Every prospective pirate or mercenary crew needs to get their start somewhere. Almost universally, this start is with the humble Callista.
The Callista is a design dating back over two hundred years from a shipbuilding firm based on a turian separatist colony in the Near Terminus. Taking cues from Turian Hierarchy military designs, the Callista was originally built with a rugged design intended to be durable and quick, with unremarkable firepower. A fast-moving strike corvette with a modest cargo bay, two average-sized mass-accelerator cannons, and an admittedly sub-par GARDIAN system ensure that the Callista’s obvious role as a raider and low construction costs immediately found it a market among small pirate groups and PMCs looking to get their start.
The instant this viable market became apparent, the firm responsible for building the Callista began explicitly catering to this customer base through the line. They did this by periodically updating the design every decade or so to keep the tech used in the ship ‘competitive’ with other modern vessels of its class as the tech in older models aged and the price dropped. Meanwhile, the successful raiders who once used them sold the older models on to other buyers as they traded up, and the firm would release a near-identical updated Callista, with all the tech shiny, updated, and new once again.
Ultimately, the Callista fulfills its unremarkable role to an acceptable degree, and is held up as the classic ‘How I Got My Start’ ship by many successful pirate kings and warlords across the Terminus and Abyss. Compared to many other ships of its class in the Terminus, however, the Callista often fares poorly in a head-on fight, making its primary role to raid and capture cargo from a target transport before making a hasty retreat, making fleet actions or battles (even with other raiding ships) a poor prospect at best. Many a young pirate has met their end by over-estimating the power at their disposal and deciding to square off with an Angel, an Aeon, or (gods help them) a frigate of some kind.