Starship designs...

Omegasgundam · Tue Jul 07, 2020 10:05 pm

taalismn wrote:
Omegasgundam wrote:It is a simple fact in the Three Galaxies that you will eventually run into enemies that are resistant to energy weapons. As the TGE almost exclusively uses Energy Pulse weapons for their infantry, this is a major problem for them, particularly when dealing with those able to stay out of melee range. The traditional response is to simply mass Power Armor units, but the TGE’s conquests had shown that this was far from guaranteed to be tactically possible, so something had to be done to provide some level of kinetic damage potential to their soldiers. While conventional mini-missile launchers had long been part of the Imperial Army arsenal, they simply lacked endurance to deal with the truly durable supernatural targets, which were also a Kreegor weakness. They needed working solutions, and preferably at low cost.r]

This is surprising, given the Kreeghors' history with the Splugorth; did the Splugorth just not use 'Resistant to Energy' magic the whole time they were enslaving and later fighting the Kreeghpr? Or did the Kreeghor miss that in early Zerg-rush-to-melee-range tactics that it became a blind spot in their tactical doctrine?

Hell if I know. I didn't write the original fluff, and that explicitly has them as almost exclusively using EP weapons. And having rebelled against the Splugs.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Wed Jul 08, 2020 1:12 am

Omegasgundam wrote:[
Hell if I know. I didn't write the original fluff, and that explicitly has them as almost exclusively using EP weapons. And having rebelled against the Splugs.

Well, speculation: The Kreeghor overcame their overlords at close range melee fighting, and learned modern combat from the Kitten and other minions, who all either use energy weapons or melee weaponry(Kittani rail guns are rather scarce: we see a few on their bigger power armors and 'bots, but their infantry rail guns tend to eb copied from other people. The Kreeghor, having been bioengineered and uplifted from a primitive state, never had the opportunity to go through the kinetics stage of technological weapons evolution. They pretty much went to bash and smash, and using captured energy weapons, and so didn't get to appreciate how useful slug throwers could be,
Personally I think the Kreeghor homeworld is in a magic-poor/ sporadic flux region that interfered with Splugorth magic's, or else the Dweller Beneath had something to do with it, in addition to creating the Royal Kreeghor.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Wed Jul 08, 2020 3:10 am

taalismn wrote:
Omegasgundam wrote:[
Hell if I know. I didn't write the original fluff, and that explicitly has them as almost exclusively using EP weapons. And having rebelled against the Splugs.

Well, speculation: The Kreeghor overcame their overlords at close range melee fighting, and learned modern combat from the Kitten and other minions, who all either use energy weapons or melee weaponry(Kittani rail guns are rather scarce: we see a few on their bigger power armors and 'bots, but their infantry rail guns tend to eb copied from other people. The Kreeghor, having been bioengineered and uplifted from a primitive state, never had the opportunity to go through the kinetics stage of technological weapons evolution. They pretty much went to bash and smash, and using captured energy weapons, and so didn't get to appreciate how useful slug throwers could be,
Personally I think the Kreeghor homeworld is in a magic-poor/ sporadic flux region that interfered with Splugorth magic's, or else the Dweller Beneath had something to do with it, in addition to creating the Royal Kreeghor.

All plausible. I'm working with on the FWC right now. I have some bits to go over with you tomorrow, but for now bed.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Wed Jul 08, 2020 9:04 pm

I know feel challenged to figure out a way to work something similar into the rumored 'history' of the (E)Shemarrians as an ex-slave species of the Splugorth. The Shemarrian love of rail guns could be explained as a way of dealing, at range, with beings resistant to energy. Slice them up in close, or blast them away with kinetics/ballistics from far away.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Thu Jul 09, 2020 5:24 pm

taalismn wrote:I know feel challenged to figure out a way to work something similar into the rumored 'history' of the (E)Shemarrians as an ex-slave species of the Splugorth. The Shemarrian love of rail guns could be explained as a way of dealing, at range, with beings resistant to energy. Slice them up in close, or blast them away with kinetics/ballistics from far away.

Good idea. Maybe the Kreegor are the reason it become so widespread in Splug space.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Fri Jul 10, 2020 12:52 am

WZ-MD-017 Tungi Missile Destroyer

“Keep the range open if you can with a missile duel, but sometimes you HAVE to close within direct fire range. There’s been some criticism of a general tendency to use cruise missiles as virtually point blank weapons, but that’s often because many point defense systems are programmed to identify and prioritize cruise missile attacks, Between them and area jamming, getting close enough to directly target point defense emplacements and eyeball straight through the sensor static is the only way of being able to land a missile strike.”

The same market research that showed WZT Varakaikos could virtually double its ship orders with the introduction of a ‘blade-less’ version of their Daito Missile Cruiser, indicated that the same could be done with their MD-016 Blade. Many customers had purchased the well-designed destroyers for their balanced performance and armaments...but had little use for the ram prow that had been incorporated by Kai’Shemi tradition. Though the Blade was generally very tolerant of modification, few non-Kai’Shemi operators were willing to tempt fate by excising the ram and performing major structural surgery on their ships. Having already produced a ram-less civilian model of the same spaceframe, WZT Varakaikos was more than happy to do the cutting and revision for the customers, and in short order began rolling out a new version of the Blade, the Tungi.
As with the Daito-to-Kardara conversion, WZTV engineers removed the ram, but kept the mass, using the new weight allowance opened up to address some of the issues plaguing the Blade. A substantial amount of hull baffling was moved about, increasing overall armor protection, including the bridge. The power generation that energized and reinforced the ram prow could now be allocated to shields. However, as a conventional(by Three Galaxies general scheme) missile destroyer, the Tungi is expected to engage targets at a distance, so heavy armor is not considered to be that big an issue. As, with the removal of the ram prow, boarding actions are less commonplace, the marine contingent is reduced and the space reallocated to avionics and crew comfort facilities. To add extra heavy punch, the rebuilt prow now sports a cruise missile launcher and point defense is bolstered by the addition of two rail gun-and-laser turrets.
The Tungi’s already proven a hit with WZT customers and even with the Kai’Shemi armed services, though the Varakaikosian Navy’s acquired ships tend to be less visible and held out of the spotlight held by the ‘edged’ Blade. As with the Daito/Kardara, the VN likes to deploy Blades and Tungis in mutually supporting formations, the dedicated missile ships covering the approach(or retreat) of the blade-ships.

Type: WZ-MD-017 Tungi
Class: Missile Destroyer
Crew: 800; 150 crew, plus 250 troops, and an additional 300 passengers
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 78,000
Bridge 3,000
Engines(2) 6,000 each
Particle Beam Cannon Pods(2) 5,000 each
Cruise Missile Launcher 800
Long Range Missile Launchers(8) 250 each
Point Defense Turrets(8) 150 each
Point Defense Rail Gun/Laser Clusters(2) 150 each
Variable Forcefield* 7,000 each side(42,000 total)

*Variable Forcefields regenerate at 20% per melee
Height: 375 feet (125 m)
Width: 660 feet (220 m)
Length: 1500 feet (500 m)
Weight: 82,000 tons
Cargo: 15,000 tons
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion w/ 30 year energy life
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 7; transatmospheric
(Sublight) Mach 12
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 1.2% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 5 light years per hour
(Underwater) The Tungi actually CAN operate underwater, able to move thru the water at 60 MPH, and handle depths up to 1,800 ft
Market Cost: 980 million credits
Systems of Note:
Standard Starship Systems.

Weapons Systems:
1)Cruise Missile Launcher---The rebuilt nose now sports a cruise missile launcher.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-32
Payload: 64. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 6 missiles)

2) Long Range Missile Launchers(8)---The main weapon of the Tungi missile destroyer is its long range missile launchers.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-24 each launcher(so all eight launchers firing simultaneously will put 192 LRMs in the air at once!)
Payload: 144 each launcher, 1,152 total. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 12 missiles)

3)Particle Beam Cannons(2)---The main energy weapons of the Tungi are these two particle cannons, mounted in external pylons on the ends of the ‘wings’ where they have maximum arc of fire. The pods can rotate a full 360 degrees and swing out 90 degrees.
Range: 7 miles in atmosphere, 14 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 14 miles in atmosphere, 14,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x100 MD per shot
Rate of Fire: Three times per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

4)Short Range Missile Batteries(4)---Mounted in the hull behind sliding hatches, these SRM launchers typically fire in defensive barrages against incoming fighters and missiles.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 10 miles in atmosphere, 500 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-10 each launcher
Payload: 100 per launcher. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 48 missiles)

5)Point Defense Laser Turrets(8)---Eight point defense laser turrets can be deployed from concealed sliding hatches.
Range: 6,000 ft in atmosphere, 12,000 ft in space
(Kitsune Values: 2.4 miles in atmosphere, 240 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x10 MD per burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

6)Point Defense Rail Gun/Laser Clusters(2)----Two rapid-fire point rail gun and pulse laser cluster-turrets can be deployed from concealed sliding hatches in the forward hull.
Range:(Rail Gun) 1.5 miles in atmosphere, 3 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 3 miles in atmosphere, 300 miles in space)
(Pulse Laser) 12.000 ft :in atmosphere, 36.000 ft in space
(Kitsune Values: 8 miles in atmosphere, 8,000 miles in space) Damage:(Rail Gun) 2d4x10 MD per burst
(Pulse Laser) 2d6x10 MD per burst
Rate of Fire:(Rail Gun) EGCHH
(Pulse Laser) EGCHH
Payload:(Rail Gun) 1,000 bursts per gun; changing a drum takes 15 minutes
(Pulse Laser) Effectively Unlimited

Aux. Craft:
6 shuttles
10 Aerospace Fighters

Variants:
The MiD-017B does away with the prow cruise missile launcher in favor of another pair of particle beam cannons. This draws more heavily on the power generators, and crews are advised to more carefully watch their power gauges, as protracted firing of all the PBCs may cause micro-fluctuations in shield strength/density with the increased demand-load.
It is fully expected that WZT will produce MiD-017 versions of the WZ-MiD-016D drone carrier and the WZ-MiD-016UD mine warfare vessel.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Mon Jul 13, 2020 9:46 pm

Stasis Technologies and Space Travel in the Three Galaxies.

“I hate the idea of traveling via sleeper....it’s too much like a coffin, in a morgue, with attendants who aren’t going to treat you with the respect and dignity they would a passenger who can look them in the eye. I will never willingly submit to going into cold-sleep for any reaso-” :sleep:

“-and that’s why we drugged you. We can’t wait for the next full service passenger liner out of here. We HAVE to be in Remana Sector before three-zero-four.”

“Wreck of the HASS Carmine Princess...lost on the Goldillox-Fairport run with five thousand souls aboard. Eighteen years before a deep survey probe stumbled across her drifting in the interstellar. Four thousand passengers survived to be rescued thanks to being in cold sleep when the negative mass drive reversed polarity and killed everybody on the awake decks.”

“Shooting the Tessman Gate saves twenty months’ travel time by regular flight, but it emits a strong field of tau-C radiation that’s listed as a bio-hazard for most species. Heavy shields can block most of it for the time it takes to make transit, but it can still do a number on nervous systems. That’s why anybody running the Gate is told to go through in shielded stasis...between the extra protection of the pod casings and the buffering afforded by the stasis drugs, the radiation damage is pretty much nulled.”

“Wait, here...give your hair a quick spritz with this before you go under. It’s cryo-hairspray. Keeps your mane from cracking and fading in suspension. Should work for humans too.”

(*intercom*)<<“Will all outbound Casserini please assemble in the medical annex? It’s time to go! Our flight leaves in two hours and the med staff wants to have us all in-processed, in starsleep, and put aboard! All our clothes have aleady been packed and loaded, so come on in! We don’t want to be the late ones on this adventure! Yeeehhhh!!”>>

“We always have a few stowaways who manage to bribe some port official to smuggle them aboard in stasis along with the animal hiberpods. It’s even more dangerous than trying to stow away in the regular passenger sections because they often don’t have access to decent hibergear and, because we don’t know they’re aboard, in an emergency we can’t evacuate them with the rest of the listed passengers.”

“Mister Kinkari, kindly refrain from referring to reviving our mission specialist scientists from cold-sleep as ‘time to clean out the refrigerator’.”

“These are my pajamas, These are my cryosleep pajamas. They’re not so much warm as they are modesty-covering and they don’t crack and bleach when frozen.”

“Great, just great.....this ALWAYS happens. I get shipped to one edge of the galaxy and all my luggage and my clothes get shipped to the other.”

Cold Sleep, HiberSleep, Null Sleep, Suspended Animation, Bio-Stasis, StarSleep, Cryo-Time...it’s the other aspect of modern space travel that doesn’t get talked about a lot, Maybe because it harkens back to the old days of slowboats and light-huggers, before most cultures discover ways to jump the speed of light threshold. Fact of the matter is, though, hiber-stasis is still a big part of the modern spaceflight scene.
The fact of the matter is, even with contra-gravity FTL velocities pushing six, seven, even eight light years a standard hour, space gates and fold-jumps, space is a LARGE place. Sometimes it can take weeks, or even months, to cross gulfs between stars. While many coreworlds may be close enough that those with access to the right technology can commute light years and back on a daily basis. most trips are across expanses that would boggle the mind if experienced in real-time. Travel times can be hard on the minds of interstellar travelers. Unless you’ve got plenty to keep you occupied, or have a low amusement threshold, long space voyages can be tedious, especially if you’re not active crew and have nothing meaningful to do.
And when moving larger numbers of people between the stars, economics still plays a role. Keeping large numbers of active passengers in cubic and sustenance eats up money and mass, which equals more expense in the fuel to carry the necessary structure and life support. It’s CHEAPER to move people like cargo and often safer from a security standpoint, so many mass-transport companies try to encourage hibersleep passages.
And there’s health benefits too. Sometimes modern space travel has bad effects on a person’s health. There’s a number of conditions aggravated or brought on by contra-gravity and FTL technologies that can range from annoying to life-threatening. There’s hazards of shipboard life too, if a person isn’t used to starfaring. Stasis systems can shield the sleepers from the detrimental effects of spacetravel.
There’s also a fair number of people who find spacetravel -terrifying-, but they have to travel anyway. They could take drugs the whole trip, and many do, but there’s side effects, the least of which is looking and behaving doped to the gills. If one is lucky, and happens to be traveling with companions, and-or can get a private cabin, spending the trip locked inside one’s travel quarters tended to by an understanding minder is possible. However, that isn’t always practical on long trips, and many space lines and carriers don’t allow it, citing health concerns.
Depending on the hibersleep technology, a lot of people don’t like the idea of being unconscious and helpless, unaware of what’s happening around them, and wholly dependent on the goodwill of others to see them safely to their intended destinations. Often it’s compounded by the preparations for hibersleep; undressing and sometimes not even getting anything to cover up with, then getting plugged into machines in intimate places just emphasizes how helpless one is, being treated akin to a medical patient, or worse, as CARGO.

No doubt the reader has heard or seen the horror stories; the popular media is full of them, about what can go wrong with hibersleep systems. Somebody screws up the drug dosage, or the thermostat goes haywire. Some alien lifeform begins eating helpless sleepers, slavers divert shiploads of sleepers into slavery or harvest them for organs, or somebody programs the braindance to make everybody in the pods into zombies. Or disaster strikes a ship, and the crew neglects to save the sleepers in the and rush to the life pods. Sad to say, they’re all true, but it’s a large megaverse, and everything’s bound to happen SOMEWHERE. Like people getting struck by de-orbiting space debris while riding the grav-tram to work. Doesn’t stop trillions of people from taking trains, though, because the risk is so low.
The fact of the matter is hibersleep systems are no more dangerous than going to the dentist for a procedure. Billions of sophonts across the Three Galaxies use stasis systems to travel without mishap.
And the stats prove that ships that get lost long term between stars? When it could be months or even years before they’re found? When they are discovered, it’s much more likely to be those who were already in, or got into after the disaster, hibersleep who survive. Those ships with hibersystems, even just emergency backup systems, stand a better chance of having survivors in a deep space accident than those that don't.

The main reasons hibersleep systems are still so common are as follows:
-Emergency---Emergency hibersleep systems can extend life support supplies for those stranded in space, expanding the window of time in which they can be rescued. Even between coreworlds like Goldilox and Terra Prime, space is so vast that it can take YEARS to find a stranded starship if it comes to grief in the interstellar void.

-Medical---Many hibersystems hold life processes at a minimal level, slowing or outright stopping further deterioration. It’s common to ship terminally ill patients, if hibersleep induction isn’t going to kill them outright, to other places where they can receive better care. Psychological aversion to spaceflight, ‘spacesickness’, or ‘spaceship madness’ are also legitimate reasons many cite for going into hibersleep.

-Cost---Despite the high price tag for individual hibersleep systems, many carriers see them as cheaper and easier measured against the long term layout for transporting conscious passengers and the expenditures on food, air, and entertainment associated with them. Many long-duration probes and expeditions also use hibersleep stasis to extend their supplies, keeping task-non-essential personnel ‘on ice’ until needed.

-Security----For transporting some people, moving them in hibersleep is the safer option from the standpoint of security apparatus. Various judiciary organizations of the CCW prefer to transport dangerous criminals in some form of stasis rather than give them opportunity to make trouble while on a starship. The TGE routinely moves large numbers of conscript laborers under stasis to avoid them learning where they’re going and leaking the information to dissident factions.

The three general categories of Bio-Stasis systems are as follows:

-Metabolic Reduction----The mildest forms of hibersleep in the Three Galaxies are metabolic reducers, usually drug therapies that induce a state of coma, slow a person’s metabolism and reduce their minimum necessary intake of air, water, and nourishment. Some even provide passive exercise to prevent atrophy of muscles. Such processes are good for short term usage, but the person still exhales and excretes, so provision has to be made for keeping them clean.

-Suspension systems ---Suspension systems go farther than metabolic reducers; they take the subject deeper than coma, slowing metabolic processes even further, or stopping them altogether. Suspension systems usually use some combination of preservative chemicals, a stable suspension medium, and energy fields to keep the mental processes ticking over, albeit slowly, at the edge of total flatline. Suspension systems require a lot more elaborate support systemry and some sort of monitoring, be it a conscious attendant or AI. They’re good for longer-term applications, but are much more expensive and technologically demanding to use. They’re also a lot messier, what with all the tubes, inputs, outputs, and exotic suspension gunks. Some cultures have developed drugs or nanites that can induce suspension effects without all the attendant hardware, but they tend to be the exception, not the rule. That having been said, suspension systems are the standard for most spacefaring cultures who can survive having such things done to their physiology.

-Chronotronic stasis systems are the most sought-after because they directly affect the flow of time for the subject. Chronotronic systems allow the person to simply step into the field, turn it on, and presto, the next thing they know they’re at their destination and stepping out of the field. No drugs, no tubes, no mess. And most chronotronic stasis systems have bonuses like rendering the locked-in person effectively impervious to harm. No kidding, there’s accounts of self-contained emergency stasis fields and their contents surviving ramming through planetary cores and even stars at relativistic velocities. They can also be used for storing other things as well. Problem is, chronotronic stasis systems, though less biologically messy than suspension systems, are MUCH more sophisticated and expensive. Only a few modern polities have the state of the art to generate chronotronic stasis, let alone mass produce it for everyday application across their space fleets. Salvaged Ancient stasis systems bring top credit, especially if they can be retrofitted to exiting ships and ideally reverse-engineered. The UWW notably has a few workarounds in this regard, using various forms of magic, but mot everybody can or wants to use magic, which can be fickle.

In general, while most polities and species within the CCW are allowed to set their own regulations for use of hibersleep, the TVIA’s Interstellar Transportation Bureau has drafted some general guidelines for its use:
-Vessels carrying 25% or more of their listed passenger capacity in dedicated hibersleep must have a means of evacuating the hibersleep systems in event of emergency. This may take the form of the sleeper bay being jettisonable and capable of acting as a life raft in its own right, or individual stasis modules must be able to act as lifeboats, with the means of being ejected to safety.
-Suspension Systems MUST have a minimum autonomous life span, usually certified in terms of months’ duration, without external support. An emergency revival system must be built in.
-For (x) number of suspension systems or metabolic reduction users aboard a starship, there must be a stasis-qualified technician and/or attendant medical personnel.

The TGE has similar regulations, but their standards are lower for conscript transport systems(where a certain percentage of loss is expected and calculated).

The Golgan Republik has similar, but even more strict, regulations like the CCW’s. Golgan stasis systems are rigorously inspected and inspected to be able to allow minimum estivation durations measurable in DECADES.

The Central Alliance and other star nations make do with whatever systems are available on he amrket, though it’s rumored that many full conversion cyborgs in the Central Alliance have built-in cyborg stasis systems that allow their biological components to go into life support-conservative shut-down mode in emergencies.
Most mainstream passenger lines make provision for sleepers, setting aside cabins and holds specifically for hiber-modules. Those that don’t offer such service will allow sleeper-passengers only if the latter provide their own equipment. There are a few spacelines that specialize in carrying only bio-suspended passengers, usually for special purposes, but these tend not to be well-advertised compared to the ‘living it up between the stars’ adventure-oriented cruise carriers.

“You have to take extra care with sleeper ships, maybe more than you would with regular active, conscious passengers. Sure, cold-sleepers use a minimum of air, food, water, power, and cubic, also don’t need entertainment, don’t get bored, don’t go wandering and poking their noses and fingers places they don’t belong, but they also can’t tell you if something’s wrong with them or if they spotted something funny aboard. Also, in event of an emergency, you can’t get them moving on their own feet to safety, can’t enlist them to help you, and they’re utterly defenseless aside from whatever scant protection their hibernaculums provide. And you can’t revive them in the middle of a crisis. They’re more helpless than newbornes, in their little crib-pods, and you have to protect them. Those who claim the sleeper-services treat people like cargo never saw the lengths the good companies go to to protect their charges. The personnel who handle the cold-sleep bays tend to be maternal, protective, and intense. They’ve heard all the horror stories too. Anyone or anything that threatens their charges in their sleep is going to face some serious wrath.”
----Komos Veljo, Golgan Senior BioStasis Technician, GRSS Melodious Rumblings

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Tue Jul 14, 2020 3:10 am

Here's my work for the FWC's orbital assets. I'm still building some fluff for the ground part, including just where all this industrial development is coming from, but this is will is enough for now. I'll likely be editing it for the rest of tomorrow as I notice typos and errors.

Naturally, inspired by Kitsune’s Long Fang.
Free Worlds Council FWC-LT-105 ‘Long Tooth II’ Interceptor
“There has been a lot of noise over the Long Tooth II, but as far as I can tell nobody in the GSA had anything to do with it, and I would have been the one to sign off on it. We know they're getting help from SOMEBODY, but none of the usual suspects are making the right noises to fit the bill. Our best guess is that someone involved in the USA is helping things along, but this is based on some really circumstantial bits of data that we’re half convinced are false. The people we’ve been able to get onsite show that we’re dealing with obvious cut outs, and their security is more than enough to stop us from getting the actual truth. They’ve managed to catch an impressive number of ISB agents as well, and as long as we’re not dealing with another bunch of Spluggorth or Naruni equivalents we honestly don’t really care who they are as long as they keep the FWC in the fight.”
---- Branch Manager LONG SHOT, GSA Good Hope Station

“The FWC have, by necessity, become the masters of combining TGE and CCW technologies into one craft. It's honestly a headache to make them work together for a multitude of reasons, but they make it work nonetheless. The sheer ingenuity they put into making fundamentally inferior designs into something worth flying is incredible. I would accept most of their senior engineers onto my staff without any hesitation, and I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the GSA is looking into a ‘brain trade’ to see it happen.”
---- Captain Harriet McKenna, CAF, Director of Project Prominence

”There’s been a good deal of talk about developing a lighter interceptor, but we don’t have the engineering assets to spare, we have even less industrial capacity to use it, and we already have an answer. Our talks with WZTechYards have allowed us to put them in contact with our Consortium supporters, so we’re seeing a steady stream of credits get debited to our accounts with them. This lets us purchase a substantial number of their various offerings, which hold up well against the new birds the CAF is beginning to field. The USA is buying up the high end models, but complaining about that is just being greedy, and the reports that I’ve seen say that they are really putting them to work in the ass ends of galaxies.”
---- Supreme Commander Rachel Klass, Free World Council Cadre

While the original Long Tooth was a cross spectrum improvement over the old Flying Fang, being faster, more heavily armed, easier to maintain, having less parts, and only marginally more expensive, it was anticipated the the TGE would likely respond by fielding a better craft that’s less than half a millenia behind the tech curve. The Sharktooth was an unpleasant surprise in how capable it was, but the Free Worlds Council’s engineers were already hard at work developing a further refined version, ultimately resulting in the Long Tooth II. The primary changes are the engines, shields, and the lasers, the details of which have driven the ISB into a frenzy trying to find out where they are getting their assistance from. This is because the engines are VFF are almost identical to those used on the Bushido Industries Katana, and the lasers are equally similar to those on the Black Eagle. There are rumors of an FTL equipped version in the works, replacing the Mini-Missile Launcher to fit, but this is not considered particularly likely at this time.

Spoiler:

Bashed on Kitsune’s Mosquito
Free Worlds Council FWC-SPD-Y1 ‘Sylphide’ Heavy Strike Fighter
(aka ‘Gun Dancer’, ‘Devil Bird’)

“I am simply at a loss for words for the Sylphide. The closest analogy I can think of is a shrunken Yannar, but that doesn’t have all the right connotations. When operational, it burns like a star, and it scorches droves of lesser ships with its radiance. I’ve already ordered several teams to look into how we would make and use our own, because this monster’s performance is more than enough to put up with the headaches of keeping it.“
---- Captain Harriet McKenna, CAF, Director of Project Prominence

“Before anyone asks, we have even less idea than usual how the hells they came up with these things. The security around the Michael Yard is justifiably paranoid, but that doesn’t hold a candle to their efforts to obscure where they're getting the FTL drives. The rest of the thing is understandable, if completely unconnected from what we consider conventional, but the drive is a true unknown. What little we can put together shows that the material they’re made from comes from known deposits in FWC territory, so we’re probably not dealing with an outdimensional supplier, but we don’t know if they found a cache or a factory. My money is on the latter, as they wouldn’t be anywhere near as willing to risk installing them on direct combat assets if they had a finite stock. They’ve certainly started using them on infiltration craft though, as that sort of speed is simply too useful to too many things for them not to.”
---- Branch Manager LONG SHOT, GSA Good Hope Station

‘What the--- OH SHI’
---Common sentiment among TGE convoy escorts encountering the Devil Bird.

The Sylphide is arguably a WZTech Yard design, but it is produced with and sold only to the Free Worlds Council. Arguably represents a paradigm shift in how parasite craft are designed, this beast of a heavy aerospace fighter trades theoretical endurance for burst potential, with its engine bening ludicrously overcharged to maximize performance. While this resorts in breathtakingly short service life between overhauls, the Sylphide can accomplish simply jaw dropping feats between them, out performing the Scorpion and having more firepower than most high end Proctor equivalents. The FWC uses the Sylphide as both scalpel and sledgehammer, quickly becoming the terror of smaller TGE flotillas..

But perhaps its greatest claim to fame is its simply astonishing FTL drive, capable of propelling at 7 lightyears an hour. This is the contribution of the FWC to the project, and just how they have managed to acquire these engines is a complete mystery. The FWC is naturally tight lipped on the subject, but actual analysis of the drives reveals that they share effectively no design similarities with any other production CG drive in the known worlds. The leading idea is that FWC patriots have discovered either a cache of these advanced items or an automated production line, and WZT’s material analysis of what they have been given shows that the latter is strongly possible.

The primary failing of the craft is its power plant, which needs an extensive rebuild after around a month of operation, with the Lucerin-Antimatter system being far too unstable for the multi decade endurance that conventional reactors take for granite. This is admittedly a far more expedient process that would normally be the case, as these overhauls were included as part of the normal operating cycle, but it means that a Sylphide unit is rarely up to full strength and needs a constant supply of replacement parts to maintain operational readiness. If the power plant need only keep the life support systems running, it could last 3 years before mechanical problems would cause it to fail, but this is not thought to be a plausible need.

Spoiler:

Combining Taalismn’s Amok and my Berserker-50 into something for the FWC, and a shout to one of Kitsune’s creations in the variants.
Free Worlds Council ‘Hope’-class Attack Ship
(aka ‘Free Zerker’)
“While it's not surprising that the FWC would choose to clone the Berserker for their first major mass production design, they had the sense to copy the better version. The Torac was impressive for what they had to make it with, but the Hope represents them being able to keep making hulls after their boneyards have been emptied. There has to be a Torac II in the works though. They work too well together for it to be otherwise, and the Torac has a lot of potential if they didn’t need to shoehorn it into a Berserker body.”
----Captain Vicen Trancluw, CAF

“The Hope owes a lot to the Amok, as it showed the FWC how to use normal materials into the TGE’s ship architecture. The ceramic-laminate of theirs is a way better grade material than what the TGE put into their exports, but it’s still behind the organo-borosilicate the TGE uses in their own ships. The Amok also gave them a good idea for what they needed to do to make it run on a fusion plant, which is way less of a headache than trying to jump to antimatter. We showed them how to make and run a full shipyard, but they don’t need any help developing a ship.”
----- Anonymous, (-WHITENOISE-) Operative

“While the rebel’s Hope-class represents a failure in our efforts to suppress them, we can take some comfort in that it is clearly an inferior version of our Berserker. We have seen no indications that they are putting any effort into cloning the Nuss needed for a true copy, so their ships will always lag behind ours. Unfortunately, their captains keep on proving themselves to be far more creative, which results in a constant attrition of our light assets. This independence would be a problem if we could ever drag them into a fleet engagement, but as this has always been the one thing they have sought to avoid at all costs. When they eventually slip up, we will crush them, but that’s never really been the question.”
----- Internal Memo, Kreegor High-Command

The first design to leave the Michael Yards, the Hope class Attack Ship can be considered a hybrid of the Amok and the Berzerker-50, removing hull flourishes to simplify production and using salvaged components to meet production targets without as great an investment in secondary facilities. The FWC has managed to build up a shockingly large stockpile of salvaged Berzerker components over the last century, and can use them to fuel its own construction efforts for at least a decade at their current expansion rate. Being a Berserker derivative, it is very inflexible, but the FWC is happy to have any new ship it can, and each hull can free up a more versatile ship for more complicated activities.

The engines on the Hope are a mismatch of modified Berzerker units, drawing from the FWC’s extensive tomes of jury-rigging lore to create a factory standard upgrade that matches the performance of those in the Berzerker-50. Considering that the Hope has to lug around 400 tons more armor mass to retain the same level of protection, this performance level is a noteworthy accomplishment, even if it comes at a substantial maintenance burden. There was a great deal of thought into making the moved Horn Lasers modular, but it was ultimately considered not worth the expense, and the TGE did not make use of TW enchanted ships. The weapon suite is mostly the same, but the Cruise Missile Launchers are often replaced with an equivalent LRM launching version, with the FWC having managed to establish local production some time ago. Many of the FWC’s Berserkers have had similar modifications for the same reason.

The FWC uses its Hopes the same way it does its Berserkers, although it would rather risk the latter before the former for moral reasons. Beyond being a Berserker clone, the class’s primary weakness is its short reactor life, but this is not thought to be a serious issue. It is thought to be exceedingly unlikely that any individual ship will last long enough for its mere 15 year operational period to be relevant, and the only reason they did not opt to go for an even cheaper single decade model was because it wouldn’t have provided enough power for all the ship’s systems. The current plan is to have Hope flotillas be led by a Torac or upcoming Torac II, with an attached escort carrier providing fighter support.

Spoiler:

An upgrade of the Taalismn’s original Torac.
Free Worlds Council Torac II-class Heavy Destroyer
“It was tough to see the old girl go, but at least she took a pair of Smashers with her. That's the sort of trade High-Com dreams of, which is likely why they gave me a new ship. The new Torac is, on paper, not that different from the old one, but the reality is far different. Having an actual proper hull makes a tremendous amount of difference from an operational perspective, as we have the room to actually do maintenance and store supplies. We can stay out nearly 3 times as long, which lets us hit much further from home. The addition of an ASF flight is also a major help, as it lets us do things that we previously couldn’t. The Hope class are cheaper and faster to make, but the Toracs are going to be just as important in the larger scheme of things.”
---- Captain Snade Areso, FWCS Latamer Meadows II

“The team over at Oridone has collected a lot of data on a new version of the Torac, which uses a proper hull instead of shoehorning a Smasher into a Berserker from the scrap yard. Combined with the formal military academies that we’re seeing crop up, the FWC is on the cusp of becoming a real navy, with all the capabilities and institutions that you would expect out of a true political power. At the rate they’re going we’ll see them making real Cruisers within 20 years, and won’t that be a hoot. I hope that we’re going to take another go at the TGE before then; it would be embarrassing to not be the ones to smother the TGE.”
---- Branch Manager LONG SHOT, GSA Good Hope Station

“The rebel’s newest version of their ‘Torac’ aglomination now warrants the designation of being a proper ship, which is a disappointing sign of their growing industrial capabilities. We expect it to be used the same way, only better at it and less vulnerable to bad luck. That they use it at all is a sign of their desperation, but it still presents a problem for us to deal with. They have proven to be infuriatingly capable of neutralizing Smasher flotillas, and have forced us to start running patrols in high risk sectors with Executioners. This is unacceptable, and efforts must be made to find a more cost effective counter to these high speed raiders. It may be necessary to field a larger attack craft than the Berserker, but this radical step can wait until a full analysis is conducted.”
----- Internal Memo, Kreegor High-Command

The original Torac was an obvious case of desperation leading to ingenuity, using recycled hulls as the basis for an enlarged ship, but this naturally had no shortage of regrettable operational problems. The FWC’s recent growth in industrial power has allowed OSSA to expand to full hull construction, allowing them to solve the various compromises and create in the improved Torac II. While the ceramic-laminate is less weight efficient than the Kreegor’s NSN shell-alloy, the Torac II has the mass budget to burn, and manages to retain its high speed despite gaining a bit over 2 kilotons. Additionally, the disappointing LRM launcher was replaced with twin heavy models, greatly increasing its long range barrage capabilities. Finally, a small hanger bay was added to the lower hull, and is able to service a flight of 6 fighters. Despite all of this, interior space has been substantially increased making it far more capable of long term independent operation.

An important change was an improvement to the primary energy weapons. While still cut down versions of full capital mounts, their range and single-discharge damage potential has been brought up to part with those larger systems. There were substantial investigations into whether the slow charging twin mounts could be replaced with a faster firing single, but the disappointing conclusion was that there currently little engineering or cost benefit to doing so. The primary hindrance was that they would need to design and produce a model compatible with TGE systems, which is projected to take years even with their experience. However, a small team is working away at it, and hopes to field a working example within a decade.

Spoiler:

Free Worlds Council Dreadnought Hopebringer Upgrade
“I was almost assigned to the Nisbroloth before the Good Hope Rebellion. I like to think I would have made a difference, we don’t know just how they managed to take her. There should have been a substantial number of Royal Kreegor and Invincible Guardsmen on her at all times, but she had apparently taken substantial crew losses in her prior engagements, and we never received the reports for them. Going over the relevant personnel records, combined with the condition of the orbital docks that First Corkscrew observed when they got there, I think the mostly likely answer is that Cren-Cressak Velsig was gathering major a response force in one of the dock’s secondary bays, and that most if not all of the Invincible Guardsmen there were present due to being eager to get involved in the fight on the ground. It wouldn’t have been subtle either, which means that then that damned rebel Klass hijacked the orbital defense grid the first thing he did was dump a few salvoes of Cruise Missiles into the bay, which would explain why part of the dock was glowing vapor. They only had fusion heads, but it would have been enough.

The subsequent loss of the Niphal I can only attribute to stupidity, as Cren-Cressak Persez simply screwed up his targeting priorities and shield allocation and let the Nisbroloth take out his Primary and Secondary weapons before switching to butchering the Smashers. The Niphal was later further crippled by several Cosmo Knights boring their way through the hull and damaging the FTL drive, allowing the rebel to take out the command sections with precision hits. Unfortunately, they were careful about it, and were thus able to a good chunk of her internal systems, most notably her AM plants. The Nisborloth only had around 30 years of life in her original set, which would have been exhausted long before she took out the Choli, so they had to have managed to recover enough to conduct a full rebuild. If you add in the Nipha’s remaining endurance, she would have only had around 5 years left at that point, so they would have been desperate to get new ones, which explains why it took so much damage in that engagement.”
----Senior Invincible Guardsman Croliv Profsen, assigned to Dreadnought Telbranth, 4th Battlegroup, First Thundercloud Fleet.

“High-Com had a really hard time committing us to Thundercloud, but the increase in tensions between the TGE and CCW convinced them that the CAF would come riding in if the Kreegor committed a big enough fleet to smash Good Hope. It also finally gave us a chance to finally fix the structural damage we took against the Choli, and add a few improvements in the process. We were lucky in that the Empire decided to wait for an opportunity to make major gains against the CCW rather than take advantage of the Minion War to roll us up, but I think the Emperor and friends weren’t quite ready to admit they needed to do so and the opportunity to sink a knife into the Consortium was too much to let go. In a dead sprint, it’ll take us a bit over a month to get from Oridone to Good Hope, but I’ve been informed that if the TGE makes a Fleet level push they’ll be met with at least two CAF Dreadnought Groups, which is something I’d put in the Consortium’s favor even in a 2v1 scenario. Those Emancipations are more Carrier than Gunboat, and they gunboat better than the Doombringer.
----Captain James Clanter, Free Worlds Navy, Dreadnought Hopebringer

“Our efforts to crush the rebels has been dealt another setback, with the dissidents in the Oridone system managing to expand their capabilities enough to conduct the major structural repairs needed to fully restore the Nisbroloth’s hull. Additionally, she has received extensive alterations to her defensive armaments, almost certainly intended to make her less vulnerable to massed Berserkers. An increase in the number of surface protrusions indicated the installation of additional equipment, most likely EWAR systems to better protect her from long range ordinance. Given 4th Battlegroups current strategic limitation, it is likely that the Nisbroloth will be used to conduct attritional attacks on patrol forces, which will hamper our ability to secure our interior and conduct retaliatory strikes. Add in that the Dreadnought Telbrath is overdue for a powerplant replacement, and the situation around the Halvorks Sector looks very grim.
----TGE Internal Memo, Thundercloud Fleet.

The ultimate sign of the Free World Council’s ability to resist the will of the Kreegor Emperor, the Dreadnought Hopebringer was in rough shape after her victory over the Choli. It is only within the last few years that the FWC had developed their industrial base enough to finally repair her structural frames, and only the Oridone system of the Thundercloud Galaxy had the orbital facilities to do so. After a great deal of heated debate, which included several brawls, it was eventually decided that it would be an acceptable strategic risk if the Hopebringer was dispatched to the region for a comprehensive refit. This decision was greatly aided by the increasing open hostility between the CCW and the TGE, which has led Supreme Commander Rachel Klass to believe that the CAF would likely intervene should the Kreegor muster a sufficiently sized fleet to blitz the FWC’s Corkscrew territory. The increasingly dramatic changes of what had become known as the ‘Shaw Reformation’ had already resulted in a massive increase in civic support for military endeavors, and back channel negotiations between Good Hope and Terra Prime were beginning to produce tangible results.

When the Hopebringer pulled into the OSSA yard 36 days later, local engineers immediately jumped into action. Beyond the structural repair work, the FWC’s Engineering Corps had long dreamed up a series of modifications that could be done to the ship if only they had the facilities to do so, and now they finally did. Using materials and components taken from the strategic stockpiles, every trained yard worker that could be spared, the Hopebringer received a comprehensive rebuild over the course of 4 months. The TGE would naturally try to disrupt the project, including several major attacks on the system, but the overstretched First Thundercloud Fleet was simply spread too thin to muster sufficient forces. The Hopebringer would emerge in better shape than she had been in when the rebellion had first acquired her over a century prior, and soon went to work harassing the TGE’s Thundercloud holdings.

Taking advantage of the massive amount of structural work that needed to be done to the ship, the FWC shipwrights decided to radically reconfigure the Hopebringer’s hangers, both expanding them and making them much more efficient. Each of the ‘Rain of Death’ transports has been replaced with accommodation for no less than 40 Flying Fang sized craft, totaling to a whopping 320 additional storage pads. The layout has received additional improvements, becoming better suited for continuous flight operations and finding room for a substantial number of utility craft.

While the primary weapons have been for the most part unchanged, the secondaries have been almost entirely replaced. The smaller Particle Beam Turrets have been replaced (and their number expanded upon) with Triple Barrel Medium mounts, more than offsetting nominal decrease in rate of fire and having twice the effective range. Thought has been put into exchanging a few for a kinetic option, but the TGE does not use TW enchanted ships, so it is thought to be unnecessary. The old Cruise Missile Launchers have been replaced with the more flexible models that the TGE is beginning to introduce into service, allowing it to fire double sized salvoes of LRMs, and have had their munition bunkers doubled in volume. And perhaps most importantly the older PD mounts have been replaced with a dual GR-1000 and SRM emplacement. While only possible due to the ship’s sheer size, the range increase is sufficient to get off several more bursts of fire against incoming missiles and strike craft before they impact or fly past.

As she is over a century old, the Hopebringer is on her 3rd reactor system, with the 2 replacements having been ‘donated’ by her destroyed sister ships. The efforts to obtain the second are what was responsible for her previous structural damage, but High Command considered a mostly intact functional ship infinitely superior to a fully intact barely-functional one. Similarly, the FTL drive has been kept in working shape by scavenging from her kills, and has enough spares for a full rebuild if need be. Her secondary systems have been substantially expanded however, with the FWC naturally going to great lengths to shoehorn in whatever additional capability they can into their most powerful asset. The ship’s large hull and power output allows her to host very powerful sensors and EWAR equipment, and have been networked together to form a distributed network. In particular, her FTL detection equipment has proven invaluable in allowing her to escape would be ambushers, and have allowed her to single out Smasher flotillas and isolated Executioners.

While it should come as no surprise to anybody that the FWC is absolutely incapable of constructing a Dreadnought, there is speculation that they may have scavenged enough wrecked Executioners that they could plausibly assemble a working ship or two. This is outside the current capabilities of the OSSA orbital facilities, and the FWC is naturally focusing on expanding to full Cruiser production before reaching for full capital ships, but some speculative design studies have been produced by the burgeoning FWC design staff.

Currently, the Hopebringer operates with a substantial escort fleet, consisting of 2 Warshield-equivalents, 3 Smashers, 8 Hunters, 18 Berserkers, and typically around 12 Escort Carrier conversions. This is the largest fleet formation in the FWC, and represents a very large chunk of the FWC’s Thunderchild ship assets. However, the opposing First Thundercloud Fleet is horrifically overextended and engaging in a campaign against the Domain of the Splugorth Kingdom of Desslyth on the near opposite end of their holdings, which has forced the TGE forces facing the FWC into a defensive posture. Thus, the Hopebringer is currently running rampant over the dispersed elements of the 4th Battlegroup, and it is widely suspected that a showdown between her and the Dreadnought Telbrath is inevitable.

Spoiler:

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Tue Jul 14, 2020 2:47 pm

While I'm hashing out the rest of the fluff and ground units, here's something that's actually finished, and is what people really care about. The rest will likely take some time, as I have other things that need to be done. It might be a week or two.

Inspired by Kitsune’s Ronin
Free Worlds Council FWC-LA-H ‘Liberator’ Upgrade
”The Free Wolders are being understandably cagey with how they’ve upgraded their Warlords, but we do know it's now called the Liberator, and it got major increases in firepower and speed. The changes in armor shaping also indicates that they’ve done something there as well, we don’t know if it's been improved or they're just using a different source of material. We do know that they’ve started making them in meaningful numbers, which honestly is the biggest news. If the FWC can make a meaningful chunk of their own equipment, then they become far more flexible in what they can do.”
----Major Philip Fredette, CAF

“They’re a bit tougher. I ran into (and subsequently worked with) a few on an op a few months ago and they took some hits that I know would have just barely put down a W2, and they still had a partial layer of armor left. The shield and arm guns have been pretty standard on FWC units for a while, and I’ve always thought they were a good idea, but the new Multi-Rifle they’re toting is actually impressive for how simple it is. Tactically, they generally use them as jumpers, as being constantly airborn is just asking for trouble. They’ve also gotten pretty good at using them as boarders, and any PA can turn a corridor fight into a mook horror show.”
----Colonel Vlar Reltish, CAF Ground Forces

”As presumptuous as the name is, the rebel’s armors are more effective than the ones we give our lesser Legionnaires, and a good lesser pilot can easily trump a poor Kreegor one. I have seen far too many idiotic Kulsons get themselves killed to place much hope in the average competence of the Imperial Army, so I am not terribly surprised that the lumbering oafs have such a difficult time rooting out rebels. All they have is mindless brute force, and if that was the best answer then we would have crushed them a century ago. I fully expect the rebels to continue to do better in what few equal force engagements they partake in, and that will not change unless the Imperial Army changes. And that would likely be more trouble than it's worth.”
---- Anonymous, Invincible Guardsman

While the Free Worlds Council had long lacked the ability to domestically produce warships, much simpler items such as infantry weapons and Power Armor were within their rear, and several mostly intact factories had fallen within their grasp. After frantic work to ensure that the TGE did not destroy them in retaliation, the relocated factories have been hard at work producing replacement Warlord IIs on Good Hope and Oridone. As the W2 was something of a shoddy downgrade for non-Kreegor Legionaries, they rebel engineers almost immediately went to work trying to improve it, and have seen a substantial amount of success. After the obvious inclusion of an N-40 or N-50 Force Field, the most common alteration was to replace the head lasers with dual mounts in both forearms, removing the blades with a more practical weapon. The other common alteration was to add a EP-8 to the underside of the Gravity Autocannon, inspired by the Multi Rifle of the Silverhawk.

But the recent upsurge in the FWC’s industrial capabilities have seen a much more extensive upgrade come out, now formally designated the Liberator. With the TGE beginning to upgrade their own forces, the FWC had to keep up to stay relevant, and the Warlord II chassis still had a great deal of developmental potential. While extensive refit efforts are underway, the Warlord II will continue to be the mainstay of the rebel army for years due to the difficulty of getting them returned for servicing and immediate needs on the front. Output from the Michel Yard and OSA facilities on Good Hope and Oridone have seen massive increases, but are still far short of being able to supply the FWC with all of its needs.

The Liberator is an extension of the earlier modification efforts, but done in a much more systematic manner. The most significant engineering changes were the expansion of the CG flight system, allowing it to serve as a mediocre space combatant and excellent boarding suit. The OSA sourced generator incorporates several technological developments to significantly improve output without meaningfully increasing cost, allowing substantially more to be done on the armor. The more visible change was the removal of the Kreegor styling and replacement of the armor higher grade material, with the more time consuming to fabricate composition being considered a worthwhile investment. For the foreseeable future, the FWC will have substantially more material fabrication capacity than projects to use it on, resulting in more resources being spent on what units they can produce. The last major change is the primary weapon, with the Multi Rifle being upgraded to use the grav gun model used in the TGE’s Warlord IV, and the underbarrel mount has been replaced with the impressive EP-11, with the upgraded power plant being far more able to meet its demands than the older TGE model.

Spoiler:

Type: FWC-LA-H ‘Liberator’

MDC/Armor by Location:

Speed:

(Kitsune: 20% of light speed; Accel/decel at .9% of light speed per melee)

Market Cost: ~4.5 million credits new. Refit cost is around 700K, but the FWC has no shortage of volunteer labor.

Weapons Systems:

1) Multi-Rifle:

(EP-11) 3200 ft in atmosphere, - miles in space

(EP-11) 80 shot capacitor, charges at 10 shots a melee

2) Back Mini-Missile Launcher:

3) Forearm Dual Pulse Lasers (2):

4) Melee Weapon (2):

5) Hand to Hand:

6) Alternative Rifle Weapons:

Variants:

Earlier versions only had the Forearm changes and either a N-40 or N-50 Force Field, and typically go for around 400K more than a comparable Warlord II.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Tue Jul 14, 2020 7:20 pm

Nice to see my old designs out on a final outing.

Took two ships out with her? Yes, that's a good trade for weight if you absolutely have to lose a ship. Followed by an upgrade? Even better.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Tue Jul 14, 2020 8:43 pm

taalismn wrote:Nice to see my old designs out on a final outing.
Took two ships out with her? Yes, that's a good trade for weight if you absolutely have to lose a ship. Followed by an upgrade? Even better.

The basic design was as good as could be achieved given the circumstances, and it was optimized for the sorts of hit and run ops that the FWC is forced to emphasize. The details for Latamer Meadows I's last engagement aren't that important in the 'who did what' sense, but set up was that it was a delaying action to buy time for a stolen mega-freighter full of military grade ship components to get away. The FWC had 2 other Toracs, 6 Berserkers, and 3 smaller escort carrier conversions up against a standard Smasher group of 3 Light Cruisers and 6 Berserkers. The FWC lost the Meadows, 4 Berserkers, and a squadron of Flying Fangs, but they wiped the board otherwise, and they managed to get their salvage team on site before TGE reinforcements did. Considering the tonnage difference, it was a major upset, and the Cressak would have been executed if he hadn't been vaporized by an AM Cruise Missile. The FWC got the various specialist/difficult to produce long lead components to feed the Michel and OSSA yards for 4 years, along with 3 megatons or so of critical power armor and fighter components, which is more than a fare trade in the Cadre's book.

Its going to take FWC High-Command a while to adjust to the fact they they have a reliable stream of new ships. The overall strategy of force preservation and opportunistic raiding won't really change considering the force differential, but they'll be more willing to send off clunkers on one way trips if the target is attractive enough and they can get the crew back. A lot of the FWC's standing fleet is composed of warships that are on the verge of both system and structural failure, and aren't worth the effort of trying to salvage for components considering the amount of much more recent TGE scrap they have, so there are going to be many 'blaze of glory' ops in the near future. For these 'Suiciders', I'm thinking around 14 crew in a pair of docked slight shuttles with remote access rigs, giving them a hope of getting away when it pops. They'll need some more hands to get them there, but those aren't needed when the shooting starts.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Wed Jul 15, 2020 10:16 pm

Cynoceran State Republic Krenno-class Cruiser
(Aka ‘Leadpots’, ‘Lead-Buckets’, ‘Fish-pans’, ‘Cynopots’)
“These damned things have the bedamned habit of showing up wherever we establish colonies along the Eastern Cloud of the Cluster, and demanding that we surrender our communications facilities, powerplant, and industrial plant to ‘inspection’, citing ‘Cynoceran security matters’ as an excuse to let their stormtroopers tromp through everything and take what they want. I’d toss their groundpounders off a local cliff if I could, but then we’d have to deal with the burn-lasers and nukes those things would still be pointing!”
---Ceril Mallen, Odina-Neskos Colonial Development Corporation.

“Hitting the engines requires a very narrow approach angle. Difficult, but not impossible, and helped by the fact that there’s little in the way of weaponry covering that angle, once you get close enough. Other prime targets include this feature here, which is the main sensor array. Take that out and missiles and lasers all lose coordination. Problem is, you’re facing all of the laser batteries on approach-”
---Tactics lecture. Odinan Federation SpaceForce Academy

“The Cynocerans actually developed a pretty good drive with a low emission signature...not exactly ‘stealthy’, but good enough, with some competent maneuvering, to make tracking the ship difficult. Unfortunately, the Cynoceran military then blew this potential advantage by training their crews to travel in lockstep squadron formations that may as well be fully-lit candelabra for their visibility on sensors.”
----Redell Sorel, WZTYards Military Engineering Analyst

“Anybody who ever called a Krenno ‘primitive’ has never been stuck on a colonial orbital platform with nothing but a few centimeters of plasteel between them and hard vacuum, wondering if the square-chins standing a few dozen kilometers off are really going to put a heavy torpedo through that barrier.”

The Krenno-class cruiser was once the martial workhorse of the Oda Cluster Cynoceran police-state in their nearly centurylong cold war with the Odina Federation. Though by modern Three Galaxies standards, the Krenno is at best a second-rate warship, for the pre-reContact Odina Federation and their antagonistic former colonies, the Krenno represented a serious martial force.
Roughly saucer-shaped, Krennos were well, if not heavily, armored(for their tech base), as the Oda Cluster lacked shield technology. The primary antiship weapons system was a heavy missile launcher, backed by four heavy lasers and an array of point defense projectile cannon . They could also carry a short company of troops, especially useful in boarding actions and in suppression missions.
Though the armaments and armor may have changed over the decades, and build quality vary as well, one outstanding feature of the Krenno has been its engines. One thing Cynoceran science and technology got right were the Sikaasci-series pulse drives, which are both reliable and energy-efficient. While maximum output of a single ship thrust unit may not be impressive, nothing short of a direct up-the-tailpipe shot can disable the Krenno’s engines.
Krennos were feared both because of their numbers and the aggression of their crews, especially when deployed in numbers. Though not as large or as powerful as the massive Gemiyor-class carrier-battleships that were the Odinans’ main capital unit, the Krennos were faster, more maneuverable, and more numerous, and crews were trained in squadron swarm attacks.
Krennos were for the better part of a century an ominous presence along the long shared border with the Odina Federation, aggressively posturing against their opposite numbers and engaging in provocative ‘incidents’ when they could get away with it.
However, for all their martial bluster, and mass production of the Krennos and other designs, the Cynocerans were falling behind the Odinans technologically. The Krenno was becoming long in the tooth and improvements to the design were incremental at best; the Odinans were well familiar with the design from all of the incidents, and there were few new tricks the ships could play that the Odinans didn’t know about. The mass tactics were also well-known, and the regimented group-think policies of the Cynoceran State discouraged individual initiative in Krennos crews. Even while the Odinans tried to maintain peaceful diplomatic talks going in the face of Cynoceran saber-rattling, their space force academy was teaching its students how to take out the Krennos, even though they might not be calling it out by name.
The boot to the head came when a five ship Krenno squadron on a territory grab got nearly completely wiped out by a single Odinan Snark-class corvette crewed by cadets on a training flight. The Odinans capitalized on every known weakness of the Krenno design and Cynoceran tactics to pick off the cruisers until only one remained to be chased back across the border in humiliation. The debacle mortified the Cynoceran High Command, especially after word got out into the general populace, breaking the aura of invulnerability of the military. An immediate purge was made of various armed services and industrial staff, and an overhaul of the military ordered. Several crash programs were ordered to address the demonstrated weaknesses of the Krenno and update the ships, or come up with a replacement for them. However, soon after the incident, the Oda Cluster reestablished contact with the Galactic community and the Human Alliance, and the Odina were first to reap the rewards of trade and technological exchange. Suspicious of the CCW and fearing that the Federation would soon use their growing technological edge to aggressively settle old scores with Cynocera, the State High Command ordered stepped up production of new cruisers, even though no significantly upgraded version had been finalized, trusting that numbers might carry the day or at least buy time when war broke out. The State shipyards were still producing Krennos when economic and social realities caught up with the Republic and it collapsed in the Cynoceran Spring.
The dissolution of the Cynoceran Republic left hundreds of military ships rotting at dock, or in partial states of assembly in the yards as the military state was disbanded. In the aftermath a few ships were stolen by disgruntled former military crews who went off to become pirates or mercenaries. Several Cynoceran worlds(including a hard-liner rump-state of the former Republic) wanting no part of reunification with the Odinans, continue to maintain and produce small numbers of Krennos as part of their system defense and police forces. WZT, as part of Federation-requested demilitarization efforts, acquired over a hundred ships, a half-dozen shipyards, and mountains of spare parts to repurpose and tinker with. Certain subassemblies, especially Sikaasci engines, have begin appearing in a number of WZT and ASI designs.

Note: Prior to reContact, neither the Odina Federation nor the Cynoceran Republic had developed any meaningful space fighter capabilities beyond a few transatmospheric armed aerospace craft used mainly for planetary defense.

Type: CR-LCG04 Krenno
Class: Light Cruiser(the Three Galaxies would consider it a frigate or gunboat)
Crew: 110+ 300 troops
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 7,000
Bridge 2,000
Sensor Dome* 800
Engines** 3,000
Heavy Torpedo Launcher 600
Laser Cannon(4) 300 each
Point Defense Rail Guns(4) 150 each

*Knocking out the main sensor array imposes a -2 to the lasers(which can subsequently only be fired under individual control) and missiles to strike.

**For purposes of critical damage, Krenno engines are -3 to target and hit.

Height: 120 ft
Width: 400 ft
Length: 300 ft
Weight: 19,000 tons
Cargo: 3,000 tons
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion w/ 25 year energy life
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 5; transatmospheric.
(Sublight) Mach 8
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 0.8% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 3 light years per hour
Market Cost: Post-Cynoceran Collapse, a fully-kitted out (minus full missile warload) Krenno could be found on the galactic black market for as little as 290 million credits .
Systems of Note:
Standard Starship Systems, plus:

*Low Emission Drive---Halfway through their long production run later models of the Krenno would be fitted with the Sikaasci-G pulse engine, which burned fuel more efficiently internally and produced less emitted radiation, and their exhaust plumes cooled and dispersed more quickly. Sikaasci-G drive units are -20% to Read Sensory Instrument rolls to detect and track.

Note: Oda Cluster sensor systems generally lacked the range and accuracy of current 3G systems, having 25-30% less range and resolution capability. The Odina Federals had slightly better sensors than their Cynoceran counterparts.

Weapons Systems:
1) Long Range Anti-Ship Torpedo Launcher(1. front)---The main armament of the Krenno was a single heavy torpedo launcher, firing 15-ton projectiles. Odinan missiles were, prior to reContact, larger than standardized 3G missiles and more akin to Golgan nuclear torpedoes or pre-spaceflight SLBMs. Though payload seems woefully limited by 3G standards, sixty missiles was deemed more than adequate(and menacing) in the preContact Oda Cluster.
Range: 500 miles in atmosphere, 1,000 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 500 miles in atmosphere, 50,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d8x1,000 MD for fusion warheads, though other warheads were available, including conventional high explosive(6d6x10 MD to 100 ft blast radius), hypervelocity kinetic penetrator( 1d6x100 MD to a 100 ft radius and can penetrate up to 250 ft of loose soil/100 ft of rock or concrete), chemical (effects vary; usually nerve agents), sensor probes, and, it was rumored, enhanced radiation neutron warheads.
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-6
Payload: 60 torpedoes

2) Heavy Lasers(4)---These would count as medium-category weapons on mainstream 3G culture warships, but they were considered heavy weapons by the less-advanced Odina Cluster militaries. Their bulky design necessitated mounting them largely outside the hull’s protection, despite efforts to armor them, and the lasers’ flexible, but damage-prone, mountings have earned them the nickname ‘penholders’ from some analysts.
Range: 4 miles in atmosphere, 8 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 8 miles in atmosphere, 8,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x100 MD per blast, 2d6x100 MD per dual blast from two cannons (counts as one attack), and 4d6x100 MD for all four cannons firing on the same target at once(counts as one attack)
Rate of Fire: Four shots per melee maximum
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

3) Point Defense Rail Guns(4)---These are the Krenno’s main PDS. Older technology, but proven.
Range: 3 miles in atmosphere, 6 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)
Damage: 3d6x10 MD per 20-rd burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: 1,000 bursts per cannon before needing reloading from stores

On the alternative, some later-model post-‘Snark Massacre’ Krennos mounted new laser PDS that did less damage, but greater range, and had individual fire control sensors.
Range: 5 miles in atmosphere, 10 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 10 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x10 MD per pulse burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited
Bonus: +1 to strike

Auxiliary Craft: None.

Variants:
Over the four decades that the Krennos was at its peak, the Cynoceran government produced several variants, most notably a command-communications cruiser(which sacrificed troop capacity for extra communications and computer gear), Electronic Warfare vessel, mine warfare tender and missile cruiser(sacrificing the troop capacity for double the missile launchers and extra torpedoes), though none of these were produced in the same numbers as the generalist model. After the ‘Snark Massacre’, a crash overhaul initiative was launched, and over a half-dozen variants, mainly focusing on relatively minor improvements to engines or different weapons configurations(including the aforementioned missile cruiser), were rushed into production.
Post-Spring, the surviving operational Krennos are mostly of these later types, upgraded with whatever scraps of Galactic technology the various Cynoceran sub-states have managed to acquire.
WZT has been rumored to be tinkering with Krenno space-frames(as they have with just about every old design they get their hands on) to see if any more use can be squeezed out of the design. Adding forcescreening, replacing the problematic lasers, sensors, and main missile armament would be obvious moves.

Omegasgundam · Wed Jul 15, 2020 10:34 pm

A viable alternative to a Berserker, if your willing to tolerate the mediocre speed (sublight and FLT) and lack of shield. Assuming adding a decent (5K MDC) fixed force field is practical, the FWC would have financed getting as many of them as possible when the TGE hammer first hit. The other weapons can be fixed later, but the shield is the big issue.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Wed Jul 15, 2020 10:39 pm

Omegasgundam wrote:A viable alternative to a Berserker, if your willing to tolerate the mediocre speed (sublight and FLT) and lack of shield. Assuming adding a decent (5K MDC) fixed force field is practical, the FWC would have financed getting as many of them as possible when the TGE hammer first hit. The other weapons can be fixed later, but the shield is the big issue.

Yep, one former instrument of oppression turned into a tool of freedom. The FWC is good at that sort of repurposing.

Omegasgundam · Wed Jul 15, 2020 10:47 pm

taalismn wrote:
Omegasgundam wrote:A viable alternative to a Berserker, if your willing to tolerate the mediocre speed (sublight and FLT) and lack of shield. Assuming adding a decent (5K MDC) fixed force field is practical, the FWC would have financed getting as many of them as possible when the TGE hammer first hit. The other weapons can be fixed later, but the shield is the big issue.

Yep, one former instrument of oppression turned into a tool of freedom. The FWC is good at that sort of repurposing.

If nothing else, their crews will be far more creative and driven, which will let to hulls go out with a bang when the time comes. They could even make use of the emissions masking if they can get a decent EWAR suite to help them.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Mon Jul 20, 2020 2:47 am

The canon Executioner is arguably the worst ship in Fleets, as it legitimately has less firepower than the Warshield. Looking at the fluff and the stats, I think its a miss-mash of two different ships write-ups that were smashed together without any regard to whether or not it actually worked, which makes me even more disappointed in the book as a whole. Assuming its just 650 years out of date, here's an improved version that has an actual role as something other than target practice for a Protector.

TGE Executioner II Upgrade
“Unlike the smaller Block-50 ships, the Executioner is simply too large and expensive to replace via attrition, so they had to develop a proper refit program for them. We know they’ve ripped out the troop bays to fit the guts needed to completely replace the weapon suite, which has always been simply pathetic of a major capital vessel. It's still light for a Battleship, but it isn’t outgunned by a single Warshield anymore. The new Champion does though, which means that the TGE is going to have to go make a new hull or two if they want to continue their usual strategies. But if Intel has picked anything up on that front, I’m not on the ‘need to know’ list, so I can only give speculation.”
----Captain Captain Vicen Trancluw, CAF

The original Executioner, while quite large, was simply horrifically under-gunned, with the latest blocks of the far smaller Warshield Cruiser having substantially more firepower. If they were to be remotely useful against the steadily improving CAF, they desperately needed an overhaul, and as soon as possible. The simplest solution, and thus the most practical, was to completely replace the older weapons with much improved models, and sacrifice the marginally useful ground forces to provide room for the expanded support systems necessary to make use of them. This also allowed for the replacement of the Raid of Death dropships with additional aerospace fighters, which have become far more of a concern than in previous centuries. Additionally, several modest automation improvements have resulted in the required crew being reduced by almost a thousand individuals, and the near complete removal of the ground forces make the ship far more tolerable to operate than most TGE designs. The rest of the ship was generally considered to be perfectly acceptable, but in a last minute alteration a substantial amount of external sensors and EWAR equipment was included for additional protection.

While the upgrade is still nowhere near as capable as the CAF’s Protector, and is arguably matched by the new Champion Heavy Cruiser, the Executioner now has an actual place on the battle line, and it has regained the ground it has lost against the various independent capital designs. Fleet Command has recognized that the hull has become fundamentally dated, and plans to replace them on the construction slips with the still developmental Eradicator Battlecruiser, which promises to be a far more efficient and combat capable platform. Similar projects include the Defiler Heavy Cruiser and Gore Nest Fleet Carrier, which promise to at least maintain the status cue with the resurgent CAF.

Spoiler:

Omegasgundam · Wed Jul 22, 2020 11:48 am

And here's a list of nasties for the TGE to give to its true powerhouses, so that they remain an actual threat against the improving CAF and FWC of my side-continuity.

The Fruits of Artifice
“While I can’t say I am particularly enthused by there being an entire House of Royals who devote themselves to being mystic scholars and craftsmen, they at least remain competent in the warrior arts. The creations they offer on the other claw are most impressive, and I must say they are worth the negotiations to acquire. They almost assuredly have far greater pieces that they keep to themselves, but that is simple common sense. So long as they remain aggressively detached from the political intrigue of Kreegor-tut, they will be a substantial asset to the Empire as a whole. That they’ve put down roots on the other side of the planet helps things in that regard.”
-Warlord Ovita, TGE

Soon after the disastrous Telbranth affair, where the rebel Free Worlds Council stole a second Doombringer Dreadnought, the Kreegor Emperor came to the conclusion that the Trans Galactic Empire's military reputation was in dire need of restoration. The might of its massed legions and armadas was clearly insufficient to instill order, and thus a number high profile 'prestige' units were needed to rally support. This had traditionally been done by the immense prowess of the Royal Kreegor and Invincible Guard, but they were beginning to loose their edge against the new generation of equipment being produced by the rest of the Three Galaxies. Unfortunately, the TGE's industrial and scientific infrastructure was poorly suited to developing and producing quality armaments and vessels in the needed time frame, but there was an alternative option. The newly returned House Yivarin were already famed as accomplished spell casters and Techno-Wizards, and were perfectly willing to engage in military arms contracts with Imperial forces, and they sidestepped the normal issues of 'foreign merchants' by being Royal Kreegor themselves. While the Yivarin's production capabilities were relatively finite, this was in some ways a benefit, as they would be unable to provide enough material to arm a coup attempt without being noticed. It helped that the House was blatantly mercenary in its dealings, and the Imperial House was the legal owner of more than half of the TGE's prodigious wealth.

Trans Galactic Empire ‘Royal Battle Armor’
“We have been informed that you produce a most notable form of armor for our most capable servants, and would like to know more”
"The 'Royal Battle Armor' is really just a cantrip by our standards, but it is substantially better than anything else that can be produced in the Empire. Its intended more as a lure for future commissions, but we don't loose anything by offering them somewhat above production costs. While we can't produce enough to outfit a meaningful portion of the Imperial Army, it would be practical to outfit the Invincible Guard and a large fraction of the Royal Houses within a few years."
"We are intrigued. What else can you offer for our direct vassals?"
"If your Imperial Majesty is willing to spend the coin, then there are very few limits."
---- The Kreegor Emperor and the House Yivarin representative, 2 years after the Minion War

“As much as I hate to say it, the ‘Royal’ armors the TGE is getting from those House Yivarin weirdos are legit works of art. Somebody over there has some actual taste, and he can make others follow his lead. They’re apparently also useful in actual combat, which is something you don’t often see in most of these sorts of garments. And I’m not talking ‘surprise assassination attemp’, I’m talking ‘charge a defended trench line and engage in a CQC melee.’ The mystic features are what really make it work, but that’s not really our field.”
---- Altess Social Rag

”These armor is a good example of useful enchantments being used to maximum effect. The material isn’t the normal TGE fair, but it’s still relatively conventional and can be replaced without a Techno-Wizard. All the actual systems are in the underlayer, and the Royal’s supernatural strength allows them to easily deal with the weight. From a wear’s perspective, the armor is incredibly articulate, and all of the features are intuitive. The use of Amulets and Talismans is inspired, as it gets around several of the normal drawbacks to these sorts of creations. The only nominal flaw I can find is the lack of a PPE battery, but its wearers have more than enough to spare. If this is the quality of work that we can expect House Yivarin to hand out, then the TGE is going to become a serious problem.”
---- UWW Report on a captured example.

The simplest Techno-Wizard creation that House Yivarin offers to its fellow Royal Kreegor, the Royal Battle Armor is intended as a teaser for what the mystically focused House can do. For all of its features and improvements, it is considered to be merely the most basic form of protection, and is priced accordingly. As it is relatively simple to produce, House Yivarin has made a very substantial number of them over the past few years, with most of the work being done by their elven servants. Despite their natural durability, the other Royal Houses find that the ‘RBA’ significantly improves their combat effectiveness, with the active spells being far easier and more convenient to use than their own natural spell casting abilities.

Spoiler:

Trans Galactic Empire IPA-WI-R-1 ‘Royal Warlord’
(aka “Super Warlord’, ‘Big Royal’, ‘Wiz-lord’)

”We would request that House Yivarin develop and produce a more capable Power Armor for our loyal Royal Kreegor subjects, so that they may continue to stand above the lesser species and serve as icons of the Trans Galactic Empire. Cost is a secondary concern, so be free to include what magical and technological enhancements you can. It is preferable that this be accomplished within 2 years. As the other Houses are no doubt fully willing to subsidize the effort, you may offer them on commission to those that desire them.”
“Give us 4 months. We already have Royal scale armors in limited production for our own members, and it will be trivial to modify them for wider proliferation. The only reason it can’t be done immediately is that we’re still setting up our local production facility and we’ll need to do some quality control testing. Our time is valuable, so priority will be given to those that are best able to provide desired materials for our research efforts.“
---- The Kreegor Emperor and the House Yivarin representative, 2 years after the Minion War

“Based on the pieces recovered, the ‘Royal Warlord’ is continuation of the same architecture style used in the Royal Battle Armor, using the wearer’s supernatural nature to make alternative engineering compromised than the norm. We have found evidence of something akin to a familiar link being employed, which draws comparisons to our own Warlock Marines. While we do not believe it is the same enchantments, it does raise the possibility that we could further improve our own designs. The actual capabilities of the armor are more or less what you would expect, and the enchantments are used well.”
---- UWW Report on recovered samples

”We don’t know much about the new Techno-Wizard PA the Royals have, but it's obvious that engaging it on its own terms is a losing proposition. They hunchbacks aren’t stupid, so they have to have Energy Resistance and Invisibility as base systems. Fortunately, we now have PA and ground vehicle Wiz-Sniffers being introduced, so the later isn’t a complete no-sell to massed ordinance anymore. I hear that the Fleet is going to be assigning Proctors with full ORACLE sets to provide overwatch in future hot spots, so that’ll give us more warning. It's going to absolutely suck to run into one in close quarters though.”
----Colonel Philip Fredette, CAF

A much more capable alternative to the mundane Warlord III, the Royal Warlord is a Techno-Wizard creation of newly returned House Yivarin, built by and for Royal Kreegor. Substantially larger and more advanced, the Royal Warlord is equal to the CAF Ground Pounder in terms of technological sophistication and material quality, and is extensively enhanced with magitech systems. Beyond simply being bigger and more durable than it's lesser cousin, the Royal Warlord boasts a far more powerful reactor, rivaling that of the 180 ton Dark Slayer in capability. This allows it to be lavishly equipped with high energy systems, such as a far stronger force field, better CG hover system, and vastly improved charging rates on the primary weapons. The other weapons have also been improved, with the head lasers being replaced with pulse models, and the missile launcher doubling in capacity. The most liked features are the enchanted blades and vastly increased strength, allowing it to land absolutely devastating blows in melee.

As brutal as that is, it is the Techno-Wizard enchantments that make the armor so widely feared. While all Royal Kreegor are intuitive spell casters, few of them make effective battlefield use of it, and their mystically provided library is always small. The Royal Warlord provides many useful spells in a ready to use package, able to be activated on command. The sensor suite and amulet clusters are of tremendous help against supernatural foes, and the various spell casting systems dramatically increase combat effectiveness for a brief time. In addition to normal Techno-Wizard systems, the Royal Warlord also features several improved spell casting talismans, which can be recharged by the commissioner even if he does not have the spells in question. They can be thought of as something of a less flexible precursor to Paladin Steel’s ‘spell card’ Multiplexors, but represents the upper limit of what House Yivarin has so far made available to their fellow Royal Kreegor.

While the Consortium has yet to encounter these mighty armors in the field, they have managed to piece together enough to have a general understanding. Their current working counter is simply an extension of their normal anti-Royal Kreegor tactics; send a squadron of ASFs to bury it in ordnance if remotely practical, and to avoid playing to its strengths if at all possible. In situations where massed ordinance is not an option, the best bet is to avoid contact or massively outnumber it with CEPA or Ground Pounder equipped forces. Royal Kreegor are as rare as they are dangerous, and the CAF is willing to tolerate a far greater amount of collateral damage and simple overkill if it means quickly removing one from the board. Their recent acquisition of vehicle scale magic detection equipment make ‘mere’ Invisibility: Superior far less of a perfect escape method that it was only a few decades prior, and being able to give an approximate location is generally enough for massed SRMs. House Yivarin is well aware of the issue, and is working to develop a both a better cloaking method using Shadow Magic and a way to reduce the effectiveness of explosives.

Spoiler:

Trans-Galactic Empire TGE-ST-115R 'Bloodrinker’ Techno-Wizard Interceptor
“We believe that the new Sharktooth is worthy of our normal Kreegor subjects, but the improved power armor that your House has produced has led us to believe that a similar aerospace craft would also be a quite exceptional addition to the Empire’s arsenal.”
“The thought has occurred to us as well. The work is still in the early stages, but we expect to have a singularly capable strike craft to offer to mystically capable pilots within 2 years.”
“With the normal commissioning arrangements.”
“Of course.”
----The Kreegor Emperor and the House Yivarin representative, shortly after the deployment of the Royal Warlord.

“The good news is that the new Magic detectors make it rather obvious when one of the bastards is lurking around, but there’s enough margin of error to make long range targeting painful at best. Void combat is simply too spread out to make most area of effect weapons effective, so the Bloodrinker will be able to disengage at will unless you have a fighter with a good pilot and a HOUND sensor on his ass when he does it. The one saving grace is that we’re almost never going to need to deal with serious numbers of them in any engagements, unless the Emperor had decided to make a personal appearance. Then all bets are off.”
---Captain Harriet McKenna, CAF, Director of Project Prominence

“Speaking from personal experience, the FTL drive is really there to allow you to return home if your carrier gets destroyed. It's going to be a long and boring flight, but one of the really nice features of the Sustain Talisman is that it takes the edge of the latter. It also gives you time to think up an explanation to give your superiors as to how you got into that mess, and saves you the political embarrassment of having to surrender to lessers simply to get something to eat. The Hull Regeneration is useful in that it allows you to repair it without going back to the Yivarin, and while they do the contractually mandated repair work its best not to do it anymore than you have too. It also means that there’s no reason for anyone else to touch your craft in the field, which drastically cuts down on the sabotage attempts. The mental link will tell you if there’s anything done to it, but it can take time to fix that you might not have in an emergency scramble.”
-Anonymous, Royal Kreegor

A followup to the Royal Warlord PA, the Bloodrinker is a slightly enlarged Techni-Wizard version of the Sharktooth intended for Royal Kreegor. House Yivarin has comprehensively upgraded all design aspects, with better systems and materials making the fighter far more capable than its lesser peers. The overall protection in all aspects has been increased by 50%, and the speed is now within a hair's breadth of the CAF Scorpion. The lasers and gravity autocannon have been replaced with ones equal to those on the CAF Black Eagle, granting both greatly improved firepower and range. A miniaturized FTL drive rounds out the conventional systems, granting it independent interstellar capability.

But it is the Technowizard features that make the Bloodrinker truly transcend its rivals. The Mystic Link the craft has with its commissioning pilot grants it sublime maneuverability in their hands, and grants a degree of mastery over all of its other aspects previously known only to Cyborgs and those with Telemechanics. The ‘conventional’ enchantments consist of those that are considered most beneficial in aerospace combat, with most of them focusing on making the craft a far more elusive target. Additionally, the craft also features the ever popular Immune to Energy, as well as an improved version of Hull Regeneration, which takes advantage of the mystically conductive semi-organic hull to grant full hull restoration capability. It also features the now typical array of mystic sensors, amulets, and talismans that are expected in Yivarin creations, adding that much more basic utility.

The Bloodrinker’s only real flaw is its exclusivity and scarcity, which are as much draws for its Royal pilots. Barring the Imperial Kreegor, it is unheard of for any Imperial Navy vessel to host more than a pair Bloodrinkers, which are often the personal craft of the ship’s Ryclus and CAG, with only the later making common use of it. Even then, they are rarely found on a hull smaller than an Executioner, as the Royal Kreegor pilots warrant nothing less. The CAF has made note of the Bloodrinker, and is responding by expediting the distribution of PPE detection equipment among its own strike craft, which will hopefully allow a 6 craft flight to counter the Technowizard craft when it makes itself known.

Spoiler:

Trans-Galactic Empire TGE-BL-155R ‘Bloodthirster’ Royal Transport
“A bold statement, but We believe your House can deliver. If your progenitor is anything to go by, you are being conservative in your estimate. What do you think you can do for a slightly larger craft? Say something the size of the Bloodletter?”
“The Bloodletter is still developmental, but we have some personal transports to draw some inspiration from. A large portion of the work that goes into the fighter would also carry over, so about an additional year all told.”
“Wonderful. There are no end of uses for a capable craft of that size. Many of them don’t even necessitate using its weapons! But We foresee that it will be simply impractical to make in substantial numbers, with your artisans already having quite the list of tasks to accomplish already.”
“That is correct, your majesty. Fortunately, we were already intending on pulling out of a number of our now redundant holdings, which will give us a quite substantial increase in manpower. We even have a great many trustworthy servants to shoulder a good portion of the burden. I must admit to being unclear on how Lord Yivarin managed to acquire the latter, but the Calians have been faithfully been serving us for more than a millennia, with all do devotion and diligence."
“Calians? We think we have heard of them before, and it must have been quite the adventure if Yivarin managed to acquire enough of them to form the core of your house’s vassals.”
“Lord Yivarin has also managed to breed them into being more generally useful, at least for our purposes, and a large number of them have become reasonably capable artisans in their own right. They will never be true researchers, but they make wonderful assistants.”
----The Kreegor Emperor and the House Yivarin representative

“The one upside is that the Bloodthirster is going to be rare as hell, with only a relative handful of the Royal Houses having the resources and connections to get them. But that still leaves the problem in that they are absolute nightmares from a security perspective, because they are near perfect infiltration craft. Even if you can detect and intercept it, it’s as heavily armed and armored as you would expect something a Royal Kreegor would elect to use as a personal shuttle. It's just as much of a problem on the outgoing side, and if the rumors of a teleport system are true it's going to be a complete pain in the ass to kill any Royal that has one. The Invincible Guard have to be getting their own equivalents soon as well, if only to serve as a counterweight. We have to expedite ORACLE distribution to system defense commands.”
--- Chief Director Gene Starshot, GSA.

“Pain in the ass is putting it mildly. My teams had no less than 6 of the bastards teleport themselves out of a no-win situation over the last two years. If you want to kill one of the real Blue Bloods these days, you have to trash their ship first, and they know when you do it. They’re complete ********, but they’re not stupid, and the really nasty ones got that way because they know when to cut and run. It would be so much easier if we could use the big warheads, but that’ll have to wait until the next big throwdown.”
----General Vlar Reltish, CAF Ground Forces

An outgrowth of the Bloodrinker, the Bloodthirster is intended as a high-class personal transport, and as a TGE vessel it is naturally armed to the teeth. House Yivarin is noticeably more stringent for who they allow to acquire these craft, leaving them in the hands of the Emprie’s true elite. Beyond the simple utility of an extremely capable stealth combat transport, the Bloodthirster has become a status symbol of the upper noble class, and can be fitted with all the luxury amenities that Royal Kreegor can admit to having a preference for, and being able to simply vanish from view has value that transcends mere currency. Those with Bloodthristers can conduct their private affairs knowing that they will remain private, and are as well protected as possible short of being on a Smasher Light Cruiser. Additionally, the ship is blisteringly fast in FTL, allowing its operators to return to their duties all that much faster.

Spoiler:

Trans-Galactic Empire 'Imperial Kreegor’ Super Dreadnought
“Out of curiosity, just how large a craft can you enchant? We may have to commission a personal transport for Ourselves to keep up appearances.”
“Given our currently available knowledge base, we could create a mystic version of the Doombringer, but that would require a substantial amount of infrastructure to be made plausible.”
“Fydra Beta has a space nexus that you may appropriate.”
“With a space nexus and the Empire’s largest shipyard on hand? That simplifies things tremendously. It shouldn’t take more than 4 years to set up the Tangent Yard-Station, which would provide additional benefits beyond simple construction. The ship would take a good decade assuming we don’t see a dramatic change in our manpower requirements, and I know a substantial number of our House would be quite interested in such a rare large scale project.”
“Then let it be done. The Doombringer has become somewhat dated with the Consortium’s own Dreadnought, and could stand to be revisited. We can’t have the damnable rebels making us look bad either. A full enchanted version would be appropriate for Our august presence, and send the appropriate message to Our subjects.”
“We may have some refits for the current ships that will soothe your concerns regarding them. The pseudo-familiar link that we have been incorporating into our creations has some fascinating utility from a national security perspective.”
“Oh? Do tell. It would be nice to put some of Our lingering doubts to rest.”
----The Kreegor Emperor and the House Yivarin representative

“The ‘normal’ Super-Dread is bad enough, but the Imperial Kreegor is going to be an outright nightmare to deal with. As the Emperor’s personal command, it’ll have all the best toys, and will function as a true flagship for whatever fleet is present. Add in that it's going to be both more durable and is as enchanted as something you’d expect out of the UWW, the only ‘good’ way to take it down we have so far it massed ASF launched Heavy AM torps at close range. Which is going to be even harder than usual, considering the tentative TOE we got our hands on listed a full damn wing of Bloodrinkers in its hangers. The only bright side is that there’s only going to be just the one, which means that we can drop a few fleets on it when it shows its head.”
----- CAF Admiral of the Fleet Janice Nikola

“Our few spies in Fydra Beta, through a streak of what can only be dumb luck, managed to accidentally get their hands on the revised lower hull of the improved Doombringer, so we should be able to do a similar rebuild to the Hopebringer and Lightbringer the next time they needs serious reconstruction. I’ve talked with our OD friends, and they’ve agreed to facilitate moving the various spare parts we have for them to Oridone, so if the opportunity comes up we can do it. And while I hate to say it, it might be a good idea to ship everything else we can, as we won’t last long if the mystic version the Yivarin are building gets thrown at us. Thundercloud is simply a safer place for us to put down roots that Corkscrew right now”
----Supreme Commander Rachel Klass, FWC Cadre.

The TGE has begun a sweeping upgrade of its current military, but the one major vessel so far not included was the mighty Doombringer. After substantial debate, the Emperor came to the conclusion that the pride of the TGE simply needed a major improvement to stay competitive with the CAF’s new Emancipation, which had proven itself disturbingly capable as both a gun and carrier platform. With the Imperial Armada’s current roster of such vessels reduced to 22 with the capture of the mostly intact Telbrath at during its refit during the infamous raid on Halvorks, the Doombringer was unarguably falling behind, and the emergency recall of the Second Thundercloud Fleet to its traditional holdings only worsened the relative balance of power against the resurgent post-Minion War CAF. As was now often the case in high prestige projects, House Yivarin was called into to provide consolation, and would soon find themselves fully responsible for a particularly important facet of the program. The Dreadnoughts stationed in Corkscrew would be cycled through Fydra Beta for the next decade, receiving the major alterations, and House Yivarin has now taken over the primary construction slip in order to produce a extremely powerful vessel to serve as the true flagship of the Imperial Armada, the Imperial Kreegor.

The ‘normal’ Doombringer II is a comprehensive rebuild of the original, greatly revising its systems to make it better suited for going up against peer opponents. The forward lower hull has been radically changed, with two additional Super Horn Lasers being added to the underside. The secondary weapons have also been replaced and expanded, more than doubling the number of lesser anti-ship weapons. The anti-fighter/missile turrets have been replaced with models that have been quietly copied off of the FWC’s Hopebringer refit, and the Cruise Missile Launchers have been upgraded to dual purpose models that have become popular across the Imperial Navy. Also taken from the Hopebringer is an extensive array of long range sensors and EWAR equipment, increasing the ship’s survivability against massed ordinance strikes.

As stated before, House Yivarin was heavily involved in the primary project, both scientifically and mystically. Beyond engineering skill, the Kreegor Emperor commissioned the magic using House to provide a number of practical mystic improvements to the ships, such as Circles of Protection and a long range mystic sensor suite. It is also quietly rumored that the ships also have a mystic link to the Emperor, allowing him to remotely neutralize them should he desire to do so, which would explain the doctrinal changes that the Imperial Navy is instituting. Considering the previous handling of the vessels, and the existence of similar links in previous Yivarin creations, most treat this as a given. The Doombringers currently in Thundercloud and Anvil have not yet been upgraded, but it is intended that they be refitted at Fydra Beta when their reactors need replacement.

But as potent as these changes are, the Imperial Kreegor herself will be a breed apart. Almost every aspect of its construction is being supervised by House Yivarin, and several key aspects are being directly handled by Lord Yivarin and his Doppelgangers. To start with, the Imperial flagship’s hull has been greatly augmented with technowizard enhancements, making it half again as resilient as it would otherwise be. This infused hull is then used to channel enchantments of an unprecedented scale, making it truly nightmarish to neutralize through conventional means. Even further protection is granted by the full wing of Bloodrinkers and a squadron of Bloodthirsters, in addition to the ‘normal’ 3 wings of Invincible Guardsmen piloted Sharkteeth.

As the official ship of state and the flagship of the entire Imperial Navy, the Imperial Kreegor will be under the direct command of the Kreegor Emperor, who was an accomplished naval Cressak before being elevated to Tronton and later Warlord. The ship will be crewed entirely by those qualified to be part of the Invincible Guard, and their loyalty to the Emperor is unquestioned. The expansive Imperial Suite will allow the ship to serve as the mobile capital of the TGE if need be, although the bureaucratic apparatus would need to be spread over a number of mobile stations due to their sprawling size. The Emperor fully intends to use the Imperial Kreegor to command the next war against the CCW within the next 50 years, and he would prefer it begin within the next 30 if current trends continue.

Spoiler:

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Wed Jul 22, 2020 1:24 pm

And now I'm going to finish off the CAF with what will be their most common design, and then the least. After this I'm going to do work on the UWW, which will be interesting with all the different design styles.

(Based on Kitsune's version, with additions from DB:8)
Consortium Armed Forces CEPA-01 Exoarmor
(‘Super-Trooper’)

”The CEPA is what every soldier has ever wanted since functional Power Armor became a thing, a mass production design that can replace normal EBA. It has the systems to make full use of the range of whatever you can hold, assuming your armorer sets it up right, and a host of incredibly helpful addons if your procurement office has the cash to shell out. It’s not always appropriate, but it's rarely a bad choice when it is. The only drawbacks all relate to its primary strength, its too light to be as durable or as well equipped as a full suit of PA, but it's head and shoulders above standard EBA .”
----General Vlar Reltish, CAF Ground Forces

“The CEPA really does represent a seismic shift in how we conduct planetary warfare. It’s an admission that non-powered infantry are unacceptably vulnerable on the modern battlefield, and that you need some form of augmentation to stay relevant. The UWW has magic, and the USA has their biomods, but the only acceptable method we can use is massed exoskeletons. They’re pricey, yes, but far less so that a full suit of Power Armor like the Ground Pounder. When we apply the levels of mass production that we did with the CG-F units, we can drive the price even lower, which will make it a merely painful expenditure as opposed to an outrageous one. The projected project cost is looking to be substantially higher than what we spend to get the Emancipations, but the immediately obvious and widespread benefits will kill any serious protest. ‘Keeping our boys alive’ is a strong selling point after-all.”
---CAF Admiral of the Fleet Janice Nikola

”As difficult as it is to admit, the Consortium’s new infantry armor makes them a far more problematic foe on the ground, which will make our conquest much more tedious and exhausting. While the expenditure of coin is no double a sign of their decadence, it is a fact that one of their front-line soldiers is now a match for a short squad on Kreegor Legionaries, which is not an acceptable exchange by any stretch of the imagination. While the best solution is to place even more focus on our Power Armor, I shudder to think at how time and resources that would cost. A more practical solution is to field our own equivalent, using our superior Kreegor physiology to simplify and rationalize the design. With your permission, I will issue the order immediately.”
“Let it be done, Warlord Ovita. The rebels will be an adequate field test when it is finished. The Consortium is becoming concerningly less inept, and it would not do to give them an excuse to embarrass us. Hmmm…… We may have to ask that infuriating Wander for his input about a Royal grade model. Knowing him he’s already half finished something that can be appropriated, but we’ll need something that can be produced by less….. skilled and storied…. individuals. ”
-Warlord Ovita and the Kreegor Emperor.

Drawing from the expensive lessons learned during Operation Gut Cutter, the CEPA is the CAF’s equivalent to Naruni’s NE-BA-55 ‘Super-Soldier’. As bare bones as can be made practical, the CEPA bridges the divide between battle armor with an exoskeleton and a true suit of power armor. The overall intent was to produce something that could be used as the former with as much capability of the latter, and by all accounts it succeeds admirably. While the absolute baseline model is merely a higher basic spec version of the Naruni model, it quickly increases in capability when the various options are included, gaining incredible leaping mobility from a CG Flight Pack and firepower from integrated weapons. Other common additions include full force fields and nuclear batteries. The CAF allows the purchase of the basic models, but reserves the most capable versions for its own use, which include the infamous ‘Spector’ Sensor and reverse engineered Thermo-Kinetic Armor.

As much as the CAF would like to give every infantry soldier their own CEPA, this is impractical to say the least, and unwarranted. The overwhelming majority of the CAF’s ground operations are some variety of Peace Keeping, which are more than adequately served by lesser unpowered EBA. The CEPA is reserved for truly hazardous assignments, such as combat missions against other galactic militaries and boarding actions.

Spoiler:

And finally my (first) saving throw for the Big-E. The write up in Fleets was just stupid, but this should be workable. I've since given it a substantial rebuilt, but that comes in almost a decade later.
Consortium Armed Forces 'Emancipation’ Dreadnought Upgrade
”A lot of the mockery that gets sent at the Big-E is due to the honestly stupid configuration that it was in during the field trials. It was never intended to stay that way for long, but the media kept using it as their stock photo of the class. This is compounded by some of the early proposed parasite compliments being jumbled together, which made it look like the biggest and most overpriced assault ship in existence. That fortunately changed after Gut Cutter, which prominently displayed them looking like proper Consortium ships. The true production version is a far better design, which we’re going to need against the improved Doombringers.”

“The old Doombringer was honestly undergunned for its mass, which would have made a shootout between it and even the test-type Emancipation something of a one sided battle in our favor. The rebuild they’re pushing through makes it much more even fight, but we still have the advantage in most aspects. We also know how to operate as an actual fleet, which will do wonders in balancing the exchange ratio. While we’re still as much Carrier as Gunship, we’re much better at both.”

“The CAF really gave themselves an unnecessary black eye with the test configuration, but that’s died down with the Minion War. The much more ‘Protector-ish’ silhouette of the rebuild has done much to restore confidence in the class, and the fact that it's clearly no longer intended to serve as an assault ship makes it far more palpable to the general population. The old perception was that it was something the TGE would have put out, and that was a bad thing to be stuck to a CAF ship.”

The original 3 Emancipations were more test-beds than actual warships, with tremendous flaws in their weapons and hull layout being evident to even the most novice engineers. However, the Balanced Hammond Drive has some peculiarities that needed to be worked out, resulting in the distinctive ‘claw’ appearance of these early configurations. Once the final kinks were solved, the ships immediately returned to drydock and began a very extensive rebuilding process, comprehensively changing the ship's appearance and capabilities. Work was almost complete at the outbreak of the Minion War, which delayed efforts somewhat. However, the delay allowed the details of the now famous ‘Restoration’ Package to make its way to Goldilox, resulting in some last minute alterations.

The most obvious change is it’s appearance, with the spindly and claw-like silhouette being filled out with additional hull sections, framework, and armor. This led to substantial improvements to the support systems of the primary forward mounts, resulting in quadrupling of the sustained rate of fire. Secondary armaments were also greatly improved, with the 40-inch HI-lasers turrets being increased by 50%, backed up by no less than 24 Triple Gauss Cannon Turrets now festooning the hull to provide protection against energy resistant targets. The Cruise Missile Batteries have been doubled, and an even greater number of LRM Batteries have been installed to provide area defense against incoming strike craft and light attack ships. Lastly, the older PD weapons have been improved with much larger installations, now firing MRMs and having a much deeper payload for the GR-1000s, and an array of Tachyon Scatterguns have been included for burst anti-missile defense.

The ship has also received defensive improvements, with overall hull strength being more than doubled and the somewhat small Variable Force Field being replaced by one that was appropriate for the ship’s mass. Like on the Restoration, the Emancipation now features a cutting edge longer range sensor array and EWAR suite, granting the ship greatly improved tactical awareness and protection against guided ordinance. As a final defensive feature would be added post-war, after the CAF took note of the creations of House Yivaran. While the fully inorganic hull makes the process of applying mystic wardings substantially more time consuming, the CAF was willing to spend the resources to hire the services of a well respected major UWW cabal to apply them to their most powerful vessels, granting them a degree of protection against more exotic means of attack.

Spoiler:

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Wed Jul 22, 2020 9:19 pm

WZT/TmeR-SBB01 ‘Demas’ Battleship
(aka ‘Skola’)
“...just how many guns is that damn thing packing?!”
“They have a lot of space aboard those frames.”

“’Skola’?”
“One of the few words of Sorm we can translate and articulate. It apparently describes a large quill-....more like horns...covered armored beastie native to the neobarbs’ homeworld that even they have trouble trying to eat. No, the Sorm didn’t like it when we began raiding into THEIR space with Demas battlegroups; their comm-chatter compared them to the foraging rampages the skola make through Sorm communities. Seemed appropriate, so the battleship crews have started using the term as well.”

“I’m not saying the Tmelain are looking to pick a fight with the TGE what with the Tme being reestablished, but their new construction makes it clear that if there’s ever a rematch, the Tme mean to exact some hard payback on the Impies. Knowing they’re still likely to be outnumbered, they’ve outfitted their new battleships to be able to take down more than their weight in Impie battlewagons if it comes to that sort of situation. ”

The Tmelain, famed and feared in the Rim for their massive powerful Cachalot Landing Ships, lost the ability to build more when the TransGalactic Empire rolled over their worlds. They regained some of their industrial might when they were able to retake several of their stakehold worlds, and establish a new capital world for their exiled culture. With the assistance of WZTechYards, the Tme were able to build new shipyard facilities, with warship production taking priority. Repairing and replacing the older Cachalots which had been used to transport a good percentage of their population to their new refuge worlds was established early, but while they purchased a good number of warships from WZT and their allies, the Tme were looking to create their own new designs as well. Membership in the United Systems Alliance gave them some security, but the Tme recognized that few of their fellow members had the capacity to design and build capital warships(the USA tended towards lighter vessels appropriate for trade protection). Having seen Kreeghor Smasher battleships shoulder aside their homeguard fleet ships and shrug off their weak firepower, the Tme had an appreciation for heavy warships.
The Demas is an effort to field a Tme battleship design that could act as a backbone to the new defense forces the Tmelain-in-exile were building, and as a weapon they could sell to the United Systems Alliance.
The Demas is based on the Cachalot, using several frames for new assault transports being built in the new Paktra Shipyards and pulled early for conversion to full battleships. The Demas conversion sacrifices troop capacity in favor of added armor, propulsion, and weaponry, turning the transport into a dedicated shipkiller and weapons platform.
It was actually two work-up Demas hulls that were sent to take part in the defense of Altess Prime. These ships were sent sans main weapons, especially the massdrivers, in expectation of being refitted with more appropriate weaponry onsite. How the AJC knew the Altess would have weaponry to spare for the Tme battlewagons remains undisclosed, but rumors abound that the AJC had previously unknown dealings with the Altess beforehand, had psychic foreshadowing, or else the GNEAF component of the taskforce was already bringing along enough spare guns to stuff into the available spaces on the Demas.
As it was, the Altess DID have available weaponry in the form of several old surface-to-space energy cannons and orbital fortress guns that the Armoria were willing to part with, and the task force had both means and time to install them before the Golgans made their push on Altess Prime. Afterwards, the Tme were allowed to keep the refitted cannons by the grateful Altess. Perhaps more importantly, the Tme and WZTYards had full battle records of how the Demas configuration performed in combat before they finalized the design. This data proved invaluable in completing the final design.
The Demas retains some planetary attack capabilities, but trades the massdrivers for additional heavy energy cannon. Troop and lander capability has been exchanged for additional fighters(including a large drone complement) and missile launchers, though some mass has been shaved with the removal of the troop-lander barges. This has allowed a 30% increase in speed.
The Demas is being offered as a backup design to the Joshua Norton II Space Battleship, which has been introduced as the USA’s ‘standard’ battleship design. Interestingly enough, the Altess have placed an order for two right off the assembly line, possibly as tributes to the ships that served in defense of their world, and as part of a nice gratuity to the Tmelain.

(Note: ‘Demas’ is a traditional Tme name for a large toothed predatory cetacean analogue of the lost Tmelain homeworld. The Tme gave the name to the battleship after it was explained to them what ‘Cachalot’ meant in reference to whales).

Type: WZ-SB-003 Demas
Class: Space Battleship
Crew: 1,150 +360 Marines + 600 Aerospace Complement
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 100,000
Bridge 20,000
Hangar Decks(6) 13,000 each
Engines 60,000
Mega Ion Disruptor Cannon(1) 60,000
Heavy Laser Cannons(2) 8,000 each
Medium Laser Cannons (6) 900 each
Tachyon Cannon(6) 500 each
Kinetic Kill Rail Guns(4) 600 each
Cruise Missile Launchers(4) 500 each
Long Range Missile Launchers(6) 500 each
Point Defense Particle Beam Cannon(18) 180 each
Point Defense G-Cannons(20) 200 each
Point Defense Mini-Missile Launchers(12) 150 each
Variable Forcefields* 72,000 (12,000 each side)

*Shield Refresh Rate is 20% per melee

Height: 1,500 feet (500 m)
Width: 1,800 feet (600 m)
Length: 1 mile (1600 m)
Weight: 51 million tons
Cargo: 4 million tons
Powerplant: Advanced Lucerin-Fuelled Nuclear Fusion w/ 50 year energy life.
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 3; transatmospheric. Rarely operates in an atmosphere, however.
(Sublight) Mach 8
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 0.8% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 5 light years per hour
(Underwater) Not Possible
Market Cost: 59 billion credits to build
Systems of Note:
Standard Starship Systems, plus;

*Syzite-Crystal composite armor---First pioneered on the tiny Atom Light Fighter, this advanced armor comes in the form of overlapping flat crystalline ‘cells’ bonded together by fiber-conduits that help transfer and disperse energy from weapons attacks, reducing the damage. This effectively works to render the ship’s hull resistant to ENERGY weapons, such as lasers, ion, plasma, and particle beams(do HALF damage). However, magic attacks and kinetic attacks(rail guns, explosive missiles, meteors, etc.) do FULL damage. If the ship’s hull takes more than 70% overall damage, the dispersion network is compromised and energy attacks revert to full damage.
Note also that the Syzite-Crystal incidentally renders the Demas INVULNERABLE to energy disruption attacks such as its own Ion Mega Cannon and directed EMP assaults.

*ORACLE Mk V---Omni-diRectional Aura Classification and Locator Electronics--- Dealing with supernatural threats being an all-too-common occurrence for AJC ships, detection capability is considered to be standard for new construction(and as many older ships as they can refit) vessels. A TW development of the SNARLS PPE Scanner, this system consists of a series of advanced Technowizardry scanner systems(TW optic mounts, static crystal PPE meters, and whatnot) stationed around the ship, feeding into a central computer system with special TW-derived interface program algorithms. The system is designed to detect incoming magical/paranormal attacks and alert the crew to them(hopefully in time to allow them to take defensive measures). Linkage to the Ectofiber Grid has increased the sensitivity and effectiveness of this system.
See Aura: Slightly different than the spell in that it can scan an entire target such as a ship or station. The enchantment can be used to target a single individual but only have one tenth normal range when being used in that matter. Costs 60 P.P.E. per activation due to extended range. Range: 1,000 miles (1,610 kilometers) in space and 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) in an atmosphere. Effects / Abilities: Gives an approximate count of the number of life forms onboard. Gives the average level of experience, highest level of experience, and lowest level of experience [Given in these terms: Low (1-3), medium (4-7), high (8th and up).] Tells if there is any magic onboard. Gives if there are any psychics onboard (Mind Block will prevent detection), Gives a general count on the amount of P.P.E. the target has (basically the P.P.E. of the crew and any devices which store P.P.E.). Detects if there is any kind of possession. Finally sees if the crew or ship has any unusual aberrations.
• See the Invisible Sensors: The ships has several special optical and other sensor systems with see the invisible on them. Same as spell and used at will (requires no P.P.E. to activate). Range: 2,000 miles (3,220 kilometers) in space and 2 miles (3.2 km) in an atmosphere. Effects / Abilities: Can see forces, objects, and creatures which can turn invisible, or are invisible. Can also see vaporous beings and astral bodies.
• Sense Magic: The ship has sensors which the give the ability to detect active magic. Similar to spell and used at will (requires no P.P.E. to activate). Range: 200,000 miles (322,000 kilometers) in space and 200 miles (320 km) in an atmosphere. Effects / Abilities: detects the presence of magic if within detection range of ship and gives bearing on magic and basic range although not exact position. Detects active enchantments but will not generally detect spell casters in general.
• Sense Rifts: Ship has sensors which effectively allow Rifts to be detected(requires no P.P.E. to activate). Range: 500,000 miles (805,000 kilometers) in space and 500 miles (805 km) in an atmosphere. Effects / Abilities: Detects the presence of Rifts (including those created by Rifts Drives) and unlike when detecting magic gives position very accurately.

Weapons Systems:
1) Superheavy Ion MegaCannon(1, center body)---This GARGANTUAN ion weapon is meant to both vaporize targets and disrupt entire electrical systems with enhanced ElectroMagnetic Pulse. Each shot is powered by triggering a fusion nuclear plasma explosion inside the weapon’s firing chamber, then shaping the EMP wave with forcefields and directing it like a giant invisible bullet.
This weapon has been known to cause aurora-like upper atmosphere disturbances on planets that it is used against, as well as lightning-like atmospheric phenomenon in the lower atmosphere.
This weapon has been retained by production Demas, despite its slow rate of fire, because of its area of effect and extra damage to shields. They are arguably the closest the AJC has to duplicating the Altess’ magnetic photon arrays. The SIMC has been improved with advancing technology to have a slightly faster recharge cycle.
Range: 16 miles in atmosphere, 80 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 80 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space )
HALF range to expand the area of effect to a 30-degree wide cone.
Damage: 6d6x1,000 MD per blast, DOUBLE damage to forcefields
Plus, electrical damage similar to the Triax Lightning Blaster:
01-15 No additional damage
16-30 Instrumentation flickers for 1d4 seconds, and lose initiative
31-45 All weapons systems go off-line! One comes back online in 1d4 melees.
46-60. All systems off-line for 1d4 melees
61-75 Communications, targeting, and radar are knocked off-line. Manual targeting only; -3 to strike, and no initiative
76-90 All systems except one weapons system are cooked; -25% to piloting at 1/3 maximum speed. -50% at 1/2 maximum speed, -75% at maximum speed, no initiative to strike, -3 to Dodge and Strike, and lose 1 action/attack per melee.
91-00 All electrical systems are zapped, and the vehicle is dead in space.

(Atmosphere)
Wipes out unshielded electronics within a 100 mile radius of the point of targeting
Rate of Fire: 1 shot every 10 minutes
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

2) Heavy Laser Cannon Arrays(4, lateral outriggers)---Powerful triple-barrel laser cannon batteries replace the massdrivers. These are fusion-pumped weapons using a plasma combustion chamber similar to the SIMC, but have a faster rate of fire. The Tme wanted an array that could outgun a TGE Executioner battleship and punish the Imperial vessel long enough for other factors to come into play.
Range: 30 miles in atmosphere, 100 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 30 miles in atmosphere, 30,000 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x1,000 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: Twice per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

3) Medium Laser Cannons(6)---These six cannon, normally kept concealed inside the hull behind sliding armored ports, are meant to give the Cachalot some direct fire capability against capital warships, though they are also precise and accurate enough for pinpoint planetary bombardment. Originally considered to be heavy weapons in Tme service, these have been downgraded in classification to medium weapons.
Range: 7 miles in atmosphere, 16 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 16 miles in atmosphere, 16,000 miles in space )
Damage: 2d6x100 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: Twice per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

4) Cruise Missile Launchers(4)---These were installed in old hangar bays for the heavy combat landers. With WZT reliably producing cruise missiles, it was decided to give the Demas several full batteries of them. In a turn of irony, the launchers supplied to the Tme for their Demas battleships were those originally slated for new Providence/Constitition-class battlecruisers, but with the rethinking of that program and new construction temporarily suspended, it was thought unnecessary to leave the subsystems subcontractor lines idle.
Range: Varies by missile type
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by missile type
Rate of Fire: From 1-12 missiles can be fired in one volley
Payload: 36 Cruise Missiles per launcher. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 6 missiles)

5) Long Range Missile Launchers (6)---These highly versatile launchers can be used to launch anti-ship missiles(though not as powerful as Cruise Missiles, they can be launched in multiple-missile salvoes), surface attack ordnance, mine dispensers, recon probes, and other specialized projectile types.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-12
Payload: 576 LRMs, 96 missiles per launcher; additional missiles may be carried and loaded from cargo, but will take at least 15 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 12 missiles),

6) Kinetic Kill Rail Guns(3x4)---The AJC listened to their own repair crews that did the CAF Restoration work and made sure to fit all new construction Demas with KKGs in the form of four triple-barrel batteries. Their Syzite-Crystal composite armor being vulnerable to kinetic attacks, Demas crews have good reason to respect KEWs.
Range:(Palladium) 10 miles(40 miles in space)
(Kitsune) 10 miles(10,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d4x100 MD per 80 rd burst, 3d4x100 MD for all three cannon firing simultaneously(240 rounds)
(Fragmentation rounds) Do 4d6 x10 MD to a 100 ft wide area with an 80 rd burst, 6d6x10 MD to a 150 ft wide area double cannon burst, and 8d6x10 MD to a 200 ft wide area per triple cannon burst. Targets of the frag rounds are -2 to dodge.
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: 32,000 rds(400 bursts) per cannon

7) Tachyon Cannon(6)---Originally the plan was to add medium range missile launchers to provide intermediate range anti-fighter/missile defense, but combat experience at Altess Prime showed the effectiveness of ‘sprayers’. Besides, it was argued, medium range missiles could be carried by the ship’s large complement of fighters.
Range: 5 miles (2,500 m) in atmosphere, 10 miles (10,000 m) in space w/ 6 mile wide arc*
(Kitsune Values: 5 miles in atmosphere, 5,000 miles in space)
*Width are reduced to 1/4th in atmosphere
Damage: 1d6x100 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

8 ) Point Defense Particle Beam Cannons(18)----Rapid fire particle beam energy point defense cannons for antimissile/fighter defense. With the recent introduction of the PS-HPBC-21 particle beam cannon(an improved version of the BFG mounted on the ‘Murder-Hobo Megabago’), the original spec PBCs have been replaced with the more powerful model. The original weapons have reportedly been recycled to equip the growing defensive ‘gun buoy’ battle-satellite network around the Tmelain shipyards.
Range: 8,000 ft in atmosphere, 16,000 ft in space
(Kitsune Values: 3 miles in atmosphere, 300 miles in space)
Damage: 5d6x10 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: EGCHH(4-6)
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

9) Point Defense G-Cannons(20)---Rapid fire kinetic energy point defense cannons for antimissile/fighter defense. Acting upon the recommendations of the commanders at Altess Prime, the Tme shipyards replaced all the original rail guns with GR-1000 G-guns.
Range: 6 miles in atmosphere, 12 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 6,000 miles in space)
Damage: 4d6x10 MD per 10 rd burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH(4-6)
Payload: 1,000 bursts per cannon

10) Point Defense Mini-Missile Launchers(12)----Anti-missile/anti-fighter barrage weapons. Largely unchanged from the original, with the exception of being able to fire the S-Sting mini-missiles now percolating through AJC fleet force logistics.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 100 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-20
Payload: 400 mini-missiles per turret. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 15 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 96 missiles)
(Option)---The Mini-Missile launcher component of these turrets can be modified to fire the “S-Sting” ‘Smart Mini-Missile -----The S-Sting(for ‘Space Stinger’) is an attempt to adapt the guidance systems and accuracy of the ‘Black Talon’ L-SAM to a space-based missile. The missile resembles a rather stubby cylinder with a blunt-nosed optical cluster and protruding verniers(extend after launching), owing to the fact that the vacuum of space negates the need for streamlining the weapon.
Note that the ‘S-Sting’ has only limited effectiveness in an atmosphere....HALF bonuses in a thin atmosphere and weak gravity well like Mars’, and NO bonuses, and HALF range in a thick atmosphere and standard gravity like Earth’s.
Range: 4 miles in atmosphere, 32 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 4 miles in atmosphere/ 400 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x10 MD to a 15 ft blast radius
Bonuses: +7 to strike

Aux. Craft:
16 Shuttles
100 Fighters
400 Drones
360 Power Armors

Variants:
The Demas is arguably already a variant of the Cachalot, but the advance order of two by the Altess raises interesting possibilities. Though the order may be a form of gift to the Tmelain, the ships upon delivery will likely be refitted to be even more automated, the crew quarters remodeled to the sybaritic standards acceptable to the Altess, and the main armament changed out for more advanced Altess-produced weapons. There is also speculation that the fighter complement will be made up wholly of drones, though of what providence remains unknown(while Enryues would be readily available and a known quality to the Altess, having seen them in action over Altess Prime, new Naruni designs or perhaps even a locally Altess-designed and -sourced drone fighter may be possible).

*WZ-SB-003A---There are currently only two examples fitted to this spec, and both of them were the original ships deployed to Altess Prime. The WZ-SB-003A lack the ion disruptor, but have instead been refitted with massive Altess-made heavy laser cannon. Their point defense rail guns have since been upgraded to the GR-1000 specification, and their flight decks remodeled to carry fighters and drones.
Changes/Modifications:
Weapons Systems:
1) Superheavy Laser Arrays(2)---These take the place of the original mega ion disruptor and are old planetary defense cannon that the Armoria had mothballed. They predate the current state of the art magnetic photon arrays(which is probably why the Altess allowed the AJC to keep them afterwards) but still pack a considerable punch.
Range: 16 miles in atmosphere, 100 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 100 miles in atmosphere, 100,000 miles in space )
Damage: 6d6x1,000 MD per shot
Rate of Fire: One shot every minute; the WZ-SB-003A typically staggers the firing of the two arrays to 3 melee intervals.
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

7) Medium Range Missile Launchers(6)---These were the original intended intermediate range missile/fighter defense weaponry. Experience at Altess-Prime led to them being replaced with tachyon cannons.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 160 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-16
Payload: 80 missiles each launcher, reloading from the cargo hold takes 15 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 24 missiles)

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Thu Jul 23, 2020 10:14 pm

Pests with interstellar capability.....

Sorm ‘Femur’ Cruiser
(aka ‘Boneship’)
<<“Sorm Femur at three-seven-three..no, make that four, repeat FOUR, Sorm Femur cruisers...correction, FIVE Femur cruisers! This is it, lads, the hunt’s come to our home space!”>>

“I don’t envy the bastards in the res-teams who get to revive the poor souls pulled from the abattoir holds of the boneships. They hardly ever wake up sane after what they’ve experienced. Sometimes I wish we would leave them dead rather than try to snatch something back from the darkness. Nothing good can come from those damn ships, and once the forensic techs have studied them, I’m quite pleased to destroy them. I think of it as exorcism.”

The neobarb Sorm have puzzled many anthropologists and technologists as to how the rapacious species manages to maintain a spacefaring capability. Theories range from a slow evolution into technological capability, while others believe that the Sorm were gifted, either by extinct patrons or still-living supporters, with their current technology.
Their starships show the basics of FTL design, combined with a unique aesthetic, but how the Sorm achieved spaceflight, let alone starflight, is an enigma. Regardless, the Sorm have proven a viable and deadly threat to several sectors of the Three Galaxies, and the sight of their distinctive ships in a star system, especially an inhabited one, is cause for alarm.
The main and most frequently encountered Sorm warship is the ‘Femur’, so-called due to its resemblance to a humanoid thighbone. The Sorms’ own name for the ship-type is virtually unpronounceable by most humanoid vocal apparatus, but has been deciphered by Noro psychics to mean ‘swift conveyor of hunters to delicious prey’. The Femur is their main anti-spacecraft unit, hunting down and seizing prey and eliminating defenders.
The Femur has a long hull plated in psuedo-ceramic armor, and ending in a distinctive spherical drive module hanging under the end of the hull. Propulsion is by a fairly basic contra-gravity drive, presumably of Sorm manufacture, though several examples have been found to have incorporated elements of known engines of other species, including CCW, TGE and even Kittani. This has raised speculation that the Sorm may prefer scavenging drives when available, rather than use their own homemade units, or else may be working off a cache or source of engines that they themselves didn’t produce in the first place. Recent intel developed by the United Systems Alliance, though, has identified several Sorm ‘factory’ sites near or on their homeworlds assembling new ships, though whether these locations include Sorm-operated propulsion works or simply caches of old engines remains unknown.
Sorm ships use a combination of kinetic and disabling energy weapons such as ion projectors or neutron cannon. Missile systems seem either beyond Sorm capabilities or distasteful to their sensibilities(Sorm under Noro psychic interview have indicated that they prefer weapons that ‘leave meat’).
Rather than variable forcefields, Sorm ships generate monoplanar force shields.
One technological feature that has come as an unwelcome surprise is the ability of the Sorm to actively track other CG/FTL ships through hyperspace without elaborate sensor systems such as deployable arrays.
Crew accommodations on a Femur are reportedly fairly spartan, with only high-rank Sorm having private quarters, often decorated with trophies taken in combat. For the most part, rank and file Sorm spend their time aboard ship estivating in cocoons clustered in galleries around communal eating areas that double as social spaces.
Fortunately, for all their size, Femurs are relatively fragile craft(and the Sorm apparently have not discovered how to generate high-end or variable forcefields), and modern warships can destroy them quite easily. Unfortunately, they rarely travel alone, usually in the company of other cruisers or escorted by packs of Bonecutter attack ships(which they can carry as parasite craft; the Femur lacks internal hangar space).

Type: Sor-HC01 ‘Femur’
Class: Cruiser
Crew: 350+ 500 troops
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 38,000
Bridge 4,000
Drive Sphere 10,000
Fusion Guns(3) 500 each
Ion Cannon(5) 400 each
Neutron Cannons(6) 400 each
Point Defense G-Cannon Turrets(10) 300 each
Forcefield 9,000
Height: 450 ft
Width: 350 ft
Length: 1,500 ft
Weight: 700,000 tons
Cargo: 35,000 tons
Has provision for carrying up to 800 slaves in conditions that can only be described as ‘abominable’, though Sorm rarely leave prey alive for long.
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion(Estimated energy life before refueling of 30 years)
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 3; transatmospheric.
(Sublight) Mach 10
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 1.0% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 3 light years per hour
Market Cost: No functional Femur has ever appeared on any Galactic market.
Systems of Note:
Equivalent to Standard Starship Systems, plus:

*Ceramat Armor---The Sorm make use of a ceramic composite that is extremely resistant to heat(heat, plasma, and even the thermal flash from nuclear weapons do 1/4 normal damage). Lasers, ion weapons, and concussive blasts from high explosives do normal damage, particle beams do 50% more damage, and high speed kinetics such as rail guns, g-cannon, and armor-piercing warheads do DOUBLE damage.

*Repair Foam---As vulnerable as the Ceramet may be to kinetic strikes, the Sorm seem to have realized that it is also vulnerable to high speed impacts with space debris...an almost unforgivable sin for higher performance spacecraft. So the Sorm technology has incorporating a form of self-repair/healing mechanism that pumps a quick-sealing and -hardening ceramic foam-paste into any holes in their ships’ integument. This is virtually automatic, and repairs 1d6x10 MDC of gross hull damage to any part of the hull, per melee. It CANNOT repair damaged/destroyed weapons systems or other active systems. It is unknown what the limits of this system are with regards to how much damage it can continually repair.

*Hyperspace Tracking---The Sorm seem to be able to track escaping ships through FTL-hyperspace without the need to deploy large tracking arrays. Note that they cannot DETECT ships moving through hyperspace, but can trace a ship they see leaving INTO hyperspace. Sorm ships will typically try to tag along as quickly as possible(within 1d4 minutes) to follow a ship to its destination, but even if they don’t, they can at least get a general direction the vessel is fleeing in.

Weapons Systems:
1) Fusion Guns(3)---These are the Sorms’ main anti-warship weapons and are directed radiation weapons of fairly short range for capital units. They fire packets of plasma that attempt to explosively combine with target materials.
Range: 7 miles in atmosphere, 14 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 14 miles in atmosphere, 14,000 miles in space)
Damage: 4d4x100 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: Twice per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

2) G-Cannon(10)---These are cruder and bulkier than their CAF and TGE equivalents, but still very effective.
Range: 8 miles in atmosphere, 16 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 16 miles in atmosphere, 16,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x100 MD per burst
Rate of Fire: Six times per melee
Payload: 500 bursts per cannon

3) Ion Cannon(5)---These weapons are typically used to take other spacecraft more or less intact for boarding and scavenge.
Range:(Palladium)5 miles in atmosphere, 10 miles in space
(Kitsune Values) 5 miles in atmosphere, 5 ,000 miles in space Damage: 1d4x100 MD per blast,
In addition to physical damage, the cannon does EM damage. Percentage of EM damage is determined in relation to target’s main body((damage/main body)x100=percentage). For every 10% of damage from main body in ion damage, target will be -1 to strike, parry. and dodge. In space target acceleration will be reduced by 15%, in atmosphere top speed will be reduced by 15%. Roll once on critical hit charts in Phaseworld or Conversion book as appropriate.
If target takes 60% of main body in ion damage, ship or vehicle will be disabled completely. All weapon, navigation, and other systems will shut down and need to be repaired/replaced to work again/reboot.
Does NO damage against non-mechanical/electronic targets.
The ion cannon is equally effective against bionics
Rate of Fire: Three times per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

4) Neutron Cannon(6)---The Sorm possess a crude form of neutron emitter with effects similar to the Kittani weapon.
Range: 5 miles in atmosphere, 10 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 5 miles in atmosphere, 5,000 miles in space)
Damage: 4d6x10 MD per blast, plus 50% more damage to ORGANIC targets. Also irradiates a 30 ft radius around the point of impact: those without radiation shielding or EBA must roll versus lethal poison or take 2d6 Hit Point damage(megadamage constitutions do NOT take this extra damage), and will be -9 to initiative, -7 strike/parry/dodge, and reduce Speed, APMs, and skill performance is HALF. Effects last until the damage is healed. MDC organic beings failing the save will be -4 to initiative, -3 strike/parry/dodge, and reduce Speed, APMs, and skill performance is HALF for 2d6 minutes after a radiation strike, while their bodies cope to the shock. Effects are cumulative from multiple strikes.
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

5) Bombs(?)---While the Sorm may not use missile weapons, on occasion they have been observed to use their capital ships to deploy heavy freefall ordnance. The weapons deployed have ranged from large incendiary drops to Tsar Bomba-style multi-megaton nuclear devices, depending on the circumstance(the block burners have been used on fortified cities to flush out prey, while the nuke was used on a Chedive fortress that showed NO signs of yielding to the Sorm invasion). Bomb drops have all been from within atmosphere; the Sorm do not seem to have mastered the mechanics of orbital bombardment.

Auxiliary Craft:
Up to 10 BoneCutters can attach to the length of a Femur.

Sorm ‘Cactus’ Carrier
(aka ‘Gnarlee’, ‘Bloodscrapper’)
“In principle, these bastards are like our Brunels; big spacetug haulers with modular pods that can hook into a central core. Operationally, though, they use them like combination carriers and planetary assault ships. They also don’t take full advantage of the modularity aspect; generally a Cactus adds lobe-modules and they stay in that configuration baring damage or a change in the particular swarm’s fortunes. So no two Cacti are exactly alike. “

“Sorm carriers look impressive as hell towering over an LZ, and they bristle with ugly cannon, so I’m not surprised a lot of the lotech cultures out here are rightly terrified of them, especially after seeing their tube- and rocket-artllery swatted with impunity out of the air. But if you keep your head and you know what you’re doing, you can cut these things down at the base; they look REALLY spectacular collapsing. I even dropped one using a load of NaiBead fireworks. That particular bloodscrapper went down spewing plasma sparkler fire from every port and vent-”

The Cactus is the Sorms’ main carrier platform, an unusual vessel that acts as combination troop carrier, fighter carrier, and surface base lander. Small swarmer parties will typically have one as their mobile base of operations, while larger swarms have been observed to have several dozen. These large units represent major incursions.
Cactus Carriers resemble their namesakes; large towering multi-lobed structures rising from a circular base that holds the main engines. They are ‘tail-sitters’ with the interior decks aligned perpendicular to the direction of acceleration/deceleration. Landed, they become towering fortresses from which Sorm forces can disembark on their rampages.
The ‘lobes’ sprouting from the main body are covered with protruding spikes, some of which are antennae, but the majority if which are point defense weapons and attachment points for small craft, which are carried externally. The lobes can serve as cargo holds, barracks, or even lifeboats and reentry pods. Lobes blown free of the main body have been found months later floating in open space, still airtight and sustaining life. More ominously, Cactus carriers have been destroyed in orbit by defense forces...and later, Sorm hordes have emerged from ejected and unnoticed hull-lobes that have survived reentry.
Cactus Carriers rely on their parasite craft and embarked troops as their main weapons; they lack sufficient weight of heavy anti-warship armaments. They mount, however, a very strong complement of point defense systems, a combination of lasers and G-guns.
Sorm tactical doctrine is for the Cactus Carriers to hang back until the Femurs and Bonecutters have eliminated a target world’s main resistance, then the ships land, ideally near a habitation center, where the Cactus can terrorize the populace with their weapons, and the emerging Sorm hordes can breakfast away their post-estivation cravings with the fresh meat of their victims.
Fortunately, the Sorm don’t seem to have cracked the problem of variable forcefields, and their existing field generation capability is weak, leaving their ships protected only by their physical armor and what point defense they have.

Type: Sor-CvLs01 ‘Cactus’
Class: Heavy Troop/Fighter Carrier
Crew: 750 + 500 per lobe
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 15,000
Bridge Tower 2,000
Fusion Gun(1) 500
Neutron Cannons(3) 400 each
Lobes(10+2d6) 1,000 each
Laser Cannon(6 per lobe) 200 each
G-Cannons(4 per lobe) 200 each
Engine Block 9,000
Forcefield 9,000
Height: 2,200 ft(this essentially becomes length in flight)
Width: 950 ft at base
Length: 950 ft at base
Weight: 3.8 million tons
Cargo: 200,,000 tons
Each lobe can hold an additional 2,000 tons(8,000 tons if wholly dedicated to holding cargo)
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 3; transatmospheric.
(Sublight) Mach 8
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 0.8% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 3 light years per hour
Market Cost: None have been made available for sale
Systems of Note:
Equivalent to Standard Starship Systems, plus:

*Jamming---The Sorm, for all their primitiveness, seem to understand electronic jamming, and they will regularly use the powerful powerplants of their Cactus-carriers to brute-force pump out enough electromagnetic static to make virtual hash of EM-based communications in their vicinity. Planetary attack flotillas routinely use this to cut off communities from being able to summon help and prevent local resistance forces from coordinating attacks. Jams and distorts radar returns in a 60 mile radius(60,000 miles in space) of the spacecraft, and communications(civilian bands with 90% proficiency, military with 75% effectiveness) in an 150 mile radius(150,000 miles in space).

*Ceramat Armor---The Sorm make use of a ceramic composite that is extremely resistant to heat(heat, plasma, and even the thermal flash from nuclear weapons do 1/4 normal damage). Lasers, ion weapons, and concussive blasts from high explosives do normal damage, particle beams do 50% more damage, and high speed kinetics such as rail guns, g-cannon, and armor-piercing warheads do DOUBLE damage.

*Repair Foam---As vulnerable as the Ceramet may be to kinetic strikes, the Sorm seem to have realized that it is also vulnerable to high speed impacts with space debris...an almost unforgivable sin for higher performance spacecraft. So the Sorm technology has incorporating a form of self-repair/healing mechanism that pumps a quick-sealing and -hardening ceramic foam-paste into any holes in their ships’ integument. This is virtually automatic, and repairs 1d6x10 MDC of gross hull damage to any part of the hull, per melee. It CANNOT repair damaged/destroyed weapons systems or other active systems. It is unknown what the limits of this system are with regards to how much damage it can continually repair.

*Hyperspace Tracking---The Sorm seem to be able to track escaping ships through FTL-hyperspace without the need to deploy large tracking arrays. Note that they cannot DETECT ships moving through hyperspace, but can trace a ship they see leaving INTO hyperspace. Sorm ships will typically try to tag along as quickly as possible(within 1d4 minutes) to follow a ship to its destination, but even if they don’t, they can at least get a general direction the vessel is fleeing in.

Weapons Systems:
1) Neutron Cannons(3)---The Sorm possess a crude form of neutron emitter with effects similar to the Kittani weapon. The Cactus mounts three in swivel turrets just behind its bow. In landed mode, these cannon are typically used to sweep the landing zone of resistance.
Range: 3 miles in atmosphere, 6 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 6,000 miles in space)
Damage: 4d6x10 MD per blast, plus 50% more damage to ORGANIC targets. Also irradiates a 30 ft radius around the point of impact: those without radiation shielding or EBA must roll versus lethal poison or take 2d6 Hit Point damage(megadamage constitutions do NOT take this extra damage), and will be -9 to initiative, -7 strike/parry/dodge, and reduce Speed, APMs, and skill performance is HALF. Effects last until the damage is healed. MDC organic beings failing the save will be -4 to initiative, -3 strike/parry/dodge, and reduce Speed, APMs, and skill performance is HALF for 2d6 minutes after a radiation strike, while their bodies cope to the shock. Effects are cumulative from multiple strikes.
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

2) Fusion Gun(1)---These are the Sorms’ main anti-warship weapons and are directed radiation weapons of fairly short range for capital units. They fire packets of plasma that attempt to explosively combine with target materials. The Cactus carries a single fusion gun mount in its bow.
Range: 7 miles in atmosphere, 14 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 14 miles in atmosphere, 14,000 miles in space)
Damage: 4d4x100 MD per blast
Rate of Fire: Twice per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

3) Laser Cannon(6 per lobe)---Each lobe, regardless of function, carries a set of laser cannon for point defense.
Range: 3 miles in atmosphere, 6 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)
Damage: 6d6x10 MD per rapid-fire burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

4) G-Cannons(4 per lobe)---Each lobe, regardless of function, carries a set of g-cannon for point defense.
Range: 1.2 miles in atmosphere, 3 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 3 miles in atmosphere, 300 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x10 MD per 40 rd burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: 1,000 bursts per gun

Auxiliary Craft:
Can carry 8 Bonecutter attack ships per lobe(4 per side)

Variants:
Cactus Carriers vary from each other mainly in the number of lobes attached to their central core-frame, and the main purpose to which each lobe is committed. However, a number of reports have surfaced showing some Cactus Carries carrying specialized weapons lobes, such as carrying extra fusion guns., more powerful g-cannon or lasers, or rocket pods One incident indicated that a Sorm vessel used relativistic bombing to lob heavy projectiles with heavy massdriver damage velocities at a planet, though whether this was a specially-made projectile of simply a detached hull lobe remain unclear.

Sorm ‘Bonecutter’ Attack Ship
“Against scientific outposts and bare floor agri-colonies, these things are murder-wagons and terror-birds. Against dug-in triple-A or heavy infantry with enough good manpad fly-geeker missiles, though, they become sky-trash.”

“I’d almost be amused at the prospect of shooting more of those ‘skeets’ out of the air, if not for the fact that every one of those that we miss means a fifteen-count of those damn monsters being out there somewhere menacing the settlers here.”

The ‘Bonecutter’ is a Sorm light combatant, similar to the CAF Proctor, that is typically deployed in large numbers to overwhelm the defenses of victims. It takes its name from the carnivorous nature of the Sorm and the ships’ resemblance to bonesaw blades. The ships are used as both heavy fighters and ground attack craft, providing Sorm hunt parties with ‘over-the-shoulder’ aerial artillery support.
Hull plan is that of a fat flying wing or saucer, with protruding ventral and dorsal atmospheric control surfaces and drive vanes, armored in the same psuedo-ceramic as the larger ships. Surprisingly, these ships have their own FTL capability, allowing them to act as advance scouts. They also seem to have the same FTL tracking capability of the larger vessels, via means that still elude Three Galaxy analytical engineers studying wrecked vessels. This has fueled speculation that the tracking system may require the biological presence of the Sorm in concert with their technology, or may be a trait of the Sorm themselves. Being the fastest of the known Sorm ships, the Bonecutter is the vessel most often dispatched to track escaping prey, following them to their destination and hopefully to more prey.
Though individually not much of a threat to proper warships, Bonecutters are potential murder against civilian ships and communities. Deployed in sufficiently large numbers, they can overwhelm the defenses of even large warships.
Fortunately, Bonecutters have rather weak armor and rudimentary forceshielding, and against dedicated modern air defense systems have fared poorly(some United Systems Alliance troops have taken to calling them ‘skeets’).

Type: Sor-A01 ‘Bonecutter’
Class: Attack Ship
Crew: 5 +10 troops
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 900
Cockpit 200
Forcefield 700
Height: 23 ft
Width: 85 ft
Length: 75 ft
Weight: 80 tons
Cargo: 10 tons
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion(Estimated energy life before refueling of 6 years)
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Hover to Mach 5; transatmospheric.
(Sublight) Mach 11
(Kitsune Values: 40% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 1.1% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 5 light years per hour
(Underwater) Unlike their larger ships, the Sorm Bonecutter can land on and take off from water, making defending possible landing areas that much more difficult.
Market Cost: None have been made available for sale
Systems of Note:
Equivalent to Standard Starship Systems, plus:

*Ceramat Armor---The Sorm make use of a ceramic composite that is extremely resistant to heat(heat, plasma, and even the thermal flash from nuclear weapons do 1/4 normal damage). Lasers, ion weapons, and concussive blasts from high explosives do normal damage, particle beams do 50% more damage, and high speed kinetics such as rail guns, g-cannon, and armor-piercing warheads do DOUBLE damage.

*Hyperspace Tracking---The Sorm seem to be able to track escaping ships through FTL-hyperspace without the need to deploy large tracking arrays. Note that they cannot DETECT ships moving through hyperspace, but can trace a ship they see leaving INTO hyperspace. Sorm ships will typically try to tag along as quickly as possible(within 1d4 minutes) to follow a ship to its destination, but even if they don’t, they can at least get a general direction the vessel is fleeing in.

Weapons Systems:
1) Neutron Cannon(2)---The Sorm have developed(or found) enhanced radiation projection weapons that work in similar fashion to the neutron weapons used by the Splugorth in that they do extra damage to living creatures, but they also have the added side-effect of weakening prey by adversely affecting vulnerable nervous systems.
Range: 1 mile in atmosphere, 3 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 3 miles in atmosphere, 300 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x10 MD per blast, plus 50% more damage to ORGANIC targets. Also irradiates a 30 ft radius around the point of impact: those without radiation shielding or EBA must roll versus lethal poison or take 2d6 Hit Point damage, and will be -9 to initiative, -7 strike/parry/dodge, and reduce Speed, APMs, and skill performance is HALF. Effects last until the damage is healed.
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

2) G-Cannon(4)---These are cruder and bulkier than their CAF and TGE equivalents, but still very effective.
Range: 1.2 miles in atmosphere, 3 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 3 miles in atmosphere, 300 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x10 MD per 40 rd burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: 500 bursts per gun

3) Bombs/Rockets---The Sorm don’t use guided missiles, but instead use unguided ‘dumb’ munitions.
*Rockets
Range:(Short) 7 miles in atmosphere, 14 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 7 miles in atmosphere, 400 miles in space)
Damage:
(Fragmentation) 1d6x10 MD to a 60 ft blast radius
(Incendiary) 1d4x10 MD to a 50 ft blast radius, plus 01-75% chance of setting combustible materials aflame
(High Explosive) 2d6x10 MD to a 20 ft blast radius
(Plasma) 3d4x10 MD to a 40 ft blast radius
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-8
Payload: 24 tubes under each wing, total of 48

*Bombs---Can carry the equivalent number of freefall bombs, only DOUBLE the blast radius.

Variants:
*BoneSlicer---Laser-armed variant, replacing the G-Cannon with powerful lasers
Range: 12,000 ft in atmosphere, 36,000 ft in space
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 200 miles in space) Damage: 2d6x10 MD per burst, 8d6x10 MD for all four laser mounts firing simultaneously.
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

*BoneBomber---(Aka ‘Daisy-Cutter’) Replaces the crew/troop compartment with an ordnance bay instead. These versions are used to carpet -bomb or ‘stuka’ prey resistance. Can carry 7 tons of freefall bombs;
*250-lb Bomb----2d4x10 MD to 50 ft blast radius
*500-lb Bomb----4d4x10 MD to 60 ft blast radius
*750-lb Bomb----4d6x10 MD to 65 ft blast radius
*1,000-lb Bomb----1d4x100 MD to 70 ft blast radius
*2,000-lb Bomb----2d4x100 MD to 80 ft blast radius
*5,000-lb Bomb----4d4x100 MD to 100 ft blast radius
*10,000-lb Bomb----4d6x100 MD to 120 ft blast radius
*22,000-lb Bomb---- 4d6x100 MD to 180 ft blast radius

OR, can carry the equivalent of the aforementioned rocket warheads, 175 in all, and DOUBLE the blast radius.

*BoneDrilla---Kamikaze version, piloted by one crew member and carrying a large explosive charge or nuclear weapon. The deployment of this variant seems to be a recent development in response to the Sorm facing more advanced opponents; the Sorm use BoneDrillas as their equivalent of cruise missiles. Word has it the task of piloting these suicide-sleds is given to old or disgraced and downfallen Sorm who would otherwise be eaten, but have been given a last chance to redeem themselves.

*Stealth Cutter?---Some witnesses have reported making eyeball contact on BoneCutters that have not shown up on other sensors, suggesting that some Sorm ships may utilize some form of stealth. If so, the militaries opposing the Sorm would be VERY interested in verifying if this worrying development is true.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 2:44 pm

Hi ho, hi ho, it off to knockoff Kitsune I go!

Lothrain Mageworks/WZT ‘Heartwood’ Corvette

(‘Tree Ship’, “Wood Boat’)

“The Heartwood is really just an overgrown heavy fighter, but that makes sense from their perspective. They use it as a customs and patrol craft, and having the extra bodies really helps with inspections. The relatively small number of conventional systems means that the maintenance burden is below normal for the type, which allows them to get by with as few as 12 people if needed. It was originally designed as a missile boat, but the Annihilate Cannons were added on at the last moment. They’re at least on par with most conventional mounts, so I bet that the UWW is hoping that they make them a standard weapon.”

"The Heartwood has two semi-experimental systems, the Annihilate Cannons and the small Rift Jump Drive. The former is something the Dwarves have been fiddling with for a good century or so, but they’ve never managed to make it work right. The Hearwood’s pseudo-living and Ectofibre infused hull provides just enough mystic oomph to get it functional, and the feedback back will hopefully allow them to finish the refinements. The Rift Jump Drive on the other hand is considered somewhat finicky due to the ship’s relatively low mass, which poses a number of engineering problems. That's the reason the Arcane Patrol Ship weighs so damn much, which led to most of its other issues. They think they’ve ironed out the last of the kinks though, and the Guildmasters I’ve talked to think they can put it on a 4 kiloton hull now, but there’s not much of a reason to do so.”

"While it's objectively a bit annoying to have a source of competition sprout up, Lothrain isn’t going to be looking for proper military contracts any time soon. Their Boomerangs and Heartwoods are not what the Warlock Fleet is looking for and they know it. Thus, they’ve shaped their sales strategy around marketing to the planetary defense forces, we won’t have the production capacity to spread ourselves that thin. While the Rhilith orbitals still have plenty of growth left in them, a lot of people don’t have the time to wait, and so they turn to Lothrain to pick up the slack. It's better than turning to Naruni after-all.”

The follow-on to the Boomerang, the Heartwood is Lothrain’s first domestically produced warship. Looking something like a cross between a late age of sail frigate and an early ironclad, the Heartwood is intended to serve as a general patrol ship, enforcing customs seeing off casual outlaws. Like the Boomerang, the Heartwood is constructed from a single Great Banner Oak, although it uses a full mature specimen rather than a one quickly grown on a plantation. The pseudo-living hull is combined with Ectofibre to grant it incredible mystical energy channeling ability, allowing it to do much more with less. While the raw protection is somewhat low for its mass, the various Techno-Wizard enchantments more than make up for it.

For the conventional components, Lothrain Mageworks once again reached out to WZTechYards. While still using a normal fusion reactor, the relative lack of high energy systems allows for most of it to be directed to the propulsion, giving it a good thrust profile. The missile launchers were copied off of the Hauberk, along with half of the PD turrets. To make up for the lack of MRM salvo strength, half the turrets have been upgraded to use more powerful and longer ranged weapons, drawing from the various ‘Heavy’ Modular Fighter Mounts that WZT offers. Many suspect that Lothrain Mageworks will soon become a true affiliate of the sprawling consortium, giving ASI a true competitor for Techno-Wizard ship design.

Spoiler:

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 7:56 pm

I just noticed I never posted my version of Kitsune's upgraded CAF Assault Shuttle.

Consortium Armed Forces SAS-12-D Advanced Assault Shuttle
The CAF has had to conduct many drop operations in recent decades against enemies with effective air defenses, and the Assault Shuttle’s lack of a shield has proven to be a constant problem. The Shuttle’s lack of agility meant that it always took serious hits, and dozens of fully loaded shuttles have been lost due to their inability to take sustained anti-ship fire and its inability to shoot back. After a string of bad press, the procurement board authorized an expedient upgrade to improve the situation. Only a relatively small portion of the total fleet was intended to be converted, but the demands of the Minion War and the subsequent dramatic increase in the effective budget have expanded it to the entire inventory. The ongoing purge of the bureaucratic/legal forest helped things along as well.

The improved Assault Shuttle features the shield off of the Proctor, more than doubling its ability to take incoming fire and remain intact. This also results in far less rattled soldiers, which makes them more effective when they hit the ground. The undercarriage is now also adorned with more than 30 medium missile pylons, allowing it to carry a quite substantial amount of guided ordinance for use against enemy interceptors and fixed defenses. The fire control system was also upgraded to make use of it, allowing it to control substantial solvoes.

MDC/Armor by Location:

Variable Forcefield------------------400 per side (2400 total)
Market Cost: 180 Million Credits new, ~40 million to refit

Weapons Systems:

1) Laser/MM Turrets (4):

2) Variable Focus Particle Beam Cannons (2):

3) Underbelly Medium Missile Pylons (32):

Variants:
The only prior ‘on-book’ variant was the installation of a basic 2 ly/h FTL drive, granting it much improved inter-system mobility and allowing it to reach locations without its mothership entering the combat zone. This required a substantially more capable power generator, and is quite uncommon. All of them have been upgraded to the new standard however, due to needing less work than the baseline model. +30 Million Credits.

There has been substantial talk of turning the upgraded shuttle into an EWAR craft, with its massive internal bay being able to fit a large array of sensors and jammers. While this has not yet been done, there is substantial interest in it, so it is likely that prototype will be constructed soon.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 8:05 pm

Omegasgundam wrote:Hi ho, hi ho, it off to knockoff Kitsune I go!

Lothrain Mageworks/WZT ‘Heartwood’ Corvette.

Makes me long for childhood days of reading science fiction on the porch of a summer cottage by the sea shore... boats and the ocean of space....flights of fancy walking on old timbers...the groan of sails and the star-sprayed black sky... :-(

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 9:30 pm

taalismn wrote:
Omegasgundam wrote:Hi ho, hi ho, it off to knockoff Kitsune I go!

Lothrain Mageworks/WZT ‘Heartwood’ Corvette.

Makes me long for childhood days of reading science fiction on the porch of a summer cottage by the sea shore... boats and the ocean of space....flights of fancy walking on old timbers...the groan of sails and the star-sprayed black sky...

I kind of imagining the Lothrain ships a bit like those of the elven armada in Spelljammer.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 10:11 pm

SolCannibal wrote:[

I kind of imagining the Lothrain ships a bit like those of the elven armada in Spelljammer.

I got that vibe from the canon stingray Arcane Battleship of the UWW.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 11:29 pm

taalismn wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:[

I kind of imagining the Lothrain ships a bit like those of the elven armada in Spelljammer.

I got that vibe from the canon stingray Arcane Battleship of the UWW.

In what book do i find it?

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Fri Jul 24, 2020 11:39 pm

SolCannibal wrote:[

In what book do i find it?

Dimension Book 6: Three Galaxies, pg. 144.
It's the Nexus Mark X Battleship.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 12:33 am

taalismn wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:[

In what book do i find it?

Dimension Book 6: Three Galaxies, pg. 144.
It's the Nexus Mark X Battleship.

No image?

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 12:46 am

SolCannibal wrote:No image?

No image.

But it's described as being wider than it is long, has wings, and a powerful canon armament in its 'scorpion-like' tail. Now it COULD look more like a dragon, I suppose, but the overall impression I get is of a stingray.

SolCannibal · Unread post by **SolCannibal** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 1:07 am

taalismn wrote:
SolCannibal wrote:No image?

No image.

But it's described as being wider than it is long, has wings, and a powerful canon armament in its 'scorpion-like' tail. Now it COULD look more like a dragon, I suppose, but the overall impression I get is of a stingray.

So, kind of like this a little, i guess.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 1:28 am

SolCannibal wrote:
So, kind of like this a little, I guess.

Yep, pretty much.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 8:14 pm

Tiger-1 Mobile Base/Battlefortress
(aka ‘Stars’ Bane’)

“Big? You wanna talk about BIG? The Tiger’s so freakin’ big that even three weeks after we took over the thing and started repairs, we were still winkling out holdouts and ex-slaves who’d been hiding in corners here and there aboard!”

“The main service corridors on this thing are big enough to drive -tanks- down! And that’s exactly how we took this thing; Regular Army managed to get some armored aboard. Between the Stellies space-walking on the outside, and the groundies fighting what amounted to an urban campaign on the inside, the poor dumb Dominion ‘borgs got pulverized in between. Never saw anything like it before in my career.”

“The Stars Bane is a lesson that bigger is not always better.”

This massive vessel can be considered to be the spoils of war, a prize taken during an antipiracy action. It was formerly the Stars’ Bane, and the flagship of the pirate border-state Darc Dominion before it made the unwise decision to hit a Greater New England star nation supply convoy.
From what can be discerned from surviving records, this MASSIVE vessel started life as a mobile industrial complex built by some still-unknown human periphery state. Whether it was abandoned and later salvaged, or stolen outright, by the pirate-state Darc Dominion, remains unknown. In any event, the so-called ‘Darc Lord’ had the vessel modified into a warship; entire blocks of onboard manufacturing ripped out and relocated to the Dominion’s slave-worlds, and the resulting space turned over to weapons and hangar bays. The remaining shipboard industrial facilities were turned over to producing munitions and components for the Dominion’s complement of fighters and combat vehicles. The solar arrays had weapons mounts added to them, the massdriver transport system altered into combat cannon, and the industrial energy projectors modified into weapons. The former administration quarters aboard the industrial platform became the living quarters for the DarcLord and his closest lieutenants, with several chambers becoming his opulent throneroom and trophy rooms.
Upon its completion, the newly renamed -Stars’ Bane- became the much-feared symbol of the Darc Dominion, the flagship of the feared Darc Lord, scourge of the lesser worlds that cowered under the Dominion’s iron heel. The mere approach of the massive ship was cause to fear, and was often enough to quell rebellion before the giant warship could bring its powerful planet-searing weapons to bear.
Despite its military makeover, the Stars’ Bane remained something of a paper tiger. Though it looked extremely formidable, the massive ship was quite slow and handled awkwardly. Its shields were weak for its size, and its armor, though tough, was distributed unevenly around the massive space-frame. Its weaponry came from a variety of sources and varied in performance from individual weapon to weapon, with an improvised fire control system that worked just fine against weaker opposition, but which could be severely taxed against more modern and well-equipped opponents. The Darc Lord relied more on using the complement of fighters and small craft(a ragtag lot of mercenary dregs pulled from various backwaters) to reduce the resistance of prospective conquests, while the Stars’ Bane closed to orbit and then used its massdrivers and solar accumulators to threaten the planetary populations directly.
The Stars’ Bane’s size worked against it in the end when the Darc Lord made the mistake of launching an attack on a convoy of Aegis Stellar Industries-flagged transports. Seeing a giant warship bearing down on them demanding their surrender, the PS/ASI escort force panicked; thinking that if they turned and ran, the transports would be cut up anyway, the escort force turned and attacked, preparing to sell themselves dearly to give the vulnerable cargo ships and personnel transporters time to escape. The unexpected charge by the outmassed escort ships caught the Dominion gun-crews offguard long enough for the smaller warships to actually do substantial damage and make physical contact with the giant ship’s hull. Stars’ Bane’s very scale allowed GNE Stelmarines to establish beachheads on and inside the ship and get enough heavy equipment aboard to actually conduct tank warfare inside the ship’s large corridors. A lucky missile barrage against discombobulated point defense systems resulted in the forward quarter of the ship being blown off, along with the Darc Lord and his command bridge, ending coordinated resistance(but also making confirmation of the DarcLord’s death impossible). Unfortunately, the damage also destroyed the ship’s navigational computers, meaning that the exact location of the DarcLord’s Dominion that much more difficult to ascertain.
Currently the Stars’ Bane, renamed the Tiger-1, is in orbit of the ASI mining world of Tsi-Eta Gamma, being refitted for relocation to the Amberjin facilities. There it is expected to be refitted into a mobile industrial complex, thus restoring the giant vessel to its original purpose.
Currently PS/ASI has announced no intention to duplicate the design, so the Tiger-1 remains a solitary animal, though aspects of its design are expected to appear on other PS/ASI factory-ships.

Type: Tiger-1 Mobile Battlefortress
Class: Mobile Industrial/Base Complex/Battleship.
Crew: Capacity for some 200,000 crew and workers. Capacity has ben expanded to be able to carry a maximum of 500,000.
At the time of its capture, the Stars’ Bane was undermanned, with a complement of only about 38,000.
MDC/Armor by Location:
Main Body 400,000
Bridge(actually the Secondary Bridge/Engineering) 5,000
Hangar Bays(8) 3,000 each
Heavy Laser Cannons(25) 1,000 each
Medium Laser Cannons(75) 600 each
Point Defense Lasers(120) 180 each
Medium G-Cannon(50) 500 each
Light Rail Guns(100) 150 each
Long Range Missile Launchers(10) 500 each
Short Range Missile Launchers(80) 300 each
Mini-Missile Launchers(120) 250 each
Microwave Cannon(2) 2,000 each
Tractor Beam Mounts(40) 150 each
Massdrivers(2) 7,000 each
Solar Arrays(2) 2,000 each
Propulsion Blocks(2) 50,000 each
Variable Forcefields 6,000 per side, 36,000 total

Height: 0.4 miles
Width: 3 miles
Length: 2.8 miles
Weight: 32 million tons
Cargo: 7 million tons
Powerplant: Nuclear Fusion w/ 60 year energy life
Speed:
(Atmosphere) Not possible; designed for space operations
(Sublight) Mach 5
(Kitsune Values: 60% of light speed; Accelerates/decelerates at 0.5% of light speed per melee)
(FTL) 3 light years per hour
(Underwater) Not possible
Market Cost: A similar vessel could be expected to be valued in the 50 billion+credit range.
Systems of Note:
Standard Starship Systems, plus:
*FTL Comm Arrays---The Star’s Bane mounted several antennae farms for FTL radio, allowing the DarcLord to keep in touch with his empire. Post-Tsi-Eta Gamma, the surviving arrays were shown to be little better than commercial systems, and the destruction of the command bridge also took out the main communications center, removing any chance of discerning details about the Darc Dominion from the comm-logs and settings.

*Onboard Manufactories---The Star’s Bane originally had several extensive refinery and fabrication facilities aboard, but either these had been removed at the time of the ship was acquired, or the DarcLord had them removed and transferred to other facilities. A few smaller lines remained, though, mainly churning out repair parts for the ship and parasite complement, and power-packs for small arms.

Weapons Systems:
1) Heavy Laser Cannons(25)---The Stars’ Bane’s main complement of capital weapons appear, for the most part, to have been scavenged from various sources and mounted aboard the ship, attached to the industrial power grid.
Range: 15 miles in atmosphere, 80 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 80 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d4x1,000 MD per shot
Rate of Fire: 2 shots per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

2) Medium Laser Cannons(75)---Like the heavy lasers, these appear to be an adhoc collection of weapons acquired from various sources and grafted onto the original industrial platform
Range: 5 miles in atmosphere, 10 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 10 miles in atmosphere, 10,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d4x100 MD per single barrel, 2d4x100 MD for two cannons firing simultaneously(counts as one attack).
Rate of Fire: Four shots per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

3) Point Defense Lasers(120)---The original ship DID have an array of point defense lasers for dealing with small asteroids and meteorites.. These have been supplemented by additional laser weapons pulled, as with so much of the added armament, from various sources. Despite their number and cyborg gunners, a lack of effectively coordinated fire control meant that there were gaps in coverage, which proved fatal when the ASI/GNE military forces pushed on through to board the Star’s Bane. Many of the destroyed turrets are being replaced by the ASI/PS repair crews with CCW-pattern dual laer-and-mini-missile turrets and a more effective fire control system.
Range: 1 mile in atmosphere, 2 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 200 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x10 MD per burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH(usually 5-6)
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

4) Medium G-Cannon(50)---A number of these fairly substantial weapons were stripped from other sources and added to the Stars’ Bane’s hull.
Range: 8 miles in atmosphere, 16 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 16 miles in atmosphere, 16,000 miles in space)
Damage: 2d6x100 MD per cannon, or 8d6x100 for all four cannon firing simultaneously!
Rate of Fire: Each barrel can fire four times per melee
Payload: Effectively Unlimited

5) Light Rail Guns(100)----Added to beef up point defense. Like the laser PDS, these weapons appear to have been collected from other sources and plugged in wherever the Dominion crew could improvise mountings. Fire control tended to be left to the individual weapons’ gunners.
Range: 3 miles in atmosphere, 6 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)
Damage: 4d6x10 MD per burst
Rate of Fire: EGCHH
Payload: 500 bursts per gun before reloading

6) Long Range Missile Launchers(10)---Not part of the original design, but instead kludged on using systems salvaged from other ships.
Range: Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-5
Payload: 50 per launcher, 500 total ready to fire; additional missiles may be carried and loaded from cargo, but will take at least 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 12 missiles)

7) Short Range Missile Launchers(80)----Similar to the LRMLs, these were added adhoc from a variety of other sources.
Range:Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 160 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-10
Payload: 100 per launcher, 800 total. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 30 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 24 missiles)

8 ) Mini-Missile Launchers(120)---Point defense mini-missile launchers, scrounged from various other ships and even ground vehicles.
Range:Varies by Missile Type
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 100 miles in space)
Damage: Varies by Missile Type
Rate of Fire: Volleys of 1-10(Average)
Payload: 200 mini-missiles per turret. Additional missiles may be stored in the cargo holds and reloaded within 15 minutes(1 ton of cargo per 96 missiles)

9) Heavy Massdrivers(2)---Originally believed to be part of a supply system for shooting payloads across space, it didn’t take much imagination or skill to convert these devices into orbital bombards, lobbing building-sized rocks at planets. These are among the most feared weapons on the Stars’ Bane, as they can wipe out entire cities in a single shot.
Range: 500 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 500,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d6x1,000 MD in space, 1d4x100,000 MD against planetary targets, resulting in a 4 mile wide crater, plus 1d6x1,000 MD to a 5 mile radius beyond that, and 4d6x10 MD to the next 10 miles out beyond that.
Rate of Fire: 1 shot every 5 minutes per gun
Payload: Carries enough material for 50 shots
Penalties: -6 to strike moving targets 100 ft or larger, -15 to strike anything smaller

10) Solar Accumulators(2)---These are massive photonic arrays that were originally designed for laser propulsion of cargo payloads, smelting metallic asteroids, and superheating icy moons, until the DarcLord found out they could be used for boiling lakes and rivers, vaporizing communities, and incinerating croplands. Though powerful and long-ranged, the Accumulators are slow to recharge and awkward to direct, and are virtually useless against any target with any sort of mobility.
Range: 60 miles in atmosphere, 120 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 120 miles in atmosphere, 120,000 miles in space)
Damage: 1d10 MD per melee of exposure; damage spread over a 2,000 ft radius
Rate of Fire: Can maintain it constantly, full-melee.
Payload: Conditionally unlimited; the Accumulators can keep up this photonic barrage effectively constantly as long as the ship and its collectors are in unobstructed sunlight(equivalent to 1 AU around a yellow dwarf star), and starting from a full battery reserve. Has a one hour reserve, but will take 12 hours to recharge once the banks are depleted.
Penalties: -4 to strike moving targets 100 ft or larger, -12 to strike anything smaller

11) Microwave Projectors(2)---Originally meant to take gathered solar power and transmit it to planetary rectennas for conversion to inexpensive electricity, these massive antennae were instead, uder the Darc Lord’s command, tuned to more deadly frequencies. Though not immediately fatal to human life and useless against fortified targets, the microwave projectors COULD wither crops and knock out unshielded electronics and electrical grids.
Range: 50 miles in atmosphere, 100 miles in space
(Kitsune Values: 100 miles in atmosphere, 100,000 miles in space)
Damage: 3d6 SDC per melee of exposure; damage spread over a 3,000 ft radius
EM effects: Used against unshielded power grids(such as cities and towns), the microwave blast has a 75% chance of knocking down electrical systems, including vehicles, in an 30-mile radius of the point of aim. Unprotected computers and other hardware not protected by surge protectors, and hooked into the common power grid, may still be affected up to a hundred miles or more away by power surges through the power lines.
The beam is less effective against shielded systems such as those on space structures(10%) and military systems(5% for surface military vehicles), which are hardened against radiation.
Against spacecraft, These are ineffective, but can blank out radar and microwave radio-band communications as long as the ship is caught in the beam.
Rate of Fire: Can maintain it constantly, full-melee.
Payload: Effectively unlimited

12) Tractor Beam Projectors(25)----The ship carries, as part of its original industrial equipment, a large array of tractor beams for handling various materials in microgravity. The standard heavy array has a space range of 100 miles and can haul 10,000 tons.

Auxiliary Craft:
200 fighters(could carry 500)
60 assorted light-shuttles
50 assorted medium- and heavy-class shuttles
Can dock up to 20 destroyer-sized vessels

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 9:22 pm

That sort of thing has to be a semi-common story across the rim. Some nut job gets a large piece of what is normally civilian hardware, and uses it to oppress primitive planets.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 9:56 pm

Omegasgundam wrote:That sort of thing has to be a semi-common story across the rim. Some nut job gets a large piece of what is normally civilian hardware, and uses it to oppress primitive planets.

Hey, grab a deep space tug, grab enough space junk, and start playing 'Hammer of God' orbital drops with the local primitives if they don't pay tribute.
Thing is, like the "Man Who Would be King', in a surprisingly number of cases, the would-be god-kings eventually screw up, mistaking 'primitive' for 'stupid'. They wind up dead(or worse).
And in some BAD cases, the 'primitives' wind up getting ahold of some high-tech themselves, maybe get the wrong idea about how things work in the galaxy, and become a pirate species who have to be put down by the space patrol. .

drewkitty ~..~ · Sat Jul 25, 2020 10:53 pm

A ship for the Manhunter Game....interesting.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sat Jul 25, 2020 11:05 pm

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:A ship for the Manhunter Game....interesting.

Which one?

drewkitty ~..~ · Sat Jul 25, 2020 11:24 pm

taalismn wrote:Tiger-1 Mobile Base/Battlefortress
(aka ‘Stars’ Bane’)

...snip...

Weapons Systems:
1) Heavy Laser Cannons(25)--
(Kitsune Values: 80 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)

2) Medium Laser Cannons(75)---
(Kitsune Values: 10 miles in atmosphere, 10,000 miles in space)

3) Point Defense Lasers(120)---
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 200 miles in space)

4) Medium G-Cannon(50)---
(Kitsune Values: 16 miles in atmosphere, 16,000 miles in space)

5) Light Rail Guns(100)----
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)

6) Long Range Missile Launchers(10)---
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)

7) Short Range Missile Launchers(80)----
(Kitsune Values: 160 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)
etc...

The Kitsune(player race) are from the manhunter book.

And something like "The Greater New England star nation" is also sort of signaling it is Manhunter, because it presumes idea for the name came from the NA NE, or from the N.Euro nation.
Both of which are/were in the MH dimension/Game.

Omegasgundam · Sat Jul 25, 2020 11:31 pm

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:
taalismn wrote:Tiger-1 Mobile Base/Battlefortress
(aka ‘Stars’ Bane’)

...snip...

Weapons Systems:
1) Heavy Laser Cannons(25)--
(Kitsune Values: 80 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)

2) Medium Laser Cannons(75)---
(Kitsune Values: 10 miles in atmosphere, 10,000 miles in space)

3) Point Defense Lasers(120)---
(Kitsune Values: 2 miles in atmosphere, 200 miles in space)

4) Medium G-Cannon(50)---
(Kitsune Values: 16 miles in atmosphere, 16,000 miles in space)

5) Light Rail Guns(100)----
(Kitsune Values: 6 miles in atmosphere, 600 miles in space)

6) Long Range Missile Launchers(10)---
(Kitsune Values: 3,400 miles in atmosphere, 1,800,000 miles in space)

7) Short Range Missile Launchers(80)----
(Kitsune Values: 160 miles in atmosphere, 80,000 miles in space)
etc...

The Kitsune(player race) are from the manhunter book.

And something like "The Greater New England star nation" is also sort of signaling it is Manhunter, because it presumes idea for the name came from the NA NE, or from the N.Euro nation.
Both of which are/were in the MH dimension/Game.

I'll handle this.

Check your PMs.

drewkitty ~..~ · Sat Jul 25, 2020 11:40 pm

Of course I might realize (after the fact) I probably came in at the end of a conversation and commenting with my own knowledge base. Since I've been avoiding this topic like the plague from day one, I probity don't know about things said at the beginning of the conversation before I wandered in to comment on the last ship posted..

Omegasgundam · Sat Jul 25, 2020 11:55 pm

And now I think that most of my Warlock Fleet is ready. As usual, most of it is inspired by Kitsune, and two of them are from taalisman. I'm still working out how to rehash the Arcane X 'Battleship' from DB: 6, do the fluff for the Light Carrier, and I haven't started on the Battlecruiser.
EDIT: And I completely forgot about the Aurora variant. Oops.

New Space Magic Spells
Because the list presented in Fleets lacked some really obvious utility spells. Input from taalisman.

Spoiler:

Based on Kitsune’s work.
United World Warlock WF-F15X ‘Shadow Bolt II’ Medium Fighter

(‘Super-Bolt’)

The original Shadow Bolt had been the primary Aerospace Fighter of the United Worlds Warlock for more than half a millennium, but it was clearly showing its age. Modern strike craft were both much faster and more heavily armed, and often carried enough missiles to make the Shadow Bolt’s inherent resistance to energy weapons mostly irrelevant. But it would be the Minion War that pushed it over the edge, with the UWW suffering absolutely horrific losses against the Demonic Bone Fighters. In the name of expediency, a variety of open market designs were produced to stem the damage, but something had to be done if the UWW was to produce its own domestic fighter design. The Shadow Bolt itself was sufficiently dated that trying to update it was considered impractical, so a tender for a new design was issued a year after the conclusion of Minion War and the banishment of Cormal.

The best design that was offered was an enlarged and improved version of the Shadowbolt, gaining 2 full tons of mass for badly needed upgrades. The reactor and propulsion systems are duplicates of those put into the Katana, with the near destroyed Bushi Federation eager to get an additional source of revenue via licensing production to Rhilith. The hull uses more and better armor material, increasing overall protection by almost 50%, and the wings have been modified to fold for easier storage. For additional protection, the ‘Armor of Ithan’ force field has also been greatly improved. Finally, its armaments have been improved and expanded with dual Sub-Particle Acceleration Cannons, twice the Telekinetic Machineguns, flexible ordinance hardpoints, and more versatile Bottled Demon Missile Launchers.

Additionally, the ship’s mystic capabilities have also been upgraded, with a moderately sized mystic generator being installed to provide power for the enchantments of Shadow Meld and Invisibility: Superior, adding to the previously lacking default systems. While the original Shadow Bolt had been intended to be fitted with these, the nightmarish complexity of the craft had caused them to be abandoned. The Shadow Bolt II solves this with a drastically improved internal design combined with gratuitous use of Lotherian sourced Ectofibre, resulting in the overall cost going down despite becoming more capable. To top it off, the Shadow Bolt II also features the now standard Circles of Protection and a small array of advanced utility talismans.

While sharing little to no parts with the original, the Shadow Bolt II has been met with a welcome reception. Despite costing 15 million more than the Super Tanto, it comes with powerful Techno-Wizard systems, and primarily uses normal UWW logistical infrastructure. While many original Tantos (updated with the full modular weapons) have been acquired as a stopgap measure, the UWW hopes to use the Shadow Bolt II as its primary shipboard ASF for the foreseeable future. While there was substantial thought into developing a heavy fighter similar to the CAF’s Proctor, it was decided that a Techno-Wizard version of the WZT Slingshot would be a more effective course of action. Efforts are underway to replace the ‘Armor of Ithan’ based force field with an ‘Invisible Armor’ version, which would provide additional protection and be inherently resistant to energy attacks.

Spoiler:

A revision of something taalisman posted in this very thread.
WZT/UWW YF-204-TW ‘Slingshot II’ Heavy Fighter

(aka ‘Hex’, ‘Super-Spatula’, ‘BatSpat’)

The original Slingshot was explicitly an expedient substitute to the original Proctor, which suffered from severe production disruption during the Minion War. Afterwards, General Galaxy would release an improved LRF-26 model, which meant that the basic Slingshot needed to up it’s game to stay competitive. Almost simultaneously, WZTAnvil received a tender from the United Worlds Warlock for a more refined version that could be converted to Techno-Wizardry, and so the project commenced.

It was decided early on that the basic design would draw from the YF-203L, which was the most capable configuration of the original Slingshot. The biggest change was an increase in engine power, bringing it in line with what was now considered the baseline for heavy fighters. The other meaningful changes were replacing the weapons with the now popular modular fittings, adding a pair of large countermeasure launchers, and provisions for mounting the underslung medium ship weapons of the YF-203E. WZTAnvil was somewhat familiar with the requirements for most common Techno-Wizard enchantments thanks to their work on the preceding Boomberang, and was able to set aside sufficient room for the various bits of the mystical support structure needed. The design was then handed off to the Warlock Fleet.

After assaying that the design was everything that it was expected to be, the Techno-Smithies installed the now normal suit of enchantments to the craft. A good sized P.P.E. generator was installed in the small bay set aside for it, and Ectofibre was infused into the fighter’s structure and armor. The near mandatory Shadow Meld, Impervious to Energy, and Invisibility: Superior were added with skill born from experience, and the common protective circles and wards were included for additional protection. It was decided that it was worth the effort of replacing the Force Field with an ‘Invincible Armor’ based one.

The new craft was exactly what the Warlock Fleet desired, offering heavy firepower on a relatively compact package. The lack of a Rift Jump Drive was not seen as a serious issue, as it would be primarily used to perform inter-system hops from its host platform. Similarly, the lack of boarding capability was a lesser concern due it being exceedingly likely that a more appropriate craft would be nearby to perform a proper inspection. A relatively modest production run has started on Rhilith, with the mostly complete hulls being shipped off to more magic rich systems to be finalized.

Spoiler:

Based on Kitsune’s work.
United Worlds Warlock ‘Iron Spear’ Assault Shuttle
Created to solve the UWW’s lack of a proper Assault Shuttle, the Iron Spear is essentially a Techno-Wizard version of the CAF’s upgraded model. The various improvements from the original have been carried over, but have been expanded with numerous enchantments. While it would be possible to produce them new, the UWW has reached an agreement with the CAF to buy long serving examples that are in good shape, with the residual PPE making it easier to enchant.

Spoiler:

An improvement of something I came up with, based on taalisman's work.
United Worlds Warlock/Rhilith Yards ‘Hauberk’ Destroyer Upgrade
('Wizberk', ‘Flash Bulb’, “Sun Boat’)

"I understand why command opted not to start using this Lucerin substance to fuel our ships, but the loss in capabilities was noticeable. Fortunately, the new mystic augmentations to the reactor system can compensate, which brings the Hauberk to its full potential. I must admit that the technical details escape me, but it apparently works by using mystic means to solve several key engineering issues and causing the caged star in the heart of the system to be ‘stronger’. I’ve seen some Elementalists work on the assembly so there is more to it than that, but that is well outside of my area of expertise. The yard dogs have also managed to work out the kinks in the power distribution system, so we should start seeing some mystic weapons relatively soon. I must admit that the materium options have grown on me though, as the greater range has been of far greater use in chase engagements. And those Kinetic guns have been critical more times than I care to remember.”
---- Anonymous, Star Elf Tarohass Ahheat (Captain)

“The Nova Battery is still short ranged for a sub-capital ship weapon, but it gives you the firepower of a full Cruiser for a few minutes if your capacitors are topped off. Thankfully, the Hauberk is half again as fast as the old Werewolf, so you can actually make use of them. I shudder to think about how difficult it would be to bring them to bear in the 4-millennia old relics that we were using previously. Other than the range, its primary issue is that you can’t really use it after you use the Rift Jump Drive unless the crew charges it themselves, which is admittedly a better than normal use of their energies.”
---- Anonymous, Dwarven Guildmaster

"I would love to know that they did with the reactor to cause all those knock-on effects, but it's almost certainly due to some Guild secrets that they’ve been sitting on for a few millennia. It wouldn’t surprise me if the Star Elves also lended a hand from their deep archives, and who knows how far back those go. We might as well ask, but I’m not going to hold my hopes up. These are people that have a substantial number of full blown Rune Smiths, and they’re up there with the Splugorth in keeping their knowledge to themselves. It would probably take a half century to replicate it even if we knew how to do it, because these sorts of mystic enchantments tend to be as much about the craftsman as what he’s doing.”
---- Anonymous, ASI Amberjin Design Team.

After their initial grumbling over using a foreign design, the Star Dwarves would come to appreciate the simple Hauberk, with its efficiency and flexibility allowing for a great latitude of variation. Its internals were well laid out from both an operation and maintenance perspective, the frame was of particularly sturdy design, and the ‘ectofibre’ material more than compensated for the relative loss of mystic conductivity from using conventional hull materials. And it was very effective in combat, performing at least as well as the best equivalent purely Techno-Wizard creation, and at a fraction the cost. It’s only ‘failing’ was that it wasn’t the Aurora, but that a simply unfair comparison. The engineers at Aegis Stellar Industries were clearly on to something with their hybrid methodology, and the Guildmasters wanted to see just how far they could push it.

Thus, rather than trying to turn the Hauberk into a pure Techno-Wizard design, the Dwarves decided to use magic to enhance the various systems, starting with the reactor. The UWW had opted not to use Lucerin for logistical reasons, but the system infrastructure to use it was still present. Thus, the Guildmasters decided to use a good deal of esoteric mystic lore to improve the output of the fusion reactor, with Techno-Wizard augmentations compensating for the usual operational risks such modifications have. It would prove to be a resounding success, almost doubling the available power, and had a surprising mystical influence on the ship itself. While all fusion reactors have a symbolic link to the concept of suns and stars, the enhanced system was far closer than most, which could be used to enable further alteration.

While not openly discussed, the past half millennium had prompted a major change in how the UWW considered desirable ship weapons, which had resulted in more and more of it’s ship’s armaments consisting of conventional designs. Even the new Arcane X Cruiser, with its mighty Flare Cannon, otherwise relied almost entirely on mundane weapons for its sustained firepower. It was simply too expensive in terms of mystical energy to match the shear range and rate of fire with Techno-Wizard equivalents, barring unusual edge cases such as Lay-Line or Nexus powered stations and exotic elemental power sources feeding thematically appropriate systems. And the Hauberk’s new reactor, by sheer accident, just happened to fall under the later.

Leveraging the symbolic link, the newly developed Nova Battery promises to be a revolution in Techno-Wizard weapon design. The already incredibly energy efficient Nova Blast spell is combined with the thematic boost of the fusion reactor with more traditional range boosting methods, resulting in a weapon that has 4x the normal range at half the energy cost, and could be boosted to 8x the range for the full energy cost. While still able to quickly drain a ship’s mystic capacitors, it stands head and shoulders above any previous UWW weapon, and has drawn the attention of many prominent renowned mystic experts across the dispersed nation. Naturally, it was immediately classified as a military secret, with even more stringent controls than the Bottled Demon Missiles. Work on expanding on this principle continues, and it is hoped that a true capital scale weapon will be created within a decade.

While many of the Techno-Smithies would have liked to replace the Variable Force Field with a mystic version, the simple truth was that it would have been prohibitively expensive to do so, and the actual benefits would be relatively minor. If the shield operators were on the ball with the distribution, the conventional shield was often superior unless one of the protective spell’s resistances came into play, and even then it was highly situational. Research began into a method to compensate for this, but for the time being the VFF remained as it was.

The majority of the ship’s internals already used UWW standard components, but there was substantial room for improvement in the active Techno-Wizard systems. The original package of Expel Demons, Immune to Energy, and Star Light had been chosen do to their immediate utility and relative ease of application, but now that more time was available it was felt that something better could be implemented. While the sun-like nature of the reactor prevented the use of Shadow Meld, Invisibility Superior and Hull Regeneration were still possible. These would allow a ship to quickly disengage and lick its wounds, increasing overall survivability tremendously. Additionally, the Star Light spell could be tuned to be sufficiently randomized to prevent simple ‘center of effect’ targeting, arguably filling the defensive role of Shadow Meld.

The UWW has fully shifted to producing this superior version, and is converting its pre-existing roster at a rapid pace. The upgrade resolves nearly all the complaints about the original, and Hauberk will continue to be the mainstay of the rebuilding Warlock Fleets for long years to come. The recently introduce Warlock variant of the Aurora may be more powerful, but it is substantially more difficult to produce and maintain, and will be reserved for rapid response formations.

Spoiler:

Based on Kitsune’s work. Use his pick for reference, but I added a few more guns.
United Worlds Warlock ‘Mandrake’ Light Cruiser
”The Mandrakes are basic line fillers, but they’re not bad ships. Capability wise they’re close to the Warshield, if lacking in missile power. The Ice Guns can eat entire CM salvoes, so they can at least break even there in a closing engagement. And they really want to be closing, because that’s their guns are all pointed forwards. Fortunately, they’re also faster than most cruisers, so they can usually position themselves for it. It can get dicey against multiple opponents though.
----USA Internal Memo

“The BeuShips report states that we have around 6K cruiser hulks and near hulks that are intact enough to be stripped for the needed P.P.E. generators and Rift Jump Drives. I’m including the marginal designs into the near hulk category, as I don’t think there will be much pushback if we throw them into the fire considering how poorly they performed. We were lucky in that the Demons rarely battered ships until they exploded, but that's because they wanted sacrifices. If we can’t provide our soldiers with better equipment, then we don’t deserve to lead them.”
----High King Silverlight, addressing Warlock Fleet Command.

”There was a great deal of talk about using two of the Magana’s engines rather than three class specific ones, the tactical benefits of the marginally higher speed were too important to skimp out on. It also lets us use different fabrication facilities, so they’re not directly competing for the same source of components. I hear Lothrain is setting up an appropriately sized foundry, which isn’t out of place for what we’ve seen out of their industrialization efforts. They’re likely working on a Light Cruiser of their own, but it’ll be for their own use or for the member worlds if their ASF and corvette are anything to go by.”
----Anonymous, Rhilith Industrial Management.

The Mandrake was created as a lighter alternative to the Morgana le Fay for general patrol work, costing less to operate and having substantially less crew. The Rift Projector Cannon and affiliated support systems have been removed, allowing for a reduction in the ship’s P.P.E. generation systems, which are often drawn from older ships that are in not the best shape. The only other change to the armaments are that the secondary turrets now all point forwards. For secondary systems, the hanger space and troop compliment have been greatly reduced, but most other factors are identical for logistical purposes. While the production priority is currently focused on the larger Morgana’s, once the supply of Iron Ships to strip for components dries up the Mandrake will become substantially more common.

Spoiler:

Based on Kitsune’s work. Use his pick for reference, but I added a few more guns.
United Worlds Warlock ‘Morgana le Fay’ Cruiser
”The Three Galaxies have become a far more dangerous place over the last few decades, with the Minion War only pushing trends further along. If we are to continue to protect our members and interests, we need to greatly expand our mobile forces. Magic has become a much less novel and terrifying element to the belligerent forces, and we must adapt to keep them at bay. Thus, I propose a radical expansion of our heavier fleet elements, to be conducted with all possible haste.”
----High King Silverlight, addressing the UWW Conclave.

“Yes, I served on an Iron Ship, and if you get me going I have horror stories for months. The Morgana is incomparably better to man, and I will beat anybody that whisks nostalgically over them with my wrench. I am glad the old beasts are on the way out, and I think most of the Guildmasters are as well. The damn things are offensively crude, and completely lack any sort of sophistication that is expected out of a ship built in this millennium, and I hope they’re all crapped for parts and material.”
----Anonymous Leiter (Chief Engineer), Warlock Fleet

”The UWW took tremendous hull losses during the Minion War, and their Cruisers are as depleted as their escort and patrol ships. While the Iron Ships get a lot of derision for good reason, most of the other similarly sized ships were about as capable in a fight. It’s estimated that they had less than 3K left between the Warlock Fleet and the member worlds when it was all over, so they desperately needed to bulk up their numbers. The Morgana can be considered an outgrowth of the thought that led to them acquiring the Hauberk, and I haven’t heard of any meaningful complaints about them.”
----USA Internal Memo

Inspired by the success of their revision of the smaller Hauberk, the Dwarven Guildmasters moved on to developing a replacement for the ancient Iron Ship. Its various flaws needed no elaboration, and now the budget was sufficiently opened enough to construct a fleet to replace the greatly diminished force. The resulting ‘Morgana le Fay’ class Cruiser is everything the United Worlds Warlock could have asked out of such a vessel, and they are moving to phase out the expensive to operate Iron Ship as soon as possible.

Historically aware interdimensional travelers have noted that the Morgana looks like a turn of the 20th century French Battleship, with a distinctively ‘tumblehome’ hull design. While much larger than the Iron Ship, it is also much more pleasant to operate due to vastly improved automation and support systems. The extensive use of Ectofibre based materials has allowed for the vast majority of the various Techno-Wizard systems to be ‘dumbed down’, making them far easier to produce and maintain. To further reduce costs, most of the ship consists of conventional technology, with Rhilith provided systems being just as effective as the most capable Techno-Wizard equivalents. Additionally, the P.P.E. Generators, Rift Jump Drive, and Rift Projector Cannon can usually be sourced from written-off Iron Ships, which reduces the price by a further billion and a half. This has driven the per ship cost down to within shouting distance of what most other major navies would consider typical, allowing the UWW to replenish its hull numbers in what it considers to be lightning speed.

As is often the case these days, the near totality of the Morgana’s weapons are of conventional technology, with the exception of the feared Rift Projector and Mini-Death Cloud Cannons. While it had been hoped that the long awaited ‘Annihilation Cannons’ would be finished, the best estimates place it as being a decade away from being ready for use on non-niche designs. The ship’s missile launchers are fitted to use Bottled Demon variants, but they are just as often loaded with conventional munitions. The Techno-Wizard enchantments are scaled up versions of those on the upgraded Hauberk, and take advantage of the greater skill level of the lead artificers assigned to building these larger ships.

Spoiler:

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 12:15 am

Omegasgundam wrote:And now I think that most of my Warlock Fleet is ready. As usual, most of it is inspired by Kitsune, and two of them are from taalisman. I'm still working out how to rehash the Arcane X 'Battleship' from DB: 6, do the fluff for the Light Carrier, and I haven't started on the Battlecruiser.
EDIT: And I completely forgot about the Aurora variant. Oops.

S'right...I was unaware you were working on the last one, and on top of everything else? Where you;'re finding the time and energy to do all this, I have NO idea(even fortified with iced tea, I barely get a page done a day now).
You'll occasionally forget something in the rush.

And drewkitty ~..~?
It's okay. It's not like you came in and began shotgunning suggestions with NO knowledge of what was really going on.
I'm rather impressed by your knowledge of the Manhunter book, in fact.
Admittedly, though there are occasional bits and pieces taken from the MH 'verse book. Waste not, want not.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 1:22 am

And here's what I just put together for the Aurora

United Wizards Warlock ‘Aurora-W’ Aerospace Frigate
(aka ‘Light Spear’, ‘Star Chaser’, 'Dancing Sword', ''Void Dragon')
http://i408.photobucket.com/albums/pp16 ... img204.jpg

”At last”
----Common sentiment among Star Elves and Dwarven Guildmasters upon seeing the Aurora-W

“The one failing of the Aurora is it’s lack of Shadow Meld, which forces you to use the more expensive and shorter duration Invisibility: Superior if you want to maximise your stealth capabilities. The mystic generators have enough output to keep it running indefinitely, but there are more ways to get past mystic invisibility than just being hard to pick out. Once the shooting starts, Starlight can fill the role, but the Commissions are usually given assignments that require a degree of subtlety, and a 600m or so ball of light definitely isn’t that. If we could get an Antimatter version to solve the problem, it would be perfect.

Operationally, you can fit a full platoon’s worth of gear if you're willing to crowd the sides of the hanger a bit, and the bodies can fill up the bunks that are set aside for specialist crew. Super-Bolts have folding wings to cut down on the deck space needed, and the pilots that work with us are the best around, so you can also fit in the Raider kits if you get clever. The teleport pad is at the rear of the bay, so you have the space to fit a full half platoon or 5 Raiders in a single jump if need be. The Commissions are assigned Force Recon MCAs, so we all have homers to guide the rest in and get pulled out. We practice a few times a month for a Cluster **** extraction, so we know how to handle yoinking the entire team back while the fighters are landing.”
----Kern Haze Phennington

”It was a stone cold ***** to get the shield working, but it was worth it. Most people know to switch to kinetics when the Warlock Fleet is in town, but only a handful have ever made it a main focus. It's a bit of a pity that the ships are going to be so rare for a while though, most of the artificers that can do the work are needed to lead up Cruiser construction, and Command has those as a higher priority. The Hauberk is a fine ship, but it just doesn’t have the presence of the Aurora.”
----Anonymous, Senior Dwarven Guildmaster

The United Worlds Warlock desired ASI’s Aurora class frigate the moment they laid eyes upon it, and 5 years after the Minion War they could spare the resources to do it. While they can only fit it in between production cycles of the more important Cruisers, the Aurora is by far the most coveted posting assignment in the Warlock Fleet. The ships so far constructed have been given over to the reconstituted Commisions, which have had substantially better luck than their predecessors, and explains the standard inclusion of a rare TW Teleporter system.

Spoiler:

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 1:41 am

What do you call a joint -AJC/UWW Aurora squadron(s) operation?
An Aurora Dance.
Each type bringing its own special tricks to the Dance, and there's damn few non-Ancient ships that can come away from a clash with a Dance unscathed...nay, -crippled-... by the experience.

drewkitty ~..~ · Sun Jul 26, 2020 2:29 am

Question: What do you mean by...

Powerplant: Advanced Nuclear Fusion w/ 25 year energy life with Techno-Wizard Augmentations.

Do you mean that the fusion plant will run for 25 years from the fuel built into it?
Cause based off of other PB writings that is what you sound like you mean.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 2:42 am

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:Question: What do you mean by...
Powerplant: Advanced Nuclear Fusion w/ 25 year energy life with Techno-Wizard Augmentations.

Do you mean that the fusion plant will run for 25 years from the fuel built into it?
Cause based off of other PB writings that is what you sound like you mean.

Fueling is at whatever rate the GM says it is. I think keeping a years worth of antimatter on a ship is idiotic, but Palladium treats it like candy. Engine life is how long it needs to go before the system needs to be replaced in my opinion.

drewkitty ~..~ · Sun Jul 26, 2020 12:15 pm

Omegasgundam wrote:
drewkitty ~..~ wrote:Question: What do you mean by...
Powerplant: Advanced Nuclear Fusion w/ 25 year energy life with Techno-Wizard Augmentations.

Do you mean that the fusion plant will run for 25 years from the fuel built into it?
Cause based off of other PB writings that is what you sound like you mean.

Fueling is at whatever rate the GM says it is. I think keeping a years worth of antimatter on a ship is idiotic, but Palladium treats it like candy. Engine life is how long it needs to go before the system needs to be replaced in my opinion.

Thank you for answering my question directly. Critique, writing: it should of been the first thing you said, not the last. (am I OCD...about words: yes.)

I thought fusion reactors ran off hydrogen.
Or did you read the Aliens Unlimited: Galaxy Guide gamebook, page 156 and using the AM fusion drive core idea for your reactors?

Omegasgundam · Sun Jul 26, 2020 12:52 pm

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:
Omegasgundam wrote:
drewkitty ~..~ wrote:Question: What do you mean by...
Powerplant: Advanced Nuclear Fusion w/ 25 year energy life with Techno-Wizard Augmentations.

Do you mean that the fusion plant will run for 25 years from the fuel built into it?
Cause based off of other PB writings that is what you sound like you mean.

Fueling is at whatever rate the GM says it is. I think keeping a years worth of antimatter on a ship is idiotic, but Palladium treats it like candy. Engine life is how long it needs to go before the system needs to be replaced in my opinion.

Thank you for answering my question directly. Critique, writing: it should of been the first thing you said, not the last. (am I OCD...about words: yes.)

I thought fusion reactors ran off hydrogen.
Or did you read the Aliens Unlimited: Galaxy Guide gamebook, page 156 and using the AM fusion drive core idea for your reactors?

'Fusion' is the act of combining particles into a different configuration. Hydrogen happens to be the most convenient by a long shot, so it generally assumed to be the default.

The idea of using magic to make an 'ordinary' fusion reaction MORE (in a metaphysics sense) just came to me. I've heard of reaction doping and other boost methods, but I don't think they were going around in my head at the time.

drewkitty ~..~ · Sun Jul 26, 2020 12:58 pm

okay, I will make the question clearer.

Omegasgundam wrote: ...I think keeping a years worth of antimatter on a ship is idiotic...

Why are you, going off topic, by equating 'Fuel' to 'Anti-Matter' here when the reactor being talked about is a fusion reactor?

Or were you doing an 'explaining' why you chose to have fusion reactors instead of the AM power sources before you answered the question, & thus making the comment out of context?

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 1:34 pm

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:okay, I will make the question clearer.
Omegasgundam wrote: ...I think keeping a years worth of antimatter on a ship is idiotic...

Why are you, going off topic, by equating 'Fuel' to 'Anti-Matter' here when the reactor being talked about is a fusion reactor?

Or were you doing an 'explaining' why you chose to have fusion reactors instead of the AM power sources before you answered the question, & thus making the comment out of context?

I was commenting on Palladium having most of their Phase Worlds vehicles be antimatter powered. Even the Power Armor. Which fight on planets. With people on them. In relatively close proximity.

Omegasgundam · Unread post by **Omegasgundam** » Sun Jul 26, 2020 3:28 pm

And now I think the bigger ships are ready. I've edited the earlier ones to reference the projected future variants and some slight clean up. An idea that I have is the Warlock Fleet equipping its AM Cruise Missiles with one-use Talismans of Impervious to Energy, which really neuters most PD options against them. Most people make heavy use Kinetics and MMs though, so its not a perfect weapon like Phase Cruise Missiles, but it open up possibilities for future shenanigans such as Apparition decoys and the like.

United Worlds Warlock ‘Arkenfire’ Light Carrier
”One of the holes in our roster is the lack of a proper carrier and/or assault ship. We’ve historically put converted Iron Ships and civilian hulls to fill it, but that is clearly non-viable. Part of the reason we have lost so many Shadow Bolts against the Demons was due to them being parceled out in penny packets, allowing them to be defeated in detail. We must have a method of bringing concentrated wings onto the battlefield, and we need it before the next spat of widespread hostilities occurs. While I am not an engineering officer, I believe that the relatively simple and uncluttered hull of the Mandrake would be a good place to start looking.”
----Internal Memo, Warlock Fleet

“Operating off an Arky is way better than the Iron Clunkers for obvious reasons, and some that are less obvious. The mystic generator has runs leading into the maintenance bay, so it's much easier to recharge the guns when it comes time to pay the bill. Considering just how many birds fly off this nest, that's more than half the ship’s capacitors every day just to keep them running if you average it out. It was painful enough to do it with the Clunker’s 4 squadrons due to the bad bay layout, and don’t even want to think about what it would be like if the Arky had to deal with the same ****.”
----Anonymous, Warlock Fleet Fighter Corps

”The new Elemental systems can be a bit finicky, but they’re nowhere near as bad as what I hear the ones they had on the test beds were. A few proper Warlocks are assigned to engineering to keep the beings chained up in the generator calmed down, and the links to the Meteor guns are nice and solid. The TW Fusion Reactor helps, as the Fire Elementals really like having something they consider to be a sun so close. The upgraded Rift Jump Drive still has some hiccups reaching it maximum theoretical strategic speed, but the 6 hour cool down is enough for the 40 light years that are expected out of it. I think we could get better results if it was set up to do 32 light years every 4 hours, but there’s some really tricky dimensional spellwork when you get to that level, so I’ll leave it to the experts.
----Anonymous Leiter (Chief Engineer), Warlock Fleet

The Arkenfire is essentially a stretched Mandrake hull turned into a Light Carrier. Developed to fill the distinct lack of such vessels in the Warlock Fleet, it is much more effective than the various Iron Ship conversions that were used previously. While some firepower has been sacrificed, the majority of the Mandrake’s weapons remain, and the point defenses have been expanded to better cover the larger ship. The Arkenfire is too massive to use salvaged components, meaning that they are entirely of new manufacture. The UWW has decided to turn this into a virtue, and has installed a number of systems from the defunct Arcane-X Cruiser, which increase its strategic mobility and survivability against hostile fighters and missiles.

The Warlock Fleet has decided to split the Assault Ship role from the Carrier one, allowing their ships to specialize. The general thought is that the relatively small hull (compared to full Fleet Carriers) would result in split configurations having insufficient amounts of either, and be generally ineffective. The Carrier configured Arkenfire can hold 6 squadrons of 24 ASFs along with a short battalion of Warlock Marines, while the Assault Ship configured Wolfstone holds 2 ASF squadrons and a short mechanized brigade. The hull is equipped with twice the normal number of TW Teleporters to better facilitate deployments, which is something that no technological force in the Three Galaxy enjoys.

As the ships use entirely new core systems, production of them has been bottle-necked by the need to convert the pre-existing infrastructure to the new models. The ‘Invincible Armor’ shield generators were almost trivial to substitute for the old ‘Armor of Ithan’ ones, but the ‘Generator of the Elements’ and the Advanced Rift Jump Drive require much more work. Current projections place the conversion to be finished just before the last ship construction cycle that makes use of salvaged components from the old fleet, so the overall disruption is hoped to be minimal.

Spoiler:

And now for the big boy. Kistune’s idea as usual.
United Wizards Warlock ‘Firedrake’ Battlecruiser
”As painful as it is to admit it, the few Brightwander and similarly sized ships we have are simply insufficient for what has been asked of us. We have lost many ships and their brave crews due to not having a capital battleline. Making more of those ships is simply out of the question due to the sheer expense, but Rhilith has the experience needed to construct multi-megatons conventional hulls. I propose that we develop a practical Battlecruiser design to form the new backbone of our reconstituted Warlock Fleet.
----High King Silverlight, addressing the UWW Conclave.

“The Firedrakes are the biggest ships we’ve made in more than single digit numbers, and they are beasts to say the least. While the Brightwanders are a bit heavier, they’re also not proper warships, and it shows. The Battlecruisers focus on the Battle part, and are by far the most heavy armed and armored ship the UWW has ever had. They need to be fitted with an external CG Drive to get them out to the Tangent, but once they do they are turned over to the best Techno-Wizards the Warlock Fleet has access to. Rumor has it that most of them also feature rare and exotic equipment that the Warlocks have picked up over the centuries, and I’d believe it. There is a tremendous amount of effort being put into them, and Fleet Command wants them ready to take on whatever can be thrown at them.
----Anonymous, Rhilith Industrial Management.

”In all honesty, the mystic generation system on the Firedrake is ridiculous. The only reason to have something that absurdly capable is to power big spells like Create Nebula and Summon Comet. Considering just who they assign to these ships, it's pretty much a given that you’ll have 6-8 mages that can do that, which ups the potential damage it can put out even more. The new Flare Cannon they put on it can also make use of it, and it's generally reliable unlike the Rift Projector, but it’s still a bit niche due to tactical limitations.”
----Anonymous, Space Warlock, Warlock Fleet.

The Firedrake is intended to become the backbone of the Warlock Fleet, becoming the largest dedicated combat vessel in United Worlds Warlock service. Resembling a drastically scaled up late-WWII battleship, the Firedrake will be the flagship of the Warlock Fleet’s Battle Groups, and a clear sign that the UWW means business. Production is currently bottle-necked by the need to construct infrastructure to create the needed components, but it is hoped that this will be overcome within a decade.

In terms of mystic systems, the Firedrake can be considered the successor to the bug ridden Arcane-X Cruisers, which was constructed in very limited numbers. As priority targets, none remained in a functional state after the Minion War, and none were produced afterwards due to their Iron Ship like expense. However, Inglix was able to revise the core design features into a much more reliable and cost effective configuration, coming at the cost of ‘merely’ a massive ballooning of the mass requirements. The Firedrake also features a much improved shield system, now based off of ‘Invincible Armor’ rather than ‘Invulnerability’, and no longer suffers interference with the Flare Cannon. It is powered by an enlarged ‘Generator of the Elements’, which also fuels the large battery of Meteor Cannons flanking the sides and the Advanced Rift Jump Drive.. Anti-fighter and missile defense is further boosted by a pair of miniature Death Cloud Cannons and a semi-experimental ‘Shockwave’ generator, which has not demonstrated any serious operational problems.

But the primary firepower of the ship are its conventional weapons. The UWW does not have the capability to make true super-capital weapons such as those the CAF puts on the Protector, but they can mass smaller and similarly ranged Cruiser mounts. The Firedrake is armed with no less than 4 separate triple capital turrets, supported by a reasonably sized array of dual medium turrets and dispersed Cruise Missile Launchers across the forward facing hull. While thought was given into consolidating the launchers into a pair of CAF standard mounts, the development of expendable talisman enchanted munitions has prompted the retention of the current clustered arrangement, as the deeper magazines and flexible loading system made it much easier to employ them.

The Firedrake also hosts an appreciable parasite complement, consisting of 4 squadrons of 24 craft. It also hosts a pair of mechanized Warlock Marine companies and an additional reinforced company of Marine Raiders for use in first response situations. The ship’s high strategic speed means that it is often the first ship to arrive at a hotspot, and having what amounts to a battalion of high-end ground forces is often enough to diffuse whatever problem is occurring on the ground. In a proper naval conflict, they would be replaced by an additional squadron of ASFs and a company of space use power armor.

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