Battle-Class Ships (BCS? FCS?) Again (Rob / 2026)

[Badenov]

Did you consider the effect configuration has on the odds of penetration (assuming you're using CT's HG, of course)? A wedge hull is fairly popular, and reduce the number of damaging hits from the J Meson to 1.6, the N Meson to 3.2, and the T Meson to 2.4, putting the J well behind.

I had not included the configuration in my calculation because I had planned for all the ships to have the same config, so in theory it wouldn't skew any results, but you are correct in your calculations and I agree with your conclusions. The bigger mesons are more able to make any Config roll more easily, but not enough to change the result from favoring the N meson.

The wedge is the most effective of the aerodynamic hulls, and one of the most effective of all the hulls. Distributed and Buffered Planetoid are more effective, but have overwhelming drawbacks. And the ability to field refuel adds a ton of tactical flexibility. I consider the wedge hull essential for any line of battle ship just for the ability to field refuel. That said, for capitol carriers and other ships that are not planning on sitting in the front line, Conf 6, Flattened Sphere, gives you all the perks of streamlining on the cheap. It's more vulnerable to Mesons (but realistically, the wedge doesn't buy you much protection, either), and if those ships are getting shot at, it's already gone into the toilet and you're pretty much screwed. The line-of-battle ships don't get a ton of protection against full power Meson Beams, but I'm expecting attacking mesons to be degraded as missile and particle hits spread out the damage.

All off-topic for this thread, though.

Well, the topic's drifted a bit, so yes. I wasn't clear on the purpose of the original thread, but I felt compelled to share because I have done the deep dive into the assertions made subsequently. .

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Tonnage	Qty in 60,000 tons	Hits vs Meson Screen 9
7500, J Meson	8	2.22
10000, N Meson	6	3.5
20000, T Meson	3	2.5

You are simplifying a little to far, I believe...

I get something like this:


The T gun is just too large.
The N gun is superior to the J gun, slightly ameliorated by having more J riders, hence damage resilience.

1MDt is 105 N Riders or 142 J Riders.
105 N Riders will kill 9.4 or 6.6% of the J Riders.
142 J Riders will kill 4.8 or 4.6% of the N Riders.
The N gun is still winning, but at a lower margin.

PA T riders will kill them all at an alarming rate, of course.


And shooting at a lower tech TL-14 target (Zho, Solo, etc.)


Against a lower TL enemy the Mes J is probably superior.
Who are you planning to fight, other Impies or Zhos?
Perhaps the frontier fleets have J guns and the Core fleets have N guns?

 

[whartung]

As is apparent, the difference is not huge

A 60% difference in effectiveness of the N gun over the J gun is huge.

Whether they cost out that way is a different story.

 

[Badenov]

You are simplifying a little to far, I believe...

I get something like this:
View attachment 7511

The T gun is just too large.
The N gun is superior to the J gun, slightly ameliorated by having more J riders, hence damage resilience.

1MDt is 105 N Riders or 142 J Riders.
105 N Riders will kill 9.4 or 6.6% of the J Riders.
142 J Riders will kill 4.8 or 4.6% of the N Riders.
The N gun is still winning, but at a lower margin.

PA T riders will kill them all at an alarming rate, of course.


And shooting at a lower tech TL-14 target (Zho, Solo, etc.)
View attachment 7510

Against a lower TL enemy the Mes J is probably superior.
Who are you planning to fight, other Impies or Zhos?
Perhaps the frontier fleets have J guns and the Core fleets have N guns?

I did simplify a lot. In my defense, my quick answer turns out to agree with your more complicated answer, though I didn't pick up a lot of the nuance you did. I also wasn't able to get the TL14 Mesons into the same hull tonnages that the TL15 versions fit into. The interesting thing was how lethal the PA ships are, and that's one of the reasons I bumped the N Meson riders to 10,000 D-Tons - they take one less size-based crit from the T PAs. At the 60,000 ton fleet size, my PAs slip in at 12,000 tons, so I get 5 in my fleet. If the PA SDBs hit on 6+ (TN: 0 + Agi 6), that's a 72% hit rate, and at 10,000T, Size K, only one crit, so 33% take-down crit rate, I get about a (5 x .73 x .33=) 1.2 ship take-down rate, much less than the Meson N take-down rate at that fleet size.

I reran my math at the Million D-Ton fleet size and got your numbers, so I have mathed wrong somewhere, but I'm not quite sure where or how, .

A 60% difference in effectiveness of the N gun over the J gun is huge.

Whether they cost out that way is a different story.

Sorry, I was thinking additively rather than multiplicatively, I blame the late hour. As I said, the costs are roughly proportional to the ship tonnage. The Meson N is 10,000T and 11,284 MCr. The Meson T is 19,999T and 18.049 MCr. The lower proportional cost is because I had to trim the armor down to 12 to get the T Meson down to under 20,000T.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

If the PA SDBs hit on 6+ (TN: 0 + Agi 6), that's a 72% hit rate, and at 10,000T, Size K, only one crit, so 33% take-down crit rate, I get about a (5 x .73 x .33=) 1.2 ship take-down rate, much less than the Meson N take-down rate at that fleet size.

I reran my math at the Million D-Ton fleet size and got your numbers, so I have mathed wrong somewhere, but I'm not quite sure where or how, .

As I used the wrong to hit for PAs, as you noted, I hope you didn't get exactly the same...


At short range, mesons are better:

Better make sure you can control the range, add some cheap frigates, at even more cost...

The weakness of PAs is that a single weapon hit will reduce their effectiveness. It's only 3.6 turns in the reserve, but that is too long...

Increasing the size of the riders and hardening them against crits somewhat (spare computers, screens, crews) makes them larger, hence more expensive, hence fewer, hence less guns, hence less good against other meson riders.


Note that without spare crews, computers, and screens, the kill chance on a crit is more like 58% than 33%... Fairly cheap insurance.


Killing size A screens:

 

[Badenov]

As I used the wrong to hit for PAs, as you noted, I hope you didn't get exactly the same...

Sorry, I wasn't looking carefully. I got the 17.8, and mixed it up with the 17.1.

View attachment 7513

This last case is why my riders are a full 10,000 tons. 1 fewer crit is a huge deal. And vs TL14, you don't even take that.

At short range, mesons are better:
View attachment 7514
Better make sure you can control the range, add some cheap frigates, at even more cost...

So, if it's Meson vs PA, the Meson side will close if it can. Otherwise, I imagine neither side would take the risk without some other advantage. Rating 3 or 5 pilots would help here. IMTU, there is a training pipeline for command pilots prior to assuming their duty station.

The weakness of PAs is that a single weapon hit will reduce their effectiveness. It's only 3.6 turns in the reserve, but that is too long...

A damaged PA won't generate kill shots, but it will still degrade the hell out of a target's weapons.

Increasing the size of the riders and hardening them against crits somewhat (spare computers, screens, crews) makes them larger, hence more expensive, hence fewer, hence less guns, hence less good against other meson riders.

Screens are a must for me and Meson Screen 9 is standard on my ships. It cuts the hits almost in half for N Mesons, and by like 3/4 for J Mesons. That's a big deal.

Note that without spare crews, computers, and screens, the kill chance on a crit is more like 58% than 33%... Fairly cheap insurance.

I have 3 sections worth of Frozen Watch, and the Screens, but I left out the backup computer to make room for another missile bay. But I'm weighing one extra missile bay as a smidgen more defense vs the Suicide Sled configuration vs the spare comp as a defense against the PA crits.

Killing size A screens:
View attachment 7516

The problem with screening ships is they take away space in the carrier from ships than can generate kills. As system defenders, sure, but they can only generate weapon degrade hits, the same as PA's that have been degraded, so not useless, but it still takes budget from ships that can generate kills, so I'm not sure they're a good use of budget.

 

[mike wightman]

You play the game. Your spinal ships take damage, you move them to the reserve to repair while your bricks soak the enemy attack. You then return to the line of battle. Repeat. You are hoping to mission kill some of his before he mission kills some of yours. The side that gets a numerical advantage can then tip the odds in their favour.

Note that navies rarely commit points balanced forces to an engagement...