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Ruger
Lyran Alliance
Hauptmann General
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 2039
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 Posted: 23-May-2002 12:29 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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An interesting discussion has popped up on the Classic BattleTech Message board concerning RCT transport and which would be better served for the role of troop transport...some maintain that it would be better to have multiple standard JumpShips than a WarShip akin to a Potempkin...thoughts?
Additionally, during the course of the discussion, it has been postulated that 2 Overlords and 3 Excaliburs would be enough to carry an entire RCT...I just spent about 30 minutes looking over the numbers, and here was my post in response to this assertion:
"Depends on the RCT...standard RCT composition is 132 'Mechs, 324 armored vehicles, 3591 infantry troopers, 36 artillery pieces and 40 aerospace fighters...some have more, some have less...this is the average...
The ships you list can only carry 108 'Mechs, 216 tanks, and 756 troopers...as well as 18 fighters...
Thus, none of the standard complements can be carried in their entirity by these 5 DropShips...at least not for the average RCT...best balance is 3 Overlords for most of the 'Mechs (2 are standard models, one is a Command model for overall unit command), 3 Excaliburs (for the rest of the 'Mechs, and most, 216, of the vehicles), and either 3 Triumphs (most cases) or 3 Hercules (for Lyran RCTs...not enough of these ships in service however) for the rest of the armor (108 tanks)...the Hercules version would take care of about half the infantry, which is not enough, and the Triumph version only one-third...this requires further troop transports, such as a pair of Condor DropShips, for the 40 artillery tanks, etc. that could possibly be carried between them, and the 24 platoons of troops, which about half of the infantry still needing to be taken into account by the Hercules battlegroup or one-third that by the Triump battlegroup...so, we need still more troop transports...Seekers work well in this role, 5 would fill out the infantry complement for the Hercules battlegroup, and allow for motorized infantry's bikes and jeeps...it would take 7 for the Triumph battlegroup...
Additionally, you still need to account for the remaining 22 aerospace fighters not accomodated by the Overlords...best bet is to have some of the Seekers converted to fighter/infantry carriers (to reduce total amounts of DropShips), or to include 4 Leopard CV-class DropShips...
So, by my count, this produces a relative minimum of 16 to 18 DropShips PER RCT, and perhaps as many as 20 or 22...This is using the largest capacity DropShips for most roles...it does not include Unions, Fortresses, normal Leopards, Furies, etc...The numbers could easily double or triple if such is used...
Nasty...and this does not include the newer, more specialized DropShip types like the Combine's Okinawa-class fighter carrier or their Nagumo-class infantry carrier, or the FWL's Hannibal-class armor/infantry transport..."
What do you think? Am I off or is my thinking on target?
Ruger
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Talen
Capellan Confederation
Sang-shao
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1269
Location: United States
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| Posted: 23-May-2002 12:55 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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Warship/Jumpship Problem
It depends on the size of the force. But I say have at least one of the carrier ships be a Warship, something to give assualt dropships something to think about if they are on an attack line. Even a small Destroyer would make dropship captains think twice about attacking the rest of the Jumpships. The problem is the cost of those ships. A long cylnder with a K-F Drive can house 6-7 Jumpships, so your mass of ships would go on those, while your escort droships/fighter carriers would stay with the Warship, mostly. For a 22-40 Dropship force (using your numbers) you are looking at about 5-10 Jumpships, plus at least one Warship, escorts, etc.
As for your numbers dealing with landing a force, does everything go down at once? I mean, technically a fleet could have one of those Mammoth (was that the one) class ships that could hold 1/2 their stuff, and then Overlords just ferry it down. Now, I dont have 3057 with me anymore (damn thing got thrown out),but I remember the Mammoth being pretty rare. I see your point with neededing lots of large, and even more medium size ships for an RCT, but when is a force that big actually landing at once? I havent read too many of the books, but the only time I remember forces in that number were the major battles of the Clan wars, prior the IS fleets couldnt transport enough 'mechs around at any one time. Right? DO they have enough ships to dedicate to that kind of transportation?
_________________
"Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well." - Leto II
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Ruger
Lyran Alliance
Hauptmann General
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 2039
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| Posted: 23-May-2002 13:07 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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On 2002-05-23 12:55, Talen wrote:
As for your numbers dealing with landing a force, does everything go down at once? I mean, technically a fleet could have one of those Mammoth (was that the one) class ships that could hold 1/2 their stuff, and then Overlords just ferry it down. Now, I dont have 3057 with me anymore (damn thing got thrown out),but I remember the Mammoth being pretty rare. I see your point with neededing lots of large, and even more medium size ships for an RCT, but when is a force that big actually landing at once? I havent read too many of the books, but the only time I remember forces in that number were the major battles of the Clan wars, prior the IS fleets couldnt transport enough 'mechs around at any one time. Right? DO they have enough ships to dedicate to that kind of transportation?
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Personally, I don't think BTech is really set up for spaceborne transfer of cargo like 'Mechs such as your suggesting...they'd most likely be crated, and then you'd have to get rid of the crates, etc...
The whole purpose of an RCT is to have a massive, combined arms force that assaults a planet together, blitzkrieging the opposition (at least in my mind's eye)...if you are going on an assault...you want all the forces of a unit on the ground at one time...this would mean that you want them to all go down together...at least the 'Mechs and portions of the armor need to go down together...and now there is battle armor to consider...I can easily see Seekers moddied to be aerospace fighter/Battle Armor carriers to secure initial LZs, maybe with some 'Mech support, and then the rest coming down within a few hours of that initial landings...in fact, that's the primary reason I suggested Seekers, due to their higher thrust abilities...they get in first, secure the initial LZ, and then the 'Mechs land, fully securing it, then the armor comes in with the arti...
At least, that's my opinion...I could be wrong...
Ruger
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Raven!
Clan Snow Raven
Galaxy Commander
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1326
Location: United States
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| Posted: 23-May-2002 13:31 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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I agree. When I first read about RCTs I was like "What Inner Sphere power even has the CAPABILITIES to have more then one or two of these?"
What you just outlined above seems to stress this point.
For example, say you do take the minimum number of dropships, what was it twelve? that you need to land the troops. This means you have no support ships and very limited fighter escort. One assault dropship and a few fighters (say a Claymore and a few wings) could seriously desimate your attack force before they had a chance to fight.
To avoid this it would be best to launch in a number of small vessels, which limits your losses in the event of a hull breach. Then you have the problem of needing more ships and jumpships, so you're better off bringing assault dropships of your own. The logistics for an operation of this scale would be enough to drive one insane.
Warships are almost a necessity for defense, but again they are VERY rare and spaced out. But when I think of something like this what i'm thinking of is the landing at Normandy. Not just a blitzkrieg attack, but full out warfare. Total warfare against a planet for complete domination and control against a counter attack.
Raven!
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Talen
Capellan Confederation
Sang-shao
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1269
Location: United States
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| Posted: 23-May-2002 14:11 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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You know, since an RCT force would be so hard to prp in the first place, due to the high volume of dropships needed, you would most likely dedicate Warships with assualt dropships to escort the smaller, cheaper Jumpships. Since you are looking at somewhere near 20-40 Dropships, you are investing quite a bit, so you'll need the heavy escorts such as Destroyers, Corvettes, and if the IS can field them, Cruisers and Battleships (3067 has some IS Battlecruisers, right?). I mean, what else are the Warships gonna do? The Clans dont use them too often due to it not being honorable, the other houses most likely have them sitting around doing nothing...so I'd say take the chance, throw 3 Battleships as escorts, loaded with assualt dropships and fighter carriers, and send your fleet in. Any one planet probably wont have enough defense to deal with it, espicially not in space.
Raven is right though, the logistics for such a force would be totally mind blowing, espicially for the Innersphere. The Clans have the resources...but not the will to use it.
_________________
"Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well." - Leto II
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Ruger
Lyran Alliance
Hauptmann General
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 2039
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| Posted: 24-May-2002 10:39 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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Quote:
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On 2002-05-23 14:11, Talen wrote:
You know, since an RCT force would be so hard to prp in the first place, due to the high volume of dropships needed, you would most likely dedicate Warships with assualt dropships to escort the smaller, cheaper Jumpships. Since you are looking at somewhere near 20-40 Dropships, you are investing quite a bit, so you'll need the heavy escorts such as Destroyers, Corvettes, and if the IS can field them, Cruisers and Battleships (3067 has some IS Battlecruisers, right?). I mean, what else are the Warships gonna do? The Clans dont use them too often due to it not being honorable, the other houses most likely have them sitting around doing nothing...so I'd say take the chance, throw 3 Battleships as escorts, loaded with assualt dropships and fighter carriers, and send your fleet in. Any one planet probably wont have enough defense to deal with it, espicially not in space.
Raven is right though, the logistics for such a force would be totally mind blowing, espicially for the Innersphere. The Clans have the resources...but not the will to use it.
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I remembered something else last night as I was getting off work, and Raven hinted at it...in addition to the forces I listed earlier, we'd also need assault DropShips for cover fire as well as freighter type DropShips for supplies...that easily tacks on another 10 to 20 DropShips...making the smallest size for RCT transport around 30 DropShips per RCT, and maybe upwards of 80 or more!
Yeesh!
Ruger
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Talen
Capellan Confederation
Sang-shao
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1269
Location: United States
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| Posted: 24-May-2002 11:22 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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And someone is trying to convince me that an IS house has the capability of doing this? This is a major militay opperation for an assualt on a capital world only, cause you arent gonna devote THAT much of a force otherwise. The problem is...the numbers arw only showing 120+ 'mechs. A capital world is gonna have more than that (3055+ that is), so your entire force dont mean Jack!
Espicially if someone takes Raven's Communist vehicle tactics into consideration. There could literally be hundreds of thousands of those things to augment whatever 'mech force the capital does have.
Basically this RCT would be a flashy show of weapons, but regulated to district capitals, a waste of 60 dropsips, and at least 10-15 Jumpships. This so-called force is useless unless the timing is so absolutely perfect that the defender army is caught with 3/4 of its force off planet.
When i first played this game, two jumpships were hard to find in the same star system...even the houses had troubles getting more than 5 of them going in the same direction for one of those command circuts. Now you wane me to think of 20 Jumpsips...yeesh.
_________________
"Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well." - Leto II
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Sir Henry
Team Bansai
Senior Tech Specialist
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 4899
Location: United States
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| Posted: 24-May-2002 13:23 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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It just takes alot of Logistic skills to accomplish it, but it can be done. Whether the Force suvives after getting there requires alot of other Skills. 120 Mechs??? A Solaris Stable????
Sir Henry
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Sir Henry
A Dragon in the disguise of a bunny, is still a Dragon.
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Raven!
Clan Snow Raven
Galaxy Commander
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1326
Location: United States
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| Posted: 24-May-2002 15:04 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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I don't even think the Snow Ravens have the ability to launch a force like that, and they have the most ships of any faction in the game. Perhaps if we teamed up with the Ghost Bears...
This is a huge undertaking though, and would have to be done mostly by combat drop (cause a smaller force could keep a larger force bottled up in a dropship, which would mean they only face four or five at a time, whatever can dismount, rather then the whole load at once). Major massive undertaking, I just don't see the Successor States doing it.
Hell i don't see the Clans doing it even if they dropped all ideas of honor.
Raven!
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Rarich
Federated Suns
Leftenant General
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 991
Location: United States
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 09:00 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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15 Starships: 5 Potemkins, 5 Monoliths and 5 Starlords This evenly splits the transport into 3 groups that match the 3 battalions
The massive transport capacity is needed to support the Assaultboat and Fleet aerospace. These units are needed to break into a system and get the troops on the ground. (this is about a third of the total)
The other 2/3 are the overlords, excaliburs, triumphs and seekers that land the RCT, with Carriers assigned for the RCT aerospace.
This makes for a huge fleet, but is more manageable than trying to load up on smaller ships. flexibility is maintained since Battalions can operate independantly. Supply can easily have their ships shuttling with supplies too.
The total Dropboat strength would be in the 45 to 50 range. using standard designs has some awkward fits with shortages of space in one area, and excess room in another.
Warships could be added to this with one assigned to each battalion flotilla. or a battlefleet of 9 ships could be assigned to the RCT fleet. The Potemkins would provide some warship capability, but they are more transports, right?
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Nuke a gay baby whale for the supreme being!
[ This Message was edited by: Rarich on 2002-05-28 09:07 ]
[ This Message was edited by: Rarich on 2002-05-28 09:13 ]
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Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side & a dark side, and strings also lie under it all.
Life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease.
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Talen
Capellan Confederation
Sang-shao
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1269
Location: United States
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 09:41 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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I guess I can call it pretty good...i said 10-15
If I still had my 3057, I could remember which Jumpships those were.
The problem is that you are looking at the minimum dropship requirements with large ships like Overlords. That is generally the main big boy, a few others here and there are larger...but rarer. The point is that in order to do this, the entire succesor house would suffer. This one RCT would draw from the entire fleet (cause I refuse to believe there are still a lot of the larger dropships out there, State-side, it has only been a few years (16 at most) since the IS re-agined the ability to create large ships.) and the entire fleet would suffer. If 2 Overlords had to be replaced by Unions, your Jumpship requirements go up fast.
_________________
"Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well." - Leto II
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Old Dog
Capellan Confederation
Sang-wei
Joined: 24-May-2002 00:00
Posts: 299
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 09:54 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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Here's a question I have: How economically sound is this? That is to say, how much would it cost to supply this force of 15 Jumpships, 50 Dropships, the Mechs, the Tanks, the Troops, the Techs, and so on with gear, gas, and grub?
A single RCT sounds like something you'd drop on Hesperus II, but only if you wanted to lose.
The teams are fantastic on defense, mind you, where men and machines have no transport worries, but, geeze.
Mechs were made into warriors for a reason: They're cheap to run, operate in small, easily-transported groups, and can go anywhere, landing and operating in any environment without support. To throw this away in favor of dropping some soldiers in a front-line drop, and tanks as well? Gads.
Seems as though it would work better to send in the Mechs, establish a 'beachhead' (Does that term apply when it isn't a beach?) then drop in some soldiers and engineers for guards and to set up defenses. Tanks and more men flow in for a third leg, when you start to prepare for an attack.
Do I grok this correctly?
-- Old Dog, always learning new tricks
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Ruger
Lyran Alliance
Hauptmann General
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 2039
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 15:25 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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Quote:
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On 2002-05-28 09:54, Old Dog wrote:
Here's a question I have: How economically sound is this? That is to say, how much would it cost to supply this force of 15 Jumpships, 50 Dropships, the Mechs, the Tanks, the Troops, the Techs, and so on with gear, gas, and grub?
A single RCT sounds like something you'd drop on Hesperus II, but only if you wanted to lose.
The teams are fantastic on defense, mind you, where men and machines have no transport worries, but, geeze.
Mechs were made into warriors for a reason: They're cheap to run, operate in small, easily-transported groups, and can go anywhere, landing and operating in any environment without support. To throw this away in favor of dropping some soldiers in a front-line drop, and tanks as well? Gads.
Seems as though it would work better to send in the Mechs, establish a 'beachhead' (Does that term apply when it isn't a beach?) then drop in some soldiers and engineers for guards and to set up defenses. Tanks and more men flow in for a third leg, when you start to prepare for an attack.
Do I grok this correctly?
-- Old Dog, always learning new tricks
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This is why, at least from what I remember reading, most RCTs are defensive units, only transfered between worlds to garrison the important ones...this is also why the 4th Succession War played merry hell with the economies of both the Lyran Commonwealth and Federated Suns...they didn't have enough transport for all the RCTs they were moving, and stripped what they needed from civilian corporations...
You'll notice that most troop movement right now deals with either moving whole units to garrison worlds, or when attacking, they only really send in the 'Mechs...and maybe relatively small numbers of tanks and infantry...
I expect the attacks on Tharkad and New Avalon to boast FULL RCT invasions...can you imagine the fleets that will be insystem then? New Avalon already has around 4 or 5 RCTs with another 2 to 4 stadand 'Mech units defending it now...and Vic is going to try and take it...standard military doctrine calls for the attacker to have AT LEAST 3 times the amount the defender has to take over a static objective without pyrrhic losses...and even then, victory is uncertain...
Ruger
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Talen
Capellan Confederation
Sang-shao
Joined: 05-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 1269
Location: United States
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 15:31 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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But then there is the "Mega Factor"...the factor that gives all of Vic's forces elite status and excellent luck...
_________________
"Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well." - Leto II
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Vagabond
Mercenary
Mr. Referee
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 5724
Location: United States
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| Posted: 28-May-2002 17:03 Post subject: RCT transportation... |
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in my experiences, theres no such thing as luck.
couldn't resist.
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one must work hard to cultivate the mind and body. and one must always cultivate the mind.
//^(^_^)^\\
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