Current plan for Imp. Space - Documentation

Black Ops Navy Squadron – Form (shape and structure)

This thread is dedicated to the form/shape/structure of the space section of the Black Ops.
I would like this thread to act as reference material, which I will keep updating as we decide to change things. Please discuss this topic in the thread dedicated to discussion. The outcomes of these discussions will be applied to this thread, the plan. If we can keep this thread clean, it will be easier for people to see the current state of the division/branch, useful for both veterans and mostly new players.

As the title states, in the subject of this thread is form/shape/structure. I will try to publish ideas we (Tyraan, Jon-Sohn, me and others that influenced these visions) came up with so far. I will start off by thanking Belidos and Tyraan for the planning they did on the Auxilary Wing that was supposed to take off back in the Second Act. This material is very useful, and if there is no objection, we will use some of it for the Black Ops Navy Squadron. The ideas will be modified however, as the type of elite squadron we are going to have now, differs from the Auxilary Wing, we want to exaggerate the specialness of the Black Ops Navy Squadron. This is the core idea of these documents.

For now, we think it is best to start of with one squadron, that consists out of two wings (plus a special thing any pilot can participate in when required), a fighter wing, and a bomber wing. The fighter wing consists of dogfight/scouting purpose ships, this wing is launched for patrols and fighting hostile starfighters. The bomber wing consists of bombing purpose ships, which will be launched for destroying larger hostile ships and structures. Due to our low numbers, both wings will probably be deployed during missions, which should keep us all happeh!

The Black Ops (standing out in skill and reflexes) uses the Imperial Navy's top notch ships we think. So for both wings, we thought it would be a good idea to have wingleaders use extraordinary yet experimental ships of the same class as their wingmen (Fighters having a superior fighter ship, bombers having an advanced bomber type of ship).



Fighter Wing

Wingleader: TIE Aggressor: This superior strike fighter looks and acts a lot like it's little brother, the TIE Interceptor specialist fighter. It's speed and maneuverability was similar to the interceptors, although the Aggressor possessed more firepower, which includes a rear turret for the elemination of pursuers. (This wingleader could have a dedicated gunner, which can create an epic duo in RP, friends or competitors. Another option is to have the turret most of the time, and have an interceptor pilot gun in the wingmen's ship only in special, stealthy, low number operations.)

Wingmen: 2x TIE Interceptor: The name of these ships is self explanatory, these light ships were deployed to quickly intercept and destroy wings of enemy fighters. They stand out high above the TIE fighters due to their high speed and maneuverability.


Bomber Wing

Wingleader: TIE Oppressor: The Oppressor was the first attempt to fit a bomber's firepower into a variant of the TIE hull similar to those of TIE Fighters and Interceptors. Although experimental and expensive, the ship performed very well, damage wise. But just like its sibling the TIE Bomber, it was heavy (less maneuverable) and slower than most other starfighters.

Wingmen: 1x / 2x TIE Bomber: TIE Bobers were ships designed for taking out large space structures and ships, aswell as performing atmospheric bombardements. Typical about the TIE Bomber is the second hull, one hull functioned as cockpit for the pilot, the other was a storage of bombs and heavy missiles


Both wings will mostly fly together during missions (under the same squadron leader). During training phases (depending on the type of training) the wings will be split, as in some training phases dogfighting speciality will be trained and in another bombing runs for example.

Black Ops Navy Squadron Flagship

A YE-4 Imperial Gunship will be used as flagship for the Black Ops Navy Squadron.
The ship will be deco'd accordingly (Done by me, Jon, and whoever wants to join in.) Deco will include passenger area, crews quarters (bunks), engineering (engine controls), escape pods, and more. The ship can be used for RP events, these will mostly be all about interaction between imperials, (any branch really. They are similar to the cantina nights we used to host now and then, but imperial only. There will be long flights in during people can roleplay aboard the ship, talking to people, maintence to the ship, etc (Not only for pilots!). AFKers can use the bunks. Detailed information about the ship will be posted in the CONTENT thread.



Decimator

The Decimator is a small imperial multi passenger ship, its weaponry consits of two turrets, one on the top of the ship and one on the bottom. The ship is not particularly large, which makes it a good ship for the more dangerous patrols. The ship can now and then be used to run patrols when two fighter reinforcements are available, it can also be used for gunner training. I suggest that a pilot other than the Squadron Leader, yet higher ranked, (perhaps Jon) takes responsibility for this ship and deco, so ownership of the POB ships is spread over multiple pilots.




Regarding multi passenger ships:

If we'd want to work like the Imperial Navy system as close as possible, we would need people dedicated to crewing larger ships, and pilots dedicated to flying starfighters. Imperials would be bound to either of these positions. However, years ago I joined a community similar to ours, (military roleplay in another game, another theme, setting etc) and this group had three main divisions, Infantry, Air Division and Fleet. People that piloted small fighters were part of the Air Division, and people that crewed large ships as pilots and gunners were in the Fleet. For months this worked out alright, the fighter pilots were called for action a lot more than the fleet members though. It got even worse as the community shrunk, and fleet personnel was barely ever needed, leaving the fleet members in boredom. Similar things that happened were for instance that only one fleet ship was required on the battlefield which took 5 fleet members, while 10 were online, the community was not able to provide enough stuff to do for fleet members. It ended up in a lot of people leaving due to the lack of activities, a result of unbalanced positions. With this in mind, and the fact that our community is starting with few numbers. I strongly believe that we should not make the same mistakes. Although I want to bind a pilots to specific position and crafts in the starfighter wings, I do want to give them the opportunity to serve as gunman now and then on a multi-person ship. Creating some kind of diversity and preventing people from getting bored with the only job they got. For this reason I have not set up a POB wing. If we ever grow to become really big, we could change this, and have a wing dedicated to POB manning, but for now, I really stand behind this solution.

I fear that this specific topic is going to be controversial, but this solution is to prevent serious conflicts from happening, like I have seen in the past.



Rank Structure

We will start off with a small integrated version of Belidos' rank structure. Squadron leader will be the highest rank for now. Apart from lecturing pilots (trainings and briefings). He will lead the wings in space.


As we get more Black Ops members for whatever reason, we can first expand each wing, (more wingmen) when a wing gets too big, it will be split.


Outfitting

Part of being awesome, is looking awesome. Something that crossed my mind was customization. We, the Black Ops squadron are supposed to be the empire's top, which makes me think of high prized assets to organisations/governments/movements in other stories, books 'n' films. One example being Dr House, who plays by no-ones rules except his own, yet he is not kicked out because of his epic skills and mind. I am not saying every member of the Black Ops should be a dick with a huge ego, in contrary, this squadron is part of the Empire which stands for order and organisation. But due to this being a special group, I think it is acceptable to have slightly customisable pilot appearance. Suits should ofcourse look imperial. See the next picture for examples I have in mind.




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This system consists of ideas from me, Tyraan, Jon and Beli. Stay tuned as this thread will be edited as discussions point out that things should be changed.

And again, please do not post here, instead use the discussion thread. And remember, we can't please everyone.