I actually wonder if the stock Excelsior design has dedicated flag spaces. Briefvoice mentioned in an omake that Ainsworth usually commanded from the Auxiliary Bridge, and given the mission and the doctrine our Explorer designs were made for, it doesn't make much sense to have it as a requirement. Flag spaces may well not have appeared until the Excelsior-A when it was obvious they weren't all going to be in the Explorer Corps.
Even if they do, Rennie obviously has a role commanding the legion of Miranda-As and did from when we designed her, and more importantly, Rennie is newer. Her equipment and layout for the job is probably better, particularly since she post-dates the Gaeni discovery of holotechnology (while not part of her basic design, all sorts of little things get installed at a late stage) and would incorporate the lessons and recommendations of officers who fought the Biophage, possibly even some of the GBZ actions if anyone had a "no, you need to put this person here" moment.
I'd like two new offensive doctrine teams, if not immediately, eventually. There are benefits to researching offensive doctrine that we don't plan on implementing, so they retain value even well after we fill out one doctrine tree. We still get the target priorities and attack patterns from other trees.
Some more engineering construction analysis, taking advantage of the GBZ status page last being updated in 2314.Q2.M1, during which the outposts there are still under construction.
Looking more closely at the construction completed so far, we can infer that the engineering ships don't simultaneously haul cargo AND build, but their initial arrival does carry cargo. Reasoning follows:
96 SpcE from 2 engineering ships' total 24SpcE/mo implies 4 months of progress so far. But 4 months of resource shipments at the rate of 44b 28s per 2 mo only adds up to 88b 56s, not the 92b 60s that's stated.
So the engineering ships have to contribute a total of 4b 4s. Engineering ships each have stats of 2b 2s. If 2 engineering ships provided 4b 4s every 2 months, then it would total 8b 8s over 4 months, which is twice the amount needed to match the 92b 60s total. Hence, the engineering ships must be only providing cargo once, totaling 4b 4s.
Now the 2313-2314 Collie outpost and Squirri outpost construction:
First thing to note is the different B and S costs for these outpost projects. This is evidence that the Apiata and Starfleet outposts are different at least in construction, and possibly in final stats.
Second, they both have 144 SpcE cost, which is half that of the 2x1mt Collie repair yard. For a two engineering ship team, that equates to 6 months of work to build an outpost.
In the Sguirri outpost case, it's clear that some of the four engineering ships are actually serving as ghetto cargo ships part-time, since otherwise, there's no way to make the numbers work. I still couldn't match the 56b 56s 72SpcE by 2314.1.1 AND a completed build by 2314.1.3, unless I had the cargo ship and freighter start out at 2313.3.1 and the 2 engineering ships starting at 2313.4.3 rather than 2313.4.2.
However, this still required a complicated dance of engineering ships just to meet these two goal posts, while matching the 2314.1.1 numbers. Specifically, I had 2 engineering ships arrive in 2313.4.1 with 4b 4s, build for 3 months until 2314.1.1, leave for 2 mo, arrive back in 2314.1.3 with 4b 4s and to finalize the build in a month. The other 2 engineering ships arrive in 2313.4.3 with 4b 4s, leave immediately for 2 mo without any building, arrive back in 2314.1.2, then build for two months until the outpost is finished in 2314.1.3. Thus, the engineering ships ship over 8b 8s by 2314.1.1, then another 8b 8s by 2314.1.3, while building 72SpcE by 2314.1.1, then another 72SpcE by 2314.1.3.
More importantly, this has implications on the build time of the Arcadian Crisis engineering build times. According to the 2314.Q4.M3.F2 Arcadian Crisis post, we have:
and an engineering team with the expected 2 engineering ships (and surprisingly, not the Bulwark that's also in the vicinity from the last Captain's Log), that can:
This is at odds with the 6 month build time for the GBZ outposts. So this can indicate one of the following:
1) That the GBZ outpost 6 month build times are including the heavy industry 3 month build time of the outpost components
2) That the GBZ outpost build times are slowed down by 2 month resource round-trips, and that LBZ crisis build times would have 1 month resource round-trips
3) That the LBZ crisis build times are somehow much faster than normal
That last possibility is partially contradicted by the 12 month build time of a LBZ crisis starbase, when a snakepit-ordered starbase takes 12 months to finish if in a non-border sector (or perhaps close enough to industry hubs) [Vega in Sol sector, Betazed in Sol sector], and 18 months otherwise [Beta Indi in RBZ, Lapycorias in CBZ].
The second possibility (shorter resource round-trips) is also dubious, but for more esoteric reasons.
The only way LBZ would have shorter resource round-trips than the GBZ is:
a) if the GBZ had to source its resources all the way from the Sol or some other spinward trade hub, and the LBZ is sourced from either Sol or Rigel. The GBZ status page does describe the "Capital to Frontier Supply Chain" as Sol <-> Tellar Prime <-> Amarkia <-> Leas Akaam <-> Apinae <-> Delzarr (<-> Collie). However, such a trip by cargo ships and freighters should take at least (~6 subsector lengths * 2 week per subsector standard warp speed) * 2 trips ~= 24 weeks ~= 2 quarters for a round-trip. This is why the repairs of Bon Vivant and Shield require that 1 quarter to be ferried from Collie all the way to Welleck. So it's far more likely that the cargo ships and freighters are just taking 2 month round trip between Collie and maybe Amarkia (though that may require above standard warp speed, so maybe a closer node on the supply chain).
b) if the LBZ can source from Betazed. This is actually plausible, but there problems with this. Betazed is probably not an industry hub, while Sol definitely is, and Rigel is likely to be. There probably is a supply chain being set up from Sol/Rigel to Betazed now (for the crisis if anything), but if the LBZ can source from Betazed due to this, then the GBZ should be able to source from Apiata, which is nearly as relatively close. Furthermore, it's likely for the outpost components to be stored on the world that built them, which from the heavy industry teams available, is far more likely to be in Sol, Tellar, Andor, or Rigel, rather than Betazed. The repair yard components, for instance, are definitely being built on Andor (as we voted).
Regardless of which of the above reasons it is, this does bode well for the LBZ 2x1mt repair yard we're intending to build. It indicates that the LBZ 2x1mt repair yard won't take a full year after the 3 months it will take for the heavy industry team to build its components. That the total time from component construction to repair yard opening should at most be a year.
Well, that's 14 years in the can. Next one for the big 15yr anniversary.
@lbmaian - cargo is shipped every other month, since it needs to be fetched from Apinae. The cargo from the Engineering ships is a one-off because they stay on site and don't go back for more cargo. You can also throw more engineering resources at the project to just make it go faster.
SF Berth A (3mt) – Leave empty after Kumari completes repairs (ETC 2316.Q2) and do not resume NCC-1665 Miranda-A build. Advise berth to prepare for Ambassador prototype in 2316
SF Berth 1 (1mt) – Occupied with Miranda-A build as double build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2316.Q1)
SF Berth 2 (1mt) - Occupied with Miranda-A build as double build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2316.Q1)
40 Eridani Berth A (3mt) – Leave empty after Courageous refit completes (with rush, ETC 2315.Q2)
40 Eridani Berth B (3mt) – Leave empty.
40 Eridani Berth 1 (1mt) – After Intrepid completes refit as Miranda-A in 2315.Q3, switch out with Dryad in Sol sector and begin refit of Dryad in 2315.Q3 (ETC 2316.Q3)
40 Eridani Berth 2 (1mt) - After Eketha completes refit as Miranda-A in 2315.Q3, switch out with Calypso in Licori Border zone and begin refit of Calypso in 2315.Q3 (ETC 2316.Q3)
Ana Font Berth A (2.5mt) - Occupied with Excelsior build (ETC 2317.Q1)
Ana Font Berth 1 (1mt) - Occupied with Renaissance build (ETC 2317.Q2)
LOCF Berth A (2.5mt) – Leave empty.
LOCF Berth 1 (1mt) – Begin Renaissance build in 2315.Q2 (ETC 2318.Q2)
UP Berth A (3mt) – After Excelsior completes in 2315.Q2, begin Excelsior-A in 2315.Q2 as double build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2318.Q2)
UP Berth B (3mt) - Occupied with Excelsior build (ETC 2317.Q1)
UP Berth C (3mt) - After Excelsior completes in 2315.Q2, begin Excelsior-A in 2315.Q2 as double build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2318.Q2)
UP Berth 1 (1mt) – Occupied with Renaissance under construction as triple build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2316.Q3)
UP Berth 2 (1mt) - Occupied with Renaissance under construction as triple build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2316.Q3)
UP Berth 3 (1mt) - Occupied with Renaissance under construction as triple build using Chen's bonus (ETC 2316.Q3)
Reasons for this:
We need to slow down on production in order not to end up with ships we are unable to crew. This means not starting too many ships this year.
We need to conserve resources for the Ambassador prototype and starting a number of new constructions and refits in 2316.
We need a lot of Excelsior berths open, as it is highly likely we are going to have repair capital ships during the Licori war. This plan leaves 4 Excelsior berths open and available to conduct repairs in 2315.
@lbmaian - cargo is shipped every other month, since it needs to be fetched from Apinae. The cargo from the Engineering ships is a one-off because they stay on site and don't go back for more cargo. You can also throw more engineering resources at the project to just make it go faster.
Yeah, that was how I was modelling it. Good to get confirmation. But I still had to play some engineering shipping games.
The Gory Details:
2313.3.1: cargo ship + freighter (hereafter known as group A) ships 12b 12s, starts round-trip back to source (Apinae)
2313.3.2:
2313.3.3: group A ships 12b 12s
2313.4.1: 2 engineering ships arrive (hereafter known as group B), shipping 4b 4s, stays and builds 24SpcE
2313.4.2: group A ships 12b 12s; group B builds 24SpcE
2313.4.3: group B builds 24SpcE; another 2 engineering ships arrive (hereafter known as group C), shipping 4b 4s, starts round-trip back to source without building
2314.1.1: group A ships 12b 12s; group B starts round-trip back to source without building
> At this point, we now have 56b 56s 72SpcE, matching the progress report.
2314.1.2: group C arrives, shipping 4b 4s, stays and builds 24SpcE
2314.1.3: group A ships 12b 12s; group B arrives, shipping 4b 4s, stays and build 24SpcE; group C builds 24SpcE
> At this point, we now have 76b 76s 144SpcE. Sguirri outpost is now complete.
Can't build cargo ships in one year, and those berths would all be filling up again in 2316. (2 new Excelsior-A, 1 Excelsior refit, and the Ambassador.)
Besides, have you looked at how many capital ships we're sending to war? 4 empty berths may well be not enough.
Weapons/Offensive Doctrine (working on weapons for the next while, switching to offensive doctrine when the first project there is completed)
Starbase Design/Defensive Doctrine (working on defensive doctrine for quite a while, switching to starbase design when the forward defense tree is complete or mostly complete)
Somewhat lower priority:
Shields/Whatever (working on shields for the forseeable future)
Starbase Design/Whatever (in addition to the team listed above and unlike that one working on starbase design immediately and for the forseeable future)
So, no interest or need another team in Personal Equipment? I wouldn't mind another team in Computers area as well, perhaps speeding up the work towards the next Colony Core upgrade.
Can't build cargo ships in one year, and those berths would all be filling up again in 2316. (2 new Excelsior-A, 1 Excelsior refit, and the Ambassador.)
Besides, have you looked at how many capital ships we're sending to war? 4 empty berths may well be not enough.
Hm, okay. And we don't have an Excelsior we can refit in the Courageous's berth? Even if we have to juggle the Courageous to the LBZ to replace one we pull from there? A rolling refit of EC ships would make some sense to me.
So I don't have a strong opinion at the moment, but the sake of other voters, here are some considerations:
1) With war with the Cardassians possibly around the corner, do we still want to continue our 5+ Excelsior(-A) concurrent builds? Even the Excelsior-A refit doesn't make Excelsiors as combat efficient as Renaissances and Miranda-As. 2 Excelsior-As can be traded for the following combat-oriented builds:
- if saving E: 5 Miranda-As (equal E cost, much lower O & SR costs, slightly higher total berth time yet half the 1st build latency)
- if saving O or SR: 7 Miranda-As (about equal SR cost, much lower O cost, higher E cost, much higher total berth time yet half the 1st build latency) or 4 Renaissances (equal O and SR cost, twice the E cost, higher total berth time yet lower 1st build latency)
- or some combination of Miranda-As and Renaissances, balancing the SR and E costs
That said, the Excelsior-As would overall be superior for garrisoning (event response).
edit: more trade-off info
2) Are we willing to spend the expected 40pp for an Excelsior(-A?) cost infusion in 2316? BV still plans on starting 2 Excelsior-A builds and 2 Centaur-A builds next year to reach that 5+ Excelsior-A concurrent builds, and that infusion is necessary for that. Starting those Excelsior-As that year is opportune because they would be right on schedule for a EC crewing. But if we want those 2316 Excelsior-As but don't want to pay for an Excelsior-A cost infusion, we may need to drop an Excelsior-A build in 2315 or replace it with something more SR-efficient.
edit: Link to BV's spreadsheet: Boldly Go Shipbuild
3) When are we expecting to start war with the Cardassians? This has minor implications on build timing (like when to start Rennies vs Mir-As, etc.)
So, no interest or need another team in Personal Equipment? I wouldn't mind another team in Computers area as well, perhaps speeding up the work towards the next Colony Core upgrade.
We could make reasonable use of additional teams with just about any specializations, but I don't see the ones you listed as especially urgent. The next colony core upgrade is gated behind isolinear computers which we are already working towards and for single track projects a newbie team isn't going to do hugely better than generic team 4. Throwing the occasional boost their way (probably starting this year) should be enough. I expect the pp cost of new teams to rise and we also have other things to spend pp on so we should have rp surpluses now and then even after reasonable recruiting efforts.
EDIT: I can kind of see the logic [heh] though. T'Lorel keeps the sub-commanders on the heaviest flags so they can coordinate from the thick of it; meanwhile if T'Lorel has to coordinate from one place or another or hang back it's not as big of a drop in combat power. Also, I suspect the facilities on the Renaissance are brand new, state-of-the-art, and perfectly suited to large-scale coordination.
Less logically, maybe she likes that new ship smell.
Renaissances are also about as survivable as Excelsiors, faster on the helm and more likely to avoid sniping superweapon fire.
This makes them a logical place to put the fleet flagship if you're worried that your enemy has a unique asset capable of knocking out individual ships with a single shot, but that is likely to prove to be a one-use or few-use weapon.
More evasion than a stock Excelsior with the same shields and hull. Granted this is the fleet that contains the Megatortoise but it's definitely not an unreasonable place to command from.
I agree - I'd prefer Miranda-As instead, especially if we're still planning 5+ Excelsior-A concurrent builds.
Those Centaur-As would've been more useful than Miranda-As in the Licori war, but those builds aren't even scheduled to start before the war is projected to end.
So I don't have a strong opinion at the moment, but the sake of other voters, here are some considerations:
1) With war with the Cardassians possibly around the corner, do we still want to continue our 5+ Excelsior(-A) concurrent builds? Even the Excelsior-A refit doesn't make Excelsiors as combat efficient as Renaissances and Miranda-As. 2 Excelsior-As can be traded for the following combat-oriented builds:
I would like to generally keep about 5 Excelsior-As in build at any one time, yes. They are far superior for Event response, and Event response can be the thing that keeps you from going to war in the first place.
2) Are we willing to spend the expected 40pp for an Excelsior(-A?) cost infusion in 2316? BV still plans on starting 2 Excelsior-A builds and 2 Centaur-A builds next year to reach that 5+ Excelsior-A concurrent builds, and that infusion is necessary for that. Starting those Excelsior-As that year is opportune because they would be right on schedule for a EC crewing. But if we want those 2316 Excelsior-As but don't want to pay for an Excelsior-A cost infusion, we may need to drop an Excelsior-A build in 2315 or replace it with something more SR-efficient.
If necessary, we can always drop a 2316 Excelsior-A build instead. I'm confident we'll work it out, but I'd like to get some Excelsiors started this year. We didn't start any in 2314.
3) When are we expecting to start war with the Cardassians? This has minor implications on build timing (like when to start Rennies vs Mir-As, etc.)
What, compared to this hypothetical "Pacifist Constellation" that we wouldn't even by able to build until 2317 if we order it next year? Or the Keplers (beyond the prototype) that we likely can't build until 2322? Centaur-As build a year faster than Constellations and take fewer crew.
However, I don't feel the need to defend out year choices Remember, we will be voting only on 2315 builds, and I am not proposing to build any Centaur-As in 2315. There's plenty of time to argue about what to build in 1 mt berths in 2316. It doesn't make that much difference for 2315 choices.
I would like to generally keep about 5 Excelsior-As in build at any one time, yes. They are far superior for Event response, and Event response can be the thing that keeps you from going to war in the first place.
Better at event response, yes. Preventing war? Eh...that only really matters for ships in the border zones. We're also approaching the point where we can have an Excelsior(-A) in every sector.
Now I am pretty worried that we're skirting the line on our defense needs (as an, defensive strength, not the reaction stat or garrison requirements) with the upcoming near-doubling of Cardassian shipbuilding capacity. With some basic modeling, I estimate the Cardassians producing about 40 ships worth around 450 C+H+L by 2320, and with your Starfleet shipbuilding plans around 2313ish, our production would only meet about 2/3 of that in C+H+L sum (and a bit more than 1/2 in ship count due to our explorer emphasis) in the same time frame. I haven't rechecked with your latest shipbuilding plans, but it's probably around the same ballpark.
Previously, I was counting on our member fleets to pick up the slack, but this recent crisis may prove that the member fleets can be politically unreliable. As discussed extensively with Simon, I suspect it won't be as much of a problem with a defensive war, but I'd expect any comprehensive counterattack that involves member fleets to run into war support problems.
I'm tentatively willing to trade an Excelsior-A build for a Renaissance + Miranda-A + some repair resource slack. It's less event response potential, but more combat potential. And we'd still be constructing 5 explorers concurrently (4 Excelsior-A + Ambassador) alongside 2 concurrent Excelsior-A refits - that's plenty enough explorer construction/refitting in my opinion.
It may be worth considering to put Explorer class hulls exclusively in the hands of the Explorer corps, and letting the rest of Starfleet handle smaller ships.
Still, the Federation is desperately in need of growing its economy with more shipyards and mining colonies, as well as a larger Starfleet Academy.
It may be worth considering to put Explorer class hulls exclusively in the hands of the Explorer corps, and letting the rest of Starfleet handle smaller ships.
Still, the Federation is desperately in need of growing its economy with more shipyards and mining colonies, as well as a larger Starfleet Academy.
Plus, a Renaissance has Presence 4 Defense 5; it's not a great event response unit compared to an Excelsior-A with Presence 6 Defense 6, but it's nowhere near as bad as Mirandas, Constellations, or even Centaurs and Constitution-Bs. For dealing with the events that cause wars when you screw up, a Renaissance isn't actually that bad of an option.
It may be worth considering to put Explorer class hulls exclusively in the hands of the Explorer corps, and letting the rest of Starfleet handle smaller ships.
Still, the Federation is desperately in need of growing its economy with more shipyards and mining colonies, as well as a larger Starfleet Academy.
"We need more of everything," while true, isn't very actionable because it doesn't let us prioritize and settle on a specific course of action that addresses whichever priority we consider highest. As others have noted, we really can't afford to neglect sector event response by the regular fleet; it's gotten to the point where somewhere close to as many of our event response awards are coming from regular fleet units as from the Explorer Corps. Plus we've been cheerily researching a doctrine that revolves almost entirely on rewarding us for building an explorer-dominated fleet.
That may be so, but we are dealing with the same problem as we did when we had to decide what class to use as the basis for the new hospital ships. We could've gone for an Explorer class hull, but didn't because that would've left us with maybe 4 hulls. Hulls with the best modifiers possible, admittedly, but still only 4, in a Federation that was rapidly expanding in size and membership.
That's why the Renaissance hull was chosen instead; it'd offer double the number of ships to be seeded through Federation space for emergency response even if it meant only a +2 on medical emergency rolls instead of +4 when a hospital ship was available to assist.
"We need more of everything," while true, isn't very actionable because it doesn't let us prioritize and settle on a specific course of action that addresses whichever priority we consider highest. As others have noted, we really can't afford to neglect sector event response by the regular fleet; it's gotten to the point where somewhere close to as many of our event response awards are coming from regular fleet units as from the Explorer Corps. Plus we've been cheerily researching a doctrine that revolves almost entirely on rewarding us for building an explorer-dominated fleet.
However, explorer dominated fleets are expensive on a per hull basis, and one of the major constraints Starfleet is facing is lack of numbers to respond with. I seek to handle this problem by constraining the desired number of explorer class hulls, using freed up resources for increased number of cruiser class hulls.
