The Essential Guide to Force Exile/Shien-class assault frigate

Shien-class assault frigate

Description
The recruitment of Jalsinnare Brotherhood into the Yanibar Guard was accompanied by the transfer of their outmoded assault frigates into Yanibar Guard Fleet custody. No sooner had the 530-meter long warships reached the Kraechar Arms docks and been dubbed the Shien-class then controversy broke out over their usage. The assault frigates drew the same sort of criticism as their namesake saber form had when first introduced by the Jedi Order: namely that they were too aggressive and did not fit the military doctrine of the Yanibar Guard.

It was easy to see why such a warship would not be welcomed by many staunch traditionalists in Yanibar's Governing Council and upper ranks of the Yanibar Guard Navy. The Shien-class was designed primarily to assault surface installations and support ground troops storming said installations. While consistent and useful with the practices of the Jalsinnare Brotherhood, surface assaults on offworld locations were exceedingly rare in Yanibar Guard practice and all but excluded from a military doctrine heavy on standoff attacks and pinpoint hit-and-run raids.

Despite its controversy, the warships were nevertheless entered in for lengthy force integration refits at the Kraechar Arms yards and relaunched after several years of modifications. When completed, they still retained their assault/support configuration. Powerful repulsorlifts and ion engines allowed them to operate in a variety of atmospheric conditions for weeks on end, while their primary armament was particularly well-suited to surface bombardment.

Instead of traditional turbolaser batteries, the Shien-class carried four triple hypervelocity 280mm rail cannon turrets as its primary armament,all mounted on the ventral side of the ship for maximum application of firepower to targets on the surface. While the rail cannons were short-ranged for effective space combat, they were devastatingly effective at close ranges, particularly in atmosphere where the shock waves from the metal slug impacts would inflict further damage. They were also not dissipated in atmosphere like turbolaser bursts and could be fired for sustained bursts as well as employed for indirect fire if the weapons' muzzle velocity was lowered.

Unlike all other Yanibar Guard Fleet ships, the Shien-class did not feature all-degree defensive battery configuration. Instead, its firepower was layered into "kill cones" designed to orient more weaponry along particular firing cones. While this was distinctly contrary to Kraechar Arms ship design, the work required to reconfigure the defensive batteries into an all-degree scheme would have added more cost and time to an already lengthy and pricey refit. As the assault ships were not intended for use in primarily ship-to-ship combat, all-degree defensive coverage was not considered essential. Instead, the Shien-class remained an oddity, a large warship designed to support ground troops.

To protect them in this hazardous set of operations, the Shien-class carried reinforced shields on par with a Soresu-class Fleet Defender and thick hull armor. It was also equipped with a number of laser cannon and turbolaser batteries for self-defense and space combat. The Shien-class also served as a testbed for experimental anti-missile systems developed by Kraechar Arms, designed to protect it from starfighter or surface assaults using concussion missiles or proton torpedoes. The Mark 3 version of this system proved to have over a 50% success rate against projectiles fired from at least two kilometers away and could be used as a point-defense weapon against starfighters. As such, it soon spread to other fleet ships.

The Shien-class also featured ample room to deploy large numbers of Javelin-class shuttles and Jalsinnare Legionnaires. Twenty-four shuttles could be carried in the hangar bay of the Shien, as well another two squadrons of Stiletto gunships. This capability allowed the Yanibar Guard to deploy their repulsorlift assault craft without first debarking them onto the surface as was previously required due to lack of an atmospheric launch platform. For added cargo capacity, each Shien-class also carried four Discblade freighters.

As part of their refit, all of the Shien-class assault frigates were equipped with sufficient command, control, and communications equipment to facilitate conduct of an expeditionary ground campaign. This seemingly mundane addition was also hotly contested due to the fact that the Yanibar Guard was not intended to conduct expeditionary large-scale ground campaigns. The refit was narrowly approved, but in return, the Yanibar Council voted to reduce the number of operational Shien-class frigates from a planned five down to three in order to limit the expeditionary capability of the previously-defensive Yanibar Guard. The remaining ships were decommissioned and scrapped.

History
The Jalsinnare Mercenary Brotherhood joined the Yanibar Guard in 19 ABY and brought with them six aging assault frigates originally constructed in between 50 and 40 BBY. Recognizing their obsolescence, the Yanibar Guard Fleet had them refurbished and modernized after a lengthy debate over their role. The Jalsinnare had desired to keep their ships, which had weighed heavily into the decision to keep them in service, though only a reduced number were allowed in service. One was immediately scrapped due to being barely spaceworthy and two more were also salvaged due to the governing council's unwillingness to fund more than three of the ships.

The refit was slow and lengthy, compounded by difficulties with integrating new technology into a legacy platform and budget cuts. It was not until 23 ABY that all three ships were refurbished, but despite a four year overhaul, Kraechar Arms head Sarth Kraen could promise no more than ten to fifteen years of service life from the vessels. This announcement brought renewed criticism of the Shien-class, and yet the three warships were commissioned and entered service relatively quietly.

They saw some service in limited fleet raids against pirate or slaver outposts or forces, but rarely fired shots in anger. Yanibar Guard Fleet admirals were afraid to risk the warship without support in the atmosphere of unfriendly worlds and orbital or starfighter-launched weaponry was generally more effective than the rail cannons of the Shien-class anyway. The ships were in service, but had no clearly defined role except to support invasions that the Yanibar Guard had no intention of launching.

The first time a Shien-class assault frigate entered a hostile atmosphere was in 27 ABY, when the Shien-class assault frigate Tassitus descended into the atmosphere of Leritor to provide supporting fire for and extract a commando mission that had rescued a captured Elite Guardian from Yuuzhan Vong captivity. The assault frigate's weaponry, fired at less than twenty kilometers altitude, devastated a Yuuzhan Vong force attempting to encircle the commandos, and Jalsinnare troops were able to extract them from Leritor. The Shien-class was chosen for this mission primarily because it was of limited value in a space fight and the rest of the available Yanibar Guard Fleet was creating a diversion to distract the Yuuzhan Vong. Due to its relative unimportance and its suitability for the mission, it was finally employed in the role it had meant to fulfill&mdash;supporting ground troops, albeit on a very small scale.

Appearances

 * Nine Riders