Confed Light and Heavy Cruisers

psych

Destroyer of assclowns
This thread is being started to publically unveil the latest work of the WC Saga team. This time around, the release is a dual-cruiser pack.

This first ship is our final model of the Tallahassee-class, the Confed heavy cruiser from Wing Commander 3. The decision to construct a new model was made after the revelation that our previous versions were infected by an incurable case of C.F.S. (Chronic Fanboy Syndrome).

This gun-heavy warship is designed for slug-fests with other cruisers and planetary bombardment. Weaponry is 4 Anti-Matter Turrets, 8 Laser Turrets, six torpedo tubes, and a capship missile launcher. Length is 530 meters and displacement is approximately 18,200 tons.

talla-new1.jpg


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talla-new3.jpg


Credit goes to Michael “Lynx” Lechner for the original model and textures. Anton “Tolwyn” Romanyuk did the final texture correction and technical assistance. The final texture adjustment and additional details was done by Michael “Starman” Pretli. The ship was a bitch to bring online, it was so bug-ridden that it took us literally months to finish.

This second ship is a “fill in the gaps” design. Like the Jutland-class carrier, this ship wasn’t seen in the games but was mentioned very very breifly in the novels. It was basically up to the artist to design the blueprints of the ship, but something that involved lots of research so it wouldn’t turn out to be a dissapointment.

This ship is the Savannah-class light cruiser, a ship that is fan designed but has its roots in WC canon. These vessels are supposed to be the light cruisers that were in service with the Confed Navy during the 2669 era, and then were sold to the Republic of the Landerich. The existance of these ships are founded in the WC novels. One is the TCS Andromache, which later becomes the FRLS Themistocles in the False Colors novel; another ship of this class would eventually become the FRLS Xenophon.

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Ship designation is LCA, which going by the WC Bible means “Light Cruiser Armored”. The Armored means “equipped with phase shields” The weaponry is designed for raider purposes. Weaponry is 3 Anti-Matter Turrets, 6 Laser Turrets, 2 IFF missile launchers, and a capship missile launcher. Length is an even 500 meters and displacement is approximately 15,000 tons (opposed to 530 and 18,200 for a heavy cruiser).

You might notice that this looks very similar to the Tallahassee-class cruiser, and that is deliberate. There are two main reasons, 1) the design blueprints was supposed to be conservative and “in tune” with the ship building philosophy of that era and 2) this is the smaller light cruiser counterpart to the Tallahassees, and is better for fast raiding. The name “Savannah” was picked because it is a US Southern city that was in tune to the word “Tallahassee”- also a southern city. It’s the yin to its yang. We have some screenshots for comparison.

talla-new6.jpg


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Yours truly did the concept art and passed it to Lynx, who did the final model and textures. Starman converted it in-game.

We will ease off on releasing models of capital ships for now. The WC Saga Team will now move towards showing off the remodeled WC3 fighters. Afterall, Wing Commander is a fighter combat game.
 
Hmm, I never thought much of this particular capship (but then, as a general rule, I don't think much of any WC3 Confed ships), so about the only compliment I can offer is that the models are up to WCS' usual standard ;).

One nitpick, which you're of course free to completely ignore - the name of the light cruiser class. In WC3, capship naming schemes had been kinda messed up anyway, but still... wouldn't it have been better to give it a name that would somehow be topically linked to "Andromache"?
 
Quarto said:
Hmm, I never thought much of this particular capship (but then, as a general rule, I don't think much of any WC3 Confed ships), so about the only compliment I can offer is that the models are up to WCS' usual standard ;).

One nitpick, which you're of course free to completely ignore - the name of the light cruiser class. In WC3, capship naming schemes had been kinda messed up anyway, but still... wouldn't it have been better to give it a name that would somehow be topically linked to "Andromache"?

Quarto, reason we did this is because even though the WC3 cruiser was the Ajax, the Agincourt in the WC3 CCG, and the cruiser names were Achilles, Agamemnon, Dornier, Dominion in WC4 novel and the Juneau and Dover in False Colors, the class was "Tallahassee". So instead of going for a derivative of the names itself, we went for a derivative for the heavy cruiser class.

Iceblade, heavy cruiser has 5-8 fighters. Light cruiser has 5.
 
Great Job!
The light one is prettier than the heavy. And its proportions are more harmonic. Really nice.
 
What's Chronic Fanboy Syndrome? And how is the final version different from the earlier versions of the Tallahassee I saw not so long ago?

Anyway, looks nice. I'm keeping it. :)
 
Doesn't at least the Tallahassee-class carry a couple of shuttles as well? I know that Grahm's ship in False Color does, but is this something special or what?

The models look wonderful, guys,
 
Which ones (Ajax, Coventry, Sheffield) were the destroyers and which ones were the cruisers escorting the Victory in WCIII? I forget, or maybe I never really knew. What actually happened to the Victory's escorts? We all know what happened to the Victory. One of the only ships Blair ever served on that survived.

"They got a plack right over your bunk."
 
psych said:
This ship is the Savannah-class light cruiser, a ship that is fan designed but has its roots in WC canon. These vessels are supposed to be the light cruisers that were in service with the Confed Navy during the 2669 era, and then were sold to the Republic of the Landerich. The existance of these ships are founded in the WC novels. One is the TCS Andromache, which later becomes the FRLS Themistocles in the False Colors novel; another ship of this class would eventually become the FRLS Xenophon.

I actually got the impretions the the TCS Andromache/FRLS Themistocles was actually of the Manasses class of cruisers, both from the CIC encyclopedia and from reading False Colors.
 
I like the comparisons of the two. Very much in tune with the designs of the era, looks like a raiding type vessel (reminds me of a german pocket battleship).

Screenshots are great...
 
HammerHead said:
I actually got the impretions the the TCS Andromache/FRLS Themistocles was actually of the Manasses class of cruisers, both from the CIC encyclopedia and from reading False Colors.

This is something in which there is no confirmation nor denial, so it can go either way. Hell, we don't even know that it's Manassas-class (the only mention is the TCS Manassas from Academy). In this case, a Confed light cruiser in service in WC3. I prefer doing stuff that fills in the gaps or resides in the "no confirmation nor denial" gray area rather then doing stuff that directly contradicts (for example, my very own fAnBoY wC3 HeAvY CrUiSeR cAuSe Da aJaX sux0rs).

(I'll tell you this right now in that the original plan was to make it the Manassas-class but we decided not to because that would be much more controversial to make a broad assumption like that).
 
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