Combat Abilities
Compared to other battleships, the Eternal is lightly armed, with only a single heavy beam cannon, 6 smaller beam cannons mounted on the wings, a few CIWS guns, and a battery of defensive missile launchers. Eternal's primary battery, however, are the two heavily armed METEOR units and the mobile suits that use them. The METEOR units can either be used by mobile suits or mounted externally on the ship as fixed turrets to increase the Eternal's firepower.
Armaments
- Beam cannons
- A large beam cannon is mounted above the catapult deck and functions as the ships main gun. It is supported by 6 much smaller beam cannons, three mounted on each wing.
- The largest type of armaments installed on the Eternal are its CIWS guns. The ship features two 2-barrel CIWS guns and additional 12 single CIWS. As with most other ships, these guns are primarily used as defensive weaponry used to shoot down incoming missiles.
- Missile launchers
- A large number of missile launchers are mounted across the hull of the ship. As with the CIWS guns, these launchers are used primarly for defensive purposes to intercept incoming missiles.
History
The support ship Eternal is a space warship in the ZAFT forces designed specifically to support the advanced ZGMF-X09A Justice Gundam and ZGMF-X10A Freedom Gundam. In addition to hanger space for them, the Eternal also carried their heavily-armed METEOR units on a pair of external docking clamps. Soon after completion, the ship was stolen by Lacus Clyne and Andrew Waltfeld and used by the Clyne Faction during the rest of the First Alliance-PLANT War. Together with the Archangel and the Kusanagi, the Eternal formed the Three Ships Alliance, an independent force who seeked to end the First Alliance-PLANT War. The Eternal eventually took part in the Second Battle of Jachin Due, the last big battle of the war.
After the war the Eternal was hidden within an asteroid, and Andrew Waltfeld and Lacus Clyne secretly immigrated to the Orb Union. Later during the Second Alliance-PLANT War, after Andrew and Lacus returned to space, the two reunited with some of the remaining members of the Clyne Faction, including Martin DaCosta, who had been commanding the Eternal in their absence.
Eventually, a ZGMF-LRR704B GINN Long Range Reconnaissance Type located the Eternal, forcing it to flee its asteroid base in order to draw ZAFT forces away from the mobile suit factory also concealed within the base. The Eternal approached Earth as Andrew fought the pursuing ZAFT forces in the stolen ZGMF-X88S Gaia Gundam, until Kira Yamato arrived in the MBF-02 Strike Rouge to assist. The outdated Strike Rouge however was badly damaged, resulting in Kira coming aboard the ship and being presented with the ZGMF-X20A Strike Freedom Gundam, which he used to defeat the Eternal's pursuers. After the Earth Alliance was more or less defeated by ZAFT, the Eternal, together with other ships of the former Three Ships Alliance and Orb, tried to stop PLANT chairman Gilbert Durandal from taking full control over the Earth Sphere. The group successfully stop him and bring an end to second war.
Gallery
Notes and Trivia
- The default captain of Eternal in Super Robot Wars J is Andrew Waltfeld, with Lacus Clyne as a swappable sub-captain, and Martin DaCosta as a support character. In this game, the Eternal does not have the CIWS, nor is it able to deploy, link with or store the METEOR units. In other games such as Super Robot Wars Alpha 3 and installments subsequent to J the Eternal does retain these features.
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