Re: Space carrier fighter philosphy [FT]

Binhan spake thusly upon matters weighty: 
> If you are going to use modern carriers as examples for carrying
spares,
> then
> you need to take into account the fact that most modern budgets do not
> cover more than 10% for spares or maintenance parts of the existing
fleet.
> Procurement for extra planes and their parts has been low and stagnant
for
> the greater part of three decades, the air arms are lucky enough to
receive
> funding for the planes they ask for, let alone the follow on funds to
> acquire
> spares and extra parts to keep them in the air.  One reason for this
is that
> it looks much more impressive to say you can put up 72 aircraft from a
> carrier, not 48 with 24 spares in case the you lose 24.

Interestingly enough, despite your following point about the distance 
from extra planes (good point!), money may limit your supply of 
spares. Cash always tells, but that doesn't mean military designers 
might not design for extra spares (even if you never get em...)

  In addition, how
> far are you really from getting extra planes on a modern carrier? 12
to
> 24 hours probably. Much shorter if there is a friendly airfield
nearby.
> Case in point would be supplying a carrier in the Persian Gulf,
resupply
> is probably a matter of minutes away with resupply from Saudi Arabia
> and so getting replacement planes would be relatively easy.
> 
> FT doesn't quite fall into this model since the fighters have a much
shorter
> range (i.e. no FTL) than the carriers.  I would suspect that you might
build
> an auxillary carrier as a storage area for ready fighters - it would
be able
> to
> launch something like one squadron a turn but be able to carry
something
> like
> 6 squadrons.	The space would be 2/3 that of normal to reflect that
the
> carrier
> is sacrificing maintenance capability for added storage space and this
would
> have to be reflected in the rules somehow - perhaps the fighters
maintained
> at a level where they can be flown but not necessarily "combat ready"
with
> stores or armed weapons.

I'm thinking you'd need between scenario unpacking. That's what SFB 
did and it made some sense. It took some time (I said 12 turns, 
assuming 15 minute turns, per fighter (Los, I did not mean 3 turns 
per squadron), so unless you want to launch understrength 
squadrons, it might take as long as 72 FT turns for one team to put 
together a squadron from spares - so probably not within the confines 
of your average FT game - more of a between games re-armament. 
 
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Thomas Barclay		     
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