Built to carry a single Line Marine Expeditionary Unit (LMEU), the Tarawa-class was derived from the Hotspur-class heavy cruiser hull and shares a great deal of commonality with the Hotspur design. While armed in self-defense, the class was built mostly for the purpose of carrying, deploying, and supporting a LMEU, with the additional support of a Wasp-class Marine Armor Transport to carry light and medium tanks (later panzers).

The class would remain in service well into the Hegemony era, only entering second-line service with the appearance of the Iwo Jima-class Marine Transport.

Design History

Designed to replace the Tripoli-class Marine Transport, the Tarawa-class would consolidate many of the missions that required 1.5 Tripoli-class hulls into a single ship. The biggest consolidation was of troops and troop transports, with the ship carrying eight Knight troop dropships and two Cobra light gunships for drop support. Each Knight dropship can carry up to twenty-two Marines, a single LAV, or a single cargo pod internally, providing the ability to rapidly deploy forces into battle. The Tarawa-class also mounts six drop pod cannons on the dorsal of the ship, which can quickly drop powered infantry troops into battle. The ship carries sufficient drop pods and support pods for up to two combat drops.

The ship shares the same 500mm missile tubs and the bow and stern weapons fit of the Hotspur-class, mostly for self-defense and deployment of bombardment weapons. Because the class would operate closer to planets than most other Imperial ships, the point defense systems were heavier to provide protection against mines and missile strikes. The 500mm missile tubes also gave the Tarawa-class the ability to launch a variety of bombardment munitions, from guided SEAD weapons to pure kinetic penetrators.

Unlike most Imperial warships, the Tarawa-class does not mount a deployable VLBI array, as the general mission of the class would make such an array inconvenient. The ship also carries full command facilities for Line Marine units, an expanded medical bay, and enlarged fabrication systems for equipment upkeep and ammo resupply. While the Imperial-era version of the ship would have a “morgue” (powered armor storage bay) big enough to equip a battalion of troops, Hegemony-era ships would carry enough powered armor to equip every Marine.

The hull would see several major revisions, in the form of battle steel armor, antimatter power systems, and an enlarged “morgue” bay during the Hegemony era. The capability of the class would keep it in service well into the later Hegemony era, only to be replaced by the Iwo Jima-class Marine Transport.

Service History

The Tarawa-class would be built in six flights, with the major differences between “flights” being the replacement of the fusion reactors with antimatter reactors, battle steel armor, and minor technical upgrades. The class would primarily operate with Patrol Fleet, followed by Battle Fleet.

The class would not see service in the Ghost Fleets, as there was little need of a Marine transport. Rumors that the largest caches had at least one Tarawa-class to quickly “assume control” of worlds that were being developed by earlier Ghost Fleet caches are continually denied.

General Characteristics

Dimensions: 240 m x 25 m x 20 m

Mass: 36,000 tons (consistent across all flights)

Power Systems:

2x Yoyodine Type 47 Gravity Fusion Reactors (Imperial Era, Flight I-III)

2x Yoyodine Type 45 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight IV)

2x Yoyodine Type 45-A Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight V-VI)

Propulsion Systems:

8x Q-Coils (350 G acceleration, all flights)

3x Slipspace rings (6 LY/day, all flights)

Endurance:

180 days on stored supplies, fuel scoops (Imperium Era)

180 days of antihydrogen at 90% power, theoretically unlimited material
endurance (Hegemony Era)

Crew:

One Class VI AI, 26 Officers, 50 NCO, 260 Able Spacers, backup bioshells and cybershells (Imperial Era)

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, three Class V AIs, mixture of uploads and biological crew equaling 410 crew members, backup bioshells and cybershells (Hegemony Era)

Marines:

Up to 1,700 Marines (Line Marine Expeditionary Unit), with backup bioshells and cybershells.

“Morgue” (powered armor bay) for one battallion (Imperial era) or the entire LEMU (Hegemony era).

Armament:

8×6.5cm positron beam cannons in double turrets (two dorsal, two ventral)

10x700mm missile tubes with gravity launchers, one array of five port and starboard.

6xDrop Pod Launchers, ventral.

Defenses:

Stealth Systems: Radar sheath, IR dampener w/military specification hypersink, hull form.

ECM: AN/SL(G)-88 Electronic Warfare Array, with “spike” and “strobe” jammer options.

AN/SG(N)-41 Electronic Warfare Array with one port and one starboard “spike” arrays.

8x Rodeo-class missile decoys, 8xMirrorball-class sensor decoys (dispensers ventral and dorsal).

Point Defense: 16 40mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

20 20mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

6x150mm counter-missile launchers, mounted in pairs bow, port and starboard.

Shields: Standard Hegemony Navigational Shields

Combat Shield Generators-150% capacity bow, 125% capacity dorsal, ventral, port and starboard, 100% capacity stern. (All Flights)

Armor: Fibersteel, 7 cm maximum (Imperium Era)

Battle Steel, 7 cm maximum (Hegemony Era)

Secondary Craft:

8x Dropships, 2xGunships, 2xPinnance, 3xCutter, 6xType 2 Recon Drones, 2xType 3 Recon Drones (Imperium Era)

8xDropships, 2xGunships, 2xPinnance, 3xCutters, 8xHarvesters, 8xType 2 Recon Drones, 4xType 3 Recon Drones (Hegemony Era)

Designer Notes

If you need to get boots on the ground, the Tarawa-class is the ship you want. Having both dropships and drop pod launchers, the class isn’t quite a “jack of all trades” (it lacks armor bigger than LAVs), it does quite a few roles very well.

• It’s not quite a hospital ship, but it does have enlarged facilities for medical emergencies.
• Since it carries a Line Marine unit, it can do most missions until Garrison Marines are deployed or the Imperial Army (“Operations other than war,” civil contingencies, occupation/planetary control, etc, etc, etc).
• It has a relatively large fabrication system, so it can start restoring planetary infrastructure during an emergency.
• And, it has a Line Marine Expeditionary Unit, which have fought so many desperate actions that even a short list would be voluminous.

The biggest issue was that the class could only drop a single battalion of powered infantry pre-Hegemony (which limited the roles of drop infantry to raids, securing locations for heavier drop ships, and/or similar “airborne infantry” missions) and it can’t carry heavier armor. While later armor (i.e. panzers) could self-deploy in the late Imperium era, there wasn’t enough space to carry anything more than a company of light armored vehicles. 

The later Hegemony-era versions of the ship could equip the entire force with powered armor (relegating the dropships to providing supplies and theater transport on the planet), but the armor issue would remain even with the larger Iwo Jima-class.

The Alaska-class fast battleship class was built for deep-penetration reconnaissance and counter-logistics missions for the Battle Fleet. A combination of factors gave the class a reputation for being “built to go into danger.” Deployed just before the Time Of The Five Emperors and revised during the Hegemony era, the Alaska-class would remain in service for years, only being replaced by the Guernsey-class fast battleship late in the Hegemony era.

Design History

The role of the “fast battleship” class always seemed to require compromises, and the Alaska-class initially seemed to have the fewest compromises. Until it was discovered that it had made no compromises.

At 65,000 tons fully loaded, the 500m-long hull of the Alaska-class was built around six triple turrets mounting 9cm positron beam cannons. This weapons loadout would give the class both incredible range and massive “shock” damage against most targets. Backing this up is sixteen 700mm missile tubes, firing the Mk-28-ModB (and later ModC and ModD) missiles with large magazines and a 410m spinal metaspace cannon with a 45cm aperture, allowing it to do more damage per hit than the Resolute-class battleship.

The class mounts heavy active point defense, reflecting the need to deal with Alpha Rho-class escort battleships with their heavy missile loads. Backing up the heavy point defense is fourteen Rodeo-class missile decoys and an extensive jamming array based around the AN/SG(N)-51 jammer system with six “spike” jammers. Passive defenses are evenly balanced, with the class being the first hull during the Imperial era to use battle chrome armor, with the Hegemony refitting the class with molecularly-collapsed battle chrome armor when the technology came into existence. Shields were considered fairly “light” by battleship standards, but against most threats the class was heavily shielded.

Along with a full ECM suite, the ship mounts enhanced stealth systems with a high-grade military hypersink for IR damping and hull modifications to make it harder for active sensors to track the ship. Like the Renown-class, the Alaska-class mounts a triple extension VLBI array that gives the class an effective 850/1600/2450 meter aperture size, allowing extremely long detection ranges against even stealthed ships. The ship has high acceleration, with 350G acceleration prior to Hegmony-era refits that would give the ship 365G acceleration. With four drive rings, the Alaska-class can do 6 LY/day in slipspace, with a Hegemony refit giving it a 6.5LY/day speed.

Like all capital ships, the Alaska-class carries a “light” marine battalion, with a company-sized powered armor “morgue” in the Imperial era (a full battalion “morgue” would be installed in the Hegemony era). For support in long-duration missions, the ship is fully capable of atmospheric fuel scooping and material printing (with quantum fabricators and harvesting drones installed in the Hegemony era).

The Alaska-class also carries full fleet command facilities, including quarters and a fleet bridge for senior staff. The class had three major revisions, the first being the replacement of the earlier AN/SG(N)-49 with the AN/SG(N)-51 ECM array. The second was the conversion of earlier versions of the ship to the new Hegemony standard with antimatter reactors and quantum fabricators. The third and final revision, prior to the deployment of the Guernsey-class was revisions to the armor systems on the ship.

Service History

Like the Renown-class, the Alaska-class was built near the end of the Alpha Wars and saw most of its combat deployment during the Time of the Five Emperors. The class would earn a reputation as a “pocket dreadnought” because of the heavy weapons load and significant defenses against long-range attacks. 

This class would remain in service through the Hegemony era, even as the Guernsey-class would replace it. It would remain in second-line service even then, only being fully retired and reclaimed as the Azores-class began to replace the Guernsey-class. 

The only major variation on the hull was the Essex-class fast escort tender, which would remove most of the positron beam cannons and all of the missile launcher to replace them with semi-external racks for sixteen Viper-class ACVs. A small number of hulls would be modified for the Ghost Fleet mission during the Hegemony era, namely the removal of the antimatter reactors and replacement with fusion reactors, and secondary modifications to improve long-duration mission operations with the class. 

General Characteristics

Dimensions: 500 m x 45 m x 40 m

Mass: 65,000 tons (consistent across all flights)

Power Systems:

2x Yoyodine Type 48 Gravity Fusion Reactors (Imperium Era, Flight I-V)

2x Yoyodine Type 47 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight V-VI)

2x Yoyodine Type 47-A Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight VII-VIII)

Propulsion Systems:

8x Q-Coils (350 G acceleration Flights I-V, 360 G acceleration Flights VI-VIII)

4x Slipspace rings (6 LY/day, Flights I-V, 6.5 LY/day Flights VI-VIII)

Endurance:

180 days on stored supplies, fuel scoops (Imperium Era)

180 days of antihydrogen at 90% power, theoretically unlimited material endurance (Hegemony Era)

Crew:

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, 30 Officers, 50 NCO, 350 Able Spacers, 300 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Imperial Era)

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, three Class V AIs, mixture of uploads and biological crew equaling 500 crew members, 300 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Hegemony Era)

Armament:

1xMetaspace Cannon, 410m accelerator tunnel with a 45cm discharge aperture.

18×9 cm positron beam cannons in triple turrets (two dorsal, two ventral, one port, one starboard.

16x700mm missile tubes with gravity launchers, four arrays of four port and starboard.

Defenses:

Stealth Systems: Radar sheath, IR dampener w/high-grade military specification hypersink, hull form.

ECM: AN/SL(G)-82 Electronic Warfare Array, with “spike” and “strobe” jammer options.

AN/SG(N)-44 Electronic Warfare Array with two port and two starboard “spike” arrays.

14x Rodeo-class missile decoys, 14xMirrorball-class sensor decoys (dispensers ventral and dorsal).

Point Defense: 22 40mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

28 20mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

10x150mm counter-missile launchers, mounted in pairs in the bow, port, starboard, dorsal, and ventral.

Shields: Standard Hegemony Navigational Shields

Combat Shield Generators-175% capacity bow, 150% capacity dorsal, ventral, port and starboard, 100% capacity stern. (All Flights)

Armor: Battle Chrome, 9 cm maximum (Imperium Era)

Collapsed Battle Chrome, 9 cm maximum (Hegemony Era)

Secondary Craft:

2xPinnance, 4xCutter, 18xType 2 Recon Drones, 8xType 3 Recon Drones (Imperium Era)

2xPinnance, 4xCutters, 8xHarvesters, 20xType 2 Recon Drones, 10xType 3 Recon Drones (Hegemony Era)

Designer Notes

Here’s where one of the interesting dicatomies of the Imperial Navy comes up, and the Alaska-class is now where ships are built exclusively for Battle Fleet and its mission of being the “heavy fist” of the Empire..

Trade Is Life is an unofficial motto for the Imperium, and keeping the life-blood of the Empire flowing is important. The reverse is true-even with printer (and later fabricator) technology, a core portion of Imperial doctrine was the denial of logistic assets to an opponent. In Imperial naval doctrine, this mission was what the fast battleship class was built for-able to destroy most light escorts and transports, while evade heavier escorting ships. This would force enemies- especially the Alphas-to either risk massive logistic losses or commit capital ships to defending convoys.

The Alaska-class was built for that mission-having battlecruiser acceleration, but battleship weapons and defenses. Debates about if the Alaska-class was a better ship than the Resolute-class battleship continued for years. The one biggest issue of this class was the sheer cost of the ships-you could build 2.75 Resolute-class battleships for one Alaska-class fast battleship. With the end of the Alpha threat just prior to the Time Of The Five Emperors, numbers of the Alaska-class hulls were being reduced and placed into reserve.

The chaos of what happened after the Time of the Five Emperors brought the Alaska-class back to the forefront. Many remnants of the rebel navies had battlecruisers and a few older battleships. The speed, firepower, and point defense of the Alaska-class made them critical for engaging remnant forces and destroying them. After most of the rebel forces were destroyed, numbers would be reduced again but as much as previously.

Like all Imperial capital ships, the Alaska-class carries full fleet facilities, with capabilities up to a task group or small fleet. The enlarged Marine complement also serves to provide planetary security and boarding parties as needed (a “light” marine battalion). The class almost never is sent in alone but is often a part of a task force of two to four Alaska-class ships, four to eight heavy cruisers, six to twelve light cruisers, and smaller ships and support ships based upon needs.

Only rarely is this ship-along with the Resolute-class battleship-deployed in the Ghost Fleet caches, and only the largest of the caches. The class would be replaced in Imperial service by the Guernsey-class fast battleship, entering into second-line service. The class would remain in operation until the deployment of the Azores-class fast battleship.

The Renown-class would be a controversial replacement for the Hood-class of battle cruisers in the Imperial Navy. Designed and built just before the end of the Alpha threat, the Renown would later serve in both the Imperium and Hegemony-eras of the Empire as a task group command ship, counter-piracy warship, and often the largest hull in operation for Patrol Fleet operations. 

Design History

Initially designed as a revision of the Hood-class battlecruiser, the Renown-class would instead see several major innovations in both design and construction. The first was the replacement of the double 9cm turrets with triple 6.5 cm turrets, sacrificing long-range firepower for faster and heavier firepower at optimal engagement ranges. The class would also be slightly lighter for missiles, mounting only ten missile tubes over twelve. Fortunately, by the time the Renown-class began deployment, the Mk-28 missile (specifically the Mk-28-ModB version) was entering service.

Point defense is built around eight counter-missile launchers, point defense x-ray lasers in 40mm and 20mm apertures, and ten Rodeo-class missile decoys. The ship also carries a AN/SG(N)-44 jammer array with up to four “spike” jammers for anti-missile engagements. Passive defenses were actually lighter than the Hood-class, with only “cruiser-weight” armor and shields. During the Hegemony era, the ship would have heavier armor installed, but the class would be considered “fragile” against battleship-grade and above opponents.

The class also mounts a full stealth and ECM suite, with a high-grade military hypersink for quick IR dampening. The class also mounts a triple extension VLBI array, giving the ship an effective 600/760/1520 meter array width. This is considered vital for the commerce protection role, as the class can detect potential threats at significant distances under stealth. The class also has a 350G acceleration (360G with Hegemony-era refits) and can operate at 6 LY/day in slipspace with four drive rings.

The Renown-class also carries a “light” marine battalion, with a company-sized powered armor “morgue” in the Imperial era (a full battalion “morgue” would be installed in later versions). The ship also carries standard material printers (later to be replaced with quantum fabricators in the Hegemony era) and is configured for atmospheric “scooping” for refueling.

This class also has full fleet facilities, including quarters and a separate fleet bridget for senior staff.  Most of the hull revisions were for minor technical issues, including the replacement of the fusion reactors with antimatter reactors in the Hegemony period. The only major changes to the class was thicker battle steel armor and slight improvements in the Q-coils for higher acceleration.

Service History

Built just before the end of the Alpha Wars, the Renown-class would remain in service through the end of the Wars, the Time of the Five Emperors, and finally into Hegemony service. Almost exclusively used by Patrol Fleet during its history, it was well regarded for most of the internal security and anti-piracy missions it performed. Crews regarded the class as nimble but fragile-capital ship weapons were capable of doing significant damage if attacks got past the shields and armor. 

Both of these defensive issues would be resolved in the later Indefatigable-class battlecruiser, which would take the “battleship writ small” design concept in terms of armor and weapons.

A number of hulls would be modified for the Ghost Fleet mission during the Hegemony era, namely the removal of the antimatter reactors and replacement with fusion reactors, and secondary modifications to improve long-duration mission operations with the class. Proposals for a full battalion Marine transport on this hull were continually proposed, but were never deployed.

General Characteristics

Dimensions: 350 m x 35 m x 30 m

Mass: 45,000 tons (consistent across all flights)

Power Systems:

2x Yoyodine Type 48 Gravity Fusion Reactors (Imperium Era, Flight I-V)

2x Yoyodine Type 47 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight V-VI)

2x Yoyodine Type 47-A Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight VII-VIII)

Propulsion Systems:

8x Q-Coils (350 G acceleration Flights I-V, 360 G acceleration Flights V-VIII)

4x Slipspace rings (6 LY/day, all flights)

Endurance:

180 days on stored supplies, fuel scoops (Imperium Era)

180 days of antihydrogen at 90% power, theoretically unlimited material endurance (Hegemony Era)

Crew:

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, 30 Officers, 50 NCO, 350 Able Spacers, 300 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Imperial Era)

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, three Class V AIs, mixture of uploads and biological crew equaling 500 crew members, 300 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Hegemony Era)

Armament:

1xMetaspace Cannon, 310m accelerator tunnel with a 40cm discharge aperture.

21×6.5cm positron beam cannons in triple turrets (two dorsal, two ventral, one port, one starboard.

10x700mm missile tubes with gravity launchers, two arrays of five port and starboard.

Defenses:

Stealth Systems: Radar sheath, IR dampener w/high-grade military specification hypersink, hull form.

ECM: AN/SL(G)-82 Electronic Warfare Array, with “spike” and “strobe” jammer options.

AN/SG(N)-44 Electronic Warfare Array with two port and two starboard “spike” arrays.

10x Rodeo-class missile decoys, 10xMirrorball-class sensor decoys (dispensers ventral and dorsal).

Point Defense: 16 40mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

20 20mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

8x150mm counter-missile launchers, mounted in a pair in the bow, triple tubes port and starboard.

Shields: Standard Hegemony Navigational Shields

Combat Shield Generators-175% capacity bow, 150% capacity dorsal, ventral, port and starboard, 100% capacity stern. (All Flights)

Armor: Fibersteel, 8.5 cm maximum (Imperium Era)

Battle Steel, 9 cm maximum (Hegemony Era)

Secondary Craft:

2xPinnance, 4xCutter, 14xType 2 Recon Drones, 6xType 3 Recon Drones (Imperium Era)

2xPinnance, 4xCutters, 8xHarvesters, 16xType 2 Recon Drones, 8xType 3 Recon Drones (Hegemony Era)

Designer Notes

Here’s where one of the interesting dicatomies of the Imperial Navy comes up, and the Renown-class marks the dividing line between Patrol Fleet and Battle Fleet.

Trade Is Life being an unofficial motto for the Imperium, and keeping the lifeblood of the Empire flowing is important. The Renown-class is built to defend Imperial commerce as a part of Patrol Fleet, while the Alaska-class fast battleship is designed to attack hostile commerce and shipping as a part of Battle Fleet and both designs reflect that mission. The enlarged Marine complement also serves to provide planetary security as needed (a “light” marine battalion) and full fleet facilities for a squadron or task group. It’s not quite the generalist that the Hotspur-class is, and it is rarely deployed without an escort of at least two to four light cruisers and supporting elements, but it is considered a workhorse hull of the Empire and has always reflected this role.

With few exceptions, this is the largest Imperial ship by type in a Ghost Fleet cache, with only the largest of caches having a Alaska-class fast battleship or a Resolute-class battleship. Debates about if this was a good idea or not always foundered on the simple fact that nobody wanted to risk leaving something like a Bismarck-class dreadnought, a Yamato-class super-dreadnought or a Iowa-class monitor outside of proper military supervision.

The Imperial Hotspur-class Heavy Cruiser was built in the middle-Imperium period and represented the platonic ideal of the heavy cruiser mission and role. Even with the end of the Alphas and the Time of Five Emperors, the Hotspur-class of heavy cruisers would remain in service-with major revisions-during the Hegemony era. It wouldn’t be until the middle/late Hegemony period that a new heavy cruiser class, the Hachiman-class, would start replacing the Hotspur-class.

Design History

Built as a replacement to the Hafgan-class of heavy cruisers, the Hotspur-class would make the most of several improvements in Imperial technology against the Alphas and a change in battle doctrine where more beam cannons backed up by heavier missile point defense would be vital.

Like all Imperial capital ships, the Hotspur-class would mount a spinal Metaspace Cannon, namely one with a 240m accelerator tunnel and a 35mm discharge aperture. This would give the class nearly 25% greater range than the Alpha’s equivalent cruiser class and better power handling systems. Backing this up is six dual-mount turrets with 6.5 cm positron beam cannons. Arguments about the weapons loadout have continued through its deployment, but the Imperial design opinion was that more cannons with a higher rate of fire was more important than bigger cannons with longer range.

For missile engagements, the Hotspur-class mounts eight 500mm missile tubes with gravity drivers port and starboard. The Hotspur-class could use earlier Mk-22, Mk-24, and Mk-26 missiles, but the class was built to use the Mk-28 missile. This class of missile would become legendary, as it had both better range and better acceleration than its Alpha-equivalent missile, and in the -C, -D, and -E versions a more powerful warhead.The Mk-28 would remain in service far into the Hegemony era, with the -U and -W versions only being replaced by the Mk-32 missile.

Point-defense consists of six 150mm counter-missile launchers with 20mm and 40mm x-ray laser cannons in casement mounts. The reach of the counter-missile launchers would make it difficult for peer-level hulls to engage the Hotspur-class with missiles at long ranges. Passive defenses include shields and armor, with a heavy emphasis on “bow-on” engagements.

As a part of the ship’s systems, the hull also carries full stealth systems, IR dampening with a military-grade hypersink system, ECM systems (spike, strobe and anti-missile jammers), and sixteen decoys in ventral and dorsal dispensers. In addition, the ship also carries a full load of reconnaissance drones to extend the ship’s sensor range and a 450 m/875 m deployable passive VLBI array. The Hotspur-class has an Imperial standard 6LY/day in slipspace and can accelerate up to 350 G at maximum power.

The class also mounts full flag-facilities for command of squadrons and task forces on every hull. This not only includes space for a flag officer and his staff, but specialized computing and communications systems for command and control of fleets across several light hours.

The hull would see several major revisions, in the form of battle steel armor, antimatter power systems, and enhanced computing systems during the Hegemony era. This would extend the ship’s lifespan and keep the class in secondary service with the deployment of the Hachiman-class heavy cruiser.

Service History

The Hotspur-class would be built in eight flights with nearly thirty-thousand hulls being manufactured. Most of these hulls would be retrofitted from earlier flights with fusion reactors to later antimatter reactors and improvements in computer technology. While the Hachiman-class would be this ship’s replacement, the Hotspur would remain in production for over a decade for Patrol Fleet and Ghost Fleet missions.

The basic hull would be used for a number of missions, not the least of which was the Tarawa-class Marine Transport and the Serendipity-class survey cruiser. 

A number of hulls would be modified for the Ghost Fleet mission during the Hegemony era, namely the removal of the antimatter reactors and replacement with fusion reactors, and secondary modifications to improve long-duration mission operations with the class.

General Characteristics

Dimensions: 230 m x 25 m x 20 m

Mass: 35,000 tons (consistent across all flights)

Power Systems:

2x Yoyodine Type 47 Gravity Fusion Reactors (Imperium Era, Flight I-IV)

2x Yoyodine Type 45 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight IV-V)

2x Yoyodine Type 45-A Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight VI-VIII)

Propulsion Systems:

8x Q-Coils (350 G acceleration, all flights)

3x Slipspace rings (6 LY/day, all flights)

Endurance:

180 days on stored supplies, fuel scoops (Imperium Era)

180 days of antihydrogen at 90% power, theoretically unlimited material endurance (Hegemony Era)

Crew:

One Class VI AI, 25 Officers, 40 NCO, 250 Able Spacers, 150 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Imperial Era)

One Class VII AI, three Class VI AIs, three Class V AIs, mixture of uploads and biological crew equaling 400 crew members, 150 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Hegemony Era)

Armament:

1xMetaspace Cannon, 210m accelerator tunnel with a 35cm discharge aperture.

12×6.5cm positron beam cannons in double turrets (two dorsal, two ventral, one port, one starboard.

8x700mm missile tubes with gravity launchers, two arrays of four port and starboard.

Defenses:

Stealth Systems: Radar sheath, IR dampener w/military specification hypersink,
hull form.

ECM: AN/SL(G)-88 Electronic Warfare Array, with “spike” and “strobe” jammer options.

AN/SG(N)-41 Electronic Warfare Array with one port and one starboard “spike” arrays.

8x Rodeo-class missile decoys, 8xMirrorball-class sensor decoys (dispensers ventral and dorsal).

Point Defense: 12 40mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

18 20mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

6x150mm counter-missile launchers, mounted in pairs bow, port and starboard.

Shields: Standard Hegemony Navigational Shields

Combat Shield Generators-175% capacity bow, 150% capacity dorsal, ventral, port and starboard, 100% capacity stern. (All Flights)

Armor: Fibersteel, 8 cm maximum (Imperium Era)

Battle Steel, 8 cm maximum (Hegemony Era)

Secondary Craft:

2xPinnance, 2xCutter, 12xType 2 Recon Drones, 4xType 3 Recon Drones (Imperium Era)

2xPinnance, 2xCutter, 6xHarvesting Drones, 14xType 2 Recon Drones, 6xType 3 Recon Drones (Hegemony Era)

Designer Notes

“Space, the final frontier…these are the voyages of…”

If there is an Imperial ship that has the same heritage as the Federation Constitution-class, the Hotspur-class is it. It’s the Imperium’s general workhorse cruiser, capable of handling just about every cruiser mission out there. While there are more specialized hulls that can handle very specific missions, the general purpose hull for most Imperial missions that don’t require a squadron or fleet is a few Hotspur and some light cruisers and destroyers, with a small support fleet train (fleet tenders, maybe a Marine transport and a hospital ship).

(Since this is Real Life and not a TV show where extra ships means extra SFX costs, even the Enterprise would be going with at least two to four destroyers and a fast fleet tender or two.)

A replacement for the Lysandra-class light cruiser at the start of the Hegemony era of the Third Imperium, the Lachesis-class light cruiser was built specifically for the light cruiser mission in the Imperial Navy. This mission includes convoy and task-group escort, exploration, survey, and anti-piracy missions, with the Lachesis-class making the most of the experience of the Lysandra-class.

Debates about the class-namely the relatively light beam cannon load-would result in the replacement of the class with the Lindworm-class in the Middle Hegemony period.

Design History

Like the Lysandra-class light cruiser, the Lachesis-class was built for interior missions, including exploration and line-of-communications operations between Imperial worlds. With the class being built after the end of the Alpha Wars, combat with Alpha warships wasn’t a major consideration. However, the Imperial Navy did maintain combat capability against Alpha or other “near peer” warships as a major portion of the ship concept.

The Lachesis-class can be seen as a revision of the Lysandra-class, and it is only in defensive systems and support systems that the class can be considered improved. The ship is built around a spinal Metaspace Cannon with a 120m accelerator tunnel and a 30cm discharge aperture. Secondary direct-fire weapons are built around twelve 5cm positron beam cannons in dual turret mounts, considered to be a far too light weapons load for the class (the later Lindworm-class would mount 6.5cm beam cannons in dual turret mounts).

Long-ranged engagements are based around ten 350mm missile launcher tubes with gravity drivers on the ship’s port and starboard. While the class could use all Imperial-standard missiles, the Lachesis-class would have its fire control optimized for the Mk-21-B missile and the later Mk-23 and Mk-27 missiles. Point defense would not only consist of standard 20mm and 40mm x-ray lasers, but four 150mm counter-missile launchers. Debates about the effectiveness of mounting counter-missiles on a light cruiser hull is continually discussed, but against most light combatants it gives a ranged engagement option against missiles.

Passive defenses would be built around shields rated to withstand 1.5 strikes of a Lachesis-class equivalent main beam cannon strike on the bow, dorsal and ventral aspects, with a single-strike resistance to the port and starboard, and 75% resistance aft. Like Hegemony-era warships, the Lachesis-class uses battle steel armor. The ship mounts six Q-space coils and three slipspace drive rings, giving the ship a 360 G acceleration and 6 LY/day travel time. 

Sensor capability would include a 320 m/640 m VLBI array system (with two backup deployable arrays), an extensive passive and active EM sensor system, and standard navigation and operational sensor packages. The ship also carries a planetary survey package as standard, twelve sensor decoys (split between Rodeo-type anti-missile decoys and Mirrorball-type anti-sensor decoys), stealth systems backed up by a mil-spec hypersink, and the AN/SL(G)-82 electronic warfare package. The Lachesis-class would also mount the AN/SG(N)-33 electronic warfare package, which included two high-powered “spike” jammers for anti-missile duties.

Retrofits of the Lachesis-class would continue through the early Hegemony period, but no major revisions beyond reactor improvements of the hull would result.

Service History

The Lachesis-class would be built in five major “flights,” and at a replacement rate of 1.5 times the number of Lysandra-class ships currently in deployment. The only major variation between flights is the replacement of the Type 34 rectors with the improved Type 35-A1 antimatter reactors starting in Flight IV and later hull retrofits. The class would remain in Imperial service until the Lindworm-class was deployed, later to be assigned to secondary service then materials reclamation.

A proposed version would have replaced all of the missile launchers and the Metaspace cannon with bow launch arrays for Mk 25 missiles, but the Imperial Navy saw no need for a small bombardment hull and the class couldn’t carry enough missiles to be worthwhile. An additional proposal for specific revision of the hull for Survey missions was considered, but this mission would be filled by a version of the Hotspur-class heavy cruiser, the Serendipity-class.

A number of hulls would be modified for the Ghost Fleet mission, namely the removal of the antimatter reactors and replacement with fusion reactors, and secondary modifications to improve long-duration mission operations with the class.

General Characteristics

Dimensions: 180 m x 22 m x 18 m

Mass: 15,000 tons (consistent across all flights)

Power Systems:

2x Yoyodine Type 34 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight I-III)

2x Yoyodine Type 35-A1 Antimatter Reactors (Hegemony Era, Flight IV-V)

Propulsion Systems:

6x Q-Coils (360 G acceleration, all flights)

3x Slipspace rings (6 LY/day, all flights)

Endurance:

180 days of antihydrogen at 90% power, theoretically unlimited material endurance (Hegemony Era)

Crew:

One Class VI AI, three Class V AIs, mixture of uploads and biological crew equaling 400 crew members, 100 Marines, backup bioshells and cybershells (Hegemony Era)

Armament:

1xMetaspace Cannon, 120m spinal mount with a 30 cm bow discharge aperture.

12×5 cm positron beam cannons in six dual turrets, two ventral, two dorsal, one port, one starboard.

10x350mm missile tubes with gravity launchers, two arrays of five port and starboard.

Defenses:

Stealth Systems: Radar sheath, IR dampener w/military specification hypersink, hull form.

ECM: AN/SL(G)-82 Electronic Warfare Array, with “spike” and “strobe” jammer options.
AN/SG(N)-33 Electronic Warfare Array with one port and one starboard “spike” arrays.

6x Rodeo-class missile decoys, 6xMirrorball-class sensor decoys (dispensers ventral and dorsal).

Point Defense: 10 40mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

16 20mm xaser cannons with double-bounce gravity mirrors in independent casemate mounts.

4x150mm counter-missile launchers, mounted in pairs port and starboard.

Shields: Standard Hegemony Navigational Shields

Combat Shield Generators-150% capacity bow, dorsal, and ventral, 100% capacity port and starboard, 75% capacity stern.

Armor: Battle steel, 5.5 cm maximum (Hegemony Era)

Secondary Craft:

2xPinnance, 2xCutter, 6xHarvesting Drones, 14xType 2 Recon Drones, 6xType 3 Recon Drones (Hegemony Era)