Bold Venture

Bold Venture
Vessel Profile
TypeWarShip
ClassVolga

History[edit]

In 3061 the Volga-class transport CDS Bold Venture was a WarShip in service with the Clan Diamond Shark touman.[1]

Bold Venture was serving as an escort and transport vessel as part of one of the last Diamond Shark convoys to leave Vinton during the Wars of Reaving. Gathered at Salonika in early July and under the command of Star Admiral Lori Hawker, the convoy consisted of almost sixty JumpShips - two with mobile repair stations in tow - along with the Bold Venture and the Carrack-class transport CDS Star Swimmer, and was waiting for straggling merchant caste vessels when the convoy was surprised by the sudden arrival of an unidentified Cluster of vessels, which Admiral Hawker believed to be the same group of vessels that had been hitting nearby Diamond Shark stations in recent weeks.[2]

Admiral Hawker ordered the Bold Venture and the Star Swimmer to engage the new arrivals, and both ships responded quickly to her orders. The unidentified vessels were actually a Cluster of ships from the resurgent Clan Burrock, under the command of Star Admiral Olson Nga, and consisted of six JumpShips, the Riga-class frigate CBS Hetherington and some ten Stars of aerospace fighters crewed by a mixture of Burrock personnel and volunteers from Tanis. The Star Swimmer closed first as the Burrock forces began a delaying action, with the Burrock JumpShips hot-charging their engines as the fighters and the Hetherington engaged the Star Swimmer. The Burrock forces managed to inflict only moderate damage on the Star Swimmer before it closed on the JumpShip CBS Earthen Vessel, intending to board and capture the Burrock ship; the crew of the Earthen Vessel panicked at the Diamond Shark WarShip's approach and triggered their K-F drive. With the K-F drive of the Star Swimmer in close proximity, the result was the Earthen Vessel's hyperspace field warping and inflicting catastrophic damage to the drives on both ships.[2]

Despite the damage inflicted on the Star Swimmer, both Diamond Shark vessels pressed the attack, with the Star Swimmer destroying one JumpShip while a second JumpShip surrendered to the Bold Venture. Two Burrock JumpShips and the Hetherington successfully jumped out of the Salonika system, whilst the last Burrock JumpShip misjumped and was lost. Admiral Hawker believed her convoy to be safe at this point, and transmitted information on the engagement back to the Homeworlds while ordering that the Star Swimmer be stripped of essentials, as the damage inflicted on the ship meant that it would have to be abandoned as the Diamond Sharks withdrew to the Inner Sphere. What Harker didn't know was that her message would never be received, as the Burrocks had destroyed or taken control of the HPG stations between her and the Homeworlds.[2]

Two weeks after the first battle, the Diamond Shark convoy was still gathered at Salonika when the Burrocks returned. This time, the Burrocks had bought their main fleet from Tathis, just seventy light years away, and found that the Diamond Shark convoy had increased to seventy-one ships of various sizes. The Burrocks had brought the Hetherington back into the fray, along with the Kimagure-class pursuit cruiser CBS Admiral Russell Nga, the Mako-class corvette CBS Stone Crab, eight Stars of aerospace fighters, and almost thirty DropShips.[2]

The appearance of the Burrock forces caused a degree of panic amongst the Diamond Shark Merchants, but Admiral Hawker responded quickly; gathering together just over twenty combat-capable DropShips of her own from the assembled merchant fleet, Hawker used those DropShips plus the Bold Venture and the Star Swimmer - which had been stripped of several systems, but which still mounted most of its weapons and remained maneuverable - to strike at the Burrocks. The battle itself was brutal, and fought amidst the assembled Diamond Shark flotilla, with many of the Diamond Shark ships falling to targets of opportunity; twenty-one Diamond Shark JumpShips were destroyed, along with most of the combat-capable DropShips assembled by Harker and both Diamond Shark WarShips. Before being defeated, Hawkers forces managed to destroy nearly half the assembled Burrock DropShips as well as the Hetherington, but the forty-eight surviving JumpShips were left unarmed and helpless. With little choice other than to be taken as isorla, the remaining Diamond Shark vessels surrendered, and the Burrocks used their surviving warriors to place forces on the thirty-three ships they deemed to be the most important. The flotilla was then ordered to jump back to the Tanis system, although the fifteen vessels without Burrock warriors aboard all managed to lose themselves from the convoy, scattering into the Deep Periphery as the Burrocks brought the rest of their prizes home.[2]

References[edit]

  1. Field Manual: Warden Clans, p. 65, "Naval Assets"
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 The Wars of Reaving, p. 102, "Bearding the Shark"

Bibliography[edit]