Need Help with a Chaos Fleet

[Midwest]

How "available" are Strike-Cruisers to traitor and renegade forces? Esp those that have been around since the Heresy or shortly thereafter (as opposed to a more recent Chapter going rogue and taking a full fleet with them).

 

I'm working on some background stuff, and am trying to figure out what would be a "believable" fleet size. I originally approached it similar to how Marine fleets are shown in BFG, i.e. a battle-barge and a handful of strike-cruisers, but I'm not sure if that's stretching it to portray a powerful but 'average' renegade fleet (i.e. they're no Black Legion or Red Corsairs) having 6-7 capital ships.

 

Similarly, if I 'translated' everything to standard Chaos fleet vessels, would it still be OTT for such a fleet to have a battleship and 5-6 cruisers? I guess I don't know how 'average' a BFG fleet is given it represents a Black Crusade rather than a 'normal' incursion.

 

As a bit of context, I was originally wanting a decent # of ships as I wanted to give each of them its own 'personality' and having a handful would allow for a variety of detail, as I'm wanting the fleet itself to flesh out the background as much as the renegades themselves. I thought about using the Space Marine escorts, but they're almost too small based on the description of how much the Gladius can hold fex. I guess mentally I really like how ADB portrays the Covenant and Echo in his Night Lord books and they seem like the perfect scale or fit for what I'm wanting.

[the jeske]

old heresy era fleets only use post heresy crafts if those were won from loyalist forces . most of the time they use old class crusiers and battleships . So even in huge forces like legion have the number of actual strike cruisers would be rather low .

[Midwest]

My impression from the HH novels (as well as ADB's Night Lords novels) is that the Crusade-era legions had strike-cruisers. They were a wide variety of marks and types, not standardized, but they do seem to be referred to as strike-cruisers.

 

So they would not necessarily look the same as the "modern" loyalist one (and BFG even says there's a variety amongst the current Chapters), but it would basically fill the same role.

[minigun762]

SM naval vessels and resouces seem to be a fairly confusing thing, at least for me, once you move past the current standard of escorts/strike cruisers/battle barge.

 

There are multiple references to HH era battle barges and some to strike cruisers but there are just as many references to battleships and cruisers, so its safe to assume that all vessels were available. After the HH the Loyalists switched over to the current setup to help reduce their fleet strength compared to the Imperial Navy.

 

As for the overall strength of any potential warband's fleet, the siege of Vraks IA books talk about a fleet of Chaos ships and while I can't recall the exact number I think it about 3-4 capital ships with escorts.

 

If we use the SM vessels as standards, a strike cruiser can hold at least 100 Marines while the battle barge can hold at least 300. I'd assume that standard HH era cruiser would fit in the middle at around 200 Marines. If that makes sense, you'll have to determine how big your warband is. A battleship with 5-6 cruisers have the potential to hold 1000-1500 Marines easily and thats probably not counting slaves/mutants/mercs/cultists etc so thats quite a large fleet.

 

I've thought the same thing myself many times and I've yet to come across any hard and fast information.

[Notanoob]

Looking at the BFG page on Games Workshop, you can see that typical Chaos fleets have no Strike Cruisers or battle barges, Murder and Styx class cruisers etc. They're old ships from the Heresy. Take a look at GW.

[Midwest]

Yeah, the frustrating thing is that the Gladius is the only other ship mentioned to carry Marines, but it's limited to like a squad. TBH one strike cruiser is really all i need, the issue is that I came up with like 6 different names I like and want to use all of them. ;)

 

I'm surprised Marines do not have some sort of light cruiser type craft, say maybe 50-75 Marines. The difference between one squad and an entire company seems huge.

[minigun762]

Yeah, the frustrating thing is that the Gladius is the only other ship mentioned to carry Marines, but it's limited to like a squad. TBH one strike cruiser is really all i need, the issue is that I came up with like 6 different names I like and want to use all of them. ;)

 

I'm surprised Marines do not have some sort of light cruiser type craft, say maybe 50-75 Marines. The difference between one squad and an entire company seems huge.

 

Really all a strike cruiser is is a fancy light cruiser. Same overall hull strength as a light cruisder in BFG just better weapons and armor and such.

There is no reason at all you couldn't use a strike cruiser with less then a full compliment of Marines aboard, same goes for most any ship actually.

 

And since its Chaos, you could fairly easily justify salvaging an Imperial ship if you wanted.

 

For what you're trying to do, I think the most realistic option would be to downgrade your 1x battleship/5x cruiser down a notch and go with 1x cruiser/5x escorts. That way you could put the bulk of your guys on the cruiser with squads on the escorts.

[Grey Mage]

Ok, to break this down a bit-

 

Strike Cruiser is a class of ship, and battle barge is basicly the same thing only larger. While battlefleet gothic gives them a specific, set profile they also say that these are only guidelines. The actual size of a strike cruiser can vary greatly, from 4-10 hull points, more guns, less guns, more thunderhawks, better drop pod facilities, what have you. Its like saying 'age of sail destroyer' there are literally hundreds of base ship patterns contained within that and many unique vessels or modifications.

 

There has been, or likely will be, a known 'standard' pattern for strike cruisers or battle barges.

 

Preheresy fleets used ships that meet many of the 'modern' definitions for classifying things as a strike cruiser, or battle barge- and they also used alot of other vessels. The Pride of Fenris for example is a pre-heresy Emperor class battleship thats been extensively converted for use by marines, or the Imperial Fists Phalanx.

 

Chaos also has no problem mixing older and newer vessels in- you capture an imperial vessel you can crew, you take it and assimilate it. The chaos fleet list from BFG is full of older vessels that have been phased out not because of their age, but because they had a high rate of falling to chaos. Several of the vessels in there are of incredibly limited production, and a number of them are still used by the imperials (see the bastion fleets list for examples).

 

So dont be afraid to snag whatever kind of imperial vessel you want.

 

Edit: As for escorts, marines have been known to use all the standard imperial escorts as 'rapid strike vessels'. Cobras, firestorms, et all- and theyre listed as being capable of holding anywhere from 5-30 marines comfortably, along with gear, restocks, and training facilities. Remember that even an Escort in BFG is larger than any starship youll ever see in star trek, including those massive borg cubes.

[minigun762]

Remember that even an Escort in BFG is larger than any starship youll ever see in star trek, including those massive borg cubes.

 

Excellent point and one I often forget about myself.

I remember seeing a very cool chart/graph showing the various sizes of 40k warships from destroyers all the way up to battleships. I think they varied from 0.75km to +5km. For reference, the typical star wars star destroyer is usually listed at 1.6km or so.

[Grey Mage]

Star Destroyers start at 500m and go up to the superstar destroyers at 3.6 kilometers- a Lunar class imperial cruiser is about 4.5 km long.

[minigun762]

Star Destroyers start at 500m and go up to the superstar destroyers at 3.6 kilometers- a Lunar class imperial cruiser is about 4.5 km long.

 

Really? My interweb searching kept saying 1.6km. Hmm.

 

Either way, 40k ships are big in comparison to most other universes.

[Iron Lord]

While some SW ships called "star destroyers" are smaller, the ones seen in the movies (Imperial-class and Imperial II-class) are always described as "a mile long" or 1.6 km.

 

The Executor-class Star Dreadnought (referred to sometimes in novels as the Super-class Star Destroyer) is, as of most recent sources, listed as 19 km long.

 

While a splatbook that came out immediately after RoTJ described the cut-off for Super Star Destroyers as 3.8 km, at least one ship type (the "Imperial class Super Star Destroyer" seen in Dark Empire and referred to as such in the radio play of the comic)- is estimated as being 2.2 km long.

 

40K ships are indeed big. The Rogue Trader RPG has the sizes for several ships- as do the splatbooks for that game.

Avenger class grand cruiser: 7.4 km

Lunar class cruiser: 5 km

Sword class frigate: 1.6 km

Cobra class destroyer: 1.5 km

 

So far, of battleships, only an Ork battleship has had a length given in the splatbooks- at 11 km long.

[Midwest]

Edit: As for escorts, marines have been known to use all the standard imperial escorts as 'rapid strike vessels'. Cobras, firestorms, et all- and theyre listed as being capable of holding anywhere from 5-30 marines comfortably, along with gear, restocks, and training facilities. Remember that even an Escort in BFG is larger than any starship youll ever see in star trek, including those massive borg cubes.

Are you sure about that? I ask because the Marine fleet entry for the Gladius states it carries only a squad of Marines.

[minigun762]

Given the size of Imperial/Chaos vessels, I really think the amount of Marines they can pack in is infact far greater then what they normally do.

Part of this could be because they don't want to put all of their eggs in one basket. Lets face it, 30-50 Marines on one escort is a bit of a risk and part of it could be that for longer trips like patrols, the fewer Marines mean fewer resources and the ability to stay out there for an extended period of time. Then there is the whole idea that Marines themselves are incredibly rare and you would need them spread throughout the galaxy. This makes me believe that even if the standard battle barge is said to hold 300 guys, I would be quite surprised to find out that it could only hold 300 guys at absolute maximum capacity so maybe those numbers are an "optimal" capacity instead.

[Grey Mage]

Edit: As for escorts, marines have been known to use all the standard imperial escorts as 'rapid strike vessels'. Cobras, firestorms, et all- and theyre listed as being capable of holding anywhere from 5-30 marines comfortably, along with gear, restocks, and training facilities. Remember that even an Escort in BFG is larger than any starship youll ever see in star trek, including those massive borg cubes.

Are you sure about that? I ask because the Marine fleet entry for the Gladius states it carries only a squad of Marines.

As well as what minigun has said- and hes quite right- there is precident of a few squads worth of marines traveling on an escort as part of a BT crusade or an alert mission.

 

Its possible, just not standard operating procedure. Alot of the stuff written in just the marine section of the BFG Armada book pertains specificly to the way its done by codex chapters on a regular basis- even they will make exceptions.

[totgeboren]

This might not be what you are after, but I have assumed that the Devastation-class cruiser would work as the strike cruiser of the Chaos Legions. I see it that way at least, but that is based a lot on game-rules in BFG.

The Devastation cruiser has got the speed, manoeuvrability, resilience and the launch bays to fulfil the role of a Strike Cruiser. Especially the ability to launch Dreadclaws, while still engaging in fleet engagements makes me regard that class of ship as the "original" Marine Strike Cruiser, only later superseded by the more specialised modern marine strike cruiser.

I base this on the Legion specific "Battle Barge" rules, which are generally just Despoiler Class Battleships with some slight tweaks and a Chaos Marine crew. If the term Battle barge just refers to a marine Battleship with Dreadclaw capabilities, the term Strike Cruiser refers to a marine cruiser with Dreadclaw capabilities. The Dreaclaws are ofc for effective planetary assaults.

[minigun762]

Grey Mage and totgeboren both said something that made me think of another key element.

 

Loyalist fleets are artificially constrained in their abilities due to the aftermath of the Horus Heresy. The Imperial Navy (and others) didn't want Astartes fleets with ship to ship capabilities to minimize the impact of more Marines going traitor and so they compromised by focusing their fleets and ships on planet assaults and leaving the space battles to the Imperial Navy.

 

Chaos ships, which is to say pre-heresy designs, never had this kind of compromise and as such would often be a more all-purpose ship able to engage other ships as well as launch assaults on planets.

 

As an aside, I alway liked the Styx class heavy cruiser for Chaos. Fast, shooty and packing a lot of attack craft. Feels like it would make an excellent raider in the same vein as Germany's pocket battleships but with fighter support built in.

[Khestra the Unbeheld]

As an aside, I alway liked the Styx class heavy cruiser for Chaos. Fast, shooty and packing a lot of attack craft. Feels like it would make an excellent raider in the same vein as Germany's pocket battleships but with fighter support built in.

 

Styx-class was a post-Heresy design, and not that shooty or fast when put up against some of the other designs like Acheron or Slaughter. I think Hades-class probably makes for a better pocket battleship analogue.

 

I do love the Styx for its fighter bays, though. It usually ends up being the mainstay of a 3-ship screen along with two Devastation-class cruisers for my heavy Chaos fleet. ;)

[minigun762]

Good point, I guess I see fighter bays and instantly think "no need for escorts then" which is where I was going with the long range raider.

 

Part of it comes from my own personal thinking that Chaos would be better off building their warships and fleets around destruction of resources then a straight up slugging match with the Imperial Navy as Chaos generally lacks the same quantity of ships and men to win a straight up fight. Space is a very big place and Chaos Marines should be concerned with fighting the long war and if that means a lifetime of raiding, pillaging and hitting the Imperium where they're weak, so be it.