Archer missile
Production overview
Manufacturer:	Lethbridge Industrial
Type:	Anti-ship missile
Service history
In service:	2487-present

The Archer general-purpose missile is a series of guided munitions that were developed for use with the UNSC Navy, but have subsequently seen use with every major human faction in the twenty-sixth century.

Design

A staple on UNSC warships, Archer missiles are used primarily to defeat enemy warships, and are especially proficient in breaching enemy armor. They are usually equipped as a secondary weapon to complement MACs, where they are launched between salvos to keep up a continuous stream of fire. Countermeasures and point defenses pose a significant threat to an individual missile, so they are carried and fired in large numbers. Archers can and have been used in a wide range of other applications, with the most common being air defense, surface bombardment, and even reconnaissance, although they are not as useful as purpose built and more expensive models.

The basic Archer missile consists of a long, cylindrical body, which was chosen in order to maximize the amount of payload and fuel while keeping their cross-sectional profile small to make them harder to hit. The frame is made out of an aluminum alloy to reduce weight and cost, and is wrapped in a thin ceramic sheet to protect it from micrometeorite impacts. This is not true armor, and can be easily breached by even the smallest point defense slug; for this reason, it must rely on speed in order to hit its target. To improve aerodynamics in atmosphere, eight short wings are fitted, each of which has small course-correction thrusters installed. Onboard fuel takes the form of an evolved form of triamino hydrazine, which uses a more combustible mixture to further increase speed. If there is any fuel left when it hits its target, a series of channels vents the ignited mixture forward to increase penetration.

The Archer has a sophisticated AN/DBK-56 computing array installed, which comes equipped with a short-ranged communications antennae and active scanning array. Of particular note is the networked AI. On its own, it only has enough hardware to calculate the journey heading, and must be pre-programmed by a weapons technician to perform anything more complicated than ramming itself directly at its target. In a large swarm however, the missiles communicate with each other to optimize their strike and evasive patterns, as well as alert nearby missiles to unexpected obstacles. It is hardcoded to obey any orders received from the mothership, and only deliberate tampering of the circuitry can disable this. This feature was included as a safety measure, although since the Human-Covenant War, it has been expanded to allow a weapons officer more direct control over Archer swarms.

While they are capable of being used on a wide range of launching systems, Archers are generally used to equip the Mark 46 missile pod that has been mass-adopted by the UNSC Navy and later the CMA. This system incorporates five tubes fitted in an alternating pattern, with two on the top and three on the bottom. These are loaded from a munitions bay behind it which that can fit 25 missiles, organized into a magazine-type arrangement to make loading easier. This arrangement makes it possible for each tube to fire a specific kind of Archer, if missile requirements demand it. Because of the risks associated with being struck, the munitions bay is usually located some distance away from the launch tubes, with layers of blast doors, emergency cooling systems, and vents used to channel the explosion outwards to minimize damage.

Warheads

• High-explosive vacuum-enhanced (HEVE): The default warhead fitted onto these missiles, HEVE features an explosive substance that is surrounded by a reaction mass to vastly improve range and damage potential. The explosion is vented forwards in a shaped-charge funnel, with the nose being strengthened with grapheel and industrial diamond to retain its shape when smashing through armor.
• Electronic warfare (EW): The M58B releases a high-energy electromagnetic pulse to disrupt nearby circuitry and unprotected computer networks, such as vehicles, guided munitions, and occasionally other spacecraft.
• Ionic: Engineered specifically for use against energy shielding, ionic warheads are equipped with excited hydrogen ions that are vaporized into plasma upon impact. These then react with the bonds essential for good defensive barriers, weakening them and forcing the shield generator to expend more energy to maintain them.
• Multiple independently targeted vehicle (MITV): Less of a warhead and more of a munition-carrying capsule, MITV warheads are made up of seven high-speed missiles that are specifically built for air defense roles. Although primarily offered as a space fighter countermeasure, it has seen some use as a deterrent against incoming rockets and smart rounds.
• Decoy: The decoy warhead is bereft of a conventional payload, and it instead houses a sophisticated radiation emitter that is supposed to draw fire towards itself. It typically releases a high-energy infrared and radio signature that is very easily detected by most scanning systems, which is useful in allowing more powerful nuclear weapons to pass through their defenses.
• High-explosive fragmentation (HEF): These warheads are specifically intended for use against enemy singleships, where the missile explodes in their projected path and sends razor-sharp shrapnel their way. These were developed as a substitute for the more expensive MITV warheads.

Variants

M42 Archer

The M42 Archer emerged at a time when the most likely opponents were enemy capital ships of the CMA, as it had been designed in the middle of the UNSC-CMA Cold War. Because of this, there was a need to pack as heavy a warhead as possible into a single munition, even if that comes at the detriment of performance.

M58 Archer

The most widely-used missile in UNSC service, the M58 Archer is a rather small naval missile that builds on the Archer's speed and agility characteristics to counter fast-moving insurgent aircraft and corvettes, while still retaining a powerful enough warhead to make it useful against heavier warships. Introduced in 2495 as part of a contract for the standard fleetship program, the M58 Archer has been mass-adopted because of its versatility, small size, and low cost, factors which were imported for vessels equipped for counter-insurgency campaigns in mind. The M58 Archer has an overall length of 9.4 meters, a wingspan of 1.8 meters, and a fuselage diameter of 0.85 meters.