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[Taricus]

Unlike that though, this one was remotely plausible

[kisame12794]

Anyone on the team ever smoked bluesmokes?

Several, me included.

And guys, the No was a no as in, no, let's not be flinging asteroids about the system as massive KKVs.

Also, Radio, Paris was asking if missiles would be any good, and PW said that the point-defense lasers made it worthless. Relativistic cannons had nothing to do with it, so the analysis is still fine for that.

Hmm. What effects did it have?

ACTIVATE RECALL FUNCTION: Bluesmokes cause someone to become more logical and intuitive. Longtime smokers have been known to have almost precognitive intuition, but no regard for their own safety.

[Radio Controlled]

Also, Radio, Paris was asking if missiles would be any good, and PW said that the point-defense lasers made it worthless. Relativistic cannons had nothing to do with it, so the analysis is still fine for that.

Indeed, but why couldn't a manip accelerate the missile? Though one probably can't call it a missile anymore, in that case. And missiles/other solid rounds can be coated in the anti-laser coating the boarding shuttles will have to defeat laser defenses (if that isn't too expensive. I just realized PW can solve at lot of plotholes of the 'why don't we just use X' kind with 'too expensvie bucko, now run in and take that bunker by hand').

That's not going to stop one crazy bastard getting a gauss weapon and running out onto the hull of the ship and start shooting at the shuttles from there. And I wouldn't put it past them to try it as a desperation tactic.

Just gonna quote Steve here:

Also, don't worry too much about solid ammo; they don't have missiles and Gauss cannons aren't designed for point defense. It would be like hitting a fly with a cannon.

And a random dude just running up the hull to shoot (and hit) fast-moving shuttles capable of evasive maneuvers... Eh, won't say it's impossible, but certainly sounds improbable.

Hmm. What effects did it have?

GO GO GADGET WIKI SEARCH

[Taricus]

You can't discount insanity though. There's always one around

Nothing about small-craft like fighters though?

[PyroDesu]

Nothing about small-craft like fighters though?

No military or economic sense to them, pretty much. Unlike mechs (which have no engineering sense), there is a limited use, though.

To quote Ken Burnisde:

The other deciding factor is this: A "fighter" needs to be recovered (ed note: Otherwise it is some kind of manned kamikaze missile).

That means you need delta v to get to the objective, then delta v to cancel out your inbound vector, then delta v to get to a rendezvous point, plus delta v for maneuvering in the thick of things.

A rough estimate was that you needed delta v equal to about four times that of a comparable mass missile that just needs to do a drive-by shooting.

Four times the delta v means that your fuel fraction just went up by a factor of something around four (depends on your Isp).

Now put in the life support compartment, and the payload mass, and it gets even worse; rocket performance is the red queen's race, and you rapidly hit declining efficiencies.

If you could build a TLAM that had the operational range of an F-18, you could probably get more of them packed onto a comparable size ship than a comparable mass of F-18s.

TLAMs require lots of data on the target and the terrain and have to fly "over the horizon". A lot of opposition to the TLAM was that it took away the offensive strike mission from carrier aviation.

In space, there's no horizon to hide behind...

...The basic argument for fighters is that people think they're fun and cool.

The basic argument against fighters is horizon distance.

Fighters make sense in surface naval operations because a fighter can go to places where the carrier or cruiser can't. The fighter can also go to places where the big ships can't see, because of the curvature of the earth.

Unfortunately, there's no horizon for targets to hide behind in space. Even if you have something short of everyone sees everyone, it's hard(er) to justify fighters seeing things their carriers can't, just because carriers can carry bigger sensors, and space is a very sensor friendly environment.

Fighters do make sense in an orbital reference frame context, where, well, curvature of the earth matters, and where going into atmosphere matters. But this turns fighter carriers into "brown water" vessels that work in the tide pools of planetary gravity wells, which isn't the role you see them doing in fiction, which tends to take WWII carrier ops or modern USN carrier ops and apply an SFnal veneer.

Note that that's all mission specific, and only mildly tech related.

What do fighters do better than, or exclusively related to, larger ships? Answer this, and you get a reason for fighters in a setting.

[Taricus]

Short-range close defense craft, auxiliary point defence craft, air-to-orbit superiority (and vice versa).

[PyroDesu]

Short-range close defense craft, auxiliary point defence craft, air-to-orbit superiority (and vice versa).

Only the last (and barely that), and even then, only the vice versa, missiles are better for surface-to-orbit (no point boosting the extra mass of a fighter). The former are better done by making the ships that would use them better instead of adding rider craft. Range is the issue with the first two, really. Short range in space is measured in tens to hundreds of kilometers.

[Radio Controlled]

Y'know, I once imagined a Sci-Fi setting where fighters in space were viable, due to the way the FTL worked. Should write that out someday, really.

[Taricus]

Actually, with the former two, it gets much ore difficult to remove unless you have brought specialised weapons, such as point defence lasers and the like as the weapon systems are now being carried on much smaller craft.

Then there is the sensor issue. While fighters would show up on them, they would show up as far less threatening signatures compared to larger craft. Now, if you loaded a nuke, or an antimatter bomb (If such things exist.), and then just used an individual fighter (Or a flight), you could potentially do a fair bit of damage.

Then there's drone cruisers. You can use drones for reconnaissance  (Especially if there are a lack of FTL sensors, but FTL communication systems.), being much cheaper and easier to replace than a full-sized ship, and less noticeable to boot.

@Radio: There's plenty actually, it depends on the use. You just can't have carrier-based fleets since those are mostly useless due to distance and such. They are viable as auxiliaries though.

[Parisbre56]

If there is some sort of teleport-like FTL, shields and some sort of low output power source that could release unbelievable amounts of energy and/or mass over large periods of time, there would be some use for drones or fighters, I think.

[Radio Controlled]

Actually, with the former two, it gets much ore difficult to remove unless you have brought specialised weapons, such as point defence lasers and the like as the weapon systems are now being carried on much smaller craft.

Then there is the sensor issue. While fighters would show up on them, they would show up as far less threatening signatures compared to larger craft. Now, if you loaded a nuke, or an antimatter bomb (If such things exist.), and then just used an individual fighter (Or a flight), you could potentially do a fair bit of damage.

Then there's drone cruisers. You can use drones for reconnaissance  (Especially if there are a lack of FTL sensors, but FTL communication systems.), being much cheaper and easier to replace than a full-sized ship, and less noticeable to boot.

@Radio: There's plenty actually, it depends on the use. You just can't have carrier-based fleets since those are mostly useless due to distance and such. They are viable as auxiliaries though.

Wouldn't (small) missiles form an ever less threatening signature though?
And yes, drones are awesome. Who needs puny humans anyways?

Yeah, I meant fighters like you see in say, BSG or SW or something. So two fleets with capships and destroyers and the like duking it out while fighters engage other fighters to create an opening for bombers to close in.

[Toaster]

I guess the realistic issue with bombers is if we can carry the bombs that far in, why not just launch the bombs instead of the bombers?  If a bomber doesn't get shot up, then a missile won't either.

[Taricus]

Missiles have an issue with guidance and the target lock system. Not to mention not being piloted by something intelligent, whether artificial or not, does mean ECM might have a bigger affect on it compared to fighters, as it's more likely the fighters have their components shielded from such.

[Xantalos]

Anyone on the team ever smoked bluesmokes?

Several, me included.

And guys, the No was a no as in, no, let's not be flinging asteroids about the system as massive KKVs.

Also, Radio, Paris was asking if missiles would be any good, and PW said that the point-defense lasers made it worthless. Relativistic cannons had nothing to do with it, so the analysis is still fine for that.

Hmm. What effects did it have?

ACTIVATE RECALL FUNCTION: Bluesmokes cause someone to become more logical and intuitive. Longtime smokers have been known to have almost precognitive intuition, but no regard for their own safety.

Hmm. I'll need to start smoking that stuff once I become really immortal, then.

[Radio Controlled]

Missiles have an issue with guidance and the target lock system. Not to mention not being piloted by something intelligent, whether artificial or not, does mean ECM might have a bigger affect on it compared to fighters, as it's more likely the fighters have their components shielded from such.

I think remotely-guided missiles coupled with instant quantum communications can give one the benefit of having intelligent pilots without actually needing all supportive stuff for pilots. And if you can shield the fighters from whatever by whatever, you can shield the missiles the same way.

I guess the realistic issue with bombers is if we can carry the bombs that far in, why not just launch the bombs instead of the bombers?  If a bomber doesn't get shot up, then a missile won't either.

Indeed, which is why the way the FTL works in my system is integral to the justification of bombers.

Very short version: the FTL drive ('blink engine' or something), once activated, propels a ship forward at speeds several times of c. While doing so, it has no physical presence in the way we know it (could expand on it, but won't, would take too much time). However, it keeps going until it either runs out of fuel or it gets pulled out of the jump. This is because everything that has mass sends out a 'gravity field', the more mass the bigger the field. And the chance (and distance from the object) of an object forcing you out of jump increases with both your and his mass. The distance at which a ship is forced out of jump isn't always the same though, but follows a probabilistic approach, like a bell curve.
So two fighters jumping at each other could get into 20 meters from each other, while two 500 ton capships jumping will be forced out of jump at 200 kilometers (random numbers for sake of example). Moving to other starsystems is done by 'aiming' for that star and letting the engine go, meaning you will stop somewhere near the star, but this could be 10000 kilometers or 13000 kilometers away (random numbers, would need to determine a base set of numbers to make it work). Jumping again after being forced out could be handy if you drop out sooner than wanted, but once you get close enough will only move you a few meters (but, due to the nature of the system, you could jump and land 10 cm away from that sun, but the chance would be reaaaaly smal).

So now, two fleets engage. Capships drop out at certain distance. One launches big missiles with blink engines. But, if the other ship now sends out a 'net' of drones to force the missile out early, they may only lose one drone (where you just lost an expensive blink engine).

Fighters, however, can close the distance enough to shoot their weapons since, because of lower 'self-mass'/'self-gravity-field' they are forced out of jump much closer. So now the fighters need to clear a path through the drones to either let a 'blink-missile' get through without dropping out of jump to soon, or have bombers do it themselves.


There is more to it, of course, but that's the gist of it.