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landcollector said:
I remain unconvinced your dream of a full umbilical is viable. It would only be able to extend so far while maintaining the minimum thickness needed for containment measures while transferring AM and having multi-hundred kiloton starships within at most a few dozen meters of each other while manuevering is sketchy as hell to me.
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You would not need to transfer antimatter. You want to send over power and life support, so the worst connection would be EPS plasma. It's not fun and would require a beefy connection, but it would be fully viable. The whole point is the other ship can turn off it's antimatter core and do repairs and maintenance that cannot be done while the reactor is running.

The antimatter fuel transfer would happen via the cargo container pods, likely tractored around by the workabees and with it's own dedicated connection port.

And you would absolutely not maneuver while connected. You would maintain 0/0 velocity to one another and sit dead in space pretending to be a station docking port. You likely have tractor emitters near the umbilical to keep the ships from even slightly drifting.
 
Endorfinator said:
@Sayle would you just consider not having us vote on antimatter storage? The thread is never going to not take it when offered and it's really just frustrating at this point to see any other interesting possibilities instantly discarded by the range mafia.
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Honestly, I feel the casual use of "X Mafia" to label a group of voters that aren't on board with your preference is in bad faith. It stifles productive debate. I, personally , am voting for extra AM storage because I've yet to be convinced of the mid and long term viability of Spectral Analysis.
 
We've taken range every single time it's been offered. By overwhelming margins. At this point it doesn't feel like its worth a vote.
Why bother with the illusion?

And I'm not saying no anti-matter tanks, just that you can safely assume we will take it no matter the case so just move onto the vote for the next module space. Why waste a few days for a vote that will inevitably have the same results?
 
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landcollector said:
Honestly, I feel the casual use of "X Mafia" to label a group of voters that aren't on board with your preference is in bad faith. It stifles productive debate. I, personally , am voting for extra AM storage because I've yet to be convinced of the mid and long term viability of Spectral Analysis.
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What productive debate? There's never productive debate when it comes to anti-matter. If anything deserves to be called a mafia its the choice that get taken three times in a row.
 
landcollector said:
It's not been long enough yet after the 4YW for the Federation to have significantly expanded pre-war borders, so the rough diameter of our territory is around 300LY. 600+ LY of range seems unnecessary on the face, and I'm not convinced, given the retrospectives, that fleet/task force actions will be occuring often enough in the foreseeable future to have the niche of fleet AM tender being viable. On the other hand, I also have the concern of "How quickly would the Spectral Analysis module be rendered obsolete and useless?". Hm.
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[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)


Excelibur is our Uboat this will be our milkcow.
 
Commotion$ocks said:
snip
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Huh reminds me of the Bradford.

a never used kitbash from DS9 that spent most of its days being a paperweight, which is kinda sad since it's one of the better DS9/VOY kitbashes. (funny how it looks a lot more like the original design for the Miranda class)

as for the vote, I like that once again how neither option feels like a dead end. I do think that extra AM along with the high warp cruise speeds and solid weapons load gives this ship a better chance at longevity. Though I'm kind of concerned about investing so heavily into range improvements on this design.

Spectral Analysis is desirable if more situational. Great for finding weird things or noticing things that have been missed, great for a border patrol ship in that it could pick up strange anomalies. It might even help with identifying promising mineral sites for a more thorough examination by an Atwater.

However, even if I think more fuel economy/bunkerage is the boring choice, it feels the better choice to see The Federation Express stick around.

[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)
 
[X] Spectral Analysis (+2 Science)

Have to lay the groundwork for surveying synergies in upcoming votes.

Though antimatter refueling in a fleet anchor is a pretty killer combination when we could actually scrape together the hulls for an operation.
 
Endorfinator said:
@Sayle would you just consider not having us vote on antimatter storage? The thread is never going to not take it when offered and it's really just frustrating at this point to see any other interesting possibilities instantly discarded by the range mafia.
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At this point yeah, a bigger anti-matter tank could probably be accepted as standard like transporters or shuttlebays or torpedo tubes that every ship has by default.

But the problem is you can always just offer an even bigger-bigger anti-matter tank. If the next ship comes out with the 800 LY range as default, there's still empty space you could cram fuel into jack it up to 1200 LY and just imagine the work a ship could get done with that kind of stretch, it'd be a complete no-brainer not to take!
 
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KarmaA said:
[X] Spectral Analysis (+2 Science)

Have to lay the groundwork for surveying synergies in upcoming votes.

Though antimatter refueling in a fleet anchor is a pretty killer combination when we could actually scrape together the hulls for an operation.
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Sayle explicitly said that taking anti-matter pods doesn't make this a fleet refueler, that would come from a specialized cargo module installed in the hold we added last vote. It doesn't even contribute to that.
 
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Endorfinator said:
I'm going to be honest I don't see how increasing the range of the ship is going to incentive Starfleet to keep these within the border?

The text for the stellar scanner says it would be able to gather information by passing nearby unexplored systems or points of interest while maintaining its speed! There are tens of thousands of unexplored stars within the Federation's existing borders, we barely know anything about our own backyard.
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To quote the update:
Sayle said:
Given the large cargo space, this could allow the ship to take onboard a great number of parts and machinery, then spend over a year on the border rendering assistance to the more distant colonies and settlements.
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Sayle said:
This ability and its highly efficient warp drive would likely incentivise the ship for mission profiles that bake in a more excursionary course.
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The antimatter option will support the ship being on the border helping colonies. The Spectral Analysis will be supporting the ship taking excursions outside Federation space.

[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)
 
Endorfinator said:
Sayle explicitly said that taking anti-matter pods doesn't make this a fleet refueler, that would come from a specialized cargo module installed in the hold we added last vote. It doesn't even contribute to that.
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A dedicated cargo module that we have, or at least will have anytime the mission profile calls for it.

This antimatter expansion is to ensure we can rush over at maximum cruise to whatever ship needs antimatter (or anything else) badly no matter where in the Federation they are.

[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)
 
A Slipspace Tree said:
To quote the update:


The antimatter option will support the ship being on the border helping colonies. The Spectral Analysis will be supporting the ship taking excursions outside Federation space.

[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)
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I'll concede the first point, but an excursion doesn't mean going outside the Federation, it just means going out of the way a little during normal operations. People really really underestimate how many stars there are in relatively small volumes of space, we would be mapping those in greater detail.
 
Endorfinator said:
I'll concede the first point, but an excursion doesn't mean going outside the Federation, it just means going out of the way a little during normal operations. People really really underestimate how many stars there are in relatively small volumes of space, we would be mapping those in greater detail.
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Ok, but it is at least a mild anti-synergy with the cargo. The cargo wants to be moving between places with people basically all the time. It doesn't want to stop and look at stuff. It pulls the ship in a direction other than what we want the ship to be doing as much as it can.

The additional range means that we don't have to divert to a refuel station as often and can run at slightly higher warp profiles more often, meaning the mission of cargo delivery is more effective.
 
Roaming_Guardian said:
Please reread. The ENTIRE point of this upgrade is that we DONT have to stop to use it, just alter course a bit to get closer and zoom on past at max cruise.

It is passive Science while the Federation does whatever else needs doing. Gathered in flight in interstellar space.


Also do not forget, telescopes can only do so much so quickly, and space is very. Very large.
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Plus looking at stuff from a gradually shifting angle and over many light years seems pretty useful. If we're out near the edge of space the number of really high tech fixed installations for science seems like it'll be relatively low. Some military installations and intelligence gathering certainly but if this ship can do science as well that's a big difference in capability. Another extremely useful capability is just getting details about how those system's readings are changing over longer periods of time (if these ships do multiple runs or patrols) that's huge.

They'll almost certainly need to pick up and move different cargo from the interior or a nearby Pharos before they need refueling. Since the extra tanks can't be used to help a fleet without an additional module (feels unlikely this ship since it appears we're headed to the saucer next) extra AM drops down my priority list.
 
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KarmaA said:
Plus looking at stuff from a gradually shifting angle and over many light years seems pretty useful. If we're out near the edge of space the number of really high tech fixed installations for science seems like it'll be relatively low. Some military installations and intelligence gathering certainly but if this ship can do science as well that's a big difference in capability. Another extremely useful capability is just getting details about how those systems readings are changing over longer periods of time (if these ships do multiple runs or patrols) that's huge.

They'll almost certainly need to pick up and move different cargo from the interior or a nearby Pharos before they need refueling. Since the extra tanks can't be used to help a fleet without an additional module (feels unlikely this ship since it appears we're headed to the saucer next) extra AM drops down my priority list.
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No no, the extra tanks we are voting on here cannot be used to refuel other ships, but that's a capability we already have due to our cargo bays ability to carry deployable fuel tanks. The antimatter tanks here are about giving the Federation range to ensure it can make deliveries at maximum cruise and otherwise run around the Federation like a marathon runner delivering packages.
 
KarmaA said:
Plus looking at stuff from a gradually shifting angle and over many light years seems pretty useful. If we're out near the edge of space the number of really high tech fixed installations for science seems like it'll be relatively low. Some military installations and intelligence gathering certainly but if this ship can do science as well that's a big difference in capability. Another extremely useful capability is just getting details about how those system's readings are changing over longer periods of time (if these ships do multiple runs or patrols) that's huge.

They'll almost certainly need to pick up and move different cargo from the interior or a nearby Pharos before they need refueling. Since the extra tanks can't be used to help a fleet without an additional module (feels unlikely this ship since it appears we're headed to the saucer next) extra AM drops down my priority list.
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Just to clarify we wouldn't be voting on an additional module for fleet refueling capability. The cargo bay we voted for last vote is inherently modular and can be fitted with a fuel bladder and refueling equipment as part of a mission payload.
 
[X] Antimatter Storage (Range: 314ly -> 628ly)

This kind of range with this kind of load out is near ideal for the Federations currently sensitive meta, especially with spamming the Miranda. Even funnier, the Federation can get its own range expanded by refueling from an Archer or a Pharos in the interior

And as it's capable of slapping aside anything in the currently known generation of its own peers the fact the nature of its own mission profile encourages more Miranda's as well. Not just an anchor on a tactical level but a strategic one outside of our network of Pharos Stations as well
 
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