3125 Scale Worb Dreadnought (DN) MGL

The Omega Octant is east of the Alpha Octant empires seen in the Star Fleet Universe (beyond the Inter-Stellar Concordium), on the other side of a galactic void. That void is a dead zone where life is impossible and ships fall apart, marking a separation between Octants. The Worb Technocracy is comprised of beings for which no easy comparison exists, for they exhibit animal, vegetable, and mineral characteristics in a single life form. An individual Worb looks akin to a two-meter-tall mushroom, topped by a small cap 50-60 centimeters in diameter. The individual “breathes” through a series of colorful, rippling fronds running along the “stalk.” A set of six tentacles extend outward from a point approximately three-quarters down the length of the stalk: three act as “legs” bearing the weight of the Worb, while the other three guide the body while in motion, or act as fine manipulators when at rest. Worb have a high metabolic rate, yet spend half of their lifetimes asleep as a result. Worb crews have only two shifts: at work or at rest.

Worb society is intertwined with the nature of Worb reproduction, which is carried out through spore dispersal. While thousands of spores may be dispersed at a time, only one in every 10,000 spores germinates into a fertile Worb; all others are barren. Further, only one in every 50,000 spores grows into an intelligent Worb; the others (fertile or otherwise) are culled from the population and recycled as food. Those rare spores (one in five million) which produce both intelligent and fertile Worb assert leadership over their society, controlling every aspect of it as they will.

The Worb Technocracy is ruled by the “Fertile Council,” drawn from the leadership of each Worb sub-caste (of which there are a great many). As with the Romulan great houses, there are often fierce rivalries between the major Worb castes, though outright civil war was been averted during the era of warp travel. Among the most notable of castes are the High Worb, who have the highest reproductive rate and who see themselves as the natural leaders of all Worb; the Broad Worb, renowned as mavericks who insist on operating starships and attrition units with exclusively phaser-based weapon suites; the Low Worb, a pacifistic caste which crews Worb scouts and survey cruisers; and the White Worb, who are the key logistical suppliers to the Technocracy at large.

The Worb developed warp travel independently and had believed themselves to be alone in the universe until a Drex battle fleet, on a sweep for Ymatrian holdouts after the Horde's brutal invasion of the Drex Unity, passed into Worb space. The robotic Drex determined that the Worb were no threat to their Drexari masters and decided to leave the Technocracy in peace, but not without a stern warning against future aggression. Alas, fear that the Drex might return to destroy them led the Worb to redouble their efforts to establish themselves as a military power, to include sending long-range missions to uncover and acquire samples of Ymatrian antiproton technology. The Worb grew to become a medium-ranked Omega power, fighting the Drex, the Hivers, and others (to include the Zosman Marauders) at various instances, though they came perilously close to being destroyed during the Andromedan and Souldra invasions of the Sixth Cycle.

Worb starships tend to be a size larger than their counterparts in most other “metal-hull” fleets, due to their preferred use of turrets  which may be set to face in their primary direction (either directly forward or directly aft) or to a 60-degree position to port or starboard of their primary facing. However, Worb ships tend to be quite sluggish when they turn because of this, and also tend to breakdown more frequently. Worb attrition units lack turrets, so are of the expected size (though the Worb do build relatively large “volatile warp” gunboats). The Worb developed certain offensive and defensive systems on their own: the subspace rocket (a heavy direct-fire weapon with a “time-on-target” delay which increases the farther it has to travel before impact) and a subspace energy field (which can be used to keep enemy attrition units at bay for a time). Their salvaging of Ymatrian technology also led them to adopt antiproton phasers, antiproton beams, and the antiproton lance, though the latter two tend to appear only on larger Worb warships. Notably, the application of these technologies is impacted by the rivalry between Worb sub-castes; the Worb never field “mixed” fighter squadrons; certain Worb castes refuse to operate or serve on certain classes of ship; the Low Worb are reluctant to commit their scouts to purely offensive operations (though they can, and do, fight in staunch defense of the Worb species if called upon to do so).

Designed to be the crowning achievement of the High Worb sub-caste, who believed that its construction would secure their position as the leaders of the Fertile Council for all time, the Worb dreadnought is an immense vessel; it is akin to the conjectural “three-boom” Seltorian light battleship. It is armed with four antiproton phaser-1s and two subspace energy field generators on the base hull; a pair of antiproton phaser-1s on each of its huge warp nacelles; two antiproton phaser-1s, a pair of antiproton beams, and an antiproton lance on the foremost turret; two antiproton phaser-3s and a pair of subspace rockets on both the fore-port and fore-starboard turrets; and two antiproton phaser-1s, two antiproton phaser-3s, and a subspace rocket on the aft turret. In addition, it is capable of deploying a “short squadron” of six High fighters. While expensive to build, the Worb produced a good number of them, not least since the neighboring Hivers had no counter to such a tremendous unit. During the Seventh Cycle, the Worb developed a powerful space control ship variant of this base hull.

The ship is available in a variety of materials. Ships are unpainted, use standard flight stands available from many sources, and, while designed for gaming, make fine display pieces.