Poll

What is your favorite assault ship? Why?

Achilles
1 (2.9%)
Aesir
4 (11.8%)
Assault Triumph
2 (5.9%)
Claymore
1 (2.9%)
Conquistador
6 (17.6%)
Elephant
1 (2.9%)
Hamilcar
0 (0%)
Intruder
4 (11.8%)
Kuan Ti
0 (0%)
Leopard
1 (2.9%)
Lung Wang
2 (5.9%)
Mercer
0 (0%)
Merlin
2 (5.9%)
Nasagawa
2 (5.9%)
Noruff
1 (2.9%)
Titan
4 (11.8%)
Arcadia
0 (0%)
Avenger
3 (8.8%)

Total Members Voted: 34

Author Topic: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?  (Read 2975 times)

Minemech

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What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« on: 25 February 2023, 21:38:44 »
I intentionally avoided Pocket Warships for this. Some of the above can be improvised assault ships.

AlphaMirage

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #1 on: 26 February 2023, 01:04:17 »
I like the Elephant, it's got good thrust, decent weapons, and transport capacity

Alan Grant

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #2 on: 26 February 2023, 09:01:03 »
Did some stuff with the Lung Wang PWS a while back. Loved it. Really does work like a mini warship especially akin to some of the old SLDF warships with bow-heavy armament like the Essex. Being a Spheroid technically, the decks are oriented in the right direction (engines are down, bow is above your head), so the internals of the ship make a lot of sense. Having some marines and ASFs is nice, and the sub-capital lasers are solid (the different modes, like AA, bracket fire, provide some situational options).

Even just its appearance grew on me. Looks like some kind of ocean predator.

Reminds me a lot of the Rocinante from The Expanse in some respects.

I only have two complaints. I wish she had at least one small craft, to carry boarding parties or a small ground detachment, and I wish she had some AMS. But you can at least put some missile-interception capable ASFs on her to offset the threat of capital missiles. The Troika variant ASF which has an infantry compartment and an AMS is a very viable faction appropriate way to alleviate some of those deficiencies.

The fact that she isn't an enormous and expensive beast of a dropper means you can afford to put her in the fight and risk losing her. I value that. Unlike some of the other options that are too expensive, too rare, too valuable, to be that expendable. I like assault ships that you can put in the middle of a swarm of ASFs, providing an ECM cloud for the ASFs, while they all move together to fight the enemy.
« Last Edit: 26 February 2023, 09:03:16 by Alan Grant »

Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #3 on: 26 February 2023, 09:08:37 »
I like the Intruder... I think of it as the OG Combined Arms transport.  8)

Dragon Cat

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #4 on: 26 February 2023, 10:42:05 »
Conquistador simply for rule of cool looks brilliant and has great transport capabilities while also being well armed
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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #5 on: 26 February 2023, 19:30:09 »
I voted for the Leopard, because it's used by damned near everybody, and the 3054 models pack a lot more punch than you'd expect for such a small ship, especially a transport. Also because the DroST IIb wasn't a listed option, and that's my clear winner. :smitten:
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Kerfuffin(925)

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #6 on: 26 February 2023, 20:18:51 »
I like the Aesir/Vanir frame. Clans haven’t been helped by not getting access to subCaps until after the last wave of dropships were designed.
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Frabby

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #7 on: 27 February 2023, 01:01:09 »
Haven’t voted yet because the answer would depend on mission details. What exactly does "assault" entail? Some of the suggested designs are incapable of certain missions, for exaple not all are 'Mech carriers.

On a purely personal level I have a soft spot for the Lung Wang because it is uncompromisingly simple and straightfoward (and also because of my soft spot for Liao and the fluff introducing it where it trashed a Davion prototype).
Stats wise I've always been impressed with the Titan.
The newer classes, like Aesir/Vanir, are like new 'Mechs to me: There are too many for me and they hardly registered with me.
« Last Edit: 27 February 2023, 01:05:45 by Frabby »
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Jellico

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #8 on: 27 February 2023, 02:43:04 »

The newer classes, like Aesir/Vanir

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idea weenie

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #9 on: 27 February 2023, 04:20:23 »
Here are sarna links for the Dropships with basic descriptions of each.  Adjectives such as small, decent, lots, etc, are relative to its size rather than overall (so a large Dropship with a small troop complement might carry more troops than a small Dropship with a large troop complement)
Achilles - 4.5 kton, 8/12, primarily direct combat
Aesir - 18 kton, 5/8 thrust, 30 ASF, Small NCSS, lots of guns
Assault Triumph - 8.6 kton, 3/5, Troop carrier dropship (battalion of Vees)
Claymore - 1.4 ktons, 6/9, primarily for vs other Dropships in similar weight class
Conquistador - 17.4 kton, 3/5, decently armed Military transport
Elephant - 15 kton, 5/8, primariyl armed and thrust, with small onboard troop capability
Hamilcar - 3.575 kton, 4/6, short fuel supply, some Mechs/ASF, decent and mostly forward-facing weapons
Intruder - 3 ktons, 4/6, primarily an armed platform rather than troop transport
Kuan Ti - 2.2 ktons, 6/9, short fuel range, lots of weapons
Leopard - 1.9 ktons, Pocket Warship version is over 4/6 thrust, carries a nasty anti-shipping missile launcher
Lung Wang - 2.6 ktons, 5/8, lots of forward guns,
Mercer - 4.5 kton, 5/8, good weapons, 10 Mechs,
Merlin - 2.5 ktons, 6/9, limited fuel supply, but fast and with a decent punch
Nasagawa - not yet present at Sarna
Noruff - 1.9 ktons, 8/12, adequate weapons (but will be able to control the engagement due to its acceleration)
Titan - 12 ktons, 5/8, good fighter carrier, decent weapons
Arcadia - 3 ktons, 6/9, good energy weapons defense, to deliver Protomechs to a target
Avenger - 1.4 ktons, 7/11, a gunship


I chose the Conquistador for one key reason: you know the pilot of that Dropship will want to do a barrel roll at least once.

Edit - I had the accel wrong for the Achilles
« Last Edit: 27 February 2023, 05:11:55 by idea weenie »

Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #10 on: 27 February 2023, 04:33:44 »
The Achilles is 8/12, isn't it? ???

Weirdo

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #11 on: 27 February 2023, 07:45:16 »
What exactly does "assault" entail?

In Battletech, "Assault DropShip" is a specific term meaning "optimized for directly entering combat", as opposed to those that transport mechs, troops, fighters, cargo, etc. Those on this list that also possess transport bays, either the transport part of the ship is secondary to the weapons and armor, or it has enough weapons and armor that it can pull off the assault role despite being primarily a transport.
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Elmoth

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #12 on: 27 February 2023, 09:00:37 »
Lung wang. It is a stretched leopard, so ething that IMO works better for raids than the standard leopard (too low cargo capacity and no infantry or tank support)

The Eagle

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #13 on: 03 March 2023, 11:16:10 »
Merlin, but I make no apologies for being a Marik fanboy.
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boilerman

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #14 on: 03 March 2023, 23:30:29 »
Voted Avenger, but my true favorite assault is missing - the Fortress. The Lion is up there too.
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Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #15 on: 03 March 2023, 23:37:28 »
Yeah, I was wondering why the Fortress was missing from the list...  ???

Weirdo

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #16 on: 04 March 2023, 01:06:17 »
I strongly dislike the Fortress in this role. It's a flying identity crisis, unable to decide if it's an assault ship or a troop transport. Doesn't help that it seems some of the writers for 3057 didn't get the memo defining assault ship, and mistakenly thought it meant transport for ground assaults.

It's an adequate assault ship at best, though an excellent transport.
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Failure16

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #17 on: 04 March 2023, 04:05:59 »
I went with the Avenger since I'm old-school and I like my assault ships to enter the atmosphere* and bomb somebody if I need to**. But the Intruder's capabilities are not to be discounted.

And yes, the Fortress is made to assault a planet-head, but it carries too much to want to send it into harm's way routinely or have it patrol like I would the more stereotypical assault ships.



*Which is why the Achilles and I can never fully commit to each other, despite our numerous trysts.
**And that is just an artifact of my foundational Regulan DNA eking out.


EDIT: Proofreading, explication
« Last Edit: 04 March 2023, 11:30:31 by Failure16 »
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Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #18 on: 04 March 2023, 06:14:49 »
I think the identity crisis goes back to DropShips and JumpShips.

Failure16

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #19 on: 04 March 2023, 11:28:29 »
Which is how I picture every spacecraft in the BTU to this day (past the original depictions from 3025 and MW1E, naturally).
Thought I might get a rocket ride when I was a child.          We are the wild youth,                                And through villages of ether
But it was a lie, that I told myself                                          Chasing visions of our futures.                   Oh, my crucifixion comes
When I needed something good.                                         One day we'll reveal the truth,                    Will you sing my hallelujah?
At 17, I had a better dream; now I'm 33, and it isn't me.      That one will die before he gets there.       Will you tell me when it's done?
But I'd think of something better if I could
                           --E. Tonra                                                      --C. Love
--A. Duritz

Giovanni Blasini

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #20 on: 04 March 2023, 16:14:47 »
I voted for the Titan.  It's very nearly the do-everything assault ship.

First off, in either its SLDF or Clan form, it's a respectable carrier platform.  Yes, the Clan version stretches its cargo holds to carry 30 fighters, but it still has more cargo for its birds than a lot of other carriers, but whether you're packing 18, or you're packing 30, either is a respectable number of fighters to bring to a fight, giving you enough to screen your DropShip, target the enemy's CAP, and still have a reserve of anti-DropShip fighters,

Then we get to the Titan herself.  At 5/8 thrust, she may not seem like the swiftest assault ship out there, but that's appreciable thrust for a 12,000 ton assault ship/carrier hybrid, making her fast enough to keep up with her own heavy fighters when on the attack.  Armor is respectable, too, with enough armor in any one location to survive, when starting intact, a single NAC/25 hit.

Now, the weapons.  Most are generally respectable, but there's one bay of 12 large lasers sin the nose that's as brutal as anything out there, requires sucapital weapons for other ships to match, and can still get a threshold roll against a sizeable portion of the smaller WarShips out there.

The only thing, really, the Titan can't do, Mechwarrior PC games aside, is transport ground troops.  If it really could do that, it could do anything.  It's almost criminal the Clans never did a full upgrade before the Titan Monitor.

Runner-Up: the Model 96 Elephant.  This is a do-anything JumpShip, but the better weapons arrangement and fighter loadout of the Titan put it in front, IMO.
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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #21 on: 04 March 2023, 18:48:03 »
Yeah some folks might prefer to keep their carriers safe in the rear, but an aggressive formation that has the Titans in front mixing things up right alongside their wing is a truly fearsome beast to tangle with. >:D
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Giovanni Blasini

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #22 on: 04 March 2023, 19:05:27 »
Yeah some folks might prefer to keep their carriers safe in the rear, but an aggressive formation that has the Titans in front mixing things up right alongside their wing is a truly fearsome beast to tangle with. >:D

Way back when in the FGC, I basically sacrificed a Titan and her squadrons to save one of my WarShips, and beat the living crap out of a Sovetskii Soyuz doing it, thanks to that 10-point laser bay in the Titan's nose beating the cruiser's thresholds in every location.  The reduction of that bay on the Titan Monitor made me a sad panda, because it could've maintained that and gained the Killer Whale bay.
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boilerman

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #23 on: 04 March 2023, 19:07:31 »

And yes, the Fortress is made to assault a planet-head, but it carries too much to want to send it into harm's way routinely or have it patrol like I would the more stereotypical assault ships.

How often do you make planetary assaults? IMO they're rare enough and by definition big enough to justify committing 1 or 2,or more Fortress dropships.
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Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #24 on: 04 March 2023, 19:19:17 »
The Long Tom is the main benefit once you land...  ^-^

Failure16

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #25 on: 04 March 2023, 20:01:54 »
How often do you make planetary assaults? IMO they're rare enough and by definition big enough to justify committing 1 or 2,or more Fortress dropships.

And yet the feat of aggregating several Fortresses together has only been done once.

As the player of a long-term mercenary regiment, I personally find myself conducting forced entry ops/planetary assaults with disconcerting frequency. They were rather common, even in the late 3SW (despite the fan-base's assertions to the contrary).

The Fortress is made for that initial entry subtask of the planetary assault operation: heavy armor and good firepower allows you to bull onto the dropzone and then start disgorging a load of bad news into the enemy's belly. But--and I suppose was not clear about this--what I would rather not do is send it off on missions or patrols like I would my Avengers or Achilleses, or Intruders. Those are small enough, and lack the directed focus of carrying a significant portion of the invasion force, that I can feel good as using them as a separate maneuver or tasking asset.

And besides, I like to keep my artillery grounded where I can use it, too.
Thought I might get a rocket ride when I was a child.          We are the wild youth,                                And through villages of ether
But it was a lie, that I told myself                                          Chasing visions of our futures.                   Oh, my crucifixion comes
When I needed something good.                                         One day we'll reveal the truth,                    Will you sing my hallelujah?
At 17, I had a better dream; now I'm 33, and it isn't me.      That one will die before he gets there.       Will you tell me when it's done?
But I'd think of something better if I could
                           --E. Tonra                                                      --C. Love
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Minemech

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #26 on: 06 March 2023, 18:32:55 »
 Oldskool assault ships bring neat atmosphere to the game. I take the spread of the vote to show that none greatly overshadows the others in bringing fun to the table.

Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #27 on: 06 March 2023, 20:37:26 »
That sounds like a win for TPTB...  8)

Weirdo

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #28 on: 07 March 2023, 11:00:34 »
It's definitely good for space fans to have a variety of effective ships to choose from. We can build all kinds of space combat forces, instead of everyone just slapping different coats of paint on all the Achilles they can find, plus some faction-specific support and maybe PWSes. :thumbsup:
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Daryk

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Re: What is your favorite assault ship? Why?
« Reply #29 on: 07 March 2023, 18:30:41 »
Agreed!  The simple ambiguity of "assault ship" helps with that immeasurably...  ^-^

 

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