Wulfen Superfighter
- Craft: Shuumar Central
Command Wulfen 1.0 Fighter
- Type: Heavy Fighter
- Scale: Starfighter
- Length: 14 meters
- Skill: Starfighter piloting; Wulfen (see below)
- Cost: 2,150,000 credits (see below)
- Crew: 2
- Passengers: 1
- Cargo Capacity: 40kg
- Consumables: 2 months
- Hyperdrive Multiplier: x2
- Hyper Backup: None
- Nav Computer: Limited to 3 jumps
- Maneuverability: 5D+2 (see below)
- Space: 11
- Atmosphere: 450; 1,300 kph
- Hull: 3D+2
- Shields: 1D
- Sensors:
- Passive: 30/1D
- Scan: 45/2D
- Search: 65/3D
- Focus: 4/4D
- Weapons:
- 3 Heavy Laser Cannons (fire linked)
- Scale: Starfighter
- Fire Arc: Front
- Crew: Pilot
- Skill: Starship Gunnery
- Fire Control: 2D
- Space Range: 1-3/12/25
- Atmosphere Range: 100-300m/1.2km/2.5km
- Damage: 6D+2
- 2 Ion Cannons
- Scale: Starfighter
- Fire Arc: Front
- Crew: Pilot
- Skill: Starship Gunnery
- Fire Control: 4D
- Space Range: 1-3/7/26
- Atmosphere Range: 100-300m/700km/2.6km
- Damage: 4D
- 1 Proton Torpedo Tube
- Scale: Starfighter
- Fire Arc: Front
- Missile Loadout: 5
- Crew: Pilot
- Skill: Starship Gunnery
- Fire Control: 2D
- Space Range: 1/3/7
- Atmosphere Range: 30-100m/300m/700m
- Damage: 9D
Designed with the special abilities of the Shuumar in mind,
the Wulfen fighter is of a rather unusual appearance. A pair of X
shaped wing struts extend from the main body of the ship, one
extending in each direction. These struts house four ion engines
each, with the rear engines mounted toward the rear and the forward
engines toward the front. All of the other systems are located in
the somewhat spherical central capsule.
Because of the Wulfen's unusual configuration, it is far more
maneuverable than the standard ships, and is also capable of a
number of tricks that even the most sophisticated of New Republic
or Imperial craft cannot even attempt. It can reach a full stop in
milliseconds, and accelerate to full speed in little more time. In
addition, the Wulfen is just as fast and maneuverable in reverse as
it is in forward, and it can slam from full forward to full reverse
without any great difficulty.
Because of it's special abilities, the Wulfen lends itself to
truly remarkable tactics. A favorite among Wulfen pilots is to
stay just out of laser cannon range of the target, and disable it
with their ion cannons. This requires a delicate touch, as the ion
cannons only outrange standard lasers by a single meter, but the
Wulfen can usually duck back out of the range of the opponent craft
when they feel threatened, and once one of these ships get behind
a target, they are almost impossible to shake. In addition, the
Shuumar have modified a fair number of their ships to include a
pair of long range lasers instead of the ion cannons. These
weapons have the following stats:
- 2 Long Range Laser Cannons (fire linked)
- Scale: Starfighter
- Fire Arc: Front
- Crew: Pilot
- Skill: Starship Gunnery
- Fire Control: 3D
- Space Range: 1-7/17/36
- Atmosphere Range: 100-700m/1.7km/3.6km
- Damage: 4D+1
With these weapons mounted, they have a few meters to play
with while baiting enemy fighters, and as such have proven nearly
invulnerable against small groups of enemy fighters.
The one reason that the design of the Wulfen has not been
copied by any other power is the tremendous stresses that it places
on it's pilots. Even the most modern inertial dampers can't do
much against the sort of g-forces that the sudden stop and go
motions of the Wulfen put out. Even with full modern inertial
dampers, a full speed in and out reverse puts up to 12g of pressure
on the pilot for short times, enough pressure to knock out or kill
a human pilot. Other maneuvers have been known to put even more
pressure on the pilots, and Shuumar have been known to travel at
double normal speed (two move actions), reverse (one action), and
head back at full speed (a final action) all within a 5 second
interval, putting nearly 24g worth of pressure on the pilot,
pressure that would be great enough to crush a human skull flat.
Only the Shuumar, with their high gravity adaptations can survive
a combat mission in a Wulfen.
The Shuumar are attempting to build a combat cruiser with
similar capabilities. Known as the Wrath of Heaven Cruiser, this
ship would easily be able to destroy just about any capital ship in
existence, especially in it's current form, where it mounts a
planetary defence level Ion Cannon modified for additional range.
However, the Wrath of Heaven project has met with a number of
setbacks, and after the three prototypes constructed were lost with
all hands in an accident that appeared to have been sabotage, the
project has been put on hold until the agent or agent responsible
can be apprehended. The Shuumar people do not have enough spacemen
to risk loosing any more to accidents of that sort.
Note: In playtesting, the Wulfen proved substantialy more
effective than X and B wings, knocking them out without noticable
difficulty. A-wings and TIEs were somewhat more difficult, but
still couldn't really challenge them, as they can simply sit still,
spin around real fast, and blast anything that comes in range. In
order to keep things balanced, it is important to remember that the
Shuumar do not have that many fighter pilots, and as they are a long
lived, slow breeding race, they do not expect any great numbers to
grow up any time soon. Still, with the Wulfen fighters, they have
become a military power, and if they ever would complete the Wrath of
Heaven, they would be a power of the first rank, as that ship can drop
ISDs like flies. (the prototypes were destroyed by Black Serpent agents,
who have left a series of clues leading back toward the New Republic.
The Shuumar investigators, with the aid of several NR operatives
discovered the deception, but have still been unsuccessful at
tracking the saboteurs back to their source.) Also, it is
important to note that the Shuumar are not particularly
mechanically inclined, and do not make the best pilots, though
their veteran pilots are improving fast.
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