Barrister class Patrol Frigate
| Barrister class Patrol Frigate | |
|---|---|
 Bringing the Law | |
| Type: HP Police Ship | |
| Category | ACS |
| Size | 1,000 Tons |
| Hull Configuration | Saucer Hull |
| Streamlining | Streamlined Hull |
| Tech Level | TL–15 |
| Engineering | |
| Computer | Model/8 with extra capacity |
| Jump | J-3 |
| Maneuver | 7 G |
| Armaments | |
| Hardpoints | 10 |
| Accommodations | |
| Staterooms | 0 |
| Personnel | |
| Crew | 44 |
| Officers | 5 |
| Enlisted | 39 |
| High/Mid Passengers | 0 |
| Payload | |
| Cargo | 7.0 Tons |
| Fuel tank | 0 Tons |
| Construction | |
| Origin | Third Imperium |
| Manufacturer | [[GSbAG]] |
| Year Operational | 958 |
| End of Service | Examples still operate post-Collapse |
| Price | |
| Cost | MCr1,076.0225. MCr968.42025 in quantity. |
| Architect fee | MCrAdrian Tymes |
| Statistics | |
| Quick Ship Profile | HP-KL73 |
| Images | |
| Blueprint | Yes |
| Illustration | No |
| Source | |
| Also see | Security Vessel - Police Ship |
| Canon | Published, fan design |
| Era | Third Imperium |
| Reference | EXTERNAL LINK: MGT Forums |
| Designed with Mongoose Traveller High Guard rules, but portable to other versions. | |
The Barrister class Patrol Frigate is a law enforcement starship.
- It is a paramilitary ship and a Patrol Frigate.
Description (Specifications)
It is a vessel with 7-G and J-3 performance. It has a streamlined saucer hull.
- It carries significant armament and a defensive suite.
- It ordinarily carries a Gig and ordinarily does not carry drones.
- It has a 44 sophont crew including 6 marines.
The Barrister class's intended primary mission is anti-piracy patrols, specifically to investigate likely pirate ships and seize them if investigation confirms their status. Standard operations are to lock down smaller ships using twin ion bays, then send the customized boarding gig - which, by combining its maneuver and reaction drives, can hit a combined 25 Gs long enough to cross to boarding range (able to move from Long range to Adjacent in a single round, or Very Long to Adjacent in two, with Thrust to spare). It is preferable to disable the entire enemy craft, but for larger enemies known to lack marines, just disabling enough weapons to create a temporarily safe approach vector for the boarding gig will suffice; the gig is completely hardened, so as to fly inside the ion beams if necessary. (Legends tell of small capital ships captured this way. A few of those tales are even true, but in every case the boarding team had luck and several advantages.) Anything too big or hardened for that approach can be addressed from a distance by the missile bay, or failing that, by escaping to summon the navy. Barristers fill the rest of their hardpoints with defensive weapons optimized against laser and missile fire; anything that nuclear dampers or meson screens would be useful against, are generally foes a Barrister should not engage in the first place. Although optimized for solitary operations, they can serve in a fleet as part of an escort screen.
As the purpose of this ship class is to capture ships, would-be pirate lords dream of piloting one, though few have been able to pull together the sizable (by pirate standards) necessary crew even when they could acquire a Barrister. The class designers deliberately opted away from using software to replace crew in order to frustrate such attempts. This is also the reason for double occupancy for all crew save the captain and officers. There are the usual grumblings about governments that are hard to distinguish from pirates, but almost all Barristers are operated by organizations that can make a credible claim to owning the systems they operate from, and as such know better than to capture ships that other nearby governments would object to the capture of, which keeps Barristers' targeting systems locked squarely on pirates, raiders, slavers, and other such widely disliked sorts. Thus, if an honest merchant winds up in their sights, usually the easiest way to get clear is to shut down engines and treat it like any other customs inspection. (In several cases this has caused a Barrister's crew to be so surprised that they fell back to following written procedure, including not firing the ion bays when the target stopped voluntarily, and letting the merchant go when inspection found no evidence of wrongdoing.)
Image Repository
Not available at this time.
General Description & Deck Plans
- Deck Plans for this vessel.
Basic Ship Characteristics
Following the Imperial Navy and IISS Universal Ship Profile and data, additional information is presented in the format shown here. [1]
| Basic Ship Characteristics [2] | ||
|---|---|---|
| No. | Category | Remarks |
| 1. | Tonnage / Hull | Tonnage: 1,000 tons (standard). 14000 cubic meters. Streamlined Saucer Hull.
|
| 2. | Crew | Crew: 1 Captain, 3 Pilots, 1 Astrogator, 5 Engineers, 2 Mechanics, 20 Gunners, 1 Medic, 6 Marines, 1 Administrator, 4 Officers. |
| 3. | Performance | Acceleration: 7-G maneuver drive installed.
|
| 4. | Electronics | Model/8 ship computer with extra CPU capacity distributed through the ship. |
| 5. | Hardpoints | 10 hardpoints. |
| 6. | Armament | Twin ion cannon weapon bays. One missile weapon bay. |
| 7. | Defenses | Type-3 point defense battery. Six turrets with mixed sandcasters and pulse lasers. |
| 8. | Craft | One boarding gig, optimized to carry the marines at high speed. Vacc suits required for EVA (extra-vehicle activity). Rescue Balls for crew escape normally carried. |
| 9. | Fuel Treatment | It is typically equipped with a fuel purification plant and fuel scoops. |
| 10. | Cost | MCr1,076.0225 standard (...no architect's fees: while the design is not standard, blueprints are readily enough available throughout the Third Imperium and beyond). MCr968.42025 in quantity. (These are the official average cost numbers according to GSbAG, which included the extended decimal fraction.) |
| 11. | Construction Time | 24 months standard, 18 in quantity. |
| 12. | Remarks | A police ship designed to disable and seize ships of a few hundred tons. |
History & Background (Dossier)
The Barrister was first manufactured in response to rising piracy concerns in Spinward Marches Sector after the fall of the Kingdom of Drinax, but soon spread to the Vargr Extents. Within a century, it was being sold in Gateway Sector, Hinterworlds Sector, and Reaver's Deep Sector. Efforts have been made to keep it out of the hands of the Solomani Confederation, though as of 1105 they have acquired and reverse-engineering examples, and have begun manufacture of knockoffs. The Aslan Hierate tends to see use of this ship as dishonorable, the K'kree see the internal spaces too small, and the Hivers see the ship as too blunt for their tastes. Suspiciously similar designs are known to exist in the Zhodani Consulate, but there is no direct evidence of industrial espionage.
It is more often seen outside the Third Imperium than inside, usually sold to client states facing rashes of piracy. (Inside the Third Imperium, the Imperial Navy often takes care of pirate threats significant enough to justify a Barrister, though a few Barristers serve as special operations ships within various sector fleets.) This was anticipated by the GSbAG design team, which took several measures to make sure the design would not be usable by true pirates (including to client states who wished to effectively be pirates instead of enforcing fair laws), such as designing above the technology level that pirates could usually hope to get spare parts for. Even client states typically have to purchase maintenance from GSbAG suppliers, at which time their logs and practices are reviewed, with the official purpose of keeping the users honest - which has deterred some would-be customers.
Class Naming Practice/s & Peculiarities
Ship Interior Details: A Barrister takes the shape of a flying saucer. Aside from the fuel spaces and landing gear, it is three coaxial cylindrical decks stacked atop one another, the central deck somewhat wider. None of the airlocks open to the side of the ship, but instead to the ceiling and floor, with extendible ladders or lifts. Unusually, the drives are all in the upper and lower decks, making these primarily engineering spaces. Most of the crew never leaves the rear half of the main deck, though airlocks are spaced around to provide quick evacuation in case of emergency. (More than one Barrister engineer, upon having to unjam the missile bay or realign the ion emitters mid-combat, has been reassured by this even if they did not need to use it.) The boarding gig nestles into the rear, protected by the bulk of the Barrister while undocking and docking. The bridge has gunners' workstations along the edge, with the rest of the consoles (for the captain, pilots, astrogator, and 3 of the officers; doctrine is that 1 officer must stay off the bridge during combat in case it gets taken out) arranged around a central holotank.
Sometimes, a Barrister is called upon to insert a small crew onto a planet through a blockade. In these cases, the boarding gig's forced linkage apparatus, breaching tube, acceleration bench, and laser drill are removed to make room for 6 g/bikes and more fuel, allowing the gig to make a suicidal dive from 100 diameter limit of even the largest habitable planets (size B or smaller; habitable worlds only go up to size A) down to the surface, decelerating at the midpoint so as to halt just above the surface and let its passengers dismount safely. The passengers stay seated on their g/bikes during the descent (the pilot and gunner - now co-pilot or sensor operator - still have their cockpit seats), which makes for an uncomfortable ride (and less safe, if the g/bikes are not securely locked to the hull - as they often are not, as unlocking them is one more thing to do during the hasty exit at the end). While this can often accomplish the insertion before any blockading ships can intercept, the gig rarely has any hope of making it back out, and so is set up to be abandoned and continue on autopilot until it is inevitably blasted from above, the g/bikes having been used to get the crew to cover and away before then. Plotting this escape route is done before the Barrister even begins its jump into the system, and the mission scrubbed if there is no delivery point that will allow a quick getaway. The Barrister will typically only make a jump 1 or 2 into the system, so as to have enough fuel to immediately jump out after the gig undocks.
Barristers are named after famous prosecutors.
Selected Variant Types & Classes
Paramilitary Ship - Security Vessel:
References & Contributors (Sources)
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- Marc Miller, Frank Chadwick, John Harshman. High Guard (Game Designers Workshop, 1980), 20-37. (Design Sequence Used)
- EXTERNAL LINK: An Alphabet of Ships
- Traveller Wiki Editorial Team
- Author & Contributor: Adrian Tymes
- Author & Contributor: Lord (Marquis) and Master of Sophontology Maksim-Smelchak of the Ministry of Science
- ↑ Timothy B. Brown. Fighting Ships (Game Designers Workshop, 1981), 10.
- ↑ Timothy B. Brown. Fighting Ships (Game Designers Workshop, 1981), 10.