for the ones he just launched. That alone could pay for the whole program. Maybe. Especially if he included missiles and decoys on the tanks as well. It would lighten up his ships as well for more speed, or allow him to fire more torpedoes from close range during an attack. And then if he added small engines to the tanks they could change course if the enemy changed its base course. Acting more like the real ships they were supposed to be.
"Damn." Jack said to himself. No w the tanks were starting to look complex and expensive. Defeating the whole concept of Cheap enough to lose. Not to mention the development costs.
Jack had to chuckle at that thought. He had found out the hard way that costs had a way of ballooning when a simple, seeming easy project became increasingly complex or difficult and costly when unforeseen problems cropped up. Then he had done what was only natural. Not wanting to waste already spent credits, he had pressed on and on and on. Dumping more and more money into what too often turned into a black hole. Sometimes the end product did not seem worth the development costs and all the work he had to put in by the time he had finished. But then sometimes the product was worth its weight in gold. But he could never tell for sure which ones were going to be what, until he had used them in combat. Sometimes the ones he thought were a waste of credits when they were finished, turned out to be pure gold.
This Destroyer was turning out to be one of the Gold's even though a lot of worthless hulks had been left behind and sold for scrap to get it right. Another great but expensive improvement was increasing the Destroyer's big 8 inch gun's rate of fire. Their old 10 rounds a minute was ridiculous when you only had seconds to fire at a close range target while strafing. Which was why Jack had originally installed 8 of them, having to design the ship around the guns to get what he needed. But eventually he did learn when to cut projects that did not look promising or started racking time and up bills. Though he found out later no research was ever completely wasted. Parts and pieces of any research, even failed research, could be used many ways and places if you used your head. Sometime with amazing results.
Jack studied the enemy fleet for a second. Wanting to impress Tom with what his little ships could do against such a large enemy fleet in the hope that he would sell his monster and buy a couple squadrons of his Battleship Destroyers, (a hopeless thought). He knew he needed to be able to make more than the four attack run passes on the enemy fleet, the tanks he was able to bring with him allowed. He needed more reaction mass drop tanks but the little ships could only carry so many without adding a lot of heavy racks.
He started thinking of the failed hulks that he had built that were such bad designs, that no one wanted them even at scrap prices. Trying to figure out a way to turn them into drop tank transports without having to spend a lot doing it.
He was already using the ships from one failed design attempt as tugs for recovering the tanks that survived the battles before they drifted too far away. Which is why he tried to drop his tanks in mass as they headed for the fleet to act as decoys. Most could be simply refilled (remassed being the universal term for filling the reaction mass tanks of Space ships) and reused or rebuilt cheaply even if they were holed or took a little damage. The little ships of the failed design were little bigger than boats, had a great rang for their size even with the destroyer sized engines (the first ships he had used drop tanks on) and were originally armed with only torpedoes and a few small point defense weapons. But it turned out that torpedoes simply ware not enough by themselves to take out most big ships even in mass attacks. Not to mention the fact that their small size against the point defenses of modern fleet Destroyers and Cruisers made them easy to kill once
"Damn." Jack said to himself. No w the tanks were starting to look complex and expensive. Defeating the whole concept of Cheap enough to lose. Not to mention the development costs.
Jack had to chuckle at that thought. He had found out the hard way that costs had a way of ballooning when a simple, seeming easy project became increasingly complex or difficult and costly when unforeseen problems cropped up. Then he had done what was only natural. Not wanting to waste already spent credits, he had pressed on and on and on. Dumping more and more money into what too often turned into a black hole. Sometimes the end product did not seem worth the development costs and all the work he had to put in by the time he had finished. But then sometimes the product was worth its weight in gold. But he could never tell for sure which ones were going to be what, until he had used them in combat. Sometimes the ones he thought were a waste of credits when they were finished, turned out to be pure gold.
This Destroyer was turning out to be one of the Gold's even though a lot of worthless hulks had been left behind and sold for scrap to get it right. Another great but expensive improvement was increasing the Destroyer's big 8 inch gun's rate of fire. Their old 10 rounds a minute was ridiculous when you only had seconds to fire at a close range target while strafing. Which was why Jack had originally installed 8 of them, having to design the ship around the guns to get what he needed. But eventually he did learn when to cut projects that did not look promising or started racking time and up bills. Though he found out later no research was ever completely wasted. Parts and pieces of any research, even failed research, could be used many ways and places if you used your head. Sometime with amazing results.
Jack studied the enemy fleet for a second. Wanting to impress Tom with what his little ships could do against such a large enemy fleet in the hope that he would sell his monster and buy a couple squadrons of his Battleship Destroyers, (a hopeless thought). He knew he needed to be able to make more than the four attack run passes on the enemy fleet, the tanks he was able to bring with him allowed. He needed more reaction mass drop tanks but the little ships could only carry so many without adding a lot of heavy racks.
He started thinking of the failed hulks that he had built that were such bad designs, that no one wanted them even at scrap prices. Trying to figure out a way to turn them into drop tank transports without having to spend a lot doing it.
He was already using the ships from one failed design attempt as tugs for recovering the tanks that survived the battles before they drifted too far away. Which is why he tried to drop his tanks in mass as they headed for the fleet to act as decoys. Most could be simply refilled (remassed being the universal term for filling the reaction mass tanks of Space ships) and reused or rebuilt cheaply even if they were holed or took a little damage. The little ships of the failed design were little bigger than boats, had a great rang for their size even with the destroyer sized engines (the first ships he had used drop tanks on) and were originally armed with only torpedoes and a few small point defense weapons. But it turned out that torpedoes simply ware not enough by themselves to take out most big ships even in mass attacks. Not to mention the fact that their small size against the point defenses of modern fleet Destroyers and Cruisers made them easy to kill once
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