Questionable Raptor

[C57D]

Thinking about writing an early era Klingon campaign for the FASA RPG, I am looking for a suitable, simple, medium size player crew vessel.

I am loving the look of the Klingon Raptor from "Sleeping Dogs", but a little confused by it's stated crew of 12. At 145 meters long and four decks, and given the Klingon lack of luxuries, I would have expected space to squeeze in about 5-10 Officers and maybe 35-40 crew?

Also since the bridge has about 7 stations, and the need for "Reactor Pit" crew too, 12 crew doesn't seem anywhere near enough. Especially if you want some Marines to raid the servitors you encounter!

I haven't yet tried to work out deckplans to see how my theory holds up, but all opinions welcomed

 

[eyeresist]

You are right that the Klingon ship in "Sleeping Dogs" seemed rather sparsely populated. Best explanation I can come up with is it was a carrier ship, which might ordinarily have carried supplies or ground troops.

 

[Timo]

Curiously, 12 was also Sulu's (proven correct!) estimate for the crew of Kruge's Bird of Prey in ST3:TSfS - and that ship really is a rather good match to the Raptor size-wise. Shorter no doubt, but then again, most of the length in any Klingon ship is in the neck which may contain little habitable or working space.

Possibly Klingon command centers only get extensively crewed for battles, and usually there's just a duty officer present? That would still leave few personnel to attend to the machinery. But merely keeping the engines running during a battle might be considered so dishonorable that all warriors would rush to the guns and fight for the privilege to sit/stand at the helm, and the engines be damned (even if this costs the crew their victory and their lives)!

Again, ST3 would seem to indicate that for this of this size, there are few or no crewed spaces other than the main fighting center and perhaps engineering during a battle, and that the crew is its own raiding party.

Alternately, Kruge and the ship from "Sleeping Dogs" might have been on a special deep space mission where endurance was boosted by leaving most personnel ashore. The usual complement might be something more reasonable...

Timo Saloniemi