Uh oh? No turbolasers left

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"Boss, I have grave news for you" the shipyard foreman told Charzon in her office. "There are no turbolasers left in out inventory. To compound the issue, our turbolaser supply contract has expired; how are we to deliver the ships the Banking Clan has ordered from us?"

"I understabnd your concern, and that I agree with you that the Banking Clan wouldn't like their ships to arrive to them without the number of turbolasers they paid for. But let me count the ships we delivered against the turbolasers these ships have, shall we?" Charzon said while taking out a spreadsheet of the ships delivered against the total number of turbolasers times the number of ships specified in the contracts. "Is the problem also one of quad lasers or point-defense lasers?" Novroskis required nine triple-tube turbolasers each, Bowsers required two dual turbolasers, Kameks required four double turbolasers, Saculs required six double turbolasers. There were no Bowsers or Saculs on order, the Kamek-class was not yet approved for sale, five Bowsers were delivered already, and yet Star Tours is rumored to exercise some options for Bowsers soon... the main problem was the Banking Clan order. 28 ships were due for delivery and the other customers ran through the initial supply of 100 triple turbolaser turrets.

"The Pullmans and the Zambonis are unaffected because quad lasers are not the issue here; this is strictly a turbolaser issue. We do not have any double or triple-tube turbolasers left. Get us some turbolasers!"

"I have opened the process for bidding on the turbolaser supply"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

The assistant that was responsible for the Sasori Research debacle, Marcia Halpern, entered the room after hearing about how there are no turbolasers left in reserve at the dockyards for the construction of the remaining Novroski units, and also that there are no double-tube turbolasers left for the upcoming Kamek-class or any options Star Tours may exercise on the Bowser-class. And any future capital ships, which may require more turbolaser turrets than even the Novroski does, will require turbolasers, one way or another.

"Here are some turbolasers that can fit the needs. The Banking Clan may be willing to sacrifice tube numbers if the new tubes offer the same firepower as on their first two units" Marcia told Charzon, while handing her two turbolaser fact sheets.

"So we have the heavyweight AV-X08 Corona from Aurora Industries, which is cheaper, can replace three tubes apiece but is a lot heavier, or the more lightweight MC1008 Skipper from Mon Calamari Shipyards, which can replace two tubes, is shorter-ranged but costs more. It's better to keep to one supplier of turbolasers; it makes for easier maintenance"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Hmm... if the MC1008 Skipper was more lightweight on a per-tube basis, the resulting ship would be lighter and have greater acceleration. Or better fuel economy if it didn't. After all, none of the Bowser-class, Kamek-class or Novroski-class were meant to be used for direct combat; Star Tours has never been a spaceline to complain about short turbolaser range. And the Banking Clan either - pirates wishing to steal cargo have to close in to get theirs. Most civilian clients are not that picky about what turbolasers their own ships have so long as the resulting firepower is there and the maintenance and reliability of the turbolasers is not compromised.

"The first two Novroskis have 27 tubes. We can outfit 14 Skippers on a Novroski and improve fuel economy, whereas nine Coronas would not. But Bowsers and Kameks can perfectly make use of the Skippers."

"But at the same time, outfitting 14 Skippers means reconfiguring the hardpoints, and we would then incur delays in their delivery on top of what we already have. The Banking Clan will be very unhappy if we have to delay the delivery of these units"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"Why can't we have it both? One that takes care of the triple tubes on the Novroskis and another one for the rest?"

"Perhaps these weapons are not compatible with the targeting computers onboard... you know what that would mean for you if we find out that the turbolasers aren't compatible with what we currently have"

"Yes, ma'am"

Charzon needed to make sure that all the systems are compatible with what's being built. Obviously, her assistant was given one chance to redeem herself from that failure to secure a sale with Phenex Industries. Fitting turbolasers that were incompatible with other onboard systems would only delay deliveries for further Novroski-class units more, which would make the Banking Clan unhappy to the point of asking for compensation, in the form of Pullmans or Kameks. She could ill afford to lose that client. But since there are no Kameks or Bowsers currently on order, she could more easily afford it to be the case for these two classes, one essentially being the long-haul version of the other. Charzon was no expert in shipboard weapons systems so she couldn't tell off-hand whether these two systems were compatible with their products or not.

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"These were the only models we found that were compatible with our systems; for some reason the Phenex Turbolaser Mk-II was not compatible with our targeting computers. Sure, they had good reliability, but they were using a different protocol as far as their interface with the targeting computer is concerned"

She was surprised at how Marcia came to know about avionics better than she did herself. But somehow Marcia convinced her that going with two different models of turbolasers would come in handy, especially because Charzon ran the math, and she realized that it would be more expensive to outfit Novroskis with Skippers but Bowsers and Kameks could be at almost no extra cost. And, for Saculs, she could give the option of outfitting Skippers or Coronas, as none were built yet.

"Now we realized it may be cheaper to outfit Novroskis with Coronas and everything else with Skippers, let's go with that order. Just realize how many it would take of each before committing"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"But what about future ship classes?" Marcia said, in a fit of anger. "You began planning in secret for some sort of... hospital-carrier? You really think Star Tours will grow to the point where they will be able to operate a galaxy-wide cruise with what you codename a maximum battleship, even though that ship seems to have nothing in common with battleships, other than size?"

"We can't build either ship just yet. But neither ship plan shall leak to the greater public until we are actually ready to lay down the keel. But even the Maximum Battleship has to have some turbolasers, probably not like those heavy Imperators or DBY-827s that both count for eight times the canon turbolaser standard per tube, but turbolasers nonetheless."

"Why is it a maximum battleship anyway?"

"A maximum battleship is a ship that is at most 999 meters long and must have a maximum firepower of at most 450 turbolaser standards, or half that number if a maximum battleship is a carrier. Maximum battleships may be owned by any faction or corporation. Novroskis are built to maximum-frigate standards rather than to maximum battleship standards"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Maximum frigates were instead 400 meters long at most, and, in general, could equip at most 100 turbolaser standards' worth of firepower. But they were called maximum frigates because it was the largest ship an individual could own without corporate ownership. But they digressed a little bit about what a maximum battleship was about: they can't make it past the planning stages. Back to the turbolasers they are currently contemplating ordering so that they could finish the job on the ships being built. Now, they disagree one another about the nature of that order.

"The only thing that is for sure: they will have to work on the same protocol for weapon-computer interface"

"Do you want to be at that stage again once the Banking Clan order is fulfilled?"

"No?"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"We should at least plan for 10 more Novroskis, this means at least 350 Coronas and we should plan for a Bowser/Sacul/Kamek production run demanding equally many units of the Skipper"

"Isn't that a bit much to try to sell 80 Kameks and a few Saculs or Bowsers?"

"We may never know which spaceline or shipping company may want a Kamek as its workhorse. Star Tours is, yes, expanding, but they will stick to the Bowser for the time being. And they appear interested in the Tofolk-class, rather than in CR90s or other ships in that size class, like the Tikulini"

"Ringo Vinda is Star Tours' maintenance base, how could they not buy from Ringovinda StarYards?"

"How many new orders do you think we could get for these things until we sell 10 more Novroskis?"

"1-2 Saculs, 30 or so Bowsers and Kameks total"

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

"Don't forget, Marcia: from now we shall order turbolasers when orders are placed and confirmed. The Novroski order from the Banking Clan was placed before the current protocol takes effect, hence the situation in which we are now"

"All right, ma'am... but that doesn't solve the issue of how many Skippers we are to order!"

"Considering we need Skippers if any unit comes back here for maintenance and needs a turbolaser turret replaced, 200 Skippers shall do the trick for now, if the numbers you just said were realized"

But Bowsers/Kameks were a lot smaller than Novroskis; the demand for freighters seems to be inversely proportional to their size. She can't imagine that only 30 Kameks or Bowsers would be ordered in the time 10 Novroskis would. Picket corvette-sized freighters would be a lot easier to sell to smaller space freight operations, and Pullmans, which are one notch down the size chart, are sold to a few individual spacers and regional space freight companies.

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Charzon prepares two separate letters to separate suppliers to obtain the agreed-upon supply of weapons:

//Encrypted Message
// To: [member="Reshmar"]
// From: Charzon Loulan

My name is Charzon Loulan, and I am the Ringovinda StarYards representative. Because we have outstanding orders for multiple classes of ships, namely the Kamek-class medium transport and the Bowser-class medium transport, and that we have run out of turbolasers, we would like to order turbolasers, namely 200 units of the MC1008 Skipper Pulse Turbolaser.

Enclosed payment for 4.5 million credits is on the way.

Namaste,

Charzon Loulan
CEO, Ringovinda StarYards

---------------------------------------------------------

//Encrypted Message
// To: [member="Taeli Raaf"]
// From: Charzon Loulan

My name is Charzon Loulan, and I am the Ringovinda StarYards representative. Because we have outstanding orders for multiple classes of ships, namely the Novroski-class armored transport, and that we have run out of turbolasers, we would like to place an order for 350 units of the AV-X08 Corona turbolaser.

Enclosed payment for 7 million credits is on the way.

Namaste,

Charzon Loulan
CEO, Ringovinda StarYards