Spinal Mount Weapons

Intro
The largest class of ship weapon, very few civilizations are capable of constructing these devastating engines of mass destruction.

Spinal weapons come in three segments which must be linked together:

A Capacitor, which transforms power into a stable form and builds up a change to be released.

An Amplifier, which boosts the accelerated slug, reinforces the magnetic shell of the plasma, or enriches the particle stream.

And a Barrel, which emits the weapon's projection.

Because of the obscene energy costs per shot, Batteries are too inefficient to power the weapon. Some vessels use Ship Capacitors attached to each amp or the Drive Capacitor of a Johnson-Tanaka Drive.

The Barrel of each Spinal Weapon must be left open to space, outside the walls of the ship. This is a significant weak spot, but necessary. Anything caught in the way of the projection will be destroyed.

Spinal Laser Barrel


At full power with enough amplifiers, this highly excited wave of high energy particles is more than enough to cut a ship in half when its shields are down.

Spinal Plasma Barrel


If the enemy ship has its shields up, the Spinal Plasma Cannon can change that. When this weapon's projectile smashes into the shields of an enemy ship, the fierce magnetic containment emits a pulse which overwhelms all but the most hardened of power grids and heat sinks.

When exposed hull is hit, plating vaporizes in a wildfire of destruction.

Spinal Railgun Barrel


An enormous rod is accelerated down the length of the Spinal Railgun's amplifiers, which can be slung at near relativistic speeds towards an enemy. With no technical range limits, this high speed kinetic kill vehicle will eventually hit something, whether that sterilizes a planet or guts a warship is anyone's future guess. Most shields will be strained if not broken by this sudden blast, but a direct hit to hull will be devastating no matter how many amps are attached to the barrel.

Spine Amplifier


As many Amplifiers as are desired may be built in sequence, enhancing the weapon's power.

Some ships will only have 1 Amp, which is enough to act as at least the next level up from a Large Turret. Others will have as many as 10 or 15, making up half or more of the length of their ship.

Each Amp will require a heat sink with a dedicated radiator, as well as X power.

Spine Capacitor
While expensive to manufacture and very large, so much so that most civilizations would be bankrupted by attempting to construct this device, the Spinal Capacitor serves only one purpose: to soak up power from the ship's grid and focus it into a sudden overwhelming burst of energy to the amplifiers.

This is only the first element of the Spinal Weapon. A row of amplifiers must be attached, ending in a Barrel which sets the weapon's type.