Spaceship Classifications

Naval Ships
Automated Gateway Drive Vessels (AGDVs) are automated vessels that provide FTL capability to surrounding ships that would otherwise be incapable of Gateway travel.

Frigates are the most numerous vessels in any navy. At 150-200 meters in length, these small and versatile vessels can be equipped with a wide rage of equipment for any task, be it stealth, point defense, orbital bombardment, or dogfights with other frigates. Their main armaments usually consist of ion torpedos and repeater gauss cannons.

Frigates usually lack an internal Gateway drive, and are thus unable to travel FTL on their own; instead having to rely on external AGDV's or the Gateway drives of their parent capital ships.

Cruisers are the mainstays of their respective navies. Typically around 300-500 meters long, These ships are remarkably fast despite their size and bulk, and are equipped with their own internal Gateway Drives. This allows cruisers to operate independently or serve as the command centers for groups of frigates. In a larger fleet, they wield the bulk of the armor and weaponry of the group, engaging hostiles at distances of hundreds of kilometers with their main guns, or using their extensive shields and point defense to protect the fleet carriers from harm; sometimes, it's both.

Fleet Carriers are cruiser-sized ships that forego a cruiser's main gun replace it with as many hangars as the hull can support, capable of holding multiple hundreds of starfighters. Carriers, like cruisers, have their own internal Gateway drives, and often serve in much the same capacity; either independently or as command centers.

Dreadnoughts are the largest warships in service: kilometer-long ships built to perform both artillery and carrier function. Their particle lances, which take up nearly half their total length, can propel streams of molten metal at a significant fraction of the speed of light, and their size can support as much if not more starfighters than a carrier can. Because of its destructive potential should it ever impact a planet, many even think a dreadnought's main gun to be a proper superweapon.

Drednoughts are considered to be the pinnacle of force projection in the Galaxy, and what this means varies from nation to nation. Some, like the Gaian Federation, keep their dreadnoughts docked and use them sparingly. Others, like the Ixaran Directorate, regularly use their dreadnoughts as an intimidation tactic.

Civilian Ships
Freight Ships are built to transport goods and people between celestial bodies. These ships can range from 50 meter-long buses to 200-meter long cargo barges to kilometers-long arkships

Arkships are dreadnought-sized ships that are built to be able to sustain a population of 20-30 thousand people in a stable environment for weeks or even months as the ship makes its way to a habitable planet marked for colonization. These vessels aren't equipped with weapons, so travelling arkships are always accompanied by a naval flotilla escort. In the case of the galaxy's largest arkship, The 75 km-long Void Pilgrim, it is built to be entirely self-sustaining and houses over 25 million Rishin.

These vessels may come with light armaments and barriers to protect against unknown threats that may inhabit unexplored star systems.