Designing a Carrier in 2E

[Tyrel Lohr]

As I continue to work on the tech and unit rules, I decided it might be nice to have a "live fire" demonstration of what starship design looks like in 2E. I have talked about it in length in the other thread, but I think it would be more interesting to show an actual ship being put together to better illustrate how everything works.

First of all, let's suppose that we are a bunch of plucky humans that want to design a new carrier. We are fairly low-tech right now, with the current tech levels: Defense 3, Anti-Ship 4, Anti-Fighter 3, Command 3, Engines 2, Carrier 3, Sensors 2, FTL 1, Shipyard 2.

The first step when designing our carrier is to decide how big we want it to be (Unit Size). The larger the carrier, the more Mass we will have available to purchase equipment with. However, larger ships will cost more to build (Mass / 100), take longer to build, and require more Docks during construction.

At this point, we should probably look at our imaginary economy and see just how much money we want to be spending on each carrier. After all, if our economy can only afford to be spending 9 EP a piece on these carriers, then designing a more expensive unit isn't going to be doing us a whole lot of good.

Let's just assume that we do want to spend 9 EP per carrier when all is said and done. That gives us a desired Maximum Mass of 900. Looking at the available ship sizes/archetypes, that gives us two optimal candidates: the SIZ 5 Protected Cruiser hull or the SIZ 6 Heavy Cruiser hull, with Maximum Mass values of 900 and 1100, respectively (these numbers are still in flux, and will likely change after further testing).

Now, why would we ever choose the CA hull over the CP? The answer is Maintenance Cost. You calculate MC by taking your unit's Mass divided by the Maximum Mass for the class, then multiply the result by the Unit Size divided by 10. A 900 Mass CP would cost 0.50 to maintain, while a 900 Mass CA would cost 0.49 to maintain. Honestly, this isn't much of a savings -- if you had 10 of these carriers, you would save 1.2 EP per year on maintenance going with the CA over the CP.

One other benefit to going with the CA is that it makes your ship look larger than it really is, which could be valuable when playing in a campaign that makes good use of fog of war rules. Your opponent might think your 900 Mass CA might actually be a full 1100 Mass CA until he has a run in with them and realizes the difference.

In our case, we are going to go with the CP hull. It is smaller, which will be better for our supposed empire. At Unit Size 5, the CP will require 5 Docks per carrier to build at our shipyards. Our current Shipyard tech level is 2, so each of our shipyards will provide 3 Docks (Shipyard TL + 1 = Docks per shipyard). That means we will have to dedicated two shipyards per carrier to build these units, with 1 Dock leftover for other purposes.

All right, so far we have defined that we are going to use up to a maximum of 900 Mass for our ship, and that it is going to be a SIZ 5 Protected Cruiser with Command Cost 2. That gives us our initial stats -- now to add equipment!

Before we do that, however, let's give our new ship class a name. I'll call it a Columbus-class, since Jay and I were just in Columbus last week for Origins 2009. That way we have a friendly name to refer to our carrier class as for the remainder of this write up.

As our first equipment purchase, let's buy some Command equipment for our carrier. Command costs 40 Mass at TL 0, and we are at TL 3, so our cost is 40 x 0.87^3 = 27 Mass per point. Traditionally in VBAM, we try to give units a Command Rating that is equal to three times its Command Cost. Therefore, let's give the Columbus-class a Command Rating of 6, at a Mass Cost of 27 x 6 = 162 Mass. Wow! That's a lot of Mass! It's expensive, too, when you stop and consider that it also represents a cost of 1.62 EP. If we end up running low on Mass later, we could always reduce ourselves to Command 5.

Next, let's add some Defense Rating to the Columbus. Units don't *have* to have Defense equipment installed, but any unit with a Defense Rating of 0 are destroyed with their first point of damage, so players are strongly encouraged to beef up their units accordingly. The Columbus is going to be a fairly passive unit, but it needs to be able to survive in order to support its fighter flights. Our current Defense tech level is 3 and Defense's base cost is 50, so Defense currently costs us 50 x 0.87^3 = 33 Mass per point, and we have 738 Mass remaining after purchasing Command Rating. For right now, we'll purchase 7 Defense for this ship, at a cost of 231 Mass. That leaves us with 507 Mass remaining for other systems.

Speaking of other systems, we probably should put some Engines on the Columbus! Engines cost Unit Size x 20, and we have TL 2 in that field. That gives us a Mass Cost of (5 x 20) x 0.87^2 = 76. Ouch! This carrier is not going to be a speed demon. We can probably put 2 Engines onboard and still have enough space left over for its carrier duties and some guns, so let's do that. That costs 152 Mass, and brings our available Mass down to 355.

Before we go any further, let's add Carrier Rating to our carrier (kind of important!). Carrier has a Mass Cost of 30, and we have TL 3 in the field. That gives us a Mass Cost of 30 x 0.87^3 = 20 Mass each. Now, in Second Edition, flight units can take up a variable amount of basing capacity, so the higher the Columbus' Carrier Rating, the more versatility we will have when it comes to assigning fighters to it later. In our case, though, we are running out of Mass on this hull... so let's add 10 Carrier Rating to the ship, costing 200 Mass. We have 155 Mass left to spend.

The Columbus currently looks like this: Defense 6, Engines 2, Command 6, Carrier 10.

It would be nice to put some guns on this carrier, so that it could at least try to defend itself. Anti-Ship costs us 50 x 0.87^4 = 29, and Anti-Fighter costs us 50 x 0.87^3 = 33. We could add 3 Anti-Ship and 2 Anti-Fighter to this hull, for a total Mass Cost of 153. That brings the Columbus' total Mass to 898.

Let's call it quits at this point. The final ship's stats are: Defense 6, Engines 2, Command 6, Anti-Ship 3, Anti-Fighter 2, Carrier 10.

Now, this ship lacks several other key components (Endurance for cruising range, Sensors for detection, etc.), and it also doesn't have an FTL drive... so it is stuck at home. Oops! That last one is a bit of an oversight. At FTL TL 1, each points costs us 100 x 0.87^1 = 87 Mass. We could add FTL 1 to the Columbus by gutting a few of its other systems: -1 Command (+27), -2 Carrier (+40), and -1 Anti-Ship (+29) give us 96 Mass, enough to pay for FTL 1 with 9 Mass left over.

The Columbus' total Mass should now be 889, and these are its stats: Defense 6, Engines 2, FTL 1, Command 5, Anti-Ship 2, Anti-Fighter 2, Carrier 8.

That's not bad for a sub-par protected cruiser hull! A few tech advances and we would be able to build an even better ship for less.

Now for the ship's other stats:

Construction Cost: 9 EP
Maintenance Cost: 0.49
Completion Time: 7 Turns

And, just for giggles, let's say we were also designing a SIZ 1 Light Fighter to be berthed aboard this Carrier. SIZ 1 Flights have a Maximum Mass of 50, which means that, well, they can't do much. In that 50 Mass we could just insert 1 Anti-Ship (29 Mass) and 1 Engine (all flights are considered to be SIZ 1 for Engine costs, so that is 20 x 0.87^2 = 16), for a total of 45 Mass.

I still have to get Flight costs locked down, but it likely that each of these Light Fighters could cost 1/3 to build (1 EP per 3 Flights), and their Maintenance Costs would be in the region of 0.05. Completion Time is 1 Turn, as they are SIZ 1, and because they are SIZ 1 each Light Fighter occupies a single point of Carrier Rating -- the Columbus could carry 8 of them.

-Tyrel

[Charles Lewis]

Thanks for sharing! Now what am I going to put in the next Dev Journal?

j/k

Personally, I'm really liking how this system is coming together. I hope others do, too!

[MarkG88]

I'm really enjoying what I'm seeing. Thanks Tyrel good stuff!

[OldnGrey]

And, just for giggles, let's say we were also designing a SIZ 1 Light Fighter to be berthed aboard this Carrier. SIZ 1 Flights have a Maximum Mass of 50, which means that, well, they can't do much. In that 50 Mass we could just insert 1 Anti-Ship (29 Mass) and 1 Engine (all flights are considered to be SIZ 1 for Engine costs, so that is 20 x 0.87^2 = 16), for a total of 45 Mass.

I still have to get Flight costs locked down, but it likely that each of these Light Fighters could cost 1/3 to build (1 EP per 3 Flights), and their Maintenance Costs would be in the region of 0.05. Completion Time is 1 Turn, as they are SIZ 1, and because they are SIZ 1 each Light Fighter occupies a single point of Carrier Rating -- the Columbus could carry 8 of them.

-Tyrel

So a Carrier Rating of 1 costs a base 30 mass, and can only contain 1 SIZ 1 fighter.
The example flight above has a mass of 45 but how many SIZ 1 fighters are in this flight?
If a basic flight, which seems to have been 6 for ages, then each fighter has a mass of 7.5.
Therefore in this example it costs 200 mass to carry 60 mass of fighters.

Is it just me (Jay would probably say it is) or does this seem wrong somehow?

Paul

[HairyHeretic]

Well, its not just going to be the fighters, is it? There'll be the bunk space for the pilots, and the infrastructure for both flights and crew ... weapons storage, fuel, servicing, spare parts. I would assume all of that is being covered by the mass devoted to the fighter basing.

[OldnGrey]

I think what I am trying to say is that having the construction as a flight and "Carrier basing" as a fighter makes it look lopsided.
A flight (above example) has AS 1, so unless we are going into fractions for the odd fighters left over or they are "spares", they may as well not be there.
Might just be that for a while it has been basing 1=1 flight Vs Carrier 1 = 1 SIZ 1 fighter.
Fighters could get very costly quickly unless they a generous tech level and a large ship.

Paul

[Charles Lewis]

But with that Carrier 8 rating you could instead carry four SIZ 2 fighters rather than eight SIZ 1. Or some combination thereof.

[OldnGrey]

But with that Carrier 8 rating you could instead carry four SIZ 2 fighters rather than eight SIZ 1. Or some combination thereof.

That is a given for this system, but the stats are per "Flight" not fighter, so it still comes down to how many fighters are in a flight and how much is the cost of a flight going to jump per SIZ of fighter?

If fighters fight in set flights, which I presume would need to be if AS and AF are bought per flight, then would'nt Carrier be chosen in flight "sizes"?
Would it be cost effective to carry less than full flights?

Do you see what I mean? I do not always explain well.

Paul

[Tyrel Lohr]

I think the confusion is that Flight units are tracked as cohesive elements -- you do not purchase or base individual fighters, for example, you purchase and base Flights as a whole. So the stats for the fighter class I designed in the example (SIZ 1, 45 Mass) is for an entire Flight of those fighters, not the cost for each individual fighter.

The reason why we don't want to touch the question of "how many fighters are in a flight?" and track fighters individually is because the number of small craft in a Flight can vary dramatically from setting to setting. For Wing Commander, the numbers are quite low -- 1 to 3 fighters per flight. For Babylon 5 and Star Wars, the numbers tend to be in the 4-8 range, IIRC.

As for the reason that Carrier Rating has a Mass Cost of 30, the real reason is because it is nearly half of what AS/AF cost and balances out the fact that a carrier has to actually be equipped with Flights to have any real combat effects. This mass is used to provide the crew, fuel, and servicing facilities that Flights and their pilots require (as HairyHeretic described previously).

Now, one thing I am toying with (as it would make the rules easier) is to require Carrier Rating to be used to repair damaged Flights. There could be another related technology that is more cost efficient for this purpose, too. Basically, under this system Carrier Rating would double as Repair Rating for purposes of repairing damaged Flights. Each point of Carrier Rating would allow you to repair 1 Damage from any one based Flight unit. Flights cost so little to begin with that paying for repairs ala Starships doesn't make sense, so I thought a Carrier-based repair system would be the way to go. Then we just need some sort of a "Flight Ops" or "Machine Shop" secondary tech that would carry out repairs without providing basing, so that players could opt to specialize in that direction if they wanted to.

Also, based on your comments in the other thread, Paul, I am leaning towards using a formula similar to the Starmada one which would top out the Maximum Mass of a superdreadnought at 2000, and reduce the Max Mass of a heavy cruiser to 1000. That seems to bring the ships more in line with where they should be, more or less, because that would force the Columbus-class from my example to be a heavy cruiser, which based on its stats seems like a better fit.

Flights would use a similar system, except their Max Mass values would have 1/4 that of the starships. This allows a player to build a super-heavy gunboat at SIZ 10 and have 500 Mass available. Sure, that allows the Flight to be more powerful than a full destroyer, but it also would require 10 Carrier Rating to base (or else probably 2 Tender Rating, if building dedicated gunboat tenders).

-Tyrel

[OldnGrey]

I think the confusion is that Flight units are tracked as cohesive elements -- you do not purchase or base individual fighters, for example, you purchase and base Flights as a whole. So the stats for the fighter class I designed in the example (SIZ 1, 45 Mass) is for an entire Flight of those fighters, not the cost for each individual fighter.

The reason why we don't want to touch the question of "how many fighters are in a flight?" and track fighters individually is because the number of small craft in a Flight can vary dramatically from setting to setting. For Wing Commander, the numbers are quite low -- 1 to 3 fighters per flight. For Babylon 5 and Star Wars, the numbers tend to be in the 4-8 range, IIRC.
-Tyrel

What had me confused was "because they are SIZ 1 each Light Fighter occupies a single point of Carrier Rating -- the Columbus could carry 8 of them. "
Should this have been each Light Fighter Flight?

Also, based on your comments in the other thread, Paul, I am leaning towards using a formula similar to the Starmada one which would top out the Maximum Mass of a superdreadnought at 2000, and reduce the Max Mass of a heavy cruiser to 1000. That seems to bring the ships more in line with where they should be, more or less, because that would force the Columbus-class from my example to be a heavy cruiser, which based on its stats seems like a better fit.
-Tyrel

Why a formula since there are only ten mass ranges and you have already decided where the middle and end are? Just curious since you must already have an idea of where you want the divisions to be.

Flights would use a similar system, except their Max Mass values would have 1/4 that of the starships. This allows a player to build a super-heavy gunboat at SIZ 10 and have 500 Mass available. Sure, that allows the Flight to be more powerful than a full destroyer, but it also would require 10 Carrier Rating to base (or else probably 2 Tender Rating, if building dedicated gunboat tenders).

-Tyrel

Oh poo! Excuse me. Does that mean that small ships will be in flights?
Jay and I have been exchanging ideas on constructing small ships from Attack Boats up as individuals (been going through the Starmada Edition while making new counters) and just about had it down pat. Attack Boats only being permitted using the Ammo rules so they have to return to their tender or station to re-arm (if they survive).

Paul

[terryoc]

I think it'd be useful to distinguish between "small, but fully capable, starship" and "planet or tender based patrol boat". Because my favourite system, SFB/FC, does that. So when you talk about a "flight" of "super-heavy gunboats", are you talking about something like a flotilla of SFB PFs with six to a flotilla (or whatever your source material defines)? In SFB, a flotilla (or "flight" if you like) of PFs has as much firepower as a dreadnought, but has no command capabilities, pretty much no ability to self-repair, no ability to reload consumables (like missiles), and very limited strategic range (a few hundred parsecs from the tender). They also tend to blow up pretty easily. So I imagine that a gunboat/PF flotilla would have considerable Mass, but require a lot of basing capacity (the tender having little self-defense capability of its own), and most of the Mass is put to AS systems.

[Tyrel Lohr]

What had me confused was "because they are SIZ 1 each Light Fighter occupies a single point of Carrier Rating -- the Columbus could carry 8 of them. "
Should this have been each Light Fighter Flight?

Yes, the units are handled on a Flight basis, so the unit's SIZ is the amount of space it takes to base a Flight of that unit type.

Why a formula since there are only ten mass ranges and you have already decided where the middle and end are? Just curious since you must already have an idea of where you want the divisions to be.

I have been going back and forth as to where I thought the divisions should be, and what would be best for playability. As you say, if the initial book limits the player to ten size options, why define a formula otherwise? The answer is mainly to provide some consistency for future development. As for changing the values, I have to do some testing to see if having the Maximum Mass of a superdreadnought be 2500 (at current) or 2000 (as per formula) would provide a more balanced game experience.

Most of the values I picked on the lower end already line up pretty well with those of the formula provided, and those all seem to work -- I was most worried about making sure that SIZ 1-4 was balanced, so that players could still build interesting frigates and destroyers while still not allowing them to be *too* effective.

Oh poo! Excuse me. Does that mean that small ships will be in flights?
Jay and I have been exchanging ideas on constructing small ships from Attack Boats up as individuals (been going through the Starmada Edition while making new counters) and just about had it down pat. Attack Boats only being permitted using the Ammo rules so they have to return to their tender or station to re-arm (if they survive).

Small ships are still supposed to be individual units, though there is nothing saying they couldn't be handled as "flotillas" for thematic purposes (the game let's you get away with handwaving a lot of stuff away to fit your respective source materials).

Attack Boats would be the equivalent of large Flight units, but they could just as easily be Flights of one instead of Flights of two, six, eight, etc.

Jay hasn't mentioned anything about the Attack Boat conversations with me, so I haven't incorporated any of those ideas into 2E. The idea of forcing them to return to their carriers to rearm their expendable weapons sounds like an interesting idea!

So I imagine that a gunboat/PF flotilla would have considerable Mass, but require a lot of basing capacity (the tender having little self-defense capability of its own), and most of the Mass is put to AS systems.

That is the direction that I am taking Flights in 2E. On the lower end you have your traditional fighters and shuttles, but on the upper end up you have gunboats and other "daughter craft" that have to be based either from a planet or carrier. The equivalent of PFs in 2E would be large Flights, but the construction rules as written wouldn't allow them to be as powerful as a dreadnought, but I SIZ 10 Gunboat flight would have the Mass equivalent of a Heavy Cruiser at about half the cost.

Flights in 2E also lack Command Ratings or Command Costs, as their deployment is entirely limited by their basing unit. This is both a good and bad thing for players, as it means that a force with sufficient basing can commit large number of Flights to a battle; however, a fleet has to have carriers or tenders to transport and launch its Flights or else the Flights might end up just sitting around waiting to be destroyed.

-Tyrel

[nimrodd]

Okay, so what are the differences in the size values 1-10 for ships and for fighters? From the examples you have given, I have these values:
SHIPS
Size 1 - 100 Max Mass
Size 3 - 400
Size 5 - 900
Size 6 - 1100
Size 10 - 2500 (or possibly 2000)

FIGHTERS
Size 1 - 50 Max Mass

There's not that much difference in size (relatively speaking) between a Size 1 fighter flight & a Size 1 ship. I was under the impression that there would be greater differences.

Also, your examples from the carrier design:

Before we go any further, let's add Carrier Rating to our carrier (kind of important!). Carrier has a Mass Cost of 30, and we have TL 3 in the field. That gives us a Mass Cost of 30 x 0.87^3 = 20 Mass each. Now, in Second Edition, flight units can take up a variable amount of basing capacity, so the higher the Columbus' Carrier Rating, the more versatility we will have when it comes to assigning fighters to it later. In our case, though, we are running out of Mass on this hull... so let's add 10 Carrier Rating to the ship, costing 200 Mass. We have 155 Mass left to spend.

And, just for giggles, let's say we were also designing a SIZ 1 Light Fighter to be berthed aboard this Carrier. SIZ 1 Flights have a Maximum Mass of 50, which means that, well, they can't do much. In that 50 Mass we could just insert 1 Anti-Ship (29 Mass) and 1 Engine (all flights are considered to be SIZ 1 for Engine costs, so that is 20 x 0.87^2 = 16), for a total of 45 Mass.

How do you fit a Size 1 Flight (Max Mass 50) into 1 Carrier Point (Mass 30 before Tech reduction). To me, 1 Carrier Point should be equal to the mass of a Size 1 Flight. This should not be able to be reduced by Tech, since the Flight Size itself is not actually shrinking with TL, just the components you put in them.

After all, this is a Carrier, not a Tardis.

[nimrodd]

Is 2E still going to have #* weaponry for fighters, or is it going to be only whole numbers now?

[wminsing]

There's not that much difference in size (relatively speaking) between a Size 1 fighter flight & a Size 1 ship. I was under the impression that there would be greater differences.

I think the disconnect is that it 'Ship Mass' and 'Fighter Mass' do not appear to be exactly analogous. That is, 50 mass of fighter does not equal exactly 50 mass of ship. In the construction system it may be better to make this more explicit. I might even consider dropping 'mass' as a term- it does create assumptions about sizes of things that will trip people up, when all it really is a highly abstract measurement of capability costs.

The example is overall great though, the possibilities inherent in the construction system make me really excited to start a new campaign.

-Will