Clash at Night

From Sphere
Revision as of 22:32, 4 September 2012 by Shrike (talk | contribs) (Created page with "Escorts (5 pts each) :Escorts are the lightest interstellar warships. Individually lightly armed and shielded, they are also fast and agile and make difficult targets for heavy c...")
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Escorts (5 pts each)

Escorts are the lightest interstellar warships. Individually lightly armed and shielded, they are also fast and agile and make difficult targets for heavy cannons. All are armed with plasma torpedoes and respectable detection abilities, and make decent(for their cost) anti-air defenders.
- Destroyer: Generalized combatants armed with small-caliber guns and plasma torpedoes.
- Frigate: Combatants that are specialized for the picket and detection role, with enhanced anti-cloak sensing systems.
- Benders: Stealth ships armed with plasma torpedoes, benders can fire devastating first strikes from concealment. Unfortunately due to the technical limitations of a cloaking device, benders are shieldless and slow.


Cruisers (20 pts each)

Midsized warships, cruisers are versatile in all roles. Most do not use plasma torpedoes, instead relying on batteries of medium-caliber guns.
- Heavy: Balanced combatant, the archetypical 'cruiser'.
- Raider: Fitting larger-caliber guns (but less of them), raiders can threaten heavier warships or provide long-range support for friendlies.
- Scout: Designed to 'fight for intel', scout cruisers are heavily shielded and have a respectable turn of speed, though their main battery is distinctly weak.
- Fast Attack: Built more like oversized destroyers than conventional cruisers, fast attack cruisers are equipped with a substantial arsenal of plasma torpedoes. Their reduction in shielding allows for greater engine output, making them as fast as escorts.
- Flak: Cruisers that replace their primary batteries with huge numbers of light and anti-air weapons.
- Boomer: Oversized benders of cruiser tonnage, boomers have a small number of mid-caliber guns to back up their array of plasma torpedoes. As per their smaller siblings, boomers are both shieldless and slow.
- Tender (Flag only): Used as support and administrative flagships for escort-sized warships (generally benders), tenders are no better at fighting than destroyers. What they offer is an array of support equipment that keeps their short-ranged brood in fighting trim even after long spells on the front lines, improving their effectiveness in combat.


Capital Ships (60 pts each)

Capital ships are the pride of any fleet and the deciders of any major naval battle.
- Battleship: The 'queens of space', battleships carry long range, high-power weapons and heavy shielding, along with a battery of light guns to defend against destroyers or other light craft that get too close.
- Battlecruiser: Designed as the 'fast wing' with the speed to pace cruisers, battlecruisers have the firepower of battleships but noticeably reduced defenses.
- Monitor: Slow warships armed with siege weapons, specifically designed to smash heavily fortified positions such as orbital forts or supercapital warships. While effective in this role, their cumbersome and slow-firing siege cannons are of limited use against ships of equal or smaller size.
- Carrier: Warships with cavernous hangars for squadrons of one- and two-man attack fighters, carriers have little integral armament of their own.
- Factory Ship (Flag only): Tenders built on capital-tonnage hulls, factory ships bring not only vast quantities of supplies but substantial machine shops and repair bays to the area of operations. This lets them act as the support ship for both escorts and cruisers.


Supercapital Ships

Built at staggering expense, few sector commands will have more than a handful (or even a singular example) of these immense warships. Derided by some admirals as white elephants, they can nonetheless change the course of battles singlehandedly. Of course, the loss of any one of these ships is a major blow. All supercapital ships count as Flagships.
- Dreadnought:
- Mothership:
- Superfortress


Flagships (10 for escort, 30 for cruiser, 90 for capital)

All fleets must have one flagship, where the Admiral commands his fleet into battle. Flagships have improved performance relative to their mass-produced kin but are fundamentally similar; every flagship is of a defined type (such as a Flag Heavy Cruiser or Flag Battleship). All flagships may take one modification to further customize them: