Conway's 'Warship 2000-2001' turned up on Friday. An
article in it on the late war British destroyers set me wondering about DDs in
Full Thrust.
The seem to be two basic and conflicting roles for DDs. As escorts for the
battlefleet to protect them from attack by fighters and missiles and as
attackers themselves. A ship optimised for either role is of little use in the
other.
What are peoples opinions? Do you build a class of fleet destroyers optimised
as escorts with ADFCs and a heavy point defence battery and a separate class
of
DDs optimised for attack - with heavier beam or
missile armament whose main defence from missiles or fighters is speed.
What sort of size and spec do you use for your DDs and is there a place for
smaller escorts?
When the new edition comes out, with its improved sensor rules (hint, hint)
scouting will be more
important - and small fast expendable scouts may come
into their own. Until then they seem little more than a waste of points in a
fleet action except as a suicide screen for the heavies to suck missiles away
from them.
***
The seem to be two basic and conflicting roles for DDs. As escorts for the
battlefleet to protect them from attack by fighters and missiles and as
attackers themselves. A ship optimised for either role is of little use in the
other.
***
Well, it's shifting all the time. In WWII, you had torpedo boats firing
torpedoes, and torpedo boat destroyers doing the same, while more designed for
defense against TB's.
Earlier war II, there was little threat perceived from planes, so the above
was still in effect.
Of course, there's a strong case to be made for 'only one world war with a
long, imperfect haitus in the center...'
In the Fleet Book I designs, the escort functions are pretty much via light
cruiser varients.
As I've played mostly FB designs, DD's are defensive mainly in 'best' manner,
i.e., offense.
Offensive DD's make much more sense if you see them as occasionally on
detached service.
> What are people's opinions? Do you build a class of
I'd build a DD mass about 34 or so, give it the option for an ADFC+PDS
package or an attack package. IIRC my DDs have 9 mass available for
weapons payload, so ADFC version might have 5PDS + 1ADFC + 1B2 (3 arc)
for knocking down corvettes. Antiship version might have 1SMR-ER + 1 B3
(1arc) or 2 B2 (3arc); or 2B2 (3arc) + 1 B1 + 4 submunition packs; or
2B2 (3arc) + 1FCS + 2 needles (or Heavy Needle from last week's WotW);
or plenty of other variants.
I would not try to combine ADFC + attack variants.
The attack DD's main defense against fighters/missiles is either having
an ADFC variant in the formation or, more likely, not being worth shooting at.
I don much the same with my destroyers, though mine are usually a little
bigger.
Al though now, after reading LOTS of naval history... I'm considering taking a
more traditional WWI destroyer formation in to battle the next time. I'm
thinking about 6 mass 30-40 destroyers with a heavy P-torp armament,
lead by a light cruiser.
later Chris
[quoted original message omitted]
> Michael Robert Blair wrote:
> The seem to be two basic and conflicting roles for
The former variety is usually called "Frigates" nowadays, IIRC :-/
> What are peoples opinions? Do you build a class of
I tend to use cruisers and/or capitals for anti-missile/fighter work.
FFs and DDs are for stopping enemy strikeboats without tying up the
bigger ships' firepower and generally make a nuisance of themselves :-/
> What sort of size and spec do you use for your DDs
The entire size range indicated in DD1, simply because I use the DD1 size
ranges to classify the ships. Specs depends on the fleet's theme,
but generally wide-ish medium-range armament and high thrust ratings.
(...higher thrust ratings than the heavies, that is. Some people say that even
my capital ships have high thrust ratings <g>)
> and is there a place for smaller escorts?
Smaller *escorts* only go down to FF size or so. I often use smaller
*strikeships*, though.
> When the new edition comes out, with its improved sensor rules (hint,
The new edition of Conway's Warships will have improved sensor rules?
<g>
The main - some would say only - task of "small fast expendable" scouts
is to determine if there's any point in fighting or if you should bug out as
fast as possible. Unless FT3 features a strategic, or at least an operational,
game in addition to the tactical rules (or players
world-wide start using gaming tables bigger than mine - 120x100mu; some
gamers have repeatedly told me that the gaming standard is 96x48mu or
72x48mu :-/ ), those scouts won't get a chance of carrying that job
out. The tactical games only starts after you have already decided to fight,
and the sensors that'll get used most (because they survive the longest) are
those on your cruisers and capitals.
Regards,
[quoted original message omitted]
> --- Michael Robert Blair <pellinoire@yahoo.com> wrote:
> What are peoples opinions? Do you build a class of
OK, there are exactally two classes of 'escort' ship in main force usage (by
which I mean in HSF or Sector Fleet battle squadrons, cruiser squadrons, or
destroyer squadrons NB: My Fleet OOB has been totally reworked from the ground
up but is not currently available online). There are "Escort Cruisers" which
are moderately sized cruisers with a slew of PDSs and a pair of ADFCs. And
there are 'Escort Destroyers' which are standard destroyers minus beam
batteries and with extra PDS and an ADFC. There are four other
classes of destroyer (plus a destroyer-sized
purposebuilt commerce raider). DDGs have heavy SMR armament and are used for
fast strike in support of battleline units. Skirmishers around the
battleships, no? The DDTs have Pulse Torps and fulfil the same role in Sector
Fleets (Sector Fleets are intended for
long-term independant operations with little
logistical support, so expendable ordnance is
pointless). DDs are beam-armed destroyers intended to
support DDG/DDT and to shoot up the enemy's small fast
strike ships. And DDLs are "Destroyer Leaders", flagships for destroyer
squadrons.
> What sort of size and spec do you use for your DDs
Same as the French. And yes, there is. But not much of one.
> a waste of points in a fleet action except as a
You want a suicide screen, try taking a frigate
(NAC-sized, for discussion). Rip out the beam
armament, add FTL towing capacity. This can hall
about a half-dozen Size 2 ships. With 1 point of hull
and 1 point of drive, you have a Thrust 10 Target
Drone which can drive your SMR-using opponent up the
wall. (Mother class drone tender and Mu-class target
drones...)
G'day Michael,
My DDs are usually offensive and I tend to leave the defensive stuff to my
CLs/CEs. However for one of the races I muck around with a bit I have a
defensive all PDS+ADFC line up which act like a "shield wall" in front
of the capitals against missile heavy opponents.
Cheers
Beth
> --- "laserlight@quixnet.net" <laserlight@quixnet.net> wrote:
I'd give them a lot of Class-1 beams and PDS, with 1 or 2 ADFC. (5
class-1, 2
PDS, 1 ADFC for example). The beams will work against fighters and missiles
and the PDS will back them up. This follows both the classic FT paradigm
(class-1s
on DDs, class-2s on CA, etc.) and the WW2 paradigm (5" are class-1, 8"
are
class-2, etc.)
> Michael Llaneza wrote:
> I'd give them a lot of Class-1 beams and PDS, with 1 or 2 ADFC. (5
If this was a "classic FT paradigm", it must've been in 1st edition.
The 2nd ed. sample DD used B-batts (equivalent to Class-2s) as its main
armament...
Regards,
It's been a looong time since I played 2nd ed. :-)
> --- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote:
> Michael Llaneza wrote:
> I'd give them a lot of Class-1 beams and PDS, with 1 or 2 ADFC. (5
Then I'm even more confused by the "classic paradigm" thing. All of the
"official" FB1 DDs use either missiles or B2s as their main armament...?
Regards,
My mind plays tricks on me sometimes. In this case, a logical deduction (my
assignment of weapon sizes to ship classes) was presented as an actual memory.
Which it obviously isn't.
And I wasn't looking at either FB1 or FT when I mentioned it. It just seemed
so
plausible at the time ;-(
> --- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote: