Morne Gutstabber, Captain of the Pirate ship "Pale Demon" sagged in his bridge chair waiting on a convoy that he had been carefully trailing through the borders of Dartrok space staying just at the edge of his sensor range. He had gotten ahead of the ships and planned to use gravity capital missiles to pull the group out of FTL travel. The rumors he had gotten from multiple sources indicated that the Dartroks had no vessels besides those Dreadnoughts. He also had heard that they only had a very limited number of the Dreadnoughts so none would be escorting convoys. There might be a few ships from the races that the Dartrok had taken over but likely nothing more than a couple of destroyers. He considered himself more lucky than most pirates and had acquired an old Kreeghor Defiler class heavy cruiser and no destroyer ever built would be able to survive his weaponry. He ordered his weapon officer to fire a spread of gravity warheads from two of his cruise missile launchers and he watched the group of merchant ships get pulled from FTL space. He reacted in horror when he saw what he had pulled into his trap. There was a ship that was the size of a cruiser yet gave a signature similar to his stolen ship data on a Dartrok Dreadnought. The Dartrok cruiser started to accelerate toward his position and he knew he would not have time to jump into FTL. Hew was dead because he had trusted those damn rumors.

Little is actually known about the Dartroks. The Dartroks are a race of very powerful beings that have just recently appeared in the Three Galaxies. The races appear to be slightly large than human sized coal black figures that appear similar in shape to man-o-war jellyfish with a huge number of prehensile tentacles. Their ships are based on a pseudo organic material and are incredibly powerful, heavily armored, and quite capable of taking on most ships of the races of the Three Galaxies. Especially since the motivations of the Dartroks is completely unknown, these ships cause all nervousness among most other races when these ships appear in their system.

For the first few attacks by the Dartrok, only the huge dreadnoughts and fighters were seen but as time went on, a larger variety of their ships were seen. The cruiser seems to be used in jobs that a Dreadnought would be too large but are still not to be taken lightly. In Many was, the Dartrok cruiser seems to be a Dreadnought made smaller. These ships are the equals of many navies' best heavy cruiser designs and should be taken by overwhelming odds if possible. These ships look a little like a very thin and streamlined manta-ray. Like the dreadnought, these ships are not constructed in any traditional way and the equivalent of the ships systems are biologic in design. These include computers, engines, weapons, and even the ship's hull. The computer is a powerful neural intelligent and capable of operation independently. The ship's hull has the ability to repair damage and to adapt to attacks directed at it given enough time. The ship's systems are all based on electric and gravitic manipulation. The ship propulsion is based on gravitic systems, the ship's shields are based on gravitics, and all of the ships weapon systems are based on one or the other as well. The FTL propulsion system is very similar are very similar to those operated on most ships in the Three Galaxies but as stated previously are biological. The ship has an acceleration as fast as many Phase World fighters although it is no faster than the dreadnought is. Because of the extraordinary speed of this ship, the large capital ships of the Three Galaxies cannot stay at missile range to fight the ships that way.

Like the Dreadnought, the ship's weapon systems are designed around close combat. This might allow other ships to use the intercept time to use missile launchers to destroy the ship before engaging in close combat but the ship has a gravity wake weapon that throws a wave of gravity out in all directions. While less powerful than the one mounted on the Dreadnought, this system is capable of destroying missiles quite easily but is also quite capable of doing fairly heavy damage to larger targets as well if within range. Its limitation is that it is fairly short ranged and can only be used once per melee. The ship has one long range gravitic slicer cannon that is capable of doing massive damage to other ships and has a good change to hit vital systems on ships. The remaining weapon systems are electrical based but are just as lethal as the Gravitic weapons.

The Dartrok ship can carry up to 20 fighters and can carry slave race troopers for ground assault. The number appears to be in the range of 400 or more

This writeup of the Dartrok Cruiser uses modified Phase World starship rules. See Revised Starship Rules for Phase World for more details

Model: Dartrok Star Cruiser
Class: Cruiser
Crew: Unknown, needs one Dartrok to function but does need crew for maximum performance. Actual Crew size unknown (For game terms assume that the ship has a crew of around 400 with 20 being Dartroks and the remainder are slave races. Boarding parties will have trouble due to the fact that each Dartrok is about as powerful as a low powered supernatural intelligence)
Troops: 400 Slave Troopers

Vehicle Compliment:

	20	Dartrok Fighters
	8	Dartrok Shuttles

M.D.C. by Location:

	Slicer Beams Cannons (1):	4,000
	Heavy Electrical Discharge Cannons (8):	1,000 each
	Point Defense Electrical Discharge Cannons (20):	400 each
	[1] Bridge:	15,000
	[1] Emergency Bridge:	15,000
	[2] Main Body:	80,000
	[3] Variable Force Field:	10,000 a side (60,000 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 destroyed, 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 destroy the Cruiser, putting it out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck. Both the hull and the ships systems have the ability to repair themselves. The ships hull and ships systems regenerate damage at the rate of 1D4x100 MDC per minute. The ship can only repair up to half the total MDC of a system or the main body.
[3] Shield positions are variable and can be combined into one shield. The shields regenerate at a rate of 5% (3,000 MDC) per melee round.

Speed:
Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Sublight: Gravity drive allows the ship to travel up to 60 percent of the speed of light. The ship can accelerate/ decelerate at an incredible rate of 1.3 percent of light per melee.
Atmospheric Propulsion: Maximum speed is mach 10. Can enter atmosphere and leave the atmosphere of a planet easily.
Star Drive: Gravitonic drive; maximum speed: 8 light years per hour.
Maximum Range: Effectively Unlimited by either Drive system. Carries about four years worth of supplies on board and power system gives power for 20 years before the ship needs refueling.

Statistical Data
Height: 200 feet (61 meters)
Length: 750 feet (228.6 meters)
Width: 300 feet (366 meters)
Weight / Mass: 180,000 tons (163.000 metric tons)
Power System: Unknown
Cargo: Cargo holds are scattered about the ship that allows for carrying up to 20,000 tons of Cargo in addition to standard compliment of supplies and ammunition
Cost: Unknown, any culture in the Three Galaxies would pay hundreds of trillions of credits for an undamaged working model of this ship.

Weapon Systems:

1. Gravity Wake Generator: This weapon system outputs a series of gravitic waves in all directions. This weapon is quite effective for a variety of different purposes. It is useful to destroy missile and do damage to larger ships. The weapon system prevents most forms of FTL from being used within the radius of weapon system when activated for once melee even though the system only lasts for about 4 seconds each time activated. Any ships with variable shields will have the damage applied to all shields at once but divide by six each penetration of an individual shield for damage applied to ships hull. When this system is used, the Cruiser's acceleration is reduced to 1/3 of normal or 0.5% of light per turn.
   Mega Damage:
   Missiles Scale Targets: 1D6x10
   Starfighter Scale Targets: 3D6x10
   Destroyers Scale Targets: 1D6x100
   Cruiser Scale Targets: 2D6x100
   Battleship Size Targets: 1D6x1000
   Range: 10 miles (16 km) in an atmosphere and 1000 miles (1610 km) in space.
   Rate of Fire: Once per Melee.
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited
2. Gravity Slicer Beam Cannon (1): This weapon is incredibly powerful and can decimate most ships very quickly. The weapon uses controlled opposing gravimetric waves to create an energy beam weapon that shreds the target. Due to the deep penetration of the weapon, it has a much better chance to do critical damage to the target and ships dread the slicer beam hitting their fusion reactors. The weapons have standard penalties to hit fighters and other small targets. The Gravity Slicer Beam Cannon fires has a 60 degree arc of fire. The weapons do full damage to targets in magic rich universes with the spell impervious to energy.
   Mega Damage: 4D6x1,000 per Slicer beam strike (optional rule is that cannon gets a critical on a natural 18, 19, or 20 due to its high penetration)
   Range: 187 miles (300 km) in an atmosphere and 187,000 miles (300,000 km) in space.
   Rate of Fire: Once per Melee.
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited
3. Heavy Electrical Discharge Cannons (8):These weapons systems are in many ways similar to Phase World ion cannons but are very powerful. The weapons have standard penalties to hit fighters and other small targets. Each electrical beam cannon fires individually and have a 180 degree arc of fire.
   Mega Damage: 4D6x100 per blast
   Range: 16 miles (25.8 km) through atmosphere and 16,000 miles (25,800 km) in space.
   Rate of fire: Four Times per melee round per cannon.
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
4. Point Defense Electrical Discharge Cannons (20): These weapons systems are in many ways similar to Phase World ion cannons. They are very effective against fighters but are not as effective against larger ships. The weapon does more damage to organic targets because of the nature of the beam. Each mount has a 360 degree rotation and 180 degree arc of fire. Weapon has a bonus of +4 to strike
   Mega Damage: 4D6x10 per cannon (Double damage to organic targets).
   Range: 600 miles (960 km) in space and range is 6 miles (9.6 km) in atmosphere.
   Rate of fire: Equal to gunners hand to hand (Usually 4 or 5).
   Payload: Effectively Unlimited.

Special Equipment:

• Adaptive Hull: The Cruiser has the ability to adapt to attacks on it. Once a specific attack has been used against the ship, it will adapt to that attack and any attack of that type that is encountered afterwards will only be at half effect in the next engagement. Magical attacks will continue to inflict full damage. Variable frequency weapons such as variable frequency lasers can be reset to do full damage once this is discovered. The adaption takes about 5 days to be completed.
• Sentient Ship: The Cruiser is alive, and is quite aware of what it is and what its doing. It will not take orders from a non Dartrok. The computer is also telepathic and can communicate with Dartroks and other ships using this method.
  The ship should be considered to be a powerful neural intelligence in terms of Rifts. This computer can pilot the ship at 98%, can fire all weapons with half normal attacks, and has +10 to strike, +4 to dodge, and +4 to initiative (these include all bonuses). If a full crew is onboard it will be able to fire all weapons at will and will have +12 to strike, +6 to dodge and +7 to initiative.

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[ Rifts® is a registered trademark owned by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc.]

By Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune ).

Copyright © 2000, Kitsune. All rights reserved.