Remove ads

Starfleet Design Bureau

Linked contents
Starship Design Bureau Starfleet Design Bureau
Reader mode
Captainwolf said:
I don't see why there would be a notable increase in combat power/IC on a minimalist frigate. I figure at best it will be 18 - 20 IC for a design that has the same firepower and worse manuverability than a stingray (only 1 impulse engine saves 2, don't know how much a no-deflector hull shape would save)
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I think most of the savings comes from cutting firepower and dropping an engine.
 
SaltyWaffles said:
Likewise, fighter craft don't have the firepower or range to have any kind of advantage over warships. Warships will have more powerful weapons with greater range and at least adequate accuracy.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Would making somewhat larger vessels (beyond fighter-sized, but not large enough for its own dedicated warp drive) able to carry larger payloads (Edit: and perhaps some shielding) offset some of this disadvantage? I must admit, I'm not fully sure how much these vessels might change any combat situation, and as I've stated before, a 'carrier' concept might be more useful as a mobile repair station/salvage ship with worker bees instead of fightercraft.

Besides, something like this would be post-war (if it even leaves the drawing board at all), but it's an interesting line of thought for Trek.
That I've basically reinvented CLACs from the Honorverse only just now occurred to me.
 
Last edited:
SaltyWaffles said:
None of that really works for space combat, at least not with the technology levels we see in the Trek-verse.

Simply put, the main reason carriers are so effective IRL is that aircraft can travel way, way faster than ships because they fly through the air rather than trudge through an ocean.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Not disagreeing but Star Trek kind of functions on naval combat rules rather than how IRL space combat would look.

Fighter craft launched from a carrier don't work in space because size doesn't matter overmuch up there. IDK its something like that at least, I got that take from this video:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-dQbKaKNEY

Not that it matters much, since as aforementioned Star Trek subscribes to WWII in space like so many other sci-fi franchises
 
LunaMoth said:
Fighter craft launched from a carrier don't work in space because size doesn't matter overmuch up there. IDK its something like that at least, I got that take from this video:
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Kyle Hill explained that if Voyager before detected Earth from a very far distance that gave us the well-known 'Pale Blue Dot' image, then a ship in space can still detect things far from it.
 
Silversun17 said:
I think most of the savings comes from cutting firepower and dropping an engine.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
You could save 4 by dropping an atomic torpedo launcher and impulse thruster, and probably like 3 industry by using arrowhead hull without deflectors. That brings cost down to 18. However, that is only 28% cost savings while making the ship much less survivable (because high manuverability lets you dodge and more size lets you survive more hits), and reducing the ship's firepower.

I would rather have 3 stingrays than 4 inferior frigates
 
Captainwolf said:
You could save 4 by dropping an atomic torpedo launcher and impulse thruster, and probably like 3 industry by using arrowhead hull without deflectors. That brings cost down to 18. However, that is only 28% cost savings while making the ship much less survivable (because high manuverability lets you dodge and more size lets you survive more hits), and reducing the ship's firepower.

I would rather have 3 stingrays than 4 inferior frigates
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I voted for Stingrays but the suicide can lobby is making a comeback.
 
[X] Recommend the continued production of the Stingray as a mainline tactical vessel.

Maybe the Romulans will also learn it's named after a 'not-so-dangerous' animal and underestimate it. :V
 
StriderInCosmos said:
Would making somewhat larger vessels (beyond fighter-sized, but not large enough for its own dedicated warp drive) able to carry larger payloads (Edit: and perhaps some shielding) offset some of this disadvantage? I must admit, I'm not fully sure how much these vessels might change any combat situation, and as I've stated before, a 'carrier' concept might be more useful as a mobile repair station/salvage ship with worker bees instead of fightercraft.

Besides, something like this would be post-war (if it even leaves the drawing board at all), but it's an interesting line of thought for Trek.
That I've basically reinvented CLACs from the Honorverse only just now occurred to me.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Let's put it this way: phasers can hit basically anything that isn't well-cloaked and is in range with 100% accuracy. They also pack a big punch.

This means that, more or less, the only way to get a physical payload to the target warship is to overwhelm it with numbers in too short a time for the phasers to hit them all. Since it is basically guaranteed that a single hit will kill such a small target, this boils down to rate of fire for the phasers.

So any fighter or strike craft will basically get blasted before it can get close enough to do anything, but if there are enough strike craft in the attack, then some of them may survive long enough to attack the target before being destroyed (and some of them may even survive long enough to make it back). At that point, you may as well be firing missiles that devote more of their mass/design towards being better missiles than wasting anything for a pretense of "making it back to the carrier".

A mobile repair station and such is perfectly fine, and makes sense. Because it's logistics, not combat, so you don't have firepower or shielding enter the equation at all.

But otherwise? It makes far more sense to have something like a Defiant-sized warship that maximizes firepower, speed, durability, and ease of construction/low resource cost by being small and doing away with stuff that isn't necessary. If the Federation had been churning out Defiant-class warships like the US was churning out M4 Shermans in WW2, then the Dominion War would have looked quite a bit different.
 
Fair enough. However the vote goes, the fireworks show that'll come after will be a sight to see. And I'll keep the salvage/repair carrier idea in my back pocket for later.
 
SaltyWaffles said:
Let's put it this way: phasers can hit basically anything that isn't well-cloaked and is in range with 100% accuracy. They also pack a big punch.

This means that, more or less, the only way to get a physical payload to the target warship is to overwhelm it with numbers in too short a time for the phasers to hit them all. Since it is basically guaranteed that a single hit will kill such a small target, this boils down to rate of fire for the phasers.

So any fighter or strike craft will basically get blasted before it can get close enough to do anything, but if there are enough strike craft in the attack, then some of them may survive long enough to attack the target before being destroyed (and some of them may even survive long enough to make it back). At that point, you may as well be firing missiles that devote more of their mass/design towards being better missiles than wasting anything for a pretense of "making it back to the carrier".

A mobile repair station and such is perfectly fine, and makes sense. Because it's logistics, not combat, so you don't have firepower or shielding enter the equation at all.

But otherwise? It makes far more sense to have something like a Defiant-sized warship that maximizes firepower, speed, durability, and ease of construction/low resource cost by being small and doing away with stuff that isn't necessary. If the Federation had been churning out Defiant-class warships like the US was churning out M4 Shermans in WW2, then the Dominion War would have looked quite a bit different.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
On that note we might want to consider having a short legged gunboat class on the rosters constantly. Not as offensive craft but as a mass produced defense vessel so each Federation world can ward off pirates and run short range rescue missions. The sting ray may end up a pretty good proof of concept for this depending on its war preformance.


StriderInCosmos said:
Fair enough. However the vote goes, the fireworks show that'll come after will be a sight to see. And I'll keep the salvage/repair carrier idea in my back pocket for later.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I pitched a similar idea last thread as a engineering and humanitarian aid ship
 
Phasers, and phase cannons, don't have 100% accuracy, but @SaltyWaffles is essentially correct. They have a HIGH ENOUGH accuracy to be absolutely devastating to small craft. Fighters just don't work in Star Trek like they do in Star Wars.
 
[X] Recommend the continued production of the Stingray as a mainline tactical vessel.

We already have the schematics and the shipyards are already spooled up.

Just drown em in Stingrays
 
[X] Advocate for the construction of a minimally expensive combat frigate capable of engaging the small Romulan ships one-on-one.
Stingrays aren't being made fast enough to replace losses and cover approaches, and are easy to destroy by the Romulans. We need numbers to survive ambushes and to force the Romulans to disperse themselves. I feel this is going to be a war of attrition, which will favour large numbers.
 
[X] Recommend the continued production of the Stingray as a mainline tactical vessel.

The Stingray is already a very efficiently-designed small combat craft, trying to make it much cheaper starts really hurting its actual value in a fight. Going larger with a combat-focused battleship could be valuable, but I don't think it would work better than just pumping out more Stingrays.
 
ramdomperson said:
Stingrays aren't being made fast enough to replace losses and cover approaches, and are easy to destroy by the Romulans. We need numbers to survive ambushes and to force the Romulans to disperse themselves. I feel this is going to be a war of attrition, which will favour large numbers.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
We haven't lost any Stingrays to the Romulans though? We haven't even really fought them yet, since this update was called "The Opening Salvo."
 
[X] Recommend the continued production of the Stingray as a mainline tactical vessel.

Maybe Federation policy will be to open fire at empty space at random times and hope you hit a cloaked ship.
 
[X] Advocate for the construction of a minimally expensive combat frigate capable of engaging the small Romulan ships one-on-one.
[X] Recommend the continued production of the Stingray as a mainline tactical vessel.
 
LazyLayabout said:
I've noticed several people (maybe more) have voted for two of the options at once. @Sayle is that valid? If so, I need to rethink things.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
To be clear, voting for multiple options does not mean they want to get both effects. The default SV vote handler is basically Approval Voting. For a 3-option vote like this, that means a vote for two options is basically an anti-vote for the 3rd. If someone votes for all three, all they did is raise the numbers by one with no effect on the actual end result.
 
[X] Support the construction of a heavily-armed battleship capable of enduring combat with multiple attackers.
 
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Remove ads
Back
Top