thedrake | 17 Jun 2006 12:56 p.m. PST |
Looking to find some more books with spaceship battles featured in them (PLEASE NO Honor Harrington!) Have the Starfire series and the old Terran Trade Authority space battle books plus a few Star Trek novels but was wondering what others think are good books with good spaceship battles in them.Looking for more ideas for my solo Full Thrust gaming. Thanks, MD |
Delta Vee | 17 Jun 2006 1:00 p.m. PST |
possibly the "lensman" series by EE doc Smith its got mind bogglingly hughe space battles , and dridgilbe planets and black hole projectors and simaler stuff. |
overrevdsquat | 17 Jun 2006 1:12 p.m. PST |
"A fire upon the deep", by Vernor Vinge (sp?). Has some in, a bit different. Also some of the Iain M Banks sci fi, for sentient ships in combat. Pete |
Pictors Studio | 17 Jun 2006 1:14 p.m. PST |
Forever War has a few neat space battles in it. |
Huscarle | 17 Jun 2006 1:22 p.m. PST |
Richard Meredith 'We All Died at Breakaway Station' C J Cherryh 'Downbelow Station' David Weber & Steve White 'In Death Ground', 'Crusade', et al |
colkillgore | 17 Jun 2006 1:42 p.m. PST |
The RCN series by David Drake With the Lightinings Lt. Leary, Commanding The Far Side of the Stars and The Way to Glory |
Formerly Regiment Games | 17 Jun 2006 2:30 p.m. PST |
I really like the concept of space battles presented by Rick Shelley in his Lucky 13th Spaceborne stories and his Royal Space Marines stories, trilogies each. |
Ron W DuBray | 17 Jun 2006 2:56 p.m. PST |
you also might like to take a look at some of history's navy battles for ideas for your space combat they work out very well for example the battle of "midway", or the "bismark hunt" from wwII or 100s of others |
Go0gleplex | 17 Jun 2006 4:16 p.m. PST |
The Last Legion series
The Dark Wing
Trading in Danger
Face of the Enemy
|
HardRock | 17 Jun 2006 5:15 p.m. PST |
Bill Baldwin's 'Helmsman' series. Good stuff, very naval. In the later books using smaller ships, more air combat style. |
thedrake | 17 Jun 2006 6:08 p.m. PST |
Thanks for all the suggestions.Have found many naval battles from history are a great source;have used them as inspiration for many of my solo FT games. MD |
Ethics Gradient | 17 Jun 2006 6:30 p.m. PST |
'The Vor Game' by Lois McMaster Bujold. Battle occurs quite late in the story, but worth the wait (damn fine series of books regardless). 'Starworld' by Harry Harrison. Very convincing battle using railguns and missiles. |
rmaker | 17 Jun 2006 6:53 p.m. PST |
Another vote for the Lensman series. Gotta love those "ravening beams of corusicating force". |
marcus arilius | 17 Jun 2006 7:57 p.m. PST |
vol 1 of the War World series has a great meeting engagement battle that keeps escalading into a major fleet battle. and Dread empires fall books by Walter Jon Williams has some good spacebattles in which unlike Webers Deathground books they run out of Dreadnaughts and fight the war with crusiers and frigates. |
battlepack2001 | 17 Jun 2006 8:29 p.m. PST |
Elizabeth Moon has a few good ones! |
Ironwolf | 17 Jun 2006 9:32 p.m. PST |
>Bill Baldwin's 'Helmsman' series The best sci-fi series out there. He is suppose to be working on another one?? |
minigamer1953 | 17 Jun 2006 9:51 p.m. PST |
Lensmen series? Wow! You guys must be older than dirt to remember those :-) Really – an excellent recommendation. I read them when I was younger than dirt – I still have images of the battles and there were a lot of them in the series. In fact I still have the original paperbacks. Not sure I could open them without the binding falling apart. That was when writers could still dream about the possibilities of incredible discoveries. I haven't read Sci-Fi for a long time, as it seems "preachy" being about human morals, disputed theories, and a lot of schlock. BTW. I too am older than dirt
.. |
Imperator | 18 Jun 2006 2:47 a.m. PST |
The Flight Engineer Series by S.M Stirling and James Doohan Execution Hour and Shadow Point by Gordon Rennie |
Delta Vee | 18 Jun 2006 3:28 a.m. PST |
Ric:- older than dirt me? nope i got mine the old fashoned way, I wated till my dad wasnt looking then waltzed off with them, replaced the last one in the series ( children) that hed lent to someone and not had returned and spent a week or 2 reading. I was happy to re read them in comfort and without him moving my book mark. |
brass1 | 18 Jun 2006 8:16 a.m. PST |
Walter Jon Williams 'The Dread Empire Falls' series has an interesting take on space warfare in a milieu where a lot of old SF standbys -the inertialess drive, instantaneous communication/detection, etc- aren't available, not to mention what happens when a huge, hidebound space navy gets involved in its first shooting war in 3400 years. LT |
Hundvig | 18 Jun 2006 11:01 a.m. PST |
I'll agree with all of the above (especially Lensman and Dread Empire Falls), and add Westerfeld's "Killing of Worlds" novels, which have some insanely cool ultra-tech (but not "magic" tech) space battles. You might also like Norwoods "Midway" trilogy if you can find them
thinly-veiled WW2 in space, but pretty good reads. |
agtfos | 18 Jun 2006 2:04 p.m. PST |
Peter Hamiltons Nights Dawn Trilogy. (The Nutronium Alchemist etc) Has some great battles, including living starships (some posessed by the dead, including one dead trekkie, who is busy morphing its form into the enterprise) using 'beam weapons' against traditional mechanical (and rather clunky) ships, with nukes and lasers. Very good tactics, satellite defence systems etc. |
Parzival | 18 Jun 2006 2:28 p.m. PST |
Walter H. Hunt's Dark Wing series has some good space battles. Timothy Zahn's Conquerors series offers at least two (been awhile since I read them), and they're great books anyway. |
SavageDoc45 | 18 Jun 2006 7:02 p.m. PST |
Most of the books mentioned previously I can second, the rest I'm going to track down. You also might try an Anime called Legend of Galactic Heroes. It's pretty good, but sometimes wading through all the politics and exposition to get to the fleet engagements can be frustrating. |
marcus arilius | 18 Jun 2006 7:40 p.m. PST |
Forgot about the Wingcommander series of books. Had a lot of good space battles. |
Scottjm | 18 Jun 2006 8:48 p.m. PST |
Scott Westerfeld's Risen Empire books has a couple interesting battles in it. |
Imperator | 19 Jun 2006 2:52 a.m. PST |
I should be shot for forgetting this one Renegades Honor by William H Keith Jr Capital Ships using rail guns in ship to ship action you have to love that. |
Red5angel | 19 Jun 2006 1:47 p.m. PST |
Honor Harrington usually comes up on a thread like this. I checked out a couple of books, I think I read the first 3 or 4 and the problem that seems to occurr sometimes where the books start out interesting enough but then they have to develope the characters and get into the politics and less combat, which was what finally turned me off of that series. Maybe I'm shallow but when I look for military scifi I like to read books that have military scifi in them mostly, if not all. Some of the old writers understood that sometimes that's the case and so they wrote the books with that in mind. Now a days everyone wants to write then next great classic and it ain't gonna happen. Gimme guns, explosions and some tanks. |
emckinney | 19 Jun 2006 3:26 p.m. PST |
The Dark Wing: the space battles are too vague for my taste. They come across as once-sentence outlines for a space battle game where you have to allocate power to offense, defense, and movement (Warp War, anyone?). Elizabeth Moon's Herris Serrano/Esmay Suiza ("The Familias") series has some very interesting ideas, but they're not fleshed out and you really get the feeling that she didn't think through the technology. There are quite a few "Huh?" moments—"Are they travelling sub-light speed to another star system to reach a wormhole???" Anyhow, warships use a fascinating combination of "flying" and "jumping" in battle. Crew training is critical in how quickly a ship can get a firing solution after it jumps, which largely determines whether or not it will survive. Oh, and the fiction piece in the setting book for Attack Vector from Ad Astra Games. If you want to get closer to what space combat is _really_ like. (If you really, really want to know what a space navy is like, Elizabeth Moon's books are tops. Who else explores complexity of the life support systems and their constant need for maintenance? As a former Marine, Moon is also quite familiar with military bureaucracy, with all its annoyances and absurdities. When Esmay Suiza discovers that there's a regulation that applies only to her
) |
Tyrel Lohr | 19 Jun 2006 9:02 p.m. PST |
First thoughts when I saw the subject was Weber's Starfire books, but since you already have them
Have you tried any of W. Michael Gear's sci-fi books? They are a little hard to find, and might not be what you are looking for, but I found them to be enjoyable. His Forbidden Borders and Way of Spider trilogies would probably be the best fits. I preferred the Forbidden Borders books the most. -Tyrel |
Wulfen96 | 20 Jun 2006 2:31 p.m. PST |
"Westerfeld's "Killing of Worlds" novels" Yes, oh yes. Two of the best books I've read in some time, in regards to military sci-fi. I'll also second Peter Hamilton's Night's Dawn series, which I'm currently reading. |
AndrewGPaul | 22 Jun 2006 5:32 a.m. PST |
Alastair Reynolds' Redemption Ark features a stern chase at 0.5c. Iain M Banks' Excession, Consider Phlebas and Algebraist also have some (IMO) god combat sequences. However, they're far from being the focus of the books. |
Cyclops | 30 Jun 2006 10:08 p.m. PST |
I'm loathe to recommend something from GWs Black Library (they're unreadable these days, bring back Kim Newman) but Execution Hour is actually pretty good for a cinematic view of space combat. The Forever War has a more 'realistic' feel, i.e. the battles consist of firing off a missile and then waiting a week or two while it makes its way to the target. More exciting than it sounds. The bok is mainly concerned with ground combat though. |
chrisweuve | 03 Jul 2006 7:16 a.m. PST |
I am surprised that no one mentioned either Dave Trowbridge and Sherwood Smith's _Exordium_ series (sadly out of print) or Scott Gier's _Genellan_ series, (available from Mike McCollum's SciFi-Arizona). Two very different view of naval combat, but both VERY well done. |
ScottWashburn | 07 Sep 2006 3:15 p.m. PST |
"The Sky is Filled With Ships" (yes, it was a novel before it was a game) and "Battle for the Stars", both written in the early 70s have some interesting space battles. Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye" and "The Gripping Hand" along with Pournelle's CoDominium series and the War World spin-offs (all set in the same universe) have a number of good battles in them. |
ScottWashburn | 07 Sep 2006 3:20 p.m. PST |
Heck, I almost forgot H.Beam Piper's "Space Viking". Several very cool space battles in that one. And Piper is one of my favorite authors. |
The Lost Soul | 01 Nov 2006 4:46 p.m. PST |
I seem to recall the Skylark series by E.E. Doc Smith as being really good. Of course its been a number of years since I read them and they get a bit formulaic after a while, but I did enjoy them as a kid! No, I'm not that old. . . but they were part of my dad's collection. |
ScottWashburn | 19 Mar 2008 8:17 a.m. PST |
And now I can add my own book: "War Among the Ruins" to the others I mentioned above. It has several good space battles (plus some ground battles) in it. Available from Amazon at: link or through PaperTerrain paperterrain.com |
CAPTAIN BEEFHEART | 19 Mar 2008 9:42 a.m. PST |
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wballard | 23 Mar 2008 4:33 a.m. PST |
If you can find "Recall Not Earth" by CC MacApp, I recommend it. |
cooey2ph | 29 Mar 2008 7:06 a.m. PST |
I second the Helmsman Saga by Bill Baldwin, especially the installments entitled "Galactic Convoy", "The Trophy" and "The Defenders". I've only had the chance to read two novels from the Wing commander series but they're both good and may be of help. Specifically, they're "Fleet Action" by William R. Forstchen and "The Price of Freedom" by Ben Ohlander and William R. Forstchen. |
Falling Airborne | 04 Apr 2008 10:43 p.m. PST |
How has no one mentioned Jack Campbell's "Lost Fleet" series? |
Stinger Six | 05 Apr 2008 11:58 a.m. PST |
Yeah, I was just about to come in with a shout out to Campbell there. The Lost Fleet Series is great! |
palaeoemrus | 13 Apr 2008 1:40 a.m. PST |
David Feintuch's "Fisherman" series is pretty transparently Hornblower-esque so it might not appeal to someone who rejects Honor Harrignton but you might check one out from the library and see what you think. |
Covert Walrus | 18 Apr 2008 10:42 p.m. PST |
"Space Viking" is not just realistic, given the tech involved, but has logical political machinations as well . . . more than you can say for the "Lensman" much as I love the idea of not just vapourising a ship but VOLATILISING it!! ( It's a real word . . . ) Everything here fits the request, though I think there are others – Also, Rick Shelley is a little too ground-based, though I love his interface shuttles and how they fight. |