Originally posted 15 Jun. 2005.
At the urging of the Forum Watchdogs, FotW will be joining all other “~ of the Week” columns on the Fan Articles board from now on. It would not have been my preference, but hey - you might argue with Mu/Psi to their faces, but me? I have this raging aversion to suffering ‘re-education’ - or a 9mm brain aneurysm. :o Besides, if you squawk ident like that, you’re never going to sneak through their sensor grid to wreak havoc within, are you? ;D }:)
“Dawn of the Jihad”, they call it. Me? I call it “Red Dawn”, like the DVD I watched last night. You Blakers think you know about at infiltration, subversion and sabotage? ??? My response is the same now as it was then:
WOLVERINES!!!!
;D In any case, here we go....
SL-15 Slayer - 80t, TRO3025
All proposed fan-variants should be posted in the corresponding “FotW Workshop” (https://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2462.0.html) thread.
(http://www.sarna.net/wiki/images/2/2f/Slayer.gif)
More or less exclusive to the Combine and a few select customers, the SL-15 is another example of the DCMS/DCA’s strong bias towards designing their fighters to deploy in teams. Eighty tons of high-endurance, unrelenting pain-in-the-ass, the Slayer holds pride of place amongst the Drac heavy fighter force in 3025 and for some time in the IS2 era - and why not? They designed it, they build it, they know it best - and if you think they’re going to give up that sort of edge voluntarily, you’re not as bright as you think you are. :P
3025 era - “Old School”
Even in the oldtech days, the SL-15 Slayer was a borderline nightmare in the same vein as the Transgressor. To 3025 minds, ‘heavy fighter’ automatically meant “tough and overgunned, but cumbersome”, so seeing an eighty-ton system perform at the same 6/9 as most mediums must’ve caused a few cries of “does not compute!”. ;D Its mobility is matched by its staying power: the thing carries ten tons of reaction mass, folks, which is an operational radius that no starfighter would match until the F-11-RR Cheetah, and its armour fraction is a hair this side of unholy: fourteen-point-five tons of standard plate, 84/50/48, means that MLs are no threshold threat, and you need a damned PPC to TAC the thing’s nose! :o
On the other hand, the armament is a little disappointing at first glance. Twenty SHS means that the Slayer is borderline overcooled (much like its operational partner the SL-17 Shilone) when you look at its weapons loadout: twin medium lasers in each wing, one ML each nose and tail, and a big honking Zeus 56 Type.IV autocannon with two tons of ammo in the snout. Prior to the release of TRO3075, this was the only IS1 fighter to mount an AC/10, and the reasons why that’s so are pretty self-evident: to many eyes, they eat too much weapons volume for their throw-weight, making them a little pointless. As this is the type’s only weapon with better than Short range, and it’s ammo-constrained to boot, those same doubters have all the more to point to and chortle about. But look again, kohai, and bear witness to the cunning of the Dragon. ;D An alpha-strike with all the forward ordnance is two under maximum heat capacity, and a full fore-and-aft barrage is only a +1 on the heat-scale - barely a blip for a one-turn salvo. The AC/10 is interchangeable with a medium laser heat-wise, meaning that in a close fight, one can trade it out for the aft laser to discourage pursuers, or the nose laser to lay a solid clout on the other guy to match that of the wing laser-bays.
A squadron of Slayers is just the touch you need to complete your opponent’s misery. }:) Each SL-15 can carry fifteen tons of bombs at 3/5 - enough to turn most CBT maps into moonscapes; a Strafe offers an enemy mud-bug five medium lasers, and a Strike tosses in the AC/10 as well, enough firepower to fell many smaller BattleMechs and soften up most larger ones quite nicely; and in the anti-shipping role, you can address the victim target with three 6-point Capital bays (each wing laser-bay and the ACs) and a 3-Capital bay for the nose lasers, which will give most DropShips reasons to find elsewheres to be. }:)
SL-15s can be used for most things you might want to use a 6/9 fighter for, and a few you might not immediately think of when you look at AT2/R starfighters. For instance, if you want to keep a CAP over an area for a long, long time, the Slayer’s fuel endurance is unbeatable, and it’s about the only L1 heavy that can contemplate making a truly long-range interception (by making a long, slow burn, as opposed to the short, fast one of most light-fighters). However, where the Slayer truly excels is in a furball, where its superior endurance and resilience begins to tell. It’s like pitting a well-conditioned boxer against some hard-hitting butterball: unless he lands a lucky hit in the early going, you can just absorb his blows and let him wear himself out while you methodically take him to pieces, remaining cool and fresh while he huffs and puffs and gets all overheated trying to teach that tar-baby a lesson or two. ;)
As has been said repeatedly in these columns and elsewhere, the Slayer should not operate alone (Handbook and Watcher Council doctrine notwithstanding ;D), and is not even intended to. Their common 6/9 thrust profile means that the Slayer and Shilone can keep pace with one another, making for SL-15 and SL-17 units natural pairings: the SL-17s’ LRMs ‘shoot in’ the Slayers, who then press the enemy so hard at knife-fighting range that they can’t go after the Shilones which are still pouring support fire into the furball. Which is the bigger threat - the 65-tonner standing back and TACing you to death with missiles, or the guy who’s right in your face, doing the same with an AC/10 and five medium lasers? Not an easy tactical problem to solve, methinks. :o Adding in some S-3 Sai as additional flank-support should just about finish the job of ruining the enemy’s day. }:)
By the same token, opposition players can cause Slayer formations some anxious moments if their systems are properly handled. Lucifers or Stukas can put sufficient LRMs onto a Slayer to threshold its nose and take its big gun out of play; F-90 Stingrays can turn with SL-15s, and that fearful PPC can generate TACs from all angles; SYD-21 Seydlitz can out-turn Slayers and harry them to death, their large lasers’ Medium range rendering them immune to return fire from the stern ML. If both sides are smart and follow the mantras (http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2107.0.html), the engagement could get very, very lively.
In the 3025 era, the Slayer had three main variants, all of them off-loading the Zeus 56 and its ammo for an LRM-15 with two tons of ammo and an SRM-6 with one ton: the SL-15A puts both launchers forward; the SL-15B installs the SRM mount aft, for added ‘mace’ ;D; the SL-15C leaves the SRM forward and installs the LRM launcher aft, for perhaps the ultimate in L1 Parthian shots. ;D These variants all need to watch their heat a little, but they can generate goodly amounts of throw-weight (if not quite matching the one-shot ‘whack!’ of the AC/10) with better range-performance, arguably obviating the need to package Shilones with the Slayers. For my part, I’d deploy a squadron of two -15A lances and a lance of -15Cs, allowing for maximum Long-range punch on the run in, six SRM-6s of missile goodness at closest-point-of-approach, and a pair of LRM-15s to add a nasty little postscript to the run (or swat those damned Seydlitz!).
[VARIANT PROPOSAL(S) REDACTED] All proposed fan-variants - including my own - belong in the corresponding “FotW Workshop” thread: https://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2462.0.html
3049 and beyond - “New Wave”
Obviously not wanting to make radical changes in a proven design with the Clans’ hot breath on their necks (and in the middle of a drastic DHS shortage to boot), the Dracs chose to make only one change in their proprietary heavy aerospace system when foundtech made itself known, substituting an Imperator Code Red LB-10X autocannon with an additional ton of ammo for the the old Zeus 56 Type.IV. Now, when using Cluster ammo, this refit is actually a little lacklustre: you’ve lost 40% of your Medium-range hitting power for a -1 TH bonus, which isn’t much of a bargain. But using Slug ammo, the SL-15R retains all the punch and performance of the old model while gaining a little more in heat-efficiency terms (a full fore-and-aft alpha-strike is completely heat-neutral). Other than that, there isn’t too much that can be said about this version that I haven’t already said above; however, the lack of ferro-aluminium armour (for even more survivability) or an SL-15A/B/C updated with Artemis is a little disappointing, especially in light of newer starfighter designs... but then, the Combine is developing its own new fighter designs, leaving the Slayer somewhat out in the cold. :'(
[VARIANT PROPOSAL(S) REDACTED] All proposed fan-variants - including my own - belong in the corresponding “FotW Workshop” thread: https://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2462.0.html
Be advised: the attached .txt transcripts of previous runs of this thread contain numerous reader-proposals for variants. I’ll try to change those out for ‘sanitised’ versions of those threads when I can, but I can’t promise it’ll be soon - that’s a lot of ground to cover. ;)
EDIT: Fixing broken/NSFW links caused by Internet Rot.
SL-** Slayer – TRO3039 Update
Originally posted 7 May 2008.
It seems that the older version of the Slayer’s fluff was... not entirely accurate. Apparently, it wasn’t actually a pre-Amaris design after all; rather, it was designed in the chaos surrounding the Coup and Kerensky’s March to Terra, quite possibly as part of the preparations for what would come after Steffy-boy got what was coming to him. (Given the Combine’s historical attitude of "Graargh! Me conquer galaxy!" (as Cray once put it :P), I wouldn’t really call this a ‘precaution’ against ‘possible’ conflict; without the Cameron cult of personality dynasty to rein them in, it wasn’t a question of if the Dracs would jump their neighbours but ‘when?’ - and they wanted to be ready come H-hour. ::))
FWIW, it’s also noted that despite the elegance of its lifting-body construction, the Slayer is another of AeroTech’s ‘triumphs of brute thrust over aerodynamics’, using oversized vector-jets to shift its ‘bricklike’ body about the sky. (Such things were also said of the F-4 Phantom II, however, and it contributed to the formation of an entire world-wide generation of Phantom Phanatics, so I don’t know you could call such a statement an actual slur. :P)
Third and final note from the new fluff, especially relevant to folks like MadCapellan and his ‘Objective Raids ’67’ project: apparently, Wakazashi licenced the baseline to two(!) Periphery realms for their own use: the Outworld Alliance’s Ramora-based United Outworlders Corporation, and the Taurian Concordat’s Wingman Enterprises Ltd on Pinard. (The Canopians recently tried for a licence, too, but given the current ‘disputes’ over who’s actually running the show on Luthien these days, that’s kind of ‘up in the air’, as it were. :P)
Getting on to the upgraded models, it’s specifically noted that the slow and moderate approach to re-teching the Slayer was a natural byproduct of good sense taken a touch too far; like most engineers, Wakazashi’s design team figured it wasn’t broke, so why fix it? This is not always a bad approach to take - look at many of the other ‘refit kits’ thrown around in TRO3050 if you want to see why - but it also stifled innovation to a certain degree, which was why the SL-15R only got an LB-10X autocannon in place of the old Zeus 56, and I get the impression that that was done only as part of a ‘fly before you buy’ policy on their/the DCA’s part.
Nonetheless, for all its limited extent the SL-15R proved satisfactory to the boffins, and when supplies of ER beam-weapons and DHS became ‘sufficiently secure’ (which happened in 3066, I might note - man, the Dracs really did have a bottleneck on those things!), they took the next step in their heavy-fighter’s development-path.
-> SL-15K Slayer: 80t, 6/9/8/10, 20 DHS, 84/50/48; N: LB10X (3t), ERML; W: 2ERML; A: ERML
Now, admittedly this is still rather underwhelming to many eyes, especially when compared to really tech-heavy birds like the all-new Drac birds or that Scourge of the Spaceways the Eisensturm; the direct pull-out/plug-in replacements don’t take as much advantage of the new gear’s capabilities as one might hope, so the SL-15K is thoroughly oversinked and arguably undergunned. From a logistical standpoint, however, it’s simply marvelous: the fluff specifically notes that the changes are simple enough to turn into a depot-level refit kit that the DCA/DCMS had hoped to apply to all of their SL-15-series spaceframes, regardless of previous technological sophistication, and thus standardise all of their Slayer squadrons. (Sadly, the Combine’s internal ‘troubles’ are stalling this programme.)
[VARIANT PROPOSAL(S) REDACTED] All proposed fan-variants - including my own - belong in the corresponding "FotW Workshop" thread: https://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2462.0.html