SPD-502 Spad - 30t, TRO2750
Originally posted 10 Aug. 2005. All proposed fan-variants should be posted in the corresponding “FotW Workshop†thread. The other ‘slow light’ out of the SLDF’s ‘experimental’ school, the
Spad is actually quite nice from a fluff standpoint, as it is given much the same treatment as the CRB-27
Crab gets for the ground-forces: an absolute doddle to repair and maintain, the sort of bird where the maximum necessary fixes for even the worst hangar-queen are only a few plug-and-play modules, some speed-tape and a good healthy kick in the hydraulics to get back into the air to kick ass once again. ;D
Even smaller than the ZRO-114
Zero, the
Spad gets its 7/11 thrust-curve from a 150SFE, one of the lightest engines you’re ever likely to find in a starfighter. (It’s also found mainly in the lightest and most maligned of L1 ’Mechs, such as the COM-2D
Commando and the VLK-QA
Valkyrie, so if you ever need replacement powerplants.... ;)) The fuel load is the typical five tons - no real issue there. The armour is a
very healthy eight tons of standard plate, 46/25/32 - only the nose is protected against ML TACs, but only the nose carries weapons, so that’s not the issue it might be. The weaponry, though - exsqueeze me? This thing mounts a
particle projection cannon!? :o That’s a shedload of throw-weight for something this small, m’man. The ‘back-up’ weaponry includes a medium laser and a small, the latter on a (fluff-only) turret-mount with 360
o coverage against tail-gaters. With only ten SHS, though, the
Spad needs to make sure it doesn’t salvo all of its weapons two turns in a row.
(Incidentally, the nose-mounted weaponry, with the ML mounted in front of the cockpit but above and behind the PPC, is described as being the main reason for the type’s name, as it is reminiscient of ordnance layouts found in WWI fighters. Taken as referring to the ML alone, that’s fair enough, but if it’s meant to describe the whole weapons package, I don’t know which model of Spad biplane these guys were thinking of - the only Spads I remember mounted twin Vickers on the engine cowling; it was the SE-5a which mounted a heavy Vickers on the cowling and a lighter Lewis gun on an overwing rail. ::) Trust me: I read lots and lots of ‘Biggles’ novels when I was a kid. ;D That said, I’m told that there
were some models of WW1 Spad which used a hub-mounted cannon with a cowling-mounted MG, and I was always more of a follower of the RFC types than the French/American ones in any case.... [shrug])
Note well: as with the
Zero, despite being of SLDF origin every single component of this bird is stock-standard IS1 technology, so with the right line of BS, you can get away with folding them into a Succession Wars scenario and maintaining them in the era before the Grey Death Memory Core. }:)
Tactically, the
Spad is in a sort of no-man’s-land. It’s too slow to keep up with most other light fighters, but it would make a decent ‘dogfighter escort’ for many mediums and heavies - especially the SLDF’s 7/11 HMR-HD
Hammerheads, which have the same thrust-curve; the
Hammerheads have the heavy close-range punch, while the
Spads provide the defensive energy-weaponry the
Hammerhead itself lacks; similarly, the 7/11 LRM-boat RGU-133E
Rogue might appreciate the company. ::)
It’d also play well as a defensive platform for fixed installations, much like the
Zero and the GTHA-500
Gotha. It doesn’t have quite as much reach as the
Zero’s LRMs, meaning that the same ’bait-and-switch fire-support’ techniques aren’t quite as useful... but still, a PPC has to be respected, and if employed right the
Spad can be a downright pain in the
mik’ta. ;D
In the attack role, the external loads aren’t much to write home about - only six tons at 5/8 - but that same thrust-curve also means that you can pull a P-51D: max out on external fuel and escort the heavies all the way to and from target, only punching off your tanks when/if someone takes a shot at you. }:) And with nothing but energy weapons, it’s also a pretty good strafing machine; okay, a PPC, an ML and a dinky little SL aren’t enough to force a PSR on a ’Mech, but they’ll get his attention... and if you hit something
other than a ’Mech, well.... }:)
Taking down a
Spad? The two stock answers come to mind: speed, or raw firepower.
Standard interceptors can get inside a
Spad quite handily, but I don’t know that they’d be willing to risk a smacking from its PPC to do it, so you might want to go for the ‘high-end’ lights and low-end mediums, like the S-4
Sai, SL-25
Samurai or the (fellow SLDF!) HCT-213B
Hellcat II, which can out-turn (or at least hang with) the
Spad and have the armour and firepower to withstand its punishment long enough to do the damage themselves.
At the other extreme, a couple of salvoes from something like a THB-D36
Thunderbird or an AHB-443
Ahab will leave a
Spad much the worse for wear, and if you’re going to insist on dogfighting
Spads with a heavy, the TR-13
Transgressor might be your best bet - lots of Medium-range, high-hitting-power weapons to offset the PPC, and a 6/9 thrust-curve that can
almost keep up with the lighter machine. Personally, though, if I had to take on
Spads with heavies I’d stick with slashing attacks - bearing the
mantras in mind, you don’t want to turn with the other guy when a turning fight is what he craves. ::)
Of course, this sort of listing might not be complete without mention of the SL-17
Shilone, whose combination of Long-range/high-throw-weight, decent energy weapons, 6/9 movement and great heat dissipation makes it perhaps the ideal ‘utility’ medium starfighter. (You might have noticed by now that I have a certain fondness for that bird, much as I just don’t ‘get’ the DC itself. In all honesty, I can’t quite explain that myself... no, wait, that's not entirely true. “I don’t shoot a man for being incompetent in the Devil’s work; I shoot him for being
competent in the Devil’s work. A certain admiration for his technique is a necessary part of the process.†:D)
[VARIANT PROPOSAL(S) REDACTED] All proposed fan-variants - including my own - belong in the corresponding “FotW Workshop†thread: http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,3088.0.html Be advised: the attached .txt transcripts of previous runs of this thread contain numerous reader-proposals for variants. I’ll try to change those out for ‘sanitised’ versions of those threads when I can, but I can’t promise it’ll be soon - that’s a lot of ground to cover. ;)
