Despair

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One of six Corellian gunships captured by House Plagueis during the taking of the new Ascendant Fleet, the Despair has become an attack ship of the Corsair raid fleet. When outside of large engagements, it roves through both stellar and planetary battlefields, crushing fighter resistance and crippling freighters and defensive positions.

History

Commissioned in 17 ABY alongside its peers Angst', Ace, and Sharpshooter, the DP20 frigate Wisecrack was created for the defense of the Corellian system's commercial interests. Together with her sister ships, she fought back or destroyed many pirates and raiders who would have made claim against their prey, the Wisecrack often used in flanking maneuvers against large squadrons or corvettes. The ship became known as a beacon of Corellian safety, until the Galactic Alliance reassigned her and her sisters to the 108th Expeditionary Assault Fleet. This act would be just one more grievance in a pile of issues fomenting between the Alliance and the Corellians.

Serving admirably, the Wisecrack was nonetheless undermanned when the Ascendancy and her crew, the Dark Jedi of Plagueis, struck from nowhere. Overwhelmed alongside Angst, she soon found herself crewed by Subjugates and firing upon her peers. In a display of fate's ironic edges, she was used to flank the Ace and Sharpshooter, taking out their engines before they could escape an assault from both sides.

Renamed Despair, the ship became a raiding vessel for House Plagueis.

Characteristics

Designed to serve more adequately as a vessel of war than its relative, the CR90, Corellian gunships had a greatly reduced amount of space for passengers, troops, or cargo. During their design phase, two words guided the shipwrights and engineers of CEC: Fast and deadly. As such, engines made up half of their available interior space, with the rest reserved for deflector shield generators and weapons systems. Because of this speed and lethality, they were ideal craft for raiders and pirate fleets, but also saw extensive use by the Rebel Alliance and were even used by local Imperial fleets.

The DP20 gunship bore a stock armament of eight double turbolaser cannons, four concussion missile tubes, and six quad laser cannons. This made the vessel useful for a number of reasons. Ideally, it was meant to destroy fighters, bombers, and other snub or shuttle craft en masse; where a capital ship's bulk made accurate strikes against such craft difficult, the gunship could pinpoint and destroy them with much greater accuracy. However, they were also capable of harrying and dealing damage to larger ships, while still being maneuverable and quick enough to evade powerful craft such as Star Destroyers. In Plagueian hands, these vessels have become central to crippling and raiding ships for supplies and slaves.

DP20 ships held accomodations for forty-five crewmen and forty-six gunners; in Plagueian hands, both posts are occupied by Subjugates. In addition, the 120-meter craft always house a Sith, and the crews rotate outward. In the close-knit environment of such a small ship, crew members become akin to families, something that increases the possibility of Subjugate crewmen finding identities and rebelling. To combat this, the crews of the gunships are routinely cycled out or, if necessary, purged. The Sith aboard is both a measure against boarders and a safeguard against slaves; in such enclosed spaces, a lightsaber and the Dark Side make them more than a match for invading soldiers or a crew of lightly-armed slaves.