The Corona-class Corvette is the Core Systems Republic Navy lightest non-small craft vessel dedicated to anti-fighter duty. At 400 tons it is just larger then the Longbow, its multi-purpose sibling, but the similarities in design and function end there. Brought into serve late into the CS-Spartan war, it proved to be more then effective. It tore the Spartan fighter corps to bits and pieces, and earned itself a sterling service record. Its main secret lay in its armament: The Spartans fighters, light, agile, and nimble, but lightly armed (Only with a single beam laser), and lightly armored (Usually no armor, except for a few bomber types) were easily disrupted by so much pulse laser fire. It effectively denied the weapon system's range in area that was turned into a kill zone for the Spartan Hoplites, their name for their fighter corps.
Design
Hull Design
The hull design is based largely on the Longbow, the gunship it was meant to supplement with more direct anti-fighter firepower. It was uptonned by 100, allowing for equivalent armor to the Longbow, making it tough to crack, but increasing its propulsion and power drives to a height never recorded before in the history of the Republic before: It had the ability to rapidly and effectively track targets. The 3 triple turrets are mounted on the same "firing lane" if you will, meaning that while independent tracking is usually the norm, but can actually lock into place with a more limited firing arc and the entire ship will gyrate in order to bear all 9 pulse lasers the same targeting vector, allowing for an untold amount of destruction to be sent towards, say, the incoming Hoplites, which always flew in very tight, very rigid formations that didn't break until the last possible moment. A Longbow captain said, right during the opening moments of an engagement with a Hoplite carrier, "It was like a solar flare. First there was only the black of space and red of the Republic. Then there was so much light the bridge glass tinted down to almost the maximum it could, there was so much light being thrown off." From there, the ship which had been using a test designation, officially graduated into the Republic Navy and was christened by the first ship's crew, the Corona-class.
Electronics
The electronics suite onboard the Corona are state of the art by necessity. Before the introduction of the FC5 generation Fire Control programs, there was simply no way to effectively manage so much weapons fire. Now, however, it is child's play to link firing patterns to the M-Drive in order to give max performance from the ship. In addition to the FC5 is its top of the line sensor/ECM/ECCM suite, capable of dealing with just about any Spartan E or CM they had.
Armament
9 pulse lasers destroyed Hoplites, 3 sandcasters rendered their puny beam lasers ineffective. It was almost no contest.
Standard Navy Configuration:
Corona-class Corvette | d-Tons | Cost (Cr) | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Hull | 400 tons | Hull 8 | 16 MCr | |
Streamlined/reflex/ss | Structure 8 | 80 MCr | ||
Armor | Ceramol | 12 points | 60 | 16 MCr |
Jump Drive D | Jump 2 | 25 | 34 MCr | |
Maneuver Drive N | Thrust 6 | 25 | 52 MCr | |
Power Plant N | 40 | 104 MCr | ||
Bridge | 20 | 4 MCr | ||
Computer | Model 5/fib/bis | Rating 25 | 20 MCr | |
Electronics | Extremely Advanced | +2 Jamming DM | 5 | 4 MCr |
Weapons | Hardpoint #1 | Triple Turret (Pulse laser/pulse laser/pulse laser) | 1 | 1.5 MCr |
Hardpoint #2 | Triple Turret (Pulse laser/pulse laser/pulse laser) | 1 | 1.5 MCr | |
Hardpoint #3 | Triple Turret (Pulse laser/pulse laser/pulse laser) | 1 | 1.5 MCr | |
Hardpoint #4 | Triple Turret (Sandcaster/sandcaster/sandcaster) | 1 | .75 MCr | |
Fuel | 132 tons | One Jump-2 and 2 weeks | 132 | |
Cargo | 37.5 tons | 37.5 | ||
11 Staterooms | 22 personnel (max) | 44 | 5.5 MCr | |
Extras | Fuel Scoops | |||
2 Fuel Processors | 2 | 0.1 MCr | ||
Ship's Locker | ||||
11 Escape Pods | 22 personnel (max) | 5.5 | 1.1 MCr | |
Software | Maneuver/0 | |||
Jump Control/2 | 0.2 MCr | |||
Evade/3 | 3 MCr | |||
Fire Control/5 | 10 MCr | |||
Library | ||||
Total | 400 | 355,150,000 Cr |