Post by Gamov on Sept 7, 2009 22:52:37 GMT -5
Name: Predator-class Assault Carrier
Appearance:
Historical Information:
Commissioned by the Empire and constructed by Kuat Drive Yards, the Predator-class Assault Carrier was designed with input from members of the elite Storm Commando Corps. and was meant to operate as a deep space attack ship that could be custom fit to meet just about any need. Able to assume a multitude of roles, the Predator carriers represented a slight shift in the Empire's military policy in response to the guerrilla tactics exhibited by the Rebellion. In the early years of the Galactic Civil War, their tactics were focused almost exclusively around large, heavily-armed warships, such as the Imperial-class Star Destroyer, and proved ineffective when faced with the hit and fade attacks that were common practice for the Rebellion. It was not only slow and inefficient to deploy an Imperial-class Star Destroyer to guard a system in response to a Rebel incursion, it was also costly and would tend to spread the Empire's naval assets thin, leaving openings for the Rebellion to later exploit and plunder.
These factors underlined the Empire's need for a ship capable of patrolling the farthest reaches of Imperial space that could respond to a given situation and deliver the power necessary to curb Rebel insurrections. Thus, the Predator-class Assault Carrier was born. Sharing some aspects with other bulk cruisers of the Imperial Navy, the Predator boasted a considerable weapons package in addition to its advanced hyperdrive engines and generous fighter components, making it ideal for policing high risk systems and enforcing order on the very fringes of Imperial space.
At the time of its introduction in 3 ABY, the Predator class was deployed in limited numbers in order to test the craft's strengths and weaknesses in actual combat before the Empire would commit to full scale production, its design having met some stiff criticism at first when it was revealed that soldiers, not prominent Naval personnel, had played a role in the design of the ship. As such, many within the Imperial Navy were skeptical of their abilities and maintained that expanding production for the line of Imperial class Destroyers was the only effective way to win a war. With regards to these misgiving, many task force commanders who received these ships as new additions to their forces relegated them to menial tasks, prizing their Imperial Star Destroyers above all else.
Due to this prejudice against the new design, the Predator saw only limited action initially, often stationed near backwater worlds or tasked with supplementing Imperial forces guarding high security locations such as the Fondor shipyards and KDY. Eventually, however, the design would come to be a valuable addition to the Imperial Navy and made a name for itself in the months following the Battle of Hoth. Operating, more or less, independently on the periphery of the main Imperial fleets tasked with locating the Rebel forces that had dispersed in the wake of the battle, the Predator would score a series of victories for the Empire, easily seeking out and neutralizing small pockets of light Rebel resistance in advance of their main parent fleets, proving their effectiveness as long range, medium-assault vessels in addition to their prowess as an Assault Carrier. Shortly thereafter, the Empire authorized full production of the Predator carrier and began deploying them in more significant numbers across the galaxy in order to fill in the gaps that larger ships, such as the Imperial class, were unable to due to logistical inadequacies.
By the time the Galactic Civil War came to an end with the Empire's defeat at Endor, approximately 40,000 of these assault carriers had been constructed and issued to the various fleets in the galaxy. Having proven itself as a viable solution that mixes both the punch of a medium-assault frigate with the fighter supremacy of a carrier into a lethal package, the Predator is certainly considered a high water mark of sorts in carrier design and remains as one of the premiere designs that is still in production well after the reign of the Empire, its longevity only eclipsed by that of the iconic Imperial class Star Destroyer.
Characteristics:
With a design conceived, in part, by members of the Imperial Storm Commando Corps., the Predator carrier stood out in stark contrast to the standard Escort Carrier of the Imperial Navy and hosted a number of technical innovations that made it a very flexible craft. Whereas the Escort Carrier was built specifically for the transportation of fighters, was lightly armed in proportion to its size and resembled little more than a box with a curved hull and an engine at the back, the Predator-class was capable of fulfilling a number of roles and bore aesthetic features more indicative of other Imperial ship designs.
A nimble, narrow-hulled ship, with a flared arrowhead bow and three sublight thrusters mounted in a vertical row on the stern, the Predator, surprisingly, took few cues from other Imperial starship designs and instead incorporated some aspects from a few of the older CIS ships and applied them in some form or another, while simultaneously retaining its own unique look.
Design Aspects from CIS ships:
The first of these was an aspect of the ship that was clearly visible from the exterior, but could not be fully appreciated until it was viewed from the inside.
The Predator's hangar, bearing some similarities with those seen on the older Providence-class Destroyers fielded by the CIS during the Clone Wars, was a great feat of engineering in terms of its functions and storage capacity. When fielding the advanced Predator-class TIE fighters, crews could make excellent use of the fighter's compact design to maximize space inside the hangar through the two retractable docking racks on the ceiling. Each individual rack was capable of holding 36 of these fighters, for a total of 72 fighters in all, and operated by deploying from hidden compartments in the walls of the hangar, where they would reveal further design aspects taken from the droid armies of the Clone Wars. The racks took a page from the Multiple Troop Transports used by the Trade Federation during the occupation of Naboo years earlier.
Each launch rack held the fighters in vertically stacked rows of 2x9 (2 fighters high by 9 fighters deep on each side of the rack) so that their collapsible wings were facing towards the ceiling with the cockpit facing the ground. The TIEs were deployed when the arms on the rack would rotate the fighter 90 degrees to its right to face a movable catwalk that was suspended high above the hangar floor. From here, pilots would enter the craft while it was still in its vertical position before the rack arms would elevate the ship 90 degrees vertically as the catwalk was moved down to allow for the first group of fighters to launch. The next group of fighters on the lower side of the rack would then be drawn up to the catwalk by the mechanical rack arms, where the process would repeat again. After one side of the rack had finished launching, the entire assembly was rotated 180 degrees to bring the next group of fighters up for deployment, where the launching procedure would repeat once more until all fighters had been launched.
In this way, a Predator-class Assault Carrier was able to deliver several dozen fighters to the field all at once. A facet of their design that allowed for them to take the initiative in combat and often establish air superiority far earlier than their rival Alliance ships which still used the standard method of launching fighters from the tarmac inside their capital ships. When this process was first seen in action by Imperial Naval personnel serving aboard the vessel, however, the comment was made that it reminded them of a TIE production factory more so than a carrier launching fighters. Contrariwise, the racks used for the Predator-class TIE fighters could be removed entirely and replaced with standard racks built to house other TIE variants.
The second technical achievement was actually not visible from the exterior of the ship, but rather, was due to the manner in which the internal structuring of the ship had been constructed.
Compartmentalized into three distinct sections (the bow, mid-section and stern, respectively), each section of the ship was connected by a series of maze-like service corridors that were meant to provide easy access to escape routes for the crew, while serving the opposite purpose for any invading force that managed to board the vessel. Unless one knew the exact layout of the internal organization of the ship, these twisting hallways quickly became confusing and would stall the advance of any boarding party from reaching critical systems in a timely manner, buying the crew valuable time to initiate a number of defensive countermeasures that could be used to trap and nullify any hostile threats.
Chief among these defensive mechanisms was the inclusion of large, durasteel blast doors located between each distinct section of the craft in the main access corridor that ran the length of the ship from bow to stern. Working on the same principles as the particle shield traps on board many Providence-class Destroyers, these sturdy doors were put in place to isolate and seal off segments of the ship from one another in the event of a catastrophic hull breach, each door shared a composite mixture of alloys similar to those found on the hulls of modern Destroyers and was almost impervious to hand held cutting torches, such as the fusion cutter or plasma cutter, making the task of slicing through these immense obstacles all but impossible without the proper tools. While these individual sections were sealed off, their various critical systems could be controlled from the command deck of the carrier without effecting the rest of the systems through out the ship.
A popular method of dealing with boarding parties was to trap them in either the bow or mid sections of the ship and off-line the life support systems by venting all breathable air into space, suffocating the invading force. Alternatively, should the commanding officer of the carrier see fit to afford his enemies a relatively quick death, environmental seals could be activated that would render the compartment air-tight before being flooded with toxic fumes or nerve gas to effect a swift end to any person(s) unlucky enough to be trapped within the confines of the sealed area. Later, the gas would be vented into space to clear the section before it was re-opened for use by the crew.
A third, and crucial characteristic borrowed from older CIS ships was the use of internal shield generators, as was the case with the Lucrehulk-class Battleships.
Lacking the iconic command tower and twin KDY shield generator domes that capped the frames of nearly every conceived variant of Star Destroyer model fielded by the Empire, the Predator internalized all of its shield generators to minimize, if not totally eliminate, the risk of them being completely disabled by concerted fighter attacks during a skirmish. Located in the stern section of the ship and housed in thick protective armor between the fin-like command decks that protrude from either flank of the ship, the Predator utilized a smaller variant of the existing KDY ISD-72x shield generators that were common place on the Imperial-class Star Destroyers. With roughly 3,000 SBD, just above the Victory II-class, the Predator's shields provided only a fraction of the protection that Imperial-class Destroyer's shields did, but at a fraction of the cost, making them easy to produce, replace and install should something occur where such a repair needed to be effected.
Design Aspects from Imperial ships:
Having been built around the purpose of serving as a deep space assault craft, the Predator shared some design aspects with the Empire's Victory II-class Destroyer, their premiere vessel for deep space combat. Designers looked to the propulsion systems of the Victory II first and foremost, installing updated variants of the Hoersch-Kessel Drive, Inc. engines to power the ship and provide it with excellent sub light maneuvering speed. This decision to incorporate a slightly overpowered version of the engines seen on the Victory II directly contributed to the Predator's lethality in combat. Despite its size, the upgraded propulsion systems afforded it the necessary speed needed to keep up with other Imperial ships and engage the faster Alliance ships. However, since the carrier was not expressly designed to take on heavier Rebel vessels, such as the MC-80- or MC-90-class Star Cruisers, these engines served best in helping to keep the Predator highly mobile so that it could escape to a safer distance in the face of heavier ships that it was unable to compete with on a one on one basis, allowing for its fighter compliment to screen its retreat and keep any fighters or bombers away while the carrier acquired a more favorable position.
Aside from the engines, the Predator, as with many Imperial vessels, took part in the philosophy of fewer, more powerful guns as opposed to more numerous, and substantially less powerful, weapons.
Its most prominent weapons were the two single-barreled cannons mounted in superfiring turrets on the dorsal center line, each one commanding a wide field of fire from their respective positions at the front of the ship. These guns could fire in 180 degree arcs to either port or starboard sides and a 90 degree lateral traverse. Additionally, the rear most gun located near the mid section of the ship was built to rotate a full 360 degrees so that it could, should such be required, fire towards the back of the ship by aiming its muzzle up the angled dorsal structure between the command decks. There were also two double-barreled heavy turbolaser mountings on the ventral center line, fore and aft of the hangar bay, while two small turreted laser cannons were mounted on the very tip of the bow. In addition to the heavy guns that were meant to guard the carrier against medium-sized ships, the Predator was protected from fighter attacks by its series of quad barreled point laser defense turrets.
Resembling smaller versions of the Octuple barbette turbolaser cannons found on the Imperial II-class Star Destroyers, these versions were fitted for anti-fighter defense and mounted in double barreled settings found at various points on the hull of the ship, with a particularly high concentration of them located near the mid section of the ship to guard the hangar and command decks from attack. Two pairs of these guns were mounted on both the port and starboard flanks of the ship at either side of the hangar's main opening, while the remainder of the guns were dispersed elsewhere.
Taking full advantage of the Predator's narrow hull, many of the point defense systems were placed on the central spine of the dorsal structure from the bow to the apex at the stern. Each setting was able to traverse in a 360 degree arc to cover almost every conceivable angle in front of, above or to either side of the ship. Two more pairs of guns were mounted on the top of each separate command deck and were capable of firing in 180 fields to the fore and aft of the ship as well as having a 90 degree vertical traverse angle.
As a result of its innovative design aspects and impressive weapons platforms, the Predator-class could be adapted relatively easily to serve a variety of roles that included:
Escort Carrier:
Serving in this capacity, a Predator-class Assault Carrier could provide additional protection and support to smaller task forces or lightly armed convoys of smaller transport-class vessels. Typically, a ship assigned to this task was armed with a full naval wing of fighters and bombers (72 craft in total, supported by 180 operations personnel), depending on the mission priority requirements. A Predator-class tasked with escorting a convoy was generally outfitted with a mixed wing of fighters and bombers, while a ship assigned to supplementing a task force was almost exclusively used as a fighter carrier for air supremacy and dominance, usually making use of more advanced TIE fighter designs like the TIE Interceptor, TIE Hunter and Predator-class TIE fighter.
Battle Carrier:
A Predator-class Assault Carrier charged with acting in this role was usually part of a much larger force of ships that was composed of various Destroyers or Frigates, such as the Imperial-class Star Destroyer and Victory II-class Star Destroyer, and was generally outfitted to serve as a troop transport depending on the nature of the ships it was working in consort with. While in use as a Battle Carrier, the Predator was able to host an entire regiment of Imperial soldiers (2,500 soldiers +1,000 support personnel) for planetary invasion purposes. However, when serving in the capacity of a carrier dedicated to moving large numbers of soldiers, a Predator could field no additional fighters and relied entirely on other craft for fighter support.
Medium-Attack Cruiser:
Perhaps this role, more than any other, was one of the primary application for the Predator-class and defined its capabilities as a flexible warship. Acting under this designation, a carrier could support a typical ground support wing utilized by the Imperial Army (40 fighters in all, supported by 40 pilots, 25 sensor techs, 25 controllers and 60 ground crew personnel for a total of 150 soldiers), and a full assault battalion of soldiers for planetary deployment (662 troopers, 206 support personnel and 31 repulsorlift vehicles). While serving as a medium-attack cruiser, the Predator sacrificed a portion of its fighter compliment to make room for a small contingent of shuttles, landing craft and barges for armored assets that would be deployed in support of the main battalion. Predator-class ships operating as an attack cruiser generally did so as part of a pair, working closely with another Predator carrier that had been outfitted to either fill the escort role or medium-attack cruiser role, combining their overall assets to deliver an impressive attack force that was effective at quelling small planetary revolts and engaging light enemy fleets.
Special Operations/Stealth Assault Cruiser:
One of the lesser used derivatives of the Predator-class, the Spec. Ops. variant was utilized exclusively by Imperial special operations forces, such as the Strom Commandos, for covert operations deep within enemy space and were constructed with special titanium-reinforced alusteel hulls that would dampen their signature on enemy scanners. Additionally, some variants incorporated a stygium powered cloaking generator that would allow for the ship to loiter in an enemy system to gather information while remaining, essentially, undetectable. These stealth variants would usually sacrifice the combat fighters fielded by the other iterations within the class, instead hosting a small contingent of TIE Phantoms, specialized Lambda-class shuttles and Viper probe droids for long range reconnaissance missions. Predators designated as stealth cruisers were always crewed and captained by Storm Commandos, due to the typically sensitive nature of the missions they were assigned to complete, and were equipped with a series of 10 orbital drop pods that were launched from the hangar, via specialized launching racks, and could carry a single individual from low orbit to the surface of a planet with speed and safety. They contained a small number of rations (enough to sustain a single soldier for about a month), extra ammunition, medical supplies, and a long range transmitter in case of an emergency. They could also be employed as escape pods in the event that the crew needed to evacuate the ship.
With no outside support from any of the other branches of the Imperial Armed Forces, these “Storm Carriers”, as they were colloquially dubbed by their crews, operated under much stricter guidelines and were fitted with an advanced hypermatter annihilator reactor that could be used to jump the ship safely away from any encounter it could not win. Likewise, if a Stealth Predator was in danger of being captured, the crew could initiate an overload of the reactor, the effects of which would completely vaporize the craft to prevent the design from falling into enemy hands.
As the storm commandos were regarded as elite infantry, these ships were also capable of deploying a small contingent of troops for planetary assault. The warship carried a complement of three escape pods in case of an emergency.
Armaments:
Though lightly armed in comparison to other Imperial vessels of the time, the Predator class was fully capable of holding its own against other medium-assault craft, able to utilize its fighter compliments in conjunction with its impressive firepower to tackle many objectives at once while remaining relatively safe on the fringe of any potential engagement. The full weapons suite on a given Predator-class Assault Carrier included:
2 single barreled heavy turbolasers.
2 double barreled turbolaser cannons.
12 quad barreled medium point defense laser turrets.
Dimensions:
Length: 1,100 meters (~3,600 feet)
Width: 300 meters (~900 feet)
Height: 250 meters (~800 feet)
Crew Requirements: 6,400 personnel
Maximum Cargo Capacity: 9,000 metric tons
Consumables: A single Predator-class Assault Carrier can carry enough supplies to sustain its crew for roughly 5 years.
Compliments:
Depending on the role for which the carrier is assigned, the Predator-class can transport and deploy anything from a standard naval wing of fighters to a regiment sized Imperial ground force. Though its primary role is still retained as being that of a fighter/bomber carrier.
Technical Specification:
Communications Array: HoloNet transceiver.
Shielding: Modified KDY ISD-72x shield generators.
Engine Units: 3 Hoersch-Kessel Drive, Inc. engines.
Hyperdrive Classification: Class 1.0 main hyperdrive with a backup Class 15.
Power plant: Hypermatter annihilation reactor.
Classification: Assault Carrier.
Appearance:
Historical Information:
Commissioned by the Empire and constructed by Kuat Drive Yards, the Predator-class Assault Carrier was designed with input from members of the elite Storm Commando Corps. and was meant to operate as a deep space attack ship that could be custom fit to meet just about any need. Able to assume a multitude of roles, the Predator carriers represented a slight shift in the Empire's military policy in response to the guerrilla tactics exhibited by the Rebellion. In the early years of the Galactic Civil War, their tactics were focused almost exclusively around large, heavily-armed warships, such as the Imperial-class Star Destroyer, and proved ineffective when faced with the hit and fade attacks that were common practice for the Rebellion. It was not only slow and inefficient to deploy an Imperial-class Star Destroyer to guard a system in response to a Rebel incursion, it was also costly and would tend to spread the Empire's naval assets thin, leaving openings for the Rebellion to later exploit and plunder.
These factors underlined the Empire's need for a ship capable of patrolling the farthest reaches of Imperial space that could respond to a given situation and deliver the power necessary to curb Rebel insurrections. Thus, the Predator-class Assault Carrier was born. Sharing some aspects with other bulk cruisers of the Imperial Navy, the Predator boasted a considerable weapons package in addition to its advanced hyperdrive engines and generous fighter components, making it ideal for policing high risk systems and enforcing order on the very fringes of Imperial space.
At the time of its introduction in 3 ABY, the Predator class was deployed in limited numbers in order to test the craft's strengths and weaknesses in actual combat before the Empire would commit to full scale production, its design having met some stiff criticism at first when it was revealed that soldiers, not prominent Naval personnel, had played a role in the design of the ship. As such, many within the Imperial Navy were skeptical of their abilities and maintained that expanding production for the line of Imperial class Destroyers was the only effective way to win a war. With regards to these misgiving, many task force commanders who received these ships as new additions to their forces relegated them to menial tasks, prizing their Imperial Star Destroyers above all else.
Due to this prejudice against the new design, the Predator saw only limited action initially, often stationed near backwater worlds or tasked with supplementing Imperial forces guarding high security locations such as the Fondor shipyards and KDY. Eventually, however, the design would come to be a valuable addition to the Imperial Navy and made a name for itself in the months following the Battle of Hoth. Operating, more or less, independently on the periphery of the main Imperial fleets tasked with locating the Rebel forces that had dispersed in the wake of the battle, the Predator would score a series of victories for the Empire, easily seeking out and neutralizing small pockets of light Rebel resistance in advance of their main parent fleets, proving their effectiveness as long range, medium-assault vessels in addition to their prowess as an Assault Carrier. Shortly thereafter, the Empire authorized full production of the Predator carrier and began deploying them in more significant numbers across the galaxy in order to fill in the gaps that larger ships, such as the Imperial class, were unable to due to logistical inadequacies.
By the time the Galactic Civil War came to an end with the Empire's defeat at Endor, approximately 40,000 of these assault carriers had been constructed and issued to the various fleets in the galaxy. Having proven itself as a viable solution that mixes both the punch of a medium-assault frigate with the fighter supremacy of a carrier into a lethal package, the Predator is certainly considered a high water mark of sorts in carrier design and remains as one of the premiere designs that is still in production well after the reign of the Empire, its longevity only eclipsed by that of the iconic Imperial class Star Destroyer.
Characteristics:
With a design conceived, in part, by members of the Imperial Storm Commando Corps., the Predator carrier stood out in stark contrast to the standard Escort Carrier of the Imperial Navy and hosted a number of technical innovations that made it a very flexible craft. Whereas the Escort Carrier was built specifically for the transportation of fighters, was lightly armed in proportion to its size and resembled little more than a box with a curved hull and an engine at the back, the Predator-class was capable of fulfilling a number of roles and bore aesthetic features more indicative of other Imperial ship designs.
A nimble, narrow-hulled ship, with a flared arrowhead bow and three sublight thrusters mounted in a vertical row on the stern, the Predator, surprisingly, took few cues from other Imperial starship designs and instead incorporated some aspects from a few of the older CIS ships and applied them in some form or another, while simultaneously retaining its own unique look.
Design Aspects from CIS ships:
The first of these was an aspect of the ship that was clearly visible from the exterior, but could not be fully appreciated until it was viewed from the inside.
The Predator's hangar, bearing some similarities with those seen on the older Providence-class Destroyers fielded by the CIS during the Clone Wars, was a great feat of engineering in terms of its functions and storage capacity. When fielding the advanced Predator-class TIE fighters, crews could make excellent use of the fighter's compact design to maximize space inside the hangar through the two retractable docking racks on the ceiling. Each individual rack was capable of holding 36 of these fighters, for a total of 72 fighters in all, and operated by deploying from hidden compartments in the walls of the hangar, where they would reveal further design aspects taken from the droid armies of the Clone Wars. The racks took a page from the Multiple Troop Transports used by the Trade Federation during the occupation of Naboo years earlier.
Each launch rack held the fighters in vertically stacked rows of 2x9 (2 fighters high by 9 fighters deep on each side of the rack) so that their collapsible wings were facing towards the ceiling with the cockpit facing the ground. The TIEs were deployed when the arms on the rack would rotate the fighter 90 degrees to its right to face a movable catwalk that was suspended high above the hangar floor. From here, pilots would enter the craft while it was still in its vertical position before the rack arms would elevate the ship 90 degrees vertically as the catwalk was moved down to allow for the first group of fighters to launch. The next group of fighters on the lower side of the rack would then be drawn up to the catwalk by the mechanical rack arms, where the process would repeat again. After one side of the rack had finished launching, the entire assembly was rotated 180 degrees to bring the next group of fighters up for deployment, where the launching procedure would repeat once more until all fighters had been launched.
In this way, a Predator-class Assault Carrier was able to deliver several dozen fighters to the field all at once. A facet of their design that allowed for them to take the initiative in combat and often establish air superiority far earlier than their rival Alliance ships which still used the standard method of launching fighters from the tarmac inside their capital ships. When this process was first seen in action by Imperial Naval personnel serving aboard the vessel, however, the comment was made that it reminded them of a TIE production factory more so than a carrier launching fighters. Contrariwise, the racks used for the Predator-class TIE fighters could be removed entirely and replaced with standard racks built to house other TIE variants.
The second technical achievement was actually not visible from the exterior of the ship, but rather, was due to the manner in which the internal structuring of the ship had been constructed.
Compartmentalized into three distinct sections (the bow, mid-section and stern, respectively), each section of the ship was connected by a series of maze-like service corridors that were meant to provide easy access to escape routes for the crew, while serving the opposite purpose for any invading force that managed to board the vessel. Unless one knew the exact layout of the internal organization of the ship, these twisting hallways quickly became confusing and would stall the advance of any boarding party from reaching critical systems in a timely manner, buying the crew valuable time to initiate a number of defensive countermeasures that could be used to trap and nullify any hostile threats.
Chief among these defensive mechanisms was the inclusion of large, durasteel blast doors located between each distinct section of the craft in the main access corridor that ran the length of the ship from bow to stern. Working on the same principles as the particle shield traps on board many Providence-class Destroyers, these sturdy doors were put in place to isolate and seal off segments of the ship from one another in the event of a catastrophic hull breach, each door shared a composite mixture of alloys similar to those found on the hulls of modern Destroyers and was almost impervious to hand held cutting torches, such as the fusion cutter or plasma cutter, making the task of slicing through these immense obstacles all but impossible without the proper tools. While these individual sections were sealed off, their various critical systems could be controlled from the command deck of the carrier without effecting the rest of the systems through out the ship.
A popular method of dealing with boarding parties was to trap them in either the bow or mid sections of the ship and off-line the life support systems by venting all breathable air into space, suffocating the invading force. Alternatively, should the commanding officer of the carrier see fit to afford his enemies a relatively quick death, environmental seals could be activated that would render the compartment air-tight before being flooded with toxic fumes or nerve gas to effect a swift end to any person(s) unlucky enough to be trapped within the confines of the sealed area. Later, the gas would be vented into space to clear the section before it was re-opened for use by the crew.
A third, and crucial characteristic borrowed from older CIS ships was the use of internal shield generators, as was the case with the Lucrehulk-class Battleships.
Lacking the iconic command tower and twin KDY shield generator domes that capped the frames of nearly every conceived variant of Star Destroyer model fielded by the Empire, the Predator internalized all of its shield generators to minimize, if not totally eliminate, the risk of them being completely disabled by concerted fighter attacks during a skirmish. Located in the stern section of the ship and housed in thick protective armor between the fin-like command decks that protrude from either flank of the ship, the Predator utilized a smaller variant of the existing KDY ISD-72x shield generators that were common place on the Imperial-class Star Destroyers. With roughly 3,000 SBD, just above the Victory II-class, the Predator's shields provided only a fraction of the protection that Imperial-class Destroyer's shields did, but at a fraction of the cost, making them easy to produce, replace and install should something occur where such a repair needed to be effected.
Design Aspects from Imperial ships:
Having been built around the purpose of serving as a deep space assault craft, the Predator shared some design aspects with the Empire's Victory II-class Destroyer, their premiere vessel for deep space combat. Designers looked to the propulsion systems of the Victory II first and foremost, installing updated variants of the Hoersch-Kessel Drive, Inc. engines to power the ship and provide it with excellent sub light maneuvering speed. This decision to incorporate a slightly overpowered version of the engines seen on the Victory II directly contributed to the Predator's lethality in combat. Despite its size, the upgraded propulsion systems afforded it the necessary speed needed to keep up with other Imperial ships and engage the faster Alliance ships. However, since the carrier was not expressly designed to take on heavier Rebel vessels, such as the MC-80- or MC-90-class Star Cruisers, these engines served best in helping to keep the Predator highly mobile so that it could escape to a safer distance in the face of heavier ships that it was unable to compete with on a one on one basis, allowing for its fighter compliment to screen its retreat and keep any fighters or bombers away while the carrier acquired a more favorable position.
Aside from the engines, the Predator, as with many Imperial vessels, took part in the philosophy of fewer, more powerful guns as opposed to more numerous, and substantially less powerful, weapons.
Its most prominent weapons were the two single-barreled cannons mounted in superfiring turrets on the dorsal center line, each one commanding a wide field of fire from their respective positions at the front of the ship. These guns could fire in 180 degree arcs to either port or starboard sides and a 90 degree lateral traverse. Additionally, the rear most gun located near the mid section of the ship was built to rotate a full 360 degrees so that it could, should such be required, fire towards the back of the ship by aiming its muzzle up the angled dorsal structure between the command decks. There were also two double-barreled heavy turbolaser mountings on the ventral center line, fore and aft of the hangar bay, while two small turreted laser cannons were mounted on the very tip of the bow. In addition to the heavy guns that were meant to guard the carrier against medium-sized ships, the Predator was protected from fighter attacks by its series of quad barreled point laser defense turrets.
Resembling smaller versions of the Octuple barbette turbolaser cannons found on the Imperial II-class Star Destroyers, these versions were fitted for anti-fighter defense and mounted in double barreled settings found at various points on the hull of the ship, with a particularly high concentration of them located near the mid section of the ship to guard the hangar and command decks from attack. Two pairs of these guns were mounted on both the port and starboard flanks of the ship at either side of the hangar's main opening, while the remainder of the guns were dispersed elsewhere.
Taking full advantage of the Predator's narrow hull, many of the point defense systems were placed on the central spine of the dorsal structure from the bow to the apex at the stern. Each setting was able to traverse in a 360 degree arc to cover almost every conceivable angle in front of, above or to either side of the ship. Two more pairs of guns were mounted on the top of each separate command deck and were capable of firing in 180 fields to the fore and aft of the ship as well as having a 90 degree vertical traverse angle.
As a result of its innovative design aspects and impressive weapons platforms, the Predator-class could be adapted relatively easily to serve a variety of roles that included:
Escort Carrier:
Serving in this capacity, a Predator-class Assault Carrier could provide additional protection and support to smaller task forces or lightly armed convoys of smaller transport-class vessels. Typically, a ship assigned to this task was armed with a full naval wing of fighters and bombers (72 craft in total, supported by 180 operations personnel), depending on the mission priority requirements. A Predator-class tasked with escorting a convoy was generally outfitted with a mixed wing of fighters and bombers, while a ship assigned to supplementing a task force was almost exclusively used as a fighter carrier for air supremacy and dominance, usually making use of more advanced TIE fighter designs like the TIE Interceptor, TIE Hunter and Predator-class TIE fighter.
Battle Carrier:
A Predator-class Assault Carrier charged with acting in this role was usually part of a much larger force of ships that was composed of various Destroyers or Frigates, such as the Imperial-class Star Destroyer and Victory II-class Star Destroyer, and was generally outfitted to serve as a troop transport depending on the nature of the ships it was working in consort with. While in use as a Battle Carrier, the Predator was able to host an entire regiment of Imperial soldiers (2,500 soldiers +1,000 support personnel) for planetary invasion purposes. However, when serving in the capacity of a carrier dedicated to moving large numbers of soldiers, a Predator could field no additional fighters and relied entirely on other craft for fighter support.
Medium-Attack Cruiser:
Perhaps this role, more than any other, was one of the primary application for the Predator-class and defined its capabilities as a flexible warship. Acting under this designation, a carrier could support a typical ground support wing utilized by the Imperial Army (40 fighters in all, supported by 40 pilots, 25 sensor techs, 25 controllers and 60 ground crew personnel for a total of 150 soldiers), and a full assault battalion of soldiers for planetary deployment (662 troopers, 206 support personnel and 31 repulsorlift vehicles). While serving as a medium-attack cruiser, the Predator sacrificed a portion of its fighter compliment to make room for a small contingent of shuttles, landing craft and barges for armored assets that would be deployed in support of the main battalion. Predator-class ships operating as an attack cruiser generally did so as part of a pair, working closely with another Predator carrier that had been outfitted to either fill the escort role or medium-attack cruiser role, combining their overall assets to deliver an impressive attack force that was effective at quelling small planetary revolts and engaging light enemy fleets.
Special Operations/Stealth Assault Cruiser:
One of the lesser used derivatives of the Predator-class, the Spec. Ops. variant was utilized exclusively by Imperial special operations forces, such as the Strom Commandos, for covert operations deep within enemy space and were constructed with special titanium-reinforced alusteel hulls that would dampen their signature on enemy scanners. Additionally, some variants incorporated a stygium powered cloaking generator that would allow for the ship to loiter in an enemy system to gather information while remaining, essentially, undetectable. These stealth variants would usually sacrifice the combat fighters fielded by the other iterations within the class, instead hosting a small contingent of TIE Phantoms, specialized Lambda-class shuttles and Viper probe droids for long range reconnaissance missions. Predators designated as stealth cruisers were always crewed and captained by Storm Commandos, due to the typically sensitive nature of the missions they were assigned to complete, and were equipped with a series of 10 orbital drop pods that were launched from the hangar, via specialized launching racks, and could carry a single individual from low orbit to the surface of a planet with speed and safety. They contained a small number of rations (enough to sustain a single soldier for about a month), extra ammunition, medical supplies, and a long range transmitter in case of an emergency. They could also be employed as escape pods in the event that the crew needed to evacuate the ship.
With no outside support from any of the other branches of the Imperial Armed Forces, these “Storm Carriers”, as they were colloquially dubbed by their crews, operated under much stricter guidelines and were fitted with an advanced hypermatter annihilator reactor that could be used to jump the ship safely away from any encounter it could not win. Likewise, if a Stealth Predator was in danger of being captured, the crew could initiate an overload of the reactor, the effects of which would completely vaporize the craft to prevent the design from falling into enemy hands.
As the storm commandos were regarded as elite infantry, these ships were also capable of deploying a small contingent of troops for planetary assault. The warship carried a complement of three escape pods in case of an emergency.
Armaments:
Though lightly armed in comparison to other Imperial vessels of the time, the Predator class was fully capable of holding its own against other medium-assault craft, able to utilize its fighter compliments in conjunction with its impressive firepower to tackle many objectives at once while remaining relatively safe on the fringe of any potential engagement. The full weapons suite on a given Predator-class Assault Carrier included:
2 single barreled heavy turbolasers.
2 double barreled turbolaser cannons.
12 quad barreled medium point defense laser turrets.
Dimensions:
Length: 1,100 meters (~3,600 feet)
Width: 300 meters (~900 feet)
Height: 250 meters (~800 feet)
Crew Requirements: 6,400 personnel
Maximum Cargo Capacity: 9,000 metric tons
Consumables: A single Predator-class Assault Carrier can carry enough supplies to sustain its crew for roughly 5 years.
Compliments:
Depending on the role for which the carrier is assigned, the Predator-class can transport and deploy anything from a standard naval wing of fighters to a regiment sized Imperial ground force. Though its primary role is still retained as being that of a fighter/bomber carrier.
Technical Specification:
Communications Array: HoloNet transceiver.
Shielding: Modified KDY ISD-72x shield generators.
Engine Units: 3 Hoersch-Kessel Drive, Inc. engines.
Hyperdrive Classification: Class 1.0 main hyperdrive with a backup Class 15.
Power plant: Hypermatter annihilation reactor.
Classification: Assault Carrier.
