Designed for strafing runs and inter-gunship dogfighting, the Daiclonius is a large self-aware and highly maneuverable foe capable of maneuvers traditionally associated only with fighter craft, appearing to move similarly to a dolphin in the way its limbs flow and motion to vector the engine thrust.
The Daiclonius excels in descending deep into enemy territory and masking its presence, striking targets of opportunity or making hit and run maneuvers to disable greater vessels and dogfighting with ships of similar classification, effectively an anti-gunship gunship.
Though by default it includes no primary weapon, the nature of the Daiclonius means its armory can change to best suit the events around it, making it a highly prized possession among Aevalli alongside its ability to transverse vast distances under very little power.
The Daiclonius is also capable of atmospheric flight and landings by rotating its rear ordinance pods “prongs” to face the ground and lower front landing gear from beneath the nose.
Prepared especially for the battle of Salvation, the Daiclonius was a super-imposition unit designed to go deep into enemy territory in tightly knit well hidden groups, a favored tactic of the Sourcian who prefer tactical advantage and suppression to outright brute force. A total of three hundred were built before the end of the battle of salvation, a culmination of wars against a number of races who had grouped together to fight the Sourcian on their own turf using their own tactics. Losses were heavy but the Amelliaus demonstrated its worth time after time as tactics changed and it adapted: brute-forcing its way through numbers of fleets, carrying its deadly cargo to strategic destinations. At present, Daiclonius gunships are scarce and alone. Since the second incident, many have roamed without command or orders, leaving them paranoid, frightened and extremely hostile under the majority of circumstances.
Armor Sections:
A biologically grafted flexible endo-skeleton exists beneath the structolloid hull, providing motion control for flexible parts and a framework to build around. This internal skeleton also houses the internal networks which allows the bioloid and mechanoid components to communicate with one another.
A biologically grafted metalloid hull, Structol (a type of Sourcian) is evolved and bred to absorb to exhibit traits of complex alloys and metallic structures yet heal like a living thing. Structol is able to rebound physical impact and deflect energy based weapons by using a highly constricted Casmir field across its hull preventing any object with an atomic mass from penetrating it unless it packs sufficient kinetic energy. When the hull is at full charge, it vibrates out of phase at the Planck scale, forcing particles and waves with a low density to rebound from its surface, absorbed and thrown from it. The fully charged state cannot be maintained infinitely though it is self-sustaining until an impact is delivered at which point it must recharge after its capacity has been depleted on the specific part of the armor. Structol is also highly flexible despite its great thickness and able to extend and warp to envelop new components meaning the ship is able to continue growing long after its conception.
Integrated into the hull are a number of complex systems which allow the Daiclonius to mask its own energy patterns and output but also copy those of the craft it encounters. It is indistinguishable from other craft until in visual range should it choose to hide itself.
A simple life-support system is able to change the temperature, gravity axis and specific air mixture aboard the Daiclonius. This system is often dormant until occupants are detected and is a separate independent system of the Daiclonius' intelligence network.
Powering the Daiclonius is a hybrid Zero-Point-Energy device cum fission reactor and capacitor designed to continue working during all circumstances, since zero-point-energy disruption weapons were popular among Sourcian foe. Pressure from the fission reactor is often vented as controlled thrust through macroscopic holes in the engine pylons and in emulated engines from the rear ordinance pods for atmospheric flight and combat maneuvers but cannot be maintaned for more than 6 hours before the core's expulsion chambers are depleted, taking a further 8 minutes to normalize before the process can begin again. This 6 hours can be reduced to 60 minutes of high-speed atmospheric flight, comparable to a form of after-burner by injecting the same waxy substance used in the cannon mechanism in a form of “full bore” thrust or in sharp bursts by flooding the vent chamber with a vapor of the heated liquid wax to create a sharp controlled accelation which can be vented in the direction the pod is pointed in.
The brain of the Daiclonius, the Neural Clusters are a combination of aligned crystal structures which store neural data, complex cells, optic neural fibers and an optic computing system. There is also a quantum computing system strictly used only for combat intelligence, estimation and wormhole calculations. The Neural Cluster of the Daiclonius is effectively sentient with the ship as its physical body and is free to make decisions of its own though psychologically trained to act for the good of its creators and to attempt to understand their needs during transit despite the fact the Neural Cluster has no active language capacity beyond what the computer translates from spoken language into impulses. The Neural Cluster is also tightly bonded to a vast array of sensors throughout the ship's internal and external, both mechanoid and bioloid. This allows the ship to not only observe its surroundings but also within itself into the entire electromagnetic spectrum and various types of resonance on various scales to detect a target or track bodies within itself.
Complex capacitors and coil systems broadcast the Planck scale disruption to draw ripples into the phasic patterns of zero-point-energy and amplify the Structol armor's Casmir-Barrier. With a heavy charge, the engine pylons can generate a wormhole through space though the energy required to do so means that both halves of the Core must be active which would drain the entire capacity of the Core capacitor in a single use though the greater the distance to travel, the higher the energy requirement is. While time travel is theoretically possible with this system, it has not been explored and appears to carry an extremely high risk.
The cannon is a complex weapon and yet lacks any moving parts. The trans-phasic cannons work by super-heating a metallic waxy build-up within the ammunition stores which is then electro-statically charged to hold the round together. Finally, the end round is fired similarly to a rail-gun and its quantum phase is shifted dramatically as it exits the barrel. Though single shots aren't effective on larger targets as conventional weapons, the fact the cannons can repeatedly fire at extremely high speeds makes them extremely effective with suppression tactics when concentrated on larger targets. The Trans-Phasic cannons are capable of stripping down both sub-space barriers (by de-stabilizing the sub-space and forcing it to neutralize into normal space) and causing a biased distortion among complex graviton systems, drawing them away from their source rendering graviton based technologies useless unless the distortion can be normalized or over-powered.
Rifle-pods are small pods set into the forward and rear ordinance pods which fire a sharpened highly dense metalloid crystal with an explosive or nuclear payload at trans-hypersonic speeds in rapid clusters designed to impale themselves into the hull of enemy craft. Some types are designed to impale into a craft and then de-equalize the pressure by delivering an explosive compression, either blowing off the panel it is embedded into rising the air temperature within the craft. Rifle pods possess an intense tracking capability beyond the dexterous ordinance pods they are launched from as they are partially living Structol with basic intelligence capable of following a specific target. All ordnance pods include a moderate laser-cannon upon their tip to attempt to make the target falter or cause damage without the intended impact and can be detonated with an intelligent proximity fuse.
By generating a wormhole and then shifting its phase dramatically, the resulting shockwave near-randomly shifts the octave that zero-point-energy is fluctuating at, making it unpredictable and impossible to collect for up to 6 minutes at a time. The Core aboard the Daiclonius is pre-configured to collect from this frequency already at high speed, acting as a well which causes a denial-of-service for all active zero-point-energy devices. The weapon is highly impractical to deploy in poor odds as it drains the primary capacitor which prevents the Daiclonius from escaping. In the event the Core cannot fully reactivate for the duration of 6 minutes, its primary weapon systems will not be 100% effective.
*With a salvaged BOT power unit, the Denial Wave is now able to operate for up to 12 minutes but if over 10 minutes are used, the Maras is unable to utilize its wormhole capabilities effectively, thus compromising its defensive capabilities and mobility.
Walls are either of a dull smooth metalloid surface, ribbed or bare revealing a complex crystalline structure. Beneath all three lies a spongy teal and orange material.
Engine area Occupying the rearward section, the engine housing merely contains the power source to the engine and is quite a tight squeeze for the most part with a number of access shafts and ledges dotted about the Core. The majority of the engine itself is actually external in the form of conductive pylons and ion vents.
Bridge An inaccurate depiction, the Bridge features a vast tactical system but no specific placements or furniture for personnel to situate themselves upon save for a ledge at the rearward section and a number of panels set which reach inward about the room. The role of the bridge is to act as a surrogate control system should the Daiclonius be commanded.
Cabins In some events, a Daiclonius may be used for transit of materials or personnel. A number of chambers are able to create ideal conditions for crew cabins, 12 in total, dotted about decks 4 and 5, either side of critical systems.
Storage Directly beneath the engine housing in a secured area, a storage facility can be formed for cargo transport. In the majority of Daiclonius, this is instead a second engine housing, delivering more power to the engine pylons and weapons.
Maintenance conduits A number of small tunnels run through the form of the ship for emergency access to systems, both mechanoid and bioloid.
Cannon junction Situated against the very roof and base of the Daiclonius, the Cannon junction leads to a manual control system and storage capacitors for the cannons both on the dorsal and underside of the Daiclonius. Because the cannons are able to rotate and the payload may vary, manual gunnery control is also available though the majority of the time these systems rest forward or are controlled by the ship.
Offensive override junction A junction is placed which in times of emergency allows for all offensive systems to be powered down and for neural control of the ship to these systems be severed.
Neural systems Junction A junction set between the isolated neural cluster and primary control structure (otherwise known as the spine of the gunship). It allows modifications and upgrades to be installed into both bioloid and mechanoid systems of the ship or for the two to be separated entirely.
Vascular systems Junction A vast pump situated forward of the engine housing, the vascular systems junction pumps coolant and nutrient transport plasma through the bowels of the ship. If deactivated, the ship can sustain itself for up to 6 months.
Digestive system A throwback to its biological origins, a digestive system is present within the bowels of the ship which can break down any biological matter through a combination of physical and chemical digestive processes. This system is normally dormant unless used as either disposal, torture or in emergencies. Once the digestive system is 10% through chemical digestion, it cannot be stopped and the contents will be destroyed.
Passage ways A number of hallways and junctions are placed between the rooms of the ship. In the event there are no rooms, the passage way can be replaced with a large primary weapon.
Gravitor box External of the engine room, the gravitor box shifts quantum phase to create a powerful graviton well at any given angle of the ship, allowing it to “fall” in the direction it wishes to travel. The phasic field created by the gravitor box is amplified through the engine room's systems and out through the engine pylons rear of the Daiclonius.
Payload Launcher The external pods of the Daiclonius contain a number of payloads which can be launched. Usually, these are razor sharp dense semi-crystalline-metallic forms created as a chemical waste-product of the engine room. The pods can rotate and lean against the structure of the body. A further two are placed upon the front-side of the secondary pods further back.
Ordinance bays The Daiclonius has a further two hanger-sized areas which connect directly to the payload storage areas which feed ammunition and launch a large salvo instantaneously.
Hanger One hanger place directly before the engine pylons which is hull-sealed and can comfortably accommodate three shuttles. Atop the roof is a caging system designed to rapidly deploy armored units into combat alongside drones.
Usually, the Daiclonius includes four Sourcian Warriors and a number of automated maintenance drones though the Daiclonius is highly adaptable to suit its passengers.
This article was approved by Wes on 2007/02/25 and added to the wiki 2007/03/12 in this approval thread.