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Right, I was trying to figure out the rough scale of a Standard battleship in 40k scale. Which is massive.

I then came across that a Lunar class battleship would be about 5m long in Epic scale (according to lexicanum that is from the BFG rulebook). I understand they're massive so didn't really blink until I thought... That would make a standard escort class about 1m in Epic. And around 4.6m in 40k (I may have my numbers wrong at 40k scale).

These size ships are only meant to be large enough to be manned by 1 squad of space marines plus crew... An escort would surely be able to carry a company at that size? I don't know how big the Plasma reactor, weapon systems and warp drive is, but they can't take up THAT much of the ship.

That is HUGE... Surely a case of GW not considering scale properly again?

You must remember that 40k ships (at least, imperial ones, as they usually lack a high degree of mechanization) are manned by thousands (or even tens or hundreds of thousands) of crewmen and servitors. In addition to living space and every manner of life-support areas, massive reactors, engines (for both sub-light and warp travel), capacitor banks and weapon broadsides, metres thick armour, bulkheads and compartments, kilometres long maintenance tunnels, luxurious high-ship accomodations, enormous storage areas (remember even small ships can hold large contingents of soldiers, machines or materials) take up a great deal of space, not considering the darker, abandoned areas of the ships, infested by all kinds of vermins, mutants and real scavengers sub-cultures.
In addition, it's probably not that an escort CANNOT hold a full company (which, consjdering the great number of support personnel and materials, is unlikely anyway), but that it's not tactically sound. Why would a chapter put a big, costly, extremely rare, figting force in the smallest vessel at its disposal (remember that every chapter has a fleet of at least some strike cruisers, not to mention battle barges or even Ramilles-class star fortresses some chapters posses)? That would mean risking it to be destroyed before even being deployed. In addition, escorts are built to ESCORT major ships and are rarely fielded on their own.

a standard escort sized ship is 1.5 kilometers.

http://www.merzo.net/



Long story short, you would need several city blocks for a 40k scale Space Ship.

The scale at Merzo is inflated and was changed from the original artist's scale without his permission. The artist can be found at deviantart.com with the original:

http://the-first-magelord.deviantart.com/gallery/8686311#/d1cy8r5

The crew scale as given by Andy Chambers, chief developer of BFG, on the original BFG mailing list is:

http://www.wolfedengames.com/battlefleetgothic/crew.htm

1500-2000 crew per damage point for human capital ships. For escorts, about 200-500.

That yields approximate crews for cruisers of 12,000-16,000 and battleships of 18,000-24,000

The accepted consensus scale according to the original BFG list was:

Cruiser ~3km
Battleship ~6km
Escorts 750m-1km

This scale is actually remarkably consistent in GW and BL publications by multiple authors over multiple years. In Shadow Point, an average Dictator class cruiser is given a crew size, though it is unclear if attack craft crew are included:

Now, six years later, he was one of the most senior non-commissioned officers amongst a crew of almost thirteen thousand... p. 62, Shadow Point, by Gordon Rennie

The size of a Retribution is given in Dark Disciple

Admiral Rutger Augustine look out over the vast length of his flagship vessel, the mighty Retribution-class battleship, Hammer of Righteousness.
...Six kilometres from stern to prow... p. 31, Dark Disciple

The relatively recent Soul Hunter describes a crew for a grand cruiser, which is larger than a cruiser, more in keeping with Andy Chambers' scale:

Over 25,000 crew called the warship home, even though a sizable chunk of those were slave labourers and servitor wretches... p.95-96, Soul Hunter

Grey Templar wrote:a standard escort sized ship is 1.5 kilometers.

http://www.merzo.net/



Long story short, you would need several city blocks for a 40k scale Space Ship.

If the newer books from Fantasy Flight for the Rogue Trader role playing game are considered canon at all, then this is absolutely correct. As far as I can tell, one inch on BFG ships equals about one mile if I squint really hard and hold the ruler sideways.

While I look that up, here's a fun image that's probably not exactly to scale.

Notice the space marine in the bottom-center of the image.

Dictator-class cruiser, which is basically the same model as the popular Lunar-class cruiser; 5.1km long with a crew of 85,000 (additional crew include 15,000 pilots)

Jordan wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:a standard escort sized ship is 1.5 kilometers.

http://www.merzo.net/



Long story short, you would need several city blocks for a 40k scale Space Ship.

If the newer books from Fantasy Flight for the Rogue Trader role playing game are considered canon at all, then this is absolutely correct. As far as I can tell, one inch on BFG ships equals about one mile if I squint really hard and hold the ruler sideways.


Dictator-class cruiser, which is basically the same model as the popular Lunar-class cruiser; 5.1km long with a crew of 85,000 (additional crew include 15,000 pilots)

As I stated previously, the crew for a Dictator class cruiser was stated as almost 13,000 (+/- attack craft pilots) in Shadow Point. We are talking a 6.5x difference from FFG numbers, not a small variation, yet other novels also adhere to the Andy Chambers' scale.

FFG's numbers are dubious considering how widely out of sync they are compared to other publications. The BL publication Soul Hunter stuck more closely to Andy Chambers' crew scale and it was published AFTER FFG's RT. Put simply, FFG's numbers are an outlier, like how the "big numbers crowd" might claim Titans are the size of mountain ranges based on some artwork (and which conflicts with all other Titan related background). FFG have done a Goto and gotten their background jarringly out of sync, like saying bolters shoot lasers.

endlesswaltz123 wrote:Right, I was trying to figure out the rough scale of a Standard battleship in 40k scale. Which is massive.

I then came across that a Lunar class battleship would be about 5m long in Epic scale (according to lexicanum that is from the BFG rulebook). I understand they're massive so didn't really blink until I thought... That would make a standard escort class about 1m in Epic. And around 4.6m in 40k (I may have my numbers wrong at 40k scale).

These size ships are only meant to be large enough to be manned by 1 squad of space marines plus crew... An escort would surely be able to carry a company at that size? I don't know how big the Plasma reactor, weapon systems and warp drive is, but they can't take up THAT much of the ship.

That is HUGE... Surely a case of GW not considering scale properly again?

An escort could carry a company, but wouldn't be able to do much with them when they got wherever they were going. A strike cruiser can have a company deployed and on-planet almost immediately.

I keep reading BFG as big friendly giant. my real world life is interferring with warhammer, oh no! It doesn't sound very scary if its a big friendly giant strike cruiser

vercingatorix wrote:I keep reading BFG as big friendly giant. my real world life is interferring with warhammer, oh no! It doesn't sound very scary if its a big friendly giant strike cruiser

I keep reading Big fething Gun... with the added 9000.