Author Topic: Capital Weapon Analysis  (Read 21581 times)

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Capital Weapon Analysis
« on: 26 February 2018, 13:26:09 »
The universe of capital-sized weapons is both fairly small and fairly balanced, so it's amenable to being analyzed all at once. Given that I've been constructing a bunch of designs over in Aerospace Fan Designs, I thought I'd do some number crunching. Note that I won't be including sub-capital weapons or mass drivers, as those are much more limited in availability and play differently.

Each weapon will be analyzed on a few derived stats.
  • Damage per effective kiloton, which adds 10 rounds of ammunition and all necessary double heatsinks to fire the weapon,
  • Damage per million C-bills, which will give a sense of if it's cheap or expensive, and,
  • The maximum number you can mount in a single bay(for ballistic/energy only), which determines how well it can bracket and how much peak damage you can get for thresholding.

Those will then be used to discuss what sort of use cases are best for the weapon.

Energy Weapons
Naval Laser 35
3.5(35) damage, 700 tons, 52 heat, long range, $500,000, can switch to fighter targeting mode
4.82 damage/kton, 7.0 damage/$M, 20 max per bay(=70 damage).

Naval lasers are decent dual-purpose weapons that can both defend against fighters and warships, though they probably shouldn't be your main weapons in either role on larger ships. Because NL/35s have a shorter range than the other NLs with no better efficiency stats, they're definitely weaker against warships. However, the smaller size means they're less prone to overkill than other NLs against fighters, so if your NL mounts are anti-fighter first and anti-warship second, NL/35s are a strong choice.

Naval Laser 45
4.5(45) damage, 900 tons, 70 heat, extreme range, $850,000, can switch to fighter targeting mode
4.81 damage/kton, 5.3 damage/$M, 15 max per bay(=67.5 damage).

Much like NL/35s, these are good dual-role secondary weapons. Can be used fairly interchangeably with NL/55s, depending on available weight. On lighter ships where fire control is not an issue, these can make a very good primary battery, as they're just as weight-efficient as NPPCs while also having an anti-fighter option.

Naval Laser 55
5.5(55) damage, 1,100 tons, 85 heat, extreme range, $1,250,000, can switch to fighter targeting mode
4.81 damage/kton, 4.4 damage/$M, 12 max per bay(=66 damage).

Use these just like NL/45s, as they're basically identical.

Light Naval PPC
7 damage, 1,400 tons, 105 heat, long range, $2,000,000
4.82 damage/kton, 3.5 damage/$M, 10 max per bay(=70 damage).

These suffer somewhat by comparison to NL/55s, as they don't do much more damage, are no more efficient, have less range, and lose the anti-fighter targeting option. The best use for these is probably getting a maximal 70-point bay, as they're the only energy weapons aside from the NL/35 that can do so, and they use less fire control in the process(and a 70-point bay is gross overkill for anti-fighter work, so the lack of an anti-fighter mode is no problem).

Medium Naval PPC
9 damage, 1,800 tons, 135 heat, extreme range, $3,250,000
4.82 damage/kton, 2.8 damage/$M, 7 max per bay(=63 damage).

These save a noticeable amount of fire control slots compared to NL/55s, so on ships that are likely to fill their slots up, these can be a good primary battery. Also, a lot of heavy bays do 60 damage, so any metagamers who build their ships with 610 armour per facing will hate you for making 63-damage bays.

Heavy Naval PPC
15 damage, 3,000 tons, 225 heat, extreme range, $9,050,000
4.82 damage/kton, 1.7 damage/$M, 4 max per bay(=60 damage).

The biggest energy weapon, these provide all the usual no-ammo, long-range joy with very low fire control usage. A 4x HNPPC bay is a monster, able to fully bracket if needed, threshold almost anything, and keep firing forever while leaving lots of room for other guns - there's a reason the McKenna used so many of them. These are best suited to heavy ships that need serious long-range smashing potential where fire control is a real issue.

Ballistic Weapons
Naval AC/10
10 damage, 2,000 tons, 30 heat, long range, $2,000,000(ammo = 0.2 tons, $30,000)
4.96 damage/kton, 4.3 damage/$M, 7 max per bay(=70 damage).

These have slightly better efficiency than the energy weapons, and they can create 70-damage bays, but they lose range in comparison. If you want the ability to fully bracket and long range, these might be your pick, but energy weapons will give it a run for its money.

Naval AC/20
20 damage, 2,500 tons, 60 heat, long range, $5,000,000(ammo = 0.4 tons, $60,000)
7.89 damage/kton, 3.6 damage/$M, 3 max per bay(=60 damage).

Compared to NAC/10s, these are dramatically more efficient - the only thing they lose is the ability to fully bracket. If you expect to be rolling on 12s a lot, these might not be your pick, but otherwise they're a really solid all-around choice.

Naval AC/25
25 damage, 3,000 tons, 85 heat, long range, $7,500,000(ammo = 0.6 tons, $75,000)
8.20 damage/kton, 3.0 damage/$M, 2 max per bay(=50 damage).

These suffer by comparison to their neighbours - they're not as efficient on tonnage or fire control as a NAC/30, and can't bracket to -2 like a NAC/20. These shouldn't be used unless you have very particular amounts of remaining tonnage, or you're metagaming against an enemy with ~240 armour on a facing.

Naval AC/30
30 damage, 3,500 tons, 100 heat, long range, $10,500,000(ammo = 0.8 tons, $90,000)
8.43 damage/kton, 2.6 damage/$M, 2 max per bay(=60 damage).

The most efficient guns in their range bracket by far, these are a great all-around choice for tonnage efficiency combined with decent range. They suffer somewhat from bracketing rules, but they're still solid.

Naval AC/35
35 damage, 4,000 tons, 135 heat, medium range, $14,000,000(ammo = 1 ton, $105,000)
8.58 damage/kton, 2.3 damage/$M, 2 max per bay(=70 damage).

These lose the range of the NAC/30, but they gain the ability to create 70-damage bays. They're probably the best single option for creating gigantic holes in enemy armour in a knife fight.

Naval AC/40
40 damage, 4,500 tons, 135 heat, medium range, $18,000,000(ammo = 1.2 tons, $120,000)
8.73 damage/kton, 2.1 damage/$M, 1 max per bay(=40 damage).

These don't have the ability to bracket at all, and have both the shortest range and smallest bay size of any capital weapon. But they're the single most tonnage-efficient and fire control-efficient guns in the game. If you want to get in close and peel armour off as quickly as humanly possible, these are the guns for you.

Light Naval Gauss
15 damage, 4,500 tons, 9 heat, extreme range, $20,300,000(ammo = 0.2 tons, $45,000)
3.33 damage/kton, 0.7 damage/$M, 4 max per bay(=60 damage).

In Mechs, gauss weapons are good because they don't need heatsinks, but in a WarShip, heat sinks are just added tonnage - there's no space limitations. As such, these lack any role I can imagine. A HNPPC with full heat sinks(even if they're singles!) will have the same range and damage with the same number of fire control links, but weigh over a thousand tons less. Never use these, outside of house rules.

Medium Naval Gauss
25 damage, 5,500 tons, 15 heat, extreme range, $30,350,000(ammo = 0.4 tons, $75,000)
4.53 damage/kton, 0.8 damage/$M, 2 max per bay(=50 damage).

These are substantially more efficient than the LNGauss, and are better on fire control space as well. They're slightly less efficient than NPPCs even so, but if you're in a really heavy ship where fire control is a concern, they can be usable.

Heavy Naval Gauss
30 damage, 7,000 tons, 18 heat, extreme range, $50,050,000(ammo = 0.5 tons, $90,000)
4.27 damage/kton, 0.6 damage/$M, 2 max per bay(=60 damage).

These lose a bit more efficiency compared to MNGauss, but gain a bit more fire control efficiency and a bigger bay size. They have similar use cases overall.

Missile Weapons (Note that I'm ignoring tele-operated variants of the standard missiles for simplicity - they're nearly identical)
Barracuda
2 damage, 90 tons, 10 heat, extreme range(or better), $90,000(ammo = 30 tons, $8,000), -2 to hit
5.06 damage/kton, 11.8 damage/$M.

These are nice anti-fighter defences, but they really suffer in an extended fight due to the extreme ammo weight. In an era before heavy AMS coverage, these were good jack-of-all-trades weapons, with the ability to crit at extreme range even without thresholding and the ability to attack fighters alike, at the cost of staying power. In an AMS-heavy battlefield, these get a lot weaker.

White Shark
3 damage, 120 tons, 15 heat, extreme range(or better), $130,000(ammo = 40 tons, $14,000)
5.68 damage/kton, 11.1 damage/$M.

Much like a Barracuda, except with far better crit rolls instead of anti-fighter bonuses. These are the best friend of an outnumbered force - fire a few dozen from your cruiser at a McKenna and pray for a golden BB. Not bad on efficiency, either. Like other missiles, these suffer badly from long fights and abundant AMS.

Killer Whale
4 damage, 150 tons, 20 heat, extreme range(or better), $150,000(ammo = 50 tons, $20,000)
6.06 damage/kton, 11.4 damage/$M.

The high-damage option of the capital missiles, though with no particular gravy to go along with it. These are the most efficient extreme-range weapon in the Star League era, even with their huge ammo weight. Also, even in the high-AMS era, these can get through more firepower than most, due to their higher HP - it takes 14 AMS systems to guarantee that you'll knock one of these down.

Kraken-T
10 damage, 220 tons, 50 heat, extreme range(or better), $500,000(ammo = 100 tons, $55,000)
8.03 damage/kton, 9.5 damage/$M.

A monster on efficiency, and the missiles are strong enough to get through the AMS firepower of even a Leviathan. It's like a Killer Whale, but more so. Definitely use these in preference to Killer Whales if they're available.

AR-10
250 tons, $250,000, can fire any of Barracuda/White Shark/Killer Whale ammo.

These can suck up a ton of weight, because the game forces you to carry 10 missiles of each type if you want to be able to use them - if you want all three choices, the 250 tons becomes 1450, which is more than a LNPPC for half the damage and less staying power. But the versatility is very nice, and a few of these as support weapons will appear on most designs that can spare the weight. Note that you can mount both a Barracuda launcher and a White Shark/Killer Whale launcher for less total weight than an AR-10, allowing you to fire two missiles a turn if desired. Thus, you should only use these if you expect to use all three missile types, or if fire control limits are a concern.

Small Weapons
I won't go into the zillions of these that exist, but I want to highlight one in particular to use as a comparison:
ER Large Laser (Clan)
1 damage, 4 tons, 12 heat, medium range(extreme in sub-capital terms is medium for capitals), $200,000
100(!) damage/kton, 5 damage/$M.

While the NAC/40 is massively efficient by capital standards, these are over eleven times better, with the same maximum range(though they do take higher range penalties for being standard-sized). Mech-sized weapons are actually fearsomely effective in a capital-sized fight, and it's mostly the lack of fire control slots that prevents them from dominating everything.

Summary
  • For versatility, NL/45, NL/55, AR-10, and maybe NAC/20 are your friends.
  • For anti-fighter weapons that can double as light anti-WarShip weapons, use NL/35 and Barracuda.
  • For raw smashing power at extreme range, use MNPPC or HNPPC, or maybe MNGauss if you're short on fire control.
  • For raw smashing power at closer ranges, you want some combination of NAC/30, NAC/35, and NAC/40.
  • If you expect short games with low levels of AMS, missiles are incredibly strong. If everyone is bristling with AMS and you expect to go 30 rounds, don't bother.
  • If you're metagaming with bay sizes, anything goes, but the old saying of "play stupid games, win stupid prizes" comes to mind.
  • Load up on small weapons as best you can. Fire control weight makes them inefficient after a while, and their ranges are short by capital standards, but they're vastly more efficient than anything else within their ranges, and they also do nasty things to fighters.

It should be noted that this is pure theorycrafting - I haven't had much chance to play actual games with WarShips, so it's possible I'm missing something here. Corrections are welcome, along with any other comments you may have. Thanks.
« Last Edit: 06 April 2018, 09:52:02 by Alsadius »

Weirdo

  • Painter of Borth the Magic Puma
  • Catalyst Demo Team
  • Major General
  • *
  • Posts: 40758
  • We can do it. We have to.
    • Christina Dickinson Writes
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #1 on: 26 February 2018, 14:18:04 »
Very nice analyses!

It should be noted that due to bearings-only rules, all capital and sub-cap missiles can reliably engage targets well outside extreme range.
My wife writes books
"Thanks to Megamek, I can finally play BattleTech the way it was meant to be played--pantsless!"   -Neko Bijin
"...finally, giant space panties don't seem so strange." - Whistler
"Damn you, Weirdo... Damn you for being right!" - Paul
"...I was this many years old when I found out that licking a touchscreen in excitement is a bad idea." - JadeHellbringer
"We are the tribal elders. Weirdo is the mushroom specialist." - Worktroll

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #2 on: 26 February 2018, 14:28:44 »
Good call. Made a minor edit accordingly.

Giovanni Blasini

  • Lieutenant Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 7103
  • And I think it's gonna be a long, long time...
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #3 on: 26 February 2018, 15:21:55 »
I was actually surprised at how well the NL/35 came out from this.
"Does anyone know where the love of God goes / When the waves turn the minutes to hours?"
-- Gordon Lightfoot, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #4 on: 26 February 2018, 15:32:57 »
TBH, that is the only one aside from the light Gauss that feels almost totally useless to me. I can't imagine many cases where I'd prefer NL/35s to NL/45s. They're equally efficient, but the /35 has shorter range and uses more fire control. Unless you're on a ship so tight for mass that four NL/45s(to have full bracketing options) feels extravagant, you'd be crazy to use the /35s and cut off your own range for no particular gains.

Weirdo

  • Painter of Borth the Magic Puma
  • Catalyst Demo Team
  • Major General
  • *
  • Posts: 40758
  • We can do it. We have to.
    • Christina Dickinson Writes
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #5 on: 26 February 2018, 15:40:55 »
When you're using capital weapons for fighter defense, damage almost doesn't matter. A light escort WarShip can fit more quad-35 bays in a given mass than it can quad-45s, meaning more chances to hit a given fighter squadron, or a chance to hit more squadrons at once if you're feeling lucky.
My wife writes books
"Thanks to Megamek, I can finally play BattleTech the way it was meant to be played--pantsless!"   -Neko Bijin
"...finally, giant space panties don't seem so strange." - Whistler
"Damn you, Weirdo... Damn you for being right!" - Paul
"...I was this many years old when I found out that licking a touchscreen in excitement is a bad idea." - JadeHellbringer
"We are the tribal elders. Weirdo is the mushroom specialist." - Worktroll

mikecj

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 3254
  • Veteran of Galahad 3028
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #6 on: 26 February 2018, 18:43:07 »
Thank you!
There are no fish in my pond.
"First, one brief announcement. I just want to mention, for those who have asked, that absolutely nothing what so ever happened today in sector 83x9x12. I repeat, nothing happened. Please remain calm." Susan Ivanova
"Solve a man's problems with violence, help him for a day. Teach a man to solve his problems with violence, help him for a lifetime." - Belkar Bitterleaf
Romo Lampkin could have gotten Stefan Amaris off with a warning.

Ruger

  • BattleTech Volunteer
  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 5562
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #7 on: 26 February 2018, 18:58:56 »
I know by the numbers, they aren't very good weapons, but there's still something about the thought of quad LNGauss and dual HNGauss cannons that calls to my soul...Of course, I also favor quad NAC-10 mounts as well for frigates and destroyers...especially if using bracketing rules...and especially for my personal version of the Congress-class frigate...

Ruger
"If someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back." - Malcolm Reynolds, Firefly

"Who I am is where I stand. Where I stand is where I fall...Stand with me." - The Doctor, The Doctor Falls, Doctor Who

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #8 on: 26 February 2018, 20:27:36 »
When you're using capital weapons for fighter defense, damage almost doesn't matter. A light escort WarShip can fit more quad-35 bays in a given mass than it can quad-45s, meaning more chances to hit a given fighter squadron, or a chance to hit more squadrons at once if you're feeling lucky.

There's some truth to that - you can get 9x quad-NL/35 for the same weight as 7x quad-NL/45 - but they're worse against warships. Depends which role you see as the primary, I guess. I tend to lean towards the anti-warship role first on my NLs, but if you think of them as long-range anti-fighter weapons, then the /35 isn't bad. Barracudas are still a bit better in some ways, but there's ammo dependence to deal with on them. I'll edit accordingly.

I know by the numbers, they aren't very good weapons, but there's still something about the thought of quad LNGauss and dual HNGauss cannons that calls to my soul...Of course, I also favor quad NAC-10 mounts as well for frigates and destroyers...especially if using bracketing rules...and especially for my personal version of the Congress-class frigate...

Oh, for fluff they're great. The stats are weak, but that's why I mentioned house rules. How about naval gauss rifles get halved range penalties? The MNGauss is a bit OP under those rules, but the others seem fair. (Alternately, have that only apply to the light?). And quad-NAC/10 mounts are perfectly reasonable destroyer weapons - they hit pretty hard, aren't bad on efficiency, and can bracket well.

Vition2

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 856
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #9 on: 26 February 2018, 21:25:31 »
There's some truth to that - you can get 9x quad-NL/35 for the same weight as 7x quad-NL/45 - but they're worse against warships. Depends which role you see as the primary, I guess. I tend to lean towards the anti-warship role first on my NLs, but if you think of them as long-range anti-fighter weapons, then the /35 isn't bad. Barracudas are still a bit better in some ways, but there's ammo dependence to deal with on them. I'll edit accordingly.

I like the overall analysis, though I would argue that using the minimum ammo capacity (especially for capital missiles) skews the numbers somewhat - I feel the expectation that combat will only last 10 rounds is a weak assumption.

For some specifics, Barracuda numbers drop dramatically with the mere addition of 5 rounds of ammo (from 5.06 dmg/kton to 3.67 dmg/kton), increasing it to a more reasonable (imo) load of 20 missiles drops it even further (to 2.88 dmg/kton).  The trend continues with all the capital missiles, with magazines of 15 decreasing their damage per kiloton to less than that of all the energy weapons, what they have to balance this out is the potential crit on a hit.  Mostly I just felt the need to look further than 10 shots per weapon.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #10 on: 26 February 2018, 21:35:28 »
Yeah, missiles are far more variable based on engagement length than any other weapon type. AC and Gauss ammo are a joke when you're in the hundreds of thousands of tons, but missiles are a serious logistical burden. If you expect short fights, missiles are very good, particularly if AMS is rare. In a longer fight, they're either going to run dry, or take big piles of alternate weaponry off your ship to ensure that they don't. If you build your ships with cargo holds the size of a small moon like the Star League did that's no big deal, but for more max-minned/short-legged successor state ships, they impose a lot of unpleasant trade-offs.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #11 on: 28 February 2018, 15:33:04 »
Not bad at all.

The SubCaps are a bit problematic to analyze in the same way for sure.  I did the math once for figuring out where the break even point is for the Light Sub Capital Cannon versus the NAC 10-30.  I don't seem to have it around anymore but I remember that even accounting for fire control, heat sinks, and ammunition loads how many you could get in place of the various NACs made them a very interesting alternative.

Demon55

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 2597
  • Planning wisely.
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #12 on: 02 April 2018, 22:06:53 »
Thank you for the great analysis Alsadius.

grimlock1

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 2087
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #13 on: 03 April 2018, 11:08:16 »
Not bad at all.

The SubCaps are a bit problematic to analyze in the same way for sure.  I did the math once for figuring out where the break even point is for the Light Sub Capital Cannon versus the NAC 10-30.  I don't seem to have it around anymore but I remember that even accounting for fire control, heat sinks, and ammunition loads how many you could get in place of the various NACs made them a very interesting alternative.

Caveat: what I know about the aero side of the house could fill a shot glass.

I thought the point of sub-cap weapons was to turn dropships into glass cannons that could threaten warships.  Putting those weapons on a proper warship almost seems like using protomech AC's on regular mechs.
I'm rarely right... Except when I am.  ---  Idle question.  What is the BV2 of dread?
Apollo's Law- if it needs Clan tech to make it useable, It doesn't deserve those resources in the first place.
Sure it isn't the most practical 'mech ever designed, but it's a hundred ton axe-murderer. If loving that is wrong I don't wanna be right.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #14 on: 03 April 2018, 11:22:40 »
Well that may have been the intention but you lose no range by going from a NAC 10-30 to a Light Sub Capital Cannon and with the weight disparity and how damage is by bay instead of individual gun, you can use quantity to make up for lack of quality and potentially still have weight to devote to other stuff.  Including more guns.

The more broken part?  Sub Capital weapons only take a +3 against targets 500 tons or lighter.  So using bracket fire they can make a very nasty long range AA screen.

I may have to see about recreating that break even calculation.

Maelwys

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 4872
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #15 on: 03 April 2018, 12:06:29 »
Can Sub-caps use bracketing?

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #16 on: 03 April 2018, 12:11:53 »
Yes.
« Last Edit: 03 April 2018, 12:16:22 by monbvol »

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #17 on: 03 April 2018, 13:07:53 »
Okay it is a bit quick and dirty but here is a spreadsheet that shows how many Light Sub-Capital Cannons you can get for each NAC.  I even went up to 40 and maxed heat dissipation using DHS.

The lasers and missiles are a bit tougher since the ranges do differ so I'm not sure how fair of a comparison it would be to do such a mass based comparison.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #18 on: 03 April 2018, 19:18:54 »
If I can give a tl;dr on your spreadsheet, there is a number of LSCCs that has more damage and less total mass than any of the traditional capital-sized ACs. For the NAC/10, the difference is huge(9 LSCCs does 18 damage vs 10 for the NAC/10, while still being 6% lighter all-in), though it's fairly small thereafter. This doesn't factor in fire control weight beyond the first of the NAC replacement batteries, however. If you're replacing a block of, say, 3x NAC/40, you're using 60 LSCCs to do it, which starts to get into very substantial fire control weights. If my math is right, it's 18% heavier than the NAC/40s would be.

So basically, on small ships that don't saturate their fire control, sub-cap weapons are incredibly good. But for big ships that need big guns, the fire control need gets too extreme at some point and the capital weapons come into their own.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #19 on: 03 April 2018, 19:29:12 »
Fire Control doesn't apply until after 12/20(Dropship/Warship) weapons in an arc and only for 13/21+(Dropship/Jumpship) so there is no Fire Control to take into account until comparing to the NAC-40.

Even factoring it in the damage versus weight all in does allow a lot more LSCCs.

The break even before the big guns come good is pretty substantial.  I'll see about factoring all that together after some food.

Jellico

  • Spatium Magister
  • Freelance Writer
  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 6120
  • BattleMechs are the lords of the battlefield
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #20 on: 03 April 2018, 19:59:19 »
Bracketing doesn't work against targets under 500 tons.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #21 on: 03 April 2018, 20:04:07 »
I missed that somehow.  Hmmm, well SubCaps and only being +3 instead of +5 still make a useful alternative.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #22 on: 03 April 2018, 20:09:42 »
Okay found the relevant passage in StratOps:

Quote
Minimum Range: Bracketing Fire Mode cannot be used against
non-Large Craft (including fi ghter squadrons) at short range.

So that seems to pretty conclusively allow Bracket Fire mode against non-Large Craft at Medium and Long Range.

I am Belch II

  • Lieutenant Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 10106
  • It's a gator with a nuke, whats the problem.
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #23 on: 04 April 2018, 03:50:45 »
Nice write up.
Walking the fine line between sarcasm and being a smart-ass

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #24 on: 04 April 2018, 08:46:37 »
Fire Control doesn't apply until after 12/20(Dropship/Warship) weapons in an arc and only for 13/21+(Dropship/Jumpship) so there is no Fire Control to take into account until comparing to the NAC-40.

Even factoring it in the damage versus weight all in does allow a lot more LSCCs.

The break even before the big guns come good is pretty substantial.  I'll see about factoring all that together after some food.

I understand. My point wasn't that your sheet was wrong, it's that it doesn't include all situations. If you're replacing a single NAC in an otherwise-unused arc, your math is right. But if you're in an arc that's fairly full - say, replacing a triple NAC/40 on a McKenna - then the fire control weight will go up very quickly.

That said, your sheet is wrong in one particular way as regards fire control - if I'm reading StratOps right, then as soon as you go over 20 weapons per arc on a WS, you take the total mass of all guns in the arc and multiply it by the modifier(0.1 for 21-39 guns, 0.2 for 40-59, 0.3 for 60-79, etc.) and that's the fire control mass. So for 21x LSCC, you'd be looking at 0.1*4200 = 420 tons of fire control weight, not 20 tons. It's not per-gun, it's all of the guns in the arc that count towards mass. So add 400 tons to the NAC/40 example, or more plausibly just cut it down to 20 LSCC and keep equal damage with less weight.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #25 on: 04 April 2018, 11:13:49 »
Yes there is a point where the NACs will overtake the LSCCs.  I got distracted from finding where that was again but I'll see if I can nail down that point.

The relevant section from StratOps:

Quote from: StratOps
Advanced aerospace units have the option of exceeding their listed maximum of weapons per arc, at the designer’s option, but if they do so, additional fire control systems and power distribution systems will need to be installed. To determine the weight of these systems, divide the number of weapons mounted in any firing arc that exceeds its weapon limits (12 for JumpShips, 20 for Space Stations and WarShips) by the limit value, and round the result down to the nearest whole number. Multiply this result by 0.1 times the total weight of all weapons mounted in that arc (discounting ammunition), and round the final result up to the nearest half. This is the final weight of any expanded fire control and power systems the unit requires for such weaponry.

So I have been reading it wrong.

But I'm not sure any fire control is actually calculated like that.
« Last Edit: 04 April 2018, 11:49:03 by monbvol »

Kidd

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 3535
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #26 on: 04 April 2018, 11:36:20 »
Great analysis. This deserves to be put in Fan Articles I think.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #27 on: 04 April 2018, 11:37:53 »
Okay found the point where the damage and the mass starts favoring the NAC-40 over the LSCC accounting for minimum ammunition, heat sinks, fire control, and raw mass of the weapons.

Starting at 5 NAC-40s you actually have a little extra tonnage with enough LSCCs matching the damage to do a little something else with but not enough to mount another LSCC.

10 NAC-40s replaced with enough LSCCs to match damage leaves no tonnage for other things at all.  11 or more the NAC-40 starts coming good.

If there is such a point for the NAC-10 it is so far out there to not be practical to try and out muscle the LSCC.


Pending some math revisions.
« Last Edit: 04 April 2018, 11:52:06 by monbvol »

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #28 on: 04 April 2018, 13:00:26 »
Well trying to construct a proper if statement to follow the StratOps rules for fire control drove me a bit nuts so I just brute forced it a bit instead.

End result though I did find the point for each NAC where mounting that many offers a tonnage advantage over how many LSCCs would be needed to match the overall damage.  Yeah there is some wiggle because of where things actually wind up but it should be close enough.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #29 on: 04 April 2018, 13:39:00 »
Let's say the number of weapons is in cell A1 and the total mass of the weapons is in B1, for simplicity.

Fire control weight is =IF(A1>20, FLOOR(A1/20, 1)*B1/10, 0)

I've made up my own sheet, which analyzes break-evens. This assumes nothing but ACs in the arc, and both trying to do equal damage. LSCC beat NAC/10 in any number, but for the bigger guns they get worse quickly. 6x NAC/20 beats 60x LSCC, 3x NAC/30 beats 45x LSCC, and 2x NAC/40 beats 40x LSCC.

This doesn't factor in things like bay size, bracketing, targeting sub-caps, and whatnot, to be fair. It's just raw damage per ton. Use with caution, void where prohibited, etc. etc. etc.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #30 on: 04 April 2018, 14:11:36 »
Except that equation doesn't quite match the rules but does show me where I was going wrong myself but I'll leave the brute force in my sheet since I know it works according to the rules.

By the rules 21-59 guns still only get 0.1 because you take number of guns in the (arc-arc limit)/20 round that down times 0.1 to a minimum of 0.1 for 21+.  So you don't get 0.2 until 60-79 guns.

So it'd really be =IF(A1>20,FLOOR((A1-20)/20,1)*B1/10,0)

Dropships and Small Craft don't get that discount, which I think does cause confusion.

NAC-10s do eventually come good thanks to the fire control and minimum ammunition factors but it is such a large number of NAC-10s that for all intents and purposes you are correct.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #31 on: 04 April 2018, 14:30:49 »
I think you're reading it wrong.

Quote
To determine the weight of these systems, divide the number of weapons mounted in any firing arc that exceeds its weapon limits (12 for JumpShips, 20 for Space Stations and WarShips) by the limit value, and round the result down to the nearest whole number. Multiply this result by 0.1 times the total weight of all weapons mounted in that arc (discounting ammunition), and round the final result up to the nearest half. This is the final weight of any expanded fire control and power systems the unit requires for such weaponry.

Let's look at a WarShip arc with 45 LSCCs.

1) divide ...

a) the number of weapons mounted in any firing arc = 45

b) that exceeds its weapon limits (12 for JumpShips, 20 for Space Stations and WarShips) = it does, so proceed

c) by the limit value = 20

So (1) is 45/20 = 2.25

2) and round the result down to the nearest whole number. = round down to 2.

3) Multiply this result (which is 2)

a) by 0.1

b) times the total weight of all weapons mounted in that arc = 45 LSCCs weigh 9000 tons

So (3) is 2*0.1*9000 = 1800

4) and round the final result up to the nearest half = no change.

That's 1800 tons, not the 900 you're implying. It's possible I made a mistake here, but I don't think so. Hopefully if I did, going through my thinking in this detail will help you point out where I erred.

Also, your function is wrong for cases where it has 21-39 weapons - it'd give a fire control mass of nil, if you evaluate it. You want to replace "(A1-20)/20" with "MAX((A1-20)/20, 1)" to do what you're saying.
« Last Edit: 05 April 2018, 05:19:43 by Alsadius »

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #32 on: 04 April 2018, 17:08:07 »
The trouble is where the comma is.

I read the instruction as:

divide the number of weapons mounted in any firing arc that exceeds its weapon limits

It is one instruction, not two separate instructions.  If it contained the subclauses as you conclude there would be another comma or some other grammatical indicator.

Either way StratOps really should have included an example where Fire Control came into play because the instructions do read so differently from Dropship and Small Craft instructions.

Vition2

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 856
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #33 on: 04 April 2018, 17:27:20 »
I read it how Alsadius does.

For me it reads like this (for warships): If firing arc mounts more than 20 weapons, then divide by 20, round result down to nearest whole number.  Then Multiply the result by 0.1...

So 1-20 = no increase
21-39 = 0.1 multiplier
40-59 = 0.2 multiplier
etc.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #34 on: 04 April 2018, 17:47:51 »
At this point I'm not sure it really matters since we do agree there is a point where each NAC can outperform enough LSCCs to get the same damage.

Even with Alsadius' numbers that point makes things a bit uncomfortable for all the NACs for why you should use them if given the choice.

Cryhavok101

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 1840
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #35 on: 05 April 2018, 16:30:48 »
I also parse it the way Alsadius does.... but now he has posed the question of who is right in the rules questions forum here; https://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php?topic=60970.0

So I'll wait to see what they say about it.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #36 on: 05 April 2018, 18:32:29 »
It is a weird wording compared to Tech Manual's on the matter.  Which I find much clearer and it happens to have examples to make it even clearer.

To make matters more complicated none of the TROs or record sheets list fire control tonnage.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #37 on: 05 April 2018, 18:37:02 »
Though I do see he is slightly misunderstanding how I parse it.

I parse it as 21-59 is modifier 0.1 and applied only to weapons 21-59, not weapons 1-20.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #38 on: 05 April 2018, 18:55:32 »
Though I do see he is slightly misunderstanding how I parse it.

I parse it as 21-59 is modifier 0.1 and applied only to weapons 21-59, not weapons 1-20.

I know that's how you're arguing it works, but it doesn't work that way under any reading that I can see. If you subtract 20 and then divide the result by 20 and round down, you're left with zero until you have 40 weapons.

Also, which weapons are "the extra ones"? If a facing has 7x MNPPC, 7x LSCC, and 7x UAC/20, is the fire control weight 180 tons for the MNPPC, 20 tons for the LSCC, or 1.5 tons for the UAC? It seems pretty unambiguous that it applies to all weapons in the arc, not just the extras.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #39 on: 05 April 2018, 19:14:13 »
I am interpreting the instruction to round down to a minimum of 1, never rounding down to zero.

As for your example the way I've always done it it'd be 1.5 tons.

But odds are I am wrong as space isn't something I spend a lot of time designing stuff for.  Last time I think I did it the official rules were still Battlespace.

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #40 on: 10 April 2018, 19:20:13 »
Ignorant newbie designer here -

As I'm looking at the math, and assuming that under the advanced rules there is no upward limit on the number of fighter scale weapons that can be mounted (assuming one is willing to accept the rapidly mounting fire control cost)

Is it just me, or is it not the case that sufficiently large numbers of fighter-scale weapons will out-perform, in terms of damage to mass (not to mention their anti fighter utility) capital scale weapons, even up to the largest numbers of capital scale weaponry one is likely to mount?

For illustration, as I'm mathing it:

A facing mounting 600 Clan ERLL will deal 600 Capital Scale Damage at Extreme Range.  It will mass a hair under 9.4KT including fire control, and produce 7.2K heat - for an effective mass, assuming DHS, of 13KT

A matching mount of 40 Large Capital PPCs will deal the same 600 Capital Scale Damage, while massing 132KT including FireCon, and producing 9K heat.  Effective Mass 136.5KT

Roughly 10 times as efficient.

I have to be missing something.




monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #41 on: 10 April 2018, 19:34:15 »
Sort of.

Sub-Capital and Capital weapons have double the range.  So yeah on a pure damage to weight comparison without considering range yeah it is pretty bad.

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #42 on: 10 April 2018, 19:36:56 »
Hmm.  I wonder if there is a niche for 'sudden death flashbulbs' with enough armor to survive to weapons range and enough firepower to kill anything in a single pass once they get there...

Oh, well.  Even if there is, I dont want to play that game, and I'm going to assume that theres some in-universe reason we dont see it.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #43 on: 10 April 2018, 20:00:32 »
The rules don't really do enough to stop that sort of thing but I don't think it happens in universe because things work quite differently and is why I personally hope when they do revise the rules again that standard weapons are not nearly so effective against Warships.

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #44 on: 10 April 2018, 20:07:31 »
Well, the problem is that if you give Warships some sort of special resistance to normal scale weaponry, fighters suddenly become useless against them.

The best bet, as I see it, is to further extend the range advantage of capital (and subcapital) scale weaponry.  Say rather than x2, maybe scale it to x10.. such that on a capital ship battlemap, fighters 'reach' is at most 1 or 2 hexes. 

Just spitballing, here.

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #45 on: 11 April 2018, 06:49:23 »
RL battleships had effectively total immunity to normal-scale weapons, but small planes took them down just fine. They just mounted capital-scale weaponry to do it - it wasn't a fighter's machine guns that did Taranto and Pearl Harbor, it was 800kg bombs and full-sized torpedoes.

If you want the same dynamic in BT terms, make it so that the guns of a fighter wing aren't what they attack WarShips with. Use the bomb hardpoints instead. With minimal adjustment, a fighter can carry capital missiles using one hardpoint per five standard-scale points of damage. Clean up the AMS rules a bit(so that they don't provide de facto missile immunity), and you have an attack style much more like WW2, with organized attack waves, than the "SWARM OF BEES!" approach. As a bonus, it also justifies those gigantic cargo bays on the SLDF ships, as well as their relative lack of small guns - fighter resupply gets a lot more weight-intensive when each plane is launching off its own mass in missiles every sortie, and the fighters themselves get less worrisome.

It's not a perfect swap, but something in that vein ought to work, IMO.

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #46 on: 11 April 2018, 08:36:22 »
I at first read ‘RL’ as ‘Renegade Legion’ rather than ‘Real Life’, and thought ‘I kill Leviathans with massed 7.5/6 fire just fine, TYVM’.

Amusing anecdote aside - That would be just peachy with me, though it would demand that Warship Armor have some resistive, rather than purely ablative, component - a departure from most Battletech armor assumptions.  Though I note in passing that Battlemech Armor has resistive properties against lowtech cannons, etc - though amusingly not against infantry carrying springfields..

Immunity to non capital scale weaponry, coupled with a fix to AMS performance and a focus on fighter waves delivering missiles swarms in a strike role, would go a long way.  Would also put more dimension in the fighter interactions - you need fighters to fend off opposing fighters at long range before they launch, or at the least to force your enemy to put some fighters in the escort role (to defend their calitsl missile laden friends) against your fighters - diluting the strike into survivability.

Some of this depends on what feel we want - do fighters sweep space of Battleships?  Can Battlewagons mount enough defense to turn fighter attacks into hideous wastes or at best pyrric victories?  How do we make it play well in the normal case, when the design system easily allows for fighter carriage that totally outstrips anything currently seen?

Still, good thoughts/discussion.

Ruger

  • BattleTech Volunteer
  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 5562
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #47 on: 11 April 2018, 18:44:41 »
RL battleships had effectively total immunity to normal-scale weapons, but small planes took them down just fine. They just mounted capital-scale weaponry to do it - it wasn't a fighter's machine guns that did Taranto and Pearl Harbor, it was 800kg bombs and full-sized torpedoes.

While their guns didn't take out battleships, (WW2) fighters could use there guns to effectively attack deck crews, bridge superstructures, etc. of those ships...and they also worked well against smaller ships like destroyers, frigates and corvettes (or what would be called those types these days)...especially those armed with .50 caliber machine guns or 20 mm (or larger) cannons...

It'd be basically like using infantry squads vs. BattleMechs, but not armed with support weapons...

Ruger
"If someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back." - Malcolm Reynolds, Firefly

"Who I am is where I stand. Where I stand is where I fall...Stand with me." - The Doctor, The Doctor Falls, Doctor Who

idea weenie

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 4855
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #48 on: 11 April 2018, 21:39:53 »
Well, the problem is that if you give Warships some sort of special resistance to normal scale weaponry, fighters suddenly become useless against them.

You'd have to pair that up with some way of indicating how many guns are being fired in a bay.

For example, assuming the two sets of weapons, you would have two weapon lines:

Bay 1: CERLL  600 (6000 std)  (heat)  (various shorter ranges)
Bay 2: HNPPC  600 (6000 std)  (heat)  (various ranges)

But if you changed it to include number of weapons:
Bay 1: CERLL*600 (6000 std)  600  (heat)  (various shorter ranges)
Bay 2: HNPPC*40 (6000 std)  600  (heat)  (various ranges)

Then you could have a simple set of math.  If a target ship has 1 standard pt of resistive armor, then you subtract (the number of weapons * amount of resistive armor) from the standard damage being delivered:
So the CERLL Bay would do 5400 damage: 6000 - (600 * 1) = 5400 standard damage
The HNPPC bay though would do 5960 damage: 6000 - (40 * 1) = 5960 pts of damage

If the target had 5 pts of resistive armor, then the calculation would be:
The CERLL Bay: 6000 - (600 * 5) = 3000 standard damage
The HNPPC bay: 6000 - (40 * 5) = 5800 pts of damage

The types of weapons would not make any difference, as mixing weapons with different damage output would make the bay less effective against resistive armor.

For example, instead of using 600 CERLL, you use 300 CERLL, and 600 ISML:
Bay 3: Mixed laser*900 (6000 std)  600  (heat)  (various ranges)

1 pt of resistive armor means this bay will only do 5100 pts of standard damage (6000 - 900 * 1).  The pure CERLL bay above did 5400 pts of damage.  Technically the bay should be doing some damage against 7 pts of resistive armor (300 CERLL * net of 3 pts of damage each = 900 standard damage), but in the interest of making the math easy I am not going to bother with that.

At 5 pts of resistive armor, inner sphere small and medium lasers, along with Clan small lasers are no longer useful for damaging hardened armor hulls.  Fighters would have to use AC/10, AC/20, PPC, and similar weapons to do damage.

LRMs would be treated as 5-pt hits, SRMs would be 2-pt hits, though you'd want a critical hit table to reflect the fighters trying to target critical items on the surface.  The problem is the fighters have to get close to avoid massive to-hit penalties, and the ship they are targeting is likely using a jammer that is more massive than their entire squadron.

This is similar to another mecha game where the resistive armor in a location was equal to its current armor points, divided by 10, FRD.  So a 50-pt slab of armor would be immune to medium laser hits, but a 49-pt slab of armor repeatedly hit by medium laser fire would fail after 23 hits (and the first 10 hits only bring it down to 39 pts of armor).

glitterboy2098

  • Lieutenant Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 11991
    • The Temple Grounds - My Roleplaying and History website
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #49 on: 18 April 2018, 15:47:49 »
since it was warship armor tech that allowed the damage reducing Ferro-lamellor armor for mechs, perhaps warships should get a simple reduction on standard damage taken? i mean, F-L armor on a mech or vehicle reduces damage taken by 20%, rounding up. having standard warship armor reduce standard weapon damage taken by say, 10%, with the advanced armors giving a higher %, would seem reasonable. the use of massed fighters remains effective as an anti-warship tactics, but it puts more emphasis on the heavy hitting big fighters with their massive weapons loads, instead of the cheaper interceptors and other lighter designs with a few popguns. it also gives further justification for why so many warship designs go in for the advanced armors beyond the slight increases in armor points. (which don't really give much of an advantage, given the amount of mass saved vs the spare kilotonnage most of the designs have)

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #50 on: 19 April 2018, 06:01:52 »
I wouldn't want a percentage, I'd want a flat number. Percentages hit warship weapons as hard as fighter weapons, which isn't the goal.

Also, warship armour is not capped by points like mech armour, it's capped by tons. Advanced armour doesn't save you weight, it actually increases your possible protection by a large amount.

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #51 on: 19 April 2018, 06:31:49 »
Even if its a flat number, of the number is (mich) short of immunity, were still gonna see stacks of, say, Heavy Gauss Rifles, NPPCs, etc.

Maybe simplest to just let fighter-scale weapons deal no damage.  “Capital Scale Armor is Immune to Standard Scale Weaponry” - if you want to hunt capships, carry capital or subcapital weaponry, and hang subcap missiles off your fighters.

Cryhavok101

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 1840
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #52 on: 19 April 2018, 09:49:47 »
Make the armor on any given facing reduce all standard scale damage by the armor threshold on that facing.

This would make individual fighters pretty terrible against capital armor, and it would make squadrons that concentrate fire on specific locations more dangerous. It would also use numbers already on record sheets rather than having to add more numbers in somewhere.

HobbesHurlbut

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3089
  • Live Free or Die Hard
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #53 on: 13 May 2018, 15:07:17 »
Well, the problem is that if you give Warships some sort of special resistance to normal scale weaponry, fighters suddenly become useless against them.

The best bet, as I see it, is to further extend the range advantage of capital (and subcapital) scale weaponry.  Say rather than x2, maybe scale it to x10.. such that on a capital ship battlemap, fighters 'reach' is at most 1 or 2 hexes. 

Just spitballing, here.
That is why the ASF has Alamo and anti ship missiles for external ordnance.
Clan Blood Spirit - So Bad Ass as to require Orbital Bombardments to wipe us out....it is the only way to be sure!

idea weenie

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 4855
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #54 on: 17 May 2018, 22:49:36 »
Make the armor on any given facing reduce all standard scale damage by the armor threshold on that facing.

This would make individual fighters pretty terrible against capital armor, and it would make squadrons that concentrate fire on specific locations more dangerous. It would also use numbers already on record sheets rather than having to add more numbers in somewhere.

Terrible?  It'd make individual fighters almost useless, unless you optimized cheap small weapons to punch through.  You might be able to design an ASF with a large number of Medium Lasers to damage a warship based on total standard damage.

AC/20 is 14 tons for 20 pts damage and produces 7 pts heat, for 17.5 tons for heat neutral using DHS.  (1.143 dmg/ton)
Medium lasers are 1 ton, 3 heat, 5 damage per, for 4 tons each (assuming only using SHS).  That makes Medium Laser spam capable of doing 1.25 dmg/ton

1 AC/20 and 4 Medium lasers will appear the same on the ASF record and do 20 std dmg at short range, but one of them does all the damage at a single impact, and the other is likely to spread them around.

To me the AC/20 are more likely to do damage against thicker armor, so I would like some way of knowing if I am getting hit by papercuts, or hammers.  The only way to know that is by listing how many weapons are being fired from that location.

Since ASF at Warship scale should be like infantry at Battlemech scale, an easy method would be changing it where ASF cannot damage capital scale armor, except for a limited number of anti-armor shots (aka antishipping missiles carried underwing).  As the antishipping missiles are fired, they are marked off the squadron's sheet, similaar to how SRM volleys are marked off Battlearmor sheets.

But note that ASF does not damage Capital scale ARMOR.  If the armor is breached in a location, the ASF can have fun damaging the internals.  Or would allowing ASF to roll to try for critical hits be allowed?  I.e. instead of damaging the Warship, they perform their squadron attack and roll for critical hits, where the roll is based on the damage and number of ASF still left in formation.

HobbesHurlbut

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3089
  • Live Free or Die Hard
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #55 on: 18 May 2018, 07:18:28 »
Terrible?  It'd make individual fighters almost useless, unless you optimized cheap small weapons to punch through.  You might be able to design an ASF with a large number of Medium Lasers to damage a warship based on total standard damage.

AC/20 is 14 tons for 20 pts damage and produces 7 pts heat, for 17.5 tons for heat neutral using DHS.  (1.143 dmg/ton)
Medium lasers are 1 ton, 3 heat, 5 damage per, for 4 tons each (assuming only using SHS).  That makes Medium Laser spam capable of doing 1.25 dmg/ton

1 AC/20 and 4 Medium lasers will appear the same on the ASF record and do 20 std dmg at short range, but one of them does all the damage at a single impact, and the other is likely to spread them around.

To me the AC/20 are more likely to do damage against thicker armor, so I would like some way of knowing if I am getting hit by papercuts, or hammers.  The only way to know that is by listing how many weapons are being fired from that location.

Since ASF at Warship scale should be like infantry at Battlemech scale, an easy method would be changing it where ASF cannot damage capital scale armor, except for a limited number of anti-armor shots (aka antishipping missiles carried underwing).  As the antishipping missiles are fired, they are marked off the squadron's sheet, similaar to how SRM volleys are marked off Battlearmor sheets.

But note that ASF does not damage Capital scale ARMOR.  If the armor is breached in a location, the ASF can have fun damaging the internals.  Or would allowing ASF to roll to try for critical hits be allowed?  I.e. instead of damaging the Warship, they perform their squadron attack and roll for critical hits, where the roll is based on the damage and number of ASF still left in formation.
Yeah critical hit rolls should be doable. Armor cannot cover everything in equal thickness and some equipment simply cannot be armored completely.
Clan Blood Spirit - So Bad Ass as to require Orbital Bombardments to wipe us out....it is the only way to be sure!

Weirdo

  • Painter of Borth the Magic Puma
  • Catalyst Demo Team
  • Major General
  • *
  • Posts: 40758
  • We can do it. We have to.
    • Christina Dickinson Writes
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #56 on: 18 May 2018, 08:28:07 »
Does this thread need to be moved to Fan Rules?
My wife writes books
"Thanks to Megamek, I can finally play BattleTech the way it was meant to be played--pantsless!"   -Neko Bijin
"...finally, giant space panties don't seem so strange." - Whistler
"Damn you, Weirdo... Damn you for being right!" - Paul
"...I was this many years old when I found out that licking a touchscreen in excitement is a bad idea." - JadeHellbringer
"We are the tribal elders. Weirdo is the mushroom specialist." - Worktroll

marcussmythe

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1204
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #57 on: 18 May 2018, 11:29:56 »
Maybe?  Or maybe we just need to make a new one there...

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #58 on: 18 May 2018, 12:25:08 »
There is already a thread for how one would change the Aero rules down there.

So if we can keep this about analysis/comparison I see no need to move this entire thread but perhaps it could use some pruning?

On that note to add something useful I've been contemplating the other Sub Capital weapons and how they compare to their Capital counterparts.

Sub Capital lasers are probably the most interesting of the bunch.  They lose range as damage increases thus making it hard to compare anything but the SC-1 to anything other than the NL-35.  Once we get a clarification on the fire control issue I'll run the numbers but eyeballing the weight and heat already pretty well tells me the NL-35 is likely obsolete.

The missiles could prove more interesting than what my eyeballing indicates but I do suspect once I actually get into the numbers they will have the toughest time competing against their Capital counterparts.

Daryk

  • Lieutenant General
  • *
  • Posts: 37060
  • The Double Deuce II/II-σ
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #59 on: 20 May 2018, 11:27:01 »
The NL-35 wasn't made obsolete by the NL-45?  I always thought the extra range band was more than worth the slight increase in weight...

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #60 on: 20 May 2018, 23:41:06 »
I've actually found the NL-35 surprisingly useful to fill in gaps in fire power and coverage, especially on smaller vessels, enough so that the weight difference of the NL-45 was just enough that I'd have to give up a weapon there completely.

As such I've never considered the NL-45 to completely render the NL-35 pointless, but I do grant it comes damn close.

Daryk

  • Lieutenant General
  • *
  • Posts: 37060
  • The Double Deuce II/II-σ
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #61 on: 21 May 2018, 03:39:19 »
Makes sense!

Lagrange

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 1376
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #62 on: 07 August 2018, 19:01:17 »
The screen launcher seems to also at least merit a mention.  The area effect damage means that it essentially always hits targets in short range and since stacking is unlimited in space hexes the damage that it inflicts is potentially unlimited.  That's a rather unique effect which could potentially be heavily exploited against fighter swarms.

editing:
Oops: Naval C3 changed in the errata, so I agree Light Naval Gauss seems born obsolete.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #63 on: 15 November 2018, 16:24:03 »
I just saw that xotl answered the question but the wording of his answer still sounds like my interpretation is correct, that weapons 1-(bay limit for the unit) are not charged fire control but weapons (bay limit for the unit+1)-2x(bay limit for the unit) are penalized.

But checking the updated StratOps does clear up the wording, thus indicating I am wrong.

Well I was prepared for that outcome as it does make the fire control rules consistent across all unit types.

So in the end it actually changes little as the numbers may have been wrong but the conclusions we both drew agreed in principle, that the break even points for the NACs versus SCCs was a little uncomfortable for the NACs.
« Last Edit: 15 November 2018, 16:31:56 by monbvol »

Alsadius

  • Lieutenant
  • *
  • Posts: 926
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #64 on: 19 November 2018, 11:41:50 »
The break-even works out to "small ships use small guns, big ships use big guns", more or less. Consider the following:

20x NAC/40 = 800 capital damage, 90,000 tons weapons, no fire control = 90,000 tons total.
vs
160x Medium Sub-Cap cannon = 800 capital damage, 80,000 tons weapons, 64,000 tons fire control = 144,000 tons total.

But yes, it does say bad things about medium-sized ships (that don't saturate their fire control) using full-size guns. Which is a bit silly, but the rules are a bit wonky in places, and this is one of those places.

monbvol

  • Colonel
  • *
  • Posts: 13267
  • I said don't look!
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #65 on: 19 November 2018, 12:32:01 »
*nod*

Though there is one other factor that helps the MSCC or even the LSCC versus the big guns even on big ships, they can bracket fire much more effectively.

Something the NAC-40 can never do and the NAC-35 can only barely do.

beachhead1985

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 4068
  • 1st SOG; SLDF. "McKenna's Marauders"
    • Kilroy's Wall
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #66 on: 19 November 2018, 19:26:35 »
I know that you're ignoring the Tele-op variants of the standard Capital missiles, but I have to ask why don't we see them more often?

Looking at the rules, I've never gotten why they were not more popular.

Only shows up post 3050, but not a big deal made, either.
Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries

These, in the day when heaven was falling,      Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
The hour when earth's foundations fled,         They stood, and earth's foundations stay;
Followed their mercenary calling,               What God abandoned, these defended,
And took their wages, and are dead.             And saved the sum of things for pay.
     
A.E. Housman

Jellico

  • Spatium Magister
  • Freelance Writer
  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 6120
  • BattleMechs are the lords of the battlefield
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #67 on: 20 November 2018, 15:32:36 »
Heavier and a pain in the neck to use.

They tie up your missile bay until you relinquish control of the missile. That can be 4 or 5 turns at long ranges. Also it is surprisingly hard to direct a missile onto a target that doesn't want to be hit.

In comparison a conventional missile using way points is fired and forgotten and just needs to get near a target before it's own radar takes over.

I find -T missiles easiest to use at very short ranges where you can direct it in in a single turn to two.

Weirdo

  • Painter of Borth the Magic Puma
  • Catalyst Demo Team
  • Major General
  • *
  • Posts: 40758
  • We can do it. We have to.
    • Christina Dickinson Writes
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #68 on: 20 November 2018, 17:22:21 »
I agree with all of that, though i do like the ability to fine-tune the missile's speed when sending it off on bearings only launches. Sometimes fifty hexes per turn is a bit much, especially if you want the chance for a second attack if the first misses, or to spook the other guy into predictable movement by presenting him with an attack he can evade.
My wife writes books
"Thanks to Megamek, I can finally play BattleTech the way it was meant to be played--pantsless!"   -Neko Bijin
"...finally, giant space panties don't seem so strange." - Whistler
"Damn you, Weirdo... Damn you for being right!" - Paul
"...I was this many years old when I found out that licking a touchscreen in excitement is a bad idea." - JadeHellbringer
"We are the tribal elders. Weirdo is the mushroom specialist." - Worktroll

beachhead1985

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 4068
  • 1st SOG; SLDF. "McKenna's Marauders"
    • Kilroy's Wall
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #69 on: 21 November 2018, 15:29:13 »
Heavier and a pain in the neck to use.

They tie up your missile bay until you relinquish control of the missile. That can be 4 or 5 turns at long ranges. Also it is surprisingly hard to direct a missile onto a target that doesn't want to be hit.

In comparison a conventional missile using way points is fired and forgotten and just needs to get near a target before it's own radar takes over.

I find -T missiles easiest to use at very short ranges where you can direct it in in a single turn to two.

That was very clear, thank you.

So, a specialist weapon, if that, in the meta?
Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries

These, in the day when heaven was falling,      Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
The hour when earth's foundations fled,         They stood, and earth's foundations stay;
Followed their mercenary calling,               What God abandoned, these defended,
And took their wages, and are dead.             And saved the sum of things for pay.
     
A.E. Housman

Jellico

  • Spatium Magister
  • Freelance Writer
  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 6120
  • BattleMechs are the lords of the battlefield
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #70 on: 21 November 2018, 18:55:39 »
They are a good idea that ran head first into the reality of vectored thrust.

They are niche but a useful niche. I know Weirdo likes them as a standoff weapon under certain conditions but I don't usually get maps that big.

There is an old WWII MBT tactic that involved rolling a depth charge under a passing ship/boat and that is how I tend to use -T missiles.

Charge in with something like a Taihou. Get to about 12 hexes. Put a salvo of guided missiles in the void beside me. Move in to 6 hexes next turn. Release the first salvo to direct themselves in, and fire a second salvo to be guided in. Hilarity follows.


Stay away from Barracudas.  -T just misses the point of them. Bigger the missile the better. You have to put in a lot of effort to get -T missiles to connect so you might as well get something for it.

Weirdo

  • Painter of Borth the Magic Puma
  • Catalyst Demo Team
  • Major General
  • *
  • Posts: 40758
  • We can do it. We have to.
    • Christina Dickinson Writes
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #71 on: 21 November 2018, 22:09:24 »
They are niche but a useful niche. I know Weirdo likes them as a standoff weapon under certain conditions but I don't usually get maps that big.

Big maps are nice, but they're not needed to enjoy bearings launches. My favorite time to use them is when my target is at long or extreme range, at which point the travel time is short enough and most large ship's movement predictable enough that I can launch the missiles with their radar set for medium or short range and be near certain of catching my target in the sensor zone, making for very easy to-hit rolls.

 Interestingly enough, I've noticed that a good counter to this is to go full throttle and pull a Marko Ramius. Point into the missiles and max burn, there's a good chance that a cocky opponent will have put his activation hex too close to you and you can fly right past the missiles before they go active.
My wife writes books
"Thanks to Megamek, I can finally play BattleTech the way it was meant to be played--pantsless!"   -Neko Bijin
"...finally, giant space panties don't seem so strange." - Whistler
"Damn you, Weirdo... Damn you for being right!" - Paul
"...I was this many years old when I found out that licking a touchscreen in excitement is a bad idea." - JadeHellbringer
"We are the tribal elders. Weirdo is the mushroom specialist." - Worktroll

HobbesHurlbut

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3089
  • Live Free or Die Hard
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #72 on: 22 November 2018, 09:36:58 »
Marko Ramius Maneuver heh I have to remember that.
Clan Blood Spirit - So Bad Ass as to require Orbital Bombardments to wipe us out....it is the only way to be sure!

Wolf72

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3043
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #73 on: 23 November 2018, 11:20:13 »
(going off of memory)

Capt: How'd you know he'd turn that way?

Jack: I didn't, I guessed.  I had a 50/50 shot and needed a lucky break.
"We're caught in the moon's gravitational pull, what do we do?!"

CI KS #1357; Merc KS #9798

"We're sending a squad up."

mikecj

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 3254
  • Veteran of Galahad 3028
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #74 on: 24 November 2018, 01:19:50 »
You mean the "Crazy Ivan"?
There are no fish in my pond.
"First, one brief announcement. I just want to mention, for those who have asked, that absolutely nothing what so ever happened today in sector 83x9x12. I repeat, nothing happened. Please remain calm." Susan Ivanova
"Solve a man's problems with violence, help him for a day. Teach a man to solve his problems with violence, help him for a lifetime." - Belkar Bitterleaf
Romo Lampkin could have gotten Stefan Amaris off with a warning.

Icerose20

  • Sergeant
  • *
  • Posts: 158
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #75 on: 24 November 2018, 02:20:24 »
Crazy Ivan, was every so often, turn hard 90 degrees to hear if anyone is in you wake.

Ramius maneuver is play chicken with a torpedo in hopes you get under its arming time or distance. 

Kidd

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 3535
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #76 on: 24 November 2018, 03:54:55 »
You mean the "Crazy Ivan"?
the "Crazy Ivan" in the Tom Clancy-verse (Tom Clancy is not the most authoritative of IRL subject matter) is a 360-degree* turn made by a Russian submarine to check what's behind the sub using the bow sonar, which can't see directly behind as well as it can see in front. Think like you're driving in the middle of the night and you want to see what's behind you, not just with mirrors, but with your headlights.

*assuming no course change is being made at the same time

HobbesHurlbut

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3089
  • Live Free or Die Hard
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #77 on: 24 November 2018, 08:32:23 »
the "Crazy Ivan" in the Tom Clancy-verse (Tom Clancy is not the most authoritative of IRL subject matter) is a 360-degree* turn made by a Russian submarine to check what's behind the sub using the bow sonar, which can't see directly behind as well as it can see in front. Think like you're driving in the middle of the night and you want to see what's behind you, not just with mirrors, but with your headlights.

*assuming no course change is being made at the same time
Icerose20 has it right though, the blind spot for the sonar is right behind the sub. So usually it just need to turn about 45 degrees at most, to "sweep" over the blind spot.
Clan Blood Spirit - So Bad Ass as to require Orbital Bombardments to wipe us out....it is the only way to be sure!

Wolf72

  • Captain
  • *
  • Posts: 3043
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #78 on: 24 November 2018, 08:50:44 »
Crazy Ivan, was every so often, turn hard 90 degrees to hear if anyone is in you wake.

Ramius maneuver is play chicken with a torpedo in hopes you get under its arming time or distance.

Now, just to invent a time machine and change that post before I hit send! 
"We're caught in the moon's gravitational pull, what do we do?!"

CI KS #1357; Merc KS #9798

"We're sending a squad up."

Kidd

  • Major
  • *
  • Posts: 3535
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #79 on: 24 November 2018, 11:30:26 »
Icerose20 has it right though, the blind spot for the sonar is right behind the sub. So usually it just need to turn about 45 degrees at most, to "sweep" over the blind spot.

Just describing the alleged tactic in its original context and meaning :) I don't know how true it is.

Icerose20

  • Sergeant
  • *
  • Posts: 158
Re: Capital Weapon Analysis
« Reply #80 on: 24 November 2018, 15:23:06 »
As in the Case of the Dallas following the Red October, doing the Crazy Ivan also may cause the trailing sub cavate in its own wake, signalling its presence. 


 

Register