The Shipyard: Earth Alliance CAS-320 "Shepherd" Starfury Transport for use in A Call to Arms

The Earth-Minbari war was a catastrophic defeat for the Earth Alliance even if 'technically' they were victorious with the Minbari surrendering at the Battle of The Line for unknown reasons. The unstoppable Minbari advance had left the military and orbital infrastructure of human territory devastated and in the immediate aftermath of the war the Earth Alliance struggled to secure their borders against both neighbouring powers and raiders with the limited number of ships that had survived the war.

A Pair of Shepherds Join some Tethys VBSS and a Tethys Police Leader on Patrol in 2249

With shipyards churning out Dreadnoughts, Heavy Cruisers and the new Omega-Class destroyer as a priority to secure external borders against aggressors, the small number of medium sized ships that survived the war were left massively overstretched and with Raider activity on the increase, an interim solution was required.

One of the solutions was the CAS-320 "Shepherd". The design brief required a ship capable of operating from areas with limited or non existent orbital infrastructure, the capability to deploy Starfurys, which combat experience in the Earth-Minbari war had shown was the Earth Alliances most effective weapons platform, and the firepower to engage and destroy Raider ships. Able to operate from planetary surfaces which had suffered far less than orbital facilities and fast and easy to construct the Shepherd was quickly adopted by the Earth Alliance and rapidly put into service with the first one being designed, built and deployed just 5 months after the Battle of the Line. Production continued for some time but was gradually reduced and then stopped as the raider threat was reduced and the Earth Alliance fleet and orbital infrastructure was rebuilt. By 2260 the shepherd was relegated to small backwater planets with very little in the way of infrastructure and is set to continue in service for some time to come.

Designing the ship

The Shepherd is a ship design that appears in the Babylon Project Earthforce Sourcebook. I don't know of anywhere else it has been explored but technically as the Babylon Project is a licensed product it is a canon design and Tyrel Lohr has made an STL for it. The design in Babylon Project has a ship with minimal armament but I felt that it should have more firepower to justify the cost of 1 Patrol point

A pair of Shepherds engage Shokan Raiders attacking civilian liners

As a small fighter carrier the ship bears some similarities to the Hermes but a conversion with only small changes would leave it as too similar to the Hermes. The defining feature of the Hermes is the Jump drive, whereas the Shepherd is atmospheric. Atmospheric is a feature that is not relevant very often so a swap of these features would simply mean the Hermes would be taken in the majority of situations. What is needed is a completely new design.

I took the Tethys Police Leader as the basis and reduced the firepower, the ship having only shorter ranged weapons and lacking the main laser, while also removing the Command trait. It does have a significant, if short ranged armament which will stand it in good stead against more lightly armed and armoured opponents, but as it is only hull 4 it will quickly succumb to even lighter weapons fire. The Fighter component is limited to Aurora Starfurys only as I would envision the ship being designed as an emergency stopgap with no provision for future Starfury development. There is also the fact that the Thunderbolt is an atmospheric fighter itself so wouldn't need the Shepherd to take it from a planets surface to orbit, and the Badger is a very specialised design.

What we end up with is a Ship deploying a single fighter, is fairly fast, very well armed at short range and is fragile. It lacks the jump drive and missiles that make the Hermes such a great choice so other than acting as an initiative sink it can't influence the fight unless it closes with the enemy.

What do you think? Is this a ship you would use in your games? What would you change?

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Miniature STL's by Tyrel Lohr
Miniatures painted by me
Photography by me.