Standard‑Body Disclaimer
This document follows the ISA Armaments Register, Edition CY 2689. Local jurisdictions may impose tighter restrictions than theL/Rscheme described here.
It is nearly impossible to find a space‑faring hull that isn’t armed. Even civilian freighters mount point‑defense or low‑grade turrets, because shipping lanes in the Requiem for Innocence (RFI) setting are rarely safe. To tame the chaos of multiple species and manufacturers, the Interstellar Ship Authority (ISA) maintains a single cross‑compatible Armament Standard. All weapons referenced on the wiki conform to that standard.
Spaceborne weapons have been produced for centuries by different races and companies. The naming and classification of these weapons had been anything other than standardized, often with weapons being released with model numbers making them sound like new weapons, while in fact, they're the same junk they've been selling for two decades, with a shiny new name. It was difficult to compare two models of the same type of weapon from the same manufacturer, let alone compare two weapons across two different manufacturers or races.
The Interstellar Ship Authority has created a standardized weapon categorization standard, and does independent testing and rating of ship armaments that they publish bi-annually. However, that's just the weapons they certify; anyone can use the notation to help customers understand how weapons relate to each other. (This standard is so popular, both the League and Terran militaries have adopted it as their official standard.)
Note: All ships on this wiki will have their armaments listed in the ISA standard.
The ISA standard for ship weapon classification is as follows:
<Weapon-Type> <Variant> Grade <Grade Number>[L | R]
Weapon‑Type — Grazer, Railgun, Plasma, etc.
Variant — Turret (default), Lance, Spinal, Spinal Lance. ("Cannon" is an older, deprecated synonym for Lance—both denote a fixed, narrow‑arc mount.)
Grade Number — based on Nominal Aperture Diameter (NAD) (see § Grade).
Suffix — ownership legal‑status bookkeeping only.
Grazer Turret Grade 3 (active corvette gun)Grazer Turret Grade 3L (civilian‑licensed)Grazer Lance Grade 7 (battleship main)Grazer Turret Grade 4R (ex‑cruiser gun)Grazer Spinal Grade 8R (dreadnought spinal ‑ always R)The ISA officially recognizes the following weapon type names:
Note: Projectile weapons (missiles, torpedoes, KKVs, etc) are often fired from launchers, which are considered weapons, but not listed as a recognized weapon type. The reason for this is because the delivery mechanism can be varied enough that it warrants separate classification.
The ISA recognizes the following warhead types as valid designators for projectile weapons. New types must be petitioned through the Standards Office before commercial sale.
| Warhead Type | Code | Primary effect | Civil legality |
|---|---|---|---|
| High‑Explosive | HE | Chemical shaped‑charge or fragmentation | Legal ≤ Grade 2, license required above |
| Kinetic Impactor | KE | Pure mass–velocity kill (no explosive) | Legal ≤ Grade 2, license required above |
| Nuclear Fission | NU | Kiloton‑range nuclear blast | Restricted‑only (R) |
| Fusion / Thermonuclear | FU | Megaton‑range staged fusion | Restricted‑only (R) |
| Electromagnetic Pulse | EM | Non‑nuclear EMP warhead | Legal ≤ Grade 2, license required above |
| Antimatter | AM | Annihilation reaction, extreme yield | Restricted‑only (R) |
| Plasma | PL | Magnetically confined plasma discharge | Legal ≤ Grade 2, license required above |
| Gravitic Plasma | PG | Gravitically confined plasma discharge | Legal ≤ Grade 2, license required above |
Note: Other weapon types may be used (especially for Sooni and Grey weapon systems). However, those are unofficial designations and may be subject to change, or inconsistent in their usage or meaning.
The ISA recognizes the following weapon variant specifiers as being allowed in conjunction with the weapon name:
| Variant | Mount / firing arc | Civil legality |
|---|---|---|
| Turret | Traversing mount | Legal ≤ G3, otherwise license required |
| Lance / Cannon | Fixed forward, narrow arc | Legal ≤ G3, otherwise license required |
| Spinal | Fixed, keel‑integrated | Restricted‑only (R) |
| Spinal Lance | Forward spinal, Grade 8+ | Restricted‑only (R) |
These weapon variants are viewed as modifying the base weapon type significantly enough that specification is not just allowed but required.
It should be noted 'Spinal' and 'Spinal Lance' variants are outlawed on civilian registered ships without special licensing. 'Lance / Cannon' variants are allowed as long as they are Grade 3 or lower.
Projectile weapons use launcher classifications based on throw‑mass capacity rather than mounting variants. Launchers are typically either internal tubes or external pods, with the specific configuration being less important than the throw‑mass capacity.
| Class | Max throw‑mass | Civil legality |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0.05t | Legal ≤ G3, otherwise license required |
| 1 | 0.25t | Legal ≤ G3, otherwise license required |
| 2 | 1t | Legal ≤ G3, otherwise license required |
| 3 | 4t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 4 | 10t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 5 | 25t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 6 | 50t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 7 | 100t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 8 | 200t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 9 | 400t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 10 | 800t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 11 | 1,600t | Restricted‑only (R) |
| 12+ | ≥3,200t | Restricted‑only (R) |
Weapon grades are an integer number starting at 1 with no upper bound. They serve as a rough approximation of how "powerful" a weapon is. This rating is relative to the weapon type, and not necessarily comparable across weapon types. For example, a Grade 3 grazer is not equivalent to a Grade 3 plasma weapon.
Weapon grade is derived from the Nominal Aperture Diameter (NAD)—the width, in centimeters, of a weapon’s destructive core measured at its ISA‑defined optimal test range.
For grazers, lasers, and particle lances, the ISA plots beam intensity across its diameter 100 000 km from the emitter:
FWHM ignores faint fringe spill and captures only the core that actually vaporizes armour.
Plasma bolts never form a tidy beam. Instead, the ISA cameras track the mag‑confined bolt core at the designated test range—10 km for classic plasma or 50 000 km for gravitic plasma. The outer bloom mostly scorches; the core is what punches through plating, so that diameter is recorded as the NAD.
The table below lists the official test ranges, optimal ranges, and broader operating envelopes for each family.
| Weapon family | Test range (km) | Optimal combat range | Typical operating envelope |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plasma | 10 | 10km | Knife‑fight ≤ 500km |
| Gravitic Plasma | 50,000 | 50,000km | 10,000–75,000km |
| Grazer / Laser / Particle | 100,000 | 100,000km | 50,000–300,000km (can stay coherent > 500,000km vs. stationary) |
| Railgun / Grav‑rail | Bore dia. | ~25,000km | 10,000–75,000km |
| Missile | 100,000km | 1,000–250,000km | Sprint <120s; effective to ~300,000km |
| Torpedo | 100,000km range | 50,000–500,000km | 10,000–1,000,000km; flight time 2–10min |
| Grade | NAD band | Typical carrier hull |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | ≤ 25cm | Fighters |
| 2 | 26–50cm | Heavy fighters / corvettes |
| 3 | 51–75cm | Corvettes / destroyers |
| 4 | 76–100cm | Frigates / light cruisers |
| 5 | 101–125cm | Cruisers |
| 6 | 126–150cm | Battlecruisers |
| 7 | 151–175cm | Battleships |
| 8 | 176–200cm | Dreadnoughts |
| 9 | 201–225cm | Super‑dreadnoughts |
| 10 | 226–250cm | Ultra‑heavy mobile capitals |
| 11 | 251–275cm | Mobile siege / fortress‑ship spinals |
| 12+ | > 275cm | Station‑class spinals |
Grades continue in 25cm increments beyond 12.
While energy weapons use Nominal Aperture Diameter (NAD) for grading, projectile weapons use Nominal Destructive Yield (NDY) - the total energy delivered inside a 100 m sphere at detonation, stated as TNT equivalents. The ladder rises by full decades so a one‑grade jump always feels frightening, allowing direct comparison between projectile and energy weapon lethality.
| Grade | NDY band | Practical effect |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | ≤1t | Swats fighters, drones |
| 2 | 1–10t | Spoofs frigate PD, cracks gunboat hulls |
| 3 | 10–100t | One‑shot corvette / destroyer kill |
| 4 | 100t–1kt | Vaporizes frigate armour or guts a light cruiser |
| 5 | 1–10kt | Cruiser kill – comparable to ten simultaneous Grade‑5 plasma bolts |
| 6 | 10–100kt | Battlecruiser kill; blast radius 500–1,000m in vacuum |
| 7 | 100kt–1Mt | Battleship kill; multi‑kilometer ablative flash |
| 8 | 1–10Mt | Dreadnought kill; rips open fortress decks |
| 9 | 10–100Mt | Super‑dreadnought / hardened station |
| 10 | 100Mt–1Gt | Heavy orbital foundry or small moon outpost |
| 11 | 1–10Gt | Planetary crust‑buster |
| 12 + | ≥10Gt | Strategic deterrent, banned in most treaties |
A Grade‑5 missile (1–10kt) outclasses a Grade‑5 grazer shot (~10t) by two orders of magnitude, which is why navies still bother hauling magazines of chemical ordnance despite the logistical burden.
The term 'energy weapons' refers to any weapons that take energy in place of ammunition. This does not mean that they don't require a 'fuel' (such as plasma), but rather they aren't typically limited to ammunition stores and their "fuel" can be generated by the ship (subatomic particles, hydrogen, etc).
A "grazer" is a gravity assisted particle accelerator, and its name is a misnomer of "gravitic laser" (and it's misspelled). Grazers are not lasers, they are, in fact, particle accelerators. They accelerate subatomic particles (neutrons, typically) to a significant fraction of the speed of light. The larger the neutron generation, the larger the 'beam'.
Grazers, despite their complexity, are very user friendly, predictable and precise. They have become the most common energy weapon type with strong proponents among military types because of their range and energy efficiency. The weapon includes neutron generation so requires no ammunition, offers high energy conversion efficiency, and delivers near-instantaneous hits that are impossible to dodge at typical combat ranges.
However, grazers suffer from relatively low overall damage compared to other weapon types and weak performance against regenerative or ablative armor due to their focused beam characteristics. Their complexity also makes them difficult to repair and prone to failure from moderate battle damage, though their precision and reliability under normal conditions makes them the preferred choice for most military applications.
Plasma is most commonly used to generate fusion inside of a fusion reactor, however, it's an incredibly powerful weapon when well contained. The problem with plasma is that it is a high-energy state of matter and it wants to condense into a gas quickly. In order to prevent it from doing so, it has to be magnetically constricted. This means that most plasma weapons have a range of however far out they can keep the beam cohesive.
Plasma weapons deliver devastating levels of damage with large area-of-effect coverage, making them incredibly effective against regenerative or ablative armor and standard ship defenses. Their low complexity makes them easy to repair and difficult to disable completely—damage typically reduces effectiveness rather than causing total failure. The plasma's cumulative radiation effect often proves more destructive than the initial impact.
However, plasma weapons are severely limited by their very short range (10km optimal, extending to knife-fighting distances under 500km), making them unsuitable for most space combat scenarios. They are also power-hungry, imprecise, indiscriminate in their targeting, and compete with the ship's reactor for the same fuel supply. Before grazer technology was miniaturized, plasma was preferred, but it has fallen out of favor due to these range limitations and the difficulty of mounting effective plasma systems on smaller craft.
Gravitic plasma weapons were the response to the technological advances of grazers. Typically utilizing a good deal of the same technology, gravitic plasma weapons use artificial gravity wells to overcome the confinement issues of traditional plasma weapons, to a high degree of success.
Gravitic plasma is still considered highly experimental and it is hardly even being researched (since the flaws of grazers are widely considered acceptable). Current generation weapons, however, are highly promising as alternatives to grazers with the same devastating (if not more so) impact of a plasma weapon but at truly terrifying distances.
Note: It is possible to fire a traditional plasma weapon into a subspace bubble, allowing for it to achieve literal astronomical distances, however, that would be considered a subspace weapon, and is banned by the Charlemagne Accords.
Advanced weapon technologies are rumored to be in development by several species which utilize exotic matter states and gravitational manipulation techniques. These experimental systems achieve destructive yields far exceeding conventional energy weapons through neutron-degenerate matter projection and gravitational field weaponization, but remain largely theoretical or restricted to prototype installations.
Electromagnetic launchers that hurl solid penetrators. Simple, reliable, and devastating against physical structures; dependent on ammunition magazines.
Enhanced rail launchers using gravitic rails to achieve extreme velocities, increasing kinetic punch and range.
Moving beyond energy-based armaments, projectile weapons encompass every self‑propelled munition—from chemical sprint rockets to autonomous megaton torpedoes. These weapons share the same Grade ladder as energy weapons, allowing bridge crews to compare lethality at a glance across all weapon families.
Each projectile type uses the same testing methodology as energy weapons—Test Range, Optimal Range, Operating Envelope—followed by tactical analysis. These ranges describe where the ISA certifies performance and where navies deploy these weapons.
Conventional sprint weapon. A volley of Grade‑3 or ‑4 missiles can saturate a destroyer screen and threaten even cruiser armor through sheer numbers and velocity. These are the "bullets" of space combat—cheap, fast, and fired in swarms to overwhelm point‑defense systems.
Autonomous torpedo. Carries micro‑PD, ECM, and high‑order AI to weave through layered defenses. Strategic magazines rarely exceed three rounds per capital hull. Missiles are the bullets; torpedoes are the scalpel. A destroyer might carry eighty Grade‑3 missiles, but a dreadnought carries two Grade‑9 torpedoes and guards them jealously.
A bus that releases smaller seekers, decoys, or mines. Ideal for soft‑kill saturation or coordinated multi‑vector nuclear strikes. Always classified R due to autonomous targeting algorithms that make them unsuitable for civilian deployment.
Carries no warhead—only a smart guidance package and dense alloy core. Legal ≤Grade 2 for private security ships; higher‑grade penetrators are restricted as de facto strategic weapons due to their devastating kinetic impact.
Specialized torpedo that generates a concentrated cloud of plasma around the target instead of using a conventional explosive warhead. Allows for much longer range plasma "shots" than ship‑mounted plasma weapons, though still shorter‑ranged than conventional torpedoes. The plasma discharge creates devastating area‑of‑effect damage but requires sophisticated magnetic containment systems.
Advanced variant using gravitic containment instead of magnetic fields to maintain plasma coherence over much greater distances. The artificial gravity wells created by the torpedo's systems overcome the traditional confinement issues of plasma weapons, delivering devastating plasma bursts at near‑torpedo ranges. More complex and expensive than magnetic plasma torpedoes but with superior range and containment stability.
Grade ratings remain constant across technological generations. A Grade 5 grazer built three centuries ago and one fresh off a slipway both punch a ~125 cm core at 100,000 km. Similarly, a NU Missile Grade 5 from any era yields 1–10kt at the target.
New models may weigh less, draw fewer megawatts, cycle faster, spoof defenses better, or sprint faster—but Grade never changes with age. The ISA rating system tracks raw destructive capacity only. Improvements in efficiency, guidance, propulsion, or other performance metrics never alter the headline classification, maintaining consistent tactical assessment across generations of technology.
This is a section I had ChatGPT whip up to help us when trying to figure out the size magizines to give a ship. This really only works out for capital ships, but it's good enough I wanted to preserve it.
Here’s a version with no nested code-fences (only a single triple-back-tick block for the formula) and the tables spaced so most Markdown engines—GitHub, Gollum, DokuWiki’s MD plugin, etc.—render them cleanly.
Simply copy-paste everything below into your /ships/armaments page.
“How many boom-sticks fit in the hull?”
| Symbol | Meaning | Where to get it |
|---|---|---|
| L × W × H | Bounding-box dimensions (m) | Ship stats / 3-D model |
| class | ISA launcher class (0–9) | Table below |
| code | Warhead code (HE, EM, NU, …) | Table below |
| f_ammo | Magazine fraction by role | Presets below |
V_eff = V_class × k_warhead
N = floor(0.20 × f_ammo × L × W × H / V_eff)
(0.20 = C_b 0.50 × η_int 0.40. Adjust if your hull layout differs.)
| Class | V_class (m³) | Typical round |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0.05 | PD dart |
| 1 | 0.25 | Micro-missile |
| 2 | 1 | Cruise missile |
| 3 | 4 | Heavy AS |
| 4 | 10 | Corvette-killer |
| 5 | 25 | Cruiser-killer |
| 6 | 50 | BC-buster |
| 7 | 100 | BB-breaker |
| 8 | 200 | Dread-cracker |
| 9 | 400 | Super-dread |
| Code | k_warhead | Note |
|---|---|---|
| HE | 1.00 | Baseline |
| EM | 1.25 | Capacitors & coils |
| NU | 0.70 | Very high energy density |
| FU | 0.85 | Extra staging |
| AM | 1.50 | Magnetic bottles |
| KE | 2.00 | Dense penetrator + booster |
| CL | 1.10 | Dispenser hardware |
| SB | 0.40 | Micro-dart racks |
| Ship role | f_ammo |
|---|---|
| Escort / Carrier escort | 0.005 |
| General-purpose warship | 0.01 – 0.02 |
| Arsenal / Missile boat | 0.03 – 0.06 |