(please excuse typo in thread title, intended to be 1701-F)
This thread exists because before designing any ship I work out its reason to be and what I want to include before I get down to the more time consuming art portion.
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Design the next Enterprise contest...
The Isaac Hull class design will be based primarily on the Vesta class (USS Aventine) as it is the first ship designed specifically for slipstream travel and the geometry that starfleet engineers found was most effective. I view the Vesta class as the modern version of the Sovereign class. My other main influence will be the Emissary class star cruiser.
A blurb from the STO site about the star cruiser. "One of the largest ships used by starfleet, the Emissary class is most often used as the flagship of a fleet or support for the most difficult of missions."
Some new technologies I intend to build the ship around that are not included in the Sovereign class.
* Slipstream
* Phaser lance
* Interphasic cloak
Two new functions not previously seen
* Carrier
* Special built flagship
I named the class after Commodore Isaac Hull (in today's ranks he would be a rear admiral). A brief biography is available at
http://www.mywarof1812.com/leaders/hull_isaac.htm He was one of America's best naval commanders during the war of 1812. Of importance to star trek lore he commanded the schooner USS Enterprise as a first lieutenant against the Barbary Pirates.
Comments
After the conclusion of the Dominion War there was an evaluation of how it was conducted and one of the key Federation weaknesses identified is that while individual ships and crews fought valiantly there was a lack of experience in handling task forces and fleets in coordinated operations. While there have been flagships throughout Federation history and often were the most powerful ships in the fleet, they were flagships only in the symbolic sense and only occasionally carried a member of the admiralty. In addition to this organizational issue that needed to be addressed, existing ships simply were not designed to host a permanent admiral in the terms of a flag bridge from which they would coordinate activities and their staff. In many cases where there was an admiral on board there was a tendency for them to lose focus on the big picture and sometimes try to take command of the ship itself from her captain.
The Emissary class star cruiser was starfleet's first solution to this problem. It was designed shortly after the Dominion War concluded using existing technology but events occurred which delayed construction considerably. The primary event being the Borg invasion which not only wiped out over 40% of starfleet and the majority of its combat units but also many planets and shipyards which would have been used to build these ships. In the following decades starfleet capital ship construction was largely halted due to the need to rebuild the necessary infrastructure before front line units could again be produced. By the time the Emissary class started seeing service it had already been outclassed by rival ships produced by the Typhon Pact members. The concept of a ship designed from the keel up as a flagship proved its mettle during the ensuing cold war by allowing starfleet to make the best use of its limited resources. Unfortunately, ships of this type required massive resources and took a long time to construct, as a result they were produced in extremely limited quantities while construction focused on smaller combat oriented ships that could be rapidly produced and forestall invasion.
While terrible, the Hobus event allowed the Federation to catch its breath as the Romulan Empire disintegrated and the Typhon Pact members first fell upon the scraps of the Imperial Remnant which soon expanded into fighting each other. After absorbing the Gorn Empire the Klingon Empire turned its attention to the Federation but were repulsed after bloody fighting and the war terminated in an armistice by allowing the Klingons to save face when the Federation revealed the extend of Undine influence. Peace was to be short lived as a reconstituted Borg returned. It is in this environment that starfleet decided to produce another class of flagships to take advantage of technological advancements and form the core of task forces designed specifically to hunt down and destroy the Borg, this class was designated the Isaac Hull.
Get that carrier **** out of here.
As shown in TNG's "All Good Things", starfleet was using both cloaking devices and phaser lances in the STO era and traveling in excess of warp 9.x, however these are still known to be forbidden technologies at the close of DS9. The question is how and why is starfleet now taking advantage of these abilities and also why some ships have a third nacelle.
Until recently the cloaking device had no canon explanation, but the 2009 movie provided us with one. When heart of the Romulan Empire was destroyed in the Hobus event all hell broke loose, later when the Federation mediated a cease fire among the Typhon Pact which were squabbling over the scraps of the empire the Federation diplomats the opportunity to renegotiate the Treaty of Algeron. While there were many alterations, one of the more noticeable ones was removing the restriction over Federation use of cloaking devices. In TNG's "Pegasus" it is reveled that the Federation continued developing a form of cloaking device using "interphase" (See TNG "Next Phase"), which technically may not have been illegal as it was merely an R&D project, but as demonstrated it had serious drawbacks. A classified component of slipstream drive, had a double effect of allowing a phased ship to detect its surroundings, making it practical for starfleet to begin using this technology.
The third nacelle and double digit warp factors are relatively easy to explain. Nomenclature referring to warp 10+ are actually slipstream factors, and slipstream is basically warp drive enhanced by quantum tunneling. Older style ships that have a large draft, such as the Galaxy (42 decks) require an additional stabilizing nacelle to safely transit slipstream, more modern ships with reduced draft such as the Sovereign (24 decks) do not have this requirement which limits the necessary retrofitting.
Nadion cannons were prohibited by the Khitomer accords, which has been abandoned and resumed multiple times, during the most recent conflict with the Klingon Empire development went ahead with this game changer of a weapon, though for public consumption it has been named a phaser lance. These cannons are enormous and so cannot be mounted on normal ships, restricting actual usage to battleships, dreadnoughts, and carriers.
I'm still undecided as to how I will proceed on this front, but as the Romulans (Scimitar) and Klingons (???) are both effectively using carriers the Federation has started doing likewise. Given that a flagship has additional C&C capabilities it is logical for this unit to double as a carrier.
Aventine Dimensions
Length: 672 meters
Width: 182 meters
Height: 87 meters
Sovereign Dimensions
Length: 685.7 meters
Width: 445.9 meters
Height: 131.2 meters
Vigilant (new defiant) Dimensions
Length: 180 meters
Width: 136 meters
Height: 32 meters
Star Cruiser Dimensions
Length: 724 meters
Width: 255 meters
Height: 90 meters
Too bad about the Typhon Pact not being part of the timeline, I won't miss the Borg invasion though.
I'm not overfond of it myself, but it's to balance out the Klingons. Do you seriously think that any superpower would not develop a unit equivalent to what their enemy is fielding?
Klingons don't need balancing, they need players with brains to counter them. There's a reason we have Gravity Well and Cannon Scatter Volley. Besides, Carriers is a Klingon game mechanic and should not in any way be associated with the Federation.
That said, outside of the game, your logic is sound. Just don't forget this is for a video game, not some fanfic.
The Borg Invasion whil interesting had an incredibly bad ending.
I like most of thie ship ba the Interphaisc cloa and Carrier functions. Interphaisc cloak becuase the Feds in STO (as far as I'm aware) aren't at war with the Romulans and I the Carrier as I think that should be either left toward the Klingons or as a dedicated refit of something like the Akira.
Be interesting to see the actual design I always like the looks of the Aventine.... *Coming to an STO game near you soon*
My carrier may not turn out to be quite what you're expecting though. Instead of using swarms of tiny fighters I intend to provide a couple of dedicated docking points for Viligant class escorts which can be deployed in a fashion similar to the photonic fleet mechanic. Tactical escorts, as laid out in DS9, are fairly limited in both speed and fuel supply which means that they need a fairly local base of operations such as a planet, a starbase, or a carrier (basically a mobile small starbase). If I have enough time (and decide to go the carrier route), I may also design a scaled down Vigilant with about 1/3 the abilities but can fit in an oversize shuttle bay and 4 of these can be launched by the carrier.
:rolleyes:
it leaves me wondering if the titan adventures did too because its intertwined with destiny/
Unbelievable such as the Soviets and the US allying against the TRIBBLE? Like the Soviets and Chinese allying against the US?
Or perhaps you could go back a little further to WWI, or to the 100 years war, or the 30 years war, etc.
Odd alliances happen for a variety of reasons and really aren't that uncommon. The Typhon Pact is fairly understandable, yeah the component members dislike each other alot but they have all demonstrated that individually they cannot stand up to the Federation, in part because the Feds will play them off against each other, but united they have a chance not only to stand up to the Feds but possibly even conquer them. The Pact can't stand in the long term, but is useful in the short term and has a specific goal.
Romulans are fiercely independent, especially when times are desperate (re: their whole journey from Vulcan.) They still have plenty of worlds to call their own and plenty of ships. They are actually in BETTER standing than their ancestors were when they only had a few ships with lower tech and few, if any, base planets. The standard Romulan would simply become even more agressive, as demonstrated to the extreme by Nero.
The other thing to consider is that even when faced with, what would have essentially been a mass surrender, getting them into a coalition against the Dominion was a challange. Why? In general they are quite xenophobic, mostly a result of their ancestorial space travelling. "Modern times" for them have only proven that trusting strangers still comes at a great cost to personal security. Furthermore, the chances of the Romulans intending on remaining hostile to everyone around them is quite high. Anyone teaming with them might as well paint a giant target on their hulls.
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The Breen just came out of an alliance that left their reputation in even worse standing with the local powers than they already were. Nobody trusted or liked them before; that would be even moreso in the aftermath of the Dominion War. But they have always been independent and kept to themselves. Their homeworld was not attacked or destroyed, and any loss of ships during the war would have been delt with in a manner they had been previously - within their own sphere of influence.
There really isn't anything substancial to make a case for them to seek an alliance with anyone. They would really have to be given something truly amazing as an offer from the Romulans since even the Dominion had to go to them, as opposed to the other way around. What would a group of Romulan upstarts have to offer when they've got few resources to squander, are known hostiles, former adversaries who even have a saying "never turn your back on a Breen" and are obviously looking for other people simply for political and military backup?
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Gorn are already on Klink side. Even if you have exiles or breakaway colonies, I would see the Gorn going to the feds before going to a broken up superpower. They would become a potential resource drain, and Feds are more willing to give. Romulans are not. Gorn can't be so stupid as to go to a group that must retain most of their resources to sustain themselves and their empire.
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Tholians don't like anyone. They are uber powerful. Their tiny patrol craft (even after one had been disabled) were able to take on and capture a Connie in TOS, and over 130yrs later, I'm sure their tech would progress as well. If they can trap a ship, they can set up defense grids/webs like crazy. Sorry, but I see them going more inward and focussing on territory defense, rather than reaching out to a broken power who they could tear into.
The main problem the Typhon Pact concept is that all players are untrustworthy of one another and/or carry deeeeeep seeded prejudices based on experience and psychology. The other problem is there is no believeable reason I see for anyone to rally to a breakaway and weakened Romulan power, in fact, it's much more believeable for all the others to want to gang up and attempt to conquer it, if anything. These counterpoints I've made are what a writer must consider before doing a story, otherwise the reader/player is gonna be like...WTF?
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Umm dude... do you actually read or know the events occuring within STO? The Feds are in such denial over the Undine threat that an Admiral convinces you to go murder every Romulan on a medical facility? Klingon's are the ones who have revealed the Undine influence...
Not to mention the war still rages.
Make it a Battle Carrier, that way it still can have some carrier functions ,but , have a more of on Offensive punch/
so far that's the best in universe explanation for the all good things stuff i've seen.
Ignore the pretend-game power for a moment. What do you see when you fight fighters? A lot of ships plinking are only a problem if you ignore them, but once you look at them wrong, they explode. The Carrier can spawn new waves endlessly. But the endless respawn is a game mechanic. In the Startrek universe, the carrier would be out of fighters after 4-6 waves and be useless. Carriers are a terrible idea for the Startrek universe. It just doesn't fit anything we know and have seen in Startrek. If Fighters could carry torpedoes that could destroy ships with one or two hits, they would make sense, but they clearly don't. Carriers are one of the worst game concepts to include in a Startrek game.
Carriers with itsy bitsy fighters are a bad concept for Star Trek.
However, think for a moment about a pared down Defiant. The defiant was a combat oriented minimalist Starfleet ship, but it still had a shuttle bay and science area and sickbay and a cargo bay and supplies for 3+ months, etc. If you threw out those extras you could probably cut its size in half while not reducing combat power.
Think of a carrier not as something that carries single seat fighters (such as in Nemesis or DS9) but rather for a pared down defiant with space for just a few weeks independent operation and stripped of everything that isn't purely for combat. The "carrier" would basically be their mobile home base and could take care of any medical or repair or refueling needs. 2-6 of these small ships or attack craft could feasibly be carried, wouldn't be easy to kill, and would be a real boost to combat power.