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MarkushMasterWarrior In reply to madmax460 [2020-04-13 21:43:18 +0000 UTC]

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madmax460 In reply to MarkushMasterWarrior [2020-04-14 00:22:30 +0000 UTC]

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LordArcheronVolistad In reply to LordArcheronVolistad [2020-01-11 03:15:32 +0000 UTC]

Analysis: Despite that one viewing nag, I really do admire and like this piece of art. The ship used to make up the stern of the vessel is consistent with the naval architectural style of the AHE, it’s sleek, enigmatic and elegant as appropriate for a highly-advanced spacefaring civilization. It looks solid and domineering with some parts not as elegant as others (the detailing on the broadsides of the hull and the big frontal prod), which makes perfect sense for an experienced military running low on resources. It looks awesome, but more-importantly it does so while maintaining an appearance of practicality. For me as a guy who draws AHE ships with canon-diverging bits like rows of stacked turrets to make them look more-practical, I respect that. The general design of the ship gives me some things to speculate on, if you don’t mind. 

First of all, the ship’s forward glowing extremity: This could be several things, such as an armored comprehensive sensor system (because the sensitive equipment works best when protruding farthest out of the other systems of the ship but damage hazards need to be considered). Or it could be a central spinal cannon like the one used on what I like to call Prime Battleships (the fish-shaped ones that Forthencho commands and that can one-shot Forerunner capital ships). The fact that it’s sticking out of the tall prow and has that glow to it suggests that it may be reinforced by one or more energy fields which would be shielding or disruptor fields to help the main gun survive damage while it’s firing at the enemy or as a last-resort, making it able to ram into the innards of enemy ships and fire inside them, causing more-damage in an effect similar to how the previous Noble 6 detonated a nuke inside of a Covenant battlecruiser over a city and the shields kept most of the blast bouncing inside the ship itself. The fact that the ship’s front seems to have more armor than the sides supports this. 

Onto the weapons. From the looks of it, there are potentially 4 types of primary weapons on the ship with several kinds of smaller point-defense and ancillary turrets or emplacements. First potential weapon is the spinal cannon I just talked about above. The second is one of the most-obvious, coming from the original model. I am of course referring to the pair of armored headlight-looking pods which rest right behind the top half of the vertical prow, the one with 3-4 blue lights in them. These, judging from the ship’s description in Warfleet p.14, would be the Fibril Cutters. As to what precisely that means, here’s an idea: The medical definition of Fibrillation is “a muscular twitching involving individual muscle fibers acting without coordination” or “very rapid irregular contractions of the muscle fibers of the heart resulting in a lack of synchronism between heartbeat and pulse”. Based off of this, devices which use the principle of Fibrillation as a form of dealing damage would most-likely be some kind of disruptor. The weapons would fire streams or bolts or whatever of concentrated energy which would cause the atoms composing the target to act erratically and inject so much energy into them that they break molecular or even atomic bonds and particles are flung every which way, causing absolute havoc with the target matter’s structural integrity as it is gradually ripped apart by its own matter shredding free of organized consistency. Some things start to disintegrate and fizzle as matter becomes agitated and disturbed, and those parts detonate, causing more tears and secondary explosions. Such things hitting power systems or charged weapons would cause even more damage. 

The next potential weapon system would be the long thin prongs on the side of the wings of the ship which are swept somewhat down. They remind me of the cannons of a Star Wars ARC-170. Judging by the way the cannons look, they have a longer range and penetration power than the forward-mounted fibril cannon pods. The long thin barrels suggest that in addition to range, the weapons have an increased fire rate due to the majority of the system being exposed and thus being able to radiate excess heat out of itself (if they don’t have the tech simply to redirect all waste heat into the weapon discharges). The 4th potential weapon I can see would be the large blue glowy cylinder in front (relative from POV) of the wingtip cannons. This may be some kind of larger static weapon to finish off tougher targets when the main cannon cannot be brought to fire fast enough. The fact that it’s so far back in the hull may suggest that the weapon would be harder to hit from an enemy that the ship is facing (and in any situation they would have shields up, guns blazing, and escorts around it) and that it is more-volatile in nature so best leave it away from all of the other weapons and just the right distance from the engines sos that it can benefit from the likely higher-shields around that area but an explosion of them won’t chain-react to the engines or reactor. The fact that this system is also exposed (glowy cylinder) makes me think that it is either a way to shave off excess heat if that is a problem and facilitate faster repair, or so they can jettison it if it becomes critical. Then again, it may not be a weapon at all, maybe it’s an arresting thruster to slow the ship down or move it backwards. It could also be a shield generator, you decide.

Onto the possible secondary weapons: 

The sides of the hull are more-detailed and exposed compared to the prow and stern regions, so the most-logical explanation is that they are modular utility areas which house all manners of things like supplies, vehicles, living quarters, and yes, secondary weapons. Smaller anti-ship turrets and guided missile pods would help in broadside maneuvers as the ships are running through a Forerunner blockade or responding to a flanking attack, and even smaller weapon systems would be used as screening against small craft and swarms of Forerunner weapon-ships, which were a common sight. Beam and blast weapons would be used against tougher and larger targets while rapidfire flak and pinpoint beam weapons (red: phaserstrips) would be used against smallcraft and to intercept shieldbreaker ordinance. Imagine a Forerunner commander thinking he can overwhelm a pack of these ships by shredding them through with sentinels (like what happened to the Banished Carrier in HW2) only to see all his ships get eviscerated by a Galactica-style wall of explosions. Given that the AHE are losing the war and resources, modularity and adaptivity like this on their ships is paramount, so each of the hull sections can be easily-swapped-out to fit nearly any mission parameters. 

Another thing that I find interesting about the hull would be how behind the blue cylinder is a section of the ship which looks like it would be spherical or pretty damn close if viewed from the top. Given the sheer thickness of armor and hull this one part would have around the central point, I would guess that this is where the main reactor of the ship is located, with the Slipspace drive not being much farther away. I also like the shape of the stern, it looks like a huge armored cowling that covers the main engines, which is important since you wouldn't want to get the ship disabled and surrounded.

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MarkushMasterWarrior In reply to LordArcheronVolistad [2020-01-11 06:06:53 +0000 UTC]

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MarkushMasterWarrior In reply to Kamikage86 [2020-01-10 21:27:45 +0000 UTC]

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