BattleTech - The Board Game of Armored Combat
BattleTech Player Boards => Fan Designs and Rules => Non-Combat Vehicles => Topic started by: beachhead1985 on 14 August 2016, 15:33:22
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Air Recon Drone (modern)
Faction: Anyone but the Homeworld Clans
Era: 3057 and onward
Mass: 4,999kg
Type: Fixed Wing
Chassis Mods:
Omni
Ultra-Light
Technology/Availability/Legality: EEC
Chassis and Controls:
Base Chassis and Control Weight: 8%
Tech Level Modifier: 0.85%
Chassis Modifiers: 0.5
Final Chassis and Control Mods: 3.4%=170kg
Engine and Transmission:
Type: Fusion
Thrust: 7/11
Base Engine and Transmission Weight factor: 0.5
Movement Factor: 40
Engine/Transmission Weight Multiplier: 0.75
Base Engine & Transmission Weight Percentage = Base Engine and Transmission Weight Factor x Movement Factor: 20
Final Engine and Transmission Values: EDB, 750kg
Fuel: Fixed Wing, Small/E 1000 Thrust Points; 130kg
Armour: BAR 3/E; 9pts
3/2/2/2
Structural Integrity: 6
Equipment:
500kg Drone Control System
500kg Sensor Unit
2,796kg Omnipodspace
Quirks: Drone, Internal Bomb Bay
(http://c8.alamy.com/comp/D6Y0RR/1693-ryan-firebee-target-1962-12-11-D6Y0RR.jpg)
Air Recon Drones, of which the Sian/Ceres FireWasp is the best known are used for reconnaissance purposes and occasionally for other missions. Being able to be launched from the ground, from a mobile, Zero-Length Launcher as found in the Hi-Scout drone-carrier or from any airborne platform makes the Air Recon Drone a flexible capability for any force to have.
Earlier models lacked the extremely useful modular capability which allows different equipment, to be fitted to match the mission, including booster units for the drone and sensor systems and even bombs. In current models, even the Drone and Sensor units can be switched out with limited difficulty (Semi-modular) and replaced with more powerful units or even a cockpit at the cost of a reduction in omnipod space.
Common load-outs for an Air Recon Drone would be a Beagle Probe and TAG system, or a Guardian ECM, a Recon Camera and a Chaff Pod.
Variants:
Original Air Recon Drone; the Scoltek SkyEye.
The SkyEye lacks the Modern versions Omni capability and instead fills the fuselage with a recon camera, remote sensor dispensor and additional Sensor equipment.
Target Drone.
A similar, but smaller unit; these drones are used for training anti-aircraft units in their trade and also by Fighter Weapons Schools across the Inner Sphere and beyond. Target Drone are usually faster and may mount additional lights to make them easier to spot to compensate for their small size.
Quail Drone.
Quail Drones were used by the Terran Alliance and later Hegemony as an adjunct to their Torrent Bomber formations. Sporting additional flight surfaces and a blocky exterior a Quail drone produces a Radar return compatible with a large, fixed-wing aircraft. In theory this would lead enemy airdefences to waste time on Drones and miss some bombers. More recently similar technology has been used by WOB during the Jihad to spam enemy air defences in conjunction with mass assaults of interplanetary Landing Craft.
Hound Dog.
Hound Dog Drones are almost like a hybrid of a tele-operated missile, a cruise missile and the original drones. Filled with explosives they are used as terminally remote-piloted Stand-Off attack missiles.
Note; Anyone got any ideas how I could make a Planet-to-Space Capable recon drone you could fit in a Hi-Scout?
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I like this one. Air scouts are useful-especially when you loose contact and they fall out of the sky-that's a good sign the enemy are in the area!
I think a sounding rocket and a small satellite payload might be best for that application-launch a small constellation of one-use cubesats on a 30 minute suborbital trajectory straight up. Not reusable, but perhaps workable within the 15 ton limit.
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I like this one. Air scouts are useful-especially when you loose contact and they fall out of the sky-that's a good sign the enemy are in the area!
I think a sounding rocket and a small satellite payload might be best for that application-launch a small constellation of one-use cubesats on a 30 minute suborbital trajectory straight up. Not reusable, but perhaps workable within the 15 ton limit.
Hmmm...We don't a ruleset for something like that yet, do we? Satellites, yes, but rockets?
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I don't write the rules, but I'd eyeball it at 10 tons of chemical rocket for every 1 ton lofted into space, and 5 tons of payload in a 10-ton fusion-rocket that can actually make orbit. Which is basically just an aerospace fighter with drone controls, a 3-g engine, one ton of fuel, and which costs about half a million C-bills? Probably less if you don't intend to recycle that engine-if you just switch it on the one time, you can probably discard a lot of safety features.
...actually, are capital missiles just one-use aerospace fighters, or chemical propellant rockets? Now I have to know.
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I don't write the rules, but I'd eyeball it at 10 tons of chemical rocket for every 1 ton lofted into space, and 5 tons of payload in a 10-ton fusion-rocket that can actually make orbit. Which is basically just an aerospace fighter with drone controls, a 3-g engine, one ton of fuel, and which costs about half a million C-bills? Probably less if you don't intend to recycle that engine-if you just switch it on the one time, you can probably discard a lot of safety features.
...actually, are capital missiles just one-use aerospace fighters, or chemical propellant rockets? Now I have to know.
I'm getting that; "Created a Monster" feeling again...
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For just over 600K, you can get 20 tons to orbit and get the ASF back to the ground safely.
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Interestingly enough; I do have an old stardate magazine which has a number of oddball ASF in it; one is a 15-ton minifighter.
The Hi-Scout can take 15 tons, worth of drones, right?
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Interestingly enough; I do have an old stardate magazine which has a number of oddball ASF in it; one is a 15-ton minifighter.
The Hi-Scout can take 15 tons, worth of drones, right?
14.
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14.
Hmmm, well if the rules can be tweaked to do 15 tons, surely they can be made to 10 as well. I can't seem to get HMA to do it though. Anyone got a copy of MegaMechLab running to try it on? it does fighters, right?
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Hmmm, well if the rules can be tweaked to do 15 tons, surely they can be made to 10 as well. I can't seem to get HMA to do it though. Anyone got a copy of MegaMechLab running to try it on? it does fighters, right?
For the 15-tonner, see if you can put in 1 ton of cargo. Then when you put it in the Hi-Scout, you leave that 1 ton empty.
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For the 15-tonner, see if you can put in 1 ton of cargo. Then when you put it in the Hi-Scout, you leave that 1 ton empty.
So deliciously evil.
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Why not make some disposable recon drones that you could use underwinged from an Omnifighter? Well you can make one that fits inside a purpose built cargo bay / bomb bay and release it.
Along with satellites.
TT
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Why not make some disposable recon drones that you could use underwinged from an Omnifighter?
That's...what the OP is. Oh gods, did I never once mention that?
Leaping Luthien!
I mean...the Clans don't make much if any use of these, but...that is totally what the basic Air Recon drone is. Except it doesn't have to be an omnifighter.
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Wow...no I never once did explicitly say that...
Yeah, this thing can be launched as Underwing Ordnance, as detailed here; http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php?topic=51934.msg1250060#msg1250060
And reproduced here;
Drone
Bomb Slots: 8
Cost (in C-Bills, Equivalent): 1,500,000
Availability: EEC
Aerial Reconnaissance Drones have been around Since the Mid-20th Century, but the technology has only recently re-appeared, during the Capellan Civil War of the later 3050s and early 3060s.
These drones are only rarely deployed by Aerospace Fighters and are more commonly launched from Small Craft, Low-Flying Dropships and fixed-wing Support vehicles.
While intended for reconnaissance duties, they have a small internal bay for stores, which may contain a bomb.
And lastly, check this out; I got HMA to make a 10t ASF I can call a drone.