Universe: Gamma
Story: Galactic Conquest (and offshoots)
First seen: Don't remember
Type: Multi-use spacecraft
Year(s): 2240-ish onwards
Crew: circ 100
Passengers: 100 - 3500 depending on version.
Top Speed: Warp 6, can travel in hyperspace
Weapons: 10 heavy lasers, numerous smaller turrets (military version)
Defence: Standard shields
Capacity: 50,000 tons (cargo version)
Length: 400m
Width: 90m
Height: 100m
Fuel Type: "Fuel Slugs"
General Info:
A multi-purpose spaceship, operated by many military and civilian users. Their main appearances came in Galactic Conquest stories, where the military version is the mainstay of the FW fleet.
By the time of the Galactic Conquest stories, this is already quite an old ship. It's interior is very spartan and utilitarian, lots of ladders, pipes and bare metal, though presumably passenger versions can be nicer. It still packs a punch in battles, though. It's "ring" of heavy lasers allowing it to get in among enemy fleets and do some damage.
Variants:
Military - The one most often seen in the stories, it has many guns and beefed-up shields. There's also extensive, and cramped, passenger accomodation to transport troops. Others are fitted with hangar bays to be fighter carriers.
Passenger - Unarmed, of course, though still with good shields. The large room that would usually house the ring guns is instead a fancy dining hall, theatre, cinema or whatever the owners specify. Passengers stay in the "neck", and their luggage lives in the bottom of the "orb".
Cargo - Just has loads of empty space. Built-in cranes and manipulating arms help to load it. External containers can also be carried. May also be armed, depending on the piracy threat.
Exploratory - May also be armed, similar to the passenger version, but with fewer cabins and more cargo space. Carries various sensors for scanning planets and asteroids, when charting new systems.
Medical - Military or civilian versions, with differing shield powers to suit. Beefed-up teleportation systems to quickly transfer wounded people directly from damaged ships to doctors..
Origin / Inspiration:
Rather obviously inspired by the Discovery from the movies of 2001 or 2010... you'd think, anyway. And I did likely have (vague memories of catching small bits of) those in the back of my mind when coming up with it. But actually it came from a ship I imagined when I was reading an old "Micro Adventure" book I got out of the village library (when my village still had a library, which is going back a bit!). I recall the story mentioned a spaceship having a circular room or deck with various guns poking out.
Also the original concept for the Spectra was insanely huge. The ball part was meant to be the size of the Death Star! My cousin and I watched a film in the cinema once, when we came out a 3D standee thing was advertising Independence day. I said "It's like a Spectra is hovering over New York!", as I imagined the aliens' 15-mile-wide ship to only be the bottom of a Spectra's spherical part. The scale of the Spectra got gradually reduced until it became a modest-sized ship.
The rear of the Spectra was inspired by the Blockade Runner out of Star Wars, with loads of engine exhausts. I imagined each one being connected to an "open ended" warp core from Star Trek TNG, the "pulses" go down the core and just blast out of the back. When I told my cousin it's powered by "fur'een o them cores layin' on their sides" he went off on a rant about how huge those cores actually are (didn't look all that big on TV!), emphasized by gruesome details of what would happen to somebody if they fell from the top to the bottom of one.