[hider=Nightshade]
Classification: Tanto-class corvette
Dimensions: Comparitively small. Maybe 250-300 feet long?
General Equipment: Tanto-class corvettes are about the smallest FTL-capable starships possible. They can drop out of Einsteinian space with minimal wake, allowing them to sneak into hostile systems with a good chance of avoiding detection. Tanto-class corvettes are built to maintain a low profile and are therefore the tool of choice for clandestine operations such as spy missions or covert ground force insertions. They are equipped with advanced sensor suites that allow for passive surveillance without giving away their position. They are thinly armored, which makes the vessel more nimble at the cost of making them vulnerable in heavy combat.
Armament: The [i]Nightshade[/i] is not designed for traditional naval combat. Railguns are too heavy and unwieldly for its specialized stealth role, and instead relies on antiship missiles for its offensive capabilities. It has four minicannon turrets, which are primarily used as point-defense weapons for shooting down incoming missiles, but have some limited use in offensive situations. The [i]Nightshade's[/i] missiles are mainly conventional weapons, though it is equipped with four missiles armed with nuclear warheads. Three are small .75 megaton ship-killers - powerful enough to vaporize even well-armored warships yet small enough to allow the [i]Nightshade[/i] to escape from the blast. The fourth is a high-yield 10 megaton warhead, to be used to destroy a large city or colony if an uncontainable Scourge hotspot is found.
Special Equipment: The [i]Nightshade[/i] is a "bughunter": one of a handful of ships in the Solidarity's fleet tasked with seeking out and destroying the last remaining pockets of Scourge infection scattered throughout the galaxy. It carries a marine contingent comprised of the 19th Cohort: a specialized and highly-trained unit of Solidarity marines that specialize in destroying the Scourge. In addition to the marines and their armament, the [i]Nightshade[/i] has a rather cramped hangar bay that can accommodate two dropships and a number of parabullet pods for conveying the marines to the surface of a planet.
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