On the Centaur and the subsequent Centaur-A refit, I feel they both were likely testbeds for new high-automation systems. Filling the thing with bleeding-edge automation technology would explain the massive SR cost and relatively good crew efficiency. It would also explain the quick refit, as ideas that didn't work are replaced with (equally expensive) ideas that did.

This also explains why it's a design that's very likely to fall to the wayside rather than continue to be upgraded. Basically, it's an Ares that went a step further and actually got built, in the sense that it relied heavily on technology that wasn't fully realized but was pushed ahead of its time.

Such designs also usually leave long-lasting legacies in the designs that come after them. The Renaissance and the Kepler will likely owe a great deal to technologies pioneered in and refined from the Centaur.

If you think about it, all the 2280s to 2300 designs were "testbeds".

Constellation, with its experimental sprinting 4-nacelle design.

Excelsior, with its experimental transwarp engine that failed. It did get reworked over the course of a decade, but it's still not that great of a design for its weight. It survives by dint of it being the biggest baddest ship in the block, and Starfleet's penchant for high stakes exploration.

And finally the Centaur, as you mentioned.

It still doesn't necessarily mean that a "testbed" can't be turned into something useful, like the Excelsior. Just that that Centaur's niche is so squeezed between Miranda-A, Constellation-A, and Renaissance, that its habitat has essentially eroded away. Evolve or die.

Try and beg/borrow/steal a berth to push the Miracht Agrad to Excelsior-A?
Is there actually an open 3mt berth anywhere? Since the majority are voting for the Sarek refit, we don't have any open 3mt berths ourselves.

edit: Correction: The 40 Eridani 3mt berths will be open in Q3, but we intend to start building Excelsior-As in 2317 Q1. I suppose they could negotiate with us to stagger one of those Excelsior-As to start in 2317 Q3 to fit in a Miracht Agrad refit in a 40E berth.
 
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e: Also, are they not planning on replacing the Miranda-A they lost?

? TSF didn't lose a Miranda. Only UESPA did.

I do feel like there's a large scope for adding 'experimental' parts to the SDB doc, where using them in actual designs gets you a +4~5 to research, or even big lump sum tech advances. But they're a bit nutso on the SR.

I like this idea. But using it to explain the Centaur in particular might be a bit problematic, unless you make some of the T1 parts experimental high-SR low-crew variants, which may necessitate a bit of sheet rebalancing around T1.

edit: Alternatively, maybe T1 is should just be high SR & more crew efficient in general, marking an "automation" transition from T0 to T1.
 
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[X][BETA] Oreasa Starfleet Shipyards
[X][CREW1] Crew with Explorer Corps
[X][CREW2] Crew with Standard Crew
[X][NAME1] Tarrak
[X][NAME2] Pleezirra
[X][AMBY] Heavy Ambassador
[X][BUILD] 2316 2 Ambassadors, Resume 1 Miranda-A, 1 Excelsior refit, 2 Miranda-A refits, 2 Constellation Refits
 
What I do like about this explanation is that it pretty neatly gels with the design ideas that led to the Galaxy, with other ships being used as technology test beds as part of a looong-range approach to the apex peacetime explorer (the Galaxy).

I do feel like there's a large scope for adding 'experimental' parts to the SDB doc, where using them in actual designs gets you a +4~5 to research, or even big lump sum tech advances. But they're a bit nutso on the SR.
honestly, with how tight we are on SR, i dont see that ever really working.
 
Technically possible (if you move this Centaur start date to 2298 due to prototype penalty), since the USS Centaur ship was never explicitly named, but unlikely or inconsequential. There's only a single gap in the low NCC-210x registries: NCC-2102. Even lost ships should still retain a NCC registry entry. Oddly enough, Yukikaze has registry NCC-2101, despite not being the lead ship.
That just suggests the USS Centaur had NX-2100 and was lost before being assigned a NCC number like the canonically NX-2000 Excelsior was. Perhaps that was even the reason to shift away from those NX registries for prototypes.
 
I see Wolfe has escaped his commando duties.
"FINALLY, MY BEAUTIFUL REPORTS."

I was curious if this would put Wolfe out of the action, since I assume as a former EC guy he just loves field assignments. Probably pretty jealous of Sharizz, actually, yearning for the good old days. However after having spent at least a week dodging Gartia's Goons on Celos before the Aeroknights showed up, he might have got his fill of being in the field and quite happy to be on Earth/Apinae/wherever.

Curious though -- what does the spinward Frontier cover? Cardassian Affiliates who aren't the Sydraxians? Soon the Ferengi?

E: It's also personally kinda funny, because Wolfe is probably sending reports to Harriman

I feel kinda bad for Taggart. Her last known mission on the Winterwind was a failure, and she leaves for another posting.
Not where I would have expected her either, until I remembered that one of her personal heroes, McAdams, worked the exact same job.

@OneirosTheWriter keeping track of alternate character motivations better than me, apparently. :D

There's for sure an omake explain why though.
 
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I'm almost stumped as to what the Tellarites should be building.

They already have four Rennies in the oven. The Lorch Krind will finish repairing in three months. I'm going to add two Engineering Ships to the smaller berths. So one 1mt berth open now, one open next quarter.

And they have 235br/90sr burning a hole in their pocket.

Current fleet disposition is:
1 Excelsior
1 Connie-B
3 Constie
2 Centaur-A
6 Miranda-A

Add in Centaur-As for scouting? Try and beg/borrow/steal a berth to push the Miracht Agrad to Excelsior-A? A fifth Rennie?

Logically they ought to start refitting their Constellations. They probably need the attention anyway after so long in service.
 
Current as of start of 2316.

Mining Colony, Josephine III [20 (25) BR/yr, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr) ] 2304.Q2
Mining Colony, Pygmalion 337 IV-3 [20 (25) br / year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr) ] 2307.Q2
Mining Colony, Beta Corridan [10 (15) br / year, 10 (20) sr / year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2308.Q2
Mining Colony, Galus V system [15 (20) br / year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2309.Q2
Mining Colony, Gamma Canidae V, [15 (20) br / year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2311.Q2
Mining Colony, Lapycorias VII, [20 (25) br/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2311.Q2
Mining Colony, Lapycorias XIII, [25 (30) 20 (25) br/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2312.Q2
Mining Colony, Collie, [10 (15) br/yr, 15 (25) sr/yr, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2314.Q1
Mining Colony, Ulen Gao VII, [20 (25) br/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2315.Q2

Mining Colony, Hophos III-2 [20 (30) SR/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)] 2303.Q2
Mining Colony, Biroth System [15 (25) SR/yr, 5 (7) RP/yr, (1 pp/yr)] 2304.Q4
Mining Colony, 21 Themis VII system [15 (25) sr / year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2309.Q2
Mining Colony, Tagh Pakot, [15 (25) 10 (20) sr/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2312.Q2
Mining Colony, Corvo, [15 (25) 10 (20) sr/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2313.Q2
Mining Colony, Peco Sigma, [10 (20) sr/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2315.Q2
Mining Colony, Castor IV-2, [20 (30) sr/year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)], 2315.Q2

Research Colony, Aelin System, [ 5 (7) rp / year, (1 pp/yr)], 2306.Q2
Research Colony, Athos V with Romulans [ 5 (7) rp / year, (1 pp/yr)] 2307.Q2
Research Colony, Meridia VI system [5 (7) rp/ year, (1 pp/yr)], 2309.Q2
Research Colony, 17 Jamboree IX system (Yel'urulasu), [5 (7) rp/ year, (1 pp/yr)], 2309.Q4
Research Colony, Ke'Luur, [5 (7) rp/year, (1 pp/yr)), 2312.Q4
Research Colony, Aga Carmide, [ 5 (7)rp/year) , (1 pp/yr)], 2313.Q2


Total income: 155 (200) 150 (195) br. 135 (225) 125 (215) sr. 35 (79) 30 (72) rp. 0 (22 21) pp

Under construction
Research Colony, Cronulla VI, [5 (7) rp/yr, (1 pp/yr)] ETA 2316.Q2
Mining Colony, 41 Miele IV, [25 (30) br/yr, (2 rp/yr), (1pp/yr)], 2316.Q4

Bonuses in effect:
+5 br from each BR mining colony.
+10 sr from each SR mining colonies.
+2 RP from each research colonies.
+2 RP from each non-research colonies.
+1 PP from each all colonies.

Potential Colonies:

Mining Colony, Kappa Tau, 15 (25 20) br/yr, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)
Mining Colony, Proxima Eridani, 15 (25 20) br/yr, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)
Mining Colony, Piara V, 25 (35 30) br/yr, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)
Mining Colony, Mica III, 25 (30) br/yr (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)
Mining Colony, Kohl II, 25 (30) br/yr, 25 (35) /sr per year, (2 rp / yr), (1 pp/yr)

So reading this over, there's a couple errors here, which I've highlighted above. Mostly due to the fact that until somewhat recently, the base and bonus income often weren't listed apart and thus the total was hard to determine. Plus some erroneous tech bonus (like +10 BR) have been listed before.

You're also missing the new 41 Miele IV colony under construction in the GBZ. And again, the research colony/station at Aga Carmide is ded - it would make absolutely no sense for it to still be around, and the 2315 EOY and Nix's map assumes it's lost.

FYI, the EOY tallies use this audit ledger spreadsheet as a source, which does list the full breakdown of annual income, including member worlds, colonies, and misc.

@OneirosTheWriter, please use the above corrections in the front page.

Lapycorias XIII:
Captain's Log event:
[Gain new mining colony option, Lapycorias XII, +20br/yr]
Snakepit option (yes, the named changed from XII to XIII *shrugs*):
NEW Request Mining Colony at Lapycorias XIII, 8pp (4 turns, gain +25 br/year)

Tagh Pakot:
Captain's Log event (unnamed at this point, but found by Enterprise):
[+20sr, +10sr/yr colony option in (-2b)]
2310 EOY names the colony:
Gain Tagh Pakot Mining Colony option, +10 (15) sr/yr
Snakepit option:
NEW Request Mining Colony at Tagh Pakot, 8pp (4 turns, gain +15 sr / year)

Corvo System:
Captain's Log event:
[Gain Mining Colony Option, Corvo System, +5 (10) sr/yr]
Snakepit option (yes, apparently Corvo system was revised to have base 10sr, which makes sense since we've never had a base 5sr colony before):
NEW Request Mining Colony at Corvo, 8pp (4 turns, gain +10 (15) sr/year)
 
Omake - Record Breakers - Night
Okay so I originally wrote this as part of the Licorication series, but it wasn't done in time for the end of the war.

Sidenote: I've already written Branwen's Kobayashi Maru. I can't post it for another three ingame years. why.png

Record Breakers
"You know if you pull this off, even with Shaen's help, whether you get commended or grounded is a tossup." The warning was delivered in a tone amused rather than serious as Branwen tinkered with something on the pilot's chair of the small shuttle.

"Maybe, but I figure the Academy atmospheric speed record is worth something." Buthelezi replied from the back of the shuttlecraft. They were using a variable-geometry shield generator prototype from the engineering labs to go for a shuttle speed record; first this required preparing the shuttle.

The problem wasn't really power with shuttles as such. Starfleet designs were hideously unaerodynamic, but had a great deal of power available, and could nullify their own mass with their inertial dampeners and artificial gravity to make the climb to orbit easy. It was shield envelopes. As you approached hypersonic speed then compression and friction heating of the air and the hull became too severe for many of the more fragile external systems, and the shields were needed to protect them. But the shields were even less aerodynamic, and themselves required power that could not be put towards the engines. Quite a lot of power, in fact. Shuttle speed in atmosphere was thus usually capped below Mach 4. Improve the aerodynamics of the shields, and all that power you were using for thrust suddenly mattered a lot more.

The Orions, who had aerodynamically designed shuttles, had broken that rule with low-hypersonic Mach 5 "sprints" a few times during the fighting over Duaba and Celos. Leave the shields off, suffer the skin damage, navigate by stopwatch and map if you had to because your windows were black and your sensors were burned out. Of course afterwards they'd had to scrap a bunch of shuttles and runabouts that had exceeded their hull lifetime stress, and there had been a couple crashes too. They were aerodynamically designed, but not aerodynamically designed for hypersonic flight. The plan for this was to convert the shuttle's shield envelope into a cone-flow waverider shape.

"What are you doing over there?" Buthelezi asked after a moment of thinking.

"Since this is an experimental shuttle and also over fifty years old, it comes with an eject system. You'd never survive ejecting at hypersonic speeds, so some things need to be altered." Branwen shrugged, long brown hair bouncing briefly with the motion, but didn't seem to have looked away from her work when he checked. "You know, if you just wanted go fast, there are racing leagues and such."

"Can't go fast for science in those." He looked up again to find the Yan-Ros staring at him now. Buthelezi had long since gotten used to the Huntress' ability to somehow move, either in great or in small ways, without anybody noticing. "Racing's...good, but it's not exactly my idea of productive. Less thrills per lightyear in a Starfleet runabout but they count for more, if that makes sense?"

Branwen nodded. "Sure. Nothing I didn't hear in Hunter's School." She went back to working on the seat.

Buthelezi went back to his own thing, then looked up a moment. "You don't talk about Hunter's School. I've heard a million stories about being Huntress Branwen, but nothing about Hunter's School." He had. The news from the Atuin had been met with disbelief and a lot of obsessive pouring over sensor records, but Branwen simply looked at them and started critiquing the style; too flashy, in her opinion. Not wild, but just wide, swinging too far, too much motion. Numerous hand-to-hand instruction sessions had seen her admonish someone about control; fight like your motion is being rationed, she'd said a few times. The challenge about a party ship had made her snort something about "rookies and adrenaline" and shake her head.

Branwen chuckled but kept working. "It's not fun. Being a Hunter or Huntress is a series of challenges that only one in a hundred thousand Yan-Ros could hope to meet even with all our training and equipment, and most of those will have the good sense to not try. Hunter's School is there to wash out everyone who'd be throwing away life or sanity."

Buthelezi raised his eyebrows at that description. "I take your point." He closed up a panel and opened another one, then froze, staring at it. Branwen had caught this and was about to look for herself, maybe grab the tricorder she was wearing, when he spoke. "Why is there a tricorder rigged in here?"

"Because it's an Academy experimental shuttle and five hundred thousand students have been through it since it was made. Kirk probably did his initial flight training on this blasted thing." Branwen had returned to her work, thumped the seat, and then made an affirmative noise. "Better. Okay, that's my part done."

Buthelezi looked up from a rat's nest of wires. "I'd just beam out anyways."

"Not with the shields up you wouldn't," Branwen pointed out gently, "but fortunately the ejection system will cut power to them just before it fires you out. Besides, my personal shield system isn't allowed for the next few Away exercises, they're disaster-relief stuff, and Shaen and the engineering prof did the math. It will hold long enough for you to slow down to something you can survive. Just remember not to pull the parachute until later."

Buthelezi stared at her. "Didn't you almost break some of Stonn's fingers for trying to touch your stuff once?"

"Sure." Another shrug as Branwen did a quick tricorder scan of the chair. "And you probably shouldn't touch it either since you don't know it well." Her expression softened. "I'm not paranoid about other people touching my Huntress gear. Maybe a little possessive, sure, it's a social status thing back home, but not to that level. Every last bit of gear a Hunter carries is designed to be a weapon or at least a bomb in an emergency. We fight the nasty things and usually the big things and you need more kill than you thought you would way too often. I'm not going to let people who haven't at least done a familiarization course mess with it."

"And you're giving it to me?" Buthelezi was mock-accusing.

"Sure am. After disabling the ability for the shield generator to explode, because I like you. Have fun with Shaen." She was probably winking at him with that, Buthelezi considered. Honestly Shaen was good company, but not in that sense.

Buthelezi turned to look at her. "Hold up. I told you why I'm here, you dodged reciprocal. Which you're good at, but I noticed."

A tight, but toothy, grin. Yan-Ros seemed to do those quite well. "You know the Atuin thing? There's a saying, survive five years as a Hunter and you've proved you can do anything. I did my five years, seventeen to twenty-two. Now for the other part. Explorer Corps. Captain's chair of the new explorers they're talking about, the Ambassadors. Can't settle for anything less, the honor of the profession's on the line."

"And when they kick you upstairs?" Buthelezi raised both eyebrows for that. "I mean, I'm okay with ending up somewhere behind a desk, personally, as long as they let me fly on weekends or something. Occasionally let me break a window with sonic shockwaves if I'm good. You don't get to fly runabouts forever."

"An Excelsior would probably be a nice change of pace." She grinned. "We'll see. But right now I think personnel had better send a team with stun-set phasers along with the promotion to commodore."
 
Considered it! UESPA and maybe even the Amarki are other candidates for trying to get started on an Ambassador.
"Legate, the Federation has finished the two prototypes for their new dreadnought."
"Two.... absolute madness. Well, no problem. We can handle two of them."
"They are also building a third."
"Meh, doesn't change things that much."
"And their member states are building three more."
"FUUUUUUUU-"
 
"Legate, the Federation has finished the two prototypes for their new dreadnought."
"Two.... absolute madness. Well, no problem. We can handle two of them."
"They are also building a third."
"Meh, doesn't change things that much."
"And their member states are building three more."
"FUUUUUUUU-"
Lets do it. It will give us more Ambassadors and give the Cardassians Heart attacks. Especially the one named USS Enterprise.
 
Seriously the Tellarites have a pretty robust fleet as it is, I'm not sure what they gain by more numbers unless we ask for them to down their required defence with all the hulls. Which would be pretty self serving.
 
I am currently envisioning, in the event of a serious war, using the Tellerite cruiser squadron as a strategic reserve - throw them into points were our lines have failed or need replacement ships now.
Just with current shipping + under construction they have 8 cruisers (yes Constellations still count as cruisers)
 
Considered it! UESPA and maybe even the Amarki are other candidates for trying to get started on an Ambassador.
They definitely have the resources and income to afford one. But they can't start an Ambassador until 2321 Q4, so planning for it right now is a bit premature, since it takes them less than 4 years to accumulate the resources and crew necessary for an Ambassador.

I imagine that the Amarki are going to have their own take on a 3mt explorer battlecruiser once they look at the complete Ambassador. They're awfully proud of their Riala, and they don't like being shown up (witness their massive economic mobilization to catch up with the Apiata).

Seriously the Tellarites have a pretty robust fleet as it is, I'm not sure what they gain by more numbers unless we ask for them to down their required defence with all the hulls. Which would be pretty self serving.
We'd want to garrison Tellar sector with what we have anyway, just for event purposes.

But that does bring up a good point. If member fleets are restricted to staying within their national borders (which aren't going to aligned with Starfleet sector boundaries since some sectors contain multiple nations), it's going to be relatively cramped.

This wasn't a problem in the old 4-member Federation, because each member nation had a border which they could help garrison or patrol/explore from. But with the massive expansion of the Federation, we're going to start seeing the equivalent of "landlocked" nations.

In the short-term, I'm expecting some deal-making between neighboring nations for open borders, but I think there will eventually be a reckoning that the Council will have to legislate a longer-term solution for.
 
In the short-term, I'm expecting some deal-making between neighboring nations for open borders, but I think there will eventually be a reckoning that the Council will have to legislate a longer-term solution for.

Some of this can probably be the Watsonian reason for the mechanical changes in Forward Defense; passing more internal mapping and defense requirements to member fleets that aren't on the borders to keep them happy.
 
Inserted tally
Adhoc vote count started by UbeOne on Jun 11, 2017 at 5:56 AM, finished with 51634 posts and 42 votes.
 
Okay, vote closed, can I get a tally?
Pretty clear and straightforward victories in every category:

Vote Tally : Sci-Fi - To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) | Page 2055 | Sufficient Velocity
##### NetTally 1.9.2

Task: BETA

[X][BETA] Oreasa Starfleet Yards
No. of Votes: 22

[X][BETA] Oreasa Starfleet Shipyards
No. of Votes: 8

[X][BETA] Bajel Marrett Shipyards
No. of Votes: 3

[X][BETA] Betza Shipyards
No. of Votes: 1

[X][BETA] Oreasa Shipyards
No. of Votes: 1


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: CREW1

[X][CREW1] Crew with Explorer Corps
No. of Votes: 38


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: CREW2

[X][CREW2] Crew with Standard Crew
No. of Votes: 38


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: NAME1

[X][NAME1] Tarrak
No. of Votes: 25

[X][NAME1] James T. Kirk
No. of Votes: 5

[X][NAME1] Epona
No. of Votes: 4

[X][NAME1] James Kirk
No. of Votes: 3

[X][NAME1] Curiosity
No. of Votes: 1


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: NAME2

[X][NAME2] Pleezirra
No. of Votes: 38


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: AMBY

[X][AMBY] Heavy Ambassador
No. of Votes: 42


——————————————————————————————————————————————
Task: BUILD

[X][BUILD] 2316 2 Ambassadors, Resume 1 Miranda-A, 1 Excelsior refit, 2 Miranda-A refits, 2 Constellation Refits
No. of Votes: 29

[X][BUILD] 2316 2 Ambassadors, 2 Miranda-As, 2 Miranda-A refits, 2 Constellation Refits
No. of Votes: 2

Total No. of Voters: 42
 
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