Charon-class light frigate (EXverse)

The Charon-class light frigate is one of the five frigate classes currently in service with UNSC Navy. A legendary warship, was designed by a famous naval architect whom created a light warship capable of atmospheric flight and to land on a planet's surface. Having a large hangar bay and a light armament, Charon-class is a very fast vessel which primary purpose is to land expeditionary assets on a planet and support them with weapons and logistics.
Built at the end of 25th century, Charon-class became a common sight throughout the Insurrection, because thanks to her the UNSC nevermore need large carriers to transport small contingents and Albatrosses to land them on planets; instead, it could now landed them directly on the planet, as well as saving resources operating with smaller warships.
Despite this, Charon-class ships weren't designed for independent operation; as such, when the Great War started, these warships found themselves outmached even by the smallest Covenant ship, either wolfpack tactics worked due to a very light armament. With the goal to change the destiny of the Charons, TanSec built a new flight of frigate in the thirties of 26th and it upgraded ships still operational, but improvements were not so significant.
It was for this that surviving Charon ships after the war were not upgraded; instead, the Navy decided to deploy them as guards of low-strategic importance planets, until lifespan ended.
== History ==
===A new path===
Charon-class were the successor of the century-old Prague-class, a light frigate class that it made history in the UNSC Navy as the backbone of naval escort unit. However, while RFI released in 2489 by the Naval Command contained precise data about how would have been the successor, TanSec decided to ignore the RFI and propose what would become a radical change in the UNSC naval doctrine. And Charon-class had the credit to having change this doctrine.
Naval architects George Grosicki and Danielle Beatriz da Silva employed at TanSec proposed a lightly-armed frigate which purpose would be to transport, land and support ground units, while being capable of escorting larger unit. Instead Naval Command was looking for a true escort ship, with no plans to use it as transport and atmospheric support. Initial design, anyway, didn't impress naval officers, however after the Far Isle rebellion UNSC improved expeditionary and naval doctrine and the design was finally accepted, though with some changes.
With the spreading rebellions throughout the human space, UNSC and CMA introduced a new generation of carriers; however, while CMA choose to finance large carrier that would have transported hundreds of troopers and marines, in addition to vehicles and aircrafts, UNSC opted for a hybrid solution: given the fact that many colonies had a small population, and that large carriers were expensive to operate, it decided to reduce the amount of carriers - leaving CMA to finance them, on one hand, while on the other it decided to fund a far smaller ship which, in case of need, it could be used as a small carrier. Some speculated that UNSC had already the plan to overthrown the CMA, so leaving the CMA to fund these massive carriers it wouldn't have affected its short term budget. Anyway, UNSC traced a new path in naval doctrine.
This new doctrine, eventually, led to a Charon final design which included a large hangar bay, an elevator and an anti-gravity generator; the latter two combined would have proved useful to land troopers and vehicles directly on a planet. Final, cheap design led to the introduction of the first small carrier - as it was informally know among ground flag officer - in the UNSC Navy. However, naval flag officer noted since the beginning that, while among the various roles featured capital ships escort, weapon systems were too light in order to use Charons as an escort for whichever vessel. A flaw that would then filled by Paris-class and Stalwart-class frigates, as well as by destroyer-type ships.
===Rise of the Insurrection===
Charons were a top target for rebel cells, at least in the end of 25th century, as they would deprived UNSC of a tactical advantage and they would forced UNSC to use larger carriers, rising costs. On October 14th, 2499, then-UNSC Bellerophon was captured by a unknown insurrectionist group above Camber, where it was docked to be resupplied, not even four months after introduction; three months later UNSC Compliance was stolen above New Carthage; same fate happened for other eight frigate in just three years and a half.
UNSC believed that some rebel sympathizer-Tan Sec manager gave override codes to some insurrectionist group, with which they bypassed UNSC battle network and stole the frigates undisturbed. However proof were never founded, but these events led the heavy frigate project to be assigned to Sinoviet, instead of TanSec, and to a gradual disappearance of TanSec from military spacecrafts market only to be reintegrated more than a decade later with the Gladius-class heavy corvette.
Anyway, the reliability and the tactical advantage of using Charons in some contexts persuaded CMA to order one hundred ships, giving additional flexibility to CMA battlegroups.
So, due to this new doctrine, Charon-class ships didn't take part to the assault on Eridanus, as this was a major operation that, in fact, included carriers, cruisers and destroyers, but not any frigate. However, Charons partecipated in other battles during the 10-years long Operation: TREBUCHET. Same did CMA, which fleet and its always declining budget would have seen an always decreasing employ of capital ships in favor of much smaller vessels, as they were Hillsborough-class destroyer and the Charons. In fact, at least by 2520, CMA hadn't anything but ships no bigger than a destroyer.
===Human-Covenant War===
In 2525 CAA lost contact with the colony of Harvest. CMA, in response, deployed Battlegroup 4, under the command of Captain Maribeau Veredi, of the CMA Heracles; Charon-class ships' CMA Arabia and CMA Vostok were also part of this battlegroup.
They found a single Covenant ship and Harvest glassed, but as soon as they tried to contact the alien ship this opened fire, destroying the two Charons and severely damaged the Heracles, forcing the latter to retreating. The lost of the two Charons showed up that a single plasma torpedo would have been enough to destroy a Charon. Nontheless, many Charons were part of the Battlegroup X-Ray, during the Second Battle of Harvest.
But with the introduction of Stalwart-class in 2526, Charons lost definitively the escort role; by this time, the Navy would have used them as small carriers and giving orbital support to ground forces; Admiral Cole used often Charons in his Third Fleet by this purpose. Either Flight II would have changed things, as the airframe was already too old to host deep improvements. Due to this, Charons were charged to defend planet with low importance, or were kept in reserve, even so thirty were present at Camber when Thel 'Vadamee attacked the planet in 2537, and all were destroyed. 
Keeping these ships in reserve meant that a large number of Charon ships were still operational at the start of the ultimate Battle for Earth, much more than other classes. Many were kept in reserve in surroundings of Sol System: at least ten were in some facilities above Mars, while others were above Earth but on the other side of the planet when the Prophet of Regret invaded the planet; about twenty where at some depots above Callisto. Among these, UNSC Forward Unto Dawn and others were part of Seventh Fleet and partecipated in the Battle of Voi, but they survived. The Dawn, after the battle, pursued the High Prophet of Truth through the portal up to The Ark, but was subsequently cut in half after the Installation 08's collapsing.
==Specifications==
===Hull===
Charon-class is 489.71 meters long, 155.58 meters wide and 139.20 meters high. At the centre of the hull there is the bridge, located on the top as common on UNSC frigates, while on the bottom there is a large hangar bay; this hangar has an elevator capable of disembarking vehicles and troops directly on the surface, making dropships needlessly in some cases.
The mass of a Charon ship is 0.99 million metric tons in Flight I, whereas Flight II weigh 1.01 million metric tons; however this increasing mass is not caused by armor, as both Flight I and II has sixty centimetres of Titanium-A armor - although Flight I has the A1 and Flight Ii the improved A2. Instead, the slightly increased mass is caused by an improved armament.
===Propulsion===
SFTE Series IV CODEN OKB Karman 9A is provided to the class allowing them to sustain interstellar travel. Sublight engines are different between the two flight: Flight I has four Naoto Technologies V4/L-DFR, fast and cheap engines capable of pushing a Charon at extremely high speeds compared to other frigates; Flight II, differently, has four Orphios Energy Systems Jupiter-4, which feature a modern cooling system.
===Crew and complement===
Maximum crew and complement of a Charon is 782, distributed as such: 222 are crew's manpower, while five hundred are UNSC Marines or Army Troopers and sixty are ODSTs or other special forces units. Crew quarters are generally medium-size compared to other frigates, and they allow a good quality of life. Despite having a small kitchen, a gym is fitted allowing sailors and troopers to keep themselves fit.
The hangar bay is large enough to house 20 Pelican dropships, 3 D96-TCE Albatross dropships, 16 M12 Warthog vehicles, 8 M808 Scorpion tanks and 12 AV-14 Hornets attack VTOL. This is the standard configuration, though not official, as the hangar bay can house more aircrafts than vehicles and conversely, depending on the mission's objective. During the Human-Covenant War no other configuration wa used.
===Armament ===
While during Insurrection Charon-class frigates hid their lack of firepower, thanks to the fact that rebels hadn't ships larger than a frigate - Charons were considered the most powerful ships that a rebel group could deploy - since the initial contact over Harvest their inferiority emerged significantly. Constantly outgunned even by CRS cruisers and corvettes, not even their upgrade in 2535 brought any effect.
A Mark II, Light Coil is the primary weapon of the class. While Flight I has the 83B6R3 variant, Flight II has 77D4C1 variant. The main difference is that 77D4C1 is capable of firing smaller slug but at a much faster rate of fire, as seen by Battlegroup Victory during the Battle of Voi; thanks to the Jupiter-4 engine, 77D4C1 variant can fire a 300-tons shell every thirty seconds at thirty-five kilometers per hour, whereas 83B6R3 variant could fire a 400-tons shell every two minutes at thirty kilometers. Besides this, 83B6R3 was lesser reliable, as after fifty shells some coils shoud have been changed.
50 M58 Archer missile pods are fitted onto the hull; in Flight I every pod contains ten missiles, while Flight II twenty, thus having a slightly increased firepower.
Nuclear armament is made up of 3 M4093 Hyperion nuclear delivery system, both Flights.
4 M870 Rampart point defense guns are fitted; this amount is doubled in Flight II, granting much more anti-air covering.
==Ships of the line==
Name 	Hull Classification Symbol	Commissioned	Destroyed 	Notes 	 	
Flight I 	Flight I 	Flight I 	Flight I 	Flight I 	Flight I 	Flight I
 	FFG-188 	2499 	Unknown 	Lead ship of the class. 	 	
 	FFG-98 	2504 	2525 - Harvest	The first human warship to be destroyed alongside Arabia 	 	
 	FFG-161 	2507 	2525 - Harvest	The first human warship to be destroyed alongside Vostok 	 	
Flight II	Flight II 	Flight II 	Flight II 	Flight II 	Flight II	Flight II
 	FFG-201 	2537 	2552 - The Ark	Took part to the Battle for Earth and the Battle of Installation 00