Cobra Gunship

Designed on the fly in YE 41 in the opening stages of the nepleslian_triple_front_war by necessity from a joint effort between NAM engineers, and the available resources able to be mustered by the 3rd Assault Fleet and its NSMC personnel; The Cobra class gunship is a fast and effective craft for rapidly inserting and supporting NSMC marines and equipment ahead of a fleet or without the use of a fleet to ferry or insert them otherwise.

Originally requested through logistics petition in late YE 41 by acting admiral in charge of 3rd assault fleet forces in the Free Range territory; Admiral Calloway, and his cohort in the NSMC in the form of commanding general over the 309th “Ruthless Riders” Mechanized Infantry; General Apollodorus Wiegand as a method of rapidly and efficiently deploying small groups of marines from the 309th across the planets and stations dotting the Free Range territory.

With the use of NAM ship repair and production facilities and the oversight of Nepleslian Arms and Munitions engineers within the fleet, The Cobra's first prototype was manufactured in a few weeks, And semi mass production from there until the designs where sent to NAM propper to begin full production for use primarily within the 3rd Assault Fleet. Practically speeding through the design process, the ship still manages to fit in a few unique features of its own, including an underbelly elevator for deploying large vehicles such as armored personnel carriers, APCs, and even a Maximus RUSE from the belly of the ship to load and unload ground vehicles. The ship's interior is somewhat Spartan, as most of the interior is taken up by a vehicle cargo bay, cramped living spaces, and logistical supplies like weapons/armor lockers and power armor bay.

The cobra, Being the smallest warship available to the NSN is also both lightly armored and armed. Made for rapidly deploying NSMC personnel and supporting them through using its weaponry as anti-air and light CAS and ground support. While also lingering in theater to provide squads of marines a base of operations to store their armor and weapons and a light compliment of vehicles as well as other logistics such as food, medical supplies, and spare parts.

The Cobra gunship specializes in using its speed to run ahead of friendly NSN/NSMC fleet elements to rapidly insert vanguard forces or emergency support before NSMC/NSN elements can arrive on scene.

• Rapid insertion of ground/boarding forces ahead off fleet elements
• Ground Support
• Anti Fighter/Bomber

The Cobra is a simple, brutalist design of bulky armor and noticeable weaponry. The weapons are plain and apparent without sleek coils or covers and without the possibility of failure possible from obscuring the ship's weapons in bays with two quad barreled turrets on the front over two dual turrets on the underside of the ship for anti-starfighter purpose. A single great gun lies on the belly towards the back of the ship for fighting hard targets like tanks or bunkers or for the daring suicidal crew who want to leave a few dents/holes in an enemy frigate before it returns the favor.

The cobra is crewed in a way that one officer is in command of the ship and even when off duty is never far. As well as multiple pilots, gunners, and engineers to ensure there is always a man on duty at their station and at least one to two others to relieve them or offset their work to ensure no one man needs to bear the burden of maintaining their station twenty-four hours a day.

See Damage Rating (Version 3) for an explanation of the damage system.

On the lowest levels of the ship, positioned alongside the Power Armor bays in the lower decks on the ship. It contains enough firepower to arm a significant force for several engagements and scenarios. Here is where Marines gather to maintain, service and store their weapons assisted by junker drones.

The Armory would contain the following:

The armory also contains multiple utility weapons such as grenades, knives, and axes as well as armor enough for every marine onboard and suits for the tank crew and corona crew.

The ship contains an ADF system on the hull that uses microwaves to stimulate pain receptors in the body, forcing targets to turn away and flee. Very effective against unarmored targets but not intended for combat use. The ADF works especially well when the marine contingent must leave the ship and crew moderately or completely undefended.

• Amount: One
• Primary Purpose: Anti-personnel
• Secondary Purpose: Sensor disruption
• Damage: Less than lethal.
• Range: 100 Meters (Max range)
• Rate of Fire:| continuous.
• Payload: Effectively unlimited, so long as the ship provides power.

see NAM Na-DSA-XX Directed Scalar Array Mounted at the font of the ship, A directed scalar array helps protect the ship from incoming threats like approaching fighters. The scalar array targets detected craft or munitions en-route to the ship and can be used to fry unprotected technology like targeting sensors on munitions on or fired by a fighter or enemy craft that may otherwise be unprotected by any protective sensors on the craft.

The scalar array is a directed weapon and can not target more than one craft at a time.

• Amount: One
• Primary Purpose: Anti-fighter
• Secondary Purpose: Sensor disruption
• Damage: Destroys electronics, kills animals, and detonates ordinance.
• Range: 1 AU
• Rate of Fire: continuous.
• Payload: Destroys electronics, kills animals, and detonates ordinance.

see OI-V9-W3600 Heavy Pulse Laser Vulcan

On the bottom of the ship are two turrets each containing dual vulcan heavy pulse laser weapons for firing at ground targets or ahead bellow or to the sides of the ship on coaxial mounts. On the top half of the ship are two coaxial turrets each with quad vulcan lasers for a total of 12

• Amount: Four (Two dual turrets)
• Primary Purpose: Anti-fighter, Anti Armor
• Secondary Purpose: Ground Support
• Damage: T-9
• Range: 2.8 miles (4500m), 87,000 miles in space (140,000km)
• Rate of Fire: 15 Pulses per second.
• Payload: Effectively unlimited as long as the fighter craft has power.

See NAM "Svarog" Anti-Ship Mass Driver AShMD-01a On the underbelly towards the rear of the ship, The Cobra carries a single Svarog mass driver for anti-ship and ground support.

• Amount: One
• Primary Purpose: Anti-Ship, Anti Armor
• Secondary Purpose: Ground Support
• Damage: T-11
• Range: 30,000 meters in atmosphere, 300 kilometers in space.
• Rate of Fire: ~12 RPM
• Payload: variable

On the back and spine of the ship, several countermeasure dispensers are present in the case of missile or guidance based attacks threaten the Cobra. Each belonging to the Na-V6-M3700 "AEGIS" Active Missile Guardian/Interception Suite. The cobra uses the Hyperspace fuel tap flare and Anti-radar chaff systems from the Aegis countermeasure suite.

• Damage: Tier 3
• Range: 5,000 meters (~3.107 miles)
• Rate of Fire: 5×3 charges/second¹⁾
• Velocity: 1 km/s
• Payload 75 charges, self-replenishing

• Range: 325 meters (~0.202 miles)
• Rate of Fire: 2 charges/second
• Payload 12 charges/launcher²⁾

The Cobra contains and extensive vehicle bay that takes up most of the lower decks of the ship. The vehicle bay is separated from the power armor bay by a massive and powerful elevator that can deploy vehicles, troops, or equipment. Each vehicle has its own small storage space to lock them down when not in use and a small motor pool to maintain and provide repairs to the vehicles.

In the case of the corona gunship, The gunship can be loaded onto and deployed from the cobra while in flight but must otherwise be manually unloaded from the ship and taxied away from the ship to take off.

The Vehicle bay contains the following:

• One Heavy Tank or Light Tank
• One Corona Heavy Gunship
• Two Light vehicles no larger than an APC³⁾
• Five Na-J3

The Cobra features a small array of NSMC use power armors for marine use, Attached to the vehicle and elevator bay across from the vehicle bay it is easily accessible by any marine as the frame are each locked in a small bay locked to the bulkhead of the ship and doesn't hinder the marines in any way such as being bottlenecked to enter a dedicated armory. The Power armor bay shares a motor pool with the vehicle bay where armor can be worked on.

The power armor bay contains the following to outfit its marine detail:

The ship contains a very easy to produce communications systems on the front hull. While not as sophisticated as those on most military vessels, they cover the basics (subspace and radio) and provide an acceptable amount of security. In an emergency, the communications system can act as a low-resolution sensor system by using the receiver to pinpoint radio or subspace transmitters much in the same way that human ears pinpoint sounds.

The ship has an efficient shielding system, relying on a teardrop-shaped spatial distortion to warp space around it and alter the course of laser, missiles, etc. that are headed for the ship. A second system, called “the spike” only protects the front of the ship, acting as a giant cone. It protects the ship from collisions during high-speed flight. Both of the shields can take a lot of damage but are not infallible, and fail after a few good hits.

The gunship is equipped with a Mercurite shielding system, which is capable of blocking most forms of electromagnetic radiation. This is useful for blocking electromagnetic pulse-type weapons.

A by-product of antigravity (repulsion) technology, the damper shield has been heralded as the best defense against scalar electro-gravitational pulse weaponry, which are notorious for their ability to destroy ammunition, electronics, and organic life forms. While scalar EM waves penetrate conventional shielding because they can travel wherever gravity can go, the damper field uses a low-power antigravity field that negates the force of gravity and consequently provides an effective shielding system against scalar EM weapons systems.

A black veil is installed on the cobra to help with its electronic protection and detection from hostile ships and forces.

see Na-M/V-E4100 Black Veil Electronic Warfare Suite

The underside of the ship contains a loud sound system with three speakers hooked directly into the cockpit’s communication system and radio. The speakers are operated by a dial in the cockpit that allows the pilot to change the input settings.

Designed for quick inspection of ships the multi-dimensional density scanner takes precise gravitational readings at various points in space using a combination of a gravity sensor and the ship’s own hyper pulse drive. The result is a quick 3d mapping of an object or planet surface with density measurements displayed.

Subspace mass sensors instantly detect mass readings and movement of objects up to 1 AU (93 million miles) distant from the ship. The readings are used both for early warning and navigation when traveling at sublight speeds. The readings are not very detailed and cannot detect objects of less than 60,000 kg.

Tachyon Scanners detect the disturbances in the gravitic characteristics of normal space caused by the passage of ships traveling through hyperspace. Tachyon scanners also reduce the effectiveness of enemy missile jamming systems.

Unidirectional Gravity Plating plating on the roof emits a pseudo-gravitational field that is attracted to the plates on the floor pushing everything on the ship 'down'. This creates the false sense of gravity that permeates the ship.

The ship's exterior is equipped with two large rapid-launch bays, which are forcefield-contained openings in the hull. The bays make it possible for powered armor to fly out into space at their convenience. The bays also open out which slope down and touch the ground when the ship is landed, allowing troops to disembark.

Charmaylarg created this article on 2019/09/24 12:30.

Approved by Syaoran on 11/16/2019