Harrow-class battlecruiser

## *Harrow* class

The ***Harrow*-class Star Battlecruisers**, also known as ***Insurgent*-class Star Destroyers** and simply as **Iktharan battlecruisers**, are the preeminent capital warships fielded by the Star Empire. Known for their speed and firepower, they make up the majority of 'heavy' starships in all known Iktharan fleets. Quite modern - and one of the trend-setters for abandoning mostly broadside fire in favor for end-on engagement - and fast, they are the bleeding edge of the Empire's sword.

These ships spawned a number of derivatives thanks to their modern, redoubtable, and efficient design: though mostly restricted to some new classes of Terran starships, other nations would produce near-direct copies.

## Design

### Dimensions and Role

At about one kilometre in length, the Iktharan *Harrow*s were broadly comparable in length and mass to the Terran Alliance's own *Mercury*- and *Luna*-class battlecruisers, but took on a broader number of functions due to the class's popularity within the fleet. A broadly wedge-shaped hull with significant sloping forward, mated to two boxy engine nacelles half-sunk into the main hull, gave these ships an immediately distinctive appearance; their impact on Terran fleets during the undeclared fringe war between the Empire and the Alliance is most evident by several design similarities to the later Terran 'colonial service cruisers' of the *Rhea* class.

As with most other battlecruisers, the *Harrow* class were designed to sacrifice protection (and therefore mass) to gain an increase in acceleration and maneuverability: they retained the gunpower of more heavily-built capital ships, in sharp contrast to all but the newest Terran battlecruisers, their primary opponents.

### Power & Propulsion

These ships were powered by a single **C**ontrolled **O**ver**r**eaction core: an otherwise-standard deuterium-based fusion reactor scaled up to gigantic proportions, the COR-A uses a contained overreaction inside the core, prevented from running out of control by very precise matrices, to generate power far beyond what its size would indicate. While this did generate a prodigious amount of power - equal to Terran reaction cores, if not to the latest Lucaelian ionization reactors - it also made the ship's core dangerously unstable if it were breached. As a result, in case of crippling battle damage, standing orders were to evacuate the ship rather than try to save her; it also made Iktharan technology difficult to analyze precisely as a result.

Thrust was provided by four boxy units in two nacelles, to port and starboard respectively, at the rear of the ship. Sunk partially into the hull to provide less of a target, these plasma-impulse thrusters gave the *Harrow* class a surprising amount of acceleration and maneuverability for their size, able to outrun and out-turn all but the newest Alliance capital ships. Their fuel efficiency, however, was considerably less- they consumed large amounts of propellant, forcing them to maintain supply lines on even short campaigns. Maneuverability was provided by a directional electromagnetic field generator which could alter the direction of the propellant cones: they also had plasma drive vents located across the hull.

### Artillery

While they lacked the superlasers present in almost all modern Alliance starships, the *Harrow* class was nonetheless very heavily armed: they outgunned many contemporary battleships. Their primary weapons were eighteen beam cannons: capable of approaching 405 megatons per shot, they were slightly more powerful weapons than what the Alliance possessed (their laser cannon average being 380 megatons in the latest ships) but fell well behind the more advanced states and races in the name of simplification for mass production purposes. These weapons were mounted in fixed mountings forward on the prow.

To these weapons were added four fixed cannons (in the prow) and four twin turrets (located on the nacelles, one to each quarter) for hybrid mass drivers: heavy ferrous slugs fired at 5% the speed of light made these weapons perfect for punching through extremely heavy armour, though they could do little to Consortium protection. They could also fire explosive shells at 2.5% the speed of light. Added to these were several fusion accelerator cannons and flak guns for point defense: as the Iktharans preferred physical projectiles for interception of high-speed starfighters (recognizing their inability to build antistarfighter directors with sufficient precision for direct energy weapons), these dotted the hull in significant numbers.

Additional armament was in the form of dozens of cells and launchers for seismic missiles: the warhead would emit sonic shockwaves at the target, resonating on several frequencies and shaking the target to pieces if it connected. Small and fast, they had to be launched en masse to ensure adequate hit probability.