Luxor

Type: Cruiser
Introduction: early 28th century

Mass: 800,000
Sail Integrity: 5
Thrust: 3/5
Fuel: 3000 tons
Structural Integrity: 80
Armor: 1280 tons of ferro aluminium armor (768, 128+8 per facing)

Docking Collars: 4
Fighters: 18
Small Craft: 6
Crew: 250
Lifeboats: 12
Escape Pods: 12
Grav Decks: 1 150 meter
Cargo: 50,522

Bay 1: Fighters (18) 4 doors
Bay 2: Cargo (50,522) 5 doors
Bay 3: Small Craft (6) 2 doors

Weapons:

Fwd
4 Heavy Naval PPCs
4 AR 10

FL/FR
4 Heavy Naval PPCs
4 AR 10

LBS/ RBS
4 Heavy Naval PPCs
4 AR 10

AL/AR
6 Naval Autocannon 25s


Overview:

Built to replace the outdated Avatar, the Luxor was intended to serve as a 
heavyweight picket ship and escort to the larger battleships and 
battlecruisers that made up the core of a battlefleet, combining the picket 
abilities of a frigate with the firepower of a heavy warship of the line. 
Luxors were also often assigned to patrol the League member states in order 
to help maintain security in troubled parts of the Inner Sphere and in 
general show the flag. A handful also served as command ships for groups of 
frigates and destroyers.

The Star League built two Luxors a year from 2725 to 2760, however the SLDF 
high command ended their construction of the ship after that, at least 
partially to focus on other cruiser classes like the Sovremenyy, Milwaukee, 
and Sovettski Soyuz. The Soyuz in particular was heavily favored by the 
powers that be over the Luxor, with its somewhat smaller pricetag and thanks 
to not a small amount of back room deals by Blue Nose Clipperships. Delhi 
Warships, the original producers of the Luxor, built another half a dozen of 
the class for the Capellan Confederation after that, but they halted 
production in 2764.

The Luxor would get a new lease on life a month later, however, as Project 
Shipwreck, the SLDF's secret program to develop a new standoff weapon system 
for their warship fleet, yielded the Adcap naval cruise missile. The 
designers were debating the best way to deploy this fearsome new weapon when 
someone (reputedly a secretary who's previous great contribution to the 
project was making cofee) said "why not just use the ship you've been 
using?", refering to the Luxor class Jigoku, which was serving as the test 
ship. Allegedly the designers stared blankely at the secretary at first, 
until finally someone in the group said "yeah, why not?"

At the time, the Luxor seemed to be the perfect ship to carry the adcap, with 
its twenty AR-10 launchers and its cavernous missile magazine. All fifty of 
the existing Luxors were scheduled to be brought in to refit them with the 
new computer systems necessary to control the adcap, and at the same time 
Krester's Ship Construction acquired a license from Delhi Warships to 
construct new Luxors (making sure to leave out all mention of the adcap). The 
Periphery uprising interfered with those plans, however, and only three 
Luxors were modified (including the Jigoku), the rest being too desperately 
needed on the front lines. In the meantime Krester's Ship Construction 
launched the first new Luxor, the Defiance, in late 2765, and was hard at 
work on the second when Amaris launched his coup. The uncompleted Stalker was 
one of the first casualties of the Amaris Coup, destroyed in its shipyard by 
the cruiser Philadelphia in order to prevent its capture by Amaris forces.

Like so many other warships, the majority of Luxors did not survive the 
Amaris Coup. Ironically two Luxors were destroyed during the liberation of 
the Bryant system by the very weapon that they were intended to carry. Amaris 
forces were able to recover a dozen or so functioning adcaps from the ruins 
of the Krester shipyards, and used them quite effectively, crippling the 
Mckenna Class Moshe Dayan and destroying the Luxors Leander and Birmingham. 
Other Luxors fell during the march to Terra, and by the end of it there were 
barely a dozen ships of the class left in service, most of them so badly 
damaged that they had to be scuttled. The last four ships accompanied the 
exodus fleet.

One of these surviving ships, the reliable old Jigoku, has become infamous 
among the clans as one of Clan Wolverine's most effective warships during the 
trial of anihilation. The ship scored an impressive number of victories over 
ships from Clan Wolf and generally did its best to keep the full attention of 
Clan Wolf on it, presumably to buy time for other ships to slip away. Whether 
it suceeded in that particular mission is not known, but the Jigoku was 
eventually caught and destroyed by Clan Wolf. The three remaining Luxors 
remain in mothballs, possibly due to the stigma of the Jigoku, though there 
is some indication that Clan Wolf intends to reactivate one of them to 
bolster their naval forces.