Minerva

Minerva is a Colonial capital ship in .

Background
The Minerva, a predecessor to the post-war Mercury, highlights a marked shift in battlestar design, moving the focus from stability and defense to raw firepower. Despite being smaller than the Jupiter, and less armoured than the Artemis, the battlestar's aggressive turret placements on every sector has given the Minerva a reputation as an effective capital destroyer.

Weapons layout and performance
The ship has a 22% base damage reduction and 100% base subsystem repair rate. Its firewall regerates at a rate of 100/s.

Special abilities
The Minerva possesses point defense turrets on either side, generating a protective flak field to deter enemy fighters and destroy incoming munitions.

Strategy
Upon first becoming available, players will immediately notice the upgrade in firepower and munitions when compared to the Artemis-class battlestar. The Minerva has a more aggressive attack profile, favoring a "head-on" approach and favors high-risk, high-reward strategies. Given the turret placement, once approaching the target, it is advisable to approach the enemy from below or to line up a broadside for maximum damage.

In terms of fleet dynamics, it may seem tempting to want to build (and stock) as many battlestars as possible onto a high-ranking fleet officer. For example, two Minerva-class battlestars paired with two Artemis-class battlestars and a Ranger bring the fleet point total to 7850, with combined eight munitions slots, eight fighter/utility wings, and a lot of ballistic firepower. Alternately, some players may note that pairing two Minervas with two Jupiters brings the fleet total to an even 8000 with the two most powerful ships in the game. However, this also means that the fleet will be slow and will have difficulty bringing ranged munitions to bear until they engage effective DRADIS range.

As such, it may be more useful to stock no more than two battlestars in any given fleet; for even greater versatility, mis-matching the battlestar classes will help diversify the fleet and balance the fleet dynamic.