What angers me the most is the radical change of design from Galaxy to Sov. (aside from the technical things)
TNG established a majestic and unique ship design with the Galaxy and Nebula Class. Their emphasis on round shapes and a heavy saucer and small nacelles where really different to anything i have seen. But then suddenly they discarded that design in favour of a more mainstream "fast" looking design. Not very innovative IMO.
The Sovereign was not the successor to the Galaxy, it was simply the next Enterprise. The Sovereign is supposed to fill a mission profile like that of the Excelsior, not like that of the Galaxy.
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
Now how exactly are the moves with the Sovy' at a max of up to hours each, enough to tell a story, supposed to show higher continuity of technology than a tv show that ran for multiple seasons? A long running show about a refuse barge could even outdo three movies for that just for the content worth of time and plot device.
It doesn't really have anything with the runtime - TNG had a very thorough writer's bible which became the technical manual. People cared and invested time and effort into elaborating the treknology involved. I am pretty sure nobody cared when they designed the Sovereign.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
Now how exactly are the moves with the Sovy' at a max of up to hours each, enough to tell a story, supposed to show higher continuity of technology than a tv show that ran for multiple seasons? A long running show about a refuse barge could even outdo three movies for that just for the content worth of time and plot device.
I'm not discussing wheather the movies could or could not portray the needed continuity in tech or the science aspects involved. I'm simply stating the facts that they didn't.
It doesn't really have anything with the runtime - TNG had a very thorough writer's bible which became the technical manual. People cared and invested time and effort into elaborating the treknology involved. I am pretty sure nobody cared when they designed the Sovereign.
Also, pretty much this.^
The people behind TNG, heavily influenced by Gene himself, went into some really deeply thought through analysis both abouth the technological and scientific aspects they wanted to implement in the show. They wanted most of the stuff that would be seen on TNG to be able to be explained in a rational sense within the confinements of the show's own technobabble and suposed future technological and scientific achievments. In comparison, they never bothered much with that for the movies due to the format and final goals of the product.
I'm pretty sure that the longer the phaser strip means more power phaser beam was forgotten long before the Sovereign was designed.
I'd actually say that it probably doesn't really apply in ST canon.
I'll beg to differ. I think the length of the phaser strip represents the power available from that ship to put into a single phaser array. The advantage is a greater firing arc but the drawback is larger power requirement. I sort of draw upon this conclusion of the evolution from the "nipple beam banks" of the Constitution/Excelsior age, to the small phaser strips of the Ambassador age (which are still in the same positions as the previous beam bank setups), to the phaser arrays of the Galaxy/Nebula/Sovereign/Intrepid/etc age we are in now.
The difference between the lengths of the arrays on the Galaxy vs the Sovereign, is in my opinion, due to more sharp angles on the Sovereign's design. The Galaxy is much more smooth and rounded in shape with a more continuous surface. The Sovereign has a lot of abrupt edges.
In any case, that's my speculation.
Member since November 2009... I think. (UFP) Ragnar
I'll beg to differ. I think the length of the phaser strip represents the power available from that ship to put into a single phaser array. The advantage is a greater firing arc but the drawback is larger power requirement. I sort of draw upon this conclusion of the evolution from the "nipple beam banks" of the Constitution/Excelsior age, to the small phaser strips of the Ambassador age (which are still in the same positions as the previous beam bank setups), to the phaser arrays of the Galaxy/Nebula/Sovereign/Intrepid/etc age we are in now.
The difference between the lengths of the arrays on the Galaxy vs the Sovereign, is in my opinion, due to more sharp angles on the Sovereign's design. The Galaxy is much more smooth and rounded in shape with a more continuous surface. The Sovereign has a lot of abrupt edges.
In any case, that's my speculation.
I'm more thinking in Voyager where no matter which phaser stripe is used, they all seem to do the same amount of damage.
The longer the stripe, the more firing angles it has, but I think the translation to direct firepower was forgotten.
I'm not discussing wheather the movies could or could not portray the needed continuity in tech or the science aspects involved. I'm simply stating the facts that they didn't.
Also, pretty much this.^
The people behind TNG, heavily influenced by Gene himself, went into some really deeply thought through analysis both abouth the technological and scientific aspects they wanted to implement in the show. They wanted most of the stuff that would be seen on TNG to be able to be explained in a rational sense within the confinements of the show's own technobabble and suposed future technological and scientific achievments. In comparison, they never bothered much with that for the movies due to the format and final goals of the product.
My whole point is that the way that a feature movie, or even series of movies is made makes it extremely difficult to do they things that you are talking about with the series. The series was a program with more time to develop and work on, each of the movies are a project. The amount of time spent for development of series to movie is ~ 100:1. There was no way, no matter how much someone wanted to, to make a "bible" as comprehensive for a movie content ship as is it for a multiyear tv series ship.
Whats a more accurate line of best fit, a 100 point scatterplot or a 3 point. The more content(data), the more refined.
What angers me the most is the radical change of design from Galaxy to Sov. (aside from the technical things)
TNG established a majestic and unique ship design with the Galaxy and Nebula Class. Their emphasis on round shapes and a heavy saucer and small nacelles where really different to anything i have seen. But then suddenly they discarded that design in favour of a more mainstream "fast" looking design. Not very innovative IMO.
I really have to ask, does that truly anger you? Its just IP, a construct, its not real life. I could see if you were let down or didn't personally feel drawn to it. But anger, isnt that a bit strong?
I grew up on TOS and they tend to be the designs I like. I dont think the Galaxy is "majestic" or a thing of beautfy, its okay, I like other designs better. No Star Trek ship certainly brings up primal emotions of mine.
this array configuration couldn't be more counter intuitive, i guess you could call it athletically pleasing if you never though for a moment how arrays work, and what might be THE factor that makes them strong or not. the inner side arrays cant even line up a forward shot, the 2 forward split arrays are some of the weakest on the ship, the last you would want split for no reason, and that outer side array is like half as long as it could be, hell it should probably be connected all the way around. a proper armament on that saucer would be an array positioned at the very top of the slope down starting after that flat area on the sides, warping all the way around.
just like with several cryptic designs like the guardian and regent, that have no forward firing arc at all, as if these ships would actually broad side by choice outside this game, and fire 8 pinprick shots at once instead of 1, from their largest array. that should be able to hit any target in at LEAST 270 degrees.
a bunch of needle picks are not a more war time approach ether, those would be shots to disable, or keep a cloaked ship illuminated, shots fired in anger to destroy would use as many emitters as possible and fire from the largest array. anything else is an inefficient use of plasma
its canon both in the show and in the tech manual, that the phaser arrays are fed form the end. the array itself is made up of individual modules that are open on both sides. they are fitted connected to each other to make a long string. when firing, the energy is fed into the end of the string and passed along the energy conduit at the base of all of the emitters until it reaches the firing point, it is then focused and shaped there.
you could vastly increase the firing rate by keeping the phaser array charged. then its just a matter of releasing as needed instead of sending the charge of energy down the conduit as needed.
dunno if it was a service life span item or a safety item, but in the show, it was rarely seen that the phaser array wasn't being charged up as part of the firing sequence.
voyager did the same thing, though hers only seemed to be fed from the aft end of the strip. this was probably to save space. it IS a small ship after all. it is likely that the smaller arrays on a galaxy are fed from only one end while the larger ones are fed from both ends.
On the subject of smooth vs angular between the Sovereign and the Galaxy that's one thing where we have the precise producers thoughts.
Many on the production team didn't like Probert's smooth Galaxy design.
They believed that in order to display scale, they need relief and shadow. To that end the 4 foot model has more texture. I have no doubt that when the Sovereign was designed that was placed at the forefront of what they wanted to see. That said the Sovereign's saucer overall is still very smooth as is the Stardrive section.
It's quite obvious actually, at least to me. The Galaxy Class is a product of an era when known scientific facts as well as coherency and continuity played ar huge role in the development of Star Trek and the technology involved. The Sovereign Class is a result of pure moviemaking needs a.k.a. the old Galaxy model is not good enough for movies, nor is it "cool" or fresh enough anymore. So the anwer would be - nobody really bothered with the need to explain how or why, it was there for purely entertainment purposes. A artistic design decision trumping tech continuity.
Well when Gene got the opportunity to make TNG he wanted a much more serious hard science approach then the kind of mad cap style of the Original. Unfortunately his ideology was also to remove the fun of the Original Series a little, but overall it turned out as he wanted. This extended to the ship where Andrew Probert wanted to create a ship that displayed that the technology had advanced to the point where they could put aside function and create something based on the form that they wanted.
Don't take this as bashing the Sovereign Class, but I'm amost 100% sure that the scientific backgorund as well as technological continuity played a very minor role in it's design as oposed to the Galaxy Class where almost 100% of the details have been really deeply thought through in order to make more scientific and technological "sense", something Roddenberry insisted on.
I'm sure noone will argue that TNG as a show had a unique approach with more scientific and technological basis, coherency and continuity in the technologies used in Star Trek than any other Star Trek show and especially the movies.
I don't know, I take that as fairly bashful.
In any event you would be incorrect in your assumption. John Eaves did take a logical approach to the creation of the Sovereign, and much of it was informed by the world the ship was going to be entering. As beautiful as it was the neck on the Galaxy and the Ambassador was a liability against the Borg, so they got rid of it. By joining the saucer and Stardrive it makes it a tougher ship overall. She didn't just look faster, she was faster, incorporating the latest in warp field theory. The Sovereign, the Intrepid, the Prometheus, the alien Dauntless all use the slimmer more compacted, design with the longer saucer.
The sad fact is that the films didn't have the time to go into the minutiae that we enjoy, and they didn't create an updated technical manual to prove that they didn't stop thinking to enjoy the rule of cool. What we know is that the Sovereign was a tough sleek ship outfitted with the latest technology that Starfleet had to offer and that in the second decade of her life the Galaxy was Starfleet's premiere frontline heavy battleship suffering no known losses in the Dominion War.
mk12 emitters are more powerful then mk10, but the biggest sovereign array is lest then half the size of the biggest galaxy, its going to have a LOT less emitters. having slightly more powerful emitters isn't going to make up the difference. there's also nothing preventing a galaxy class from getting upgraded to mk12 across the board too.
as far as smaller ships having smaller arrays go, every one of those newer classes has arrays proportional to their smaller size, compared to the array/size ratio the galaxy has. the sovereign is less then half the size of a galaxy, its big guns are less then half it's size, wheres the controversy? bigger ships are going to have more plasma conduits, be more flushed with plasma waiting to be used. if smaller ships had bigger guns, they ether wouldn't be able to keep up an acceptable rate of fire, or not use full array discharges because the EPS system couldn't keep up with the draw. plus, the only ship an array like the galaxy's would fit on, is the galaxy. call the saucer too bulky all you want, they couldn't fit a gun like that on anything else
I didn't say slightly. I presume substantially.
That said of course your Galaxy will always be able to carry larger and more powerful arrays. But I wonder if it could power them? Of course the Galaxy could field any warp core that would fit, but the Sovereign's class 8 core is stronger.
Excuse me now while I dream of updated interiors where you could slot different warp cores on your ship and they would change in your engineering, so you put in a Sovereign's core and it shows up in your Galaxy engineering
What angers me the most is the radical change of design from Galaxy to Sov. (aside from the technical things)
TNG established a majestic and unique ship design with the Galaxy and Nebula Class. Their emphasis on round shapes and a heavy saucer and small nacelles where really different to anything i have seen. But then suddenly they discarded that design in favour of a more mainstream "fast" looking design. Not very innovative IMO.
As said above, the Sovereign succeeds the Excelsior not the Galaxy. The Galaxy had just succeeded the Ambassador. These ships were meant to coexist and likely to fill completely different roles even if they were both explorers. But the Sovereign coming out later has more advanced technology, and that technology and design was pushed even further to respond to the Borg threat.
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
wasn't the newer model made a bit smaller to ease handling? i vaguly recall a note that the 6 foot version was difficult to deal with at times, and the smaller one reduced that.
considering the cost of the models, a difficult to deal with model would be the start of the need to spend that sort of money. once they bite the bullet and commit to a new model, then they would probably include all of the changes they want into it as part of the process of building a new one.
Well, I don't know what trait the T6 Galaxy ship is going to end up with, but if it comes with something about beam arrays, it might finally satisfy some people.
wasn't the newer model made a bit smaller to ease handling? i vaguly recall a note that the 6 foot version was difficult to deal with at times, and the smaller one reduced that.
considering the cost of the models, a difficult to deal with model would be the start of the need to spend that sort of money. once they bite the bullet and commit to a new model, then they would probably include all of the changes they want into it as part of the process of building a new one.
That was one of the reasons the 4 foot Galaxy model was built. The other, as noted, was the relief.
In any event you would be incorrect in your assumption. John Eaves did take a logical approach to the creation of the Sovereign, and much of it was informed by the world the ship was going to be entering. As beautiful as it was the neck on the Galaxy and the Ambassador was a liability against the Borg, so they got rid of it. By joining the saucer and Stardrive it makes it a tougher ship overall. She didn't just look faster, she was faster, incorporating the latest in warp field theory. The Sovereign, the Intrepid, the Prometheus, the alien Dauntless all use the slimmer more compacted, design with the longer saucer.
I partially agree with you. While it does make sense to remove the neck portion for the reasons you stated, not all of the ship was logically designed. In fact, parts of the Sovereign were designed intentionally to look like the Connie. John Eaves mentioned two cases in particular:
In profile this Enterprise is not unlike a stretched out version of the D, and still has that ship's short warp nacelles. Eaves says that at this stage he was still being quite cautious, but now that he had the go-ahead to explore the design he started to suggest more radical changes. The first was extending the nacelles. "I loved the older look with the long nacelles, and I thought that with the new powerplants and the new technology behind it a longer, sleeker nacelle would balance the craft better."
One design element, however, had little to do with structure or logic, and everything to do with nostalgia. “I remembered that the original Enterprise had these two little triangles on the forward end of the saucer,” said Eaves.
So when I was laying out the bottom of the E’s saucer, I put those two little triangles up at the forward end of mine. I have no clue what they’re for; they’re just a neat shape, and I wanted to include something from the old ship as a “thank you” to Matt Jefferies. I also wanted to give fans of the original series something they could spot and say: ‘Ah, there’s something carried from the past into the present.’
I agree that parts of the ship were intentionally designed to overcome weaknesses in previous ships. However, it's obvious that not all of the design elements used in making the Sovereign were developed with logic in mind. The two main phaser strips on the underside of the saucer have no justification for being separate pieces. The TNGTM firmly establishes that one long phaser strip is more effective than two smaller ones. Therefore, it was an aesthetic choice, not a "logical" one.
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On the subject of smooth vs angular between the Sovereign and the Galaxy that's one thing where we have the precise producers thoughts.
Many on the production team didn't like Probert's smooth Galaxy design.
They believed that in order to display scale, they need relief and shadow. To that end the 4 foot model has more texture. I have no doubt that when the Sovereign was designed that was placed at the forefront of what they wanted to see. That said the Sovereign's saucer overall is still very smooth as is the Stardrive section.
To a point that is true. When Doug Drexler had his blog up, he noted that he much preferred the six foot model overall because of the curvier lines of the ship, one reason for the four foot model was that they had needed to bulk up and strengthen the secondary hull where the model is held for filming, as that was causing constant fatigue issues with the six foot model. Doing this however made it look fatter and less appealing to a few on the model team: Six foot model top; four foot model bottom.
Since they had to make a new model anyway they added in extra hull detailing as that was the primary issue design wise that they had with the Galaxy-class. With TNG Remastered we get new CGI shots combining the best of both worlds for certain scenes.
I partially agree with you. While it does make sense to remove the neck portion for the reasons you stated, not all of the ship was logically designed. In fact, parts of the Sovereign were designed intentionally to look like the Connie. John Eaves mentioned two cases in particular:
I agree that parts of the ship were intentionally designed to overcome weaknesses in previous ships. However, it's obvious that not all of the design elements used in making the Sovereign were developed with logic in mind. The two main phaser strips on the underside of the saucer have no justification for being separate pieces. The TNGTM firmly establishes that one long phaser strip is more effective than two smaller ones. Therefore, it was an aesthetic choice, not a "logical" one.
John Eaves mostly mentioned the Constitution-class Enterprise when talking about the weakness of its neck; the problem with his reasoning is that he then goes and sticks two huge warp nacelles on two equally weak looking and vulnerable warp pylons. In the TNG era it's those parts of the ship that caused more problems in combat than not.
John Eaves mostly mentioned the Constitution-class Enterprise when talking about the weakness of it's neck; the problem with his reasoning is that he then goes and sticks two huge warp nacelles on two equally weak looking and vulnerable warp pylons. In the TNG era it's those parts of the ship that caused more problems in combat than not.
Exactly. Eaves only partially went through with the whole logical-reasoning process, but didn't finish it. Hence, the warp pylons and small, separate phaser strips were designed out of aesthetics and not out of practicality. There's no logical reason for why the phaser strips are separated.
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its canon both in the show and in the tech manual, that the phaser arrays are fed form the end. the array itself is made up of individual modules that are open on both sides. they are fitted connected to each other to make a long string. when firing, the energy is fed into the end of the string and passed along the energy conduit at the base of all of the emitters until it reaches the firing point, it is then focused and shaped there.
you could vastly increase the firing rate by keeping the phaser array charged. then its just a matter of releasing as needed instead of sending the charge of energy down the conduit as needed.
dunno if it was a service life span item or a safety item, but in the show, it was rarely seen that the phaser array wasn't being charged up as part of the firing sequence.
voyager did the same thing, though hers only seemed to be fed from the aft end of the strip. this was probably to save space. it IS a small ship after all. it is likely that the smaller arrays on a galaxy are fed from only one end while the larger ones are fed from both ends.
they aren't just powered on ether end. to try to quote the manual from memory, it says something like this
"banks of emitters are individually powered by main trunk lines of the electro-plasma system"
so, like every 10 or 15 emitters has a major conduit dumping power into them. some of those small arrays you see on ships? those are probably the amount of emitters that 1 main trunk line tends to power. this means damage to the array would allow the rest of the array to still operate, because its powered by so many trunk lines.
each emitter also has its own capacitor that stores energy, and a prefire chamber that it can fire into the surface discharge plate, and can act like a totally independent phaser bank. but, being connected together in an array allows any or all of the emitters to dump the power in their own capacitor into a single, powerful shot. at basically any target that any part of the array has line of sight with. this passing of power down the array is that moving glow effect you see in the show. thats how arrays work.
That said of course your Galaxy will always be able to carry larger and more powerful arrays. But I wonder if it could power them? Of course the Galaxy could field any warp core that would fit, but the Sovereign's class 8 core is stronger.
Excuse me now while I dream of updated interiors where you could slot different warp cores on your ship and they would change in your engineering, so you put in a Sovereign's core and it shows up in your Galaxy engineering
I didn't call the Galaxy's saucer bulky.
the more or less accepted figures for mk 10 and mk 12 emitters is an output of 5.1 and 7.2 mw, not a substantial difference.
the galaxy's largest has 200 emitters, so an output of 1020 potentially. being generous to the sovereign, lets say its largest has 90 emitters, still that tops out at 648. upgrade the galaxy and it outputs 1440. if anything, it looked like the galaxy has more then enough capacity to keep those arrays fireing at an incredible rate. with EPS upgrades to go with emitter upgrades, it should be able to run them just fine.
phasers are not going to get substantially better in less then a decade, they just aren't. phaser tech is like 200 years old by then, and arrays configurations about 50. this is a mature tech, like the internal combustion engine. it evolves slowly and constantly, but there's no quantum leaps to be had. and even if there was, you could just upgrade the galaxy. in fact, the enterprise probably got mk12 emitter in the 7th season, they mentioned a major phaser upgrade in one of the episodes. by then, the NX sovereign prototype would have been out running trials in the last stages of development, mk12 would have existed in 2370.
i wasn't trying to imply you called the saucer bulky, people thinking its too big is common though.
and warp cores and power, im convinced are pretty much a non factor. given how tiny warp cores are in relation to the rest of the ship, when they could be made much bigger if they weren't generating enough power to run everything easily, given how during the nemesis battle the enterprise's warp core was out of action the whole time, and the amount of energy that must be needed to accelerate a ship to warp, let alone got thousands of times faster then light, that must make running the rest of the ship like powering a light bulb. warp cores size and output is likely tied only to top warp speed, running the rest of the ship must only take a fraction of any core's output.
in nemesis, you see the enterprise at full combat speed, dumping phaser shots constantly, holding shields up, recharging them, fighting at its potential, wile only running on the impulse reactors, and any other auxiliary fusion cores. if i was starfleet, i'd make sure the backups to the warp core could carry the ship through a battle without loss of performance, and that looks exactly like what happened. only problem with that though, is those fusion cores running at maximum output? burned through all the ship's deuterium, that would have taken years for the more efficient warp core M/AM reaction to burn through, wile producing orders of magnitude more energy at the same time. the ship just up and ran out of gas there at the end, it wasn't even heavily damaged, the scimitar wasn't armed with any really heavy guns.
so, lack of power isn't really a thing on these ships. for systems like shields and weapons, the only limitation could be the EPS conduit flow volume to them, and how much power they could actually use.
I really have to ask, does that truly anger you? Its just IP, a construct, its not real life. I could see if you were let down or didn't personally feel drawn to it. But anger, isnt that a bit strong?
I grew up on TOS and they tend to be the designs I like. I dont think the Galaxy is "majestic" or a thing of beautfy, its okay, I like other designs better. No Star Trek ship certainly brings up primal emotions of mine.
Yeah, you're right, "anger" is a bit harsh.
But it shows that the (late) producers of TNG and especially the movies didn't care much for giving TNG a "chance" if you want to call it that way.
The special and unique shape of the GCS and the Nebula was iconic in it's own. Less of a mainstream design. Yeah some ppl. don't like it much but some don't like the constitution design also. What i want to say is that the GCS and NCS design was something that should have been continued, especially because it was different.
For me the Sovereign design was a step back, more like a update of kirks ship or a Excelsior imo.
(first and foremost it's loooong and extended nacelles. Streched and flat, just like a updated and "cool" version of a excel. for the average cinema audience)
I tend to think they favoured the Sovereign design because it was more mainstream and more fast and modern looking than the Galaxy. In my opinon this only shows the lack of care by the producers and that they didn't gave any big thoughts about Trek or it's consistency.
Another thing that bothers me is that i really think that ST:8 would have had a much bigger emotional impact to the audience (or fans) if they had let the big -D survive ST:7.
Just imagine the corridors and engineering room ppl have grown to over 7 years getting "borgified" and finally a full battlescene with the ship TNG fans loved, or the scene where the escape pods leave the ship. But instead they represented just "some" ship pepole have had no relation to.
Don't get me wrong i'm not quarreling about that, lol.
I just think it was a really bad decision, that's all.
"...'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured...the first thought forbidden...the first freedom denied--chains us all irrevocably.' ... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. I fear that today--"
- (TNG) Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie
But it shows that the (late) producers of TNG and especially the movies didn't care much for giving TNG a "chance" if you want to call it that way.
The special and unique shape of the GCS and the Nebula was iconic in it's own. Less of a mainstream design. Yeah some ppl. don't like it much but some don't like the constitution design also. What i want to say is that the GCS and NCS design was something that should have been continued, especially because it was different.
For me the Sovereign design was a step back, more like a update of kirks ship or a Excelsior imo.
(first and foremost it's loooong and extended nacelles. Streched and flat, just like a updated and "cool" version of a excel. for the average cinema audience)
I tend to think they favoured the Sovereign design because it was more mainstream and more fast and modern looking than the Galaxy. In my opinon this only shows the lack of care by the producers and that they didn't gave any big thoughts about Trek or it's consistency.
Another thing that bothers me is that i really think that ST:8 would have had a much bigger emotional impact to the audience (or fans) if they had let the big -D survive ST:7.
Just imagine the corridors and engineering room ppl have grown to over 7 years getting "borgified" and finally a full battlescene with the ship TNG fans loved, or the scene where the escape pods leave the ship. But instead they represented just "some" ship pepole have had no relation to.
Don't get me wrong i'm not quarreling about that, lol.
I just think it was a really bad decision, that's all.
I appreciate and respect you opinion. I dont agree with it, but thats my opinion. Of course, given my preferences, I like my saucers saucer shaped (completely round).
As far as the destruction of the D, I wasnt happy with the original 1701 going down as it did, so I can empathize. The Sovy doesnt bug me, I figured the D got its 15 minutes of fame and glory. The galaxy was different than the connie as much as the sovy is different than the galaxy.
they aren't just powered on ether end. to try to quote the manual from memory, it says something like this
"banks of emitters are individually powered by main trunk lines of the electro-plasma system"
so, like every 10 or 15 emitters has a major conduit dumping power into them. some of those small arrays you see on ships? those are probably the amount of emitters that 1 main trunk line tends to power. this means damage to the array would allow the rest of the array to still operate, because its powered by so many trunk lines.
each emitter also has its own capacitor that stores energy, and a prefire chamber that it can fire into the surface discharge plate, and can act like a totally independent phaser bank. but, being connected together in an array allows any or all of the emitters to dump the power in their own capacitor into a single, powerful shot. at basically any target that any part of the array has line of sight with. this passing of power down the array is that moving glow effect you see in the show. thats how arrays work.
there is actually a picture of it. the conduit is the base of the emitter block.. they are linked together to make a chain. maybe there are additional inputs besides at either end of the strip, but the implications are that the energy conduit is the base of the phaser strip and passes energy along the strip until it reaches the needed point which is then in turn activated to use the energy from that conduit and direct it from the conduit while manipulating it as needed with the firing aperture.
the limitations would be how much energy can be passed through the conduit as well as how much throughput a given emitter can handle. if the conduit can handle more than any one given port, then you can fire more than one emitter at a time, whether they are used in concert for a larger beam, or multiple independently targeted ports on the given available energy.
the capacitor as such would be the conduit at the base of the firing strip. it likely acts as an accumulator for the plasma energy. if kept charged, then it would effectively be a capacitor for the whole system, though more properly, its an accumulator.
there is actually a picture of it. the conduit is the base of the emitter block.. they are linked together to make a chain. maybe there are additional inputs besides at either end of the strip, but the implications are that the energy conduit is the base of the phaser strip and passes energy along the strip until it reaches the needed point which is then in turn activated to use the energy from that conduit and direct it from the conduit while manipulating it as needed with the firing aperture.
the limitations would be how much energy can be passed through the conduit as well as how much throughput a given emitter can handle. if the conduit can handle more than any one given port, then you can fire more than one emitter at a time, whether they are used in concert for a larger beam, or multiple independently targeted ports on the given available energy.
the capacitor as such would be the conduit at the base of the firing strip. it likely acts as an accumulator for the plasma energy. if kept charged, then it would effectively be a capacitor for the whole system, though more properly, its an accumulator.
go ahead and reread the part about phasers, and point out this picture you mentioned. im quite familiar with the section and have defended my position with it often. it backs up the way i described it works, i can hardly make sense of your interpretation.
"Groups of emitters are supplied by redundant sets of energy feeds from the primary trunks of the electro plasma system"
thats the opposite of implying an array is only hooked to the ship's power at ether end of the array. every single emitter has its own pipe running to it, from multiple main trunk lines depending on how large the array is, and every emitter has its own capacitor to store energy and contribute to shots .
Do you guys ever think that the T6 Galaxy is finally coming because they just really want about seven of us to shut the heck up about her and for us to go play the game?
Do you guys ever think that the T6 Galaxy is finally coming because they just really want about seven of us to shut the heck up about her and for us to go play the game?
And yes - I include myself in the 'seven'.
Eight.
And, I don't care what the reason is.
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
Do you guys ever think that the T6 Galaxy is finally coming because they just really want about seven of us to shut the heck up about her and for us to go play the game?
And yes - I include myself in the 'seven'.
No. I think (if any galaxy update happens) its because someone noticed that since EVEN BEFORE the official release of the game people already got VERY anal about the HORRIBLE job they did on the first galaxy in the game. That thing was horrible looking, BROKEN in terms of broken model AND GIMPED by stats. By fixing it now, money is to be made and t6 gives the man opportunity to sell it again. Now they only have to manage to not fck it up horribly, like that last "revamp" they did.
This is after the first fixing, where they made sure the neck would not stick out over the saucer like some broken animals spine.
DO you see that monstrosity?! That is YEARS after bridge commander modding gave us high poly and high quality models. Someone got PAID to create that.
Then the travesty conga continued:
Galaxy, intrepid, defiant were made t4 ships.
They not only skimped on delivering decent ship models, they also for some asinine reason thought that putting the FREAKING iconic ship into the "yes this is garbage soon" tier was a good idea.
It was the same on the klingon side: They had no t5 vorcha, and the neghvar sucked as much as the galaxy except not since it at the very least could fit dual heavy's without breaking immersion and was agile enough to use them in pve.
There was a risk of the D'deridex getting the same treatment, but saner minds saved it from the scrap heap. Sure its totally overshadowed b the scimitar, but that's because the scim is brokenly op,. not because the D'deridex is bad.
Then, to add insult o injury they started that TRIBBLE referral program that gave out a galaxy X - a popular modification of the galaxy. Forum rage ensued and they later sold it in the c store - for profit i assume judging by how many of them popped up back then and are still around.
As the game grew older and the ship design ethos cryptic gave as the reason why the galaxy is the way it is took a leap off the cliff, the ship never has gotten an update along with all the other "old ships" to bring it up to par.
The simple fact is: i and my friends came to STO to cart around in our favorite icons. We did not com here for weirdly shaped shovel ships.
My friends have all left in the first 3 months, where cryptic flat out ignored to even acknowledge all the broken things on our favorite ships.
Making an honest and high quality (both in model and skin and in stats) update to the iconic ships, as was done with the intrepid, has more revenue potential than continuing shoveling out weirdly shaped shovel ships no one gives a futz about.
You all know that i am 100% with you guys, but on the other side i can see that the GCS isn't on par with the new T6 ships anymore.
Personally i would have been happy if they had updated the Galaxy ship parts (including Envoy, Celestial, Monarc and Venture) and give it to the Guardian Class as alternative ship parts, similar like they did with the new Pathfinder Class.
I really like the Guardians BOFF seating and Console layout, it would have been 100% perfect for a GCS in my opinion.
(But i really dislike the guardians proportions, namely its way too fat engineering hull and and small saucer, which makes it look somehow goofy in my eyes)
"...'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured...the first thought forbidden...the first freedom denied--chains us all irrevocably.' ... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. I fear that today--"
- (TNG) Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie
You all know that i am 100% with you guys, but on the other side i can see that the GCS isn't on par with the new T6 ships anymore.
Personally i would have been happy if they had updated the Galaxy ship parts (including Envoy, Celestial, Monarc and Venture) and give it to the Guardian Class as alternative ship parts, similar like they did with the new Pathfinder Class.
I really like the Guardians BOFF seating and Console layout, it would have been 100% perfect for a GCS in my opinion.
(But i really dislike the guardians proportions, namely its way too fat engineering hull and and small saucer, which makes it look somehow goofy in my eyes)
Yes, they had that option and blew it.
However, I don't think the Intel thing fits with a GCS. It's not small, sneaky, or stealthy. It's big, powerful, and carries a presence. Perfect for a command ship. Putting a GCS in a certain area of space is like putting a CVN off the coast of a certain country. You want to send a message. That message is: Here I Am.
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
Ten bucks it gets the T6 Intrepid treatment, but with a Command seat, as in...
CMD Eng
LTC Eng
Lt Sci/Command (Intrepid has a Lt Eng/Intel)
Lt Tac
Lt Universal (Replaces old Ens Eng)
Probable 5 Eng/3 Sci/2 Tac console layout, gains 1 Tac Console when upgraded to Fleet (Intel ships, including Dauntless, Intrepid, and Guardian are still not at Fleet level)
No idea what the new console is going to be. Possible Deflector Beam from Best of Both Worlds?
I'm hoping there's a suitably awesome trait included.
I really like the Guardians BOFF seating and Console layout, it would have been 100% perfect for a GCS in my opinion.
(But i really dislike the guardians proportions, namely its way too fat engineering hull and and small saucer, which makes it look somehow goofy in my eyes)
Comments
The Sovereign was not the successor to the Galaxy, it was simply the next Enterprise. The Sovereign is supposed to fill a mission profile like that of the Excelsior, not like that of the Galaxy.
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
I dare you to do better.
It doesn't really have anything with the runtime - TNG had a very thorough writer's bible which became the technical manual. People cared and invested time and effort into elaborating the treknology involved. I am pretty sure nobody cared when they designed the Sovereign.
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I'm not discussing wheather the movies could or could not portray the needed continuity in tech or the science aspects involved. I'm simply stating the facts that they didn't.
Also, pretty much this.^
The people behind TNG, heavily influenced by Gene himself, went into some really deeply thought through analysis both abouth the technological and scientific aspects they wanted to implement in the show. They wanted most of the stuff that would be seen on TNG to be able to be explained in a rational sense within the confinements of the show's own technobabble and suposed future technological and scientific achievments. In comparison, they never bothered much with that for the movies due to the format and final goals of the product.
I'd actually say that it probably doesn't really apply in ST canon.
I'll beg to differ. I think the length of the phaser strip represents the power available from that ship to put into a single phaser array. The advantage is a greater firing arc but the drawback is larger power requirement. I sort of draw upon this conclusion of the evolution from the "nipple beam banks" of the Constitution/Excelsior age, to the small phaser strips of the Ambassador age (which are still in the same positions as the previous beam bank setups), to the phaser arrays of the Galaxy/Nebula/Sovereign/Intrepid/etc age we are in now.
The difference between the lengths of the arrays on the Galaxy vs the Sovereign, is in my opinion, due to more sharp angles on the Sovereign's design. The Galaxy is much more smooth and rounded in shape with a more continuous surface. The Sovereign has a lot of abrupt edges.
In any case, that's my speculation.
(UFP) Ragnar
The longer the stripe, the more firing angles it has, but I think the translation to direct firepower was forgotten.
My whole point is that the way that a feature movie, or even series of movies is made makes it extremely difficult to do they things that you are talking about with the series. The series was a program with more time to develop and work on, each of the movies are a project. The amount of time spent for development of series to movie is ~ 100:1. There was no way, no matter how much someone wanted to, to make a "bible" as comprehensive for a movie content ship as is it for a multiyear tv series ship.
Whats a more accurate line of best fit, a 100 point scatterplot or a 3 point. The more content(data), the more refined.
I really have to ask, does that truly anger you? Its just IP, a construct, its not real life. I could see if you were let down or didn't personally feel drawn to it. But anger, isnt that a bit strong?
I grew up on TOS and they tend to be the designs I like. I dont think the Galaxy is "majestic" or a thing of beautfy, its okay, I like other designs better. No Star Trek ship certainly brings up primal emotions of mine.
its canon both in the show and in the tech manual, that the phaser arrays are fed form the end. the array itself is made up of individual modules that are open on both sides. they are fitted connected to each other to make a long string. when firing, the energy is fed into the end of the string and passed along the energy conduit at the base of all of the emitters until it reaches the firing point, it is then focused and shaped there.
you could vastly increase the firing rate by keeping the phaser array charged. then its just a matter of releasing as needed instead of sending the charge of energy down the conduit as needed.
dunno if it was a service life span item or a safety item, but in the show, it was rarely seen that the phaser array wasn't being charged up as part of the firing sequence.
voyager did the same thing, though hers only seemed to be fed from the aft end of the strip. this was probably to save space. it IS a small ship after all. it is likely that the smaller arrays on a galaxy are fed from only one end while the larger ones are fed from both ends.
Many on the production team didn't like Probert's smooth Galaxy design.
They believed that in order to display scale, they need relief and shadow. To that end the 4 foot model has more texture. I have no doubt that when the Sovereign was designed that was placed at the forefront of what they wanted to see. That said the Sovereign's saucer overall is still very smooth as is the Stardrive section.
Well when Gene got the opportunity to make TNG he wanted a much more serious hard science approach then the kind of mad cap style of the Original. Unfortunately his ideology was also to remove the fun of the Original Series a little, but overall it turned out as he wanted. This extended to the ship where Andrew Probert wanted to create a ship that displayed that the technology had advanced to the point where they could put aside function and create something based on the form that they wanted.
I don't know, I take that as fairly bashful.
In any event you would be incorrect in your assumption. John Eaves did take a logical approach to the creation of the Sovereign, and much of it was informed by the world the ship was going to be entering. As beautiful as it was the neck on the Galaxy and the Ambassador was a liability against the Borg, so they got rid of it. By joining the saucer and Stardrive it makes it a tougher ship overall. She didn't just look faster, she was faster, incorporating the latest in warp field theory. The Sovereign, the Intrepid, the Prometheus, the alien Dauntless all use the slimmer more compacted, design with the longer saucer.
The sad fact is that the films didn't have the time to go into the minutiae that we enjoy, and they didn't create an updated technical manual to prove that they didn't stop thinking to enjoy the rule of cool. What we know is that the Sovereign was a tough sleek ship outfitted with the latest technology that Starfleet had to offer and that in the second decade of her life the Galaxy was Starfleet's premiere frontline heavy battleship suffering no known losses in the Dominion War.
I didn't say slightly. I presume substantially.
That said of course your Galaxy will always be able to carry larger and more powerful arrays. But I wonder if it could power them? Of course the Galaxy could field any warp core that would fit, but the Sovereign's class 8 core is stronger.
Excuse me now while I dream of updated interiors where you could slot different warp cores on your ship and they would change in your engineering, so you put in a Sovereign's core and it shows up in your Galaxy engineering
I didn't call the Galaxy's saucer bulky.
As said above, the Sovereign succeeds the Excelsior not the Galaxy. The Galaxy had just succeeded the Ambassador. These ships were meant to coexist and likely to fill completely different roles even if they were both explorers. But the Sovereign coming out later has more advanced technology, and that technology and design was pushed even further to respond to the Borg threat.
considering the cost of the models, a difficult to deal with model would be the start of the need to spend that sort of money. once they bite the bullet and commit to a new model, then they would probably include all of the changes they want into it as part of the process of building a new one.
I partially agree with you. While it does make sense to remove the neck portion for the reasons you stated, not all of the ship was logically designed. In fact, parts of the Sovereign were designed intentionally to look like the Connie. John Eaves mentioned two cases in particular:
I agree that parts of the ship were intentionally designed to overcome weaknesses in previous ships. However, it's obvious that not all of the design elements used in making the Sovereign were developed with logic in mind. The two main phaser strips on the underside of the saucer have no justification for being separate pieces. The TNGTM firmly establishes that one long phaser strip is more effective than two smaller ones. Therefore, it was an aesthetic choice, not a "logical" one.
Missing the good ol' days of PvP: Legacy of Romulus to Season 9
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To a point that is true. When Doug Drexler had his blog up, he noted that he much preferred the six foot model overall because of the curvier lines of the ship, one reason for the four foot model was that they had needed to bulk up and strengthen the secondary hull where the model is held for filming, as that was causing constant fatigue issues with the six foot model. Doing this however made it look fatter and less appealing to a few on the model team: Six foot model top; four foot model bottom.
Since they had to make a new model anyway they added in extra hull detailing as that was the primary issue design wise that they had with the Galaxy-class. With TNG Remastered we get new CGI shots combining the best of both worlds for certain scenes.
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John Eaves mostly mentioned the Constitution-class Enterprise when talking about the weakness of its neck; the problem with his reasoning is that he then goes and sticks two huge warp nacelles on two equally weak looking and vulnerable warp pylons. In the TNG era it's those parts of the ship that caused more problems in combat than not.
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Exactly. Eaves only partially went through with the whole logical-reasoning process, but didn't finish it. Hence, the warp pylons and small, separate phaser strips were designed out of aesthetics and not out of practicality. There's no logical reason for why the phaser strips are separated.
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they aren't just powered on ether end. to try to quote the manual from memory, it says something like this
"banks of emitters are individually powered by main trunk lines of the electro-plasma system"
so, like every 10 or 15 emitters has a major conduit dumping power into them. some of those small arrays you see on ships? those are probably the amount of emitters that 1 main trunk line tends to power. this means damage to the array would allow the rest of the array to still operate, because its powered by so many trunk lines.
each emitter also has its own capacitor that stores energy, and a prefire chamber that it can fire into the surface discharge plate, and can act like a totally independent phaser bank. but, being connected together in an array allows any or all of the emitters to dump the power in their own capacitor into a single, powerful shot. at basically any target that any part of the array has line of sight with. this passing of power down the array is that moving glow effect you see in the show. thats how arrays work.
the more or less accepted figures for mk 10 and mk 12 emitters is an output of 5.1 and 7.2 mw, not a substantial difference.
the galaxy's largest has 200 emitters, so an output of 1020 potentially. being generous to the sovereign, lets say its largest has 90 emitters, still that tops out at 648. upgrade the galaxy and it outputs 1440. if anything, it looked like the galaxy has more then enough capacity to keep those arrays fireing at an incredible rate. with EPS upgrades to go with emitter upgrades, it should be able to run them just fine.
phasers are not going to get substantially better in less then a decade, they just aren't. phaser tech is like 200 years old by then, and arrays configurations about 50. this is a mature tech, like the internal combustion engine. it evolves slowly and constantly, but there's no quantum leaps to be had. and even if there was, you could just upgrade the galaxy. in fact, the enterprise probably got mk12 emitter in the 7th season, they mentioned a major phaser upgrade in one of the episodes. by then, the NX sovereign prototype would have been out running trials in the last stages of development, mk12 would have existed in 2370.
i wasn't trying to imply you called the saucer bulky, people thinking its too big is common though.
and warp cores and power, im convinced are pretty much a non factor. given how tiny warp cores are in relation to the rest of the ship, when they could be made much bigger if they weren't generating enough power to run everything easily, given how during the nemesis battle the enterprise's warp core was out of action the whole time, and the amount of energy that must be needed to accelerate a ship to warp, let alone got thousands of times faster then light, that must make running the rest of the ship like powering a light bulb. warp cores size and output is likely tied only to top warp speed, running the rest of the ship must only take a fraction of any core's output.
in nemesis, you see the enterprise at full combat speed, dumping phaser shots constantly, holding shields up, recharging them, fighting at its potential, wile only running on the impulse reactors, and any other auxiliary fusion cores. if i was starfleet, i'd make sure the backups to the warp core could carry the ship through a battle without loss of performance, and that looks exactly like what happened. only problem with that though, is those fusion cores running at maximum output? burned through all the ship's deuterium, that would have taken years for the more efficient warp core M/AM reaction to burn through, wile producing orders of magnitude more energy at the same time. the ship just up and ran out of gas there at the end, it wasn't even heavily damaged, the scimitar wasn't armed with any really heavy guns.
so, lack of power isn't really a thing on these ships. for systems like shields and weapons, the only limitation could be the EPS conduit flow volume to them, and how much power they could actually use.
But it shows that the (late) producers of TNG and especially the movies didn't care much for giving TNG a "chance" if you want to call it that way.
The special and unique shape of the GCS and the Nebula was iconic in it's own. Less of a mainstream design. Yeah some ppl. don't like it much but some don't like the constitution design also. What i want to say is that the GCS and NCS design was something that should have been continued, especially because it was different.
For me the Sovereign design was a step back, more like a update of kirks ship or a Excelsior imo.
(first and foremost it's loooong and extended nacelles. Streched and flat, just like a updated and "cool" version of a excel. for the average cinema audience)
I tend to think they favoured the Sovereign design because it was more mainstream and more fast and modern looking than the Galaxy. In my opinon this only shows the lack of care by the producers and that they didn't gave any big thoughts about Trek or it's consistency.
Another thing that bothers me is that i really think that ST:8 would have had a much bigger emotional impact to the audience (or fans) if they had let the big -D survive ST:7.
Just imagine the corridors and engineering room ppl have grown to over 7 years getting "borgified" and finally a full battlescene with the ship TNG fans loved, or the scene where the escape pods leave the ship. But instead they represented just "some" ship pepole have had no relation to.
Don't get me wrong i'm not quarreling about that, lol.
I just think it was a really bad decision, that's all.
I appreciate and respect you opinion. I dont agree with it, but thats my opinion. Of course, given my preferences, I like my saucers saucer shaped (completely round).
As far as the destruction of the D, I wasnt happy with the original 1701 going down as it did, so I can empathize. The Sovy doesnt bug me, I figured the D got its 15 minutes of fame and glory. The galaxy was different than the connie as much as the sovy is different than the galaxy.
there is actually a picture of it. the conduit is the base of the emitter block.. they are linked together to make a chain. maybe there are additional inputs besides at either end of the strip, but the implications are that the energy conduit is the base of the phaser strip and passes energy along the strip until it reaches the needed point which is then in turn activated to use the energy from that conduit and direct it from the conduit while manipulating it as needed with the firing aperture.
the limitations would be how much energy can be passed through the conduit as well as how much throughput a given emitter can handle. if the conduit can handle more than any one given port, then you can fire more than one emitter at a time, whether they are used in concert for a larger beam, or multiple independently targeted ports on the given available energy.
the capacitor as such would be the conduit at the base of the firing strip. it likely acts as an accumulator for the plasma energy. if kept charged, then it would effectively be a capacitor for the whole system, though more properly, its an accumulator.
https://www.4shared.com/web/preview/pdf/cytQawBY
go ahead and reread the part about phasers, and point out this picture you mentioned. im quite familiar with the section and have defended my position with it often. it backs up the way i described it works, i can hardly make sense of your interpretation.
"Groups of emitters are supplied by redundant sets of energy feeds from the primary trunks of the electro plasma system"
thats the opposite of implying an array is only hooked to the ship's power at ether end of the array. every single emitter has its own pipe running to it, from multiple main trunk lines depending on how large the array is, and every emitter has its own capacitor to store energy and contribute to shots .
And yes - I include myself in the 'seven'.
Eight.
And, I don't care what the reason is.
No. I think (if any galaxy update happens) its because someone noticed that since EVEN BEFORE the official release of the game people already got VERY anal about the HORRIBLE job they did on the first galaxy in the game. That thing was horrible looking, BROKEN in terms of broken model AND GIMPED by stats. By fixing it now, money is to be made and t6 gives the man opportunity to sell it again. Now they only have to manage to not fck it up horribly, like that last "revamp" they did.
I mean LOOK AT THIS:
http://suricatasblog.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/galaxyclassrefine.jpg
This is after the first fixing, where they made sure the neck would not stick out over the saucer like some broken animals spine.
DO you see that monstrosity?! That is YEARS after bridge commander modding gave us high poly and high quality models. Someone got PAID to create that.
Then the travesty conga continued:
Galaxy, intrepid, defiant were made t4 ships.
They not only skimped on delivering decent ship models, they also for some asinine reason thought that putting the FREAKING iconic ship into the "yes this is garbage soon" tier was a good idea.
It was the same on the klingon side: They had no t5 vorcha, and the neghvar sucked as much as the galaxy except not since it at the very least could fit dual heavy's without breaking immersion and was agile enough to use them in pve.
There was a risk of the D'deridex getting the same treatment, but saner minds saved it from the scrap heap. Sure its totally overshadowed b the scimitar, but that's because the scim is brokenly op,. not because the D'deridex is bad.
Then, to add insult o injury they started that TRIBBLE referral program that gave out a galaxy X - a popular modification of the galaxy. Forum rage ensued and they later sold it in the c store - for profit i assume judging by how many of them popped up back then and are still around.
As the game grew older and the ship design ethos cryptic gave as the reason why the galaxy is the way it is took a leap off the cliff, the ship never has gotten an update along with all the other "old ships" to bring it up to par.
The simple fact is: i and my friends came to STO to cart around in our favorite icons. We did not com here for weirdly shaped shovel ships.
My friends have all left in the first 3 months, where cryptic flat out ignored to even acknowledge all the broken things on our favorite ships.
Making an honest and high quality (both in model and skin and in stats) update to the iconic ships, as was done with the intrepid, has more revenue potential than continuing shoveling out weirdly shaped shovel ships no one gives a futz about.
Personally i would have been happy if they had updated the Galaxy ship parts (including Envoy, Celestial, Monarc and Venture) and give it to the Guardian Class as alternative ship parts, similar like they did with the new Pathfinder Class.
I really like the Guardians BOFF seating and Console layout, it would have been 100% perfect for a GCS in my opinion.
(But i really dislike the guardians proportions, namely its way too fat engineering hull and and small saucer, which makes it look somehow goofy in my eyes)
Yes, they had that option and blew it.
However, I don't think the Intel thing fits with a GCS. It's not small, sneaky, or stealthy. It's big, powerful, and carries a presence. Perfect for a command ship. Putting a GCS in a certain area of space is like putting a CVN off the coast of a certain country. You want to send a message. That message is: Here I Am.
Ten bucks it gets the T6 Intrepid treatment, but with a Command seat, as in...
CMD Eng
LTC Eng
Lt Sci/Command (Intrepid has a Lt Eng/Intel)
Lt Tac
Lt Universal (Replaces old Ens Eng)
Probable 5 Eng/3 Sci/2 Tac console layout, gains 1 Tac Console when upgraded to Fleet (Intel ships, including Dauntless, Intrepid, and Guardian are still not at Fleet level)
No idea what the new console is going to be. Possible Deflector Beam from Best of Both Worlds?
I'm hoping there's a suitably awesome trait included.
as i said: shovelship.