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This article, Endeavour-class Assault Ship, was written by Ajax 013. Please do not edit this fiction without the writer's permission. |
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- "When I first saw the shells come down I thought it was a squadron of Petrel gunships. Of course, I saw towers collapsing straight away. Those weren't 120mm shells..."
- ―Corporal Jason McKellan
The Endeavour-class Assault Ship was developed during the very early 2600's, after it was found UNSC carriers where not ideal for performing in-atmosphere support missions, such as fire support and front line resupply. The Endeavour-class was designed to bring large marine forces to the front and support them for extended periods of time, with both supplies and direct/indirect fire support.
The resulting Endeavour-class was a heavily armoured warship, the size of a light cruiser and with massive internal storage space dedicated to troop storage, heavy armour, high agility and heavy energy shielding. The ship is incredibly agile in atmospheric conditions, through the use of four, powerful engines, with vectored thrust abilities. These engines are upscaled X-13 Series engines, with variable geometry. Normally fed oxygen by massive turbine fans, the engines can be fed by a carbon-diamond oxidiser for rocket fuel. The engines give it high agility in atmosphere, allowing it to nimbly move into position or even avoid enemy fire. It is primarily accelerated by two primary rocket motors to provide the majority of its forward motion. Internally, the ship holds a large troop bay, with a number of armouries and supply areas, a vehicle bay, an internal 'dead drop' bay for deploying larger dropships in large amounts and large flight deck with elevators to aircraft storage below, allowing the Endeavour-class to also deploy and receive STOL craft.
The Endeavour-class is armed with a series of 400mm dual turrets that move from recesses in the hull and can fire on ground targets designated by ANGLICO teams. It features a number of Naval Support Gun Batteries and Archer pods for long range defence against enemy warships. It features a number of phalanxes of Firestorm and Thunderstorm CIWS to stop incoming enemy fighters and missiles or even engage enemy ground forces with high precision. Its last weapon is a number of Marksman missile pods for high precision engagement of enemy ground forces in conjunction with ground forces.
The ship is capable of landing directly on the surface, with multiple elevators and loading ramps to distribute ground forces. At this point, with a combination of on-board dropships, shuttles and its flight deck, it can unload an entire Marine force and associated vehicles, supplies and bases in ten hours.
UNSC Comments
"When you a see a squadron of these girls hard burning through the atmosphere... You know somebody is getting an ass whooping."
"The thing is an almost fool proof method of bringing supplies and troops to the battlefield."
"We'd had wild weasel units pounding the ruins of New Kaliningrad, running out their surface to air missiles and surface to capital ship missiles, along with hitting any naval guns, meaning we were clear to go. Three Endeavour-class Assault Ships turn up straight outta the mist, releasing swarms of gunships and dropships. After the shock and awe had faded we had secured something like 67% of the city."
"The weapons layout is interesting...The four guns are all mounted on the underbelly of this monster at 12, 3, 9 and 6 'o' clock, meaning they can pound targets all 'round. The Phalanx batteries, MAC batteries and Archer Batteries situated all round give it pretty good self defence too."
Ships of the line
- UNSC Endeavour
- UNSC Ra
- UNSC Falcon
- UNSC Avenging Eagle
- UNSC Gathering of Fates
- UNSC Sledgehammer
- UNSC Anvil
- UNSC Thunderbolt
- UNSC Wardog
- UNSC McCawley
- UNSC Calvert
- UNSC Zeilin
- UNSC Electra
