I've written a planet-based starfighter, coming soon to a mailing list
near you. It has a pilot and a backseater in roomy crew stations, and no
way to move about for maintenance in flight. The engines are in widely
spaced pods for survivability. The endurance should be similar to a
modern jet fighter, even if the power and life support last much longer.
Roughly the same weapons load gets carried by an orbit-based missile
boat. There are six roomy crew stations in the bridge, four bunks, and
ten folding, cramped seats. It has long-term access space for in-flight
maintenance.
My idea was to give it eight crew -- the captain, a gunner, a sensor
operator, and a mechanic for the first shift, the XO, another gunner,
another sensor operator, and another mechanic for the second shift.
Off-shift crews will have to help with the maintenance part of the time.
Cooking is left to the microwave and an automed replaces the medic. At
battle stations, the six bridge people are at the workstations and the
two mechanics do damage control.
By the rules, I could bring the crew up to 12 with hot bunking. Would
more crew improve performance or just lead to overcrowding and crew stress?
The boat could carry a boarding party for a short time, hence the jump
seats. If they rescue the crew of another missile boat or "evacuate
MacArthur from Corregidor", they're effectively out of the fight.
And the key question: The missile boat is 50% more expensive than the
starfighter, and much less maneuverable in an atmosphere. In turn it
gets slightly better sensors and much longer time on station. Are both
viable designs? Parking the missile boat in orbit makes it a sitting
duck, it would have to maneuver all the time to be survivable.
Regards,
Onno
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