Siege/Sniper Light Cruiser

[Omi-kun]

http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/ss.clc.main.jpg
| Cannon (http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/ss.clc.cannon.jpg) | 1st Sketch (http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/ss.clc.1st.sk.jpg) |


Originally posted by Omi-kun from New weapons ideas for HW2
Here's my variation [of ohaunlaim's idea] A sniper captial ship, a light cruiser, moves about slowly to get into position. It is realitively stealthy so any ship must be within a 15km radius before it'll be detected. This capital ship is armed with a solitary cannon capable of firing a single slug, whether armor piercing, high explosive, or canister containing several missiles set to disperse and hit surrounding ships.
The AP slug is used to destroy enemy cap ships, fast and travels at 5,000 m/s. So it'll take several seconds to travel a long range. High explosive is to annihilate large wings of strikecrafts or to harrass enemy assault forces (capship). The canister does the same thing.

All of this requires several spotters to correctly locate the targets in 3D and in real time. Transmissions are encripted and sent via telemetry. Therefore, multiple stealthy spotters well be needed to be positioned surrounding the targeted area.

All of these requires heavy research (except for the stealth tech) and the sniper ship needs a decent amount of time to reload, and recharge.

And the opponent should have the ability to create an advanced sensor array capable of tracking long range fire (basically HW version of anti-artillery weaponry) and instigate heavy batteries of high speed rockets at the sniper ship. Since it takes so much resources and time to build the sniper light cruiser, it could move immediately after firing in a quick burst mode.
The batteries of missile and sensor array (I'm not sure if they should be two or just one ship) are on frigate and they are mobile, capable of firing three waves of rockets.

[Omi-kun]

wow, I just realized how much it looks like a frigate. I'll try to get it fixed tomorrow. In the mean time, tell me what you think.

[crobato]

I considered a few concepts for a sniper/artillery ship in my "Massive Hypothetical MMO" thread, and I'm still working on it. I seem to feel that at this point, long range missiles, like Cruise Missiles, which you can blow on contact against a capital ship, or explode in space to damage waves of strike craft with its shock waves, would be a better balancing tool. A CM needs cost to make and can be intercepted. It can be built by the carrier, and launched from a ferry.

My concept of a sniper frigate is more like a Dervish with an extended long nose. it's actually a kind of long range ion bream frigate, shooting the beam at a distance. The range is much longer than an ordinary ion beam frigate, but the damage is less.

Another concept of a sniper frigate is one that uses long range energy cannons. However, it has a slower rate of fire compared to short range energy cannons.

Neither ship can stand against strike craft attack.

An artillery ship is a different concept. Basically a frigate or destroyer built around a siege cannon, it has a very slow firing rate, but the blast radius is something similar to a Proc being scuttled. Overall firing rate is faster than Cata's siege cannon, but damage and blast radius is weaker. Still, it can wipe out a corv wall or fighter swarm.

The danger of these ships is that they may still unbalance the game despite some countermeasures.

[Reaver]

hmm yes....very nice design, but if there was a sniper/siege cannon frigate (it really does look like a frigate) u could build quite a few and kill things just as effectively as with a vette wall of 10 light and 5 heavys....

[Weavern]

Truly it looks like a frigate, sortive like an MFB from hw:c. Nice job Omi. Cannot wait for your inproved version which does not look like a frigate.

[MrNonchalant]

Perhaps as a further handicap there should be no turret, it would have to face it's target. Cruisers, probably even light cruisers, have a very poor maneuverability rating. This would make you have to turn to move making it more vulnerable to counter-battery artillery.

Also, what if you simply used the counter-battery frigate instead of a gun. Guns have only three thing good about them, they're cheapness, the cheapness of they're ammo, and they're small size, which doesn't even apply here. Why don't you just have a rocket artillery ship, I'd post my own sketch, only I don't have a scanner.

The spotters should be tiny ships, the size of a drone from a drone frigate. Equipped with full cloaking capability. That coupled with they're small size means that the computer banks of the proximity detector only register them as a glitch, or systems ghost. You can still see them if you look for them, but they don't trigger the voice warning. You'd only find them when the first couple of salvos have already come in.

Assuming that the gun was still used, you could upgrade to stealth bullets. These wouldn't use stealth, but would be lined up a few degrees from they're target then shot out. In the middle of they're flight they would release a tiny puff of compressed air (or something just as effective) and be lined back up with the target. The battery artillery would still know which direction it came from, but would have to send probes to find exactly where.

[MrNonchalant]

http://slchriszs.freeservers.com/Snap034.jpg
There! My concept of a rocket artillery ship. I used the body of an aussault frigate, paint, part of a drone frigate, and a little enginuity. The rocket pods are obvious, the huge grids. What you may not notice is the small irregularity in the nose, that's a docking cradle for the spotters.

[skywalker]

The paint part is quite noticeable.... :)

[edit] no offence intended, chris... I wouldn't bother to spend a lot of time on it either :P

and about the idea, I like it. Although, no offence, I think that a sniper ship would work a lot better with lasers. Just flat out lasers.
Oh btw what if you had the ship fire laser-guided cruise missiles? So if the target ship cloaks then the missiles lose their lock.
Hmm, just speculation.

[Reaver]

shouldn't this really be in the gallery forum.

[MrNonchalant]

Skywalker: It's not my fault that all I have is paint, let's see you do better with what I've got.

Soul~ReaveR: It's a ship concept thread with supporting pics.

[Mac_Bug]

arent you guys forgetting something.


Something that huge in an empty space can't be detected until around 15KM away?

I know we are talking HW, but come on, it really doesn't mix well with all the scientific statistics you put behind the specs.

[MrNonchalant]

That's one reason I'm in favor of a smaller rocket based system.

[Mad_Scientist]

Mac_Bug.
Homeworld has cloaking, so it doesn't seem impossible for them to have a ship that can't be detected untill 15km. However, Proximity Detectors have senser range far greater than 15km. But many weapens in Homeworld have range near 15 km already, so a sniper weapon would have huge range.

[Fissure]

Actually, proximity detectors have a range of 9500 meters, and the longest range weapon (I think) is the missile destroyer at 9130 meters. However, I think the missiles go on forever if they don't hit anything, that is just how close the ship has to be for the MD to fire at it. Ion cannons have a range of about 7000-7500, and mass drivers have a range anywhere between 4000 and 6500.

[Omi-kun]

First off,

crobato: This is equivalent to a gigantic rail-cannon. Though it's quite slow (perhaps 2-3 seconds to reach the target at dVR). The range is around 30km, I don't remember since it's been a while since I played the game. But I would think it'll be double the Visible Range (up to quadriple visible range, but with severe accuracy inhitibtion). Again, the scouts well have to be within the visible range and there should at least be 2 of them, but the optimal number should be 4. Nebulas and dust clouds well also hamper the accuracy.

I forgot to mention this, but the central/rear section of the ship has a ring like structure partially protruding out of it. That's its mini-cloak generator (got it from the Taiidani cloak generator tech drawing) that partially cloaks it for ten minutes at a time and well require eight minutes to recharge. This alows it to be unnoticeable until slightly beyond visible range.

Its rate of fire is slow, perhaps 10 seconds to reload/recalibrate. And then you'll have to manually target it again or target another one. That'll take 10 seconds before they can all triangulate. If the target is moving than it'll take 15 secs. Accuracy will be the same unless target changes vector/speed.

Soul~ReaveR: That's why I'm going to redesign it. It's a light cruiser and dagnamit I'll make it look like one. I just can't stretch it. You shouldn't be able to build more than 5 or so of them. They have limited ammunition. You choose 'em. They can carry 6 conventional rounds (AP and/or HEAT-like) and 3 canisters (burst and/or multi-missiles). And they're only available through the MS or a carrier. They dock or a short range salvage corvettes does the loading.

Shadowbird: Thanks a lot, that means a lot to me. Encouragements like your's are what drives me to excel my self. ;)

1 SL Chris Z-S: Too much handicaps and unbalance for the attackers. And I already got the idea of a counter-artillery rocket frigate. Just hide and watch. ;)

skywalker: Lasers aren't very effective. The ablative armor well desipate most of it. And a reflective coating on ships well render 'em useless.

Laser guided is a good idea. However those could be easily detected by friendly forces. And it would make it too unbalanced, there's gota be some handicaps for the attackers.

Mac_Bug: See second paragraph.

Mad_Scientist: Thanks, you seem to really understand what I'm trying to say. ;)

[MrNonchalant]

Originally posted by Omi-kun
1 SL Chris Z-S: Too much handicaps and unbalance for the attackers. And I already got the idea of a counter-artillery rocket frigate. Just hide and watch. ;)
[/B]Sorry, not this time. I realize you already came up with that idea, however I'm using a 'counter-argument rocket battery' to hit your 'light argument sniper ship.' So far, I have some more serious damage to inflict. I'm arguing that we should just say 'to hell' with the whole light cruiser sniper thing and use the rocket battery frigate in the first place. Reasons:

1.) Light Cruiser: slow, Frigate: relatively fast
2.) Light Cruiser: big, Frigate: relatively small
3.) 1 and 2 mean harder to hit with counter-battery
4.) Light Cruiser: expensive, long construction time, Frigate: moderately cheap, moderately short construction times
5.) Gun: big, lumbering, outdated, Rockets: small, fast, better able to cope with upgrades/improvements

I know the light cruiser isn't as bad as a heavy cruiser, but it's still above the frigate level and must still be a pain in the leg.

I have adequite justification on every point I made, ask for a rebuttal and ye shall recieve.

I'm also furthering ideas around the 'spotters.' No Omi, no watching for me. I usually agree with you but now is the time to go to the mattresses. It's not personal, just business.

Check these 2 links for the modern application of this hypothetical futuristic technology:
http://www.army-technology.com/projects/crusader/index.html
http://www.army-technology.com/projects/mlrs/index.html
You'll start to notice phrases like:"[the MLRS can deliver] 8,000 munitions in less than 60 seconds"
"[with the howitzer] a firing rate of 10.4 rounds per minute was achieved."
"[the MRLS can reach] in excess of 45 km"
"[the howitzer can reach] in excess of 40 km"

Now granted, gun tech would have advanced at an extreme rate, but wouldn't rocket tech have advanced at a parrellel rate?

*looks at post with a smug smile*
*thinks to self 'that it is one of my best works'*
*laughs a soft, yet evil laugh*

[Mad_Scientist]

Fissure
The distances in Homeworld seem a little weird. The mothership is supposed to be over 20km long, and I was useing this to base my claim about the Proximity Detectors and weapons. But when I had a ship move from one end of the Mothership to the other, the number on the movement disk was about 10km. The Proximity Detector seems to be able to detect things father away than 9500 meters still, even if you used the movement disk to tell distance, and if you used the mothership than it would be way beyond it. The same thing goes for weapon ranges, when I saw weapons with range near the lenth of the Mothership, I thought that they had over 15km range.

[Alpha_Monkey]

MS=7km
Cruiser=1200m
DD=900m
Scout=50m (WTF?)

Kushan ships, by the way...

[Omi-kun]

...thus leaving me with a weak link to penetrate through.

Unlike some of my other ideas (mainly the PhantomII Mk.3) this idea was inspired and composed to meet both HW expectations and gaming balance issues.

Now if these issues were irrelevant than I would've went with your idea, or at least not argue with you when you made the point. But you're placing too much power and advantageous to the aggressor.

So proceeding with my comeback, your #1 & #2 comments contradicts your point and thus helps me greatly. The aggressor is taking chances, thus he must be very skillful to pull a sneak attack off. They must plan ahead in order to pull their major assets (the sniper light cruiser) out of harm's way intact. While the defender is already at a disadvantage because they're in the blind. They must have frigates that are harder to be targeted and thus be able to stand the first incoming barrage and defend their strong holds (whether that be harvesting operations or the MS her self).

The sniper cruiser is a cruiser because if it were a frigate than the aggressor will be able to build an armada of them and just use them to desimate his/her opponent. This is basically another rush, but long range. There's nothing fun about rushes, only amateurs enjoy these tacticless methods. This is a RTS game, with the 'S' standing for Strategy. IMHO, my concept would prove to be better at letting the player develop their own stratagies other than rushes.

Again, all your reasons supports my argument (cruisers are slow, costly, and time consuming).

[MrNonchalant]

You can counter rushes by implementing an unchangable cap on that ship alone. You can also simply upgrade the sensors looking for it to counter it's increased flexibility. It would make the game more exciting by speeding both sides up but at a parrelel rate. Another handicap could be an increase in hyper cost for that ship. 'Due to it's unusual shaped rocket pods, this ship is more costly to position by Hyperspace.'

Q: How do you balance an unbalanced scale?
A: Add more weight to the lighter side.

Not enough to deter me, Omi.

[Omi-kun]

I can already see this'll be another your opinion vs. mine arguement. So why don't we stop and safe some server space? Anyway, I'll get the pictures up as soon as I finish them.

[MrNonchalant]

Fine, truce agreed upon. Maybe there should be a choice, between a rocket bombarbment light cruiser and a conventonal artillery light cruiser. The rocket version would cost more and take longer, but would offer some unique advantages.

For the counter artillery, simply use a artillery with a special sensors array.

Or we could agree to disagree.

[Omi-kun]

http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/defense.frigate-sk.jpg

The sides fold out from the top when getting ready to launch counter barrage.

http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/apa.sk.jpg
| Detailed drawing (http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/drawings/adv.prox.array.jpg) |

The top spikes fold out and are omni-directional. So it can detect the area (50km in dia) without sensor shadows. It detects only fast moving objects (3000 m/s and above) and it well orient itself so tha bottom end of it will be turned toward the target and identify the exact position and relay this info to the defense frigate. The frigate will than fire at that spot, if the enemy has moved before the projetiles gets there (about 4 seconds after the initial fire by the enemy) than it well be undetected by the adv prox.

[Omi-kun]

Nevermind, here it is, it looks better in the forum.

http://server2044.virtualave.net/wise-dude/adv.prox.array.jpg

[Weavern]

Last two look good Omi, you really need to learn how to mod :D

[MrNonchalant]

Nice, how much damage can the rockets do?

[Omi-kun]

I would ask DR_17 Alpha, but he's a dad now and is utterly devoted to his baby. *Congradulations!*

I don't know anyone else who mods, other wise I may try to get them to do so.

The counter battery frigate is very powerful, unfortunately they are not suitable in close quarter combat. They have sufficient armor to parie(sp?) a partial blow by the sniper cruisers and still be able to return fire. The rockets actually travel faster than the shells shot by the cruiser (perhaps 2x as fast) and can either a.) render the turrets useless, or b.) destroy the cruiser; depending on whether or not they implement modular damage/systems into the gameplay.

[Zartax]

What keep this anti-battery-frigate from being the battery/artillery itself?
I mean, if it got long range, fast moving projectiles and high damage (you said that it might destroy the light cruiser) it is probably going to be used instead if the ship it is meant to counter, since it can do the same, only better.

[MrNonchalant]

Check the other posts, there was already an argument about this. We never actually came to a conclusion, but Omi posed a good point:
Now if these issues were irrelevant than I would've went with your idea, or at least not argue with you when you made the point. But you're placing too much power and advantageous to the aggressor.

So proceeding with my comeback, your #1 & #2 comments contradicts your point and thus helps me greatly. The aggressor is taking chances, thus he must be very skillful to pull a sneak attack off. They must plan ahead in order to pull their major assets (the sniper light cruiser) out of harm's way intact. While the defender is already at a disadvantage because they're in the blind. They must have frigates that are harder to be targeted and thus be able to stand the first incoming barrage and defend their strong holds (whether that be harvesting operations or the MS her self). I attemted to counter that, however I don't think my solution was totally satisfactory.

[Omi-kun]

Originally posted by Zartax
What keep this anti-battery-frigate from being the battery/artillery itself?
I mean, if it got long range, fast moving projectiles and high damage (you said that it might destroy the light cruiser) it is probably going to be used instead if the ship it is meant to counter, since it can do the same, only better.

Oh, well that's easily taken care of. The defensive frigate is capable of hypering anywhere, but has very low speed though high maneuverability (so it can position itself to fire at the attackers in sub-five secs). It's stealthy so it'd be hard to be detected and thus more likely to survive attacks. However, firing will give it's position away. So if one tries to use these to attack it'll be destroyed after the first shot. And you should be able to detect it when it hyperspace within 50km of you.