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IMDC Atlas Frigate (Updated May 2025)

HUGE update. More thrust, more cargo capacity, greater survivability, Prototech reactor, and LOTS of polish. Better armed, and more. Small connector for small-grid compatibility. Pics updated.

Not my original design. Total credit goes to JD Horx, who also provided input on the update.

Original here:
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=813539243

Lore (adapted from original):

The Atlas has long been the workhorse of the IMDC fleet, Its primary role is as an escort, support, and transport ship. With its powerful thrusters, it can take off and land from every astral body of the universe and provide fire support, troops, oxygen, ammo, components, or anything else. The hangar of the Atlas is large enough to carry a wide variety of vehicles including Pumas and Ocelots, as well as small craft such as Ospreys.

While not originally designed for frontal attacks on targets larger than itself, the Atlas how now been refit with a single massive railgun able to punch clean through many lightly-armored targets, and six massive artillery turrets all able to fire straight forwards. This gives it the ability to throw well above its weight, and effectively assault planetary bases. Earlier versions proved limited in their lifting capacity compared to their size, resulting the in the ship being refit to primarily hydrogen lifting thrusters, giving it the ability to haul massive vehicles in and out of planetary gravity.

The recent update of the Atlas also saw a complete overhaul of its weapon systems, incorporating many artillery pieces while retaining a handful of older weapons for point-defense. It also saw the removal of the bottom hangar doors, which saw little use and reduced the number of vehicles that could be secured. Just as important, however, are the improvements in quality of life for the crew. Totally updated crew quarters have been implemented, and virtually everything in the interior has been updated to ensure the ship is very livable. In addition to newly-constructed Atlases, the IMDC has been recalling old ships as quickly as they can be spared for this major overhaul.

Specs:

Massive overhaul of JD Horx's IMDC Atlas Class Frigate. Fully updated for Warfare 2, Automatons, Deco Pack 3, and Prototech, with all-new weapons and an all-new interior. Major changes include:

Massively improved thrust, with hydrogen thrusters replacing most atmospheric thrusters
Bottom hangar doors replaced with solid floor and MagLocks (that old feature never really worked well)
Drivable and walkable rear hangar ramp
Flush-mounted rear MagLock crane that also enables bottom docking.
Totally redone interior, featuring beautiful crew quarters, updated bridge and CiC, and overhauled engineering sections, bathrooms and showers, and far more. All exterior doors are now properly airlocked.
Reprofiled bottom of hangar to make it look less like a flying bathtub.

More updates coming soon!

Weapons:

1x Forward-mounted Railgun (replacing the original twin rocket launchers)
6x Artillery Turrets
7x Assault Cannon Turret
3x Gatling Turrets (point-defense)

Equipment:
6x Beds
4x Cryopods
2x Bathrooms
1x Prototech Refinery
2x Assembler

Out-of-character:

This ship desperately needed a modernization. The original fixed rear ramp looked terrible by modern game standards and didn't really work well, either. The new ramp is much better and allows you to walk or drive into the ship. The old bottom hangar doors, likewise, were highly problematic for many reasons. You should use the Gravity Align script when in atmosphere to avoid entering an angle incompatible with flight. This is especially important on Pertam.

Basically, this ship is improved in every single way, while still closely maintaining the outward appearance of the original. It is totally modernized to current game standards while still keeping with JD Horx's original vision of the ship and newer IMDC designs.

Note on the ramp: the ramp open / close system has been designed around grid safety and avoiding bugs. When the ramp finishes its cycle, in either direction, the rotor is both locked and turned off. This ensures no torque will be applied to the ship. It should therefore be 100% clang-free. The system is also designed to protect against accidental multiple button presses confusing it. It utilizes a complex interlocking timer system to allow one-button operation and has safeguards to prevent you from messing; if you mess with it, make sure you understand it.

Also note with the 2025 refit: somehow I went a bit overboard on cargo capacity. It has nearly 3x the cargo of the original. It CANNOT fly on Pertam above around a 60% cargo load, despite replacing most atmospheric thrusters with hydrogen. It's fully hydrogen-stable, at least. The ship is not totally hydrogen-dependent, though nearly. You can fly in space without it, just it'll be sluggish and unpleasant. Planet-side, though, you absolutely need hydrogen.

I discovered an issue both myself and JD Horx missed for 8 1/2 years, thruster damage from the large ion reverse thrusters. Not having a way to fix it without a total redesign, I switched the affected blocks to heavy armor and stuck a welder behind them, always turned on. It won't lose even a single steel plate, so the ugly hack fixes the problem entirely.

There are a lot of scripts in this build, though only Ascent Cruise Control and Gravity Aligner are important. Grand Cruise is in the "nice to have" category since you can automate landing with a suicide burn; everything else of note is done better by the first two. WARNING: do NOT trigger the Retro Thrust script in gravity unless you want to crash; it does a flip to brake.