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Post by Insano-Man on Jan 17, 2019 17:04:43 GMT -5
This topic is a child of the Harvester Drones article directory.MADE TO EATHarvester drones have no consistent design templates. They rely on a steady stream of spare parts, either stolen, salvaged, or produced by their own, improvised manufacturing facilities. Further still, most units are produced for a specific task, and are retrofitted for generalized performance once that goal has been met. These factors combined result in an incoherent appearance that has often been likened to a roaming ball of scrap metal. Despite their looks, it is these traits that make harvesters deceptively adaptive; most are cheap to replace, easy to maintain, and readily modified for new assignments. SECTIONS- Artificial Intelligence Core- Size & Role Classifications
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Post by Insano-Man on Jan 17, 2019 17:05:12 GMT -5
A.I. CORE
There is only one common feature across harvester designs. Most harvester drones, be they heavy spacecraft or small service drones, carry an artificial intelligence core that governs every facet of their behavior. It most often takes the form of several palm-sized layers of memory fiber, making up the core's storage drive. The storage block is further encased in a set of simplistic quantum processors. Supporting equipment is laid out around the block in however a fashion available space dictates. Additional electronics are primarily augmentations; the AI core is capable of acting out all harvester behavior by itself.
A common component yet to be identified is an inexplicably-empty canister of varying size placed as close to the AI core as possible. Its purpose remains entirely unknown, and it does not appear to contribute any significant function to the AI itself. Armed harvesters often have far larger canisters. Harvester fleets and colonies engaged in protracted combat operations produce units with even larger canisters. This effect is further intensified in meatscapes; some harvesters may be built with their canister taking up as much as half of their physical profile.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jan 17, 2019 17:07:09 GMT -5
SIZE & ROLE CLASSIFICATIONSIt must be emphasized that harvester drones do not maintain any common production patterns. Each unit is potluck in its most extreme. Long-lived harvesters may steadily accumulate in parts and mass as time goes on. Consequently, the following list of common models is primarily a list of weight classifications, and even these are guidelines rather than concrete rules. Size, weight, equipment, and capabilities are all at the mercy of harvester whimsy. No two are ever the same. - The most ubiquitous of common harvester units are maintenance drones. Despite their name, maintenance drones are used for a variety of assignments extending beyond equipment maintenance. They are applied to various mining, industrial, and general labor tasks, in whatever capacity they are needed. They can take the form of either flyers, used primarily in orbit and aboard ships, or ground drones, used on Set's surface and asteroid bases. Ground drones are most often manufactured with a varying count of multi-jointed limbs reminiscent of a crab or spider. Both varieties sport tool arms on swivelling or articulated mounts, usually - but not always - for their intended task. Maintenance drones are rarely larger than an adult human, and typically weigh an average of 120kg in flyers and 190kg in ground drones.
- Similar in stature to their industrially-intended counterparts, gun drones are the harvesters' infantry. Gun drones may be produced as flyers or ground drones. Flyers are universal in orbit, regardless of their location. Planetary colonies often produce flyers as scouts and skirmishers. Ground drones are most often tracked or wheeled, but legged gun drones are not uncommon. The defining element of all gun drones is their armored weapon system. Most carry small arms, but rare examples of cannons and even missile launchers have been encountered in the past. Gun drones often lie low to the ground relative to average human height. Most weigh in at an average of 160kg in flyers and 240kg in ground drones.
- A step above maintenance drones are utility drones. Utility drones are heavy industrial units intended for major repair work, mining activity, and cargo handling. As with their smaller siblings, they are split between flyers and ground drones, and vary immensely in both categories. Some are octopedal salvage cutters laden with claws and mining lasers, others are nothing more than three wheels under a loading crane. Likewise, many mining models are armed and armored so heavily that it can be difficult to distinguish them from combat-oriented designs. Utility drones average a size on par with heavy motor vehicles, and weigh in at a rough average of 15t.
- In the combat class above gun drones are armor drones. Armor drones are to gun drones what utility drones are to maintenance drones; heavy combat units with heavy weapons and heavy armor. Large-bore cannons, railguns, and particle projectors are common weapon systems. Flyers in this class are primarily used as light fighters, but many are used as boarding transports for gun drones. As with gun drones, ground units favor tracks and wheels. Legs are rare and mostly restricted to rough terrain or low gravity. In tune to their name, armor drones have an average size similar to light armored fighting vehicles. Their weight follows the same trend; 20t in flyers, 35t in ground units.
- The heaviest harvesters that do not qualify as spacecraft or structures are assembly drones. Assembly drones are mobile construction platforms of varying size. They are most often used by deep mining operations to help refit harvester units for unexpected obstacles. Others are used for emergency repairs on critically-damaged harvesters. Others still are used as assault platforms for ship boarding operations, where salvaged ship parts are used to immediately build new harvesters for the fight. Assembly drones are typically the size of a small house, and have an average tonnage of 110t.
- Areas with high concentrations of harvester activity may see the deployment of command drones. Command drones are as their name suggests; they serve as mobile communications centers to help better direct harvester efforts in a given area. Their duties also include use as defensive hardpoints and cyberwarfare platforms in combat operations. Some may be outfitted with small-scale construction equipment, enabling them to serve in a similar capacity as assembly drones. The average size of a command drone is usually twice that of an armor drone. Their average weight is similar, at roughly 75t.
- Light droneships are corvette-sized spacecraft. Unlike smaller harvesters, there is no clear-cut distinction between industrial craft and combat craft. Some can serve as one, both, or neither. Some seem to exist simply because the harvesters had no other productive outlet for their resources. Some are transports, some are warships, and some are nothing more than stolen garbage haulers desperately trying to find a reason for being. As much as they lack for purpose, light droneships have left the biggest mark of all. Ships in this class are the driving factor behind the spread of harvesters throughout orbit. Component to it is their combined tonnage; more light droneships exist than all other varieties put together.
- Medium droneships are frigate-sized spacecraft. Like light droneships, medium droneships have no distinct role, and many occupy multiple roles simultaneously. Unlike light droneships, medium craft are exclusively constructed with an intended purpose. Most serve as flying factories for smaller harvester fleets, usually accompanied by an escort of light droneships. Most associate only with smaller ships, but it is not unusual for medium droneships to form pairs, trios, or even quartets. Similarly, smaller medium droneships often serve as escorts for heavier craft.
- Heavy droneships are cruiser-sized spacecraft. As all other harvester spacecraft, heavy droneships are not engineered for any specific task. They serve as mobile fortresses, coated in weapons, construction facilities, and strike craft hangars. Most are built from stationary platforms, such as the remains of an asteroid base following the consumption of its parent asteroid. Others are medium droneships that have simply added enough mass to their hull to ascend a weight class. Accordingly, heavy droneships are scarce - and rightly feared.
- A theorized, but yet-unencountered form of harvester craft is the superheavy droneship. Superheavy droneships are hypothesized battlecruiser-sized or dreadnought-sized ships. No evidence exists of a superheavy craft ever being constructed, but analysis of captured harvester AI cores suggests it as a possibility. Further, several major derelicts have been attributed to harvester drone construction along the outer periphery of the Scuttler Slice. Each of these skeletons could have eventually constituted a superheavy craft, given sufficient time and resources.
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