MCRN Donnager (The Expanse) vs Halcyon-class Light Cruiser) Halo

Both ships encounter the other during routine patrols near Jupiter and then open fire on each other. Starting distance of 500,000 Kilometers.

Info on the Donnager: http://expanse.wikia.com/wiki/Donnager

Info on the Halcyon: http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Halcyon-class_light_cruiser

tags. @wut@solarwavealpha@fullmetalemprah@killerwasp@decaf_wizard

@paragonnate: I'm not an expert on the navies of Halo, but feats for the Donnager?

Halcyon slipspace jumps into range and blows up the Donnager that just saw a ship teleport and so crap a brick... before getting blown up.

@fullmetalemprah: Here's a clip from the show.

Battle starts at 1:30. Notable moments. At 2:30 the Donnager's torpedoes can perform near 90 degree turns. At 5:50 their missiles come into range of their Point Defense Canons, the Donnager shoots all but two of the enemy missiles down and kills one of the stealth ships. At 6:30 the Donnager deploys it's railguns and takes down another enemy ship. Also takes multiple hits from the enemy ship's own railguns. At 8:30 an enemy railgun punches through multiple bulkheads and deep through the ship and the Donnager keeps on going. I'll write up more about The Expanse ships in a bit and list some advantages I think the Donnager has.

@wut: The Halcyon attempts to slipspace jump closer, but due to how horribly inaccurate pre-war slipspace drives are the ship winds up inside Jupiter. Boom.

For real though Expanse torps>Halo torps, Expanse maneuverability>Halo maneuverability, Expanse combat range>Halo combat range, Expanse ship design>Halo ship design. On top of that the Donnager's railguns are nothing to sneeze at either.

@paragonnate: You just jelly that the Expanse ships can't close the distance like that. Being better designed then Halo ships isn't impressive. Vehicles of Halo are craptastically designed.

@paragonnate: Have they ever survived anything on the level of a MAC round? If not that ship is heavily damaged at the very least.

@fullmetalemprah: No, their ships are made of paper. Seriously. The amount of damage PDC do, and if you are being super generous they are probably 30mm [although 20mm is more likely] does to them is hilarious. Swiss cheeses them.

@fullmetalemprah: No they haven't and they wouldn't. But the Donnager is vastly more maneuverable than UNSC ships and it could very well dodge the MAC round if the distance between the ships is great enough.

Wut, UNSC ships pretty much never use slipspace jumps like that, simply because of the absurd amount of risk involved, they stick to other means of propulsion in battle. Also, the PDCs are massively damaging to smaller ships like Corvettes and Destroyers, due to how small those ships are, the Donnager lolsnoped the stealth ship's PDC fire.

@wut

@decaf_wizard: :O Not you too!

Yes they do, and they have. Just depends on the Captain. As well these ships are known to throw WAYYY above their weght class with the right captain, we all know about the Pillar of Autumn

Just watched the video. Yeah that crew would shit its pants going against a Halcyon, the Archer missiles would overwhelm the PDCs, and a MAC would tear that ship apart. If they survive the first hit from it somehow that captain will be immediately trying to hail the Halcyon to end the conflict and the rest of the crew will be mortified by the damage it causes.

@paragonnate: MAC rounds are really damn fast, like near light speed fast. How will they dodge that? Even if it did the Archer missiles would overwhelm the point defenses and the crew on the Donnager doesn't impress me in the slightest, they're very green except for the captain.

Like people have forgotten that these things can solo Covenant Superheavy Cruisers when under the correct command

@paragonnate: Wut, UNSC ships pretty much never use slipspace jumps like that, simply because of the absurd amount of risk involved, they stick to other means of propulsion in battle. Also, the PDCs are massively damaging to smaller ships like Corvettes and Destroyers, due to how small those ships are, the Donnager lolsnoped the stealth ship's PDC fire.

When did it 'lolnope' the PDC fire? I don't recall the PDC bouncing off the hull like they were nothing. Just because the Donnager has enough mass to not suffer critical failure to its structural integrity doesn't mean the PDC fire didn't penetrate the hull.

You are the UNSC captain. You find out you are facing an unknown ship that outranges you.

What do you do?

Do you:

1. Retreat to bring back intel on the ship and regroup. Likely answer, but lets say you can't.

2. Continue.... slowly going forward while being shot at.

3. Attempt a slipspace jump. You aren't jumping into the atmosphere of the planet. You are not blindly jumping. You are jumping within range in a, fairly, empty region of space. Not exactly flying through a needle hole here.

So, unless we assume the captain of the UNSC is Zapp Brannigan level of tactical genius or just utterly refuses to make an obvious risk to attempt to win other then get shot......

They would likely make the attempt.

I thought we were doing a debate assuming both captains were intelligent people who knew the capabilities of their ship and were willingly to use them to their most potential.. are we not doing that in favor of making the UNSC ship slowly fly towards the donnager so the crew can have warm fuzzy feelings at victory?

Halo 2 Nostalgia-post @wut

On a slightly more serious note though are we actually going to assume the captain is just competent or Jacob Keys himself?

@decaf_wizard: I'll take anyone who goes, 'Oh, we are out ranged, should do something about that' lol.

My problem with expanse ships is they are glass cannons. Against each other, its all about dealing the death blow before they do. Against other verses its, "Can it kill it before it fires back/gets into range?"

If yes, then the answer is obvious. If no because the enemy has similar, or greater, range or has the capability of microjumps it then goes to:

Does the jumper have weaponry that can shatter the glass cannon [... it should, its a glass cannon], if yes, who is likely to get the first shot off if they, themselves,cannot take much retaliation fire?

I'd give the Halo side a advantage in shooting first since the Donnager just saw someone teleport in front of them.

Outside of that, good chance it could be MAD, but I'd give the Halo side the odds of victory.

Overall, I think the Donnager is the better ship, but microjumps are super useful, especially, against a glass cannon like the Donnager.

@wut: I mean especially somebody like Jacob Keys with The Pillar of Autumn was able to outmaneuver and defeat a Covenant Supercarrier through sheer tactics and precision piloting. A Covie Supercarrier would fodder the crap out of a Expanse ship and had him vastly out statted and outgunned, yet the superior tactics won him the day. The level of the captain here could be huge for exactly that reason.

Its also worth nothing the ship was able to tank plasma weapons from the thing, albeit not well.

@decaf_wizard:wait, when it keyes pull this off against a supecarrier? Those things are the 3 mile ones who laugh at Mac rounds ( ofc we got the real super carriers which are 17 miles long who REALLY laugh at mac rounds )

Fall of Reach. They beat the Supercarrier by outmaneuvering its shots, blowing through its shields and then using its shielding against it

And yea it was the 17 mile long kind

@decaf_wizard: You mind posting the evidence because Long Night of Solace is the only ship ik that was there, and it was destroyed by a slipspace bubble not the UNSC fleet?

@killerwasp: You know that the first mission in Halo Combat Evolved is literally the Pillar of Autumn escaping from the fall of Reach yes?

@decaf_wizard: yes and being chased by iirc 7 covenant cruisers to which Cortana is credited to killing a few. However I was curious again when has the UNSC taken out a super carrier through sheer firepower?

The Fall of Reach, during the space battle over the planet. There is context, in that they outmaneuvered the ship and its plasma blasts and concentrated all their firepower upon one part of the shield and tossed a nuke into the hole in the shield, which multiplied the force of the blast by containing it

@decaf_wizard: That was over harvest, and that was 1 Battleship, not a Super Carrier.

@decaf_wizard: we are you are referring to the Keyes loop I think but the UNSC has never killed a super carrier unless it was by the nova bomb planted inside of the ship. Opening a slipsace portal in the middle of a ship or blowing up a space station with bombs and Rudd placed in certain locations

@fullmetalemprah: I realize I'm years late but, if we are to take an accurate representation of both vessels starting at about 500,000km as the original question says we first got to look at ship capabilities. For some idiotic reason Archer missiles have a max range that's only a few hundred km so in this situation long range missiles are out of the question for the UNSC while the Donnager could reasonably open fire immediately. Additionally Donnager's missiles can vary in yield and so while we see them using only a few thousands kilos of TNT equivalent against the stealth ships, they could go up to kilo or mega tons after seeing the first volley dealt no damage. Additionally, prior to the post war UNSC navy, UNSC vessels could not accurately navigate slipstream space at the level necessary for a Intra-System jump so a UNSC captain would be relatively insane to attempt one near a gas giant. Even if they did and did not emerge in the gas giant its highly likely they'd still be far away from the Donnager. MCRN PDCs are 40mm not 20mm and have muzzle velocities roughly 1.5x the UNSC ramparts which the UNSC can use as a Ship to Ship weapon suggesting PDCs would be effective. But now on to the bigger point, the MAC, a Halcyon class cruisers MAC round moves around 100km/s, nowhere near light speed, which is 299,000 kilometers per second, or around that. Meanwhile a Donnie can hold around 4 Gs of acceleration assuming the crew can handle it, so any shots taken by a UNSC MAC at this range they'd have time to essentially get coffee and take a nap before evading. In this situation I don't see how the UNSC can win without getting super lucky, even if the commander is highly competent. If the UNSC Halcyon can get close it would be bad for the Donnager but then again her railguns would be able to start firing earlier than a Halcyon could fire on the Donnager so that would hurt the Halcyon. Essentially, the only way I can see the UNSC winning is with a much closer starting range or a super lucky 1 in a million slip space jump. I like the UNSC and I love the Halcyon class but given the starting conditions the Donnager holds essentially all the cards.

Also if you want to know why the Donnager would outrange the Halcyon its for 2 reasons, 1 the Donnager is a smaller target than a Halcyon and 2 a Donnager is more agile meaning that while both the Halcyon's MAC and the Donnagers Railguns have similar velocities (though much lower yield for the far smaller Donnager railguns, but still undoubtedly a threat), the slower and larger target that is the Halcyon would mean a Donnager could reasonably start firing at ranges 3 to 4 times that of a UNSC MAC.