Destrayers

Destrayers are massive disk-shaped spaceships first seen in Air-Ride-in-Style - Part I. It is the most massive object shown until then, apart from Gerath the asteroid, since it appears before Nightmare's Fortress is finally revealed. At first, a lone destrayer attacks Castle Dedede to get at Kirby. Later on, a few more appeared, and it wasn't until Cappy Town Down until the full extent of the destrayer fleet is revealed, numbering anywhere from hundreds to thousands, protecting Nightmare's Fortress.

The Destrayer fleet appears to be Nightmare's "ace-in-the-hole," as a single Destrayer is orders of magnitude more powerful than anything Nightmare has thrown at Kirby before. From Sword Knight's commentary in the episode Cappy Town Down, Nightmare was preparing for the final assault on Dream Land with the Destrayer fleet, but evidently he did not foresee the existence or completion of the Halberd, which has the firepower to rival the entire fleet combined.

Design
Destrayers look like gigantic, futuristic flying saucers; its width alone is enough to cover the entirety of Cappy Town, Dedede's Castle, as well as the surrounding area. Destrayers' edges always glow a deep azure, and have partially-covered upper and undersides. At the middle, Destrayers can extend a pod to fire plasma balls to reduce ground targets to ruin. The inside of a destrayer is filled with firing mechanisms feeding ammunition into its plasma ball launcher, and it does not have any form of defense against a target that made it inside through its formidable firestorm. Also, although they apparently self-pilot, the fact that Silica, Knuckle Joe, and several other Star Warriors managed to commandeer three of them shows they are built in with at least basic piloting capabilities, communications, and life support.

Despite being many times larger than the Halberd, Destrayers are found to be no match against it unless assaulting with heavy fire support and overwhelming numbers.

Attacks and weaknesses
Destrayers have two weapons - the plasma ball-launching pod deployed from its bottom, and a coaxial laser which can be fired in any direction from its glowing edges. The plasma balls are used against ground targets, the laser is used against flying ones. They are also capable of carrying a complement of Air Riders to engage smaller targets such as Kirby.

The plasma balls have considerable seeking ability, and can reliably hit a target as small as Kirby while chasing him through the castle corridors. They pack a punch as well, being the only thing to ever harm the Warp Star in any way, chipping a small piece off one of its corners while Kirby is distracted. They are also the Destrayers' Achilles' Heel, since Kirby gets the Crash copy ability when inhaling one of them, and can destroy a Destrayer from within.

It is an interesting fact that nothing other than Destrayers' beams and Halberd's tri-cannons and Combo Cannon have ever hit a Destrayer, and the Destrayers' laser beams have never hit anything but the Halberd and each other. The coaxial laser is powerful enough to destroy a fellow Destrayer in a single blast, but barely scratches the Halberd's shields or armor. This would mean either Destrayers are built solely with bombardment in mind and have little in the way of defense against similar-tech weapons, or that Meta Knight built the Halberd with technology Nightmare Enterprises does not have access to.

Appearances
The first Destrayer attacked King Dedede's castle in an attempt to capture the Warp Star, but was destroyed by Crash Kirby. A second Destrayer bombarded all of Cappy Town and destroyed Kirby's house and that one too was destroyed by Crash Kirby, despite Cappy Town becoming a sea of flames in the process. Another six arrived to bombard Cappy Town as well, but these six were taken care of by the Halberd. Lastly, there were also three Destrayers that were hijacked by Knuckle Joe, Silica, Sir Arthur and his knights to help the Halberd enter Nightmare's Fortress.

A spaceship that looks like a Destrayer (and possibly is one) also makes an appearance in one of the City Trial events in Kirby Air Ride.

Trivia

 * The name "Destrayer" is most likely based off the word "Destroy" or a variation of it, and may stem from tray, describing its flat shape.
 * The scene involving the first Destrayer destroying Cappy Town in Air-Ride-in-Style - Part I parodies a scene in the film Independence Day, which involves an army of powerful, mysterious aliens invading Earth.
 * The names of the Air Ride Machines that came out of the first Destrayer were (in order the way it came in the anime/English dub): Formula Star, Rocket Star, Winged Star, Shadow Star.
 * The sound of a Destrayer's underside opening is identical to a sound heard in the Star Wars franchise.