Design

The Mars, sharing a name with a much older general purpose spacecraft from the dawn of space flight, is a sign of the dire times ahead of the Directorate; it is a fully developed dedicated battleship, the largest dedicated warship produced by the Jovian Systems to date. Its main armament consists of eight dual Megabolt turrets, firing spherical plutonium warheads which undergo criticality under the hypervelocity forces of impact. Two turrets are on the dorsal bow, two on the ventral bow, two on the dorsal stern, and two on the ventral stern, giving the ship a devastating broadside. Most of the defense turrets are located on the ships sides, with torpedo launch tubes aimed forwards, upwards, downwards, and sideways built into the side chambers.

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The development of the Mars was long and costly, as it was difficult to design a recoil mechanism that could withstand the power of two Megabolt railguns firing within a turret simultaneously.

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In addition, the Mars is equipped with the most powerful energy shields and armor of the Jovian fleet, as well as a full command suite, electronic warfare, and even an EMP generator. Large hangar spaces and quarters are available for infantry, enabling the Mars to launch planetary campaigns as well as function as a warship.

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This makes the Mars the most expensive and certainly the most powerful Directorate ship to date, able to withstand several hits even from the powerful Ascendancy Longbow dreadnoughts, and its point defense systems can deal with large quantities of Ascendancy swarmcraft at once. The Mars was designed as a flagship, as it is the only ship in the Directorate fleet durable enough to reliably protect its commander for some duration of time.