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To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)

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To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest) Starfleet Ship Design Bureau, Refit ("To Boldly Go...")
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Night said:
We actually saw an attack very much like this done by the Yrillians. That said, for fighter-sized ships, you get one pass to make a difference; if your opponent is still capable of turning to pursue, it can probably chase you down and kill you.

The ideal fighter role would probably look more like Soviet Naval Aviation; large weapons with a warp-sustainer that lets them fire from a couple light-seconds out, so they can turn and escape while the enemy ship is dealing with the inbounds.

(inb4 I write omake about Tupalov Runabouts; glory be the Dance of the Vampires)
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Which is why they wouldn't be used by themselves, like current fighters/bombers are. Instead, they would be used in support of something else, be it a ship or a starbase, basically being a harasser that can do damage to opposing starships while being something else to shoot at other than the higher-value target they're protecting
 
I think we should forget about combat runabouts. Even the suggestions of how to make them viable don't really seem to make them worthwhile.

That said, the "garrison runabouts" idea for starbases has some merit. We can set their ROE as "only respond to events that don't appear to be dangerous or urgent." This way, starbases can handle trivial sector events while leaving the ships free to fry bigger fish.
 
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tryrar said:
Which is why they wouldn't be used by themselves, like current fighters/bombers are. Instead, they would be used in support of something else, be it a ship or a starbase, basically being a harasser that can do damage to opposing starships while being something else to shoot at other than the higher-value target they're protecting
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The problem is that those runabout need to be piloted, and due to vastly smaller powerplants and probably thinner hull, as well as vastly smaller overall mass, they necessarily lack the survivability to take any real hits even on a scale of an escort.

Likewise, the firepower we could cram into them is limited.

Your own statement reveals an unfortunate reality I think, of what they'd actually become: Ablative armor for bigger ships.

And we do not want to use piloted craft as ablative armor. Aside from the training of personnel needed, it would also have a big impact on Starfleet 'homefront' as well as the Federation as a whole: "In an engagement, we expect and plan to lose X amount of people, always."
That's not exactly liable to go through in Federation Council all that well, for obvious reasons.
I for one wouldn't want to be shuttle-craft rated pilot under those circumstances.

If we had competent remote-control tech to take out the pilot, and the expected material costs per shuttle were so low that compared to a damaged starship we'd experience cost savings, then I would be willing to consider something like it.
The civilian applications likewise would be pretty nice - instead of an away team, send a remote operated sensor shuttle down on the planet to take preliminary readings and then decide if it is safe(ish) for sentients.
 
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SakSak said:
The problem is that those runabout need to be piloted, and due to vastly smaller powerplants and probably thinner hull, as well as vastly smaller overall mass, they necessarily lack the survivability to take any real hits even on a scale of an escort.

Likewise, the firepower we could cram into them is limited.

Your own statement reveals an unfortunate reality I think, of what they'd actually become: Ablative armor for bigger ships.

And we do not want to use piloted craft as ablative armor. Aside from the training of personnel needed, it would also have a big impact on Starfleet 'homefront' as well as the Federation as a whole: "In an engagement, we expect and plan to lose X amount of people, always."
That's not exactly liable to go through in Federation Council all that well, for obvious reasons.
I for one wouldn't want to be shuttle-craft rated pilot under those circumstances.

If we had competent remote-control tech to take out the pilot, and the expected material costs per shuttle were so low that compared to a damaged starship we'd experience cost savings, then I would be willing to consider something like it.
The civilian applications likewise would be pretty nice - instead of an away team, send a remote operated sensor shuttle down on the planet to take preliminary readings and then decide if it is safe(ish) for sentients.
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The Yan-Ros are supposed to have reliable combat drones that support their Rangers, right? Wonder if we can adapt that for space combat.
 
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To be honest I've always been a bit stunned (to the point I described this exact thing as a tool of the somewhat similar Time-Space Administrative Bureau in a story) Starfleet doesn't have a transportable MALP equivalent. It wouldn't even need to move or do any kind of evaluating, just bundle a bunch of sensors, some batteries, and a transmitter into a trashcan-sized shell and beam it down before the away team. It sends data up to the ship, which decides if things are safe.
 
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Night said:
To be honest I've always been a bit stunned Starfleet doesn't have a transportable MALP equivalent. It wouldn't even need to move or do any kind of evaluating, just bundle a bunch of sensors, some batteries, and a transmitter into a trashcan-sized shell and beam it down before the away team.
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They do. It's called 'Redshirt'.
 
Night said:
To be honest I've always been a bit stunned (to the point I described this exact thing as a tool of the somewhat similar Time-Space Administrative Bureau in a story) Starfleet doesn't have a transportable MALP equivalent. It wouldn't even need to move or do any kind of evaluating, just bundle a bunch of sensors, some batteries, and a transmitter into a trashcan-sized shell and beam it down before the away team. It sends data up to the ship, which decides if things are safe.
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There's a delicate balance between what we should realistically be able to do given Trek Tech, and genre conventions.
 
Night said:
To be honest I've always been a bit stunned (to the point I described this exact thing as a tool of the somewhat similar Time-Space Administrative Bureau in a story) Starfleet doesn't have a transportable MALP equivalent. It wouldn't even need to move or do any kind of evaluating, just bundle a bunch of sensors, some batteries, and a transmitter into a trashcan-sized shell and beam it down before the away team. It sends data up to the ship, which decides if things are safe.
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Generally speaking, their shipboard sensors are able to pick up anything that such a sensor drone would pick up.
 
Godwinson said:
Generally speaking, their shipboard sensors are able to pick up anything that such a sensor drone would pick up.
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Except...where the planet life is all highly acidic and almost burns Chekov's fingers off or the plants attack Riker and force us to sit through a terrible clipshow or the time Sisko and O'Brien checked into the Hotel Alexius and couldn't leave and I'm sure there's a Voyager episode but none is coming to mind probably because it's two AM and I should go the hell to sleep.
 
Make it SoP to beam in a Manequin down and up, then inspect the Manequin.

Would a MALP have detected the Biophage, anyhow?
 
I blame all of you for the three minutes of lecturing/ranting I just got on the strategic intelligence of deploying the Starfleet ships that were shown in a brief clash on this episode of Star Trek Voyager.

I hope you're pleased with yourselves.:p
 
SakSak said:
And we do not want to use piloted craft as ablative armor. Aside from the training of personnel needed, it would also have a big impact on Starfleet 'homefront' as well as the Federation as a whole: "In an engagement, we expect and plan to lose X amount of people, always."
That's not exactly liable to go through in Federation Council all that well, for obvious reasons.
I for one wouldn't want to be shuttle-craft rated pilot under those circumstances.
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Leslie: "Preach." [nods]

If we had competent remote-control tech to take out the pilot, and the expected material costs per shuttle were so low that compared to a damaged starship we'd experience cost savings, then I would be willing to consider something like it.
The civilian applications likewise would be pretty nice - instead of an away team, send a remote operated sensor shuttle down on the planet to take preliminary readings and then decide if it is safe(ish) for sentients.
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Leslie: "I know more ways to mess up communications and telepresence than I can count; Nyota knows more if I run out of ideas. Wouldn't care to rely on a drone that can't fly itself, and the last time someone tried to build an armed ship that could fly itself, Admiral Kahurangi had to have her forearm reattached and I was lucky to get the satisfaction of dislocating the shoulder on the bastard responsible. We already have long range sensors that can usually spot just about anything the away team might beam into; taking time to launch a probe (we have those too) to confirm the sensor picture from shorter range isn't a bad idea, but a lot of the time it wouldn't be worth the trouble."

Night said:
To be honest I've always been a bit stunned (to the point I described this exact thing as a tool of the somewhat similar Time-Space Administrative Bureau in a story) Starfleet doesn't have a transportable MALP equivalent. It wouldn't even need to move or do any kind of evaluating, just bundle a bunch of sensors, some batteries, and a transmitter into a trashcan-sized shell and beam it down before the away team. It sends data up to the ship, which decides if things are safe.
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"Most of the time we can figure that out from orbit. Before we beam down, we know there's air to breathe, we know we're not beaming into a swamp or a lava flow or whatever. All the obvious stuff is covered. About the only thing we can't do is read the minds of any locals standing around to figure out if they're going to attack us or something, and I don't think sending a probe ahead would help."

MTB said:
They do. It's called 'Redshirt'.
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Night said:
The quality of data those give tends to degrade when the environment is unexpectedly hostile.

And you are clearly angling for The Redshirt Preservation Society's "Menace to Society" award.
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"Nope. Don't have one of those. What we do have is my Susie..."

[Transporter whine, yellow shimmers]

"...aaand MTB should have pants full of ants right now."

Susan Leslie:

"I'd have used tribbles, but that only works on Klingons."

MTB said:
Except for conveniently placed 'cannot scan' areas ...
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Night said:
Except...where the planet life is all highly acidic and almost burns Chekov's fingers off or the plants attack Riker and force us to sit through a terrible clipshow or the time Sisko and O'Brien checked into the Hotel Alexius and couldn't leave and I'm sure there's a Voyager episode but none is coming to mind probably because it's two AM and I should go the hell to sleep.
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"The acid plants were after my time, but the team was beaming down in a hurry because they were trying to save those poor dumb space hippies. Never heard of any of those other poor bastards, but yeah, stuff goes wrong once in a while. While we're at it, sometimes a space wizard makes a voodoo doll of your ship, no seriously I was there. Shit happens, we deal, though yeah maybe sometimes firing a probe would help."
 
A MALP would be helpful for inhospitable planets, as well as places afflicted by plague.
 
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