Starfleet Design Bureau

[Mechanis]

Probably loses out High Mobility though, which'll likely squeeze us another Tactical point from the evasive potential.

3 Utility slots still surpasses everything on the table, and if we get another point of Tactical out of the mobility, then I think we just won right there.

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No it doesn't. That gives us 7 points, meaning we get second place because the Tellerites have cost locked down with a 7 point entry, meaning they win in a tie. Our design must have a minimum of 8 points in order to actually win, and I see no reason why we shouldn't just go for 9 by having 5 utility and win by a decent margin.

 

[Tank man]

This I think is a vote that calls for plan-voting.

[ ] Plan Ranger
-[ ] 0: No Shuttlebay
-[ ] 1: Transporter (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 2: No Cargo Bay
-[ ] 3: Brig (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 4: Tractor Beam (+10,000 Tons)

Click to shrink...

Quite.

[ ] Plan Revenue and Customs
-[ ] 0: Shuttlebay (+20,000 Tons)
-[ ] 1: Transporter (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 2: No Cargo Bay
-[ ] 3: Brig (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 4: Tractor Beam (+10,000 Tons)

 

[FaxModem1]

[ ] Plan Feature Creep
-[ ] 0: Shuttlebay (+20,000 Tons)
-[ ] 1: Transporter (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 2: Cargo Bay (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 3: Brig (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 4: Tractor Beam (+10,000 Tons)

There, just so we can potentially have everything

 

[Alectai]

No it doesn't. That gives us 7 points, meaning we get second place because the Tellerites have cost locked down with a 7 point entry, meaning they win in a tie. Our design must have a minimum of 8 points in order to actually win, and I see no reason why we shouldn't just go for 9 by having 5 utility and win by a decent margin.

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Except we have equal armament to the Denobulan ship, so how does it still have First Place Tactical then if our tonnage and armaments is almost identical? The Type-2 Impulse Engine's already had the kinks worked out by now after all, so it'll be operating at the full 150 kt thrust. Any difference between them from a tactical perspective would be nearly moot.

 

[Wootius]

We need at least four utility points to win. There's no reason not to put everything on it and just take Medium-High maneuverability, cargo room will be useful in letting us just seize items and issuing the fines to the citizen and their ship registry number rather than have to haul every ship back to port for no reason.

 

[EternalStruggle]

It's also important to consider that we need a minimum of 4 utility functions if we want to win the contest, points wise (we're currently at 4 points and need 8 to beat the Tellerite entry) so I'm inclined to either drop the cargo or shuttle bay for the other things or just shrug and put all five on.

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The Tellerites started with 7 points, but because of how the Cost/Tactical grading moved down to 6 when we beat them in Tactical, as per the table provided in the Project Protector (Tactical) update. We only need 7 points to win.

3 Utility slots still surpasses everything on the table, and if we get another point of Tactical out of the mobility, then I think we just won right there.

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Sadly, probably not. From the way the discussion about our Tactical went, we'd need to be equal or lower than the Denobulans in mass to equal or beat their Tactical rating. Which, well, we could do, just not on 90k tons. And if the way that the tie works is we both get 2 Tactical points, then even tying them up with 2 lightweight options means we only have 6 points total and lose out to the Tellarites.

 

[LunaMoth]

[jk] Plan: Tugboat
-[ ] 0: No Shuttlebay
-[ ] 1: Transporter (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 2: Cargo Bay (+10,000 Tons)
-[ ] 3: No Brig
-[ ] 4: Tractor Beam (+10,000 Tons)

 

[FaxModem1]

We need at least four utility points to win. There's no reason not to put everything on it and just take Medium-High maneuverability, cargo room will be useful in letting us just seize items and issuing the fines to the citizen and their ship registry number rather than have to haul every ship back to port for no reason.

Click to shrink...

Also free up Starfleet for any of those times a vaccine or some other vital cargo needs to be moved, we could potentially do a relay race of moving it to local patrol ships when cargo ships are in short supply (a staple of Star Trek plots)

 

[Estro]

If this is a police cutter, it needs a brig, tractor beam, and either a shuttlebay or transporter. The cargo bay doesn't seem necessary to me.

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Cargo bay could be useful to impound things when we don't want to take our time tractoring an entire ship behind us, because I don't think that's needed for like, someone carrying enough Romulan ale for a fine but nothing else. Impounding an entire ship is a serious thing, and it also occupies our cutter for the time it takes to tractor back to somewhere we can leave the ship, while a cargo bay will fill by graduations over time.

I do think a shuttlebay is excessive.

 

[Briefvoice]

I mean, gonna be honest here, I'm inclined to just put all five utility functions on this thing because it's still going to be cheaper than the Denobulan entry while being able to do everything either of the current competing designs can do and more. Given we can only drop one function if we want to win the contest anyway, I see no significant advantage in doing so.

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Pretty sure that's not true. It would be a pretty dumb way to write the vote. If we could really only drop one function without losing than the vote would be "which function would you like to drop" not "would you like to lose". If we dropped everything, we'd probably get a chance to add some very different options for a different type of utility.

 

[Aged_Urbanist]

Okay, just doing an assessment here, but...

This is a Police Cutter, it should be treated as such. About intercepting and bringing in low level evildoers. Cargo is unneccessary, shuttles are unnneccessary.

But the Tractor Beam, Brig, and Transporters are Necessary. The Brig to separate arrested folks from their equipment, the Tractor Beam to drag their ship along, and Transporters to get people from Point A to Point B. That gets all the utility required of a police cutter, while being inexpensive.

Which puts us at a net 90 Kilotons, with a Type-2 Impulse Engine, that's very close to maximum possible Agility (90 KT mass vs 150 KT Thrust), and it brings considerable Utility to the table as well.

This isn't a cargo hauler, except in the sense that it can drag an impounded ship to be inspected, which is almost the same thing. It doesn't need to intercept warships, or battlegroups, because that is Starfleet's job, it's just meant to apprehend small, private Problems, which means you don't need to be able to move mass goods from place to place, just deploy away teams to conduct an arrest after pursuit. The Brig space can also be converted easily enough down the line as well if you want to use the base chassis for something else.

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We're building a coast guard vessel, small craft are necessary.

 

[Mechanis]

Except we have equal armament to the Denobulan ship, so how does it still have First Place Tactical then if our tonnage and maneuverability is almost identical? The Type-2 Impulse Engine's already had the kinks worked out by now after all, so it'll be operating at the full 150 kt thrust.

Click to shrink...

We already know we're going to place second in Tactical from the previous vote. Our current score stands at 2 cost, 2 tactical, and undetermined utility, meaning we need 4 utility to win by the numbers.

And from a practical point of view beyond the confines of the contest, a ship that's in the middle cost wise but able to do anything either competing design can is just a better ship for the actual role.
And since we can only drop one function if we want to win, we might as well grab all five, because again, even doing that we're second place on cost.

 

[Alectai]

... That's silly. "If both sides are tied for first, they both get punished for it and both get Second instead"

Meh.

Anyway, basically, I see our version as a cheaper, but superior version of the Denobulan option, which is "Shuttle and Tractor to impound and lock down until someone else takes it away". The Tellarites are going with a Brig and a Cargo Bay for kidnapping dudes and cargo and leaving the ship behind, but slowly because it couldn't afford anything but docking style transport. Ranger is "Catch sussy bakas if they run, kidnap their crews, and drag their ships to be impounded if anything is shady beyond Fine levels." The only real issue it runs into is if "They're not super sussy but somehow have several Standard Containers worth of GigaOpium in their hold that we have confirmed doesn't belong to them and they're unwilling to come under their own power to get rid of it." But that's... A bit of a stretch.

Plan Ranger gives us a Transporter, Tractor, and Brig, and combines that with significant tactical abilities and greater speed than the Tellarite model (Which tops out at Warp 6), We have three Utility slots to their 2 each, and we're still second place on speed and we're only not tied for First in Tactical because the rules of the contest are absurd apparently, where it considers a paper thin offense and speed effect to be only marginally below sophisticated coast-guard vessels becuase those Coast Guard vessels were too close in performance to tell so therefore they're both inferior apparently?

I just...

What is even going on here @Sayle , because As Written, this is creating some really perverse incentives that effectively demand us to just throw everything and the kitchen sink in here, because there's functionally no difference in tactical and cost between "Pour in everything" and "Pick three"?, but a lot to gain in Utility?

 

[Derpmind]

The Tellerites started with 7 points, but because of how the Cost/Tactical grading moved down to 6 when we beat them in Tactical, as per the table provided in the Project Protector (Tactical) update. We only need 7 points to win.

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I think this is correct. By putting the Tellerite entry into third place in Tactical, their entry is only worth 6 points now, not 7. So we only need 3 points of Utility to win the contest, not 4.

 

[Mechanis]

... That's silly. "If both sides are tied for first, they both get punished for it and both get Second instead"

Meh.

Anyway, basically, I see our version as a cheaper version of the Denobulan option, which is "Shuttle and Tractor". The Tellarites are going with a Brig and a Transporter for kidnapping dudes and leaving the ship behind.

Plan Ranger gives us a Transporter, Tractor, and Brig, and combines that with significant tactical abilities and greater speed than the Tellarite model (Which tops out at Warp 6), We have three Utility slots to their 2 each, and we're still second place on speed and we're only not tied for First in Tactical because the rules of the contest are absurd apparently, where it considers a paper thin offense and speed effect to be only marginally below sophisticated coast-guard vessels becuase those Coast Guard vessels were too close in performance to tell so therefore they're both inferior apparently?

I just...

What is even going on here @Sayle , because As Written, this is creating some really perverse incentives that effectively demand us to just throw everything and the kitchen sink in here, because there's functionally no difference in tactical and cost between "Pour in everything" and "Pick three"?, but a lot to gain in Utility?

Click to shrink...

No, because Cost is determined as a tiebreaker. The Tellerites have that locked down though; neither we nor the Denobulans are beating them there. We therefore have to beat the Tellerite entry on the other two categories or we get second place, because if we tie with them then they win.

Edit: okay, so the loss of a point from the Tellerite entry does mean we could squeeze a win with only three utility in the contest, but then the question becomes "why not make it able to do the same job as either entry because that would be more attractive after the contest", and at that point you're at 4 of 5 utilities anyway so you may as well throw on the fifth for a clean sweep.

Both from a "winning the contest" perspective and a "getting the ship adopted after" perspective, we have no real incentive to drop utilities.

 

[Tank man]

Lack of capability is a cost in and of itself, a negative one. Even if nominally w end up with a more expensive ship it could end up cheaper when all of its capabilities are considered (I.el what we can do verses what they can't do).

 

[Void Stalker]

... That's silly. "If both sides are tied for first, they both get punished for it and both get Second instead"

Meh.

Click to shrink...

The placement for the 2 options was laid out explicitly in the previous post- sticking with type 1 phasers means we need 3 points out of utility to win the competion

Type-1	Mass	Cost (Tiebreak)	Tactical	Utility	Total
Tellar	60000	3	1	2	6
Denobula	80000	1	3	2	6
Earth	120000	2	2		4

Type-1B	Mass	Cost (Tiebreak)	Tactical	Utility	Total
Tellar	60000	3	1	2	6
Denobula	80000	1	2	2	5
Earth	100000	2	3		5

Click to shrink...

We already know we're going to place second in Tactical from the previous vote. Our current score stands at 2 cost, 2 tactical, and undetermined utility, meaning we need 4 utility to win by the numbers.

Click to shrink...

3 points, we are at 4 and the other 2 are tied at 6.

 

[Alectai]

Yeah, I'm just...

What.

Our armament is the same, we're cheaper, and at 90 kt we'd be so close to being the same mass/speed that...

Oh.

Is it because they're using some boondoggle nonsense in theirs that makes their Phasers Hit Harder or something, and that's why we've beaten them on Cost so badly? Hence why doing a Boondoggle ourselves would have beaten them, but given us less wiggle room before getting a More Expensive Ship.

 

[Tank man]

They probably use 1B's or something.

 

[Sayle]

@Sayle if we don't take the Tractor Beam will it have Grapplers still?

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No, Grapplers have been obsoleted and they have the unfortunate nature of making you able to pull the grappling ship around.

Is it because they're using some boondoggle nonsense in theirs that makes their Phasers Hit Harder or something, and that's why we've beaten them on Cost so badly? Hence why doing a Boondoggle ourselves would have beaten them, but given us less wiggle room before getting a More Expensive Ship.

Click to shrink...

The Denobulans are having to use two nacelles to hit 6.8, which adds a lot of expense versus your single new nacelle. They're paying 8 for FTL versus your 6. But as long as they have lower mass, they do have a more agile ship which gives them a higher tactical rating.

 

[Mechanis]

Yeah, I'm just...

What.

Our armament is the same, we're cheaper, and at 90 kt we'd be so close to being the same mass/speed that...

Oh.

Is it because they're using some boondoggle nonsense in theirs that makes their Phasers Hit Harder or something, and that's why we've beaten them on Cost so badly? Hence why doing a Boondoggle ourselves would have beaten them, but given us less wiggle room before getting a More Expensive Ship.

Click to shrink...

We're using a single Nacelle design with the Type 3, which costs only 75% as much as a pair of Type 2s (or equivalents) but has basically the same performance. That's saving us a ton of cost right there.

Edit: And ninja'd by the QM ha.

 

[Sayle]

I've also added the table to the update to show the current points and spelled out how many utilities you need to win.

 

[Alectai]

No, Grapplers have been obsoleted and they have the unfortunate nature of making you able to pull the grappling ship around.



The Denobulans are having to use two nacelles to hit 6.8, which adds a lot of expense versus your single new nacelle.

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Ahhh, there we go.

But yeah, with it being pointed out that "With second place Tactical, we by definition knocked the Tellarites down a point there due to how they absolutely dumpstatted Tactical, which means we only need 3 utility slots to win", in which case, yeah, I'm reiterating my support for Plan Ranger, which gets us Kidnapping and Transportation options, and lets us sidestep the need for Cargo by just stealing the whole ship like a crazy Kushani Salvage Corvette, which by definition uses them as a cargo bay!

Yes, hypothetically, it's possible that someone literally is not guilty for having a dozen Standard Containers full of Space Opium in their cargo hold and doesn't need to be impounded, but then they can just come with us to the station and drop it off there. realistically, if there's a Significant Amount of Cargo involved, the ship is coming with us one way or another, and if it's just someone having hidden a bag of Space Weed under a seat, we don't need a full out cargo hold to secure that. Just a fucking Evidence Locker.

More importantly, even if it isn't counted as an advantage in the Tactical department, we'd still have very nearly the same performance as the Denobulan tackler in a tactical situation, and by keeping our feature creep and expenses low, we make the Ranger a much more appealing investment for the member states.

 

[StriderInCosmos]

Alright, now that we've decided on our tactical capabilities, let's have a look at our utilities.

[ ] 0: Shuttlebay (+20,000 Tons)
[ ] 0: No Shuttlebay

[ ] 1: Transporter (+10,000 Tons)
[ ] 1: No Transporter

[ ] 2: Cargo Bay (+10,000 Tons)
[ ] 2: No Cargo Bay

[ ] 3: Brig (+10,000 Tons)
[ ] 3: No Brig

[ ] 4: Tractor Beam (+10,000 Tons)
[ ] 4: No Tractor Beam

Click to shrink...

I'll take this list in order, starting with the shuttlebay. There's plenty of use to be had from shuttles that transporters still can't trump, in the capability of putting eyes in space at a point where the police cruiser isn't. It would allow an officer to get an up-close visual inspection of an outer hull that might conceal things from sensors that a skilled eye might perceive (that's a corner case, I'm sure, but it illustrates the broad effectiveness of the module).

In turn, transporters get us to a place on a ship now, which saves precious time that a smuggler or other criminal might use to destroy evidence or vent contraband. Both transport options are broadly useful and viable, so I'm going to advocate for both of them on Protector.

Which does come at something of a cost, however. I think the cargo bay is a tad superfluous, as any contraband or evidence that we might find is either small enough to go in a side room that won't impact the tonnage of the ship, or is big enough to cost a fair deal of time transferring it from one point to another if it's temperamental enough to not use the transporters on. This is a ship that thrives on not wasting time, and so I think we can pass on a dedicated cargo bay.

What we can't pass on is a brig. We're going to want criminals in our ship in a place they can't mess with, and making room for this module saves us a load of headaches later for crews.

Finally, a tractor beam. As has been stated up-thread, a tractor beam would allow us to tow ships with a large amount of contraband or temperamental evidence without having to dedicate storage space on our own vessel. It might be slow, but it's going to keep our ship rather lean.

So, at the end of the day, it seems I'll have to advocate for the Revenue and Customs plan proposed by @Tank man. It leaves us at a still relatively portly 100 kilotons, but gives us the capabilities of both the Denobulan and Tellarite proposals at a cost cheaper than getting both of them for a single polity.

 

[pedanterrific]

[ ] 3: Brig (+10,000 Tons)

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…What kind of brig weighs ten million kilograms?

For reference, a solid cube of concrete 30 meters on each side would weigh 7,000 tons.