Space Guns, GUNS, GUNS, GUNS!

[The Yosemite Bear]

It was, and I am still laughing at Graham Kennedy's assirtion that a 200mt Xlaser missile, is weaker then a photon torp. or phasor.

[Neko_Oni]

BTW what sort of ranges do you think space combat would take place at? Given that most fights will probably be in planetary orbit.

[Enlightenment]

BTW what sort of ranges do you think space combat would take place at? Given that most fights will probably be in planetary orbit.

Depends on the orbital altitude and the coverage of the opposing factions sensor networks. Without networked sensors it's not possible to detect targets that are behind the planet (i.e. below the horizon line) so combat ranges will be limited to the physical line of sight between the ships involved. With networked sensors it's possible to use missiles to shoot down targets that are below the horizon line. In this case ranges will be effectively unlimited because anything at the same orbital altitude can be targetted.

[Slartibartfast]

Slartibartfast : This is slightly OT, but didn't Larry Niven (and others in his Known Space universe) make great use of nuke-pumped x-lasers? I seem to remember them being one of the primary weapons of the UNSN during the Man-Kzin wars era.

I don't really know, all my knowledge of Niven's ringworld universe comes from the game Ringworld (haven't read any of his books), so I never saw a reference of x-lasers there.

[Headshots_Sold_Here]

The honorverse seems like a good inspiriatiion for this sort of thing. Missles for long range, with laser heads(multiple x ray thingies) while for closer you have lasers grasers energy torops and so on.

[SPOOFE]

The OP wants realistic weapons? Okay...

Realistically, the only types of weapons that would be used in space - using today's technology - would either be missiles or lasers. Essentially, weapons that don't put a lot of recoil on their host ship ('cuz recoil will cause the host ship to start to rotate away, which can screw up maneuvering...).

I don't know which system would be preferred, as I have no knowledge of real space combat (heck, I doubt anyone does ). Lasers have range, but also need power... missiles lack the range (actually, the speed to traverse that range quickly), but pack a great punch.

[consequences]

Hey kojikun, have you considered the possibility that two countries on the same planet are fighting to control resources in space, like say, the asteroid belt?

[Guest]

The problem with lasers is that they are inefficient- about 30% or less actually goes into the beam, the rest as heat. So you probably would blow up your ship rather then the other guy's. Railguns and other such things would not be good either, since you people are saying 20 MT in KE at the enemy. However the ship firing that would have 20 MT in recoil too,

[Sea Skimmer]

Another thing to note is that wars in space will ALWAYS be between two planets. No country on earth will ever fight another country on earth, in space, because its far cheaper easier and more damaging to do so here on the ground.

Perhaps not in deep space. However fighting within orbit of a planet would happen, and weapons for such already exist, witness the US and Soviet Union ASAT programs. Both produced working weapons and while the American one died after one life fire test, the Russians built or rather converted a small stock pile of old ICBM's to the role.

[Enlightenment]

The problem with lasers is that they are inefficient- about 30% or less actually goes into the beam, the rest as heat. So you probably would blow up your ship rather then the other guy's.

The efficiencies of modern-day lasers are typically much worse than even 30%. That said, the theoretical effiency limits on free electron lasers are in the 90% range. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that a sufficiently advanced civilization could operationally field very powerful weapons lasers given enough time and affort.

200gt tnt equivalent per pulse is well into the realm of fantasy, however.


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[Sea Skimmer]

The problem with lasers is that they are inefficient- about 30% or less actually goes into the beam, the rest as heat. So you probably would blow up your ship rather then the other guy's.

Modern lasers have more like 10% efficiency

[weemadando]

Read Dark Dawns for my ideas.

http://www.daltonator.net/fanfics/stories/darkdawns.txt