Panther class Experimental Frigate
Overview

To mark the year 1100 the Imperial Navy challenged naval architects across the Imperium to come up with innovative new design concepts. RINA (Rhylanor Interstellar Navy Architects ... a small design house specialising in unusual requirements) came up with a concept ship they named the Panther. The idea was for the smallest (and thus cheapest) ship capable of carrying a 100 dton meson gun while keeping up with standard fleet units (ie. Jump-4 and 6G).

RINA's design used 2 tricks to achieve this. First, rather than carry a power plant capable of meeting all energy requirements for the duration of a cruise (28 days), two power plants were installed: one for 28 days of normal use, and another for 30 hours of combat activities. Second, the main weapon could only fire at half the normal rate: energy had to be built up in the ship's jump drive capacitors. This later trick effectively halved the EPs/turn required by such a weapon. For defense the Panther relied solely on a moderately high agility.

In the end only an initial run of 4 Pathers were built (unimaginatively named Panther-1, Panther-2, Panther-3, and Panther-4). Panther-2 was destroyed in early trials, but the remaining three still function together as a squadron.


Stats


Detailed Description
TONNAGE

1,000 dtons standard, 14,000 cubic meters, close structure configuration

CREW

19 (Command=1, Bridge=6, Engineering=10, Gunnery=1, Medical=1) ... double occupancy

ENGINEERING

Jump-4, 6G Maneuver, Power plant (main)-6 (60ep), Power plant (combat)-9 (90ep), Agility 4

AVIONICS

Bridge with Model 4/Fib computer

ARMARMENT

100dton Meson gun

DEFENCES

None

CRAFT

None

FUEL

464 dtons fuel (1 jump-4, 28 days endurance, and 30 hours combat endurance)

OTHER

None


Component displacement summary

 

Components
Jump drive (J4) 50 dtons
Jump fuel (1 jump) 400 dtons
Maneuver drive (6G) 170 dtons
Main power plant (PP6) 60 dtons
Main power plant fuel (4 weeks) 60 dtons
Weapon bay (100 dton) 100 dtons
Weapon power plant (PP9) 90 dtons
Weapon power plant fuel (1 day) 4 dtons
Bridge 20 dtons
Staterooms (double occupancy for 19) 38 dtons
Computer (4/fib) 8 dtons
Total 1000 dtons
The jump drive has 20 dtons of capacitors, which can hold upto 720 EPs.



 

     

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