Starforgers Concepts – Starships

Federation/Alliance Starships:

In the Starstrikers Universe there are four classes of starships, Class A, Class B, Class C and Class D. Class A being the largest and Class D the smallest. Each class refers to the size of the starship’s engines. Below is a comparison chart that shows the most common classes from the Starstrikers Era.

These ships from the Second Generation or mid-war time frame, all dwarf the size of the very first starship, the SS Sokol. The original Class A starship would be considered a Class D starship in the Starstrikers Era.

The ships from the Starforgers Era are nuclear powered and vastly smaller than what would come after them. Above is the SS Bourke, a deep space research ship. The basic body shape and the concept of a head that can detach from the body, are first explored by ship designers of this era. As are massive, ship to ship cannons. In fact, most of the tactics and hardware displayed in these early starships, extended to the ships that came after them.

The starships of the Second Generation were all tunnel drive ships and they were considerably larger than their predecessors. The resources of dozens of planets helped to build these massive titans of war. Many thousands of people lived on them and they could stay in space for years. The firepower of just one Class A ship was more than all the ships of the Starforgers Era combined.

There are not too many Class B starships in the fleet during the Starstrikers Era. Most are heavy destroyers. Ship builders started to down size the Class A hulls in order to conserve resources and save money. During the later years of the Great War this became more popular.

Class C drives were used for all kinds of special purpose starships and required heavier ships to protect them. An example is the surveillance ship, GCU Griffin from Starstrikers.

Class D starships are usually small freighters without tunnel drive capabilities. The best known example is the Renoke from the short story of the same name.

 

Votainion Empire Warships:

The Votainion starships are known as warships. They tend to be thicker and more compact but generally larger than the Federation starships. The Votainion warships are dark green in color and sometimes, depending on the Kastra they are from, might be a brick red color. Curiously both Federation and Empire warships have detachable heads. But where it is a survivalist concept for the Federation ships, it is a tactical concept for the Votainions. Sometimes the Votainion ships will separate in combat to confuse the enemy or to make their fleet appear larger than it really is.

 

This is a sketch I drew of a Votainion warship side view.

Here we have a detailed study of the head of a Votainion warship.

 

Next time I’ll show off some of the starfighters used in Starforgers. (All drawings and models featured in this post were created by the author.)