The Type 30 Irim Gunship is a redesign of the original Type 26 Irim Gunship, a deadly starship built by Ketsurui Fleet Yards during the height of the epic million-ship wars of against the Mishhuvurthyar in YE 25. It functions as fire support in fleet battles and as a light carrier for shuttles, fighters, and power armor.
The Irim is notable for its heavy firepower that can lay waste to huge sections of space, for its ability to carry larger fighters and shuttles, and for its impressive long-range sensors.
The Irim is intended for a wide variety of mission profiles, but specializes in seek and destroy missions against enemy warships and in large-scale fleet warfare. It is intended to run with a minimal crew for up to a year away from home without external support.
Long, triangular split-boom main gun makes forward half the ship. Gun booms connect to rounded square main body, which also supports two rear triangle-shaped rear booms, and a pylon carrying an underside pod which contains the vehicle areas. Bilaterally symmetrical.
The first gunship made by Ketsurui Fleet Yards was the “Frontier-class.” Armed with the mighty Legacy Cannon, the class proved moderately effective, but design problems and lack of a dedicated computer system hampered the ship's performance. The Irim corrected all the flaws of the Frontier with a state-of-the-art design meant to support the Assault Ship philosophy. The Irim is heavily armored, and carried what was, at the time, the greatest anti-fleet energy weapon KFY had ever constructed, as well as a swarm of Lamia Power Armor. Also following the heavy-hitting Assault doctrine, the ship uses minimal crew (based on the Yui-class Scout's crew listings); in fact, the entirety of the ship's NH-17 Nekovalkyrja staff can fit on the bridge.
The Irim's role is to act as the fists of a Star Army Regiment. Named after the famous Nekovalkyrja berserker Kessaku Irim, the ship was meant to give battleship firepower to regiments that might otherwise find themselves with only destroyers. The Irim (along with the Arashi-class Escort) helped reduce the high percentage of Yui-class Scouts that were performing inappropriate roles throughout the fleets. Mass-produced at KFY's massive Hoshi no Iori shipyard complex, the ship will be an integral part of the Star Army for a long time.
Shortly following the initial deployment of the Irim, a near-fatal flaw was discovered in combat; the anti-FTL fields dampened use of not only the FTL capabilities of the Irim and other combined-drive ships, but also the STL propulsion as well. With this in mind, Ketsurui Fleet Yards quickly recalled all Irim-class assault ships and fitted them with new auxiliary sublight engines. The Quintessent Phase Transition Engines (QPT) utilize aetheric fields in vacuums of differing potential energies to create a space-time directional kinetic effect, thereby moving the ship forward. The refitted version was the Ki-S2-1b.
During the spring of YE 25, Empress Yui changed her family's name to Ketsurui in honor of her love, the late Taisho Ketsurui Chiharu, thus the latest version was the Ke-S2-1c. Near the end of YE 25, the ship was fitted (as part of the Ke-S2-1d upgrade) with production tools to create its own mecha and shuttles.
The original Irim replaced the Frontier-class Gunship in YE 24 (with major upgrades (version 1C) in YE 25) and has since then continually served the Star Army of Yamatai with such effectiveness that even when its planned successor, the Sakura-class Light Gunship, began to be mass-produced, the Irim remained a preferred for many operations and avoided its planned retirement.
In YE 30, while other ships like the Arashi-class Escort and Yuumi-class Battleship were being scrapped for materials by the Nataria Fleet Depot, the Irim remained in demand in all fleets. As the design hit its five-year mark, the First Expeditionary Fleet began a refit program on its Irim gunships to convert them so that they might hold fighters, large shuttles, and up-to-date weaponry and interior facilities.
Crew: 27 ship crew and 123 pilots for a total of 160.
Maximum Capacity: There are accommodations for 160 people.
About 235 (75 extra) people can fit aboard in an emergency, but the ship would be extremely cramped.
| Category | Starship Type | Class | Sublight Engines | Distortion Field | Hyperspace Drive |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Standard Warships | Irim | .375c (~112,422 kilometers per second) | 18,750c | 394,470c (0.75 ly/m) |
See Damage Rating (Version 3) for an explanation of the damage system.
Damage Rating (Version 3): Tier 12
| Deck | Notable Compartments |
|---|---|
| 1 | Bridge |
| 2 | Main Level - Living Areas |
| 3 | Engineering Level - Main Weapons, Cargo Storage |
| 4 | Weapons Systems, Environmental Systems |
| 5 | Pylon - Cargo Storage |
| 6 | Pylon - Sensor Dish, Secondary Engineering |
| 7 | Pylon - Sensor Dish, Science Lab |
| 8 | Vehicle Bay, Launching Catapults |
| 9 | Vehicle Storage and Maintenance Bay |
The Irim uses a Standard Medium Starship Bridge (Sakura type) carried over from the Sakura-class Light Gunship. The bridge is located on Deck 1, surrounded by armor and scanning equipment.
Cargo is stored in the outward side areas of the engineering deck and to a lesser extent in the pylon. Cargo space is limited on the Irim Gunship, making the ship somewhat short range in comparison to some of the Star Army's ships. To compensate, the crew will fill every nook and cranny of the ship with extra food at the beginning of potentially long voyages.
The majority of Deck 3 consists of engineering stations related to the Irim's huge engines and even larger main weapon. Generators, giant capacitors, thick cables, coolant pipes, and loud hum are located from front to rear throughout the giant deck's centerline (cargo areas are on the sides).
An additional, secondary engineering level is on Deck 6, where auxiliary power generators and the hyperspace fold drive is located.
The ship's living area is located on Deck 2. It contains crew cabins, lounges, the galley and mess hall, a recreation room, and other crew amenities.
The ship uses Standard Star Army Zero-Gravity Passageways.
An interesting addition to the Irim Gunship is that of a well-equipped little science lab, nestled behind the powerful sensor dome in the pylon that connects the ship's main body and its vehicle pod.
Containing vehicles and an armory, the vehicle bay has a semi-triangular shape and is about 72 meters long and 48 meters wide. The floor is a glossy black and the walls are a muted gray. A catwalk runs around the walls about halfway up on deck nine, where power armors are secured against the walls with red straps and netting.
Each side of the bay has a heavy-duty elevator that brings fighters to one of Deck 8's two launch areas. The launch areas are connected to the ship's armory, which is in the center. Each launch area has a catapult system that can be used to provide subspace encasement to power armors, firing them at speeds up to 12,500c (~1.43 ly/h) at ranges up to 25au, or through shields DR 6 or below at ranges under 2au.
The key substance that makes up the 3-foot-thick hull armor of the ship is Zesuaium. The frame of the ship is Zesuaium, and the armor plates are made of Zesuaium coated Yamataium.
The Irim uses the Warship Integrated Electronics System
The Irim refit added a powerful sensor dome that can detect the presence of most objects in real time from as far as 25 LY away using hyperspace pulses. The dome must be pointed in the target area's general direction.
The dome acts as a directed Anti-FTL Field to ships in the patch of the dome's pulses if they are within LY of the Irim Gunship.
The Irim now features all Star Army Standard Starship Emergency Systems, including 10 Ke-S3-X2900 Escape Pod escape pods and a Soul Savior Pod.
The ship has a very thorough recycling system, tied into a Hemosynthetic Conduit System, which breaks down anything classified into “waste” into its atomic components. The air recycling system (which is segmented and highly monitored for security reasons) can support up to 500 Yamataian or NH-29 personnel up to twenty years. Water can be recycled for twenty years as well.
The Irim uses a powerful Combined Field System to propel and protect itself.
An Irim gunship is capable of projecting a powerful artificial gravitic field that disrupts the operations of FTL drives of all types in a specific area of effect (minimal effective AOE is a 1,000 meter cubic area; maximum AOE is 1 AU cubic area). This is useful in preventing enemy vessels from escaping from battle. The interdiction field also has a secondary mode that can defeat the interdiction efforts of enemy forces in a localized area roughly half the size of its normal operation. See: Anti-FTL Field.
A FTL propulsion drive which pushes a vessel into a dimension adjacent to our own dimension but where distances are far smaller. See: Hyperspace Travel.
The Irim is equipped with the following starship weapons:
The floor of the vehicle storage bay is about 72 meters long and 48 meters wide. The standard vehicles held within are:
| Products & Items Database | |
|---|---|
| Product Categories | starships |
| Product Name | Irim-class Heavy Gunship |
| Nomenclature | Ke-S2-2A |
| Manufacturer | Ketsurui Fleet Yards |
