Merchant Scout

Merchant Scout
HP	15
HP:	4
DCR	35
DCR:	4
HS	3
HS:	3-6
Engines	2 Class-A Atomic
Weapons	none or 1 Laser Battery
Defenses	Reflective Hull

A Merchant Scout is a hull size-3 civilian commercial interstellar freighter designed to make planetfall and ferry cargo from system to system without having to make use of orbiting docking and cargo facilities.

Construction

Merchant scouts are most commonly refitted from decommissioned military or corporate Assault Scouts, Research Ships, or Exploration Ships (as exemplified by UPFS Eleanor Moraes), that have been extensively modified to handle up to three standard units of cargo. Few ships of this class are built from the keel up for a variety of practical and bureaucratic difficulties.

Passenger Capacity

Some Merchant scouts have fit luxury or journey class passenger quarters in place of some (or all) cargo capacity, while others specialize in storage-class passenger hauling, carrying up to a theoretical 4,500 passenger units stuffed in practically every nook and cranny of the vessel, though this would unusual in the extreme.