Chapter 348 Battleship Demotion

In order to ensure that ground forces can fight smoothly even without warships to provide orbital attack cover in future planetary ground battles, and to increase the offensive capabilities of ground combat units, the Empire has specially developed this unmanned orbital auxiliary attack system.

The beam attack of the "God of Light" is very simple, that is, an orbital attack satellite equipped with a beam cannon in orbit.

The "God of Death" is a special satellite that can cooperate with the chip on the God of Death to control the electromagnetic force and gravity in a local area.

The "God of Thunder" and the God of Death use the same support system, but the magnetic field controls the metal and releases electrical energy.

The "God of Weather" uses a huge weather column that is directly dropped from orbit and inserted into the ground.

This weather column can change the weather in some areas on the surface of this planet, and its technology comes from the planet transformation technology that the Empire is developing.

This weather tower can create extreme weather such as hail, heavy rain, tornadoes, etc. within a certain range.

Once these weapon systems are successfully tested and put into use, the Empire will not have to waste precious warship resources on supporting ground forces in future wars.

In the future, the fleet can completely abandon the satellites and continue to advance after destroying the opponent's orbital units. The subsequent landing troops will seize control of the planet with the assistance of these orbital satellites.

Unlike the quietness in the experimental ship in the orbit of Experiment 001, the Empire's largest shipyard on the orbit of Nuwa Star is bustling with people at this time.

Politicians from various colonies of the Empire gathered here, and the top military officials of the Empire were also present. They will jointly witness the launch of the Empire's first mass-produced dreadnought.

This mass-produced dreadnought is different from the three experimental ships that the Empire has already built.

The three experimental ships all use metal materials cut from the ring world by maintenance drones. Although this metal material has very high hardness, strength and other performance, the speed of material acquisition greatly restricts the construction speed of the dreadnought.

In order to speed up the construction of the dreadnought, Li Mingze ordered the Academy of Sciences to step up research on new materials that can be used as substitutes. With the day and night efforts of all scientists in the Academy of Sciences, a breakthrough was finally made.

Scientists have discovered that by adding a small amount of Ringworld Metal to an existing metal in the Empire, the alloy produced has almost half the strength of Ringworld Metal. The dreadnought built with this alloy is extremely cost-effective. Most importantly, the Empire can produce this alloy in large quantities, which basically solves the material problem that restricts the mass production of dreadnoughts.

Moreover, the Empire can use the advantage of quantity to make up for the shortcomings in quality!

The shape of this mass-produced dreadnought is still the appearance of the Michigan, but its volume is one-fifth smaller, and the construction cost is only about one-fourth of the experimental ship.

The reason for reducing the volume is that scientists have discovered that if the existing reactor technology of the Empire is used to propel such a huge warship, the number of reactors required will reach a terrifying number.

By reducing the volume by one-fifth, removing the mass projector equipped on the experimental ship (the super weapon of the original Crescent), and replacing it with a lighter new purple beam weapon as the super weapon of the warship, the number of reactors required for the dreadnought will be greatly reduced.

The Empire used the saved space to strengthen the number of main guns and armor of the warship.

The original large storage space of the dreadnought was also cut by more than half, and the remaining small part was transformed into a storage warehouse for installing a swarm of maintenance drones.

The new maintenance drones are not the product of the previous generation of civilization, but battlefield maintenance drones designed by the Empire itself.

These maintenance drones can cover the entire fleet, and each drone carries a small material transmission device that can continuously print out materials for maintenance.

These drones allow the Imperial Fleet to repair damaged hulls at any time during combat.

Not only that, in special circumstances, these drones can also synthesize fusion weapons in their bodies to become suicide drones.

In addition to the improvements in super weapons and storage space, the mass-produced dreadnought also replaced half of the mass acceleration cannons with the newly developed purple beam weapons of the Empire. In addition, the mass-produced dreadnought is also equipped with a new type of honeycomb missile.

It can be said that the mass-produced dreadnought, armed to the teeth, has greatly improved the combat effectiveness of the Empire!

"Your Majesty is here!" With a message, the guards at the gate of the banquet hall slowly opened the gate to both sides.

"Long live His Majesty!" The originally noisy banquet hall of the shipyard immediately became quiet, and everyone stood at attention and saluted in the direction of the gate.

Li Mingze entered the hall under the escort of the Royal Guards. Looking around at the excited people in the hall, Li Mingze reached out and took a glass of wine from the tray in the hands of a maid beside him.

"Today is a day worth celebrating. There is no need to be so restrained. Enjoy it!" Li Mingze raised his glass and gestured to drink it.

Everyone in the hall also hurriedly raised their glasses and drank them all. The hall was back to a lively atmosphere. Li Mingze nodded with satisfaction and walked to the French window.

The banquet hall of this shipyard is located above the five docks of this shipyard. Looking out of the window, you can see most of the five docks and their exits.

"Your Majesty, it's time to start." Tianyi reminded Li Mingze softly in his ear.

Li Mingze nodded, turned around and raised the glass in his hand facing the middle of the hall.

"Everyone, listen to me. I want to take this opportunity to announce an important matter." Li Mingze picked up a spoon and knocked the wine glass in his hand.

The people in the hall stopped whispering and looked in the direction of Li Mingze.

"In view of the fact that our empire's technology is becoming more and more advanced, the warships that can be manufactured are getting larger and larger. The original warship units are no longer suitable for the existing imperial fleet!"

"From today on, the original dreadnoughts are downgraded to battleships! Battleships are downgraded to cruisers, cruisers are downgraded to destroyers, and destroyers are downgraded to frigates!"

"And the original frigates, which are now gunboats, are all allocated to ground forces and no longer belong to the Imperial Air Force." (The size of the spacecraft remains unchanged, but the naming level is downgraded.)

"Now I announce that the empire's new battleships are officially put into use!" Li Mingze shouted.

After that, the five huge dock doors slowly opened, and five battleships with a size not much different from the Michigan slowly sailed out of the dock.

All the lights on the battleships were on, and the huge cannons on the ships were aimed neatly at the upper right corner.

"Long live His Majesty! Long live the Empire!" The officers and dignitaries in the hall shouted excitedly.