With the construction of the Independence class Battle Carrier, the CAF knew they would need assault carriers to carry troops for planetary assaults. The Admirals in the CAF did not want to invest large amounts of their budget into building new Assault Carriers either. After weighing various options, the best option seemed to be converting Packmaster class carriers to planetary assault carriers. As soon as the first Independence class carrier was commissioned, the CFS Dire Wolf was placed in a shipyard to be rebuilt. It is planned that half of all Packmaster Carriers will eventually be modified for the Assault Carrier role. The plan is to also have the other half replaced by Independence class carriers. The replaced ships will be placed in Mothball status and some of the Intrepid class carriers in Mothball status will be scrapped. This program will take quite a few years and standard Packmaster carriers will still remain in service for a long period of time.

The ships hull is only slightly modified with the decreasing of bays and the increasing of troop areas. The ship also retains the same shields as the original Packmaster class carrier. There was some discussion of increasing the ships armor but the expensive involved would have put the construction of the ships over the planned budget.

The weapon systems of the ship are only being modified slightly and these refits are planned for all Packmaster carriers, whether they are going to be converted to assault carrier or not. The main battery is being kept because the main guns are useful for planetary bombardment and can dissuade frigates and destroyers. The CAF also has no plans to replace the lasers cannons with Grazers due to the expenses involved. These leaves the ship with two 20 cm laser cannons as the ships main battery and four 12 cm laser cannons as the ships secondary battery. The ship also retains the twelve point defense particle beams, eight point defense rail guns, and twelve mini-missile launchers to be used against both missiles and fighters attacking the ship. The only change is the the ships two cruise missile launchers were replaced by two long range missile launchers. The Long Range missile launchers can be used to engage fighters and missiles yet are still powerful enough to hurt frigates and destroyers

The Dire Wolf class reduces the number of fighters carried by the ship drastically and replaces them with ground assault vehicles. This has allowed the ship to double the amount of ground assault forces on the ship. The ship carries a total of 1000 ground assault troops including those that operate ground assault power armors. Unless a base or planet is well defended, this ship has the forces to occupy the location.

This starship design uses modified starship speed and ranges. See Revised Starship Rules for Phase World for more details

Model Type: LCS-700
Class: Strategic Carrier Ship.
Crew: 1,250 crew members (including officers).
Troop Capacity: Has 1,500 pilots and co-pilots, and carries 10,000 additional troops

Vehicles:
Power Armors & Robots:

	320	Silver Hawk Power Armors
	2400	Ground Pounder Power Armors
	200	Bombard Infantry Robots
	30	Battleram Robots

Fighter Compliment:

	60	SF-69 CAF Scorpion Star Interceptor
	30	BIF-67 Katana Star fighters
	30	SF-6 Osprey Starfighters or SF-101 Black Eagle Star fighters

Assault Shuttles:

60

CAF Assault Shuttles

Tanks & Other Vehicles:

	300	Phalanx Main Battle Tanks
	400	Maniple IFV

M.D.C. by Location:

	Main Laser Batteries (2):	1,200 each
	Secondary Laser Batteries (4):	800 each
	Long Range Missile Batteries (2):	800 each
	Gravity Auto-cannons (8):	200 each
	Particle Beam Turrets (12):	150 each
	Mini-Missile Launchers (12):	100 each
	Hangar Section (Lower 1/2 of the Ship):	60,000
	[1] Bridge:	15,000
	[1] Auxiliary Bridge:	15,000
	[2] Main Body:	80,000
	[4] Variable Force Field:	5,000 a side (30,000 Total)

Notes:
[1] In reality this is how much damage needs to be done for a weapon to hit the bridge through the ships armor. This ship also has an auxiliary bridge. Even if both bridges are taken out, the ship can still be piloted from engineering but ship is -3 to dodge and all weapon systems will be at local control. Weapon hits near the bridge that do not penetrate the ships integrity can injure crew members on or near the bridge.
[2] Depleting the MDC of the main body will put the carrier out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.
[3] Shields positions can be varied and all could be combined in one shield. Shields regenerate at the rate of 5% (1,500 MDC) per melee

Speed:
Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Sublight: Has a special sublight engine that allows the ship to travel up to 60 percent of the speed of light. Star Ship can accelerate/decelerate at the rate of 0.7 percent of light per melee.
Atmospheric Propulsion: Maximum speed is 200 mph (322 kph), can enter an atmosphere and can leave but is not designed for atmospheric flight
Stardrive: Uses a Gravitonic Drive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 4 lightyears per hour.
Maximum Range: Effectively Unlimited by either Drive system. Carries about one years worth of supplies on board, but can be stretched to two in an emergency.

Statistical Data:
Height: 1,000 feet (305 meters)
Width: 1,000 feet (305 meters)
Length: 5,253 feet (1,600 meters)
Mass/Weight: 50 million tons (45.4 Million Metric Tons) fully loaded, plus can carry an additional 5 million tons of cargo.
Cargo: 5 million tons.
Power System: Anti-matter; average energy life of 50 years.
Market Cost: The Assault Conversion cost 4 billion credits (not counting other vehicles). The packmaster class carrier costs 20 billion credits to construct. The ship is not for sale outside the Consortium.

Weapon Systems:

1. Two (2) 20 cm Heavy Laser Cannons: These cannons are used to engage any large ships, including destroyers and friagtes, that come into range and when Packmaster engages in orbital bombardment. The Laser cannons can be combined together or each one used separately. They cannot be used faster than the speed of light. Weapon has standard penalties to hit fighters and small targets for a large gun.
   Mega-Damage: 1D4x1,000 per single blast or 2D4x1,000 per double blast.
   Rate of Fire: Two double blasts or two single blasts each (4 total per battery).
   Effective Range: 100,000 miles ( 160,000 km) in space, or 100 miles (160 km) in an atmosphere.
   Payload: Effectively unlimited.
2. Four (4) 12 cm Laser Cannons: These cannons are used to engage frigates or low altitude orbital bombardment. The four cannons are aimed in two separate directions; two cannons can engage the same target, but not all four. They cannot be used faster than the speed of light. Weapon has standard minuses to hit fighters and small targets. The barrels can be can be rotated 180 degrees in all directions.
   Range: 16 miles (25.8 km) through atmosphere and 16,000 miles (25,800 km) in space.
   Mega Damage: 2D6x100 MDC each. Two laser cannons can be combined for 4D6x100 Mega Damage.
   Rate of fire: Maximum of Two (2) times per melee each.
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited..
3. Eight (8) Point Defense Rail Guns: Used as an anti-Starfighter and missile weapon and against targets that are impervious to energy. Each Rail Gun is in a Turret that can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire. Projectiles come out of launchers at close to the speed of light. Cannon uses a 20 mm projectile.
   Range: 2 miles (3.2 km) through atmosphere and 200 miles (320 km) in space.
   Mega-Damage: 20 round burst does 2D4x10 M.D.
   Rate of Fire: Equal to the combined hand to hand attacks of the Gunner (usually 4 or 5).
   Payload: 10,000 Rounds (500 Bursts) each cannon.
4. Twelve (12) Point Defense Particle Beams: These weapons are used for anti-missile, anti-power armor, and anti-star fighter defense.
   Range: 600 miles (960 km) in space and range is 6 miles (9.6 km) in atmosphere.
   Mega Damage: 3D6x10 MDC each.
   Rate of fire: Equal to gunners hand to hand (Usually 4 or 5).
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
5. Two (2) Long Range Missile Launchers: These launchers replace the Cruise Missile launchers in the original packmaster design. Missiles has a top speed of Mach 20 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 8% of light per turn (faster than any starship). Since star ships will no longer engage at rock throwing distances, whether weapons can be shot down is calculated from the speed of target, launcher, and missile. When drive goes dead, missile will still cruise unless set to self destruct but has very low odds of hitting star ships (Great for hitting bases and planets because target does not move and missile when dead at -25% to detect.) Long range missiles do not have minuses to hit small targets unlike cruise missiles and are all considered smart missiles. Batteries can launch on multiple targets each.
   Range: Missile range is 3400 miles (5470 km) in an atmosphere and 1,800,000 miles (2,89700 km/9.7 light seconds) in space.
   Mega-Damage & Properties: See Phase World Missiles (Fusion does 2D4x100 MDC).
   Rate of fire: One at a time or in volleys of 2, 8, 16, or 24 per launcher, per melee attack.
   Payload: 480 total, 240 long range missiles per battery. Ship has an additional 4800 long range missile for fighter reloads but can be used for the ship as well.
6. Twelve (12) Mini-Missile launchers: These are missile turrets used for point defense against enemy fighters and missiles. Missile has a top speed of Mach 10 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 2% of light per turn (slightly faster than any starship except if it is exceeding it maximum safe acceleration).
   Mega-Damage: varies with mini-missile type (See Phase World Missiles).
   Range: Missile range is 2 miles (3.2 km) in an atmosphere and 100 miles (161 km) in space
   Rate of fire: Can fire missiles one at a time or in volleys of 4 or 8 missiles
   Payload: 128 per launcher for a total of 1,536 mini-missiles. Cargo hold has an additional 2,304 mini-missile. Reloading launchers from cargo hold takes 1D6 minutes.

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By Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune ).

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