Warship Build 18 — Quetzalcoatl Jumpship
I have been on a stream of Draconis Combine-themed builds lately (and Jade Falcon ones prior to that), so there will be a few models from that faction coming in during the next few weeks. To break this a bit, I decided to try to get stuff from other factions in-between, leading us to the first proper jumpship in this blog!
As I’ve stated in prior entries, both warships and jumpships can perform instantaneous interstellar jumps. The difference between both types is the fact that warships are purposely built for combat, while the nominal jumpships remain mostly civilian vessels, being devoid of armor and even weapons for the most part.
This usually means that jumpships are essentially used by civilian outfits like merchants or politicians, while the militaries use warships for their affairs. But this divide is not always clear-cut.
The Capellan Confederation has suffered a slow but steady decline during the Succession Wars, leading to the loss of most of its fleet. To retain some sort of serviceability in the branch, it was decided to modify some civilian jumpships for combat roles. The Quetzalcoatl was one of such cases.
Based on the Scout jumpship, one of the smaller designs of its kind, the Quetzalcoatl eschews the docking rings of the civilian vessel and instead mounts fighter bays, which turn the vessel into a light carrier of sorts. It is still held back by the lack of proper armor, meaning that it cannot really stay on the front lines. Still, it was a solution for a desperate navy.
Within the roles I previously set for these fleets, based on the Orion’s Gate wargame, I think the Quetzalcoatl is within the same class as dropships, being small, lightly armored, and very specialized.
Anyhow, it is a very simple model, as the original art isn’t really much to look at. It just takes 9 parts, plus the base. But I couldn’t leave you with just that, so I decided to parade all the Capellan ships I’ve made thus far, making it the first fleet to be somewhat functional.
Two Impavido destroyers, one Vigilant corvette, two Quetzalcoatl jumpships, two Vengeance dropships, and four fighter wings. It does look good! I wonder what the others will look like when I parade them like this.
With this said, I have changed a bit my thoughts about how to divide the roles among the ships. Essentially, larger vessels like cruisers or the heavier destroyers, remain capital ships, smaller warships are escorts, while dropships and equivalents fall into the “fighter” role within that game, the scouts becoming the fighters proper. This makes more sense if you read the rules at One Page Rules:
I’ll probably get more into this in the next post of shortly after that. For now, stay safe and let know your thoughts.
