One Wild Explosion Maker

[Knight26]

Ok, now the Ferals offshoot cousin, tentatively named the Untamed. It is an offshoot of the original feral design when it was strictly a stategic bomber. Around about the C or D model the Feral continued on its role of capital ship killer and the Untamed was borught about as the heavy strategic bomber. Ferals are capital ship killers 1 or 2 Ferals can take down most capital ships if they get their torpedoes on target. The untamed on the other hand is an installation killer, designed to destroy star bases and large planetary installations. They carry as many torpedoes as most cruisers and are only rarely used. Ferals are medium range craft, able to make a few jumps out of system and have decent endurance. The Untamed can be out for months at a time and has enough range to make it all the way to the enemy homeworlds if ever needed. The UCSB holds off on using them in this role though, as most races find directly attacking a homeworld to be distateful and in some cases irredeemable. She has 72 torpedo tubes, each of which carries two torpedoes, yep that 144 torpedoes in one bomber. Anyway the rest of the history can come later heres the pictures:

[Knight26]

Standard texture is applied right now, i may or may not add more details later, and yes it holds an internal bomb bay for ground assaults. Anyway next picture shows it with the Feral-F to give a sense of scale, and yes the nacelles are massive enough to lower the CG to an acceptable level which is what mitigated the original redesign effort. I think it came out quite nicely though it will not feature as much in the books as the Feral.

Edited August 29, 2004 by Knight26

[Knight26]

Somthing I thought you all might find interesting, the SWACS variant of the Feral-F. Like the regular model Feral the wings fold in for landing, and now so do the large sensor arrays. I am debating whether or not to put the turrets back on for defense and possibly more sensor pods, maybe something like the underside sensors of the VE-1 maybe. Anyway let me know what you think.

[Knight26]

ANd, the landed configuration. As an SWACS it tends not to carry torpedoes but instead probes and sensor pods. Any thoughts on what it might need?

[Lynx7725]

The Untamed can be out for months at a time and has enough range to make it all the way to the enemy homeworlds if ever needed. The UCSB holds off on using them in this role though, as most races find directly attacking a homeworld to be distateful and in some cases irredeemable. She has 72 torpedo tubes, each of which carries two torpedoes, yep that 144 torpedoes in one bomber.

Hmm. maybe this isn't the right place to discuss this, but I'm starting to become very curious about the strategic and tactical application of naval assets in your realm.

Seems like there is no real need for defensive mobile assets (other than small crafts), since small crafts like your Untamed has enough firepower to kill installations (!) and enough range to threaten homeworlds (!!).

Depending on your technology (the concept, not the actual implementations) and various other factors, the ways of force projections would be quite interesting to discuss.

[Knight26]

Bascially in this war there are two side, the COnfederation (UCSB) and the Federation (GF). The COnfed Space Forces by their mandate are a defensive military, organized primarily around defending their own territory from outside aggressors and internal malcontents (pirates, raiders, terrorists, etc...) The GF on the other hand is an expansionist imperial military stretching out to take as many holdings as they can. Now, the Feral and Untamed are Confed Space Forces craft. The Feral works in the Space Forces Mandate because it is primarily designed to attack enemy capital ships and small bases. THe Untamed walks a fine tight rope though, as it is designed for destroying larger facilities and for planetary attack. I probably went a little overboard in the design and it may or may not be kept. Like I said though use of it in an offensive role to destroy a large installation or planetary base, especially that of a homeworld, is unlikely for the most part. Confed Space Forces would much rather capture a large space based facility, using special ops forces to disable before a larger force comes in to take it. It comes down to resource allocation, which is better run it with a large force, destroy the facility then have to deploy additional resources to hold the system while another base is built or deploy a smaller force to try and take the facility intact? Like I said before as well the Untamed is rarely used, something more for show then anything else, it's a lumbering hulk and most commanders would rather deploy corvettes to do its job instead because they are more survivable designs. I hope that clears some things up, we can discuss it more later if you like, but I am at work and need to get back to it.

[EXO]

I always think about how these would look in Maya or Truespace. I bet they would look so stupendous in a realistic looking pics. But I gotta say, you've come a long way from your blocky protos. I hope you can sell your books soon and they'll make a movie so I can see them in action.

[Nightbat]

Untamed gives new meaning to the term "Payload" I like it

Have you thought about extending the nacelles further outward making the

struts/Center wings longer

this way, they could jettison the nacelles and get the hell out of possible interception, it would then need an engine in the center fuselage, but it would make

the survivalrate a lot higher