Cassius Bär --FIN--

Name: Cassius "Teddy" or "Grizzly" Bär

Age: 30

Born: 2352.10.31

Birthplace: Munich, Germany

Race: Human

Appearance:
Height: 6'
Weight: 175lbs
Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Blue
Skin Tone: Tanned Caucasian Skin

Rank: Captain

Position: Squadron Commander - Banshees

Ship/Station: USS Redemption

Service Record:

2375		Candidate	Marine Corps Officer Candidate School Quantico
2375		Student	Starfleet Academy, Flight School
2376		Student	Starfleet Academy, Advanced Flight Training
2377		Student	USS Dagger
2378		Pilot	USS Gryphon, VMFA 221
2379		Flight Leader	USS Gryphon, VMFA 221
2381		Squadron Commander	USS Gryphon, VMFA 221
2383		Squadron Commander	USS Redemption, VMFA 183

Personality: Cassius has a quite varied personality. Like most people, he has his moments of any moods, but generally he is very pleasant while still straight-forward and to the point. He is a very charismatic person with a an easy style and is generally very easy to get along with. He can adapt to any social or environmental situation with little time or discomfort. He is what some consider a social chameleon. But he is always studying with a keen eye, calculating different scenarios or possible outcomes, so it's very hard to catch him off guard.

Bio: Cassius Bär always knew he had flight in his blood. His family had always been proud of the fact that they were heirs to the bloodline of Heinz Bär, One of the greatest fighter pilots in Earth history during World War 2 and the greatest aces of the fabled ME-262, the first jet powered fighter. Several generations of his family had tried hard to hide the fact that heir bloodline had served in the Luftwaffe for the German army. But it could never fully go away. Whether his relatives hated the fact, or embraced it, it never fully went away. The blood had proven strong, too. Many of his forefathers had been pilots of different kinds. Transports, fighters, Aero-acrobats, military, civilian, etc, his family flew them all. There was a long and prestigious line of airmen in Cassius's family tree. And Cassius knew he was another in that great line from his earliest memories.

Cassius spent most of his early years like any other child of the time, taking lessons at school and helping out around the house. His mother stayed at home and his father worked as a regional pilot for a cargo shuttle service, though he was never gone for too long of a stretch before returning home. Cassius would constant ask his father for lessons, taking in any information the older man would give his son in flight operations, craft maintenance, and how to safely operate a spacecraft. It was Cassius's uncle, who was an aero-acrobat that would give Cassius all the information for how to push the boundaries of a crafts's limits without dangerously crossing the threshold. Cassius's father disapproved of his brother teaching the young boy dangerous flying and sharing stories of tricky maneuvers that would tear most shuttle craft apart at the seams. But Cassius loved every story or bit of knowledge he could get from both men. He knew what he was going to do when he got old enough. He never let his father know, though. The man would never approve of Cassius joining Starfleet Academy. So Cassius kept his intentions hidden as he learned from school and his family as he graduated from his primary school and transferred into college. His father was as proud as any when Cassius graduated from college with his bachelors in aeronautics.

Upon completing his college degree, Cassius went straight over to the Marine Corps enlistment office and signed the paperwork to enter into Officer Candidate School. Upon finding out, his father was about the decision, but Cassius was determined to help defend the Federation and Starfleet in the way that he knew best. He would become a fighter pilot. He had seen holovids of Peregrine pilots fighting against the Borg and other enemies of the Federation, and knew that this was what he wanted to do. So he set to it with the fervor of an addict. He drove himself every hour to his maximum as he learned through OCS and The Basic School in is training to be a Marine officer. He was a star pupil for the instructors. He wasn't the head of the class, but he made it a damn close race.

His introduction into flight training showed where he naturally excelled. He was immediately the top choice for Flight and Squadron commands by his instructors, taking on the responsibility of, not only his own training and safety, but that of the other pilots he was in charge of. Cassius took hold of this pressure and used it to fuel himself more. He did everything that he could to ensure that his pilots understood everything they learned and had as much training time as possible, even taking time out of his own spare time, as little as it was, to tutor pilots who needed extra training. And it paid off for him. His Squadrons were always at the top of the ranks, if not the best, in their training wings. After the APF and PF training, Cassius was transferred to the training wing aboard the USS Dagger for advanced training with the new fighters of the Federation, the Valkyrie fighters that had been developed to take the place of the aged Peregrine design. Once again, Cassius was the leader of his training squadron as he had been before and took hold of the mantel as he always had. But this was slightly more difficult as he and his other pilots were learning systems for a fighter that Starfleet was still not used to. So there were a few accidents in the first months of the training operations. Incidents where fighters came apart at the seams for no reason at all, or reactor core matrices failing spontaneously and violently.  Cassius saw several of his other pilots wounded, or even or even killed by these accidents. But after the first year, things settled down once more and eased into a steady ebb and flow.

After the completion of his time at the USS Dagger, Cassius was transferred to the USS Gryphon to replace one of the many pilots who had been lost during the war against the Dominion. He was just a regular pilot aboard the ship for the first year of his tour on board the ship before being promoted to the position of the flight leader of Bravo Flight of the ships primary attack squadron. It was then that the Gryphon got entangled in the Andromedan War. This war took it's toll on the Gryphon, taking the lives of pilots at a rapid pace. In 2381, Cassius was promoted to the Squadron Commander of his squadron, taking the lead position of the fighters in several of the final battles against the "Drommies" before they fled back to their own god-forsaken galaxy.

After the war, The Gryphon went back to standard duties. It was a much more relaxed and peaceful time for the ship. Cassius and the other pilots had much more down time and the death toll on the ship dropped dramatically. But then, Carpathia was elected to the President of the Federation. Cassius knew that there was trouble on the horizon. He couldn't tell just where the loyalties of his commanding officers, ad that made him very uneasy. So, he quietly and carefully requested a transfer to the USS Redemption. It took several attempts while waiting patiently to make the attempts not look suspicious. But he knew where he had to go. He had to be on the ship of one of Carpathia's stanchest opponents, Admiral Wood. After a while, his transfer was approved and he made his way to the Redemption with all due haste.

I think Major would work better for the Squadron Leader Position. Remember we are understaffed and left without alot of the senior officers That may or may not have been what happened here But when I think of a squadron in Starfleet I think of no more then 6 fighters.

That would make sense, but then they would be more of a "flight" than a "squadron" at that point, usually commanded by a lieutenant or captain. I'm perfectly fine with that. It would be a captain for the marines, or a lieutenant for the navy. So let me know which one and I'll make the change when I finish up the profile. I'll probably make him a little younger as well since he wouldn't need that much time-in-service for the higher rank.

Good thing is that we are in the future in a service that isn't that well defined in the space fighters category. My rule of thumb I've always gone by and you can let me know if it's not accurate is

3 fighters= Flight
6 Fighters (2 Flights)= Squadron
18 Fighters (3 Squadrons)= Wing

I'm not sure what other sites do or if they just go off of current military specs. We can definitely hash if out if you want a larger number of fighters. I think that if a LT can be a Chief Engineer then a Capt could command a squadron and definitely a Major. Let me know what you think buddy.

That makes sense. Works for me. I just tend to use Wikipedia a little too much for technical info.

So there would be an Alpha and Bravo Flight for each Squadron, then. Makes sense. The Squadron leader would take up the lead position in Alpha Flight while the squadron's second in command would be the Flight Leader for Bravo Flight. Would that work?If anything, I'll get some NPCs made up as well for the other members of Banshee Squadron until some more members come in who might want in on the action.

As for larger numbers of fighters, that would depend on you, really. If you want the Reddy to work as a carrier as well, then it would likely have a larger fighter compliment. But if it just has a couple support squadrons, than 12 fighters would work perfectly. From the records I can find, like on the Advanced Starship Design Bureau (though I'm not sure how "canon" that site is), Ships like he Akira carry 40 fighters. But that's their primary mission. I figure it'd be a bit different for the Reddy. I'm fine with just the 12, so that's up to you.

So you wanted to be a Starfleet Officer?  That's cool. We can do one Starfleet fighter Squadron and one Marine Fighter Squadron. Maybe that will give us some interesting dialog if we ever get a Marine Fighter Pilot.

Only one thing I see wrong though. It's 2383. So thirty years before that is 2353 for his birth year. So you might want to redo the years on his bio so it matches his age. 

Other then that he is good to go.

Sorry, for some reason I thought you had said navy fighters. I can change over his rank and everything like that later today. The marines still train at starfleet academy, right?

On the template for the character stuff it said 2377, I forgot to cross reference with the site's timeline, so I can redo the career lineage, as well. I'll get that all taken care of today.

Thanks for letting me know about the template. I will correct that. Marines could receive their flight training at starfleet academy but the would still have to go through the Marine Officer Candidate School before attending Starfleet Marine Academy, which is the same campus as Starfleet Academy just a different section of it.

I think I got everything sorted out now. It should be all up to snuff. I used information regarding current practices for pilot training with the US Marine Corps to make up the new career path for Cassius. Let me know if that looks like it works.