Get 'Designing a Space Frigate', the latest Official Spacedock Reference Book, here: www.patreon.com/posts/100184147/

@wostronohej

3 ай бұрын

Hi, not exactly related to topic, but are you planning on making a video on Super Destroyers from Helldivers 2?

@ironboy3245

3 ай бұрын

what is the game at 4:00?

@Owlfeathers0117

3 ай бұрын

@@ironboy3245 Starsector.

@ironboy3245

3 ай бұрын

@@Owlfeathers0117 is it on steam? I can't find it... Oh it's not on steam, that's a rarity nowadays, sheesh

@Napoleonic_S

3 ай бұрын

The Yamato anime series do have anti submarine warfare thing where unlike cloaking device, an enemy could hide in another dimension and you can set up something similar to depth charges to that dimension... At least that's AFAIK from watching the earlier season of the recent anime version.

Corvettes punch down, Destroyers punch up, Frigates swing at anything in sight. Battleships don't punch. They bodyslam. Cruisers are a one-ship fleet. Carriers sit back, take a smoke, and let others fight.

@genxtech5584

3 ай бұрын

I actually love this way of looking at it ;)

@bamaboy5746

3 ай бұрын

I see corvettes as "this is our first attempt at a warship, make it have as much shit it can while still being mobile and fast"

@USS_Grey_Ghost

3 ай бұрын

Frigates evolved into cruisers of the II World War from what they were in the age of sale.

@vi6ddarkking

3 ай бұрын

In space combat, assuming your setting allows for spinal weapons. Carriers are snipers, sitting back and point and deleting other ships at long range. The Punic-class supercarrier from Halo being an excellent example of the carrier role in space combat.

@DoubleTrouble-li5wi

3 ай бұрын

Genuinely a brilliant way of putting it. I'd also add Dreadnoughts look at things and they disappear.

I was on a modern frigate in the 80s, so my mind goes to three things. 1. Missile picket/Scout-hunting with good sensors and probes. 2. Going places others can't. (Including the best liberty ports.) 3. Doing it all faster than everything else. (gassing up alot.)

My favorite Frigate role in space combat has to be the examples in Homeworld and Halo. Where The Frigates are basically the Super Carriers's, Battleships's and Battlecruisers's secondary armaments with engines strapped to it. The Ion Frigate being the foremost example. Because sometimes DPS is all you need.

@seanheath4492

3 ай бұрын

The ion frigate, aka the "ship wrapped around a gun"-class (especially the Taiidan version). :P

@themightyalpaca313

3 ай бұрын

@@seanheath4492 A-10 taken to the extreme?

@hetzel3606

3 ай бұрын

i loved the boarding frigate because it looked like a battlestar lmao. In my head canon there was probably an "elite" version of that frigate that could do kind of everything but smol, like the smallest version of the main ship that could be used as power projection, maybe even carry one or two fighter/bomber. I really just wanted a battlestar in "hero's ship" format lmao xD

@seanheath4492

3 ай бұрын

@@themightyalpaca313More or less. Just look up images of the ion array frigate.

@PraetorPaktu

3 ай бұрын

Now that you mention it, things make a lot more sense. Thats a good way to think.

How about the frigates of Dune? The largest class of warship in that universe that could make planetary landings, always struck me as a good definition of what a frigate is in sci-fi.

@RorikH

3 ай бұрын

I think Mass Effect uses that standard as well. I like it too, gives it a nice extra touch of specificity.

@PositiveBlackSoul

3 ай бұрын

@@RorikH I think Mass Effect might use that standard as well BECAUSE of Dune xD

@scelonferdi

3 ай бұрын

@@PositiveBlackSoul I think it also comes down to role. A frigate is often supposed to be versatile enough to react to a range of situation. This includes (limited) ground operations. For that it's insanely practical if a ship can land. It also makes it less demanding in terms of infrastructure for longer independent operations.

@MrQuantumInc

3 ай бұрын

It seems like a number of franchises have the idea that only ships below a certain size can land on a planet. Intuitively it makes sense. So it doesn't surprise me that done and Mass Effect associate that with the term "frigate".

@mikewaterfield3599

3 ай бұрын

They really were not frigates as dune really did not have naval combat. If you had read the books you would know what happens when lasers hit shields.

IIRC, it gets more complicated when you read that 'cruiser' originally was a general term for any ship capable of long-range, independant sailing. Which included frigates. And modern frigates fill a role destroyers used to have, and destroyers fill the role of cruisers and battleships. My own classifications are - Corvette- smallest 'warship', meant primarily for in- and near-system security and patrol. Frigates- Meant as escorts in fleet formations, but capable of independent operations, though limited in range (exact dependant on setting and tech). Cruisers- The 'main' warships for a fleet, well armed and protected, capable of multi-role missions, very long-legged. Battleships/Dreadnoughts- The heaviest in the fleet, rarely operate alone, usually only leave a polities borders when a war is going.

@jaquigreenlees

3 ай бұрын

Frigates also make perfect convoy escorts of merchants through pirate infested regions or convoys to ferry supplies during hostilities. Corvettes* for system defence so they can reach the outer edges of a system and still have the ftl so they can shift to where needed in the defence. * During WWII Canada had the 3rd largest Navy, but mostly Corvettes in their classification that were tasked with convoy escort duties. This is part of why the definitions are so fuzzy, different Countries used different definitions.

@rodrigopaim82

3 ай бұрын

Even in current real life every country uses its own definition and a nation corvette can be more powerful then another nations frigate by a huge margin

@Nerd_Detective

3 ай бұрын

Something that fascinates me about frigates is that, in most historical uses until the modern day, you weren't really seeing frigates in fleets. Age of sail frigates were mostly too small for the battle line, but they might be supporting a fleet. WWII frigates were too slow to even keep up with a battle fleet. Yet modern frigates have shown a big shift from that, often being the largest multi-role surface combatants of most navies that don't field destroyers. It's interesting how, as technology evolves, ship types change and navies just kind of arbitrarily pick old terms or invent new terms. Like how the UK was going to use "corvette" for destroyers until it ended up being used for much smaller merchant escorts instead. It's almost beautifully arbitrary.

@user-roninwolf1981

2 ай бұрын

In Star Trek Online (and probably all of Star Trek in general) the Miranda-Class was classified as a Frigate, as well as the Centaur-Class. For the role of Corvette, the Defiant-Class would be the one. The Saber-Class is marginally larger than the Defiant-Class, and the Steamrunner-Class is already evidently larger than the Defiant-Class. The one thing I've noticed that distinguished the Defiant from the Miranda was the firepower and the armor; the Miranda-Class was less armed with beam arrays and beam banks, while the Defiant-Class had ablative armor and could employ the heavy cannons.

@Treveli45

2 ай бұрын

@user-roninwolf1981 Trek is a gods damn nightmare for ship classifications. Generic 'starship' for every Federation vessel, widely varying ones for everyone else, most of which make them sound scarier than they are. First classification I remember for Miranda's were heavy frigates, then other sources said light crusier. I stick with heavy frigate, because frigate fits their smaller size, and heavy for the phaser cannons they mount. Defiant and vessels like her I give the special class of 'destroyer', a frigate sized vessel that is dedicated to combat. Their whole layout and equipment is for fighting. If a destroyer shows up, it's not for science or first contact, it's because someone's ass needs kicking.

Frigates in Homeworld: The thing I’m constantly pumping out trying to figure out the best Rock-Paper-Scissors combo at the moment. To build Ion Frigates or not to build Ion Frigates

@failedexperiment9073

3 ай бұрын

The correct answer is to steal all Ion frigates.

@templarw20

3 ай бұрын

Homeworld frigates definitely fall into the "tight specialty" interpretation. My favorite is probably the Multi-Beam Frigates from Cataclysm. While they are not in HW2, we do sort of see where they ended up with the larger ships (especially the Battlecruiser) having "pulsar" beam point defense.

@headshot6959

3 ай бұрын

Correct! A huge omission by these guys and a thumbs-down from me.

@headshot6959

3 ай бұрын

@@templarw20 If there ever was a game gearbox ought to remaster! With the right combination of multi-beams and acolytes you feel unstoppable. And the storyline is perfect.

@aridianknight3576

3 ай бұрын

@@headshot6959apparently it’s because they lost the source code.

Normally, I like that you guys dig up relatively obscure stuff to talk about, and not just what's big an trending. That's a big part of what makes your videos interesting. That being said, can you please cover the Super Destroyers from Helldivers! They are quickly becoming one of my favorite sci-fi designs- despite them being a bit of a 'do everything' ship.

@Madaseter

3 ай бұрын

Oh yes we need that video 😂

@Spactual

3 ай бұрын

👍

@507jones3

3 ай бұрын

One if my favorite obscure sci-fi is crest of the stars it has it's own ship classification and it cares about heat at during sustained combat!!! (My favorite ships are the missle ships called battleships in world)

@dereksherwood3794

3 ай бұрын

I really think of the Super Destroyers as tiny carriers mixed with an arsenal ship. We've never seen them fight other ships, from weapon placement to interior logistics, they seem entirely geared for supporting ground ops. Even the mission timers are based on their ability to descend into low orbit and provide combat support, which is a unique feature... how many ships are designed to get dirty in atmo? :)

@mitwhitgaming7722

3 ай бұрын

@@dereksherwood3794 My thoughts exactly

I hear frigate and I automatically picture the ones in the Homeworld Games, they were the smallest FTL capable ships. the Ion Frigates were the best, just a flying gun and it was so satisfying to watch them come into range and open fire all at once.

@ALLMINDmercenarysupportsystem

3 ай бұрын

I think of the various Bungie era Halo frigates. Also flying guns.

@templarw20

3 ай бұрын

@@ALLMINDmercenarysupportsystem Most human ships in Halo are flying guns. That's what they needed...

@ALLMINDmercenarysupportsystem

3 ай бұрын

@@templarw20 The frigates are especially so. Considerably less armor and ship around the gun.

I’d like to see a compilation and analysis of “submarines but in space” from sci-fi.

@seanheath4492

3 ай бұрын

They'd almost have to include Wrath of Khan and a lot of (especially later) Honorverse stuff.

@Keemperor40K

3 ай бұрын

By technicality all ships are submarines in space (as they have to be hermetically sealed). But to get to that particular definition of submarine it also has to do stealth extremely well. In that sense all ships with defined stealth capabilities are submarines in space. Extra points if the ship can maintain its stealth characteristic while engaging.

@hoojiwana

3 ай бұрын

We did that already! - hoojiwana from Spacedock

@PraetorPaktu

3 ай бұрын

They have done that already.

@jamesxiaolong2199

3 ай бұрын

There about 3 ships I see being talked about, the Battlestar Osiris, the UX-01, and the SSV Normandy.

Ship definitions vary wildy in real life too. In the 1960s, the USN built several classes of 6000+ ton SAM-armed ships that were initially classified as "frigates" because their job was to escort carriers, the USN term for what the rest-of-the-world calls frigates being "destroyer escort (DE)". Then in the 1970s they decided to fall in line with the rest of the world, with most of these huge "frigates" being reclassified as "cruisers" and the smallest ones as "destroyers". Nowadays they go off size and "rate" (i.e. quality): cruisers are big first-rate ships, destroyers are smaller first-rate ships, and frigates are even smaller second-rate ships. All of them have all-round capabilities, just to different degrees. In the Royal Navy, by contrast, destroyers are anti-aircraft vessels and frigates are anti-submarine vessels, whatever their size: the Type 22 frigates were bigger than the contemporary Type 42 destroyers.

@jaredragland4707

3 ай бұрын

We needn't even mention all the various ships that were called frigate, destroyer and cruiser in the age of sail. "Fourth rate ship of the line" designated a class of ships that were called any of the above at some point, by someone, just aa one illustration of how confusing that conversation is.

@edwhlam

3 ай бұрын

And new Type 26 frigates, displacing between 7,000 to 9,000 tonnes, are larger than some destroyers.

@cp1cupcake

3 ай бұрын

Destroyers originally were 'torpedo boat destroyers' and that was their mission goal. Now, I think most of the US destroyers are bigger and more well armed than its cruisers.

@MrHws5mp

3 ай бұрын

@@jaredragland4707 The term destroyer was invented after the age of sail. It's a contraction of "torpedo-boat destroyer", i.e. a small fast ship with quick-firing guns that was intended to chase down and destroy torpedo boats. Navies soon realised however that the "torpedo boat destroyer" was a better and more versatile platform for the torpedoes than the boats, so it morphed from an escort into the smallest offensive ocen-going craft. Then when anti-submarine and anti-aircraft escort became critically important in the first and second World Wars, destroyers gradually morphed back into escorts, generally landing torpedoes in favour of more AAA and ASW equipment.

@MrHws5mp

3 ай бұрын

@@cp1cupcake The rampant size inflation started in the 1970s with the USN's Spruance class destroyers: 7000 ton replacements for 3000 ton Gearings. This was much criticised at the time, but the USN had it right and most navies have come round to this way of thinking. What the USN had realised was "steel is cheap and air is free", i.e. there's no point compromising the capabilities of your ships by making them cramped and difficult to upgrade in order to save on hull costs, when the latter are only 10% of the price anyway. Better to have plenty of "elbow room" and claw back the small cost increase from the efficiencies that result from that.

Nice to see the Adamant class get some love. 100% my favorite ship from Deadlock.

@thrall1342

3 ай бұрын

Hands down. Ranger is a great second place for me.

@RobinTheBot

2 ай бұрын

Honestly, you only need those and scout ships to beat the game. It's got the highest range (somehow) and has great value -per-point. Standard fleet is the Scout, 1 big ship, and 4 of those.

I like that consept of submarine warfare in ww2, basically being how you hunt down a stealthed cloaking ship in sci-fi. They have much in common.

@carloshenriquezimmer7543

3 ай бұрын

Like the episode in Star Trek when the romulans first appeared.

@casbot71

3 ай бұрын

​@@carloshenriquezimmer7543And the battle in the Mutara Nebula in *The Wrath of Khan.* That's what made that battle so epic and suspenseful, that it still stands up today as how to make ship to ship combat dramatic.

In my setting, frigates take a kind of "battleline" role in space warfare. They're on the front lines of any naval battle, and are easily modifiable for numerous roles. For example, C.A.F. (Cosmic Armed Forces, aka the human military) frigates can be turned into escort/bodyguard vessels for more valuable starships (such as more lightly armed carriers), or just charge straight ahead and bear the brunt of enemy fire then shoot back with particle/laser cannons, or even just becoming minor transports that carry 2-3 vehicles into areas larger ships can't get to (IE closer to the ground of a low gravity battlefield).

@seanrea550

3 ай бұрын

That kind of fills their age of sail role of being the smallest category of the ships of the line. The first rates would take the prime beatings while the frigates would screen the fleet and when line of battle was engaged serve as signal relays off line of the main shooting match.

It's so hard to pin down what a Frigate is. Generally I think of them as either semi-independent long range patrol craft or fleet support (especially anti-missile/fighters). They are bigger and more durable than than Corvettes, that are just above fighters in most senses, but well below cruisers in terms of combat capabilities. They serve primarily for scouting and early detection, but have no role in big ship fights outside of asset protection and can only really damage larger ships in wolf pack flotillas, where their numbers and relatively fast speed (for a ship) can be maximized to deal damage out of proportion to their relative weight with the enemy. But here the defining factor is weapons power. If your weapons power is too high Frigates become basically death traps (as happens in Halo), but if you have defenses or maneuverability that can make up for this short coming, then the fleet support/defense is their best primary role with again scouting and early warning as a dangerous secondary.

@XMysticHerox

3 ай бұрын

I like the original (modern) frigate distinction from WW2 which was basically a destroyer/upscaled corvette designed to primarily escort other ships. While destroyers would be similar sized vessels designed primarily for offensive operations. Similar to your idea.

@Max_Flashheart

3 ай бұрын

Frigates are big enough to be useful in fleet defense and can work as fleet defense/anti aircraft/Submarine and radar pickets. But are also ideal for chasing the enemy or scouting independently. A Frigate is a serious threat to most vessels.

When you mentioned Starsector, I immediately knew you were going to call out the Wolf. It's fast enough to decline engagements it can't win, agile enough to flank larger enemies, armed enough to hurt them and cheap enough to be replaced when it invariably over-extends and gets blown up.

@specs.weedle

3 ай бұрын

For me it’s the Vanguard due to its mix of ballistic and missile weapons allowing it to tear apart frigates while punching up against destroyers, cruisers, and even battleships when in sufficient numbers, and it can easily avoid fights it can’t take with its burn drive, when not using it to chase down ships or charge into brawling range. It’s also really well protected for its size, with tanking capabilities comparable to some cruisers with the right hull modifications and well times damper field activations. It’s also cheap to deploy and maintain, and they’re reasonably cheap to obtain, if not outright free due to how almost every luddic church or pirate fleet above a certain size will have at least one that’s recoverable after battle, with its Rugged Construction hullmod massively increasing its chance to be recovered, while reducing the likeliness of permanent damage when it does blow up, and mitigating the effect of what permanent damage the ship does sustain. It ticks all the boxes of a good frigate design - fast, has great versatility due to being well armed and armored, and it’s cheap and easily amassable. If they were larger, they’d probably be labeled as cruisers, and it just so happens that it was added alongside the Eradicator-class Fast Cruiser, which both has a similar playstyle and helps cover what few weaknesses it has.

@joshfritz5345

3 ай бұрын

@@specs.weedle I'm playing an older build at the moment and haven't gotten the chance to play with the new stuff. Gotta say, my favorite destroyer is the Enforcer. It actually perfectly complements the Wolf as a battle line warship that can stand alongside heavy cruisers while the Wolves execute flanking maneuvers and torpedo runs.

the way I see sci-fi Frigates being able to do the modern frigates capabilities as anti-submarine vessels is to have some Frigates be dedicated anti-cloaking ships. they got specialized sensor arrays that can't be easily fitted onto regular combat vessels and have ways of pushing cloaked vessels out of cloak for a supporting fleet to destroy. the sensor arrays aren't perfect however, but are better than nothing. this idea would especially be useful in settings where Pirates regularly have cloaking tech.

@ryuukeisscifiproductions1818

3 ай бұрын

The thing is though in space, sensor power and capability is directly proportional to its size. A larger ship can pump a lot more power and have a much bigger sensor array, coupled with much more capable computer systems and more crew to manage that systems means a bigger ship is going to detect cloaked ships at longer ranges than smaller ones. The main advantage that a small ship would have in the cloak hunting role is that you can just build more of them, and even if a battleship ends up being far better at detecting cloaked ships, those are not the ships you want to be using for convoy escort missions and anti piracy patrols because of their greater cost.

@RorikH

3 ай бұрын

​@@ryuukeisscifiproductions1818 Using several small ships could also get you a better variety of viewing angles on any target, and if you're using active scanners then having them on a faster, cheaper ship could definitely help if Anti-Radiation-Missiles are a concern.

Love to see StarSector getting some recognition on Spacedock, a wonderfully dark sci-fi game.

@joshfritz5345

3 ай бұрын

I love the Wolf, but the Lasher is underrated. It's not as mobile as most frigates, but it packs an incredible amount of firepower into a small, cheap package.

@alecciarosewater7438

3 ай бұрын

@@joshfritz5345 It's also too slow to chase down targets or to evade large threats

@joshfritz5345

3 ай бұрын

@@alecciarosewater7438 Yes, and that was a big sticking point for me initially. It was too slow to do normal frigate things. I never used the thing, so I was surprised when I started using it the right way and it exceeded all of my expectations. It's basically a mini Hammerhead. Give it another try sometime, give it a good mix of kinetic/ HE weapons. When the ammo feeder is active, it straight up out-guns most destroyers, even an Enforcer.

@johnyendrey5590

3 ай бұрын

@@joshfritz5345I find myself turning it into a Point Defense platform for larger ships I don't want to burden with PD. Slap on some tracking hull mods, and its the perfect Carrier escort.

@ColdHatch

3 ай бұрын

​@@joshfritz5345In a fleet setting, no other frigate right now can beat an Omen. Not only does its EMP Point Defense lightning system allow it to delete fighters and missiles across your friendly ships, but it also boasts an admirable shield efficiency and flux capacity even with 360 degree omni shields allowing it to punch far above its weight given the right armaments and hullmods. I've seen it take on destroyers alone without issue. All of that with a very reasonable logistical profile of 6 supplies a month, meaning it's more efficient than scarabs, tempests, and Hyperions (of course), and you can field more of them at once in a battle. Omens are the perfect frigate.

i absolutely love the Normandy. Its sleek fast and has sharp teeth with the Thanix cannon upgrade.

Frigate has had so many definitions just in real life that it's hard to say what is or isn't a valid definition in any given SFU. At the beginning of the Ironclad Age, an armored frigate was actually the largest and most powerful class - it was mostly called a frigate because it only had one deck of broadside guns. This definition was a holdover from the Age of Sail, when a "line-of-battle ship" would have 2 or 3 full gun decks for a heavier broadside, and a frigate's single gun deck would be seen as insufficient for the line of battle. By the time you got to the Age of Dreadnoughts and WW1, the term frigate had almost entirely dropped out of use. WW2 saw a resurgence of frigate to mean a vessel smaller than the new destroyers, but then the post-war years saw fracturing of the definitions and sizes involved, with many American frigates of the mid-20th century being bigger than Soviet cruisers, followed by their reclassification as destroyers or cruisers.

@mikeunger4165

3 ай бұрын

For the USN, a frigate is any vessel too small for them to accept.

@frantremblay1630

3 ай бұрын

Also, I was re-watching Green Lantern TAS, episode 18, where the team goes to a Spider Guild "frigate" that was just a quite sizeable space station - to each their own, I guess.

@armorhide406

Ай бұрын

​@@mikeunger4165Laughs in Constellation class, cries in Oliver Hazard Perry class

You can also go the route of the German Frigates: As big and as heavily armed as cruisers. Still frigates.

@XMysticHerox

3 ай бұрын

Germany just makes no distinction between frigates and destroyers like many nations actually. Which makes sense. Post WW2 previously specialized frigates and destroyers were all made largely multi purpose so the difference has kinda disappeared.

@Poctyk

3 ай бұрын

Heavily armed? Lol. Lmao even... Oh wait you are serious F-126 class armament: 8 AShM, 16 multi purpose cells Arleigh Burke flight 3: 96 missile cells. Atago class Yeah yeah I know AL/KC etc.: 96 cells. Constellation class: 16 AShM, 32 cells. FREMM (Italian): 16 cells. Now you may ask, wtf this is anemic. Why is the ship so big? Because, and it may shock you, it's a FRIGATE. Same as original FREMMs. A patrol kind. It's main job is to partol the seas for up to 2 years non stop. Which means: redundancies, luxurious crew accomodation, etc. It will be a ship for the peaceful world that doesn't exist anymore. Obsolete before keel was laid down.

@armorhide406

Ай бұрын

JMSDF has a "helicopter destroyer" which is a carrier analogous to USN LHA/LHD Germany in WW2 straight up lied/ignored the naval treaties

i cannot describe how much i love the grounded utilitarian look of battlestars

In the Sci-Fi spaceship classification I usually adopt, in my settings or when playing games like say, Space Engineers, Frigates are described thus: Frigate: fully independence-capable (ergo, equipped with provisions and if existing in setting, an FTL drive, able to support both rapid or long range redeployment) subcapital ship vessel. Versatile and modular designs, ranging from highly specialised platforms to taking on a more generalist role, the former both during fleet deployments or when doing a variety of support and backline duties. The latter, when deployed on lone operations. Make up the backbone of a given Navy. Usually the size of destroyers, but can if necessary dwarf them. Can be automated but are often built for crewed use, unlike many destroyers. Can be used for Escort, Electronic Warfare, Sensor Suites and Communication Nodes. Naming depends on role. This is very similar to how they are depicted in EVE online, which I must say is a surprise.

During FASA's time with the Star Trek RPG license, they completely redefined the role of "frigates" in Starfleet. In the game, frigates were pure warships, filling a capital ship role in Starfleet (where destroyers and escorts filled the escort role). The Federation Starship Recognition Manual had two primary frigates: Chandley-class and the Kiev-class. The Kiev was a fast frigate, which had more of a troubleshooter/hunter-killer role, which the Chandley was a beast bigger than the Constitution refit and filled a battlespace dominance role. If the Constitution was about equal in capability to a Klingon battlecruiser, the Chandley was there to pummel them into submission. Oh, and it was originally designed to deploy Starfleet ground forces en masse. I loved that idea so much (partly because it was quite different from both the Age of Sail concept filled by the heavy cruiser (Constitution) and the light, fast specialized escort ship that were active when I was in the Navy) that I have always incorporated FASA's fleet roles into my later games (and rebuilt all of the FSRM ships using the rules of the new game I was running...currently Modiphius' Star Trek Adventures). For other settings, I see frigates as a skirmisher in a space fleet setting. If you use the concentric spheres concept of fleet deployment, frigates and other escorts (like gunships) would be on that outer ring, playing both offense and defense against their counterparts, trying to open up holes in the defensive perimeter for strike ships to deliver their payloads. (Destroyers would have a more defensive role in this setting, true to their original purpose (i.e., torpedo boat destroyers); their job is to interdict enemy ships that have penetrated the perimeter and get in the way of firing lines of enemy strike ships. Cruisers would fill the strike role, both stand off and short range, and battleships would fill the "oh, lawd, he comin'" heavy hitter role. Carriers in this setup fill the command & control and small craft operations roles.)

Star Citizen's single player game, Squadron 42, is based aboard an Idris Frigate. It supports a few solid spacefighters, carries a spinal railgun for punching up, and has a number of defensive turrets for punching down.

@blshouse

3 ай бұрын

But will it release this decade?

@desnetamane5785

3 ай бұрын

@@blshouse ha! Good question 🤣🤣🤣 I am an original backer and long since gave up playing...

@perpetrator8932

3 ай бұрын

I also backed it a long time ago. I'm sure my grandchildren will enjoy it

@Rakadur

3 ай бұрын

@@blshouse it was announced as "feature complete" last citizen con and is since then in polishing, though how long that might take is anyone's guess. It's getting there though.

@rakaydosdraj8405

3 ай бұрын

@@blshouseDecade? Probably. Might take a few years, and come out before Star Citizen goes to Beta...

Normandy SR-2 is my favorite frigate.

I mean irl frigates are basically the same as destroyers with a different history behind the particular name in terms of purpose. Sure the largest destroyers are larger than the largest frigates. You can do the same in space obviously which can add a bit of world building detal to the setting. I kinda like the distinction that the modern frigate originated from though. Which was basically destroyers and upscaled corvettes designed mainly to escort other ships (even if the naming was mainly down to a lot of confusion) which then ended up being very similar ships. Of course that distinction disappeared pretty quickly in the cold war as multi purpose ships were the thing everyone wanted.

Oh boy, naval doctrine/design + science fiction, three of my favorite things! Anyways, I've always liked the term 'frigate' for referring to a sensor-heavy warship in sci-fi. Perhaps closer to a modern AWACS craft than necessarily what is currently called a 'frigate.' After all, almost every form of sci-fi 'ruleset' ends up with some need for a craft with good sensors, data processing, and data distribution ability. For the Battlestar Galactica-esque 'fighter-focused' settings, you want something *really* similar to an AWACS node to provide forward fighter/bomber direction, for the 'major ship battles' type of setting such as Star Wars you want something fast to serve as a scout, and for settings where engagements take place at very long range where the light-lag really factors in you want something that can sit up close to the enemy and relay sensor information (especially in settings where you have some FTL communications, but your sensors are still limited to light-speed). IRL that niche is covered by AWACS aircraft, but that's largely because aircraft are so much faster than ships due to moving in two very separate mediums. In space, a 'sensor-heavy fighter' and a frigate would both move through the same vacuum using similar technologies, so it's unlikely that the former would be any faster than the latter. And even IRL improved missile technology is making AWACS survivability a bit tricky, so putting a bit more ECM, shields/armor, and sheer mass onto your sensor craft to make it survivable would push it up to near the mass of a full warship. Therefore, frigate!

Modern Frigates aren't usually multirole vessels, actually. The Office of Naval Intelligence usually classifies vessels based on a combination of speed, tonnage, and role, with Frigates being the second smallest fleet warships (with only Corvettes being smaller) and Frigates typically specialize in one role, usually anti-air or anti-subsurface in keeping with their roles as escorts. By contrast, Destroyers will usually specialize in two roles (either anti-air, anti-surface, or anti-subsurface), and Cruisers will be well suited to all three, hence why ONI considers the PLAN RENHAI-Class as a Cruiser instead of a Destroyer. Sometimes, smaller navies like the Norwegian and Russian navies will make multi-role Frigates that can basically do the work of a Destroyer while still being the size of a Frigate, but this is more of a consequence of either "political correctness," so to speak (Frigate sounds less scary than Destroyer), or an inability to really build larger ships.

As an Empire of War player, nebulons are such versatile ships that you can literally never go wrong with just slapping a few nebulons into every fleet

Great vid ^^ And one of my Favorites, is the Idris Frigate in Star Citizen. Mainly because it fits the Frigate role very well, but also because the ship is very fleshed out, every bed, bathroom, corridor and cupboard is built into the model to help the narrative it will carry in Squadron 42. Only ship I've seen so well planned out inside is the Expanses Rocinante, and that's a comparatively tiny ship.

@rakaydosdraj8405

3 ай бұрын

The devs made a point to balance "Functional naval ship" and "Boarding action FPS Arena."

The frigates from Homeworld 1, 2 and Cataclysm. Aside from one general purpose frigate, all were specialized in one way or another to help bigger ships deal with smaller ships.

In my Sci-Fi I'm writing, the hero ship is initially classified as a corvette, it's old role, but is salvaged and revamped. By planned book 4, it's reclassified as a frigate, wince it finally gets much needed upgrades, especially in the electronic warfare side and weapons to better match the captain (and crew) capabilities.

I always imagined frigates as a heavy cavalry type units... like big armored horses or camels... They are fast highly agile and relatively strong they also can take a certain amound of damage until they cannot fight anymore... Mainly used to sweep smaller enemy groups or break formations of bigger fleets in a blitzkrieg manner... they are also very useful in pushing back enemy units to regroup and reestablish fleet formations fast and efficient once your formation was broken by the enemy...

Man Deadlock really is one of the best space fleet games. Killer job expanding the limited ship rosters of what it's adapting and hot take the turn based combat is actually better than real time. Makes it much easier to be strategic. Shame we don't get more games like it.

I have thought about the system for my works. Dreadnoughts- Big tough ships that can act as almost like mobile bases. Intended for long term habitation for research and terraforming projects in peace time. While serving as command ships and brawlers/ heavy hitters in war time. Cruisers- All Rounder Ships that are mainly used for long range missions and Dreadnought escort. Though in later years they begin to see more independent operations in so called cruiser wings. They offer a balance of protection and fire power while remaining mobile for their size. Frigates- These ships are often used for missions that the larger ships would be unsuited too or too much for. Also for Cruiser escort. They tend to serve in patrols, anti piracy, and act as couriers (There is FTL travel, but FTL communication is limited) Corvettes- Smallest of the “Ships”, they are used almost exclusively for escorting Frigates in patrols and occasionally as couriers themselves. They are rarely used for anything more than low intensity actions. Then there are Craft like Shuttles and Fighters. Shuttles are used to ferry people between planets and small amounts of cargo. Fighters are the combined role of Fighter and Bomber, they can be equipped with mounted torpedoes and missiles that can target space craft or ground targets. While also carrying weapons to deal with other craft. They can also be used for surveys of planets, their targeting sensors capable of scanning the surfaces as well.

@Rosivok

3 ай бұрын

What you wrote there sounds exactly like how I classified my phase world ships. And of all of them the frigate was the best hero ship. Cruisers were usually way too much and the Corvettes were usually a little fragile.

5:02 I'll start a fight right here. In the traditional sense, I would call the U.S.S. Defiant a destroyer ..... but that just me.

@jimskywaker4345

3 ай бұрын

I'd call the Defiant a gunship. It's highly maneuverable, and outputs a ton of damage. It's meant to take on things much bigger then it.

@templarw20

3 ай бұрын

I would agree with that. Of course, I would also call the Sovereign a battleship or dreadnaught.

@KatamuroTheFirst

3 ай бұрын

@@jimskywaker4345by pre-ww2 definition Defiant is a destroyer, a lot of the early destroyers were just ocean-going torpedo boats. as the years went on the definition of the destroyer got broader and broader until now where the line between frigate, destroyer and cruiser is basically a blur

@oddforoddssake3751

3 ай бұрын

No no, that makes a lot of sense. It's got heavy cannons, a blistering torpedo armament and high manoeuvrability, along with a small frame. It's a destroyer, alright! Just don't call it that, the higher ups will get mad

@XMysticHerox

3 ай бұрын

Modern frigates and destroyers have no real distinction. They did in WW2 when modern frigates came about but after missiles became a thing they were all redesigned to be multi purpose and those distinctions disappeared. You could call the Defiant either. If we do go by the original WW2 distinction though yes the Defiant is 100% a destroyer in purpose. Though if you go by the Federation -propaganda- framing of it as a "heavy escort" it would actually be a frigate. So hard to say.

I played Eve many years ago. Will forever have a soft spot in my heart for a fully decked out Rifter.

For me, frigate = escort and skirmisher. Possibly small troops transport for landing actions. Something between Mass Effect, Halo, Battlestar Galactica, and The Expanse.

I know it is listed as a light cruiser but I always felt the White Star from Babylon 5 was actually a great example of a frigate. Always felt that the Normandy, especially the SR-2 was inspired by the White Star, just something about the way it moves in fights or when dodging enemies. I'm not claiming it was inspired by it just how it felt while playing Mass Effect.

@darthquigley

3 ай бұрын

You could make the argument that "frigate" and "light cruiser" mean basically the same thing. They're both small to medium sized (though bigger than sloops or corvettes), fast, and long ranged. It's just that the terminology changed between the age of sail and the battleship era. For most of the time that new cruisers were being designed, the term "frigate" had fallen out of use.

Thinking about you comment about real life frigates having an anti-submarine role, I wonder if the sci-fi equivalent would be anti-stealth. Flushing out stealth craft in various ways for allies to target and destroy them

I love the Okinawa-class frigates from Starfleet Command. The old games. Small, nimble, and relatively flat. They never were that powerful as a ship, but tney were great in learning how to play the game.

Never forget when the Enterprise depth-charging the romulan Warbird in Balance of Terror.

@royasturias1784

3 ай бұрын

Starship Enterprise early on in TOS and TAS was seen as more of a science / exploration / diplomacy vessel, with limited armaments and shields mainly for self-defence.

Love the Adamant, early game the wall of death tactic works so well with them, sit a couple behind a Battlestars flak screen and watch as they punch way above their weight.

The term frigate has varied so much that if you dont know what to classify a ship as, just add an adjective infront of the word frigate and you're set.

In my setting, frigates are generally smallish vessels comparable to destroyers but are focused almost entirely on screening friendly ships

Anytime BSG Deadlock is referenced is a good day by me. Love that game!

EVE does have stealth bombers which are the tactical stand-in for submarines, and frigates are generally a pretty good counter for them.

@paulsd9255

18 күн бұрын

Funny enough Stealth Bombers are t2 Frigates

I love all spacedock videos

The closest thing to submarine warfare in space combat is fighting in dence gas environments like in a gas giant or a nebula. For that you need some ship that can take the pressure changes. Like a Delta Flyer.

@WolfeSaber9933

3 ай бұрын

Or what can happen in Star Blazers, where the underwater part is a ship being in another dimension.

@NNYYLL

3 ай бұрын

There's one, in Space Battleship Yamato 2199, called "Dimensional Submarine" It has specialized engine & some kind of ballast tank that can make the whole ship to phase into another alternate dimension in real time Not to be confused with warp jump from point A to B to C, but it's literally "diving" between a space & subspace dimensional boundry layer

@WolfeSaber9933

3 ай бұрын

It's 2199@@NNYYLL

@XMysticHerox

3 ай бұрын

Frankly actual stealth ships are plenty close to submarines. Space is very big so the advantage of having a ship sit in a gas giant is a little dubious. Nebular aren't dense enough to matter.

@WolfeSaber9933

3 ай бұрын

@@XMysticHerox Stealth ships fall into the category of electric warfare.

Wedge - " They're going after the medical....ah frigate."

Another one that I'd throw in as a 'good' frigate in Sci-fi space warfare is the ANS's Raines-class frigate from the game Nebulous: Fleet command. Despite being the second smallest ship in the ANS it has large enough mounts to carry enough heavy torpedoes to take down at least one capital ship - maybe even two if you're really good with it. The ship also has the space to have two reactors, so it can carry very energy intensive equipment like long-range search radars, jammers, and even PD lasers for missile defense (however not all of these things at once). Because of it's low top speed and thin armor it's not a good frontline combatant, but it can take on a wide variety of supporting roles: Missile defense, swarm defense, EWar, spotting, target illumination, etc.

I really liked the Frigates in the Homeworld series at first. They can withstand some oncoming fire but usually only had only one weapon for the task that they where designed for. In Homeworld 2 it was nice to see Frigates with two weapons, one main and one secondary; like the Marine and Infiltrator Frigates having their main "weapon" being the ability to capture enemy vessels but also had the support of a secondary weapon. Similary, the Heavy Missile Frigate had big missiles for main weapons that had long range and a smaller missile launcher for extra short range fire that could intercept fighters better. Hopefully the third instalment of the series will continue this way of thinking and even give Fighters and Corvettes multiple weapons for engaging different targets if necessary. I have commented multiple times about the Homeworld series and would like to see a Spacedock video about the series. :)

I love all spacedock content

For some reason Frigates are my favorite ship class in most sci fi stories.

I love the idea of explaining the roles of different types. Please, continue, I wish to see more!

I would love for you to make a playlist of ship types in sci-fis. Like friget and corvettes and destroyer, but also stuff like sheild ships, sniper ships, drone ships and other roles and tech used for custom ship way of battle.

Thank you for the eve love. Still one of the best space games out there.

A few years back I came up with an idea to get a "submarine warfare" vibe in space combat without it feeling like shoehorned-in WWII. Here's how it works. In this universe, FTL travel is via "Subspace", an alternative dimension in which the physical laws are different and FTL travel is permitted. Ships from our dimension can only travel through it in a bubble of normal space ("N-Space") there are three ways of doing this: Gate Drive. This uses a fixed gate that's external to the ship, which therefore needs the least amount of it's mass devoted to machinery. Essentially the gate "blows a bubble" through subspace with the ship inside it, which pops it back into N-space at the desired point. The ship's course is fixed by the launch conditions and it can't maneuver, or change it's exit time in subspace: it's blind and "on rails" once launched. The advantage is that the ship can carry the maximum payload fraction of any type. The disadvantage is that you need a gate at your jumping off point. You don't need a gate at your exact arrival point, but obviously, if there isn't one within sublight travel range then you aren't going back or anywhere else. For this reason, Gate Drive is most favoured for commercial operations between developed planets with gates at both ends. Jump Drive. This uses the same principles at Gate Drive but the "bubble generator" is carried in the ship itself. Power, fuel and machinery volumes are much higher, but payload fraction is still useful and the ship can go wherever it wants (within the limits of subspace physics). Conditions are the same as Gate Drive in subspace, i.e. blind and on-rails. The flexibility means that his is the only choice for exploration vessels and the favoured choice for military ones. Sub-Phase Drive. This uses a different principle to move the ship into Subspace, which allows it to "hover" there for extended periods, maneuver, detect other ships, and choose it's exit point. The cost is an ENORMOUS power/fuel/machinery volume, taking up 90% of the ship and costing a fortune. Sub-Phase Drive ships ("Sub-Ships" for short) are therefore almost useless for normal space operations of any sort and wouldn't be of any military interest were it not for one other kink of the Sub-Phase Drive: the drive can also be used as a weapon in subspace, projecting a distortion field which causes the N-Space bubble of any ship flying through it to collapse and the ship to rematerialize in N-Space _differentially_ along it's flight path, resulting in it's instant and total destruction. The Sub-Ship can only project this field for a few seconds over a limited range, and in doing so it is involuntarily "dropped" back into N-Space itself, in a depleted state and needing some time to recharge and re-calibrate it's drive. Conventional ships in N-Space can use a variety of sensors that are part-in/part-out of Subspace in order to detect Sub-Ships without committing anything like the volume to machinery that they do, but these sensors are limited in range, ambiguous and variable in response, and jammable. They also need to be deployed some distance from any other masses, so ships using them have to tow them on cables or mount them on long booms, which makes them awkward and slow to deploy/retreive. Sub-Ships can also be hunted by other Sub-Ships, of course. Sub-Ships therefore present the same kind of threat to Gate Drive and Jump Drive ships that submarines do to surface ships in the real world. All the elements of stalking, correct attack timing and playing mind games with a terrifying unseen enemy are there. The anti-Sub-Ship sensors are analogous to the variable-depth sonars and towed array sonars used in the real world.

FASA games had a great Star Trek Starship Combat tabletop game back in the 80-90s. They included Frigates for almost all ST races. Frigates were warships centered on Troop transport and assault, both planetary and shipboard. They had a basic Troop assault for the ship/ship combat, but the game went out of publication before it was pursued further. A lot of people still play and resources are available online.

The role of Frigates: Being the coolest damn ship in any setting they show up in IMO

In my unfinished homebrew sci-fi setting I took pains to have different nations and species refer to their ships differently (I always really like that sort of touch), but broadly speaking from the humanity-centric view the main difference between frigates and destroyers is role/capability. There's a lot of size overlap, but the upper end of frigates tends to be a bit larger than the upper end of destroyers. Destroyers are pure combat ships and typically designed with remaining close to resupply, either major hubs or with fleets, and in the latter they are there to protect the big ships. Frigates are the utility ships in fleets, offering EW or mission specific setups, and outside of fleets they are generally considered to be the smallest capital ship capable of independent action, such as patrol or escort. They'll often have stores of emergency supplies and other gear for disaster relief, as they would be expected to be the most likely to be the first one the scene (no FTL comms aside from FTL communication drones/probes, and FTL in my setting still means a couple days at least). They usually still pack enough firepower to deal with pirates/bandits or to trade shots with some raiders from a hostile nation, mainly through packing a spinal mass driver big enough to punch above their weight a bit. This is one of the reasons frigates tend to be a little bigger than destroyers, as the latter tend to be built around massive missile volleys and turrets, with smaller but faster firing mass drivers.

In my own sci-fi setting Frigates (& they also come in Light and Heavy variations depending on mass) are the most common sort of 'naval' vessels in space. Small and less costly to operate, but capable enough for most common tasks. In fleet actions they usually have a cruiser they are escorting which is their command ship, though 'pairs' and 'trios' are common to see even outside of fleet actions. Their only real downside is they *usually) have limited numbers of small craft and lack command and control facilities of larger vessels.

A solid thumbs up for me is the Interceptor Mark 4 (also called the Pirate cruiser) from Star Wars. As much as I love the Munificent (actually being my favorite) I found it was technically considered a cruiser (though I kind of doubt it given how it was used) the Interceptor Mark 4 always got my attention. Its design was as practical and streamlined as possible and by all accounts was just two wedges with a rectangle in the middle. Building that rust bucket must have been as simple as 1, 2, 3. Two laser cannon batteries and two turbo laser cannon batteries with Ion cannons and a proton torpedo launcher made for simple, practical yet powerful weaponry but it came off to me as the perfect ship to use in numbers... and at the end of the day that's what a frigate is- versatile Naval cannon fodder to be used in large numbers to overwhelm the enemy. Despite not having a hangar, I could easily see Interceptor Mark 4s being used in large numbers with no objections.

You're absolutely right that Star Trek blurs lots of lines. The Enterprises are outright called "cruisers" so I'd use that basis to call them cruisers, and use this as a fixed point for the basis of the rest. As I understand, frigates are also supposed to be less standalone than other classes of ship, so I'd use this basis in defining the other roles. As such, Intrepids like Voyager or the Miranda class or Constellation class I'd classify as "light cruisers" as they are essentially cruisers but smaller. In Star Trek I'd reserve "frigate" for vessels like the Nova class or the Defiant class; Defiant is quite spartan and suits combat with other roles and functions neglected, while the Nova is similar but for scientific roles. I'd also call the Centaur class a frigate, as these were quickly tacked together specifically for the Dominion War. A Vor'cha would be a destroyer.

I mean, the Age of Sail Frigate evolved into the Cruiser so really, any ship that fills the Cruiser Role (medium combatant capable of both fleet action and independent long range patrol for extended durations) can also count. The beauty of Frigate is that anything other than a Capital Ship can be one.

Love your guys info dumps on all the specs and techie stuff from various sci-fi IPs. Quick way to nerd out dip from reality for a minute. Thanks for all the content.

This is another excellent video, and it is masterfully made. I truly enjoy learning about the various ships in the different science fictions and the designs of several of the ships are quite unique.

I have an entire faction I've built and have a classification system for my navy. Frigates are (generally) the smallest FTL capable ships in my navy. Corvettes are smaller, but relegated to system patrol (much like coastal warships). They aren't as powerful as the next size up (Destroyers), but they make for good scouts or picket ships to protect larger ships from flanking, strikecraft, or missiles/torpedoes.

A sci-fi example similar to HMS Surprise is the RCS Princess Cecile. Though classed as a corvette rather than a frigate, she still ticks the same boxes the Surprise does: float like butterfly, sting like bee, tough as nails, runs like bat outta hell. (And yes, Daniel Leary also buys her for his own the first chance he gets.) The Sissie (as her friends call her) is particularly dear to my heart because she's the hero of one of the few times a David Drake book ever made me laugh out loud, when the teeny-weeny 1,300-ton Sissie makes the big tuff macho 80,000-ton superdreadnought Direktor Karl run for home with its tail between its legs!

I feel like you COULD translate a frigate to antisubmarine warfare in space, if you have a setting like Star Trek where cloaking or stealth is common; you have some kind of patrol frigate on the edges of a fleet, or patrolling friendly space with very advanced sensor arrays of some kind and looking for those cloaked ships sneaking around. Now as for the actual killing of those cloaked ships, you'd need to think of ways to make the frigate be good at that, but finding them is certainly something you can have frigates do.

There was a Star Trek Original Series novel I read as a child called "The Great Starship Race", in which a fellow Federation captain was EXTREMELY proud of his frigate relative to the Enterprise. IIRC he differentiated it as being a much more single-purpose ship than the Enterprise, smaller, but denser with combat-applicable capability. If that's the case, at least part of the reason the designation isn't common in Star Trek might be the overt militarism of it flying against Starfleets ongoing head-in-the-sand pretense that they aren't a military.

I love this kind of thoughtful content!

In the sci-fi setting I'm working on, frigates are largely used in 'cruiser' roles like anti-piracy and long range security patrol. They're the smallest general purpose capital ship and are very common with Privateers. It should be noted that in the setting Destroyers are the same scale, but are more a dedicated escort type vessel, focusing more on point defense and working as part of large battle groups or to defend covoys.

Speaking of anti submarine roles, the only settings I have seen space submarines in is Space Battleship Yamato. They hang out in Hyperspace, or subspace, or something, and pokes out a small periscope like sensor thing from a small portal into normal space.

For anti-submarine warfare, one good sci-fi analog was that Star Trek episode where the Federation was trying to stop the Romulans from interfering in the Klingon Civil War. Cloaked vessels and how to fight them are about as close as you can get to submarine vs surface ship operations.

Banner/Crest if the Stars doesn't get any love here. The Roil-Class Assault ships are amazing Frigate analogues. They serve as a Hero ship and are very versatile in combat. Assault-ship duels are even compared in-universe to jousting and make for dramatic storytellying.

My favorite Frigate in Sci-Fi is the SSV Normandy. I used to be a Star Trek fan, but then I got into Mass Effect in 2007

When it comes to frigates i see them as the type of class to just shoot both ships of their size and lower classes, though depending on the scenario i can see some being good at taking down the bigger ships

Good to see Starsector getting a mention, it's criminally underrated.

I like the Normandy the most - It has guns, mobility and space for a strike force if necessary. Perfect for a "Ready Force" assignment

I think it would have been good to point out that there are at-least three different historical definitions of "frigates": Sailing, steam age and modern. The sailing frigate was the heavy cruiser of the sailing age. Frigates, corvettes and sloops-of-war were even referred to as "cruizers" by the Royal Navy. They were usually defined as single-deckers with more than 20 guns. Like cruisers in WWI and WWII, frigates were designed for long-range independent missions. They were expected to fight other firgates and smaller vessels, while being fast enough to escape from two- and three-deckers. Steam age "frigates" were originally escort ships, small and slow destroyers who protected convoys against submarines. Nowadays the term includes any mid-sized ships that focus on support functions, like anti-air or anti-submarine warfare. So a sci-fi frigate could be 1. a mid-sized expeditionary/cruising warship 2. a slow defensive escort ship 3. a small multi-role support ship that engages smaller targets Frigates in sci-fi are often very fast because people assume that smaller ships must automatically be faster and manouverable, but that isn't always the case. Escorts don't need to be much faster than the slow transports they are defending.

in the Space Battleship Yamato/Star Blazers series they had frigates and the ships did also have "space submarines" that the ships used a form of space charges to hunt down

One way to include depth charges in your setting is to have warp travel, more specifically warp travel through another dimension. So you'd want your frigates to posess weapons that disrupt travel in that other dimension, pulling them out of it or damaging them when they stay in it. As this possibility creates stalking ships that would be super specialized for prolonged stay in the other dimension/space and ambushing ships in normal space you recreate the whole surface escort/submarine rivalry.

The frigattes in the Homeworld games. Those are fantastic, remarkably versatile and reliable with several highly specialiced options like the Ion Beam Frigatte, the Support Frigatte that can not just repair and re-fuel fighters but also repair larger ships. Meanwhile the Drone Frigatte has a whole bunch of small, easily replaced gun drones and wreaks absolute HAVOK on any fighter swarm coming too close to it.

The hero ship in one of my setting is explicitly a frigate. Small, agile, and designed to shoot down missiles while carrying enough firepower via its own torpedoes and gamma-ray lasers to make it a credible threat to larger ships as it can at least potentially mission kill one, if not kill one entirely with some luck and clever planning. This is not to say it can always kill a battleship - in a fair fight it'll lose badly - but that adds some thought into how it's used, I think. Day to day though it's designed to patrol with most fleet battle stuff being screening larger ships or installations, or transports. In war if operating independently it's kind of meant for commerce raiding, recon, etc. It does have a shuttlebay, but it isn't enough to ferry huge amounts of troops anywhere and those would be dedicated transports. The crew size is possibly a bit small - only a dozen - but in the setting it's stolen; to give those characters a chance at reasonably operating the ship I decided to go with a heavily automated setup. For the navy this saves on crew costs on an expendable ship. For our heroes it means they can fly the thing.

Frigates are my favorite class of ship in both Age of Sail and Scifi. I'd personally add to the specification or requirement, that frigates aught to be the largest space faring ship capable of (safe) atmospheric entry. For instance, to provide direct gunfire support in a hot LZ or as a means to recover smaller dropships, in a heavily contested zone. Something larger with more armor to take hits, but fast and nimble enough to bug out.

Just my own thoughts Corvettes: small ships used primarily for scouting, escort, and point defense. They stop the fighters and bombers, and other small ships from getting too close to the big ships. Destroyer: small ships outfitted with weapons meant to take out larger ships while working in packs, usually missiles or large spinal mounted weapons Frigates: small-medium sized fast ships built for versatility and armed with a variety of weapons. It’s not the best at anything but it is good at everything. Cruisers: Medium-large ships meant for medium range combat, similar to a large destroyer in that its focus is to fight ships that are larger than itself. Battleships: Flying space fortresses armed with long range heavy weapons and heavy amor Carriers: Large, slow, carry swarms of fighters and bombers, lightly armed with decent armor. Battlecarriers: the unholy love child of a battleship and carrier, it has weapons and armor that while still heavy are less heavy than a pure battleship, and enough hangar space for a few squadrons of fighters. Think the various kinds of Star Destroyers from Star Wars. Big ships with big guns and able to carry fighters. Super Battleships: Battlecarriers but bigger. One ship fleets, with a large array of weapons, and hangers for a large number of fighters and maybe even space to carry one or two smaller corvette sized ships. Super Carriers: Take a carrier, make it even bigger. Enough fighters, bombers, and landing craft to block out the sun during an invasion.

Eve : "And some for combat roles" (Shows an ibis) You get a like for that

@paulsd9255

18 күн бұрын

Before the cyno changes even that lone Ibis sitting by the gate could have been a cyno just waiting to initiate hot-drop-o-clock

Love how this came out a couple of days after Falling Frontier showed off 3 new Frigates

In the Star Wars game _Empire at War_ the Frigates were essentially Cruisers, stronger than "Corvettes" (escort vessels) but weaker than Capital Ships. The Imperial _Acclamator_ and _Victory_ class Star Destroyers (and in the "Forces of Corruption" expansion, the mercenaries' military-surplus Venators) were coded in-game as Frigates.

From smallest to largest and separated by category Auxiliary Spacecraft: Fighters, Bombers, Shuttles, Runabouts, Gunboats Escort Ships: Monitors, Lineships, Corvettes, Frigates Capitol Ships: Destroyers, Cruisers, Battleships(Dreadnoughts), Flagships(Carriers) Super Ships: Stars(Battlestar/Star Destroyers), Hulks (Super Star Destroyer), Stations (Starbase/Babylon 5) Bird of Prey is an Attack Submarine and a War Bird is a Ballistic Missile Submarine

I'd say the Defiant is not a frigate but rather more like a PT Boat. Small, nimble, packs an oversized punch. About the only thing not PT Boat about it is the durability, since it's very tough for its size.

It might have been helpful to present how a frigate was defined in the past. The "frigates" in the mid 16th Century were sailing galleys, basically oar-powered galleys with and sails. They were primarily coastal vessels and also in the Mediterranian Sea. They were very popular with pirates. They did not do well in the open ocean. The ocean-going figates of the 17th century to the 19th century were three-mast ships with one gundeck. These ships could not stand in the line of battle. Only Ships-of-the-Line (SoL, aka battleships) could do that. Frigates acted as scouts and messengers for these battle fleets. Because they were fairly fast, typically the heaviest class (both in displacement and firepower) below the SoL, and can carry enough food and water for long cruises, these ships often operated independently to patrol the sea lanes and act as commerce raiders in time of war. Basically the all purpose ship. These were the "cruisers" of the day since they would cruise the seas and oceans. In many ways, they were the equivalent of both the modern day destroyers and cruisers. With the introduction of steampower, steel hull and turreted guns, the term frigate disappeared. In WW II, the British neede a class of ships for convoy escorts. The primary opponents of these escort ships were submarines and armed merchantships. As such, they had decent anti-sub capabilities and modest guns. Because convoys were slow, the were only slightly faster than the convoys at about 20-25 knots, compared to destroyers that were typically 30 knots and faster. The Royal Navy dubbed these ships frigates. The US Navy has effectively the same class of ships, but classified them as destroyer escorts. After WW II, the USN adopted the term frigate. The early Cold War frigates still had escort duties that either specialized in anti sub or anti-air. Because the ships were small, a true multimission vessel was not practical till later. And, they were still not as fast as destroyers. However, they were cheaper and their presence freed up larger, more capable ships to do higher intensity missions. Today, friagtes can be true multi-mission ships, or stay very specialized and very cable in their specialty. Furthermore, many European navies have dropped the term destroyers and refer to destroyers and frigates simply as frigates. So what would space faring frigates be? Whatever the creaters of the universe wants. LOL Their mission may resemble those of the past or may represent a new class that fits a specific need in space.

The difference between the Cruisers and 'Frigates' that I note in Star Trek is that Cruisers are designed to 'Cruise' like it says on the tin; they go out and explore as a Jack-of-All-Trades, while the Frigates are shorter-ranged and designed to poke things that the Cruisers have already found. They are actually an evolution of the same thing; the Age of Sail Frigates were the Cruisers of old. During the late 19th Century when ships became armored the term 'Frigate' was replaced with the more descriptive 'Cruiser' with both Armored Cruisers (later called "Heavy Cruiser" but U.S. Navy still used the 'CA' hull number of the Armored type) and Light Cruisers, which could be pumped out cheaply to do any type of mission and patrol territory and sea lanes in peacetime more economically than a big expensive specialist Battleship.

Thanks for the content.

A frigate serves as the first boss battle in Nexus: the Jupiter Incident, but it behaves more like a battleship, being big and escorted by smaller ships. Later in the game, smaller escort-y ships are designated frigates, with one of the frigates you get for your fleet being a "laser frigate" which specialises in laser weaponry obviously

In EvE Online, "Frigates" refers to a size category, namely the smallest one. Both the "Frigate" and "Cruiser" categories have a wider variety of ships than the other size categories, but each variety, even the highly specialized ones seems to have a cruiser version that does the same exact thing except bigger and better and much more expensively. EvE online definitely leans into "small = fast" so that speed often dictates how people actually use those ships. Though really the most defining differences between size categories is cost. Your pilot is immortal, but the ships cost money every time. In eve onlien ships seem to specialize in shooting ships of the same size. So a duel between two frigates will be quick and deadly, but a frigate and a battleship will find themselves themselves in a long stalemate.The bigger ship will see that they keep missing, the smaller ship simply won't be doing enough damage. If both of them included repair modules or shield recharge modules the battle could literally last forever (or until the smaller ship gets bored or reinforcements arrive).

Nice. Can't wait to see your vid on cruisers.

@royasturias1784

3 ай бұрын

Split into different flavours: Light cruisers - basically bigger and more costly frigates; fast counters to enemy strike craft Heavy cruisers - armoured killers of low-tonnage starships Aviation cruisers - light/heavy cruisers retrofitted with strike craft or shuttle launch bays Large/grand cruisers - basically half-battleships (armour and speed of battleships, but main guns and 2x size of heavy cruisers) Battlecruisers (to some degree) - armour and speed of heavy cruisers, but size and main guns of lower caliber of battleships Auxiliary cruisers (not the German definition in both World Wars) - cruisers occupying certain support roles like fleet tending, munitions, mine laying, repairs, troop transport... Command cruisers - cruisers with lots of electronic modules; makeshift flagships when capital ships aren't available / authorized

When I designed a sci-fi setting of my own I classified frigates as small capital ships with armament that focused on guns. They'd act as screening ships for fleets, shooting down missiles and attack craft.