Starfleet Design Bureau

[Roaming_Guardian]

The Federation could absolutely be throttling dilithium extraction for political/economic considerations (trying to not stripmine too badly, looking to conserve known deposits against future need, etc).

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I recently took a bit of time into the Dilithium Fleet Holdings on STO. And while Dilithium was fucking EVERYWHERE, easily enough for hundreds of ships, there was also an interesting little throwaway line.

It implied that Dilithium crystals regrow in reasonable timeframes, if left partially intact. Specifically, optimizing between extraction and replenishment.

Beta canon still. But interesting.

And we also should have Scotty figuring out how to reuse old crystals soon.

 

[Strunkriidiisk]

Have your quote, we are at capacity. The Klingons have more ships and better technology because they've been in space for centuries longer, have way more territory to make up for their inefficiencies, and steal everything else they need from whoever they can.

Time will fix all problems.

Starfleet Design Bureau Sci-Fi

Design starships from Enterprise onwards, dealing with production capabilities and internal layouts to meet the demands of Starfleet as Earth takes the galactic stage. With art!

forums.sufficientvelocity.com

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Much obliged, I'll surrender the point then.

 

[Razzocnor]

Basically, a note to everyone complaining about how the war went:

The Klingon Empire is much older, larger, has more advanced military technology, and is vastly more experienced in combat than Starfleet. By every reasonable metric they should have completely steamrolled the Federation, and only failed to do so because only a fraction of their empire actually mobilized, and did so highly inefficiently due to political concens. The Federation flat out lacks access to the amount of resources to match them because the Klingons control more space, more Dilithium, more metal mines, more shipyards, and more populace.

That the Federation survived the war at all against a modern Klingon warfleet is an incredibly grand achievement.

This was not a fair war between peer powers. This was Russia declaring war on Ukraine, with the Federation in Ukraine's place. Well, except the Klingons actually maintain their equipment properly.

 

[Shard]

There is, of course, something Starfleet can do to have more ships capable of defending the borders that we didn't do in the quest timeline. It's been repeated frequently enough in quest:

Don't spend significant amounts of Starfleet's shipbuilding resources on ships that can't fight.

People just don't like that answer.

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This classic rejoiner also politely doesn't mention that ships that have more military parts have less ability to acquire more strategic resources. More torpedoes equals to more cost as well as less space for facilities like labs and so forth that prospect for more strategic resources, leading to less ships that are also each less capable in research and like.

Trade-offs exist! It's why we have voting choices!

Then there's the whole 'expansion of the member fleets, hell yeah' while also ignoring that if resources were used to expand the member fleets, Starfleet is necessarily smaller. This usually goes hand in hand with complaining about the existence of piracy problems et cetera, I have not kept track of exact posters but like - If Starfleet is smaller, wouldn't the piracy problems necessarily be worse?

It's all very frustrating. It's why my posts have been 'Sayle should just make us win forever', because tradeoffs and bad things happening are an important part of quests.

Here is the fundamental issue: For the Federation to have advanced technology, they need a culture that values science over other factors, hence science ships with weapon space dedicated to labs. For the Federation to have an impressive economy it must have a culture that values economy over other factors, hence engineering ships with lesser combat capability. For the Federation to have an open hand to the many cultures in the galaxy, it must have an inclusive diplomatic posture that necessarily is naive on some level.

edit:

An example right here is that by adding Aft Torpedoes, we have increased the cost of the ship by about 7%, with the 1 less module representing 1/6 = ~16.6% less effectiveness in science were this ship to have used that module for science (at 1 module = 2 science). The Darwin is in exchange a menace in combat. A trade-off was involved! 66% more torpedoes per ship (1.66x0.93 = 54% more torpedoes for the same cost) and 0.93x0.8333 = 77% of the science done for the same cost. Was it worth it? Quite possibly, yes. But the trade-off existed. You can't argue that it doesn't exist.

edit 2:

This then raises the question of optimizing ships to fit in the valueset of [Military, Economic/Engineering, Economy/Science]. In my view, what we probably want is like, heavily-armed giant engineering vessels plus minimally armed economical science vessels. Why? Because labs go obsolete. Obsolete science ships are minimally good, obsolete engineering ships are 'merely' less good. So in the progress of time, we can expect engineering ships to stick around a long while and science ships to have runs that scrap much faster than an engineering vessel.

That means what we'd like is to produce as much science/research in the limited time period that a science vessel is useful - before the very technological advancement that they drive obsoletes them and we stop building or possibly even maintaining them. That suggests being frugal on their weaponry (especially torpedoes) is the way forward. More space, less cost. Engineering ships can be expected to stick around much longer so can justify being heavily armed. Plus engineering capabilities is much more useful than science capabilities in warfare most of the time, so it's actually quite a natural combination to be had.

Edit^3: Fixed science phrasing. Oops.

 

[Golgotha]

Not 77% less science, 77% science compared to what we otherwise would have had.
But that aside, I agree with your points, and honestly voted against those torpedoes. I wanted the science.

 

[Quickshot0]

To fully consider the matter, one has to also take in to account that the Federation Fleet has requirements and needs that must be met. This is relevant in that when currently rebuilding the fleet it has need of combatants.

This will likely mean more ships will be built of a ship that can do science and combat well, possibly more then enough to offset the loss of science one could have had in a fully dedicated design. It's also worth noting that the increased firepower makes potential loss of these ships on the frontier less likely, which would then again mean longer life times where they do science.

So the total practical effect due to this is far less easy to guess at. Though in this case, in this particular time where a new faster light combatant is needed, I suspect it means we'll get more of these ships if they can fight. And because they're so good at planetary surveys, this might lead to more planets being surveyed for colonization and useful plants, and so Federation space being settled more quickly.


But that's just a guess, one can argue from various points of view after all. Still I think it's reasonable because the current Federation will struggle to have enough ships to support many pure specialists. Thus generalists will probably be valued.

 

[Candesce]

An example right here is that by adding Aft Torpedoes, we have increased the cost of the ship by about 7%, with the 1 less module representing 1/6 = ~16.6% less effectiveness in science were this ship to have used that module for science (at 1 module = 2 science).

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Was it worth it? Quite possibly, yes. But the trade-off existed. You can't argue that it doesn't exist.

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Oh, the trade-off definitely existed. Which was why my preferred vote for the Darwin was 1x forward rapid launcher, no rear launchers; I wanted a ship with a certain minimal amount of military power, but spending more than that breakpoint meant we'd have fewer Darwins (or whatever other ship we'd have spent that cost on).

In retrospect, and with more data from the war interludes, I think the rear torpedoes are particularly relevant in Fleet combat and the better phasers might be enough that 2x standard tubes would have been a sufficient forward battery, saving us in cost rather than the extra module slot. Maybe paying for the extra phaser bank to the rear as well.

I don't think we need to load up every ship Starfleet makes with weaponry; what I think is that we need to make sure every cruiser Starfleet makes can actually show up in a fleet battle rather than getting designated a noncombatant, as the Archer and pre-refit Kea did. Because that's a much bigger hit to the effective resources Starfleet can bring to bear in a war than having slightly fewer and more expensive ships.

That engineering vessels expire much more slowly than science vessels is an interesting point; I'll keep it in mind in the future.

 

[Wootius]

Oh, the trade-off definitely existed. Which was why my preferred vote for the Darwin was 1x forward rapid launcher, no rear launchers; I wanted a ship with a certain minimal amount of military power, but spending more than that breakpoint meant we'd have fewer Darwins (or whatever other ship we'd have spent that cost on).

In retrospect, and with more data from the war interludes, I think the rear torpedoes are particularly relevant in Fleet combat and the better phasers might be enough that 2x standard tubes would have been a sufficient forward battery, saving us in cost rather than the extra module slot. Maybe paying for the extra phaser bank to the rear as well.

I don't think we need to load up every ship Starfleet makes with weaponry; what I think is that we need to make sure every cruiser Starfleet makes can actually show up in a fleet battle rather than getting designated a noncombatant, as the Archer and pre-refit Kea did. Because that's a much bigger hit to the effective resources Starfleet can bring to bear in a war than having slightly fewer and more expensive ships.

That engineering vessels expire much more slowly than science vessels is an interesting point; I'll keep it in mind in the future.

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Rear torpedo vs rear phaser comes down to this: do you want to be better at running away or better at contributing in fleet battles? Torpedos let you deter chase, but phasers have 3x the DPS in a target rich environment.

If we want better fighters phasers seem like the choice to me.

 

[Candesce]

Rear torpedo vs rear phaser comes down to this: do you want to be better at running away or better at contributing in fleet battles? Torpedos let you deter chase, but phasers have 3x the DPS in a target rich environment.

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No, actually, because in a target rich environment you're reliably going to have targets for your forward phasers and firing to your rear comes at the expense of your forward DPS.

The important thing is that two torpedoes are enough to give a BoP a very bad day, and (unlike the phasers) don't reduce your forward DPS any to fire. And as we've seen, BoPs will get behind our ships.

 

[Wootius]

No, actually, because in a target rich environment you're reliably going to have targets for your forward phasers and firing to your rear comes at the expense of your forward DPS.

The important thing is that two torpedoes are enough to give a BoP a very bad day, and (unlike the phasers) don't reduce your forward DPS any to fire. And as we've seen, BoPs will get behind our ships.

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Yes, and a rear phaser will fire three times on a tailing BoP vs a single tube.

With forwards/backwards phasers, 2 tubes forward, and a forward and chasing BoP that need 3 units of damage to mission kill you will deal with them in 4 units of time versus 9 units of time with your setup even while swapping between phaser firing arcs.

 

[Candesce]

With forwards/backwards phasers, 2 tubes forward, and a forward and chasing BoP that need 3 units of damage to mission kill you will deal with them in 4 units of time versus 9 units of time with your setup even while swapping between phaser firing arcs.

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... Two forward and two rear torpedoes deal with the first two BoPs in one unit time, if the tubes start loaded (a given in a fleet action). A bit more, because the the rear BoP will need a phaser shot from somebody to finish, but it doesn't need to be the Darwin that does it - a Kea refit is particularly capable of making finishing shots like that.

Future rear BoPs, unless they're in such numbers that they can immediately get a second on your tail, will also take less than 3 turns to kill; the torpedo tubes don't need a target to be loading.

 

[Wootius]

... Two forward and two rear torpedoes deal with the first two BoPs in one unit time, if the tubes start loaded (a given in a fleet action). A bit more, because the the rear BoP will need a phaser shot from somebody to finish, but it doesn't need to be the Darwin that does it - a Kea refit is particularly capable of making finishing shots like that.

Future rear BoPs, unless they're in such numbers that they can immediately get a second on your tail, will also take less than 3 turns to kill; the torpedo tubes don't need a target to be loading.

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Two rear torpedos cost a module slot, defeating the whole point of the discussion? Although looking back at it, apparently we didn't get the option for single tube back. So rear tubes will always have cost hey module slot, but that sucks.

Preloading isn't simulated, or else the Excalibur would have 198 burst damage. I'm also assuming consistent damage, so I'm not waiting on loading times.

 

[Sayle]

"Give us the order and we'll roll over the border, Mr. President. But they'll fight us like hell the whole way, and it will cost blood and treasure. Give us another year after that and we'll be pushing on Kronos. But dismantling the Great Houses will be the work of a decade and I can't tell you how many people we'll lose doing it. Or even if we can."

"You're talking like just stepping foot in Klingon territory will start a forever war. I'm not sure I believe that, Admiral."

"Believe it, Mr. President. If we start taking Klingon worlds it turns into victory or death. Even a ceasefire will give us time to prepare for the next war, build our logistics, leverage our advantages. The Federation does well in peace. You can't say the same thing for the Empire."



The final months of the Four Years War were a flurry of activity in the disputed border zones. Starfleet's offensive sprang back to life the moment the second tranche of Excalibur-class cruisers reached the front, some of which became the lynchpin of squadrons while others conducted deep strikes along lines of resupply. The D7s that the Federation task groups were wary of had proven to be less dangerous than supposed thanks to their hurried construction, and with the 'D7 killers' leading the charge in force the Empire simply lacked the ability to assemble the force concentrations needed to diffuse any of the multiple pushes that were methodically repelling occupying forces from border colonies and disassembling the spaceborne installations that had been set up to support the war effort.

The loss of Karhammur's political talents had rendered the House of Duras' position in the Chancellorship shaky and uncertain, and although Koval was able to see off rising threats to his rule the central power that his father had enjoyed was firmly out of reach. It was that ability to mobilise the Great Houses that were most needed in the closing stages of the war, but with individual families proving unwilling to band together to protect strategic points, the divided Houses were left attempting to hold their new worlds without support. Even the weakened power of Starfleet was proving fatal to these ambitions, with garrisons destroyed or forced to retreat in quick succession.

With the Klingons collapsing in real-time there was a risk that the Federation would then overextend itself with a counter-invasion of Klingon space. There was certainly appetite for this both politically and militarily in the parts of the admiralty that were supportive of a continuing total war. But where the state of the much-diminished Starfleet was a strong argument for peace, the devastation of the border regions proved a much more compelling reason for a break in hostilities. Years of Klingon occupation had been brutal, though not as severely as had been feared by the core worlds. There were no reprisal killings for acts of disobedience, although any organised resistance efforts had been brutally quashed by the military governors.

Unfortunately the fact remained that the well being of the colonists beyond their ability to work had not been a concern, and infrastructure beyond the necessities had been neglected. Beyond the physical trauma, the mental welfare of the colonists who had often emigrated from their homeworlds to start a new and simpler life was also a serious concern. In order to redeploy Federation fleet assets to begin repairs, emergency interventions, and evacuations it would necessarily mean a reduction in military shipping that would be vital for a major offensive.

Humanitarian concerns won out. Negotiations with the Klingons began in June of 2244, headed by Sarek of Vulcan. The Federation was not in the dominant position it had been decades earlier when it dictated terms to the Kzin Patriarchy, nor had it completely dismantled the warfighting abilities of the Empire. Indeed, the heavy losses incurred by Starfleet left it with scarce diplomatic leverage beyond the threat of invading the Empire itself. That the Klingons were not utterly opposed to such a scenario made the talks that much more fraught with worry by Federation diplomats that the war would become a costly frozen conflict.

Sarek instead adopted a novel angle of attack - by threatening to supply Klingon client states with material aid and aggressively courting them diplomatically, he presented an exceedingly troublesome state of affairs which stopped short of continued open war with the Federation. While the House of Duras was situated closer to the Romulan border and thus did not overly concern itself with the invasion scenario on a personal level, the threat of general disorder from the semi-independent worlds which provided well over a third of their supply of strategic material was another matter.

The Treaty of Archanis was not quite a return to status quo antebellum, but came very close. The Klingons were permitted to dismantle and recover any constructions made in Federation territory, and in exchange any citizens which had been taken into Klingon space were repatriated to the border world of Ajilon. The Empire would also compensate the colonists they had exploited to fuel the industry of the conquered colonies. To prevent any encounters leading to further hostilities a two light-year demilitarised zone was established into which no military vessels should travel.

In practice the Empire began to pointedly travel through the demilitarised zone whenever it would be convenient to them, but the Federation would adhere to the terms of the treaty for the next twenty years. While several of the Great Houses did pay the very minor compensatory sums to which the Federation colonists were entitled as a matter of honour, most within the Empire insisted on collections by a representative of the Federation in person: a scenario which was of course improbable at best. The colonists were instead supported by funds allocated in the Relief and Reconstruction Act of 2246, which was written with the presumption that the promised sums were not recoverable.

For Starfleet the war had been a trial by fire against a superior opponent with difficult lessons. The front-heavy armaments which had been increasingly favoured for starships of all types had shown serious weaknesses against more maneuverable Klingon craft, and much of the war had turned on the question of strategic range and speed. Had the fleet been operating at a higher warp factor then lines of defense and strongpoints could have been established much further forward and the loss of Arcadia could have been prevented entirely.

That said, the usefulness of the high-cost and high-performance Excalibur-class could not be overstated. The war had thoroughly discredited a once-popular viewpoint that the future was to be found in light cruisers which could be inexpensively built to carry out the myriad of duties needed in the ever-expanding Federation and then consolidated in the event of warfare. While there was still a place for specialist vessels, military theory in the coming years would be more focused on how to deal with the long-range deployments and individual engagements necessitated by deep interstellar warfare.

With such heavy considerations and indeed such heavy costs, it was a much-needed dose of sunshine when the Attenborough launched shortly after the conclusion of the treaty, a ship very much designed for the ideals that so much blood had been shed to defend. With the end of darkness came the dawn, and an admittedly tattered but resolute Federation emerged from the conflict determined that never again would it be pushed to the brink of destruction.

 

[Candesce]

Preloading isn't simulated, or else the Excelsior would have 198 burst damage. I'm also assuming consistent damage, so I'm not waiting on loading times.

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5 torpedoes x 18 = 90, +18 from the forward phasers. That's the Excalibur's full forward salvo, though our design document puts it at 110 rather than 108. I'm not seeing where you're getting 198 from.

So I'm not seeing any evidence there's no preloading.

 

[CanYouMeme]

Once again, the power of max-quality big ships proves its value in the age old question of "Exactly how much of this investment are you recovering after the shooting is done?"

So we need either more phasers, or phasers with bigger firing arcs. If Starfleet is smart, they'll start heavily investing in the triple-torp launchers se we can get a marginal increase in actual capabilities with fewer of them.

Yeah, and if wishes were latinum we'd buy out the Grand Nagus. We made the decision to bum-rush a non-retrofitable next-gen warp engine, and weren't allowed to make two plans so we could have a smaller engine as a stopgap. Suck it up Starfleet/Yoyodyne, you wouldn't put in the resources to have your cake and eat it too.

EDIT: Damn autocorrect. Although it would be both interesting and hilarious if the Nagus actually was a Magus.

 

[Wootius]

5 torpedoes x 18 = 90, +18 from the forward phasers. That's the Excalibur's full forward salvo, though our design document puts it at 110 rather than 108. I'm not seeing where you're getting 198 from.

So I'm not seeing any evidence there's no preloading.

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If preloading effected anything, you'd fire ten times? Torpedos when doing DPS are just x/3, no one is worrying about the loading mechanisms.

(So yes, you fire twice in 4 units of time but your weapon still takes six total units to cycle for the next round. Meanwhile phasers of fired four or six times.)

 

[landcollector]

it was a much-needed dose of sunshine when the Attenborough launched shortly after the conclusion of the treaty, a ship very much designed for the ideals that so much blood had been shed to defend

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" TREEEEEEES!"- random Attenborough class crewman
"And here we see the surprising rapidity of humans to revert to their preferred pasttimes when not under imminent threat. Fascinating." - anonymous Vulcan science officer

 

[Candesce]

If preloading affected anything, you'd fire ten times?

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...? No, you'd fire five on the first turn: one from each standard tube, three from the rapid.

Rather than having to wait until turn 3 to fire at all.

 

[ScyBlade]

That said, the usefulness of the high-cost and high-performance Excalibur-class could not be overstated.

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But are they high-maintenance?

I think not, but want to be sure.

 

[Model DC.14F]

Well, we didn't exactly win, but we definitely didn't lose. And now we know what we need to improve on our ships.

It does look like the Type-2 Phasers will be mature by our next design, so hopefully we can either fit more, or get a stronger variant to deal with maneuverable opponents.

 

[Steven Kodaly]

The Treaty of Archanis was not quite a return to status quo antebellum, but came very close.

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Here's hoping it's not just an armistice for twenty years.

 

[Phalfpipe]

I love that the Excalibur is such a revolutionary design that it's going to influence everything else being built from now on.

I also think the war went about as well as it could. It sounds like some of the Klingon great houses take the Federation seriously now , in a 'worthy adversary' sort of way.

 

[Traveller76]

Humanitarian concerns won out. Negotiations with the Klingons began in June of 2044, headed by Sarek of Vulcan. The Federation was not in the dominant position it had been decades earlier when it dictated terms to the Kzin Patriarchy, nor had it completely dismantled the warfighting abilities of the Empire.

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Small Error. With this peace the politics of the Empire are going to be ugly and the Romulans will be learning some lessons about the Federation.

 

[Tank man]

June of 2044

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Should be 2244.

With such heavy considerations and indeed such heavy costs, it was a much-needed dose of sunshine when the Attenborough launched shortly after the conclusion of the treaty, a ship very much designed for the ideals that so much blood had been shed to defend. With the end of darkness came the dawn, and an admittedly tattered but resolute Federation emerged from the conflict determined that never again would it be pushed to the brink of destruction.

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And another great war post.

Also, it's kinda funny that the Attenborough is launching/coming into service post war given David Attenborough did his national service in the Royal Navy post war.

 

[Shard]

I wonder if we're designing the Type-4 Nacelle next. It would explain why no further Excaliburs are built for sure.

Edit: Also, probably worth noting. In 20 years time a lot of our technologies make the leap into Mature. Impulse Engines, Photon Torpedoes, Hull, Shields.. We're basically just in time to have the ability to goldplate a ship right before possibly a major conflict.