[TML] Expanding the turret selection.

[Greg Nokes]

> You could argue that fire control tonnage is not required, either.
>

You could, but you would be wrong. ;-)

> "If a turret is installed, then one ton of space must be allocated to
> fire control systems."
>
> Since a fixed mounting is clearly not a turret, you could argue that a
> fixed mount does not require fire control tonnage.  If we follow that
> path, then fixed mounts are at no cost to weight or to displacement,
> making them MUCH more attractive, especially on smaller ships where
> tonnage and weight are at a premium.
>

And what are you going to use to aim at the target 10,000k (10kkm)  
away? Dead reckoning and a slide rule? Even if the weapon is mounted  
and you have to point the ship to aim, you need something that tells  
you where to point the ship and when to pull the trigger.

> Now, I'm thinking of fixed mounts as LITERALLY fixed in place.  The
> gun mounts on a B5 Starfury type fighter, or cannon/machine guns in
> fixed wing or chin mounts on modern aircraft, where the cannon is
> absolutely fixed in place on the airframe, and you aim it at the
> target by maneuvering the airframe.
>

All of those work in visual range, under 10km. When you eyeball mkI  
can track the target, your brain can estimate the speed, and then you  
can lead the target, placing tracer rounds into the vicinity. Heck,  
modern fighters have fire control for their fixed weapons - if you can  
get from a 5% hit ratio to a 50% hit ratio you just increased the  
lethality of the weapons system by a factor of ten.


> There's an intermediate step between fixed mounts to turrets, a weapon
> mount with a limited arc of fire, equivalent to the waist/tail guns on
> a WW2 bomber, or the door guns on a helicopter, or WW2 German
> jagpanzer anti-tank weapons, where you have SOME limited ability to
> aim the weapon without moving the vehicle, resulting in less of a
> firing arc than the full 360 arc / up to 90 elevation of a "perfect"
> turret, but more than the 0 arc/0 elevation of a fixed mount

Lasers at 10kkm are nothing like MG's at 200 yards.


>
> (Missiles, being guided, can steer themselves into the target, so I
> don't see literal fixed mounts being as much of a problem for
> missiles.  There might be some sort of penalty if they're initially
> launched into the wrong arc of sky.  I suspect that would depend on
> whether they hard launch at full thrust, or soft launch from the
> hardpoint, get a little distance from the launcher, orient themselves,
> and then kick in full thrust.)
>

Missiles need fire control more then lasers - we need to be able to  
guide them to with in terminal range (assuming non-fire and forget) or  
at least something that interfaces with the sensors on the firing  
vessel, giving you 'tone' when the missile is locked on your target.  
The only time that missiles would not need fire control is FFAR or  
WWII era unguided rockets. Good luck hitting anything smaller then a  
planet at 10kkm

;-)