C8 Ber'Taa (Bird of Blood) Class

One of the largest designs of her day, the Ber'Taa was designed along the Klingon Doctrine of the time that prioritised Cruisers as the main arm of a strike force. In this sense, she was designed as a massively oversized Cruiser rather than as a now traditional Capital Ship design.

## Development

The original D7 qItI'tinga' (Great Powerful Conqueror) Class was designed as a replacement for the ageing D6A Kl'ar (Leader) Class. The Kl'ar had already proven to be increasingly obsolescent by the late 2230s and a larger, more capable Cruiser was required.

Essentially a scaled up and "fleshed out" D6A, the D7 out performed her smaller progenitor in every way. She was faster, more heavily armed, more heavily armoured and shielded and possessed the latest in sensor technology available to the Klingon Empire at that time.

Given her basis on a proven design, the introduction of the D7 proceeded quickly beginning in 2242. Production was accelerated, as were withdrawals of the D6A, following the disastrous incursions into Federation space in 2244, 2246 and most seriously in 2248 at the Battle of Bernard. Complete replacement had occurred by 2250, with 2/3rds of the D6A's in service being transferred to the Romulan Star Empire and the remainder being converted for specialised duties.

In 2255, after the acquisition of Cloaking Technology from the Romulans, the qItI'tinga' received her first refit, becoming the D7A. Captains were ordered to only engage or disengage the Cloaking Device when outside of Federation sensor range, so as to keep the device a secret from Starfleet Intelligence. This directive was followed successfully for many years, and Federation analysts were unaware of the usage of Cloaking Devices by the Klingon Empire until the beginning of the 2270s.

It was around this time that Klingon Tacticians began to devise an even bigger, even more powerful Cruiser. Klingon Doctrine of the time focused attacks around the power of Klingon Defence Force Cruisers, both Heavy and Light. All other classes were designed to support the Cruisers in their attacks. However it was acknowledged that advancing on sheer numbers is an unsound military tactic, and that a larger vessel would be optimal for attacking particularly fortified positions.

Problems arose from the start however when, given the political climate at the time and desperate to increase the power and prestige of their house, House Gar'Oth (designers of the new warship) massively overstated her capabilities. This did however have one unexpected benefit; Starfleet Intelligence caught wind of the exaggerated claims made by House Gar'Oth and were convinced the Klingon Empire was producing a warship that no Federation starship could hope to match.

With no other weaponry available to the Klingon Empire at the time, the new Ber'Taa (Bird of Blood) Class was designed with as many forward firing Photon Torpedo Tubes as possible in a massive spaceframe. Ultimately for a ship of her size, she was underpowered, but these wing mounted Torpedo Tubes did set a pattern for later, far more successful designs.

The Ber'Taa was gradually upgraded throughout her years of service, although these never took the form of a full refit. In 2274 her ships systems were overhauled and standardised with that of the D7C qItI'tinga' (Great Powerful Conqueror) Class, as an interim measure to simply maintenance and increase efficiency until replacements could be introduced.

## Operational History

The prototype Ber'Taa was launched in 2262 and immediately the falsity of her design specifications was revealed. She could barely make warp factor 4.8 when her designers claimed that she would have Cruiser-like speed. She was sluggish at impulse power also, suffered from onboard power shortages, and was cumbersome even for a ship of her size.

Production of further Ber'Taas was halted pending an inquiry. However, the rising tensions between the Empire and the Federation meant that the High Council were forced to approve the resumption of production, lacking any other design to replace her with. Improvements were made both before and during service, eventually reaching acceptable performance levels, but from the day of her launch the Klingon Defence Force was looking for a replacement.

Starfleet first encountered the Ber'Taa during the climatic stand-off over Organia at the end of the 4-Day War in 2266. Due to the involvement of the Organians, she was never tested in battle during that conflict and her flaws were never discovered by Starfleet, who ran training simulations involving the Ber'Taa (to her original, fictional specifications) for many years. It was not until 2281 that Starfleet Intelligence learned the true capabilities of the Ber'Taa, although the inaccurate training simulations ran by Starfleet continued to be part of command training until after the Organian Conflict.

In 2282, her replacement finally entered service. The C8B VoD'leH (Emperor) Class was an entirely different design to the Ber'Taa, and only shared a designation for disinformation purposes. Along with the earlier C9 Puw'Leth (Sawblade) Class, which entered service in 2272 as the first Battleship in the Klingon Defence Force, the VoD'leH completely replaced the Ber'Taa in service by 2285, although several were refurbished and outfitted for use during the latter stages of the Organian Conflict as part of a planned offensive against the Federation.

These few operational Ber'Taas were used during the War of Pacification, despite being painfully outclassed. Due to continued losses, especially after the Ormong of 2291, more and more mothballed hulls were recommissioned. They were most commonly encountered during the Gorn counter-invasion of Klingon space in 2292 during the General War, acting as a final line of defence.

## Apocrypha

Already replaced and hopelessly obsolete, withdrawals and scrapping began again in 2293 after the cessation of hostilities. Temporarily postponed in the tensions after the Praxis Incident, all ships of the class were finally disposed of by the stipulations of the Khitomer Accords.

## Specifications

* **Class:** Supercruiser
* **Hull Type Designation:** KCB
* **Length:** 549m
* **Crew:** 683
* **Warp Nacelles:** 2

* **Maximum Sublight Speed:** 3000 k/s (30 Mk/s)
* **Cruise** **Warp Factor Speed:** wf 5.8
* **Safe** **Maximum Warp Factor Speed:** wf 7.0
* **Hull Rating:** 460 HSF
* **Shield Rating:** 670 FSP

* **Sensor Rating:** 600 SRU

* **Armament and Equipment:**
	+ Primary
		- 4 × Disruptor Cannon
	+ Secondary
		- 5 × Photon Torpedo Tube
	+ Heavy
		- None
	+ Advanced
		- None
	+ Equipment
		- Tractor Beam Emitter
		- Klingon-Type Cloaking Device
		- Probes
		- 3 × D'ktagh (Dagger) Shuttle

## Ships in Service (2292)

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IKS KoC'QIc'DaH

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IKS PoLc'QocH

IKS Ber'ToQ

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IKS Goqw'l

IKS Moq'Qla

IKS KloH'TeQa

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IKS Ta'RohM

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