 April 29, 2010 - 2:34pm | Just done a bit of work to my deckplans for a Pirate/Civilian Corvette - so far it's very much an early work in progress. Just done a first draft of an overall plan/deck layout - would appreciate feedback at this point (it'll help me sort things out), and yes - I've just realised the landing struts are far too small and need enlarging, lol! |
 April 30, 2010 - 4:09pm | As I mentioned (prematurely it seems LOL) in the other thread...that's about how I envisioned it should look. I didn't anticipate any workpods though, that's a nice touch. I would "wing mount" the laser cannon though, since it's a 40 cubic meter system it's a simple matter of splitting it into a pair of 20 cubic meter set-ups (one per wing), that way it can chew up more space without interfering with the actual decks. It would also further define a need for "wings" beyond aerodynamic qualities and engine access. |
 November 4, 2010 - 4:12pm | The cone on this drawing has roughly a 4.5m base radius and 5m height giving it a volume of 106 m3. A nose mounted LC leaves 66 m3 for other nose mounted gear. Actually more since your cone is bowed out and the drawing dipicts parts of the LC machinery apparently wrapping around the central elevator. BTW, I love this rendering of Corvette, very nice artwork. I downloaded it to use as the basis for my own interpretation of this under appreciated ship. The main modification that I made was to round the aft section too (I also repurposed some of the decks). The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
 November 6, 2010 - 5:16am | I like the touch of 4 decks worth of accomodation- historically this ship was used for piracy and that activity usually calls for heavy crews- at first to swarm and subdue a ship then to crew the prise. and no pirate wants to be limited to the capability of only taking 1 prize- a large enough crew ensures he will be able to crew 2 or more prizes. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 November 7, 2010 - 7:21pm | Why is the Corvette considered a pirate vessel? |
 November 7, 2010 - 10:16pm | Why is the Corvette considered a pirate vessel? That is the way it has always been portrayed in the SFKH adventure modules. I thought Warriors of White Light said something about that. But I think I is mistooken.. Time flies when your having rum. Im a government employee, I dont goof-off. I constructively abuse my time. |
November 8, 2010 - 9:14am | I always treated it as a failed competitor to the Assault Scout. It has survived primarily as an excise cutter, private security escort, rescue ship, and, of course, corporate warbird. The pirates tend to get their Corrvettes from one of these original sources. FYI... I'm planning on submitting an article about the Corvette to the Frontiersman. Rick, if you're still around, I'd like to use a modified version of your drawing crediting you with the original art. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
November 8, 2010 - 2:49pm | Why is the Corvette considered a pirate vessel? I don't think it was supposed to be exclusively a pirate ship, it just turned out that the two printed modules used them as such (Warriors of White Light and Dramune Run). It was merely introduced as a new ship class in WoWW and coincidentally in the hands of pirates. Nautically speaking, a corvette is a small, sleek, and fast craft. Chevy kept that in mind when they first belted out their long reigning sports car boasting the same name in the 50s and still keeps true to that today... SF missed the fast mark by "overloading" it with a MHS:5 laser cannon on a HS:4 craft (which no doubt explains the sub-par performance for the HS:4 craft), but then again that could just be a pirate modification and not necessarily a corvette-unique feature. In Star Wars, Leia's ship that the Star Destroyer was pursuing in the opening was a Correlian Corvette. Granted the Lucasverse missed the "small" aspect by making it a 150 meter boat (or HS:6 in SF-speak). Now combine those two and you'll have a more realistic "space corvette": HS:4 with laser batteries (plural, instead of one and the performance restricting oversized cannon) or at least a pod laser system in lieu of the cannon. |
November 14, 2010 - 12:55pm | Why is the Corvette considered a pirate vessel? That is the way it has always been portrayed in the SFKH adventure modules. I thought Warriors of White Light said something about that. But I think I is mistooken.. It was merely introduced as a new ship class in WoWW and coincidentally in the hands of pirates. WoWW does indicate that the increased pirate activity in system was due to the appearance of the Corvette in significant numbers in the hands of the pirates. It also says that Streel supplied the funds to the pirates to purchase the ships. I think most of us believe that the Corvette is a Streel design. Doubtless Streel would want to limit the White Light pirate investment outlay by also being the manufacturer of the Corvette as well. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
November 14, 2010 - 3:54pm | If Streel designed the pirate corvettes, it would have been cheaper for them to have simply supplied them with the corvettes rather than the funds to buy the corvettes. I'd like to think the corvette was an actual Frontier design (from some mega-corp or otherwise), but I still lean to the theory that the pirates sacraficed speed and agility of the original design in favor of more firepower (re - the MHS:5 laser cannon on a HS:4 vessel that should boast ADF/MR:4/4 instead of 3/3) and that the pirate corvette is not a standard design, rather a modified-by-them design. |
November 14, 2010 - 4:43pm | I'd like to think the corvette was an actual Frontier design (from some mega-corp or otherwise), but I still lean to the theory that the pirates sacraficed speed and agility of the original design in favor of more firepower (re - the MHS:5 laser cannon on a HS:4 vessel that should boast ADF/MR:4/4 instead of 3/3) and that the pirate corvette is not a standard design, rather a modified-by-them design. I like Shadow's take on this, though that is usual with stuff that shadow comes up with. However, I think the real reason the corvette had the laser cannon was so that it was certain that the assault scout the PCs were flying was going to catch the ship. To put it another way it was neccessary from a module writing point of view and not from any "in setting" point of view. Just how I see it. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
November 15, 2010 - 3:04am | Well, an assault scout would still catch a corvette if it had the HS:4 ship's standard ADF of 4 (remember, the assault scout is rated at 5). If anything, they made it 3 for the following module so that the Gullwind could catch it LOL However...someone may have to double check this as I don't have my module handy at the moment but IIRC the pirates did not suffer any penalties for maneuvering in the asteroid belt while the players would have to follow the standard rule to pursue them off the beaten paths (which involves ADF and MR). That being the case, the pirate corvettes could have any ADF and MR rating. If the pirates did suffer penalties, then the players had the advantage with better ADF and MR so from the module writing point it favors the players catching the pirates. Either way, with "stock" HS:4 performance the players would still have had a slight edge, but making the pirate ships 3/3 substantially tilts the favor in the players' way. |
November 15, 2010 - 1:05pm | ...someone may have to double check this as I don't have my module handy at the moment but IIRC the pirates did not suffer any penalties for maneuvering in the asteroid belt while the players would have to follow the standard rule to pursue them off the beaten paths (which involves ADF and MR). I don't see that in the module, but I like it as a way to level the battle field. I see no need to make things too easy on the PCs.  If Streel designed the pirate corvettes, it would have been cheaper for
them to have simply supplied them with the corvettes rather than the
funds to buy the corvettes. As Streel provided the funds "unknown to the government of Clarion", according to the scenario, I would assume that means secretly through a series of loosely affiliated subsidaries and partners in order to make it difficult, if not impossible, to trace back to the source. If Streel provided either the cash or ships directly, it makes it too easy for Clarion to ban trade with them for life. Secretly assisting the pirates (and presumably smugglers) allows Streel to have their cake (profits and revenge now) and eat it too (bigger profits when the ban is lifted). Streel would be an extremely stupid mega-corp to not try to publicly stay in Clarion's good graces and serve its penalty like a 'good' corporate citizen. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
November 15, 2010 - 3:11pm | Streel would be an extremely stupid mega-corp to not try to publicly stay in Clarion's good graces and serve its penalty like a 'good' corporate citizen. Well, they did furnish the weapons to the smugglers destined to the Liberation Party in the prior scenario... |
November 17, 2010 - 9:38am | Streel would be an extremely stupid mega-corp to not try to publicly stay in Clarion's good graces and serve its penalty like a 'good' corporate citizen. Well, they did furnish the weapons to the smugglers destined to the Liberation Party in the prior scenario... You could write that off as an over eager corporate manager who was angling to become a VP of EVP but not neccessarily sanctioned from the top down, though had it succeeded and Streel not been implicated then no one would have complained within the corporation. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
November 22, 2010 - 7:55am | Streel would be an extremely stupid mega-corp to not try to publicly stay in Clarion's good graces and serve its penalty like a 'good' corporate citizen. Well, they did furnish the weapons to the smugglers destined to the Liberation Party in the prior scenario... We know that they were Streel made weapons. We don't have the paper trail about who provided them to the smugglers.  The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
November 22, 2010 - 4:02pm | Actually, the module specifically says that the computer on the smugglers' ship divulges that the weapons were furnished by Streel. |
November 23, 2010 - 6:07am | SF/KH:0 Warriors of White Light gamma subsection three, page 11 subtitle "More Evidence" |
