"15mm Hunter-class Gun Carriage (preview)" Topic

The Hunter class of Federal Marine gun carriages is designed around a lengthened Caffarata-class hull, and can mount a variety of support weapons. Like the Caffarata infantry carrier it is a hybrid anti-grav/wheeled vehicle.

The Hunter SPA carries a 30cm neutron howitzer into battle.

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The Hunter AAA provides vital air defence, mounting two pulse lasers as well as a launch box for an early warning drone which can be set to search for incoming aircraft and missiles beyond radar range.

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The Hunter MLRS provides the corps commander with extremely long range firepower which can deploy a variety of sub-munitions.

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The class is named for Thomas Peck Hunter, a 20th Century Royal Marine who was awarded the Victoria Cross for sacrificing his life to save others in his unit who were exposed to devestating enemy firepower. His extremely aggressive use of his gun (a Bren gun) to support his fellow marines sets the standard by which all Federal Marine Hunter batteries strive to perform.

Prints are done and on their way to me. Models should be available within a month or two.

Linkys not working. : (

None of the links work…all show broken and no longer available :(

Fixed, it's a bug in TMP that if you post pic links, then edit the post (like to fix a typo) TMP crams additional junk text into your pic's URL and then you have to go in and manually remove it.

Yep, all working for me now

Bah! I want that Mechanoid heavy gunship, not another puny human contraption that will merely delay the inevitable!

Leland R. Erickson
Metal Express
metal-express.net

Very nice.

Isn't 4 projectiles a rather small barrage for the MLRS? Otherwise nice concepts.

Rocket tech now (and even more so in the future, one assumes) is not like in WWII when katyushas fired lots of unguided rockets and hoped for the best. Four ballistic missiles in the box is plenty, the rest being stored in the hull, which has a sliding ammo door. The box tilts back, takes four more missiles from the autoloader, and is ready to fire again.

Those are all very nice. Did you decide on production? Is this going to be a kit with three weapons (my personal choice) or One weapon and vehicle per set? I can think of lots of nice uses for the extra weapons (even though I would likely just modify them to be changeable on the one vehicle).

Looking forward to seeing this in person ehwn my order arrives.

Jeff

I can imagine that the missile options may include all the variants found in todays cruise missiles, AP, HE, bunker buster, bomb-lets, mines, tac nukes and so on… If you have ever seen a harpoon armed with bomb-lets its a sight to behold… It flys over the target and drops hundreds of sub munitions that wipe out a large area, so much for fox holes and soft cover :)

This is just my thoughts on the subject…

Nose, you beat me to it; nothing says yer ed like an on-target CBU deployment..

Leland R. Erickson
Metal Express
metal-express.net

Fair enough. I can handle that logic.

Not to mention the DNA-seeking plasma submunitions favoured by Federal Marine gunners.

Leland you are getting your wish, I am happy to report, as the Hatchet gunship is in the same shipment, as is Pringul's hotrod, the art deco flying saucer I had made for planet 15.

Very nioe looking designs.

I'd think that given the direction of travel we see today in point defences, by the time we have antigrav and 'neutron' howitzers, it will be a straightforward challenge for an air defence vehicle with speed-of-light weapons like the Hunter AAA to shoot down relatively slow-moving projectiles like those fired by the Hunter MLRS.

Hence why you might in fact see a reversion to more rather than less rockets – to overload the defences.

I'd see the Hunter MLRS as useful against a low-tech foe, but much less useful against an adversary armed with similar weapons to the Federal Marines.

I agree with Collins: against an opponent with artillery interdiction batteries (like the US Navy *now*, the Israelis in about 5 years, or the Slammers), you would need to launch enough missiles or shells to overwhelm the point defenses.

I think that assumes that rocket/missile tech hasn't kept pace with technology as well.

Mister Khurasan, Sir, ya know I'm settin' to do somethin' *unspeakable* to that poor gunship when it arrives, right? MWAAHAHAAHAHAHAAA!!!

Leland R. Erickson
Metal Express
metal-express.net

Lol.. Leland, I have no idea what your thinking but I get the sense that its illegal in all 50 states :)

Nose, it's probably outlawed by the Geneva Convention, and will land me in the docket in The Hague…. like that's gonna stop me:

link

BWAAAAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAAAAAA!!!

Leland R. Erickson
Metal Express
metal-express.net

Not sure how a rocket/missile is going to outrun a speed-of-light weapon like the Hunter AAA, which according to the colour text, has an early warning drone to extend its radar horizon. Perhaps if the MLRS had more launch rails it could fire some decoys – but now we're back where jamesonsafari started.

Well, the laser might be speed of light, but the cradle it's mounted in isn't moving at the speed of light! And of course the speed of light of the weapon does not mean an automatic hit, it just means that the weapon reaches its firing point at the speed of light -- where the fire control system tells it to go.

SF ballistic missiles could benefit from all sorts of technological advances, including stealth, shielding, and even light speed (or near light speed) travel.

It might be feasible to overwhelm a missile defense system with a vast number of missiles, but that seems more likely when nations are firing missiles at each other, and I mean that literally, an exchange of strategic missiles between two powers firing at each others territories. Not sure how practical it would be on a mobile tactical missile system. Note that as missile defense got better on ships in the 60s and 70s, fleets did not mount huge numbers of the same old missiles, they mounted better, faster, more lethal missiles, in basically the same numbers as before.

Of course as Doris Day's mother informed us, que sera, sera, and the future's not ours to see. Different gamers might have different visions of the future battlefield, no right or wrong, just different.

I particularly like the 30mm neutron cannon, but i would use (hopefully will at some point)it as an externally mounted heavy tank weapon.

Yes commanderroj, that vehicle was made to work as an AT chassis as well. Mark and I tried to make weapons that would be versatile to meet different NF/SF gaming requirements. Glad you like the model!