson

    AdmiralWesJanson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 23, 2005
    Just a quick thought, but could one of the 8 Km or 12.8 Km SSDs be the Sarlaac project, recycled to hide the real Executor project from the Senate?
     
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  13. Tzizvvt78

    Tzizvvt78 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2009
    We have several references to Republic battleships in the CW-era (the Campaign Guide, the ROTS:ICS and a TCW sticker book, of all things).
    The ICS and sticker book singles out Venators as escort vessels for these battleships. The CG says they were deployed in groups of three, like the Republic's "heavier cruisers", implying they are too numerous to be Star Dreadnought/dreadnought-scale ships. Might just be "battleships" more akin to the Lucrehulk in size, but with firepower like an Anaxes battlecruiser, without the long-range independent travel profile. We have potential candidates with the rich Core sectors and Colonies sector forces, like the Tapani. Maybe the Pelagia Star was one of them?

    There's also references to Rothana being spied on by several other starship manufacturers and them implementing design-choices based on the Acclamator into their own fleets.
    Rothana was also said to be designing its own battleship and destroyer models based on the Acclamator. Maybe a conglomeration of designs ripping each other off could one day account for these Lucasfilm concepts seeing the light of day? :D
     
  14. TheRedBlade

    TheRedBlade Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 17, 2007
    Great list, Tzivvt. Now, if we could work on your apostrophe use...

    Also, who would have guessed that a sticker book would be a source of a potentially radical revision to Republic fleet format? Anything that gets Rothana or Rendalli more in the game, I support
     
  15. AdmiralWesJanson

    AdmiralWesJanson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 23, 2005
    Maybe Sorosuub could be responsible for one or more of those concept art accumulators. They gave us the Dauntless, which is rounded but was a liner, not a warship. They also gave us the Liberator Cruiser, an angular combat cruiser with large carrier capacity. The name could even be tied to the Clone Wars era Liberator troopship like the Guardian of the republic/Trader's Luck.

    Most of the Acclamator concept designs could be covered by the idea that a number of troopship Acclamator knockoff designs were built quickly at the start of the clone wars by various companies to fill the rapidly expanding demand for them in the Republic fleet?

    A lot of these knockoffs and stopgap designs could be built quickly then phased out as the war progressed and newer ships were put into production, which would fit the history of the Trader;s luck, which was retired before the Republic fell, which would mean prior to the end of the Clone Wars. And the Liberator cruiser could be a ship design that followed the lead of the Venator-class, which replaced the Acclamator with a design that still carried troops, but was far heavier on the starfighter complement.
     
  16. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

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    Nov 25, 2007
    Definitely worth it to be added to the list, I guess I wrote that off to be an indirect mention of Mandators, but here to hoping its not.

    Also worth an add, I have always have high hopes for there being other Republic battleships and local planetary navy battleships classes[face_praying]
     
  17. Tzizvvt78

    Tzizvvt78 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2009
    What's wrong with it?

    The sticker book is actually continuing a trivia from the ROTS:ICS. Still nice to see. I was hoping TCW would finally showcase a ship like that, getting closer to the Imperial era, but it looks like that's a pipe-dream.

    Here's the page in question, from DK.com:
    [​IMG]

    The text, if it's difficult to read: "The Grand Army of the Republic uses these massive ships to transport troops and starfighters as well as escort battleships." Pointing to both the Venator and the Acclamator, in fact.

    The obsolete Acclamator article on the OS had this gem: "So effective and impressive were the Acclamator designs that many leading shipbuilders looked on with envy, and began incorporating similar concepts into their own fleets." This actually mentions design(s), more than one. Also gives an opening for more than one competitor using similar designs in other fleets. The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia retconned the Nexu from The Cestus Deception as an Acclamator variant and Pellaeon uses another variant in the RC books and his Republic comic cameo, so this is consistent.
     
  18. DarthCane

    DarthCane Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    May 30, 2002
    I hear you on the simpler and cheaper. Years ago when I was designing a hypothetical fleet mix for the Alliance in the GFFA I had the vast bulk of the work being done by a massive fleet of "corvettes" (describing their multirole design; they were of comparable length and much greater mass than a Nebulon-B or Carrack). The next class up the chart was a "frigate" (again, more comparable in size and firepower to a "pocket Star Destroyer") produced in about half the numbers of the Imperial-class. Larger battlecruiser-scale combatants were limited to a few thousand ships, most of them fleet carriers. Finally, there were to be 6-12 Star Defender/Star Dreadnought types, with most being more of the command ship/mobile base role than a direct combatant.

    The thing is not to focus so much on raw numbers of ships as requirements. The main reason for the USN keeping 10-11 carriers around is that on average you'll only have 3 on station and able to respond within hours or days, with another 5-6 resting up from deployment or on pre-deployment workups available on a few weeks' notice. Then there will be a couple in a refueling cycle or other heavy drydock maintenance. There's also the fact that modern naval aircraft, especially if you're concerned about keeping your enemies at long range, are heavy beasts - the F/A-18E/F and F-35C tip the scales at 60-65,000 pounds at full load; the old F-14 could get up over 70,000 pounds. Not that it would be impossible to design a midsize carrier to handle those aircraft, but it would be a challenge and something crucial might have to give. That's not to say the supercarrier fleet won't or shouldn't be downsized; I'm just cautioning that you can't just replace one big deck with two smaller ones or a bunch of cruise missiles and not lose some very valuable capabilities. The old Imperial Sourcebook had a good line on that - I seem to recall a statement that while in some instances 300 IPV System Patrol Craft were more valuable than a single ISD, in most they were not.

    I'd be looking less at the carriers and more asking why the USN (and several other navies) have billion-dollar plus surface combatants designed for WWIII chasing pirates off Somalia and drug smugglers in the Caribbean. For all the (often valid) criticism of the LCS program, as is it's a pretty good candidate for taking care of those mundane show-the-flag deployments where the likelihood of getting shot at with anything more sophisticated than a grenade launcher is low, along with perhaps some helicopter-carrying support vessels (I'm not sold on VSTOL jets). Keep the big boys back for a dustup that actually requires their capabilities.

    With that said, the GA fleet plan I came up with some time ago was pretty much based on raw numbers - X number of ships for Y number of sectors, with most of the flexibility being in deploying the heavies. Were I occupying the august halls of the Anaxes War College with a more complete strategic picture, I'd probably cut the number of larger ships by a third or a half - does every Sector Fleet really need a minimum of two large carriers, or can most just make do with frigates and corvettes? Should the federal GA fleet even be organized by sector, or should it be concentrated in large regional commands and send out task forces/groups as needed?
     
  19. TheRedBlade

    TheRedBlade Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 17, 2007
    It should read "Executors" in that right-hand block. Executor's means "thing belonging to an Executor"

    Neat info on the Acclamator variants. One of the few downsides of TCW giving us Venators earlier in the war was that the Acc was de-spotlighted. As such, they were almost a forgotten class for a bit.

    The phrase "escort battleship" is interesting, as I'd expect it to be written "battleship escorts." I wonder if that's a way of saying that they're plenty fierce in their own right, but can assist something much bigger and meaner.
     
  20. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 25, 2007
    That's actually on me. Corrected, but still not doing too bad considering I was an engineering major:)

    Getting back to balance of naval forces in the Galaxy or in the real world, in order to be flexible enough to account for changes in offensive/defensive weapons, tactics, and types of warfare, I believe there would always be a need for large ships if you want to be a major political player. The number of these ships would wax and wane over the Era's, but I don't see them going completely extinct. Unless defensive weaponry advanced greatly, I do see a point in Earth's future where their roles will be even more limited, but I see no reason why the SW Galaxy should suffer the same fate.
     
  21. Tzizvvt78

    Tzizvvt78 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2009
    The concept of the Acclamator was to be an analog to the amphibious assault ship (basically a helicopter/strike craft carrier). That's why it wasn't named a "Star Destroyer", it wasn't really a direct predecessor beyond the shape. If the Star Destroyer is a super-heavy cruiser/carrier/troop transport hybrid, then I'd say the Acclamator is a frigate/support ship/carrier/troop transport hybrid.

    TCW started using them in space battles as well as planetary invasions, so they're more than just transports/fighter carriers.
    An issue of DeAgostini's Star Wars Starships & Vehicles Collection described them with firepower equivalent to a "medium frigate", which I assume is why they can pull their own weight in a battle.

    TCW:IV and EGTW rated it as a "heavy cruiser" in the Anaxes classification system.
    Due to its large size, it might've qualified as a Star Destroyer (in the Anaxes system), but the relative low firepower (if we assume the medium frigate-level still holds) pulls it down from Star Destroyer to heavy cruiser. (The smaller Gladiator is rated a Star Destroyer in the book.)

    They transport troops and fighters and can escort battleships. It's just based on a paragraph in the profile description from ROTS:ICS: "The ship is also capable of planetary landings as a military transport and can be an escort for battleships in the Republic armada".

    That's because in the SW universe, there's weapons developed for punching through shields, which spurs development of better shields, which spurs development of better weapons and usually both developments mean larger space frames for the power equipment. If Teshik's prophecy from EGTW comes true, there's going to be superlasers developed in the legacy era at some point.

    I assume we might one day get huge shield-ships for naval fleets, but other than that, we have large carriers and possibly missile batteries (arsenal ships, though that concept seems to be dead in the water).
     
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  22. Zeta1127

    Zeta1127 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 2, 2012
    I still stand by the following paper I wrote shortly after TEGTW was published.

    Republic and Imperial Capital Ship Development
    Republic and later Imperial capital ship development was the evolution of multi-role warships and to a lesser extent more specialized counterparts. This development started with the Acclamator I-class assault ship and the need for a well-armed transport for the GAR. The war pressed the Acclamator I more and more into a space warfare role, which led to the development of the Acclamator II-class star frigate in order to supplement the Acclamator I.

    The CIS possessed many large warships, like the Lurcrehulk-class variants, and later the Recusant-class light destroyer and Providence-class carrier/destroyer, which led to the development of the Victory I-class Star Destroyer and later the Victory II, a multi-role destroyer, and the Venator-class Star Destroyer, a starfighter carrier. However, the threat of such warships as the Lucrehulk-class variants and Malevolence-class heavy cruiser still loomed, and even though the Republic possessed Kuati battlecruisers and dreadnoughts since the beginning of the war, they weren't very common. This led to the development of the Imperator-class Star Destroyer (later known as the Imperial-class), a large multi-role destroyer, the Tector-class Star Destroyer, a large fleet combat destroyer, and the Secutor-class Star Destroyer, a large starfighter carrier, with the three classes only seeing limited service as task force command ships before the Republic was reformed into the Empire.

    The period that followed was the perfect environment for multi-role destroyers, which led to the rise of the newly-rechristened Imperial I-class Star Destroyer as the preeminent warship of the Empire. Of course, the Empire always sought to maintain its military supremacy, even when it appeared no other power could challenge them. This led to the continued use of Clone Wars era destroyers, battlecruisers, and dreadnoughts updated with modern technology, and many new designs, like the Allegiance-class Star Battlecruiser (colloquially known as the Imperial Star Battlecruiser, due to its similar appearance to the Imperial-class Star Destroyer), a dreadnought escort and communications ship, the Executor-class Star Dreadnought, a massive command ship, and the Eclipse-class Star Dreadnought, a massive flagship for the Emperor. The Alliance showed that there were challengers to the Imperial naval supremacy, which led to the rapid adoption of enhanced designs, like the Imperial II-class Star Destroyer, and the development of new designs to better fill specific roles, like the Dominator-class Star Destroyer, an interdictor, built on the same space frame as the Imperial and Tector-classes, to supplement the Immobilizer 418 cruiser, and the Procursator-class Star Destroyer, a destroyer escort to supplement the Victory-class and a smaller counterpart to the Tector-class.

    A combination of the ever increasing threat posed by the Alliance and the Empire's insatiable desire to maintain naval supremacy, led to the further development of numerous new designs. The new battlecruisers included the Bellator-class Star Battlecruiser, an intermediate design between battlecruisers and dreadnoughts. The new dreadnoughts included the Vengeance-class Star Dreadnought, a stealth counterpart to the Executor-class, the Sovereign-class Star Dreadnought, a general deployment equivalent to the Eclipse-class, and the Assertor-class Star Dreadnought, the final evolution of the lineage of the Executor and Eclipse-classes. With most of these new warships only seeing limited deployment, while the others remained largely unseen until after the Battle of Endor.
     
  23. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 25, 2007
    Couldn't have said it better myself
     
  24. Gorefiend

    Gorefiend Chosen One star 5

    Registered:
    Oct 23, 2004
    The Ardent would actually fit perfectly if they go back to something like the Old Republic, it is somewhere in the middle/heavy cruiser range, has fighters, troops, is insanely fast and still seems to the build to be able to take deceit amounts of damage. Plus they should have tons of them left over from the war.


    Though not at the same point, as the rate at which they kept loosing these is actually almost ridicules if you think about it, they had already lost at least 23 (one even getting captured) of them by the end of the Dark Empire. Also the Destiny’s Way SSD could be the Megador or the Dominion.

    As on Battleships, check the EGW ;) anything above a light cruiser will be called a battleship and since the Ven and Acci are are overstuffed fighter carriers (or can be turned into these) it actually makes more sense from them to be the escorts for things like the Dreadnaught and similar designs which did not normally haul fighters.
     
  25. King of Alsakan

    King of Alsakan Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 25, 2007
    As I have said before the authors pen is mightier than than the largest dreadnought.:) Plus in my mind, 46 dreadnought is just a strong planetary navy anyway.;)

    Fair point, I am taking the optimistic position that at least some of the battleship mentions are indeed dreadnoughts on the Anaxes scale.