Super Weapons

The Empire has built 6 very powerful superweapons. These are each capable of annihilating entire planets or even sectors. They were designed to control the populations through fear. The war that resulted in their construction resulted in both sides suffering very heavy losses.

In the chaos of the war, almost all of the superweapons where lost to the Empire. One Weapon remained in the possession of the Empire, while SIV Corp managed to steal three superweapons. The last was captured and hidden by Retrograde, much to the disagreement of the other factions in the Coalition.

## List of the Super Weapons

### "The Kraken"

Project BAC: Nicknamed "The Kraken", it is probably one of the more conventional super weapons. It uses simple physics to fire a superheated asteroid projectile at high speed onto a stationary target or celestial body. The resulting force obliterates the target with minimal residual effect.

- History - The Empire lost this weapon during it's testing phase. Improperly designed moorings on the main firing system failed during a live fire test, resulting in the core unit being fired off into the opposite direction of the testing grounds. Due to asteroids being it's primary source of ammunition, the testing grounds where held in a dense asteroid field. This made finding the lose machine as it speed out of sensor range nearly impossible for the empire. After weeks of searching, the empire only found parts of the system imbedded on a few large asteroid clusters. The Kraken was deemed lost.

The weapon was found, months after it's disappearance, by miners working with SivCorp. Badly damaged, the wreckage was dragged to SivCorp space, where it was found to be operational. The Coalition forces where split on what to do with the newly acquired superweapon, and it was stored at SivCorp's secret research base, Division 5.

### "Indominus"

Project NGPP: This Giant Railgun was meant to bombard planets from great distances. It was a hybrid between a normal cannon and a railgun. The projectiles had a small primer (compared to their size) and were made of a hypermagnetic material. By moving the projectiles charged batteries, that powered electromagnets, which pushed the projectiles even more. This way, the projectiles could reach insane speeds. Achieving such high speeds, the projectiles did not need any warhead. Their impact was enough, to create shockwaves capable leveling hundreds of square kilometres, often igniting the atmosphere in the vicinity.

It was stolen by Retrograde Solutions GmbH in 3334C.E.. One of Retrogrades scouts intercepted imperial messages about a prototype weapon being transported with a heavily guarded convoy. When the convoy was half way there, an imperial transport came flying towards the convoy at full speed. It was coming from an asteroidfield, and sent an S.O.S. signal. A short moment later there was a large explosion in the middle of the Convoy. Most of the smaller or faster ships were lucky, but not the main escort. It was badly hit and the now attacking ships of Retrograde destroyed it with torpedoes, which led to its reactor exploding.

When the battle was over, the prototype was beyond repair. Retrograde tugged it back to their home, hiding it in the nebula for the next few years. Following an internal dispute, Retrograde later decided to salvage the prototype. It was salvaged for resources at one of Siv Corp's shipyards, as many members of the council did not like the fact, that the super weapon was stolen and hidden. Retrograde also was not in need for not functioning super weapons, but they needed resources

### "Arc Cannon"

Project LAFL: When the Empire made contact with the Tankium Syndicate, they quickly felt the necessity to improve on their shield breaking weaponry. They made plans for a giant Tesla gun, that melts shields in the matter of seconds. It was designed as the main weapon for a big war ship that was specifically built for this weapon. This war ship had to house a massive reactor and needed a large cooling system, as the heat production of the weapon and the reactor were tremendous. Both systems had to be specifically developed for this weapon, as normal reactors or cooling systems were far too insufficient.

When the weapon was tested, the engineers discovered that the weapon could be overcharged to cause the arc to jump between targets. The resulting load on the reactor was a problem though, and it was not recommended to operate it like that at any time. Too high loads on the reactor could cause instabilities, which may lead to the reactor exploding. In the case of the test fire, the engineers could prevent such an accident, as they only over charged for a small time and knew how the system would react. Later the captain of the ship, who was known to be stubborn, was part of the combat group that destroyed the homeworld of Siv Corp. The ship fired on the planetary shield to make the planet vulnerable for orbital bombardment. Defending ships could only watch, as the shield collapsed. They were unable to react fast enough. When the shield collapsed, the Arc had unforseen effect on buildings and anything living. Due to the atmosphere it burned and destroyed anything on the sruface, killing everything in its way. Any Survivors were victims of the following bombardment. When the defending ships closed in, the captain realized they were flying in tight formation. He immediately ordered to overcharge the weapon, so they could be dealt with quickly. When the Engineers told him to stop, he insisted on overcharging. A few seconds later the ship went dark and was drifting in space. The rear was burst as the reactor exploded and killed most of the crew.

### "The Hive"

Project MDF: Designed as a form of biological weapon of mass destruction. Utilizing an invasive species of insect, they bio-engineered them to be more resistant to extreme climates, increased rate of reproduction, and made them omnivorous. All these changes combined made insects that could be released upon a planet and in a matter of weeks reach critical mass, at which point nothing could stop the swarm from consuming all biological matter on the planet. The entirety of the consumption process would take less than a year. For any worlds this weapon was used on fear of spreading the Hive to other systems made blockades mandatory tying up recourses. The result of this weapon left the planet a baron wasteland incapable of supporting life. With no more oxygen or organic mater to feed on the insects would die out leaving behind mild radioactive husks, in small numbers the amount of radioactivity was harmless, but the husks of a swarm left radiation capable of killing most sentient life, should they try to repopulate the system.

### "Thunderwave"

Project SCMR: An electro-magnetic pulse of gargantuan proportions that once activated rendered all technology within a sector inert. the population of the planet could survive, but with no technology they'd be trapped with no way to call for help. Ships or stations within range would find all systems including life support disabled. The resulting loss of power would find them careening through space, crashing into other objects, or falling into gravity wells of nearby planets or moons. Even should a ship arrive after the device was activated it would take a nearly impossible effort to either rescue the population or restore the system to operational status.

### "Catapult"

Project MAL: The Catapult was a heavy mover, intended for deep space mining operations. It was built to carry a whole refinery to distant sectors, so mining ships did not have to fly vast distances to empty their cargo holds. It was also used to tug big ships or other bulky equipment around. In 3335C.E. one was part of an imperial mining operation far away from most civilized sectors. The refinery module was dropped in the middle of a asteroid belt, while most of the mining ships were mining smaller asteroids in the vicinity. The mover was flying around with a small escort, hauling asteroids towards the mining operation. When Siv Corp found the operation, they quickly took out the escorts and stole the mover. They modified it by adding more engine power, so it could outrun most pursuing ships. At first it was used to take resources from the empire, later it was used to fling asteroids at stationary targets, as it was a cheap and effective way to cause massive destruction. A problem with this approach was, that it took a long time to align the ship, accelerate and release the payload. Also, not every sector has suitable asteroids in it