RFC's take on what the Royal Torch Navy might need...

SharkHunter wrote:--snipping--

Theemile wrote:The entire Torch Navy doesn't have enough spacers to man 1 Wayfarer AMC (14 Frigates x (<120men) = 1/2 of Wayfarer's 3000 man complement.) If it has 3K personel laying around, it would be better spent manning the ex-PNiE DDs and CLs.

That's where David's "smaller CLAC" quote gets interesting, from the Pearls of Weber. All of the new-build construction includes an extremely high level of automation, a SAG-C even with marines takes < 400, each LAC crew is 10 members apiece, plus an additional maintentance crew per wing (two sets x say 20-30 maybe? the whole naval sections could be run by less than the same size crew as a single old style CA heavy cruiser like an RMN Star Knight or Mars, then use whatever remaining hull size for the marine assault contingents.

Also, given that Honor's first ship was a LAC, those LAC commanders become the first round of DD officers once they're ready, and they're battle tested and trained in the mean time.

That's as opposed to dumping two limpeted frigates from something like the Haile Sowe (sic?) which requires about 50% of the same manning, sans marines,and leaves those freighter/frigate combinations still available for independent slaver capture operations.

OK, a Little perspective.

The Torch Navy had - at best - 2000 trained spacers at the end of Torch of Freedom (which was ~ Fall of 1921 iirc) manning their 14 Frigates, 1 space station, and 1 Freighter. The 18 captured DDs, 5 captured CLs, and 5 captured CAs, will require ~13,500 additional men to man if they decide to do so - .

Let's not forget, A Star Knight or Mars CA used ~1000 personel each. My 120 men per frigate # is from the stats of a Silensian Frigate - a Torch Frigate probably is closer to 80 people per ship, lowering the Torch navy to ~1500 personel - but we don't know. That is why I proposed a Minelayer - the crew is probably in the low 100s.

I agree, some modern LACs (10 men per RMN LAC or 12 Men per RHN LAC) is a good way to build the corps and get training in place.

The Haile Sowle, as used in Cauldron of Ghosts, is used as a decoy to get military forces (which already have hypergenerators and don't need a mothership to transport them) close to the station without raising alarms - our mil spec mini-CLAC will raise alarm bells the moment it crosses the alpha wall. The 2 would be used in VERY different ways for different missions.

SharkHunter wrote:

Theemile wrote:--snipping--The entire Torch Navy doesn't have enough spacers to man 1 Wayfarer AMC (14 Frigates x (<120men) = 1/2 of Wayfarer's 3000 man complement.) If it has 3K personel laying around, it would be better spent manning the ex-PNiE DDs and CLs.

That's where David's "smaller CLAC" quote gets interesting, from the Pearls of Weber. All of the new-build construction includes an extremely high level of automation, a SAG-C even with marines takes < 400, each LAC crew is 10 members apiece, plus an additional maintentance crew per wing (two sets x say 20-30 maybe? the whole naval sections could be run by less than the same size crew as a single old style CA heavy cruiser like an RMN Star Knight or Mars, then use whatever remaining hull size for the marine assault contingents.

Also, given that Honor's first ship was a LAC, those LAC commanders become the first round of DD officers once they're ready, and they're battle tested and trained in the mean time.

That's as opposed to dumping two limpeted frigates from something like the Haile Sowe (sic?) which requires about 50% of the same manning, sans marines,and leaves those freighter/frigate combinations still available for independent slaver capture operations.

Theemile wrote:OK, a Little perspective.

The Torch Navy had - at best - 2000 trained spacers at the end of Torch of Freedom (which was ~ Fall of 1921 iirc) manning their 14 Frigates, 1 space station, and 1 Freighter. The 18 captured DDs, 5 captured CLs, and 5 captured CAs, will require ~13,500 additional men to man if they decide to do so - .

Let's not forget, A Star Knight or Mars CA used ~1000 personel each. My 120 men per frigate # is from the stats of a Silensian Frigate - a Torch Frigate probably is closer to 80 people per ship, lowering the Torch navy to ~1500 personel - but we don't know. That is why I proposed a Minelayer - the crew is probably in the low 100s.

I agree, some modern LACs (10 men per RMN LAC or 12 Men per RHN LAC) is a good way to build the corps and get training in place.

The Haile Sowle, as used in Cauldron of Ghosts, is used as a decoy to get military forces (which already have hypergenerators and don't need a mothership to transport them) close to the station without raising alarms - our mil spec mini-CLAC will raise alarm bells the moment it crosses the alpha wall. The 2 would be used in VERY different ways for different missions.

Which is why using the AMC works nicely - it looks like a merchant ship, because it is a merchant ship. Cutting down on the usage of the pod laying components cuts down on the personnel required to man the ship.

fallsfromtrees wrote:Which is why using the AMC works nicely - it looks like a merchant ship, because it is a merchant ship. Cutting down on the usage of the pod laying components cuts down on the personnel required to man the ship.

That makes no sense. There are very few people assigned to the pods. They are fully automated for the most part. The crew need comes from the rest of the weapons, engineering, LACs and the tactical crew. In other words, the stuff you want to use.

Also, Navy size isn't equal to the size of he crews. There is a significant number needed for the shore based support. For example, training, logistics, planning, medical, etc.

fallsfromtrees wrote:

Theemile wrote:OK, a Little perspective.

The Torch Navy had - at best - 2000 trained spacers at the end of Torch of Freedom (which was ~ Fall of 1921 iirc) manning their 14 Frigates, 1 space station, and 1 Freighter. The 18 captured DDs, 5 captured CLs, and 5 captured CAs, will require ~13,500 additional men to man if they decide to do so - .

Let's not forget, A Star Knight or Mars CA used ~1000 personel each. My 120 men per frigate # is from the stats of a Silensian Frigate - a Torch Frigate probably is closer to 80 people per ship, lowering the Torch navy to ~1500 personel - but we don't know. That is why I proposed a Minelayer - the crew is probably in the low 100s.

I agree, some modern LACs (10 men per RMN LAC or 12 Men per RHN LAC) is a good way to build the corps and get training in place.

The Haile Sowle, as used in Cauldron of Ghosts, is used as a decoy to get military forces (which already have hypergenerators and don't need a mothership to transport them) close to the station without raising alarms - our mil spec mini-CLAC will raise alarm bells the moment it crosses the alpha wall. The 2 would be used in VERY different ways for different missions.

Which is why using the AMC works nicely - it looks like a merchant ship, because it is a merchant ship. Cutting down on the usage of the pod laying components cuts down on the personnel required to man the ship.

The AMCs required 3K personel. How much manpower do you think the pod bay took? Even if they found a way to cut 1 thousand bodies, they still are using the manpower of the entire current Torch navy - or the manpower needed to man 2 of the captured CAs, 4 of the captured CLs, or 6 of the captured DDs.

Remember, the AMCs were SLOW (100% accel was 190 Gs), had the defenses of a CA, had no fore or aft weapons (except the pods), light sidewalls, and zero ability to take a hit. Against a real warship, if the AMC does not fire first, it is in trouble.

The Hawlie Sowlie can do the same ambush job with <300 personel and every unit can hyperout independantly

This is not the ship you want taking up most of your navy's personel. As a small navy, I'd rather have 6 DDs than a (podless) AMC carrying 12 LACs. Heck - The RMN would have preferred to have the 6 DDs if it could have when it converted the Trojans.

kzt wrote:<snip>
Also, Navy size isn't equal to the size of he crews. There is a significant number needed for the shore based support. For example, training, logistics, planning, medical, etc.

All the more so for a mature force than for a scratch together navy like the RTN is currently. The USN could probably shake out sufficient trained bodies to man 1/2 again it's current fleet if it gave a few seconds thought to it.

I was specifically mentioning Spacers - and Torch probably has a few hundred people on the ground currently supporting them - and (from Cauldron) is trying to build the rest of the infrasturcture needed to support a real navy long term. For every person in space, there needs to be at least 1 person (usually a trained person) supporting them on the ground - so to add a full up AMC, you would really need to add 6 K personel to man the ship handle the logistics, training , maintenance, planning, and personel support.

Sharkhunter, I think you should remember that David was not bringing up the idea of a small CLAC on his own. He was responding to someone else who had come up with the idea. He was only citing Torch because it was the only navy he could think of that might actually find a use for the idea. Mostly he was responding to shoot the idea down.

SWM wrote:Sharkhunter, I think you should remember that David was not bringing up the idea of a small CLAC on his own. He was responding to someone else who had come up with the idea. He was only citing Torch because it was the only navy he could think of that might actually find a use for the idea. Mostly he was responding to shoot the idea down.

Very good point, which I should have included as the original caveat. Personally I think it's a fascinating concept -- except as others have pointed out, maybe like more like a minelayer in terms of missile than a tube-based launcher, which both the RMN and RHN have built on BC size hulls.

A Nike size minelayer hull could also include LAC carrying and marine carrying, a mission parameter would have the LAC as near space control, the big hull as obviously the carrier for the LACs and assault craft, and just enough long-distance missile capability to defend a space station or ground assault in process from intervention by SL or Mesan navy ships. Maybe the RMN can loan them Audrey Pyne (from Operation Buttercup) who oughta be close to ship command-level rank by now.

By the way, I'd have it be Erewhonese built, as to our knowledge Haven doesn't have a Nike size hull spec.

The problem is that putting dozens of huge holes in the flanks that extends past the centerline tends to make whatever armor system the hull originally had pretty pointless. So while you have a Nike sized ship it will be vastly more susceptible to golden BBs. It probably won't be as tough as a SagC in combat.

Torch needs about a dozen more modern LACs and support logistics for them. That is for basic training along with system defense and adminsitration (customs etc).

On a slightly different topic, I just happen to know where Manticore could come up with a whole bunch of lightly used pinnacles and other small craft with in-system capasity (and quite possibly even armed) with loads of spair parts, training and operations manuals (probably even simulators). The best part is that while Manticore could just give them to Torch, training cadre could be supplied by Maya along with initial maintenance support and trainers since Maya has been operating a lot of FF/SLN equipment in the past.

It gives them more things usefull for training people to work in space and both transportation and other duties including space to ground and back again.

I recall that the Torch Marines seem to be drawn from a lot of former Solarian Marine sources. As a short term solution and home for a lot of now "surplus" SLN powered armor and other Marine gear, Torch would make good use of it. All that Solarian Marine vacume related gear as well.

kzt wrote:The problem is that putting dozens of huge holes in the flanks that extends past the centerline tends to make whatever armor system the hull originally had pretty pointless. So while you have a Nike sized ship it will be vastly more susceptible to golden BBs. It probably won't be as tough as a SagC in combat.

Agreed, KZT, which is why it wouldn't have much of a place in a full on scrum, but then the RMN isn't going to give the RTN a -C. If needed it could still lay a "DDM pdd mine field" as a 2nd force attack suppressor [like at Solon], and the drones needed to control a launch, etc. but that would be sort of a worst case scenario I would think.

This ship's job would purely be ONLY as a force-carrier and a small amount of long range tactical support at ranges of maybe 25-35MM km from the LAC and assault ship targets and presumably stealthed and in a direction where they're not likely to be in the line of fire or ambush range under any normal circumstances.

Then again it's only a hypothetical and whether the RTN would want that set of capabilities or a shipyard would agree to build it in the time available is another breed of cat altogether.