Celestial Raptor
Command/Control Battlecruiser
The Mogg’theran Celestial Raptor “Comm-Con,” as it is known to mercenaries and other species, is a combination battlecruiser and light carrier. In truth, it rates better than many battleships, but its role flexibility classifies it more as a battlecruiser.
Celestial Raptors were the newest ship-of-the-line at the end of the Mogg’theran control of the Empire of Many Suns, and it was quickly becoming one of the most feared vessels in space. It carries a staggering array of offensive weaponry, and three Clutches of the deadly Starblade star fighter. Its docking bay was also large enough to carry troop carriers and transports, making it an excellent troop deployment vessel as well.
The ships travel
by means of gravity drives which distort gravity around the vessel, propelling
it in any direction it needs to go. This means there are no drive emissions.
Celestial Raptors can also use this same effect to cloak the ship from mass
sensors. However, it does not protect from visual detection or detection by
electromagnetic field detectors. However, some Raptor captains will hide their
ships near gas giants, close to stars, or close to planets with powerful
magnetic fields to mask their EM emissions and make a surprise attack. The
ships travel faster-than-light by opening up a massive
Celestial Raptors, like all Mogg’theran ships, have now become more than just ships, they are also the Mogg’therans’ homes as well. This means, by necessity, these ships are kept in prime condition, despite having more actual mileage and use than any other ship of its kind. It also means that Mogg’theran space crews are some of the best-trained starship crews in the galaxy, and they can consistently get peak performance out of an already formidable vessel.
If you want to know why the Arkhon never considered invading the Empire of Many Suns, well, here you go.
Model: Celestial Raptor-Class Command
and Control Ship
Class: Battlecruiser
Crew: 3,255 crew, 27 warriors (fighter pilots), and 12 shuttle/transport pilots. Can also carry 400 additional passengers or troops. Since Mogg’theran ships have become homes to the entire species, almost all Raptors carry a full load of passengers at all times.
Auxiliary Craft
27 Starblade Heavy Fighters (Divided into 3 Clutches of 9 fighters)
8 shuttles (type varies from ship-to-ship)
2 light transports (type varies from ship-to-ship)
Can also house two more visiting light or medium transports or four more shuttles at any time
M.D.C. by Location
Plasma defense turrets (10) – 400 each
Particle pulse cannons (4) – 1,200 each
Atomic torpedo arrays (2) – 2,000 each
Gamma flare emitters (2) – 5,000 each
Dual light plasma ejectors (2) – 600 each
Long-range sensor needles (2) – 2,000 each
Short-range sensor array – 1,500
Wings (2) – 25,000
Gravitic tractor beam emitter – 2,500
*Engineering cylinders and primary gravity field generators (2) – 30,000 each
Docking bay – 8,000
**Command module – 40,000
Outer Hull Section (40 ft/12/2 m area) – 150
Inner Hull Section (40 ft/12/2 m area) -- 120
***Main body – 130,000
*Inflicting more than 75% damage to one of these cylinders will make the wormhole generator inoperable. However, the damage can be repaired by the ship’s crew in a few days (2D4) unless the cylinder is completely destroyed.
**Destroying the Command module will destroy the bridge, the light plasma ejectors and the short-range sensor array. The ship can be controlled from a secondary control room with no bonuses and no short-range sensors, but the command staff, Captain and Pilot were likely killed and the ship will retreat from action. NOTE: The ship is controlled from a tactical center inside the command module, the bridge itself (the front protrusion with windows) just houses helm control and navigation.
***Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will completely disable the vessel, causing the crew to attempt to evacuate using lifeboats, shuttles, fighters and transports. The vessel will be in tatters, with multiple hull breaches, loss of main power, gravity control, propulsion, all weapon systems and life support. Reducing the ship to -20,000 M.D.C. will result in a titanic explosion, doing 2D6x1,000 M.D.C. to anything within a mile radius. Nearby vessels will likely notice the power spike and have two melee actions to get out of the blast radius.
Speed
Maximum Sublight Speed: 0.2C (20% of the speed of light)
Max Acceleration/Deceleration Rate: 5G’s per melee round
FTL Speeds: These ships cross a wormhole at a speed of one light year per every 12 hours. Every 120 hours, or 10 light years, the ship needs to drop into “normal space” and let the gravity drive cool down and recharge for 12 hours before creating a new one. This is not a problem when traveling with other Battlecruisers, who will immediately open a new wormhole, allowing its sister ships’ gravity generators to rest.
Top Atmospheric Speed: Not possible safely. These ships are not designed to function any lower than low planetary orbit.
Statistical Data
Height: 268.5 ft
Length: 1500 ft
Width: 939.5 ft
Cargo: 200,000 tons (including visiting ships)
Power plant: Micro-singularity Generator with a 50-year lifespan
FTL System:
Range: Unknown. Theoretically, they could travel for 50 years without concern (until the singularity generator gave out) due to the advanced recycling technology they’ve developed since their home world was destroyed and they became nomadic.
Cost: Absolutely not for sale.
Weapon Systems
1. Gamma flare emitters (2): These are the ship’s main guns, and are the large cannons at the tips of the wings. They fire concentrated bursts of intense, hard, gamma radiation that inflict tremendous heat and radiation damage to their targets, vaporizing massive amounts of matter, which then explodes due to rapid expansion.
Primary purpose: Assault
Mega-Damage: 3D6x1,000 M.D. per blast. Dual blasts do 6D6x1,000 M.D. Dual blasts can only be fired at capital class vessels, such as battleships, battlecruisers, carriers, etc.
Rate of fire: Each cannon can fire once per melee round
Payload: Effectively unlimited
2. Particle pulse Cannons (4): Located on the main body, under the neck, these weapons are rapid-firing particle beam cannons used to hammer enemy cruisers and capital ships. Their high rate of fire is used to keep enemies from regaining their balance or the initiative while the gamma flares recharge. However, they do less damage than most heavy anti-ship particle beam cannons.
Primary Purpose: Anti-ship
Mega-Damage: 5D6x100 M.D. per cannon. Cannons can be fired in pairs for 1D6x1,000 M.D., or all four can be fired for 2D6x1,000 M.D.
Rate of fire: Each cannon can be fired four times per melee round.
Payload: Effectively unlimited.
3. Atomic torpedo arrays (2): Slung between and under the particle pulse cannons are two atomic torpedo arrays, with three launch tubes each. The arrays fire the Mogg’theran equivalent of nuclear missiles. Instead of using a sphere of explosives to compress uranium or plutonium, atomic torpedoes fire a ball of super-compressed hydrogen surrounded by a gravity field. The field collapses when the torpedo reaches the target in a perfect implosion that sets off the nuclear chain reaction. These torpedoes are guided to their targets by gunners through the use of gravity controls. Anything that disrupts the gravity field (particle beams, EMPs, sudden gravitational field changes, or impacting another object) will allow the hydrogen escape. These weapons are relatively slow-moving, traveling at the speed of an average anti-ship or long-range missile.
Primary Purpose: Anti-ship
Mega-Damage: 3D6x100 M.D. per torpedo.
Bonuses: +2 to strike and +2 to dodge. Can perform two actions per melee round.
Rate of fire: Can fire individual torpedoes, or volleys of two, three, or six (using both arrays). Each array can fire a total of six missiles per melee round.
Payload: Effectively unlimited.
4. Dual light plasma ejectors (2): These double-barreled plasma guns are mounted as cheek guns on the forward command module, and are used against incoming missiles, frigates and light attack ships making runs at the command module. They can also be fired at incoming fighter craft, which have a +2 to dodge.
Primary Purpose: Defense
Mega-Damage: 1D4x100 per dual blast. The guns are fire-linked and always fire dual blasts.
Rate of Fire: Up to four times per melee round
Payload: Effectively unlimited.
5. Plasma defense turrets (10): These turrets, controlled by an operator from a central weapons control deck, are the ship’s primary anti-star fighter and point defense weapons. They are plasma cannons with short range, but good stopping power.
Primary Purpose: Defense
Mega-Damage: 4D6x10 M.D.
Range: 5 miles
Rate of Fire: Equal to hand-to-hand attacks of the gunner (usually 4 attacks)
Payload: Effectively unlimited
6. Gravitic tractor beam emitter: This weapon is used to slow or immobilize enemy vessels, making them an easier target to hit, or to tractor them in for capture. The weapon can be sustained on one target at a time and the target must stay in the forward firing arc of the Celestial Raptor. The emitter fires an invisible cone at the target vessel, which then narrows down to a beam, making it very hard to dodge (-4, standard ship scale rules from the Phase World Source Book still apply).
Primary Purpose: Capture
Mega-Damage: None. Any ship caught in the beam will find its speed greatly reduced. The amount of reduction is based on the scale and mass of the vessel. Capital ships have a speed reduction of 1D4x10%, sub-capital cruisers, frigates, destroyers, and large commercial vessels (250 feet or longer in length) are slowed down 2D4x10+20%. Any ship smaller than that is immediately immobilized and held in place. Ships which are slowed less than 50% are -4 to dodge all other attacks until the tractor beam is deactivated. Ships slowed 50% or more are unable to dodge. No ship under the effects of this weapon can activate their FTL system, with the exception of the Vorhasi and the Arkhon.
Rate of Fire: Once per melee round, can be sustained for as long as necessary.
Payload: Effectively unlimited.
7. Self-Destruct System: Discovered by accident during a pitched battle with the Rhtharians during their initial uprising, Celestial Raptor captains can order a gravity drive overload on a single point inside the ship. This creates a rapidly collapsing gravitational field that causes the micro-singularity reactor to increase in size temporarily. Essentially, it creates a temporary black hole. Fortunately, the gravity field is not caused by the pure mass of the singularity, but by the gravity drives, so it exists only for a few moments after the ship itself has been consumed. This is only used in the most extreme circumstances, and takes time to build up. If used in low orbit, it can cause a planet to suffer a mild nuclear winter due to atmospheric disruption. If the captain sets a course to actually enter a planet’s atmosphere before the singularity is created, it can render a planet inhabitable!
Primary Purpose: Total annihilation
Mega-Damage: Anything caught in the radius of effect is completely destroyed. If done near a planet’s surface, it will cause 6D6x1 million mega-damage to a 10-mile radius, will crack the planet’s crust, annihilate a major portion of the atmosphere, and set much of the planet’s local oxygen supply on fire. In addition, the warping gravitational field could (45% chance) alter the planet’s rotation and utterly lay waste to the ecology and weather. The planet will have to be terraformed to be habitable again.
Effective range: creates a 10-mile diameter sphere of destruction. Anyone within 20 miles must make a piloting roll at -20% or be sucked in due to the gravitational tidal pull.
Rate of Fire: Takes two minutes to charge up, during which time any mass detector within a light year will be screaming that something’s going horribly wrong. The process can be stopped if both engineering cylinders can be destroyed before detonation.
Payload: Can only be done once, after which the ship is atomized, along with everything else in the area of effect. This weapon has only been used twice in history and 99% of Mogg’theran commanders pretend it doesn’t exist and never even consider it. Of the two captains who have used this ability, one is reviled as a mass murderer for using it against an inhabited planet, and the other is heralded as a martyr for using it to defend a fleet of retreating refugees.
Sensors: The Celestial Raptors have the best sensors of any Mogg’theran vessel, with long-range sensors with a range of one light year, and short-range sensors with a range of 500,000 miles. While the ships have all standard sensors, Mogg’theran sensor operators tend to rely heavily on mass sensors.
Bonuses: +10% to all piloting, sensor operation and weapon systems rolls, and +2 to initiative, due to crew training and experience.
