At the end of the Dilgar War the Earth Alliance was able to aquire some examples of the Spinal Laser. After seeing this devastating weapon in action the Earth Alliance wanted to incorporate it into their own fleets and several prototype ships were commissioned to mount the weapon by Earth Force command.
One problem experienced is that the weapon required a huge amount of cooling and power equipment and with the low technology of Earth this was only further expanded. Designers realized that they could not merely refit a ship but they would have to design a ship around the weapon. Rather than design a totally new hull which could take years they decided to adapt a Nova Dreadnought to the task, in much the same way that the Omega Destroyer was born from it. The design would require a huge amount of reworking and in the end many of the components were relocated, removed or replaced along with several changes in the general frame of the vessel. When it was finally complete, five prototypes came off the line, dubbed Priapus Spinal Cruisers.
The Priapus Spinal Cruiser bears a great deal of resemblance to it's parent ship the Nova Dreadnought. With the same long body and hammer head fore section. Designers discovered that the Hangar launch tube was an ideal place to fit the Spinal Laser. The weapon extends back into amongst the primary systems along with a great deal of support equipment. The hangar was entirely removed, and another was worked into the structure more aft with launch specifications similar to the Hyperion. The amount of equipment in the primary section meant a lot had to be changed. The engine was pushed back into the aft section which left no room for the thrusters, requiring the addition of two engine pods on either side of the aft area. There was so little room for the engine that it had to be downgraded into a less powerful unit.
Much of the weaponary was removed, keeping six arrays for anti ship and anti fighter defense, as well as the interceptor grid. Because of the orientation of it's weaponary and it's sluggishness it was deemed more of a support ship. Which meant that the jump engine would be removed in favour of more room for primary components.
Several field and actual battle tests proved the Priapus was quite vulnerable from enemy fire attacks, espicially flanking attacks. The design may have been workable if not for the incredible amount of maintenance required for the meets of cooling, focus, power and other equipment for the main weapon. The combination of added engine pods and changes in the frame of the vessel caused several weaknesses to appear in terms of stress and fracture points. All of this eventually lead to the scrapping of a Spinal Laser platform in the EA fleet.
