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Starfleet Design Bureau

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Zimmerwald1915 said:
The scenario being imagined is that a ship going to warp in-system is going to, with its deflector, disturb any amount of small meteoroids, dust, or other objects that, having been disturbed, might pose a danger to planets. Important planets tend to have ways of interdicting dangerous objects, of course (Earth had the Verteron Array in Enterprise, for instance), but given the choice one would rather not take the risk most of the time.
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One gets the impression that the problem is mostly related to the ship creating warp fields in close proximity to existing gravity wells, hence why ships break orbit before going to warp. The Defiant warping into close proximity of a star was considered notably dangerous even in the 24th century. To the ship, that is, not the planet. It's possible that beta-canon "warp ramming" was used by ships already accelerated to as close to the speed of light as they could get before engaging warp, so as to deny anybody at the destination the chance to slow them down before impact.
 
[X] Plan Ranger

I don't see the need of a cargo bay if you can beam the crew over. If you find something your impounding the ship 9 times out of 10. Which means the crew beamed over and a guard team watching the contraband.
 
Wootius said:
Ships do not warp in system by default: no one wants hundreds of FTL missiles flying near inhabited planets.
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This ship will, because as stated in the design goals:
Sayle said:
planetside incidents can rapidly escalate into spaceborne escapes that their current roster aren't capable of interdicting
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and further:
Sayle said:
Internally it is capable of warp 6, which is labeled as enough to outpace most civilian ships
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And even with impulse engines only ships still travel at significant fractions of C, so no matter what there will be other assets available within an hour or two.

This ship isn't supposed to be conducting surface assaults or long-range patrols or SAR or whatever else people are thinking of. It's supposed to fly around a system you control, inspect merchant ships, and occasionally interdict a merchant or smuggler who's made a silly mistake. The ships that it's meant to be engaging can't even do anything if it just tells them to turn around and head to a police station to be arrested.

Besides, making the ship more expensive means that there will be less of them, which is probably not ideal for what is supposed to be a very cheap police boat. As the latest update points out:
Sayle said:
Putting in everything might win you the contest but lose you standing when it comes to actual procurement.
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Winning the contest is all very well and good, but that doesn't guarantee that people will actually buy our ship. It's being pretty heavily implied that we really need to think about what's necessary to actually fulfill customer needs at a price they're happy to pay, and it doesn't sound like they want to pay much.
 
BeepSmile said:
I think lighter ships will be cheaper to make, so a given polity might be more inclined to build more of them.

Kartr_Kana, your posts makes me feel you are expecting a much broader set of mission profiles that these ships would be expected to accomplish than I do.

I think these ships are in-system anti-smuggler ships, and the bigger stuff you are talking about would be better addressed by calling for support from a big ship from a federation member's home fleet/starfleet.
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I expect it to aid vessels in distress, board suspect vessels, need to respond to emergency situations while crew members are aboard suspect vessels, act essentially as roadside assistance, police response, and fire/medical response as well.

Wootius said:
Ships do not warp in system by default: no one wants hundreds of FTL missiles flying near inhabited planets.
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Must not have watched Star Trek IV recently.
 
billymorph said:
Shuttle seems a little pointless for this kind of ship. It's a small patroller designed to stay within a system or cluster, it doesn't need parasite craft for detached duties and it's never going to need ship to surface functionality. Loading and off-loading can be done at a starbase, inspections can be done remotely or via the transporter, and the mass is better spent on the utility of secure holding space.
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A shuttle means that the patrol ship can be in two "places" at once to some extent, and if more shuttle types are developed instead of the basic admin type that's additional versatility.

I think the everything-but-the-cargo-hold setup seems sensible.
 
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