The interstellar missile ship is also called the interstellar arsenal ship, or the interstellar firepower ship.
It takes the interstellar missile as its chief means of attack, for its hull holds within it vast magazines storing a great many interstellar missiles.
And because it is rather like a powder keg — the moment it takes an enemy hit, exceedingly perilous! — in fleet combat it needs, like a carrier, an extremely high degree of protection.
But at the same time, its short-burst firepower output is one that near enough no ship type can rival!
For the interstellar missile is a long-range interstellar weapon of extremely high hit-rate, with built-in guidance and lock-on.
Unless it's intercepted and destroyed, or the target ship leaves maximum firing range, it is certain to strike home!
And most important of all, its firing interval is exceedingly short!
For it needs no charge-and-cooldown; in theory it needs only the interstellar missile's loading time, and to convey one interstellar missile automatically from magazine to launch-silo takes under 10 seconds.
So an interstellar missile ship can, in the shortest span, loose off every one of its interstellar missiles, dealing an enemy fleet a saturation strike of firepower within a short window of time!
"This ship is fine, fine indeed — it's just…" Zhao Chen muttered inwardly.
This ship's strengths were plain, and its weaknesses just as plain.
It wasn't the being-prone-to-fall-once-hit part.
It was — it burns money like all hell!
The few interstellar missile ships among the T1 series and T2 series had long since been phased out.
The T3-series interstellar missile ships were exceedingly few in number too!
The reason was — it burns too much money!
For often, after an interstellar missile ship fully loaded with missiles carried out three to five saturation strikes, the build-cost of the missiles it had loosed came to the equivalent of building one standard ship of the same grade!
And those three-to-five rounds of attack, not counting the time to replenish the spent missiles, took, all told, under a dozen-odd minutes from first to last!
A dozen-odd minutes to fire off a ship's worth of build-resources!
Even the imperial military would find it hard to shoulder so high an ammunition outlay!
By comparison, an ordinary ship might well be the better value.
And so the interstellar missile ship had become a very out-of-favor ship; by what Zhao Chen understood, the Starlight Empire had only one model of interstellar missile ship still in service — and in exceedingly small numbers at that!
"Let me look at the detailed data first." Zhao Chen began, in his mind, to read the detailed data of this technical blueprint.
T2 Lion-King-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ship
Ship type: Interstellar missile ship
Tech grade: T2
Hull-armor strength: 130 units – 150 units
Cruise speed: 25 star-knots
Warp engine: Grade-4 warp engine
Hull length: 258 meters
Mass: 150,000 tons
Crew posts: 50
Ship weapons: 50-cell interstellar missile launch-silo, with a matched full load of 500 T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missiles
This T2 Lion-King's various attribute figures counted as fairly standard — but its loadout of 500 interstellar missiles was, by Zhao Chen's understanding, over two times greater still than the maximum load of even the phased-out T2 interstellar missile ships!
Truly a mobile firepower-output platform, one might say!
The attack power of a single T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missile was no less than the main-gun damage of a T2 battlecruiser!
Picture it — 500 T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missiles loosed in unison at an enemy fleet; how gorgeous a scene that would be.
But when Zhao Chen worked out the build-cost, a string of numbers trailing zeroes seemed to swim before his eyes.
One T2 Lion-King's build-cost was not high — only 1.5 million star coins, exactly the same as a T2 Queen Bee-class Heavy Carrier Starship.
This build-cost included the first matched batch of 500 T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missiles.
And of these 500 T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missiles, a single one cost a full 1,000 star coins!
Which was to say, for a T2 Lion-King to spend its interstellar missiles was the equivalent of firing off near 500,000 star coins' worth of supplies!
Three rounds of firepower output came to the equivalent of shooting a whole T2 Lion-King empty.
Zhao Chen covered his face — what manner of warship was this; this was plainly a "gold-devouring behemoth."
He now understood why even the Starlight Empire had no way to keep this ship in large numbers.
Bear in mind, what Zhao Chen had reckoned was only the build-cost!
Were it reckoned by sale price, that would be a figure dozens of times over!
"But by the performance, this T2 Lion-King of mine is several times finer in value than any T2 interstellar missile ship on record. And I have no way, in the short term, to keep a large fleet — this small-but-fine sort of ship suits me, in fact." Zhao Chen showed a thinking look.
Had Zhao Chen had even a single T2 Lion-King in the battle just past, dealing with one T3 Black-Iron-class Medium Interstellar Destroyer would have been child's play!
And as for the other T2 Mechanical Race warships, they'd have been sitting ducks!
Not counting interceptions, an average of 10 to 20 T2 Lion-King-class interstellar missiles could rob a T2 Mechanical Race warship of its combat ability.
Build it!
Zhao Chen steeled his heart — gold-devouring behemoth though it was, Zhao Chen would build it!
For as the ship-technologies Zhao Chen brought out grew ever more numerous, the risk of exposure was already, step by step, rising.
Take this very battle: Zhao Chen had shown a T2 carrier possessed of star-shield tech, and this news, he was sure, would reach certain scheming ears within a short time.
Before that, Zhao Chen had to have force enough to guard himself.
The interstellar missile ship would become a trump card in Zhao Chen's hand!
"Once we're back, I'll build a few first! Paired with the T2 Black-Rhino-class Interstellar Heavy-Assault Escorts! Shield and spear both — simply perfect!" Zhao Chen was much excited; he could scarcely wait, even, to lead such a fleet out and give it a round of true combat.
And just as Zhao Chen was daydreaming of these fine days—
Lilith reported a matter to Zhao Chen: they'd taken in a batch of crew from Shen Bing's T2 Hyena.
"13 crewwomen in all; they had flesh-wounds in the earlier fight, but all have been properly seen to," Lilith reported.
"Eh? Shen Bing's crew? How is it I know nothing of this." Zhao Chen looked at Lilith, taken aback.
Lilith looked at the commander, puzzled. "I reported it to you once just now… you said outright, 'good… good'; I took it you'd agreed. Shen Bing's T2 Hyena is gravely damaged, its ship-engine has failed too; by the look of it, it can hardly voyage back — it can only wait for a later interstellar repair ship, or rely on other ships to haul it home."
Zhao Chen was taken aback — it seemed that just now, absorbed in the matter of the T2 Lion-King, he simply hadn't heard Lilith's words clearly.
"In that case, settle them aboard our ship for now… oh, right — how is it they're all crewwomen? Are there no crewmen on Shen Bing's ship?" Zhao Chen asked, without thinking.
Lilith said lightly, as though it were nothing, "Those crewmen have all been arranged aboard Zheng Xiong's ship."
This Zheng Xiong was the smoking uncle.
As for why she'd arranged it so? Lilith loathed every male but Zhao Chen!