The future: DW Fighters?

[Astorax]

Do anti-ship missiles out range the air power projected from carriers by so much? From what I understood, air power was still King and, if thats true, then the carrier is still King of the seas.

[Wade1000]

In Distant Worlds, the distinctive characteristic of a fighter module weapon should be an extreme range and one form of point defense against same fighters and missiles.

[Fishman]

ORIGINAL: Astorax

Do anti-ship missiles out range the air power projected from carriers by so much? From what I understood, air power was still King and, if thats true, then the carrier is still King of the seas.

Yes, and while airpower itself is still relevant, as a naval unit, the carrier itself is obsolete: In modern warfare, a carrier taskforce must contend with completely unidentifiable targets numbering in the hundreds, and the political consequences of slagging a bunch of harmless civilian craft would be severe. Meanwhile, hostiles are pretty much indistinguishable from harmless civilian craft, there could be hundreds of them, and missiles are pretty cheap. Even if you kill a hundred attacking ships, the remaining hundred will kill you. Basically, carriers are obsolete sitting ducks that no longer function in a relevant role in a modern naval battle. We blow bazillions on them and we use them to launch planes off of, but as actual NAVAL ships, they are obsolete.

Similarly, space fighters never had any meaning in the first place. In DW, a ship can teleport itself to a point on the other side of the system in a matter of seconds. Fighters would not really compare favorably against the existing variety of missile-like weapons unless their range was much better, given how easily they would be shot down en-masse, and if their range was THAT much better, your target would simply warp in closer. You could treat them as "not really units", but simply a kind of missile with a different attack graphic, but then...that wouldn't really MEAN anything.

[Dadekster]

I would love to see fighters in this game. It's simple rock, paper, scissors and would just add another tactical piece to the puzzle regardless of what people think modern day carriers are worth. In this game I'd like to see major capital ships be helpless against squadrons of bombers (aka guided missles with pilots). This would make sure people who like to fly around in a fleet of 50 super expensive extra large world crushing capitals still be vulnerable to a 3rd rate empire that fields tons of these 'bombers' in smaller/cheaper ships of the line. This makes mr. Ilubmycaps have to at least provide dedicated anti-bomber protection...which would then make the other guy have to react to his screening force, and thus strategy and tactics was born. It's all about coming up with a better combined arms/fleet approach which makes ship battles so much fun imo.

As far as people thinking carriers are obsolete, I disagree respectfully. The whole concept of a plane flying off a carrier deck may be old school in the day of guided missles and so forth, but nothing else can bring force projection like a carrier task force. For some reason people seem to forget the kind of firepower a carrier possess not to mention all the ships it brings with it. Guided missles are great and all...but you still have to get close enough to use them and not to many navies I know that we need to worry about have 'hundreds' of ships with guided missle technology that's gonna penetrate the screen that a carrier task force can throw up between its own CAP, escorting destroyers and frigs not to mention the close in zip guns etc. Same thing for people who have subs. Now how effective and useful our floating cities are in this day and age are a different subject completely. But the way some folks are talking, you'd think some dude in Bubba Gump's shrimp boat with a bit of yarn, bubble gum and a LAW rocket could sink one of our carriers.

[Fishman]

ORIGINAL: Dadekster

I would love to see fighters in this game. It's simple rock, paper, scissors and would just add another tactical piece to the puzzle regardless of what people think modern day carriers are worth. In this game I'd like to see major capital ships be helpless against squadrons of bombers (aka guided missles with pilots).

There's a flaw in this idea: This is DW, and there is no arbitrary rule enforcing any particular weakness. If I pack a major capital ship with PD, it will fare just as well as any smaller ship, if not better, as it can withstand more hits before going out of commission. In fact, in the standard description, capital ships carry FRIED, which means your fighters explode like popcorn in a single wave. You COULD make fighters, by creating tiny micro-escorts that have a single weapon and an engine. They would also die instantly.

ORIGINAL: Dadekster

Guided missles are great and all...but you still have to get close enough to use them and not to many navies I know that we need to worry about have 'hundreds' of ships with guided missle technology that's gonna penetrate the screen that a carrier task force can throw up between its own CAP, escorting destroyers and frigs not to mention the close in zip guns etc.

Pretty much of all of them, actually. The Iranians, the Chinese, they all have the ability to perform missile spam. Back in 2002, we did a wargames exercise to "prove" how superior our new shiny ships were.

They got their asses handed to them by Iranistan. It was a major embarrassment that got mostly hushed up.

ORIGINAL: Dadekster

Same thing for people who have subs.

Subs are alive and well and will continue to be relevant in the future. There aren't really any good methods we have of reliably finding and killing them before they can pop up in within torpedo range of your fleet, like the Chinese did a few years back.

ORIGINAL: Dadekster

But the way some folks are talking, you'd think some dude in Bubba Gump's shrimp boat with a bit of yarn, bubble gum and a LAW rocket could sink one of our carriers.

Well, it's something like an Exocet or a Harpoon, but yeah, pretty much. That's exactly what happened. A mass of small boats indistinguishable from "Bubba Gump's shrimp boat" sent a carrier task force to the bottom of the Persian Gulf in a simulated exercise which had been blatantly rigged to favor "our" side. Carriers are floating metal coffins. If you're thinking of joining the navy, sign up for a submarine instead.

[jam3]

The more mass something has the more energy it takes to move it. Thats the main reason for fighters in space. And I think the other standard "technical" reason would be that fighter craft would be too small too contain a hyperdrive system and it if not a drone an organism cant live in a confined space for too long, thus the reason for carriers.

Fighters would need to be added by the developers and given a special status in the combat engine so there not affected by area weapons, with the exception of them adding some specific anti fighter weaponry. Fighters should be like other ships and have their own icons and move at maybe 4x 150-200 ish that of other ships. They should be the fight thats going on while the big ships are closing in on one another. You should be able to design them and make fighters and bombers and other variant types. I would expect all of this to be in an expansion as its a bunch of work.

And just thinking of the amount of defenses a modern carrier has on board I don't care what a simulation says as long as the officers and crew aren't aslepp it would be hard as heck to sink one. Not to mention every other ship in the task force knows that its job is to protect the carrier at all costs.

[lordxorn]

ORIGINAL: Fishman

ORIGINAL: Astorax

Do anti-ship missiles out range the air power projected from carriers by so much? From what I understood, air power was still King and, if thats true, then the carrier is still King of the seas.

Yes, and while airpower itself is still relevant, as a naval unit, the carrier itself is obsolete: In modern warfare, a carrier taskforce must contend with completely unidentifiable targets numbering in the hundreds, and the political consequences of slagging a bunch of harmless civilian craft would be severe. Meanwhile, hostiles are pretty much indistinguishable from harmless civilian craft, there could be hundreds of them, and missiles are pretty cheap. Even if you kill a hundred attacking ships, the remaining hundred will kill you. Basically, carriers are obsolete sitting ducks that no longer function in a relevant role in a modern naval battle. We blow bazillions on them and we use them to launch planes off of, but as actual NAVAL ships, they are obsolete.

I know this is kind of off topic, but I disagree with you. You make a valid point about hundreds of targets coming at your from all angles, but a little bit over exaggerated. The carrier is still king of the seas precisely because of the aircraft it carries, which can project power much further and put eyes on before hostiles get to close. Plus a civilian liner would be retarded to ignore the numerous warnings it would receive by flying to close to a Carrier Battle Group's area of influence.

In a full on war where some lesser naval country would love to sink a flat top, all civilian traffic will be re-routed and all the hostile targets will be weeded out by the numerous screening ships in the CVBG. The navy is also upgrading it's carriers to metal storm missile defense systems that can fire a million rounds a sec, youtube it.

While you are 100% correct that missile cruisers/frigates have surmounted even the time honored battleships from modern navies, carriers remain a integral part of any 1st world's navy. Otherwise if you are correct, then myself and all the smart navy brass that have studied nothing but naval warfare are completely wrong.

[vils]

Sorry pals, absolutely zero interest in having fighters and, thus even more micromanaging on useless units to handle, moreover very unrealistic.. We already have escorts.. even those i find pretty much useless..

Fighters belongs to another game, this isnt Star Wars this is Distant Worlds!

[lordxorn]

ORIGINAL: vils

Sorry pals, absolutely zero interest in having fighters and, thus even more micromanaging on useless units to handle, moreover very unrealistic.. We already have escorts.. even those i find pretty much useless..

Fighters belongs to another game, this isnt Star Wars this is Distant Worlds!

I respect that opinion, and you may be right. DW would need considerable changes to do fighters right. If this turns out to be the case, I wouldn't mind seeing them in a sequel. [:'(] star wars or not there is still a huge interest in them.

[jam3]

I couldn't disagree with him more myself Xorn, with pretty much everything he has said. Missle systems have their own place as well as there own unique problems. He kind of sound like the guys who thought there would be no need for cannons on fighter jets in the vietnam era cause missles would prevent combat from ever getting that close plus the speeds would be to great. Gotta wonder if he has ever met a pilot, those guys are freaks of nature. A human being cut from a particular cloth in charge of a highly manueverable vehicle is capable of some pretty astounding things. In space you could come up with several scenarios where this would be applicable as well, its all fantasy anyway. Thats one of the reasons pilots will probably always be better than a drone. A pilot has an innate sense of mortality and like any other organism a unique desire to survive.

[jam3]

Oh and not just star wars.

Battlestar Galactica
Space: Above and Beyond
Babylon 5
Stargate
Wing Commander (well there was a movie)

and a few more im probably missing

[Bartje]

Fighters could always be represented as squadrons with innate strengths and weaknesses vs certain ship armaments (anti-fighter vs main cannons)

Missile / drone carriers are an innovation as well however, and certainly have their place in the order of things!

It would be great if both options were implemented. This would net a nice triangle situation (Missiles / Drones VS Manned / Unmanned Fighters VS Naval Vessels)

What do you build, and how do you balance your forces?

Do you specialize in one? Or become a jack of all trades?


One thing is certain though, carriers must keep their distance!

[Fishman]

ORIGINAL: lordxorn

The carrier is still king of the seas precisely because of the aircraft it carries, which can project power much further and put eyes on before hostiles get to close.

Unfortunately, missiles have a range which exceeds that of aircraft, as they do not need to return. Additionally, while the carrier's AIRCRAFT are still valuable resources, especially as most opponents lack a credible airforce, the supercarrier itself is simply a sitting duck, and better results could be accomplished by smaller, cheaper, lower-profile escort carriers.

ORIGINAL: lordxorn

Plus a civilian liner would be retarded to ignore the numerous warnings it would receive by flying to close to a Carrier Battle Group's area of influence.

I'm going to assume you did not mean "fly", as ships do not fly, which is their main weakness, but a carrier group's influence at which it can reasonably command people to stay away is not sufficiently large that it can declare such a zone without effectively blockading the entire Persian Gulf, or a similarly sized region. The coastal sea is a crowded place, and at any given time, hundreds of civilian ships could be easily within missile range.

ORIGINAL: lordxorn

In a full on war where some lesser naval country would love to sink a flat top, all civilian traffic will be re-routed and all the hostile targets will be weeded out by the numerous screening ships in the CVBG. The navy is also upgrading it's carriers to metal storm missile defense systems that can fire a million rounds a sec, youtube it.

Yes, those CIWS systems are impressive, but how many missiles can they really stop? One? Ten? A Hundred? None of these is enough!

ORIGINAL: lordxorn

While you are 100% correct that missile cruisers/frigates have surmounted even the time honored battleships from modern navies, carriers remain a integral part of any 1st world's navy. Otherwise if you are correct, then myself and all the smart navy brass that have studied nothing but naval warfare are completely wrong.

The military is always ready to fight the last war. Remember the WW2 battleship admirals? It was demonstrated well before the war started that battleships were obsolete and easy prey for aircraft. This advice was largely ignored because in the event that those battleships were downsized, the admirals would lose their jobs, and so they were unwilling to believe. This same thing will happen in the next war. The carrier battlegroup is a doctrine evolved from WW2, to fight enemies of comparable strength in battles. In the modern world, nobody fights like this anymore. The supercarrier is a piece for a type of a war that no longer exists, clinging to life because many thousands depend on its existence for their livelihoods.

ORIGINAL: jam3

He kind of sound like the guys who thought there would be no need for cannons on fighter jets in the vietnam era cause missles would prevent combat from ever getting that close plus the speeds would be to great.

Yeah, well, they were wrong. Turns out cannons are great for shooting up the many things that don't actually have missiles, and compared to the cost of the rest of the plane, they are pretty cheap. It is true that there are not really any serious dogfights carried out with cannons, but cannons still find a lot of use outside of interceptor dogfights.

ORIGINAL: jam3

In space you could come up with several scenarios where this would be applicable as well, its all fantasy anyway.

It's always possible to invent a scenario in which Space Fighters somehow find a use that makes sense. However, DW has sort of locked itself into a corner here: Fighters have no meaningful role in DW without massive changes to the rules.

ORIGINAL: jam3

Thats one of the reasons pilots will probably always be better than a drone. A pilot has an innate sense of mortality and like any other organism a unique desire to survive.

Pilots are also remarkably squishy, have demanding life support needs, and extremely poor tolerance for acceleration. A desire to survive is very nice, but this is contrary to the goals of a missile, which wishes to plow into its opponent, causing the gruesome deaths of everyone involved. A fighter, with a live pilot, that wishes to survive, must now carry 4x the delta-V and additionally needs weapons, and life support with magical properties. A drone missile needs none of these things, being that it simply needs to accelerate to the target and plow into it. Warhead optional, kinetic energy is quite lethal in space.

In the context of DW, fighters suffer the problem of either being indistinguishable mechanically from missiles, or being very easily killed if they emulate shiplike properties, as FRIED systems are available midgame and upwards, and render any such small, easily destroyed craft completely obsolete. Ever see what happens when you let off a shockwave in the presence of a swarm of larger-than-fighters escorts? They all kinda die. Given that the traditional role of space fighters in fiction is attacking large capital warships, and mounting shockwave generators is a standard item according to the description of capital ships, this will result in the instant death of all of your fighters.

[Bartje]

 
-Missiles can be carried by fighters, hence they also serve as extensions of the carriers weapons range. Fighters are a projection of force, Intelligent Force.

-It is cheaper to use shorter range missiles from a returning / non suicidal launch platform than to use expensive long range seeking missiles.

-In space, Life support is arguably only air, I don't think that pulling G's is possible in space???

-The main advantage of a Fighter would be its maneuverability, allowing it to evade most attacks. (In most Sci-Fi Universes)


If fighters can evade attacks by larger ships they have reasonable staying power and perhaps pack enough punch in numbers to be viable

[Astorax]

You would not pull G's per se but you couldn't get away from inertia. 

[Bartje]

That's true but I ment it as a reflection on what piloting equipment and stress would have to be handled. In essence a modern planetary fighter pilot would have a (much?) tougher physical job.

[Wade1000]

Fighters, even soon on Earth, are going the way of automated/non piloted.

[Fishman]

ORIGINAL: Bartje

-In space, Life support is arguably only air, I don't think that pulling G's is possible in space???

Nope. "Pulling Gs" is a direct consequence of acceleration and Newtonian physics. You can't avoid that just by being in space.

ORIGINAL: Bartje

-The main advantage of a Fighter would be its maneuverability, allowing it to evade most attacks. (In most Sci-Fi Universes)

Maneuverability requires "pulling Gs", which a manned fighter cannot do as well as an unmanned missile.

ORIGINAL: Bartje

If fighters can evade attacks by larger ships they have reasonable staying power and perhaps pack enough punch in numbers to be viable

Unfortunately, you can't evade FRIED, so you're screwed.

[Aurelian]

http://scienceblogs.com/interactions/2007/07/newtons_laws_in_science_fictio.php

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... ceFriction

I know, technobabble makes anything work in space-fi. But as was mentioned above by someone, that word realism.

[Bartje]

Right, so DW ships don't entirely follow the laws of physics do they? Or do they? I'm confused!

Is there an ingame explanation in the sense of hyperdrive and sublight speed drive ignoring newton's laws?

It must be a Quantum Effect Field! [;)]