Commodore Helix
Disintegrations done dirt cheap.
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: to create a lightning-fast fighter craft for Helix Solutions
- Image Source: Andrew Shabhan
- Canon Link: Tri-Fighter
- Permissions: N/A
- Primary Source: Wookiepedia, Tri-Fighter
- Manufacturer: Helix Solutions
- Affiliation: Helix Solutions
- Market Status: Closed-Market
- Model: HCI "Calliphora" Interceptor
- Production: Limited
- Material: Durasteel, Quadanium, Droid components, weapon components
- Classification: Interceptor
- Length: 5.4 meters
- Width: 3.45 meters
- Height: 3.45 meters
- Armament: High
- Defenses: Very Low
- Deflector Shielding
- Squadron Count: Low (8)
- Maneuverability Rating: Very High
- Speed Rating: Very High
- Hyperdrive: No
- All Standard Features
- Discord Missile Launcher
- Improved Droid Brain
- Greased Lightning: There are few faster vessels on the move than the Calliphora, be it in or out of atmosphere. Sporting powerful engines and light deflector shields to increase speed, it is capable of leaving most other fighters in the dust.
- Spin on a Dime: Matching its deadly speed is its maneuverability, superior by far to its hated Condor Rivals, and outmatching most organic-manned fighters. Its advanced mechanical brain grants it powerful range and distance calculation abilities, as well as startling reflexes, making it able to evade most incoming fire.
- Powerful Weaponry: The Calliphora possesses more than enough armaments to dust off the dogfight when it arrives, most notably a shield-ignoring solar ionization cannon.
- Glass Bones and Paper Skin: The Calliphora is a powerful but delicate piece of machinery, equipped with no more than token defenses. While equipped with deflector shielding, these are more for the purposes of easing atmospheric flight, and will provide only nominal protection against incoming fire.
- High Ion Vulnerability: The Calliphora is particularly vulnerable to ion weaponry, given the sophistication and delicacy of its systems.
- Instigator: Helix's Calliphoras bear a standing and heated rivalry with the Condor fighters, and "accidental" friendly fire incidents between these vessels tend to happen if either side thinks they can get away with it.
- Fighter Duellist: While able to combat enemy fighters with ease, the Calliphora is somewhat hyperspecialized in this role, and its armaments lack the punch to do any real harm to anything larger than a freighter.
The Calliphora was developed in response to several encounters with fast and powerful hostile interceptor fighters, capable of running circles around Helix's Condor craft.
The result is an almost incredibly fast and maneuverable starfighter, able to make a mockery of the clumsy efforts at "flying" performed by most organic pilots. The fighter stretches the limits of what physics will allow in atmosphere, but it is in space where it truly shines.
The Calliphora quickly became the bane of enemy fighter craft, between a body capable of dancing through the heartbeat-thin gaps in incoming fire, and a droid brain advanced enough to avoid it with near-perfect, split-second trajectory calculations, it didn't take long for this fighter to earn a terrifying reputation among pilots who had faced it and lived to tell the tale.
Armed to the bulkhead with a trio of heavy laser cannons, six underslung missile racks, and most notably a solar ionization cannon, it was more than capable of turning nearly any fighter it faced into free-floating space dust should it catch them.
Still, this fast-moving carrion fly had a flimsy shell. Should return fire indeed manage to catch it, a kill was all but guaranteed: the vessel's shielding wouldn't do more than turn away a glancing hit.
The Calliphora also was not capable of taking on corvettes or frigates with anything like efficiency, given the somewhat specialized focus of its armaments, and would avoid flak vessels with all its ability.
To Helix's mingled amusement and consternation, the advanced droid brain that the Calliphora (like most Helix droids) was equipped with lead to these vessels developing cocky, maverick personalities, and a fierce rivalry with their Condor counterparts that occasionally would even spill over into violence, though seldom in the middle of a battle. As a result, these vessels are usually segregated within hangars, as any encounters between them tended to get ugly quickly. Both sides were (usually) capable of being professionals within combat, but outside of it, both would sometimes egg ground combat units into performing obnoxious pranks that bordered on sabotage.
For their part, Helix accepts most of these difficulties, as it has no intention of marketing these vessels to non-company assets in any case.
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