Scout

Starship Databank Entry

The Scout is a small, speedy ship, whose outwardly weak appearance masks a weapon of great and devastating power.

This ship is the workhorse of the Shofixti, though designed with Yehat technologies. It possess a fearsome explosive weapon, the Glory Device, a kamikaze charge with a wide and powerful explosion blast.

Propulsion

The Scout is a small, fast, and maneuverable ship with excellent acceleration. Gravity wells do not affect it much, but collisions with asteroids can knock it wildly off-course. It is especially susceptible to the Chmmr Avatar's tractor beam, though using such a device on a Scout is comparable to pulling a time bomb towards your chest.

Armament

Primary

The Scout is equipped with the Mendōkusai Energy Dart, a weak, forward-firing projectile with a short-to-medium range and a fast firing rate. This is held in check by the puny combat batteries aboard the vessel.

Mendōkusai, rather appropriately, translates to 'annoying' in Japanese.

Secondary

When faced with defeat, a Scout vessel can use its ultimate weapon, the Glory device: a powerful bomb capable of inflicting massive damage to an enemy vessel at close range. Unfortunately, detonating the Glory device is fatal to everyone aboard the Scout vessel when the device is activated. To prevent accidental activation, the secondary weapon must be pressed three times. A series of switches is visible in the melee screen so that pilots may see if the bomb is ready to detonate or not.

Tactical Overview

The Glory Device is effective against the Chmmr Avatar because it can destroy two, or sometimes even three ZapSats if activated at short range. The shields installed on Utwig Juggers and Yehat Terminators are also incapable of blocking Glory Device damage, making these ships vulnerable as well. Additionally, the following ships have small enough crew complements that they can be killed outright with the Glory Device:

• Arilou Lalee'lay Skiff
• Druuge Mauler
• Orz Nemesis
• Pkunk Fury
• Thraddash Torch
• Umgah Drone
• Zoq-Fot-Pik Stinger
• Slylandro Probe
• Another Shofixti Scout

Against most other ships, the Scout is weak, but proper use of the Energy Dart and Glory Device can sap the strength of the enemy ship so that others may have an easier time destroying it. Damaged ships can also be finished off with a well-timed Glory Device detonation. Strategically, this means that the cheaper Scout can sacrifice itself to take down much more powerful ships. Slow, battle-damaged ships are particularly vulnerable to this tactic because they cannot escape a Scout that wishes to activate the Glory device.

Some AI-controlled ships, such as the VUX Intruder, Umgah Drone, Ur-Quan Dreadnought, and Ilwrath Avenger, are vulnerable to various AI exploits involving use of the Mendōkusai Energy Dart. Generally, one either circles the enemy ship, firing darts, or in the case of Ur-Quan, shoots down fighters until the mothership is vulnerable to an attack run with the Glory Device.

If the enemy ship is destroyed by the Glory Device the Shofixti anthem will be played as if victory was assigned to the fallen hero. Importantly the player who controlled the Scout will chose his next ship after the player who controlled the ship destroyed by the Glory Device and knowing the choice of the enemy which (provided the selection is not random) may give him advantage in the following fight.

3DO Shofixti Scout Basic stats Crew: 6 Value: 5 pts Battery: 4 Batt. Regeneration: 0.1 units/frame Armament Primary: Mendokusai Energy Dart Secondary: Glory Device Refire delay: 3 frames Refire delay: 0 frames Energy use: 1 units Energy use: 0 units Propulsion Max speed: 35 world units/frame Turn rate: 0.5 facings/frame Acceleration: 5 units/frame Mass: 1