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Honestly, how big would you imagine space battles in 40k? Call me crazy, but I go with 200 to 1,800 spaceships. Just want some of your opinions on this. If you vote, you can post how many spaceships you would imagine.

On the scale of 40k, the bigger the better. 100+ battleships with support craft a side, complete with boarding actions, and you've got something awesome to behold.

 Paradigm wrote:
On the scale of 40k, the bigger the better. 100+ battleships with support craft a side, complete with boarding actions, and you've got something awesome to behold.

I completely agree. I've always favored giant space battles in 40k. A shame they are hardly written about

Space battles are a victim of 40K's "durr we have no sense of scale" issue.

A "battlefleet" is the largest single entity of ships that the Imperial Navy can assemble under one commander, and is used to protect entire sectors. Sectors are generally defined as 200 light-year cubed swathes of space, and can contain hundreds of planets.

Battlefleets typically range from 40 to 75 ships- Cadia's battlefleet numbers ~45 ships, as an example. It makes no sense that forces of such small sizes can somehow defend such massive swaths of Space, but it is what it is.

In times of great need, Battlefleets can work together, case in point Battlefleet Gothic and Battlefleet Cadia have come to each other's aid during both the 12th and 13th Crusade. However, generally speaking a single battlefleet is considered enough to defend its own sector from any space faring threat- meaning that the majority of the time, space battles the Imperium is involved in only have a small handful of ships on their end, whipping out the "glorious" battlefleet sized 40-75 ship fleet as an almost last-resort.

No wonder Hive Fleets embarrass the Imperium in void brawls so often.

The BFG supplement Warp Storm gives the Battle of Callavell in the Age of Apostacy as one of the largest "set-piece" battles in Imperial history, In that, the Imperial force fielded 8 battleships, 5 grand cruisers, 6 battlecruisers, 5 heavy cruisers, 9 cruisers, and 6 light cruisers for a total of 37 capital ships. The renegade forces in that battle fielded 6 battleships, 4 grand cruisers, 6 battlecruisers, 9 heavy cruisers, 11 cruisers, and 8 light cruisers for a total of 46 capital ships.

The Gothic War is an example of what happens when the Imperium is seriously threatened in space. When local forces find themselves outmatched, they fight a holding action and retreat to their main bases, while other neighboring sectors send reinforcing fleets, and if that is not enough, more are sent from farther sectors. An Imperial capital ship is more than a match for the average pirate ship (which is escort sized), which will tend to prey on vulnerable merchant shipping anyway as war rarely makes for good profit, and most of a sector fleet's job will be "showing the flag" at outlying planets, patrols, and escorting transports. The big battleships (of which a sector might have only 2) are generally kept close to the main bases and shipyards unless needed.

Remember a sector's battle fleet numbers consists of warp capable ships. Each system may maintain non-warp capable ships which then fall under the classification of monitors or system ships. These are sufficient to be a match for most local piracy.

And escorts, every 40k fleet travels with destroyers and other light escorts which act as torpedo boats, screening bigger ships or acting as fast response to threats that's the big slower capital ships cannot effectively counter and too hevey for the bomber squadrons and fighter escorts.

So hundreds may be possible.

Though when a escort itself can be 1000m long....

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Space battles are a victim of 40K's "durr we have no sense of scale" issue.

A "battlefleet" is the largest single entity of ships that the Imperial Navy can assemble under one commander, and is used to protect entire sectors. Sectors are generally defined as 200 light-year cubed swathes of space, and can contain hundreds of planets.

Battlefleets typically range from 40 to 75 ships- Cadia's battlefleet numbers ~45 ships, as an example. It makes no sense that forces of such small sizes can somehow defend such massive swaths of Space, but it is what it is.

In times of great need, Battlefleets can work together, case in point Battlefleet Gothic and Battlefleet Cadia have come to each other's aid during both the 12th and 13th Crusade. However, generally speaking a single battlefleet is considered enough to defend its own sector from any space faring threat- meaning that the majority of the time, space battles the Imperium is involved in only have a small handful of ships on their end, whipping out the "glorious" battlefleet sized 40-75 ship fleet as an almost last-resort.

No wonder Hive Fleets embarrass the Imperium in void brawls so often.

Earlier, I dozed off into one of my little 40k brainstorming scenarios and I thought ginormous space battles would be awesome. GW unfortunately as you said has no common sense when it comes to numbers. It seems so plain and simple to me too. As big as the imperium is, I am sure battlefleets can easily number at least 200 vessels. A lord Admiral leading the battlefleet and 8 admirals leading battlegroups of 25. Just my opinion

I would quite like to see a skirmish sized space battle game pitting a small number of support ships, fighters and a capital ship in various scenarios - close quarters ambushes through asteroid fields or debris or industrial stations, space hulk-esqe sensor blips hiding either ships or nothing, hidden deployment of ships powered down waiting for prey to be flushed towards it, etc.

Hmm, seems my estimate was a little high then, as much as I think it would be reasonable if GW could do basic maths/physics.

Are there any records of larger battles from the Crusade/Heresy era? Everything else was bigger in those days.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SilverMK2 wrote:
I would quite like to see a skirmish sized space battle game pitting a small number of support ships, fighters and a capital ship in various scenarios - close quarters ambushes through asteroid fields or debris or industrial stations, space hulk-esqe sensor blips hiding either ships or nothing, hidden deployment of ships powered down waiting for prey to be flushed towards it, etc.

This would be pretty cool. Even better if it has Newtonian physics and a flexible orientation mechanic.

The common battle fleet in World War 2 was something like (Correct me if I am wrong) 2-3 Destroyers to every Cruiser, and 3 Cruisers to every main Battleship and supporting the battleships would be 1-3 Support vehicles such as Submarines.

Now considering most fleets would be holding 50+ Guardsmen regiments in it, I would them as Cruisers. And I would think about 10 Guard regiments in each Cruiser, so that would be 15 Destroyers, with 2 Battleships and maybe 6 Support crafts. So that'd be 33 in a basic Guard defence fleet by my estimate, and each Cruiser/Battleship would host various numbers of small fighter and bomber crafts as well as other munitions carts and smaller fleet vessels.

So I think there would be something in the hundreds for a basic battle fleet of Imperial Guard/Imperium. This is just me guestimating numbers and stuff, so yeah not the best thing to go off. But I reckon somewhere between 600-1000 for a basic conflict.

 SilverMK2 wrote:
I would quite like to see a skirmish sized space battle game pitting a small number of support ships, fighters and a capital ship in various scenarios - close quarters ambushes through asteroid fields or debris or industrial stations, space hulk-esqe sensor blips hiding either ships or nothing, hidden deployment of ships powered down waiting for prey to be flushed towards it, etc.

Pretty sure battlefleet gothic had all of that in the basic game rules. Also while the battlefleets themselves might be relatively scarce don't forget all the PDF in-system defence boats to deal with raiders and day to day threats. The battlefleets are designed to deal with external threats or serious internal strife.

Andy Chambers (designer of BFG) on crew sizes and also transport capacity for warships:

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

Voted dozens, only counting capital ships. Probably several hundred supporting vessels. Thousands of ships sounds ridiculous.

Iracundus wrote:
Andy Chambers (designer of BFG) on crew sizes and also transport capacity for warships:

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

Some stupid compactbanner add keeps popping up when I try to view your link. ???

It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

 Random Dude wrote:
It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

Spaceship as in, the total arraignment of spacecraft and all its variants.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

Spaceship as in, the total arraignment of spacecraft and all its variants.

In that case, thousands.

 Random Dude wrote:

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

Spaceship as in, the total arraignment of spacecraft and all its variants.

In that case, thousands.

Yup, I agree

 Random Dude wrote:
It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

Battlefleet Cadia, the battlefleet who's job is to protect the second most important part of space in the entire Imperium, second only to Terra itself, has a total of 12 battleships.

99% of the space battles the Imperium is involved don't have more than a few dozen ships larger than fighter craft.

I don't think it really matters in terms of spectacle. In void combat, the difference between a dozen and a hundred space ships would be more blinky dots against the blackness of space.

So, I don't care.

Disagree.

 BlaxicanX wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
It depends on what you mean by spaceship. If you're talking battleships and frigates, probably hundreds. If you're talking fighters and support craft too, probably thousands.

Battlefleet Cadia, the battlefleet who's job is to protect the second most important part of space in the entire Imperium, second only to Terra itself, has a total of 12 battleships.

99% of the space battles the Imperium is involved don't have more than a few dozen ships larger than fighter craft.

As usual, I choose to ignore GW's more egregious sense of scale fails.

I'd imagine it would depend on the nature of the battle. If both sides are unprepared and scrambling to throw any ships in the area at each other, I'd say dozens. If it's a planned battle, where both sides have had a chance to build up their forces (like Armageddon, the Damocles Gulf Crusades, or Sabbat Worlds), it should be hundreds. Thousands would probably only be seen in largest of conflicts with the highest of stakes (Terra itself coming under siege). Keep in mind that each Imperial Battle Cruiser is huge, having crew numbers that rival the population of a large modern city and the firepower to bombard entire continents, if not blow up a whole planet with Exterminatus. Unopposed, a single battle cruiser can serve as base for a planetary invasion.

 BlaxicanX wrote:


Disagree.

Oh right, forgot this is science fantasy we're talking about. Uhh... bigger is better? Really nowhere to go but up with a space fantasy void battle.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

Iracundus wrote:
Andy Chambers (designer of BFG) on crew sizes and also transport capacity for warships:

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

Some stupid compactbanner add keeps popping up when I try to view your link. ???

Same here. Glad it wasn't just me!

FM Argos

Forgemaster Argos wrote:

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

Iracundus wrote:
Andy Chambers (designer of BFG) on crew sizes and also transport capacity for warships:

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

Some stupid compactbanner add keeps popping up when I try to view your link. ???

Same here. Glad it wasn't just me!

FM Argos

Whew, thought it was just me as well haha

Navies are expensive. Navies are valuable.

So dozens. A lot of naval battles that I am aware of are between a few ships. Even more of them are just shows (as in, ships face off but never sufficiently damage or hurt each other to be a win).

The loss of a couple of ships is a defeat in many battles. You could have hundreds of ships and loose 5. That would be a horrific loss.

Dozens to me makes the most sense.

 Swastakowey wrote:
Navies are expensive. Navies are valuable.

So dozens. A lot of naval battles that I am aware of are between a few ships. Even more of them are just shows (as in, ships face off but never sufficiently damage or hurt each other to be a win).

The loss of a couple of ships is a defeat in many battles. You could have hundreds of ships and loose 5. That would be a horrific loss.

Dozens to me makes the most sense.

I believe over the length of a million worlds, several hundred or so vessels can be supplied for a sector. Dozens would be fine but think about how IG would be transported. Millions of guard would need hundreds of troop carrying vessels and a battlefleet to protect them while they make their way to the designated warzone. In a galaxy as big as this one, the Imperium needs more than just "dozens" per sector imo.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
Navies are expensive. Navies are valuable.

So dozens. A lot of naval battles that I am aware of are between a few ships. Even more of them are just shows (as in, ships face off but never sufficiently damage or hurt each other to be a win).

The loss of a couple of ships is a defeat in many battles. You could have hundreds of ships and loose 5. That would be a horrific loss.

Dozens to me makes the most sense.

I believe over the length of a million worlds, several hundred or so vessels can be supplied for a sector. Dozens would be fine but think about how IG would be transported. Millions of guard would need hundreds of troop carrying vessels and a battlefleet to protect them while they make their way to the designated warzone. In a galaxy as big as this one, the Imperium needs more than just "dozens" per sector imo.

You asked for space battle.

Only a fool would commit hundreds of ships into a battle both offensively and defensively. Most of the time the fleets should be standing off other fleets and committing small amounts of forces to actually briefly fight.

A battle will only include dozens in a sensible manner. At most.

Anything bigger is crazy and the imperium would need a lot of dedicated production for repairing and constructing vessels to replace losses. Given how old their fleets are, I assume they use them wisely.

So dozen is where its at (in my opinion)

Reposted from that link that people seem to be struggling with. It loads for me, then you can stop it before the ad loads.

My two pennyworth on crew sizes was around 1500-2000 per damage point for Imperial and Chaos capital ships (adjust down a bit for Eldar and up a bit for Orks), but only around 2-500 total for escorts. Space Marine ships, as had been mooted, I would imagine to benefit from a lot of automated systems and wired in servitors to reduce their crew requirements to a minimum and increase their state of readiness in comparison with Navy ships. I would imagine that most Imperial and Chaos capital ships could find transport capacity for troops equal to about 1/3 to 1/2 their crew compliment. Tanks, artillery, Titans etc would need specialist transports to carry in any significant numbers. - Andy Chambers

 Lord Tarkin wrote:
Honestly, how big would you imagine space battles in 40k? Call me crazy, but I go with 200 to 1,800 spaceships. Just want some of your opinions on this. If you vote, you can post how many spaceships you would imagine.

What counts as a spaceship? Anything void-capable? Like the thunderhawk with flareshield (essentially void shields)? Or does a spaceship have to be warp capable with geller fields and stuff.