Future Point Defense Options

The logical answer is to remove the dedicated broadside cradle. Go to a nose and tail mount instead.

Ok so far all of these ideas have been shot down:
Dedicated missile defense ships
CM pods
CM attached to MDM
drones with PDLC
Larger Lacs dedicated to anti missile ops
CM pods for LACs
dedicated anti missile LACs (Katanas are already almost that)

here are the ideas that so far have not been shot down:
Longer range CM
FTL CM control
More independent CM

ok first for the longer range CM the issue that applies in this case seems to be that these are to inaccurate to be worthwhile and that seems to be the main argument against these

now the FTL CM control is a great idea I think as it would allow longer range intercepts to be possible as the launch ship would be much more capable of guiding the CMs onto their targets as the command loop would be so much shorter and the CM would only need to mount a FTL receiver and not a transmitter which might make it small enough to be practical

now for the more independent CM i have not seen any real argument against these so far except that these would be larger and you could carry fewer of them but I believe these would probably be the best option because it would allow the launch ship to be able to control more CM as the CMs that it launches need less guidance from the launch ship. This already is shown to be possible as the MK.9 Viper is a modified CM that is more or less a fire and forget missile so i think that if they were to modify the MK.9 by getting rid of its warhead and using the space that that frees up to mount even more sensors and computers to make the missile even more of a fire and forget missile so you now only need to send the missile updates and not continuous guidance.

Now apart from these ideas the only other real option that i see would be to have the manties make the CLACs that are designed to be in the wall of battle which would serve the role of rapid ammo refill for the Katanas and you would simply have a large number of Katanas so you can cycle them into and out of the missile defense location and the ammo refill CLAC.

--snipping--

SharkHunter wrote:...Could an ammo ship put out a mass of "LAC CM size box launch cell pods", which the LACs would then take on tow, giving each LAC three or four zones of CM fire before they even go to the internal magazine? Both the ammo ship(s) and CLAC(s) then withdraw of course, and then the fleet goes into maneuver (using Lorelei(s), decoys, etc. to further deplete and misdirect the incoming storm).

Thoughts?

JeffEngel wrote:Katanas will likely run dry of Vipers before an enemy wall runs dry of missile pods, but depending on what is coming in, they may do well enough to husband their ammunition and thin the incoming missile volley less - if the remainder is enough that the closer defenses can handle it adequately...

....Better decoys may be another avenue to pursue too.

In reverse order. Better decoys are referred to in Mission of Honor (MOH), and are called Loreleis. They can fake an SD signature for a longer period of time than prior decoys and drones and operate independently of close in ships.

We're told that the latest generation LACs are almost as efficient as pre-war RMN destroyers in screen, so use 120X HMS Troubadour's screening ability in HotQ as a comparison, fire control wise.

Concept wise, this "tow more LAC massile cells" is the same as of "not having to husband the ammunition". Tactically, for example task a singe CLAC Aviary CLAC (except with Katanas, 200 or so) to guard a half squadron of 4 Invictus class SD(p)s. That gives you an offensive missile punch of around 34,000 Missiles (4K are ACM) less pen-aids and ECM missiles) . That gives the half squadron enough firepower to punch out maybe 100 enemy SD(s), any type if the SD(p)s aren't destroyed first.

In this little battle exercise, the LACs launch, pick up the extra launch cells, and are maneuvered into position. Instead of one layer, now you put the Katana(s) in 4 staggered layers, 4MM KM and each layer has the equivalent loadout of the whole set compared to internal only magazines. Each layer manages a zone of 4MM Km, 3MM to the front, and 1MM Km to the rear. to protect your SD(p)s. There's a limitation in how much your SD(p)s can maneuver in the XY plane to the rear, however.

That gives you around 12mm KM of extra interception space, four times the CMs, and you still have a last layer of LACs to fit between your mini-wall's wedge's weak points, Plus no one is suggesting that the SD(p)s aren't maintaining their own CM fire as well.

I'd wager a bunch of Manticoran credits that Honor AH would at least say "why not ask?" if someone suggested that Hemphill/Foraker et. al and their toybox of younger tech wizards shouldn't be tasked to figure out the scheme.

JeffEngel wrote:Better decoys may be another avenue to pursue too. Keyhole II platforms go the route of a small number of very powerful ones with self-defense capability. More along that line is one option, but another - not necessarily incompatible one - is a deeper supply of more disposable decoys. The smaller fusion plants should open the door to smaller decoys of comparable power, so a ship could carry more of them. For that matter, if some sort of decoy could be built the size and approximate shape of a missile pod, some of them could be included in SD(P)'s as that additional organic (well, independent of another starship anyway) missile defense capability.

This basically describes the Lorelei decoys; apparently launchable from (Mk-23 capable?) missile tubes and capable of mimicking a SD(P) for a short time.

It's also closer to the original intent of the thread: To promote ideas for organic defense capabilities; eg ideas on how to defend a SD(P) that don't depend on some other ship(s) being around when defenses are needed.

SharkHunter wrote:--snipping--

SharkHunter wrote:...Could an ammo ship put out a mass of "LAC CM size box launch cell pods", which the LACs would then take on tow, giving each LAC three or four zones of CM fire before they even go to the internal magazine? Both the ammo ship(s) and CLAC(s) then withdraw of course, and then the fleet goes into maneuver (using Lorelei(s), decoys, etc. to further deplete and misdirect the incoming storm).

Thoughts?

JeffEngel wrote:Katanas will likely run dry of Vipers before an enemy wall runs dry of missile pods, but depending on what is coming in, they may do well enough to husband their ammunition and thin the incoming missile volley less - if the remainder is enough that the closer defenses can handle it adequately...

....Better decoys may be another avenue to pursue too.

In reverse order. Better decoys are referred to in Mission of Honor (MOH), and are called Loreleis. They can fake an SD signature for a longer period of time than prior decoys and drones and operate independently of close in ships.

We're told that the latest generation LACs are almost as efficient as pre-war RMN destroyers in screen, so use 120X HMS Troubadour's screening ability in HotQ as a comparison, fire control wise.

Concept wise, this "tow more LAC massile cells" is the same as of "not having to husband the ammunition". Tactically, for example task a singe CLAC Aviary CLAC (except with Katanas, 200 or so) to guard a half squadron of 4 Invictus class SD(p)s. That gives you an offensive missile punch of around 34,000 Missiles (4K are ACM) less pen-aids and ECM missiles) if the SD(p)s aren't destroyed first. That gives the half squadron enough firepower to punch out maybe 100 enemy SD(s), any type.

In this little exercise, the LACs launched, picked up the extra launch cells, and are maneuvered into position. Instead of one layer, now you put the Katana(s) in 4 staggered layers, 4MM KM and each layer has the equivalent loadout of the whole set compared to internal only magazines. Each layer manages a zone of 4MM Km, 3MM to the front, and 1MM Km to the rear. to protect your SD(p)s.

That gives you around 12mm KM of interception space, four times the CMs, and you still have a last layer of LACs to fit between your mini-wall's wedge's weak points, Plus no one is suggesting taht the SD(p)s aren't maintaining their own CM fire as well.

I'd wager a bunch that HHA would at least say "why not ask?" if someone suggested that Hemphill/Foraker et. al and their toybox of younger tech wizards shouldn't be tasked to figure out the scheme.

I think that the issue with this idea is that the LACs will not be able to hold the CM pods inside of their wedges which would cause the pods to have a large impact on the LACs but if you were able to fit the CM pods into the LACs wedge then this idea certainly could work as far as I can tell assuming you are talking about basically just towing the CM pods to increase the total amount of CMs the LACs can carry and not try to launch more CMs then what they currently launch

Weird Harold wrote:

JeffEngel wrote:Better decoys may be another avenue to pursue too. Keyhole II platforms go the route of a small number of very powerful ones with self-defense capability. More along that line is one option, but another - not necessarily incompatible one - is a deeper supply of more disposable decoys. The smaller fusion plants should open the door to smaller decoys of comparable power, so a ship could carry more of them. For that matter, if some sort of decoy could be built the size and approximate shape of a missile pod, some of them could be included in SD(P)'s as that additional organic (well, independent of another starship anyway) missile defense capability.

This basically describes the Lorelei decoys; apparently launchable from (Mk-23 capable?) missile tubes and capable of mimicking a SD(P) for a short time.

It's also closer to the original intent of the thread: To promote ideas for organic defense capabilities; eg ideas on how to defend a SD(P) that don't depend on some other ship(s) being around when defenses are needed.

while the original purpose of this thread was to figure out how to increase a SD(P)s organic missile defense ability I am pretty sure that we have established that there is no current way for an SD(P) to be able to defend itself against the amount of missiles that are currently being exchanged between fleets in an engagement so the thread has shifted to be just how you can improve a fleets missile defense ability.

Valen123456 wrote:Now we have been told about Mycroft (basically a system defense variant not tethered to a ship), Keyhole II platforms used for the role Tarantula was created for (system wide missile fire control). As the GA becomes better experienced in manufacturing this technology could we begin to see smaller and more portable versions of this type of technology? After all one advantage of Missile Pods (effectively clusters of tethered missile tubes) was to allow smaller ships to carry big ship armaments.

I'm not sure what you want to use this for. You'll have to explain the purpose you see for it, before anyone can evaluate it.

RFC has in the past stomped down on the idea of specialist ship types for the RMN and emphasized that they prefer multi-role capabilities in all their ships. This is understandable, but to me a future option (and one Foraker might have explored) is a dedicated EW or control link carrying ship. Not specifically an AWAC platform but a non-armed ship that dedicates almost all of its weight to this purpose, (effectively a more mobile Keyhole platform with two impeller rings and a service
crew).

This is one of the ideas that David has specifically shot down.

Adding Keyhole is shown to dramatically consume space even on battle-cruiser sized vessels due to the need for a dedicated cradle (see MaxxQBuNine's wonderful work on deviantart for this). If dedicated Keyhole type ships are nonviable, could another future avenue be smaller "cruiser grade" platforms (call it "Keyhole-Light") that provide all the capabilities of Keyhole but at a slightly reduced capacity that works well enough, and can be carried easily enough, on lighter ship types. These could even be carried pod-like limpet-ed to a hull, or even in a missile core (or pod carrier of some type) and rolled out when needed.

Thoughts?

David has already said that Manticore is looking at a smaller version of Keyhole for cruisers.

captinjoehenry wrote:while the original purpose of this thread was to figure out how to increase a SD(P)s organic missile defense ability I am pretty sure that we have established that there is no current way for an SD(P) to be able to defend itself against the amount of missiles that are currently being exchanged between fleets in an engagement so the thread has shifted to be just how you can improve a fleets missile defense ability.

The demise of Adm Filareta pretty conclusively demonstrated than Fleet Defense Doctrine works pretty well -- ie no ships larger than a LAC killed and few even damaged.

Even if there is no current organic defense improvement possible -- a premise disproved by the Lorelei decoys -- the thread is about future options. That means "not limited to current methods."

JeffEngel wrote:Even running dry, they may be able to make runs to and from a wall defense CLAC for reloads in longer battles, especially if they aren't deployed too far forward. And if things get desperate, they can always get in among the incoming missiles, roll, and take the missiles on their own wedges. If the missiles are programmed to accept them as targets in that case, they are setting themselves up to be attacked painfully well, but if one LAC is going to eat a number of missiles targeted on a SD(P), even that may be a win in the harsh calculus that applies.

A LAC can't really "get in among the missiles." Missiles accelerate far too fast for that. They would cross the volume that a LAC could cover in milliseconds. And space is big. Missiles are spread over a volume thousands of kilometers wide, and a LAC wedge is simply too small to interdict missiles deliberately. A counter-missile can do it because its acceleration is even higher than a missile's. If missiles start targeting LACs, they won't be aiming for the wedge; they'll be trying to get around and hit the broadsides, bow, or stern.

Wiki:
Laser cluster

If an attack missile managed to break through the countermissile engagement zone, the last line of active defense was the point defense laser cluster. A laser cluster was a grouping of a number of individually weak lasers, much weaker than an anti-ship laser. While this reduced the range, it allows for a higher refire rate per cluster. A laser cluster typically had enough time for 1 shot before the attack missile could engage the ship. Supplementing the point defense clusters was the ship's energy armament. Anti-ship lasers and grasers could also be tasked to engage incoming missiles.[1]
Manticoran clusters as of 1920 PD contained eight emitters, each capable of firing once every sixteen seconds. This resulted in one shot every two seconds from each cluster mounted on a ship.

In serious threat environments - and considering missile throw weight nowadays, salvos meant to swamp defenses, intuitively, might leave a denser grouping of missed missiles. Perhaps it's time to adjust "firing time" of a laser cluster as opposed to firing rate, to kill more strays with each firing. At the speed of an attacking missile in final acquisition, reset rate of laser cluster is crucial. If systems can handle longer firing rates.

The option should at least be there and programmed on the fly. Perhaps computer recommended.

Oops. Suggested by Norma Schwarzkopf (niece).

well on the subject of future technology here are a couple of ideas:

CM dedicated Keyhole:
have SD(P)s mount addition Keyhole like platforms that are dedicated to mounting large amounts of CM control and guidance links

FTL CM control links:
if the manties can manage to cram a FTL receiver into a CM they would be able to increase the effectiveness of CMs as they would have shorter command loops which would increase the effectiveness of CMs at all ranges and CMs do not need to mount a FTL transmitter as they have nothing worthwhile to send back to the launching ship

Use the ships Active Electronically Scanned Array for links:
i would assume that the ships in the honorverse use AESA radar system which means that they could use part of their radar system to provide fire control links like modern fighter jets which considering the massive size of the arrays that the ships mount should be able to control a huge amount of missiles if you have the software to handle that many

Self Guiding CM:
The MK.9 Viper is based off of current mantie CMs and they are fire and forget weapons so if they could take a similar approach and take a MK.9 missile remove its warhead and replace it with even more capable sensors and ai the launch ship would be able to launch a much larger amount of missiles as the launch ship would only need to give the CM a target and provide some target info update while it is in flight which would heavily reduce the amount of control the launch ship would need to exert to control the CMs

Faster / Larger / Even more PDLC:
if they can make their PDLC even larger as in more emitters and increase their recharge rate or just mount even more of them then the PDLC would be much more capable of engaging the missiles that get through the CMs.

Self Guiding PDLC:
if they could make the PDLC self contained like the Phalanx system on current US navy ships they could increase its efficiency as they would not be dependent on the ships primary fire control and detection system