Anti-Shipping Conventional Bomber

[Khymerion]

Mostly as a thought experiment that came up from a conversation, with the big heavy warships taking back to the seas... we saw the problem of 'Wow, that is a LOT of AA on these monsters.'  Well, being a pair of old hands at Harpoon, we almost immediately thought of the old terror of the skies, the Backfire.   Well, producing one of these massive beasts with conventional fighters was purely out and not wanting to resort to larger aerospace, ie: on the cheap, meant having to go into the large support vehicles and thus, we rolled out a nice stand off artillery bomber... one that would actually have a place it seemed even without a big carrier, fast cruiser, or convoy to sink.

Anyway... here is a moderate recreation of the Backfire (with appropriate fully loaded weight!).   We had to cut a lot of corners to get something fast and capable but it worked for the though experiment.

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Type:  Backfire
Weight: 125 tons
Type:  Large Support, Fixed Wing


Equipment
Chassis       Tech E                                     16 tons
Engine        Tech F         Fuel Cell                69.5 tons
        Cruise   7
        Flank     11
Structural Integrity:       7
Range:      950 fuel points                           19 tons
                     
Armor        44 pts       Tech E    Bar 8            2 tons
               Nose            12
               Wings         11/11
               Tail               10

Weapons
Arrow IV Launcher            Front            15 tons
Arrow IV ammo (5)           Body              1 ton

External Hard Points:  12                       2.5 tons
Typically 2 Anti-ship Arrow missiles or 2 Arrow IV missiles and 2 Light AA missiles if a stand off against interception was a concern.

It is not a great weapon but it does give a conventional weapon capable of stand off attacks against ground targets and formations, capable of getting in and then burning back out quickly with the relatively fast speed of the bomber.   It also allows to be a good hypothetical enemy to begin working up counter attack strategies for.   Still not sure if the conventional bomber would be able to fire it's Anti-ship missiles at a dropship in near space but it also put an interesting threat to descending or ascending dropships.

Like I said, it's a thought experiment.

[Red Pins]

Hm.  These would easily replace the conventional WiGEs of my AU, particularly with the Tandem-Charge Arrows.  Heck of a lot faster and survivable, too.

I like it.

[VhenRa]

Afraid to say it doesn't work. Fuel Cells can only be used on Aircraft with Prop-Chassis mod.

[serack]

nice thought work , I tend to put AIVs on smallcraft for similar duties , makes them mobile and deadly if few get together :)

[Khymerion]

Afraid to say it doesn't work. Fuel Cells can only be used on Aircraft with Prop-Chassis mod.

Well...  darn, I can fix that up in post.   Thanks for catching that.   Sometimes the lack of any digital assist can be a pain.

Well, it can drop down to an ICE engine and only be at a mere 6/9 and 14 tons of fuel.   Fusion and the plane can actually go up a speed to a 8/12 and actually gain 5.5 more tons of fuel for a whopping 24.5 tons of fuel.   Considering it is now pushing over 1225 thrust points worth of fuel, the plane would then be bordering on actually being a long ranged bomber, it's air bases able to be concealed far from normal areas.   Might be worth it to consider.

[Dragon Cat]

pushing up the speed could also open the door to carrying additional ordinance under the wings adding to the firepower and making the use of your fuel capacity - loitering over a target area.

EDIT scrolled down and noticed you've covered external ordinance - darn

instead of the engine you could increase internal payload add to the overall firepower or more ammo

[Khymerion]

pushing up the speed could also open the door to carrying additional ordinance under the wings adding to the firepower and making the use of your fuel capacity - loitering over a target area.

EDIT scrolled down and noticed you've covered external ordinance - darn

instead of the engine you could increase internal payload add to the overall firepower or more ammo

I'll run the numbers a few times and see if I can get another launcher on somehow...  also working on a prop version for that classic Tu-95 Bear flavor of long ranged bomber.

[Dragon Cat]

I'll run the numbers a few times and see if I can get another launcher on somehow...  also working on a prop version for that classic Tu-95 Bear flavor of long ranged bomber.

Even a Thunderbolt, LRM system or an Extended LRM system, although they may be more suited to a low range unit than this which appears to be more high level

[Nebfer]

Well...  darn, I can fix that up in post.   Thanks for catching that.   Sometimes the lack of any digital assist can be a pain.

Well, it can drop down to an ICE engine and only be at a mere 6/9 and 14 tons of fuel.   Fusion and the plane can actually go up a speed to a 8/12 and actually gain 5.5 more tons of fuel for a whopping 24.5 tons of fuel.   Considering it is now pushing over 1225 thrust points worth of fuel, the plane would then be bordering on actually being a long ranged bomber, it's air bases able to be concealed far from normal areas.   Might be worth it to consider.

950 points of fuel gets it a range of 34,200km, 1,225 points of fuel will net you 44,100km of range.
using the high altitude ranges, IIRC using low altitude rules it's effectively 1km per fuel point...

[Khymerion]

950 points of fuel gets it a range of 34,200km, 1,225 points of fuel will net you 44,100km of range.
using the high altitude ranges, IIRC using low altitude rules it's effectively 1km per fuel point...

That is not bad at all... especially for a conventional.

[VhenRa]

Could also just put the Props on, keep same engine, same speed. Props are like 3-3.5 tons, take that out of fuel and reap the fact fuel for prop planes is lighter. By my calculations, you will gain something like 100 points of fuel by switching to props, even as you take that tonnage out of the fuel tank.

Or crack option, switch to props.. switch to fusion. Gain BACK tonnage (Even if using Tech E Fusion!) because you don't need fuel anymore. Oh and have unlimited (fuel wise) loiter time because Fusion + Prop = Unlimited Range.

[Khymerion]

I wanted an anti-ship missile truck of a conventional bomber and the needed 180 tons to get the 18 slots of external stores was a beast of a plane, then added another 5 tons to hit the historical benchmark.   Fully loaded, this monster bomber can only crack 4/6 but unloaded, thanks to it's propellers, has to restrict it's top speed to only cruising instead of it's potential top speed of 12.    Though it does bring three anti-ship arrow missiles on external racks to the table on a single airframe, a threat to say the very least.

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Name:  'Bear'
Mass:  185 tons
Type:  Fixed Wing, Large

Chassis:   Tech  F      Propeller Driven                   22 tons
Engine:   Fuel Cell   Tech   F                                 132 tons
    Cruise:      8
    Flank:       12
Fuel:       677 thrust points                                     10 tons
Armor:                   22          Tech E    Bar 8              1 ton
           Front      6
           Sides     5/5
           Rear       6

Weapons
Arrow IV Launcher        Front       15 tons
Arrow IV Ammo (5)

External hard points:   18    3.5 tons

Was tossing around a few ideas of just tearing out the internal Arrow IV launcher and going for an internal bomb rack to lift up more stores and padding out more thrust points worth of fuel.  Needless to say, the presence of such a bomber or it's smaller jet/fusion cousin could definitely give an invasion commander a few things to worry about, at least for thought experiments on how to defend and secure a landing zone on a planet.

[Dragon Cat]

Going purely for bombs would be a problem though it would mean this unit would have to fly over a target area - on its own it is going to be very vulnerable to anti-air fire with that paper for armour

[Khymerion]

Going purely for bombs would be a problem though it would mean this unit would have to fly over a target area - on its own it is going to be very vulnerable to anti-air fire with that paper for armour

True... and it is a stand off platform.   Wasn't sure if you could use alternate bombs like Arrow missiles in a bomb bay or or not.  If you could, yeah, totally tear out that arrow rack and throw in the bomb bay... but even 677 fuel points gives it a range that is nice.

[VhenRa]

Yeah, you can.

Just can't dump more then 6 tons of weapons a turn as I understand.

Edit: Just realised, you can still make use of that above 8+ thrust when unloaded for ACM, can't you? And climbing?

[Khymerion]

Yeah, you can.

Just can't dump more then 6 tons of weapons a turn as I understand.

Edit: Just realised, you can still make use of that above 8+ thrust when unloaded for ACM, can't you? And climbing?

Just can't go over velocity 8 with a prop plane for purposes of maintaining control, that's all.   That just means this bomber has alot of power to throw around honestly.

Also, if it can only drop 6 tons of weapons, well...  that means it can throw another Anti-ship missile out the bomb bay a turn... giving it a relatively incredible alpha strike before having to turn and bolt for it.   So 12 tons of internal bomb capacity (two more Anti-ship missiles) and then 4 extra tons of fuel to boost it's range and that would make it a pretty fun plane to fly.   It would definitely throw an air defense unit for a loop knowing a squadron or two were floating about out there.

[Dragon Cat]

But it would need an escort if a leopard was attacking your planet one of the fighters off it could splash the bomber

Saying that if you've already engaged the enemy keeping their attention then this would be a nasty surprise to troop DropShips

Or if there's no aerospace them the LZ >:D

[Khymerion]

But it would need an escort if a leopard was attacking your planet one of the fighters off it could splash the bomber

Saying that if you've already engaged the enemy keeping their attention then this would be a nasty surprise to troop DropShips

Or if there's no aerospace them the LZ >:D

That is the idea.  The concept behind the thought experiment was purely around the idea that instead of letting ASFs have free roaming will to go fluttering about, a viable threat outside of other ASFs that might actually preclude maintain a defense screen constantly lest these things come trundling in and disgorge their cargo.   The idea behind it was to find a way to keep a round the clock screen up without burning out pilots having to be always on alert and burning up precious fuel running those patrols... as is the case with many of the heavy carrier lacking fuel and often needing constant resupply.

Heck, considering the lack of deep fuel tanks on carriers and ASFs...  we toyed around with the idea of using decoy flights of bombers to draw away and burn up fuel,  just running clean at loaded bomb speed (4/6 fully loaded is not bad honestly) and then going back to full power to break and run the moment sensors pick up approaching interceptors and draw the fighters away... before the real strike squadron comes in while the ASFs come back to refuel.

Going to need to do a work up of the cost/bv of these platforms to see how they stack out and their viability.

[VhenRa]

Might want to do up a variant fitted up as a Recee plane. Fitted with a few of the "Satellite" imager setups. Especially that 8/12 Fusion version. Even a simple High-Res imager can provide an interesting capability. Another possible variant is one fitted with a pile of vehicular mine dispensers. If you have enough slots... you can fit 32 dispensers into the same space as the Arrow IV Launcher... and thus fill 64 hexes with mines.

[Khymerion]

That would be an utterly terrifying use of the airframe.   Had thought of the Recon/AWACs use but definitely not the mine dispenser model.   Forgetting, do we have mid air refueling?   If so, the fusion model of the turbo prop bomber might be interestingly adapted to that role with the massive reduction of engine space, lack of need for fuel itself, and thus an incredible amount of potential fuel it could bring up to resupply other bombers and aircraft.

[VhenRa]

That would be an utterly terrifying use of the airframe.   Had thought of the Recon/AWACs use but definitely not the mine dispenser model.   Forgetting, do we have mid air refueling?   If so, the fusion model of the turbo prop bomber might be interestingly adapted to that role with the massive reduction of engine space, lack of need for fuel itself, and thus an incredible amount of potential fuel it could bring up to resupply other bombers and aircraft.

Yup. See TRO: 3075 and the Stork refueling plane. Which has 19.5 Tons of Fuel. Each Refueling Drogue uses up a ton and one slot.

[Khymerion]

I'll get right on working on a fusion engine Bear then and see just how much fuel I can put up in the air to supply other ASFs and bombers.

[Khymerion]

Okay, not changing anything on the Bear except going over to a fusion engine over dropped the overall engine tonnage to now just less than an Atlas at 94.5 tons instead of the old heavier than a super heavy mech of 132 tons.   So with infinite range thanks to what will probably be the loudest turboprops in history (like it's namesake), a dedicated refueling plane would be able to lift a rather substantial 65.5 tons of cargo into the skies and tearing everything off... still at it's rather nuts speeds and with a refueling drogue.   So after converting over to liquid storage instead of dry cargo (though it would be funny to imagine the crew throwing chunks of frozen hydrogen out the back to try and refuel another plane), that would give the plane about 57 tons of refrigerated liquid storage... enough to completely refuel 5 of it's conventionally engined bomber cousins or full on 10 fighter star of pretty much any of the original 3055 clan ASFs and still have a bit left in the tanks.   Not too bad really.

[ckosacranoid]

Speaking of evil, what the tonnage on a shipping missile and damage? That could be fun for dropping onto freinds for fun with this.
This is just evil and I like.....might have get more minis and add to mybmerc unit....

[Khymerion]

Speaking of evil, what the tonnage on a shipping missile and damage? That could be fun for dropping onto freinds for fun with this.
This is just evil and I like.....might have get more minis and add to mybmerc unit....

6 tons per ASM.   So it can drop a single ASM per turn from an internal bomb bay.  They do 3 pts of capital damage (30 pts standard).   That would give it a rather substantial alpha strike of 4 ASMs on it's opening strike...  assuming it might be the variant that tears out the A4 launcher for a 12 ton bomb bay and 4 more tons of fuel.    Another terrible idea that came up during the skype call was that there might be a few 'escort' bombers mixed in with the anti-shipping bombers and then spewing out a good 24 light AA missiles per bomber against any approaching interceptors as a retaliation strike.   Sure, the bomber strike was going to lose planes... that's a given but that was sure a nasty number of counter strike missiles.

A ground attack role would see it's bomb slots changed a bit.   Since the ground attack missiles are smaller than the ASM, it still would only be able to lift 3 external A4 air launched missiles and 2 internal A4 missiles but it could actually still carry 3 Light AA missiles externally and 2 internally so it has at least some stand off capability while airborne.   Again, they are going to die in droves... much like any Harpoon player will be used to but getting to shoot back for once is nice.

[VhenRa]

Light AA are two slots...

[Khymerion]

Light AA are two slots...

Oh, guess I must still have an older book... must have errata that and didn't notice.   Pg 359 of my copy of Tactical Operations said 1 slot per LAA... guess they fixed that.  Oh well.  Still, 9 missile spam off the XO racks and 3 from the internal is still pretty good for an alpha strike while still able to make a good speed.

[Nebfer]

Question while a Arrow is 5 slots on the external is it 5 err tons in terms of payload?

I mean if you had a 15 ton cargo bay, I know you can only drop six slots worth of items per turn, would not you be able to carry 5 of the 3 ton ASMs? (with the ability to drop one per turn?), or just 2 due to it taking up "6 tons" each (even though it only mass's 3 tons)?

Or in other words the Light Air to Air missile has a mass of 500kg but takes up two slots for external ordnance, with a 15 ton cargo bay you could drop 3 of them a turn, and carry 30 of them or would only carry 7 due to them taking 2 "slots/tons"?

[Khymerion]

Question while a Arrow is 5 slots on the external is it 5 err tons in terms of payload?

I mean if you had a 15 ton cargo bay, I know you can only drop six slots worth of items per turn, would not you be able to carry 5 of the 3 ton ASMs? (with the ability to drop one per turn?), or just 2 due to it taking up "6 tons" each (even though it only mass's 3 tons)?

Or in other words the Light Air to Air missile has a mass of 500kg but takes up two slots for external ordnance, with a 15 ton cargo bay you could drop 3 of them a turn, and carry 30 of them or would only carry 7 due to them taking 2 "slots/tons"?

See, I have never gotten a good explanation of the mechanics of the internal bomb rack so I just kinda assumed 1 ton = 1 slot... I am probably horrible wrong (I usually am about ALOT of things).

[pheonixstorm]

Two things. What if that warship has any A4 with ADA arrows? Haven't looked too much into those myself so not sure on the game mechanics for the range etc.

Also, when dealing with the backfire and bear or even a badger have you read Red Storm Rising from Tom Clancy? Has a nice take on naval combat involving a regiment of the bombers and a carrier group. Not to mention all the other nasty shocks of naval warfare and modern combat.