The Monster
Monster
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: To create a flagship and mobile headquarters for The Dire Wolves Mercenary Company.
- Image Source: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8aPQw
- Canon Link: None
- Permissions:
- Primary Source: None
- Manufacturer: Joint effort between Roble Manufacturing and Locke and Key Mechanics, with some materials from Nargath Holdings, all overseen by The Dire Wolves Mercenary Company.
- Affiliation: The Dire Wolves Mercenary Company
- Model: TDWSF-1 Aegis
- Production: Unique
- Material:
- Classification: Multi-role Command Frigate
- Length: 350 meters
- Width: 120 meters at engine deck
- Height: 90 meters at tallest point
- Armament: Very High/Extreme/Average
- 10 Hades Mass Driver cannons (Various power settings change Armament ratings)
- 10 Lightstorm Turbolasers
- 15 Quad laser cannons
- 6 Missile launchers
- Cluster Missiles 40
- Cruise Missiles 10
- Proton Torpedoes 20
- Defenses: High
- Phalanx Shield system (power settings change defense rating)
- 3.5 meters of armor composite plating (Durasteels and ERsteel)
- First two layers are Durasteel 421A (base) and Durasteel 421S (middle), with an ERsteel outer layer. On top is a carbonite coating to protect against corrosive attacks
- RAAM-M3 Tactical Ordnance Jammer
- Hangar Space: Very Low: 1
- Hangar Allocations:
- Starfighters: 0 squadrons
- Support Craft: 1x GS-77 gunship docking point on underside of the ship
- Maneuverability Rating: High/High/Very High
- Speed Rating: High/Average/Very High
- Power settings affect ship performance
- Hyperdrive Class: Fast: 1.0
- Has an oversized RMR-S22X Hypermatter reactor to increase power capacity while maintaining a manageable fuel consumption.
- RX-D13 and RX-D13X engines for increased performance and reinforced hull to account for the extreme stresses associated with putting those kinds of upgrades in a Frigate.
- EX compatibility with all Locke and Key Mechanics systems allowing for greater networking potential when coordinating with CIS units (must be initiated by Locke and Key personnel however).
- Freyja comms suite provides a state of the art comms for the ship allowing for secured, unsecured and open broadcasting options giving the ship a top of the line options for comms.
- A detention hold that has 15 Universal Energy Cages, and 5 Duranium box cells, enough cells to house 20 individuals.
- An armory that carries all the weapons armor and combat supplies to outfit 125 commandoes, while also supporting the 150 personnel that man the ship.
- A centralized droid brain managed most of the common functions of the vessels with various droids doing most of the non-specialized tasks.
- There is a large briefing room that can be completely sealed from the rest of the ship to become a secure room, not allowing any data transmissions, sounds, or any kind of radiation without CO or XO approval. This room seats roughly 30 persons with a centralized holoprojector, capable of projected both images and real time data of any combat space allowing the current captain to see everything surrounding his vessel.
- The ship has a MXC-R13 Saja class sensor array.
- For point defense and Starfighter interception the ship has 15 Quad laser cannons strategically placed to give the ship 360° coverage from any attack.
- The Hypermatter reactor for the ship and engines are actually built for a 500 meter long vessel giving the ship an edge in power generation and acceleration compared to other ships of its class.
- The TDWM-1 "Hades" is any captain's absolute dream of a weapon system. It's versatility and adaptability incarnate, giving the ship the ability to stand off and hammer targets with very slow firing massive power shots or close the gap and put the weapons on a much faster firing low power mode as it flies through the brawl. Or if all else fails you can roll the dice and one of the guns at full power, either killing the target, or you, or both, or possibly buy yourself and anyone else enough time to escape. This weapon system is the centerpiece of this vessel, and it has 10 turrets with 2 guns in each. So yeah, eat your heart out.
- 10 Lightstorm Turbolasers courtesy of Locke and Key Mechanics, giving the ship plenty of firepower to make anyone else coming against this vessel second guess their life choices.
- Missile launchers for drive by missile/Proton Torpedo attacks and cluster concussion missiles for Starfighter squadrons that get a little too cocky.
- Phalanx shield system that allows the ship to redeploy it's shielding rapidly to hostile fronts and reinforce its defenses from almost any angle.
- RX-D13s and RX-D13Xs for enough maneuverability that this ship performs like a veritable sports car compared to other vessels.
- The entirety of the ship, except for the engines because their armor thickness is a little thinner, is covered in a 3.5 meter thick layered Durasteel 421A, Durasteel 421S, and ERsteel armor with a protective carbonite coating to shrug off most of the lighter weapons that might get through the shields. And because its power to weight ratio is that great, it still performs like the vessel has only 1 meter of standard Alusteel armor plating.
- Gotta Go Fast: This ship was designed with the power availability and thrust equivalent of a 500 meter heavy frigate crammed into a 350 meter frigate. This ship can out maneuver all but the fastest of corvettes or star fighters allowing it to pull insane maneuvers in combat to get an edge on whatever it might face. If you need a fast ship to run a blockade, or to reposition to assault an opening in the enemy's line, this is the ship you call to lead the attack, or make the run.
- I don't care what range you are at: The primary weapon system of this frigate is the TDWM-1 "Hades" Mass Driver. It has multiple power settings for two different ranges, up close and personal, and "Hello you're dead". This weapon system is in short devastating to most targets especially if the other ship is already tied up in a fight with something else, allowing for this frigate to move in, deliver the kill shot, and get both vessels into fighting something else to try and turn the tide of battle. And on top of this, the ship has 10 Lightstorm Turbolasers that when their Lightstorm mode is activated make this ship absolutely relentless in close combat. And then, there's the missiles. While only having six missile launchers, the Aegis has the capability to fire different missiles for different situations from cluster Missiles for point blank range engagements with star fighters, to long range cruise missiles, to proton torpedoes to engage enemy capital ships. This ship can engage at any range very, very effectively and if you want to roll the dice against it, good luck. You'll need it.
- Adaptable is my middle name: For a Frigate this ship is extremely adaptable and attacks every task given to it in the typical Dire Wolves Manner, extremely aggressively. Do you need a command and control point that's mobile and able to coordinate with multiple different assets at differing wavelengths and security frequencies? The Aegis can do that. Do you need a fire support platform that's able to defend itself from lighter scouting attacks while still delivering heavy hammer blows to multiple ships in the battlespace in a manner that makes even Star Destroyer captains soil their pants when from out of nowhere an 800mm AP round smacks into their hull and detonates causing massive damage? The Aegis' Hades guns are perfect. Do you need a ship to quickly respond to a defense in depth to reinforce positions with fighters and other craft while larger ships shift over to actually fill the gap, or if on the offense exploit a gap and put some hard hitting heavy firepower inside and make an enemy commander scramble to try and cover? Bring. It. On. We'll take all comers.
- Need us in atmo?: This ship has such a great power to weight ratio that if needed for operations, it can enter a planet's gravity well and even atmosphere to perform ground support and CAS operations. And while a lot slower in atmosphere, it is still not by a long shot sluggish.
- It's still just a frigate: Despite all the firepower and armor and shielding crammed on this vessel, it's still just a Frigate. This ship while it has more weapons and armor and other systems per ton than a lot of other vessels, just doesn't have the space to properly fill a role that a proper cruiser is needed for. It doesn't have the same level of overall firepower, or shields, or support crews and as such it is easy to overwhelm with a much smaller force than a standard cruiser that's made for Ship of Line combat. It can't stand and trade hammer blows with other vessels and if it's getting close enough for other vessels to engage, it relies on its speed and maneuverability to get out of fights. When facing larger vessels its plan of attack is to outmaneuver and deliver a quick strike to kill the target quickly, when faced with multiple opponents this becomes difficult if not impossible as the frigate can't tank enough damage to justify it maneuvering in for the kill and as such will have to disengage and run.
- These guns only work in space: Due to the construction of the TDWM-1 Hades, it's performance is extremely hampered once in atmosphere of a planet as the rounds are not exceptionally aerodynamic, and the turrets themselves can't effectively target fast moving targets, nor targets outside of their hard limits for angles makes these guns extremely poor in atmospheric engagements.
- Capacitors make a really big boom: This ship uses an extensive capacitor system that makes up for the massive power draw of its main weapons, the Hades cannons, that store a lot of energy each of the cells. These cells are extremely volatile when damaged, and in order to keep within safe parameters when battle damage is sustained that output into the turrets of these weapons needs to be lowered which reduces rates of fire and actual power output per shot. And if one of these capacitor systems catastrophically fails, it will destroy a huge section of the ship, possibly causing a sympathetic failures or worse, cascade explosions through other capacitor systems to the point the entire ship is out of action, or only has enough power generation left for a fraction of its weapons. If this happens to a turret that's attempting to charge a round such as an APDS or Super Ion cannister shot, the results could literally be an entire section of the ship is now gone. Not just a destroyed turret or hull breach, we're talking a 40 meter radius from the edge of the turret is now gone, with damage extending throughout the ship.
The Aegis started out as nothing more than a dream, a thought up idea that Sergei had when he began recruiting more into The Dire Wolves Mercenary Company. It was to be a home for his soldiers, something small and fast, mean and fierce, and as adaptable as the company was. Sergei left it at a dream until he encountered the scientist Dr. Ryan Alphonse. When he rescued him from the pirates in CIS space, Sergei saw the potential in him. When he negotiated the man's release and offered him a job, Sergei gave the man two jobs.
"Maintain the gunship and help people on board when you can. And build us a ship, something that every Dire Wolf in our company can call home. Something that is as fierce as a team of ours in combat, as fast as possible, and so fearsome on the field of battle that any who see our vessel approach, know that we are the harbingers of death for the wicked, and a beacon of hope for the righteous and downtrodden,"
Ryan wasn't one to waste time with niceties or words, and while his degrees in engineering and physics didn't directly translate into ship building, he set to learn how to design, build, and orchestrate the construction of such a vessel. At first he thought that he should build something massive and fearsome like the galaxy had never seen, but quickly decided against it. Large capital ships were slow, lethargic, and while essentially dreadnoughts in the field of battle, they were easy targets for ships with anti-capital ship weapons.
So he settled on the design for a 350 meter long frigate, and set several design objectives. It had to have consumables for up to a year, and fuel to match. It had to be fast, and it had to hit like a cruiser, with the ability to survive the brawl of space combat in an engagement.
The first issue he figured to solve was powerplant and engines, settling on a design from Roble Manufacturing, and made the decision to actually get a powerplant a size larger, meant for a 500 meter long heavy frigate, with engines to match. He then worked on weapons, and seeing a design from the same manufacturer, but seeing its limitations, ordered a turret from Roble Manufacturing to not only develop a new weapon based on the same design. What came out of that program was the TDWM-1 "Hades", a veritable master piece of weapons technology. Satisfied with the performance of that as the primary weapon system for the ship, he backed it up with 10 Lightstorm Turbolasers, 15 Quad laser cannons, and six missile launchers. The ship could now punch like a cruiser, if only for a little while, and with the backup weapons would be a fearsome opponent against similarly sized vessels, and would surprise anyone that went toe to toe with the ship in a larger vessel.
Then he began looking at the vessel's construction, settling on a honeycombed style of hull structure, however replacing the hexagon style with triangles to increase the structural strength of the hull. For materials he decided on using a Duranium alloy with a small percentage of Alusteel to save on costs, and proceeded to build the spaces for everything on the vessels. He chose an angular hull shape to increase its offensive capability, used Durasteel 421A to protect all the vital electronics on board the ship from EMP attacks and power surges. He even designed where the barracks would be, the command deck, armory, detention center, everything down to last terminal access point.
He exceeded his expectations when completed, having built a ship that could house a crew of 150, plus another 120 combat personnel, 20 detainees, and a small contingent of droids to manage smaller menial tasks aboard the ship. It had an armory for all the personnel on board, as well as a point to put confiscated weapons and armor. And in the engineering bay a full suite to fabricate and manufacture replacement parts, or let the engineers aboard the ship fabricate new designs for smaller parts or even weapons if they had the material on hand. It could carry only 700 metric tons of cargo, but while it was a symbol of someone who brought stability to a system, it was definitely more intended as a ship of war. This vessel would be able to sustain itself on its own fuel, consumables and parts for the various needs of the ship for over a year. The munitions count was at full combat haul, 200 rounds of AP and Ion rounds, 40 boarding pods, 80 rounds of HE, and 5 rounds of what the crew members called Shield busters or Super Ion rounds, along with 5 more of APDS rounds. For missiles it packed 40 cluster missiles, 10 cruise missiles, and 20 proton torpedoes.
With a hyperdrive rating of 1.0, the ship was able to get along fast enough, but the real test of the ship was its power management system. The Aegis, even with the ship's oversized powerplant, didn't have enough power to actually run everything at peak efficiency so the ship instead managed on a power supply system that would at times divert power from unnecessary systems to give more free power to combat operations of the ship. This was also one step further though as the ship could divert power from the weapons, shields, and engines with the simple command from the helm, giving the ship the options to set it into a slow moving heavy hitting artillery platform, to a fast moving slugger that could pull up behind a ship, fire a broadside, and immediately make a getaway. It's a ship that allows for captains to showcase their creativity and ingenuity in battle, but demands that they and their crews properly manage the power settings otherwise they risk killing everyone on board.
In essence the vessel is exactly what The Dire Wolves Mercenary Company is. It's an adaptable tool that can be as precise as a scalpel, or as devastating as a sledgehammer. It can operate both in space and in atmosphere, and while it has its drawbacks and small size working against it, it's sheer amount of firepower should make anyone who happens to come against it pause. It's a Frigate with the speed of a Corvette that can have the punching power of a Cruiser. It's a home for all those who march, train and fight for The Dire Wolves. It's very presence is a sign that while the ship still operates, hope still lives. And if you have hope, you can fight.
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