Spacecraft Weaponry (Patreon)

Note : Apologies for this file being late, but it's kind of chaos here, with parliament being dissolved.

Also, I've gotten some less than safe for work art of Alexandra and Emilia from an artist friend, which is available on the discord.

While the weapons of the Old World are mostly unuseable as they are, many others have sprung up, borne of magic and ideas of the Federation, they govern the wars among the stars.

Prism :

Faster than Light. The venerable prism weapons are incredibly effective as always, if leaving a bit to be desired against most shields, but highly expensive, mass inefficient and slow firing. Generally built in two types, prism cannons, that are medium range weapons able to seriously damage a ship before closing to carronade range for the real fight, or prism lances, meant to perform artillery duels among the stars and fight missile boats at their maximum range.

Carronade :

While the term is generic, a carronade in the Imperial era is a short ranged gun firing a bolt of incandescent energy that is not quite plasma, though for many purposes it behaves similarly. The king of space warfare, many battles are decided once the fleets close to carronade range. Rapid firing, cost effective and highly destructive, their only disadvantage is their woeful lack of range.

Laser :

From recovered weapons of the Old World to prisitine weapons built by the Inner Core's staryards, lasers are returning to space warfare. While they are far less mighty than they used to be, a pulsed laser may still deal damage comparable to a carronade at three times the range. They are, however, immense energy hogs, requiring either mundane power generators to keep running or a small mountain of mana.

Fusion :

From the humble fusion gun to the gargantuan solar lance and stellar howitzer, fusion weapons fire nuclear projectiles through a mixture of magic and technology. It is whispered that the technology existed under the Federation, and was being rolled out to the navy, but there is conflicting evidence. Either way, fusion weapons are the extreme end of high arcane and technology, and have so far only appeared in the hands of the Imperial Navy, for its tip of the spear fleet units.

Plasma :

Old fashioned plasma cannons, the mainstay of the Federation's knife fights, on the rare occasions that they were fought. Mostly built as point defence systems that could in a pinch be used to fight off enemy vessels, they are nowadays only used as slightly stranger carronades or premium point defence. Even greater energy hogs than lasers, they almost require a conventional power source to be viable.

Railgun :

The mainstay of Federation warfare, the railgun has fallen on hard times. Unable to match the ferocity of the carronades or the range of prism lances, they are now a salvaged mid range weapon timidly trying to challenge the mighty prism cannon. Nowadays railguns are mostly salvaged to be used with guided projectiles equipped with momentum drives, negating their biggest problem of travel time and effectively turning them into glorified missile launchers.

Shard :

As with ground warfare, shard weapons are an imitation of the Old World's pulser weaponry. Highly effective and dangerous, they fire extremely rapidly and use surprisingly fast projectiles, with highly compact and thus easy to bring to bear builds. Overall, excellent point defence weapons, though they severely lack in armor penetration and range, as all kinetic weapons do.

Pulser :

With the failure of hyperspace and most artificial gravity technology, Federation pulsers are so much junk.

Missile :

The old reliable, missiles have changed much since the days of the Federation, trading hyperdrives and gravity generators for momentum drives. They may not decide the battles between great fleets anymore, nor most fights for that matter, but they remain the single most flexible weapon available to anyone and thus remain in mass production despite their shortcomings.