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Starfleet Design Bureau

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Derpmind said:
For our upcomming Explorer, I think we all expect to go for as big and chonky of a saucer as we can manage.
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There is an argument to be made in favor of a more nimble hull, as it allows us to leverage a limited Starfleet industrial budget more effectively. The arrowhead/delta style primary hull was rejected for Thunderchild in no small part due to lack of shielding systems leaving her no time to bring a tightly focused weapons loadout to bear, regardless of potential turning speed. That's no longer the case with current technologies, but weapons are still the most hideously expensive ship components available to us. We can't even afford to fill every weapon slot available on the current utility cruiser project!

So long as the civilian industrial budget allows for it, we probably ought to go big on impulse engines rather than guns for our ships going forward, especially for larger designs. This will be easier on less massive primary hulls.
 
Steven Kodaly said:
There is an argument to be made in favor of a more nimble hull, as it allows us to leverage a limited Starfleet industrial budget more effectively. The arrowhead/delta style primary hull was rejected for Thunderchild in no small part due to lack of shielding systems leaving her no time to bring a tightly focused weapons loadout to bear, regardless of potential turning speed. That's no longer the case with current technologies, but weapons are still the most hideously expensive ship components available to us. We can't even afford to fill every weapon slot available on the current utility cruiser project!

So long as the civilian industrial budget allows for it, we probably ought to go big on impulse engines rather than guns for our ships going forward, especially for larger designs. This will be easier on less massive primary hulls.
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On the other side, the Explorer being large paid diplomatic dividends with the NXs, and military dividends during the war with the Romulans; I would also suspect that the budget on this ship is a lot tighter than the Explorer will be, given those are Starfleet's big high prestige flagship class. Additionally, because Explorers are explicitly intended to Go Boldly months or years from our borders, it's just a good idea to ensure that they can handle as wide range of problems as can be managed, for which a larger vessel is superior.

Also, themewise, we basically turned the NX into a proto+Connie so we might as well go for a proto-Galaxy as its successor. But then this is all contingent on what options we get there when the time comes.
 
here is a tally of the votes at this time:
Adhoc vote count started by Skippy on Dec 3, 2023 at 7:13 AM, finished with 186 posts and 100 votes.
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Strunkriidiisk said:
As a thought, you could do it how To Boldly Go did it? Each class gets its own pennant number 'set' - i.e. Constitutions were NCC-17XX from 00 to 99, Mirandas were 18XX, and so on. So this project could be NCC-800 or whatever you decide the number of grandfathered ships ought to be.

Starting in the 800s would probably work under this model, with the grandfathered ships taking up previous sets?

Freedom (assuming you consider it canon, I think this class would predate the divergence point/where we took control of the SDB) - 2XX
Stingray - 3XX
Merchant - 4XX
Enterprise/NX - 5XX
Thunderchild - 60X
Skate - 7XX
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Only problem there is that it only accounts for the United Earth ships, and not Vulcan, Andoran, etc. Though given how few ships everyone seemed to have, it might just be a case of smushing everything (there's no good reason or the NX's to use up 99 slots, for example).
 
About the only reason to go for the 50 meter hull is if we really wanted to Go Fast with 4 engines. But while that would make the ship better in combat, it would come at the cost of effectively two internal slots, since the shuttles basically count for one. And we want this ship to be good for both utility and combat.
 
Chargone said:
Only problem there is that it only accounts for the United Earth ships, and not Vulcan, Andoran, etc. Though given how few ships everyone seemed to have, it might just be a case of smushing everything (there's no good reason or the NX's to use up 99 slots, for example).
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Starfleet is distressingly human centric for what is supposed to be a service shared between all member worlds of the federation, I think its safe to say that alien federation ships don't count for the numbering.
 
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2166: Project Khufu (Spaceframe: Part Three)
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] 75-Meter Hull, 4 Decks (+Shuttlebay, +Auxiliary Slot)

    The larger hull is eventually selected as the ideal choice: not only will it provide a shuttlebay, but also an extra set of internal spaces for auxiliary systems. It does leave the ship looking a little back-heavy, but you're sure that you'll put out stranger looking vessels. At some point. Probably. But to be fair most designs look a little peculiar before you add the nacelles, and that's next on the agenda.

    Here you have the two obvious choices: cruise or sprint. For a ship designed to spend most of its time in motion, the cruise-based nacelle geometry seems the obvious choice, but you shouldn't neglect the possibility that a rapid response time could be vital during emergencies. After all, you can always build more ships but you can't build more people. The logic behind the actual construction is fairly simple, with a more spherical warp field producing higher efficiencies and a longitudinally stretched warp field providing greater maximum velocities. But then there is an interesting and unconventional proposal: what about only one nacelle?

    The suggestion is sound in theory, though some computational work will need to be done to find the best position for the warp coils. One nacelle is less effective to be sure, and the weaker warp field would reduce speeds across the board. But it would also be substantially less expensive, allowing you to potentially swap out the cost of the second nacelle for another impulse thruster. Or even keep the design as and present the Khufu as less expensive than projections. It's something to consider.

    [ ] Cruise Configuration (+0.4 Cruise)
    [ ] Sprint Configuration (+0.4 Maximum)
    [ ] Single Nacelle (-0.4 Cruise/Max) [Prototype]

    Credits Remaining: 570
    Industry Remaining: 19.6

    NacellesMassCost (Credits)IndustryStatsOther
    Cruise40,000400.80.4 Cruise
    Sprint40,000400.80.4 Sprint
    Single20,000-1800.4-0.4 AllPrototype




    Two Hour Moratorium, Please
     
  • Threadmarks
    • [ ] Cruise Configuration (+0.4 Cruise)

    Utility workhouse cruiser seems like something we want able to move between systems relatively quickly which is a cruise function (max speed tends to be for emergencies)
     
    The single nacelle would look so silly on this thing, and it would mess with the fowl theme, still I'm tempted to take it.

    Which option do you guys think will end up looking the most like a goose?
     
    I'm of the opinion that rapid response to emergencies is more important for an internal utility cruiser.

    We should maximize cruise speed for our explorer so it can cover more ground when exploring out there.
     
    for our basic ship i say better "normal" top speed. we are unlikely to run everywhere.

    had this been the science ship from last time i would at least think about the single cell but no.
     
    [ ] Cruise Configuration (+0.4 Cruise)

    I think this one since I think we can expect that this machine is gonna be spending most of its time in transit from somewhat to elsewhere.
     
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