I just did a mockup of a single semi-internal nacelle saucer. I think it doesn't look too bad.
It's a 120 meter saucer with an inline secondary hull. I swept the edge of the saucer all the way back to the inline hull to give it a teardrop outline. The deflector is in a blister swung under the saucer and a second blister is swung above the saucer to provide a spot for a photon torpedo tube.
The idea is a budget picket. It's not the biggest or the fastest, but with a single nacelle and a limited size it could be produced in numbers. It would have performed the role of anti-pirate patrol ship and planetary defense picket. It doesn't need to go far and it doesn't need to go fast, but it goes far enough and fast enough to get the job done and the job is normally to put 6 phasors and a photon torpedo in a place to ensure that place stays peaceful.
And again, the debate of extended vs. standard seems like it could be solved by just making an A and B version with one being the standard length for higher sprints while the other is the extended version.
Developing warp nacelles is hard, and they're extremely interdependent systems. We would basically need to spin up another entire Yoyodyne from scratch, with none of their accumulated expertise, or try to split the existing Yoyodyne dev group in half after building duplicates of all their supercomputer clusters and research facilities and recruiting a whole bunch of probably-less-skilled-else-why-weren't-they-hired-already engineers.
Like, sure, it's possible, but in-setting I'd expect outcomes along the line of "amortized program expenses mean that all warp drives effectively cost double for the entire generation of drive tech, and complications from splitting the dev team mid project and replacing half of each half with new, definitely-unfamiliar, probably-less-skilled replacements mean all prototype rolls are now experimental rolls, and all performance outcome rolls are worst-of-two. You can run twin programs next time around, though."
Out-of-setting, of course, the answer is a fairly obvious "No, you may not have your cake and eat it too."
They seem to use a half saucer design with a more spindle like secondary hull, but the fact that you are not wrong makes me feel justified that it's at least a viable design.
There is a massive tactical advantage in being able to disengage and either reengage at will or drop onto a ballistic sublight course to hide and slink away for reinforcements.
I understand the economy advantages to cruise but fear policymakers will take that speed as an excuse to curtail building programs out of a misguided sense that the universe is safe. And to be frank the "max cruise" stat, which is the limiting factor for response times, will be little affected by this choice anyway.
I'd much prefer to build more hulls with better peak performances and similar ability to concentrate and respond in emergencies, even if slower when at a leisurely lope.
Best case Standard option Cruise warp 5.2 or 140.6c
Worst case extended is Warp 5.4 or 157.4c
Best case extended is Warp 5.6 or 175.6c
Vulcan is 16.5 Ly from earth.
Warp 5.2 is 42 days 7 hours
Warp 5.4 is 37 days 17 hours
Warp 5.6 is 33 days 20 hours
Saving roughly 5 days at worst and roughly 9 days at best.
That difference is going to grow even greater the longer distances our ships need to travel. So I wouldn't say that it's a minor difference between cruise speeds.
[X] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)
I have not run all the numbers this time, but in general a faster Cruise speed will get you somewhere meaningful in a much shorter amount of time than a faster Sprint speed that you can't maintain.
On the other hand, it negates the entire point of choosing the Polyferride alloy a couple rounds back and leaves us with a +1 Cost for no Gain at best, an active Loss at worst. That seems counterproductive and silly to me.
That is entirely true, and there is a level of connection with the warp core of the ship, but based on my reading, I feel you're conflating the nacelles with the entire warp system. The nacelles are just a component that works in tandem with the core, and are subject to changes even between various starship classes to account for size of the vessel, mission profile, etc. As such, it feels (to me at least) like an easily modular part of the warp system. Now, I could be entirely wrong, but that's my read of the whole situation.
On the other hand, it negates the entire point of choosing the Polyferride alloy a couple rounds back and leaves us with a +1 Cost for no Gain at best, an active Loss at worst. That seems counterproductive and silly to me.
No, because it means that by picking Polyferride we largely countered the cost of longer nacelles, so instead of +.4/-.6 we are actually +.4/-.5 to 0, +1 cost.
And I am being swayed by the purely non-military application concept. Faster civilian ships is powerful even if we don't end up designing them.
[X] Extended Length (-0.6 Maximum Warp, +0.4 Cruise)
We've built internal surveyors and cargo/utility ships in the past. Those are going to do a lot of flying across more or less safe space and cruise speed is important for them.
Anything travelling very far would also benefit, at the opposite end of things. A good cruise speed on that kind of ship would let it go further in the same maximum time in space. But we already did our explorer.
Yeah, but even then, do you want those ships to move at efficient cruise or at max cruise? Even an explorer most of the time isn't planning to go to its max theoretical range and then back. And I imagine the types of cargo Starfleet tends to haul would be more time sensitive than the usual civilian hauling where you might take a time loss to save some fuel.
Remember that maximum cruise speed is halfway between efficient cruise and top speed, so because the top speed decreases more than the efficient cruise increases, our maximum cruise speed will actually decrease.
This is why I have gone for standard length nacelles and suggest that during fitting we go for increased cruise configuration
No, because it means that by picking Polyferride we largely countered the cost of longer nacelles, so instead of +.4/-.6 we are actually +.4/-.5 to 0, +1 cost.
Remember that maximum cruise speed is halfway between efficient cruise and top speed, so because the top speed decreases more than the efficient cruise increases, our maximum cruise speed will actually decrease.
This is why I have gone for standard length nacelles and suggest that during fitting we go for increased cruise configuration
Oooh. If that's the case... man alive, that's pretty mean. And at least, as you've said, we can configure the nacelles on a ship design to prioritize cruise capability if we go standard... I'll have to muse on this, but I'm leaning more towards the standard length now...
The faster warp speed from the alloy and the slower warp speed from the longer nacelles both happen. Getting the longer nacelles doesn't make the alloy do nothing. It simply means that the alloy is countering the major drawback of the longer nacelles. We are reducing the severity of the longer nacelles drawback in exchange for more cost.
The faster warp speed from the alloy and the slower warp speed from the longer nacelles both happen. Getting the longer nacelles doesn't make the alloy do nothing. It simply means that the alloy is countering the major drawback of the longer nacelles. We are reducing the severity of the longer nacelles drawback in exchange for more cost.
Ah. You would be wrong then. The Alloy itself was a 0.1 to 0.4 increase while the longer nacelles is a flat 0.6 loss. Best case is a 0.2 net loss, which still sucks for a +1 Cost, worst case is a 0.5 net loss. I'm not seeing the value you are.
The faster warp speed from the alloy and the slower warp speed from the longer nacelles both happen. Getting the longer nacelles doesn't make the alloy do nothing. It simply means that the alloy is countering the major drawback of the longer nacelles. We are reducing the severity of the longer nacelles drawback in exchange for more cost.
The problem is, even assuming best possible result, combining the alloy and extended length still leaves us with a 0.2 decrease to maximum warp. The boost from the Bussard collector isn't listed numerically yet - which means that we can't realistically make decisions based on assuming how much of a boost it will receive. And it's also worth noting that, even in the ship design phase, we usually max out at a 0.4 Factor boost to maximum or cruising speed - which means that, even assuming we optimize all our future ships for sprint, Extended would mean that the polyferride must provide at least a 0.2 factor boost to maximum warp to offset Extended's decrease to maximum speed.
I'm going to be voting for Standard Length, because trying to optimize the nacelle length for cruise seems fairly terrible in comparison to optimizing a ship's design for cruising.
[X] Standard Length
