TGDB.net - Game news, cheats, solutions, walkthroughs, trainers, saved games and much more!

MAX VELOCITY: 390 m/s
MASS: 9900 TONS
Special Action: Swarm
During the Homeworld wars, the Puppeteer class drone frigate was an excellent idea that arrived ahead of its time. While the Puppeteer could surround itself in a sphere of remote turrets, the drones lacked maneuverability, and once they were destroyed, the unarmed Puppeteer either retreated or was destroyed as well. This lack of adaptability quickly relegated the Puppeteer to light anti-strike craft roles and rear area guard duty, where its weakness would not prove quite so deadly.
Seeing potential in a design that other Kiith were quickly abandoning, Somtaaw engineers went back to the drawing board both with the frigate itself and the drones. The major breakthrough in drone design came from studying the attack swarms used by the protectors of Khadesh. Using that technology as a baseline, engineers were able to design and build their own Swarmer drone fighter, which retained the firepower of the old static drone but combined it with full maneuverability and a combat AI. Now that the drones were able to control themselves, the space aboard the command frigate that was being used for drone techs and their equipment could be utilized for weaponry.
The result of all this design work is the Hive class ADF, a heavily armored frigate armed with twin medium mass drivers in a fixed forward mount and having the capacity to launch and maintain six Swarmer class attack drones. The Hive's mass drivers are not powerful enough to handle another capital ship all by themselves, but are very effective in supplying heavy fire support for the Swarmer wing. While the Hive is a much more rounded combat craft than the Puppeteer, it is still vulnerable to massed strike craft attacks if its compliment of Swarmers is destroyed. Hive squadrons will often enter combat first and use their drones to draw fire away from more valuable manned strike craft, and then retire for a few minutes to rebuild their Swarmer compliment before returning to battle.
Required Tech - FRIGATE DRIVE
MICRO SHIP CONSTRUCTION
Upgrade Tech - ENERGY CANNON
REPAIR BOTS
ADVANCED FRIGATE DRIVE
ARMOUR LEVEL 2
ARMOUR LEVEL 3

"Sentinel"
Class defence pod
Mass: 21 tons
Firepower: 290
Armor: 350
Coverage: 15%
Maneuverability: high
Max. Velocity: 250 m/s
Special Action: Shield
The Sentinel has the dubious distinction of being the smallest manned craft currently serving in any Hiigaran fleet. Microships were developed by Somtaaw engineers to function purely as remote drone craft, like the
Swarmer attack drone or the Leech breaching pod; the Sentinel was originally intended as an advanced mobile sensor platform. Unfortunately, as more and more design features were added to the Sentinel's specs, it quickly outpaced the control capability of even the most advanced AI. The final breaking point came when energy scientists came up with a compact force-field generator and added it to the Sentinel's systems. Flight
AI's were unable to cope with the distortions created by the polarized gravity fields, and this finally had tragic results during a live test, when drone Sentinels created a full strength field and slipped out of position, slicing
a Dervish frigate in half with a loss of all hands.
The Sentinel project would have been cancelled at this point if not for the efforts of a certain Aart ne Somtaaw, a rather vertically challenged junior member of the engineering team. After installing a rudimentary cockpit into the prototype and donning the lightest vacc suit he could find, Aart put the Sentinel through a punishing set of trials, using all the Sentinel's advanced systems and proving that powerful guns, long range sensors and a field generator could all function in one very small craft.
As a reward, Aart was put in charge of assembling the first Sentinel Squadron. Dubbed the War Dwarves by the rest of the fleet, these small pilots have one of the most dangerous and unglamorous jobs in the fleet: standing guard in tiny cans of plasteel, keeping an eye out for incoming threats and protecting thousands of their
Kiith mates aboard the larger ships of the fleet.
Required Tech - MICRO SHIP CONSTRUCTION
Upgrade Tech - ENERGY CANNONS
FORCE FIELD LEVEL 1
FORCE FIELD LEVEL 2
FORCE FIELD LEVEL 3
ADVANCED SENSORS
ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Leech"
Class breaching pod
Mass: 26 tons
Firepower: -
Armor: 30
Coverage: -
Maneuverability: very high
Max. Velocity: 1250 m/s
Special Action: Leech
The Leech is the most sophisticated drone in the Somtaaw fleet, and is designed to get in and heavily damage enemy ships in situations where a conventional attack craft would be destroyed in seconds. The Leech is designed to be stealthy and evade all conventional sensors, so that it can come right up to an enemy vessel and clamp on. The drone is unarmed except for a payload of molecular acid, which it uses to bore through enemy hulls so that it can access the plasma drive conduits. Once bonded to the enemy ship, the Leech uses the enemy ship's own drive plasma to melt through the hull, damaging it slowly. The Leech's AI is designed to infiltrate the enemy ship's systems and relay false messages, silencing damage alarms and repair routines; in general, the crew of an enemy vessel doesn't realize anything is wrong until it is too late. The Leech carries a resource pod as well, so that it can actually absorb the mass of the enemy vessel instead of simply venting it into space. This mass can be returned as raw materials to the Command ship, if required.
In order to stay in contact with the Command ship, but avoid having its transmissions picked up by enemy ships, the Leech uses a phased telemetry system that actually shunts part of the signal through hyperspace. It is rumored that Taiidani scientists are already working on a system that would detect these signals, but this would require a massive upgrading to advanced sensors.
Required Tech - PHASED TELEMETRY
Upgrade Tech - ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Deacon"
Class Destroyer
Mass: 28,000 tons
Firepower: 8500
Armor: 16,000
Coverage: 30%
Maneuverability: low
Max. Velocity: 325 m/s
Special Action: None
When the great Crusade against the Beast was in its darkest days, Kiith Somtaaw found itself desperate for heavier firepower and the capital ships to carry it. While research into Bentusi design philosophy would eventually bear fruit in the awe-inspiring Dreadnought, it would have not come in time had the Deacon class
Destroyer not been pushed into service. The Deacon was originally intended to be a new generation of heavy transports, but when the demands of war hit the Somtaaw fleet hard, the design was quickly modified while still on the drawing board. The Deacon's loading booms were scrapped and replaced with heavy ion beams in a fixed forward mount, while the 4 side-mounted point-defense turrets were replaced with medium rail guns to give all-around firepower. The most innovative addition was the dorsal mounted missile turret, which gives the destroyer a full 360 degrees of long-range hitting power-capable of tearing apart enemy frigates before they can get into range to return fire.
The Deacon's baptism of fire came at the battle of Coruc Farr, when two Somtaaw destroyers were left alone to hold off a Beast Heavy Cruiser and a full flight of infected strike craft. In the thick of battle, the lead destroyer, the
Naar-Tel, closed with the beast cruiser and was raked by an infection beam. As deck after deck of the Destroyer fell to the
Beast infection, the Naar's Captain made a desperate decision to vent drive plasma into the infected areas and then out into space. At the cost of gutting a quarter of his own ship and killing a sizable percentage of his own crew, the Naar's
Captain was able to keep his ship in the battle and help destroy the beast Cruiser.
From that day on, the Naar Directive, as it became known, became the standard response from Allied heavy capital ships to Beast infections. And, while the price in Hiigarian life is always high, instant death in a blast of high-energy plasma is preferable to the twisted immortality of becoming part of the Beast.
Required Tech - DESTROYER DRIVE
MISSILE LAUNCHER
ADVANCED ION CANNON
Upgrade Tech - ENERGY CANNONS
ADVANCED DESTROYER DRIVE
REPAIR BOTS
ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Shaman"
Class Carrier
Mass: 129,000 tons
Firepower: 4200
Armor: 65,000
Coverage: 80%
Maneuverability: very low
Max. Velocity: 300 m/s
Special Action: None
The Shaman class Carrier had been in development for some time before it was finally brought into battle.
This Carrier was based on Kiith Somtaaw's first foray into heavy ship construction, the Chieftan class Ore
Processor, and retains the same no-frills approach to capital ship building; engineers arrived at the design by upgrading the Chieftan's main power plant to support a military-class drive system and a PDA construction bay.
The Shaman is not an elegant Carrier, but it is durable, efficient and crewed by the best that Kiith Somtaaw has to offer. The two outboard bays are capable of launching and retrieving multiple strike craft, while the inboard
Frigate bays are guarded by heavily reinforced doors, capable of taking multiple ion beam strikes and still protecting the fragile construction and maintenance equipment within.
The Shaman was originally designed as the second phase of Kiith Somtaaw's expansion into deep space. With the two main Command Ships exploring and exploiting a sector, Shamans were meant to consolidate and help harvest multiple resource sites while the Command ships moved on. Their construction bays were never intended for anything more than building a couple of recon squadrons and acolytes for survey/guard duty; the frigate bay was there simply to build and maintain Worker class vessels. With the advent of full-blown war, however, the Shaman's bays were upgraded to full production ability, and room was made in what was supposed to be a resource hold for sleeper bays to support spare pilots.
In their combat role, Shamans will often construct a wing of Sentinel defense pods and operate behind their forcefields while supporting a fleet in direct combat. The Shaman's medium turrets are not meant to operate offensively, but they can still cause considerable damage to any slow-moving target that wanders into range. With repair bays so close to combat, Hive and Dervish frigates can afford to quickly pull back behind the Shaman's
Sentinel shield and dock with relative safety.
Required Tech - DESTROYER DRIVE
SUPPORT SYSTEMS
Upgrade Tech - ENERGY CANNONS
CRYSTAL HARVESTING ABILITY
REPAIR BOTS
ADVANCED DESTROYER DRIVE
ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Archangel"
Class Dreadnought
Mass: 152,000 tons
Firepower: 24,000
Armor: 85,000
Coverage: 80%
Maneuverability: very low
Max. Velocity: 280 m/s
Special Action: Repulse
Desperate wars require desperate measures, and the development of the Archangel class dreadnought was no exception. Even though Kiith Somtaaw was struggling valiantly, it eventually became clear that the fleet had no answer to the Beast version of the Taiidan Heavy Cruiser. And, while it would obviously take another full cycle for Somtaaw to research and develop the technologies needed to build the Hiigaran Avatar Heavy Cruiser, it was equally obvious that there would be nothing left of Kiith Somtaaw by the time a cycle of research could be completed!
Taking deep penetration scans of Bentusi tradeships, Somtaaw engineers tried to duplicate the radial binding design that give Bentusi ships their incredible durability and energy control. The experiments were less than successful, and dozens of engineers died as experimental alloys gave out under the incredible pressure to which they were subjected. Finally, as losses were threatening to push the Hiigaran fleet back into their home system,
Somtaaw engineers were able to produce a hybrid design that had some of the durability and power of a Bentusi craft and was still manageable with Hiigaran crews and technology.
The Archangel combines the best attributes of the Avatar Heavy Cruiser and the Taiidani Missile Destroyer, and shields it all in a hull of curved, bonded armor plate that deflects more damage than it absorbs. With 4 heavy turrets backed by 2 full missile banks, the Archangel initially had a powerful offensive punch, but was still vulnerable to flanking maneuvers that brought enemy fire in from the rear, where the heavy mass drivers couldn't reach. This problem was solved rather dramatically with the addition of two heavy ion turrets, which covered the top fore and bottom aft firing hemispheres. Once released into active service, the Archangel has proved devastating to Beast and Imperial forces alike, despite the fact it takes a crack crew to keep her power systems under control.
Required Tech - ADVANCED DESTROYER DRIVE
MISSILE LAUNCHER
ENERGY CANNONS
ADVANCED ION CANNON
Upgrade Tech - REPULSOR WEAPON
REPAIR BOTS
ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Chieftan Mk3"
Class
Ore Processor
Mass: 89,000 tons
Firepower: 2500
Armor: 45,000
Coverage: 80%
Maneuverability: low
Max. Velocity: 250 m/s
Special Action: None
Next to the Worker resource collector, the Chieftain is one of the most venerable designs in the Somtaaw fleet.
As its designation implies, the Chieftain is basically a massive ore processing and refinery unit, designed to take in cargo from workers in deep space and process it. While it is almost as large as a carrier, the Chieftain is mostly composed of vast storage bays and long processing lines. Duty aboard a Chieftain is hard, dirty work, but most of Kiith Somtaaw is more comfortable with the honest work of mining than the killing and dying of war.
The first Chieftains produced were strictly industrial ships; with 4 high-speed transfer docking pads for
Workers, they could strip an asteroid pocket bare in days. It was only after a series of attacks from Turanic raiders that the Chieftain was fitted with 4 medium mass driver turrets. As full war broke out, the Chieftain was yet again modified with 4 automated repair beams. Since there are no excess officers to manage these systems, the repair beams are under AI control, and automatically begin to repair any friendly unit in range.
Despite these changes, which have led to the Mark 3 version, the Chieftain is one of the few pre-war ship designs that has never brought aboard combat officers to help with managing ship systems and fleet coordination.
Every Chieftain that has ever been launched and every one that has been lost in combat to this date has been crewed by nothing more or less than the ancient soul of Kiith Somtaaw: the Miners.
Required Tech - HANGAR MODULE
Upgrade Tech - CRYSTAL HARVESTING ABILITY
ENERGY CANNONS
REPAIR SYSTEMS
REPAIR BOTS
ARMOUR LEVEL 2

"Explorer"
Class Deep Space
Mining Vessel
Mass: 613,000 tons
Firepower: 5400
Armor: 98,000
Coverage: 70%
Maneuverability: very low
Max. Velocity: 110 m/s
Special Action: Siege Cannon
The epic voyage of the Mothership proved that in order to survive the threats posed by a hostile
Galaxy, you had to have a vessel that was prepared to handle anything. Once it became obvious that politics on Hiigara would favor the most powerful families, lesser Kiith like Somtaaw realized that their only hope to achieve some sort of political and social autonomy lay in the stars. Already experienced in deep space mining techniques from their