SPECIFICATIONS

GOVERNMENT:  Officially an ex-Ogre class ship, now openly used as a space-pirate vessel.  Unofficially, the Jovian Defense Forces/Saturn Space Fleet troopship Forge that was originally part of the Earth Federal Space Marines fleet during the 1st Interplanetary War (The Stygian Conspiracy novel era)
TYPE: Special Forces Troopship
MODELS: Ogre class Mark-II upgrade (JDF)/Star Forge class Special Operations vessel
DATE INTRODUCED: 2179 AD
LENGTH: 392 feet (119.5 meters)
WIDTH: 132.62 feet (40.4 meters)
HEIGHT: 93.5 feet (28.5 meters)
MATERIAL: Composite-Alloy 
POWER PLANT: Macrotechnologies IPFF-5000 Ion Plasma Fusion Furnace x 4
OUTPUT: 5000 Megawatts each (20,000 MW total)
ARMOR TYPE: Crystal Composite
ARMOR THICKNESS: .5192 inches
DISPLACEMENT: 4500 tons
CREW: 64 (4 Operators, 4 Gunners, 2 Officers, 4 Engineers, 4 Technicians, 4 Electricians, 2 Medical, and 40 Mecha Pilots)

PROPULSION:
              FASTER THAN LIGHT DRIVE :
             1x Pallas Research PRID-T2-800 Type-2-Mark-II intersection drive unit
             SPEED: .213 light years per hour maximum warp

             PRIMARY SUBLIGHT (Main Engines)
             4x Lunar Dynamics PD-2000 plasma drives
             SPEED: kiloMACH 4.4 or 0.10C each (3,350,000 mph each or .01125C each: .045C total for all three engines combined)

             SECONDARY (Main Engines)
             3x Rocketdyne FT-100A fusion thrusters
             SPEED: 11,400 mph each (34,200 mph total)

WEAPONS:
            PRIMARY (OFFENSIVE):
             2x Militia Military Industries MMI-PC-3180 540-megawatt triple PHELAC turrets; Effective Range: 1600 miles; Payload: unlimited with nuclear battery clutch system; ROF: 3 blasts every twenty seconds with a cyclic rate of 9 blasts per minute.

             PRIMARY (DEFENSIVE):
             2x Federal Armory FA-EMPAC-150 150-megawatt electromagnetic particle accelerator cannon; Effective Range: 750 miles; Payload: unlimited with 900-megawatt nuclear battery clutch; ROF: 6 blasts every two seconds or 180 blasts per minute.

             SECONDARY (OFFENSIVE):
             2x Republic Arms RA-STL-02A space torpedo tubes; Missile Type: MST-1M 1000-pound Active EMS-guided space torpedo (143.4 kiloton nuclear warhead); Effective Range: 7111 miles; Payload: 10 space torpedoes each in an autoloading torpedo tube; ROF: 1 torpedo per two seconds with a cyclic rate of 30 torpedoes per minute.

ELECTRONICS:
             1x Laser Communications array with a 10 AU range.
             1x Super Luminal Velocity Communications Suite with a range of 10 light years.
             1x Passive EMS sensor array with a range of 500,000 miles.
             1x Active EMS sensor array with a range of 1000 miles.
             1x Super Luminal Velocity Sensor Suite with a range of 1 parsec (3.26 light years).
             1x Gravitational Control/Antigravity unit Effect: provides artificial lift,g-force compensation and enhanced maneuverability.

DEFENSE SYSTEMS:
             6x Warptron DF-200 200-megawatt deflector field generators; RANGE: 200 feet; OUTPUT: 36,000 gigajoules (with a regeneration rate of 3600 gigajoules every ten seconds).

HANGAR BAYS:
             1x 6816.4-yd3 mecha hangar that normally holds forty 30-ton mecha (usually battle robots like the MBR-01 or SBR-01 series), but can accommodate machines up to 50 tons if need be. The hangar also holds an additional 2016.4 yd3 of excess space for spare weapons, parts, and other support equipment when the standard load of forty 30-ton mecha is on board.

Description/Overview:
         Originally an Ogre class of military transport ship, the F.S.S.-Forge (Federal Space Ship) was chosen by General Kabuto Tokugawa to be the home of his Special Forces unit--The Jolley Rogers--after the 1st Interplanetary war ended.  Like many of the old Ogre class ships in the inventory of the Jovian Defense Forces, the Forge was originally built by the United States Space Navy in 2164 AD for their initial attack on the United Nations Space Corps bases on the Earth’s moon, Luna. The  Forge actually took place in that assault and got a name for itself as being a very lucky spacecraft in a tight spot.  The Forge was an unbelievably successful planetary assault transport ship during the 1st Interplanetary War (its exploits are covered in the novels of The Stygian Conspiracy [Shemyaza Awakens, Ruins of the Ancients, & Children of Methuselah) and the vessel earned a name for herself due to the sheer number of space and atmosphere missions she fought in and survived. The Forge was refit to a Mark-II series after the battle of Pallas inflicted serious damage to the ship in 2172.  This didn't slow down the old girl as she found herself in both the invasion of Venus and Mars while transporting the famous Sledgehammers Space Marine battle robot platoon into hellish conditions for missions that bordered on the insane.  General Kabuto Tokugawa had served on the Forge from the time she entered service with the Earth Federal Space Marines in 2168 AD, up to the end of the war.  With a new platoon under his command for special operations, and a solar system in chaos after the 1st Interplanetary War ended (mostly due to the disputes between the EFR and the JDF over the asteroid belt and Mars), General Tokugawa was cautious not to request the use of any type of craft that would easily be traced back to the Neo-Hebrews of Saturn.  It was for this reason that he demanded the Forge be refit and upgraded (as much as possible) for use as an undercover spacecraft for his special operations unit.  Since the Forge was an obsolete ship by JDF standards, it was an easy sell to the JDF council and the General got his old ship back for him to use under his guise as the infamous space pirate Captain Hemlock.  
        Tokugawa got the R&D guys at NoWhere station to outfit the old Ogre class troopship with a UN-Solar Empire built Pallas Research PRID-T2-800 Type-2, Mark-II Intersection Drive unit.  This massive FTL engine barely fit into the old Plasma-drive housing of the ship, but the engineers squeezed it in giving the Star Forge unprecedented warp speeds for the early 2180s.  Four EFSN style Lunar Dynamics PD-2000 plasma drives were added to give the ship a decent sublight speed, and to add to the illusion of a privately upgraded Ogre class vessel.  The original fusion thrusters were kept but were updated. 
        It was no secret that the old Ogre class ship was NOT very capable in ship-to-ship combat, naturally General Tokugawa saw that the Forge required an upgrade to its weapons. The NoWhere station engineers saw the only way to upgrade the ship was to add 500 tons of additional superstructure to the ship and add a pair of brand new turret housings.  This made the General nervous and he demanded that the beam weapons placed in these newly made turrets be of EFSM manufacture.  Thus the design team fitted three Militia Military Industries MMI-PC-180 180-megawatt PHELAC cannons into a single beam turret they rechristened the MMI-PC-3180.  This 540-megawatt triple PHELAC battery on each turret gave the upgraded Forge a nice one-two-punch that allowed it to hold its own in a fight with all but the largest warships of the late 2170s and early 2180s.
         Like all of the Ogre class built, the main purpose of the ship was the need for a multipurpose vessel. Originally, the upgraded Forge was to have a new mecha hangar bay that could house variable fighters, however that would have created problems with keeping the craft's affiliation with Saturn secret, as they were the only power using variable fighters at that time.  Thus to avoid the rather unlikely idea that space pirates would have Protean fighters, the ship was outfitted with conventional mecha so it would look like a privately owned spacecraft.  So a standard complement of HBRs and MBRs were added to the ship, giving it the appearance of being a pirate vessel. 
        Once all the new features were added, and the old features upgraded, tested, and refined back into working order, General Tokugawa christened the ship "Star Forge" as she was now an FTL capable spaceship.
        The Star Forge was instrumental during the Ceres Conflict of the mid-2180s, and served well during that mission.  However, even with all the new systems, engines, and weapons, the Ceres Conflict exposed the age of the ship and its limitations.  She was used by Tokugawa's Jolley Rogers one last time during the Outer Sphere War to try and locate the whereabouts of the Posse Comitatus.