User blog:Thunder Luigi/Bastard's Laser

The Bastard's Laser is a complex of four smaller lasers that can potentially concentrate one, very intense beam. This was notable for sectioning off a part of Kothar station.

Description
''Alice gave this laser its name after its very first test fire roused up reactions consisting of the expletive. She came across this blueprint through her first few years in the weapon-dealing busniess, and decided to keep it for herself despite it having a designated recipient. After a lengthy construction, she fried that recipient after it demanded compensation. Now she terrorizes the galaxy with the threat of wiping entire stations and cities with this laser while hiding far away in the orbit of a neighbouring planet.''

Appearance
The weapon is represented as a white, hollowed out cylinder, with part of its circular face resting on the middle of a rectangluar slab as wide as the cylinder's diameter. The muzzle end appears to be able to retract and has a series of oblong slits that reveal some of the inside. Inside the cylinder is a coiled rod that is capped with a glassy, dark purple sphere. Near the back of the weapon, the upper half of the cylinder is glass that shows some electronics and and a generator marked off with a radiation hazard symbol.

Behavior
Depending on how the player wishes to operate the Bastard's Laser, it will behave differently.

Up to four units can be mounted on a ship. If the player wants to make a fifth one for the Groza Mk II, a message will come up when attempting to mount it: "The energy needed to power a fifth laser will be redirected from propulsion and life support systems if mounted. Please mount a different weapon!"

The weapon has two firing modes, regardless of the number of units mounted: "unfocused" and "focused". Unfocused mode allows a forty-fold increase in loading speed, bu at the cost of a four-fold decrease in damage. Focused mode allows the maximum damage to be delivered, but at the cost of minutes-long loading speeds. If the laser is recharging and the player decides to travel to the orbit of another planet, the weapon will be ready to fire after the planet loads.

Like other continuous beam lasers, this will automatically strike a ship targeted by the scanner while unfocused. Otherwise, it will simply fire straight ahead. However, this will not automatically target a ship on "focused" mode. Possessing the ability to would require energy already being used to concentrate the beams.

The following table shows how much damage can be given and how long it takes to recharge. The first sub-column shows values for "focused" mode, while the second shows values for "unfocused" mode.

Blueprint
Blueprints for the Bastard's Laser were siezed from Alice and were given to Brent Snocom, trusting that he will not construct this for military purposes. However, he trusts Keith more than himself and is going around the galaxy to find him. In practice, this means that there is a 1 in 50 chance that you will encounter Snocom in any Space Lounge, with the following message:

"Hello once again, Keith! Thank goodness I've found you! I have the blueprints for what could possibly the the most powerful laser in the galaxy. I was given this after some of my men arrested Alice and imprisoned her at Damarque I. Now they want me to get the approval to build this so we can end this bitter war, but I feel like we might lose control and destroy civilians with it. You know what, I will pay you to take this off my hands: 100,000$ and the blueprints for the Bastard's Laser. What do you say?" Are you ready for the pain? Grab your largest ship, cram some Rhoda Blackholes, and get out there if you want to make this thing with only one bathroom break!
 * 4t Berger Converge IV
 * 4t M6 A4 "Raccoon"
 * 6t SunFire o50
 * 1t Mimung Blaster
 * 20t Neétha EMP
 * 2t Nirai Overcharge
 * 1t Radioactive Goods
 * 50t Nanotech
 * 72t Electronics
 * 10t Sodil
 * 27t Cesogen
 * 1t Chromo Plasma

Trivia

 * Alice only used this once through the Valkyrie storyline, and has never been since then. She makes no reference to it, either, not even giving a name.
 * This is merely the user's interpretation of a paritcular phenomenon. GOF Wikia user admin 8100STAR gives his interpretation of the weapon as the Vitisha.
 * Players will never obtain this item. So shut up about it.