Re: How big is a troopship? [DS/FT/SG2] (and what it all means)

On Thu, 23 Sep 1999, Michael Llaneza wrote:

> My last Striker II scenario had power armored troops in concealed 
> positions with semi-portable AA weapons (rockets and one-shot plasma 
> weapons) ambushing grav tanks. That yahoo may be packing some serious 
> heat.

And that position wasn't softend up by Ortillery for what reason?

> woohoo ! I put a 4" hole in an engine ! or the cockpit, or a rocket 
> pod, or into the cargo bay (or troop compartment for an assault 
> shuttle); say, what kind of fuel do these things use ? .... There's a 

The cockpit would be a problem, but if it was to an engine, then I'd 
think there'd be sufficient power to affect a safe landing. This thing 
has enough juice to get to orbit. Coming down is a whole lot easier. 

> wide range of damage results possible, lets be suitably paranoid 
> about ground fire. How many assault transports in your initial wave 
> will seriously hose you if you lose them. My list includes all of 
> your C3 assets, fire support units, your aid station (if landing 
> one), etc.

I'm not saying any ground fire would be a non stopper, just that only
the 
heavy ground fire would. 

Why are C3 assets coming in on the first wave? Same goes for hospitals. 

> I can agree with some dedicated fire support zooming about, but your 
> transports should have something to add to the suppressive fire. I'd 
> say heavy rocket pods and a dual purpose point defense gun (combining 
> PDS and APSW roles in DSII) at a minimum.

Probably not a bad ide. The big lander that I have is a 25 mass lander.
A 
Class 1 beam isn't something to shrug at. 

> The door mounted .50s were great for suppressive fire in hot LZs. I 

Thought they used Door mounted M60s or the occasional 7.62 mini gun. An 
M2HB would be a bear to fire in a door mount. 

> seriously doubt too many direct hits resulted, but not much short of 
> a tank or bunker can slow a .50 round down. And in the fun with 
> physics dept: how does a .50 cal round compare in energy to an NVA 
> regular. Hmmm, e=mv^2... the .50 is relatively light, and moving very 
> fast, whereas the NVA grunt is about 50kg counting the AK47 and isn't 
> moving very fast...	anyway :-)

heh, thats why the VC hated the M2HB. 

> I fully agree that anything that goes anywhere near any sort of 
> ground defenses should be adding at least some firepower to the 

Or a heavy escort. I don't see any kind of mass drop going in with out 
some aerospace there for cover/supression.

I'm still trying to figure out how VTOLs are going to get down to the 
surface. Truck them down in a big lander and assemble them or have some 
sort of disposable system that chucks it out on the way to the
ground...?

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