I just had a nice long phone conversation with a reader / beta-reader about some of the more technical details of utilizing military vernacular for many of the things in Privateer Tales. Specifically, I was trying to come up with a rank structure that was easier for the non-mil. crowd that didn’t insult the mil. crowd at the same time. I feel like we made good headway and in the end, I think we have something that is realistic, but not over the top.
At the same time, he mentioned that some of my ship classifications were out of order. Initially, I wasn’t buying it, but when I started researching it with him, I folded my position quickly. Simply put, I had a few ship classes poorly positioned. Probably the most egregious were cruisers and corvettes.
As it turns out corvettes just aren’t as big as I’ve suggested and cruisers are generally bigger . So what’s an author to do? Easy, I’ll make sure we have it right and then put it in the forward of Give No Quarter and use corrected references going forward. I’m sure going to miss those corvettes, though.
I’m avoiding using Matt’s full name just yet, until he’s had a chance to review my new list and make sure he’s okay with his name appearing on the blog. The following sheet is close to what we’ll end up with.
| Class | Tonnes | LOA-Meters | Examples |
| Dart | < 10 | ||
| Tug | 80 | 20 | Adela Chen |
| Cutter | 150 | 30 | Sterra’s Gift |
| Sloop | 300 | 40 | Hotspur |
| Corvette | 500 | 40 | Banny Hill ( parley) |
| Light Frigate | 1,200 | 50 | Cape of Good Hope |
| Frigate | 1,800 | 120 | Justice Bringer, Peace Bringer |
| Light Cruiser | 4,000 | 100 | Fist of Justice, Hammer of Justice |
| Destroyer | 6,000 | 140 | |
| Crusier | 8,000 | 150 | |
| Heavy Cruiser | 14,000 | 200 | Walter Sydney Adams, Theodore Dunham, Hipparchus |
| Battleship | 18,500 | 250 | |
| Dreadnaught | 42,000 | 600 | Bakunawa |
| Platform | 12,000-really long |
Oh and for a quick update… I just passed 24,000 word mark in Give No Quarter. I’m hoping to be past 40,000 by the end of January and writing complete by mid March. By adding the Audio Book, Life of a Miner and Wizard in a Witchy world, I’ve been extremely busy, but I couldn’t be having more fun!
The artwork above is a 3d rendering of our new destroyer by artist Elias Stern. Please check out his work at deviantart.com as Lord Doomhammer. The model is just a taste of what’s to come and take it from me, you’re going to love what he’s come up with for Give No Quarter’s cover.
Happy Reading!
Jamie
Great to see this. Just a question, is there a reason the light cruiser is smaller than the destroyer?
Hi Michael – We’re not final just yet and I’ve had the same comment from another. I might switch their positions or possibly remove the light cruiser entirely.
Hi Jamie,
Nice to see you working on the ship’s size and specs.
I just have some concerns about them as they are far from realistic or even viable.
Just to point some of my concerns:
1. Light frigate and light cruisers.: They are not about size but armor and weapons. Frigates are most for patrol and escort missions and the light cruisers for escort and fast attack (hit and run). The lack or armor and more powerful weapons make them a lot faster than their heavy counterparts. The size varies for just a few meters not more.
2. Tonnes and LOA: Unrealistic as we know that thrusters and fuel takes a lot of space (depending on how you design them it can be almost half the length). Let’s not forget that even if in space there is no weight, mass stills there.
How can a Tug of only 20 meters length and and a mass of 80 tons be able to push or pull barges with hundreds of thousands tons of cargo? A tug for this kind of operation should be something like a giant with a head of a pygmy. Really big engines, huge fuel tanks and a small crew area.
It’s my opinion that you can fairly use navy’s ships mass for your ships
some examples:
A Cutter with 1,140 tons with an overall length of 64m
A light frigate with 3’600 tons and an overall of 125m.
A frigate with 4’800 tons and with an overall length of 133m,
A Destroyer with 6,800 tons with an overall length of 154m
A Light cruiser with 11,700 tons with an overall length of 180m
A Heavy cruiser with 13,600 tons with an overall length of 205m
It’s not possible to shorten these values as even if you use light materials, armor still has mass, and you’ll also have to think about food, water and most important air.
A good point of start thinking about spaceships needs is analyzing a submarine.
A Los Angeles class submarine has 110m in length x 10m beam x 9.4m draft. It displaces around 6’000 tons and has a crew of 129. It can stay submerged for 90 days.
A Virginia class submarine has 115m in length x 10m beam. It displaces around 7’900 tons and has a crew of 135. It can stay submerged for while food remains and maintenance is not needed.
Many people has thought a lot about sci-fi ships and there are excellent sites on many different topics to help people get an idea on what it works and don’t.
I spent quite some time reading about military tactics and deployments to understand how it is in real life and I could see that many authors do the same as they use real tactics in their stories.
I use to do the same about spaceships and military ones. Even if a sci-fi book is about fiction, a little bit of plausibility is always necessary and many people around the net as sci-fi authors did the same.
Here is a site that may be helpful to you: http://www.milsf.com/ship-size-tonnage-and-crew/
If you want I can send you some other sites with hard-science info and military tactics.
Thanks for your books.
Best
what happened to filbert? didn’t see any mention of their stray in the book hope he’s well
Hi Al –
You’re right, Filbert was not mentioned beyond the fact that Dave Muir had been taking care of him. We’ll have to see if he shows up in the future. He’s been a pretty good survivor so far. wink wink