how did the Defiant survive?

[The Wormhole]

^^The Defiant usually had a crew of 40. I'm not sure crew compliment of an Akira class, but a Galaxy has around 1000 and a Nebula 900.

 

[Kemaiku]

I'm guessing it wouldn't take an enormous amount of time familiarising the crew with the ships systems, only the Prometheus had such a high learning curve that so few people could man her.

The Defiant class has much more conventional technology, especially in a full production run model. At 40-50 personnel per ship, a full production of 18 ships is 810 (45x18) which is less than one Nebula class.

I don't really see any problem with the class being manufactured at around 3 per year, 45 personnel each.

 

[bullethead]

I'm guessing it wouldn't take an enormous amount of time familiarising the crew with the ships systems, only the Prometheus had such a high learning curve that so few people could man her.

The Defiant class has much more conventional technology, especially in a full production run model. At 40-50 personnel per ship, a full production of 18 ships is 810 (45x18) which is less than one Nebula class.

I don't really see any problem with the class being manufactured at around 3 per year, 45 personnel each.

Three per year is an absurdly low number considering the breadth and scope of the Federation though. Especially when you take into account the fact that the Mirror Universe Defiant was built in like a year and a half by a bunch of people operating out of a space station with no real construction equipment to pretty much the same quality as the original Defiant. If it's that easy to build the freaking ship, then the Federation should be spamming Defiants at the same rate America put out destroyers in WWII.

 

[cwl]

the American WW2 Destroyer analogy is a good one. I agree, I imagine Starfleet would produce the Defiant at a similarly high rate.

 

[Timo]

Yet it's difficult to get around the fact that old ship types predominate in DS9 fleets.

Perhaps it's easy to build a starship, but nigh-impossible to cast a warp coil - so starship production suffers from bottlenecks similar to the building of battleships and some lesser vessels in the early 20th century, with gunbarrels in extremely short supply and great demand.

Doubtful. The class is task specific.

This argument is somewhat undermined by the fact that the class designed specifically to fight the Borg actually ended up doing armed recce and some escorting, very successfully at that. The best we can argue is that the class is unsuited for some tasks, but it doesn't appear to limited to just a single one.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[CoveTom]

As it was already mentioned, there were numerous factors at work here.
The movie producers wanted to destroy the Defiant, but Ds9 producers didn't want that and threatened with showing the Defiant as intact in the next episode as if it was never destroyed.

I've seen this mentioned before, but I don't find it believable. The head honcho of First Contact was Rick Berman. The head honcho of DS9 was... Rick Berman. Yes, Ira Steven Behr may have been the showrunner and managed the day-to-day operations of DS9, but he ultimately reported to Berman. It's not like he could have just thumbed his nose at Berman and done something completely contrary to the movie. Neither Berman, nor Paramount, would have stood for that.

 

[Saquist]

Yet it's difficult to get around the fact that old ship types predominate in DS9 fleets.

Perhaps it's easy to build a starship, but nigh-impossible to cast a warp coil - so starship production suffers from bottlenecks similar to the building of battleships and some lesser vessels in the early 20th century, with gunbarrels in extremely short supply and great demand.

Doubtful. The class is task specific.

This argument is somewhat undermined by the fact that the class designed specifically to fight the Borg actually ended up doing armed recce and some escorting, very successfully at that. The best we can argue is that the class is unsuited for some tasks, but it doesn't appear to limited to just a single one.

Timo Saloniemi

As long as the task does not exceed the ships weapons and defenses it's negligible.

 

[Anwar]

As it was already mentioned, there were numerous factors at work here.
The movie producers wanted to destroy the Defiant, but Ds9 producers didn't want that and threatened with showing the Defiant as intact in the next episode as if it was never destroyed.

I've seen this mentioned before, but I don't find it believable. The head honcho of First Contact was Rick Berman. The head honcho of DS9 was... Rick Berman. Yes, Ira Steven Behr may have been the showrunner and managed the day-to-day operations of DS9, but he ultimately reported to Berman. It's not like he could have just thumbed his nose at Berman and done something completely contrary to the movie. Neither Berman, nor Paramount, would have stood for that.

And besides, Ron Moore co-wrote FC so you'd think he would've objected to it too (unless it was his idea).

Behr blamed Berman for a lot of stuff and showed little appreciation for any good Berman did, wouldn't surprise me if this is just another exaggeration.

 

[Timo]

As long as the task does not exceed the ships weapons and defenses it's negligible.

Huh?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Saquist]

As long as the task does not exceed the ships weapons and defenses it's negligible.

Huh?

Timo Saloniemi

I'll need more articulation for a proper reply.

 

[Timo]

All right, go get some, then. I'll be waiting.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I'm guessing it wouldn't take an enormous amount of time familiarising the crew with the ships systems, only the Prometheus had such a high learning curve that so few people could man her.

The Defiant class has much more conventional technology, especially in a full production run model. At 40-50 personnel per ship, a full production of 18 ships is 810 (45x18) which is less than one Nebula class.

I don't really see any problem with the class being manufactured at around 3 per year, 45 personnel each.

Three per year is an absurdly low number considering the breadth and scope of the Federation though. Especially when you take into account the fact that the Mirror Universe Defiant was built in like a year and a half by a bunch of people operating out of a space station with no real construction equipment to pretty much the same quality as the original Defiant. If it's that easy to build the freaking ship, then the Federation should be spamming Defiants at the same rate America put out destroyers in WWII.

I'm sure the main reason the ISS Defiant (yes, that is what it's called - just look at this ) looked so much like the real one is just because of budgets. Meaning, it would be easier to simply use stock footage of the ship, plus virtually unaltered interiors, because it would cost too much for the set designers to make any drastic changes.

The "real" ISS Defiant probably would have looked much more threadbare.

 

[Saxman1]

None of the TNG movies happened anyway. (Kidding.....maybe)

I more often than not like to think that is true.

 

[bullethead]

I'm guessing it wouldn't take an enormous amount of time familiarising the crew with the ships systems, only the Prometheus had such a high learning curve that so few people could man her.

The Defiant class has much more conventional technology, especially in a full production run model. At 40-50 personnel per ship, a full production of 18 ships is 810 (45x18) which is less than one Nebula class.

I don't really see any problem with the class being manufactured at around 3 per year, 45 personnel each.

Three per year is an absurdly low number considering the breadth and scope of the Federation though. Especially when you take into account the fact that the Mirror Universe Defiant was built in like a year and a half by a bunch of people operating out of a space station with no real construction equipment to pretty much the same quality as the original Defiant. If it's that easy to build the freaking ship, then the Federation should be spamming Defiants at the same rate America put out destroyers in WWII.

I'm sure the main reason the ISS Defiant (yes, that is what it's called - just look at this ) looked so much like the real one is just because of budgets. Meaning, it would be easier to simply use stock footage of the ship, plus virtually unaltered interiors, because it would cost too much for the set designers to make any drastic changes.

The "real" ISS Defiant probably would have looked much more threadbare.

The ship's look doesn't matter. What does is the fact that they managed to build the spaceframe and get it to replicate the combat performance of the original, despite being built in a short amount of time without proper facilities or personnel.

 

[Deks]

Who says that they hadn't had proper facilities or personnel for the job?
The rebels had to have engineering capabilities in order to run and maintain the station for one thing.
Furthermore, I would surmise that any Starbase (which DS9 in the 'good' universe) would have the resources to construct a ship.

Terrok Nor could have been reasonably armed in the first place.
The Cardasssians stripped Ds9 though on their departure, but Terrok Nor... they didn't get this chance.
So it's weapons could have already been adequate (not on the level of DS9, but still...).

 

[jpch]

Well she was the first ship created for pure tactical purposes. its small size allows it to maneuver any other ship. plus we saw on screen evidence that she possessed ablative hull armor.

 

[Timo]

...Although once again it should be pointed out that we have no real evidence that she would be the first pure warship; her maneuverability has been matched by other vessels, and usually to no avail because enemy targeting systems easily cope; and the presence of ablative armor is not explicitly limited to her (although some dialogue from "Paradise Lost" might indeed suggest the armor is rarely found anywhere else).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Kemaiku]

Warship or not, I don't see a problem with a high-ish turnout of the class, I'm assuming they're deployed mainly to deep-space or frontline operations that spread them out and limit the number of them that can assemble for any mission, meaning we see very few of them.

Given that the Sovereign is meant to have certain hull sections coated in the armour (only in tech manual books etc not mentioned onscreen) I think it's becoming a more widely used item now that the Defiant has successfully tested it.

 

[Timo]

FWIW, the TNG Tech Manual also indicated the E-D had this sort of coating already. Might be it has always been there, only in varying thicknesses: at times, it has been felt that it serves as adequate combat armor, while at other times the rat race between weapons and protection has reduced it into mere meteoroid protection.

Timo Saloniemi