Super Hunter Class Destroyer (New Coventry):

Introduction:

The two berserker class attack craft were operating clandestinely within Consortium Space for intelligence gathering purposes. While both of the ships were operating under orders from Trans-Galactic Empire intelligence command, the ships would be on their own if they were captured. The Empires story would be that the vessels were pirate ships, purchased from the Free Worlds Council.

The mission was very unusual. Most Kreeghor missions withing the Consortium of Civilized Worlds were to gain intelligence on the Consortium Armed Forces but this mission was an attempt to get intelligence on an Independent Defense Force. The New Coventry Navy had been vastly increasing over the past several years and it was felt by Kreeghor military planners that this could pose a threat to planned expansion into the area and be a stumbling block to any T.G.E. attacks on the Consortium. While the New Coventry Navy expansion program was just getting underway, the construction of several Orbital Defense Fortresses was a serious concern. Each fortress, when complete, would have equal or greater firepower to a Kreeghor Dreadnought. In many attack plans on the Consortium, New Coventry would be one of the first locations captured. One of the specific goals for this mission was to test the capabilities of the modified Hunter class destroyer that New Coventry operated. Previous information had indicated that these ships were heavily upgraded. The plan was to create an ambush to test the ship’s actual capabilities.

They had been already operating near New Coventry for several weeks but it appeared they had finally been able to catch a New Coventry Hunter class Destroyer. They had put up a decoy distress call that appeared to be from a small vessel that had been prospecting the system. The distress beacon was far enough into the system that the Hunter would be unable to escape into FTL. The only problem was that the Berserkers had been positioned to maximize the area that they covered and could not give effective close support to each other and they could not integrate their volleys together. Still, they had two ships to the New Coventry's one.

Both Kreeghor ships began vectoring toward the Hunter and began firing cruise missiles once they figured that the Hunter was likely to have detected them. There was no hope that the Hunter would not notice the Berserkers so there was no reason to hold off on firing cruise missiles. The Hunter began returning firing and the Kreeghor commander had his first surprise. He knew that a Hunter has a cruise missile launcher that fired missiles at the rate of one at a time but the Hunter fired a volley of missiles that was fourteen cruise missiles. He figured that the Hunter used her fighters to augment the missile launch but it still showed a very canny captain. The second missile volley from the Hunter came as a bigger surprise when the ship still managed to launch six cruise missiles as a volley. Still, six or fourteen, the Hunters volleys can fire no where near the two volleys of twenty cruise missiles fired back at it. In addition, his ships were firing X-Ray laser warheads and the New Coventry ship was likely only firing nuclear warheads in return.

As the first volley of missiles entered into the envelope for the long range missiles carried by two of the Hunter's fighters. Three cruise missiles of first Kreeghor Volley were already destroyed before even entering the range of destroyer's medium range missiles. Fifteen of the cruise missiles were eliminated by the combined medium range of the Hunter and her fighters. The remaining cruise missiles were easily eliminated by Hunter's and her escorting fighters' close in weapon systems.

The Hunter's cruise missiles were all targeted on a single Berserker. That Berserker was not as lucky as the Hunter. Each of the cruise missiles broke into four missiles just before entering the Berserker point defense range. There was no way that the Berserker's close point defense could deal with 56 missiles. Fourteen missiles were eliminated but that still left 44 missiles of which 37 hit the Berserker and flattened the ship’s shields. While this had not inflicted a large amount of damage, the ship was now naked to missile fire. The follow up cruise missile volleys, while not as numerous as the first volley and a higher percentage were destroyed by point defense, were able to destroy the Berserker.

The Hunter had continued to be as hard a target as ever. When the remaining Berserker and the Hunter closed with each other, the Hunter started launching decoys from its cruise missile launchers to compensate for her fighters running out of missiles. When the two ships entered within beam range, they both fired. The Hunter and the Berserker both hit each other but the Kreeghor commander missed the final surprise. As the ships were passing outside of the beam range of each other, the Hunter showed that the rate of fire for its Particle Beams had been improved and fired a second burst which hit the Berserker in the bridge killing the Commander instantly. After this, the remaining crew of the Berserker surrendered.

Background:

New Coventry prefers the Hunter class destroyer over the Scimitar because the Hunter mounts about equal fire power to the Scimitar yet the Hunter requires a crew that is a great deal smaller, and needs less resources to maintain.

New Coventry has been able to acquire a large number of Hunters destroyers. They have acquired some of them straight from the CAF. Others they got from various surplus organizations without any weaponry. Finally, they have gotten some of the vessels from scrap yards as hulks and have completely rebuilt them. In the next few years, New Coventry is planning to start manufacturing Hunters from scratch and they believe that the CCW and its military arm, the CAF, will not raise problems because the ship was not an original CAF design.

The New Coventry Navy modifies the ships when they enter New Coventry service making them more lethal without being as expensive as constructing new vessels would be. The modifications that are most important to the design of the ship are an improved particle beam design, the addition of four pepper box single shot cruise missile launchers (See description of systems for details), and special software for the internal cruise missile launcher. The new particle beam cannon design has the same range and power rating as the original yet it uses less power and the storage capacitors allow a recharge twice as rapidly as the original until the capacitors run out of charge. This allows the weapon system equal the damage of a Super Berserker's X-ray laser system for several minutes without the risk of exploding bombs inside of the ship. The original internal cruise missile launcher can only launch one missile at a time. Many fleets looked for a way to negate this short coming. What New Coventry has taken advantage of is the fact that while the launcher cannot launch volleys, it has a very fast reload rate. With some excellent gunners and crews, the rate has been able to be as high as seven or eight in a fifteen second period. What has been developed is delayed activation software for the missiles' engines. As long as the missiles will take at least thirty seconds to reach their targets, all the missiles launched in a melee can be used as a volley to overwhelm point defense. While four to eight missiles are not enough to overwhelm most ships' point defense, when combined with the pepper box launchers this becomes twenty to twenty-four missiles in a volley, a heavier throw weight then a Kreeghor Berserker for the first shot. While not as important, ships' point defense also has a major boost as well. In place of two of the rail guns are Tachyon scatter beams that can often take out entire volleys prior to then striking the ship

When these ships initially entered service, these ships normally carried the Osprey class starfighter with two fighters being interceptor model and two models being of the bomber variant and were armed with four cruise missiles each. The ships presently normally carry four FTL Black Eagles with two being bomber variants and two being interceptor variants. Occasionally, Katana class fighters will be carried in place of some or all of the Black Eagles. In the future, the fighters should be replaced by the Lightning class starfighters that is still in the prototype stage.

Most captains of New Coventry ships, having a Psionic or two in the crew will outfit the crew with Techno-Wizard protections and additions. These often include the spells of Invisibility Superior, Shadow Meld, and Impervious to Energy.

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: HF-75D
Vehicle Type: Frigate Combat Ship.
Crew: 24
Troops: 10 Marines and 10 fighter pilots.

Vehicle, Robots, and Power Armors:
Power Armors:

Combat Environment Power Armors

Fighter Compliment:

	2	SF-101LR Black Eagle medium fighters
	2	SF-101I-LR Storm Eagle medium interceptors

M.D.C. By Location:

	Heavy Particle Beam Cannon (Front, built into hull):	800
	Heavy Particle Beam Cannons (2, built into sides):	650 each
	Rail Gun Turrets (2):	400 each
	Point Defense Laser Turrets (4):	300 each
	Tachyon Scatter Beams (2):	400 each
	Cruise Missile Launcher (1, underside):	1,000
	Medium Range Missile Batteries (2, Top and Underside):	450 each
	[1] Bridge:	1,200
	[2] Main Body:	4,500
	[3] Variable Force Field:	1,000 a side (6,000 Total)

Notes:
[1] In reality this is how much damage needs to be done for a weapon to hit the bridge through the ship’s armor. This ship does not have an auxiliary bridge. Even if the bridge is destroyed, the ship can still be piloted from engineering but the ship is -3 to dodge and all weapon systems will be at local control. Weapons hit near the bridge that does not penetrate the ships integrity can injure crew members on or near the bridge.
[2] Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will put the destroyer out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.
[3] Shields positions can be varied and all could be combined in one shield. Shields regenerate at the rate of 5% (300 M.D.C.) per melee.

Speed:
Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Sublight: Has a special sublight engine that allows the ship to travel up to 60 percent of the speed of light. Star Ship can accelerate/decelerate at the rate of 0.95 percent of light per melee.
Atmospheric Propulsion: Maximum cruise speed is Mach 1 (741.5 mph / 1,193.3 kph), can enter an atmosphere and can leave but is not designed for atmospheric flight.
Stardrive: Uses a Gravitonic Drive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 4.5 light-years per hour.
Maximum Range: Effectively Unlimited by either drive system. Carries about one year worth of supplies on board.

Statistical Data:
Length: 300 feet (91.4 meters)
Height: 70 feet (21.3 meters)
Width: 80 feet (24.4 meters)
Weight / Mass: 6,000 tons (5443 metric tons)
Power System: Anti-Matter with a 50 year life span. The ship normally only goes 10 years between refueling and refitting.
Cargo: Small cargo hold that can carry up to 500 tons of cargo not including a standard compliment of supplies and ammunition. Hold is 20 x 20 x 40 feet in dimensions (6.1 x 12.2 x 12.2 meters). Each enlisted crew member has a small locker for personal items and uniforms. Ship’s officers have more space for personal items. Most of the ship’s spaces are taken up by extra ammunition, armor, troops, weapons, engine, and other equipment.
Market Cost: 380 million for a rebuilt Super Hunter with new weapon systems. The Black Market or the Kreeghor would offer several times it's value for an undamaged completely working vessel.

WEAPON SYSTEMS:

Three (3) Heavy Particle Beam Cannons: The particle beams are redesigned versions of the particle beams that are on a standard Hunter with the same range and same beam output. They use less power than the original particle beam and have a more efficient capacitor, allowing the particle beam to fire about twice as often as the system they replace. One cannon is in the nose and the other two are on the sides mostly in the hull. The weapon system cannot be used to engage targets while traveling at faster than light velocities.
Maximum Effective Range: 10,000 miles (16,000 km) in space and 20 miles (32 km) in an atmosphere.
Mega-Damage: 2D4x100 M.D. each (6D4x100 Maximum for all three)
Rate of Fire: Maximum of two (2) times per melee per cannon.
Payload: Has a capacitor with 10 charges per cannon. Capacitors recharge at the rate of one shot per gun per melee which allows the cannons to fire for 2.5 minutes (10 melees) before being only able to fire once per melee.
Two (2) GR-1000 Large Gravity Rail Gun Turrets: Since the GR-1000 rail gun is the standard weapon that most New Coventry ships carry, two of the rail guns carried in the standard Hunter destroyer have been replaced by GR-1000 Rail Guns. The other two rail guns were replaced by Tachyon Scatter Beams. They are used as an anti-starfighter and missile weapon and against targets that are impervious to energy. Each rail gun is in a turret that can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire. Projectiles come out the rail guns at a significant fraction of the speed of light. Gravity rail gun uses a 30 mm projectile.
Maximum Effective Range: 16 miles (26 km) through atmosphere and 1,600 miles (2,575 km) in space.
Mega-Damage: Rail gun inflicts 4D6x10 M.D.C. for a 40 round burst.
Rate of Fire: Equal to the combined hand to hand attacks of the gunner (usually 4 or 5).
Payload: 10,000 Rounds (250 Bursts) each cannon.
Four (4) Point Defense Lasers in Ball Turrets: This system is unaltered from what is carried on a standard Hunter class destroyer. This is the star ship’s primary anti-starfighter, anti-robot, and anti-missile defense system. Each laser is in a turret that can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire. The weapon system cannot be used to engage targets while traveling at faster than light velocities.
Maximum Effective Range: 200 miles (320 km) in space and has a range of 4 miles (6.4 km) in an atmosphere.
Mega Damage: 2D6x10 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) Point Defense Tachyon Scatter Beams: Replaces two of the rail gun turrets. The other two are replaced by more powerful rail guns. The main purpose of this system is as an anti-missile point defense. They do this by firing a wide blast that affects all targets in a cone that can destroy whole volleys of missiles before the strike the ship (Roll once against a volley and unless the missiles roll to dodge greater than strike roll, they are all destroyed.) The stream lasts for significant fraction of a second and missiles tend to run into the stream (Gives +4 bonus vs fast moving targets such as missiles.) This system has an interesting property that the system can actually be used at FTL speeds because Tachyons travel faster than the speed of light. Each Tachyon Scatter Beam is in a turret that can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire.
Maximum Effective Range: 99.4 miles (160 km) with a width of 12.4 miles (20 km), range and width is one sixteenth in an atmosphere.
Mega Damage: 2D4x10 M.D.C. each.
Rate of Fire: Maximum of four (4) times per melee each.
Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
One (1) Cruise Missile Launchers: Missiles have a top speed of Mach 25 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 10% of light per turn (far faster than any starship.) Whether weapons can be shot down is calculated from the speed of target, launcher, and missile. When drive goes dead, missiles 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 the target does not move and missile, when unpowered, is at -25% to be detected.) Cruise missiles have penalties to hit small targets but are all considered smart missiles. While missiles are only launched at the rate of one at a time, the ship’s computer has special software that allows all the missiles to hit a target at the same time for the purpose to make point defense of a target more easily overwhelmed. This is done by slowing down the acceleration of missiles and by setting some for delayed activation and target must be at least 30 seconds away. Missiles are then considered to only have an acceleration of 5% of light for the first turn. These launchers can also be combined with pepper box launchers.
Maximum Effective Range: Cruise Missile range is 8,000 miles (12,875 km) in an atmosphere and 4,000,000 miles (6,437,376 km/ 21.5 light seconds) in space.
Mega-Damage & Properties: See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details (Anti-Matter multi-warheads inflict 5D6x100 M.D.C. each.)
Rate of Fire:One cruise missile per melee attack (special software allows 4 to 8 missiles to be launched as one volley depending on gunners hand to hand attacks).
Payload: 50 cruise missiles total
Two (2) Medium Range Missile Batteries: Weapon system is used for hitting enemy robots, fighters, and against incoming cruise missiles. Like other Phase world systems, weapon system range and speed has been greatly increased compared to Rifts Earth systems. Missiles have a top speed of Mach 15 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 6% of light per turn. Batteries can launch on multiple targets each at the same time.
Mega-Damage: Varies with medium range missile type (See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details.)
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.
Rate of Fire: Can fire missiles one at a time or in volleys of two (2), four (4), or eight (8) missiles per battery.
Payload: 160 per launcher for a total of 320 medium range missiles.

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Writeup by Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune).

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