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Starfleet Design Bureau

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Lohjak said:
We haven't actually changed anything since the Excalibur retrospective, so I'm not sure why people are freaking out.
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Actually we have, in that retrospective no Excalibur's were lost to combat with the Klingons (hence all the F-15 memes), here we've already lost one.

Sayle said:
I'm also not sure where people got the idea that the Klingons built 60 D7s or something along those lines that I saw mentioned. "Dozens" means 24+.
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I'd say that the implication is about 36+, usually when dozens are specified it means more than just two dozen (since one could literally just write two dozen).
 
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Sayle said:
I'm also not sure where people got the idea that the Klingons built 60 D7s or something along those lines that I saw mentioned. "Dozens" means 24+. Although to be fair I kinda expected a Spanish-Elysian War level meltdown so I'm a bit gratified it hasn't gone that far.
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Ok. That makes a tremendous amount more sense. The Excalibur can take a D7 2 on 1 with reasonable odds, but the Klingons built twice as many D7s as we have Excaliburs. The Federation and Klingons are on roughly even footing, Starfleet just got caught with their pants so far down they are blocking Satan's view.
 
I think it be great that the reason we started arming up our none combat focus starships was because of this war, suddenly we needed guns, and so we decided everything must have a gun.
 
I hate the costs but think we need the FRL burst damage for dropping shields and cracking tough enemies potential enemies. I don't want this ship to struggle with D6's that happen to be operated by "pirates".
[x] Forward Rapid Launcher (Cost 53 -> 65)
[x] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]

As mentioned earlier, I'm game for really any excuse to make a decent patrol ship that's cheaper than the Excalibur. We've already got a Newton and a dedicated cargo ship is at odds with something we want to get into fights without hesitation. So a system surveying craft that isn't focused on detailed investigation of habitable biospheres could work. Between that class and this one we could pump out 30 or so ships in the mid term so they'd be a common sight near our borders to discourage "banditry". They'd help spread the load from the Excaliburs and while surveying would be parked in unexpected systems. This class for systems with habitable planets and the next class for any other system. Federation gets knowledge and the Klingons can't narrow down systems to avoid.
 
Man, am I glad that the arguments about building our ships with extra range won out.
Would have been really embarassing to have Starfleet's operational range crippled because of Klingons hitting the Pharos stations that support shorter-legged ships.

Shard said:
I mean it looks like the Klingon State has more industry than the Federation, if they can build dozens of D-7s while the Federation has build.. uh, a (singular) dozen Excalibur in that same timeframe, it kind of looks pretty gloomy? It's one thing to be outmatched militarily while you try and quickly build up a military force to close a military force gap, it's quite another to actually just be out-industrial capability'ed while also being out-military'ed.
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Or they have a similarly sized economy and industrial sector, and just spent the industrial budget we(the Federation) spent on building shit like Pharos stations and system fortifications on building starships.
That sort of thing isnt free.

And it even makes sense from an Imperial PoV to focus on building starships which can both defend and be sent out to engage in conquest. However, it does leave vulnerabilities if your ships are away.
Like during a major war.
 
Anyway, my position on what went wrong that lead to this:

Since the Federation-Kzin war, we have specifically and intentionally prioritized science and logistics over warfighting ability:

We chose the low-damage but cheap phaser.
The Pharos-class was built for logistics, with defenses being a distant third place priority.
The Kea was built without torpedoes to fit extra science in.
We delayed the Warp 8 Core, and made it impossible to refit to our existing ships.
We built the Archer as a noncombatant.

Any of these done with an eye to warfighting would put us in a better position now.

The lesson we should be taking here isn't "we need to abandon the Federation's ideals;" it's "make sure at least some of your ships aren't helpless in a fight."

Starfleet can have every ship be a science, or engineering, or exploration vessel. What Starfleet cannot do is pretend that means those ships are noncombatants, and so we can shave away their combat potential in favor of a few more shiny points in their specialty.
 
uju32 said:
Man, am I glad that the arguments about building our ships with extra range won out.
Would have been really embarassing to have Starfleet's operational range crippled because of Klingons hitting the Pharos stations that support shorter-legged ships.


Or they have a similarly sized economy and industrial sector, and just spent the industrial budget we(the Federation) spent on building shit like Pharos stations and system fortifications on building starships.
That sort of thing isnt free.

And it even makes sense from an Imperial PoV to focus on building starships which can both defend and be sent out to engage in conquest. However, it does leave vulnerabilities if your ships are away.
Like during a major war.
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Then they shouldn't have the reach to even get TO the core of the federation without running out of fuel. You NEED that sort of logistics investment to get anywhere.

They should need to be running at efficient cruise the whole way and would get cut to pieces by the Federation fleets that can shoot around at over maximum cruise.

It only makes sense if they have logistics built right up to our borders and have rushed in logistics into our territory as they advanced.
 
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[X] Two Forward Torpedoes, Two Aft (Cost: 53 -> 62) [-1 Modules]
[X] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]
 
Tank man said:
I'd say that the implication is about 36+, usually when dozens are specified it means more than just two dozen (since one could literally just write two dozen).
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Agreed.

A dozen (1), two dozen (2), a few dozen (3~4), dozens (4+). But this feels like it shifts a bit based on country and region.

Edit: And I'm happy about the clarification that this time it's closer to 24 than 60.
 
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[X] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]

Wow. Ouch. That's a hell of a bloody nose they just gave us...but I didn't hear no bell.
 
Fouredged Sword said:
Then they shouldn't have the reach to even get TO the core of the federation without running out of fuel. You NEED that sort of logistics investment to get anywhere.

They should need to be running at efficient cruise the whole way and would get cut to pieces by the Federation fleets that can shoot around at over maximum cruise.

It only makes sense if they have logistics built right up to our borders and have rushed in logistics into our territory as they advanced.
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You just need a bunch of tankers and supply ships commandeered from the civilian economy to support your campaign.
The Federation is literally 150 light years across at the greatest extent; its industrial heart will be 70-100 light years from the Klingon border.

Sure major damage means that your ships have to go all the way back to the shipyards for repairs instead of getting repairs much closer to the front line, but thats a deliberate choice based on the sort of war you are doctrinally equipped to fight.
If your naval doctrine is oriented towards raiding and short overwhelming offensives, not a problem.

And Klingon ships tend to be built lighter than Starfleet ships anyway, with more emphasis on offense than survivability.
 
VOTE
[X] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]



Id rather standardize on Rapid Launchers across the entirety of Starfleet.
And I do agree that future weapons votes should probably have both phasers and torpdoes in the same vote.
Especially since they are explicitly costing module slots now.
 
uju32 said:
You just need a bunch of tankers and supply ships commandeered from the civilian economy to support your campaign.
The Federation is literally 150 light years across at the greatest extent; its industrial heart will be 70-100 light years from the Klingon border.
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Assuming an average fleet speed of warp 6.4 that'd take the Klingons about 97.5 days to reach the core (70ly), whilst they'd definitely have a faster auxiliary force than we do (for the most part) I don't think they'd all be Archer speed, so let's say they can make warp 5.5 counting the fleet train - that's 153 days and 16 hours before they get into the core.
 
[x] Forward Rapid Launcher (Cost 53 -> 65)
[x] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]
 
[X] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]

This does make me somewhat regret dropping the rear phaser, but this war is a really good lesson on being prepared and not sacrificing military capability for science/engineering to extreme.

After teh War, San Francisco might legit come in clutch with cheaper Combat Vessels.
 
[X] Two Forward Torpedoes, Two Aft (Cost: 53 -> 62) [-1 Modules]
[X] Forward Rapid Launcher, Two Aft Torpedoes (Cost 53 -> 69.5) [-1 Modules]
 
Not sure what I want more here, I can see good reasons for both having the aft torpedos and having more labs, so I'm sitting this one out.
 
[X] Two Forward Torpedoes, Two Aft (Cost: 53 -> 62) [-1 Modules]

I do hope we get another option for wartime builds, i really liked the thunderchild and shark.
 
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