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Let's Talk Romulan Ship Design
atharun18999
Member Posts: 66 Arc User
As a mainly Romulan player, am I the only one who finds most of their ships oversized? Specifically the Escort style Warbirds?
Additionally it feels like the Romulan Ship design is all over the place. With a Fed or Kling ship you can generally tell that they are from those faction (alternate race ships aside) as they tend to follow a fairly consistent design principle. The Romulan ships are all over the place though.
You have the Dehlan which looks like a Chicken of Prey, The Ha'feh which is MASSIVE and looks like a pregnant goose. The Ar'kif which is somewhere in between these 2. The D'Khellra looks like an angry rooster.
Then you have ships like the the Faeht which is sleek and sexy but stands out from the rest even more. Other ships such as the Aelahl which seem like forward progress from the D'Deridex but then you get the Command battlecruisers which can are essentially birds in space (yes I know the Romulan Raptor) but just look odd. Then you have the Daeinos which is flat.
All this just goes to show that Romulan ship design is all over the place. May we please get a defined ship design philosophy going forward please or possible a Dev/artist to explain what they are looking for when desinging a Romulan ship?
Additionally it feels like the Romulan Ship design is all over the place. With a Fed or Kling ship you can generally tell that they are from those faction (alternate race ships aside) as they tend to follow a fairly consistent design principle. The Romulan ships are all over the place though.
You have the Dehlan which looks like a Chicken of Prey, The Ha'feh which is MASSIVE and looks like a pregnant goose. The Ar'kif which is somewhere in between these 2. The D'Khellra looks like an angry rooster.
Then you have ships like the the Faeht which is sleek and sexy but stands out from the rest even more. Other ships such as the Aelahl which seem like forward progress from the D'Deridex but then you get the Command battlecruisers which can are essentially birds in space (yes I know the Romulan Raptor) but just look odd. Then you have the Daeinos which is flat.
All this just goes to show that Romulan ship design is all over the place. May we please get a defined ship design philosophy going forward please or possible a Dev/artist to explain what they are looking for when desinging a Romulan ship?
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The developers looked at the DD and the Scimi and decided that Romulan ships were basically large. In my opinion, this is as erroneous as looking at the USS Nimitz and deciding all USN ships are basically large. I believe the images I saw of DD's alongside the Enterprise in TNG showed ships of comparable size, while the Valdore was smaller. If we equate the DD with the Enterprise, we should then realize that there would be a host of smaller Romulan ship designs intended to support the mighty DD: frigates, escorts, destroyers, and various other vessels, all of which would be smaller, and very likely to be more maneuverable, than the ship they were intended to support.
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
I agree that Romulan ship designs were limited but to just go all in on the idea of their ships being large is ridiculous imo. It's not just the size either. the overall aesthetic for Rom ships is very inconsistent. I just with one of the devs and/or artists would talk about how they approach the Rom ship designs.
Design philosophy wise:
Romulan hull design seems to favor wide-spread nacelles, often amidships unlike Federation and Klingon designs, and a lot of hull space in a broad wing with a narrower, often curved forward hull about the same size as a trailing aft hull, though there's some variety (Starfleet can broadly be said to be a saucer connected to a tube connected to two nacelles on pylons on the same plane as the saucer).
Also - Romulan ships have large volume, but a lot of it's empty space. Presumably related to either singularity core design or battle cloak requirements.
Member Access Denied Armada!
My forum single-issue of rage: Make the Proton Experimental Weapon go for subsystem targetting!
U WOT M8?!
/lol
Other canon Rom vessels include the shuttle from an episode of DS9 that belonged to that 'its a fake' senator, used in game. There was a small 'scout' vessel in TNG that appears in STO as the commanders gig.
And the drone remote piloted vessel from ENT thats available as a scim pet.
Lt. Stiles: "You'll know, sir. They're painted like a giant bird of prey."
My only complaint about the Romulan ships is that the others aren't painted (other than a drab green). On the plus side, they all (well, almost all) at least are shaped like a bird of prey. Maybe the Romulan naval architects moved from painting to sculpture.
And there are a couple of other canon Romulan ships in game. The T'Varo from Enterprise, and the Romulan Scout/Science ship from TNG, (those last two appearing as small craft variants here).
Blasphemy.
The D'deridex is a large part of why the Romulans are my favorite species. It is a unique design and intimidating.
Probably not the best practical design but the aesthetics are awesome.
It looks like it got bloated and was then split open to let out the gas, but retained the distended shape. And it's associated with the fascist bully boy version of Romulans, which I find disgusting. TOS Romulans ftw.
It's designed to intimidate an opponent, twice the size of a galaxy and very heavily armed
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
Most of the volume of which is empty space. If you took a Galaxy and a D'Deridex each made of modeling clay and smashed them down to a ball, the balls wouldn't be that much different in size.
Regardless of which, like in TOS, we see a lot of Connies, but very few other ship types because there were only a few models to film. This doesn't mean Connie was the only ship class the Federation fielded, and it shouldn't mean that D'Dereidex is the only ship class the Roms fielded. There should be Romulan versions of Mirandas, Novas, Lunas, etc. Romulans should have small, hard hitting escorts, large fat cruisers, and a host of ships between.
I concur
The pilot ships tho.... imo they are pretty hideous and look like someone built models off of a chicken someone tossed onto a table, positioned and took pictures of.
So allowing those to be the 'odd' ships in the list... I'd say Romulan designs are doing just fine at a unified design scheme
We all know what the Jem Hadar did to the D'deridex, it's sheer size makes it impractical when faced with a smaller more quicker opponent, so having a balanced fleet of large ships and small to medium sized vessels makes sense
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
Notable mentions for terrible designs: Pilot Warbirds. The Okhala is the only one that makes the pack less terrible.
Going to be picking up the Vastam whenever a sale comes around and boycott that Fed Hestia most likely for locking its essential canon ability (MVAM) and all T6 features that rely on it behind a 2500 zen paywall. Probably passing on T6 Gal-X as well because they won't allow the more 'advanced' chevron separation, and no basic cruiser commands that includes +turn rate to make it more fun. Wish Rom cruisers and Warbird BC came with cruiser commands as well. The terrible Dysons have subsystem targeting and singularity abilities after all, and low subsystem power should mitigate cruiser command advantage as well.
On the fence about the Morrigu with Valdore skin - a perfectly balanced ship, just wish it had more active abilities besides just shield, and a more mature design. Had they put more effort in improving an already great design (Valdore) I would have got the pack as the Arbiter already looks awesome and different enough from the Avenger plus mixes well with it.
I also agree about the drab paint, but also the textures feel completely uninspiring. I mean, I bet a computer program could do something appealing based on acceptable random angles alone. So many talented artists out there, give them the chance to put their creativity to play.
My character Tsin'xing
The Dhelan isn't huge...T'varo surely isn't huge
I don't like their Pilot ships either...but when I looked at them...I thought bugs..especially with their green color.
At first I also thought that I liked the Romulan Pilot ships the least, but I think the Klingon ships are in the end the least satisfying to me visually. I just don't like the impulse engine parts, where as I am relatively happy now with a mix of Romulan Pilot vessels. My biggest problem is that the only outer wings I really like are from the Jaeih.
But, regradless of how the Pilot ships look, they are awesome fun to fly.
The Dyson Destroyers were probably my favorite design. In the Dyson material they strongly remind me of the Babylon 5 Whitestars (and were the only ships that looked good in the Dyson material), and in green they look like a bit of a (more attractive) continuation of the TNG era Warbird. Same reason I like the Aelahl.
I thought 'bugs someone stepped on'.
I like almost all Romulan designs. Each of them has something that appeals to me more or less. Except for the "bugs". Too angular for my taste, and not enough "birdy".
the pilot ships are really ugly, they don't seem finished or something is missing; + like i hate the scimitar, i can't like this kind of design. the faeht is great, but she could have a longer neck and could be thinner. the t6 d'deridex is an hideous whale.
the arkif is cool, the third best design after the aelhal and the vets ships; the vet ships are really nice.
i don't like the mogai (a very strange ship), the dhelan is correct; the dhael could have been better, there is something strange with the wings and the big nacelles, but i like the head and the hull.
this ship should have been like that: http://images-cdn.perfectworld.com/www/ff/1b/ff1b7127d73f02cb1f1fe00516ad8bfa1366396690.jpg
the d"deridex is not bad, but the D'ridthau is a big fail
btw, the faeht has the same cloaking device