darkstarling
Brilliantly Crazed
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Ideally both
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I think that we are upgunning in our imagination way too hard here.
Excalibur burst damage is more than OK, and then add more phaser coverage. Just by virtue of size those phasers will be more effective.
More torpedoes forward might help more in a 1v1 if our maneuverability is good enough, but why on earth are we saying rear fire rfl. I think someone even wanted two.
That just feels like unnecessary cost for only moderate effectiveness.
The rear torpedoes are great on the Excalibur because they get used as part of a fly by. This dude won't be doing that - he's only firing rear torpedoes if someone flies behind him. Now, as an anchor that might happen occasionally, but I don't think enough to justify the cost at all.
Excalibur burst damage is more than OK, and then add more phaser coverage. Just by virtue of size those phasers will be more effective.
More torpedoes forward might help more in a 1v1 if our maneuverability is good enough, but why on earth are we saying rear fire rfl. I think someone even wanted two.
That just feels like unnecessary cost for only moderate effectiveness.
The rear torpedoes are great on the Excalibur because they get used as part of a fly by. This dude won't be doing that - he's only firing rear torpedoes if someone flies behind him. Now, as an anchor that might happen occasionally, but I don't think enough to justify the cost at all.
Horologer
Incertae sedis
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- a risen sea
If the enemy can actually burst this ship down, then everything else about this ship– including its own burst damage– is irrelevant, because it's completely failed at its tactical mission. (It's also now an expanding fireball, but that's a secondary concern.
)It's supposed to be an anchor of fleet actions, which means it has to be able to take punishment, likely from multiple enemies. If it one enemy can burst it down, though, it's obviously not going to be able to fill that role.
Strunkriidiisk
THE LEGEND
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Trek is a setting where it's better to have a fast time-to-kill against opponents in a space battle. Shields do not make a ship impervious to damage while they're up - we see enough exploding consoles or times where some critical system is rendered inoperable after a hit to the shields.
So no, just 'tanking' hits and relying on that while cherry-tapping the opponent to death should not be our first course of action.
So no, just 'tanking' hits and relying on that while cherry-tapping the opponent to death should not be our first course of action.
Nothing can withstand multiple enemies for long (Borg and Reman Warbird bullshit excepted). And yes, even tanky ships can die in 1v1s if you saddle them with an awful weapons loadout. As you do in your hypothetical.If the enemy can actually burst this ship down, then everything else about this ship– including its own burst damage– is irrelevant, because it's completely failed at its tactical mission. (It's also now an expanding fireball, but that's a secondary concern.
It's supposed to be an anchor of fleet actions, which means it has to be able to take punishment, likely from multiple enemies. If it one enemy can burst it down, though, it's obviously not going to be able to fill that role.
KlavoHunter
THOU SHALT WORSHIP NO GODS ABOVE ENTERPRISE!
Latest thoughts: High Maneuverability would allow a Federation with less than 100% phaser cover to easily bring enemies into line of her, say, aft phaser batteries. Or the aft torpedo launcher.
The Type-2 Mk.II Phaser has a 75-degree arc.
Since the Command Deck Saucer gave us good phaser firing lines on the upper hull, I could see the upper hull facing getting a full 5 phaser banks, so that ANYTHING in the dorsal arc can be fired on by phasers, and it's just a matter of helm rolling the ship to bring priority targets into that arc.
The ventral arc could surely get away with a more modest phaser armament, since it wouldn't have perfect arcs anyways... 3 banks enough?
Exceeding the torpedo firepower of the Excalibur is a necessity, though I think we can squeak by with 'just' 2 forward and 1 aft RFL, for 6 torps forward and 3 aft. Especially if we have the High maneuverability to utilize the aft torps offensively...
I'm reminded of the scenes from My Enemy, My Ally where USS Inaiu utterly dwarfs Enterprise, and when she shows up for the space battle at the end of the novel and ends a cutting-edge Romulan-Klingon Battlecruiser in one pass at warp... Feast your eyes on the description of the Defender-class Battleship!
The Type-2 Mk.II Phaser has a 75-degree arc.
Since the Command Deck Saucer gave us good phaser firing lines on the upper hull, I could see the upper hull facing getting a full 5 phaser banks, so that ANYTHING in the dorsal arc can be fired on by phasers, and it's just a matter of helm rolling the ship to bring priority targets into that arc.
The ventral arc could surely get away with a more modest phaser armament, since it wouldn't have perfect arcs anyways... 3 banks enough?
Exceeding the torpedo firepower of the Excalibur is a necessity, though I think we can squeak by with 'just' 2 forward and 1 aft RFL, for 6 torps forward and 3 aft. Especially if we have the High maneuverability to utilize the aft torps offensively...
I'm reminded of the scenes from My Enemy, My Ally where USS Inaiu utterly dwarfs Enterprise, and when she shows up for the space battle at the end of the novel and ends a cutting-edge Romulan-Klingon Battlecruiser in one pass at warp... Feast your eyes on the description of the Defender-class Battleship!
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That's me!
Here's why:
Much of the fleet engagements where we form lines of battle, Klingon/Romulan/Khys always end up using larger numbers of more agile ships for swarming and wolf pack tactics.
You beat those tactics by making your mainline dangerous at every angle.
"Why would you want 2 rfl launchers aft?"
So that waywhen you have two D7s in front of you and three coming out of cloak behind you, you can smack in both directions.
That's just science.
Over-arming this ship and wasting resources is a distinct possibility, and I for one default towards safe decisions when pressed (a bad habit I'm trying to work on). However I can't recall any design we've done where more firepower was a bad thing. There may have been debate (even ones I agreed with) over whether trading firepower for modules was worth it, but the firepower itself has never, if my memory serves, been a waste.
Part of my desire to make this thing an absolute monster is to see whether there is increased utility in such a thing. Let's say it gets decent phaser coverage, 2 fore RFLs and 0-2 fore single-tubes, and 1 rear RFL, 3-4 thrusters and quad nacelles, I'd like to know whether or not such a thing is actually useful, or whether the post-mortem review tells us we overspent and it wasn't worth it. That information in itself is extremely valuable and can be used to inform future designs.
Agreed, the highest agility possible would mitigate any small holes in our coverage and let us make at least limited use of our aft torpedoes against many kinds of enemies, not just pursuers.
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KlavoHunter
THOU SHALT WORSHIP NO GODS ABOVE ENTERPRISE!
phaser lance when???
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darkstarling
Brilliantly Crazed
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Around when I get my cloaking device
I am not sure I support the idea of 2 RFL in the rear, but I think it DOES have viability beyond just doing passes.
You can, in effect, do Parthian shots. You turn to fly at the enemy, firing your forward torpedoes, but rather than close into a melee you then turn around and fly directly away from them. Your rear arc is just as powerful as your forward arc so you don't care that the conflict is now nose to tail and the enemy is now forced to spend their acceleration chasing you instead of dodging your powerful phasers and 6 torpedo rear salvo.
And you can spin to win. Fire 6 torpedoes in the nose to nose salvo, fire 6 more as you turn your tail to them, then 6 more as you turn your nose BACK because you don't particularly need to retreat, you just want to cycle what torpedo arcs you bring to bare as quickly as possible.
I'm just not sure it's actually worth the cost when a single RFL would be plenty and a budget 1-2 single launchers is something we should maybe consider from a sheer cost perspective.
You can, in effect, do Parthian shots. You turn to fly at the enemy, firing your forward torpedoes, but rather than close into a melee you then turn around and fly directly away from them. Your rear arc is just as powerful as your forward arc so you don't care that the conflict is now nose to tail and the enemy is now forced to spend their acceleration chasing you instead of dodging your powerful phasers and 6 torpedo rear salvo.
And you can spin to win. Fire 6 torpedoes in the nose to nose salvo, fire 6 more as you turn your tail to them, then 6 more as you turn your nose BACK because you don't particularly need to retreat, you just want to cycle what torpedo arcs you bring to bare as quickly as possible.
I'm just not sure it's actually worth the cost when a single RFL would be plenty and a budget 1-2 single launchers is something we should maybe consider from a sheer cost perspective.
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It's interesting that despite the new ships being intensely maneuverable, that coverage was still an issue. Indicating that not all issues can be solved with maneuvering and some times you just need more coverage. Though that sure makes you think on how the Constitution design had substantially less coverage even then the Excalibur, due to its weapons having even less allowed angle.
I mean, the Constitution had a much lower score for tactical. Good enough for what it was, but it struggled. The Callie and her fellow swords dominated.
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Dilithium, other strategic materials and to a lesser extent personnel are the only non-fungible limiting factors that exist on the size of Starfleet. Specialist man-hours, shipyards and the like can all be increased by deliberate Federation national policy
Word of Sayle appears to be pretty clear about this
And as importantly, investing around a hundred points of Cost and strategic materials into a warship and then skimping on its primary weapons suite? Makes no economic or military sense
Its like going on the hook for a two million dollar mortgage, buying a maximum coverage home-owners insurance policy but then declining to buy the separate flood insurance.
In Florida
This
We've seen it happen to explorer-class ships
Not to mention that ship crews are not just spare parts you can grab off out of some store room
A cohesive ship crew is a work of dark alchemy, can take years and multiple tours to gel, and improves with experience if we can keep them alive; those veterancy bonuses can be startlingly effective
The benchmarks for performance are always moving for most categories, and what was an S yesterday might end up a D tomorrow with shifting standardsIf the enemy can actually burst this ship down, then everything else about this ship– including its own burst damage– is irrelevant, because it's completely failed at its tactical mission. (It's also now an expanding fireball, but that's a secondary concern.
It's supposed to be an anchor of fleet actions, which means it has to be able to take punishment, likely from multiple enemies. If it one enemy can burst it down, though, it's obviously not going to be able to fill that role.
Thats why its usually advised to build well past minimum benchmark standards
The Klingons and Romulans are going to be trying to beat the Excalibur however they can, whether its with heavier ships or by implementing new weapon types and designs
Do you think the Bortas or whatever replaces the currentgen D7 isnt going to be up-armed?
And its hardly unprecedented to see tanky ships get focused down
We DID see the enemy burst down several 290,000 ton Sagamarthas early in the 4YW with coordinated action; it was specifically called out at the Battle of Pharos Seven, where we lost the Fuji and the Vesuvius early in the battle
The battle was a bitter lesson for Starfleet. While most of the roster was fully capable of engaging the Birds-of-Prey on equal or superior terms, the D6 proved even more devastating than anticipated when working in concert. The Sagarmatha explorers were a favoured target due to their mass and quickly crippled, while the lighter Selachii-class was unable to break through the D6's shields in the face of such volume and intensity of fire. Phaser fire from Pharos Seven's main batteries provided welcome support against the lighter Klingon vessels, but the Newtons and Excaliburs quickly proved their worth.
This ship is meant to be resistant to fire; its not meant to be immune
You cannot make military decisions based on the assumption that the enemy will approach you the way minion mobs attack the hero in an action movie
It does make sense, given how a lot of our enemies specialize into ship designs that shed as much non-combat utiility in favor of the most combat they can squeeze into the smallest ship size
Ships that tiny tend to be high agility, which makes it a problem for narrow-angle armaments
As for the Constitutions, @Fouredged Sword is right that the Excaliburs were much better warships
Its also worth considering that this is an alt TL, and our enemies are probably stronger in response to some of our own investments. The Romulans didnt manage to nuke New Brazilia in canon, after all
Anyway, Merry Xmas y'all
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One does wonder how the absolute fuck they're getting their dilithium etc, given we were told straight up that the only way Starfleet can get bigger is if it's better at looking for strategic resources (some combo of more ships with better survey facilities spending more time looking for them). If they're mostly ditching non-combat utility, how the hell are they finding dilithium deposits or whatever else? They can't logically be sustaining themselves off of piracy or tribute- if locating them is nontrivial for us, what percentage of strategic resource deposits within the Klingon sphere of influence do you think are conveniently already discovered by grossly-less-advanced client, slave, tributary, or raiding-target species?
I'll grant they're several times our population size, volume of space controlled, and economic output and still significantly ahead of us in most technology fields (although that advantage is rapidly decreasing and they know it). But even so- even combining mines, tribute, and piracy- it seems farcical that they can even match, much less exceed, our strategic resource production when their starships just don't devote any meaningful space, budget, or personnel to noncombat utility jobs like finding the strategic resources that are the major limitation on fleet size and naval production.
And if you're going to bring up the internal economic factors and power struggles that are the actual limitations on their shipyard output that just makes it sillier because it means their total available strategic resource limits are so much higher than the economic and political limits on actually turning those resources into crewed warships that the resource exploitation cap doesn't matter!
I suppose it's possible that locating them is trivial for the Klingons- that their sensors are so impossibly advanced that they can just flyby scan entire star systems for strategic resources without ever needing a geologist on the ground- but in that case it instead seems farcical that they haven't already rolled over the entire quadrant.
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Given how the Klingon building efforts to put out ~27 D7s were described, as compared the the Federation's 18 Excaliburs...
The answer is, they don't. Not on any kind of equivalent scale.
The Klingons broke open all their piggybanks in order to exceed the Federation economy for a single generation of ships, despite being bigger, older, and higher tech.
-Resource density is not even across space, and the Klingons, due to getting into space before us and where their planet is situated, got dibs on the better spots for strategic mineral mines
Explains how they got their Empire running early, if thy can afford more ships
This has some textev since Praxis was being mined for something unstable nough to explode with subspace effects
-Their tributary/client states are doing much of it for them as tribute
The final Four Year War update said their tributaries provided a third of their strategic material supply
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KlavoHunter
THOU SHALT WORSHIP NO GODS ABOVE ENTERPRISE!
Yep, the Klingons have Praxis right above their homeworld, and also Rura Penthe as another strategic resources gold-mine to fuel their conquest sprees. The Klingons are literally blessed by their gods (whom they killed, for being more trouble than they were worth)!
Horologer
Incertae sedis
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I described giving this ship virtually no torpedoes as something from the Mirror Dimension. I think that was pretty clear that I wasn't suggesting we do that.
What I am arguing is that this ship doesn't need Excalibur-level burst damage to win duels reliably. It's tough enough to handle one opening salvo. Again, it has to be. That doesn't mean it just sits there and facetanks all the damage– it can and should dodge, deflect, ambush, whatever– but it has to be able to handle that damage somehow. If it can't, it won't be able to handle the front lines of a fleet action. So we have to operate on the expectation that it will last a significant period of time against a single ship.
And during that time, it's going to be putting out a lot of damage even discounting torpedoes. A maximum of 36 damage a turn is nothing to sneeze at. One hit from both is enough to deplete an Excalibur's shields. Three hits from both is more than enough to destroy it completely. That's not cherry tapping. That's a serious threat to any enemy ship.
Here's the important part: this damage is also very reliable and consistent. This is in contrast to the Excalibur, which has extremely high damage– but only if it's got torpedoes loaded, and only if the enemy is in a narrow forward firing arc. Otherwise, it's at best got two phasers, and usually not even that. Its average damage is about a tenth of its alpha strike. Unsurprisingly, previous updates tell us that our enemies are doing everything in their power to stay out of the Excalibur's forward firing arcs.
Which brings us full circle: this is why Starfleet is asking us to design this ship. They want a tough ship that can't be outmaneuvered, so it needs lots of phasers for near-comprehensive coverage. Burst damage and alpha strike damage are still important for this ship, for all the reasons previous mentioned, so it still needs a good torpedo loadout. But unlike the Excalibur, torpedoes are not this ship's primary armament.
This is something the Federation is always working on behind the scenes. Our budgets are steadily growing over the course of the quest. The issue is that this isn't a civ quest, so we don't actually have fine control over Federation policy. We have very limited control over how those non-fungible limiting resources get assigned to projects. Right now, the Federation's got a budget for this ship, and I think it's unwise to make any assumptions about how elastic it is.
The only reasonable assumption is that the more expensive we make this ship, the fewer we are going to have. That's not an argument to cut costs to the bone, because our ships need to be functional, but we have to balance that against Starfleet's need for more hulls.
Okay, and with all that out of the way, what does this mean for this design? It means we don't need to wildly outdo the Excalibur, so 3+ RFLs are overkill. We also don't want to neglect torpedo damage, so we need at least 1 RFL. And since we're a little pinched for space, we don't want to have regular torpedo tubes if it can be avoided, which means... drumroll please...
Two fore RFLs. Maybe a regular aft torpedo.
Yes, that's the payoff for this wall of text. Two fore RFLs. Merry Christmas.
My brain is still recovering from Christmas celebrations, so I can't make a very intelligent response.
But I would point out the one thing that springs to mind that makes me want to give this quite a feisty rear armament; the Excalibur-class found that its rear weapons were firing at maximum and it was struggling to get stuff out of its rear arcs. It's a small, nimble murder-ship with max agility, and its rear phasers were literally burning out from repetitively firing over and over. This thing, when it fights in groups, is expected to be a damage-sponge, a "fleet anchor", so presumably it's going to suffer even moreso from being swarmed. That alone means it needs to be able to dish out killing blows to anything small or fast enough to get into its rear. I honestly am starting to be thoroughly convinced that it needs a rear RFL, and at least 1 fore RFL, but I'm voting for 2 if given the opportunity.
This thing probably won't be as agile, and even if it was past experience tells us we can't reliably keep enemies from repeatedly pummeling our backs. That means we have to be able to destroy BoPs or similar and we need more phaser banks covering many more arcs to give our ship more firing options. That last thing about the phasers was outright stated by Sayle, I think.
Equal Rear and Aft armaments is a idea I've thought about and agree that would work pretty well for a boat like this. 3 forward and 3 aft torpedoes with our higher phaser damage just means they have no good way to approach us and gives us a huge average damage and multi-target rating. Maybe something like 30-41 damage every round, so close to 3 or 4 times higher then the Excaliber's.
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That's also me!
These ships are built for cruise, likely to get new nacelles when available, and will be refit-compatible with warp nine warp cores; I think Starfleet will be flying them until the pylons fall off.
That means they need to punch in the weight class of not just current potential hostiles, but also ships built a hundred years (or more!) from now.
And also, on the political side of things, there will never be a better time to increase the baseline firepower of our ships than right now.
I think 2 forward / 1 aft RFLs is the minimum acceptable firepower for our new line anchor, and I'd really prefer 3/2.
Id argue the opposite
The Excalibur established itself as the pacing threat in its weight class for the local stellar neighborhood with a five torpedo salvo in its forward arc. When we were designing the Callies, we used the Dee six as the minimum base threat; you can expect potential hostiles to do the same with the Callies
Id like to match it at a minimum, and preferably include some SWAP-C room for a mid-life firepower upgrade if necessary to increase its service life. Which is why my current preference is for three torpedo launchers forward: two RFls and one standard launcher, with the standard launcher upgraded to a third RFl in the seventies refits
I dont believe anyone has proposed more than three RFls in the forward arc
At least not in its original loadout
As for cost, its worth remembering that the Federation built the twelve-ship, two hundred and ninety thousand ton Sagarmartha class in this quest on a smaller budget more than sixty years ago
Make it worth the trouble, and Starfleet will buy it. Both Arcadia and Andoria are incentivized to support tactical procurement
The rear arc is the one area where I might question the expense of additional rapid launchers, given the comments about how enemy agility makes aim difficult
Compare:
Two RFls: 24 cost
Two standard launchers: 4.5 cost
One extra impulse thrust drive to take the ship to Extra High Maneuverability: 5 cost
My personal inclination ATM is to put two standard launchers plus, if necessary, an extra impulse drive in the ship's ass
Which would come to
Forward: 2x RFl and 1x standard
Aft: 2x standard
Thats a total of five launchers, same as the Excalibur, but with a forty percent heavier forward salvo and both stronger and more comprehensive all-round phaser coverage. Then, if an upgun is needed, Starfleet can pull one or more of the standard launchers during the Seventies Refits and replace them with RFls
I'd respectfully point out you may have overlooked module cost/size. Remember that this thing's probably gonna have to solo plenty of threats, and might be alone for a long period of time. So if it has to fight, it has to be able to reliably absolutely curbstomp its prey. I say again, we thought the Excalibur was excessive. The only thing we could've done to make it stronger would be to give it semi-experimental covariant shielding at massive cost. And even as potent as it was, the Excalibur didn't win us the war, it just prevented our civilization being conquered.
It also needs to min-max its modules as well as firepower, and Starfleet's gonna get annoyed if we increase mass purely for more shootiness. If we're gonna lose a module to torpedoes, it's probably a very good idea to get every last warhead we possibly can. That means a glut of triple-shot launchers wherever practicable.
This thing's gonna be expensive. I'm gonna vote and argue hard for quad-nacelles or any other warp-boosting too, since it absolutely needs the highest possible speeds to justify its cost (drastically increases its usefulness in and out of combat).
I usually shill efficient cruise, but... If we give it extended fuel tanks, and quad nacelles biased for sprint, that might buff it's max cruise and drastically help when, not if, we need to use it in fleet actions.