OBT Forum

Speaking in broad terms (since I haven't read Aerotech nor played it), it seems like there should be a way of keeping warships in the setting....surely spaceships aside from small dropships and aerofighters would be operating on a different scale than battlemechs.  It seems like abstract rules could be worked out, in theory, to cover any interactions there would be between orbit and the planet's surface.  You shouldn't have to worry about warships trying to saturation bombard planets and killing mechwarriors sight unseen becuase deterrants should exist to stop this within the universe.  Not even talking about specific game mechanics there should detection and defense systems that keep warships at a safe distance.

I don't see any conflict between having warships in the setting and mechwarriors and their mechs having primacy within the game.

Naval sensors of that caliber aren't something that exist in Battletech. Neither are massive orbital defense systems (save the SDS systems found predominately in the Star League era). You absolutely could add them in, but it isn't something you add without consequence. That's a paradigm change, and when you do that to any setting, you need to be clear and upfront that you are taking a step away from the setting as it exists. Add in orbital defense systems capable of deterring most WarShips, and you also make it incredibly difficult for a DropShip to land for even a simple raid. Take away that option, and you have drastically changed the way warfare works in Battletech. Warfare (save for specific periods of massive conflict) has largely been based around mobile forces prosecuting objective raids. Even planetary invasions are not really planetary invasions, due to the sheeple populations found on most BT worlds. They are a series of objective assaults to take key facilities and then the rest of the planet simply falls in line. The Aerospace Technologies section in StratOps (starting on pg 122) has some more details on WarShips role in the setting, along with some details on system defense stations.

I don't disagree in theory with some of the things you suggest, but such technologies don't exist in a vacuum. They have consequences far outside simply being WarShip deterrents. Frankly, one of the easiest and cheapest WarShip deterrents is aerospace fighter squadrons with nukes.

On your second point, I'd agree. I don't see a conflict between having WarShips in the setting and 'Mechs having primacy. I do see a conflict between having large fleets in the setting and 'Mechs having primacy. Common misconceptions aside, the Dark Age does still have WarShips in the setting, and they have seen active use. They actually work quite well there, without upsetting the delicate balance of maintaining one of Battletech's core conceits of the 'Mech as ruler of the battlefield.

Edit: On a semi-related point, spawned from something Knightmare mentioned earlier. I'd actually argue that the Star League era is a perfect example for why large fleets disrupt the idea of 'Mech primacy. The Hegemony was not a threat capable of browbeating the other Houses into the Star League because of its impressive BattleMech divisions primarily. They were a threat because they had an impressive army backed up by an even more impressive navy. Without that navy, the Hegemony never pulls off the necessary arm-wrangling. Heck, without that navy, McKenna never founds the Hegemony. We're talking about a faction literally built from the threat of orbital fire support. That's how significant their navy is to them, they would not exist without it. The naval forces define the Hegemony and much of the subsequent era...not the BattleMech. The Jihad only managed to avoid the same issue by having drastically reduced naval fleets, and even there, they only mitigated the issue...not avoiding it completely.

A few things to clear up here.

I did not realize how relatively underdeveloped the state of Battletech orbital defenses were.  I thought since advanced stuff was used by the WOB in Jihad Final Reckoning that similar systems had existed before.  I jumped to an erroneous conclusion about the state of BT Universe tech based upon my Jihad readings.

They existed during the Star League era in far greater numbers (and technological advancement) than they did during the Jihad. Final Reckoning offers up information on Casper drones and other space-based systems, as I recall. The Star League had these systems perfected and massively implemented on a significant number of core Terran Hegemony worlds. The naval battles seen during Final Reckoning and JHS: Terra pale in comparison to the battles seen during the Star League Civil War (specifically, look up the information on Terra and Epsilon Eridani off the top of my head). It's also possible that portions of these types of systems were implemented during the Star League era on some of the House capital worlds and Golden Worlds (I honestly can't recall). But during the Civil War, these systems were absolutely wrecked, so much so that I believe pieces survived on Terra only. These sort of defenses make systems a difficult nut to crack open, which means the conflict gets ugly, bloody, and nuclear very quickly. So, defense systems do exist. And there are even some more recent developments on that front (the Combine's Battlesats and Capital Missile equipped submarines, the Blakists Rattler, etc.). But again, they are very limited in production and implementation. With good reason honestly, as these systems seem to serve far more as a giant red target than massive deterrent. From what has been seen in BT's history, they tend to work...once. Some one either tests them and loses, or cracks them and wins. Either way, the cost is high. I can understand why more systems stick with run of the mill patrols, assault craft, Pocket WarShips, and fighter squadrons. If you keep making big sticks, so does your opponent (perhaps not in the real world, but BT and the real world parted ways a long time ago).

Naval sensors are a whole other beast in BT. I know that various folks have made very heavy technical breakdowns of how they tend to work in BT, and you can probably search for such threads on the official BT forums. To give a very simple reduction, space is BIG, REALLY BIG. Planet-based sensors picking out even jumping vessels, particularly if pirate points are used (or vessels jump in above or below the orbital plane) let alone fleets attempting any sort of communications blackout protocol...well, those sensors are going to struggle. Generally, drive plumes are the easiest way to detect things, but it is generally too late by then but do much more than prepare for contact in a few days. Same goes for the neutrino flares from fleets jumping in. Once they are in-system, you just better hope your defenses are up to snuff. And again, all of this is tempered by the fact that Battletech is about the ground battles. While some fleets do get stopped before landing, it is more than exception than the rule. Story needs and the community's interests tend to dictate that enemy forces reach the ground in some capacity, no matter how "unrealistic" it may seem. Rule of cool and all that.

And an interesting historical point about the time period from the Hegemony to the Star League.  I'm afraid I'm not up on setting history that far back so I'll take your word for it. 
If you're right that's an interesting notion:  it may not be warships that are the problem.....merely large fleets of them. 
From my readings in Dark Age stuff, there does seem to be anecdotal support for that statement.

That's always been my take on it. Others may obviously feel otherwise.

The only thing that sorta runs counter to all this is that I've seen alot of posts on the Battletech official forums with people asking about either warships or shipyards and post-Jihad era and ever time I can recall the answer from TPTB has been destroyed, mothballed, or the like.  I'll have to go back over forum posts and double check my memory on this last point.  I definately got that impression....but it may well have been me misunderstanding.  I'll have to do further reading on that point to make sure I'm not way off base.

You're not off base. And it doesn't really run counter to the setting. There are a few factors in play here. You have the concern from outside the setting that continuing on with larger fleets is problematic, as was noted before. You also have a setting that has seen a level of destruction on par with the later stages of the 1st and 2nd Succession Wars, which are pretty much the most destructive periods in BT's history.

These two periods have quite literally hundreds of systems dying out entirely. It is unrestricted warfare at its most grotesque levels. The Jihad reached the same type of conflict (unrestricted warfare), though not the scale of those two earlier conflicts. This means that infrastructure is shattered. While it doesn't quite reach the levels of destruction seen on the Hegemony worlds after the Star League Civil War, it isn't far off in some cases. Just look at a handle full of these shipyards. Many of them were in key production planetary systems, and were among the first targets by the Blakists. Galax, Alarion, and so on. And it doesn't even end with the Jihad. The Bloody Millenial attacks do even more damage in this regard, doing lovely things like dropping giant rocks on Free World League aerospace production worlds, or the Regulans deciding to nuke everything until it glows. So, yes, the Star League Civil War and the Succession Wars were much worse. On the flip side, the Houses had much more production capability after the height of the Star League era (leading into the Succession Wars), so they could lose more. Production in the modern era is a drop in the bucket compared to that Golden Age. So when the FedSuns lose Galax and have massive damage to Kathil, we're talking about a near death blow to their naval production. The Blakists were crazy, but they weren't stupid (at least not all the time). They hit hard, early, and frequently. So, interstellar shipping has been massively disrupted. A new faction has been born around Terra. The Blakists drop back in a few years later for even more terror attacks. And these factions STILL haven't even really recovered from the losses of the Jihad at this point. So yeah, orbital facilities outside of getting merchant ships back in production take a backseat for quite some time.

You also have to add in the morale factor here. So you're a Successor State ruler, and you've lived through the Jihad. Your citizenry have seen the skies of a number of your worlds darkened by enemy forces. Some of these worlds (in some cases, even your own damn capitals!) were lost to the enemy for years. Your people have watched their fleets batted aside in nuclear fire. They've heard stories of cyborg monsters from a crazed religious order slaughtering people in the streets. And your might WarShips weren't enough to protect them. You are now faced with the prospect of rebuilding. Your armies are shattered, your navies are broken, and your production capabilities dropped so far in some cases that you were using units last produced during the Age of War several hundred years prior to the formation of the Star League (Retrotech). So, do you sink insane amounts of C-Bills into getting shipyards rebuilt that can produce at best, less than a dozen units a year? Or do you take that same money, rebuild your ground forces, your shattered civilian infrastructure, AND still have money left over to build some shipyards that can produce three or four times the number of smaller defensive units (Pocket WarShips)?

Now let's assume that you know the other states are going for the smaller defensive swarm fleets. Nobody is rebuilding WarShips with any real priority. Do you want to buck the trend? Will your two battlebarges do anything for you against your ancient enemy's dozen or so swarm fleets that can hit far more targets? I know which way I'd lean, but again, others may disagree. This was the situation they were facing at the end of the Jihad. Massive reconstruction on worlds that in many cases (like the capitals and some of the interior production worlds) had not seen even a raid win the last two hundred years. So, everybody sort of said "We'll get to the WarShips...eventually." Next thing you know, eventually becomes 40 or 50 years, and now it is even harder to get such a project off the ground. Research has been lost or forgotten, people don't see the need anymore, and armies are already on shoestring budgets due to the general downsizing of military forces.

This is what you're facing at the end of the Jihad and leading into the Dark Age. As I said earlier, WarShips are not gone forever. They're just taking a siesta over the corner. And that fits within the setting. It happened to some degree after the Reunification War. Again after the Star League Civil War (though in those two cases, on a much shorter/smaller scale). Again after the Succession Wars. Again after the FedCom Civil War. This pattern repeats again, and again. Honestly, the factions have actually come out of the Jihad better than they have in most of those other prior conflicts. At least this time around, they have the possibility of rebuilding their fleets at some point in time. During the Succession Wars, they even lost the ability to come close to constructing a single WarShip ANYWHERE.

The other issue with increasing nuclear weapons to counter WarShips is exactly what we saw during the Jihad. It will take time, but somewhere, somebody will swing back towards thinking of nukes as viable ground support weapons. In fact, you've already seen it happen in rare occasions in the Dark Age. Just like when that Pandora's box was opened again during the Regulan/Thomas Marik stand off and then again during the FedCom Civil War...their usage will grow. It won't reach Jihad levels again for a while, but the sooner their usage is expanded in space, well...look out planetside forces. Some officer or faction leader will think it is okay to start opening up the caches.

Nuclear weapons were also extensively used during the 1st Succession War and likely contributed to the extinction of "the big fleets" at least in my view. I dare say that WMD was thrown around more during the 1st Succession War than during the Jihad.

Oh, absolutely. That's not even debatable, but pretty much established in canon information. I should have noted that in my last post, and my apologies on that. The Jihad was used as the most recent example, not the most prolific. I'd wager even the 2nd SW had more nuke usage than the Jihad, at least in the early stages. There are still a fair number of worlds that disappear off the map during that conflict as well.

The scariest thing I remember reading about in the Star League sourcebook (I think?) was the nuclear hand grenades for infantry. It was tough to catch a breath after the laughing stopped.

Then you've devolved the storyline to a Third Succession War-style setting. As the total-war setting of the Jihad showed, when a massive conflict combines constant fighting for a long period of time and attacks against a faction's industrial base WarShips inevitably die spectacularly. You can say it was the company's aim to destroy the WarShip fleets of the Inner Sphere and Clans, but lets face it, a decade fighting the WoB is going to take a serious toll. In fact, I'm not surprised more ships weren't destroyed...

Industry in 3100-3145 does seem to be worse than the Third Succession War, sure. But "apocalyptic" and "post-apocalyptic" aren't the only possible settings for fleet actions. There's got to be a pretty big middle ground.

That said, orbital fire is incredibly overpowering—it's nothing like standard artillery—and ground forces have little in the way to counter its effect outside of the use of nuclear weapons launched from ASF. Assuming ASF are present. Either way you have a dead WarShip or a dead ’Mech regiment. 

Figure out a solution that without breaking the current setting and I'll give you a big interwebs cookie. Seriously, being able to counter a WarShip without removing it's reason to exist is a difficult question to answer.

Station warships primarily at jump points or assign them to escort active shipping & logistics. De-glorify nukes; make orbital fire approximately as effective as regular artillery. It's easy, guys! Neutering 'Mechs against infantry was 1/10th as reasonable.

The "original" 3025 setting revolved solely around DropShips. The new PWs bring the setting full circle to the original 3025 era while still accounting for the advancing timeline and new weapons/technology. As far as "canon" is concerned WarShips were a few sentences on the back of a game box until TRO 2750 showed a few from a time frame FASA had no intention of ever developing.

BattleSpace was AeroTech's replacement only because the Clans returned to the Inner Sphere. Again, nothing close to the "original intent of old canon."

So you agree that Catalyst is trending toward smaller ships than was established 1987-1994; and your only quibble is that TR:2750 set a careless precedent for WarShip tonnage. Given that real-world aircraft carriers already mass ~100 kilotons, are 2750's masses all that unreasonable? Is the existence of king-sized WarShips incompatible with the existence of smaller KF-capable warships?

Because that's literally the job of the SLDF. The House Navies didn't have to "monitor" their space anymore

How numerous and large are the non-House ships being monitored by these many thousand enormous SLDF ships?

If you have large fleets and don't use them (or simply say they cancel each other out)...then why have large fleets? Just to be numbers on a page?

Why have infantry be part of the setting? Why astechs? Why civilians? Why stars?

skiltao, if you meant for that spoiler to be hidden, that wasn't the case.

Those numbers are interesting, when you look at the original split I had (FASA versus FanPro/CGL taking over). Obviously, I simply broke down the books before, as I wasn't taking the time to count through the number of vessels. Nice work there. You'd expect that FASA would have the lion's share, as they were laying down the foundations of the Star League era and WarShips in general. I actually would not have expected the FanPro/CGL side to be as close as it was to the FASA numbers. My original reasons for using the FASA versus FanPro/CGL split came from the fact that is was the closest point (from memory) I knew of when Randall Bills and much of the same staff stepped into line development roles. The continuity of staff (on the Battletech side) from FanPro through CGL was roughly equivalent to the continuity of staff during the FASA era. I don't recall if Randall had any line developer credits under the FASA imprint. The best product to check would be FM: Periphery (as it was one of the last FASA imprint products), but I don't have an electronic copy. I know that FM: Updates came out under Randall's aegis. Anyway, that's why I made the split as I did.

Station warships primarily at jump points or assign them to escort active shipping & logistics. De-glorify nukes; make orbital fire approximately as effective as regular artillery. It's easy, guys! Neutering 'Mechs against infantry was 1/10th as reasonable.

That would require fleet sizes that even the Star League couldn't regularly pull off, if you're looking to have regular patrols in most significant systems for each faction. It also leads back into the same issue of drastically changing the raiding paradigm that serves as a major part of the setting's backdrop. How do you allow for raids and smaller, objective based ground conquests with such a preponderance of naval resources in more systems? (That's not meant as a smart-ass response, truly. That's a serious question, as I'm not seeing how you avoid the issue.)

De-glorify nukes and changing orbital fire are both certainly strong suggestions, but not something that can be done with the existing rules. What those things can do have been established within the context of the Total Warfare rules. If you're looking at another rules edition (possibly coinciding with the rumored 3250 era), then those things definitely become more viable options.

Industry in 3100-3145 does seem to be worse than the Third Succession War, sure.

I'm not so sure about that. Considering how many new designs have hit the market in that time frame versus the 3rd SW period (at least the early through middle 3rd SW), I don't see that. Then again, without some sort of Objectives series, it's tough to pin down exact production.

Why have infantry be part of the setting?

Unless infantry somehow magically develop the ability to wipe entire regiments out with the equivalent of 1/20th of their weapon allotments (something WarShips can do with just a few capital bays), there's not really much comparison. Honestly, prior to Total Warfare's changes for infantry, they weren't really a very effective part of the setting. That's definitely a change in direction, but it is one that has far more built-in balance than massive WarShip fleets.

Also, you're probably barking up the wrong tree here. I like infantry far more than 'Mechs.

...and now you're just a shill. What'd they buy you off with? 

Seriously though, there's way too many "fans" who think all FASA's good stuff was written by Catalyst and all Catalyst's mistakes are actually FASA's. 

Mostly, with quality product that didn't have atrocious editing, proofing, and poorly thought out ideas. I'd also politely ask to keep your personal attacks to yourself. This "fan" is quite entitled to his own opinions, opinions which you're quite capable of disagreeing with, without needing to drop the air quotes proving some sort of fan superiority over others. It's also tough for me to be a shill for a company I've put more than my own fair share of criticisms down about here, as well as on the BT forums. If you'd like to start a thread relating to the problems I've had with CGL's products, feel free. I have a laundry list of them from the JHS series, if you'd like a starting point. I've also found their proofing and layout to have gone downhill since they lost some previous personnel. I don't think as highly of it in current products. That should help to give you some idea of what I thought of the early to mid FASA proofing and layout, in comparison. Those particular previous personnel were a huge boon when they came in board in the end of the FASA era. But compared to the products of much of the early FASA era that I find near painful to read, yes, I get more value in CGL's product. Then again, what do I know? Apparently, I'm just a shill.

While I was working on an upcoming unit last night, I stumbled across something. I'm not even sure if the question is specifically "What's up with WarShips?" but more "What's up with naval assets in general, especially transports?"

If you look at the Master Unit List under IS General, Periphery General, and Mercenary for the Late Republic and Dark Ages area, it paints a pretty bleak picture. In terms of what is available as general transports available for all, it doesn't look very promising. The obsolete variants of the generic transports show up, but I'd have serious doubts that those are being manufactured anywhere in large numbers. We're looking at most of the upgraded versions of those variants tracing back as far as 3052 through 3056. Knowing the devastation the Jihad brought down on shipyards, I can't imagine when those yards are rebuilt that they would return to producing obsolete variants last updated in 2762 or further back. The setting has often depicted interstellar shipping being at a premium, so where exactly are the factions getting their transports? Sure, they've replaced some of them with newer designs (like the Truntzburg for the Lyrans or the Seleucus for the League), but not many. And most of those newer designs are very specific types of transports. Most of the combined arms transports (the Excalibur, the Hercules, and the Fortress) were built only at yards that have since been destroyed. I haven't found any references to those specific yards or even those designs being brought back online elsewhere. That's a very interesting question regarding 3145 that I haven't seen answered yet.

What I wouldn't give for the Objectives series to have been updated. It's a damn shame they didn't sell well enough to continue their existence.