NationStates Jolt Archive


OoC: Designing a boarding craft.[MT]

Dumpsterdam
04-06-2005, 21:47
The idea is that I want to design a submarine capable to transporting a squad of naval stormtroopers right up to a ship, put them aboard(while providing support fire), get away and do it all undetected.

No stats yet, I wana hear idea's regarding stealth, deployment of the craft, troop deployment, firepower and maybe some specialised equipment.
Theao
04-06-2005, 21:52
It would be nearly impossible to develope a 'undetectable' craft, you could develope a difficult to detect but not undetecable.
Dumpsterdam
04-06-2005, 21:55
I'm not talking about a huge attack submarine but something in the area of a rescue submarine. Don't forget that I'm looking to deploy eleven men, not a platoon.
Omz222
04-06-2005, 22:00
The idea is that I want to design a submarine capable to transporting a squad of naval stormtroopers right up to a ship, put them aboard(while providing support fire), get away and do it all undetected.

If it's designed to give support fire once the stormtroopers are on the ship, then it would be almost impossible to still have them all undetected, as automatic fire blazing from a submarine or the stormtroopers themselves will warn just about any sailor of impending danger. Depending on what the actual target of the stormtroopers would be, said craft can be very quiet, though there's still a chance of detection especially when it surfaces.
Taldaan
04-06-2005, 22:03
For stealth, magnetohydrodynamic drives might be worth a look, although I don't know how practical they would be.

Click! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetohydrodynamic_drive)
Dumpsterdam
04-06-2005, 22:04
I want it to provide fire support when the stormtroopers board and get detected in the process.

As soon as the deployment is complete it will return to its carrier vessles(probably a Macabee or Swordfish class)
Dumpsterdam
05-06-2005, 00:09
Friendly bump, lets hear some idea's for propulsion, stealth materials and how to deliver the squad.
Theao
05-06-2005, 00:13
As to troop deployment, if you have the blueprints of the target ship, a metal cutter, if you don't grappling hooks with auto-winches.
Dumpsterdam
05-06-2005, 00:14
I'm looking for something fast, so the metal cutter is out of the question, maybe C4 charges?

Or I could just take the winches, allows for quick entry and is dirtcheap.
Theao
05-06-2005, 00:17
If you want to sink or warn the ship then go C-4, otherwise the winches are probably the best idea.
Cesania
05-06-2005, 02:24
Magneto Hydro Dynamics are a good idea, I use them in all of my subs, another idea would be counter sound generators, they work pretty much the same way noise cancelling headphones work but use more power to cancel more noise created farther from the generator. the actual deployment should probably be winches, cutting through a warship hull is just asking for all kinds of trouble but if you really want to shaped charges are the way to go.
McKagan
05-06-2005, 02:28
What kind of ship are you trying to take over with 11 men?
Binthor
05-06-2005, 02:58
Well, obviously, you wouldn't be able to take out a Super-Dreadnought toting 1,000 Marines with 10-12 stormtroopers, but you could might be able to take a smaller vessel, such as a Frigate or Destroyer (Though I'd highly doubt it, unless you used multiple subs). A more practical idea than taking the whole ship would to be to maybe asault the bride or fire control room. If you take out a ships AA capability, you could easily land more troops on board with a helicopter. Personally, I think an underwater seal/explosive breach would be cool, and you could try to take out the engines with a demo team that way, but I don't know... Winches would almost definately work better to get the bridge.
No endorse
05-06-2005, 03:08
I'd recommend trying to get divers to plant explosives on near the drive shafts, or even try to destroy the rudders or propellers. Boarding a ship would be suicide, but an awesome RP, especially if you screwed up their reactors.

What I'd really like to see though is a team of divers plant nuclear charges on the hulls of half a fleet, get out of there, and blow the place. Any survivors would be so stunned and blind that a cleanup would be easy.
Dumpsterdam
05-06-2005, 09:20
No Endorse, how do you plan on getting to the rudders, shafts, proppellors when the ship is sailing at around 30 knots?

As for the question of how where gona take over the ship; well we don't.

The key is to put a eleven man squad of heavily armed(MINOTAUR bodyarmour) naval stormtroopers(who are brainwashed killers anyway) aboard and let them cause as much havoc as possible. So flamethrowers, shotguns and miniguns are not out of the question.
The primary mission is to cause as much chaos and destruction as possible, killing crewmen and fighting either towards the bridge or the fire control centre.

Many ships on NS include marine detachments nowadays, but people that still use american designs(BAAAAD idea) do not. So a crew will have a very difficult time holding of eleven bloodfrenzied killers armed with flamethrowers, miniguns and the strength to rip a grown man's arm off.

Oh and if they do manage to take over the ship, THEN I'll send in a chopper with reinforcements.
Adejaani
05-06-2005, 09:36
The biggest problem I see is the actual invasion process. If you use the regular hatches (ie the ones on the upperside of the hull) and some sort of extendable gangway with a driller cutter thing, you run the serious risk of having a sinking ship take you down after you cause your havoc.

You can't really have a sideways hatch either. Apart from the fact that you'd create a serious weakspot in the hull over there, if you're trying to go one way and the ship goes another, that seal would break and it would be a bad day for everyone.

The only reasonable explanation would probably be a bow hatch, which would preclude the main forward sonar set and most of the torpedo tubes in order to get the breaching and transfer equipment. One idea I have is to use a... I'm not sure what the word is.

Just imagine it this way: Take a bite out of a (bread) bun and stick your tongue into the hole. That's how I'd design such a breaching method. You could then use retractable spokes to anchor your submarine into the hole you create (and an inflatable skirt to keep the area relatively dry) and use a regular hatch to disgorge the troops.

However, that said, this is a lot of expense for one specialist mission. You're better off designing a stealthy platform to put an ultra large bore torpedo into the target's side instead, but that's just me talking.
Praetonia
05-06-2005, 11:21
Supposing for a minute that you can design a craft that can pull up against a ship without being detected, which I am not convinced that you can, or I am not convinced that you can in most circumstances, and then disgorge a cargo weighing nearly half a tonne, why not just carry 2 men and a heavy demolition charge? It's much easier, much cheaper and doesn't result in messy consequence like being gunned down by the enemy ship's marine detachment.
GMC Military Arms
05-06-2005, 11:30
The primary mission is to cause as much chaos and destruction as possible, killing crewmen and fighting either towards the bridge or the fire control centre.

Since it's unlikely you'd have a level-by-level schematic memorised if you're a blood frenzied killer, it's be funny to watch them fight their way blind...

'Sir, it's a disaster! We've lost the kitchen to them!'
Nascent
05-06-2005, 11:45
I really doubt that a sub large enough to carry eleven men would be able to get close enough to a warship to board. So really the only thing I can see this type of ship do is for pirating missions against unprotected merchant vessels. Anything else would be suicide.
Relative Liberty
05-06-2005, 12:01
Since it's unlikely you'd have a level-by-level schematic memorised if you're a blood frenzied killer, it's be funny to watch them fight their way blind...

'Sir, it's a disaster! We've lost the kitchen to them!'
Imagine being stuck on ship without food for two years since the control room has been smashed and bloodthirsty marines in walking tank suits are occcupying the kitchen.
GMC Military Arms
05-06-2005, 12:22
Imagine being stuck on ship without food for two years since the control room has been smashed and bloodthirsty marines in walking tank suits are occcupying the kitchen.

How did they find their way to the control room, again? Crazed CHAMPIONS OF KHORNE RAR bloodnits aren't so good at following signs or remembering maps.
Buechoria
05-06-2005, 14:35
Uh, I want to point out that this is, how do I put this... impossible.

You must remove a piece of the hull in order to allow an enterance for the soldiers, and once the submarine docks away, or like in rescue submarines, the tunnel is retracted, the hull will flood with water. To make this harder, you must attempt to match the speed and find an area on the ship that would be both accesible and safe, i.e. there are no objects in the way such as pipes or generators.
Dumpsterdam
05-06-2005, 14:46
Since it's unlikely you'd have a level-by-level schematic memorised if you're a blood frenzied killer, it's be funny to watch them fight their way blind...

'Sir, it's a disaster! We've lost the kitchen to them!'

Ah but a navy fights on its stomach doesn't it? ;)

But seriously, a vague imprint of where to go should be fine, or just the imprint of where to attach ready-made C4 charges.

Think of these units as shocktroops, not all that effective in a practical way but more effective in creating confusion and scaring the hell out of the crew. They won't be effected by pain that much, untill they fall over and die, so side arms will not be very effective, and I won't be using this against ships with marine detachments.

As for the means to get aboard, surface the sub, use grapel hooks with autowinches and let the sub get away. Should work fine in harbours or unsuspecting ships, because; who suspects a minisub's crew to board you?
Tom Joad
05-06-2005, 14:46
Quite. I don't see the point of having a submarine deliver this ultra stealth vessel with its eleven men unless it was trying to capture something like documents or a person and in either of those cases you'd need blueprints or helpful hosts:

"Really Secret Equipment ->"

If you want to disable a vessel then simply using this carrier submarine would be a much better idea, now if you were developing something to raid naval bases it might be a different matter however that brings up a whole other series of problems.
Roman Republic
05-06-2005, 14:49
The only Craft i think is the greatest to me that carries more than a squad, has more firepower, stealthy, and manverable. the craft is the Mark V Special Operations Craft. URL: http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/factfile/ships/boat-mkv.html
Tom Joad
05-06-2005, 14:51
Should work fine in harbours or unsuspecting ships, because; who suspects a minisub's crew to board you?

Considering various forms of insertion in to harbours have been used to lay mines and do various dastardly sabotage type things in the past, I would of suspected that every military harbour was rather keen to prevent minisubs or any other form of naval insertion from entering their harbours.

Afterall frogmen came about as a method of destroying ships when they're most vunerable, at anchor.
Dumpsterdam
05-06-2005, 14:59
Well to be fair, my naval instalations don't realy have any way of stopping minisubs, apart from the underwater barriers, electronic minefields and the occasional torpedo net.(I rely on sonar instalations, air patrols, regular sonar sweeps by the Grand Armada and minefields as a sort of early warning system so that any intruder will get detected fairly fast outside of the harbour)

And in NS, well if you can link me to a operation where somebody used minisubs to sabotage a harbour I would like to see that.
No endorse
05-06-2005, 15:33
No Endorse, how do you plan on getting to the rudders, shafts, proppellors when the ship is sailing at around 30 knots?

Well, you wouldn't want to try it against something like that. But if the enemy fleet is holding station in something like a blockade, then that is when you'd strike in this manner. You could try against a moving target... but you'd have some trouble in the form of divers getting torn to pieces by large propellors. At those speeds, just torp the rudders/drive shafts and board with winches.
Relative Liberty
05-06-2005, 15:36
How did they find their way to the control room, again? Crazed CHAMPIONS OF KHORNE RAR bloodnits aren't so good at following signs or remembering maps.
They'll find it eventually.
Fluffywuffy
05-06-2005, 16:39
Here's my idea: You get a normal nuclear submarine and deck it out in the normal stealthy features: MHD drives, anechoic tiles, etc. But then you remove all the normal bells and whistles: no torpedo tubes and the like. Then you rearrange the insides of the submarine so that the former tubes are filled with soldiers. This is somewhat easy so far, I suppose. On the outside of the sub, you could have pop-up machine guns and grappling hooks. When you find your prey, you surface just enough that rafts can carry the soldiers away, and then you provide covering fire with electronically controlled machine guns. For further stealth, perhaps you can create a sub design that lacks a conning tower. I don't know the cost of all this, nor do I care, because I wouldn't ever build this.
The Island of Rose
05-06-2005, 17:08
I, personally, find this good only against Flagships. Assuming you can get past everything surrounding the RAWR Flagship. Not good against a Frigate, because then you'd just be wasting teh money.

Now those unregistered fishing trawlers..... you can use it on them.
Praetonia
05-06-2005, 17:22
Here's my idea: You get a normal nuclear submarine and deck it out in the normal stealthy features: MHD drives, anechoic tiles, etc. But then you remove all the normal bells and whistles: no torpedo tubes and the like. Then you rearrange the insides of the submarine so that the former tubes are filled with soldiers. This is somewhat easy so far, I suppose. On the outside of the sub, you could have pop-up machine guns and grappling hooks. When you find your prey, you surface just enough that rafts can carry the soldiers away, and then you provide covering fire with electronically controlled machine guns. For further stealth, perhaps you can create a sub design that lacks a conning tower. I don't know the cost of all this, nor do I care, because I wouldn't ever build this.
But what's the point? Why not just keep the torpedos and then fire them at the target vessel? Why bother with all this boarding stuff...
Omz222
05-06-2005, 17:24
I, personally, find this good only against Flagships. Assuming you can get past everything surrounding the RAWR Flagship. Not good against a Frigate, because then you'd just be wasting teh money.

Now those unregistered fishing trawlers..... you can use it on them.
The flagship itself isn't all that useful no matter how much anti-submarine armaments it has, it's really the escorts round it. By surfacing the submarine and getting a few shocktroopers onto a flagship, it's almost guarenteed that you will not only have the escorts firing at this mini-sub, but sailors arming themselves with weapons from the armory...

...assuming that the mini-sub can get through a series of escorts placed around the flagship in a formation, and then insert them onto the ship without sinking. Otherwise, what's the use of landing your troops on the decks of an escorting frigate?
Crookfur
06-06-2005, 17:17
Honestly what is wrong with the good old balsa wood/fibreglass kayack launched from a fair distance out? of course you aren't goign to get wanky battle siuts and uber soldiers in a kayack but if its good enough for the SBS and SEALs then it can't be bad.

yes IRL special forces do train in boarding and capture operations ships both underway and stationary but that is generally freighters and tankers filed with terrorists not warships staffed by trained soldiers.

Of coruse NS boarding actions woudl have to get through the insane sensors and other exotic things likes dolphin screens most navies would have...


NOW that was random, hope soem of it makes sense...
Tom Joad
06-06-2005, 19:54
Couldn't agree more Croofur, the SBS are using a kayak designed sixty years ago and little has changed except the material. Stick that in your multi-million boarding submarine and carrier vessel, silly idea.