Huntress-class Ambush Corvette

> *"I stand atop a ship named persistence, beneath sails made of resolve."*
> - Motto of the independent corvette *Guinevere*
>
>

The ***Huntress*-class Ambush Corvette** is an experimental class of warship designed by Keeper's Dance Fleet Yards in the aftermath of the devastating Frontier War in 0300 PCU. One prototype, CSV *Huntress*, was produced, but was abandoned in a shipbreaking yard in the Rialtis System after all available KDFY resources were committed to the Avalon Exploratory Initiative. The ship was later recovered by Cassandra Farren, who rechristened the ship *Guinevere* and refitted her as an independent privateer corvette.

## Design

### Spaceframe

At a length of 98 metres with a wingspan of 28.05 metres, the spaceframe of the *Huntress*-class represents a stark departure from virtually all preceding Centran warship designs. The design of the *Huntress*-class was inspired by the Outriders used by the Frontier Union during the Frontier War, and it was intended to fill the role of a fast attack vessel that the Centran Defence Force, built around large and heavily-armed ships, lacked. As the first opportunity for innovation in many years, the CSV *Huntress* prototype also played host to many new technologies, and became one of the most expensive ships ever constructed in the Tantalus Cluster.

The *Huntress*-class was built around an unconventional horizontal deck layout unlike most designs that rely on either thrust gravity or spin gravity-generating rotating centrifuges. The class relies on Drift-intensive Directional Paragravity Circuits to generate artificial gravity. This allows for a slimmer spaceframe and lower target profile. The centre of the ship is dominated by a large cargo bay with a retractable loading ramp.

### Propulsion

The *Huntress*-class' main engine is a single Drift-Accelerated Fusion Thermal Rocket at its stern, fixed to a slight gimbal. This allows to craft to accelerate to relativistic velocities for fast, transplanetary travel. The enormous amount of heat generated by the engine is dispersed by a pair of radiator fins on either side of the engine, which extend away from the engine as heat build-up intensifies.

The ship also boasts eight centrally-mounted vectored fusion thrusters, replacing conventional chemical reaction control systems, which serve as the ship's main means of manoeuvring. These eight engines allow the ship to re-orient itself at unprecedented speeds.

The *Huntress*-class' vectored fusion thruster system has a number of design flaws that were never properly addressed: the ship is extremely difficult to pilot and requires extensive practice to familiarise a helmsman with each engine. Low-strength correctional burns, such as docking, are extremely difficult to perform. Should one of the thrusters be damaged, the ship will become almost impossible to pilot.

### Armament

The *Huntress*-class' main armament is a spinally-mounted Broadhead-Lock retractable coilgun. Capable of firing molybdenum permalloy projectiles at high velocities, the weapon reflects to the ambush tactics that the corvette was designed for, allowing it to deliver a crippling first strike at the opening of combat. The coilgun is capable of firing armor-piercing shots or hull-shredding canister rounds. The weapon can also be double-shotted by loading two projectiles and charging both the primary and backup capacitor banks to increase firepower. Despite producing an extremely powerful shot, this technique is known to be extremely inaccurate and risks the weapon suffering a catastrophic failure.

The class is also equipped with four laterally-articulated 6.3-inch "Swivel Gun" kinetic autoguns, fixed in pairs to the vessel's wingtips. Each gun mount is equipped with advance ranging lasers and rapid-action targeting suites. Serving as point-defence, the autoguns shield the corvette from missiles and serving a secondary role as ship-to-ship weapons in close combat. The autoguns are capable of inflicting moderate damage to light warships and dispatching strike craft.

The *Huntress*-class also mounts a pair of rapid-cycling pressurised launch slits for torpedoes in its prow. The ship carries a complement of variable-yield guided torpedoes, multi-warhead swarm missiles, dumb-fire cluster rockets, and advanced flechette torpedoes designed to burst into a cloud of heated shrapnel that inflicts devastating damage on unprotected crews and subsystems.

### Sensors and communications

The *Huntress*-class carries a large array of sensors and communications systems. A laser rangefinder is used to determine the distance to a a target, while imaging LIDAR is used to survey targets and create a digital 3-D representation. A passive EM telescope detects a wide range of electromagnetic waves and frequency bands.

Unmanned probes can be fired from the torpedo silos. These systems allow the ship to deploy drones to conduct surveillance and reconnaissance missions without the need to expose the ship. A LightCOM Transstellar Communication System allows for in-system communications.

### Crew facilities

The *Huntress*-class has two main decks and one sub-deck. The class is designed for a crew of eight, but it automated to the point that it can be flown by a single pilot. However, a minimum crew of three is required to operate all shipboard systems properly. The class is dependent on Drift-based inertial compensation to protect the crew against injury from the radical g-forces the ship's fusion thrusters can generate.

The *Huntress*-class makes use of Drift-powered Directional Paragravity Circuits to provide artificial gravity for its crew, as opposed to more common thrust-based or centrifuge spin gravity systems. An extremely rare feature for a ship of its size, these circuits were installed on the *Huntress*-class owing to its ambush role: designed to lie in wait for weeks on end before attacking a target, the crew would be subject to microgravity for prolonged periods to time while the ship was idle. As the ship was too small for a centrifuge, it was decided that the cost of these circuits was justified to maintain crew morale, comfort, and health.

### Auxiliary craft

The *Huntress*-class carries eight escape pods deployed from two vertical launch systems in the ship's prow.

## History

The *Huntress*-class was designed in the aftermath of the devastating ten-year conflict known as the Frontier War by Keeper's Dance Fleet Yards. KDFY enjoyed a brief period of full wartime funding without the constant demands of fleet maintenance and repair, and began a project to introduce modern designs into the largely-outdated and war-weary Centran fleet. This project resulted in the creation of the CSV *Huntress*, a prototype for a revolutionary new class of ambush corvettes.

The *Huntress* had a number of design flaws that were never adequately solved, including extremely complex maintenance requirements, a complicated piloting system, and use of an enormous amount of increasingly-scarce Drift to run its paragravity circuits. By 0302 PCU, virtually all strategic materials and KDFY's design efforts had been committed to the Avalon Exploratory Initiative and the construction of Edric's Gate, and the project was abandoned. In the sudden transfer of resources and personnel, the *Huntress* fell into a web of classified bureaucracy, preventing it from being completed or being scrapped for materials. The *Huntress* was simply abandoned in a shipbreaking yard in the Rialtis System, forgotten by both the Centran Defence Force and KDFY as both organisations became preoccupied with the Edric's Gate project.

The *Huntress*-class remained a relatively unknown project owing to the small size of both the vessel and the design team. The prototype was ultimately retrieved from the shipbreaking yard by Cassandra Farren. Farren rechristened the vessel the *Guinevere*, operating as a privateer under a Letter of Marque. The *Guinevere* would ultimately form part of the Avalon Expedition Fleet, deploying through Edric's Gate to the CDC-41-Gamma nebula in 0304 PCU.

## Notable ships

* *Guinevere* (formerly CSV *Huntress*), KDFY-2709-HC - Independent Privateer Corvette

## References

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 The Sojourn: Huntress Class Ambush Corvette (Guinevere) - Ship Breakdown
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Guinevere Cross-Section
3. ↑ Paragravity on the Guinevere | Official Lore Short
4. ↑ *The Cold Divide*