One of the major questions facing the galactic powers before the discovery of the RTN, was how did the Andromedan's support such a large fleet? The lack of any large scale shipyards (that were known of) caused a number of Analysts to look for other alternatives.
And they already had one example to go from--the Seltorian Hive Ship, a large spacegoing shipyard. So the GIA positited the possibility that the Andromedans might have their own version of such a ship, a craft that could produce smaller vessels and thus support the burgoning Andromedan fleets.

Three designs were proposed-- a modified intruder and Dominator, both of which were capable of producing base modules and sattelite ships. The third design was a unique (and uniquely large ) design that could produce intruders and other size class 3 motherships.
It was assumed that due to their rarity, no size class 2 ship could be produced outside of a conventional ship yard. (Rumors that such a ship was programmed as an April Fools Joke remain unconfirmed.)

While it might be considered an amusing footnote, a fair amount of energy was wasted trying to find these non-existant ships, demonstrating how early misconceptions about how the Andromedan's worked (and trying to fit them into Galactic assumptions), worked to hinder the response to the Andromedan threat in the early stages of the invasion.

By Charles Gray (Cgray45) on Friday, January 29, 2021 - 07:46 pm: Edit

Andromedan Factory Ships

(this is the rough draft for the fluff, I’m trying to keep it under 2 pages).

Before the nature of the RTN network became fully understood, a major question facing every Empire was how were the Andromedans able to support their obviously huge fleet? Engineers and logistics officers were able to total up the number of ships destroyed and damaged, along with how quickly Andromedan forces could respond to threats.
They concluded that the Andromedan’s had to have a logistics infrastructure that was equal if not greater than that of the Galactic powers. And yet, while numerous mining and resource extraction sites were found, the Galactic Powers were never able to find the kind of construction facilities that could explain the huge fleets the Andromedans were throwing around with Abandon.

One theory was promoted by the GIA Extragalactic Threats Department. The Seltorians had brought an entire factory with them, one capable of building and supporting a quite large fleet. Given that any extragalactic invader would need to bring their entire support base with them, would it not be reasonable to assume that the Andromedans had brought similar factory ships to support their fleet? The fact that they were mobile, explained why the Galactic Powers had never found them—they were relocated whenever an enemy fleet came close to them.

A good deal of effort was put into finding these ships, especially during the early 190s, when the Galactic Powers were desperate to find a vulnerability they could exploit, and the GIA shared its information with other powers, which had varying opinions on it. The Klingon’s found the theory highly credible, given their direct experience with the Seltorians, while the ISC dismissed it, and focused on finding hidden Andromedan construction bases.

As the nature of the RTN and the link to Andromeda became clear, the idea of large factory ships lost credibility, although a die-hard group of analysts raised the danger of “hidden” ships that might launch another attack should the galaxy relax its vigilance. In the years immediately after the success of Operation Unity, the discovery of some newly built satellite ships brought this theory back into brief prominence, until a hidden construction station was discovered and destroyed.
Nonetheless, the designs lived on in the simulators of the various Empires, training future command cadets about the dangers of fighting enemies that might have no fixed targets to attack.

On a more amusing note, a (very) modified variant of this theory lived on in the critically panned (but commercially successful) Revenge of Andromeda franchise, which covered the second wave of Andromedan invaders, using shape-changing mercenaries (largely to explain the presence of any number of guest stars playing the enemy of the week) and factory ships to once again overthrow the galactic powers.

Strategic Implications:

Had these ships existed, the Galactic Powers would have faced an Andromedan invasion that had no “single point of failure” as the actual invasion did. Victory, if achievable at all, would have come at a far more grinding pace, and most importantly, would not have been complete until all the factory ships had been hunted down. Such a setting would have resulted in a far more exhausted, and to be honest, paranoid society, as no nation could ever be 100 percent certain it had accounted for every factory ship.


Andromedan Factory Ships.

It was presumed that as primarily support units, no factory ship would be heavily armed. In addition, the inability to have more than two active displacement device equipped ships in an area would handicap the ability to have a heavy escort. For this reason, the factory ships were equipped with MWP to provide a disposable screen behind which they could retreat. It was assumed that mining, repair and support sleds would be deployed to a zone before the factory ship arrived, and if necessary would be left to their fate should enemies attack. Lastly, most simulations assumed that a factory ship would be escorted by a mothership, in order to provide protection from any enemy attack.

The GIA assumed that any ship that was “completed” and possessed a displacement device would not be able to immediately use said device, in order to reduce the chance of an accidental activation (in game terms, any displacement devices on a newly constructed ship would be marked “destroyed” in order to reflect vital components being left for later assembly).

Finally, any mothership would be launched via displacement device and could not, under any circumstances, return to its construction bay. Such ships would also begin with empty hanger bays.

Slipway class:

The slipway was based on a modified Infestor class with a construction bay capable of holding three medium satellite ships (12 space points) or any combination of ships, pods and other items that might be under construction. The slipway class was limited to satellite ships, and in the simulators was used to explain how a intruder could lose its brood in one battle and then re replenished in an astonishingly short time.

Drydock Class

Based on the Dominator class, the Drydock was a point of some disussion among the GIA, with many analysts arguing that the Andromedans did not have the capability to build new motherships. Other’s argued that the travel time from other galaxies made the existence of such a ship necessary.
The Drydock Class contains one satellite construction hanger, identical to the Slipway class, and a single unitary bay capable of constructing size-class 3 ships.
Most simulated engagements assumed that a Drydock would be escorted by a Dominator.

Shipyard Class:

The largest ship in the simulators, the Shipyard class was nearly the size of the (yet-unknown) Devastator, with the ability to construct no less than 24 spaces of satellite ships at a time, with a single unitary bay capable of constructing motherships of up to size-class 2.

Had it existed, such a ship would have been a devastating threat to the Galactic Powers, quite capable of rebuilding the entire invasion force from scratch if given enough time.