Panther PNT-15K
Rules Level: 	Tournament Legal
Technology Base: 	Inner Sphere
Chassis Config: 	Biped
Production Year: 	3075
Extinct By: 	Never
Chassis: 	Alshain 560 Endo-Steel
Power Plant: 	Omni 175 Fusion Engine
Cruising Speed: 	53.75 km/h
Maximum Speed: 	86.0 km/h
Jump Jets: 	Lexington Ltd Lifters
     Jump Capacity: 	150 meters
Armor: 	Durallex Medium Light Ferro-Fibrous w/ CASE
Armament:
     1 Victory Nickel Alloy ER Large Laser
     1 Shigunga Adaptarack MML-5
     1 C3 Computer (Slave)
Manufacturer: 	Wakizashi Enterprises
     Primary Factory: 	New Samarkhand
Communications System: 	Sipher ComCon SCU-4
Targeting and Tracking System: 	Cat's Eyes 5
Overview
The end of the Wolf War saw the DCMS come to a uncomfortable conclusion, which was that the Panther, while a capable mech in it's day, was by now severly out of date and badly needed a rethink.

While newbuilds had managed to improve the design somewhat there was still a huge number of the lack luster 10K refits around meaning that something would have to be done about those before even considering building more of the newer models.

A combined think tank of Chadran Arms and Wakizashi engineers went to work redesigning the Pnt-10K with the intent of making it a much better design for the late 31st century, a no easy task seeing as the resources allocated were a bit limited so using excessively expensive items such as extra light engines was out of the picture.

Intially stumped, the design team's salvation came when they heard of Ceres Metal's reworking of the Vindicator as they soon came to the conclusion that a similar treatment would be just the thing the Panther needed to become a capable design again.



Capabilities
The first thing on the list was to redo the heat sinks, replacing the thirteen single heat sinks with ten doubles, this being made considerably easier by the installation of a new 175 rated engine, improving the design's ground speed to 58 kilometers a hour, and the addition of a extra jump jet also improved the design's jumping distance to 150 meters.

It was with no small regret that the design team eventually chose to replace the Panther's signeature weapon with a extended range large laser, but the two tons thus gained were put into good use. First on the to get list was a C3 slave system, considerably improving the Panther's ability to work with it's lance mates, while a five tube multiple missile launcher not only more than made up for the downgrade of the main weapon, but also improved the short range firepower slightly.

As a final touch the design gained a half ton of armor and had all of it replaced with light ferro fibrous armour, improving the protection to near maximum, which also caused it to be redesigned a little in outside appearance, gaining a more cat like look as befitting it's name.

All in all the new Panther was in every way a improvement over it's preceding refits


Deployment
Wakizashi has issued a recall of all current in service 10K Panthers for them to be updated to this new variant, and the older variant is looking like it will be extinct by the early 3080's. So far the response from the mechwarriors assigned to the new Panthers has been overwhelmingly positive.

The success of this design, and it's clantech half sibling (see variants) has helped both companies to finally bury the hatchet over their previous issues and start working together instead of against each other.



Known Variants
Although strictly speaking not a variant, Chadran Arms developed a very similar design for the Nova Cats.

Called the Alley Cat officially but sometimes called the Panther IIC this variant uses a clantech er ppc and a atm missile launcher, but otherwise is virtually identical to it's half sibling.


Technology Base: 	Inner Sphere 	35 tons
Chassis Config: 	Biped 	Cost: 	3.330.360 C-Bills
BV2: 	968 	Tech Rating/Era Availability: 	E/X-X-E
Equipment 			Mass
Internal Structure: 	Endo-Steel 	2.0
Internal Locations: 1 CT, 4 RT, 7 LA, 2 RA
Engine: 	175 	Fusion Engine 	7.0
Walking MP: 	5
Running MP: 	8
Jumping MP: 	5 Standard
Jump Jet Locations: 1 CT, 2 LL, 2 RL	2.5
Heat Sinks: 	10 (20) - Double (7 in engine) 	0.0
Heat Sink Locations: 3 LT, 3 RT, 3 RA
Gyro: 	Standard 	2.0
Cockpit: 	Standard 	3.0
Actuators: L: SH+UA+LA+H    R: SH+UA+LA+H
Armor: 	118 points - Light Ferro-Fibrous 	7.0
Armor Locations: 2 LT, 3 RT, 1 LA, 1 RA
CASE Locations: 1 LT	0.5

	Internal 	Armor
	Structure 	Factor
Head: 	3 	9
Center Torso: 	11 	16
Center Torso (rear): 		5
R/L Torso: 	8 	12
R/L Torso (rear): 		4
R/L Arm: 	6 	12
R/L Leg: 	8 	16

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Criticals	Tonnage
C3 Computer (Slave) 	HD 	1 	1.0
MML-5 	LT 	3 	3.0
ER Large Laser 	RA 	2 	5.0
@MML-5 (LRM) (24) 	LT 	1 	1.0
@MML-5 (SRM) (20) 	LT 	1 	1.0
 

Quote:

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Forgot to talk about the 'mech; obviously, it fulfills a wonderful place in the DCMS military- it ain't fast or flashy, but it can hit at any range, and rather heavily for it's size.

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