Vehicle of the Week: Monitor Naval VesselThe Monitor Naval Vessel is the brainchild of entrepreneur Robert Habeas, who observed that while there were a great many blue water patrol vessels, the few units available for riverine operations were generally converted civilian patrol boats. Since riverine and littoral environments are precisely the sort of place you frequently need to patrol, especially in fighting guerillas, that's a bit of a problem. Habeas didn't have the money to ship and assemble the units themselves, so he hit on a different approach with his new Nav Hull venture: shipping them kits where they can supply their own hulls and engines. While that's not as simple as it sounds (combat vehicle engines and internal structures are somewhat different in performance terms from support vehicle manufacturing), it's not a huge problem for the governments that can afford to invest in true combat vehicles, especially ones as heavily armed as the Monitor, for doing that sort of job. Built on New Samarkand, the kits have been shipped all around the Periphery and Inner Sphere, and crews generally find duty boring. Most worlds simply don't have threats on that level all that often, meaning that Monitors tend to keep the lid on quite nicely.
The primary (and only detailed) Monitor variation is described in TRO3039. At 75 tons, it's right on the edge of the top end of the heavy vehicle category, with a 195 ICE of various brands providing the motive power to sustain a 54 kph top speed. Not great but adequate in close quarters like the Monitor is intended to operate in. The armor plating comes to eight tons arranged 22/22/22/40. If you're wondering why the turret is so heavily armored, that's because it came from the original design that way. That's right, original design. Specifically, the Demolisher. Nav Hull just navalized the design and stuck it on, twin 185mm ChemJet class 20s and all. You only have three tons of ammunition, though, so you need to pick your shots, but anyone trifling a Monitor at short range won't live to regret it. Each side and the rear has a Harvester 2k SRM 2 sharing a common single ton of ammunition while there's 1.5 tons of infantry bay for a squad of jump infantry. Two things are probably missing to the conventional naval design in this size range, but when you remember what the Monitor is supposed to be doing, it all makes sense. A hydrofoil would be vastly faster, while you'd think someone might remember the torpedoes, right? Well, let's go back to where the Monitor's primary operating zones are. They might be useful in a littoral zone, but in a lot of riverine environments, the increased draft of a hydrofoil can be a serious headache. Not so much in game terms, sure, but in the universe, it increases the number of places a Monitor can get into, especially in the tight, constrained terrain where those autocannons are going to be such a horror. Those same situations tend to keep torpedoes to a minimum - submarines can theoretically operate in surprisingly shallow depths but doing it has a nasty tendency to run aground.
Usually, I'd start laying out the variants here, but since they're not in RS3039 Unabridged due to production difficulties, that's a little harder than usual. We have some broad thumbnail sketches. You either get faster, losing an AC/20, although where the other ton went is one of those little details no one mentions. (I somehow doubt gthat it went into upgrading to a Gauss rifle in the Succession Wars, but you could fit a Thumper into the space if you need a riverine artillery boat.) The other variants go the opposite direction, slowing down to mount an intriguing sounding three lighter autocannons or more armor. I'm not sure I'd go that way personally - losing all that speed is going to make you a sitting duck for the
other popular denizens of the river world, hovercraft - but it's an option, definitely.
Monitors are best kept to the watery equivalent of the same roles Demolishers operate in: Tight quarters or as the guard component of a larger force. Unfortunately, that last part runs afoul of the limited number of surface vessels slow enough that a Monitor can keep up. On the rivers, though, they can be used to deny a waterway to someone, cruising along it and daring an opponent to react. In deeper waters, a few Sea Skimmers of whatever type or various hovers can be added, allowing them to either drive opponents toward the Monitor, or hide somewhere while opponents trying to evade the Monitor blunder right into a fast reaction unit. It can also serve as an escort to river barges.
If you can, attack a Monitor from below. They're quite literally defenseless against torpedo strikes. If you
can't, focus fire and try to punch the armor out from outside its reach. AC/20s are AC/20s, whatever you might be riding in, and you don't want to deal with that kind of firepower if you don't have to. Beyond that, it's another vehicle. Crit-seekers to cripple it if you get the opportunity, then pound it down with sustained fire.
References: The Master Unit List only has the
original variant up since we're still lacking sheets for the others, but we do have a miniature in the colors of the merc unit
Kraken Unleashed.
