Author Topic: Stealth Dropship  (Read 5095 times)

I am Belch II

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Stealth Dropship
« on: 26 January 2020, 19:46:41 »
While watching the Expanse there were these Stealth Ships that were in the show causing havoc.
I was just wondering  if I could make a dropship with Stealth Armor like mechs and ground vehicles?
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AlphaMirage

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #1 on: 26 January 2020, 20:19:08 »
I don't think stealth armor is a valid choice for dropships.  With how bad BT sensor tech is I also wouldn't worry about it, you will only be detected maybe a day in advance if the enemy is lucky but that can be dropped down to hours if using a pirate point or a high decel burn on approach

Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #2 on: 27 January 2020, 11:45:40 »
Capellans have a ship like this- https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Zhen_Niao- which hides in orbit to provide observer data for ground forces.  Not sure what the Beagle does in space, but it was a ship that was not even confirmed to exist until Oriente captured one.  Pretty sure that any surviving crew did not want to be exchanged back into Capellan hands.
Colt Ward
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Jellico

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #3 on: 27 January 2020, 12:15:32 »
Light your engines up and you will be spotted.

If you have a month or so to play with there are alternatives involving coasting in from outside the gravity well.

Precentor Scorpio

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #4 on: 27 January 2020, 12:33:20 »
Maybe your game master will allow you to have a tarp that gives your ship some stealth capabilities once you are on the ground?

Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #5 on: 27 January 2020, 14:12:28 »
Light your engines up and you can be spotted.

Fixed that . . . we get plenty of stories in canon of JS arriving unnoticed, or the JS jump is recorded but they lost track/could not find DS.  Its a big sky, and most worlds do not seem to have scanners covering a majority of the sky let alone the complete sky.  Then you have detection thresholds for wide aperture scanning that flags it for closer examination.

One canon example that comes to mind- Heserpus (pretty important, right? best scanners, dedicated radar techs?) THINKS they detect a jump from a pirate point . . . sends the GDL DS and ASF out to investigate.  They find nothing . . . the JS departed and the 3 or 4 DS it was carrying go to ground on the moon, undetected until a ASF patrol overflies them.  The DS even move from that spot IIRC without even being detected though they had left evidence of landing.

Which also brings another point to mind . . . a drive flare/plume can be hidden easier with pirate points since you can use bodies on the elliptic plane to approach behind and slingshot out from as you go up/down the well.  But you will have to kick on the thrusters to land.

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I am Belch II

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #6 on: 27 January 2020, 15:43:54 »
I was thinking more of a space combat for a Stealth Dropship. I guess in the show when the engine turned on it was spotted very easily at closer ranges. I just would assume like a standard stealth where it would be harder to hit at ranges.
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AlphaMirage

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #7 on: 27 January 2020, 15:53:27 »
Capellans have a ship like this- https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Zhen_Niao- which hides in orbit to provide observer data for ground forces.  Not sure what the Beagle does in space, but it was a ship that was not even confirmed to exist until Oriente captured one.  Pretty sure that any surviving crew did not want to be exchanged back into Capellan hands.

The Zhen Niao is a small craft with ECM but no Stealth armor designed to passively monitor a planet.  The beagle gives it better targeting in space but the hyperspectral imager is the kicker

Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #8 on: 27 January 2020, 16:37:13 »
I understand the purpose of the sensors but not as much for their specific effects- what I said is that was the closest you could come to in a spacecraft, and that it was more per the fluff.  Stealth armor just made the jump to vehicles and its described function would not really help with how things work in space.
Colt Ward
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idea weenie

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #9 on: 01 February 2020, 12:48:25 »
Best bet for a Stealth Dropship might be imitating another Dropship entirely.  So your combat Mule Dropship uses 'stealth armor' to imitate the visual and infrared signature of a civilian Mule Dropship.

Daryk

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #10 on: 01 February 2020, 12:51:34 »
The Bugeye was designed to look like a Buccaneer, so that idea has canon support as well.

AlphaMirage

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #11 on: 02 February 2020, 09:01:32 »
The Bugeye was designed to look like a Buccaneer, so that idea has canon support as well.

There is also the Pueblo

Col Toda

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #12 on: 12 February 2020, 11:26:04 »
Seen vague references  to stealth smallcraft . A drop ship with that kind of expensive  armor seems counter intuitive . 

Daryk

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #13 on: 12 February 2020, 17:17:47 »
Right up until you land it in a remote area, and want to hide it...

Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #14 on: 13 February 2020, 10:14:05 »
Right up until you land it in a remote area, and want to hide it...

Camo nets . . . as described in Dying Time and the Crescent Hawks short story.  Man, I hated covering VEHICLES . . . and you imagine a dropship?
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Wrangler

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #15 on: 13 February 2020, 11:46:54 »
The Vampire Class-Dropship could be put on this off a list it? Its only five hundred tons. (Edit phone dictation...)

She a small target to try spot.  Going ballistic until she arrives could maker into decent stealth dropship.
« Last Edit: 13 February 2020, 21:41:32 by Wrangler »
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Daryk

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #16 on: 13 February 2020, 17:39:42 »
Camo nets . . . as described in Dying Time and the Crescent Hawks short story.  Man, I hated covering VEHICLES . . . and you imagine a dropship?
Which is my point... Stealth Armor makes sense so you don't have to do the net thing.

glitterboy2098

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #17 on: 06 March 2020, 13:46:23 »
Best bet for a Stealth Dropship might be imitating another Dropship entirely.  So your combat Mule Dropship uses 'stealth armor' to imitate the visual and infrared signature of a civilian Mule Dropship.
or like what the Gray Death Legion tried to do on insertion to Verthandi, when they painted their Trojan class Dropship to resemble a Combine Union class.

Charistoph

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #18 on: 06 March 2020, 16:55:26 »
I'd be curious to setup something like this to have a pocket warship acting like WW1/WW2 submarines where they sneak in range, unload a deadly mess of capital missiles and somehow sneak away with minimal retaliation.
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Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #19 on: 06 March 2020, 16:57:07 »
Blakists did that . . . and the Dracs were trying out that with the Nekehonos IIRC.
Colt Ward
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Col Toda

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #20 on: 10 March 2020, 06:48:38 »
The vast majority  of invisible  drop ships is hiding in plain sight . Take over a routine  regular cargo run and arrange pay off the small craft customs check if there even is any . Just a listening post gets you recorded transmissions of the expected cargo carrier  .  The know something  is up less than 2 hours warning  if you are lucky or they are lazy .  Slight reported
 missjump putting the more than  sensor range of a base . ECM in Areospace gives you a limited  penalty  to hit is the best that can be done .  Going in ballistic to a hole in the sensor envelope  of the planet just looks like a meteor until space/ atmosphere  entry .  Aerodyne  is  far more in keeping with stealth  insertion  .  Clandestine  operations happen just take an advanced team and alot of time to be nearly invisible  .  Classic  Ninja saying invisibility is about skill and patience than anything else.

I am Belch II

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #21 on: 11 March 2020, 11:10:32 »
Weren't the Pocket Warship idea...was just a big cargo dropship and put some weapons and some armor on it. Its the suprise factor of the whole attack, happens once and you don't need it again.
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Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #22 on: 11 March 2020, 11:55:34 »
Not really . . . Pocket Warships included things like Union X, Overlord A3, and Merlin . . .R1?  which were all previous military dropships.  Cargo dropships- like the Mule- were turned into Q ships, structurally they were not built to be military ships but rather refitted with capital scale weapons for ambush type attacks.
Colt Ward
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Wrangler

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #23 on: 11 March 2020, 12:14:32 »
Trojan is civilized Union, but has hidden LRM launchers.
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snewsom2997

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #24 on: 05 May 2020, 12:50:20 »
Wouldn't a stealth Dropship just be a dropship with its engines powered down, coated in some stealth paint or rubber coating?

The engines are always going to be the dead giveaway, but if you are just passing through on a dirty picture run, jump well outside the Jump point, accelerate until you hit detection range and just coast in and out the other side.

Stealth Armor or not, once you fire up your fusion bomb propelling you ship, they are going to detect you.

Colt Ward

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #25 on: 05 May 2020, 13:25:19 »
Depends, there is some speculation that you can hide it with the sun, or if you plot the course to be nose on you can lower detection below thresholds by radiating all the heat to the aft.  Or come in on the plane and use a orbital body to block LOS until you slingshot around it while keeping nose on.

Everyone always seems to think its easy to spot something in space . . . but space is BIG, and your going to be relying on the ability of your detection devices and the programmed thresholds & algorithms.  Didn't we just have a rock go zipping by that snuck up on the planet?
Colt Ward
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Cannonshop

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #26 on: 05 May 2020, 18:47:11 »
"Stealth" with anything in space is more about methodology than technology.

that said, one of the non-canon things I'm playing with in the "Administrator" stories, is stealth tech.  (and the various ways to defeat it.)

the basic explanation I came up with, is that space is big.  space is really big, you might think it's a long way from your house to the local drug-store, bt that's peanuts to space.

The BEST detection grids are going to be arrayed facing three things, because space is so big:

1. Nearer repeating temporary points-the lagrange points in your main planetary orbit or the stable lagrange points for the larger bodies in a given system-these can be monitored by satellites without needing more sensor operators than your typical planet has people.

2. the Zenith/Nadir points in the system.  Because everyone has those on their charts/programmed into their jump computer and it's generally smart to have your main ports of entry under some kind of surveillance.

3. Near-orbit for an inhabited planet.  'near orbit' means out to about Luna's orbit.  this can be practically monitored and reacted to without lightspeed delay.


Those three are your practical maximums, as in Sol system level coverage, and there will be holes in that coverage.

Why? because space is big.  it's really, really big. it's also three dimensional and full of big, massive, moving objects that exert their own gravitation and because of that, create points and periods of gravitational equilibrium that are moving through the system at ranges where your detection will be too late.

if it happens at all.

Methodology for stealth:

1. Traffic.  The Bug-Eye's big 'stealth' method was to imitate a commercial dropship on an established commercial route.  All the advanced tech in the Bug Eye were about being too small to be a jumpship, therefore having to be a dropship, thus local, thus not a foreign surveillance device.  This is the "Hiding in plain sight" method.

2. Come in from an angle with less surveillance.  This is what a Scout class jumpship is all about.  Arrive at a temporary point that's semi repeatable/predictable, and release your dropship payload on a ballistic course, relying on the fact that space is big and the drive plume is short-duration or small, to get your stealthy package into position.

3. Reduced signature: Teh Bug-eye and the Scout both rely on small jump signatures, because they're statistically less likely to show up, esp. if you're dealing with a system that gets a lot of traffic.  (either merchant or military).

4. Radio Silence.  If you're not broadcasting and you're keeping burns short, faced away from likely surveillance, or masked behind objects, you're pretty hard to track.

all of these rely in one way or another on ballistic trajectories or coasting to avoid that big-ass lance of fusing hydrogen that is a typical engine burn for thrust.

most also rely on traffic which ARE doing a lot of thrusting around the system.

Now, Technological stealth measures?

1. ECM/ECCM  this ties back to the 'hiding in plain sight' thing.  You're looking like something else that isn't worth looking at.

2. Stealth/Low observable tech: nonreflective coatings, absorbing materials for the typical bands  used for detection, a black 'absorbing' jumpsail instead of the highly reflective silver-or-gold style, if you run 'cold' with  your engine you can imitate a rock or even a hole in space...until you have to fire your fusion manuever drive.  At that point, you become REALLY OBVIOUS-but only if the detectors are looking your way.  ways to mask this include exploiting space in the target system-like drifting and cold-thrusters to orient your drive so the system's sun (or suns) is at your back.  Sensitive systems will be blinded by the big ball of fusion behind you, and you can accelerate.  (Notably, you're probably doing this off a slingshot orbit from deep in the outer system.)

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Daryk

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #27 on: 05 May 2020, 19:40:29 »
+1 for tradecraft over technology!  8)

Tyler Jorgensson

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Re: Stealth Dropship
« Reply #28 on: 06 May 2020, 00:21:45 »
You'd also have to design a lot of tech that isn't BT based to get away from the fusion reactors/engines to make a design even remotely stealthy. Ironically you'd want to move into Halo-esq territory(or similar low level sci-fi's), Starcraft being another example (you could attempt a cloaking generator similar to CLPS: A boondoggle for sure). 'd research similar current technology from Aircraft or Drones (military planes of course).

Of course that's all for the Fan Designs forum :D