Galaxy Domination Guide

Chapter 65 059 Shipbuilding List

Bai Zhongqi did not believe that a universe full of diverse races and civilizations within the game would mean the absence of advanced alien civilizations in the universe where Earth resides. Taking the Brain Worm as an example, it is a type of dangerous alien creature that, although it must parasitize within a human body, can undoubtedly steal human scientific and technological achievements.

It is inevitable that there are alien life forms more powerful than the Brain Worm in the universe. The fact that Earth had not suffered a large-scale invasion by alien civilizations over the years did not mean it would never happen in the future.

Especially since Iridium Star continually embarked on the path of universe exploration, it was bound to come into contact with many alien civilizations, and contact could mean conflict. Iridium Star must also possess a powerful armed force capable of defending the civilization of the Empire.

The Sacred Falcon, a class of main battle ship, was the latest in terms of technology, but when it came down to actual firepower, it was actually at the lower end among the Iridium Star main battle ships. The technology carried by R19 was not complete, and Bai Zhongqi needed to organize the Empire's Scientific Research Institute to fill in the gaps in the previous technology tree.

Since these technologies were generally stored in the database, redeveloping them would be somewhat easier than developing them for the first time. Right now, Shipyard 318 could build the strongest main battle ship available, which was the Bojiang Class Battleship built by the Empire 180 years earlier.

The Bojiang Class was almost twice as big as the Sacred Falcon Class and had more firepower than the Sacred Falcon. The Bojiang Class was also the Empire's first model of warship that was equipped with a Singularity Weapon and, in fact, it was the only type of battleship that possessed such a weapon.

When he used to play the game, Bai Zhongqi remembered clearly. The second ship of the Bojiang Class, the heroically named warship, encountered a malfunction with its Singularity Weapon during a rescue mission, which ultimately led to the destruction of the entire ship and became one of the most tragic accidents in the history of the Empire.

From that point on, the Bojiang Class was decommissioned from the Universe Army of the Empire after barely half a century of service, and the Singularity Weapon became a historical term among the doomsday weapons of the Empire.

The so-called Singularity Weapon, as the name implies, directly created an unstable singularity to achieve a terrifying gravitational collapse. Enemy warships and even celestial bodies at the collapse's center would be directly attracted by gravity and sucked into the gravitational singularity. After a brief construction of the singularity, it would burst and eventually disappear.

Iridium Star's physicists were temporarily unable to explain why a singularity would erupt until it disappeared after its formation, nor where the matter absorbed by the singularity had gone. However, this did not prevent the people of Iridium Star from transforming it into a doomsday weapon, which they preferred to call the Black Hole Weapon.

The subsequent wars proved that this weapon had huge energy consumption, required a long preparation time, demanded numerous escort ships for protection, and was also prone to malfunctions that could lead to the annihilation of one's own forces, rendering it basically immature as a weapon.

Therefore, during its late service, the Bojiang Class had its Singularity Weapon dismantled, additional turrets were piled on, and after only a few years of service, it was replaced by newer battleships.

Maintaining a main battle ship consumes vast amounts of resources, and Bai Zhongqi did not intend to embark on the construction of main battle ships like the Bojiang Class until the resources and economic strength of Iridium Star reached a certain level. Although he had postponed the construction of the main battle ships, Bai Zhongqi was not going to give up on building other main combat vessels.

Within Bai Zhongqi's list of buildable warships, the current Fleet's Rampaging Bear Class Heavy Cruiser was a good choice. It was a ship designed and constructed during the major conflict against Spiral Mosquito Star, characterized by its low cost, simplicity, and use – in other words, a large cannon fodder that was affordable to deploy.

The current Fleet's Flying Bear, an old vessel from the Spiral Mosquito Star war, had participated in over twenty large and small star battles during the latter part of the war, even sinking enemy warships, making it quite a meritorious ship.

However, even the efficiency-driven people of Iridium Star felt that having a warship like the Rampaging Bear Class, mainly equipped with only a few Electromagnetic Accelerator Cannons and launching Plasma Warhead Missiles, was somewhat unworthy of the United Empire; thus, nearly two thousand Rampaging Bear Class were launched during the war, half were mothballed as soon as it ended, then another quarter were dismantled, with successive retirements following.

Today, less than a hundred remain in service with the United Empire Universe Army.

Of course, what the people of Iridium Star looked down upon was still out of reach for Earth at present.

Bai Zhongqi thought that a Heavy Cruiser costing about the same as two Escort Ships was definitely a more cost-effective combat force. It could be built relatively quickly and deployed in large numbers to the Star Alliance Fleet, and could even be used as a main battle ship if necessary.

Bai Zhongqi also had a tendency to combine existing Iridium Star technology, working with the Empire's Scientific Research Institute and the Empire's Military Equipment Bureau to develop a new cruiser.

The cruiser would be able to house an even more powerful main cannon and utilize newer technologies, especially propulsion technologies, thus allowing it to truly act as a main battle ship on occasion.

When playing games, Bai Zhongqi felt that cruisers were a somewhat awkward class of ship. Except for carrier cruisers, which were still widely used in the Fleet for air defense and regional reconnaissance, the status of pure heavy cruisers had fallen a lot.

The Empire Fleet was powerful, and for basically every mixed mission Fleet, a main battle ship could be allocated as the flagship, a firepower that heavy cruisers couldn't match. Plus, heavy cruisers couldn't compete with destroyers and escort ships in terms of multi-tasking (jack-of-all-trades) capabilities and cost.

Hence, the typical configuration of the Empire Fleet usually comprised a main battle ship leading a group of smaller ships, making the appearances of heavy cruisers over a thousand meters in length quite rare, with no new ones recently built.

Now, however, Bai Zhongqi faced a completely different situation. With less consumption than main battle ships and fiercer firepower than escort and defense ships, cruisers suddenly became very important. Bai Zhongqi sought to continuously build heavy cruisers to fill the strength of the Iridium Star Fleet.

Small and highly flexible ships were something Bai Zhongqi also planned to build in large numbers. The Dart Class was undoubtedly a very excellent anti-air escort ship, but for the moment, Bai Zhongqi had no particular need for large-scale anti-air defenses.

Bai Zhongqi needed more balanced all-rounders that could embark on various tasks including reconnaissance, exploration, escort, rescue, and landing support—versatile destroyers or escort ships.

The Axe Halberd Class destroyer was one that carried a small planetary bombardment weapon and could reach lengths of over seven hundred meters, possessing very balanced combat capabilities and excellent versatility. Basically, from fleet battles to landing operations and even planetary bombardment, the Axe Halberd Class could meet common interstellar warfare needs.

Traditionally, people would also call ships equipped with planetary bombardment weapons (that are not main battle ships) planet-killer ships, so the Axe Halberd Class could also be referred to as the Axe Halberd Class Planet-Killer Ship.

The Tai'a Class frigate, only slightly larger than the Dart Class anti-air escort ship, was a type of comprehensive frigate. Although it cost more to build than the Dart Class, its applications were much broader.

These two types of escort and defense ships were also from the older generation of Iridium Star vessels, essentially phased-out weaponry, but Bai Zhongqi thought, all things considered, that their combat capabilities were not much weaker than the newest main escort and defense ships of the Iridium Star United Empire from before he crossed over.

Unlike the stark difference between the naval warships of the early 21st-century Earth and those from the World War II era, there had been considerable technological innovation with Iridium Star interstellar warships, but the advances in firepower were not particularly drastic.

Take main caliber weapons for example, Iridium Star warships had stabilized their energy output for almost a thousand years. Obviously, over these thousand years, weapons with equivalent output had reduced energy consumption, decreased cost, increased rate of fire, extended range, etc., but there weren't any significant improvements in terms of striking power.

This was mainly related to the level of enemies, as in the last thousand years, there had been no need for Iridium Star to develop main cannons with greater energy output (larger calibers), so Iridium Star continuously perfected its existing weapons.

When it came to selecting technologies on the tech tree, Bai Zhongqi focused more on some less popular military and civilian technologies, hoping to create unexpected chain reactions.

Shipyard 318 was set to have one super-large dock and nine medium docks, with a construction cycle lasting up to 45 days. Bai Zhongqi estimated that within six months to a year, the combat strength of the Iridium Star Fleet, excluding main battle ships, could increase by more than fivefold from its current state.