Capability of Model 96 Elephant in Aerospace Battles

[Scrollreader]

I'm not terribly familiar with Aerospace (mostly the occasional strike or strafe on the tabletop in CB).  And I didn't see a write-up on this "assault" dropper.  Assuming you have four ASF in the bays, does the addition of the dropship itself give you sufficient oomph to get past say two squadrons of roughly comparable fighters?  In service of delivering the mech a and vehicle cargo, of course.  Bay-wise it looks great for a decently sized integrated Merc force, but I really don't know about the Aero game.  Is it (with 4 integral ASF) sufficient as a light raider, or is it more of a second wave dropper?  I lack a frame of reference for what the armor guns and thrust mean, for Aerospace combat.

I certainly don't expect it to go to to toe with a PWS or a modern assault, but can it handle itself?

[Colt Ward]

I am going to have to look when I can check the stats but . . . couple things to remember is it was built under different rules, using equipment from a different era so it suffers from power creep, and it has a specific function.

But from memory . . . it should be treated as a medium customs frigate-type design.  It has organic craft- ASF/SC IIRC depending on model, marines, a solid weapons suite, decent armor (for the time) and great thrust . . . which means its going to do fairly well IMO unless against some of the dedicated ship-killers.  I think it can hang with the original assault dropships, maybe the '67 upgrades, and not sure about sub-cap armed PWS.

[Alan Grant]

It's a good all-around ship. I'm surprised at how much armor it has, which is a common failure of most of the old dropship classes. Coupled with decent speed. It's firepower is kinda weak for a dropship of its sheer size.

Because its a spheroid, and its firepower is spread around on different arcs, its going to be better at anti-fighter work than at ship-to-ship combat, where something like an Achilles could tear it up. But it's not without potential. If it keeps rolling and presenting fresh armor, it might outlast an opponent. Which I think is what it was designed to do, hold off an attack.

It's got enough firepower to splash a small attack dropship or two. Think Avengers, original Lung Wang, especially something with less armor than it has. Assuming it can keep presenting fresh armor and outlast the opponent. Which is actually viable considering its speed. If it runs into something heavier than that, Achilles on up, it's odds go down quite a bit.

It's tough enough to give an opponent pause. But in the Jihad and post-Jihad eras, it suffers from lacking any kind of point defense weaponry. The easiest way to deal with one is to throw some missiles at it.

It might be the ultimate pirate ship. Attack weakly defended colonies and convoys. It's got the armor, speed and just enough firepower to deal with minor opposition, and it can bring the pirate gang to the party with all that troop capacity. It's got the universal docking setup which is useful in many situations.

It would definitely make a good troop transport, but with its scarcity and that universal docking, fleet support really is its jam. If I was designing a naval taskforce, assault dropships, carriers, troop transports etc. I'd tack on one of these for tug support and logistical support. But would be willing to put it in the line of fire because of its armor and speed. I'd treat the troops it can carry as a supporting force. Some marines and other units specialized in zero-G and hostile environment work. Or maybe a unit specialized in landing zone security. Kinda like the ground units attached to the Medusans mercenary unit, which they carried on things like Fortress and Intruder-class dropships.

One of the awesome potential roles of the Elephant is the ability to take one that is empty, dock with a crippled troop transport floating around in space. Transfer over the troops and equipment, and have the Elephant pull Gs to stabilize the crippled vessel so that another rescue vessel can get to it (or give the crew a chance to restore their vessel). While the Elephant can potentially serve as the replacement troop transport in the interim.

[Scrollreader]

Ok.  That sounds about what I was thinking.  At this point, the description of space combat is going to be mostly narrative for the campaign.  (Probably using the ASF "support" out of the Battlemech Manual).  But it sounds like it wouldn't be unreasonable for it to be able to 'punch through' a leopard CV and complement, or deal with a (small) planetary ASF garrison (using the Small Craft Bays for its own fighters).  Basically, enough fighting power to remove the threat of enemy air superiority, if not give it to the guys in the cargo holds.

At least, so long as things go as planned.  As mentioned, if there's a serious assault dropper or PWS, or heavy enemy ASF, there's always the option to make the commute interesting for the group.