Threat 0xZRQ448E - Target codename "Acacia"

[TetrahedronCaptain (PCG)]

Hey, first Draugr ship! Woohoo! It’s a bit bigger than planned, but ah well...

Destroyer Type 43 Acraenos-pattern Mk. XIV - "Acacia":

Identity verified… access granted. Beginning secure transmission...

Like the other vessels of her race, the vessel we’ve codenamed “Acacia” is largely an enigma. She carries the markings of an “Acraenos” vessel, a mining clan. Based on examinations of intact hulls and computer systems, it is believed that Acacias are employed as light mining rigs and ore haulers when not on combat duty, using their thick hides to protect themselves from the rigors of the asteroid belts they mine.
    In combat, the Acacia will act as a light fire support ship, escort carrier or in other secondary roles. Their weapon loadout is rather peculiar; their main weapon is an impressive centerline coaxial energy cannon at the front capable of surprisingly damaging attacks at longer ranges than one would expect from a Draugr vessel. Supporting this are a few medium and heavy weapons, also focused towards the frontal arc; most of the lighter weapons, however, are located at the rear of the craft. It is recommended the frigates, corvettes, and strike craft engage this ship from the front, as it’s sluggish turning rate means it likely won’t be able to bring most of it’s heavy firepower to bear; larger vessels, however, should attack from the rear, where most weapons generally aren’t of a high enough caliber to pose a serious threat.
    That all being said, large-sweep data correlation suggests that Acacias are not frontline craft; instead, they’re mainly deployed as support units to groups of smaller ships that otherwise would have to go without vessels of its size, or as support/auxiliary elements in large engagements. They are occasionally used command/control roles, such as tertiary command craft, communications, EW, or fire control; however, they do not perform well in these aspects compared to more specially-built CnC/support craft, and are thus only employed as supplementary or replacement units when such dedicated craft are unavailable.

Spoiler:

Designer’s Notes:
So on Saturday, S-H jokingly suggested I try to build a tiny Draugr ship in 24-hours or less. It ended up bigger (and taking longer) than I had anticipated, but I like the final result. Big shout-out to Arik, both for essentially creating the Draugr’s style and for the SNOT suggestions here*. Still trying to balance the color scheme, and probably make some more modules, but the ship itself is done.

Stats:
-Classification: Destroyer
-Role: Fire support, various support roles, escort carrier, ore hauler, miner
-Dimensions:
    • Length: 400 meters
    • Beam: 150 meters
    • Draft: 90 meters
    • Mass: ~2,000,000 metric tons, estimated
-Armaments: Varies widely; baseline seems to be 15 energy-based gatling AA weapons, 15 light mass drivers, 3 medium mass drivers, 2 heavy mass drivers, 1 centerline energy cannon, 2 anti-crew beams of unknown type, 3 heavy energy cannons
-Shielding: Single-layered shield of unknown type; seems to be particularly adept at blocking mass-based weapons
-Armor/Hull: Thick duranium composite armor with unidentified trace elements; reinforced load-bearing superstructure
-Sublight: Three nadion-emission catalyst engines; sluggish turning and acceleration, but decent top speed
-FTL: None observed or recorded
-Sensory/Comms: Unknown; believed to be somewhat expanded compared to standard Acraenos ships
-Crew: Several hundred Draugr; exact numbers difficult to acquire
-Strike Craft: None by default; capable of equipping hangar or Shatterer transport modules
-Ammo: Unknown
-Assault: Average, for Acraenos vessel
-Other: N/A

Dropbox link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/dc6p6h48y4sq4gv/Draugr%20Acacia%20%28Type%2043%20Mk.14%29.lxf?dl=0

Comments/criticism/questions/concerns are welcome, as always!

*...I should probably actually comment on some of those fighters, shouldn’t I?

[Star-HunterCEO]

This way, a whisper wanders...

Spoiler:

Very nice little ship, especially for something built so quickly. Has a suitably rugged appearance, with a good blend of curves and angles. Although I'm not usually a fan of exposed studs, in this case they somewhat contribute to the ship's rougher design. Asymmetrical antennae caught my eye. Not entirely sold on the red/green color scheme, but maybe there's a way to make it work.

One thing I will say, however, is that the ship doesn't strike me as particularly "alien". It feels less like something an intergalactic raider would fly, and more like something a backwater miner/pirate would employ. That said, this is the first Draugr ship we've seen, so who knows how the design style will develop over time.

[ForgeRecruit (No Affiliation)]

When a whisper wanders willingly, where does the wandering whisper willingly wake after it whips whispingly whenever?
...and why?

What SH said, love the verticle combined with flat appearance, and especially the geebling, nice touch. I especially liked the front lower geebles myself. I agree that it doesn't feel "alien", but I will refer back to an earlier conversation I had with you about "alien design" stereotypes. (in particular, bugs) It can look rugged with a industrial feel and still be alien, because #breakthesterotypes. It does have something of a armed freightor/part time fighter part time hauler feel to it, which is good given it's roles.

[TetrahedronCaptain (PCG)]

S-H: Yeah, color scheme wasn't exactly what I hoped. I wanted a sort of freighter-design thing, and figured cargo containers tended to be colored red and green, so there you go.

As for the design... well, that was mainly Arik. He had recently discovered Homeworld 2 ships when we were making the species, so he decided they should have a decidedly Vaygr-ish theme to them. As for the in-universe explanation... uhhhhhhh... what Ant said.

Ant: Yeah, I'm quite proud of the SNOT work on this one, as I mentioned already.

@Both: Thanks!

[Dino27Captain (PCG)]

S-H summed it up. Love the ship! Not sold on the color-scheme, ship suits the role perfectly, but doesn't look too alien.

Of course, Trek alien ships all pretty much look about the same  (for the most part, save for very well thought out species) so it works within a partly Trek based universe.
Still. how do we keep these ships alien enough, without them being stereotypical? 

Anyways, I love this ship! It's very different from what you've done before! It's rugged, it's utilitarian, it's a bit bulky, and it's beautifully ugly. Great work!

[TetrahedronCaptain (PCG)]

Dino- Thanks! Yeah, the whole HW2-style is a new one for me; I have to keep resisting my urges to make another ST ship out of habit.

TBH, I'm not sure how to make this style feel alien. The Vaygr as a whole seem to be pretty much in-line with our other stuff; it's possible a master-builder could wring out the subtleties that make the difference, but I have a hard time imagining anyone but S-H managing that. I suppose we could further magnify the asymmetry and/or try to incorporate some detailing you wouldn't usually see on our ships, but that would take a good deal of perfecting to get right. Dunno.

Once again, thanks; we'll have to keep that all in mind going forward.

[Lord Admiral AriklegoLord Admiral (MSI)]

Honestly, I'd say this is really good, Tetra.

My personal vision for the Draugr ships (and seriously, guys, feel free to do other stuff/disagree with me/throw out other idea/etc. I'm not the head honcho running this ) is to have sort of boxy-ish, flat-rectangle ships, with some rounded elements, a "scavenged" look, armor plating slapped on top delicate scrapped-together ship systems, parts of other ships incorporated in, a few super-advanced/super-alien pieces of tech thrown in, and then an attempted nice-looking paintjob thrown over it.

Reasoning why:
-Boxy/Rectangular: They're fairly utilitarian. They're not going to have exotic bug mandibles, super-curvy hull sections, and stuff like that. It's too much work to fit it into the design. And on the note of utilitarian, think lots about what stuff they'd put on it. Do they need cargo containers for holding trade goods or supplies? How would they put on the weaponry to make it the most effective (or making it able to function at all)? How would they get the modularity they need to attach either a captured warp nacelle or that ion engine they scavenged onto the same base chassis/frame?
-Scavenged look: This should be obvious. They get almost all their building materials from half-exploded enemy ships. They don't have time to individually pull off every wire, screw, console display, armor bulkhead, pipe, and fluffy captain's chair from the big hunk of command bridge they just blasted off, so they slap it onto a ship, do some welding or whatever, and send that newly-built ship into battle.
-Armor: They need armor, of course. Probably what this would consist of taking big sections of armor plating off ships (or maybe making their own) and attaching it around a ship. Personally, I love the look of greebles exposed between gaps in the armor plating, so I'm gonna play that for all it's worth. Everyone else do whatever they like.
-Alien Tech: I assume that most of their tech would be stolen from the Masters, or else taken from people groups they've attacked and scavenged from. So their tech would be a mix of super-advanced Master tech, some bits of tech from other galaxies they've visited during their travels, and stuff they've stolen from factions in our galaxy. I figure the Masters' tech would be clean/simplistic-looking and super-advanced, maybe like Halo's Forerunners, then we could have fun with making other galaxies' tech.
-Paintjob: Something to keep in mind everyone. This was once a race who, though servants, were probably very proud of their work and service to the Masters. Chances are they had a strong sense of nobility and grace before they were simply discarded. And now more than ever I think they would take every chance to try and mimic their former glory.
...In other words, don't totally toss out the idea of adding nice paintjobs, decorative or sentimental details, etc. as being too impractical for such a utilitarian species.

[Dino27Captain (PCG)]

^^^^
And Arik pretty much just designed the aesthetic for our new baddies.

[TetrahedronCaptain (PCG)]

Dino- Yeah... I already said that.

Arik- Good to finally have that all in one place; I'll keep it in mind.

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