Olimbus class Heavy Lift Ship:

Captain Conroy of the heavy lift ship Cogentrix considered his latest contract. His ship had been contracted to pick up a disabled Warshield class cruiser, the Endymion, and transport it to a repair yard. Having pulled him off his planned schedule, the Consortium was paying him a hefty premium.

From what he understood, the Endymion had run into a major cosmic Ley Line storm. An extremely freak occurrence, the magical energies had badly damaged the cruiser’s faster than light drive. One had to wonder however if something had not been maintained properly because they almost never broke down. It was his understanding that there had been a survey done and the drive was beyond repair.

Luckily for the cruiser, she had been within a few light days of the star system Cardiff and was able to limp into the system. Unfortunately, the system was sparsely inhabited and had no major ship repair facilities. In fact, there was little in heavy industry in the system.

The Consortium could have sent out a repair ships but there was many concerns. Trying to repair a cruiser in a system without the proper facilities was extremely time consuming. They would be lucky to be able to do it within six months. Even single part and component would have to be shipped out. If there were any additional problems, it might take a year or more to properly repair the vessel. If it had been a destroyer, it would have been far more likely that a repair ship would have been sent.

It was very lucky that the Cogentrix was nearby. A Olimbus class heavy lift ship, it had just finished delivering the modules to build a new mining facility in the Selenit system, just a hundred light years away. That system had more industry but still lacked the facilities to repair something as large as a Warshield class cruiser. Instead, the Endymion would be transported to a major Consortium ship yard. Even though the Cogentrix was comparatively slow, the thousand light year trip would take only a couple of weeks. Captain Conroy understood that they wanted to get the Endymion operational within a couple of months. He was skeptical but he was pretty certain it was a better option than trying to repair it in the system.

Thinking about his own ship, Captain Conroy reflected on the design. Quite large although quite a bit smaller than some of the largest cargo vessels in the Three Galaxies. Still, it was quite different in design in that it was effectively two shells with a large bay between them. A Warshield class cruiser was comparatively small compared to some of the loads the Cogentrix often carried. Ships and other objects up to several million tons could be carried easily as a result. Ships of up to around six hundred meters in length could be carried. Few cargo vessels had such a single large bay. Both tractor beams and hard attachments kept the cargo from moving.

Because of the relatively small number of these vessels operating within the Three Galaxies, the small crew of the Cogentrix was almost always busy. The ship split its time between civilian and military duties although civilian jobs were more common and took up around eighty percent of the schedule of the large vessel. Being that it could carry larger modules than almost any other class of ships in the Three Galaxies, it was often used to carry major equipment for mining facilities, processing centers, and space stations.

The captain had only carried a damaged warship on his ship one time before. More common military jobs were transporting materials for orbital defense facilities. In addition, he had carried a cargo load of destroyers a number of times to customers. It was less expensive to carry them unmanned to the customer as cargo on a heavy lift vessel than have a crew for each destroyers. A handful of times he had carried a monitor to a customer as well. Monitors were cruiser size vessels but lacked faster than light drives. In some cases, they might be transported in a disassembled manner but more often were transported aboard a heavy lift ship.

There were a small number of these ships operated by major military forces including the Consortium Armed Forces and the Trans-Galactic Empire. The nearest Consortium military heavy lift ship was several thousand light years away and would takes weeks to get there. Considering the distances involved, it was cost effective in this case for the Consortium Navy to simply commission him to transport the disabled cruiser.

He had run into trouble rarely. Some of her sisters actually were unarmed although that made him nervous. The Cogentrix did carry some weaponry however. It was enough to dissuade those who were overly curious in most cases. She carried a pair of long range missile batteries, four medium range missile batteries, and a number of point defense mounts. In hostile areas, it would be escorted by one or several warships. In this case, it would join up with a pair of Longbow class escort vessels. His understanding was that they were already in system. The Consortium was rightly concerned how easy it would be for pirates to capture the cruiser while being transported.

The captain of the Cogentrix imagined the frantic activity aboard the Endymion, preparing it for transport. Only twenty light years out, the Cogentrix would arrive in just a few hours. Part of what needed to be done was to make sure everything was properly secured. As well, all of the ordnance needed to be unloaded. It would be loaded in a fleet collier. A Warshield class cruiser carried over six hundred capital missiles, twice as many long range missiles, and many thousands of smaller missiles. It was also his understanding that only a skeleton crew would remain aboard while it was transported. After a few moments, Captain Conroy decided that it would all sort itself out and sipped his tea.

This starship design uses modified starship speed and weapon range rules. See Revised Starship Rules for Phase World / Three Galaxies for more details.

Model Type: OCB-12B

Vehicle Type: Heavy lift Ship

Crew: 94 (10 Officers and 84 Ordinary Crew)

Vehicles:

Light Shuttles (for Crew Emergencies but can be used for light cargo)

M.D.C. By Location:

	Point Defense Laser Cannon Turrets (8):	250 each
	Long Range Missile Batteries (2):	500 each
	Medium Range Missile Batteries (4):	300 each
	Outer Hull (40 x 40 ft/ 12.2 m x 12.2 Area):	100
	Inner Hull (40 x 20 ft/ 12.2 m x 12.2 Area):	75
	[1] Bridge:	8,000
	[2] Main Engines (2):	10,000 each
	[3] Main Body:	45,000
	[4] Force Field (Regular):	10,000

Notes:

[1] In reality this is how much damage needs to be done for a weapon to hit the bridge through the ship’s hull. This ship does not have an auxiliary bridge. Even if the bridge is destroyed, the ship can still be piloted from engineering but ship is -3 to dodge and all weapon systems will be at local control. Weapon hits near the bridge that do not penetrate the ships integrity can injure crew members on or near the bridge.

[2] Destroying the main engines means that the ship’s faster than light systems are destroyed and maximum sublight speed is reduced by half.

[3] Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will put the liner out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.

[4] Shields are not variable. Shields regenerate at the rate of 5% (600 M.D.C.) per melee round.

Speed:

Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.

Sublight: Has a special sublight engine that allows the ship to travel up to 20 percent of the speed of light maximum due to civilian shields. Star Ship can accelerate/decelerate at the rate of 0.45 percent of light per melee.

Atmospheric Propulsion: Maximum speed is 100 mph (161 kph), can enter an atmosphere and can leave but is not designed for atmospheric flight. The ship would likely come apart in an atmosphere and are only operated in space.

Stardrive: Uses a Gravitonic Drive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 3 light years per hour.

Maximum Range: Effectively Unlimited by either drive system. Carries about two years worth of supplies on board and a small hydroponic section for the small crew but normally does not operate for that long without resupply.

Statistical Data:

Length: 3,124.6 feet (952.4 meters)

Height: 1,460.6 feet (445.2 meters)

Width: 1,494.4 feet (455.5 meters)

Weight/Mass: 7.2 million tons (6.5 million metric tons)

Power System: Advanced Fusion with a 20 year life span. The ship normally only goes 5 years between refueling and refitting.

Cargo: Can carry up to 4.4 million tons (4 million metric tons) of cargo in addition to crew’s supplies. Loads up to 1,968.5 feet (600 meters) long and 1,312.3 (400 meters) wide and tall can be carried. In addition, each common crew member has a small locker for personal items and uniforms. Ship’s officers have more space for personal items.

Market Cost: 8.5 Billion credits (Unarmed version about 6.2 billion)

WEAPON SYSTEMS:

Eight (8) Laser Batteries: Weapon system is used as an anti-missile, anti-power armor, and anti-star fighter. Weapons system has no penalties to hit fighters and small targets and can be operated by a gunner or a gunner program (+2 to strike, 3 Attacks per melee). The weapon system cannot be used to engage targets while traveling at faster than light velocities.

Maximum Effective Range: 200 miles (322 km) in space and 4 miles (6.4 km) in an atmosphere.

Mega Damage: 3D6x10 M.D.C. each.

Rate of Fire: Equal to the combined hand to hand attacks of the gunner (usually 4 or 5).

Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
Two (2) Long Range Missile Batteries: Missile has a top speed of Mach 20 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 8% of light per turn (faster than any starship.) Whether weapons can be shot down is calculated from the speed of target, battery, and missile. When drive goes dead, missile will continue to travel in a straight line unless set to self destruct but has very low odds of hitting star ships (Great for hitting bases and planets because target does not move and missile, when unpowered, is at -25% to be detected.) Long range missiles do not have penalties to hit small targets, unlike cruise missiles, and are all considered smart missiles. Batteries can launch on multiple targets each at the same time.

Maximum Effective Range: Long Range missile range is 3,400 miles (5,470 km) in an atmosphere and 1,800,000 miles (2,897,000 km/9.7 light seconds) in space.

Mega-Damage & Properties: See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details (Fusion warheads inflict 2D4x100 M.D.C. each.)

Rate of Fire: Can fire missiles one at a time or in volleys of two (2), eight (8), sixteen (16), or thirty-two (32) per battery, per melee attack.

Payload: 320 total, 160 long range missiles per battery.
Four (4) Medium Range Missile Batteries: A slightly higher capacity version of the medium range missile batteries carried on a normal Merchantman. Missile has a top speed of Mach 15 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 6% of light per turn. Normally used for anti-fighter and point defense. Batteries can launch on multiple targets each at the same time.

Maximum Effective Range: Medium Range Missile range is 160 miles (257.5 km) in an atmosphere and 80,000 miles (128,750 km/0.43 light seconds) in space.

Mega-Damage: Varies with medium range missile type (See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details.)

Rate of Fire: Can fire missiles one at a time or in volleys of two (2), four (4), or eight (8) missiles per battery, per melee attack.

Payload: 64 per battery for a total of 256 medium range missiles.

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Writeup by Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune).

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