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Any company dealing with the SAC, and the USSA, is often hampered by the Gaian philosophy when it comes to product design. Bahn/Zai's newest Team, Kitbash, discovered this when they tired to sell the Wyvern. While it was a suprerior suit in many ways, it simply was not a design that was environmentally firendly. As such it never saw mass production and Bahn/Zai lost a large amount of money on the deal.
Kimble Industries, a small ship building company, was aware of this sort of thinking when they put forth their design for a new SAC crusier. While they were not the only company bidding on the cotract, they were ultimately successful. The problem all of the comapanies ran into was the same. A vessle that met the specs needed for the war ship were, like the Wyvern, not environmentally freindly enough. Those that met the Gaian's desires lacked something in military usefullness.
Kimble dealt with this problem by producing not one ship design, but two. The Calabim Cruiser and the Ofanim Cruiser. The Calabim outclassed every cruiser currently fielded by either the ODF or the SAC (the Ruby Cruisers had much better armour and were able to hold their own against Calabims) when it came to weapon systems and defensive measures. The Ofanim on the other hand was a ship closer the the Master class in many ways, a ship that could preform many duties.
The catch?
The Ofanim and the Calabim were basically the same ship. With a number of rather ingenious designs Kimble Industries designed the Calabim to be the ship that was needed to fight and win (it was thought) the war, and then afterwards to become the Ofanim, a ship that was more useful to peace time duties.
It got them the deal.
The Calabim is, as stated, a war ship. It offers no creature comforts. The quarters on board would seem cramped to even a member of the ODF. Tight quarters and high crew concentrations lead to the ship becoming very dirty, a build up a grime and such more than anything else. In fact SAC regulations stated that should any Calabim remain in use after the war (ie. not converted over to Ofanims) that no crew sepnd more than two months serving on the ship. Furthermore, once every six months the ship is to undergo a thorough cleaning that will include exposing the interior to vaccum.
When converted over the Ofanim Class the ship looses some of its
weapons systems (though the Ofanim is still a warship) and rotating
crew decks are added on. This opens up much of the interior space,
creating a much more liveable environment.
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