📄️ Skiffs
Although the strikers that adventuring parties choose tend to be of the lesser sizes, there are types that are too small for even them. One of those is the skiff. Weighing in between just 10 and 20 tonnes, skiffs are amongst the smallest possible interstellar ships.
📄️ Shuttles
With the size of the shuttle, there is a little more space aside from the striker rod and therefore a bit more versatility. Shuttles are the smallest size that has actual floor space: you can even stand up in some of them.
📄️ Ramblers
The rambler is a common term for what is, essentially a big shuttle. Ramblers are often described as the shanty-town of strikers, its bucket-of-bolts “design” represents an attempt to get the abilities of a scout (see next section) without the price tag (or performance, or reliability, or, well, pretty much, anything).
📄️ Scouts
The scout is a venerable design, and one of the most common templates for light interstellar craft. They are popular because of their relative ease in operating (particularly in atmospheres), overall versatility and low costs (both in purchase and operation). Some argue that a scout will initially cost more than a rambler, but after a few years, they become much cheaper.
📄️ Couriers
The courier can be considered a heavy and fast scout. Couriers have a similar versatility, are also compact and have broadly corresponding design realisations. They are notable and distinct from many other strikers in that they sport two striker rods side-by-side, in parallel, with the cargo and living space sitting between them.
📄️ X-Boats
<img
📄️ Traders
The trader is a venerable class of ship, and the smallest of the so-called merchant ships. The configuration was originally conceived of as a specialist high value, low mass transit platform, it has proven to be very versatile and has found applications in research, and deep space salvage. The trader configurations each find an economical compromise between crew or passenger compliment, goods capacity, and solid interstellar speeds.
📄️ Escorts
The escort is the lightest configuration designed for military use. They are not generally used in battle, rather they are deployed on small targeted missions to be completed by a small platoon or patrol and would be typified by having the possibility of a confrontation, without necessarily expecting one. As the same suggests, they may be escorting another interstellar ship. Other common examples include: investigating some nefarious activity, rooting out a cell of brigands, or to simply act as a security detail for a colony.
📄️ Freighters
Sometimes called fat traders, freighters are the largest, and by far the most common of small scale merchant ships. Freighters gain considerable benefit from offering more contiguous space, and better overall economy. Their size means that they can accommodate much more robust power plants, which provides the sort of versatility that privateers and adventurers like.
📄️ Liners
System liners constitute some of the most common design templates for the small interstellar liner. They are named such because they are generally too small for the regular traversal of long-haul routes (that frequently go sector-wide or even inter-sector), or as cruise ships that would travel on an itinerary of systems that might span a couple of sectors.
📄️ Patrol Boats
The patrol boat is a venerable class of vessel, used as the backbone of naval power. Unlike the smaller escort, a patrol boat is not all about being a can for a squad of marines. Nor is it about troop transport. The patrol boat is a strategic military asset in its own right, used to project power through being widespread.