Gavin Darklighter
THE FINAL STAND
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Posted - 2008.08.27 04:55:00 -
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Any good ship from Schlock Mercenary would dominate. They generate power through neutronium annihilation, or "annie" plants that convert mass directly into usable energy. The biggest ships in Schlock mount 10,000m primary annie plants. If you consider the density of neutronium, thats a pretty big energy reserve. The most direct application of this energy is in projecting gravity to shield the craft, propel it, and attack other ships. A larger ship can simply use its "gravitics" to compress a smaller ship into neutronium and feed its mass into the reactor to be used as fuel. A ship lacking proper shielding or sufficient energy to power the shields is helpless to the "gravity gun".
Ships in Schlock typically move at around .6 the speed of light. Most ships can reach speeds around .8c, but past that your reactor no longer has enough mass to convert to energy to bring you back to a stop. Ships move between planets either by traditional "worm-gates" or, more recently, through a plot-device called the teraport that can transport you instantly across the galaxy, provided there are not teraport disruption systems active at either the starting point or the destination.
Warships are typically flown by AIs with thinking power that is hard to comprehend in human terms. A good AI in Schlock could put as much thought into a tactical situation in a split second than you could get from a room full of the best human tacticians in hundreds or even thousands of years.
Ships are armed not only with the previously mentioned gravy-guns but also every type of homing, projectile, and beam weapon imaginable. Missiles seem to be the most dangerous as their propulsion and payload is provided by small "annie-plants", making them capable of attacking at ~.7c and carrying a yeild equivilent to, say, a hundred kg of mass converted directly into energy in the form of "bang". Any type of projectile mounting an annie plant and a gravitic drive is also doubly dangerous due to its ability to breach shields before exploding. Projectiles of this type are called "breacher" rounds or missiles. Missiles can also mount teraport drives of their own making them able to instantly transport themselves anywhere that is not being interdicted. Due to these capabilities combat usually revolves around using your own various countermeasures and point defenses to prevent any warheads from reaching your ship. Only AIs are capable of competent combat due to the resulting complexity.
signature picture exceeds the size limit.~WeatherMan |