KOS-1A Koroshiya - 95t, TRO3145:DCMS
All proposed fan-variants should be posted in the corresponding “FotW Workshop” thread. The name
Koroshiya — ‘Killer’ — suggests that the KOS-1A is the heir-apparent to the DCA’s stalwart heavy, the SL-15
Slayer, and there are aspects of the design that make it quite worthy of that distinction. Ninety-five tons of surly disposition wrapped around a 380XLFE, the
Koroshiya is a well-considered example of what you can do with some of the cute techs introduced in
TacOps. The core elements would be recognisable to anyone who served in the Jihad era, and indeed may have been set by lessons from that wide-ranging conflict. All of the armament is nose-mounted, simplifying fire-control: twin HPPCs punch big, nasty holes in anything not mounting reflective armour itself (more on that in a moment), and an Apollo-enhanced MRM40 with two tons of ammunition follows up with a fearful number of five-point clusters to exploit those breaches, or ‘TAC out’ lighter-armoured designs. Twenty-one double heat-sinks cover the heat-burden of its entire armament, making it clear that the engineers at Wakazashi Enterprises
still do not regard ‘alpha-baby’ as an insult when it comes to their fighter-designs. Five tons of fuel are the ‘SLDF standard’ for aerospace designs, so there are no surprises there. The Angel ECM housed in the tail-section makes life extremely difficult for the people who try to get a clear bead on the ship. And the final, most crucial element of making the KOS-1A truly nasty lies in the armour: eighteen-point-five tons of armour,
reflective armour no less, wraps it up in a 103/71/51 pattern that just on its thickness would be immune to ML TACs across all aspects, and leave an LL hoping for stern-shots.
I say ‘just on its thickness’ because the
nature of that armour is key. For those of you who haven’t picked up
Tactical Operations yet, reflective armour reduces the damage of all energy weapons which strike it by
half, rounding
down — and the combination of low mass, decent throw-weight, good range and no ammunition requirements mean that the overwhelming majority of ASFs rely on energy weapons for most or all of their armament. That means that the usual rules of ‘what thresholds this bird?’ don’t apply; at an effective damage of a mere 2 points, the usual ‘ML metrestick’ is meaningless (unless you break out the ‘re-engineered’ models the Davions have developed), and even Clan ERPPCs can’t crack any point on the
Koroshiya but the stern. Large lasers? Forget it. Basically, reflec-armour is a revolution in fighter design, and the
Koroshiya is here to a] prove it and b] make everyone else hate life in the process.
There are fighters that appeal to the technically-minded pilot/player, the folks who prefer to think their way around corners.
At first blush, the
Koroshiya is not one of them.
The TRO entry’s fluff calls the craft a ‘battering ram’, and there’s a powerful temptation to use it in that fashion. The battle of Palmyra demonstrates the perils of succumbing: a unit of AFFS
Cutlasses that found themselves turned into a non-revertor force by the destruction of their carrier put their Gauss Rifles to good use, destroying a number of
Koroshiyas and their parent DropShips before dying like true sons of the Suns, ramming and killing a
Taihou.
Against energy-heavy fighters, the arrogance and ‘blunt-instrument approach’ bred by flying a
Koroshiya are well-founded: you can sneer at almost anything they can dish out, then deal out a horrific punch in return. Missile-heavy designs are in the same boat: even though the KOS-1A lacks AMS, it doesn’t need it in most circumstances, since most normal-style missile-racks are limited to five-point clusters and they can’t get any more TACs than the beams against a ship with baseline thresholds of 6 and above. However, either you or that attitude will die suddenly and brutally as soon as you come across something with a decent ballistic armament — like the afore-mentioned
Cutlass and its Gauss Rifle, or even an AoW-era
Vulcan with its twin AC/10s or an Ack-20-packing
Lightning.
I don’t know if the newly resurgent DCMS/DCA will want to use the KOS-1A in air-to-mud work, since it would be ‘interfering’ in the ‘honourable battles’ its ‘samurai’ are fighting. (Note the air-quotes. Do me a
favour.... ::)) Nonetheless, a Strike from a
Koroshiya will ring the bell of even an Assault ’Mech: twin HPPCs are very likely to punch holes in the armour of most non-RA’d ground-units, and a salvo of forty MRMs will both peel off huge sheets of what armour is left and reach inside to wreck critical components. Moreover, while a full load of external ordnance will drop the ship’s movement to a waddling 2/3, nineteen points of bombs will finish the job of ruining the target’s day for you.
As those brave martyrs proved at Palmyra, you
can kill the
Koroshiya with a sufficient supply of guts, though big-enough ballistic weapons or Thunderbolt-style missiles would be a great help. The counter-fighters named above would be a good place to start, as would the usual check-list of
useful tips and guidelines, but I’d also recommend looking into Air-to-Air Arrow Missiles (AAAMs), especially for fighters too light to mount ballistic weapons or T-Bolts in the 10-or-higher range. They may not kill a ‘Killer’ outright, but a twenty-point hit from an HE warhead will sure-as-hell remind the bastards that a sharp-enough sword
can hurt a Dragon.
Again, no Workshop from me. Not only is this a little soon to ‘fix’ a ship we’ve only just met, frankly I’m still trying to get my head around the wider range of toys the new era offers. :-\ For everyone else:
All proposed fan-variants belong in the corresponding “FotW Workshop” thread: http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,30090.0.html