Her nacelle pylons end at the engines in a single piece, but there are four pylons (two sets of them) that intersect from the top and bottom of engineering, which is weird itself. They don't look like they can move or fold to allow the ship to land in any way. But the Shenzhou has no trouble dipping all the way down to only a few hundred feet above the group and hovering with thrusters, then just sailing off like the 1701 did in Into Darkness.
The twitter readouts showed her reactor core wireframe, two "loaded" forward torpedo tubes with little missile icons (the special effects of her torps at the BotBS's and Discovery's from scuttling the Glenn are identical but...cost and all that), and a readout of her warp as "Warp 6, 392c, 100%" with a status bar showing her at maximum output. The top end of the bar is red, which along with 100% kind of points to it being the literal top speed.
Which is fine, too many ships kept trying to be the fastest last time. I just find the seriously smooth topside of the ship odd, with only the fins to stick out. And maybe the Intrepid type could do it too, the Rise of the Federation novels have the Pioneer do at least one atmospheric flight. It's the gravity of the gas giant that causes them not to have enough thrust.
Burnham only wanted to aim something at the Klingons, not so little they ignored it or so powerful it prompted an immediate attack. She asks only to point the phase cannons at them to make them show themselves. A phaser or torpedo lock might have been too much too soon.
When the phasers and disruptors hit hulls, they create weird plumes of fire, but no scorching or hull breaches early on, the bolt itself seems to erupt into fire on impact. I haven't read the tie in novel, but the Enterprise is said to have full beam phasers while the Shenzhou keeps firing burst, with little difference in power.
As for her appearance and age, Starfleet's obviously been upgrading the class over the years and Phillipa simply implies the ship is aging at nearing the end of it's usefulness. Maybe it was back nearer Earth and Vulcan picking people up after a refit meant to give another 10 years. (Just short of retirement...)
The bay door is right at the back and doesn't look all that weird, the NX-01 had small bays at the back to let the inspection pods out, Shenzhou could have had more doors we didn't see to deploy the bees etc. I think The Motion Picture had bees going back and forwards from the shuttlebay though.
The 45-ish degree offset of the impulse engines isn't typical. The Sovereigns I think were sort of arranged that way (only flatter, more internal).
The Eaglemoss magazine next year should clear a lot of it up.
The twitter readouts showed her reactor core wireframe, two "loaded" forward torpedo tubes with little missile icons (the special effects of her torps at the BotBS's and Discovery's from scuttling the Glenn are identical but...cost and all that), and a readout of her warp as "Warp 6, 392c, 100%" with a status bar showing her at maximum output. The top end of the bar is red, which along with 100% kind of points to it being the literal top speed.
Which is fine, too many ships kept trying to be the fastest last time. I just find the seriously smooth topside of the ship odd, with only the fins to stick out. And maybe the Intrepid type could do it too, the Rise of the Federation novels have the Pioneer do at least one atmospheric flight. It's the gravity of the gas giant that causes them not to have enough thrust.
Burnham only wanted to aim something at the Klingons, not so little they ignored it or so powerful it prompted an immediate attack. She asks only to point the phase cannons at them to make them show themselves. A phaser or torpedo lock might have been too much too soon.
When the phasers and disruptors hit hulls, they create weird plumes of fire, but no scorching or hull breaches early on, the bolt itself seems to erupt into fire on impact. I haven't read the tie in novel, but the Enterprise is said to have full beam phasers while the Shenzhou keeps firing burst, with little difference in power.
As for her appearance and age, Starfleet's obviously been upgrading the class over the years and Phillipa simply implies the ship is aging at nearing the end of it's usefulness. Maybe it was back nearer Earth and Vulcan picking people up after a refit meant to give another 10 years. (Just short of retirement...)
The bay door is right at the back and doesn't look all that weird, the NX-01 had small bays at the back to let the inspection pods out, Shenzhou could have had more doors we didn't see to deploy the bees etc. I think The Motion Picture had bees going back and forwards from the shuttlebay though.
The 45-ish degree offset of the impulse engines isn't typical. The Sovereigns I think were sort of arranged that way (only flatter, more internal).
The Eaglemoss magazine next year should clear a lot of it up.
