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

While we do see specialized roles for warships in Star Wars, the reality is that so many of them are multipurpose amalgamations of a variety of real world ships.

Hell, just look at the Imperial-class Star Destroyer. It is a battleship, carrier, assault ship, and troop transport all in one. Even the MC80 cruisers of the Alliance and New Republic are part battleship, part carrier. Of course, given the cost and size of big warships like an ISD or MC80, one could argue that those are the exception to the rule and that dedicated ships for transport, assault, carrying fighters, etc still make sense in the GFFA.

--Adm. Nick

 

Or the specialized ship is bigger than needed. The Acclamator is a troop transport but for a much more massive troop contingent.

 

And I get the feeling Ackbar was never sure of their capabilities until the Battle of Endor. He'd told Lando that at point-blank range, their ships wouldn't last long against Star Destroyers. But considering we saw one Star Destroyer blown up by a single Mon Cal cruiser on-screen, it's fair to say he acknowledged the strength of his ships from Endor onwards, explaining why the NR put a sizable defence budget subset aside to build more of them (likely also to replace the number of captured Star Destroyers the NR DIDN'T need post-GCW -- why they were still using them prior to and during the Vong War I'll never know).

 

I haven't read Twilight Company, so I don't know if they specifically mention what size/type of drop ship and shuttle are carried, but with some of the smaller designs, like the Mobile Tac-pod, Phanton 1/2, StarSpeeder 100, Imperial light shuttle, and puddlejumper transport from the end of Obi-Wan, I could see a CR90 being able to carry a couple of them.
The ship would probably need to be modified, as I'm not sure if there's a hatch wide enough to fit them through, but at least according to one blueprint, it does have a hangar/cargo bay around 24m long, so at least the interior may not need to be modified to fit them - width might be a problem though as the bay is in the lower part of the cylinder, but might be able to get around that by hanging them from the roof.

Looks like it is. Found a video that shows the page it's mentioned on, and it looks to be Iota, not Lota. So a case of a mistaken letter.

Looking at real world ships, a ship class being around for 20+ years isn't exactly unusual, and with upgrades to the design and refitting of older ships, there is no reason that they still couldn't be competitive with the newer designs. They may also be cheaper and quicker to build, as the shipyards and manufacturing plants would already be tooled to mass produce these older designs.

 

My issue comes from the New Republic still using Imperial vessels after twenty years rather than the less crew intensive but easily capable Mon Cal cruisers or even the newer Republic-class Star Destroyers or Nebula-class Star Destroyers.

 

In both Legends and canon, I think the main advantage of the MC80 line, and its successors was that they didn't need to devote so much space/energy/focus on carrying large numbers of ground troops, walkers, and their associated transports. More room for expansive fighter hangars and repair bay, extra shield generators, and possibly a bigger powerplant that allows it guns to punch at a weight well above their normally less numerous emplacements.

--Adm. Nick

 

I bought it up on Wook's talk page, but the creator of the article is insisting it's a lower case L

 

Yeah, it is a bit odd they kept so many around considering they're symbols of the former Empire's power, but at same time the NR doesn't seem as fussed about using captured Imperial ships as the current canon NR is, and with them basically in continuous conflict up to the Vong war, I could see the Navy wanting to use captured ISDs to help bolster their fleets.

Another reason they might of kept them around is that there is really any single ship in the NR roster (at least before the Vong war) that can fully fill all the roles that a single ISD can. Ships like the Nebula and Republic class are more combat focused, but don't have the same carrying capacity, and carriers like the Endurance class are the opposite, with good carrying capacity but poor firepower, and their smaller size means they probably can't carry the same amount of vehicles, dropships, shuttles, troops, equipment, and supplies as a single ISD could.
As you pointed out, crew could be a problem with using ISDs, but the NR doesn't necessarily have to run them at full capacity, with their minimum crew requirement being only 5000. This is a bit more than twice the minimum crew of a Nebula, but less than a fully crewed one. There's also no reason that the NR couldn't have refitted them to make them a bit less crew intensive.

Um, not sure why they think it's all written in lower case... All the other ships have a capital letter for their names, including the other shuttle types.
Here's some links to a few of the other shuttles, in case you want to show them more proof of names being capitalised.
Phi class shuttle
Upsilon class shuttle
Omicron attack shuttle
Lambda class shuttle

Edit: also the TS-485 in the Iota's name is capitalised, so further proof that it isn't all lower case.

 

One piece of lore that I would love to eventually get is what was the purpose/design idea behind the MC95 cruiser line.

OOU, we know that Disney a) needed a Mon Calamari cruiser design for their Rise of the Resistance ride and b) that digital asset was used by ILM in TROS to help populate the citizen's fleet with a variety of models, namely kitbashing the baseline MC95 and creating the various variants we see on screen.

IU, we know that the New Republic demilitarized and focused most of its funding on building up the various navies of their member worlds, while keeping 10% of the funding on defense to maintain the NRDF. We know that the MC85 cruisers were decommissioned early on, plus that most of the older Alliance ships (looking at you, MC80) were also scrapped or decommissioned. Then, on top of all of that, we have the new easy to mass produce Defender-class cruisers being built at Mon Cala and Corellia.

So, what exactly IS the MC95? Another civilian ship? An updated exploration cruiser like the older MC80A? A less crew instensive warship designed to fill the ranks of the various PSF's of the New Republic? Or was it a belated attempt by the New Republic to field a new capital ship for the federal navy once they realized how threatening the First Order was?

Any/all of these could be interesting ideas. I hope one day we get a canon answer to this!

--Adm. Nick

 

I'm tempted to think the real-world and in-universe origins must be somewhat parallel: despite the higher number, the MC95 seems like a step backwards from the 85 in a lot of ways, which makes me suspect that a lot of them got turned out in a hurry.

 

The Star Wars Encyclopedia implies that the MC95 was a successor to the MC80 and MC85, so I would guess it was designed as a warship, but with it having a number of variants, some of them could have been designed as exploration or civilian ship.
I personally think it's a newish ship designed for both the New Republic and PSF's, with most of the ones we've seen being from PSFs, as most of the New Republic ones would have been destroyed with the Home Fleet - I think there's a good chance that the ones at Exegol and Batuu are from Mon Cala's PSF, as the Encyclopedia mentions that Aftab Ackbar led a fleet of cruisers away from a First Order attack on Mon Cala.

I do hope we get a bit more info on them. I'd like to know their size (they look slightly larger than an MC75, but it's hard to judge the sizes of ships in the TRoS fleet), when they were first manufactured (how new a design are they?), and if there was a design between them and the MC85 (can always hope they'll bring back the MC90).

They would have been designed around the restrictions imposed by the disarmament treaty and to meet the requirements of the NR defence forces, which wants smaller less crew intensive ships than the MC85. The ships these are likely design to replace are older designs like the MC80 and possibly the Defender class (depending on how new a design the MC95 is).

 

Each time I look at the screenshots of the fleet over Hosnian Prime I only see what could possibly be MC80 Home One types, MC80 winged Liberty types, Nebulon-B frigates and some weird looking ship I can't identify.

Confirmed if you read Allegiance comics.

 

We know from the novelization of TROS that the "Mon Calamari fleet" fought at the battle of Exegol. Squaring this with idea that Aftab escaped Mon Cala with their navy doesn't exactly jibe perfectly.

Aftab's forces (a pair of MC95 cruisers with supporting frigates and fighters) aligns perfectly with the forces at the Battle of Batuu. However, for whatever reason, TPTB decided that the Resistance in TROS would be even smaller than it was in TLJ, so all the references to Aftab bringing in a new navy and stuff from Resistance Reborn doesn't fit the vibe we get at the start of the film.

My assumption is that Leia's Resistance group is more of a central coordination hub for various resistance movements accross the galaxy. Aftab presumably orders his small flotilla of capital ships to continue harassing the First Order, but decides to stay on as part of Leia's team. Also- there is nothing in the Allegiance comic series that says the entire Mon Calamari navy defected with Aftab. My assumption is that the First Order's occupation of Mon Cala ends up causing a good chunk of the remaining MC PSF to rebel as well, which then can be used to explain why so many Mon Calamari cruisers are at Exegol.

Of course, Mon Cala cruisers don't need to ONLY be operated by the New Republic navy and the Mon Calamari PSF. I don't doubt for one second that many of the MC75 and MC95 cruisers we see at Exegol are operated by a variety of planets- Chandrila, Sullust, Lothal, etc.

--Adm. Nick

 

It wouldn't surprise me if that is exactly what they are. A few of them basically look like low detailed blobby versions of those shps.
Even so, the MC95 is probably close enough in appearance to Home One that from a distance you could potentially mistake mistake one for the other. So the ones that look like Home One could be interpreted as MC95s.

I've actually been thinking that most, or all, of the MC75s belong to other planets PSFs. Both the New Republic and Mon Calamari would have had no real need for them after the war, as ships like the MC80, MC85 and Defender class would have superseded them. By selling, or gifting them to planetary Governments, they can reduce the size of their fleets, while also helping to quickly build up the strength of various PSFs..

Where's the 144 fighter from? A quick look at Wookieepedia lists it as 72 fighters.

 

Possibly. We really should get an Expanded TFA Visual Dictionary ala TPM and AOTC (which was only released in Scandinavia).

Ah, the lack of attention to maintaining older articles strikes again.

 

Yeah, the MC75 being the oldest of the cruisers does make it a good candidate for PSF's. One thing I wonder about the MC75 cruisers is why there were so many of them? OOU its because it was a digital asset, like my prior comments about the MC95. But IU? I'd like to think that whenever Mon Cala was liberated between Endor and Jakku that they initiated a crash build/conversion program that grabbed a bunch of olf hulls/civic towers/city ships/etc and started quickly converting them into frontline warships.

Really? I thought that comment was about MC80B cruisers. Let me know what you find.

--Adm. Nick

 

Rebel/NR wings are 36 fighters, not 72 like in the Empire.

--Adm. Nick

 

The MC80B was confirmed in the EGTW to have the capacity to carry 8 squadrons. 96 starfighters is an impressive array for an NRDF capital ship in Legends.

(God I wish the MC80B was made canon again)

--Adm. Nick