Post by New Dornalia on Jul 12, 2016 21:48:19 GMT -5
The Mijolnir-Valkyrie, artist's conception
OOC: Edited Starscream's name a bit and your part for grammar, OG. ND.
OOC2: Updated to reflect current usage.
IC:
The Jormungandr-Valkyrie Transformable Fighter-Bomber is the mainstay of the Colonial Republican Marine Corps and Naval Air Arm, for fighter-bombing and when things really need to be blown up.
Origins
Development
The merger of the United Colonies of Kobol saw the implementation of new technologies and designs into one armed body. Part of this push to produce upgraded weapons and such with this new technology involved the improvement of military aircraft.
Initially, the United Colonial Fleet's starfighter arm debated what to do with the Komsomol Mark III fighter-bomber, seeing as how its unorthodox transformable nature was not previously utilized by Colonial battle strategy. Indeed, several Admirals pushed for its decommissioning, until Admiral of the Fleet De Bruyn pushed personally for the salvation of the class in starfighter service--in particular, as part of the newly redesignated Marine Special Aviation groups, which would provide air combat performance equivalent to that of the RL US Marine Corps.
However, even with modifications and refinements to the Komsomol III using advanced technologies, a new fighter was needed. A redesign was called for by a blue-ribbon panel, which fielded designs from Shirow Armaments, Triumph Engineering, Thatherton Armaments, and others. The result was a radical design manufactured by Fort MacAllister Military Reservation Special Laboratories. Renamed Jormungandr-Valkyrie, after a combination of its original class name and its "beastly" strength, it is commonly known as "Valkyrie" owing to simple shortening, or the "Starscream" noting it's similarities to that Transformer, by Colonials.
This new design, like the Unity Fighter and other improved ships, integrated advanced technology developed by Tennenbaum Laboratories to improve combat performance without adding too much extra weight and compromising other performance characteristics. Additionally, the gunsights were changed to those on the RL F-35 Lightning, among other modifications such as the MARISA Targeting System.
Operational History
The Jormungandr-Valkyrie initially was the "silent bass player" of the Dornalian side of the UCK. Serving quietly in Miradeth and in other naval conflicts, it was mostly known for being a reliable, solid design that could provide good ground support. It featured most infamously in the De Bruyn Raids as a plane providing overwatch, and made overflights on Tauron, and was also a star in the United Colonial Volunteer Corps for the Abh Empire.
However, the Jormungandr-Valkyrie really took off during the Civil War. Loyalist forces soon discovered that while a great dogfighter that had surprising speed for its size, it was an even better fighter-bomber. It carried a lot of munitions, and whether it was bombing ground targets with stunning precision or firing tons of missiles like nobody's business at spaceborne targets, the Mahdists quickly came to fear the Jormungandr-Valkyries with a vengance, making them a priority shootdown target. To make them further badass, the Hajarrans, beleagurered and operating under siege conditions, discovered the Jormungandr-Valkyries could actually serve as very competent Electronic Warfare platforms as well, with their enhanced ECM systems and top-notch scanners that let them spot for the older-model FGA.5s.
All of that culminated in a lot of shootdowns, and a lot of medals--along with an affectionate nickname--the "Valks."
Post-Civil War Upgrades
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The Jormungandr-Valkyrie have since been subject to numerous gradual service life extensions and upgrades since the Civil War and the birth of the Colonial Republic. Although even before then, it had received some refurbishment, it was during this post-war period that they began to receive some much needed TLC.
For the most part, these consisted of a variety of repairs and refurbishments found on RL aircraft, ranging from new weapons to structural repairs and rebuilds. Sometimes, these would be minor fixups, but at other times, such as with the Block 60 upgrades, they would be comparatively major (full structural rebuilds, addition of better radar-absorbing composites, for example). The Block 60 models battled during the Christmas War against the Ssi-Ruuk, and acquitted themselves well.
However, the experience of the Christmas War merely confirmed the obvious--that it was becoming a grand fighter bomber, in the tradition of the F-111, for example. The Marines loved that. But, the Navy wanted something like the Hajarran FGA.5s that could dogfight also. Thus, the stage was set for the most significant upgrade yet--the Mjolnir-Valkyrie series.
Mjolnir-Valkyrie Series
The Mjolnir-Valkyrie series is the collective name for the latest upgrade package to the Jormungandr-Valkyrie. Initially to be two platforms, it was quickly consolidated into one upgrade when the accountants began to hit people with small herrings over the sheer expense involved.
Concieved as a "mulitmission platform" geared to ground attack and support. It mainly focuses on allotting more space for tools useful for ground attack, such as radar absorbing composites and cloaking devices and enhanced handheld weapons for example. It also has a more diverse selection of anti-armor and anti-personnel ordinance and more energy to replicate said weapons in its replicator banks. It also has redesigned vectoring thrusters as well as enhanced engines, and better tracking and targeting mechanisms (the MARISA Mk. 100A1 series, based on the Clan Artemis tracking systems and the MARISA Mk. 100 system) for better acquiring fast moving targets and in greater numbers and range.
Note that this upgrades suite still retains significant anti-air capability; it retains a Colonial Jump Drive and an enhanced jump computer to enable quick battlefield jumps to get the drop on enemy forces and also retains and expands upon the ever useful suite of ECM and Electronic Warfare upgrades, including communication with other fighters to relay MARISA targeting data in real time.
Also, it comes painted in a nice shade of US ERDL, which is the standard Dornie paint scheme.
Side Note--MARISA
The Multiple Attack Response Integrated Specialized Attack Guidance System, or MARISA, is the Tennenbaum Institute's proprietary guidance system for directing multiple launched rockets at once at individual targets. It serves as one of the big reasons why the Jormungandr-Valkyrie is able to hit so many things at once.
How does it work?
MARISA uses scanning technologies formerly used with the Amethyst Anti-Cloaking system, which detected disturbances in neutrinos to "bust" conventional cloaking devices. MARISA uses a similar principle, broadcasting a scanning field projected over a broad array of frequencies at the targets in mind. Emphasis on "targets," as MARISA is aimed to take on multiple targets at once, so it operates on a scanning range and sweep that is projected in 360 degrees around the Jorumungandr, and broadcasts at multiple distances to catch people within its net. Combined with an IFF system that sorts out friendly fighters from enemies, the MARISA system immediately detects the multiple targets, and feeds them to an ordinary guidance computer for immediate tracking and destruction.
What's cool about MARISA, however, is that once it does this, MARISA also had the capacity to feed individual coordinates and calculations of each target to each individual missile. Thus, when fired in the usual Dornalian "Alpha Strike" protocol--whereupon a flurry of missiles is launched all at once--MARISA locks on to multiple targets, and effectively assigns each group of missiles a particular target, letting onboard systems do the trick. Thus, a swarm of missiles can effectively engage a swarm of targets.
MARISA has been recently upgraded with multiple-band "hitscan" scanners operating across multiple frequencies, ranging from microwave to neutrino to etc, and operates on both pulse-doppler and other frequencies; recent models have also dropped some of the more wasteful and noisy systems in favor of DRADIS-derived methods and Star Trek/Star Wars derived sensor bands as well. It has also added other amenities from the Artemis Fire Control System to enhance its tracking capacities in some models. It also now features redundant systems, namely in the form of independent sensor suites to ensure uninterrupted killing.