Narn G'Quan-class Heavy Cruiser (Babylon Five):


While Narn ships look very impressive, the Narn Culture on the whole lags behind the Earth Alliance in Technology. The Narn Heavy Cruiser looks very powerful but is in actuality less powerful than Earth Force Omega Destroyers or Earth Force Nova Destroyers. The ship is designed using a combination of the best technology that the race can design or purchase along with the technology copied from captured Centauri equipment when the Centauri left.


While this ship carries around the same amount of armor that an Earth Force Omega Destroyer, the alloys that the armor is constructed from are not as advanced so the Heavy Cruiser cannot withstand as much damage as a Earth Force Omega Destroyer can.


Early versions of this ship are armed with two heavy carbon lasers that fire forward. While these weapons are powerful, they require more of the ships volume for weapons in other fleets that have similar outputs. In later production of the ship, these cannons have been replaced with Ion Laser Cannons similar to those carried on Earth Force Omega Destroyers. To support the ships main battery, the ship carries four plasma cannons that are also used against other capital ships. While of similar output as Earth Force heavy pulse cannons, each mount is more massive and the plasma cannons are of shorter range when compared to the pulse cannon. For point defense, the Narn heavy cruiser has sixteen light pulse cannons. They are longer ranged than Earth Force point defense weaponry but the Narn weaponry does less damage.


The Narn are not without any advantages over Earthforce ships. The G'Quan's sensor systems are more spread out than the sensor systems on Earth force ships. This means that no one critical hit will normally take out the ships sensor systems.


These ships do not have artificial gravity and crews can only serve in the ships for limited periods of time or crew will suffer from the effects of no gravity.


The ship has a small fighter compliment and can carry a large amount of assault troops for assault mission but normally only carries 200 marines.

Listed is the formula to allow player and game masters to calculate the Cruisers velocity and distance traveled:


Model: Narn G'Quan-class Heavy Cruiser
Class: Heavy Cruiser / Light Carrier
Crew: 450 (20 Officers and 430 Enlisted)
Troops: Standard; 200, Maximum; 1000


Vehicle Compliment:

24Frazi Class Fighters
2Standard Narn Shuttles


M.D.C. by Location:

Main Energy Weapon Battery (2, forward): 1,000 each
Plasma Cannons (4):500 each
Light Defensive Pulse Cannons (16):250 each
Energy Mine Launchers (2):800 each
[1] Ion Engines (3):4,000 each
[2] Bridge:15,000
[2] Emergency Bridge:15,000
[3] Main Body:40,000
Wings (2):8,000 each


Notes:
[1] The Destruction of one engine reduces the ships performance by one third. The destruction of two Ion Engines reduces the ships performance by two thirds. Destroying all three Ion Engines means that the maximum sublight acceleration is reduced to ten percent of normal (using navigational thrusters).
[2] 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 also has an auxiliary bridge. Even if both bridges are 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.
[3] Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will put the heavy Cruiser out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.


Speed:
Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Space Propulsion: The starship does not have an effective top speed but is limited by acceleration. The Narn Heavy Cruiser can reach a top acceleration of 3 G but due to high fuel consumption and extra strain on the engines, the ship will normally travel at 0.5 G for any extended trips. Top acceleration is only meant for emergencies and combat maneuvers.
Because the Heavy Cruiser is mostly unshielded from the effects of radiation and hypervelocity atomic particles (It is not completely unshielded), the destroyer is not operated at speeds exceeding 20% of the speed of light.
Atmospheric Propulsion: The Narn Heavy Cruiser can operate within the outer edge of an atmosphere but if it enters deep into an atmosphere, the ship will crash.
Stardrive: Uses a hyperdrive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 6.5 lightyears per hour. This means that the Narn Heavy Cruiser can cover the Galaxy in about 18 month (will need to refuel periodically). The ship enters hyperspace by means of a jumpgate. This ship can use an already made jumpgate or can form its own jumpgate.
The G`Quan has enough power to open a jumpgate every twenty minutes (80 rounds). The gate then takes one round to open, two rounds to traverse, and another to close.
Maximum Range: Conditionally unlimited, while the fusion reactor gives power for a decade of service, the ships propulsion is limited by the ships reaction mass. The ship can be refueled at ground based facilities, space stations, and other star ships as long as they have the special facilities. The ship can also be refueled by fuel shuttles.
The Heavy Cruiser carries nine months of reaction mass for travel at 0.5 G of acceleration. Double the consumption of fuel for 1.0 G of acceleration and double the consumption again for every 1.0 G of acceleration beyond 1 G. This means the ship will burn the fuel 8 times faster than at 0.5 G of acceleration at maximum speed. The ship will often accelerate for a period of time and then shut down the engine and travel using the ships velocity. If the ships uses more than half of its reaction mass when accelerating, the ship will be unable to decelerate fully and the ship will normally only use a third or less of its fuel on accelerating so it does not run into a problem.. If the ship runs out of fuel then it must be refueled by another vehicle traveling faster or be lost.
If the ship has a large amount of flight operations, the ship is limited to about seven months endurance at cruising speed from the fighters using the ships reaction mass.


Statistical Data
Height: 328.3 feet (100 meters)
Length: 3611.7 feet (1100 meters)
Width: 1641.7 feet (500 meters)
Weight: 11 million tons (10 million metric tons)
Power System: 3 Fusion Reactors (5 year duration). However, it was recommended that the drive and power system have routine maintenance every 2 years. Also, the ship only carries about a nine month supply of reaction mass.
Cargo: 400,000 tons
Cost: 12 billion credits to construct


Weapon Systems

  1. Main Energy Battery: Older versions of this ship are equipped with Heavy Carbon Laser Cannons and newer versions of the ship are equipped with Ion Laser Cannons. Just previous to their war against the Centauri, they were planning to re-equip all of their ships with Ion Laser Cannons but due to the fact that most of their resources have been designated for rebuilding, this has not occurred yet.
    1. Heavy Carbon Laser Cannons (2): This is the main weapon of the Early versions the Narn Heavy Cruiser. At that time, the Narn were unable to get the Ion Laser cannon designs stolen from the Centauri to work properly. These weapons are highly focused conventional lasers. These cannons are larger than those on many other ships to partially make up for the fact that the weaponry is not as powerful as those on ships in the Minbari, Centauri, and Earth militaries. The cannons have a limited arc of fire. These weapons have standard penalties to hit small targets such as fighters and cannons mounted together can be combined together.
      Mega Damage: 5D6x100+200 per cannon (1D6x1000+400 for both cannons)
      Maximum Effective Range: 2.2 miles (3.5 km) in an atmosphere and 2,170 miles (3,500 km) in space.
      Rate of Fire: Once per melee round per cannon.
      Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
    2. Heavy Ion Laser Cannons (2): The cannon fires a massive burst of ionized gas down a laser beam. This weapon is a derivative of Centauri technology. This weapon is more massive than that of a Centauri mount. The cannons are quite powerful but are very short ranged and slow firing. Both cannons mounted forward. The cannons have a limited arc of fire. These weapons have standard penalties to hit small targets such as fighters and cannons mounted together can be combined together.
      Mega Damage: 6D6x100 per cannon (1D6x1000+1000 for both cannons)
      Maximum Effective Range: 2.49 miles (4 km) in an atmosphere and 2487.4 miles (4,000 km) in space.
      Rate of Fire: Once per melee round per cannon.
      Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
  2. Plasma Cannons (4): To back up the Main Battery and to give the ship the ability to hit targets at a longer range, the ship is armed with four plasma cannons. Each mount has a 360 degree rotation and 180 degree arc of fire. These weapons have standard penalties to hit small targets such as fighters and cannons each fire individually. Author Note: The source on this weapon system lists the weapons range as 100,000 km. It has been reduces to fit more with Palladium frameworks
    Mega Damage: 2D6x100 per cannon
    Maximum Effective Range: 6.2 miles (10 km) in an atmosphere and 621.8 miles (10,000 km) in space.
    Rate of Fire: Three Times per melee round per cannon.
    Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
  3. Light Defensive Pulse Cannons (16): These cannons fire rapid fire bursts of super charged Plasma. Similar to heavier pulse cannons but the weapons are of lower output and have a shorter range. Weapons are used as anti-star Fighter and missile weapon systems. Each mount has a 360 degree rotation and 180 degree arc of fire.
    Author Note: The source on this weapon system lists the weapons range as 180,000 km. It has been reduces to fit more with Palladium frameworks and weapon scale
    Mega Damage: 2D6x10 per cannon
    Maximum Effective Range: 11.1 miles (18 km) in an atmosphere and 1,120 miles (1,800 km) in space.
    Rate of Fire: Equal to gunners hand to hand (Usually 4 or 5).
    Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
  4. Energy Mine Launchers (2): The ship has the ability to drop anti-matter mines from the rear of the starship. The mines are very powerful and can cripple most ships with just a few hits. Each mine contains protons and anti-protons in separate magnetic containment fields. When a ship comes close to the mines, the containment fields collapse and the matter and anti-matter annihilate each other. If the mines are not activated, they will last 6 months before detonating on their own but can be programed to detonate after a period of time so that the mines do not become a navigational hazard. The mines can be set so that they will drift or so the mines will stay in one place using thrusters to steady the mine. These thrusters also allow the mines to change course slightly to get targets in the blast radius of the mines. Any attempt to detect the mines suffers a -25% to read sensor rolls. These mines are the equivalent of Phase world anti-matter cruise missiles without the high speed.
    Maximum Effective Range: Not applicable. The mines are dropped directly behind the ship. If the mines are programmed to drift, the ship can change course and the mines will keep traveling but mines will be at penalties to strike targets. If programmed to be stationary, any ship outside of two miles from the position of the mine is safe.
    Mega-Damage: 4D6x100 with 120 ft (36.4 meter) blast radius each mine.
    Rate of Fire: Volleys of 10 or 20 per launcher, per melee round, for a total of 40 mines per melee. Launchers are reloaded on the same melee and can be fired again on the next.
    Payload: 200 total, 100 Energy mines per launcher.




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Technical information sourced partially from Babylon 5 Technical Manual!


CGI of Ship by Craig P. Condu . More of his CGI pictures of B-5 Ships at Epsilon Jumpgate.


Writeup by Mischa (E-Mail Mischa) and by Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune).


Rifts Conversion Copyright © 1998 & 1999, Mischa & Kitsune. All rights reserved.



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