The Yamato anime series do have anti submarine warfare thing where unlike cloaking device, an enemy could hide in another dimension and you can set up something similar to depth charges to that dimension... At least that's AFAIK from watching the earlier season of the recent anime version.
Corvettes punch down, Destroyers punch up, Frigates swing at anything in sight. Battleships don't punch. They bodyslam. Cruisers are a one-ship fleet. Carriers sit back, take a smoke, and let others fight.
In space combat, assuming your setting allows for spinal weapons. Carriers are snipers, sitting back and point and deleting other ships at long range. The Punic-class supercarrier from Halo being an excellent example of the carrier role in space combat.
I was on a modern frigate in the 80s, so my mind goes to three things. 1. Missile picket/Scout-hunting with good sensors and probes. 2. Going places others can't. (Including the best liberty ports.) 3. Doing it all faster than everything else. (gassing up alot.)
IIRC, it gets more complicated when you read that 'cruiser' originally was a general term for any ship capable of long-range, independant sailing. Which included frigates. And modern frigates fill a role destroyers used to have, and destroyers fill the role of cruisers and battleships. My own classifications are - Corvette- smallest 'warship', meant primarily for in- and near-system security and patrol. Frigates- Meant as escorts in fleet formations, but capable of independent operations, though limited in range (exact dependant on setting and tech). Cruisers- The 'main' warships for a fleet, well armed and protected, capable of multi-role missions, very long-legged. Battleships/Dreadnoughts- The heaviest in the fleet, rarely operate alone, usually only leave a polities borders when a war is going.
Frigates also make perfect convoy escorts of merchants through pirate infested regions or convoys to ferry supplies during hostilities. Corvettes* for system defence so they can reach the outer edges of a system and still have the ftl so they can shift to where needed in the defence. * During WWII Canada had the 3rd largest Navy, but mostly Corvettes in their classification that were tasked with convoy escort duties. This is part of why the definitions are so fuzzy, different Countries used different definitions.
Even in current real life every country uses its own definition and a nation corvette can be more powerful then another nations frigate by a huge margin
Something that fascinates me about frigates is that, in most historical uses until the modern day, you weren't really seeing frigates in fleets. Age of sail frigates were mostly too small for the battle line, but they might be supporting a fleet. WWII frigates were too slow to even keep up with a battle fleet. Yet modern frigates have shown a big shift from that, often being the largest multi-role surface combatants of most navies that don't field destroyers. It's interesting how, as technology evolves, ship types change and navies just kind of arbitrarily pick old terms or invent new terms. Like how the UK was going to use "corvette" for destroyers until it ended up being used for much smaller merchant escorts instead. It's almost beautifully arbitrary.
In Star Trek Online (and probably all of Star Trek in general) the Miranda-Class was classified as a Frigate, as well as the Centaur-Class. For the role of Corvette, the Defiant-Class would be the one. The Saber-Class is marginally larger than the Defiant-Class, and the Steamrunner-Class is already evidently larger than the Defiant-Class. The one thing I've noticed that distinguished the Defiant from the Miranda was the firepower and the armor; the Miranda-Class was less armed with beam arrays and beam banks, while the Defiant-Class had ablative armor and could employ the heavy cannons.
@user-roninwolf1981 Trek is a gods damn nightmare for ship classifications. Generic 'starship' for every Federation vessel, widely varying ones for everyone else, most of which make them sound scarier than they are. First classification I remember for Miranda's were heavy frigates, then other sources said light crusier. I stick with heavy frigate, because frigate fits their smaller size, and heavy for the phaser cannons they mount. Defiant and vessels like her I give the special class of 'destroyer', a frigate sized vessel that is dedicated to combat. Their whole layout and equipment is for fighting. If a destroyer shows up, it's not for science or first contact, it's because someone's ass needs kicking.
My favorite Frigate role in space combat has to be the examples in Homeworld and Halo. Where The Frigates are basically the Super Carriers's, Battleships's and Battlecruisers's secondary armaments with engines strapped to it. The Ion Frigate being the foremost example. Because sometimes DPS is all you need.
i loved the boarding frigate because it looked like a battlestar lmao. In my head canon there was probably an "elite" version of that frigate that could do kind of everything but smol, like the smallest version of the main ship that could be used as power projection, maybe even carry one or two fighter/bomber. I really just wanted a battlestar in "hero's ship" format lmao xD
Honestly, you only need those and scout ships to beat the game. It's got the highest range (somehow) and has great value -per-point. Standard fleet is the Scout, 1 big ship, and 4 of those.
How about the frigates of Dune? The largest class of warship in that universe that could make planetary landings, always struck me as a good definition of what a frigate is in sci-fi.
@@PositiveBlackSoul I think it also comes down to role. A frigate is often supposed to be versatile enough to react to a range of situation. This includes (limited) ground operations. For that it's insanely practical if a ship can land. It also makes it less demanding in terms of infrastructure for longer independent operations.
It seems like a number of franchises have the idea that only ships below a certain size can land on a planet. Intuitively it makes sense. So it doesn't surprise me that done and Mass Effect associate that with the term "frigate".
Frigates in Homeworld: The thing I’m constantly pumping out trying to figure out the best Rock-Paper-Scissors combo at the moment. To build Ion Frigates or not to build Ion Frigates
Homeworld frigates definitely fall into the "tight specialty" interpretation. My favorite is probably the Multi-Beam Frigates from Cataclysm. While they are not in HW2, we do sort of see where they ended up with the larger ships (especially the Battlecruiser) having "pulsar" beam point defense.
@@templarw20 If there ever was a game gearbox ought to remaster! With the right combination of multi-beams and acolytes you feel unstoppable. And the storyline is perfect.
I hear frigate and I automatically picture the ones in the Homeworld Games, they were the smallest FTL capable ships. the Ion Frigates were the best, just a flying gun and it was so satisfying to watch them come into range and open fire all at once.
By technicality all ships are submarines in space (as they have to be hermetically sealed). But to get to that particular definition of submarine it also has to do stealth extremely well. In that sense all ships with defined stealth capabilities are submarines in space. Extra points if the ship can maintain its stealth characteristic while engaging.
Normally, I like that you guys dig up relatively obscure stuff to talk about, and not just what's big an trending. That's a big part of what makes your videos interesting. That being said, can you please cover the Super Destroyers from Helldivers! They are quickly becoming one of my favorite sci-fi designs- despite them being a bit of a 'do everything' ship.
One if my favorite obscure sci-fi is crest of the stars it has it's own ship classification and it cares about heat at during sustained combat!!! (My favorite ships are the missle ships called battleships in world)
I really think of the Super Destroyers as tiny carriers mixed with an arsenal ship. We've never seen them fight other ships, from weapon placement to interior logistics, they seem entirely geared for supporting ground ops. Even the mission timers are based on their ability to descend into low orbit and provide combat support, which is a unique feature... how many ships are designed to get dirty in atmo? :)
In the Sci-Fi spaceship classification I usually adopt, in my settings or when playing games like say, Space Engineers, Frigates are described thus: Frigate: fully independence-capable (ergo, equipped with provisions and if existing in setting, an FTL drive, able to support both rapid or long range redeployment) subcapital ship vessel. Versatile and modular designs, ranging from highly specialised platforms to taking on a more generalist role, the former both during fleet deployments or when doing a variety of support and backline duties. The latter, when deployed on lone operations. Make up the backbone of a given Navy. Usually the size of destroyers, but can if necessary dwarf them. Can be automated but are often built for crewed use, unlike many destroyers. Can be used for Escort, Electronic Warfare, Sensor Suites and Communication Nodes. Naming depends on role. This is very similar to how they are depicted in EVE online, which I must say is a surprise.
Ship definitions vary wildy in real life too. In the 1960s, the USN built several classes of 6000+ ton SAM-armed ships that were initially classified as "frigates" because their job was to escort carriers, the USN term for what the rest-of-the-world calls frigates being "destroyer escort (DE)". Then in the 1970s they decided to fall in line with the rest of the world, with most of these huge "frigates" being reclassified as "cruisers" and the smallest ones as "destroyers". Nowadays they go off size and "rate" (i.e. quality): cruisers are big first-rate ships, destroyers are smaller first-rate ships, and frigates are even smaller second-rate ships. All of them have all-round capabilities, just to different degrees. In the Royal Navy, by contrast, destroyers are anti-aircraft vessels and frigates are anti-submarine vessels, whatever their size: the Type 22 frigates were bigger than the contemporary Type 42 destroyers.
We needn't even mention all the various ships that were called frigate, destroyer and cruiser in the age of sail. "Fourth rate ship of the line" designated a class of ships that were called any of the above at some point, by someone, just aa one illustration of how confusing that conversation is.
Destroyers originally were 'torpedo boat destroyers' and that was their mission goal. Now, I think most of the US destroyers are bigger and more well armed than its cruisers.
@@jaredragland4707 The term destroyer was invented after the age of sail. It's a contraction of "torpedo-boat destroyer", i.e. a small fast ship with quick-firing guns that was intended to chase down and destroy torpedo boats. Navies soon realised however that the "torpedo boat destroyer" was a better and more versatile platform for the torpedoes than the boats, so it morphed from an escort into the smallest offensive ocen-going craft. Then when anti-submarine and anti-aircraft escort became critically important in the first and second World Wars, destroyers gradually morphed back into escorts, generally landing torpedoes in favour of more AAA and ASW equipment.
@@cp1cupcake The rampant size inflation started in the 1970s with the USN's Spruance class destroyers: 7000 ton replacements for 3000 ton Gearings. This was much criticised at the time, but the USN had it right and most navies have come round to this way of thinking. What the USN had realised was "steel is cheap and air is free", i.e. there's no point compromising the capabilities of your ships by making them cramped and difficult to upgrade in order to save on hull costs, when the latter are only 10% of the price anyway. Better to have plenty of "elbow room" and claw back the small cost increase from the efficiencies that result from that.
In my setting, frigates take a kind of "battleline" role in space warfare. They're on the front lines of any naval battle, and are easily modifiable for numerous roles. For example, C.A.F. (Cosmic Armed Forces, aka the human military) frigates can be turned into escort/bodyguard vessels for more valuable starships (such as more lightly armed carriers), or just charge straight ahead and bear the brunt of enemy fire then shoot back with particle/laser cannons, or even just becoming minor transports that carry 2-3 vehicles into areas larger ships can't get to (IE closer to the ground of a low gravity battlefield).
That kind of fills their age of sail role of being the smallest category of the ships of the line. The first rates would take the prime beatings while the frigates would screen the fleet and when line of battle was engaged serve as signal relays off line of the main shooting match.
@@carloshenriquezimmer7543And the battle in the Mutara Nebula in *The Wrath of Khan.* That's what made that battle so epic and suspenseful, that it still stands up today as how to make ship to ship combat dramatic.
When you mentioned Starsector, I immediately knew you were going to call out the Wolf. It's fast enough to decline engagements it can't win, agile enough to flank larger enemies, armed enough to hurt them and cheap enough to be replaced when it invariably over-extends and gets blown up.
For me it’s the Vanguard due to its mix of ballistic and missile weapons allowing it to tear apart frigates while punching up against destroyers, cruisers, and even battleships when in sufficient numbers, and it can easily avoid fights it can’t take with its burn drive, when not using it to chase down ships or charge into brawling range. It’s also really well protected for its size, with tanking capabilities comparable to some cruisers with the right hull modifications and well times damper field activations. It’s also cheap to deploy and maintain, and they’re reasonably cheap to obtain, if not outright free due to how almost every luddic church or pirate fleet above a certain size will have at least one that’s recoverable after battle, with its Rugged Construction hullmod massively increasing its chance to be recovered, while reducing the likeliness of permanent damage when it does blow up, and mitigating the effect of what permanent damage the ship does sustain. It ticks all the boxes of a good frigate design - fast, has great versatility due to being well armed and armored, and it’s cheap and easily amassable. If they were larger, they’d probably be labeled as cruisers, and it just so happens that it was added alongside the Eradicator-class Fast Cruiser, which both has a similar playstyle and helps cover what few weaknesses it has.
@@specs.weedle I'm playing an older build at the moment and haven't gotten the chance to play with the new stuff. Gotta say, my favorite destroyer is the Enforcer. It actually perfectly complements the Wolf as a battle line warship that can stand alongside heavy cruisers while the Wolves execute flanking maneuvers and torpedo runs.
During FASA's time with the Star Trek RPG license, they completely redefined the role of "frigates" in Starfleet. In the game, frigates were pure warships, filling a capital ship role in Starfleet (where destroyers and escorts filled the escort role). The Federation Starship Recognition Manual had two primary frigates: Chandley-class and the Kiev-class. The Kiev was a fast frigate, which had more of a troubleshooter/hunter-killer role, which the Chandley was a beast bigger than the Constitution refit and filled a battlespace dominance role. If the Constitution was about equal in capability to a Klingon battlecruiser, the Chandley was there to pummel them into submission. Oh, and it was originally designed to deploy Starfleet ground forces en masse. I loved that idea so much (partly because it was quite different from both the Age of Sail concept filled by the heavy cruiser (Constitution) and the light, fast specialized escort ship that were active when I was in the Navy) that I have always incorporated FASA's fleet roles into my later games (and rebuilt all of the FSRM ships using the rules of the new game I was running...currently Modiphius' Star Trek Adventures). For other settings, I see frigates as a skirmisher in a space fleet setting. If you use the concentric spheres concept of fleet deployment, frigates and other escorts (like gunships) would be on that outer ring, playing both offense and defense against their counterparts, trying to open up holes in the defensive perimeter for strike ships to deliver their payloads. (Destroyers would have a more defensive role in this setting, true to their original purpose (i.e., torpedo boat destroyers); their job is to interdict enemy ships that have penetrated the perimeter and get in the way of firing lines of enemy strike ships. Cruisers would fill the strike role, both stand off and short range, and battleships would fill the "oh, lawd, he comin'" heavy hitter role. Carriers in this setup fill the command & control and small craft operations roles.)
It's so hard to pin down what a Frigate is. Generally I think of them as either semi-independent long range patrol craft or fleet support (especially anti-missile/fighters). They are bigger and more durable than than Corvettes, that are just above fighters in most senses, but well below cruisers in terms of combat capabilities. They serve primarily for scouting and early detection, but have no role in big ship fights outside of asset protection and can only really damage larger ships in wolf pack flotillas, where their numbers and relatively fast speed (for a ship) can be maximized to deal damage out of proportion to their relative weight with the enemy. But here the defining factor is weapons power. If your weapons power is too high Frigates become basically death traps (as happens in Halo), but if you have defenses or maneuverability that can make up for this short coming, then the fleet support/defense is their best primary role with again scouting and early warning as a dangerous secondary.
I like the original (modern) frigate distinction from WW2 which was basically a destroyer/upscaled corvette designed to primarily escort other ships. While destroyers would be similar sized vessels designed primarily for offensive operations. Similar to your idea.
Frigates are big enough to be useful in fleet defense and can work as fleet defense/anti aircraft/Submarine and radar pickets. But are also ideal for chasing the enemy or scouting independently. A Frigate is a serious threat to most vessels.
the way I see sci-fi Frigates being able to do the modern frigates capabilities as anti-submarine vessels is to have some Frigates be dedicated anti-cloaking ships. they got specialized sensor arrays that can't be easily fitted onto regular combat vessels and have ways of pushing cloaked vessels out of cloak for a supporting fleet to destroy. the sensor arrays aren't perfect however, but are better than nothing. this idea would especially be useful in settings where Pirates regularly have cloaking tech.
The thing is though in space, sensor power and capability is directly proportional to its size. A larger ship can pump a lot more power and have a much bigger sensor array, coupled with much more capable computer systems and more crew to manage that systems means a bigger ship is going to detect cloaked ships at longer ranges than smaller ones. The main advantage that a small ship would have in the cloak hunting role is that you can just build more of them, and even if a battleship ends up being far better at detecting cloaked ships, those are not the ships you want to be using for convoy escort missions and anti piracy patrols because of their greater cost.
@@ryuukeisscifiproductions1818 Using several small ships could also get you a better variety of viewing angles on any target, and if you're using active scanners then having them on a faster, cheaper ship could definitely help if Anti-Radiation-Missiles are a concern.
Man Deadlock really is one of the best space fleet games. Killer job expanding the limited ship rosters of what it's adapting and hot take the turn based combat is actually better than real time. Makes it much easier to be strategic. Shame we don't get more games like it.
The frigates from Homeworld 1, 2 and Cataclysm. Aside from one general purpose frigate, all were specialized in one way or another to help bigger ships deal with smaller ships.
Germany just makes no distinction between frigates and destroyers like many nations actually. Which makes sense. Post WW2 previously specialized frigates and destroyers were all made largely multi purpose so the difference has kinda disappeared.
Heavily armed? Lol. Lmao even... Oh wait you are serious F-126 class armament: 8 AShM, 16 multi purpose cells Arleigh Burke flight 3: 96 missile cells. Atago class Yeah yeah I know AL/KC etc.: 96 cells. Constellation class: 16 AShM, 32 cells. FREMM (Italian): 16 cells. Now you may ask, wtf this is anemic. Why is the ship so big? Because, and it may shock you, it's a FRIGATE. Same as original FREMMs. A patrol kind. It's main job is to partol the seas for up to 2 years non stop. Which means: redundancies, luxurious crew accomodation, etc. It will be a ship for the peaceful world that doesn't exist anymore. Obsolete before keel was laid down.
The term frigate has varied so much that if you dont know what to classify a ship as, just add an adjective infront of the word frigate and you're set.
I love the Wolf, but the Lasher is underrated. It's not as mobile as most frigates, but it packs an incredible amount of firepower into a small, cheap package.
@@alecciarosewater7438 Yes, and that was a big sticking point for me initially. It was too slow to do normal frigate things. I never used the thing, so I was surprised when I started using it the right way and it exceeded all of my expectations. It's basically a mini Hammerhead. Give it another try sometime, give it a good mix of kinetic/ HE weapons. When the ammo feeder is active, it straight up out-guns most destroyers, even an Enforcer.
@@Kitkat-986I find myself turning it into a Point Defense platform for larger ships I don't want to burden with PD. Slap on some tracking hull mods, and its the perfect Carrier escort.
@@Kitkat-986In a fleet setting, no other frigate right now can beat an Omen. Not only does its EMP Point Defense lightning system allow it to delete fighters and missiles across your friendly ships, but it also boasts an admirable shield efficiency and flux capacity even with 360 degree omni shields allowing it to punch far above its weight given the right armaments and hullmods. I've seen it take on destroyers alone without issue. All of that with a very reasonable logistical profile of 6 supplies a month, meaning it's more efficient than scarabs, tempests, and Hyperions (of course), and you can field more of them at once in a battle. Omens are the perfect frigate.
One of my favourite frigate's is the Salamis class from Gundam. I know they class it as a cruiser but it always struck me as a frigate instead. It was cannon fodder until it was refit to carry mobile suits, this one change vastly improved the ship. A few years later and it's intended replacement was introduced then seventy years after that both ships were still in service. From trash to being too good to get rid of.
In my Sci-Fi I'm writing, the hero ship is initially classified as a corvette, it's old role, but is salvaged and revamped. By planned book 4, it's reclassified as a frigate, wince it finally gets much needed upgrades, especially in the electronic warfare side and weapons to better match the captain (and crew) capabilities.
I mean irl frigates are basically the same as destroyers with a different history behind the particular name in terms of purpose. Sure the largest destroyers are larger than the largest frigates. You can do the same in space obviously which can add a bit of world building detal to the setting. I kinda like the distinction that the modern frigate originated from though. Which was basically destroyers and upscaled corvettes designed mainly to escort other ships (even if the naming was mainly down to a lot of confusion) which then ended up being very similar ships. Of course that distinction disappeared pretty quickly in the cold war as multi purpose ships were the thing everyone wanted.
Love the Adamant, early game the wall of death tactic works so well with them, sit a couple behind a Battlestars flak screen and watch as they punch way above their weight.
Oh boy, naval doctrine/design + science fiction, three of my favorite things! Anyways, I've always liked the term 'frigate' for referring to a sensor-heavy warship in sci-fi. Perhaps closer to a modern AWACS craft than necessarily what is currently called a 'frigate.' After all, almost every form of sci-fi 'ruleset' ends up with some need for a craft with good sensors, data processing, and data distribution ability. For the Battlestar Galactica-esque 'fighter-focused' settings, you want something *really* similar to an AWACS node to provide forward fighter/bomber direction, for the 'major ship battles' type of setting such as Star Wars you want something fast to serve as a scout, and for settings where engagements take place at very long range where the light-lag really factors in you want something that can sit up close to the enemy and relay sensor information (especially in settings where you have some FTL communications, but your sensors are still limited to light-speed). IRL that niche is covered by AWACS aircraft, but that's largely because aircraft are so much faster than ships due to moving in two very separate mediums. In space, a 'sensor-heavy fighter' and a frigate would both move through the same vacuum using similar technologies, so it's unlikely that the former would be any faster than the latter. And even IRL improved missile technology is making AWACS survivability a bit tricky, so putting a bit more ECM, shields/armor, and sheer mass onto your sensor craft to make it survivable would push it up to near the mass of a full warship. Therefore, frigate!
I have thought about the system for my works. Dreadnoughts- Big tough ships that can act as almost like mobile bases. Intended for long term habitation for research and terraforming projects in peace time. While serving as command ships and brawlers/ heavy hitters in war time. Cruisers- All Rounder Ships that are mainly used for long range missions and Dreadnought escort. Though in later years they begin to see more independent operations in so called cruiser wings. They offer a balance of protection and fire power while remaining mobile for their size. Frigates- These ships are often used for missions that the larger ships would be unsuited too or too much for. Also for Cruiser escort. They tend to serve in patrols, anti piracy, and act as couriers (There is FTL travel, but FTL communication is limited) Corvettes- Smallest of the “Ships”, they are used almost exclusively for escorting Frigates in patrols and occasionally as couriers themselves. They are rarely used for anything more than low intensity actions. Then there are Craft like Shuttles and Fighters. Shuttles are used to ferry people between planets and small amounts of cargo. Fighters are the combined role of Fighter and Bomber, they can be equipped with mounted torpedoes and missiles that can target space craft or ground targets. While also carrying weapons to deal with other craft. They can also be used for surveys of planets, their targeting sensors capable of scanning the surfaces as well.
What you wrote there sounds exactly like how I classified my phase world ships. And of all of them the frigate was the best hero ship. Cruisers were usually way too much and the Corvettes were usually a little fragile.
I would love for you to make a playlist of ship types in sci-fis. Like friget and corvettes and destroyer, but also stuff like sheild ships, sniper ships, drone ships and other roles and tech used for custom ship way of battle.
Modern Frigates aren't usually multirole vessels, actually. The Office of Naval Intelligence usually classifies vessels based on a combination of speed, tonnage, and role, with Frigates being the second smallest fleet warships (with only Corvettes being smaller) and Frigates typically specialize in one role, usually anti-air or anti-subsurface in keeping with their roles as escorts. By contrast, Destroyers will usually specialize in two roles (either anti-air, anti-surface, or anti-subsurface), and Cruisers will be well suited to all three, hence why ONI considers the PLAN RENHAI-Class as a Cruiser instead of a Destroyer. Sometimes, smaller navies like the Norwegian and Russian navies will make multi-role Frigates that can basically do the work of a Destroyer while still being the size of a Frigate, but this is more of a consequence of either "political correctness," so to speak (Frigate sounds less scary than Destroyer), or an inability to really build larger ships.
I love the Okinawa-class frigates from Starfleet Command. The old games. Small, nimble, and relatively flat. They never were that powerful as a ship, but tney were great in learning how to play the game.
It might have been helpful to present how a frigate was defined in the past. The "frigates" in the mid 16th Century were sailing galleys, basically oar-powered galleys with and sails. They were primarily coastal vessels and also in the Mediterranian Sea. They were very popular with pirates. They did not do well in the open ocean. The ocean-going figates of the 17th century to the 19th century were three-mast ships with one gundeck. These ships could not stand in the line of battle. Only Ships-of-the-Line (SoL, aka battleships) could do that. Frigates acted as scouts and messengers for these battle fleets. Because they were fairly fast, typically the heaviest class (both in displacement and firepower) below the SoL, and can carry enough food and water for long cruises, these ships often operated independently to patrol the sea lanes and act as commerce raiders in time of war. Basically the all purpose ship. These were the "cruisers" of the day since they would cruise the seas and oceans. In many ways, they were the equivalent of both the modern day destroyers and cruisers. With the introduction of steampower, steel hull and turreted guns, the term frigate disappeared. In WW II, the British neede a class of ships for convoy escorts. The primary opponents of these escort ships were submarines and armed merchantships. As such, they had decent anti-sub capabilities and modest guns. Because convoys were slow, the were only slightly faster than the convoys at about 20-25 knots, compared to destroyers that were typically 30 knots and faster. The Royal Navy dubbed these ships frigates. The US Navy has effectively the same class of ships, but classified them as destroyer escorts. After WW II, the USN adopted the term frigate. The early Cold War frigates still had escort duties that either specialized in anti sub or anti-air. Because the ships were small, a true multimission vessel was not practical till later. And, they were still not as fast as destroyers. However, they were cheaper and their presence freed up larger, more capable ships to do higher intensity missions. Today, friagtes can be true multi-mission ships, or stay very specialized and very cable in their specialty. Furthermore, many European navies have dropped the term destroyers and refer to destroyers and frigates simply as frigates. So what would space faring frigates be? Whatever the creaters of the universe wants. LOL Their mission may resemble those of the past or may represent a new class that fits a specific need in space.
Thinking about you comment about real life frigates having an anti-submarine role, I wonder if the sci-fi equivalent would be anti-stealth. Flushing out stealth craft in various ways for allies to target and destroy them
I always imagined frigates as a heavy cavalry type units... like big armored horses or camels... They are fast highly agile and relatively strong they also can take a certain amound of damage until they cannot fight anymore... Mainly used to sweep smaller enemy groups or break formations of bigger fleets in a blitzkrieg manner... they are also very useful in pushing back enemy units to regroup and reestablish fleet formations fast and efficient once your formation was broken by the enemy...
Love your guys info dumps on all the specs and techie stuff from various sci-fi IPs. Quick way to nerd out dip from reality for a minute. Thanks for all the content.
Frigate has had so many definitions just in real life that it's hard to say what is or isn't a valid definition in any given SFU. At the beginning of the Ironclad Age, an armored frigate was actually the largest and most powerful class - it was mostly called a frigate because it only had one deck of broadside guns. This definition was a holdover from the Age of Sail, when a "line-of-battle ship" would have 2 or 3 full gun decks for a heavier broadside, and a frigate's single gun deck would be seen as insufficient for the line of battle. By the time you got to the Age of Dreadnoughts and WW1, the term frigate had almost entirely dropped out of use. WW2 saw a resurgence of frigate to mean a vessel smaller than the new destroyers, but then the post-war years saw fracturing of the definitions and sizes involved, with many American frigates of the mid-20th century being bigger than Soviet cruisers, followed by their reclassification as destroyers or cruisers.
Also, I was re-watching Green Lantern TAS, episode 18, where the team goes to a Spider Guild "frigate" that was just a quite sizeable space station - to each their own, I guess.
Great vid ^^ And one of my Favorites, is the Idris Frigate in Star Citizen. Mainly because it fits the Frigate role very well, but also because the ship is very fleshed out, every bed, bathroom, corridor and cupboard is built into the model to help the narrative it will carry in Squadron 42. Only ship I've seen so well planned out inside is the Expanses Rocinante, and that's a comparatively tiny ship.
For me, frigate = escort and skirmisher. Possibly small troops transport for landing actions. Something between Mass Effect, Halo, Battlestar Galactica, and The Expanse.
Starship Enterprise early on in TOS and TAS was seen as more of a science / exploration / diplomacy vessel, with limited armaments and shields mainly for self-defence.
@@royasturias1784 Said limited armament being once described as being able to destroy half a continent, and was apparently capable of glassing a planet or completely vaporizing a Klingon cruiser.
I know it is listed as a light cruiser but I always felt the White Star from Babylon 5 was actually a great example of a frigate. Always felt that the Normandy, especially the SR-2 was inspired by the White Star, just something about the way it moves in fights or when dodging enemies. I'm not claiming it was inspired by it just how it felt while playing Mass Effect.
You could make the argument that "frigate" and "light cruiser" mean basically the same thing. They're both small to medium sized (though bigger than sloops or corvettes), fast, and long ranged. It's just that the terminology changed between the age of sail and the battleship era. For most of the time that new cruisers were being designed, the term "frigate" had fallen out of use.
In my unfinished homebrew sci-fi setting I took pains to have different nations and species refer to their ships differently (I always really like that sort of touch), but broadly speaking from the humanity-centric view the main difference between frigates and destroyers is role/capability. There's a lot of size overlap, but the upper end of frigates tends to be a bit larger than the upper end of destroyers. Destroyers are pure combat ships and typically designed with remaining close to resupply, either major hubs or with fleets, and in the latter they are there to protect the big ships. Frigates are the utility ships in fleets, offering EW or mission specific setups, and outside of fleets they are generally considered to be the smallest capital ship capable of independent action, such as patrol or escort. They'll often have stores of emergency supplies and other gear for disaster relief, as they would be expected to be the most likely to be the first one the scene (no FTL comms aside from FTL communication drones/probes, and FTL in my setting still means a couple days at least). They usually still pack enough firepower to deal with pirates/bandits or to trade shots with some raiders from a hostile nation, mainly through packing a spinal mass driver big enough to punch above their weight a bit. This is one of the reasons frigates tend to be a little bigger than destroyers, as the latter tend to be built around massive missile volleys and turrets, with smaller but faster firing mass drivers.
Star Citizen's single player game, Squadron 42, is based aboard an Idris Frigate. It supports a few solid spacefighters, carries a spinal railgun for punching up, and has a number of defensive turrets for punching down.
@@blshouse it was announced as "feature complete" last citizen con and is since then in polishing, though how long that might take is anyone's guess. It's getting there though.
In my own sci-fi setting Frigates (& they also come in Light and Heavy variations depending on mass) are the most common sort of 'naval' vessels in space. Small and less costly to operate, but capable enough for most common tasks. In fleet actions they usually have a cruiser they are escorting which is their command ship, though 'pairs' and 'trios' are common to see even outside of fleet actions. Their only real downside is they *usually) have limited numbers of small craft and lack command and control facilities of larger vessels.
FASA games had a great Star Trek Starship Combat tabletop game back in the 80-90s. They included Frigates for almost all ST races. Frigates were warships centered on Troop transport and assault, both planetary and shipboard. They had a basic Troop assault for the ship/ship combat, but the game went out of publication before it was pursued further. A lot of people still play and resources are available online.
When it comes to frigates i see them as the type of class to just shoot both ships of their size and lower classes, though depending on the scenario i can see some being good at taking down the bigger ships
Another one that I'd throw in as a 'good' frigate in Sci-fi space warfare is the ANS's Raines-class frigate from the game Nebulous: Fleet command. Despite being the second smallest ship in the ANS it has large enough mounts to carry enough heavy torpedoes to take down at least one capital ship - maybe even two if you're really good with it. The ship also has the space to have two reactors, so it can carry very energy intensive equipment like long-range search radars, jammers, and even PD lasers for missile defense (however not all of these things at once). Because of it's low top speed and thin armor it's not a good frontline combatant, but it can take on a wide variety of supporting roles: Missile defense, swarm defense, EWar, spotting, target illumination, etc.
I really liked the Frigates in the Homeworld series at first. They can withstand some oncoming fire but usually only had only one weapon for the task that they where designed for. In Homeworld 2 it was nice to see Frigates with two weapons, one main and one secondary; like the Marine and Infiltrator Frigates having their main "weapon" being the ability to capture enemy vessels but also had the support of a secondary weapon. Similary, the Heavy Missile Frigate had big missiles for main weapons that had long range and a smaller missile launcher for extra short range fire that could intercept fighters better. Hopefully the third instalment of the series will continue this way of thinking and even give Fighters and Corvettes multiple weapons for engaging different targets if necessary. I have commented multiple times about the Homeworld series and would like to see a Spacedock video about the series. :)
@@jimskywaker4345by pre-ww2 definition Defiant is a destroyer, a lot of the early destroyers were just ocean-going torpedo boats. as the years went on the definition of the destroyer got broader and broader until now where the line between frigate, destroyer and cruiser is basically a blur
No no, that makes a lot of sense. It's got heavy cannons, a blistering torpedo armament and high manoeuvrability, along with a small frame. It's a destroyer, alright! Just don't call it that, the higher ups will get mad
Modern frigates and destroyers have no real distinction. They did in WW2 when modern frigates came about but after missiles became a thing they were all redesigned to be multi purpose and those distinctions disappeared. You could call the Defiant either. If we do go by the original WW2 distinction though yes the Defiant is 100% a destroyer in purpose. Though if you go by the Federation -propaganda- framing of it as a "heavy escort" it would actually be a frigate. So hard to say.
The role of what a frigate is changes with time. Age of sail frigates role was taken over by cruisers when armored ships became the norm, while frigates became closer to corvettes and sloops in role. Now the old frigate role is filled by destroyers.
IMO corvettes should be the next size up from fighters. I bought the fighter manual. Probably buy this one but I may just wait for corvettes and destroyers.
For anti-submarine warfare, one good sci-fi analog was that Star Trek episode where the Federation was trying to stop the Romulans from interfering in the Klingon Civil War. Cloaked vessels and how to fight them are about as close as you can get to submarine vs surface ship operations.
Ah the adamant, brings me back to my old deadlock days. I loved to have the minerva or jupiter class as the center of my fleet but i never went into battle without two or three adamants they cost so little but bring so much to the battle (fighters, Missiles and can do damage with their guns too).
There was a Star Trek Original Series novel I read as a child called "The Great Starship Race", in which a fellow Federation captain was EXTREMELY proud of his frigate relative to the Enterprise. IIRC he differentiated it as being a much more single-purpose ship than the Enterprise, smaller, but denser with combat-applicable capability. If that's the case, at least part of the reason the designation isn't common in Star Trek might be the overt militarism of it flying against Starfleets ongoing head-in-the-sand pretense that they aren't a military.
spacefrigates are spacecruisers specialsed for a military role. Thats the reason you don't see them in star trek. Btw the bird of prey mentioned is more likely based on tactic either a "destroyer" or if used strategicaly and considering their were found in private hands dualuse cruisers. Like most of history in space warships tend to be smaller than civilian or dualuse ships.
favorite frigate? probably the miranda tbh, especially in sto where there is SO MUCH VARIATION, though in fairness that does include the centaur as well so take that how you will
I have an entire faction I've built and have a classification system for my navy. Frigates are (generally) the smallest FTL capable ships in my navy. Corvettes are smaller, but relegated to system patrol (much like coastal warships). They aren't as powerful as the next size up (Destroyers), but they make for good scouts or picket ships to protect larger ships from flanking, strikecraft, or missiles/torpedoes.
When I designed a sci-fi setting of my own I classified frigates as small capital ships with armament that focused on guns. They'd act as screening ships for fleets, shooting down missiles and attack craft.
When you started talking about submarine warfare I half expected you to show some battle scenes from the wing commander movie as that resembled an age of sail style combat intermixed with sub warfare.
I could see a reinterpretation of the Anti-Submarine role being an Anti-Stealth frigate, where it's loaded to the gills with sensors and targeting equipment to paint cloaked or dark targets for other attack frigates or Arsenal Ships to fire on.
A solid thumbs up for me is the Interceptor Mark 4 (also called the Pirate cruiser) from Star Wars. As much as I love the Munificent (actually being my favorite) I found it was technically considered a cruiser (though I kind of doubt it given how it was used) the Interceptor Mark 4 always got my attention. Its design was as practical and streamlined as possible and by all accounts was just two wedges with a rectangle in the middle. Building that rust bucket must have been as simple as 1, 2, 3. Two laser cannon batteries and two turbo laser cannon batteries with Ion cannons and a proton torpedo launcher made for simple, practical yet powerful weaponry but it came off to me as the perfect ship to use in numbers... and at the end of the day that's what a frigate is- versatile Naval cannon fodder to be used in large numbers to overwhelm the enemy. Despite not having a hangar, I could easily see Interceptor Mark 4s being used in large numbers with no objections.
X4 has a definition for Frigate, there are several medium class ships, frigates, gunships (nee Bombers) and Corvettes. For that game, a Frigate is a medium class able to dock a single fighter internally. The Corvette is a similarly sized ship that is a "super heavy fighter", so can be quite a bit smaller in depth because it doesn't have to have internal docking for a "Small" ship. The Gunship is set to mostly use its turrets, so it is more an all-round combat ship. and without needing a dock space on it, can be smaller both in depth and width.
I personally like the age of sail definition of a smaller (than a ship of the line) vessel for independent small scale and supporting roles (communication, patrol, escort, pirate hunting...)
i like the celeschul orbital foundries dragon class interdiction cruiser in schlock mercenary. barring its name it is one of the mass produced ships in the series that has light weaponry for its size. it is affordable and has decent upgrades in the game.
The frigattes in the Homeworld games. Those are fantastic, remarkably versatile and reliable with several highly specialiced options like the Ion Beam Frigatte, the Support Frigatte that can not just repair and re-fuel fighters but also repair larger ships. Meanwhile the Drone Frigatte has a whole bunch of small, easily replaced gun drones and wreaks absolute HAVOK on any fighter swarm coming too close to it.
Speaking of anti submarine roles, the only settings I have seen space submarines in is Space Battleship Yamato. They hang out in Hyperspace, or subspace, or something, and pokes out a small periscope like sensor thing from a small portal into normal space.
This is another excellent video, and it is masterfully made. I truly enjoy learning about the various ships in the different science fictions and the designs of several of the ships are quite unique.
You're absolutely right that Star Trek blurs lots of lines. The Enterprises are outright called "cruisers" so I'd use that basis to call them cruisers, and use this as a fixed point for the basis of the rest. As I understand, frigates are also supposed to be less standalone than other classes of ship, so I'd use this basis in defining the other roles. As such, Intrepids like Voyager or the Miranda class or Constellation class I'd classify as "light cruisers" as they are essentially cruisers but smaller. In Star Trek I'd reserve "frigate" for vessels like the Nova class or the Defiant class; Defiant is quite spartan and suits combat with other roles and functions neglected, while the Nova is similar but for scientific roles. I'd also call the Centaur class a frigate, as these were quickly tacked together specifically for the Dominion War. A Vor'cha would be a destroyer.
A few years back I came up with an idea to get a "submarine warfare" vibe in space combat without it feeling like shoehorned-in WWII. Here's how it works. In this universe, FTL travel is via "Subspace", an alternative dimension in which the physical laws are different and FTL travel is permitted. Ships from our dimension can only travel through it in a bubble of normal space ("N-Space") there are three ways of doing this: Gate Drive. This uses a fixed gate that's external to the ship, which therefore needs the least amount of it's mass devoted to machinery. Essentially the gate "blows a bubble" through subspace with the ship inside it, which pops it back into N-space at the desired point. The ship's course is fixed by the launch conditions and it can't maneuver, or change it's exit time in subspace: it's blind and "on rails" once launched. The advantage is that the ship can carry the maximum payload fraction of any type. The disadvantage is that you need a gate at your jumping off point. You don't need a gate at your exact arrival point, but obviously, if there isn't one within sublight travel range then you aren't going back or anywhere else. For this reason, Gate Drive is most favoured for commercial operations between developed planets with gates at both ends. Jump Drive. This uses the same principles at Gate Drive but the "bubble generator" is carried in the ship itself. Power, fuel and machinery volumes are much higher, but payload fraction is still useful and the ship can go wherever it wants (within the limits of subspace physics). Conditions are the same as Gate Drive in subspace, i.e. blind and on-rails. The flexibility means that his is the only choice for exploration vessels and the favoured choice for military ones. Sub-Phase Drive. This uses a different principle to move the ship into Subspace, which allows it to "hover" there for extended periods, maneuver, detect other ships, and choose it's exit point. The cost is an ENORMOUS power/fuel/machinery volume, taking up 90% of the ship and costing a fortune. Sub-Phase Drive ships ("Sub-Ships" for short) are therefore almost useless for normal space operations of any sort and wouldn't be of any military interest were it not for one other kink of the Sub-Phase Drive: the drive can also be used as a weapon in subspace, projecting a distortion field which causes the N-Space bubble of any ship flying through it to collapse and the ship to rematerialize in N-Space _differentially_ along it's flight path, resulting in it's instant and total destruction. The Sub-Ship can only project this field for a few seconds over a limited range, and in doing so it is involuntarily "dropped" back into N-Space itself, in a depleted state and needing some time to recharge and re-calibrate it's drive. Conventional ships in N-Space can use a variety of sensors that are part-in/part-out of Subspace in order to detect Sub-Ships without committing anything like the volume to machinery that they do, but these sensors are limited in range, ambiguous and variable in response, and jammable. They also need to be deployed some distance from any other masses, so ships using them have to tow them on cables or mount them on long booms, which makes them awkward and slow to deploy/retreive. Sub-Ships can also be hunted by other Sub-Ships, of course. Sub-Ships therefore present the same kind of threat to Gate Drive and Jump Drive ships that submarines do to surface ships in the real world. All the elements of stalking, correct attack timing and playing mind games with a terrifying unseen enemy are there. The anti-Sub-Ship sensors are analogous to the variable-depth sonars and towed array sonars used in the real world.
I quite like the Imperial Navy frigates in Battlefleet Gothic. They fit into the upper end of the appropriately named broader category of escort ships. The Firestorm frigate is really cool with the giant ventral lance cannon hanging under the prow.
Frigates are my favorite class of ship in both Age of Sail and Scifi. I'd personally add to the specification or requirement, that frigates aught to be the largest space faring ship capable of (safe) atmospheric entry. For instance, to provide direct gunfire support in a hot LZ or as a means to recover smaller dropships, in a heavily contested zone. Something larger with more armor to take hits, but fast and nimble enough to bug out.
Book series by Peter F Hamilton has a Frigate (Hero) ship named the Lady Macbeth. Her combat capabilities when fully equipped stymie even those of professional Navy vessels of larger classes. Great series, BTW.
A sci-fi example similar to HMS Surprise is the RCS Princess Cecile. Though classed as a corvette rather than a frigate, she still ticks the same boxes the Surprise does: float like butterfly, sting like bee, tough as nails, runs like bat outta hell. (And yes, Daniel Leary also buys her for his own the first chance he gets.) The Sissie (as her friends call her) is particularly dear to my heart because she's the hero of one of the few times a David Drake book ever made me laugh out loud, when the teeny-weeny 1,300-ton Sissie makes the big tuff macho 80,000-ton superdreadnought Direktor Karl run for home with its tail between its legs!
In real life these classifications are a bit of a mess. But my headcanon for semi-realistic scifi (something in the style of The Expanse for example) is that corvettes are heavily armed for their size, but limited by range. They are used mostly for local area patrol/defense and in support of larger ships. Frigates are slightly bigger, not necessarily more heavily armed, but with more specialised capabilities such as EW and marines. So frigates are capable of a wider variety of missions and can act on their own if needed. I honestly don't really imagine destroyers much but jump straight into cruisers. Cruisers are mainline warships or can be more specialised in some cases. You could divide them into different types, such as battlecruisers being morea heavily armed and armored and a support cruiser could have facilities for repairing other ships for example. I also kinda don't imagine battleships to have a role but maybe sometimes some faction builds ships that are larger than cruisers just to have something that can reliably defeat any enemy cruiser out there. These could be flagships, only a few in number and always part of a larger fleet.
Get 'Designing a Space Frigate', the latest Official Spacedock Reference Book, here: www.patreon.com/posts/100184147/
Hi, not exactly related to topic, but are you planning on making a video on Super Destroyers from Helldivers 2?
what is the game at 4:00?
@@ironboy3245 Starsector.
@@Owlfeathers0117 is it on steam? I can't find it...
Oh it's not on steam, that's a rarity nowadays, sheesh
The Yamato anime series do have anti submarine warfare thing where unlike cloaking device, an enemy could hide in another dimension and you can set up something similar to depth charges to that dimension...
At least that's AFAIK from watching the earlier season of the recent anime version.
Corvettes punch down, Destroyers punch up, Frigates swing at anything in sight. Battleships don't punch. They bodyslam. Cruisers are a one-ship fleet. Carriers sit back, take a smoke, and let others fight.
I actually love this way of looking at it ;)
I see corvettes as "this is our first attempt at a warship, make it have as much shit it can while still being mobile and fast"
Frigates evolved into cruisers of the II World War from what they were in the age of sale.
In space combat, assuming your setting allows for spinal weapons.
Carriers are snipers, sitting back and point and deleting other ships at long range.
The Punic-class supercarrier from Halo being an excellent example of the carrier role in space combat.
Genuinely a brilliant way of putting it. I'd also add Dreadnoughts look at things and they disappear.
I was on a modern frigate in the 80s, so my mind goes to three things.
1. Missile picket/Scout-hunting with good sensors and probes.
2. Going places others can't. (Including the best liberty ports.)
3. Doing it all faster than everything else. (gassing up alot.)
IIRC, it gets more complicated when you read that 'cruiser' originally was a general term for any ship capable of long-range, independant sailing. Which included frigates. And modern frigates fill a role destroyers used to have, and destroyers fill the role of cruisers and battleships.
My own classifications are - Corvette- smallest 'warship', meant primarily for in- and near-system security and patrol. Frigates- Meant as escorts in fleet formations, but capable of independent operations, though limited in range (exact dependant on setting and tech). Cruisers- The 'main' warships for a fleet, well armed and protected, capable of multi-role missions, very long-legged. Battleships/Dreadnoughts- The heaviest in the fleet, rarely operate alone, usually only leave a polities borders when a war is going.
Frigates also make perfect convoy escorts of merchants through pirate infested regions or convoys to ferry supplies during hostilities.
Corvettes* for system defence so they can reach the outer edges of a system and still have the ftl so they can shift to where needed in the defence.
* During WWII Canada had the 3rd largest Navy, but mostly Corvettes in their classification that were tasked with convoy escort duties. This is part of why the definitions are so fuzzy, different Countries used different definitions.
Even in current real life every country uses its own definition and a nation corvette can be more powerful then another nations frigate by a huge margin
Something that fascinates me about frigates is that, in most historical uses until the modern day, you weren't really seeing frigates in fleets. Age of sail frigates were mostly too small for the battle line, but they might be supporting a fleet. WWII frigates were too slow to even keep up with a battle fleet. Yet modern frigates have shown a big shift from that, often being the largest multi-role surface combatants of most navies that don't field destroyers.
It's interesting how, as technology evolves, ship types change and navies just kind of arbitrarily pick old terms or invent new terms. Like how the UK was going to use "corvette" for destroyers until it ended up being used for much smaller merchant escorts instead.
It's almost beautifully arbitrary.
In Star Trek Online (and probably all of Star Trek in general) the Miranda-Class was classified as a Frigate, as well as the Centaur-Class. For the role of Corvette, the Defiant-Class would be the one. The Saber-Class is marginally larger than the Defiant-Class, and the Steamrunner-Class is already evidently larger than the Defiant-Class. The one thing I've noticed that distinguished the Defiant from the Miranda was the firepower and the armor; the Miranda-Class was less armed with beam arrays and beam banks, while the Defiant-Class had ablative armor and could employ the heavy cannons.
@user-roninwolf1981 Trek is a gods damn nightmare for ship classifications. Generic 'starship' for every Federation vessel, widely varying ones for everyone else, most of which make them sound scarier than they are. First classification I remember for Miranda's were heavy frigates, then other sources said light crusier. I stick with heavy frigate, because frigate fits their smaller size, and heavy for the phaser cannons they mount. Defiant and vessels like her I give the special class of 'destroyer', a frigate sized vessel that is dedicated to combat. Their whole layout and equipment is for fighting. If a destroyer shows up, it's not for science or first contact, it's because someone's ass needs kicking.
My favorite Frigate role in space combat has to be the examples in Homeworld and Halo.
Where The Frigates are basically the Super Carriers's, Battleships's and Battlecruisers's secondary armaments with engines strapped to it.
The Ion Frigate being the foremost example.
Because sometimes DPS is all you need.
The ion frigate, aka the "ship wrapped around a gun"-class (especially the Taiidan version). :P
@@seanheath4492
A-10 taken to the extreme?
i loved the boarding frigate because it looked like a battlestar lmao.
In my head canon there was probably an "elite" version of that frigate that could do kind of everything but smol, like the smallest version of the main ship that could be used as power projection, maybe even carry one or two fighter/bomber.
I really just wanted a battlestar in "hero's ship" format lmao xD
@@themightyalpaca313More or less. Just look up images of the ion array frigate.
Now that you mention it, things make a lot more sense. Thats a good way to think.
Nice to see the Adamant class get some love. 100% my favorite ship from Deadlock.
Hands down. Ranger is a great second place for me.
Honestly, you only need those and scout ships to beat the game. It's got the highest range (somehow) and has great value -per-point. Standard fleet is the Scout, 1 big ship, and 4 of those.
How about the frigates of Dune? The largest class of warship in that universe that could make planetary landings, always struck me as a good definition of what a frigate is in sci-fi.
I think Mass Effect uses that standard as well. I like it too, gives it a nice extra touch of specificity.
@@RorikH I think Mass Effect might use that standard as well BECAUSE of Dune xD
@@PositiveBlackSoul I think it also comes down to role. A frigate is often supposed to be versatile enough to react to a range of situation. This includes (limited) ground operations. For that it's insanely practical if a ship can land. It also makes it less demanding in terms of infrastructure for longer independent operations.
It seems like a number of franchises have the idea that only ships below a certain size can land on a planet. Intuitively it makes sense. So it doesn't surprise me that done and Mass Effect associate that with the term "frigate".
They really were not frigates as dune really did not have naval combat. If you had read the books you would know what happens when lasers hit shields.
Frigates in Homeworld: The thing I’m constantly pumping out trying to figure out the best Rock-Paper-Scissors combo at the moment.
To build Ion Frigates or not to build Ion Frigates
The correct answer is to steal all Ion frigates.
Homeworld frigates definitely fall into the "tight specialty" interpretation. My favorite is probably the Multi-Beam Frigates from Cataclysm. While they are not in HW2, we do sort of see where they ended up with the larger ships (especially the Battlecruiser) having "pulsar" beam point defense.
Correct! A huge omission by these guys and a thumbs-down from me.
@@templarw20 If there ever was a game gearbox ought to remaster! With the right combination of multi-beams and acolytes you feel unstoppable. And the storyline is perfect.
@@headshot6959apparently it’s because they lost the source code.
I hear frigate and I automatically picture the ones in the Homeworld Games, they were the smallest FTL capable ships. the Ion Frigates were the best, just a flying gun and it was so satisfying to watch them come into range and open fire all at once.
I think of the various Bungie era Halo frigates. Also flying guns.
@@ALLMINDmercenarysupportsystem Most human ships in Halo are flying guns. That's what they needed...
@@templarw20 The frigates are especially so. Considerably less armor and ship around the gun.
I’d like to see a compilation and analysis of “submarines but in space” from sci-fi.
They'd almost have to include Wrath of Khan and a lot of (especially later) Honorverse stuff.
By technicality all ships are submarines in space (as they have to be hermetically sealed).
But to get to that particular definition of submarine it also has to do stealth extremely well.
In that sense all ships with defined stealth capabilities are submarines in space.
Extra points if the ship can maintain its stealth characteristic while engaging.
We did that already!
- hoojiwana from Spacedock
They have done that already.
There about 3 ships I see being talked about, the Battlestar Osiris, the UX-01, and the SSV Normandy.
Normally, I like that you guys dig up relatively obscure stuff to talk about, and not just what's big an trending. That's a big part of what makes your videos interesting.
That being said, can you please cover the Super Destroyers from Helldivers! They are quickly becoming one of my favorite sci-fi designs- despite them being a bit of a 'do everything' ship.
Oh yes we need that video 😂
👍
One if my favorite obscure sci-fi is crest of the stars it has it's own ship classification and it cares about heat at during sustained combat!!! (My favorite ships are the missle ships called battleships in world)
I really think of the Super Destroyers as tiny carriers mixed with an arsenal ship. We've never seen them fight other ships, from weapon placement to interior logistics, they seem entirely geared for supporting ground ops. Even the mission timers are based on their ability to descend into low orbit and provide combat support, which is a unique feature... how many ships are designed to get dirty in atmo? :)
@@dereksherwood3794 My thoughts exactly
In the Sci-Fi spaceship classification I usually adopt, in my settings or when playing games like say, Space Engineers, Frigates are described thus:
Frigate: fully independence-capable (ergo, equipped with provisions and if existing in setting, an FTL drive, able to support both rapid or long range redeployment) subcapital ship vessel. Versatile and modular designs, ranging from highly specialised platforms to taking on a more generalist role, the former both during fleet deployments or when doing a variety of support and backline duties. The latter, when deployed on lone operations. Make up the backbone of a given Navy. Usually the size of destroyers, but can if necessary dwarf them.
Can be automated but are often built for crewed use, unlike many destroyers.
Can be used for Escort, Electronic Warfare, Sensor Suites and Communication Nodes. Naming depends on role.
This is very similar to how they are depicted in EVE online, which I must say is a surprise.
Ship definitions vary wildy in real life too. In the 1960s, the USN built several classes of 6000+ ton SAM-armed ships that were initially classified as "frigates" because their job was to escort carriers, the USN term for what the rest-of-the-world calls frigates being "destroyer escort (DE)". Then in the 1970s they decided to fall in line with the rest of the world, with most of these huge "frigates" being reclassified as "cruisers" and the smallest ones as "destroyers". Nowadays they go off size and "rate" (i.e. quality): cruisers are big first-rate ships, destroyers are smaller first-rate ships, and frigates are even smaller second-rate ships. All of them have all-round capabilities, just to different degrees. In the Royal Navy, by contrast, destroyers are anti-aircraft vessels and frigates are anti-submarine vessels, whatever their size: the Type 22 frigates were bigger than the contemporary Type 42 destroyers.
We needn't even mention all the various ships that were called frigate, destroyer and cruiser in the age of sail. "Fourth rate ship of the line" designated a class of ships that were called any of the above at some point, by someone, just aa one illustration of how confusing that conversation is.
And new Type 26 frigates, displacing between 7,000 to 9,000 tonnes, are larger than some destroyers.
Destroyers originally were 'torpedo boat destroyers' and that was their mission goal. Now, I think most of the US destroyers are bigger and more well armed than its cruisers.
@@jaredragland4707 The term destroyer was invented after the age of sail. It's a contraction of "torpedo-boat destroyer", i.e. a small fast ship with quick-firing guns that was intended to chase down and destroy torpedo boats. Navies soon realised however that the "torpedo boat destroyer" was a better and more versatile platform for the torpedoes than the boats, so it morphed from an escort into the smallest offensive ocen-going craft. Then when anti-submarine and anti-aircraft escort became critically important in the first and second World Wars, destroyers gradually morphed back into escorts, generally landing torpedoes in favour of more AAA and ASW equipment.
@@cp1cupcake The rampant size inflation started in the 1970s with the USN's Spruance class destroyers: 7000 ton replacements for 3000 ton Gearings. This was much criticised at the time, but the USN had it right and most navies have come round to this way of thinking. What the USN had realised was "steel is cheap and air is free", i.e. there's no point compromising the capabilities of your ships by making them cramped and difficult to upgrade in order to save on hull costs, when the latter are only 10% of the price anyway. Better to have plenty of "elbow room" and claw back the small cost increase from the efficiencies that result from that.
i absolutely love the Normandy. Its sleek fast and has sharp teeth with the Thanix cannon upgrade.
In my setting, frigates take a kind of "battleline" role in space warfare. They're on the front lines of any naval battle, and are easily modifiable for numerous roles. For example, C.A.F. (Cosmic Armed Forces, aka the human military) frigates can be turned into escort/bodyguard vessels for more valuable starships (such as more lightly armed carriers), or just charge straight ahead and bear the brunt of enemy fire then shoot back with particle/laser cannons, or even just becoming minor transports that carry 2-3 vehicles into areas larger ships can't get to (IE closer to the ground of a low gravity battlefield).
That kind of fills their age of sail role of being the smallest category of the ships of the line. The first rates would take the prime beatings while the frigates would screen the fleet and when line of battle was engaged serve as signal relays off line of the main shooting match.
I like that consept of submarine warfare in ww2, basically being how you hunt down a stealthed cloaking ship in sci-fi. They have much in common.
Like the episode in Star Trek when the romulans first appeared.
@@carloshenriquezimmer7543And the battle in the Mutara Nebula in *The Wrath of Khan.*
That's what made that battle so epic and suspenseful, that it still stands up today as how to make ship to ship combat dramatic.
I think modern submarine warfare translates better to space sci-fi (and like a lot of modern concepts is underutilized in sci-fi) but I'm biased
i cannot describe how much i love the grounded utilitarian look of battlestars
When you mentioned Starsector, I immediately knew you were going to call out the Wolf. It's fast enough to decline engagements it can't win, agile enough to flank larger enemies, armed enough to hurt them and cheap enough to be replaced when it invariably over-extends and gets blown up.
For me it’s the Vanguard due to its mix of ballistic and missile weapons allowing it to tear apart frigates while punching up against destroyers, cruisers, and even battleships when in sufficient numbers, and it can easily avoid fights it can’t take with its burn drive, when not using it to chase down ships or charge into brawling range. It’s also really well protected for its size, with tanking capabilities comparable to some cruisers with the right hull modifications and well times damper field activations.
It’s also cheap to deploy and maintain, and they’re reasonably cheap to obtain, if not outright free due to how almost every luddic church or pirate fleet above a certain size will have at least one that’s recoverable after battle, with its Rugged Construction hullmod massively increasing its chance to be recovered, while reducing the likeliness of permanent damage when it does blow up, and mitigating the effect of what permanent damage the ship does sustain.
It ticks all the boxes of a good frigate design - fast, has great versatility due to being well armed and armored, and it’s cheap and easily amassable.
If they were larger, they’d probably be labeled as cruisers, and it just so happens that it was added alongside the Eradicator-class Fast Cruiser, which both has a similar playstyle and helps cover what few weaknesses it has.
@@specs.weedle I'm playing an older build at the moment and haven't gotten the chance to play with the new stuff. Gotta say, my favorite destroyer is the Enforcer. It actually perfectly complements the Wolf as a battle line warship that can stand alongside heavy cruisers while the Wolves execute flanking maneuvers and torpedo runs.
During FASA's time with the Star Trek RPG license, they completely redefined the role of "frigates" in Starfleet. In the game, frigates were pure warships, filling a capital ship role in Starfleet (where destroyers and escorts filled the escort role). The Federation Starship Recognition Manual had two primary frigates: Chandley-class and the Kiev-class. The Kiev was a fast frigate, which had more of a troubleshooter/hunter-killer role, which the Chandley was a beast bigger than the Constitution refit and filled a battlespace dominance role. If the Constitution was about equal in capability to a Klingon battlecruiser, the Chandley was there to pummel them into submission. Oh, and it was originally designed to deploy Starfleet ground forces en masse.
I loved that idea so much (partly because it was quite different from both the Age of Sail concept filled by the heavy cruiser (Constitution) and the light, fast specialized escort ship that were active when I was in the Navy) that I have always incorporated FASA's fleet roles into my later games (and rebuilt all of the FSRM ships using the rules of the new game I was running...currently Modiphius' Star Trek Adventures).
For other settings, I see frigates as a skirmisher in a space fleet setting. If you use the concentric spheres concept of fleet deployment, frigates and other escorts (like gunships) would be on that outer ring, playing both offense and defense against their counterparts, trying to open up holes in the defensive perimeter for strike ships to deliver their payloads. (Destroyers would have a more defensive role in this setting, true to their original purpose (i.e., torpedo boat destroyers); their job is to interdict enemy ships that have penetrated the perimeter and get in the way of firing lines of enemy strike ships. Cruisers would fill the strike role, both stand off and short range, and battleships would fill the "oh, lawd, he comin'" heavy hitter role. Carriers in this setup fill the command & control and small craft operations roles.)
It's so hard to pin down what a Frigate is.
Generally I think of them as either semi-independent long range patrol craft or fleet support (especially anti-missile/fighters).
They are bigger and more durable than than Corvettes, that are just above fighters in most senses, but well below cruisers in terms of combat capabilities.
They serve primarily for scouting and early detection, but have no role in big ship fights outside of asset protection and can only really damage larger ships in wolf pack flotillas, where their numbers and relatively fast speed (for a ship) can be maximized to deal damage out of proportion to their relative weight with the enemy.
But here the defining factor is weapons power. If your weapons power is too high Frigates become basically death traps (as happens in Halo), but if you have defenses or maneuverability that can make up for this short coming, then the fleet support/defense is their best primary role with again scouting and early warning as a dangerous secondary.
I like the original (modern) frigate distinction from WW2 which was basically a destroyer/upscaled corvette designed to primarily escort other ships. While destroyers would be similar sized vessels designed primarily for offensive operations. Similar to your idea.
Frigates are big enough to be useful in fleet defense and can work as fleet defense/anti aircraft/Submarine and radar pickets. But are also ideal for chasing the enemy or scouting independently. A Frigate is a serious threat to most vessels.
the way I see sci-fi Frigates being able to do the modern frigates capabilities as anti-submarine vessels is to have some Frigates be dedicated anti-cloaking ships. they got specialized sensor arrays that can't be easily fitted onto regular combat vessels and have ways of pushing cloaked vessels out of cloak for a supporting fleet to destroy. the sensor arrays aren't perfect however, but are better than nothing. this idea would especially be useful in settings where Pirates regularly have cloaking tech.
The thing is though in space, sensor power and capability is directly proportional to its size. A larger ship can pump a lot more power and have a much bigger sensor array, coupled with much more capable computer systems and more crew to manage that systems means a bigger ship is going to detect cloaked ships at longer ranges than smaller ones.
The main advantage that a small ship would have in the cloak hunting role is that you can just build more of them, and even if a battleship ends up being far better at detecting cloaked ships, those are not the ships you want to be using for convoy escort missions and anti piracy patrols because of their greater cost.
@@ryuukeisscifiproductions1818 Using several small ships could also get you a better variety of viewing angles on any target, and if you're using active scanners then having them on a faster, cheaper ship could definitely help if Anti-Radiation-Missiles are a concern.
As an Empire of War player, nebulons are such versatile ships that you can literally never go wrong with just slapping a few nebulons into every fleet
Man Deadlock really is one of the best space fleet games. Killer job expanding the limited ship rosters of what it's adapting and hot take the turn based combat is actually better than real time. Makes it much easier to be strategic. Shame we don't get more games like it.
Normandy SR-2 is my favorite frigate.
For some reason Frigates are my favorite ship class in most sci fi stories.
Anytime BSG Deadlock is referenced is a good day by me. Love that game!
The frigates from Homeworld 1, 2 and Cataclysm.
Aside from one general purpose frigate, all were specialized in one way or another to help bigger ships deal with smaller ships.
You can also go the route of the German Frigates:
As big and as heavily armed as cruisers. Still frigates.
Germany just makes no distinction between frigates and destroyers like many nations actually. Which makes sense. Post WW2 previously specialized frigates and destroyers were all made largely multi purpose so the difference has kinda disappeared.
Heavily armed? Lol. Lmao even... Oh wait you are serious
F-126 class armament: 8 AShM, 16 multi purpose cells
Arleigh Burke flight 3: 96 missile cells.
Atago class Yeah yeah I know AL/KC etc.: 96 cells.
Constellation class: 16 AShM, 32 cells.
FREMM (Italian): 16 cells.
Now you may ask, wtf this is anemic. Why is the ship so big?
Because, and it may shock you, it's a FRIGATE. Same as original FREMMs. A patrol kind. It's main job is to partol the seas for up to 2 years non stop. Which means: redundancies, luxurious crew accomodation, etc.
It will be a ship for the peaceful world that doesn't exist anymore. Obsolete before keel was laid down.
JMSDF has a "helicopter destroyer" which is a carrier analogous to USN LHA/LHD
Germany in WW2 straight up lied/ignored the naval treaties
The term frigate has varied so much that if you dont know what to classify a ship as, just add an adjective infront of the word frigate and you're set.
Love to see StarSector getting some recognition on Spacedock, a wonderfully dark sci-fi game.
I love the Wolf, but the Lasher is underrated. It's not as mobile as most frigates, but it packs an incredible amount of firepower into a small, cheap package.
@@Kitkat-986 It's also too slow to chase down targets or to evade large threats
@@alecciarosewater7438 Yes, and that was a big sticking point for me initially. It was too slow to do normal frigate things. I never used the thing, so I was surprised when I started using it the right way and it exceeded all of my expectations. It's basically a mini Hammerhead. Give it another try sometime, give it a good mix of kinetic/ HE weapons. When the ammo feeder is active, it straight up out-guns most destroyers, even an Enforcer.
@@Kitkat-986I find myself turning it into a Point Defense platform for larger ships I don't want to burden with PD. Slap on some tracking hull mods, and its the perfect Carrier escort.
@@Kitkat-986In a fleet setting, no other frigate right now can beat an Omen.
Not only does its EMP Point Defense lightning system allow it to delete fighters and missiles across your friendly ships, but it also boasts an admirable shield efficiency and flux capacity even with 360 degree omni shields allowing it to punch far above its weight given the right armaments and hullmods. I've seen it take on destroyers alone without issue.
All of that with a very reasonable logistical profile of 6 supplies a month, meaning it's more efficient than scarabs, tempests, and Hyperions (of course), and you can field more of them at once in a battle.
Omens are the perfect frigate.
I played Eve many years ago. Will forever have a soft spot in my heart for a fully decked out Rifter.
One of my favourite frigate's is the Salamis class from Gundam. I know they class it as a cruiser but it always struck me as a frigate instead. It was cannon fodder until it was refit to carry mobile suits, this one change vastly improved the ship. A few years later and it's intended replacement was introduced then seventy years after that both ships were still in service. From trash to being too good to get rid of.
In my Sci-Fi I'm writing, the hero ship is initially classified as a corvette, it's old role, but is salvaged and revamped. By planned book 4, it's reclassified as a frigate, wince it finally gets much needed upgrades, especially in the electronic warfare side and weapons to better match the captain (and crew) capabilities.
I mean irl frigates are basically the same as destroyers with a different history behind the particular name in terms of purpose. Sure the largest destroyers are larger than the largest frigates. You can do the same in space obviously which can add a bit of world building detal to the setting.
I kinda like the distinction that the modern frigate originated from though. Which was basically destroyers and upscaled corvettes designed mainly to escort other ships (even if the naming was mainly down to a lot of confusion) which then ended up being very similar ships. Of course that distinction disappeared pretty quickly in the cold war as multi purpose ships were the thing everyone wanted.
Love the Adamant, early game the wall of death tactic works so well with them, sit a couple behind a Battlestars flak screen and watch as they punch way above their weight.
I love the idea of explaining the roles of different types. Please, continue, I wish to see more!
Oh boy, naval doctrine/design + science fiction, three of my favorite things!
Anyways, I've always liked the term 'frigate' for referring to a sensor-heavy warship in sci-fi. Perhaps closer to a modern AWACS craft than necessarily what is currently called a 'frigate.' After all, almost every form of sci-fi 'ruleset' ends up with some need for a craft with good sensors, data processing, and data distribution ability.
For the Battlestar Galactica-esque 'fighter-focused' settings, you want something *really* similar to an AWACS node to provide forward fighter/bomber direction, for the 'major ship battles' type of setting such as Star Wars you want something fast to serve as a scout, and for settings where engagements take place at very long range where the light-lag really factors in you want something that can sit up close to the enemy and relay sensor information (especially in settings where you have some FTL communications, but your sensors are still limited to light-speed).
IRL that niche is covered by AWACS aircraft, but that's largely because aircraft are so much faster than ships due to moving in two very separate mediums. In space, a 'sensor-heavy fighter' and a frigate would both move through the same vacuum using similar technologies, so it's unlikely that the former would be any faster than the latter. And even IRL improved missile technology is making AWACS survivability a bit tricky, so putting a bit more ECM, shields/armor, and sheer mass onto your sensor craft to make it survivable would push it up to near the mass of a full warship.
Therefore, frigate!
I have thought about the system for my works.
Dreadnoughts- Big tough ships that can act as almost like mobile bases. Intended for long term habitation for research and terraforming projects in peace time. While serving as command ships and brawlers/ heavy hitters in war time.
Cruisers- All Rounder Ships that are mainly used for long range missions and Dreadnought escort. Though in later years they begin to see more independent operations in so called cruiser wings. They offer a balance of protection and fire power while remaining mobile for their size.
Frigates- These ships are often used for missions that the larger ships would be unsuited too or too much for. Also for Cruiser escort. They tend to serve in patrols, anti piracy, and act as couriers (There is FTL travel, but FTL communication is limited)
Corvettes- Smallest of the “Ships”, they are used almost exclusively for escorting Frigates in patrols and occasionally as couriers themselves. They are rarely used for anything more than low intensity actions.
Then there are Craft like Shuttles and Fighters. Shuttles are used to ferry people between planets and small amounts of cargo.
Fighters are the combined role of Fighter and Bomber, they can be equipped with mounted torpedoes and missiles that can target space craft or ground targets. While also carrying weapons to deal with other craft. They can also be used for surveys of planets, their targeting sensors capable of scanning the surfaces as well.
What you wrote there sounds exactly like how I classified my phase world ships. And of all of them the frigate was the best hero ship. Cruisers were usually way too much and the Corvettes were usually a little fragile.
I would love for you to make a playlist of ship types in sci-fis. Like friget and corvettes and destroyer, but also stuff like sheild ships, sniper ships, drone ships and other roles and tech used for custom ship way of battle.
Modern Frigates aren't usually multirole vessels, actually. The Office of Naval Intelligence usually classifies vessels based on a combination of speed, tonnage, and role, with Frigates being the second smallest fleet warships (with only Corvettes being smaller) and Frigates typically specialize in one role, usually anti-air or anti-subsurface in keeping with their roles as escorts. By contrast, Destroyers will usually specialize in two roles (either anti-air, anti-surface, or anti-subsurface), and Cruisers will be well suited to all three, hence why ONI considers the PLAN RENHAI-Class as a Cruiser instead of a Destroyer. Sometimes, smaller navies like the Norwegian and Russian navies will make multi-role Frigates that can basically do the work of a Destroyer while still being the size of a Frigate, but this is more of a consequence of either "political correctness," so to speak (Frigate sounds less scary than Destroyer), or an inability to really build larger ships.
I love the Okinawa-class frigates from Starfleet Command. The old games. Small, nimble, and relatively flat. They never were that powerful as a ship, but tney were great in learning how to play the game.
It might have been helpful to present how a frigate was defined in the past.
The "frigates" in the mid 16th Century were sailing galleys, basically oar-powered galleys with and sails. They were primarily coastal vessels and also in the Mediterranian Sea. They were very popular with pirates. They did not do well in the open ocean.
The ocean-going figates of the 17th century to the 19th century were three-mast ships with one gundeck. These ships could not stand in the line of battle. Only Ships-of-the-Line (SoL, aka battleships) could do that. Frigates acted as scouts and messengers for these battle fleets. Because they were fairly fast, typically the heaviest class (both in displacement and firepower) below the SoL, and can carry enough food and water for long cruises, these ships often operated independently to patrol the sea lanes and act as commerce raiders in time of war. Basically the all purpose ship. These were the "cruisers" of the day since they would cruise the seas and oceans. In many ways, they were the equivalent of both the modern day destroyers and cruisers.
With the introduction of steampower, steel hull and turreted guns, the term frigate disappeared.
In WW II, the British neede a class of ships for convoy escorts. The primary opponents of these escort ships were submarines and armed merchantships. As such, they had decent anti-sub capabilities and modest guns. Because convoys were slow, the were only slightly faster than the convoys at about 20-25 knots, compared to destroyers that were typically 30 knots and faster. The Royal Navy dubbed these ships frigates. The US Navy has effectively the same class of ships, but classified them as destroyer escorts. After WW II, the USN adopted the term frigate.
The early Cold War frigates still had escort duties that either specialized in anti sub or anti-air. Because the ships were small, a true multimission vessel was not practical till later. And, they were still not as fast as destroyers. However, they were cheaper and their presence freed up larger, more capable ships to do higher intensity missions.
Today, friagtes can be true multi-mission ships, or stay very specialized and very cable in their specialty. Furthermore, many European navies have dropped the term destroyers and refer to destroyers and frigates simply as frigates.
So what would space faring frigates be? Whatever the creaters of the universe wants. LOL Their mission may resemble those of the past or may represent a new class that fits a specific need in space.
Thinking about you comment about real life frigates having an anti-submarine role, I wonder if the sci-fi equivalent would be anti-stealth. Flushing out stealth craft in various ways for allies to target and destroy them
I always imagined frigates as a heavy cavalry type units...
like big armored horses or camels...
They are fast highly agile and relatively strong they also can take a certain amound of damage until they cannot fight anymore...
Mainly used to sweep smaller enemy groups or break formations of bigger fleets in a blitzkrieg manner...
they are also very useful in pushing back enemy units to regroup and reestablish fleet formations fast and efficient once your formation was broken by the enemy...
Love your guys info dumps on all the specs and techie stuff from various sci-fi IPs. Quick way to nerd out dip from reality for a minute. Thanks for all the content.
In my setting, frigates are generally smallish vessels comparable to destroyers but are focused almost entirely on screening friendly ships
Frigate has had so many definitions just in real life that it's hard to say what is or isn't a valid definition in any given SFU. At the beginning of the Ironclad Age, an armored frigate was actually the largest and most powerful class - it was mostly called a frigate because it only had one deck of broadside guns. This definition was a holdover from the Age of Sail, when a "line-of-battle ship" would have 2 or 3 full gun decks for a heavier broadside, and a frigate's single gun deck would be seen as insufficient for the line of battle. By the time you got to the Age of Dreadnoughts and WW1, the term frigate had almost entirely dropped out of use. WW2 saw a resurgence of frigate to mean a vessel smaller than the new destroyers, but then the post-war years saw fracturing of the definitions and sizes involved, with many American frigates of the mid-20th century being bigger than Soviet cruisers, followed by their reclassification as destroyers or cruisers.
For the USN, a frigate is any vessel too small for them to accept.
Also, I was re-watching Green Lantern TAS, episode 18, where the team goes to a Spider Guild "frigate" that was just a quite sizeable space station - to each their own, I guess.
@@mikeunger4165Laughs in Constellation class, cries in Oliver Hazard Perry class
Great vid ^^
And one of my Favorites, is the Idris Frigate in Star Citizen. Mainly because it fits the Frigate role very well,
but also because the ship is very fleshed out, every bed, bathroom, corridor and cupboard is built into the model to help the narrative it will carry in Squadron 42.
Only ship I've seen so well planned out inside is the Expanses Rocinante, and that's a comparatively tiny ship.
The devs made a point to balance "Functional naval ship" and "Boarding action FPS Arena."
Thank you for the eve love. Still one of the best space games out there.
For me, frigate = escort and skirmisher. Possibly small troops transport for landing actions.
Something between Mass Effect, Halo, Battlestar Galactica, and The Expanse.
I love all spacedock content
I love all spacedock videos
Never forget when the Enterprise depth-charging the romulan Warbird in Balance of Terror.
Starship Enterprise early on in TOS and TAS was seen as more of a science / exploration / diplomacy vessel, with limited armaments and shields mainly for self-defence.
@@royasturias1784 Said limited armament being once described as being able to destroy half a continent, and was apparently capable of glassing a planet or completely vaporizing a Klingon cruiser.
EVE does have stealth bombers which are the tactical stand-in for submarines, and frigates are generally a pretty good counter for them.
Funny enough Stealth Bombers are t2 Frigates
I know it is listed as a light cruiser but I always felt the White Star from Babylon 5 was actually a great example of a frigate. Always felt that the Normandy, especially the SR-2 was inspired by the White Star, just something about the way it moves in fights or when dodging enemies. I'm not claiming it was inspired by it just how it felt while playing Mass Effect.
You could make the argument that "frigate" and "light cruiser" mean basically the same thing. They're both small to medium sized (though bigger than sloops or corvettes), fast, and long ranged. It's just that the terminology changed between the age of sail and the battleship era. For most of the time that new cruisers were being designed, the term "frigate" had fallen out of use.
In my unfinished homebrew sci-fi setting I took pains to have different nations and species refer to their ships differently (I always really like that sort of touch), but broadly speaking from the humanity-centric view the main difference between frigates and destroyers is role/capability. There's a lot of size overlap, but the upper end of frigates tends to be a bit larger than the upper end of destroyers.
Destroyers are pure combat ships and typically designed with remaining close to resupply, either major hubs or with fleets, and in the latter they are there to protect the big ships.
Frigates are the utility ships in fleets, offering EW or mission specific setups, and outside of fleets they are generally considered to be the smallest capital ship capable of independent action, such as patrol or escort. They'll often have stores of emergency supplies and other gear for disaster relief, as they would be expected to be the most likely to be the first one the scene (no FTL comms aside from FTL communication drones/probes, and FTL in my setting still means a couple days at least). They usually still pack enough firepower to deal with pirates/bandits or to trade shots with some raiders from a hostile nation, mainly through packing a spinal mass driver big enough to punch above their weight a bit. This is one of the reasons frigates tend to be a little bigger than destroyers, as the latter tend to be built around massive missile volleys and turrets, with smaller but faster firing mass drivers.
Star Citizen's single player game, Squadron 42, is based aboard an Idris Frigate. It supports a few solid spacefighters, carries a spinal railgun for punching up, and has a number of defensive turrets for punching down.
But will it release this decade?
@@blshouse ha! Good question 🤣🤣🤣
I am an original backer and long since gave up playing...
I also backed it a long time ago. I'm sure my grandchildren will enjoy it
@@blshouse it was announced as "feature complete" last citizen con and is since then in polishing, though how long that might take is anyone's guess. It's getting there though.
@@blshouseDecade? Probably. Might take a few years, and come out before Star Citizen goes to Beta...
In my own sci-fi setting Frigates (& they also come in Light and Heavy variations depending on mass) are the most common sort of 'naval' vessels in space. Small and less costly to operate, but capable enough for most common tasks. In fleet actions they usually have a cruiser they are escorting which is their command ship, though 'pairs' and 'trios' are common to see even outside of fleet actions. Their only real downside is they *usually) have limited numbers of small craft and lack command and control facilities of larger vessels.
FASA games had a great Star Trek Starship Combat tabletop game back in the 80-90s. They included Frigates for almost all ST races. Frigates were warships centered on Troop transport and assault, both planetary and shipboard. They had a basic Troop assault for the ship/ship combat, but the game went out of publication before it was pursued further. A lot of people still play and resources are available online.
My favorite Frigate in Sci-Fi is the SSV Normandy. I used to be a Star Trek fan, but then I got into Mass Effect in 2007
I like the Normandy the most - It has guns, mobility and space for a strike force if necessary. Perfect for a "Ready Force" assignment
When it comes to frigates i see them as the type of class to just shoot both ships of their size and lower classes, though depending on the scenario i can see some being good at taking down the bigger ships
Another one that I'd throw in as a 'good' frigate in Sci-fi space warfare is the ANS's Raines-class frigate from the game Nebulous: Fleet command.
Despite being the second smallest ship in the ANS it has large enough mounts to carry enough heavy torpedoes to take down at least one capital ship - maybe even two if you're really good with it. The ship also has the space to have two reactors, so it can carry very energy intensive equipment like long-range search radars, jammers, and even PD lasers for missile defense (however not all of these things at once). Because of it's low top speed and thin armor it's not a good frontline combatant, but it can take on a wide variety of supporting roles: Missile defense, swarm defense, EWar, spotting, target illumination, etc.
Wedge - " They're going after the medical....ah frigate."
I really liked the Frigates in the Homeworld series at first. They can withstand some oncoming fire but usually only had only one weapon for the task that they where designed for. In Homeworld 2 it was nice to see Frigates with two weapons, one main and one secondary; like the Marine and Infiltrator Frigates having their main "weapon" being the ability to capture enemy vessels but also had the support of a secondary weapon. Similary, the Heavy Missile Frigate had big missiles for main weapons that had long range and a smaller missile launcher for extra short range fire that could intercept fighters better. Hopefully the third instalment of the series will continue this way of thinking and even give Fighters and Corvettes multiple weapons for engaging different targets if necessary.
I have commented multiple times about the Homeworld series and would like to see a Spacedock video about the series. :)
Love how this came out a couple of days after Falling Frontier showed off 3 new Frigates
Love to your take on gundam’s mobile suits
5:02 I'll start a fight right here. In the traditional sense, I would call the U.S.S. Defiant a destroyer ..... but that just me.
I'd call the Defiant a gunship. It's highly maneuverable, and outputs a ton of damage. It's meant to take on things much bigger then it.
I would agree with that. Of course, I would also call the Sovereign a battleship or dreadnaught.
@@jimskywaker4345by pre-ww2 definition Defiant is a destroyer, a lot of the early destroyers were just ocean-going torpedo boats. as the years went on the definition of the destroyer got broader and broader until now where the line between frigate, destroyer and cruiser is basically a blur
No no, that makes a lot of sense. It's got heavy cannons, a blistering torpedo armament and high manoeuvrability, along with a small frame. It's a destroyer, alright!
Just don't call it that, the higher ups will get mad
Modern frigates and destroyers have no real distinction. They did in WW2 when modern frigates came about but after missiles became a thing they were all redesigned to be multi purpose and those distinctions disappeared. You could call the Defiant either.
If we do go by the original WW2 distinction though yes the Defiant is 100% a destroyer in purpose. Though if you go by the Federation -propaganda- framing of it as a "heavy escort" it would actually be a frigate. So hard to say.
The role of what a frigate is changes with time. Age of sail frigates role was taken over by cruisers when armored ships became the norm, while frigates became closer to corvettes and sloops in role. Now the old frigate role is filled by destroyers.
IMO corvettes should be the next size up from fighters. I bought the fighter manual. Probably buy this one but I may just wait for corvettes and destroyers.
For anti-submarine warfare, one good sci-fi analog was that Star Trek episode where the Federation was trying to stop the Romulans from interfering in the Klingon Civil War. Cloaked vessels and how to fight them are about as close as you can get to submarine vs surface ship operations.
Ah the adamant, brings me back to my old deadlock days. I loved to have the minerva or jupiter class as the center of my fleet but i never went into battle without two or three adamants they cost so little but bring so much to the battle (fighters, Missiles and can do damage with their guns too).
There was a Star Trek Original Series novel I read as a child called "The Great Starship Race", in which a fellow Federation captain was EXTREMELY proud of his frigate relative to the Enterprise. IIRC he differentiated it as being a much more single-purpose ship than the Enterprise, smaller, but denser with combat-applicable capability. If that's the case, at least part of the reason the designation isn't common in Star Trek might be the overt militarism of it flying against Starfleets ongoing head-in-the-sand pretense that they aren't a military.
spacefrigates are spacecruisers specialsed for a military role. Thats the reason you don't see them in star trek. Btw the bird of prey mentioned is more likely based on tactic either a "destroyer" or if used strategicaly and considering their were found in private hands dualuse cruisers.
Like most of history in space warships tend to be smaller than civilian or dualuse ships.
favorite frigate? probably the miranda tbh, especially in sto where there is SO MUCH VARIATION, though in fairness that does include the centaur as well so take that how you will
The Pelta class frigates are one of my favorite in Star Wars since they could be medical, transport, or combat oriented depending on refit.
I have an entire faction I've built and have a classification system for my navy. Frigates are (generally) the smallest FTL capable ships in my navy. Corvettes are smaller, but relegated to system patrol (much like coastal warships). They aren't as powerful as the next size up (Destroyers), but they make for good scouts or picket ships to protect larger ships from flanking, strikecraft, or missiles/torpedoes.
Good to see Starsector getting a mention, it's criminally underrated.
When I designed a sci-fi setting of my own I classified frigates as small capital ships with armament that focused on guns. They'd act as screening ships for fleets, shooting down missiles and attack craft.
When you started talking about submarine warfare I half expected you to show some battle scenes from the wing commander movie as that resembled an age of sail style combat intermixed with sub warfare.
I could see a reinterpretation of the Anti-Submarine role being an Anti-Stealth frigate, where it's loaded to the gills with sensors and targeting equipment to paint cloaked or dark targets for other attack frigates or Arsenal Ships to fire on.
A solid thumbs up for me is the Interceptor Mark 4 (also called the Pirate cruiser) from Star Wars. As much as I love the Munificent (actually being my favorite) I found it was technically considered a cruiser (though I kind of doubt it given how it was used) the Interceptor Mark 4 always got my attention. Its design was as practical and streamlined as possible and by all accounts was just two wedges with a rectangle in the middle. Building that rust bucket must have been as simple as 1, 2, 3. Two laser cannon batteries and two turbo laser cannon batteries with Ion cannons and a proton torpedo launcher made for simple, practical yet powerful weaponry but it came off to me as the perfect ship to use in numbers... and at the end of the day that's what a frigate is- versatile Naval cannon fodder to be used in large numbers to overwhelm the enemy. Despite not having a hangar, I could easily see Interceptor Mark 4s being used in large numbers with no objections.
X4 has a definition for Frigate, there are several medium class ships, frigates, gunships (nee Bombers) and Corvettes. For that game, a Frigate is a medium class able to dock a single fighter internally. The Corvette is a similarly sized ship that is a "super heavy fighter", so can be quite a bit smaller in depth because it doesn't have to have internal docking for a "Small" ship. The Gunship is set to mostly use its turrets, so it is more an all-round combat ship. and without needing a dock space on it, can be smaller both in depth and width.
I personally like the age of sail definition of a smaller (than a ship of the line) vessel for independent small scale and supporting roles (communication, patrol, escort, pirate hunting...)
i like the celeschul orbital foundries dragon class interdiction cruiser in schlock mercenary. barring its name it is one of the mass produced ships in the series that has light weaponry for its size. it is affordable and has decent upgrades in the game.
The frigattes in the Homeworld games. Those are fantastic, remarkably versatile and reliable with several highly specialiced options like the Ion Beam Frigatte, the Support Frigatte that can not just repair and re-fuel fighters but also repair larger ships.
Meanwhile the Drone Frigatte has a whole bunch of small, easily replaced gun drones and wreaks absolute HAVOK on any fighter swarm coming too close to it.
Speaking of anti submarine roles, the only settings I have seen space submarines in is Space Battleship Yamato. They hang out in Hyperspace, or subspace, or something, and pokes out a small periscope like sensor thing from a small portal into normal space.
At 5:07
USS Defiant....
The DS9 version would be classified as a corvette....or maybe a patrol ship, just based on size.
This is another excellent video, and it is masterfully made. I truly enjoy learning about the various ships in the different science fictions and the designs of several of the ships are quite unique.
You're absolutely right that Star Trek blurs lots of lines. The Enterprises are outright called "cruisers" so I'd use that basis to call them cruisers, and use this as a fixed point for the basis of the rest. As I understand, frigates are also supposed to be less standalone than other classes of ship, so I'd use this basis in defining the other roles. As such, Intrepids like Voyager or the Miranda class or Constellation class I'd classify as "light cruisers" as they are essentially cruisers but smaller. In Star Trek I'd reserve "frigate" for vessels like the Nova class or the Defiant class; Defiant is quite spartan and suits combat with other roles and functions neglected, while the Nova is similar but for scientific roles. I'd also call the Centaur class a frigate, as these were quickly tacked together specifically for the Dominion War. A Vor'cha would be a destroyer.
A few years back I came up with an idea to get a "submarine warfare" vibe in space combat without it feeling like shoehorned-in WWII. Here's how it works. In this universe, FTL travel is via "Subspace", an alternative dimension in which the physical laws are different and FTL travel is permitted. Ships from our dimension can only travel through it in a bubble of normal space ("N-Space") there are three ways of doing this:
Gate Drive.
This uses a fixed gate that's external to the ship, which therefore needs the least amount of it's mass devoted to machinery. Essentially the gate "blows a bubble" through subspace with the ship inside it, which pops it back into N-space at the desired point. The ship's course is fixed by the launch conditions and it can't maneuver, or change it's exit time in subspace: it's blind and "on rails" once launched. The advantage is that the ship can carry the maximum payload fraction of any type. The disadvantage is that you need a gate at your jumping off point. You don't need a gate at your exact arrival point, but obviously, if there isn't one within sublight travel range then you aren't going back or anywhere else. For this reason, Gate Drive is most favoured for commercial operations between developed planets with gates at both ends.
Jump Drive.
This uses the same principles at Gate Drive but the "bubble generator" is carried in the ship itself. Power, fuel and machinery volumes are much higher, but payload fraction is still useful and the ship can go wherever it wants (within the limits of subspace physics). Conditions are the same as Gate Drive in subspace, i.e. blind and on-rails. The flexibility means that his is the only choice for exploration vessels and the favoured choice for military ones.
Sub-Phase Drive.
This uses a different principle to move the ship into Subspace, which allows it to "hover" there for extended periods, maneuver, detect other ships, and choose it's exit point. The cost is an ENORMOUS power/fuel/machinery volume, taking up 90% of the ship and costing a fortune. Sub-Phase Drive ships ("Sub-Ships" for short) are therefore almost useless for normal space operations of any sort and wouldn't be of any military interest were it not for one other kink of the Sub-Phase Drive: the drive can also be used as a weapon in subspace, projecting a distortion field which causes the N-Space bubble of any ship flying through it to collapse and the ship to rematerialize in N-Space _differentially_ along it's flight path, resulting in it's instant and total destruction. The Sub-Ship can only project this field for a few seconds over a limited range, and in doing so it is involuntarily "dropped" back into N-Space itself, in a depleted state and needing some time to recharge and re-calibrate it's drive.
Conventional ships in N-Space can use a variety of sensors that are part-in/part-out of Subspace in order to detect Sub-Ships without committing anything like the volume to machinery that they do, but these sensors are limited in range, ambiguous and variable in response, and jammable. They also need to be deployed some distance from any other masses, so ships using them have to tow them on cables or mount them on long booms, which makes them awkward and slow to deploy/retreive. Sub-Ships can also be hunted by other Sub-Ships, of course.
Sub-Ships therefore present the same kind of threat to Gate Drive and Jump Drive ships that submarines do to surface ships in the real world. All the elements of stalking, correct attack timing and playing mind games with a terrifying unseen enemy are there. The anti-Sub-Ship sensors are analogous to the variable-depth sonars and towed array sonars used in the real world.
Yesssss frigates are the best. I love frigates. Never thought a Klingon BoP counts but it totally does!!
the adamant just has this sleek feel to it, like a regal car or something, just sliding around looking pretty lol
I quite like the Imperial Navy frigates in Battlefleet Gothic. They fit into the upper end of the appropriately named broader category of escort ships. The Firestorm frigate is really cool with the giant ventral lance cannon hanging under the prow.
Frigates are my favorite class of ship in both Age of Sail and Scifi. I'd personally add to the specification or requirement, that frigates aught to be the largest space faring ship capable of (safe) atmospheric entry. For instance, to provide direct gunfire support in a hot LZ or as a means to recover smaller dropships, in a heavily contested zone. Something larger with more armor to take hits, but fast and nimble enough to bug out.
Book series by Peter F Hamilton has a Frigate (Hero) ship named the Lady Macbeth. Her combat capabilities when fully equipped stymie even those of professional Navy vessels of larger classes. Great series, BTW.
A sci-fi example similar to HMS Surprise is the RCS Princess Cecile. Though classed as a corvette rather than a frigate, she still ticks the same boxes the Surprise does: float like butterfly, sting like bee, tough as nails, runs like bat outta hell. (And yes, Daniel Leary also buys her for his own the first chance he gets.) The Sissie (as her friends call her) is particularly dear to my heart because she's the hero of one of the few times a David Drake book ever made me laugh out loud, when the teeny-weeny 1,300-ton Sissie makes the big tuff macho 80,000-ton superdreadnought Direktor Karl run for home with its tail between its legs!
MCRN frigate is definitely my favorite, lethal, agile, multi-purpose.
Frigates and destroyers make AWESOME hero ships for hero crews, in my mind
In real life these classifications are a bit of a mess. But my headcanon for semi-realistic scifi (something in the style of The Expanse for example) is that corvettes are heavily armed for their size, but limited by range. They are used mostly for local area patrol/defense and in support of larger ships. Frigates are slightly bigger, not necessarily more heavily armed, but with more specialised capabilities such as EW and marines. So frigates are capable of a wider variety of missions and can act on their own if needed. I honestly don't really imagine destroyers much but jump straight into cruisers. Cruisers are mainline warships or can be more specialised in some cases. You could divide them into different types, such as battlecruisers being morea heavily armed and armored and a support cruiser could have facilities for repairing other ships for example. I also kinda don't imagine battleships to have a role but maybe sometimes some faction builds ships that are larger than cruisers just to have something that can reliably defeat any enemy cruiser out there. These could be flagships, only a few in number and always part of a larger fleet.
And sometimes I add gunships, smaller than corvettes with simple armament. Basically more of a law-enforcement or criminal role.