"The Razor" Pirate Frigate (Converted Merchant Vessel):

Pirates are a major problem in the Three Galaxies, especially in areas of the galaxies away from the major powers. In places where major governments hold sway, pirates tread lightly. Most pirates avoid tangling with real warships because even when they win, they often lose because their ships are usually heavily damaged.

Pirates use a motley crew of different vessels. Some are military vessels that they have managed to acquire, most old and even truly ancient in many cases. Sources of such ships include scrap yards which are not careful with their ships although there are also cases where military contractors do not care much who they sell to. Companies such as Naruni will sell to anybody.

Most pirate ships are converted merchant hulls. Merchant hulls are far more common than warships and weaponry is also far easier to acquire than a warship. Merchant ships are far cheaper than warships in most cases. Conversion of merchant ships into pirate ships is done by the pirates themselves and often improvised to a large extent. While pirates are best known for converting merchant ships, conversions of merchant hulls into warships is not unknown by small militaries and mercenaries especially into escort carriers.

Most pirate ships tend to be fairly small although a few are cruiser sized. There are almost no pirate ships larger than cruiser class. Small ships tend to be far cheaper as well as requiring far smaller crews. Even so, pirates usually want a ship larger than a heavy fighter or courier because such ships carry too light a weaponry to be effective at capturing merchant ships. Such ships are popular among runners however..

"The Razor" is fairly typical for a relatively small pirate vessel. There is huge variation in pirate vessels converted from merchant hulls and almost no two vessels are exactly alike. "The Razor" is converted from a LOMAX light merchant ship originally named "LC Victoria." The LOMAX hull is a fairly popular hull for pirates to convert from to build pirate ships. They are both cheap and commons. It is unknown how the pirates acquired the merchant ship in the first place. Since in the hands of pirates, the ship has been modified several times and has gone through its share of captains, officers, and crew.

The most important part of pirate ships is the weaponry. While weaponry is important on true warships, sensor systems and other features are just as important. Pirate vessels often skip on defensive systems. The standard decoy and jamming systems usually carried on warships are often lacking. In this, the Razor is similar to many pirate vessels with its sensor systems mostly civilian in origins and lacking a sophisticate electronic warfare suite.

The main weaponry on "The Razor" are a pair of particle beams and a pair of capital missile launchers. The particle beams are most likely stripped from an old wrecked Hunter class destroyer. Because of the power limitations of the fusion plant retained from the merchant design, the pirate ship is limited to two of these heavy particle beams. Some pirate ships mount additional fusion plants to support additional heavy energy weapons. The capital missile launchers are an older Kreeghor type design with a total of forty missiles between the two launchers. These are modified so that a single missile can be fired. Often a single missile is fired so that a target can be threatened into surrendering. In addition, gravity well warheads are sometimes used to targets can be pulled from faster than light space. The specialty warheads such as X-Ray laser, heavy anti-matter, and heavy gravity wearheads are not available. Decoy missiles, while available, are almost never carried by pirates.

Defensive weapon systems are limited to those from when the ship was in merchant service, four light laser mounts and a pair of medium range missile launchers. In comparison, a Hunter class destroyer has twice as many point defense mounts as the Razor. The two medium range missile launchers have thirty-two missiles ready to fire each compared to five times as many in the missile magazines on a Hunter. As such, the Razor’s point defense is inadequate generally when compared to a true warship.

"The Razor" does mount military class variable shields. Many pirate ships do not mount anything more than civilian shields. Even so, the shields are only eighty percent as powerful as the shields carried on a Hunter class destroyer. The hull is unreinforced from civilian standards and the ship must be considered comparatively fragile. Compared to most warships, the vessel does have a large amount of cargo capability. Pirates like to be able to carry off any loot they are able to plunder. Weaponry does cut somewhat into the cargo carrying ability compared to what it had as a merchant ship.

While pirates try to keep crews small, additional weaponry does increase crew by around fifty percent compared to when it was a light merchant ship. The ship also carries forty troops for boarding ships which it manages to capture. About half of the troops are usually cyborgs or equipped with light power armors. Because the ship has no shuttles, it has to dock with a ship it captures or force it to land on a planet or moon before board. Commonly the pirate will order their target to shut down their fusion reactors down and will blow the engines out to prevent it from being able to escape. In addition, the Razor does not carry any fighters. Some pirate craft do carry a handful of light fighters.

The ship is also slow compared to most warships and only has about seventy percent of the acceleration of a Hunter class destroyer. It does have military class particle shielding which allows the ship to reach higher sublight speeds than most merchant vessels. In addition to having low acceleration, the pirate ship has a maximum faster than light speed of three light years per hour.

This starship design uses modified starship speed and weapon range rules. See Revised Starship Rules for Phase World / Three Galaxies for more details.

Model Type: Modified LOMAX Light Freighter
Vehicle Type: Pirate Frigate
Crew: 38 (6 Officers and 32 Ordinary Crew)
Troops: 40 (20 usually with light power armors or are cyborg troops)

Vehicle, Robots, and Power Armors:
Power Armors:

20Light Power Armors / Cyborg Soldiers (Maximum)

M.D.C. By Location:

Heavy Particle Beam Cannons (2, built into front):650 each
Cruise Missile Batteries (2, sides):800 each
Double Barrel Defense Laser Turrets (4):100 each
Medium Range Missile Launchers (2):400 each
Outer Hull (40 x 40 ft/ 12.2 m x 12.2 Area):100
Inner Hull (40 x 20 ft/ 12.2 m x 12.2 Area):75
[1] Bridge:800
[2] Main Engines (2):1,500 each
[3] Main Body:4,500
[4] Variable Force Field:800 a side (4,800 Total)

[1] In reality this is how much damage needs to be done for a weapon to hit the bridge through the ship’s hull. This ship does not have an auxiliary bridge. Even if the bridge is 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] Destroying the main engines means that the ship’s faster than light systems are destroyed and maximum sublight speed is reduced by half.
[3] Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will put the merchant ship out of commission. All internal systems will shut down, including life support and internal gravity. The ship itself will be an unsalvageable floating wreck.
[4] Shields positions can be varied and all could be combined in one shield. Shields regenerate at the rate of 5% (240 M.D.C.) per melee round.

Driving on the Ground: Not Possible.
Sublight: Has a special sublight engine that allows the ship to travel up to 20 percent of the. Star Ship can accelerate/decelerate at the rate of 0.70 percent of light per melee. Ship has had the merchant radiation and particle shields replaced with military shields.
Atmospheric Propulsion: Maximum speed is 450 mph (724.2 kph), can enter an atmosphere because flight system is using contra grav.
Stardrive: Uses a Gravitonic Drive system that allows the ship to reach a maximum of 3 light years per hour.
Maximum Range: Effectively Unlimited by either drive system. Carries about six months worth of supplies on board (Can be stretched to nine months in an emergency)

Statistical Data:
Length: 550 feet (167.64 meters)
Height: 68 feet (20.73 meters)
Width: 84 feet (25.60 meters)
Mass/ Weight: 8,800 tons (7980 metric tons)
Power System: Fusion with a 20 year life span. The ship normally only goes 5 years between refueling and refitting.
Cargo: Cargo holds are scattered about the ship that allows for carrying up to 3,000 tons (2720 metric tons) of cargo in addition to standard compliment of supplies and ammunition. Each enlisted crew member has a small locker for personal items and uniforms. Ship’s officers have more space for personal items. Most of the ship’s spaces are taken up by extra ammunition, armor, troops, weapons, engine, and other equipment.
Market Cost: Merchant hull costs approximately 100 million credits. Conversion cost approximately 200 million credits for weaponry, shields, and other systems.


  1. Two (2) Heavy Particle Beam Cannons: The mounts are identical to those carried in a standard Hunter class destroyer and are extremely effective. They can often devastate another destroyer in just a few shots and usually all three are concentrated on a single target. The weapons have good range although not useful against fighters and has standard penalties to hit small targets. One cannon is in the nose and the other two are on the sides mostly in the hull and are extremely well protected. The weapon system cannot be used to engage targets while traveling at faster than light velocities.
    Maximum Effective Range: 10,000 miles (16,000 km) in space and 20 miles (32 km) in an atmosphere.
    Mega-Damage: 2D4x100 M.D. each (4D4x100 Maximum for both)
    Rate of Fire: Each one can be fired up to one time in a melee.
    Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
  2. Four (4) 2.5 cm Point Defense Lasers in Double Mounts: Mounted on the top and bottom side of the vessel. All mounts can fire forward and aft. Each Turret can rotate 360 and has a 180 arc of fire. The weapon system cannot be used to engage targets while traveling at Faster than Light velocities.
    Maximum Effective Range: 2.5 miles (4 km) miles through atmosphere and 250 miles (402 km) in space.
    Mega-Damage: 2D6x10 M.D.
    Rate of Fire: Equal to the combined hand to hand attacks of the gunner (usually 4 or 5).
    Payload: Effectively Unlimited.
  3. Two (2) Cruise Missile Batteries: The older Kreeghor launchers could launch as large a volley as the newer launchers but were larger which reduced payload. These are further reduced to increase space. The ship carries batteries with ten cruise missile launchers each to launch cruise missile. Missile has a top speed of Mach 25 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 10% of light per turn (far faster than any starship) in space. Whether weapons can be shot down is calculated from the speed of target, launcher, and missile. When drive goes dead, missile will continue to travel in a straight line unless set to self destruct but has very low odds of hitting other starships (Great for hitting bases and planets because target does not move and missile, when unpowered, is at -25% to be detected.) Cruise missiles have minuses to hit small targets but are all considered smart missiles. Each battery can be used to launch against multiple targets but is rarely used that way. Launchers are modified so a single missile can be fired and whatever remains in the launcher can be flushed in a single firing. Most advanced warhead types are not available and pirates generally do not carry decoy missiles.
    Maximum Effective Range: Cruise Missile range is 8,000 miles (12,875 km) in an atmosphere and 4,000,000 miles (6,437,376 km/ 21.5 light seconds) in space.
    Mega-Damage & Properties: See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details (Fusion warheads inflicts 3D6x100 M.D.C. each.)
    Rate of Fire: Volleys of one or ten per launcher, per melee round, for a maximum of 20 missiles per melee (whatever the remained in the launcher can be fired as a single volley as well) Launchers are reloaded on the same melee and can be fired again on the next.
    Payload: 40 total, 20 cruise missiles per launcher (Standard Loadout is 36 Fusion Warheads and 4 Gravity Warheads)
  4. Two (2) Medium Range Missile Batteries: Each battery is on the port and starboard side of the ship. Missile has a top speed of Mach 15 in an atmosphere and in space has an acceleration of 6% of light per turn. Normally used for anti-fighter and point defense. Batteries can launch on multiple targets each at the same time.
    Maximum Effective Range: Medium Range Missile range is 160 miles (257.5 km) in an atmosphere and 80,000 miles (128,750 km/0.43 light seconds) in space.
    Mega-Damage: Varies with medium range missile type (See revised Phase World / Three Galaxies missile tables for details.)
    Rate of Fire: Can fire medium range missiles one at a time or in volleys of two (2), four (4), or eight (8) missiles per melee attack.
    Payload: Thirty-Two (32) medium range missiles per battery.

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Writeup by Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune).

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