H E L L F I G H T E R
Class: Frigate
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Tactics: Unlike their wet navy counterparts, space frigates should not be placed on a picket line away from the core of the fleet. Weapons ranges are short, so they must operate within point defense range of the fleet elements they intend to defend from fighter attack. If possible, they should be arranged around the core of the fleet to form a sort of 'anti-fighter shell'. Ensuring that any enemy squadrons will have to pass through the point defense range of at least one aegis frigate before reaching targets in the fleet's core.
Frigates can manuever against fighter squadrons, and they will need to. While a frigate can give chase to a fighter squadron, doing so will often leave a gap in the fleet's point defenses which other enemy fighters can (and probably will) exploit. The Frigate captain is therefore cautioned to hold position relative to the fleet as much as possible.
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Game Status: No graphic.
Game Concept Credit: David Peterson.
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Its point defenses are light, but the Komodo mounts twin light EFLUX torpedo launchers positioned to give wide coverage of firing arcs. These torpedoes are not agile enough to be very effective against fighters.. but they are the perfect size munition for taking down bombers.
These torpedoes combined with the ship's 4 particle streamer cannons give this destroyer a strong anti-ship punch for a ship its size.
This class has been highly successful in both of its missions.
Class:Destroyer
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Game Status: Incomplete in game. Model in design sketches.
Game Concept Credit: David Peterson.
Model Concept and Design Credit:
Vengeance class cruisers are tough, powerful, and heavily gunned. They represent the backbone of any battlegroup, with staying power and long range anti-ship firepower. These mighty warships mount the largest torpedo system the Terran Alliance has to offer: The Mark 78 Tempest.
Class:Cruiser
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Game Concept Credit: David Peterson.
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Large enough to mount 6 heavy EFLUX launchers, 10 particle streamer cannons, and 8 point defense turrets, these mighty warships operate as the unbreakable backbone of major battlegroups.
Class:Dreadnaught
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History: The Atlantis Project was conceived during the height of the Dz'Isu war. Dz'Isu spies began to report of a buildup of materials and construction efforts. Further efforts revealed plans and operations... the Terran Alliance was building a fleet of enormous dreadnaughts which were being stockpiled and held in secret until the Dz'Isu forces were extended far enough from their bases that they would be easily crushed by the enormous force.
Dz'Isu tacticians feared that their supply lines were far too extended. Should the Terran Alliance be holding back... only pretending to be so weak to lure the Dz'Isu... should they counterstrike with strong forces while the Dz'Isu fleet was operating so far from its bases.. they would be devastated.
When Dz'Isu spies transmitted stolen plans for one of these warships... larger than anything the Dz'Isu had yet seen from the humans... an analysis of the design indicated that these ships must be quite formidable. The war was going too easily for the Dz'Isu... too easy...
The order was given to hold the advance until supply lines and bases could be strengthened. In preparation for counter attack.
A counter attack that never came.
In fact, the Atlantis didn't exist. The entire project was a ruse on the part of the terrans. They were constructing no such thing.
The Terran Alliance needed time to produce enough Star Fighters to matter. And the Atlantis Project was conceived as a way to get it.
It worked.
Toward the end of the war, the design was revisitted. In fact, it was a real design. A proposal which had been rejected for lack of resources to construct it early on. With the advent of the Shrike, the Terran Alliance was just beginning to push the Dz'Isu back. But morale was very poor. The Terran Alliance needed such a flagship.. a symbol of power for a frightened populace. A symbol to hold on to.
The Alliance fabricated video footage of the huge vessel. Manufactured documentaries of its operation in combat. They fooled their own populace with it.
And again.. it worked.
This massive warship... as elusive as its namesake... heartened the people of Earth and caused worry to the Dz'Isu, who could never quite track down where it was!
In the meantime, construction of the real Atlantis had begun. But it would not be completed until two years _after_ the war. At which point, it was 'brought back to dock' for the populace and the Dz'Isu to see that this ship 'really existed all along'.
The existence (or lack thereof) of the Atlantis was probably the best kept secret of the war. And it may have served just as well as a myth as it would have were it real at the time.
Today, the Terran Alliance has several Atlantis class dreadnaughts. Each operating as the flagship for their respective fleets.
Historians and analysists continue to argue about whether or not the Atlantis truly existed during the war. The whole affair is filed away in the public mindset along with the 'magic bullet' that killed Kennedy, the crash of a Bendasari scouting vessel at Roswell, and the hope diamond which tabloids say was stolen by Quangee and later recovered.
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Game Concept and Model Concept Credit: David Peterson.
Model Design Credit::