Abaddonae

The Abaddonae is the closest human equivalent of the true name of the armed forces of the civilization known as the Lost. Although isolationist by nature and not at all interested in territorial expansion, in the course of their migrations the Lost had encountered enough small shoal polities and Ork pirates within the Great Expanse to necessitate the existence of a small force for protection. This force is by no means a navy of a truly galactic power, and is similar to the self-defense forces of a small polity, the 35th century’s equivalent of a brown-water navy.
While technologically impressive, the necessity of operating in the shoals has led to several design limitations of Abaddonae warships, from the design of their hyperdrives to the range of their sensors. The fact that a larger ship places more strain on its hyperdrive when operating in the more energy resistant hyperspace conditions of the shoals has led the Lost to turn away from building traditional warships in favor of small light craft, usually piloted by a single Daemon. The Lost strategy for the use of these space gunboats calls for sudden ambushes and hit and run strikes rather than decisive pitched battles.
Likewise, the vulnerability of supply lines in the shoals and the mobility of all Lost spaceborne assets have led to the development of the heavily protected and largely self-sufficient forward operating base, as well as ensuring the self-sufficiency of most Abaddonae vessels.
=Technology=
==The Sigil==
Deep inside a heavily warded chamber inside every Lost warship hangs the Sigil—a large five dimensional sign made of lines of darkness, light, and fissure in reality suspended in unspace. It is a tear in the universe, a Nyarlathotepian singularity, created during the reality-shattering conflict that was the War To End All Wars. The Lost have harvested millions of these fissures and have discovered a way to make them grow and change, increasing in size and power, until they are large enough to power even the greatest Homeships, a process that may take years or even decades. When the Sigil is fully formed, a hull is built around it, weapons and sensors are installed, and the daemon pilot takes possession of a fully functional warship. Until that time, the Sigils are stored in embryonic form aboard the seedships—a sphere of solid orichalcum in a basic hull with engines bolted on for mobility.
==The Infinity Circuit==
When used to its full extent, the Sigil compresses and warps the fabric of reality so that it forms a ring around the ship, the so-called Infinity Circuit. The steady movement of spacetime being crushed and torn in that circuit, in turn, creates ripples in reality which are then used for power, propulsion, and defense by the Lost warship that is built around it. However, much of the Sigil’s power is actually lost, wasted by the countless wards placed inside Lost ships to counteract the Sigil’s harmful effects on the fabric of spacetime, and to keep the process theologically neutral and undetectable to the Lost’s ancient Enemies.
==The Maelstrom==
The Maelstrom is the primary means of STL and FTL propulsion for Lost warships. The drive uses the spacetime distortion generated by the ship’s Infinity Circuit to essentially make the ship unstuck in spacetime, simultaneously existing and not existing. A Lost ship with the Maelstrom drive active gracefully glides from one location to another while ignoring such trivialities as the conservation of momentum or even the ship’s direction and heading (a particularly unsettling sight, considering the Infinity Circuit’s visual similarity to a functioning torch drive). Indeed, such is the strength of the distortion that by increasing the power output to the system, the ship is able to travel through time as well as space, leaping a few seconds into the future (and reappearing in the exact same location), sending messages into the past, and, in fact, appearing to violate relativity by simply accelerating to speeds faster than light (mysteriously never going above 53c).
==The Sphere of Exclusion==
The most famous of the Lost’s technologies, the Sphere of Exclusion is but another extension of the Infinity Circuit’s spacetime distortion, amplified to be used offensively against incoming fire. Within a certain area of space (limited by the aura of the ship’s many orichalcum wards), the very fabric of spacetime can be manipulated and used to disrupt, weaken, or simply erase from existence both physical projectiles such as railgun rounds and missiles, and energy and particle beams. This has a most unsettling effect and even experienced spacers often lose their nerve as they see their weapons miss constantly, fly through the Lost ship without harming it, or even somehow end up turned around and flung back at them. However, every attack repealed requires a corresponding energy expenditure from the ship, and thus, as much as the Lost hate to admit it, even the Sphere of Exclusion can be overwhelmed by the power of the enemy’s attack, or by sheer weight of numbers.
==Trapdoor System==
While the Sphere of Exclusion attempts to keep the warships of the Abaddonae safe by preventing them from being hit by enemy fire, even it has its limits and can be overwhelmed. When that happens, the Trapdoor system in use aboard all Lost warships and parasite craft keeps the ship safe by shifting the energy of the beam, impact, or explosion (or even the projectile itself!) into a remote dimension. As this act is not detectable without specialized equipment, it appears to an outside observer as if the attacks simply bounce off the hulls of Lost warships without doing any damage.
==Beast Drive==
As the advanced Maelstrom Drive requires the presence of a Sigil, the numbers of which are limited, certain civilian ships of the Lost as well as most of their parasite craft use the much more common Beast Drive, so named because of its similarity to the preferred method of propulsion by the Lost’s domesticated space monsters. Very similar to conventional Heim drive, this drive generates intense gravito-magnetic fields to create a bubble of reality around the ship, which permit it to travel at faster than light speeds without actually exceeding the speed of light.
==Dimensional Tap==
Similar to various other technologies used elsewhere in the galaxy, the Dimensional Tap essentially opens a pocket rift into another dimension, using the exotic particles spilling out to power ships and machinery. This is the preferred power system on most Lost parasite craft.
==Gravitic Drive==
The means of propulsion for most Lost civilian ships and parasite craft, the Gravitic Drive works based on the manipulation of fundamental forces, essentially pushing the ship against the universe itself and thus propelling it in any direction. This gives Lost ships a great amount of maneuverability, making it especially useful for combat parasite craft.
==Sensors==
Unlike most of the Lost technologies, the sensors used by the Lost are fairly conventional by galactic standards, with the notable exception of the suite for theological defense carried by all ships, capable of detecting the traces and influences of advanced “godlike” beings. The other notable distinction is that due to Abaddonae’s need to operate inside the shoals, the sensors of the Lost tend to be shorter ranged but capable of higher resolution than those of other galactic powers. Thus, Lost ships would often use hyper-capable parasite craft to scout ahead for them, extending their own limited sensor envelopes.
==Hyperdrives==
Likewise, the hyperdrives of Lost ships are built for shoal operations and are generally more rugged and resilient, at the cost of speed. Abaddonae warships outside of shoal regions are generally slower than the galactic standard, which limits their effectiveness in light of their chosen tactics.
=Weapons of the Abaddonae=
==Beam Weapons==
===Hellbeam===
The primary weapon of Abaddonae warships, hellbeams are streams of extrauniversal particles generated within self-contained dimensional rifts and collected and directed by the intense fields of reality distortion generated by the ship’s Infinity Circuit. These exotic particles are energetic enough to tear the very fabric of spacetime, breaking apart molecular bonds and slicing through even the heaviest starship armor. Shields and other energy fields are capable of resisting these particle streams for a time, but eventually even they are overwhelmed by the relentless onslaught and collapse entirely, leaving the enemy ship defenseless. Once they penetrate inside the enemy ship and come into contact with the atoms of the matter comprising it, the particles bounce off in every direction in five dimensions, thus disrupting the fabric of spacetime and opening microscopic rifts inside the target, which grow and emit even more particles, thus potentially setting off a chain reaction capable of destroying the entire ship.
Although the rifts are self-sustaining and thus even the smallest Lost warship could potentially carry Hellbeams of the same strength as those carried by the mighty Homeships, in practice, the containment of the rift and the particle streams it emits requires incredibly powerful reality distortion fields produced by the ship’s Infinity Circuit. Thus, it is the practice of the Lost to create smaller, easily containable rifts for ships with weak Sigils, to prevent a possible breach of containment.
===Gravity Fist===
This fairly primitive (by Lost standards) weapon works by generating an intense stream of gravitons, projecting an expanding cone of extremely high gravity over an area of space and destroying any objects caught within it. As the potency of the graviton stream is largely dependant on the output of the generator, this weapon scales extremely well to large sizes. Unfortunately, as the cone of gravitons expands it also loses coherency, making the weapon effectively useless at ranges longer than a few thousand kilometers. This unfortunate limitation has precluded the Gravity Fist from being used as a primary capital ship weapon and restricted its use to that of a last-ditch point defense gun, or as the main armament of Lost parasite craft.
===Emerald Lance===
This weapon projects a green-colored energy beam generated by arcane methods using rare rubiconium derivatives. This extremely energetic beam vaporizes any matter it comes into contact with, but also disrupts atomic bonds.
Although a powerful weapon in its own right, the Emerald Lance has been completely supplanted by the more efficient Hellbeams on Lost capital ships. However, its high power-to-weight output has ensured that it remains an important part of the Lost arsenal, used for small-scale weaponry starting with secondary armament on parasite craft and going all the way down to handheld variants used by their naval infantry.
==Missiles==
Missiles had been historically neglected by the Lost in favor of beam weaponry, as they are usually impossible to replenish by the ship itself and thus cut in sharply into the self-sufficiency of Abaddonae warships. What missiles were used were usually large and expensive multi-stage missiles equipped with Beast drives, designed to strike the enemy from lightminutes away. The arrival of the Central Alliance had changed that somewhat and missiles are beginning to gain prominence in Lost military thinking.
===Type I Missile===
The most common type of missile, carried by almost all Lost warships consists of two stages. The first and largest stage consists of a powerful Beast drive which propels the missile towards the enemy at superluminal velocities. As not even the Lost could come up with a targeting system that reliably score impacts against enemy warships while moving at 53c, the missile slows back down to sublight speeds when within acceptable range of the enemy and releases the first stage, which acts as a jammer for a while before self-destructing.
The second stage and the warhead then orients itself and proceeds towards the nearest enemy ship . When within a few thousand kilometers of the target, the graviton generator inside the warhead unleashes one massive directed pulse of gravitons, greater even than that of the Gravity Fist weapon, before burning out. The weapon then accelerates wildly towards the target, and attempts to strike the damaged area, causing even more damage and self-destructing in the process. Alternatively, this missile can be configured to fire off an omnidirectional graviton wave, highly effective against enemy fighters and missile swarms.
Although effective, the Type I Missile is rather complex and expensive, and their use is generally discouraged by Lost doctrine, and, in fact, many Utility Ships, their primary users, have spent whole decades on patrol without ever firing a single salvo in anger.
===Type II Missile===
The smaller, shorter-ranged, and significantly cheaper Type II Missile had been developed by the Lost in response to the need to provide their new Missile Escort class with offensive means at short range. This missile consists of nothing more than an advanced gravitic drive which propels the warhead at relativistic velocities. When in range of the target, this missile too fires off a graviton pulse before attempting to ram the enemy relying on its kinetic energy to do devastating damage against the already weakened target.
===Vortex Missile===
A rarely used weapon, the existence of which is all but unknown to the galaxy at large, the warhead of the Vortex Missile, when in contact with matter, creates a dimensional rift similar to that powering the Lost’s Hellbeams, which, as it consumes more matter, grows in size and scope. The stream of exotic particles streaming out of the rift keeps the rift open and, when in contact with more matter, opens other, smaller rifts, which in turn produce even more rifts. Although the dimensional harmonics of the rifts had been deliberately modified, so that they would close in a few hours or a few days, during that time the endless chain reaction of newly opening and growing rifts can consume and devastate entire continents. Unfortunately, as the rift requires matter to initiate, the Vortex Missile is all but useless against targets protected by even the weakest energy fields, thus limiting its utility in space combat. Instead, Vortex Missile is used by the Lost of a means of exterminatory planetary bombardment, and it is in this role that this weapon truly has no peer.
=Warships of the Abaddonae=
(Note: all numbers are current as of January 1, 3401)
==The Darkness That Comes Before==
The most important single ship of the Abaddonae and the only true “warship” of the Lost, The Darkness That Comes Before is a massive mobile warpgate connected to the Homeships.. Despite its impressive size and formidable firepower, however, the purpose of the station is fairly peaceful—to move into systems slated for colonization under hyperdrive in advance of the Homeships and to construct the preliminary infrastructure, as well as to transfer various assets between the two systems. In the rare occasions when it has been used offensively, The Darkness That Comes Before had demonstrated that its true strength comes not from its armaments, which are impressive enough given its size and power, but from the ability to summon an endless supply of reinforcements from the Lost’s home systems via its warpgate.
While it is the seat of Devourer Of Worlds, Slayer of Suns and the closest the Abaddonae have to a flagship, because of its importance to the Lost’s migrations, the battlestation rarely leaves their home sector and almost never seen by outsiders.
Class Information:
Constructed: 1
Cost: $4500
Carrier Capacity: $500
100x Type II Parasite Craft
250x Type III Parasite Craft
100x Type IV Parasite Craft
==The Forerunner Fleet==
The Forerunner Fleet represents the hyper-capable warships of the Abaddonae tasked with patrolling the shoals of the Expanse, scouting ahead of the main migration, and the destruction of any small-scale shoal polities that lie in its path. While technologically advanced by galactic standards and capable of limited force projection, the Forerunner Fleet is too small in numbers to be considered a true fleet-in-being.
===Type I Attack Ship===
Constructed when the Lost realized that their neighbors had advanced enough technologically to present a threat to their old Utility Ships, the Attack Ships represent the ultimate evolution of the ancient design, and the true striking power of the Abaddonae. Considering their small number and fairly long build times, they are rarely used, except for large fleet battles when overwhelming firepower is needed. When they do take to the field, it is usually with the support of several smaller Lost ships that provide covering fire and draw away enemy fire.
At 500 meters long, the Type I Attack Ship is larger and better armored than the Utility Ships it evolved from, but is still far smaller than its counterparts, comparable in size to the destroyers of many other navies. Thus, it lacks the heavy armor favored by other nations, eschewing protection for speed and agility. However, despite the fact that it carries armor that is little heavier than that of a light cruiser, the ship’s advanced Infinity Circuit, vastly more powerful than those of the Utility Ships, makes it far stronger and better protected than its size would suggest.
Still, the Attack Ship’s small size dictates its tactics, which are most similar to those of heavy gunboats in other navies. Operating in pairs (called Duets by the Lost) and supported by their weaker comrades, these small agile ships use their Maelstrom drives to sidestep and evade enemy fire while covering each other with their Spheres of Exclusion. Once inside beam range, the attack ships rip into their target with powerful hellbeams, overwhelming its defenses and destroying it utterly, then retreat to safety to regroup and pounce on yet another unfortunate victim.
The pilots of the Type-I Attack Ships train and work together with their Duet partner until they can anticipate each other’s moves before they even happen. Coupled with the ability to send messages into the past, this gives the Lost warships a level of coordination that seems almost preternatural, with whole Lost fleets striking simultaneously at the same target.
Class Information:
Constructed: 9 ships
Cost: $800
Carrier Capacity: $20
2x Type II Parasite Craft
9x Type III Parasite Craft
5x Type IV Parasite Craft
===Type I Carrier===
The doctrine of the Lost tends to avoid large-scale pitched battles in favor of raids and sudden ambushes. When pressed into battle, however, Lost doctrine calls for overwhelming firepower and enormous swarms of parasite craft to dominate the battlefield and destroy the enemy force while suffering little losses of their own. It is for this purpose that the Lost had constructed these large warships, which are, at over 1 kilometer long, the biggest of the Forerunner Fleet.
Designed to be used in large fleet battles in tandem with at least one Attack Ship Duet, these carriers release their swarms of FTL-capable parasite craft from a safe distance, then use their own Maelstrom drive’s superior mobility to avoid and evade any enemy attack.
Class Information:
Constructed: 2 ships
Cost: $300
Carrier Capacity: $150
10x Type II Parasite Craft
85x Type III Parasite Craft
30x Type IV Parasite Craft
===Type II Carrier===
At 500 meters long, the Type II Carriers are little more than one enormous parasite craft bay and a warded chamber containing the Sigil. Designed to be used in smaller engagements which do not call for the presence of their larger brethren, these carriers use much the same tactics, launching their parasite craft from long range, then relying on their speed to escape enemy attack.
Class Information:
Constructed: 4 ships
Cost: $100
Carrier Capacity: $50
10x Type II Parasite Craft
25x Type III Parasite Craft
10x Type IV Parasite Craft
===Type I Utility Ship===
The workhorse of the Forerunner Fleet, the many variants of the Utility Ship perform a multitude of functions, from mapping the hyperlanes to heavy combat. Constructed between 600 and 200 years ago, these venerable ships have begun to show their age, both in physical terms and as a design, and no longer reign supreme over the battlefield as they once had. Despite this, they remain a formidable class of ships, and thanks to the durability of the Lost’s construction methods would likely remain in service for centuries to come.
400 meters long, the Type I Utility Ship is combat specialist of the class, sacrificing most of the carrier capacity of the other variants for more armor and vastly more powerful hellbeams. Like the newer Attack Ships that have evolved from the design, these small ships operate in Duets and attempt to get close to the enemy before unleashing a devastating barrage of hellbeams to overwhelm the enemy’s defenses, then retreat to safety using their Maelstrom drives.
Class Information:
Constructed: 20 ships
Cost: $240
Carrier Capacity: $1
2x Type II Parasite Craft
===Type II Utility Ship===
The single most numerous variant of the Utility Ship, these ships are the true backbone of the Forerunner Fleet and the Lost’s first line of defense. It is these ships that map and patrol the hyperlanes, keeping them clear of pirates and raiders. It is these ships that serve as the eyes and ears of the Abaddonae, their reconnaissance craft scouting ahead of Lost fleets while blinding enemy ships with jamming. It is these ships that often escort the dedicated warships of the Lost into battle, drawing away enemy fire or protecting the vulnerable carriers. It is these ships that support operations of ground troops and even carry a small complement of naval infantry for boarding actions.
With such versatility, it stands to reason that the Utility Ship would be the jack of all trades and master of none. Indeed, the Type II Utility Ship does not truly excel in any area, save for that of endurance. Ships of these class are designed for long-term patrols, capable of operating for decades without resupply, and are even equipped with nanite factories and Repilicator swarm seedlings to manufacture their own ammunition and effect repairs.
In combat, the Utility Ship is somewhat inferior in performance than its power outputs would suggest (although still remarkable for a vessel of that tonnage). In general, it is optimized for dog fights with single opponents, which it overwhelms with a strike of Beast-dive equipped missiles from long range before closing in for the kill with its hellbeams. Like with other Lost ships, the missiles are carried in external pods on the ship’s wings and cannot be reloaded in combat.
While capable of operating in Duets during large-scale battles, Type II Utility Ships suffer greatly from the fact that most of their time is spent in solitary patrols and generally have a level of coordination that is somewhat inferior to that of other Lost Duets, although still quite impressive by galactic standards. Coordination between Duets is generally decent as all pilots of Type II Utility Ships train extensively for fleetwide cooperation in between solitary patrols.
Although the Type II Parasite Craft carried by the ships of this class is capable of being used offensively in combat and has hardpoints for even heavy antiship missiles, the fact that they lack either the Maelstrom or the Beast drive means that their mobility is severely limited compared to other Abaddonae ships. Thus, it is the standard practice of the Lost to replace the complement of one of the Duet’s ships Type II gunboats with the combat-oriented Type III Parasite Craft.
Lacking advanced armaments of any kind of FTL drive, the Type I Parasite Craft carried by the Utility ships serve as mere point defense drones, shooting down enemy missile swarms or as decoys and distractions for the enemy while their mothership makes its escape.
Class Information:
Constructed: 70 ships
Cost: $65
Carrier Capacity: $5
8x Type I Parasite Craft
8x Type II Parasite Craft OR 4x Type III Parasite Craft
200x Naval Infantry.
===Type III Utility Ship===
The course of combat operations in the shoals is very different from that of the galaxy at large. Whole fleets can hide in the murky depths of shoal hyperspace, seemingly appearing out of nowhere to strike at their enemy, before disappearing once more before reinforcements can arrive. The Lost know this well and rely on large numbers of Type II Parasite Craft to serve as their eyes in the shoals or to blind the enemy to their approach with heavy jamming.
The Type III Utility Ship is vitally important for this purpose. Carrying 60 Type II Parasite Craft, each ship is equipped with advanced communications gear and even a submesonic core, overseen by a second daemon, and is capable of coordinating flight operations of dozens of recon gunboats over the space of an entire sector. To achieve this, the ship eschews all offensive weaponry, relying on the protection of other ships and its own speed to keep it safe from the enemy. Because of this, this ship is kept well away from combat, usually never leaving the protection of the Abaddonae’s forward operating base.
Class Information:
Constructed: 6 ships
Cost: $65
Carrier Capacity: $32.5
25x Type I Parasite Craft
60x Type II Parasite Craft
===Missile Escort===
The newest ship of the Abaddonae, the Missile Escort’s existence stems directly from the Lost’s realization of the shortcomings of their battle doctrine when faced with a technologically advanced heavily armed and armored enemy. In particular, Spy Probes operating in the Central Alliance have shown the Central Star Navy’s absolute quantitative and qualitative superiority in both heavy and light units. The Abaddonae’s short term solution to this has been to construct a large number of missile ships capable of negating much of this superiority by fighting from long range.
Designed to bombard the enemy heavy ships or fighter swarms with heavy missiles from standoff range, or to provide extra firepower to heavier warships during their attack runs, the Missile Escort eschews hellbeams—the traditional armament of Lost warships for large numbers of missile tubes and somewhat heavier armor. To simplify construction, the design lacks the capability to support even the smallest combat-capable parasite craft and relies on data relayed from other ships during shoal navigation. As such, the Missile Escort is incapable of independent operations and is usually seen accompanying other Abaddonae warships during combat missions.
In another departure from traditional Abaddonae practice, the Missile Escorts do not operate in Duets, but as individual units attached to an Attack or Utility Ship Duet on a semi-permanent basis.
Class Information:
Constructed: 29 ships
Cost: $65
Carrier Capacity: $0
===Type I Stealth Ship===
Orginally starting out as a yet another modification of the Utility Ship, the Type I Stealth Ship is designed for long-range stealth patrols, maintaining the Lost’s network of communications relays and sensor installations throughout the galaxy. Some of the oldest ships still in service, the Type I Stealth Ships spend whole centuries abroad, drifting in deep space waiting to be activated, or sneaking from location to location to perform needed repairs on the aging Lost infrastructure abroad. Thus, like the Utility Ships, the Type I Stealth Ships are designed for heavy endurance in mind—each ship carries a crew of three, and is equipped with highly advanced nanite factories and Repilicator swarm seedlings to manufacture its own supplies and perform needed repairs.
Although primarily designed for this mission in mind, the Type I Stealth Ship is a quite capable intelligence-gathering vessel with its complement of 20 Spy Probes and the ability to make many more on the spot.
Class Information:
Constructed: 5 ships
Cost: $65
Carrier Capacity: $10
20x Spy Probes
===Type II Stealth Ship===
The millennia spent fighting pirates and Orks in the shoals of the Expanse had taught the Lost the futility of trying to find something that wished to remain hidden by means of simple exploration—it was impossible to visit every system in the sector, especially those hidden in impassible shoals or connected to the rest of a galaxy by a single whisker lane. To do so was to invite drive failure in the shoals. The Lost prefer to discover such places by monitoring the traffic in the sector, having the enemy lead them to their own secret hideouts. Armed with this intelligence, the Lost would begin a campaign with a series of swift and powerful decapitating strikes against unsuspecting enemy forces, catching them by surprise and destroying them or throwing them into disarray, to be dealt with later (their retreat, of course, being closely monitored and possibly intercepted by pre-positioned assets).
Thus, the smallest ship in the Lost’s arsenal is also one of the most important. The Type II Stealth Ship is a stealth strategic carrier, designed to operate deep inside enemy territory, where its complement of Spy Probes would perform a variety of missions, including monitoring the enemy’s movements and relaying them back to the Lost. Realizing that given the nature of its mission, any discovery would almost certainly lead to the ship’s destruction no matter how well armed it was, the Lost had opted out to construct a large number of cheap, unarmed ships that would rely on their stealth for protection. Thus, the Type II Stealth Ship lacks all but the most basic of armaments, and even the Sigil powering the other Lost ships, relying on the somewhat stealthier and much cheaper combination of Dimensional Tap, Gravitic and Beast Drives. Its hull is constructed of sensor-absorbing polyalloys and it is equipped with the state of the art cloaking devices. Despite this, the Type II Stealth Ship generally avoids entering enemy held systems where it risks detection, preferring to carry out operations in deep space far away from everything, leaving the task of actually spying on the enemy to its complement of probes.
Class Information:
Constructed: 40 ships
Cost: $20
Carrier Capacity: $10
20x Spy Probes
==The Guardian Fleet==
While the Forerunner Fleet is tasked with ensuring the safety of the Lost civilization by preemptively dealing with potential threats before they can become a problem, the larger Guardian Fleet is tasked with something more important—to serve as the Abaddonae’s last line of defense, ensuring the protection of the Homeships carrying their population. The ships of the Guardian Fleet are expected to escort the Homeships wherever they go, never leaving their side. As the Homeships can travel FTL only by means of their Maelstrom drives, the ships of the Guardian Fleet likewise lack even the most basic hyperdrives, relying on the Lost’s network of warpgates to quickly travel between the different systems in case reinforcements are needed.
===Guardian Ship===
300 meters long, the Guardian Ships are some of the smallest warships of the Lost. Little more than powerful Sigils wrapped in heavy armor and equipped with hellbeams, the Guardian ships act as light screens to the massive Homeships, engaging the enemy’s light ships and swarms of strikecraft, or softening up their heavy warships for the Homeships’ own guns. 
Class Information:
Constructed: 100 ships
Cost: $150
Carrier Capacity: $0
===War Kraken===
Life in the galaxy is by no means limited to the habitable planets and moons and has found ways to exist even in the vacuum of space. The areas above and below the galactic planes are practically teeming with space-dwelling megafauna, to such an extent that travel through it is dangerous even for fleets of warships. The Space Krakens are but one of the variety of species of galactic wildlife, and not even particularly impressive at that.
Ranging in size from 5 to 50 kilometers in length and capable of propelling themselves by means of generating intense gravito-magnetic fields, the Space Krakens have been domesticated by the Lost and play an important role in their civilization. The daemons raise and train the massive creatures from birth, preparing them for their tasks, be it herding the massive moon-sized Budongs or pulling assorted heavy equipment.
Most Space Krakens are fairly aggressive and territorial, attacking or attempting to mate with other Krakens, other galactic megafauna, or even passing spaceships. It is these qualities that allow them to herd and control the much larger but docile Budongs. The Lost have recognized that these qualities could also be harnessed for other purposes, thus giving the birth to the War Kraken program.
The Lost thus select the biggest and strongest and most aggressive Krakens and enhance their natural impulses through a program of training and conditioning. The beasts are taught to be utterly fearless and utterly obedient to their daemonic handlers, ready to charge the enemy at a moment’s notice. The Krakens then receive extensive physical augmentations, ranging from powerful shield generators to an assortment of close combat weaponry. In battle, these terrifying monsters charge directly at the enemy’s heaviest warships at superluminal velocities and attempt to grapple with them. There, safe from the enemy’s guns, they put their extensive augmentations to good use as they tear the unfortunate warships apart or simply crush them with their massive tentacles.
Class Information:
Constructed: 0, but 12 War Krakens exist nonetheless.
Cost: $500
Carrier Capacity: What carrier capacity?
=Parasite Craft of the Abaddonae=
The following is a listing of all the parasite craft used by the Abaddonae.
===Type I Parasite Craft===
Once used widely by the Lost to combat fleets of enemy strikecraft, the Type I Parasite Craft is now considered thoroughly obsolete and is being used only on the older warships of the Abaddonae where they still have limited uses as air support for ground invasions or as additional point defense screens. Armed only with a pair of Emerald Lances and equipped with the weakest shields and lacking any means of FTL propulsion, the Type I Parasite Craft lack the ability to engage the galaxy’s more powerful strikecraft or even keep up with the mothership that launched them. Thus, they, and the imps piloting them are considered to be little better than drones and thoroughly expendable, to the extent that current Lost doctrine calls for a ship in danger to launch its entire complement of Type I Parasite Craft to delay the enemy as it makes its escape under FTL drive.
Class Information:
Cost: 10 for $1
===Type II Parasite Craft===
The eyes and ears of the Lost, the Type II Parasite Craft is vitally important to combat operations in the shoals to the extent that almost every Abaddonae ship carries at least two craft of this type. A fairly versatile design, this hyper-capable recon gunboat is equipped with advanced sensors, which, although fairly short-ranged by galactic standards, are sensitive enough to discern even hostile strike craft from light years away under shoal conditions. The rest of the space is taken up either by additional sensors, by advanced electronic warfare and jamming suites, or a combination of the two. The Type II Parasite Craft is thus capable of performing a variety of ELINT and EWAR missions.
In combat, the Type II Parasite Craft is armed with a Gravity Fist and several Emerald Lances, as well as several hardpoints for antiship missiles. Although a fairly powerful and maneuverable design, the Type II lacks any kind of in-system tactical FTL and thus its mobility is severely restricted compared to that of other Abaddonae warships and parasite craft. As such, the Lost generally prefer to avoid using the Type II in combat, leaving it to the more specialized Types III and IV.
Class Information:
Cost: 2 for $1
===Type III Parasite Craft===
The preferred craft of the Abaddonae for antiship work, the Type III Parasite Craft trades in its hyperdrive for a powerful Beast Drive which enables it to launch from carriers located well away from the action, then charge the enemy ship in a nigh-suicidal attack, launch its missiles from close range, then return to the carrier for more. Armed with a Gravity Fist and several Emerald Lances, as well as a powerful (by parasite craft standards) trapdoor system, the Type III Parasite Craft is also a capable dogfighter in its own right, capable of engaging and destroying the strike craft of other nations. At least one parasite craft in each flight is specially modified to carry advanced EW suites, covering itself and its comrades with heavy jamming.
Class Information:
Cost: 1 for $1
===Type IV Parasite Craft===
Nicknamed “the Nightmare Engine” by the Lost after the name given to it by the warriors of a long-gone civilization, the Type IV Parasite Craft is a product of a failed experiment to create a constant supply of Sigils by replicating their seedlings. Although they had succeeded in that task, the resulting Sigils would not grow beyond their present forms, leaving them useless as power systems for capital ships. Not deterred, the daemonic engineers put the resulting proto-Sigils to use and built parasite craft around them.
The Type IV Parasite Craft is, thus, essentially a mini-warship, equipped with a fully functional Infinity Circuit, Maelstrom Drive, and especially the Sphere of Exclusion, and piloted by a Lesser Daemon rather than a mere imp. While it is capable of carrying anti-ship missiles, the Type IV’s primary weapon is its own Sphere of Exclusion, which it uses offensively against enemy strikecraft, manipulating the very fabric of reality around it to destroy them. Even warships that find themselves inside the Sphere are in for a nasty surprise as the Type IV is capable of damaging them even through their heavy armor, once their protective shields have been battered down.
Although primarily a space superiority fighter, the Type IV Parasite Craft is capable of entering atmosphere in support of ground troops. It was there that it earned its name as the Lost fighter is capable of turning and area hundreds of kilometers across into a twisted mockery of reality where the only law are the sadistic whims of daemon controlling it.
Class Information:
Cost: 1 for $2
===Spy Probe===
By the standards of other navies, the Lost Spy Probe is a gunboat in its own right, equipped with a fully functional hyperdrive. It trades in all offensive armament, save for a single cutting laser, for advanced stealth systems, which enable it to infiltrate even the most heavily guarded systems. Once there, the Spy Probe’s modular design allows it to perform a variety of missions, from dropping sensor platforms or Replicator swarm seedlings (which would construct sensor platforms inside enemy-held systems) behind enemy lines to attaching themselves to comets and powering down, gathering and relaying intelligence from the enemy’s systems for months or even years to come.
Still, arguably the most important ability of the Spy Probe is the ability to follow a ship unseen for days, cataloguing and transmitting the coordinates of every system it passed. Their advanced sensor suites are designed to discern a ship’s hyperwake amongst the gravitic cacophony of the shoals and capable of picking up even stealthed ships.
Class Information:
Cost: 2 for $1
Category:Space Navy