History
It was a war beyond time, space and the very boundaries of reality as the younger species understand them. The destruction wrought by that conflict devastated galaxies, made billion-year-old civilisations extinct in droves and wiped entire universes from the fabric of multiverse. One of the countless refuges from that inconceivable cataclysm was a factory ship from a race the Kiroter'nah call 'The Progenitors'. Jumping blind through the interstices of the brane space to escape an overwhelming attack, it fell towards a universe and desperately tried to establish an emergence preference for a habitable world. It reconfigured to threespace mode just in time to emerge trailing plasma and gridfire in the upper atmosphere of a remote planet, somewhere near the rim of a backwater galaxy in this unimportant universe. Its engines slagged in the escape attempt and with serious uncorrectable reintegration flaws in the hull, the massive ship had no choice but to crash land in an equatorial jungle.
Though the damage was severe, the fabrication systems and computer core had survived intact, along with most of the secondary systems. Given time the ship could be repaired, possibly even to dimension slip capability. But in individuating from combat union, the crew discovered that time was in very short supply. Their hopes of escaping the devastating quantum-chronal reversion virus were in vain; they were fading from existence fast, along with most probably every other survivor of their ancient and once proud race. Not wanting to leave no legacy but a useless hulk, they surveyed the immediate area and considered their options. The most intelligent life form on the planet was a flying creature with class III intelligence. Upgrading to a minimal class VI configuration would take at minimum months of research (and the dilation fields would not help against the reversion virus); they had only weeks. Long evolved past even the capability to entertain despair, the Progenitors improvised as best they could with the limited time and resources available, doing the best limited brain enhancements they could and creating crude, simplistic but reliable and easily replicated shells to extent the capabilities of this organic life. Then they were gone, wiped from existence before their 'children' could even begin comprehend what had transpired.
The Kiroter'nah civilisation grew very fast, jump-started by the incredible fabrication capabilities of the crashed ship and the wealth of knowledge (young child's primers, by Progenitor standards) instilled in their cybernetic shells. Optimism and naivete gave way to pride and finally decadence as they took to the stars and began to construct great ships and installations with their poorly-understood technological inheritence. Travelling to other worlds at incredible speeds, many of the Kiroter'nah treated the younger races now emerging as their playthings. Skirting the more advanced systems that might resist them, they toyed with time lines and causality for their own amusement, switching around blocks of territory, individuals and sometimes using their fabrication abilities to make existing conflicts more 'interesting'. The ability to jump between, split and reintegrate timelines, a small but potent fraction of the Elder race's general ability to decide what became real and what remained fantasy, served them well. This era came to an end though as the wonder technology steadily became less and less reliable, soon ceasing to work at all on Earth and other advancing planets. The Kiroter'nah ships slowed to speeds little better than the younger races. Their displacers, one magic that could defeat any defences, worked now only when uncontested. The very causal stream itself froze across most of the galaxy, locking down a single objective timestream and rendering the tributaries inaccessible to the Kiroter'nah.
The problem was the FTL drives used across more and more of the Galaxy's volume. The interference generated by them would be a trivial inconvenience to the Progenitors, but the Kiroter'nah were nowhere near the level of understanding or control required to overcome them. Losing their technological advantages one by one they looked to the future, and staring back at them was existence as a third-rate power at best, a dead race destroyed in ambition or revenge at worst. This realisation, a little under seventy years ago at the time of writing, was the catalyst for a major transformation in Kiroter'nah society, technology and military doctrine. It was the start of the climb towards being a contemporary power and the start of the factional split in Kiroter'nah society that is still growing to this day.
Anatomy & Psychology
Kiroter'nah in their naked, organic form closely resemble terran bats in gross morphology, but possess hairless and slightly slimy blue skin and lay hard-shelled eggs (though they do suckle their young). They mass between 500 and 800 grams, have a wingspan of around sixty centimetres and a body length (nose to tail) of around twenty centimetres. An unusually efficient neural design makes them nearly as intelligent as a terran chimpanzee (boosted from their original dog-level intelligence by Progenitor genetic engineering). They have excellent hearing, can echo-locate and have good colour vision, though no sense of smell (taste only) and no manipulative digits. However adult Kiroter'nah are only seen in this state except when feeding, exercising, nursing and mating, and never by outsiders if they can help it.
Kiroter'nah normally appear as humanoids with morphology quite close to that of a human, excepting their fox-like heads, lion-like tails and large bat-like wings extending from their shoulders. This is a robotic body; the organic Kiroter'nah occupies a capsule in the chest. It is not just a simple shell however; it contains AI processors that handle movement, fine motor skills, speech and basic decisions as well as providing instant recall and reasoning/calculation abilities to the Kiroter'nah's organic brain via a cybernetic interface. Physically the body is constructed from an foamed aluminium structural frame; acutators are formed from sets of interlocking crystal rods that act as linear motors, while power and processing is provided by a network of thousands of brightly coloured small crystals strung together by intricate wiring. Their synthetic fur ranges from white to grey, often with a darker patterning of geometric shapes depending on individual taste, with brightly coloured cranial hair and tail tufts. Humanoid Kiroter'nah look superficially organic, but a detailed examination will quickly reveal this to be a lie; even without this their overly-smooth and repetitive movements and speech patterns will quickly tip off observant individuals.
Kiroter'nah have something of a 'split personality'; they act like they are characters in a 21st century role playing game, uttering scripted-sounding dialog and moving with a curious mix of clumsiness and artificial precision, as if they are being directed by an invisible controller. This is of course the organic Kiroter'nah inside the shell. The fusion of organic brain and AI processors is incomplete and often leads to bouts of childlike or instinctive behaviour contrasted with periods of computer-like over analysis, emotionless speech and uncreative decisions. But at their best the Kiroter'nah combine the best of both sides with creativity and cunning harnesses to a startling logical insight and predictive ability. Skipping past the natural evolution of sapience has enabled them to avoid many of the delusions and pitfalls of organic intelligence (for example superstition and religion are unknown amongst the Kiroter'nah) while foresighted Precursor tweaking of their psychology makes internal dissent and destructive competition rare compared to most evolved sapients.
Due to their mechanical bodies Kiroter'nah adults are highly resistant to NBC weaponary and can survive in vacuum and underwater without assistance for short periods. They can fly unaided in gravities of up to 1.4 g, do not suffer from shock or blood loss and can be rapidly repaired or transferred to a new body if their organic body is not hit. If their humanoid bodies are completely disabled the Kiroter'nah will abandon it and try to fly back to friendly forces. However due to the lightweight construction and relatively poor design of their bodies they are no more resistant to physical trauma than a human, and can be stunned by EMP attacks. They are not good ground fighters, having a hard time standing ground under fire and frequently trying to fly away only to get shot down when staying in cover would have prevented them getting hit. While prepared to sacrifice their lives for their flock Kiroter'nah are prone to shell-shock and easily become confused and disoriented when faced with a surprise attack.
( for game purposes these advantages and disadvantages cancels out to no modifier to ground combat ability )
Culture
The average Kiroter'nah life expectancy is 45 years. However the bulk of their memories (in a somewhat impersonalised form) and some of their personality is maintained in inorganic cybernetic storage after their death. Most Kiroter'nah children receiving their first shells at 3 years old have the memory files of a recently deceased Kiroter'nah selected for them, based on aptitude and personality compatibility. They 'grow into' these memories and personality template over the next 5 years, becoming in effect a continuation of the former individual with slight personality changes, a limited kind of personal immortality that Kiroter'nah as a species find very comforting. Since the population is growing 'new' individuals receive only a basic educational database, and are considered at a significant disadvantage for their first 'life'.
Kiroter'nah families are loose; virtually all children are raised communally on the home world and most parents only visit them a few times a year. The species does exhibit strong pair bonding, but pairs separated for long periods often have secondary 'mates' (involving intimacy only in humanoid form, not biological mating). Their society is organised into a heirarchical series of 'flocks', starting with a ship crew or production tream and working up to the 'overflock'. Democracy is widely practiced for political, administrative and even military command positions, but it is far from representative, working more as a formalised way of showing support. Sufferage is restricted to 'qualified' individuals and the vote weighting varies based on 'expertise' (in theory, in practice there is still a large social status component), while candidates are usually restricted to a small pool of 'approved' individuals. Kiroter'nah politics are relatively simple, the primary division being a set of four factions that derrive from their strongest basic instincts;
Contactiphiles
This group embodies what humans would regard as the most positive traits; optimism, playfulness and a desire to improve the lot of all sentients. Married with AI pragmatism that translates into alliance building and interventionism where there is a clear moral need (to Kiroter'nah eyes), as well as not a few practical jokes. They hold that the loss of the ability to alter timelines and disrupt other species was a good thing; they enjoy having 'equals' to interact with and regret some of the species's past actions as 'immature' and harmful. This faction advocates building a balanced fleet, particularly fast intervention units.
Supremacists
This group reacted badly to the change in status as the Kiroter'nah lost their (inherited) technological superiority. Fuelled by the species's natural conception of themselves as above ground-dwellers and other life in general, they latching on to any way to maintain a sense of superiority. They consider themselves the privilidged inheritors of the elder species legacy, an optimal blending of the organic and artificial and just generally the species that should righly and properly rule the galaxy. They admitt that this is a long term goal, but advocate building as many heavy fleet units as possible, conquering territory and forming temporary alliances to defeat and subjugate weaker races. The Supremacists usually side with the Contactiphiles in most practical decisions.
Xenophobes
Deep down nearly all Kiroter'nah have a certain feeling of inferiority, a belief that they are not true sapients and that they are merely pretending to be a technologically advanced race, coasting on the achievements of the Progenitors. This belief is irrational, though based on a certain amount of truth, but it has consumed the xenophobes. They have twisted it into a hatred and fear of all other species, believing that they will inevitably see the Kiroter'nah as inferior and try to enslave or exterminate them. They focus on the failings, injustices and atrocities of other species, convincing themselves that they must be wiped from existence. The xenophobes argue for isolationism and swift finishing attacks on crippled states, along with planetary genocide when it is unlikely to draw down retaliation. Their long-term hope and dream is to build a fleet of Excession-class planet killer weapons, to be unleashed in one terrible galaxy-consuming attack. This dream seems far away, but a major step has been taken towards it in the completion of the first viable planet-killer weapon.
Survivalists
The survivalists stem from the fundamental fear of predators in a species hunted by larger avians, vicious tree climbers and brute-like ground dwellers, which relied on intelligence to survive. They see much to fear in other races and advocate strong planetary defences and an isolationist stance, aside from pre-emptive strikes on particularly threatening enemies. They have championed the development of cloaking, interdiction and ECM technology and are trying to expand its use across the fleet. The weakest faction, the survivalists generally end up siding with the xenophobes in decision making.
Cultural Assets
Almost all Kiroter'nah have an innate talent for music; their language is typically described by humans as 'a cathedral choir played back at four times normal speed' (their purely organic voices would also be at four times the normal pitch). One contactiphile group in particular specialises in performing to xeno audiences in their own language, playing cybernetically interfaced synthesisers usually while performing complex aerial maneuvers over a huge open stage. The aggressive distortions, melodic structure and use of visual effects has led this group to be termed a 'rock band' by angloculture individuals fortunate enough to see them, and they have done wonders for the Kiroter'nah public image with certain species ('furry' ones in particular). This group has adopted the nonsensical yet enigmatic title of 'Non Shippy Things', for no reason that anyone has been able to discover.
( 1 point spent on kickass rock band )
The Kiroter'nah were the instigators of and one of the founding members of the North Galactic Treaty Organisation
Technology
Kiroter'nah ships all take the form of a series of spherical or ovoid modules (each with a grey pearly hull) embedded in an intricate metal latticework, which gives off a soft, pulsating blue-white glow when the ship's systems are online. An exemplary Kiroter'nah ship is the recently commissioned Chronostorm class:
The modularisation while wasteful in volume terms does help to contain damage from serious hits, although the exposed power conduits are a weak point once the shields begin to fail. All Kiroter'nah ships tend to have a flattened 'winged' design; this is especially prominent on the smaller vessels, despite the total lack of aerodynamics. All classes can operate in atmospheres if required using the distortion shields to form an aeroshell around the ship, though performance degrades very quickly with damage.
Kiroter'nah ships are surrounded at almost all times by a closed planar continuum discontinuity that is tapped by their shield, engine and some weapon systems. The lattice is key to conducting and projecting this field, as well as providing structural support. All ships have a set of redundant distortion generators, coupled directly to the main reactors, which then provide the basic medium that local amplifiers work with to produce specific effects (movement, shielding, distortion waves etc).
Weapons
The primary heavy weapon used by Kiroter'nah ships is the distortion wave emitter. Originally general purpose continuum manipulators used to bend space/time to their whims and play all sorts of tricks on less advanced species, their original functionality was sharply curtailed by FTL interference from the rapidly advancing younger races. As the keystone of their transformation to a military power the Kiroter'nah adapted these devices into weapons that fire deadly blasts of incorporeal destruction. There are two standard modes; space-warp and time-distort. The former is relatively focused and chaotically alters the connectivity of space in the area of effect, which travels for many thousands of kilometres at a significant fraction of c before petering out. The net result is to mangle everything it passes through into twisted scrap, rubble and mincemeat. Conventional shields rarely do much to stop it, though armour will absorb energy from the blast and weaken it. Time-distort blasts have a more subtle effect; they randomise time flow by several seconds over their wide area of effect, crashing computers, temporarily stunning personnel and playing havok with any mechanical device that requires careful control and sequencing (often tripping reactor safeties for example). Other species have found that the best way to block these blasts is to keep their FTL drives running at a low background level, which can protect a ship very well against a similar sized Kiroter'nah opponent. However this method of withstanding distortion wave bombardment inevitably leads to feedback and charge build-up in the FTL mechanism, eventually disabling it and leaving the ship able to neither run nor weather further blasts.
By contrast particle-lasers are very conventional weapons, simply combining a particle accelerator (with optional neutralisation) and a tunable free electron laser in a joint mount, sharing targeting and support systems. Particle-lasers trade raw power for precision and adaptability against specific targets and defence systems. They were the primary weapon of the Kiroter'nah before the 'uprising' of the younger races and are still heavily used as secondary weapons. Hyperkinetic guns are more recent, appearing as a point defence against missiles and fighters though the larger varieties have some utility against smaller ships. They use a two-stage electromagnetic/gravitic accelerator for minimum mass and maximum energy efficiency, allowing large numbers to be carried.
The final class of weapons used are anomaly generators. These are highly unpredictable devices, even more so than distortion wave projectors, which create various kinds of flaw in the fabric of space-time. Tracking generators create large number of small anomalies which are drawn to masses, particularly moving ones. They are deployed on some ships as an advanced anti-missile and anti-fighter defence; they home in on targets without concern for inertia and envelop it in a shattering or twisting distortion that usually wrecks or detonates it. Larger ships are basically immune to these devices as the small anomalies collapse on contact with their drive fields, and cannot penetrate thick armour. However they are quite effective as an anti-material weapon against lightly defended shipyards and similar. The other class are the large static generators, which use an evaporating singularity to catalyse the formation of large scale anomalies big enough to envelop a capital ship. These large, diffuse phenomena are difficult to detect and persist for years, but rarely cause severe damage. Instead they tend to trap ships for hours or days, throw them light years in a random direction and/or days through time, drain their fuel reserves, burn out sensors and generally produce a wide range of annoying and debilitating effects. The Kiroter'nah use a few ships specially equipped with this technology as mine layers, to disrupt enemy shipping and fleet movements.
Defences
Kiroter'nah ships rely almost entirely on distortion shielding for defence, which warps space to deflect beams and projectiles away from the ship instead of absorbing it. Under fleet combat conditions this can occasionally result in friendly fire situations where the attack is redirected towards another Kiroter'nah ship; conversely in close attack against a massed enemy enemy fire may be redirected at other enemy ships. The distortion field is focused in this fashion by dedicated generators embedded in the ship's latticework frame; these cannot realistically be targeted while the shields are up, but once the shielding capacity has been overloaded they can be taken out to prevent the shields from being restored. Distortion shields can redirect the energy of explosions, including internal ones, but have a very limited capability against missiles (the generators pulse the shields and try to shred the missiles with a localised distortion, but this is a very unreliable technique). For this reason modern classes carry an extensive array of hyperkinetic point defence guns for dealing with missiles and fighters. A very few ships extend the distortion shield into a total space warp surrounding the ship, hiding it completely from conventional sensors (though advanced FTL based sensors may still detect it, particularly if it is using its own drive). To date only a few cruiser-class ships have been equipped with this 'immersion cloaking', which is limited by both its double-blind nature (the ship's own conventional sensors are also blocked) and the fact that it replaces the shields while in use. Still, it has proven invaluable for covert raids and assorted special operations.
Engines
All Kiroter'nah military craft are powered by neutronium-catalysed total conversion reactors. A chunk of supercritical neutronium is held at the centre of the reactor by powerful gravitic fields and allowed to evaporate at a controlled rate, releasing tremendous energy. Periodically the core is stabilised, pressurised and fed a stream of liquid lead fuel to replenish lost mass. Most ships have two reactors and can do this to one reactor at a time while cruising at FTL; single reactor ships can sustain up to a week of combat operations before having to take a few hours to perform the refuelling procedure. The major disadvantage of this technology is that catastrophic damage to the reactor will release the neutronium in a highly destructive manner. The core is designed to undergo controlled failure in a way that shoots almost all the mass/energy out in two beams away from the rest of the ship, which can be a nasty (and usually fatal) shock for an enemy ship caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kiroter'nah's fleet formations take this danger into account, while their self-destruct mechanisms merely disable the safeties and force an omnidirectional neutronium explosion. Ground facilities and civilian ships primarily use conventional fusion power due to these safety issues.
Propulsion at both STL and FTL speeds is normally provided by dual-mode amplifiers that modify the ship's global distortion field to create the desired effect. One result of this is that while Kiroter'nah ships have exceptional STL speed and agility under clear space conditions, their ships become progressively more sluggish under fire due to shield-drive competition and interference effects. Under very heavy fire Kiroter'nah ships are 'pinned' and much slower than typical conventionally powered ships. High-speed designs use dedicated second-stage STL engines coupled to third-stage FTL boosters for higher efficiency at the penalty of higher mass.
Other
Kiroter'nah posses a variety of advanced and unique sensor technology based on direct continuum coupling (such as causal ripple sensors and active micropermutation scanners, also used in their advanced long-range communication systems), but their conventional STL sensors are somewhat primitive. This left them at a serious electronic warfare disadvantage until very recently; the Kiroter'nah intelligence service has been focused on stealing and reverse engineering EW technology, while purchasing it from arms dealers where possible. All ship classes are equipped with direct displacement teleporters, which exchange two volumes of space (usually spherical) in an effectively instantaneous operation. Unfortunately these displacers consume a lot of power and are trivially jammable by enemy FTL systems, but they do bypass most standard shields and are useful for covert insertion and extractions as well as high-priority cargo movements (including extracting cargo from disabled enemy shipping). Finally research on combating the enemy FTL interference problem has borne some fruit in that the effect can be reversed (with special equipment) to use Kiroter'nah distortion fields to disrupt enemy FTL systems. A few of their ships are equipped with 'remote-resonance interdictors' for this purpose.
( 20 points spent on fast communications )
( 20 points spent on displacer insertions : special ops upgrade )
Planets
Haven : BrightHome of the SkyLords ( 32pt defences )
?fluff?
Ascension : GrandFactory of the ChronoFleet ( 24pt defences )
?fluff?
Colonies : Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Epsilon ( 4 x 10pt defences )
?fluff?
Outpots : Delta, Theta ( 4 x 5pt defences )
?fluff?
Facility Omega ( 7pt obfuscation defence )
Facility Omega is a secret military research and development facility, established at the start of the Kiroter'nah 'martial awakening' five decades ago. It has been responsible for developing the bulk of new weapons and defence technology since then. The outpost is not based in a conventional system but instead orbits a rogue planet; a gas giant ejected from its original system along with many of its original moons and now wandering interstellar space. Undetectable with conventional astronomy, the Kiroter'nah located it with active continuum distort scanning and constructed a secret base on the largest moon initially to develop the then-revolutionary Nexus class battlecruiser. Since then the original facility has been greatly expanded and additional mines, fabrication plants and testing ranges have been built on the other moons in the system. Although there are no active defences, the system's obscurity has been further enhanced with a network of radiation absorbers and warp dampeners, and a formidable fleet of experimental and defence ships is present at all times.
Installations
'Quantum Echo' class long range strategic scanner platforms
The paranoid and curious Kiroter'nah place a lot of value on spatial awareness, even at the largest of scales. These vast, fragile platforms fulfil the dual role of tracking enemy fleet movements and intercepting enemy comms traffic. Consisting of 75% passive continuum distort and causal ripple scanners and 25% active micropermutation scanners, they can determine fleet composition at a range of 300 light years and with careful focusing detect the presence of large space and land based installations at even greater ranges. There are three platforms, one each in the Haven, Ascension and Omega systems. The platforms are easily put out of action by even light attacks, but fortunately they are also very easy to repair, consisting primary of a signal lattice that can be reconstructed by simple assembly droid with a scattering of hardened amplifier and processing nodes embedded in it.
( 30 points spent on long range scanning )
'Disquiet' class long range strategic anomaly projectors
Ever since their abilities first started to fail the Kiroter'nah have been searching for a technological way to regain them. It is frustrating to know that the Progenitors could achieve precise control and bypass any defences the younger races could muster, yet their 'children' can only achieve crude effects that are blockable with relative ease. The most advanced practical product of this research to date are the two 'disquiet' platforms, which are to a limited extent able to punch through FTL interference and planetary shields with sheer brute force. Powered by a cluster of oversized annihilation reactors and sporting massive focusing arrays, these stationary installations can in theory induce minute timeline shifts and spatial fluctuations at a range of several hundred light years. This will not work on; only extremely predictable locations such as orbital stations and planetary sites can be affected.
The actual results of being targeted by the Disquiet are hard to predict. Beings should experience a series of minor discrepancies between what they remember and reality. Fine details in ship designs change. One syllable in a best friend's surname changes. An order for power generators changes into an order for power converters. The third and first in command swap around, and only half the staff notice the change. Geometry may be rearranged; rooms in a building are swapped over, parts get teleported into the courtyard, staff get trapped in endless staircases and hallways for hours at a time. Direct damage is highly unlikely, but the accident rate at the target location would shoot up while morale drops through the floor, production slows to a crawl, operations are fouled up and the weaker staff have nervous breakdowns.
The two experimental platforms are stationed over Haven and Ascension, though their true function is a state secret. Unfortunately they are still under development; they have insufficient range to target anything outside of Kiroter'nah space and their emitters tend to burn out after only hours of use. There are indications that a much larger and more powerful platform is under construction at Facility Omega, but for the most part these are only rumours, even amongst the Kiroter'nah strategic leaderflock.
( no capability since these don't actually work at the time of writing )
Extensive decoy facilities and strategic jammers
Due to both mild racial paranoia and as a continuation of the Kiroter'nah instinct to build decoy nests (to decoy away predators), the Kiroter'nah engineering corps has constructed an impressive array of fake shipyards, space stations, orbital defence platforms and scanner arrays. These constructions are merely thin hollow shells, but they are equipped with basic sensor spoofing gear to make them prohibitively time-consuming to distinguish from the real thing at anything longer than weapons ranges. Supporting this effort Kiroter'nah civilian vessels often make visits to the decoy shipyards, while precise locations of all military facilities are kept secret (in conjunction with dissemination of false locations). Finally numerous low-powered continuum distort devices are emplaced around the Kiroter'nah systems; while individually weak the combined effect is to confound navigation and interfere with long-range scanning of all spacecraft that do not possess the currently valid cancellation algorithms.
( 20 points spent on 'ablative' decoys to protect shipyards + facilities )
Ships
Revalation Class : Battlespace Monitoring Craft ( 1pt FF x26 )
4 x type I combined particle-laser emitters
8 x type I hyperkinetic guns (in quad turrets)
2 x class I general purpose spatial distortion generators
2 x class I defensive distort amplifiers
1 x class I neutronium annihilation reactor
2 x class I multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (60 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (40 total troop capacity)
The Revelation class frigate is one of the oldest designs still serving in the Kiroter'nah fleet, second only to the Paradox class. Essentially the original pre-military scout craft upgraded with what weapons can be crammed in to its small frame, the class has seen high attrition to the point that there are now less serving than there are destroyers. The craft is armed with four low-powered particle/lasers that can barely scratch destroyer armour, plus early design hyperkinetic guns in a cumbersome dual-quad-turret layout. Its normal role is scouting and screening; the high loss rate leads most veterans to refer to this role as 'reconnaissance by fire'. Despite or perhaps because of its limitations a deep respect has emerged for the scout crews, who have a strong camaraderie. The best scout crews are assigned to a dedicated deep penetration group; these elite crew are experienced at working around the limitations of their craft and delivering vital intelligence just when it is needed most. A replacement frigate design with twice the capability has been in the early planning stages for a decade now, but larger ships have manufacturing priority - and perhaps a certain amount of sentiment is involved in keeping this venerable class around as long as possible.
Relativity Class : General Purpose Escort ( 4pt DD x28 )
2 x type I light distortion wave emitters
8 x type I combined particle-laser emitters
24 x type I hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
3 x class II general purpose spatial distortion generators
5 x class II defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class II multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (180 total crew)
2 x habitation/troop carrier pod (200 total troop capacity)
A solid, conservative design contemporary with the Nexus class battlecruiser, the Relativity class plugged a size/capability gap that existed in the early Kiroter'nah fleet. The minaturised distortion wave emitters were considered a technological triumph at the time, and give this class a fair capability against cruisers even without heavy support. The combined particle/laser emitters provide capability against similar and smaller opponents, while a midlife upgrade installed newer dual-mount hyperkinetic turrets to provide a useful fighter and missile defence. The Relativity class has been in slow but steady series production for the last fourty years and can be found in all the primary Kiroter'nah fleets.
Contemplation Class : Rapid Interdiction Escort ( 4 pt DDI x8 )
8 x type I combined particle-laser emitters
16 x type I hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
3 x class II general purpose spatial distortion generators
3 x class II defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class I STL warp pod
2 x class I FTL bosters
1 x command/operations pod (160 total crew)
2 x habitation pod
1 x rapid displace cargo pod
Based on the Relativity spaceframe, the Contemplation class was based on the Kiroter'nah's early experience with convoy raiding. Initially shocked by races that could fight back effectively, many target ships escaped while many more Kiroter'nah ships were destroyed by local reinforcements while in the act of plundering cargo. The Relativity class includes miniaturised FTL interdictors sufficient to paralyse all but the biggest merchant craft and high-capacity displacers for rapidly plundering cargo from disabled vessels. Late in the design phase the ship's engines were uprated to allow it to keep up with the rapid attack force then being formed as part of the Kiroter'nah's new force structure. Unfortunately all accommodating this extra equipment necessitated reducing the ship's combat capability to that of a heavy frigate.
Stats : 2 combat + 1 FTL interdict + 1 fast
Voidwind Class : Rapid Attack Combatant ( 8pt CLG x12 )
2 x type I distortion wave emitters
6 x type I combined particle-laser emitters
12 x type I tracking anomaly generaors
32 x type I hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
4 x class II general purpose spatial distortion generators
6 x class II defensive distort amplifiers
1 x class III neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class II STL warp pod
2 x class II FTL bosters
1 x command/operations pod (240 total crew)
2 x habitation/troop carrier pod (260 total troop capacity)
The Voidwind class is a triple stopgap; an intermediate cruiser design to reinforce fleet formations while the Causality series was still in development, an early defence against the fleet carrier fighter swarm threat and a way to hit fleeing ships before interdiction capabilities were widely deployed in the Kiroter'nah fleet. The class was designed to intercept incoming fighter formations and decimate them with the then-newly-developed tracking anomaly generators, as well as destroy frigates and heavily damaged destroyers and cruisers, for which it was given a conventional armament equal to a destroyer's and enhanced engines. Today the class serves primarily in a rapid assault role, particularly shredding escorts when convoy raiding. One notable weakness is the poorly protected reactor; due to being rushed into production a single large reactor was used instead of the usual dual design and it is prone to catastrophic failure under heavy enemy fire.
Stats : 4 combat + 2 fast + 2 anti-missile/fighter
Causality Class : General Purpose Combatant ( 10pt CA x16 )
2 x type II distortion wave emitters
8 x type II combined particle-laser emitters
40 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
4 x class III general purpose spatial distortion generators
8 x class III defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class III multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (400 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (300 total troop capacity)
The Causality class is a modern design of 'modular cruiser'; following on from the burst of battlecruiser construction represented by the Nexus class, the Kiroter'nah were able to dedicate significant effort to completely replacing their cruiser fleet. The old 'jack-of-all-trades' Quantum class was scrapped; economical production of multiple specialised variants was made possible by a common spaceframe and propulsion design which mounted two combat systems modules. The Causality class is the standard combat fit, possessing a pair of distortion wave emitters for anti-capship capability, modest particle-lasers for engaging destroyers and striking point targets on enemy cruisers, a full-coverage point defence suite and good shielding for its class. As with nearly all Kiroter'nah ships, they carry no armour, relying entirely on distortion fields to deflect and contain hits.
Requiem Class : Special Operations Combatant ( 10pt CAS x6 )
1 x total distort immersion cloaking module
12 x type II combined particle-laser emitters
20 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
4 x class III general purpose spatial distortion generators
4 x class III defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class III multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (400 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (300 total troop capacity)
The Requiem class is a dedicated deep strike platform, which is also highly favoured by Kiroter'nah intelligence for agent and special forces insertion and extraction. It mounts no heavy weapons and has a reduced point defence and shielding fit; instead it carries a powerful cloaking generator and an enlarged battery of combined particle/laser emitters, ideal for rapidly carving up frigates, patrol craft and merchant ships. Series production of this type was championed by the survivalist faction despite the very high development costs of the cloaking technology.
Stats : 5 combat + 5 cloak
Sapience Class : Infospace Enhanced Combatant ( 10 pt CAE x4 )
6 x wide field ultrasensitive causal ripple sensors
4 x tight focus active micropermutation scanners
8 x type II combined particle-laser emitters
32 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
4 x class III general purpose spatial distortion generators
10 x class III defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class III multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (500 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (200 total troop capacity)
The Sapience class devotes one module entirely to electronic warfare, focusing on detecting stealthy or cloaked ships and burning through opposition jamming. It carries no heavy weapons but has an enhanced self-defence weapon and shielding fit.
Stats : 5 combat + 5 EW
Hazard Class : Rapid Escort Destabiliser ( 10pt MMD x4 )
4 x type II singularity-primed static anomaly generators
4 x type II combined particle-laser emitters
20 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
4 x class III general purpose spatial distortion generators
4 x class III defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class III STL warp pod
2 x class III warp boosters
1 x command/operations pod (400 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (300 total troop capacity)
The Hazard class is the Kiroter'nah equivalent of a mine layer. This highly specialised craft is designed to speed in, drop a series of spatial flaws that spawn dangerous static anomalies, then get out before heavy defence forces arrive. It carries a limited weapons fit sufficient to deal with frigates and hold off a destroyer, but is not intended for direct combat. Instead the Hazard class can deny areas of space to the enemy, disrupt defensive patrols and convoys, and obstruct repair and construction facilities with dangerous hard-to-clear spatial warps.
Stats : 3 combat + 5 anomaly generator + 2 speed
Voyager Class : Covert Spatial Destabiliser (10pt MMS x4 )
1 x total distort immersion cloaking module
4 x type II singularity-primed static anomaly generators
8 x type I hyperkinetic guns
4 x class III general purpose spatial distortion generators
2 x class III defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class II neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class III multimode warp pod
1 x command/operations pod (360 total crew)
1 x habitation/troop carrier pod (320 total troop capacity)
The Voyager class is an extremely specialised ship created by combining the Requiem class cloaking module with the Hazard class minelayer module. The resulting ship is virtually unarmed, but can operate for long periods without resupply or detection, littering large areas of space with dangerous and seemingly inexplicable (to the enemy) spatial anomalies. In times of war these ships are intended to operate continuously in enemy trade routes and on the fringes of militarised systems; and indeed, rumours abound in the military leadership that they do so even in peacetime. Unlike the Requiem class the existence of the Voyager class is not widely known; the cloaking module is fitted with weapons barrels while the minelayer module has fake sensor dishes, to ensure that these ships are misidentified as Sapience class ships by any enemy observers that catch a glimpse of them entering and leaving dock.
Stats : 0 combat + 5 cloak + 5 anomaly generator
Nexus Class : Rapid Intervention Platform ( 24pt BC x5 )
4 x type II distortion wave emitters (in dual mounts)
12 x type III combined particle-laser emitters
80 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
3 x class IV general purpose spatial distortion generators
7 x class IV defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class III neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class III STL warp pod
2 x class III FTL bosters
2 x command/operations pods (700 total crew)
4 x habitation/troop carrier pods (800 total troop capacity)
The original Nexus design was the first dedicated capital ship design produced by the Kiroter'nah. Relatively conservative, it proved highly successful and formed the basis for several variant battlecruisers as well as serving as a pathfinder for the larger Chronostorm class. Of the ten original ships, five have been refitted to the block-40 configuration, which replaces the original quad-warp engines with a high-output triple stage system. Four Nexus-40s serve as the core of the raiding groups, bringing heavy multirole capability to distant theatres on short notice, while the final one is a dedicted fringe patrol and penetration craft. Three more ships were rebuilt into the Trajectory class, while two were lost to enemy action. A new production run is in the planning stages, but resources are currently being focused on battleship and cruiser production.
Stats : 20 combat + 4 fast
Permanence Class : Wide-Scale Interdiction Platform ( 24pt BCI x2 )
4 x type III FTL remote-resonance interdiction generators
12 x type III combined particle-laser emitters
60 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
5 x class IV general purpose spatial distortion generators
6 x class IV defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class III neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class III multimode warp pod
2 x command/operations pods (600 total crew)
2 x habitation/troop carrier pods (400 total troop capacity)
Stats : 12 combat + 12 FTL interdict
The Permanence class are a variant of the Nexus class dedicated to heavy interdiction of capital ship FTL. They can pin down an entire small fleet, a large mechant convoy or prevent damaged battleships from fleeing the fight. They lack distortion wave generators for attacking capital ships, replacing them with interdiction generators, and have slightly weaker shields and point defences. The Permanence class is instantly recognisable from a distance due to its numerous interdiction projection spines. Commanders try to keep this ship at the rear of the formation as it is a tempting target and no more capable than a cruiser in heavy fleet combat.
Trajectory Class : Heavy Close Assault Platform ( 26pt BCG x3 )
Stats : 16 combat + 10 anti-missile/fighter
12 x type III combined particle-laser emitters
32 x type II tracking anomaly generators
40 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
3 x class IV general purpose spatial distortion generators
6 x class IV defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class III neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class III multimode warp pod
2 x command/operations pods (800 total crew)
4 x habitation/troop carrier pods (800 total troop capacity)
The Trajectory class was constructed as a response to a growing appreciation for fleet carriers in the Kiroter'nah military planning community. While the carriers themselves could be engaged with long range distortion wave bombardment, this would not stop the fighters, which could easily dodge the primary armament and overwhelm the particle/ laser targeting ability (which were in any case needed to engage cruiser and destroyer targets). An uprated hyperkinetic gun fit was initiated for all heavy capital ships, but this might not be enough to stop fighter bombers inflicting heavy damage under adverse EW conditions. The solution was the Trajectory class, which deploys tracking anomaly generators in unprecedented quantities using multipole arrays. This class trades off general combat potential for the ability to unleash huge barrages of effervescent spatial flaws, which home in on and destroy fighters and missiles alike. Unfortunately this weapons system is useless against larger FTL capable ships, though it has a minimal capability against frigates and can do serious material damage to unshielded and weakly shielded static installations. Still an unproven design, one ship remains at the Omega facility undergoing further research on refining this system.
Entropy Class : Fleet Bombardment Platform ( 20pt BCZ x3 )
8 x type II distortion wave emitters (in dual mounts)
4 x type III combined particle-laser emitters
24 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
5 x class IV general purpose spatial distortion generators
4 x class IV defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class III neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class III multimode warp pod
2 x command/operations pods (600 total crew)
2 x habitation/troop carrier pods (500 total troop capacity)
As awareness of the precarious galactic security situation dawned, the Kiroter'nah desperately attempted to ramp up their fleet construction and modernisation program. Most worrying was the 'battleship gap'; many powers fielded over 10 battleships, while the Kiroter'nah had only 4 obsolete ships. A crash program to modernise the Paradox class was put in place, but the Chronostorm program could not be further accelerated due to the amount of new technology and shipyard expansions required. The Entropy class was conceived as a stopgap, fielding near-battleship grade firepower using only a reworking of existing components and facilities. The Entropy class mounts twice the long range firepower of the Nexus class it was based on, but true to the battlecruiser ideal its shielding and point defences are abysmal, a point glossed over by the Kiroter'nah news service who try to reassure their citizens that they are well defended. Still, while the class is a formidable bombardment platform it is very vulnerable to close range combat and is best kept at the back of the fleet behind a screen of more standard craft. One Entropy ship is present at the Omega development facility undergoing tests of a more power efficient distortion wave emitter system, that could potentially upgrade the standard Nexus class to this level of firepower with no loss in defensive capability.
Stats : 8 combat + 12 anti-capship
Paradox Class : Heavy Mobile Defence Platform ( 26pt DN x4 )
8 x type II distortion wave emitters
12 x type IV heavy combined particle-laser emitters
80 x type III hyperkinetic guns
4 x class IV general purpose spatial distortion generators
10 x class IV defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class IV neutronium annihilation reactors
2 x class IV multimode warp pod
1 x fleet command/operations pod (1100 total crew)
4 x habitation pods (1000 total troop capacity)
The Paradox class are the oldest hulls in service, based on the original exploration/intervention motherships that the Kiroter'nah used to use for toying with other species, messing with the timeline of entire worlds and taking choice artefacts and resources for their own use. They were wholly unsuited to military use, but due to the large investment of resources they represented they were refitted for combat operations. It is arguable if this was a worthwhile investment, as the ships are underpowered and plagued by poor speed and maneuverability (at STL and FTL). Their ageing core systems require a lot of maintenance and complicate damage control. Unlike the newer Chronostorm classes the reactors cannot operate synchronously, so no more than 50% of the ship's power can be diverted to any major system. Despite these failings, the Paradox class is still a force to be reckoned with due to its sheer size and number of weapon mounts; while the individually mounted distortion wave emitters are less than optimal for long range heavy bombardments, they are very effective against dispersed groups of cruisers and destroyers. The Paradox class are confined almost entirely to defensive patrols of the Kiroter'nah colonies and training crew for deployment to the Chronostorm flagships.
Stats : 32 combat + 4 EW (sensors/jammers) - 10 slow
Chronostorm Class : Prime Intervention Platform ( 50pt BB x2 )
6 x type III heavy distortion wave emitters (in triplex mounts)
16 x type IV heavy combined particle-laser emitters
120 x type III hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
6 x class V general purpose spatial distortion generators
13 x class V defensive distort amplifiers
2 x class V neutronium annihilation reactors
4 x class V multimode warp pod
1 x fleet command/operations pod (1200 total crew)
2 x habitation/troop carrier pods (3000 total troop capacity)
The Chronostorm class is a new design that completely retools the legacy Kiroter'nah large starship design for high-intensity military operations. The triplex-mounted distortion wave emitters are optimised for punching through jamming and distrupting enemy capital ships, instead of large scale alterations to undefended targets. Designed for brute force rather than finesse, they can inflict heavy damage at long range, though the slow propagation makes the weapon easy for smaller ships to dodge. The particle-lasers by contrast are precision weapons suitable for attacking point targets and disabling specific subsystems. They provide a general purpose, medium range capability against anything from frigates up to battleship subsystems. Finally the class mounts a relatively comprehensive although conventional point defence suite, with an overlapping network of hyperkinetic unguided guns ready to shoot down inbound missiles and fighters, with some capability against frigates and destroyers in salvo mode. The Chronostorms function as command ships and marine carriers for the first wave of ground invasions, and as such are heavily protected with the strongest available defensive distort fields. They even have a fair degree of armouring on the reactor modules, the only production Kiroter'nah type to mount significant armour. The Contactiphile faction has championed the production of this type for visible power projection, with the support of the Supremacist faction, and two further hulls are under construction.
'Destiny Star' : Strategic Dominance Platform - Experimental ( 120pt titan )
16 x type III heavy distortion wave emitters (in quadruplex mounts)
32 x type V heavy combined particle-laser emitters
360 x type II hyperkinetic guns (in quad turrets)
80 x type IV hyperkinetic guns (in dual turrets)
12 x class VI general purpose spatial distortion generators
20 x class VI defensive distort amplifiers
3 x class VII neutronium annihilation reactors
8 x class VI multimode warp pod
2 x fleet command/operations pod (3000 total crew)
6 x habitation/troop carrier pods (8000 total troop capacity)
The Destiny Star is an attempt by the Supremacist faction to create the ultimate fleet smasher, a symbol of Kiroter'nah power and superiority that will also facilitate the rapid defeat and invasion of weaker powers. Unfortunately the design is significantly beyond the capability of Kiroter'nah technology; the prototype is a patchwork of experimental systems with poor reliability and performance well below the specs. As such it is seen as a white elephant by the more realistic planners, but work is allowed to proceed in the hope that it will eventually lead to improved technology on the Kiroter'nah's conventional ships. The ship is usually docked at the top-secret Omega facility, but the worsening security situation may lead to it being prematurely authorised for combat operations.
Even considering its problems, the Destiny Star is an impressive accomplishment, easily equal to a pair of Chronostorm class battleships. The four quadruplex distortion wave projectors have a terrifying capability to transform whole enemy flotillas into twisted junk in a single salvo, though they are prone to emitter burnout. The formidable secondary armament is more reliable but suffers from fire control issues that prevent it from being fully effective, while resonance issues in the unique triple-linked reactor set-up can lead to brownouts at inopertune moments. The engineers still haven't completely solved the problem of synchronizing eight warp pods, so while the ship can manage a good speed while travelling in a straight line its maneuvering capabilities leave a lot to be desired. If the Kiroter'nah ever get this design working to full capability, it is projected to be as capable as four normal battleships.
Stats : 100 combat + 20 anti-capship
'Excession' : Planetary-Scale Time Destructor ( 100pt planet killer )
20 x class V defensive distort amplifiers
12 x class V multimode warp pod
4 x class V neutronium annihilation reactors
3 x class X one-shot neutronium-antineutronium burst reactors
6 x class X massive ordnance cascade paradox continuum crackers
1 x ejecting self-powered crew module (200 total crew)
The Excession terror weapon is the rallying cause of the Xenophobe faction. Unlike the Destiny Star, the details of which are secret but the existence of which is well publicised, knowledge of the Excession is restricted to the highest echelons of the Kiroter'nah military command. Essentially a giant guided missile, the Excession has strong shielding but no armament other than its primary warhead. On detonation it is designed to create a massive, persistent time storm encompassing an entire planet, exchanging millions of city sized areas across the surface with their counterparts randomly selected from the last 100 millenia. Even after detonation constant timequakes and shifts render the planet effectively uninhabitable for at least another century. It should be noted that these effects are only projections from tests on asteroids and small moons, as a full scale test has yet to be conducted. The Xenophobe faction envisions building a fleet of these devices to sterilise the homeworlds of all races who could challenge or threaten the Kiroter'nah. Cooler heads have restrained such an endeavour to date, holding the single Excession prototype in reserve as a retaliation option in case of full-scale invasion.
Stats : 0 combat + 100 planet killer
Fleets
Intervention Fleets (x2)
1 x Chronostorm class BB
1 x Entropy class BCZ
1 x Permanence class BCI
1 x Trajectory class BCG
2 x Sapience class CAE
6 x Causality class CA
6 x Relativity class DD
4 x Revalation class FF
The intervention fleets are the main power projection force. Each is built around a state-of-the-art heavy command ship. Ahead of the flagship is a Trajectory class to shoot down incoming fighter and missile waves, or slug it out with enemy ships at close range. Trailing is an Entropy class long range bombardment platform to blast enemy capships. A Permanence class heavy interdictor is usually held in reserve and employed to pin and destroy damaged enemies that try to escape. The cruisers and destroyers screen the battlecruisers and engage smaller opponents, with the two Sapience class ships providing the bulk of the fleet's EW capability. Four frigates are deployed at the fleet perimeter to detect sneak and flanking attacks.
Defence Fleets (x4)
1 x Paradox class DN
6 x Relativity class DD
2 x Revalation class FF
The system defence fleets are built around powerful but very slow obsolete battleships. The rest of the ships are largely used for training and reserve purposes. There is a nominal assignment of one fleet to each of the larger colonies, but they relocate as needed when incoming forces are detected.
Raiding Groups (x2)
2 x Nexus Class BC
2 x Hazard class MMD
4 x Voidwind class CLG
4 x Contemplation class DDI
The raiding groups consist of fast ships only (25% points on extra speed) and are used for attacking merchant shipping, intercepting small forces, spoiling attacks and finnishing off damaged retreating fleets. They include a limited interdiction facility and extra marines for capturing enemy ships.
Special Ops Groups (x2)
3 x Requiem class CAS
2 x Voyager class MMS
The two special operations groups consist of cloak-equipped cruisers and minelayers. They are available for sneak attacks on enemy rear areas, special ops insertion/extraction and space denial missions.
Scout Group
1 x Nexus Class BC
8 x Revalation class FF
The eight frigates constantly patrol the fringes of Kiroter'nah space looking for trouble. The battlecruiser is on permenant investigation and first responder duty, with a good chance of intercepting any small force that may have slipped past the long-range scanners. When required the scout group can deploy to monitor enemy space; the BC serves as a mothership with the FFs make fast recon runs through hostile territory.
Outpost Omega Fleet
1 x Destiny Star titan
1 x Excession planet killer
1 x Entropy class BCZ
1 x Trajectory class BCG
2 x Revelation Class FF
The two superweapons are currently undergoing space trials, while the two battlecruisers are weapons R&D platforms. Two frigates are assigned as pickets patrolling the space around the secret installation. However all ships are available to fight if the installation is located and attacked.
