Whay would real-life war spacecraft look like?

[Joseph Kerman]

On 7/23/2017 at 9:03 PM, tater said:

Most SF break some physics. Postulating any new discovery should make the author of the scenario chase down the repercussions as well as they can. Look at drives with huge Isp and decent thrust alone, that makes creating world-killers (extinction level events) pretty easy.

VASIMR's are really the more promising options, but those are non-existent as of now.

[tater]

OK, assume a near future with VASIMR. That means you've also solved fission power at X W/kg power density (can't remember what VASIMR needs to make sense, but it's a lot of power per kg reactor/radiator).

This gets you pretty idealized travel to other nearby planets like Mars. Age of sail sorts of travel times, weeks, months, and even years to the distant solar system.

What then? What is work fighting for? Why are people in the places they are? The only possible combatants must be 100% self-reliant, BTW, or Mars declares war, and Earth says, "OK, no more food or spare parts. Enjoy starving to death."

[Hummingbird Aerospace]

Turrets and big ships are not good ideas. Ever notice how in Star Wars, the big, bad ship can’t ever hit the fighters, and how the Death Star probably takes 3 hours to rotate and change it’s target? Well big space warships, if it ever comes to warfare in space, big capital ships are just... bad. First they would have a very low maneuverability. Also, space battleships would be very large, making them an easier target. Third, mainly because of the low maneuverability, and massive surface space, the ship’s surface would block the dorsal turrets from firing at ships below, therefore needing more weapons, more engines, more fuel, and more money to make and launch. While with a small fighter, they’re fast, cheap(er), maneuverable, and it can easily turn itself to fire it’s weapon, instead of relying on stupid little turrets.