The Rebel Faction

Mandalorian Cloaking Device (BHG R&D #2)

The ultimate achievement in cloaking technology. (At the cost of just about everything else)

Displeased with the options available to the galactic market, BHG invested a considerable ammount of resources towards developing their own device to supplemet the Stygium Cloaking Device.

Powered by raw Mandalorian ore, their cloaking shiled works much the same as a Stygium Cloaking Device, though it is not as economical. It utilizes the massive radiation potential of mandalorian ore for power, as well as a layering of mandalorian iron fibers across the hull of a craft and, a singularly devoted computer designed purely for monitoring the cloak. The device is no larger then its stygium counterpart, it requires more supplementary power to run and, like the stygium device, has no 'double-blind' effect"*

Their method of cloak has its own drawback however.

Any ship wishing to mount a Mandalorian Cloaking Device will require a massive retrofitting. The ships hull has to be specially streamlined and modulated to accomodate the mandalorian plating required to modulate the cloak, thus it cannot mount excessive external weapons or scanners on its hull. Most ships have to be custom designed by BHGs' own shipyards.

Layered hulls are also much more resistant to damage, however; any significant damage done to the mandalorian plating will render the cloak inefective.
The device also creates a large ammount of radiation waste which has to be stored while under cloak and released at intervals. This prevents ships fitted with a Mandalorian Cloaking Device from staying under cloak for extreme durations, however, specially modified ships can be retrofitted for waste storage. Luckily, this waste has a positive aspect while uncloaked.

The waste created by the device is so close in potential to Tibana gas that it can be used to supplement an engines power out-put. Much like a supercharger, the release of the devices byproduct into the motivators can result in breif but strong thrust. This conversion also requires that heavier power converters be installed and various other suggested upgrades.

Like the Stygium Cloaking Device, their Mandalorian equivalent bends space around the hull of a ship, causing it to virtually disappear. The device creates a pocket of null-space that does not register on standard sensors, nor does it leave the ship visable to the naked eye. However, when under cloak, ships fitted with a Mandalorian Cloaking Device are prohibited from entering hyperspace, doing so while the cloak is active will result in the fatal detonation of the devices powercore and likely backwash into a ships engines. So, any ship wishing to depart a situation at hyperspace is required to lower their cloak then engage their hyperspace motivators. Ships can line up for their prime hyperspace route under cloak, however.
The Mandalorian device does not interfere with a cloaked ships scanners, making it a perfect device for reconosiance missions. Unfortunatly, running anything higher then passive sensors will nullify the cloak and likely short out the device. The same goes for weapons, while they can be charged, if they are fired while under cloak the device will automatically shut down if it does not blow. Sheild generators also have the same effect on the device and, just being inside a strong enough energy sheild will throw the devices delicate balance off center. This effectively limits the sheild potential of any ship wishing to mount a Mandalorian Cloaking Device.
Overall, the Mandalorian Cloaking Device is an effective and economical cloaking device with extremely tempermental tendancies. It requires a ship be specially modified to run the device and comes at the cost of other systems (sheilds, weapons...)

*The Double-Blind effect is present in most forms of cloaking technology. While a ship is cloaked not only is it invisiable to enemies at the same time it is unable to see outside of its own cloak.

(I've designed this as a valid alternative to the Stygium Device which requires crystals only found on the planet Aeten II. One of my other R&D's uses the Stygium device and was already approved... again, this was created to be a viable alternative for that. Also, Aeten II belongs to Black Sun, a less then active group that has not returned any inquiries as to their intentions with Stygium Crystals (or any other attempts at contact for that matter))