Well, since people have started to notice my continued adivice for Romulans to practice in Hawk and Eagle hulls, I'd better explain the absence of Kestrels. And I'd better don some asbestos. I'll go hide in a vat of extinquisher foam now, and check back in a few days to see if it is safe.
THE STORY ON KESTRELS
In 2260 (13 years before the Day of the Eagle opens) the Klingons signed the Treaty of Smarba with the Romulans, and delivered a batch of D6's and F5s. This was a clever move on the part of the Klingons to increase pressure on the Federation's eastern border, and thus keep the flatheads out of the Four Powers war. The war didn't end as well as the Klingons had hoped, but the Treaty of Smarba did accomplish its chief goal: The Feds stayed home.
The D6's and F5's were strictly second-rate ships to the Klingons, but represented a great leap forward in technology for the Romulans. (Their Great Houses had been sabatoging each other's warp projects for years, more concerned with their own advancement than that of the Empire as a whole) The Romulans converted these ships to KR's and K5R's. Over the next couple of years they purchased several more batches of both cruisers and made many conversions of them later. (The Klingons never sold any variants to the Roms; all Rom variants were converted from this original batch of KR's and K5R's and do not represent an expansion of the order of battle.)
In 2265 (8 years before the start of this game) the Klingons also sold three D7 hulls to the Romulans. These were converted to K7R's, and then later into KCR's. All other conversions of these D7 hulls are conjectural only, and were never in service. No more than these three D7 hulls were ever sold.
By 2268 (5 years before the game starts), with the General war starting to heat up, the Romulans urgently requested the delivery of more D6 and F5 hulls to increase their number of warp-capable ships. By now, however, the Klingons were at war and unwilling to part with any ships even remotely useful. They refused any further sales. The Romulans repeated their requests, and eventaully settled for a shipment of E4 escorts. Even this was a raw deal. The Romulans expected relatively new ships from Klingon mothballs, but the Klinks kept these for themselves and instead delivered only a batch of ancient E4's, worn out from years of patrols. No more E4's were sold, and it is questionable as to whether the Roms would even have been interested.
By 2273 (the opening of the Day of the Eagle) it's thus been half a decade since the delivery of any Klink hulls. Those kestrels still in the field are in the hands of capable starship commanders and not looking for a green captain. The new starships rolling off the lines and waiting for new officers would be the Hawk and Eagle hulls. A relatively young starship captain, full of promise (such as yourself) would be assigned to one of these vessels.
There are two exceptions to my above picture:
1) As part of the deal to convince the Romulans to go to war, the Klingon high command arranged the delivery of one C9 dreadnought to Romulus. It enterred service in 2272 (a year before the game starts), and has a very experienced captain in charge. He's not going anywhere until he goes down with his ship so you shouldn't even think about this command.
2)In the confused fighting of 2274 (a year after the game starts) three Romulan Sparrowhaks became cut off and forced to resupply at a Klingon base. The Klingons then decided to keep them! The Romulan Senate was enraged, and demanded the return of their ships. The Klingons refused but agreed to transfer three D5's instead. These became KDR's, which the Romulans found useful. No more KDR's were ever delivered however, as the supply line between Romulas and Klinshai was soon after cut by a Tholian blockade. The Romulans eventually found it impossible to keep these three KDR's in repair as they could no longer get spares from the Klinks and had no facilities to build any themselves.
Thus, the KDR will appear in the shipyards during 2274 only. No more will appear in 2275 or later. If you really want a KDR, be on the lookout during 2274 and then fight hard to keep it alive. You break it you lose it.
The KCR was purely conjectural. The Klinks never sold the Roms any C7's, and wouldn't have wanted to spare any. Delivery would have been nearly impossible at this point in the war anyway as the Tholians/Feds had sealed their border quite tightly by then.
You may come across Kestrels in combat, but you will almost never see them in the shipyard.
And that's my story on Kestrels. Fly the (refitted) Hawk. Be the (refitted) Eagle. You'll feel better.
-Herr Burt the hiding
Topic: DOE Flame thread #1: Kestrels (Read 13755 times)