Interesting. What's the rest of the statline on that ship; we might want to consider it as our next-gen heavy cruiser if we're not sacrificing too much else.
Project Solkar Diplomatic Flagship
A joint study between the Lor'Vela Orbital Drafting Bureau, the University of Betazed and the Vulcan Science Academy, with consultancy from Spock, the
Solkar Project is a Vulcan-Betazoid proposal for a Star Fleet Diplomatic flagship to represent their peaceful interests within the Federalised fleet.
The all-new design takes the latest thinking on xenopsychology and fits them into a ship with diplomatic facilities to match the proposed Ambassador-A refits, at half the weight and without carrying the martial threat of an Explorer into orbit. It nevertheless offers sufficient capability to discourage bad actors, and has stronger shields and structural resilience to protect diplomatic delegations than proposed diplomatic frigate designs.
Project Solkar offers a combination of speed and endurance to conduct far-ranging and high-urgency diplomatic missions for the Federation, the command and control capability to act as a Flagship for task forces and fleets, and still matches the response capability of the new Comet design even outside its diplomatic speciality. Efficient design allows this to be achieved with fewer than 500 crew.
Rumour has it Councillor Stesk was a driving force behind the project.
User:Alliterate/2323 Solkar Project P-Cruiser - To Boldly Go
C4S4H4L6P12D7-8, so it attempts to remain a roughly Comet-level responder outside it's Diplomacy speciality, and to be more resistant to Lecarre bombs than H2 Preplers. Could be set underway this Snakepit.
By no means a generalist heavy cruiser design, though.
It could (in theory, if we're allowed) be varianted or even refit in the future into a slightly-inferior generalist Sector garrison cruiser than a generalist heavy cruiser designed from scratch in 2325 or 2327. As attached as I am to Project Solkar, it's highly debatable whether this is a better plan than to:-
-Fill in with a
'Renvoy' Renaissance-A variant (P8-10) or
'Prepler' P9-10
Kepler-variant (or even a P7-8
Centaur-BP)- theoretically if allowed- available much sooner.
-Design a garrison HC in 2325 or 2327-8.
-Get a P12 ship or two per diplo-TF from the five or six non-EC Ambassador-As we'll probably have by the mid-30s.
A small number of really-high-stat ships are likely a good thing- but maybe as Explorers our big expensive Amby-A will cover that well enough, and we can put out economical lower-cost lower-P alternatives to fill out the rest of the Task Forces.
