Warhead/Missile Technology

[fallout747]

I remember a game from back in the day that had those "Tag" missiles. the missiles did no damage, but would allow for a super heavy laser to strike whatever the missile managed to hit with perfect accuracy. Or perhaps missiles that carried punched through the hull then released robots that attack and kill off the crew in the ship that gets hit. perhpas missiles that broadcast a ships sig in radar and make a dummy ghost fleet?

[Rage-Overkill]

an LV sized missile would be a cruiser...not everything scales up sensibly :wink: MIssile tech is reacting to PD tech at this point. Doesn't matter how big the package is if it doesn't get through.

Good, 'cause right now PD is winning (due to having to deal with the drone threat) and missiles and seeking torps could use a bit of PD reaction.

EDIT: should I assume we're going to be looking at EW technologies here to help the seekers out, possibly among other things? Could shield generators be miniaturized enough to make a missile bus that carries a shield generator for a school of missiles, instead of a warhead?

You gave me an idea for Phased Torpedos!! muhahhaha can you immagine a torpedo that phases to be inbetween our space and say node space? Torpedo phases out takes only 1/4 of the damage it would from a pd weapon and rephases in when it reaches its target.

[Starknight]

You gave me an idea for Phased Torpedos!! muhahhaha can you immagine a torpedo that phases to be inbetween our space and say node space? Torpedo phases out takes only 1/4 of the damage it would from a pd weapon and rephases in when it reaches its target.

That would require the ability to create a micro-Node Line (well, maybe a pico-NL) between the firing ship and the target; I'm not sure there's enough mass at either end to anchor such a thing, even in the case of Leviathans. Although we do have Intangibility tech in Prime (not sure if it still exists in ][, I haven't gotten that far or even tried to find Cloaking yet); if that ability could be applied to missiles it would be pretty nice. I'm not sure how you would apply such a thing to energy torpedoes, though.

[feld]

2or maybe 3? Questions:

1. "Interceptor Missile" question.

In SOTS1 these weapons were not capable of shooting down other missiles. I believe with these words below:

"Other missiles remain too hard to vector against accurately and so Interceptors will NOT engage other missile ordinance."

My questions to the devs are why did they make that choice and will this change in SOTS2?

My reason for asking is that it seems odd given that both RL(tm.) trends and SF tropes favor the use of missiles to kill missiles. In RL(tm.) naval ships of all nations increasingly rely on missiles to shoot down anti-ship missiles at long and short ranges. In the ballistic missile defense world, many of the active weapon systems or research projects have used missiles to deliver a nuclear or kinetic kill payload. The race between missile and countermissile designers is heavily covered in a few space combat heavy books series...so the choice seemed odd to me. What gives?

2. Did you ever give any thought to an "area effect point defense missile"? Inspired by the scary ABM systems of the Cold War but made somewhat more workable by the vast distances involved in space combat, it would be a weapon with a large relatively weak blast radius that would destroy hordes of incoming missiles but probably damage your own ships or destroy your own outgoing salvoes without careful forethought and planning on formation design and tactics. It seems a thing that they might try...I mean, given that they routinely throw fission, fusion, and M/A warheads at each other and such.

3. Did you ever give any thought to better armors increasing the hitpoints of missiles by some amount? It seems logical and ... well...like something they'd do.

Just a thought...

v/r
feld

[Nspace]

1. "Interceptor Missile" question.

My questions to the devs are why did they make that choice and will this change in SOTS2?

I can't answer the first part, but the second part is apparently "yes, it will change in SotS2".
From the "Other Fixes" section of the r19345b patch notes:

+ Fixed an issue where PD missiles were not taking out other missiles.

Considering the new larger classes of missiles in SotS2 (IOBM, Polaris), PD missiles may only be able to hit the larger missile but still not shoot down the normal ship-to-ship missiles (I haven't used the PD missiles, so I'm not sure).

[Rorus]

You gave me an idea for Phased Torpedos!! muhahhaha can you immagine a torpedo that phases to be inbetween our space and say node space? Torpedo phases out takes only 1/4 of the damage it would from a pd weapon and rephases in when it reaches its target.

That would require the ability to create a micro-Node Line (well, maybe a pico-NL) between the firing ship and the target; I'm not sure there's enough mass at either end to anchor such a thing, even in the case of Leviathans. Although we do have Intangibility tech in Prime (not sure if it still exists in ][, I haven't gotten that far or even tried to find Cloaking yet); if that ability could be applied to missiles it would be pretty nice. I'm not sure how you would apply such a thing to energy torpedoes, though.

Sounds a bit more feasable with the flickerdrive though.

[heart of midlothian]

Does anyone know how many megatons the sol force human missiles have in each warhead?

[Mecron]

The standard solforce fission era missile was about .001 Kt yield with fusion and then AM increasing that by factors of 10 roughly. The point was not for massive explosions as much as it was just to get the most reliable large bang out of a very small and sturdy warhead.

[Tarrak]

Thanks, that brings a lot of things into perspective.

[Mecron]

I live to serve, sirrah!

[heart of midlothian]

Thanks for the reply mecron, explains why the missiles dont kill everything in one salvo.

[Darkwing dack]

I like to be Necromancer, and I have a question: This technology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosively_formed_penetrator is it going to be mine upgrade? (Like HEAP is a mass driver upgrade)

[MrBoom]

The standard solforce fission era missile was about .001 Kt yield with fusion and then AM increasing that by factors of 10 roughly. The point was not for massive explosions as much as it was just to get the most reliable large bang out of a very small and sturdy warhead.

That's what the Polaris and IOBM family are for


Hmmm.....what kind of yield do torpedoes have?

[Mecron]

in the KT range at the highest end

[Anon]

Do blast beam missiles always use HCL beam or can they be upgraded to Lancer/Cutting when you research them?