OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: A megalaser for the Confederacy's SSD
- Image Source: The Silencer
- Canon Link: The Silencer
- Primary Source:
The Silencer - Superlaser
PRODUCTION INFORMATION
- Manufacturer: Alterra Arms & Armour, Confederacy of Independent Systems
- Affiliation: Confederacy of Independent Systems
- Model: The Silencer
- Modularity: No
Production: Unique
- Material:
Chromium Frame - Turbolaser Components
- Kyber Focusing Crystal
TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
- Classification: Megalaser
- Size: Extreme
- Weight: Extreme
- Ammunition Type: Power/Electricity/Etc
- Ammunition Capacity: One shot/Effectively Unlimited
Reload Speed: Fast
- Effective Range: Extreme
- Rate of Fire: Very Slow
- Stopping Power: Extreme
- Recoil: None
- None apart from what is detailed in Strengths and the Description
- Capital Crippler: The Devastator packs enough punch to cripple dreadnoughts/SD's, significantly drain shields, or even completely destroy ships of smaller size should it hit (Up to the victim to what extent the damage done is, if any). To allow it to perform this duty to it's peak standards, it's range is extreme. This is helped by the power used to create the beam itself.
- Rapid Fire: The Devastator is, like it's predecessor, designed to be a weapon for destroying, crippling, or otherwise eliminating fleets of most sizes. For this purpose, it has a slightly faster than normal recharge rate compared to other weapons of it's class/size.
- Power Drain: The Devastator requires a large amount of power to rapidly fire, or even fire at all. For this reason, it requires either a singular, large Isotope-5 generator or multiple nuclear generators solely dedicated to it for it to function. If the generator(s) is not solely dedicated to the weapon, it will exert a massive drain on whatever other systems that generator(s) is powering, to the point of losing power to more costly systems.
- Shields Down: The Devastator requires the shield system on the ship it is mounted on to be lowered for it to fire, if not, it will hit it's own shield systems, and would likely cause an extreme power drain, if not complete system failure to it's shields.
- Tunnel Vision: The Devastator is a fixed piece of weaponry, meaning it can only fire in one direction. This direction is exactly forward of the SSD it is mounted on. So if the fleet it should target is behind it, the entire ship has to turn to face that fleet. Or , it would need to angle up if the target is above it.
The Devastator is a joint project to remake the Silencer Superlaser that was very popular among the Old Sith Empire's elite, and to put it towards a less malevolent purpose. The project was a joint effort between Alterra Arms and Armour, and The Confederacy of Independent Systems' Weapons R&D division to create a less destructive and threatening variant of it's predecessor. This effort was a tremendous success, if one considers the intent alone.
Without the original designs or blueprints of the Silencer, the effort took a considerably larger amount of time and resources than originally expected. The project, more than once, exceeded the budget allocated to it, even when the budget was revised, and raised in increments of hundreds of thousands multiple times. The final cost of the project is not up for disclosure, but the finished product costed around the eight to ten million credit mark. Without going into too much detail, the roughly ten to twenty teams of highly skilled researchers, technicians, and engineers working on the concept alone were greatly excited when they saw the weapon fire into open space for the first time.
The inner workings of the gentle giant are rather complex to the simple mind. However, to those who truly understand what they're doing, this is the explanation I would give: The beam itself is produced not from multiple lasers forming into one, rather, a larger laser formed by multiple smaller beams that fire their charge into a large crystal that then emits a large burst of energy, which is focused by going through a focusing lens which then turns the beam into a more refined, but still large, beam of energy. This beam is then fired out of the most noticeable exterior part of the weapon.
Once fired, the beam will travel down a barrel type of area, where it is further refined by the Chromium. The Chromium shaves off any excess radiation or energy, catching it, this energy is then absorbed back through the ship, into the weapon again to be reused. This is part of how the Devastator is able to fire rapidly. It recycles energy used in previous blasts, which is then converted back to usable energy that is stored in separate emitters that form a circle around the main crystal. When the Devastator is next fired, these emitters fire directly into the crystal. This means that the dedicated generators for the megalaser do not need to contribute as much. This process saves anywhere from 5-10% of the energy required to fire the laser regularly.
The other power saving part of the weapon is the energy naturally generated by the crystal, aswell as the time it takes to cool down. Being at higher temperatures does not do any damage to the weapon or crystal, as both are made to withstand the extreme temperatures of the weapon firing, the crystal heating up, and the immense energy output by the generator(s) powering the weapon. The only effect the crystal being heated up has is reducing the energy required to fire the weapon. Depending on how heated up the crystal is, the energy reduction can scale from 0% to 50% depending on how much use the crystal has seen. However, if it is fully heated up, it will require a full 24 standard hours to cool down.
