More Warships of the week? The Liberator/Avatar Class heavy Cruiser.

[Wrangler]

I always get confused what goes in those cargo bays.  Food? The Ammunition that not into the ammo bins?  Repair materials?  Supplies to sustain the docked dropships?

Avatar like other ships, have these bays who's tonnage eclipes tonnage of a current day Aircraft Carrier.

[marcussmythe]

The best in universe explanation Ive heard for the mind-boggling cargo storage on some ships (and yet whose absence on other designs is not followed by fluff about the ships cripplingly low solo operational endurance or range) is either that the ships so designed are meant to operate for vast periods of time, utterly unsupported (which seems... possible?) or that most star league (the worst offenders!) vessels will never fire a shot in anger against a peer opponent, so one may as well include space to make every vessel a potential invasion transport.

Out of universe I think its because the original designs in 2750 were made in the absence of ANY construction rules, and the massive cargo volumes represent a slap-dash fix for the inconsistency between mass and design, but I may be misremembering.

[gyedid]

For the 6 docking collars, the Dart and Commonwealth-class light cruisers also had 6 each...as to the "low" cargo, several SLDF cruiser classes had less than 100,000 tons of cargo...often far less...

Ruger

Has the intro date for the Dart been errata'ed?  I remember it came out just a few years after the Dreadnought...in which case it shouldn't have had even ONE docking collar, let alone six!

cheers,

Gabe

[gyedid]

Arguably Drop Collars is what defines a SLDF battleship.

0 Collars for Destroyers
2 Collars for Frigates
4 Collars for Cruisers
6 Collars for Battleships

The exceptions are usually misfits or mishaps.

And the latter description applies to the Avatar.

cheers,

Gabe

[Colt Ward]

Avatar like other ships, have these bays who's tonnage eclipes tonnage of a current day Aircraft Carrier.

Well, Carriers are cities for 5k people who are followed by freighters that perform UnRep.  They also get their air for free, it gets filtered for free, and they get their water because their powerplant operates . . . none of which applies to interstellar warships (unless they spend time chasing objects in Kupier belts).

I am also going to suggest those ships do not usually sail with full cargo bays . . . but for war patrols they are at 110% or 115% of cargo space (Yes sailor, you are going to have to eat your way into half the refresher berths.  You monkeys are going to have to figure out how to cycle through for sanitation in the allotted time with half the stalls.) and may even be over establishment for crew.  I have wanted to see overstrength/understrength crew rules but I am not sure we ever got them.

It could also be mentioned that neither the Dart nor the Commonwealth were Star League designed ships.

[gyedid]

It could also be mentioned that neither the Dart nor the Commonwealth were Star League designed ships.

Neither was the Avatar.  :P 

The Dart at least was Terran-designed, but if there's no change on the intro date, those 6 collars MUST be retrofits.

cheers,

Gabe

[BrokenMnemonic]

Has the intro date for the Dart been errata'ed?  I remember it came out just a few years after the Dreadnought...in which case it shouldn't have had even ONE docking collar, let alone six!

cheers,

Gabe

According to Tac Ops, Docking Collars/Docking Hardpoints came into service in 2304 (p. 304) and Interstellar Ops clarifies repeatedly that they could be fitted prior to the invention of the docking collar design that works with KF-booms, but that pre-boom collars don't allow you to transport DropShips through a jump. Pre-boom docking collars appear to basically be a way for ships to transport DropShips weighing more than 5,000 tonnes around a star system, but not between star systems. Given the limits on DropShuttles fitting into Bays, the pre-boom docking collar was presumably in part a mechanism for transporting cargo more quickly - I can see some systems having large DropShips dedicated to acting as fuel bowsers for WarShips, or some of the primitive JumpShips that had more thrust than just stationkeeping drives.

[Weirdo]

I always get confused what goes in those cargo bays.  Food? The Ammunition that not into the ammo bins?  Repair materials?  Supplies to sustain the docked dropships?

All of that, plus other kinds of supplies meant to keep you fighting, like spare NAC barrels. We're talking about guns that literally trigger nuclear explosions in the breech every time they fire. Replacing those components on a regular basis is a given. On top of that, there's a good chance that a mishap will leave you literally lightyears away from any help. How much supplies and spares need to be packed before an extended cruise isn't regarded as suicidal?

[DarthRads]

Only in the initial stat block. If you look at the actual layout of weapons by arc, the other 18 NL-45's mentioned in the initial stat block are nowhere to be found...

Ruger

I actually used that in fluff I wrote for an upgrade of the SovSoy. The refitting crew dug out the origins specs and discovered that there were supposed to be more weapons. There were even mounts and power conduits in place, but in order to speed construction and delivery, they weren't all installed. It turned out the plans was to fit them during refit, but Anaris happened.

[Sjhernan3060]

Is the liberator designed to be naval star leader or more of an escort ship for even bigger bruisers?

[Colt Ward]

Outside the Ravens and maybe the Shark/Foxes I am not sure anyone actually deploys their fleet as a star of warships.  They maybe have a provisional star that is a warship & four supporting dropships and likely DO have naval dropship stars- especially by 3130s where the PWS & Assault droppers make up the 'fleet.'  The IS Clans probably have stars of Isegrims, Nagasawa, Mercer, Miraborg, Noruff, Arcadia (3080), Vanir and Aesir along with salvaged/captured Achilles, Avenger, etc.

[Weirdo]

Yeah, you won't see WarShip Stars unless you go poke the Ravens, or find a situation where one Clan decides to take another Clan's capital world, or something similarly important. And even then, you'll only see this among the more responsible Clans.

[Sjhernan3060]

So the liberator was a revamp of an old design and from what I understand it’s pretty solid. In universe is it good enough to be worthy of new builds when the home clans come calling?

[marauder648]

The Libby has a HORRIFIC cooling system.  Think..Panther K but worse.  Also there's simply no more of the hull's left (that we know about) to be refubished into Liberators from Avatar's.  If you added more heatsinks she'd be far more viable.

[Weirdo]

Agreed. The Liberator works just fine in pre-Reaving Clan space or the pre-FCCW IS, when a Trial or assault on your major facility can be nipped in the bud by bullying your way through a fighter screen and cracking a few Overlords(enough to give your ground defenders a solid advantage), but post-Jihad or Dark Age? I think I'd actually rather have an original Avatar. The forced withdrawal rules for those eras mean you want to do your damage from a distance before someone scratches your paint and you have to leave, and even in this AMS-heavy era, those missiles are a threat at ranges few ships can respond at, with the Heavy NPPC bays killing things when they close within extreme range.

[Colt Ward]

I am trying to remember, is it one of those designs that does better with the advanced rule not requiring enough heat sinks for every weapon in that arc to fire any weapon in that arc?

[Weirdo]

In both cases, yes.