Star Trek The Birth of a Federation Military

The Original Sixth

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That's not quite true, the defiant has some sort of ablative armor coating or layer. There's also the polarized hull plating from the NX, which while not nearly as good as shields, could possibly have been used as an emergency system to buy a ship under fire a little bit more time.

Uh...the GCS does have an ablative hull.

TNG TM
The outermost hull layer is composed of a 1.6 cm sheet
of AGP ablative ceramic fabric chemically bonded onto a
substrate of 0.15 cm tritanium foil.

I mean, it's like half an inch thick, but they do have it.

The polarized hull plating was also a pre-runner to structural integrity field. And the two systems may not be compatible with each other. In fact, we can't even be sure that the hulls that the modern UFP uses is compatible with that system.

Yes?

I get a lot of folks here thinks Trek ships are poorly designed, but it's really telling in setting that NOBODY seriously up-armors ships. Not the Klingons, not the Romulans, not the Cardassians, not the Dominion... NOBODY does it. They all similarly depend on the combination of Shields+SFI just like the Federation does.

Actually, I think the BoP user's guide/handbook suggested that it had pretty thick armor. But we're not talking anything exceptionally thick.

This fundamentally means that within setting there must be some logical reason nobody does it. It's not been explicitly stated in canon, but I can think of a few logical reasons off the top of my head.

1. The tradeoff to acceleration and maneuverability isn't worth it.
It may be that more hits are evades by evasive maneuvers (which we see called for ALL THE TIME in Trek) and that adding armor to the ships would make it so that those maneuvers are dramatically less effective due to the Impulse drive and maneuvering thrusters having to accelerate so much more mass (as any serious amounts of armor on the ships is going to add considerable mass, given that you generally need fairly exotic high density materials to effectively armor against Trek weapons).

This is actually probably the crux of the issue. Realistically, some of the best armor you're gonna find around is not going to be made of steel or titanium--it's going to be graphite. Because graphite offers a strong balance between mass and protection. And when you have a spaceship (a real one), you need to worry about your mass cost. In most designs, you'll find that there is going to be a trade-off between mass cost and protection. There are drawbacks no matter what you do.

In regards to armor, even with the absurd--underline, absurd amount of heat resistance that Trek ships can take, you simply cannot produce a material that is going to laugh off a large-scale nuclear detonation at point-blank range. You'd basically need a ship made out of neutronium for that to be the case. You are better off with a lighter ship that can get that extra 100 meter distance from a nuclear/antimatter detonation than you are slapping a shitload of armor and taking a direct hit.

2. The materials needed are prohibitively expensive for large scale deployment.
As noted above, armor for Trek ships tends to be required to be made of highly unusual materials for it to be effective against Trek weapon systems. Think things like Neutronium and other exotic matter. These are things not easily replicated (as we know exotic materials often have difficulty being replicated) and thus likely take considerable investment in. This means that for large scale production lines like the Galaxy class it simply may be to cost prohibitive to manufacture the amounts needed.

Cost would also come in added mass for long-range deployment.

3. They do not have effective armor materials at the time.
I'll grant this is a variant of the point 2, just coming at it from a different angle. It may well be that they simply do not have effective armor technologies that work against common weapons technology at the time, and so it's kinda pointless. This seems weird? Consider most of the 18th to 20th century re: armor for infantry, it wasn't until the late 20th century that we developed materials that were effective against the weapons in common use, Trek might be in a similar situation.

That is the most probable case.

Trek tends to have two type of torpedoes; those that do large damage even from a distance (ie, around max yield) and those that tend to be direct hits, but tend to just blow out small holes, which means that it was probably around a few kilotons. There is simply no material that you can make that can withstand these sort of explosions at point-blank range. Your ship will be vaporized (to some degree). I don't care if it's made out of fucking lead. And what's more, you can't armor everything. You can't armor sensors. Not all the time. Not without blinding yourselves. Or your damn exhaust ports.

It won't mean shit if your armor can tank a dozen torpedoes if the first one takes out your entire sensor network. Because now you're just a blind motherfucker stumbling around.


Torpedoes are missiles, and they can be shot down, Voyager did it.

Voyager fired at its own torpedo, whose path and trajectory they knew. They would have also known of any sort of weak point in the armor (and said weak point is probably going to be on the rear, where most enemy fire is not going to hit it) and if it were shielded, they would know the shield frequency and hence be able to bypass it.

That scene was also completely nonsensical, as I've pointed out.

Nor does the ability for torpedoes modified for a particularly mission to withstand being fired into a sun (for a moment anyway) mean that therefor all torpedoes are capable of withstanding fire from other weapons,

That's a good point, but you don't need it to resist fire from all other weapons. Let's go back to my example of ship weapons. The GCS's secondary phaser emitters, which are obviously for smaller targets. 8 of the 12 arrays on the GCS don't surpass 51 MW. And half of those are at around 20 MWs. Even with the UFP's NDF phaser effects--that may not be enough firepower to destroy a torpedo. And if the torpedo is small enough and moves erratically enough, it's going to be really difficult to hit the target.

Especially because most torpedoes, being matter/antimatter warheads, don't tend to make contact detonations. Rather they are supposed to get close and detonate, causing a massive explosion that does damage to wide areas of the ship. Direct hits from full scale warheads are NOT common. And you do NOT survive. See Q Who and how well the Enterprise was doing getting backwash from its own torpedoes. It got to the point where firing any torpedoes at the approaching Borg Cube would have done more damage to them than to the enemy.

or even just a counter-missile being fired at them.

Interceptor missiles are really hard to get right. And that again asks if it's worth the cost to carry them.

If they were, why not just use torpedos to intercept incoming weapon fire, letting hostile phaser beams bounce off it's invulnerable shielding?

Or maybe it's just that the small arrays that might be used for that sort of thing (instead of being fired at the enemy firing the torpedoes) are just not capable of overpowering the armor before they impact? And even if you detonate the torpedo, so what? You still breach the matter/antimatter containment or the torpedo is programed to detonate on its own. And unless you get enough distance from that, it really doesn't matter what you do.

Replacing a starship that's been blown to atoms by a torpedo salvo is a much greater waste of time, space, and energy, not to mention lives.



A second possibility would be that while the Husnock bombarded the colony at first, they later followed up with a ground assault to finish off survivors.

Also, you didn't have 4 examples. You had one, and it was an attack on the heart of the federation itself, which was able to scramble all of five ships to defend itself. That's not a good basis for a claim that every colony (or every larger colony) should have like a dozen or so fighters on hand to defend itself.
[/QUOTE]
 
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Battlegrinder

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Obozny
Shocker. Directors and actors aren't good at infantry tactics.

I think this is the crux of our disagreement, so I'll skip the other posts and just address the point here. From what I gather, you view the ST series as a sort of rough approximation of what "really" happened (expect for some visual stuff and most of the dialogue, that's ironclad for some reason), and what we're seeing is a version of the "real" story that's heavily filtered by budgets, actor skill, etc and can really only convey the gist of it.

I don't think that's a reasonable viewpoint. That's not to say that everything we see is 100% literally what happened no matter what, but it's close. For example, take Siege of AR-558. The fights we saw in that were entirely dictated by what weapons the defenders had. If they'd had a SAW or similar weapon, they could have poured fire into the chokepoint and prevented the Jem'Hadar from breaking out. They didn't, so the Jem'Hadar pushed through, it dengerated into a wild melee, and several break through the lines, one of which Quark is forced to kill in self defense, which is an important character bit and ties into something from eariler in the episode. Now, some of that melee was probably a bit shakily choreographed and in "reality" those guys should have fought a little differantly, but otherwise it's fine.

Whereas in your version....that whole sequence of events just never happens, I guess, because it was just a facsimile of the real thing created by some director and actors that don't understand war, so people use the wrong tactics and don't have the weapons the real ones would and so on. In the "real" seige....well, we don't know what happens, because you'd hand the federation a bunch of gear they don't really have and have them fight in a totally different way, and so the entire battle never happens. I guess the line holds because they just spray phaser bolts down a chokepoint and hold the line easily, and quark's comment about war never end up coming around to apply to him, because the line holds and he's never forced to kill.

That's my problem with this "it's just a show", "it's a budget issue", "they're just actors" mindset, it destroys the actual story an meaning of the episode if you go around pretending bits of it don't count and never really happened. It's also impossible to apply your method consistently. AR-558 happened differently, because directors don't know anything about war (BTW, about that), but when Layton talks about stockpiling grenades, that absolutely 100% happened and is proof the federation has grenades, even though they never once used them in all of TNG, DS9, and VOY.


My argument is that it does not scale so quickly as to invalidate the utility of the smaller fighters.

That wasn't clear at first, you just said it was competitive.

Even if we assume they're far enough apart, it's still stupid. A half dozen torpedoes would have solved the problem. It's really just bad writing.

Yes, but it happened. That's how it is sometimes.

As for the torpedoes, they may just be really tough. The Enterprise D's hull--without the metaphasic shielding, rose to 12,000 C--and the people inside were still alive. In fact, there didn't appear to be any sort of major deformations in the hull or any real structural damage. All we saw was the ship's armor begin to glow. For comparison, gold melts at about 1,000 C. The Enterprise D's windows were still there.

And torpedoes are made with duranium, which is used in ship hull construction. And we might imagine that there are other materials the torpedo could be made of.

It may not be economical to try and detonate a torpedo.

Er, given that the hull is that strong, and yet get's torn through by hostile fire without issue, I'm not sure how that's supposed to suggest that torpedoes, with a much, much, much thinner casing, could therefor shrug off fire from similar weapons.
 

Battlegrinder

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Also, Sixth, I think you're projecting a little bit of my old arguments onto this thread, or I failed to clearly communicate them. Will edit the later, want to get posted now in case you're already responding.

Edit: I don't think the federation is stupid, or that they build thier tech badly, or anything like that. What I do think is that star trek is more than just some names and a setting and bots of technology, there's a certain feeling and tone to it, and if you start changing it some of that is lost.

Having a bunch of dudes in body armor breaching into a room with phaser SAWs and yelling out a bunch of tactical operator stuff is much more "real", yes. It's what they would do if they had unlimited time and budget to hash out every single detail f the sxene and the setting and train everyone relentlessly, but that's not what star trek is. STO really has this problem in game, where it let's players do what every trekkie fan says they should do, namely track down every single one off gizmo ever seen in the show and use them all at once, and.....it kinda ruins the game a bit, because it doesn't feel like star trek anymore when you beam down to a planet and just have your half dozen attack drones run around zapping all the bad guys without you doing anything.
 
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The Original Sixth

Well-known member
Founder
I think this is the crux of our disagreement, so I'll skip the other posts and just address the point here. From what I gather, you view the ST series as a sort of rough approximation of what "really" happened (expect for some visual stuff and most of the dialogue, that's ironclad for some reason), and what we're seeing is a version of the "real" story that's heavily filtered by budgets, actor skill, etc and can really only convey the gist of it.

I mean, it's a portrayal.

Jean-Luc Picard does not actually look like Patrick Stewart. He is portrayed by Patrick Stewart. What you're seeing is a portrayal of the setting.

I don't think that's a reasonable viewpoint. That's not to say that everything we see is 100% literally what happened no matter what, but it's close. For example, take Siege of AR-558. The fights we saw in that were entirely dictated by what weapons the defenders had. If they'd had a SAW or similar weapon, they could have poured fire into the chokepoint and prevented the Jem'Hadar from breaking out. They didn't, so the Jem'Hadar pushed through, it dengerated into a wild melee, and several break through the lines, one of which Quark is forced to kill in self defense, which is an important character bit and ties into something from eariler in the episode. Now, some of that melee was probably a bit shakily choreographed and in "reality" those guys should have fought a little differantly, but otherwise it's fine.

Again, it is a portrayal. I mean, you can look to LotR for this. How many medieval settings have clean burning fuel for their torches? Because an actual torch would just fill your house/castle with smoke. You use candles and fireplaces to illuminate your home. Or how about the Witcher games? Do you honestly think that not a single fucking person in a village has realized how to cut straight boards and nail them together to make a door that doesn't let in 50% of the wind? Or that no one understands how to use straw or plaster to keep the rain and cold out of their homes? Or that disciplined medieval military units regularly broke rank and jumped into suicidal melee with swords and shields?

Of course not. Any modern fantasy depiction is almost 100% incompetent. Because it's fantasy and it is portraying something.

Whereas in your version....that whole sequence of events just never happens, I guess, because it was just a facsimile of the real thing created by some director and actors that don't understand war, so people use the wrong tactics and don't have the weapons the real ones would and so on. In the "real" seige....well, we don't know what happens, because you'd hand the federation a bunch of gear they don't really have and have them fight in a totally different way, and so the entire battle never happens. I guess the line holds because they just spray phaser bolts down a chokepoint and hold the line easily, and quark's comment about war never end up coming around to apply to him, because the line holds and he's never forced to kill.

Lots of portrayals in the arts is inaccurate. I mean, do you think the portrayal in the movie 300 is anywhere close to being accurate? Of course not. And even in historical illustrations of major battles, those portrayals were often flawed. The point of these shows was never to present, with 100% accuracy, a functional setting. It was to provide a science fiction drama adventure that immersed you in the setting.

Society as a whole does not CARE that what might have happened in that battle was completely and utterly wrong in any sort of historical aspect of the setting. They're there for the drama.

That's my problem with this "it's just a show", "it's a budget issue", "they're just actors" mindset, it destroys the actual story an meaning of the episode if you go around pretending bits of it don't count and never really happened. It's also impossible to apply your method consistently. AR-558 happened differently, because directors don't know anything about war (BTW, about that), but when Layton talks about stockpiling grenades, that absolutely 100% happened and is proof the federation has grenades, even though they never once used them in all of TNG, DS9, and VOY.

No, the method can be applied consistently. It just requires that you accept that the portrayal may be flawed and you might therefore adjust your argument to take this fact into account. Just like we might take into account that the technical manuals are somewhat flawed. Things like 300,000 km range for MW-GW energy weapons. Things that defy the laws of physics on an absurd level, for no reason. If you accept that the people who wrote the tech manuals were ignorant of the range limitations on such weapons, then you can accept that this is probably not the range that makes sense. Or even on the capabilities of antimatter generation, in regards to certain episodes and their calculation on how powerful antimatter was.

I feel as though you're treating this as a competition that requires strict rules so we can all play on some sort of even playing field--hoping to force us to some sort of objective playing ground. In reality, all we've done is set a completely arbitrary rule that doesn't really make any sense.


That wasn't clear at first, you just said it was competitive.

Fair enough.

Yes, but it happened. That's how it is sometimes.

Let's do a thought experiment. You're really knowledgeable about Halo. If we were to take the "this is just a portrayal, they wouldn't do some of this stupid stuff" approach to Halo, what would you apply that to? If you had to look at Halo and say "this doesn't really make any sense" and instead apply a more sound doctrine or technology, what would it be?

Er, given that the hull is that strong, and yet get's torn through by hostile fire without issue, I'm not sure how that's supposed to suggest that torpedoes, with a much, much, much thinner casing, could therefor shrug off fire from similar weapons.

The main dorsal array is 20x more powerful than the largest of the smaller arrays that cover the GCS. It's 50x more powerful than half of the small arrays that I mentioned. Those small arrays are never used against capital ships. The only exception was when the Enterprise E was using it to illuminate the Scimitar. In general, they use the ventral or dorsal saucer and I think a few times they use the ventral engineering array. All the others? They don't use them. Even the main ventral engineering saucer is rarely used. Although that's because of the whole "separate the ship" thing didn't work out so well.
 

The Original Sixth

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Also, Sixth, I think you're projecting a little bit of my old arguments onto this thread, or I failed to clearly communicate them. Will edit the later, want to get posted now in case you're already responding.

Eh, too late.

Edit: I don't think the federation is stupid, or that they build thier tech badly, or anything like that. What I do think is that star trek is more than just some names and a setting and bots of technology, there's a certain feeling and tone to it, and if you start changing it some of that is lost.

I'm not trying to change the tone of the setting. That's not the intent. You can keep in-line with the tone of a setting and make some obvious adjustments.

Having a bunch of dudes in body armor breaching into a room with phaser SAWs and yelling out a bunch of tactical operator stuff is much more "real", yes. It's what they would do if they had unlimited time and budget to hash out every single detail f the sxene and the setting and train everyone relentlessly, but that's not what star trek is.

See, I don't agree with that take right there.

ST doesn't need people wearing heavy tactical body armor. Again, you can take that down to energy weapons being prevalent so no one actually uses heavy body armor that you might find in a modern setting. You occasionally get some kind of armor with padding (UFP ground forces, Klingon warriors, Cardassian military armor), but you don't need to focus in on that. And in most cases, the show revolves around naval security forces.

My position is to look at trends and tones that the show follows and try to extrapolate the most logical approach a force would take. Let's try that thought experiment on Starfleet, for example. We know that Roddenberry wanted them to be a primarily space-exploration para-military group. And what seemed to drive this was his idea to an "end of history" sort of future, where geopolitics (in this case, astro-politics) have ceased being astro-strategic in nature. Roddenberry even wanted phasers to go from looking like pistols to small vacuum cleaners because he wanted them to look more like tools, not weapons. And everyone was an "officer" and highly educated.

To that end, we can conclude:
  • That Starfleet is very, very liberal. Both in the social sense and the international relation's theory sense.
  • That Starfleet views itself first as an exploration group, second as a diplomatic group, and third as a defense force.
  • That Starfleet prefers highly educated individuals and puts a heavy emphasis on its officer program.
  • That Starfleet therefore probably does not put a strong emphasis in R&D compared to things like sensors, shields, and other technological wonders. With that in mind, we might conclude that...
    • Away teams carry minimal weapons for self-defense. No frags, flashes, or smokes. Indeed, they are mostly armed with just one side-arm, albeit a phaser powerful enough to blow apart a small house.
    • Away teams are tailored to dress in clothes that do not feel threatening or intimidating. Indeed, their security forces are often marked by bright yellow.
    • Away teams are treated more like explorers and everyone is handed a tricorder.
  • We might therefore conclude that most of Starfleet's ground forces are not well trained. They probably get minimum tactics training and probably require minimal marksmanship. Security would be the only possible exception to this, but are probably focused on de-escalation strategies and the stun setting, rather than "neutralize the target". High-tech strategies that push for force-field containment would also be preferred over shooting someone with a lethal weapon.
  • Starfleet's ground forces are probably underpaid, understaffed, and poorly supplied. Weapons, vehicles, and defenses may be decades out of date. The only exception might be rapid response forces. Planetary defense forces are probably primarily organized at the planet level with defense militias and security forces who receive minimal training, equipment, and coordination. Large capital worlds like Earth or Vulcan might have total-coverage (or near so) planetary defense shields, ground-to-space phasers/torpedo launchers, and orbital defense platforms, but your average colony world might only have a few shielded cities and defense platforms, with local militia forces acting as the bulk of the military forces.
I mean really, you could model it after just about any non-French/English country in the EU and you'd probably get a rough idea of a Starfleet.

EDIT

We might even do similar take on their rival powers.

The Klingons
They're a tough military power that follows a warrior's code and have a strong social sense of honor. They're just as likely to draw a sword or a dirk as they are a ray gun. Their technology tends to be more 'crude'. They don't really focus on the medical or scientific aspect of the setting. They're an imperial power that likes to conquer. Therefore you might suggest:

  • A heavy social focus on glory and honor leads to poor squad-based tactics. It's not that they don't understand how they work or they never do it--it's just that the Klingon's are individually motivated to all act like hotshots trying to top the other. A coordinated infantry attack can quickly turn into a glorified tavern brawl with only a loose idea of strategy and tactics as leading commanders try and keep their men in check.
  • Klingon soldiers/warriors will commonly carry swords/sabers/dirks, as well as a pistol, and probably a rifle. Their thick skulls are actually tough enough that they probably don't need helmets for most shrapnel weapons. They wear body armor and they carry grenades and explosives.
  • Klingon armor (assault skimmers?) and artillery is a mix; the bulk of it is older designs that the Klingons have kept around, but they are also supplemented by the occasional modern design. The reason for this is as follows:
    • The Klingons are not really all that innovative. In fact, they steal most of their breakthroughs from those they conquer or their rivals.
    • The backbone of the Klingon military comes from the Houses. Each House is loyal to the Chancellor, but commands its own military and fleet. There is the KDF, which is loyal to the Chancellor only, but this lacks social mobility, as only those of the higher houses can become officers. Whereas those who work within the houses can earn honors from their House leaders. House militaries are generally given what an individual house can afford--which means a lot of retired crap that the KDF doesn't want anymore. That can range from old cruisers that are a hundred years old to artillery cannons that are older than the houses that bought them. Or even a 'bring your own gear' program.
  • The Klingon military is also probably supplemented (in the lower ranks) by conquered races. These races serve as cannon fodder. They're either fully brought in on the Klingon warrior concept or they're just trying to stay alive. Being of a lesser race, they cannot hope to achieve any position of real honor. Their gear is more practical, but horribly outdated, as the Klingon leadership doesn't give a single shit about their lives.

The Romulans
Take the sort of KGB route. They like to use subterfuge and prefer cloaked ships. They are a technological peer of the Federation in many respects, though they lag behind in certain scientific fields and defenses. They are also xenophobic and seem to treat lesser races with contempt. They're also an imperial power.

  • The Romulans prefer subterfuge, so we can probably presume that they have a large, sophisticated spy network throughout the two quadrants they're active in.
  • The Romulans seem to prefer stealth-based technologies. The most obvious is cloaking, but we might presume they go to great lengths to use sensor-absorbing hulls or materials in many of their designs. Including transporters that are more difficult to detect. We might presume that their fleets tend to operate from surprise and as wolf-packs.
  • We might presume, that the subjects of the Romulan empire who are not of Romulan blood are often recruited into performing menial slave-like tasks, such as mining or acting as cannon fodder or shock troops for the empire.
  • The Romulans have a large network of assassins and are trained in ways of eliminating targets so as to avoid implication of the Romulans themselves.
  • The Romulan military is probably a mixture of high and low end stuff. The Romulans use all the good stuff, which is generally used for their special forces or elite soldiers. The crap is handed down to the subject races who are required to fight for their Romulan masters. Otherwise, the Romulans use the most advanced assault skimmers, disruptor rifles, artillery pieces, drones, and long ranged missiles.
  • Romulan gear tends to be limited to pistols and rifles for officers and the state police, but their troops and special forces tend to make use of grenades, explosives, and weapons of all sorts. Sniper rifles of some variety are often available to their assassins and special forces. Very sophisticated, but often ONLY in the hands of the Romulan elite.

The Cardassians
An aggressive police-state power that conquers its neighbors and enforces strict social codes. They were never portrayed as being particularly innovative, but very disciplined and cunning. Not to mention paranoid and xenophobic.
  • The Cardassian military is the ONLY military. Fearful of any sort of lesser species throwing off their manacles, only the Cardassians hold real military power. A subject world like Bajor might be allowed to keep its militia and security forces, but they're effectively toothless and are generally used against their own people.
  • A large security apparatus makes it difficult for scientists to innovate and the pressure of social norms make said innovation dangerous at the best of times. Most of said breakthroughs are for the explicit purpose of weapons technologies. Most other forms of research get low interest from the government, which wants better warp drives, better weapons, and better shields.
  • A lot of military knowledge is stolen or purchased from rival powers.
  • Military gear is practical, but decades behind those of other powers. Anything that is highly advanced is purchased from other powers such as the Romulans or Klingons of Ferengi. These purchased items are almost always reversed engineered after some time without the permission of the nation the bought it from and replicated by the Cardassian military complex.
  • Competence is not the driving force of the military, but rather connections are. Officers are promoted based on their families, who they know, and then personal competence. Such leaders, even when raised in the strict, spartan environment of the Cardassian military, are often horribly corrupt and over-indulgent in their tastes. As such, while the average soldier is competent and capable, they are often led by someone who was promoted for nepotism and often was pre-destined to be promoted.
  • Cardassian troops tend to use rifles, pistols, grenades, and wear proper combat gear. These are not particularly sophisticated or well integrated with each other and they are all monitored by the police state.


STO really has this problem in game, where it let's players do what every trekkie fan says they should do, namely track down every single one off gizmo ever seen in the show and use them all at once, and.....it kinda ruins the game a bit, because it doesn't feel like star trek anymore when you beam down to a planet and just have your half dozen attack drones run around zapping all the bad guys without you doing anything.

There's a reason I don't play STO.
 
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Aldarion

Neoreactionary Monarchist
1. Workforce. And you only need 1 to prove it possible.

Except it doesn't prove what you are saying. It was a torpedo fired by Voyager and detonated by Voyager. Fact that it was fired by Voyager meant that they would have known torpedo's shield frequency, since it has to be matched to the ship in order to pass through the shields in the first place (we see this in Generations as well, used against Enteprise - Klingons spy out Enterprise's shield frequency, match torpedo frequency to shields, and from then on their disruptors and torpedoes pass unimpeded - though Enterprise's return fire doesn't, for some weird reason). Meaning that any shields torpedo had were as good as nonexistent against fire from Voyager.

To prove your claim, you have to show an example of a ship shooting down torpedo fired by the enemy vessel. As it is, it actually supports my point: torpedoes can be hit by weapons fire relatively easily, yet we never see enemy torpedoes being shot down. Or even attempted at being shot down.

2. They only mentioned the guidence system, but the payload was also reconfigured, and given that the ship can't go anywhere near that deep, even with it's vastly greater power generation and special shields to protect it, obviously the stock torpedo couldn't. Surviving planetary impact, on the other hand, doesn't require very strong shields, nor does bypassing shields themselves, torpedoes have to do that normally to pass through the firing ship's shields in the first place.

Ships are much larger, and have to a) split power between shields, weapons, sensors and life support, b) avoid cooking their crews alive, c) have available antimatter reserves for a long voyage; whereas torpedo a) only has to keep up shields, guidance and antimatter containment, b) doesn't have to worry about the crew and c) only flies for several seconds. It stands to reason that torpedo will be able to have much more powerful shields.

3. Because they can't, at least not for beam weapons. It's a beam, it goes in a straight line, and if you move the path it's following the torpedo can follow.

You do understand that beam weapons move at significant fractions of c? Meaning that, generally speaking, they wouldn't have any trouble shooting either torpedoes or past torpedoes, as necessary? Especially considering that majority of engagements in Star Trek happen well within visual range, and those that don't are generally against enemies who are at significant technological disadvantage (e.g. Phoenix vs Cardassians).
 

Sailor.X

Cold War Veteran
Founder
Eh, too late.



I'm not trying to change the tone of the setting. That's not the intent. You can keep in-line with the tone of a setting and make some obvious adjustments.



See, I don't agree with that take right there.

ST doesn't need people wearing heavy tactical body armor. Again, you can take that down to energy weapons being prevalent so no one actually uses heavy body armor that you might find in a modern setting. You occasionally get some kind of armor with padding (UFP ground forces, Klingon warriors, Cardassian military armor), but you don't need to focus in on that. And in most cases, the show revolves around naval security forces.

My position is to look at trends and tones that the show follows and try to extrapolate the most logical approach a force would take. Let's try that thought experiment on Starfleet, for example. We know that Roddenberry wanted them to be a primarily space-exploration para-military group. And what seemed to drive this was his idea to an "end of history" sort of future, where geopolitics (in this case, astro-politics) have ceased being astro-strategic in nature. Roddenberry even wanted phasers to go from looking like pistols to small vacuum cleaners because he wanted them to look more like tools, not weapons. And everyone was an "officer" and highly educated.

To that end, we can conclude:
  • That Starfleet is very, very liberal. Both in the social sense and the international relation's theory sense.
  • That Starfleet views itself first as an exploration group, second as a diplomatic group, and third as a defense force.
  • That Starfleet prefers highly educated individuals and puts a heavy emphasis on its officer program.
  • That Starfleet therefore probably does not put a strong emphasis in R&D compared to things like sensors, shields, and other technological wonders. With that in mind, we might conclude that...
    • Away teams carry minimal weapons for self-defense. No frags, flashes, or smokes. Indeed, they are mostly armed with just one side-arm, albeit a phaser powerful enough to blow apart a small house.
    • Away teams are tailored to dress in clothes that do not feel threatening or intimidating. Indeed, their security forces are often marked by bright yellow.
    • Away teams are treated more like explorers and everyone is handed a tricorder.
  • We might therefore conclude that most of Starfleet's ground forces are not well trained. They probably get minimum tactics training and probably require minimal marksmanship. Security would be the only possible exception to this, but are probably focused on de-escalation strategies and the stun setting, rather than "neutralize the target". High-tech strategies that push for force-field containment would also be preferred over shooting someone with a lethal weapon.
  • Starfleet's ground forces are probably underpaid, understaffed, and poorly supplied. Weapons, vehicles, and defenses may be decades out of date. The only exception might be rapid response forces. Planetary defense forces are probably primarily organized at the planet level with defense militias and security forces who receive minimal training, equipment, and coordination. Large capital worlds like Earth or Vulcan might have total-coverage (or near so) planetary defense shields, ground-to-space phasers/torpedo launchers, and orbital defense platforms, but your average colony world might only have a few shielded cities and defense platforms, with local militia forces acting as the bulk of the military forces.
I mean really, you could model it after just about any non-French/English country in the EU and you'd probably get a rough idea of a Starfleet.

EDIT

We might even do similar take on their rival powers.

The Klingons
They're a tough military power that follows a warrior's code and have a strong social sense of honor. They're just as likely to draw a sword or a dirk as they are a ray gun. Their technology tends to be more 'crude'. They don't really focus on the medical or scientific aspect of the setting. They're an imperial power that likes to conquer. Therefore you might suggest:

  • A heavy social focus on glory and honor leads to poor squad-based tactics. It's not that they don't understand how they work or they never do it--it's just that the Klingon's are individually motivated to all act like hotshots trying to top the other. A coordinated infantry attack can quickly turn into a glorified tavern brawl with only a loose idea of strategy and tactics as leading commanders try and keep their men in check.
  • Klingon soldiers/warriors will commonly carry swords/sabers/dirks, as well as a pistol, and probably a rifle. Their thick skulls are actually tough enough that they probably don't need helmets for most shrapnel weapons. They wear body armor and they carry grenades and explosives.
  • Klingon armor (assault skimmers?) and artillery is a mix; the bulk of it is older designs that the Klingons have kept around, but they are also supplemented by the occasional modern design. The reason for this is as follows:
    • The Klingons are not really all that innovative. In fact, they steal most of their breakthroughs from those they conquer or their rivals.
    • The backbone of the Klingon military comes from the Houses. Each House is loyal to the Chancellor, but commands its own military and fleet. There is the KDF, which is loyal to the Chancellor only, but this lacks social mobility, as only those of the higher houses can become officers. Whereas those who work within the houses can earn honors from their House leaders. House militaries are generally given what an individual house can afford--which means a lot of retired crap that the KDF doesn't want anymore. That can range from old cruisers that are a hundred years old to artillery cannons that are older than the houses that bought them. Or even a 'bring your own gear' program.
  • The Klingon military is also probably supplemented (in the lower ranks) by conquered races. These races serve as cannon fodder. They're either fully brought in on the Klingon warrior concept or they're just trying to stay alive. Being of a lesser race, they cannot hope to achieve any position of real honor. Their gear is more practical, but horribly outdated, as the Klingon leadership doesn't give a single shit about their lives.

The Romulans
Take the sort of KGB route. They like to use subterfuge and prefer cloaked ships. They are a technological peer of the Federation in many respects, though they lag behind in certain scientific fields and defenses. They are also xenophobic and seem to treat lesser races with contempt. They're also an imperial power.

  • The Romulans prefer subterfuge, so we can probably presume that they have a large, sophisticated spy network throughout the two quadrants they're active in.
  • The Romulans seem to prefer stealth-based technologies. The most obvious is cloaking, but we might presume they go to great lengths to use sensor-absorbing hulls or materials in many of their designs. Including transporters that are more difficult to detect. We might presume that their fleets tend to operate from surprise and as wolf-packs.
  • We might presume, that the subjects of the Romulan empire who are not of Romulan blood are often recruited into performing menial slave-like tasks, such as mining or acting as cannon fodder or shock troops for the empire.
  • The Romulans have a large network of assassins and are trained in ways of eliminating targets so as to avoid implication of the Romulans themselves.
  • The Romulan military is probably a mixture of high and low end stuff. The Romulans use all the good stuff, which is generally used for their special forces or elite soldiers. The crap is handed down to the subject races who are required to fight for their Romulan masters. Otherwise, the Romulans use the most advanced assault skimmers, disruptor rifles, artillery pieces, drones, and long ranged missiles.
  • Romulan gear tends to be limited to pistols and rifles for officers and the state police, but their troops and special forces tend to make use of grenades, explosives, and weapons of all sorts. Sniper rifles of some variety are often available to their assassins and special forces. Very sophisticated, but often ONLY in the hands of the Romulan elite.

The Cardassians
An aggressive police-state power that conquers its neighbors and enforces strict social codes. They were never portrayed as being particularly innovative, but very disciplined and cunning. Not to mention paranoid and xenophobic.
  • The Cardassian military is the ONLY military. Fearful of any sort of lesser species throwing off their manacles, only the Cardassians hold real military power. A subject world like Bajor might be allowed to keep its militia and security forces, but they're effectively toothless and are generally used against their own people.
  • A large security apparatus makes it difficult for scientists to innovate and the pressure of social norms make said innovation dangerous at the best of times. Most of said breakthroughs are for the explicit purpose of weapons technologies. Most other forms of research get low interest from the government, which wants better warp drives, better weapons, and better shields.
  • A lot of military knowledge is stolen or purchased from rival powers.
  • Military gear is practical, but decades behind those of other powers. Anything that is highly advanced is purchased from other powers such as the Romulans or Klingons of Ferengi. These purchased items are almost always reversed engineered after some time without the permission of the nation the bought it from and replicated by the Cardassian military complex.
  • Competence is not the driving force of the military, but rather connections are. Officers are promoted based on their families, who they know, and then personal competence. Such leaders, even when raised in the strict, spartan environment of the Cardassian military, are often horribly corrupt and over-indulgent in their tastes. As such, while the average soldier is competent and capable, they are often led by someone who was promoted for nepotism and often was pre-destined to be promoted.
  • Cardassian troops tend to use rifles, pistols, grenades, and wear proper combat gear. These are not particularly sophisticated or well integrated with each other and they are all monitored by the police state.




There's a reason I don't play STO.
But if you want to make a real Federation Military you will need lots of attack drones. We are seeing combat robots on the battlefield today. The federation not having them is asinine. And on another point why aren't power armor troops in Starfleet. If the 23rd Century Federation can make a freaking Red Angel suit. They can make a dumbed down none time travel version for units on each Starship.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
Also, you didn't have 4 examples. You had one
One example is not a trend.
1. Workforce. And you only need 1 to prove it possible.
The hypocrisy is strong with this one.

Alright I think we're all tired of whaling on Battlegrinder's minimal-effort posts so Imma go back to the OP again.

1.) What would a Federation battlefleet look like in comparison to Starfleet?
While the Defiant is a fine proof-of-concept I don't think it's actually as good as it could be for this task. For instance it seems to miss far more often than any other Federation vessel. This is understandable since it was designed to fight a 3km cube that isn't seen to put much effort in dodging, swapping accuracy for higher damage/more toughness would be a safe bet against the Borg. Against (near) peer powers it's not as good.

I suspect ultimately the Defiant prototype would give birth to two new lines of ships, it's maneuverability becoming a next generation fighter and it's armor and toughness becoming a larger tougher capital craft with both drawing from it's weapons. Right now the Defiant's in a weird place where it's kinda in-between the two being half fighter and half capital ship.

One thing the Defiant gets right is rate of fire, it shooting multiple rapids in burst mode gives it vastly more immediate punch than typical Starfleet vessels. This will especially connect to the fighter version since they are going to have a high mortality rate. I could see, as a potential fighter doctrine, mounting three photon torpedoes on each wing of the fighter, all single-shot tubes with no reloads. This would leave a theoretical 12-fighter squadron able to fire 72 torpedoes at an enemy in the space of a few seconds, followed by running away in hopes of taking few losses. That's the kind of punch only the largest ships could handle and would even tear up a smaller fleet, though it would make the fighter's rather ineffective in fleet engagements since they get one shot at it. However because they shoot and run, fighter losses would be reduced and even a militarized Federation is likely to appreciate that a lot. If not a carrier, at least a tender vessel of some kind to re-arm fighters would be called for so they can get a second strike in a few minutes later.

The Defiant's pulse phasers don't seem to have much traverse at all but high firepower. Potentially they could be mounted on some sort of turret as a support to phaser emitter strips that appear to have a far lower rate of fire for capships to give them both that rate of fire and more accuracy. That would give them firepower that might look more like nuTrek's ships.

Militarily I see starbases as becoming more important. Warships are unlikely to have luxurious quarters and ample holodecks. This means more frequent shore leaves for the crew to keep morale up or they will start losing people to the science branch. Military ships won't be poking around every random anomaly so they'll likely spend more time patrolling borders, or deploying rapidly to hotspots. In both cases, a nearby base for shore leaves, re-arming, and refueling (and keeping some ships on standby to instantly respond if a situation forms) is a solid strategy.

A heavily armed starbase with a warship squadron on standby for trouble and two or three more squadrons patrolling the nearby sectors also produces a fairly wide "no go" zone for enemies. You try to slip across the border, you get an instant response in force and probably get pinned between multiple groups. So avoid that entire area. Then Starfleet deploys more bases so that their contentious borders are largely covered. Something like the Maginot line, but said line can be moved when it needs to be and has battleships available to back it up if there's a threat of a breakthrough.

2.) After given 5 years to build up an Army and a small fleet, could this Force make a difference in defeating the Cardassians?
I'm of the opinion that the Cardassian war was the Federation's to win. They didn't make a peace treaty because they were losing militarily, but because the population lacked the political will to continue. Normal Starfleet could have made a difference if they had more Captain Jellicos in charge and didn't act so forgiving about stuff like torturing Picard for weeks. Military Starfleet? The Cardassians are going to be much, much more cautious around the Federation after the spanking they'll get. Bajor will probably be much better off because the Cardassians will be loath to, f'rex, spread poison all over vast amounts of their farmland on the way out just for spite, lest they find a battlefleet coming to Cardassia to collect reparations in either goods or blood, Cardassia's choice.

A militarized Federation could take the entire Cardassian empire apart but I question if they'd have the political will to go that far. Frankly they should have just recorded what the heck happened on Bajor (and presumably many other worlds) and done a propaganda blitz about it to drum up outrage and keep going.

3.) Would Section 31 use its power to support such an initiative?
Canon Section 31, I doubt it, the ones in show (Haven't seen recent Discovery) seem to be more like Snidely Whiplash in that they manage to do as much damage to their own side or more as they do the enemy. They act almost cartoonishly evil at times. I think the version the writers were originally going for would oppose militarizing Starfleet because it would become a rival for their own personal power.

Fanon Section 31 that wants to protect the Federation probably would support it.

But if you want to make a real Federation Military you will need lots of attack drones. We are seeing combat robots on the battlefield today. The federation not having them is asinine. And on another point why aren't power armor troops in Starfleet. If the 23rd Century Federation can make a freaking Red Angel suit. They can make a dumbed down none time travel version for units on each Starship.
Robots have a tendency to turn on you in Trek though. M5, Landru, Vaal, Nomad, V'ger, The Doomsday Machine, Lore, Dreadnought, The Arsenal of Freedom, Peanut Hamper (If you accept the cartoon), just off the top of my head. Granted a majority of those were Kirk's era and not every robot is planning to turn on their creators but there are a lot of destroyed civilizations out there, some fairly recent to TNG, that put their trust in automated weapons and then said weapons did a 180. Even "dumb" nonsentient drones like the Cardassian orbital weapons platforms managed to last all of a minute before they got technobabbled in their first appearance. I'm not sure they'd go for combat drones with that kind of history.
 
Last edited:

Aldarion

Neoreactionary Monarchist
This is a What If scenario. Set in the early 2350s. The Cardassian border wars are raging and Colonies are being attacked and in some cases razed to the ground. We know from Canon that the Border wars wasn't a big deal to the Federation as the bulk of the Fleet was held back. There is much dispute on just how bad the border wars were for the Federation, but what can not be disputed was how bad they were for the Colonists. And we do know that the Federation, for whatever reason, did not commit sufficient forces to stop the Cardassian attacks into their territory. Starfleet is seen as unable or unwilling to defend the colonies.

So in this scenario a number of Federation officers have simply had enough of Starfleets pussyfooting with the Cardassians and resign from the Federation. Their goal is simple. Build a Federation Warfleet and Army to do the real work of defending the Federation while Starfleet is free to do its explorer fleet.

That Starfleet will oppose a new rival for resources, funding and personnel is obvious. But assume for this scenario that there is quite a lot of support for the building of a real Warfleet and Army in many of the colonies, particularly those along the frontier and facing borders along future and former antagonists. And they have quite a bit of power to push through this agenda.

Three questions come to mind.

1.) What would a Federation battlefleet look like in comparison to Starfleet?

2.) After given 5 years to build up an Army and a small fleet, could this Force make a difference in defeating the Cardassians?

3.) Would Section 31 use its power to support such an initiative?

1) Well, a battlefleet needs three main things:
  • Battleship / heavy combatant
  • Cruiser / main combatant
  • Destroyer / escort
Considering we are talking about a warfleet, I think the best example (albeit accounting for technological difference) would be the new builds which appear after the Wolf 359: Sovereign, Akira and Defiant. So there you have it.

2) Very likely, it would. But that depends on how much has to be changed to build it up in the first place. Shifting things around during wartime isn't exactly optimal.
 

Sailor.X

Cold War Veteran
Founder
The hypocrisy is strong with this one.

Alright I think we're all tired of whaling on Battlegrinder's minimal-effort posts so Imma go back to the OP again.

1.) What would a Federation battlefleet look like in comparison to Starfleet?
While the Defiant is a fine proof-of-concept I don't think it's actually as good as it could be for this task. For instance it seems to miss far more often than any other Federation vessel. This is understandable since it was designed to fight a 3km cube that isn't seen to put much effort in dodging, swapping accuracy for higher damage/more toughness would be a safe bet against the Borg. Against (near) peer powers it's not as good.

I suspect ultimately the Defiant prototype would give birth to two new lines of ships, it's maneuverability becoming a next generation fighter and it's armor and toughness becoming a larger tougher capital craft with both drawing from it's weapons. Right now the Defiant's in a weird place where it's kinda in-between the two being half fighter and half capital ship.

One thing the Defiant gets right is rate of fire, it shooting multiple rapids in burst mode gives it vastly more immediate punch than typical Starfleet vessels. This will especially connect to the fighter version since they are going to have a high mortality rate. I could see, as a potential fighter doctrine, mounting three photon torpedoes on each wing of the fighter, all single-shot tubes with no reloads. This would leave a theoretical 12-fighter squadron able to fire 72 torpedoes at an enemy in the space of a few seconds, followed by running away in hopes of taking few losses. That's the kind of punch only the largest ships could handle and would even tear up a smaller fleet, though it would make the fighter's rather ineffective in fleet engagements since they get one shot at it. However because they shoot and run, fighter losses would be reduced and even a militarized Federation is likely to appreciate that a lot. If not a carrier, at least a tender vessel of some kind to re-arm fighters would be called for so they can get a second strike in a few minutes later.

The Defiant's pulse phasers don't seem to have much traverse at all but high firepower. Potentially they could be mounted on some sort of turret as a support to phaser emitter strips that appear to have a far lower rate of fire for capships to give them both that rate of fire and more accuracy. That would give them firepower that might look more like nuTrek's ships.

Militarily I see starbases as becoming more important. Warships are unlikely to have luxurious quarters and ample holodecks. This means more frequent shore leaves for the crew to keep morale up or they will start losing people to the science branch. Military ships won't be poking around every random anomaly so they'll likely spend more time patrolling borders, or deploying rapidly to hotspots. In both cases, a nearby base for shore leaves, re-arming, and refueling (and keeping some ships on standby to instantly respond if a situation forms) is a solid strategy.

A heavily armed starbase with a warship squadron on standby for trouble and two or three more squadrons patrolling the nearby sectors also produces a fairly wide "no go" zone for enemies. You try to slip across the border, you get an instant response in force and probably get pinned between multiple groups. So avoid that entire area. Then Starfleet deploys more bases so that their contentious borders are largely covered. Something like the Maginot line, but said line can be moved when it needs to be and has battleships available to back it up if there's a threat of a breakthrough.

I'm of the opinion that the Cardassian war was the Federation's to win. They didn't make a peace treaty because they were losing militarily, but because the population lacked the political will to continue. Normal Starfleet could have made a difference if they had more Captain Jellicos in charge and didn't act so forgiving about stuff like torturing Picard for weeks. Military Starfleet? The Cardassians are going to be much, much more cautious around the Federation after the spanking they'll get. Bajor will probably be much better off because the Cardassians will be loath to, f'rex, spread poison all over vast amounts of their farmland on the way out just for spite, lest they find a battlefleet coming to Cardassia to collect reparations in either goods or blood, Cardassia's choice.

A militarized Federation could take the entire Cardassian empire apart but I question if they'd have the political will to go that far. Frankly they should have just recorded what the heck happened on Bajor (and presumably many other worlds) and done a propaganda blitz about it to drum up outrage and keep going.

3.) Would Section 31 use its power to support such an initiative?
Canon Section 31, I doubt it, the ones in show (Haven't seen recent Discovery) seem to be more like Snidely Whiplash in that they manage to do as much damage to their own side or more as they do the enemy. They act almost cartoonishly evil at times. I think the version the writers were originally going for would oppose militarizing Starfleet because it would become a rival for their own personal power.

Fanon Section 31 that wants to protect the Federation probably would support it.


Robots have a tendency to turn on you in Trek though. M5, Landru, Vaal, Nomad, V'ger, The Doomsday Machine, Lore, Dreadnought, The Arsenal of Freedom, Peanut Hamper (If you accept the cartoon), just off the top of my head. Granted a majority of those were Kirk's era and not every robot is planning to turn on their creators but there are a lot of destroyed civilizations out there, some fairly recent to TNG, that put their trust in automated weapons and then said weapons did a 180. Even "dumb" nonsentient drones like the Cardassian orbital weapons platforms managed to last all of a minute before they got technobabbled in their first appearance. I'm not sure they'd go for combat drones with that kind of history.
A headset controlled robot that only attacks targets you select. No need for AI. Just designate a target and the Robot attacks it.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
A headset controlled robot that only attacks targets you select. No need for AI. Just designate a target and the Robot attacks it.
"We can use the deflector dish to confuse it's aim so that the drone fires 30 degrees off target, hitting it's own target designator."

This is basically what they did to the Cardassian orbital weapons platforms, they used the deflector dish to spoof their targeting system and made the platforms fire on their own controller.
 

Spartan303

In Captain America we Trust!
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Osaul
Finally, it bears repeating that there's no such thing as a "War Galaxy" that was an idiotic bit of fandom dreamt up by SB, and the Gal-X is also not truly canon, though it's closer to being canon than War Galaxies ever were.


The term 'War Galaxy' came about not long after season 5 Episode 'The Way of the Warrior' of DS9. During the Battle of DS9 during the Klingon attack, a task force of 9 Federation Starships came in as a relief force for the besieged station. This Task Force was led by the Venture, which we know to be a Galaxy class Starship. The final scene of the episode shows a Galaxy class docked at DS9 and it looks exactly like this.

latest


This modification alone gives the ship a beefier look. Thus the term War Galaxy came into effect.

Off screen wise, this was the 4ft Enterprise Model that had been modified from the episode 'All Good Things'. The Galaxy X model. They removed the big fuck off canon, the third nacelle and the stabilizer wings, but kept the dorsal phasers. There's nothing else on this modification to the Galaxy design, but as its clear that Starfleet was preparing for war. And given the Galaxy classes dismal performance (and the loss of 3 of them within 7 years of initial launch) It is logical to assume that Starfleet took a long hard look to the class to beef up its tactical performance. We actually see something like this for the Excelsior design with the Lakota refit (which was likely slated fleet wide for the Excelsior class.). There is a lot of wiggle room to debate this. Canon doesn't exactly say there is a War Galaxy class, but it doesn't expressly forbid it, either. And given that the Dominion War Galaxy's became absolute beasts! It is logical to assume that, based on their improved demonstrated performance, they got some serious upgrades.


1) Well, a battlefleet needs three main things:
  • Battleship / heavy combatant
  • Cruiser / main combatant
  • Destroyer / escort
Considering we are talking about a warfleet, I think the best example (albeit accounting for technological difference) would be the new builds which appear after the Wolf 359: Sovereign, Akira and Defiant. So there you have it.

The Sovereign would be an ideal heavy battlecruiser. Its less massive, more streamlined and far more tanky than the Galaxy class. As Commander Saffi Larsen said in Bridge Commander 'An absolutely colossal ship'. I personally believe Starfleet truly got it right with the Sovereign. She's the perfect balance of speed, strength and flexibility.

lIDPBwm.jpg


For a heavy tactical cruiser I'd also go with the Akira. Few ships in Starfleet (aside from Sovereign and Defiant) have the 'I'm gonna fuck your grill up' feel to it quite like the Akira class.

470096c584ac77467d65cd8524e4de97.jpg


But as a workhorse for the Battlefleet I'd probably go with something akin to an Excelsior in terms of size and versatility. It was called the Yorktown class and given the look of it; it shares a lot of technology and co-development with the Sovereign class.

USSRepublic_zps3fbdd2a3.png


For Fast attack ship/Frigate duty I'd alternate between two designs. The Defiant and the Saber class. Both are amazing capable ships that fill all sorts of roles.

76YsJjDGft0DPQcAf0Or6nafHD8Z0bUYYt5yZXWNd5J7O-3Gyhry3XAWD4SDQ4tXhXJSlK43w-g5lU0510TF_yXVWV1_4A


DMP_Saber_D.jpg


And then of course mix it up with Fighters and possibly a Carrier. Maybe take the Typhon class Carrier and beef it up to hold more than 28 of the new Valkyrie class Star fighters.

Typhon-Class.png


images


Just my thoughts.
 

Sailor.X

Cold War Veteran
Founder
"We can use the deflector dish to confuse it's aim so that the drone fires 30 degrees off target, hitting it's own target designator."

This is basically what they did to the Cardassian orbital weapons platforms, they used the deflector dish to spoof their targeting system and made the platforms fire on their own controller.
I am talking about ground units not space units. You blast a ground target with a deflector dish and you will kill EVERYONE on the ground. Their forces included.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
I am talking about ground units not space units. You blast a ground target with a deflector dish and you will kill EVERYONE on the ground. Their forces included.
Well that does seem more reasonable, but even in DS9 remember that the Jem'Hadar deployed invisible smart mines on the ground and the Federation managed to hack them and turn them against the Jem'Hadar. Drones might be viable but it seems like you need organics running a tight rein on any machine every second to keep it from turning/being turned.
 

The Original Sixth

Well-known member
Founder
But if you want to make a real Federation Military you will need lots of attack drones. We are seeing combat robots on the battlefield today. The federation not having them is asinine.

Well, I agree with them having drones. Insurrection proves how easy those are to rig up by a minor power. We also saw them in DS9 in a holosuite demonstration and there was an advanced prototype used by a dead civilization that starfleet defeated. And with the increasing use of drones, we're just simply likely to see them. Especially because Starfleet can program them to attack certain targets just based on life signs. In fact, drones would probably be the most advanced things their ground forces would carry.

And on another point why aren't power armor troops in Starfleet. If the 23rd Century Federation can make a freaking Red Angel suit. They can make a dumbed down none time travel version for units on each Starship.

I don't know about power armor. I don't consider Discovery to be part of the canon. There's also no real requirement that forces us to accept power armor as the future of combat. Unless the armor provided can offset the loss in mobility in a firefight, there's no real point to having them.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
One tech we might see for ground forces is a portable shield generator. I recall in Star Wars Saga Edition there was an astromech droid that could be modified to have a small umbrella shield with about a ten meter radius, just enough to cover the party and prevent "we lost the surprise round" from turning into a TPK. I could see the Federation making something similar, where each squad has a small mobile generator (possibly hover, possibly legged or tracked) and one member is a combat engineer to maintain it. It'd be somewhat niche as it's probably useless indoors but very nice if you've got to protect an area without sufficient cover.

Said generator might also include a tractor beam based on the one Wesley made, in the episode where Data and Tasha Yar decided to sleep with each other (can't recall the episode name offhand). Wesley's version was able to keep anybody from reaching him and he could pick up and move a couch with it. A properly militarized version could dig trenches, move trees and rocks to clear roads or form quick and dirty barriers, and if any enemy is dumb enough to get in range, throw them a few hundred yards.
 

Aldarion

Neoreactionary Monarchist
One tech we might see for ground forces is a portable shield generator. I recall in Star Wars Saga Edition there was an astromech droid that could be modified to have a small umbrella shield with about a ten meter radius, just enough to cover the party and prevent "we lost the surprise round" from turning into a TPK. I could see the Federation making something similar, where each squad has a small mobile generator (possibly hover, possibly legged or tracked) and one member is a combat engineer to maintain it. It'd be somewhat niche as it's probably useless indoors but very nice if you've got to protect an area without sufficient cover.

Something similar already exists. Personal shields are in fact mentioned several times, but we never actually see them, except for the makeshift one Worf uses when holodeck goes crazy.

TNG6-fistful-shield1a.jpg
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
Something similar already exists. Personal shields are in fact mentioned several times, but we never actually see them, except for the makeshift one Worf uses when holodeck goes crazy.

TNG6-fistful-shield1a.jpg
I know personal shields exist but presumably they have some limitations that prevent everybody who isn't the Borg from using them all the time. I haven't seen anything along the lines of a motorcycle to jeep-sized shield generator that would, presumably, provide far better protection and cover a whole squad.
 

Battlegrinder

Someday we will win, no matter what it takes.
Moderator
Staff Member
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Obozny
Again, it is a portrayal. I mean, you can look to LotR for this. How many medieval settings have clean burning fuel for their torches? Because an actual torch would just fill your house/castle with smoke. You use candles and fireplaces to illuminate your home. Or how about the Witcher games? Do you honestly think that not a single fucking person in a village has realized how to cut straight boards and nail them together to make a door that doesn't let in 50% of the wind? Or that no one understands how to use straw or plaster to keep the rain and cold out of their homes? Or that disciplined medieval military units regularly broke rank and jumped into suicidal melee with swords and shields?

Of course not. Any modern fantasy depiction is almost 100% incompetent. Because it's fantasy and it is portraying something.

I feel like that example is a bit of a motte and bailey, though. "This door should designed differently" is a very differant and less controversial claim than "this import set piece battle never happened".

Let's do a thought experiment. You're really knowledgeable about Halo. If we were to take the "this is just a portrayal, they wouldn't do some of this stupid stuff" approach to Halo, what would you apply that to? If you had to look at Halo and say "this doesn't really make any sense" and instead apply a more sound doctrine or technology, what would it be?

Halo Nightfall had UNSC infantry weapons not able to be fired unless they were "powered up", which doesn't make any sense in the context of the wider setting and is never mentioned as an issue ever again......but the problem is, that element was essential to the plot of Nightfall, without it the entire film just wouldn't happen.

The main dorsal array is 20x more powerful than the largest of the smaller arrays that cover the GCS. It's 50x more powerful than half of the small arrays that I mentioned. Those small arrays are never used against capital ships. The only exception was when the Enterprise E was using it to illuminate the Scimitar. In general, they use the ventral or dorsal saucer and I think a few times they use the ventral engineering array. All the others? They don't use them. Even the main ventral engineering saucer is rarely used. Although that's because of the whole "separate the ship" thing didn't work out so well.

Yes, that's true, but on the other hand a torpedo casing is only a few cm thick, vs a meter + for the ship. weapons 1/50 the power of the main gun should still be totally effective against a target 1/100th as sturdy.

See, I don't agree with that take right there.

ST doesn't need people wearing heavy tactical body armor. Again, you can take that down to energy weapons being prevalent so no one actually uses heavy body armor that you might find in a modern setting. You occasionally get some kind of armor with padding (UFP ground forces, Klingon warriors, Cardassian military armor), but you don't need to focus in on that. And in most cases, the show revolves around naval security forces.

My position is to look at trends and tones that the show follows and try to extrapolate the most logical approach a force would take. Let's try that thought experiment on Starfleet, for example. We know that Roddenberry wanted them to be a primarily space-exploration para-military group. And what seemed to drive this was his idea to an "end of history" sort of future, where geopolitics (in this case, astro-politics) have ceased being astro-strategic in nature. Roddenberry even wanted phasers to go from looking like pistols to small vacuum cleaners because he wanted them to look more like tools, not weapons. And everyone was an "officer" and highly educated.

The issue is that logic doesn't work out well when applied in context. Yes, the federation ground forces should be ill equipped and trained...but that means they'll evaporate in conflict with other, better troops, and those high profile failures would force Starfleet to adapt. After Wolf 359 they redesigned their fleet to be more capable of combat, if every serious infantry engagement they fought was a one sided slaughter, they would do the same for infantry.

It stands to reason that torpedo will be able to have much more powerful shields.

Proportionally more powerful, perhaps. But that doesn't mean they'd be immune to weapon fire, it means they would maybe be as strong as, say, a shuttle or other larger ship, while being much smaller. This is why it doesn't matter if they knew the shield frequency in workforce or not, it would have made burning through the shields easier but by no means a requirement.

You do understand that beam weapons move at significant fractions of c? Meaning that, generally speaking, they wouldn't have any trouble shooting either torpedoes or past torpedoes, as necessary?

The beam, yes. The beam emitter, no. They can only traverse as fast as the emitter system can move.

The hypocrisy is strong with this one.

No, you're just invested in seeing me as the dishonest bad guy and aren't thinking thinks through.

You are trying to claim a trend and a general practice, that requires a number of relevant examples to provide enough data to prove that trend is real.

I am trying to claim something is possible, I only need one example of it establish that it is possible.
 

absenceofmalice

Well-known member
Temporarily Banned
Its a flying luxury yacht and small town with weapons tacted on after the fact. The Galaxy class is a symbol of the pacifist Federation hubris if anything. It wasn't until they started getting their teeth kicked in that the Federation started to change. The Sovereign however is a very different beast and is what the Galaxy class should have been.
This is everything wrong with star trek post TNG you people would have seen us blasted to retroactive floatsam by the Q so long as we did it while wearing tac vests.
 

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