Dropships vs. Dropcaps

--- Randall Joiner <rljoiner@mindspring.com> wrote:
> 
> >Dropships vs. Dropcaps:
> >
> >Why assume the cap goes down with no thrust and the
> dropship with?
> 
> Sure, you can power the cap.	That raises your cost
> significantly.  And 
> would almost definitely be used to slow down the
> cap, to keep the cap from 
> becoming a ballistic splat.  *shudder* Bad thoughts
> of Kra'vak and caps...

OK, a lot of people are throwing around terms without
defining them.	

A "Drop Capsule" is drawn from Starship Troopers.  The
capsules are shot out from the orbiting starship
(Johnnie makes several references to there being a
significant initial kick) and drop down under power. 
The capsule then falls apart (the inside of the shell
is radar-reflective and makes for good decoys) and the
power-armored trooper falls with a parachute.  In
addition, the ship fires a series of capsules filled
with decoys and jammers et al to throw off the
invader's systems.  It is not clear how much
maneuvering ability they have.

The best-known use of Drop Capsules in an SF game was
in Traveller.  The RCEG from TNE gives complete
details about an entire family of drop capsules.  The
Mk I carries a single solder in battle dress (ie,
powered armor).  It's powered by liquid fuel thrusters
capable of .75G for 4 minutes.	It has anti-radar and
anti-IR decoy launchers, and just for fun it's got a
missle rack with 2 anti-armor missles that the trooper
can use for fire support once he hits the DZ.  The
MkII familiy is a series of unmanned varients
including decoys, capsules which fall like a standard
capsule but are actually loaded with bombs, capsules
which pop open and deploy ARMs, and cargo capsules for
heavy equipment.

So you do need maneuvering power, but the launching
ship is shooting them (how?  Who cares, maybe big
hydraulic rams.  That's not my damn problem) into the
atmosphere, with maneuvering capability in-atmosphere,
but no one needs to decelerate the capsules because
they either have parachutes or fall apart and the
cargo/passengers have
parachutes/paragliders/parawings.

In other words, drop capsules are for insertions which
are going to strongly resemble parachute operations.  
Insertion by shuttle will resemble amphibious
operations.  The objection has been raised that no
military would "throw away" trained soldiers on a
one-way mission.

That's the mission profile of EVERY airborne
operation.  Sure, there's an exfiltration plan or a
plan to send in relief, but the likelyhood of that
actually happening is not 100%.  Just ask those guys
Monty left to die in Arnhem while the Guards tankers
were making tea.

John

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