Future Point Defense Options

SWM wrote:

Relax wrote:In that thread, MaxxQ also said, as far as he knew, and RFC never corrected him, that the much older and smaller ~1Mkm ranged CM's were not retconned and would fit inside an SDM cap bird.

So, much older, smaller ~1Mkm ranged birds would probably fit 5 or 7 into an Mk-16/MK-23 if 3 or 4 can fit inside an SDM canister.

Okay, I can accept that the old 1 Mkm range counter-missiles might fit into a MK-23 with minimal modification. Controlling those old, minimally functional birds at such ranges might be a problem, though.

It does appear that MaxxQ designed more volume for the warhead/laserhead section than I had thought. My blanket statement was too broad.

You still want to design a new missile for this, of course.

The point of packing them in a Mk-23 body is that you get the mk-23E missile along with them. Remember that the Mk-23 does NOT have FTL capabilities, only light speed. It is the Mk-23E that has the FTL capability. So that missile can control the old missiles at extended range, because the missiles them selves will be sufficiently close that light speed communications are sufficient.

JeffEngel wrote:Anyone have any optimism about "mobile Mistletoe", a recon drone variant used to get into a SD(P)'s cluster of recently deployed missile pods and blow them up (or at least get soft mission kills) before they fire?

The only point I have to make is you could do almost as much damage by just sweeping the pods with Drone's wedges, as with a Mistle toe burst - and stil have a decent possibility of a drone remaining after the sweep. Nukes need to be in almost skin contact with the target for them to have much effect in space, so they won't be able to clear HUGE swatches of pods. Yes, pods are vulnerable to "soft" kills, but space is a heavy radiation environment, and pods need at least a modicrum of shielding to survive against solar radiation - enough distance (which is not THAT MUCH) and even the largest weapon can't hurt them.

The caveat being a stealthed pod being hard to detect and hit - but by the same token, a stealthed pod is hard to see to know you need to use the Mistle Toe drone in the first place.

This is part of one of the sub-discussions taking place in this thread, but I wanted to ask a question:

Are the technodyne missiles truly multi-stage, or multi-drive? In SftS the textev states a counter missile drive stage was grafted on to the rest of the missile, but I interpreted that to mean it didnt actually separate from the main body, but was there to provide sufficient physical separation that whatever less-effective-than-the-Baffle shielding they came up with would work. I suspect that's also a reason Havenite MDMs were consistently mentioned as much larger than alliance ones. They couldnt quite duplicate the Baffle and had to introduce some physical separation to compensate.

ericth wrote:This is part of one of the sub-discussions taking place in this thread, but I wanted to ask a question:

Are the technodyne missiles truly multi-stage, or multi-drive? In SftS the textev states a counter missile drive stage was grafted on to the rest of the missile, but I interpreted that to mean it didnt actually separate from the main body, but was there to provide sufficient physical separation that whatever less-effective-than-the-Baffle shielding they came up with would work. I suspect that's also a reason Havenite MDMs were consistently mentioned as much larger than alliance ones. They couldnt quite duplicate the Baffle and had to introduce some physical separation to compensate.

RFC describes it specifically as a whole separate stage:

There is a reason Technodyne's approach in the Cataphract was to put what amounts to an entirely separate missile on the nose of the main missile. When I say they basically strapped a counter-missile onto the basic SLN missiles, that's exactly what I mean; they completely separated the impeller ring for the "final stage" from the impeller ring for the "booster stage," whereas the impeller nodes for a Manty/Havenite/Andermani MDM are all associated with a single power source and mounted pretty much right next to each other in three separate rings. Now, wht would they have done that, I wonder? [G]

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3091&p=67396&hilit=Cataphract#p67396

Obviously it's not as advanced as the Havenite Wars fleets' MDM's, but it's a beastly clever way of getting something like it.

JeffEngel wrote:

ericth wrote:This is part of one of the sub-discussions taking place in this thread, but I wanted to ask a question:

Are the technodyne missiles truly multi-stage, or multi-drive? In SftS the textev states a counter missile drive stage was grafted on to the rest of the missile, but I interpreted that to mean it didnt actually separate from the main body, but was there to provide sufficient physical separation that whatever less-effective-than-the-Baffle shielding they came up with would work. I suspect that's also a reason Havenite MDMs were consistently mentioned as much larger than alliance ones. They couldnt quite duplicate the Baffle and had to introduce some physical separation to compensate.

RFC describes it specifically as a whole separate stage:

There is a reason Technodyne's approach in the Cataphract was to put what amounts to an entirely separate missile on the nose of the main missile. When I say they basically strapped a counter-missile onto the basic SLN missiles, that's exactly what I mean; they completely separated the impeller ring for the "final stage" from the impeller ring for the "booster stage," whereas the impeller nodes for a Manty/Havenite/Andermani MDM are all associated with a single power source and mounted pretty much right next to each other in three separate rings. Now, wht would they have done that, I wonder? [G]

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3091&p=67396&hilit=Cataphract#p67396

Obviously it's not as advanced as the Havenite Wars fleets' MDM's, but it's a beastly clever way of getting something like it.

I've even wondered if the CM drive nodes are additionally protected by (presumably) being smaller diameter - so they sit within the diameter of the main drive rings.

After all the aft drive rings on an SD(P) are quite close to the internal pod tracks (due to the squeeze fitting 6 of them through to the aft hammerhead) - yet the very powerful main drive nodes don't screw up the nodes or molycics of the pods' missiles as they go by. I could easily believe that the disruptive interference is largely radiated sideways and "upwards" -- with the interior of the ring being largely free from it.

Although maybe I'm over-thinking it since I got the impression that pinnace and assault shuttle missiles are carried externally - and they don't get screwed up by relative proximity to the active drive ring of the pinnace (or shuttle).

JeffEngel wrote:RFC describes it specifically as a whole separate stage:

There is a reason Technodyne's approach in the Cataphract was to put what amounts to an entirely separate missile on the nose of the main missile. When I say they basically strapped a counter-missile onto the basic SLN missiles, that's exactly what I mean; they completely separated the impeller ring for the "final stage" from the impeller ring for the "booster stage," whereas the impeller nodes for a Manty/Havenite/Andermani MDM are all associated with a single power source and mounted pretty much right next to each other in three separate rings. Now, wht would they have done that, I wonder? [G]

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3091&p=67396&hilit=Cataphract#p67396

Obviously it's not as advanced as the Havenite Wars fleets' MDM's, but it's a beastly clever way of getting something like it.

Thanks for the reference. I'm perfectly prepared to concede physically separate "stages" in the sense of separate hardware, and separate locations. This may be nit picking, but I'm not quite convinced the booster detaches from the main body when it's done. The need for separation could be due to less effective shielding techniques than the alliance has. Although the pull-push idea fits nicely with MaxxQ's description of the booster pulling away to give the sustainer a clear wedge perimeter.
However, I can see a problem with that approach as the missile is likely more vulnerable at the change-over moment and that could happen within interception range of the target.

Ok here is an idea how about they just delete most of the energy broadside armament as on a SD(P) if you have anything in energy range something has already gone terribly wrong and you are screwed anyways so after you delete all of the energy weapons why don't you replace them with more laser clusters and in some of that space put in some sort of Keyhole like platform that is dedicated purely to missile defense so it has a large number of laser clusters built into it along with a bunch of CM command channels and if there is enough space also load it up with CM launchers AKA basically attach a remote platform to the SD(P) that fills the same role as the Katanas except it is built into the SD(P) so it has access to all of the SD(P) resources. Now if it turns out that you still need some sort of energy weapons i would say use more of the freed up space to expand the CM tubes magazines and load them up with lots of MK-9 Vipers which you could use to deal with light vessels that get to close.

Another option would be to make the CMs have longer range and load them up with much more powerful sensors and ais so they become fire and forget missiles so you do not need to provide as much guidance from the launching platform.

First of all, welcome to the forum captain joe (and remember, periods are your friend--that first paragraph is a bit hard to parse) and the first Old Tillman is on the house.

captinjoehenry wrote:Ok here is an idea how about they just delete most of the energy broadside armament as on a SD(P) if you have anything in energy range something has already gone terribly wrong

It's been moving that way; Gryphon-calss SD's (the last non-pod-layer) had 22 Grasers and 19 Lasers in their broadsides and 5 Grasers/4 lasers as chase. Medusa's (the first SD(P)'s), had only 15 Grasers/13 Lasers and the same chase armament. Invictus-class podnoughts dispensed with lasers altogether and have 18 Grazers per broadside and 10 Grasers per chase.

So it's gone from 98 energy mounts to 72 to 56, so about a 40% reduction.

and you are screwed anyways so after you delete all of the energy weapons why don't you replace them with more laser clusters and in some of that space put in some sort of Keyhole like platform that is dedicated purely to missile defense so it has a large number of laser clusters built into it along with a bunch of CM command channels

Definitely survivability in the next generation of SD(P)'s is a concern after recent demonstations of the destructive power of Apollo, so it will be interesting to see if any of your ideas are used.

and if there is enough space also load it up with CM launchers AKA basically attach a remote platform to the SD(P) that fills the same role as the Katanas except it is built into the SD(P) so it has access to all of the SD(P) resources. Now if it turns out that you still need some sort of energy weapons i would say use more of the freed up space to expand the CM tubes magazines and load them up with lots of MK-9 Vipers which you could use to deal with light vessels that get to close.

Here I think you are complicating matters, but I'll leave it to others to comment, as this is not really my best skill set.

Another option would be to make the CMs have longer range and load them up with much more powerful sensors and ais so they become fire and forget missiles so you do not need to provide as much guidance from the launching platform.

The longer and more capable, the larger they may get and ship size/capabilites do have a limit. And with the LAC Doctrine in place, there is already a major forward defense screen out there.

We shall see.

captinjoehenry wrote:Oafter you delete all of the energy weapons why don't you replace them with more laser clusters and in some of that space put in some sort of Keyhole like platform that is dedicated purely to missile defense so it has a large number of laser clusters built into it along with a bunch of CM command channels

This is the main role of Keyhole 1 platforms as deployed now, and a major part of KH2's design already. Adding another KH platform doesn't really work anyway, if you look at the line drawings in House of Steel and MaxxQ's renders, you'll see that even on a Superdreadnought, Keyholes take up a lot of space in the broadside, and their berth is a rather significant weak point in the armor scheme.

In order to defend against Apollo, you need to intercept the attack birds long before they are in range, which under the rules of Honorverse ship design means a different ship deployed on the missile's line of approach. I don't think that unmanned drones carried by ships of the wall and deployed as necessary can do that well, this is a situation where the screen has to be repositioned (instead of deploying it at the edges of a Wall).

The E wrote:

captinjoehenry wrote:Oafter you delete all of the energy weapons why don't you replace them with more laser clusters and in some of that space put in some sort of Keyhole like platform that is dedicated purely to missile defense so it has a large number of laser clusters built into it along with a bunch of CM command channels

This is the main role of Keyhole 1 platforms as deployed now, and a major part of KH2's design already. Adding another KH platform doesn't really work anyway, if you look at the line drawings in House of Steel and MaxxQ's renders, you'll see that even on a Superdreadnought, Keyholes take up a lot of space in the broadside, and their berth is a rather significant weak point in the armor scheme.

In order to defend against Apollo, you need to intercept the attack birds long before they are in range, which under the rules of Honorverse ship design means a different ship deployed on the missile's line of approach. I don't think that unmanned drones carried by ships of the wall and deployed as necessary can do that well, this is a situation where the screen has to be repositioned (instead of deploying it at the edges of a Wall).

I agree with you but what we are looking for is someway to give SD(P) organic missile defense that the Katanas currently provide which is why I am basically suggesting that the SD(P) should have a remote platform that fills the role of the Katanas. Because short of that or a major change in the current CM technology or laser clusters i see no way to improve a SD(P) organic point defense ability. Also where are the keyhole platforms located when they are deployed because I think they are located above and below the ships wedge but they are mounted in broadside bays which is not where I would put them if they were going to be above and below the wedge.