Well, here's a sort of example. I kind of rushed it (It only took about 1, broken three hour session today), and not being a military ship, it's got less of the "How to fight it" angle than the TI ones, it's more a history of the thing. Still, I like it well enough.
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Intelligence Dossier
Commissioned by Alliance General Headquarters, Training Dept., 2367 as a part of the Post Capella Inquiry into Overall Fleet Conditions.
Poseidon Class Freighter
Length – 57 m
Width – 40 m
Height (Deep Space Mode) – 52 m
Height (Atmospheric Mode) – 24 m
Hull: Double Plated Titanium Steel. 2000 ASE
Shields: None
Armament
4 Light Target Bessemer Kohn Type 2 Plasma Turrets, GTW Subach-Innes HL7 Refit
First commissioned in 2324, the GTFr Poseidon dates back to the early TV War and is one of the older designs still serving the Alliance. It was designed to replace the old Chronos and Comet class freighters that had been serving the alliance in the early war years, after Vasudan attacks against GTA shipping had begun devastating supply lines along the front lines of the conflict. The freighters of the time were often the productions of hasty conversions from civilian models, or of peacetime engineering philosophies that prioritized hauling space over survivability. As a result, they were slow and poorly armed. These vessels were no match for even the relatively weak Anubis class fighters that were the PVN’s primary anti-convoy fighter, and a marked contrast from Vasudan models such as the Satis, which had been responsible for more pilot deaths than any other freighter in both the GTA and PNV’s respective fleets.
The GTAs inability to mount inter system subspace drives on fighters left them with two choices – pull their their capital ships from vital outposts and the front lines for convoy guard duty, or improve the defences of the freighters in the convoys. Inevitably, the second option won out. Plans to upgrade the defences of the older freighter classes ground to a halt when computer simulations predicted the cost of the necessary upgrades to the reactor, and therefore the entire energy management system, of all the Chronos’ in the fleet would almost be the equivalent of the cost of producing an entire Orion destroyer. A new design was needed.
The design was subcontracted out to the then young firm of Triton Dynamics, who’s early conceptual designs for the propulsion system of the Poseidon impressed GTA engineers. The Poseidon was among the first vessels to feature a multi redundant thruster system. Most designs of the time, such as the Orion destroyers and Fenris cruisers, had a single, large thruster to provide maximum thrust. The Poseidon had three main thruster banks, which meant a failure in one might not necessarily shut down the entire engine. Though these were still linked to a central control and energy supply system deeper into the vessel, making the possibility of true multi redundant engines, as seen in the more modern Deimos corvettes, impossible, it did represent a significant step forward in the reliability and longevity of the engines of large vessels. Triton also proposed a freighter with six turrets, one more than the feared Satis class, and offered the ability to enter the atmosphere of colony worlds. Work on the new freighter commenced in mid 2332, less than eighteen months since the beginning of the war.
Despite initial enthusiasm however, the Poseidion project faced several setbacks in its early days. Safety concerns over the recently developed Hansbach Fusion reactor that had been proposed for the freighter delayed early prototyping, and ultimately led to the use of the far less efficient Boswell reactors. (Incidentally, in the coming years, Hansbach reactors would suffer from frequent overloads and containment failures that cost the GTA dozens of small ships, and had all but disappeared by the end of the war). The decreased energy output forced the Poseidons engineers to modify their plans, after the rapid-transfer ETS systems used on fighters that they had hoped to implement proved incapable of working effectively on a vessel of the Poseidon’s size. As a result, it’s overall armament was reduced to four turrets, and its predicted top speed dropped almost fifteen percent. The increased fuel requirements of the Boswell also meant that what little interior cargo space had been reserved was lost, limiting the Poseidon to the hauling of cargo containers. Other problems with incomplete sensor arcs, underpowered secondary thrusters, and untraceable imbalances in its anti-grav systems frustrated Tritons engineers for months on end. But the most irritating of all were the labour and material shortages that were, ironically, the direct result of the GTAs inability to maintain its convoys. Eventually running six months over schedule and almost thirty percent over budget, the only things that prevented the Poseidon project from being scrapped entirely were the dire problems in Alliance shipping, and the lack of any truly viable alternatives. Finally, however, in April of 2334, just under two years since work had begun, the first dozen Poseidon class freighters, the first instalment of an initial run of fifty, rolled off the production line to what was a decidedly lukewarm reception. After all, these vessels had only two third of the firepower that had been initially offered by Triton Dynamics, no internal cargo space whatsoever, and the lauded triply redundant thruster system, while still technically working, was still centred around a single large thruster, without which the vessels speed was decidedly limited. For a problem that had existed almost three years, the Poseidon was seen as, at best, half a solution.
Nevertheless, the Poseidon was put into service, and remarkably, soon silenced all of its critics. Convoys which included Poseidons saw a jump of almost two hundred percent in their survivability rating against convoys which did not include them, and Vasudan attacks against Terran shipping decreased even more as PVN commanders suddenly faced the suddenly and significantly increased risk of their attacks even on unescorted convoys. Its ability to traverse the atmospheres and gravity wells of colony worlds freed up the GTAs loadlifters and greatly increased the speed at which convoys could be load and unload their cargoes.
Within one month of the first Poseidons being produced, the GTA had secured the rest of Tritons initial run of fifty, ordered a further three hundred freighters from them, and begun to produce their own Poseidons under Triton supervision at the New Dawn shipyards in Sol. Thanks to the Poseidons freeing up of Terran cruisers for frontline duty, and the flow on effects of the general improvement in GTA shiping and supply, the balance of power in the war began slowly tilting back towards the GTA, though to be honest this was no more than one of the temporary shifts that would occur throughout the fourteen year war.
The Poseidon continued its service as a frontline military freighter throughout the T-V war until the arrival of the Shivans in 2335, and the Great War, during which both Terran and Vasudan shipping took heavy losses. All told, over 100 Poseidon’s were lost to the Shivans in two months, compared with the thirteen that had been lost in the entire last year of the T-V War. After the destruction of the Lucifer effectively ended the war with the Shivans, these freighters were slowly replaced, though the repair and reconstruction of the larger warships in readiness for any other large scale Shivan attacks obviously took priority. The advent of fighter mounted inter system subspace drives had suggested to many that powerful, expensive military freighters like the Poseidon were no longer needed to ensure convoy safety, but its long standing reputation as a fast, safe freighter kept it in service. In 2345, there was another attempt to retire the Poseidon in favour of the Bes class of Vasudan freighter that had proven so effective over the previous decade, and the larger freighters that were being proposed by Triton. Both these vessels, however, lacked the atmospheric capabilities of the Poseidon, and in those early, somewhat tenuous days of galactic cooperation, maintaining a viable, Terran alternative to Vasudan craft such as the Bes was seen as a desirable goal. Moreover, the cost of replacing all of the existing Poseidon’s in service would have been highly prohibitive, even when weighed against the potential benefits of the two newer classes.
The gradual increase in the prevalence of fighter based shield systems, and the rather more sudden appearance of beam weapons onto the field of battle had spelt the end of the Poseidon’s use as a convoy guard. Early attempts to shield the freighter itself had been highly costly and at best only marginally successful, and while rebel groups, including most recently the NTF, have been successful in grafting beam weapons into the crafts electronics, these are underpowered by the ships reactor, and ultimately have proven to be unstable and prone to failures.
Most modern, GTVA Poseidons have had their standard Bessemer Kohn turrets replaced with more modern Subach HL-7 units. These turrets have a significantly increased rate of fire and a better shield penetration than their predecessors, giving the Poseidon some degree of anti fighter ability and a better chance of shooting down incoming bombs, though more often than not the Poseidon serves primarily to assist the fighters that are escorting the convoy it serves as a part of, and rarely earns any of its own kills. Unless it is carrying cargo, in atmospheric mode, the Posidons securing cargo struts rotate back to minimize the vessels already considerable drag, which forces its two side turrets to deactivate. In this situation, Poseidons are particularly vulnerable, and should never be left unescorted through any but the most secure planetary atmospheres.
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Opinions? Additions?
I'll do the Orion or Typhon next (I hadn't seen your post whne I started this one).
