I'd say, two Phaser Banks (exact positioning TBD) and either 2 standard launchers or 1 RFL.
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Endorfinator
Awkwardly Social
- Location
- California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
That's about where I am. Really want to get RFLs standard. For a 100kt to 150kt a single Type 3 engine is going to be adequate, and covariant shielding is now standard.
That's a death trap this ship is going out behond the borders. Normal anomalies would eat this ship no matter possible hostile encounters.
The brief was small and specialized they said nothing on cheap.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
In fairness, 'small and specialized' does imply keeping costs reasonably low.
- Location
- Louisville, GA
Hmm:
100,000 ton saucer, -20,000 ton deflector bulge, vertical nacelles arrangement to accommodate the verticsl space needed for the warp core.
100,000 saucer, bigger bulge, that goes far enough back to fit the vertical space for the warp core (30 to 40 kt?) Miranda style engine mounts
Smaller (-80 kt) saucer, -60 kt engineering hull, standard necked configuration.
Keeping it under 150kt should keep impulse and shield costs down, maneuverability up, and can fit around 10 to 14 science?
Maneuverability should be very high, so weapons fit would be 2 phasers and 2 std torpdoes or 1 RFL..
Is there any new tech people want to try to fit? STO deflector space magic? Voyager style moving nacelles for faster or more efficient cruise?
100,000 ton saucer, -20,000 ton deflector bulge, vertical nacelles arrangement to accommodate the verticsl space needed for the warp core.
100,000 saucer, bigger bulge, that goes far enough back to fit the vertical space for the warp core (30 to 40 kt?) Miranda style engine mounts
Smaller (-80 kt) saucer, -60 kt engineering hull, standard necked configuration.
Keeping it under 150kt should keep impulse and shield costs down, maneuverability up, and can fit around 10 to 14 science?
Maneuverability should be very high, so weapons fit would be 2 phasers and 2 std torpdoes or 1 RFL..
Is there any new tech people want to try to fit? STO deflector space magic? Voyager style moving nacelles for faster or more efficient cruise?
Ideally, mind, not must be.
We can strike a decent balance between size/cost and capability, and it'd be especially hilarious if we do such a good job there SanFran's next ship after this is just ours with some different modules.
Endorfinator
Awkwardly Social
- Location
- California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Honestly given that our Excalibur can apparently go 3 vs 1 with a D7 it'd be hilarious if our specialized small science ship could 1 v 1 a D7.
I'd say more 2v1 to include margin of chance and other intangibles. 3v1 is a dicey proposition and isn't likely to be a consistent W in the Excalibur's column,
So I've mainly been mulling over modules and how they work. On the one hand I'm not going to move away from the midline-MSD thing which each module having their own graphic, but it's undeniable that different sections of the ship should have much space than others. As it stands currently the Universe-class would probably have fewer modules than a Galaxy-class starship because of the way the 2d slice along the midline works. And also I don't want to have to keep doing fatter saucers, because...well, that's more space to fill. The sphere was a big pain.
So tentatively speaking I'm thinking of calculating how 'large' a module is, so something in the heart of the saucer along a couple of decks would probably only be a third the size of something that's along the rim of the same saucer. But rather tha nbeing abstract by giving them fractional science values, I'm thinking more along the lines of a sort of category - > module system.
Let's say you have the forward rim of the saucer. It would probably be a pretty large span of space. So if you made it a science section, you'd get three 'module' slots. Maybe starboard has a biolab, forward has a hydroponics bay, and port has a chemistry lab.
Given the obvious stat-inflation I was thinking that maybe in that case you'd have basic/expert/cutting-edge thresholds as well, where if you want it to be best-of-the-best you'd need to have three biolab modules throughout the ship. That would also make possible the sort of specialistion system as it exists (medical+chemistry= +1 science for drug synthesis, etc) a more unique thing in that it would unlock more modules you can choose to add to further specialise the ship off the basis of that.
I'm not exactly 100% on any of the exact mechanics of that, but I'd welcome suggestions. It's still very much in a nebulous phase. I just don't want to add brute-force mathematics to the current system. Better to expand choice and customisation instead.
So tentatively speaking I'm thinking of calculating how 'large' a module is, so something in the heart of the saucer along a couple of decks would probably only be a third the size of something that's along the rim of the same saucer. But rather tha nbeing abstract by giving them fractional science values, I'm thinking more along the lines of a sort of category - > module system.
Let's say you have the forward rim of the saucer. It would probably be a pretty large span of space. So if you made it a science section, you'd get three 'module' slots. Maybe starboard has a biolab, forward has a hydroponics bay, and port has a chemistry lab.
Given the obvious stat-inflation I was thinking that maybe in that case you'd have basic/expert/cutting-edge thresholds as well, where if you want it to be best-of-the-best you'd need to have three biolab modules throughout the ship. That would also make possible the sort of specialistion system as it exists (medical+chemistry= +1 science for drug synthesis, etc) a more unique thing in that it would unlock more modules you can choose to add to further specialise the ship off the basis of that.
I'm not exactly 100% on any of the exact mechanics of that, but I'd welcome suggestions. It's still very much in a nebulous phase. I just don't want to add brute-force mathematics to the current system. Better to expand choice and customisation instead.
You should not understimate the value of a big section of uninterupted space. A duoble size lab would be more valuable then two normal sized ones.
You should not try to calculate how much space a ship has. Why start now? Why bring in math now?
A better way would be to continue with the eyeball method for modules. The slice through only ever shows the most important pieces of a given area anyway. Just eyeball how many modules fit into it and let the unseen areas be the fuzzy bits so you do not need to explain it. I as a quester can tell you wholeheartedly that my interest is not in the math or how authentic a ship is. It was already etablished that each ship is measured on the current needs of starfleet and are only badly compareable. The ratings are only important for the current design. The basic/expert/cutting-edge is already covered: basic since labs cover a lot but are only basic and specialiced ones represent the expert qualifier. The cutting edge comes through interaction of modules.
Please try to keep it so that you feel comfortable.
You should not try to calculate how much space a ship has. Why start now? Why bring in math now?
A better way would be to continue with the eyeball method for modules. The slice through only ever shows the most important pieces of a given area anyway. Just eyeball how many modules fit into it and let the unseen areas be the fuzzy bits so you do not need to explain it. I as a quester can tell you wholeheartedly that my interest is not in the math or how authentic a ship is. It was already etablished that each ship is measured on the current needs of starfleet and are only badly compareable. The ratings are only important for the current design. The basic/expert/cutting-edge is already covered: basic since labs cover a lot but are only basic and specialiced ones represent the expert qualifier. The cutting edge comes through interaction of modules.
Please try to keep it so that you feel comfortable.
- Location
- USA
A justification could be that it's easier to keep all the high voltage shit closer to the midline of the ship, leaving the externalities as pure crew spaces.
Horologer
Incertae sedis
- Location
- a risen sea
Hmm. So we'd vote something like:
Front Saucer (3 modules) -> Science
Aft Saucer (2 modules) -> Crew Amenities
Secondary Hull (2 modules) -> Engineering
And then vote for individual modules on each section?
- Location
- Australia
Absolutely keep your cut away method for picking modules. The looks are practically iconic.
But I do agree it needs to be mixed up a bit as ship sizes get bigger - I thought the sphere was actually a good example of having way more space free than used, but the engineering scores were bumped up enough it felt good anyway.
Sorry no helpful thoughts yet, just woke up and checked the thread first thing. I'll ponder throughout the morning
But I do agree it needs to be mixed up a bit as ship sizes get bigger - I thought the sphere was actually a good example of having way more space free than used, but the engineering scores were bumped up enough it felt good anyway.
Sorry no helpful thoughts yet, just woke up and checked the thread first thing. I'll ponder throughout the morning
TheShadowDeamon
Mighty Dragon
Yes something like this would proberably be a good compromise, that way when we start to sort out the blocks to the various choices if we wanted multiple modules for the same choice it would stack the score:
1 module - basic capability +1
2 modules - average (can't think of a better word here) +2 or 3
3 modules - advanced capability +5 or 6
Should the score bonus increase as you have more modules, as they're able to fit increasingly specialised equipment that is extremly narrow in focus but has amazing capability at it?
I would be tempted to keep things as simple as possible, probably by simply eyeballing what spaces should get X number of modules, and be willing to fudge things a lot so that scores feel right. Fundamentally given how the system is already abstracted in terms of representing the inside of a 3D ship via a 2D view, I don't think that adding too much complexity in the name of fidelity is necessarily a positive here. So long as the end result gets total Science scores that feel sensible, and provides interesting choices for voters, I think that's the main goal.
Also:
A friend shared this tweet with me today and I thought it was both funny and rather interesting. May go some of the way to explaining why Earth in Star Trek has such an abiding respect and love for the name Enterprise. The link is above but I've also included a screencap below in case it requires a login to view:
Also interesting to note that ramming the enemy when all else fails is apparently a bit of a tradition for ships bearing the name Enterprise!
Also:
A friend shared this tweet with me today and I thought it was both funny and rather interesting. May go some of the way to explaining why Earth in Star Trek has such an abiding respect and love for the name Enterprise. The link is above but I've also included a screencap below in case it requires a login to view:
KlavoHunter
THOU SHALT WORSHIP NO GODS ABOVE ENTERPRISE!
I have this poster on my wall, and it's a huge part of my ST WW3 headcanon!
'course at this point it'd be the CVN-80 Big E getting to do the honors...
Huh, one of the books has her going down in the Sea of Japan in 1995. To a similar effect.
I mean, the only thing I can contribute, and I'm pre-caffeine so having trouble parsing what other people have written, is that it'd be nice to know how many/what size/quality of modules we'd get from each starship component. Like, 3 big for sphere, 3 medium for big saucer, 2 medium for half-saucer, 2 medium from big secondary hull, 1 medium from small secondary hull etc. That way we can kinda aim for something that fits our requirements, get tighter when costs are more critical, go above and beyond when we can afford to do so.
I'm not so sure about having to have 3 large modules of biology to max out biology though, it seems kinda excessive. A large biology lab is presumably, well, large and well-equipped with tons of staff. I suppose in this case it makes sense but it does add another layer of complexity, us trying to decide whether or not we need 2 or 3 large physics labs for studying stars etc, and we could muck up a design if we assume that 1 is enough when we need 3, and that's not explicit. As designers we'd be told, "you must have 3", not necessarily here.
After-caffeine edit: Maybe a little thing that says something like,
"
-A biology science rating of 20 or higher is required, preferably 28. The higher the better.
-Chemistry and geology rating of 4 or higher is preferred. Anything higher than 6 is unlikely to yield any improvement to utility.
-6 or more shuttles are preferred
-Additional transporter pads are preferred
Bonus objectives:
-A physics rating of 4 or higher is preferred
-A cargo capacity of 3 or higher is preferred
-Ability to sustain at cruise at warp 6.5 is preferred
-Additional crew amenities to reduce crew fatigue is preferred
-A cost of less than 50 is preferred
-Ability to deliver an alpha strike damage of 60 or higher is preferred
"
That gives us clear goals that must be met, and we have to decide whether we want to focus on pure scientific usage, other utility, longevity or military robustness. We probably can't meet all those goals, but we can decide which ones are more urgent while still having clear guidelines.
And also maybe make it so general-purpose labs can do anything, but their rating is a lot lower. So a general-purpose lab's steppings are 2, 4, 6 and 8, whereas a specialized one is, say, 4, 8, 12, 24.
Possibly variations, on a standard mission a general-purpose lab can be configured for anything, say reinforcing biology, but on a typical mission can only do that thing for the duration. So we can assume that a triad of 3 general-purpose labs can meet our primary goals but can't be reconfigured for chemistry, geology or physics unless the ship's there long-term. So a general-purpose science vessel probably should mount more general-purpose labs, a survey ship should have more specialized labs etc.
I can see a few problems with my examples, but there are keener brains than me that can debug those if the basic premise has any merit.
Just my 2 cents, I hope that was semi-coherent.
I'm not so sure about having to have 3 large modules of biology to max out biology though, it seems kinda excessive. A large biology lab is presumably, well, large and well-equipped with tons of staff. I suppose in this case it makes sense but it does add another layer of complexity, us trying to decide whether or not we need 2 or 3 large physics labs for studying stars etc, and we could muck up a design if we assume that 1 is enough when we need 3, and that's not explicit. As designers we'd be told, "you must have 3", not necessarily here.
After-caffeine edit: Maybe a little thing that says something like,
"
-A biology science rating of 20 or higher is required, preferably 28. The higher the better.
-Chemistry and geology rating of 4 or higher is preferred. Anything higher than 6 is unlikely to yield any improvement to utility.
-6 or more shuttles are preferred
-Additional transporter pads are preferred
Bonus objectives:
-A physics rating of 4 or higher is preferred
-A cargo capacity of 3 or higher is preferred
-Ability to sustain at cruise at warp 6.5 is preferred
-Additional crew amenities to reduce crew fatigue is preferred
-A cost of less than 50 is preferred
-Ability to deliver an alpha strike damage of 60 or higher is preferred
"
That gives us clear goals that must be met, and we have to decide whether we want to focus on pure scientific usage, other utility, longevity or military robustness. We probably can't meet all those goals, but we can decide which ones are more urgent while still having clear guidelines.
And also maybe make it so general-purpose labs can do anything, but their rating is a lot lower. So a general-purpose lab's steppings are 2, 4, 6 and 8, whereas a specialized one is, say, 4, 8, 12, 24.
Possibly variations, on a standard mission a general-purpose lab can be configured for anything, say reinforcing biology, but on a typical mission can only do that thing for the duration. So we can assume that a triad of 3 general-purpose labs can meet our primary goals but can't be reconfigured for chemistry, geology or physics unless the ship's there long-term. So a general-purpose science vessel probably should mount more general-purpose labs, a survey ship should have more specialized labs etc.
I can see a few problems with my examples, but there are keener brains than me that can debug those if the basic premise has any merit.
Just my 2 cents, I hope that was semi-coherent.
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I think the simplest solution would be that modules where the ship is thicker are treated as being bigger. That seems like it would handle making bigger ships have appropriately bigger capabilities. It doesn't need to be some sort of x3.2 thing but just a large module fits in this space, and is drawn like a standard sized module.
The concern I have about adding more modules is that it leads to having many votes. If we do type->modules for each module of this scope, we'll either end up having many votes to pick all the modules or it makes individual votes have many options.
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slybrarian
Creature of Fable
- Location
- A Far and Sunless Land
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I think that having each visible module represent a type and then having votes on specialties might work, at the risk of getting complicated. The frustration with the fabrication has also been mentioned, so you might treat some systems as just automatically included with ships that have wider saucers but not be displayed on the diagram.
Fixed modules per size per era.
So for a current era frigate(just assume the weights are right): ~50kt sphere = 4 modules, full saucer = 3 modules, half saucer = 2 modules. 2 modules with a standard ~50kt secondary hull, 1 with a small 25kt secondary hull.
Adjust the modules up for larger classes in something like frigate - > light cruiser - > heavy cruiser -> explorer, allow us to be greedy and trade modules for more than standard numbers of torpedoes/impulse engines/shuttle bays per era or vice versa.
That'd also give us an incentive to try weird things like the Miranda's roll-bar to sneak more space in.
So for a current era frigate(just assume the weights are right): ~50kt sphere = 4 modules, full saucer = 3 modules, half saucer = 2 modules. 2 modules with a standard ~50kt secondary hull, 1 with a small 25kt secondary hull.
Adjust the modules up for larger classes in something like frigate - > light cruiser - > heavy cruiser -> explorer, allow us to be greedy and trade modules for more than standard numbers of torpedoes/impulse engines/shuttle bays per era or vice versa.
That'd also give us an incentive to try weird things like the Miranda's roll-bar to sneak more space in.
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darkstarling
Brilliantly Crazed
- Location
- Columbus, Ohio
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Fascinating! But notice that it doesn't say a word about its involvement in the infamous Cetacean Probe Incident. That ship saved the Earth twice over!
- Location
- Dragyxx
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
One thing I might suggest is differentiating the Engineering modules in much the same way that Science modules are.
Instead of one Expanded Workshop, say that the ship comes with basic machine shop capabilities as standard, and offer expansions that allow for specific additional capabilities, EX. a Warp Coil shop that permits performing limited Nacelle repairs, a Shuttle workshop that allows for constructing and performing extensive modifications on shuttles, an infrastructure workshop for building outposts and colonization equipment, a workshop with lots of spare plasma conduit and exploding consoles to replace battle damage etc.
Would sort out at least some of the arguments about workshops without just getting rid of them, by making it clear exactly what a given workshop expansion allows. Plus give people new decisions to argue about. Besides, all those specialized tools for the complicated tasks get bulky.
Instead of one Expanded Workshop, say that the ship comes with basic machine shop capabilities as standard, and offer expansions that allow for specific additional capabilities, EX. a Warp Coil shop that permits performing limited Nacelle repairs, a Shuttle workshop that allows for constructing and performing extensive modifications on shuttles, an infrastructure workshop for building outposts and colonization equipment, a workshop with lots of spare plasma conduit and exploding consoles to replace battle damage etc.
Would sort out at least some of the arguments about workshops without just getting rid of them, by making it clear exactly what a given workshop expansion allows. Plus give people new decisions to argue about. Besides, all those specialized tools for the complicated tasks get bulky.
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