1.0 - The Dragoon
Here is the ship I will discuss today.

1.1 Specifications
Bpv: 133
Bpv w/lvl1 Assault fighters: 139
Turn Class: 3
Movement Cost: 1
Tractors: 4
Transporters: 2
Marines: 14
Shuttles: 3
Hull: 21 Center
Warp: 9 Center, 9 Left&Right
Battery: 4
Total Output: 40
Shields: 32-26-26-18-18-14
2 Ph2 FAL
2 Ph2 FAR
2 Ph2 FA
2 HB FRR
2 HB FLL
2 PhG RA
Max Speed: 28
Max Speed Charging all weps: 14.5
Max Speed Charging all weps w/def. tractors: 10.5
Max Speed Charging Hb's only: 23.5
Max Speed Charging OL Hb's only: 17.5
Fighters: 3

2.1 Weapons
This ship is obviously a Hellbore only variant of the Ranger. Arcs are limited on the defensive phasers, but with rear tracking, this is less of a problem.

2.2 Arcs

This ship has some nice FLL and FRR arcs on the hellbores, and nice FAL and FAR arcs, plus the FA, on the Ph2's. Although the PhG's are RA, they are still very much useful.

Believe it or not, it can get quite hard to bring one side of the hellbores to bear on target. This is why the lord invented HET's.

2.3 Weapons rundown
The weapons of this ship explained one by one.

2.3.1 - Hellbores
The hellbore is a direct fire heavy weapon that is fitted to many capital ships and fighters in the hydran fleet. What makes this weapon unique is that it hurts all shields and does more damage to the weakest one. This makes actual damage harder than just glancing at a chart to calculate. Hellbores maybe overloaded.

[/b]2.3.2 - Damage[/b]
The hellbore uses the following formula for calculating damage:

(TotalDamage)/2 = (DamageWeakestShield)
((TotalDamage)/2)/5 = (DamageAllOtherShields)

Thus:

2.3.3 - Gatling Phasers
Gatlings are probably the most underapreciated weapons in the game. They die off fast, but, if you can get them to survive, the oponent will find a pair of fusion beams on the rear of your ship.

2.3.4 Damage
Gatlings are abit trickier to figure out the damage for. It involves probability. A gatling phaser fires 4 Ph3's. This adds all sorts of different damages and different ranges.

At range 0 there is a 83% chance of 4 point of damage and a 17% chance of 3points of damge. So, at range 0 you are more than likely going to give 15 or 16 points of damage. Just remember that a pair of gatlings has the potential for 32 points of damage at range 0.

2.4 Fighters
On this ship, fighters are an afterthought, with only 3 of them. This turns the fighters away from being a tactical necessity to being a mere annoyance for the enemy. Not to say that those fighters cant cause damage, just dont be afraid of taking this ship out with only Killerbees. The 6 extra Ph3's can come in handy, especially when you cant accidentally outrun the fighters. They can be used for drone defense, while your gatlings are used as a heavy weapon.

2.5 Power
As stated before, this ship can only go 14.5 while charging all weapons and only 23.5 charging only hellbores. Is this slow? Not in early. Although a D7 will go faster than you, if you stay slow, around 12-16, you can reinforce shields, negating those horrible rear shields and have a few points of eccm if you need it.

This ship goes even slower with overloads, 17.5 and remember you dont get any of that power back after the hellbores are charged. I highly reconmend staying awar from overloads in this ship. In fact, I only use overloads while flying the CU.

3.0 General Tactics
Now this is what you look for in these things, isnt it. Here is a rundown of a basic fight with a D7. The D7 vanilla is about 4 bpv less than the DG without any fighters (well, killerbees hardly count). With assault fighters, the DG is just a few points short of the D7C.

3.1 First pass
When you start out far from the enemy, let everything charge and go to about speed 15 while reinforcing shields.

There is your game plan, you are going in close. At about range 8 (or 15 if he is turning) fire the FAR hellbore tubes. Contine to close, save your phasers. At point blank range fire your near hellbores.

About here, fire your hellbores, they have a good chance of hitting at range 2 and an even better one at range 1, if you can make it there. Do not worry about phaser damage, if you are worried, reinforce only the forward shields.

The green line shows where you are going to go, come back around and try to get your aft phasers to bear. If you do at the gatling's sweet spot, you will have a serious advantage in the battle. From here HET to your target and gun the engine, now show him that Ph2's can do serious internal damage. Launch your fighters, whether they are killerbees or assault at this time. Your pilots will enjoy a sitting duck with flashing weapons everywhere.

If a second pass is necessary, run an large arc out to around range 30 and come in with a variation of what was just described.

Now then, as for the hellbore hold costs: I have found that you can live with it, even with the most affected ship in the game. Dont complain, figure out how to live with it, as I have.

Hobbesmaster_XC
Senior Captian, hydran squadren, Xenocorp.

EDIT: Corrected a character that might cause confusion.

EDIT: The DG can only go 28, 9 center warp plus 9 left and 9 right warp, plus one impulse engine. Sorry for any confusion this may have caused.