At what point should a Starship not be able to do barrel rolls?

[Saul]

The thing I don't like so much about Starships in recent years is their maneuverability. I'm speaking here mostly about 'Enterprise' and 'Discovery', the ships, in particular the Discovery, seem a little too nimble. There is a sense of realism to Starships that move slowly, turn slowly, as if they had a realistic mass to them that would snap if they tried to do any crazy stuff. Of course the Defiant did a lot of spinning and flying around, but she was a small ship, like the millennium falcon in Star Wars. Star Wars has kind of kept to this realism with Star Destroyers moving slow and clumsily. The JJ Trek films too have shown the Enterprise (at times) as a ship that has a real largeness to it that can't maneuver quickly.

So my question is, at what size should a Starship not be able to do a loopdeloop? Is it ok for the NX to do a vertical roll? Or should it be for only smaller ships?

 

[matthunter]

The thing I don't like so much about Starships in recent years is their maneuverability. I'm speaking here mostly about 'Enterprise' and 'Discovery', the ships, in particular the Discovery, seem a little too nimble. There is a sense of realism to Starships that move slowly, turn slowly, as if they had a realistic mass to them that would snap if they tried to do any crazy stuff. Of course the Defiant did a lot of spinning and flying around, but she was a small ship, like the millennium falcon in Star Wars. Star Wars has kind of kept to this realism with Star Destroyers moving slow and clumsily. The JJ Trek films too have shown the Enterprise (at times) as a ship that has a real largeness to it that can't maneuver quickly.

So my question is, at what size should a Starship not be able to do a loopdeloop? Is it ok for the NX to do a vertical roll? Or should it be for only smaller ships?

These are ships that can go to 0.25c in a matter of seconds without pancaking their hulls or inhabitants. A barrel roll isn't a "crazy maneuver" compared to that shit.

 

[Relayer1]

Inertial dampers would presumably give a starship the maneuverability of a fighter, cancelling the effects of it's mass and acceleration.

 

[miccaferoc]

Barrel rolling in zero gravity is a very different prospect to what a fighter has to accomplish in an atmosphere. Of course in space what is up and what is down?

But in the spirit of your question: i'd say Intrepid-Class yes, Galaxy-Class no!

 

[Timo]

I'd like to think that the larger the ship, the more power it has for the doodads that make spaceobatics possible. So a Galaxy ought to outmaneuver one of those fightercraft in all flight realms - impulse, warp, atmosphere.

It's much the same today already, in certain surprising categories: a brute-force F-15 is much more agile than the "nimble" F-16 thanks to the former's twin engines and big wing.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

The Defiant was shown pulling off some tight manoeuvres, but she is designed for combat.

 

[feek61]

Starships should never move like a fighter: period!

 

[C.E. Evans]

I don't think there's anything wrong with a Galaxy- or Sovereign-class ship doing a barrel roll or a loop-the-loop, but I tend to think such instances are just rare for ships that big, IMO. I think such maneuvers are generally reserved for instances in which shields have been compromised and a big ship is doing every thing it can to evade taking major hits. Getting a better firing solution on an also moving target is also a possibility, but most ships can fire from multiple angles.

 

[Timo]

The Defiant was shown pulling off some tight manoeuvres, but she is designed for combat.

The fun thing is that those maneuvers were of zero help in dodging enemy fire...

How are we supposed to tell which ships are maneuverable and which are not when the captains know that maneuvering does no good?

The Defiant is somewhat uniquely limited by her forward-facing guns, and forced to maneuver to bring those to bear. The Enterprise has little excuse for turning around while fighting, apart from said directional shield loss issue...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Leathco]

At the speed these ships are fighting (near light speed phasers, and tracking photon torpedos), barrel rolls and what not should not matter. In my opinion, combat efficiency is limited not by the ships mechanical structure or physics, but by the slow speed of orders given and confirmed and executed.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

The thing I don't like so much about Starships in recent years is their maneuverability. I'm speaking here mostly about 'Enterprise' and 'Discovery', the ships, in particular the Discovery, seem a little too nimble. There is a sense of realism to Starships that move slowly, turn slowly, as if they had a realistic mass to them that would snap if they tried to do any crazy stuff. Of course the Defiant did a lot of spinning and flying around, but she was a small ship, like the millennium falcon in Star Wars. Star Wars has kind of kept to this realism with Star Destroyers moving slow and clumsily. The JJ Trek films too have shown the Enterprise (at times) as a ship that has a real largeness to it that can't maneuver quickly.

So my question is, at what size should a Starship not be able to do a loopdeloop? Is it ok for the NX to do a vertical roll? Or should it be for only smaller ships?

Literally ANY starship or space craft in Star Trek can do those kinds of maneuvers. It's just a question of how QUICKLY they can do it.

A very maneuverable ship could yaw 180 degrees in, say, 4 to 6 seconds while something larger like a Galaxy class might take 10 or 12. If you define a "loop de loop" as a Z-axis pitching motion combined with constant acceleration, then smaller ships with less inertia could pull it off in a few seconds where larger ships might take longer.

Larger ships will have larger engines and will be able to accelerate just about as quickly as smaller ones in most cases, but having more mass means they'll generally be harder to turn and also harder to STOP turning, which puts an upper limit to how quickly they can swing around and point their engines in the proper direction for vector changes. Warp engines don't seem to have this problem, but then ever since TOS, warp engines haven't really been used for combat maneuvers all that much so it's almost a non-issue.

 

[psCargile]

It depends on the output of your RCS thrusters for any ship of any mass. If the thrust is weak, pivots around the center of mass will be slow. If thrust is strong, the rotation rate will be quicker. It really is as simple as the laws of levers.

 

[STR]

Did you know airliners (as in, just about all models flying today) can physically do barrel rolls? A proper barrel roll is a ~1G load on the airframe, which makes no more stressful than flying in a straight line. To answer the title: never. That is not a hard manuever.

However, aircraft are limited by gravity (and the need to produce lift), air resistance, and the fact that thinning air limits thrust and manueverability and the ground limits how low you can go. A 747 could do a vertical loop with enough height, low enough weight and enough air to maintain thrust and control. Lower gravity might help too. It's not a control surface or structural limit issue.

A space ship, freed from air and gravity, is only limited by its propulsive systems and structural limits. Given that the Enterprise-D was shown being able to pivot around 180 degrees in ~3 seconds (which is really fast, especially for something that big) the real question is why it wasn't shown doing it more often. Of course, the answer is motion capture filming wasn't up to the task on a TV budget.

Not to go Trek v Wars, but the starship Enterprise has always had the manueverability of the Falcon despite a mass closer to an Imperial capital ship.

 

[tharpdevenport]

A barrel roll for a Galaxy-class vessel seems to be a bad move, unless you are moving with an enemy ship circling around you. The saucer section is a large target and if you barrel roll, you expose wider profile area to get hit. Facing your firing target or attacking ship gives a lower profile -- less to hit. Indeed, with the way the nacelle pylons are angled, fire can pass betwixt them and the hull; we saw this Generations, as I recall.

Just because a ship can, doesn't mean it should.

 

[Timo]

On the other hand, presenting the "barn door" view to the enemy is the same as confronting him with a broadside.

When the saucer is maximally exposed, so are the phaser strips (or, in the earlier days, the rings of turrets). You get better firing solutions, and you get the option of firing multiple beams from your strip towards the single target - not just two or four, but perhaps twenty if you wish. Not that anybody usually would...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Saul]

Inertial dampers would presumably give a starship the maneuverability of a fighter, cancelling the effects of it's mass and acceleration.

True that, but most of the time the ships have been treated as something with a bit more heft, visually at least so I always have a hard time as seeing them as anything more.

Did you know airliners (as in, just about all models flying today) can physically do barrel rolls? A proper barrel roll is a ~1G load on the airframe, which makes no more stressful than flying in a straight line. To answer the title: never. That is not a hard manuever.

I remember Denzel Washington did that in the movie 'Flight'.

Given that the Enterprise-D was shown being able to pivot around 180 degrees in ~3 seconds..

I had forgotten about that. I remember the USS Discovery doing a similar move in episode 9 and I just found it weird with the long nacelles are everything.


I guess a better question to ask is this. With the better visual effects would any of you want to see a Starship do barrel rolls more? Or would you prefer to keep the Captain Horatio Hornblower ship in the sea vibe?

 

[STR]

I remember Denzel Washington did that in the movie 'Flight'.

Tex Johnson did it for real.

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Also, this A400M transport. It's a military lifter, so it's got a bit more power than a typical airliner, but there's full size airliners (757, smaller variants of the 777) that could probably pull this off without a payload or full fuel load.

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I guess a better question to ask is this. With the better visual effects would any of you want to see a Starship do barrel rolls more? Or would you prefer to keep the Captain Horatio Hornblower ship in the sea vibe?

Well, a starship has no need to barrel roll outside of "aerobatic" displays. To your larger question of "how should these things look?" I'd prefer something that matches the dialog and stated capabilities better and more consistently. The ships should be far apart, moving extremely fast, and making few (but abrupt and deliberate) manuevers. They shouldn't look like a tween playing Ace Combat on their PlayStation.

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

The E-D executes a fantastic roll as she barely scrapes through a closing Dyson Sphere door in "Relics". She also STOPS rolling when she has to. none of that conservation of momentum nonsense here!

Mark

 

[Deks]

Starships in Trek (and most notably in the Federation) project a subspace field around themselves.
We've seen in DS9 opening episode that this approach was used to lower DS9's mass so the station could be moved to the Wormhole in a short period of time on thrusters only.

O'brien balked at the idea initially because he said 'this isn't a starship'... indicating that ships typically use this method to lower their mass and gain exceptionally high maneuverability (comparable to those found on fighter craft).
The inertial dampers merely dampen inertia from extreme velocities and prevent people from ending up splattered across bulkheads... though we've seen instances where inertial dampers fail, and ships were still employing high speed maneuvers.. possibly indicating that there's more than just inertial dampers that prevent 'splattering' of people (or just bad writing which ends up disabling the dampers just to have something 'fail' in the middle of combat).

 

[Saul]

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In the Riker maneuver here the crew are leaning as the ship is turning. Shouldn't the Inertial dampers be kicking in for that? How many cups were broken here?