Thinking about the Jump torp concept some more. Though I like it in concept I think it moves into the realm of "ultimate weapon" in the same manner as the KKV does - Its always been on my mind that anyone with a small enough engine to power even a small mass at a significant percentage of light speed and targeting it accurately ends all arguments. A 100 pound mass moving at .99C would probably destroy anything it hit. The problem with ultimate weapons is that once the technology is available, the bad guys can get them too, also they make for really boring space battles. The first one to score a hit wins. There are some great ideas here though that could really be fun. Using defense drones - or assault drones with various capabilities works well - particularly with the antimatter self destruct if they are jump drive equipped. Perhaps JECP (Jump equipped Combat Platform)
Somewhat like current UAV's - could consist of a mini ZPED, Limited Battery storage, mini Jump Drive, Jumpshield emitters, sensor package for recon, ECM, Decoy, - a few tactical nuke missiles, a plasma cannon, and a couple of plasma/energy turrets for point defense, small conventional drives and the self destruct device. Basically take everything that requires a person out of Falcon one, shrink it down, stealth it, and set up the frame to accept modular recon or weapon loads. Keep a few defense drones outside locked to the hull for instant deployment - other drones could be launched through the fighter launch tubes or en-masse off the apron.
For defense - use the point defense capability and plasma cannon to destroy incoming ordinance. Drones can jump around the ship they are defending to avoid being hit themselves or can be used to jump into the path of anything that gets past the point defense field of the mothership - if used that way they work as shaped charge antimatter powered reactive armor.
For assault, jump in, jump past the point defense field or open a hole in it with Tac Nukes, use remaining tac nukes and plasma cannon to attempt to overload or breach a shield, use the drones point defense to hit emitters or weapon emplacements. Escape Jump - rinse and repeat. Or - send in the drones after softening up the target with capital fire to exploit any breaches in the shield. You could also use a jump, Fire, Jump, Fire concept to hopefully blind or confuse the target sensors long enough to sneak something big in.
Recon - jump in, go dark, coast through and gather intel. Remove targets of opportunity and jump out.
For drones, this is a pretty complex and expensive design, but its way cheaper than trying to find new pilots.
I was looking back at the posts here and I came to a realization about all this. To manufacture all this tech would be very hard to do without a base/shipyard to support this tech. Granted, they have fabricators on Aurora but they have limited space and resources. All the work discussed here would require a base/shipyard facilities for repairs/refit; some type of manufacturing facility to supply parts, weapons components, propellant; and a mining facility to supply the resources.
Right now Aurora is heading away from Earth. They need to set up shop somewhere to even try any of this. Ryk REALLY needs to get that next episode out... WE ARE ALL DYING HERE!!! 🙂 (just kidding Ryk, but really want that next episode!)
That brings to mind a quote from The Right Stuff:
Gordon Cooper: You boys know what makes this bird go up? FUNDING makes this bird go up.
Gus Grissom: He's right. No bucks, no Buck Rogers.
It takes a planetary economy to support the manufacturing that makes it all possible. The real downside is that it is a bitch to defend against so much of this space-based weaponry. Not just the exotic stuff like Jump Torpedoes, but even against asteroids and comets that get targeted at your planet. You need an active space force to defend against all of it. Let's say the Aurora defeated all the Jung ships in the Sol system. Then they (CV-01) jumps off to the next system, and a Jung cruiser shows up... Earth is still recovering, and can't launch anything for a few months. The Jung drop a few asteroids and Earth surrenders again.
I'm sure Ryk has some tricks up his sleeve to make this a lot more interesting, but it sure looks bleak from where I sit.
mpnovotny: A 100 pound mass moving at .99C would probably destroy anything it hit.
Not exactly. It has a huge amount of kinetic energy, but only a fraction of it will be used in punching a hole through a space craft. The impact itself at relativistic speeds causes it's own problems with the matter it actually hits, but generally that just means bigger hole and more locally destructive affects. The larger issue is that they are set to explode just before impact. Thus the target gets hit with many smaller fragments going at about the same speed over a larger area. You get a shotgun effect, where multiple hits add up to damage that is rather difficult if not impossible to survive, while a single hit would have lasted. This is why it's fairly common for KKV's in SF to simply spread something like sand over a large area. Since with kinetic energy, mass becomes less significant compared to speed, and many small impacts are better than a few large impacts. Defense in that case generally requires either avoiding or deflecting the projectiles. Jump drives make it a fair bit easier to avoid them as long as there is enough warning, which drones could help with. Strategically placed ZPEDs may also make it easier to deflect them.
mpnovotny: Keep a few defense drones outside locked to the hull for instant deployment – other drones could be launched through the fighter launch tubes or en-masse off the apron.
That's unlikely to be good enough. There probably needs to be two types of drones: scout/interceptor and messengers. The scout/interceptors will try to spot and/or intercept incoming FTL/jump weapons as soon as possible by being away from the ship at various intervals. Messengers help keep the scout/interceptors and the ship informed of where each other is located or will be located, and only have to be big enough to be able to do that in one jump. Ideally, scout should have enough messenger drones nearby to be able to alert every other scout/interceptor and the ship itself, that a FTL/jump craft was spotted. This allows for rapid redeployment of drones to shift from scouting to intercepting in only two jumps.
As for planetary defense, I'd be tempted to say just use a large number of ZPEDs to create a shield around the planet. However, that may not be the best idea due to the effects of all those ZPEDs. However, one thing to keep in mind is that the Jung for now still use FTL travel. This can be spotted from a distance, so it should be possible to either lay a trap for them, hit them while they are traveling in FTL, or perhaps force them out of FTL one ship at a time. In any case, it should be possible to spot roughly when an attack is coming well in advance, for as long as the Jung don't have the jump drive and/or ZPEDs.
In any case, it should be interesting to see how Ryk plays it.
I like a phrase you put out there "... perhaps force them out of FTL one ship at a time." Space Piracy! 🙂
Space Pirates... I seem to remember Nathan and Cam talking about space pirates a few times... Time to hoist up the "Jolly Roger" flag on Aurora??? Hit up a few Jung ships for supplies and intel??? I see this coming!!! 🙂
And commissioning Privateers! Free to attack Jung ships at will, and capture the booty!
Avast, ye Jung scoundrels! Heave to, and prepare to be boarded by Captain Josh and his scurvy mates!
What other kinds of weapons should Ryk invent? anything non-lethal?
The little thinking I have done about it makes me think that a jump torpedo may not be the most beneficial weapon they could rig together. I think a jump strike fighter may be ideal.
Take a fighter and basically sling on of the Takaran particle cannons along its fuselage and equip it with jump emitters. It can jump in, take a shot or two with the cannon and jump out...repeat. A small, maneuverable ship that would pack a punch. Should be cheap and easy to build and they should have the pilots for it.
Oddly enough, I recently read a book that used a similar idea to the jump bomb I presented. Although the FTL in that book limited it to only a single jump and it used a nuke instead of antimatter, so the bombs didn't always go off. I'd give the name of the book, but I'm disinclined to spoil it for those who haven't read it yet. Then again, I suppose I suppose this topic itself is something of a spoiler in terms of what might be possible. Good to see I wasn't the only one that thought it would be effective. The only downside was they didn't have enough rounds handy, but bad guys couldn't figure out why their ships were exploding :-).
@Aaron: Seems like the particle cannons might be too big to put on a fighter, or at least those that would fit may be too small to do much damage against large ships. That might have to wait until they start equipping ships that are a bit bigger.
Telporting a bomb into an enemy ship was done a lot in Perry Rhodan, although I don't remember which issues. My cheap German-English dictionary didn't have an entry for "Matter Transmitter" but fortunately I had a copy in English as well. 🙂
I would think there is a minimum size for a stand-alone jump torpedo, as there needs to be a decent sensor suite to get targeting information, and some delta-v capability, as the jumps direction appears to depend a lot on the normal space vector (course). Essentially that would be the Falcon. In order to be cheap, it would have to be more like a missile, with just mini jump capacitor, emitters, and a daring recon platform to provide terminal guidance just prior to impact.
To avoid attack, once a ship detects a hostile ship, a non-jump ship should probably have to either randomly maneuver or make mini FTL hops, which would make it appear in normal space to have multiplied itself, confusing even myself. Imagine something taking mini-jumps in a spiral, so that all the light reached the center at the same time. Which one is the 'real' target?
In the Stargate SG-1 and Alantis tv shows, they would use the Asguard "beaming" tech to "beam" nukes onto enemy ships. The idea is not new but it is good for story telling... 😉
@Nuclearman: Your objections are certainly valid. I just honestly don't know the real physical sizes of either the fighters or the cannons, or their power requirements, either. Though I do think the principle is sound. The final product, IMO, would be a two-man fighter (pilot and jump navigator) with the cannon running alongside the fuselage. I imagine it would be somewhat larger than a standard fighter, at least in length, though there isn't much need for even stubby wings other than potentially placement of maneuvering jets. It would basically be like riding a cannon, but I think tactically I would make a lot of sense.
I see lots of good ideas in this discussion and I have a rather nice link that can give everyone more ideas http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/spacegunintro.php
Taking Hamsterman's spiral light confusion and adding that there are (soon) going to be two ships that look like the Aurora... Think we might see some confusion being spread within the Jung ranks? "They hit us here at x time!" "No, they were over here then!"
Perhaps just leaving the Celestia exposed, and allowing the Aurora to jump in behind the attackers... And then add in old light confusion. Sounds fun!
