The Zephyr Class Priority transport is just that, basically a cargo section strapped to some engine units, making it probably the fastest civilian freighter ship around. As a result, the cargo section is much smaller than comparable freighters, but as the ships role is the delivery of personal packages, confidential documents or critical system parts, this was not seen as a problem.
Due to the nature of the goods being transported, the ship is armed with a small array of defensive turbo lasers, although the ship is not designed for combat at all. In fact the ships best defence is it is speed, as it has no armour and pretty lousy firing arcs for it is weapons. Critics tend to think that the weapons were added more for morale issues rather than any practical use. The ships manufacturers state though that they were added so that small obstacles could be removed without the ship having to change course and waste valuable centars in the course correction. The actual value of small turbo lasers versus the asteroids that the designers claim would be actually obstructing the ships course is pretty suspect though. Whatever the reason, in some cases they could be useful as anti-pirate weapons, although with the fire arcs installed, the ship would have be doing some serious manoeuvring, and thus more than likely endangering itself further.
One factory built variant is as a small passenger transport which simply reduces the cargo area to include a small passenger area. This version is usually employed by corporate officials or by companies requiring a rapid change of personnel. In rare cases, it has been seen as a pleasure transport, but in this case the weapons are removed.
The other known variant is not a factory job, but rather a field modification done by the people who use the ship. These are the pirates. Being a fast ship, the ship is ideal as either a pursuit ship, or more commonly as a getaway craft, going through Naval blockades with relative ease. As a result, it has a commonly called the 'Blockade Runner' by those who have to try and stop it. Unfortunately though, the speed of the craft is the only real good point of the ship, and it has almost no modification value whatsoever. In fact, the only real thing that can be done with the craft is a limited expansion of the weapons firing arcs, and even that is not perfect.
The High Speed Priority Transport was drawn and designed by Thomas Robson.
The priority transport has one shuttle bay and can launch and recieve shuttles from direction 4. The liner is not large enough to handle yachts.
The priority transport has a hyperspeed multiplier of x1.0.
Pirate ships can increase their firing arcs to LF/L and RF/R only. No further modifications are possible.
| A | B |
| 3 C.Hull 2 Bridge 4 Ph.3 1 APR 1 Battery |
8 Cargo 2 Shuttles8 Warp |
| GIF file | |
|---|---|
| Zephyr Class High Speed Priority Transport SSD | 35k |
| Ship | Crew Units | Brdg Parties | BPV | Move Cost | Size Class | Turn Mode | Explos. Str | F&E Cmd | Ftr Flights | Year | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zephyr Class High Speed Priority Transport | 2 | 6 | 22 | 0.33 | 4 | A | 4 | 0 | 0 |
This ship may land on a planet via the Aerodynamic landing system (P2.433) and via Powered landings (P2.434).
