New Ship idea (Small Ship) and Modules

Astika
In early 3262 the Alliance Assembly, seeking to bolster its humanitarian and aid capabilities requested design concepts for a “fast response, medical deployment/evacuation ship.” The Astika was the successful candidate and went into production mid-3263. Some of the features of the Astika were it’s A-symmetrical design, high visibility cockpit, main central (spinal) internal compartment that allows duel access for loading/unloading or simultaneous loading and unloading via access dors in both the front and rear of the ship, its ground hugging position when landed, and its multiple vectoring thrusters that allow for stable and accurate flight/hovering positioning and also add additional redundancy should a thruster be damaged or fail. All these features contributed to its success in its primary role, especially in regions or deployments where auto loading systems, and fully equipped landing bays are simply not available, or where catastrophic events have occurred that render these systems unusable.
It’s first deployment, 2 days after the first squadron went operational, was hailed as a huge success and vindication for the design team. A mining rig on PLANET HERE, hit a methane pocket and caused an explosion that killed 2 of the crew instantly and injured the 8 others on the rig, 2 of them critically. 22 minutes after the initial explosion the first Astika, (the “Stratton”) was on the scene and deployed the front access door while hovering 2 meters from the burning rig, medical teams evacuated the 8 survivors and started immediate surgery on one of the casualties to remove imbedded objects from the miner. Before the crew was able to disembark from the rig the Stratton was hit by an explosion, but due to the array of thrusters ship movement was less than 4mm. The ship was then able to use vertical thrust to climb to orbital cruise to allow the medical staff to continue with their surgery while in flight. When the Stratton landed at SPACEPORT HERE a damage inspection revealed the 2 of the 6 port thrusters were crippled by the explosion, but due to the vectoring and redundant thruster array no loss in manoeuvring was experienced by the pilot or crew. The pilot was quoted as saying, “It was pretty hairy there for a while, and I had no idea we lost 2 tweeters (slang for vectoring thrusters) if we’d in anything else we’d still be a smear in the dust. I don’t even know how we got here with that sort of damage.”
Over the last 40 years the Astika has had a few improvements and is now used by many in not only search & rescue but also in trading and mining roles.
On a darker note – the Astika has also ben retrofitted and used by pirates as a hard hitting surprise attack ship by removing the central internal compartment and fitting huge class weapons, such as Plasma Accelerators in its place. While these are fixed weapons only, they do pack an incredible punch for such a small ship, they are often referred to as Rattlers, on account of their deadly nature but also due to the rattle they make under acceleration because of the refit.

Base Configuration (based on Viper MkIII) Pirate Retrofit Difference
Hull Mass 55T (S) 55T (S) 0
Hard Point 1S (2T) 1S (2T) 0
1S (2T) 1S (2T) 0
1H (16T) (Fixed mount weapons only) +16
Utility Mount 3 3 +16

Hull 1C 1C +16
Power Plant (3) 3E 3E +16
Thrusters (3) 3E 3E +16
FSD (3) 3E 2E (-4) +12
Life Support (2) 2E 1E (-2) +10
Power Distributor (3) 3E 4E (+8) +18
Sensors (3) 3E 3E +18
Fuel Tank (3) 3E 3E +18

Internal Compartments
3 (Max Cap: 8T) Removed for Retrofit for Huge Spinal Weapon Mount (-8) +10
3 (Max Cap: 8T) Removed (-8) +2
2 (Max Cap: 4T) 2 +2
2 (Max Cap: 4T) 2 +2
2 (Max Cap: 4T) 1 (some lost capacity due to refit) (-2) =0
1 (Max Cap: 2T) Basic Discovery Scanner 1 ID Spoofer (see below) 0


So the Pirate Variant has reduced FSD range, reduced (and more fragile) life support that allow for an increased Power Distributor, and the Internal compartments are cannibalised to fit the Huge Weapon mount. These ships often hunt in packs with a larger vessel to collect cargo and debris from their victims who they attack by surprise.

ID Spoofer
A device that uses combinations of scanned ship data to falsify and confuse other ship scanners. When a ship is scanned by activating the ID Spoofer (much like an ECM) it will broadcast false information that has been collected and stored (from previous data scans of other ships) several of these collected readings are combined into one data stream that allow the scanned ship to hide its ID, cargo its carrying even the weapon and systems load out it currently has, allowing equipped ships to pass through security scans easily without drawing unwanted attention by running silent into a docking bay etc. The down side is that fresh ship data needs to be collected and if no new data is available then the spoof will fail, resulting in a successful scan from (most likely) system authority vessels, who, now seeing you have an ID spoofer, will often open fire as these devices are highly illegal.

(So the retro fit and the ID spoofer may only be found at Pirate bases, and the Astika needs to be purchased elsewhere then flown to the pirate base to be fitted out)

(other bases might refit other ships depending on their speciality i.e. a research or exploration base might be able to fit a larger FSD to and ASP explorer in exchange for smaller internal compartments, or bigger powerplant on a Fed gunship at a Military base, or an extra mining laser on a Type 6 at a Mining base etc)

(and could there be scope for military grade components that require a permit to own, and the permit can be very rare and only be obtained through missions, not ranks, these military grade components might be available on the black market but if you don’t have a permit, a scan will get you killed on the spot (hence another reason for an ID Spoofer)
 
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