It's been interesting, based on my most recent Far Trek gaming experience, that it's quite useful to have clearly defined roles for everyone on the bridge. Having weapons and flight handled separately actually worked quite well. I do feel now like maybe the engineering controls might benefit from being part of the main control panel clusters: the engineers can then handle energy management between shields, engines, weapons ect as they'd be in closer contact with the helm and weapons officer. I feel like maybe some of the more sensor oriented jobs like science could be handled by standing stations that are being hot desked.
Contemplating Alternative Bridge Layouts
- Thread starter Redshirt214
- Start date
The doors to the side make a lot of sense.
And the other three, turbolift "reception" is outside of the bridge compartment, yes?Here are different bridge / auxiliary control / emergency bridge layouts I created while drafting deck plans for a small (100-man crew) cutter:
Top left & middle have a turbolift door on the back wall.
The other doors lead to corridors. The bridge doesn't sit on top of the ship, but rather is embedded with only the nav-sensor dome protruding. You an see the ship (but not the deck plans) in this thread: https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/star-fleet-battles-federation-police-cutter.288135/
Andrew Probert told me back in 2005 that Gene Roddenberry's idea for TNG was that Conn, Ops and the CO could control the ship between them. The other stations would only fill up in the event of a crisis.
This wasn't exactly shown on screen, although they started making more use of the mission-specific stations in the back after Geordi moved to Engineering. Usually we see a full bridge crew in every episode, which is unnecessary. Do both the CO and XO need to be on the bridge 8 hours straight? The counselor? Several people in the back manning "Science" and "Environmental" stations? Probably not.
I agree with what others said earlier here, you would want versatile work stations that could be adapted to whatever the mission is. If you're on a scientific mission, you'd probably want several science officers on the bridge. If you're on yellow alert, you'd probably have crew coming on to monitor sensors and shields and be able to manage damage control, to free up the tactical officer's time.
This wasn't exactly shown on screen, although they started making more use of the mission-specific stations in the back after Geordi moved to Engineering. Usually we see a full bridge crew in every episode, which is unnecessary. Do both the CO and XO need to be on the bridge 8 hours straight? The counselor? Several people in the back manning "Science" and "Environmental" stations? Probably not.
I agree with what others said earlier here, you would want versatile work stations that could be adapted to whatever the mission is. If you're on a scientific mission, you'd probably want several science officers on the bridge. If you're on yellow alert, you'd probably have crew coming on to monitor sensors and shields and be able to manage damage control, to free up the tactical officer's time.
If the ship is properly manned, they CO/XO should never be required to be on the bridge at all (except for during emergencies / combat conditions), because there should be personnel assigned as Watch Officers / Officer Of The Deck to sit in the center seat, thus freeing up the CO / XO to do all the mind-numbing paperwork that comes with command.
Indeed.
One of the two being in the Ready Room/Observation Lounge et al doing "command" stuff so as to be immediately available isn't beyond RW practice (IIRC the RW name for the "Ready Room" is the "Captain's Day Cabin" or "Sea Cabin"?, the "Ready Room" is actually something else).
I'd prefer "Command Office" or something like so that "Ready Room" could be used as part of the "Mission Operations" suite were the dedicated "away team" group (including dedicated endo/exo flight element) hang out so that the main senior staff aren't doing that job all the time.
But in absence of the above, I agree that "Ready Room" for the bridge-level captain's accommodations isn't horrible.
But in absence of the above, I agree that "Ready Room" for the bridge-level captain's accommodations isn't horrible.
Yes, but generally in the former case at least one if not all three of Riker, Data and Worf were already on the bridge while he was doing that, whereas in reality if Picard, Riker or Data is on-call on "Deck 1", then at most Yar/Worf would be on-duty on the bridge itself (because they can do much of their supervisory functions from Tactical), and likely someone like LT Monroe from Disaster, potentially LT Lavelle and LT Andrew Powell would be in-charge during routine operations "in the black", orbital space or docked.
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