Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts
|
|
|
||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
| Frequently Asked Forum Questions | |
|||
|
||||
|
|
|||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| Search Older Posts on This Forum: Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts | ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| Re: In Amber Clad loadout discussion | |
| Posted By: OldNick <nmascall@btinternet.com> | Date: 3/14/05 12:53 p.m. |
In Response To: Re: In Amber Clad loadout discussion (dude1) : okay, so it looks like i underestimated support crew just a tad (too much
: regarding damage control techs: we really don't see many onboard, as far as i
As you may already know, the traditional reasons for warships having large crews break down like this: More bodies for boarding actions - Marines and naval specialists (like MC) might do the offensive boarding, but ship crew can certainly help in defence. I've gone back to the age of sail for this line of argument, but it seems to apply in the Haloverse. More human redundancy - you can take casualties and still remain effective. More bodies for damage control - there are full-time specialists, but everbody gets at least basic training in this. The best contemporary analogy for us here is a nuclear submarine. There are pressing reasons to keep the crew small - lack of space for bodies and stores, need for life-support - yet their crews are quite large, for the space available. I think I'm right in saying that submarines are the only U.S. Navy warships where the crew outnumber the bunks. Let's take a contemporary Ohio-class SSBN: Mass: 16764 tons (surfaced displacement)
Everyone joining a submarine crew is required to study and learn ALL the critical plumbing, so that 1) they don't make deadly mistakes, and 2) they know enough to use their judgement and initiative in an emergency. I for one would be very reluctant to get on board a spaceship that wasn't run the same way. I'd imagine that damage control organisation would exploit this sort of training: there'd be a core of full-time specialists trained to do heavy work in suits (firefighting, structural repairs, sealing breaches) and a parallel organisation of light damage control teams, headed by specialists, covering mainly plumbing, cable-laying and network troubleshooting. All crew (and probably some Marines) would qualify to do the light team work. : regarding aircraft maintenance: there's not much in the way of crew in the
If I remember correctly, the Pelicans are suspended level with galleries which offer at least some access. Here we're back with the contemporary aircraft-carrier analogy again. To start with, anyone moving around in those hangar bays when they're working will be a full-time specialist, or under escort by specialists (flight crew and passengers both). It's an even more dangerous environment than a carrier's flight deck in some ways, because it's so confined, and objects are potentially moving in three dimensions, not just two. A spacecraft hangar bay of this sort combines most of the worst features of a carrier's flight deck AND hangar deck. There'll be marshallers to guide manoeuvering craft (like the one with the paddles in the PoA cutscene). There'll be fuelling specialists, because even if the process is automated up to the hilt, flammable fuels flowing through temporary connections in large quantities under pressure need constant monitoring and inspection, especially in this busy and dangerous environment. There'll be a firefighting/damage control crew, with vehicles of some sort, on standy. There'll probably be tugs or tractors so you can move craft around without having to start their engines, and crew to drive or monitor those - driving a vehicle in this sort of place is a job for qualified specialists only. There will be armourers with trolleys full of weapons (more tractors), because you don't take chances with propellants and explosives in this environment, any more than with fuels. You may think I'm overplaying the danger aspect, but consider the thrust needed to move a Pelican. Even when idling, those engines are blasting out high-speed exhaust. If they're running in an air-breathing mode, then they're sucking at the other end too. Jet intakes are best avoided. And come to think of it, you're going to need ventilation on a heroic scale. There's also a bit of a noise problem. I once had the privilege of standing 150 yards from four Harriers (AV-8s) hovering over a runway at the Farnborough Air Show. They went through a very neat choreographed routine - it was deeply impressive. The only problem was the noise. Imagine a vacuum cleaner the size of IAC. Now imagine the noise it would make. In an echo chamber. Let's assume that our descendants have cracked active noise cancellation - I don't think their lives would be worth living otherwise. There's also heat from those exhausts. At a Farnborough show a few years after the one mentioned above, an interesting new Russian V/STOL aircraft embarrassed itself by melting a hole in the pavement (I missed that one). I haven't touched the maintenance side because I see that another poster has already stepped in. *OT* Dude1 - The game I built the carrier for was 'F-18E Superhornet', published by those well-known paragons of quality games software, Titus (spits on floor). I strongly urge you not to spend good money on this. In any case, the carrier, like most other vehicles in the game, was handed off for finishing and texturing to my esteemed ex-colleague Alan Massey, who may have had to simplify it a bit. E-mail me if you want more detail. | |
|
| Replies: |
The HBO Forum Archive is maintained with WebBBS 4.33. |