Prowler

The Esperia Prowler is a modernized version of the infamous Tevarin armored personnel carrier. It is named after the UPE military designation. Esperia’s astroengineers were given unmitigated access to study original versions of the ship recently discovered in the Kabal system to help meticulously reconstruct the vehicle. Now, the Prowler is the perfect fusion of two cultures: the elegance and effectiveness of the Tevarin war machine combined with the reliability of modern human technology.

Specifications
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Hardened shell
Both the pilot and co-pilot cockpit shield is constructed of kelsun composite utilizing original Tervarin engineering techniques. A process that created the most resilient transparent shielding of that era, a byproduct of the process gives the exterior an opaque coating while still allowing the operator to see out.

Ground runners
Another feature of the Prowler is it's focused gravity emitters that are positioned on the underside, which creates a cushion to allow it to navigate precarious and uneven surfaces such as landscapes or even ship hulls, whilst avoiding scans.

Transforming mechanics
The twin nacelle wings of the Prowler house a pair of low emission thrusters designed to minimize the ship's energy signature profile for a stealthier approach. These wings will also rotate, allowing more maneuvering capabilities in flight, but also double as the ship's landing gear.

Precision offense
A remote turret is placed along the upper spine of the ship, it can be controlled by either the pilot or co-pilot, offering 360 degree weapon coverage against hostile forces.

Rapid deployment
For the deployment of combat personnel, the Prowler has four Deployment Portholes along each side of the hull. These portholes are outfitted with an airshield meaning that they can be open during flight in both atmosphere and deep space. Each of these portholes is outfitted with a dedicated power supply to guarantee that the airshields will stay online. However, losing your airshields while in space would have the same effect as a hull decompression event. The cockpits won't be affected as they are sealed off from the rest of the ship.

Each station is outfitted with a safety harness to secure soldiers into their positions while in transit.

Discovery of new Tevarin settlements
In 2941, the Imperial pathfinders entered the newly discovered Kabal system and located a series of abandoned Tevarin settlements on Kabal III. At the time, Esperia was known for constructing limited runs of replica Vanduul spacecraft for military use and occasional civilian sale. The UEE Navy, particularly happy with the recent purchase of four squadrons of replica Blade fighters for aggressor training, insisted that Esperia be included in the group of analysts brought to Kabal to study potentially lost Tevarin technologies at two aerospace bases identified by the initial surveyors.

Much of what was discovered in the Kabal system remains classified today and Esperia’s overall involvement with the project is no exception. What is known is that the researchers discovered what amounted to nine fully equipped squadrons of A-model Prowlers safely stored in antinuclear bunkers. The investigation revealed that none of the Prowlers had flown for almost five centuries and that they had been properly mothballed rather than left on site. Another dozen examples were not properly prepared and had significantly decayed left to the elements on flight lines. Esperia requested that these also be provided for the study of individual parts, but instead they were remitted to another group for the study of long-term spacecraft storage.

Esperia’s initial survey team reviewed the available spacecraft, performed a series of atomic scans, and were allowed to disassemble two examples to produce an initial report on individual technologies and components involved in their construction. A UEEN test pilot was attached to the group and in the culmination of the initial study, a single vintage Prowler was fueled and tested in a 45-minute atmospheric flight that seemed to confirm that the spacecraft were as fully functional as could be determined with the equipment available in the Kabal system. The remote stage of the project took 18 months and at its conclusion, the government opted to ferry six of the Prowlers back to Esperia’s clean lab at Kutaram rather than retain the Esperia team on Kabal.

Modernizing the Prowler
As the team from Esperia completed their work disassembling and documenting the ancient spacecraft, management began to develop an extension - a blue-sky project to go beyond study and move to recreating the ship with Human control surfaces and updated modern components. A specialist team developed a formal pitch to the UEE to allow the company both access and legal rights to recreate the ship, ostensibly to sell to hobbyists and others interested in a historical spacecraft. There was also a deeper plan. Esperia was keenly aware of teething issues then-delaying the intended deployment of the Aegis Dynamics Redeemer, intended to be the UEEN’s next-generation gunship. Seeing the briefest opportunity to market the Prowler once again back to the military, the company put an amount of resources into the project that greatly eclipsed those of their prior builds. Much to the surprise of all involved, the government approved the idea almost immediately and formally declassified the recovered Prowlers for Esperia’s benefit.

One of the first issues facing the recreation team was that the models found on Kabal predated the wars and thus lacked the dorsal maser turret. Knowing that newly created Prowlers would want to correct the blind spot, the team carefully studied the example stored at Dayton to structurally adapt the new fuselage for a standard turret mount (older maser turrets having long gone out of production in favor of efficient and modular present-day systems). Astroengineers also had trouble recreating the ‘plate cockpit’, requiring several months to perfect the once-commonplace Tevarin technologies that gave the ship its distinct forward structure. Working alongside historians and collectors, the company was able to trace every subsystem and component of the original spacecraft and either resynthesize it using present-day technology or substitute it for an existing modular system. Computer systems in particular were completely reworked, with the original Tevarin software either completely lost to data rot or deemed incompatible with present-day systems.

First public debut
The new Prowler debuted in 2946 in a stunning show at the annual Intergalactic Aerospace Expo event, in which the distinctive winged ship cut a dashing and unexpected figure just as it had once in the skies of Idris IV. The intent to sell the design to the military largely fell through, with the UEEN ultimately purchasing only a limited run of the craft for study and potential special operations assignments. However, the design did immediately attract the attention of the civilian sector. Preorders for Prowlers were taken not from historians and preservation groups but instead from mercenary forces and wildcatters seeing a durable, high-tech ship for rough-andtumble operations. Generations removed from the stigma of the war, the Prowler had found an unlikely second life serving the descendants of the Humans it had once fought so fiercely against.

Development
Prowler was the boarding/assault ship in the fourth wave ships that won the poll for the $61 million crowdfunding goal on 2014-11-06. It was the first Tevarin ship introduced. It was introduced as a Tevarin ship as the developer wanted the Tevarin to be masters of shield tech, so one of the early ideas was that the ship could incorporate air shields to allow the boarding party to quickly exit the ship. The idea of being a Human reproduction of an older Tevarin warship came from the lore that the Tevarin were no longer producing ships themselves. The ship became available for pledge on 2016-11-18 during the 2016 Anniversary Sale/Intergalactic Aerospace Expo, roughly two years after the first reveal. The ship was originally planned to be released in Alpha 3.8, but it was delayed to a 3.8.X patch in later half of March 2020 because of additional polishing needed for the first Tevarin ship. It was delayed again from 3.8.X to 3.9 because the patch will be published in the middle of 3.9 PTU.

The first iteration of the concept involved multiple artists and rounds. The first round of concept was designed by Jan Urschel (Freelancer Artist), the second round was designed by Gary Sanchez (Internal Artist), with the third round was designed by Gavin Rothery (Freelance Artist). Cockpit interior and internal lighting are finalized by Sarah McCulloch (Internal Artist) and Stuart Jennett (Internal Artist). Additional concept work was done by Furio Tedeschi. The lore of the ship was developed by Dave Haddock, Adam Wieser, Cherie Heiberg, and Mike Kinshella from the narrative team.

Calix Reneau was the initial system designer of the ship, and later helped with the implementation. Stephen Hosmer (Senior Systems Designer) was involved in implementing the ship in game, with contribution from Byungjin Hyun, Daniel Kamentsky, Arthur Guillot, and Elwin Bachiller Jr. in the ship art team. The tech art team specifically Matthew Intrieri, Patrick Salerno, and Brian Chen, and Mark Abent helped in implementing the clear canopy animation.

Design brief
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 * The Prowler is very much built around agile use, with players moving easily from inside to outside, walking on the surface of the ship – should feel like an infantry-centric action platform