Lyceum Command Battleship Skimmer
By Spartan Mike

The latest exciting model to be unveiled from our Kickstarter Campaign is a devastating and huge skimming Battleship devised by the genius of The League of Crimson. In this first article Spartan Mike looks at a variant commanded by the exiled Prussian scientist Dr. Manfred von Machtstein.

While the devious mercenary group known as The League Crimson largely favours coordinated strikes with gracefully moving light vessels to destroy its prey, there are times in which their tactical evasion is met with enough resistance that forces the use of a much stronger, less subtle hand. The Lyceum Command Battleship epitomises exactly what a Crimson slap to the face feels like!

This giant vessel skims ominously above the surface of a battlefield, its mysterious anti-grav engines giving it a degree of manoeuvrability even more incredible than its lesser kin. The thick shadowy fog that heralds an attack by the League Crimson, billows heavily from the ornate, contoured hull of a Lyceum. Should speed and unnatural fog fail to guard the vessel from enemy retaliation, the banks of Shield Generators built into the chassis provide another element of frustration to its would-be destroyers.

Racked under the manta-like wings of the ship, are lined row upon row of experimental Energy Broadsides of unknown design. Although lacking the traditional ranges of the Energy weapons found in the Covenant’s Fleet, the copious overlay of projectors, combined with a dangerously caustic payload, ensure that any target blazed with its unearthly green payload, smoulder to horrible ruin.

Though its powerful countermeasures and extraordinary Energy Broadsides are enough to humble even the most seasoned Admiral, the real power of the Lyceum lies within its adaptability… and the commanders that make her their Flagship. Ingeniously, the Lyceum can be built to the specifications of anyone wealthy enough to afford one. Usually, this golden ring falls into the hands of the upper Elite members of the Inner Circle of the League Crimson. The most powerful and malevolent members spend funds unheard of in the modern era, to outfit a Lyceum to become their personal War-Palanquin.

By virtue of hull design, a pair of turrets are fit into drop-decks under the wings of the ship and allow the personal flair of the Captain to grace the field of battle. Likewise, a massive fore drop-deck can house a variety of strange and experimental armaments, often a personal project or design of the ships sinister owner.

But perhaps the most audacious design of the Lyceum, is the arrogance that crowns the top of the hull… A completely customisable command deck, in which a multitude of designs have been sighted across the global conflict. This raises the furore of enemy commanders, knowing that atop this bloated and pompous vessel, a sinister den of villainy houses the laughter of a heartless mercenary commander and their henchmen…

TESLA DOOM MACHINE

One of the earliest incarnations of the Lyceum came from the brilliant, yet shadowed mind of science – Dr. Manfred von Machtstein. Once a proud Telsa engineer in the Prussian Empire war machine, his fascination with the expanding evolutions and applications of Tesla electrical energy became a consuming obsession once he realised that the true power of the energy was in destructive might.

Years of loyal service to the Empire brought him fortunes beyond mortal comprehension, as his innovations became commonplace throughout the Prussian Armadas. His recent development of Tesla Torpedoes was instrumental in bolstering Prussia’s defence of the Baltic and raising his pride to cataclysmic heights.

However, after the failed, and unsanctioned, testing of his experimental design for a Tesla Beam on a captured merchant convoy from the FSA, Prussian High Command had had enough. Tried and convicted of war crimes (the FSA crews never survived the experiment!) von Machtstein was stripped of his titles and lands and issuing a standing order for his arrest, he had little choice other than to flee his homeland. Taking his research and mass of experiments with him, he fled south to Africa, towards the only other haven he believed would embrace him… The Scorpion’s Nest.

Now commanding a sizable fleet of likeminded allies, von Machtstein takes his research out into the field of battle atop his personal Lyceum Command Battleship. Equipped with updated Tesla Torpedo Launchers with an enhanced propulsion system, even distant enemies fall as easy quarry to their lethal explosive payload. Choosing to crew his Flagship with a crack team of engineers and research assistants, gives the Doctor unparalleled opportunities to test his masterpiece; The Tesla Doom Beam.

This devastating lance weapon sends crackling beams of Tesla energy streaking across the surface of the warzone, blasting apart any enemies foolish to be caught in the torrent, all while the Mad Doctor casts a calculating glare down from his domed laboratory.

Check out our next instalment from Spartan Mike as we look at a variant of the Lyceum commanded by Countess Ophelia Blackbriar, or the She Devil as most of her enemies know her.