Moonsword, Moderator
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Potemkin Class Assault TransportLength – 1,508 meters
Displacement – 1,510,000 tons
Crew Complement – 445
BackgroundDeveloped by Riga Interstellar Shipyards, the design that would become the Potemkin came about because of lessons learned during the Reunification War. In that huge conflict, JumpShips were freely targeted and if a JumpShip was loaded with DropShips at the time any personnel aboard were terribly vulnerable and losses of JumpShips and any troops aboard could critically affect a campaign on the ground, not just losing a battle, but perhaps imperilling an invasion of a world or system.
There wasn’t enough WarShips that could be left behind to carry troop ships and the burden of carrying DropShips loaded with tanks, troops, Mechs and supplies fell upon JumpShips which were priority targets during the Reunification War.
What was needed was a WarShip that could both carry large numbers of DropShips whilst being able to defend itself and its cargo. In Wet navy terms, what was needed was something like a LS(D) or LS(H) or Landing Ship – Dock or Landing Ship Helicopter. These large vessels would carry forces aboard and deploy them either by landing craft or VTOLs whilst having defensive weapons to protect themselves from missile attack.
R.I.S took this idea and ran with it coming up with a 750,000-ton vessel capable of carrying 10 DropShips and defending itself from hostile WarShips. This made the SLDF Admiralty very happy, but they then suggested a few changes and sent it back to Riga. This began 8 years of back and forth discussion and negotiations which saw the ship grow in size and capability (and design bloat was seemingly a habit of the SLDF) until it ballooned out to a 1,510,000-ton monster with 25 DropShip collars. And, at 1,508 meters long, this was longer than the huge Farragut class battleship and even the McKenna class, the SLDF’s most powerful WarShip was shorter than the massive transport.
This huge ship was accepted for construction and was named after the Russian military Officer Grigory Potemkin, although its more famous for the battleship Potemkin and the mutiny aboard.
The Potemkin classes great size and unique shape meant that she not only required special yards to construct the huge ship, but current shipyards had to be altered to be able to take one for docking or repairs and this raised the cost considerably. But, flush with funds following the Reunification War the Admiralty and SLDF could afford the huge price of these massive ships and 106 would be constructed with the first leaving the slips in 2611 and the last being completed in 2781. (Although this date makes little sense as this would have been built during the Amaris Civil War and actually two years after it, but its said in TRO2750 so *shrugs*)
Costing a ‘mere’ 22,646,353,000 C-bills equivalent currency the SLDF gets a LOT of ship for its bucks. Protected by over 1,300 tons of Ferro Carbide armour the Potemkin’s armour is roughly in the battleship range and is only somewhat weaker than the Farrgut or McKenna classes. Firepower wise the ship does not disappoint either. Lacking naval autocannons, instead the Potemkin is armed with firepower that would easily see the class act as an Ersatz Battleship if needed. Triple mounts for Heavy naval PPC’s formed the Potemkin’s main punch and gave her the firepower to reach out and severely damage a target. Triple and quadruple mounts of 45cm lasers as well as launch tubes for Barracuda missiles rounded out the armament and made the Potemkin a very dangerous ship to challenge and more than capable of seeing off a cruiser or destroyer.
And, thanks to the advances in fire control, the PPC’s and lasers could all be brought to bear on fighters to obliterate or heavily damage them at long range, but this is the only armament the ship has, she has no other weapons for point defence and lacks any form of Anti-missile defences. But this wasn’t seen as a drawback. Such hugely valuable ships would never be unescorted and one could expect them to be screened by cruisers, destroyers and friendly fighters and DropShips, and anything trying to get close to a Potemkin would face veritable barrage of fire and large numbers of hostile fighters and DropShips.
Unlike a Battleship or any other major WarShip the Potemkin was not fitted for any fighters of her own, and only came with 10 Small craft in two small hangars, but with docking collars for 25 DropShips the majority of the ships hull was given over to cargo space, fuel tanks and quarters for her crew and the DropShip’s personnel. In an effort to save money the SLDF didn’t include a Lithium Fusion battery and this didn’t cut into the ships cargo capacity of over 380,000 tons of onboard storage and quarters before you even count what could be carried on her DropShips.
The Potemkin could also act as a mobile refuelling port for her DropShips and had the largest capacity fuel tanks of any WarShip in SLDF service and was rated to take 25,000 tons of Hydrogen slush fuel.
As one might expect for a ship her size, the Potemkin is slow to accelerate and is quite sluggish, and the four huge Chatham 7500 engines are only capable of a mere 1.5g of sustained thrust at full roar. But able to sustain 1g thrust for a long time the Potemkin is a comfortable ship to work and live aboard.
Internally the ship’s hull is dominated by a single 95 meter diameter grav-deck that runs most of the length of the primary hull, all safely hidden under the ships hull plating and we can assume that the cargo bays for the Potemkin are close to the docking areas for the DropShips and two, rather small 5 ship Small Craft bays.
Large areas of the hull can also be converted into barracks or cargo storage areas, and Mech’s, tanks and vehicles can be unloaded from the DropShips into the Potemkin’s cargo bays for storage and maintenance.
Although expensive to maintain and run the Potemkin class gave the SLDF good service and the huge troop carrying capacity of the ships was vital during the New Vandenburg and Periphery Uprisings and the redeployment of the SLDF to Taurian space before helping move the SLDF’s Armies and Corps back to the Hegemony to free it from the clutches of Amaris.
Like many SLDF WarShip classes the Potemkin suffered heavily, but still they faired better than other classes and roughly 30 of the ships would survive to see Terra liberated and the Hegemony freed.
Personal noteAnd here’s a bit of the lore that makes little sense to me, TRO 2750 says the class was then decommissioned, TRO 3057 says they were dismantled, and this is prior to Operation EXODUS. Giving the remnants of the SLDF and Hegemony Government a mere 4 years to decommission these huge, badly needed craft or for some unknown reason scrap them. Now perhaps to save money that was needed for rebuilding these ships could have been put into reserve round Terra, or used to try and get personnel and equipment to badly stricken worlds in the Hegemony but to scrap them when they are needed? Insanity and honestly I think it’s a typo.
Also it says they were stopped when new escort craft made them not worth it, I don’t think we’ve ever had any idea of what these craft are, and really, because of their obscene carrying capacity, not much can really replace a Potemkin, the only problem is that they are bloody expensive to make and require special yards for refits and repairs, so you could re-word it as their costs being the reason why they were cancelled. But then again, the Hegemony is basically a post scarcity civilisation by this point and really money wouldn’t be an issue, but oh well!
End of noteGeneral Kerensky wisely took as many active Potemkin class ships with him on Operation EXODUS as he could, where their massive DropShip and cargo capacity turned each Potemkin that accompanied the fleet into mobile towns and cities, and during the long months of Operation EXODUS the first children would be born aboard these mobile arcologies, along with dissent and the SLS
Hermes took part in the
Prinz Eugen Revolt, and her commander was one of the men executed following the quashing of the mutiny. Two are known to have remained in the Inner Sphere, the CSV
Vision of Truth and the Lyran LCS
Nightwind which lead an audacious deep raid into Combine space to hit the Combine's capital, and here loaded with 25 assault and carrier DropShips the power of a Potemkin was shown as the ship quickly established orbital dominance over Luthien.
In Clan service, little changed save for the addition of a Lithium Fusion battery and slight alterations to the hull to allow for HarJel sealant to be included.
These massive ships would rarely carry their full loads of DropShips and some Clans even took to using the big ships as an Ersatz Battleship, but with their size and importance, never risked them in combat.
DesignUnique in design and role the Potemkin is a very potent ship no matter what way you look at it. With 25 docking collars she’s super flexible. If you went insane and loaded her up with 25 Titan’s she’d have 450 fighters, and if you used up a good chunk of the SLDF’s Lee Carrier variants you could have them pump out 1000 fighters. You want to invade a planet? Twenty five Overlords gives you 900 Mechs which is pretty much enough to subdue anything this side of a House Capital and you can carry any mix in between. And the fact that the SLDF had over a hundred of these things gives you some idea of the number of troops they could bring to bare if they REALLY wanted to ruin your day. A Potemkin is a HUGE strategic advantage for the side with them, they can move huge numbers of troops, equipment and anything they need all safely tucked up within one ship. And the ship isn’t bad either.
With an idealized broadside she can point 12 x Heavy Naval PPCs at you (in triple mounts) and seven NL-45s (one quad mount one triple) as well as a pair of Barracuda’s for plinking fighters or causing crits. And thanks to her being built when she was, she’ll have bracket firing so a nice -2 or -3 to hit with her weapons against ships at long range and fighters.
This is all on a heavily armoured platform that’s better protected than any Battlecruiser or Heavy Cruiser and happily steps into battleship territory that comes within a fair range of the McKenna class in terms of protection (201 points on the broadside, 179 nose, 156 aft) whilst her 80 points of structural integrity make her suitably solid. In a House fleet you could easily call the Potemkin a battleship and its quite understandable why the Clans used them as stand-in battleships although probably only as a show of force.
In a fight a Potemkin alone could probably see off anything short of a full on Battleship although with no internal fighters of her own she could be vulnerable to a fighter strike (although this is why you have a Titan or two aboard or a Lee CV for that role) But the job of a Potemkin isn’t to fight hostile WarShips, her guns are a very big KEEP THE HELL AWAY sign and she’s too slow to really run from a fight as her engines don’t generate much thrust, leading to slow acceleration and limited rolling/turning, meaning you can quite easily out turn the ship. No, their job isn’t to fight, its to carry massive amounts of Mechs, tanks and fighters to your world and make it their world.
But with their huge carrying capacity means that you’ve also got one VERY big basket with a lot of eggs in it and the loss of a Potemkin could be disastrous. A single Potemkin could easily carry a full Division or a pair of Brigades and thus would no doubt be very heavily guarded whilst carrying a full complement of troops and their equipment. So if you’re in a campaign and you’ve got a Potemkin, or are facing one or two, you might want to guard them or go after them.
Really the massive number of DropShips a Potemkin can carry is only really of use in a Campaign, in a stand up battle if you had all 25 DropShips aboard and launched them, then you’d need a small army of folks to control them all and that’s a tad impractical to say the least. But if you was forced into a fight, then stay at long range and bracket fire as much as you can to try and wear down an opponent before they can get too close. WarShip armour is quite weak (low numbers) and most WarShips can easily punch through each other’s armour in a few quick salvos at shorter range, so use your long range weapons to worry away at their armour and cause enough damage to knock out weapons or other systems.
General thoughtsI like the idea of the Potemkin, they really are a Tarawa or America class LHA (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America-class_amphibious_assault_ship )
just scaled up, where the Osprey’s are now DropShip’s and the armament has also grown in scale. The original 2750 has them armed with big batteries of Medium Naval PPC’s (10 per section instead of the two triple mounts for Heavy Naval PPCs) and I’m not sure what’s better. Owing to the changes in weapons mounts (where you can only have a maximum of 70 damage from a cluster of weapons) you’d have to break up the Medium Naval PPC’s into two 5 gun mounts and this does the same damage as the triple Heavy naval PPC’s but is better for bracket firing as you’d get the full -4 to hit.
As the heat and tonnage are the same for the two batteries you could even head cannon it that the first Potemkins that entered production had the Medium naval PPC’s and then a later Flight II of them had heavy naval PPCs as it was felt that the bigger guns were better for supporting ground troops if needs be due to their greater damage and longer range.
It’s also a shame we didn’t see the original 750,000 ton design and with the huge cost of building the Potemkin class, having a smaller ship that’s cheaper to produce but can still happily carry a Regiment if needed would make sense as you’d not need to use the huge carrying capacity of a Potemkin all the time, making any trip where you’re not at capacity basically an expensive ‘in ballast’ run.
ArtThe art is a mixbag. The original 2750 art
Looks pretty darn solid, a big rock solid ship that looks imposing and lumbering, yet quite sleek.
The TRO 3057 changes that asthetic, but it does give us a good idea of the placement of the Docking collars that helped give the nickname 'Corncob Cruiser'.
And its why I had Matt Plog re-do the Potemkin in this non-canon art which keeps the best bits of the 2750 design whilst altering it to make changes like having the docking collars all together in one area which, in my mind would make docking and launching/loading them a damn sight easier than having them pebble-dashed all over the hull.
As always, thoughts, comments and opinions are most welcome!
