How Would You Modify the Sovereign Class?

[Dayton3]

Lets say the the powers that be wanted to make a new Trek series.

That they wanted to set it aboard the Sovereign class Enterprise-E about 10 years after Star Trek: Nemesis (so they could show some members of the original cast handing the ship to the new crew perhaps).

But they wanted the Enterprise-E to look somewhat upgraded from that seen in the three movies it appeared in.

How would you change it?

 

[SonicRanger]

Third nacelle. Maybe a fourth or fifth nacelle too.

Super phaser cannon ("Borg Killer") mounted under the saucer.

Whatever that Bat armor was from VOY Endgame was called.

Make the nacelles move up and down, too, like Voyager's.

Add a few more decks, maybe up to 32 or 47 decks.

That would be awesome.

 

[Captain X]

I'd get rid of all those ridiculous additional torpedo tubes in favor of the original 5.

 

[JNG]

Third nacelle. Maybe a fourth or fifth nacelle too.

Super phaser cannon ("Borg Killer") mounted under the saucer.

Whatever that Bat armor was from VOY Endgame was called.

Make the nacelles move up and down, too, like Voyager's.

Add a few more decks, maybe up to 32 or 47 decks.

That would be awesome.

But seriously...saving that design is a tall order. The "stretched=speedy" BS was a mistake from the beginning, the captain's yacht and forward torpedo launcher are sandwiched impractically, and as Captain X has pointed out, the extra torpedo launchers are hard to make sense of. If the overall look had been supremely compelling, it would be possible to overlook mistakes like this, but good tech and a cool look can support each other and the absence of one sure doesn't help the other.

I guess I'd have the ship change appearance radically, and in the story, the class of ships would have been mostly a failure, explaining the fact that we've only ever seen two and that they seemed to be kept out of frontline battle in the Dominion War. Enterprise-E could be reassigned as a technology testbed, so cool "new" gadgets could rotate in and out of the story--and, naturally, get her into trouble.

 

[Captain X]

Speaking of the yacht, if they absolutely had to have it (out of tradition I guess), I'd stick it in that scooped out area at the back, so it would actually be stored in with the other shuttles for that fan-tail shuttlebay, but pop out of the bottom since it'd probably be too big to go through all the elevators and such to launch like a regular shuttle.

 

[Blip]

Oh boy, what wouldn't I change? Here goes:

1) Replace the pylons with ones that sweep forward instead of back, and lower them so that the nacelles are slightly below the rim of the saucer. Possibly elongate them to move the nacelles out beyond the saucer diameter, thus avoiding the risk of the "turkey" appearance that John Eaves has mentioned in the past...
2) Fix the underside of the Primary Hull by smoothing over the pointless stepped "plating", and removing the triangular homages to the original NCC1701. They have no purpose.
3) Replace the nacelles with a pair that look a little beefier and less "christmas tree ornament" Darken the Bussard Collectors with only a faint glow deep inside, and either decrease or remove entirely the gigantic blue warp field grills, replacing them with something a bit more akin to the E-D.
4) Add extra p/s shuttlebays in place of the existing (ridiculously large) impulse engines, as per one of the original concepts.
5) Remove the torpedo launcher from the saucer and replace the yacht with something more like the Galaxy version (only end-on, and with built-in nacelles)
6) Have one large door for the main shuttlebay like the E-D had (instead of three small ones).
7) Replace the deflector array with an oval, blue one (honestly, do we need a different colour of the rainbow for every farking component that glows?!) Add a similar auxiliary deflector to the forward saucer.
8) Remove the pointless black/grey panels. To paraphrase Kirk, "What does Enterprise need with a Kewl paint job?"
9) Smooth over the top of the saucer to eliminate the topside stepping.
10) Add a couple of smaller impulse drives on the rim of the saucer ala Ent-D, directly underneath the auxiliary shuttlebays.
11) Remove the aft shuttlebay clamshell - it looks anachronistic. Replace it with p/s doors on either side of the hull (since the pylons now sweep forward there's no obstruction) for a "drive-thru" bay to allow quicker personnel/equipment transfers.
12) Include impulse drives on the pylons similar to Voyager's. Not sure which ones I'd keep active as the main drives though...
13) Make the interior Deck 1 and external hull shapes match up properly.
14) Include a new "Ten-Forward" lounge or similar - with some truly huge windows for views.
15) Stick in a visible set of Arboretum viewports somewhere.
16) Possibly (and this is only a slim chance!) stick in some small "pulse phasers" at unobtrusive spots along the hull, for point-defence and other purposes. Better than umpteen torpedo launchers...
17) Add better RCS thruster coverage around the engineering hull.

I think that's everything (for the exterior anyway) I once did a manip to show these changes, but I've gone and lost it since I cleared out my system.. meh.

 

[HRHTheKING]

I'd blow it up and replace it with something completely different because the current design is beyond salvation.

 

[candida]

Oh boy, what wouldn't I change? Here goes:
10) Add a couple of smaller impulse drives on the rim of the saucer ala Ent-D, directly underneath the auxiliary shuttlebays.

The purpose being to fry anyone who tried to steal a shuttle when the ship was under way ?

 

[Cary L. Brown]

Overall, I'm not nearly as hostile to the Sovereign design as many other folks are. I see it as workable with minimal design changes.

I definitely think it LOOKS good... it just looks (as I've said before) to be designed more for looks and less for functionality. I've referred to this in the past as "design by graphic artist" instead of "design by engineer" and gotten some rather nasty responses from some of the artist-types who post here... but that's not a flame at all. Proberts work, and Jeffries' work, both are "design by engineer" even though both of those guys are/were primarily graphic guys. When I say that, I mean that that form must follow function... if you want something there, you have to at least have some plausible reason for WHY, even if the real reason is "because it looks cool."

Eaves' design fails on that level. It's a bunch of details, and worse yet a bunch of COLOR VARIATIONS, with no logic, no rhyme or reason, behind them.

SO... I'd revise the design to fix the things that absolutely don't work from a logical/technical standpoint, but I'd keep the overall configuration.

(1) I really LIKE the warp nacelle design, overall, but I'm a huge fan of symmetry. I'd put them so that they're symmetric to the centerline of the ship, not at 90 degrees from being symmetric. See what I've done on my "Vega" (my avatar) for an example of this.

(2) I like the warp nacelle pylons... other than the goofy "graphic arts" color variations (which I'd make far more subtle) I'd leave them exactly as they are.

(3) I like the "old style" secondary hangar bay... but the doors, as designed, are utterly non-functional. They need to be replaced with doors that can actually OPERATE (like the TOS and TMP versions had)

(4) I overall like the design of the saucer and of the engineering hull... the shapes, at least. But, as mentioned above, the ludicrous "looks kewl but makes no sense" color scheme and worse, the nonsensical "stair-stepping" all over the underside and the "notching" on the topside perimeter would need to go. If a "step" is less than a deck deep... there's NO RATIONAL JUSTIFICATION for putting it there. The exterior should be arranged to allow a practical INTERIOR to fit into it. Any "steps" would be there to allow windows or equipment lateral access... there's no other justification for it. Remember, every "notch" in any mechanical design WEAKENS that design dramatically.

(5) The escape pod "platforms" seem... over-drawn? I like the assymmetrical-hexagon pods (I've used that general arrangement in my Vega, too), but the dark grey "trim" around the clusters, and the little yellow "accents" in between them... seriously, what's the POINT, other than "making it look kewl?"

(6) The deflector "dish" isn't facing forward... HUH? I'd scallop out that area a bit more deeply, and give us a dish that actually is aligned with the intended direction of travel of the ship. That's something that most people would never even notice as a change, but it would make the design make a lot more sense. After all... this is the "sweeper" that cleans the garbage out of the ship's path, right? Shouldn't it point forward???

(7) The "Yacht." BAD IDEA, and not (for the record) part of the original design concept. I'd remove that entire area of detail. I'd replace it with something that didn't hang down quite so far (since the current one actually hangs down into the path of the deflector beam!) and have it be a simple sensor array... eliminate both the torpedo launcher AND the yacht from that location. If you really want a "yacht," I'd make it FLUSH MOUNTED in the area just aft of the "bump" which was originally the quantum torpedo launcher and got "transformed" into the yacht for "Insurrection."

(8 ) And my BIGGIE... FIX THE DAMNED IMPULSE ENGINES! I absolutely HATE how it's been done here... it's really unforgiveably DUMB. For the record, the original design had a big central impulse engine in the middle and two hangars on either side... that got changed at the dictate of the Beebs, so I don't really blame Eaves for this.

I would totally eliminate the details which currently represent the impulse engines. Just have smooth hull there.

I'd put a pair of small hangars on either side of the primary hull, exactly to port and starboard at the fore-to-aft centerline... sized somewhat like what you see with the impulse engines (which were, remember, originally hangars anyway!) I would have them have generally vertical doors (inset from the hull curvature) rather than some ludicrous deeply-slanted surface like Eaves has there.

The area where the saucer hangar bay, and the would external area just aft of there, would get changed. I'd basically extend an extruded shape aft of there, well past the extent of the saucer's theoretical "oval" edge back there. I'd put a dual-impulse exhaust at the aft end of that. You know, put the engines someplace where they can operate and provide thrust without burning off the paint (and plating, and structure) from the nacelles or nacelle pylons? AND where they have at least a little bit of ability to vector thrust.

I'd also put another pair of impulse engines... smaller, but with a great deal of ability to vector up and down, on the trailing edges of the warp nacelle pylons. And a pair of BRAKING ENGINES on the leading edges of the pylons as well. This is all stuff I did on the Vega. I did it because I was thinking through how to make the ship actually MANEUVERABLE... and this would make for a very manueverable ship at sublight.


Now, I just had to respond to "Blip's" comments:

Oh boy, what wouldn't I change? Here goes:

1) Replace the pylons with ones that sweep forward instead of back, and lower them so that the nacelles are slightly below the rim of the saucer. Possibly elongate them to move the nacelles out beyond the saucer diameter, thus avoiding the risk of the "turkey" appearance that John Eaves has mentioned in the past...

What rationale would you have for making them forward-swept (which would make them weaker)? On the other hand, putting them OUTBOARD of the saucer only makes sense. That, combined with the "lateral symmetry" thing I mentioned above, is actually what I did on my Vega, and you can see what it looks like in my avatar. I'd like that on a Sovereign... but I suspect lots of people wouldn't.

2) Fix the underside of the Primary Hull by smoothing over the pointless stepped "plating", and removing the triangular homages to the original NCC1701. They have no purpose.

I agree on the plating. But I'd leave the triangle... and just GIVE them a purpose.

Again, on my Vega, you can see a pair of yellow-tan triangles on the underside of the saucer. I made those the primary transporter emitters. It's an homage... but it's an homage which serves a functional purpose.

3) Replace the nacelles with a pair that look a little beefier and less "christmas tree ornament" Darken the Bussard Collectors with only a faint glow deep inside, and either decrease or remove entirely the gigantic blue warp field grills, replacing them with something a bit more akin to the E-D.

BLECH. As much as I respect Andrew Probert's work on the 1701D, I hate... HATE HATE HATE... those ugly "weather balloon" nacelles. The bussard collectors could look like you suggest, sometimes, though... I've always wanted to see the appearance of the collectors be something besides "spinny lights" or "bright red LEDs" and actually resemble gas being collected (and becoming superheated as it's collected... meaning it would be very much flame-like, even without actual combustion occurring). If the ship's moving fast... lots of activity there. If it's stationary in space... they should be dark (and basically look like the pilot TOS E domes).

As for the "blue grills", I think of those as the main heat-rejection system for the main power system... they're the RADIATOR, and you can't just get rid of the radiator on your car and keep it operating, can you? Particularly if they're on the outboard surface (rather than both on the topside surface) they make good sense. But they should alter appearance based upon how "hot" the ship is... if it's stationary, they should be dark (copper tubing over a black ceramic substrate). If it's moving at low impulse, the copper tubing would glow a slight "dark orange" tint. If the ship is in full combat conditions, at high warp, whatever... they'd be a super-hot brilliant blue.

4) Add extra p/s shuttlebays in place of the existing (ridiculously large) impulse engines, as per one of the original concepts.

See my comments above, but yeah, we're on the same page.

5) Remove the torpedo launcher from the saucer and replace the yacht with something more like the Galaxy version (only end-on, and with built-in nacelles)

Same basic page here, see above.

6) Have one large door for the main shuttlebay like the E-D had (instead of three small ones).

You're obviously a TNG-guy, huh? I hate the very IDEA that you'd put the shuttle bay in the CORE of the ship. Shuttle facilities should be on the perimeter, not "inset" like it is here. I got why Andrew put it where he did on the TNG E, but I never really liked it... and the insistence that the post-TNG E needed to share that feature really damaged the design, IMHO. The Beebs were so in love with their own show that they were closed to the IDEA of doing things differently... which is what killed latter-day Trek, as far as I'm concerned.

7) Replace the deflector array with an oval, blue one (honestly, do we need a different colour of the rainbow for every farking component that glows?!) Add a similar auxiliary deflector to the forward saucer.

Other than "It's what they did on TNG..." WHY? Seriously? Why "oval?" Why "blue?"

Make it coppery, and let it do as the TMP one did... (start off dimmed, start glowing dim orangeish when it starts operating, and if it's running HOT, let it be blue. I HATE the whole "ship design by whatever color of LED we have on the shelf today" concept that Trek fell into. It's a CLICHE... and it's a bad one. "Blue LED" doesn't mean "deflector" and "Red LED" doesn't mean "Bussard collector." It's visual "formula" and it's a bad thing, IMHO.

And unless there's a compelling reason (not "graphic arts" based but TECHNICALLY based) for having an oval, rather than a circular parabolic, dish... make it circular (as it was) and parabolic (as the TOS and TMP ones were but this one wasn't) and ALIGN IT WITH THE FREAKIN' AXIS OF THE SHIP'S TRAVEL! It's a tool... a MECHANISM... not a christmas light!

8) Remove the pointless black/grey panels. To paraphrase Kirk, "What does Enterprise need with a Kewl paint job?"

Agreed... some variation may have justification... (ie, Probert's refit E and Galaxy both had color variations which represented removable panels or "hazard areas" or radiator elements or whatever. Give the color variations a JUSTIFICATION, or eliminate them.

9) Smooth over the top of the saucer to eliminate the topside stepping.

I don't see a lot on the TOPSIDE that doesn't make sense... while I'd have left the "arrowhead" shape out, there's no real harm from that, si I' leave it alone as viewed from above, but I'd make the exterior (and especially the windows) LINE UP WITH A RATIONAL INTERNAL DECK STRUCTURE. I mean... SHEESH... does the ship really have "curved decks" inside?

10) Add a couple of smaller impulse drives on the rim of the saucer ala Ent-D, directly underneath the auxiliary shuttlebays.

See my argument re: revising the impulse engines. The problem with what you suggest is that you'd still be burning off paint, plating, etc, with that. You need at LEAST a 5-degree ability to vector thrust from any engine without hitting any part of the rest of the ship... and if you look at the ship from behind and you see something in front (or rather, behind) the impulse exhaust... it's a BAD DESIGN. What you suggest might seem to make sense, but it's an even worse solution that the one we got from that perspective.

11) Remove the aft shuttlebay clamshell - it looks anachronistic. Replace it with p/s doors on either side of the hull (since the pylons now sweep forward there's no obstruction) for a "drive-thru" bay to allow quicker personnel/equipment transfers.

It doesn't look "anachronistic. You're just biased towards your TNG-era pedigree (no offense intended). My problem with it is that it doesn't WORK. The door panels won't "mesh" as they open... there's no way that this mechanism can function unless the individual door panel segments actually "morph" as they open.

I actually LIKE the concept of the "drive through" bay, but... a ship like this one doesn't need that, really. I mean, if this was a "shuttlecarrier" which was flying many many shuttles and fighters at all times, sure, you need that. But how often will you be running a full combat-air-patrol around the 1701E? I'd like to see that on other ships (and the concept of the "through-deck carrier" isn't a new on in Trek, after all, at least from the fan-design side!). But it's not needed on the 1701E.

12) Include impulse drives on the pylons similar to Voyager's. Not sure which ones I'd keep active as the main drives though...

Agreed... see above.

13) Make the interior Deck 1 and external hull shapes match up properly.

Yep. I HATE it when they do that... but at least Deck 1 can be on a PLANE rather than most of the other ship's decks which are evidently on warped, curving decks in order to match the exterior windows.

14) Include a new "Ten-Forward" lounge or similar - with some truly huge windows for views.

They've GOT that. Look just forward of the current "launcher/yacht" emplacement... there's a big cut-out with windows. That's what that is... so you've already got what you want.

15) Stick in a visible set of Arboretum viewports somewhere.

Why "visible?" Seriously... I doubt that the vegetation in there needs it (the presence of windows might actually be HARMFUL for the vegetation, which needs a constant light/dark cycle after all!) and it's not really necessary for the CREW who go there to pretend that they're not in space but are actually planetside... a holographic "sky" on the ceiling makes much more sense from the crew's standpoint.

I put a "park" facility into the Vega, and yes, I have side-mounted windows in that area... but still have the holographic sky. The big, two-story windows would normally be dark anyway... just starfields... but could be turned opaque when the ship was near a star (to protect the vegetation, as mentioned, from having their biological clocks get confused!) You'd really only have the windows serve any real purpose when in orbit around a planet, right? And that purpose would be for people who were in the "park" to be able to look at the planet... no other reason >I< can think of.

So... the idea that there are no windows for any hypothetical "arboretum" in the 1701E doesn't bug me in the least. Can you give a reason that they're NEEDED?

16) Possibly (and this is only a slim chance!) stick in some small "pulse phasers" at unobtrusive spots along the hull, for point-defence and other purposes. Better than umpteen torpedo launchers...

I'm not sure what I think about this. I agree about the torpedo launcher "overkill" for Nemesis. Each launcher needs a torpedo magazine next to it... so it makes sense to have fewer launchers with larger magazines, IMHO.

Basically, the ship needs the RIGHT amount of weapons. Where would you put pulse-phasers, and why? I can see a single pair on the leading edge of the primary hull (forward of and below the topside fore transporter emitters) but no more. These would be the main "offensive" phasers... while the strips would be more defensive in nature. That's be MY approach, anyway. But I think we'd all agree that, for Nemesis, they really "overtweaked" the weaponry without a whole lotta logic behind it.

17) Add better RCS thruster coverage around the engineering hull.

I'd assume that it's already there, but just not MARKED like it is on the saucer and nacelle tips. Really, all you need is a pair of emplacements at 45 downwards, on either side of the deflector, plus one (normally covered up) inside of the separation line between the saucer and engineering hulls. The two next to the deflector would be reminiscent of the four around the deflector which Probert put into the TMP E.

Overall, good ideas, except for the silly "forward swept" thing though...

 

[ancient]

1. Give it a neck. Not a long one, just enough to make the ship less squatty and more of a 'tall ship'. It looks too much like a scout-ship without a neck.

2. Have an underside for the saucer.

3. Remove all that stupid circuit-board crap from the hull.

4. Remove those stupid impulse engines from the saucer and replace them with something more reasonable. I don't see why the ship need impulse engines like 20 times the size of all the other ships.

5. For the interior, replace the bridge set entirely.

 

[Gepard]

I essentially agree with Cary that the basic design is workable. It just needs all that graphic-designer detailing toned down or eliminated, especially the random white-and-black hull plates that don't line up with each other. Did Starfleet build a solid hull, then cut a lot of little random pieces out with a jigsaw and weld bits of different-colored metal in the holes?

But had I been Berman, I would have requested that Eaves start over with this as the base:

 

[hellsgate]

I like the third nacelle idea, swap out the current (Cousteau) Captain's Yacht with a Morpheus-Class or Arrow-Class runabout that's flush with the saucer section's ventral surface a-la the Aerowing / Intrepid-Class. I'd love to see a single phaser canon & torpedo launcher(s) housed in the forward part of the secondary hull as it was integrated into the organic flow of Galen's Legacy-Class. Do away with the saucer separation ability altogether as a battle-separation should only be done by a Prometheus-Class. Embed smaller impulse engines in the nacelles' support-struts. In the spaces left by removing the ridiculously huge impulse engines, add cargo bays, a Scimitar-type Reman Cloaking Device or "bat-armor generator" (or the fusion systems necessary to power them.) If not, then why not consider observation decks, officers' clubs, emergency medical bays, arboretums, classrooms, personnel quarters, labs, or additional shuttlebays or training holosuites for Black Op's / Groundpounders. Or, as a neat little unexpected surprise, an aft-facing set of Defiant-Class pulse-phasers to discourage tailgating on the Indri warp highway.

 

[Gepard]

^I think my brain just exploded.

 

[USS Mariner]

I essentially agree with Cary that the basic design is workable. It just needs all that graphic-designer detailing toned down or eliminated, especially the random white-and-black hull plates that don't line up with each other. Did Starfleet build a solid hull, then cut a lot of little random pieces out with a jigsaw and weld bits of different-colored metal in the holes?

But had I been Berman, I would have requested that Eaves start over with this as the base:

FYI, I'm the one who gave Hobbes those scans.

Personally, I prefer the original one, as most of it's major flaws would have been fixed in the construction phase:

 

[USS Mariner]

I like the third nacelle idea, swap out the current (Cousteau) Captain's Yacht with a Morpheus-Class or Arrow-Class runabout that's flush with the saucer section's ventral surface a-la the Aerowing / Intrepid-Class. I'd love to see a single phaser canon & torpedo launcher(s) housed in the forward part of the secondary hull as it was integrated into the organic flow of Galen's Legacy-Class. Do away with the saucer separation ability altogether as a battle-separation should only be done by a Prometheus-Class. Embed smaller impulse engines in the nacelles' support-struts. In the spaces left by removing the ridiculously huge impulse engines, add cargo bays, a Scimitar-type Reman Cloaking Device or "bat-armor generator" (or the fusion systems necessary to power them.) If not, then why not consider observation decks, officers' clubs, emergency medical bays, arboretums, classrooms, personnel quarters, labs, or additional shuttlebays or training holosuites for Black Op's / Groundpounders. Or, as a neat little unexpected surprise, an aft-facing set of Defiant-Class pulse-phasers to discourage tailgating on the Indri warp highway.

How about you DRAW THE FUCKING THING OR GIVE US A FUCKING PICTURE!?

On every single forum I've seen your post in, you, without fail, provide the most fucking unintelligible, stereotypical, fanboyish posts, deliberately. No matter how much someone gets annoyed with you, you don't seem to mind or care.

Every single piece of artwork you review has to be compared to fifteen thousand different fanships that no one's ever heard of, and half of which are either renamed concepts or kitbashes-from-hell.

Stop it. I'm surprised you haven't been called in for spam a long time ago.

 

[Gepard]

FYI, I'm the one who gave Hobbes those scans.

Personally, I prefer the original one, as most of it's major flaws would have been fixed in the construction phase:

The trouble is, Berman's "It looks like a turkey in a pan" critique has merit; the pylons look absurd from the top. What I think is advantageous about the one I posted is that the pylons and nacelles look like they could have evolved from the Galaxy-class versions, which goes a long way towards making the rest of the design fit into the Starfleet lineage. Plus, it looks nice.

 

[Trek]

I wouldn't. It's perfect.

 

[Tom Servo]

There isn't much I would change, as I like the basis for the design, and they addressed many issues I had with it with the refit for Nemesis, the largest one being the raising of the nacelles. At this point however, I would change the impulse engine location to the center of the engineering hull, a la the Ent-D, or make then smaller, because they are just two big, and right in line with the bussard collectors on the nacelles. Another thing would be to yes, tone down the business of the design. There are a lot of little bits that just aren't necessary. Tone those down, along with the color scheme. I like the multicolored panels, and even like the very dark triangular panels that flank the bridge assembly out to the impulse engines. But, it seems like the ship has an overly complicated color scheme.

 

[aridas sofia]

But they wanted the Enterprise-E to look somewhat upgraded from that seen in the three movies it appeared in.

How would you change it?

I'd take the opportunity to trash that overwrought baroque fantasy and replace it with something more restrained, elegant, and linked to established Trek ship architecture. Something that does the same thing, if that is what needs to be done, but does it with style that has a point.

Namely, I'd replace it with Vektor's Vanguard.

 

[Santaman]

In any case get rid of those stupid impulse engines because at the moment they're aimed at the pylons and nacelle's, meh just blow the whole thing to bits and start from scratch and make sure that "impulse genius" Eaves stays the hell away from it..