Information On Zeon's Aerial Battleship "King Of Dragon"

[Gelgoog Jager]

I ran into the profile of this ship from MSV90 and thought it was very interesting:

http://www.mahq.net/mecha/gundam/msv90/kingofdragon.htm

Unfortunately there's not much info on it, or even a picture. Does anyone knows more about it or has seen what does it look like?

[bilbros]

As far as I can ascertain, the linked MAHQ profile tells everything is known on King of Dragon.
Concerning the image, here you are a scan from the May 1990 issue of Comic BomBom (i.e the original source for this MSV90 feature):

http://img244.imagevenue.com/img.php?im ... _478lo.jpg

Although the picture is rather small, its size seems enough to see that the vessel really deserves its name

A second unit of the same class, the Kaiser of Dragon, appears in the manga Gundam Katana, but other than this I cannot provide further detals.

[MayflyOfSpace]

Judging at first from just the mahq profile, it reminded me of the Megafauna from G-Reco. Seeing that image confirms my suspicions. Kimitoshi Yamane definitely used King of Dragon as an inspiration for the Megafauna.

[Deacon Blues]

No, not really. The ships look nothing alike. In fact, the Megafauna looks nothing like it. This is the Kaiser of Dragon from the Gundam Katana manga that I took a screenshot of.

[Dark Duel]

Yeah, I'd have to agree that they look nothing alike. IMO the general layout and appearance of the Megafauna is much more reminescent of the Reinforce with a Zeonic aesthetic.

[MayflyOfSpace]

Well, judging from the image you posted Deacon, nah, they don't really look alike at all.

However, the image that bilbros posted, they bear some similarities. The long narrow front that leads to a larger, more rotund back section, with the wings folding out from the middle, the nacelles/stabilizers positioned at the very back of the ship.

That being said, the more similarities I try to find, the less I find, so I'll concede. And Dark Duel does have a better point. The Megafauna does look more like a Zeon version of the Reinforce.

I may have very tired and or drunk when I made my previous statement, so I'll just step back from it, haha.

[Gelgoog Jager]

The image Deacon showed would confirm that the ship is able to operate in space as well as within Earth's atmosphere. Also, I suppose the mode with the wings folded is for cruising in space, while the mode with open wings is for flying on Earth.

That being the case, I wonder if the ship is capable of atmospheric reentry? We know Zeon previously attempted to take the Gwazine-class ship Gwamel to Earth, but ultimately failed, resulting in the destruction of the ship.

On U.C. 0088, Haman's Neo Zeon succeeded on taking a large battleship to Earth, the Sadalahn. In fact, on some previous threads about the length of UC warships, Mark estimated that the Sadalahn was probably about 600-660m long, putting it on the same ballpark as the King Of Dragon (620m). Perhaps the Sadalahn is a direct descendant of it? For what it may count, Mark also estimated that the Gwanban class was also on the 600-660m range, and more importantly, that background info indicated that both the Gwanban and Gwanzan were completed during the OYW, but there wasn't time to deploy them in combat. This do would give us a precedent for such a large warship during the OYW, though admittedly, the King Of Dragon is not as big once you consider that it owes its large size in big part to its narrow wings, neck and tail sections.

And on a totally random conjecture, but seeing the large round section at the rear, which I imagine they are a Minovsky craft system similar to the Apasaras III's, I was wondering if their positioning could also indicate a relationship with another unique Zeon warship with a similar system in a similar location, the Sand Angler:

http://hobby.dengeki.com/aoz/illust/reboot02-b/