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tanadrin · 2 years

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I have great affection for the Enterprise-D, but the Galaxy-class design is just bad. It’s obviously a prestige design meant to flex the Federation’s shipbuilding power, but the result is a ship that’s not well-suited for any of the missions given to it.

Is it meant to be a GSV-like general-purpose support platform? If so, its size makes sense, and the civilian presence; you imagine it staying generally within core regions of the Federation, moving from planet to planet to support terraforming projects, do disaster relief, help colonies get off the ground, and help with big space-based construction projects. But then its weaponry and frontier science capabilities are largely wasted.

Is it an exploration vessel? Okay, then you’re crazy to put vulnerable civilians on it. It will regularly have to go into dangerous conditions and deal with novel threats. Its weaponry makes a bit more sense, but it’s still weirdly heavily armed. It is also insanely large, unless you’re going to devote most of its space to making it self-sufficient, like a kind of mobile starbase that can go out into unexplored space for years at a time, which it clearly isn’t. And it’s clearly not a small planetary science platform like the Oberth or Nova-class, a role in which 95% of the Galaxy’s capabilities would be wasted.

Is it a combat vessel, as it’s used in the Dominion war? The armament makes sense then, but most of its bulk is wasted. You should at least give over some of that space to carrying smaller combat craft, like fighters. You definitely don’t need all the civilian spaces, and in fact you’d be utterly insane to carry civilians into combat like that. It could form the core of a larger battlegroup, like an aircraft carrier, but again, it doesn’t really fulfill a carrier function, it’s just a big weapons platform. Smaller ships, like the Defiant-class, that are more maneuverable and punch well above their weight, are a much better investment. Presumably Galaxies only see combat because the Federation needs all hands on deck.

In short, it tries to be everything and does nothing, except show off Utopia Planitia’s shipbuilding capabilities. It’s a bit like the Space Shuttle. Later generalist ships like the Sovereign class pull away from the absurdity of the Galaxy, and for good reason. Its real function is clearly diplomatic, a way for the Federation to show off when encountering new species and getting into scrapes with old ones, which I guess makes sense as a lot of the Enterprise-D’s missions were diplomatic in nature like that. But it’s an awful mixup between a big starship and a small starbase. I’d much be on something smaller, with a more specific mission profile like frontier exploration.

#also it's c-tier at best aesthetically #my favorite designs are like the steamrunner/saber/akira family #sovereign/oberth/nova/intrepid class are also pretty good #the defiant is a cool ship concept but not very interesting to look at

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morns-fevered-dream · 6 months

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Here we go baby live blogging the finale of Lower Decks season 4 I'm pumped loved the twist and the tie in I've avoided spoilers and everything else so I'm excited and oh course Spoilers 💫

Little bit longer then most episodes oh we're in for a treat

I heard that the logo on Nick jacket is the starburst maneuver that lead to the trial and everything

Oh my a flashback

Will Weaton? I'm surprised Lower Decks always surprises me

Named his ship Nova One

Ah acting like the Hero

Nova fleet?

Damn Nick unsurprisingly still not over Nova Squadron

Bloodless coups? ambassadors? Ah Nick slick as hell

"Looks like Tom Paris" "I don't see it" oh my god

Oh painted ships I always thought trek needed more painted ships post 23d century

Treasure Hunters guild

Tamarian lower decks? Woah

I enjoyed the evil speech

Well I my theory about Locarno group was mostly wrong it was about Lower Decks against well everyone but no moral ambiguity it seems so eh can't always be 100% right

Captain Freeman redemption arc wooooooo

A Steamrunner Class?

Dr. Migleemo?!??!!!

What.. Tendi

Oh Billups lol

Ah Livik gonna cause problems I saw someone else on here same Livik gonna betray the Cerritos and I'll admit I like the theory

Ah Mark Twain-ing solves all arguments

Oh Cardassian Hedeki Class

Damn we're doing some wrath of khan style with the I'll just call it space cloud

Acting Captain Boimler?!?!

Oh background Haliian

That is some powerful tractor beam

I don't know why but I didn't like the phrase "I don't always agree with orders but I believe in the mission" felt off tbh

Damn it Nick she's giving you a chance

Pay wall on a bomb damn

What is that bomb turning into?

What ship is that?

Oh Orion I wouldn't had guessed

Well this'll take fixing next episode

A fun episode felt like a season finale or like a short Trek movie with ol Nick as the Villain but honestly all of LD season finale have been very good

Note: just realized the Orion ship is the ship design as the Orion ship from TAS

#star trek #lower decks #star trek lower decks #star trek ld #star trek lower decks spoilers #ld s4 e10

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scorpiondes · 5 months

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The Steamrunner II, a light redesign of the original Steamrunner class, ft the ship @toa-arania and I share joint custody of, the USS Dover.

#star trek fanart #sci fi art #star trek #spaceship #artists on tumblr #commisions open #concept art #science fiction #star trek art #starfleet #i definitely typod my name on the twitter version of this one oops

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toa-arania · 1 year

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Since she's my current blorbo hyperfixation I've decided I'm going to talk more about my Star Trek oc, Allira. I've made a couple art posts about her already but I was sort of vague in them so this is where I'm going to talk about her :)

I've already given the vague idea in the previous posts, but to go over it again: Ensign Allira is a Vorta who defected from the Dominion shortly after the end of the Dominion War. She's currently on her third clone, with the first having been terminated while researching the morphogenic virus (remember that time the founders ordered all the doctors be executed and activate their clones? Allira 1 was one of them), and the second being terminated for recklessness and a dash of insubordination. After that, Allira 3 pretty quickly got the fuck out of dodge, stealing a ship and dropping off her Jem'Hadar to starve somewhere.

After about a year fucking about in the Alpha Quadrant, doing some soul searching and otherwise figuring out what the fuck to do with herself, she decided that her best bet was to take her medical expertise to Starfleet and pray. Fast forward a few years, and here she is as a junior-grade Ensign, freshly out of the academy and horribly paranoid that everyone hates her.

Her first posting is to the steamrunner-class Dover, a patrol ship that spends her first two weeks on the job docked at Deep Space Nine for repairs. She doesn't take this especially well. She uses the time to do what she can to get to know her new roommate, Ensign (senior-grade) Rāphen Calos, a command-track prodigy- Red Squad and everything- that Section 31 seem rather taken with. Not that either of them know that, of course. Raph is a friend's oc that afaik they haven't written about anywhere but that they have posted about here and here. (They also posted about Allira here)

Raph and Allira have had a... rocky friendship. They're trying, but they're both incredibly bad at it. However, over their first few months working together they did manage to cultivate a friendship and start opening up to each other better, helping each other to relax a little and not get killed by accidentally antagonising people. Then they got sent on a mission together to one of Bajor's moons to investigate a distress signal from a mining colony.

Split off from the rest of their crew, who at that point were investigating a distress signal from a ship that just left that colony, they found themselves alone in the dark, empty corridors. Allira, confident that she'd be able to withstand whatever airborne toxins there might be there, took her respirator off to better know what they were dealing with (I like flavouring the Vorta's resistance to poisons so that they can also taste and smell them more distinctly). This turned out to be a mistake when she started hearing voices, and Raph noticed her eye starting to turn black. Just as they started panicking, an assimilated mining drone showed up to start threatening them.

Now Allira doesn't respond well to threats. When threatened with termination by the borg, her response was not to comply. Her response was to threaten to terminate herself first so they'd lose their bargaining chip, which she only doubled down on when it turned out the borg specifically needed her medical training. In response, the borg cut Raph's arm off to force her to come to the medical bay anyway.

Details time- these borg were relegated to using airborne nanoprobes because there was an error in their code that caused the assimilation to fail and just tear apart the bodies of those they tried to assimilate. Raph and Allira (and the crew of the Dover) still don't actually know what the borg were doing this far from the Delta Quadrant. Going back a bit, recall that Allira is in the middle of being assimilated.

Once Raph was stable, they made a break for it and got to a ward where Allira could irradiate herself to disable the nanoprobes. As soon as the borg noticed, they sped up the assimilation to try to kill her. Rather than let herself be assimilated, Allira tried to activate her termination implant, which was too damaged by the assimilation to work. The irradiation started, and both of them blacked out.

Two weeks later, Allira woke up in a sick bay with injuries to the entire left side of her body, including throat injuries severe enough that she couldn't speak. While recovering from her injuries and with remnants of the collective now fading from her mind, she and Raph have been given some lovely medical leave on Bajor so they can finally have some time off to relax and completely fail to healthily process how gay they are for each other (Raph refuses to open up or wind down and Allira is horribly paranoid about everyone around her, it's such a disaster of a combination)

#oc #star trek oc #long post #first (ish) post where I only ramble about an oc #I may do this again #maybe

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beammeupchief · 6 years

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U.S.S. Artemis #001 by Kurumi-Morishita on @deviantart

#Steamrunner class

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startrekships · 2 years

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Guardian, Steamrunner, and Sabre classes in Star Trek: Online

#Guardian #Steamrunner #Sabre #Spacedock #Star Trek Online #STO

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alphamecha-mkii · 2 months

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USS Enterprise-E firing phasers by Daniel Broadway

#Star Trek #Federation #Starfleet #Sovereign Class #Nebula Class #Steamrunner Class #Sci-Fi #Mecha #Spaceship #Daniel Broadway

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spockvarietyhour · 1 year

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This year in Trek we saw the return of the Sovereign-class starship, in Picard (briefly), Lower Decks (in two separate episodes) and this week in Prodigy. Truly some peak Starfleet design.

#Star Trek #Star Trek Picard #PIC #Star Trek Lower Decks #Star Trek Prodigy #Sovereign Class #Starfleet #Starship #USS Wayfarer #USS Van Citters #USS Sovereign #Akira. Steamrunner. Defiant. Centaur. Nova. also all made their returns but not as extensively as Sovereign #spoilers

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defconprime · 2 years

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USS Hiroshima

#steamrunner class #star trek tng #star trek legacy #star trek video games

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mappinglasirena · 2 years

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Picard Season 2, Trailer 3 (Pt 1)

This trailer was released in January 2022, in conjunction with quite a few other Star Trek new and releases. As far as I remember, it was the first time we got an announcement of the official relase date of Season 2: 3 March! (4th March internationally)

It also features the return of Guinan and Soong and some exciting hints at more things to come.

Once again, I have split this beast in two halves, but it is also a very long trailer, so proceed with wifi!

Notes:

Dialogue in italics is voice over, dialogue that isn’t italicized is seen spoken on screen.

Where bits of dialogues have very clearly been cut together from different lines, I’ve indicated this by adding “[cut]”

The time codes refer to the versions of the trailers I have, your milage may vary.

My naming practices are not 100% consistent, though I did my best. I’m generally talking about the different settings of the show as

“Present” (2399-2400, when we meet our motley crew again after the events of Coppelius, at the beginning of episode 1);

“Totalitarian Nightmare” (The alternate version of the present Q throws the crew into. I’m usually referring to this as the dystopian or totalitarian present/clothes/Sanctuary Districts/whatever);

“Past” (2024, the past from the perspective of our heroes.)

I use “Sirena” and “alt!Sirena” somewhat interchangeably. Practically all of the shots of the ship in these trailers show the alternative version of the ship from the dystopian timeline, and where it’s orginial 2399 Sirena, I make that clear.

I focus so much on the clothing of the characters because that’s really helpful in grouping together shots, figuring out timelines, and trying to piece together which bits of the previews belong together. Bear with me.

Trailer 3 (Second Full Trailer), January 2022

Scene 1 (Time Travel on La Sirena, Totalitarian Nightmare)

Shot 1 (00:05-00:08)

Alt!Sirena is fleeing from three evil!Starfleet ships, who are shooting at her. (Nova-class and Steamrunner-class if I’m remembering correctly.)

Shot 2 (00:08)

Picard and Agnes, both in their dystopian coats, are sitting on the bridge, Picard at ops, Agnes in the portside backwards seat. The ship is shaking and Picard looks troubled.

Picard: "There are some…”

Shot 3 (00:09)

Seven, in her totalitarian blazer, is sitting at the tactical console, while Rios, in his leather jacket, is sitting in the captain’s chair but his pilot’s controls aren’t activated. Behind them, sparks rain down from the ceiling. The ship is bathed in a green-ish light and the engines are green, though it’s not clear if the Borg Queen is currently strapped to them.

Picard: "… moments…”

Shot 4 (00:10)

Alt!Sirena is flying evasive maneuvers close to Earth, which is protected by the totalitarian hexagon detection grid. One phaser burst grazes the ship and is deflected by the shields, but she’s able to evade the other phasers and red torpedoes the evil!Starfleet ships are firing at her.

Shot 5 (00:11)

In sickbay, Elnor is lying on a metal table, shaking and visibly in pain or distress. Raffi, in her dystopian outfit, is grabbing the strap Elnor is tied down with and leans protectively over him as the ship shakes.

The walls behind them are stacked with transport crates secured with nets.

Picard: "… that haunt us…”

Shot 6 (00:11-00:12)

Shot through the sickbay skylight. Elnor is lying on a see-through sheet of plastic(??). Raffi is holding on to the restraints and the top corner of the table tightly. And is lying half on top of Elnor.

The light in sickbay is ominously Borg-green and there are boxes strewn all around the scuffed floor. [Same shot as Trailer 1]

Picard: "… all our lives.”

Shot 7 (00:12-00:13)

Agnes is running towards the front of the upper deck, setting her shirt-tails flying. Rios is sitting in the captain’s chair, though still without piloting controls. Steam and sparks are just starting to shoot from the ceiling. At the very back of the ship, the Borg Queen is tied to the engine, and all the lights in the latter half of the ship have turned green.

As Agnes runs towards the seat on the port side of the bridge, the light she just ran past turns from red to green. Seven and Picard are sitting at the tactical and ops consoles respectively, and are looking back at Agnes as she approaches.

Shot 8 (00:13-00:14)

Alt!Sirena emerges out of a swirl of white-blue light close to the surface of the sun.

Shot 9 (00:14)

Close-up of Agnes, looking astonished and scared, bathed in green light with the ship’s lights flashing behind her.

Picard: "Moments…”

Shot 10 (00:14-00:17)

Shot over alt!Sirena’s shoulder as she is flying perilously close to the surface of the sun, being blasted by arcs of heat and plasma.

Picard: "… upon which history…”

Shot 11 (00:17)

Focus on Picard, sitting at his seat on the bridge, lookinig ahead stoically as sparks fly around him and the ship shakes.

This is intercut with extremely brief glimpses of:

Picard: "… turns.”

Shot 12 (00:18)

What seems to be an astronaut in a 20th/21st century black and white snoopy cap is reaching a thickly gloved hand for a metal object hanging in the foreground of the shot. The astronaut’s face is out of focus and unrecognizable.

Shot 13 (00:18)

Back to Picard on the bridge.

Shot 14 (00:18)

A white-haired member of the Soong family is standing in a dark room (based on the pattern of shadows it could be the château conservatory at night). He is looking towards someone behind the camera with an almost evil grin.

Shot 15 (00:18)

Back to Picard.

Shot 16 (00:18)

Shot of the hands and a leg? of someone in a dark outfit that looks like a mix of catsuit and Elvish armour. They’re holding what looks like an Elvish blade in their right hand.

Blurry in the background might be one of alt!Sirena’s storage containers.

Shot 17 (00:19)

Back to Picard.

Shot 18 (00:19)

Close-up of Laris’s face. She has her Romulan ears and eyebrows. She is looking either very sad or very romantic. Picard is close to her and he’s reaching out for her face

Shot 19 (00:19)

Back to Picard.

Shot 20 (00:19)

The Borg Queen is being raised in her presentation arc past the railing at the centre of the totalitarian rally.

Shot 21 (00:19)

Back to Picard on the bridge, which fades to white.

Scene 2 (Waking up in alt!La Barre, TN)

Shot 22 (00:21-00:24)

Close-up of Picard’s face in his dystopian black leather jacket, as he wakes up in the château conservatory. He looks around and then up in confusion.

Q: “Well hello, my friend.”

Shot 23 (00:25)

Shot of the glass ceiling of the conservatory. The sky outside is fading from blue to orange in either sunrise or sunset. A grid of bright orange lines draws the large connected hexagonal shapes of the planetary forcefield across the sky.

Shot 24 (00:26)

Picard, in his black leather jacket, enters the château from a courtyard. Outside, it’s sunny, but inside the lamps are still burning.

Picard: “What is this?”

Shot 25 (00:27)

Picard looks back at someone or something, looking confused and worried.

Picard: “What have you done?”

Shot 26 (00:28-00:30)

An oil painting of the battle version of the Enterprise D (I think), fighting and destroying Borg Cubes hangs on the château’s wall.

Q: “Welcome to the…”

Shot 27 (00:30-00:33)

Q, in his black judges robe, is standing in front of Picard in the château.

Q: “… road not taken.”

Shot 28 (00:33-00:34)

Reverse shot of Picard looking at Q with a severe expression.

Scene 3 (Collection of shots, present, TN, and 2024)

Shot 29 (00:34-00:35)

Zoom in on Earth from space (à la Google Earth). The planet is covered by the hexagonal defense grid, which is partially hidden by clouds. The shot zooms in on La Barre in France.

Shot 30 (00:36-00:37)

Seven is standing in front of an opened metal wardrobe in someone’s quarters on La Sirena. She’s wearing her burgundy jacket and staring at a mirror that’s currently hidden from view. It’s difficult to guess whose clothes are hanging in the closet. The lights are flickering unsteadily. [Same shot as Trailer 2]

Agnes(?): “Do you have any…”

Shot 31 (00:37)

View over Seven’s shoulder at the hexagonal mirror. Seven looks critically at herself and touches her de-borged left eyebrow. [Same shot as Trailer 2]

Agnes(?): “… idea what’s… ?”

Shot 32 (00:37-00:38)

Two people in black tactical armour stand on top of a platform or wall, behind chest-high railing. They’re training their rifles on something nearer the ground and one of them fires a shot. The left eyes of their tactical helmets are red, the right ones white. [Same shot as Trailer 2]

Agnes(?): “… happening here?”

Shot 33 (00:38--00:39)

Elnor in his street clothes runs through some market stalls and clears an obstacle with a skilled jump as the display behind him explodes from a phaser blast. [Same shot as Trailer 2]

Seven: “Reality… [cut].”

Shot 34 (00:39-00:40)

A woman in blue Starfleet uniform is working on a console near the turbolift on the USS Stargazer. A figure is lying unmoving in the entrance of the turbolift. The ship is at red alert.

There’s an explosion in the wall behind the woman and she is thrown backwards against the wall.

Seven: “… has been broken.”

Shot 35 (00:40)

Shot of a corridor of the USS Stargazer. The lights are blinking a red alert as masses of sparks burst out of of wall and ceiling panels.

Shot 36 (00:41)

Agnes, wearing her blue blazer with a United Federation of Planets pin is standing on the bridge of the Stargazer. She whips around with a worried look as the panel behind her flickers. A thick black tentacle(? Data cable?) can just be seen taught across the front of the shot.

Shot 37 (00:41-00:42)

Seven wakes up in her bed in the totalitarian nightmare with a start. The left half of her face is hidden behind her hand on the pillow.

Shot 38 (00:42-00:44)

Rios, in his dystopian black leather jacket, stands on the bridge of alt!Sirena, having just arrived in the totalitarian nightmare. He looks around in confusion and alarm.

Picard: “There is… ”

Scene 3 (Picard visits Guinan, TN)

Shot 39 (00:44-00:45)

Picard, wearing a black turtleneck and black coat, is walking down a back alley in what could conceivably pass as a 21st century US city.

Picard: “…a divergence.”

Shot 40 (00:45-00:46)

He looks up at a street sign, which informs us the street is called “Forward Avenue” in LA’s Historic District.

Picard: “I know someone…”

Shot 41 (00:46-00:47)

He enters through a set of open doors into a building. Above the doors, there’s a golden number 10 as a name for the bar.

Picard: “… who could help us…”

Shot 42 (00:47-00:49)

Picard walks through a seating area of a bar towards the counter. The bar is relatively empty. There are a few human-looking people and an Andorian in the back.

(For the many references to earlier Trek check out discussions on twitter and elsewhere)

Picard: “… understand the change in time.”

Shot 43 (00:51-00:55)

Guinan, wearing a purple robe and characteristic hat, is standing behind the bar with her back to Picard.

Guinan: “I’m gonna need some tea. Earl Grey. Piping hot.”

Shot 44 (00:56-00:59)

Picard spreads his arms wide, smiling at Guinan. She walks over to him and they hug.

Picard: “Hello, Guinan.”

Shot 45 (00:59-01:01)

Guinan pours Picard some alcohol. They’ve sat down at one of the bar’s low tables, and there is someone who might be a Romulan or Vulcan, standing in the background.

Guinan: “Your answers are not…”

Shot 46 (01:01-01:02)

Reverse shot of Picard, looking pensively at Guinan.

Guinan: “… in the stars.”

Shot 47 (01:02-01:03)

Close-up of Guinan

Guinan: “And they never have been.”

Masterpost Trailer 0 Trailer 1 Trailer 2 pt 1, pt 2 Trailer 3 pt 2 Trailer 4 Trailer 5

#HALFWAY THERE!#(I am so sorry 🙈)#star trek picard #extrailervaganza #analysis and speculation #not mapping #picard season 2 #picard season 2 spoilers #season 2 trailer #season 2 trailer 3 #long post

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true-lower-decker-blog-2 · 3 years

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Every Class of Federation Ship Part-2

37. Kelvin Class

38. Miranda Class

39. Niagara Class

40. Prometheus Class

41. Shepheard Class

42. Sovereign Class

43. Malachowski Class

44. Merced Class

45. Nebula Class

46. Nimitz Class

47. Norway Class

48. Nova Class

49. Oberth Class

50. Olympic Class

51. Parliament Class

52. Peregrine Class

53. Ptolemy Class

54. Raven Type

55. Steamrunner Class

56. Sydney Class

57. Universe Class

58. Walker Class

59. Wallenberg Class

60. Wells Class

61. Yeager Type

62. Korolev Class

63. Magee Class

64. Federation Scoutship

65. New Orleans Class

66. Renaissance Class

67. Saber Class

68. Saladin Type

69. Soyuz Class

70. Springfield Class

71. Yellowstone Class

72. Luna Class

#star trek #star trek lower decks #star trek fanart #lds #lower decks #star trek the original series #star trek tos #star trek the next generation #star trek the animated series #star trek voyager #star trek deep space nine #star trek enterprise #star trek discovery #star trek picard #fanart #star trek ships

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weatherman667 · 3 years

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Star Trek Ships: The Akira-class

The Akira-class is my favourite, and the largest warship the Federation has ever produced, and this requires a bit of qualification.

Star Fleet Warships

The Sovereign-class is a combined Exploration/Dreadnought vessel, rather than being strictly a warship.

The Galaxy X-class Dreadnought is from an alternate timeline, where the Federation was not allowed to return to a peacetime mindset after the Dominion War, (or, it’s possible that the conflict between the Federation and Klingons stopped the Kilngons from attacking Cardiassia, which is what started the Dominion War)..

There were stripped-down Galaxy-class vessels produced for the Dominion War with standard military refit weapons and shields, but they were not were true warships, just unfinished Exploration ships. With the weaponry refit from the warship programmes, the Galaxy-class was still one of the most powerful weapons the Federation had ever produced

Not even going to touch the Kelvin/JJ Abrams/STD timeline.The Federation warships were, and are strictly limited to: Akira-class, Norway-class, Sabre-class, and Steamrunner-class. The Sovereign-class was part of the warship programme, but was half dreadnought and half explorer. The Defiant, Prometheus, and from STO, the Chimera, are dedicated warships, but were never turned into full ship classes.

Federation Starships Warship Classification, because it can get confusing.

The Galaxy-class is officially titled an Exploration ship, but militarily it would be classified as a Heavy Cruiser, Batlecruiser, or Fast Battleship. The fact that Star Fleet does not see itself as a military organization makes it difficult for the fandom, as they typically eschew standard warship designations.

The Galaxy X-class and Sovereign militarily are Dreadnoughts.

Exploration ships are ships designed for extended durations away from home, as the name implies, exploring. This isn’t a military classification, but, simply put, larger ships can move faster if you don’t bog them down too much.

Cruiser is a military qualification for ships designed to move faster than ordinary ships, while performing long-endurance, fleet-independant actions. A qualification is usually added to describe what kind of Cruiser it is, usually Light, Heavy, or Battle. Battlecruisers have the firepower of a battleship, without the armour. Battlecruisers were designed to outgun cruisers. Heavy would be a step below that, Light a step below that.

Fast Battleship was a WWII classification, and typically used for traditional battleships whom had their power plant, et al. upgraded to allow them to move at Cruiser speeds. This would probably be a stretch, as the Galaxy is more durable than anything else Star Fleet has produced, but not compared with how massive it is compared to everything else. I think Heavy Cruiser is the most appropriate classification.

In modern fleets, most ships are actually slower than they used to be, because there’s really a practical upper limit to when more speed becomes useful compared to the endemic tradeoffs involved. In Star Trek, and most science fiction shows, the speed of Faster-Than-Light travel is typically based off the amount of power it can produce, and so the Cruiser designation is incredible relevant again. The Galaxy-class was the fastest Federation ship in terms of FTL travel speed, until the creation of the Intrepid.

Dreadnought comes from the HMS Dreadnought. Traditional battleships were big, and were defined by their rating, i.e. the number of cannons they could carry. The HMS Dreadnought removed the vast majority of canons and replaced them with a few ridiculously large ones. So, in a science fiction setting, a Dreadnought is a battle ship that focuses on the use of a main canon of some sort. The Galaxy X-class has it’s Spinal Phaser Lance, while the Sovereign-class has a rapid-fire quantum torpedo launcher that more did damage than all of the rest of it’s weapons combined, even if they were top-of-the-line, next generation.

The Akira-class is a Heavy Cruiser/Carrier, which, for the first time, ever, adds proper fighters to Star Trek. It’s hangar is even larger than the Galaxy-class, and was designed from it’s inception to use it as a launching point for fighter craft. The wartime Galaxy-classes also apparently were used for this during the Dominion war, but it was a hobbled-together substitute. The Akira-class could also carry shuttles of every sort. It also took it’s cue from another failure of the Galaxy-class. While the Galaxy-class had incredible amounts of space it could dedicate to evacuation, and a ridiculous number of transporters, it simply was not designed for it. This meant that whenever they were trying to do something like this, the people were kept in hangar bays with very little in the way of necessary facilities, and it was not designed to move large number of people to and from the transporter bays and back again, and was just a logistical nightmare. The Galaxy-class was also not designed to military transportation, as while they could accommodate more military transportation than any other Federation ship at the time, they were not streamlined for it. You’d have a bunch of riflemen barely out of battle school wandering around the deepest parts of the ship looking for transporter room 20. And while they had a larger shuttle capacity than any other Federation ship, they were still not streamlined for moving large numbers of people to and fro. This is especially important if the enemy are using transporter scramblers. This is something the Akira-class rectified, being the best military deployment vessel Star Fleet ever produced.

In combat, though, it was theoretically supposed to be a stand-off torpedo boat, but likely due to the complete lack of heavier dedicated warships, is always seen fighting on the frontline. It had a whopping 15 torpedo tubes. It also had full coverage with Type-X phasers. While it’s maximum speed was not any higher than the Galaxy-class, it’s cruising speed was Warp 9.2, making it ridiculous fast compared to every other ship in the Federation, who’s cruising speed was normally Warp 6.

In the spirit of Federation pacifism, the weapons pod that carried the majority of the torpedo tubes could be swapped out for other modules. It still had full coverage with torpedo tubes, though, just not the same firepower.

As a bonus, the main Akira-class ship seen is the Thunderchild, after HG Well’s War of the Worlds.

As a drawback, all Akira-classes are the Thunderchild, as they didn’t design any different models.

#star trek #starships #akira

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