Talk:Israel/@comment-24301892-20151028050730/@comment-11135771-20151028154341

-comes out of lurker mode for a second-

Marc, generally speaking, killsats are relatively small orbital weapons platforms which carry a lot of firepower but little armour and usually no crew. They are typically controlled from the ground or from ships, and are essentially used as a form of orbital artillery. Most are not designed for space-to-space combat (although they may be quite capable of it), and tend to have a single main weapon system, possibly supplemented by defensive armaments and/or a few secondary weapons.

Battle stations on the other hand are usually massive, enormously expensive constructions larger than capital ships, carrying crews of thousands if not tens or hundreds of thousands. They often have widely varied armaments for both space-to-space and space-to-ground combat, and usually are powerful enough to fight off multiple enemy aerospace warships. Many of them also have hangar bays, shipyards, and repair stations built into them. They are used for a number of purposes, including orbital defence, surface bombardment, defensive strongholds, and command and control centres.

Both of these are general definitions, and have their exceptions.

To use examples from one of my own fleets: an example of a killsat is the Citadel-class orbital artillery platform. Many of them are in orbit around Neo-Earth to provide Prometheus forces with orbital bombardment support in battle. They are armed with missiles, lasers, and some point defence. They are fully automated and around 140 metres in diameter.

An example of a battle station is Icarus Station. Only one was ever built, and when it was destroyed, a replacement was never produced on account of the tremendous cost involved. An entire HYDRAXIS fleet was needed to destroy it. It was armed with a neutral particle beam weapon capable of levelling small cities, hundreds of MCM silos, heavy ion cannon turrets, and an array of point defence lasers. It had onboard hangars for 80 large gunships, plus fighter bays and docking stations for larger warships. It had a crew of around 300,000 and was approximately 12,000 metres in diameter.

The Cholol probably classifies as a very small battle station, similar to the smaller types of ODPs employed by the UAC.

Neither killsats or battle stations are necessarily "better"; they have different roles and each is better in some situations. Battle stations are usually a lot more powerful, but also vastly more expensive.

-reactivates lurker mode-