ST Picard - Starships and Technology Season One SPOILER Discusssion

[Timo]

Well, slightly off topic.. Well slantways.. A normal squadron should have different types of ships like a navy fleet..

Actually, not really. The original meaning of the word was a small force of a single type - typically a squadron of destroyers (Russians still call destroyers "squadronships", even though they have not been really operated in squadrons since the fifties), perhaps a squadron of battleships.

Or, to be more specific, this was the meaning of the word in the World Wars, which arguably would be where the jargon of Trek derives from. Before that, squadron was just how you hacked a fleet into smaller pieces - but since a sailing fleet would consist purely of ships of the line (the exact class not being a particularly relevant concept back then yet), it's close to the WWI/II meaning of the word in the end.

Since this is the first time we hear the term used in Star Trek, as opposed to the preceding Fleets and Task Forces, we might just as well assume there's a distinction. And it could be exactly this: for a Task you send a mixed, well thought out Task Force, but for an impromptu sortie like this you send a Squadron of Inquiry class ships only, all of them sailing from the Inquiry class pier at Sol or something.

Never should a ship be "the only ship in the sector!" Even long range exploritiry should have at least a few ships going in the same direction and be able to help in emergencys

Well, our heroes used to be the only ones in the "quadrant", which evidently was smaller than a sector (the name would suggest one-quarter the size, but how do you split a cube in four parts?). Although there did seem to be a bit of a starship vacuum around Earth specifically - perhaps because all those ships were needed farther out, and it was inconceivable that a foe could penetrate all the way to Earth without going through those ships first. Until a foe fast enough or unstoppable enough came about...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[valkyrie013]

Well "Squadron" was a word I picked that I couldn't think of another.. Basically, I'm thinking of todays Aircraft carrier .. squadron? Taskforce? Fleet?? Detachment?.. You have a carrier, a number of destroyers/ missle crusiers, submarines, tenders, fuel ships etc. in a group that goes with the carrier.. So my thought was in each sector, area that starfleet has some support ships or other ships in the area..

I remember reading about how the Stargazzer was fragged, and Picard and crew had to get into shuttles and escape pods and escape the ship.. afterwards the book said they were out there for 3 MONTHS! before rescue.. that is just Unsatisfactory! A another ship should have been nearby, within a few days.. maybe a week at most.. Also remember in the Titan book series, talks about the Titan out on deep exploritory mission, but it did mention that a sister ship was a few systems away doing there own thing, they were like 6 months away from mainline federation space..

 

[Timo]

Well "Squadron" was a word I picked that I couldn't think of another..

...But the fun thing is, "squadron" is exactly the word Picard used!

Basically, I'm thinking of todays Aircraft carrier .. squadron? Taskforce? Fleet?? Detachment?.

Today, it's a Carrier Battle Group. For a while, it did used to be a Carrier Task Force.

So my thought was in each sector, area that starfleet has some support ships or other ships in the area..

Sounds reasonable. We never saw ships like Kirk's operating in such a formation, though: at best, they gathered into what might be called a squadron for wargames, where a homogeneous force indeed was a nice way to eliminate variables in testing whether computer control would make for better ships... But perhaps Commodore Decker of the Constellation had a gaggle of lesser (and perhaps also bigger?) ships around him, and just lost contact with them due to the jamming effect of the Doomsday Machine?

I remember reading about how the Stargazer was fragged, and Picard and crew had to get into shuttles and escape pods and escape the ship.. afterwards the book said they were out there for 3 MONTHS! before rescue.. that is just Unsatisfactory! A another ship should have been nearby, within a few days.. maybe a week at most.. Also remember in the Titan book series, talks about the Titan out on deep exploritory mission, but it did mention that a sister ship was a few systems away doing there own thing, they were like 6 months away from mainline federation space..

Canonically, Picard's crew drifted for "weeks" in "shuttles".

That's still better than the poor Exeter which back in Kirk's days went missing for six months. Sure, folks apparently were told to keep an eye for her, but the search obviously was futile: Kirk stumbled onto her by accident, and not as part of such a search.

I can't bring myself to believe in a Starfleet organized into orderly Task Forces when they clearly can't even tell where their individual ships are at any given moment!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[137th Gebirg]

I prefer the more widely-accepted naval term "battle group". But then we get into the whole "Starfleet As Military" vs "Combined Service" vs "Peace-keeping Armada" debate nonsense and I really don't have the patience for that BS anymore.

Or, we could take a page from Marine Corps nomenclature, using the far more interesting-sounding "expeditionary force". Still admittedly a little on the martial side, but sounds cool nonetheless.

"Fleet" is a bit tired and overused these days, despite the fact that's exactly what we actually saw in the finale (200+ ships? That's a fleet!), by the traditional definition.

 

[valkyrie013]

I guess "Fleet" would be a good option, maybe the "Sector 2101 Exploratory Fleet"

I wouldn't have the support ships fly with the explorers, just "be around" maybe you have 5 explorer class ships doing there thing, and you would have a relativly "central" support fleet available to help if needed, they may be at a "Rally Point" for the fleet when there done with there individual missions, then they meet up, then fly to the next sector/quadrant/Hectare.. and rinse and repeat.
I'd say this would be for actions on and past a border, if a ship is within federation border doing there thing, then they might be 1 off's since there within help of a starbase or other ship.. maybe.. in my mind.. at night.. thru a straw..

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

They're called "Carrier Strike Groups" now, actually. "CBG" is still used by other nations' navies which haven't seen the need to remove "battle" from the nomenclature for whatever reason.

Today's CSGs are still centered around an aircraft carrier as the principal transport for the airborne weapons doing the striking, with pretty much everyone else focused on supporting or defending it (or for missile strikes to shore targets). A typical CSG adds 1+ cruisers and 2+ destroyers at a minimum, with some adding submarines and supply ships depending on the mission and route.

Back in the 80s, a CBG would almost always have 1 carrier, 1 cruiser, 3 destroyers, one attack submarine and three supply ships including an oiler. These days the tradeoff is to have a smaller, mobile military force supported by a larger web of logistical supplies from both sea and air; the USN also has a focus on protection of shipping in certain areas which allows for cruisers, destroyers and smaller ships to operate almost independently while taking advantage of the logistical network.

Starfleet has never really seen much need for this sort of thing, but then again they don't generally perform military actions as sending big missiles or planes to attack people they don't like. Most larger Starfleet actions usually involve assembling groups of what you have on hand for a one-off action. When they go to war it's different, but even then there's little method to the madness other than vague "destroyer units", "fighter squadrons" and "Galaxy Wings", which IMO represents the closest thing we've heard to a combat unit with a large ship at its center, carrier or otherwise.

Mark

 

[DEWLine]

Also, given the definition of "sector" in the modern Trek context, I can't see fleets with orders of operations numbering hundreds of ships assigned to specific sectors. Squadrons, maybe. But not a fleet or a "wing" ( which is the air forces' equivalent of a fleet, right?)...

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

Moreover, worh a fleet THAT big and THAT close to this so-called "lawless" part of space, one wonders how invested the Federation is in force projection in the region. There are certainly political ramifications to being able to assemble a huge military power and sending it wherever they need it within a couple days notice.

Mark

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

Apparently, at one point we were supposed to have THREE classes of starship in Riker’s fleet...

https://twitter.com/gaghyogi49/status/1246836893574184961

 

[Colonel Midnight]

^^ Says a lot about Federation peace-keeping / law enforcement capabilities if they have that many ships in one area and it’s still ‘lawless’...

Cheers,
-CM-

 

[Timo]

The situation at Vashti wasn't exactly "lawless". Rather, the problem was the usual: too much law, and too many parties enforcing it... Adding UFP law and UFP enforcing into the mess would probably just have made for more mess!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Dukhat]

Apparently, at one point we were supposed to have THREE classes of starship in Riker’s fleet...

https://twitter.com/gaghyogi49/status/1246836893574184961

And based on the descriptions of the other ships, I think the one we got was the best choice. I’m sick of ships with completely unnecessary holes in the saucers.

 

[Timo]

Well, it's Eaves' way of saying Science Ship, apparently. Getting sick of it is pretty much like getting sick of Jeffries saying Warp Engine by using twin nacelles on needlessly long booms, or Probert saying Impulse Engine by using unnecessarily glowing bits.

Of course, we only ever got one of the ring-hulled Science Ships on screen, out of Eaves' endless studies. But there might be more to come.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Ronald Held]

With the UPF the major power (allied with the Klingons), do they have the largest number of ships in their Starfleet?

 

[Dukhat]

Getting sick of it is pretty much like getting sick of Jeffries saying Warp Engine by using twin nacelles on needlessly long booms, or Probert saying Impulse Engine by using unnecessarily glowing bits.

No, it's not the same thing at all.

Of course, we only ever got one of the ring-hulled Science Ships on screen, out of Eaves' endless studies. But there might be more to come.

Unless you're referring to the Discovery, I don't know of any other prime universe ships with ringed saucers.

 

[Timo]

It's an Eaves thing: he designs tons of "science ships" that have hollowed-out primary hulls, often rings of some sort. But perhaps 5% of his designs ever see actual use, and most of those end up in places like STO. So yes, the Discovery is our one canon example. But there might well be more to follow, depending on who gets to draw these ships and to whom he or she tips the hat.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[fireproof78]

The situation at Vashti wasn't exactly "lawless". Rather, the problem was the usual: too much law, and too many parties enforcing it... Adding UFP law and UFP enforcing into the mess would probably just have made for more mess!

Timo Saloniemi

It seemed pretty messy to begin with. And there didn't appear to be any main power with direct jurisdiction.

 

[Go-Captain]

It's too bad we didn't get the three distinct ship types Chabon has now talked more about. But the very fact that he wanted those may mean that some work was done on them, and we might meet them at some point of the second season.

Timo Saloniemi

I have the impression Chabon didn't care either way otherwise he could have made time for them to get built correctly, and give them a proper presentation as was done with the Bird of Prey when Elnor is picked up.

Well, slightly off topic.. Well slantways.. A normal squadron should have different types of ships like a navy fleet.. Like for a Starfleet squadron that would be in a sector would be maybe 5 exploratory ships , then a few escort/patrol ships, a hospital ship, a fuel/tender/supply/repair ship with industrial replicators and a wet dock ability..

Never should a ship be "the only ship in the sector!" Even long range exploritiry should have at least a few ships going in the same direction and be able to help in emergencys

Star Trek ships are more like fighter craft in my mind in how there can be vast performance differences, where as sea ships can be built to pretty much the same performance parameters from very large down to very small. Fighter squadrons are always of one plane type because of the complexity of coordinating the maneuvers of aircraft. Using mixed squadrons would exponentially complicated maneuvers, even straight line ones.

Using science ships as part of a military rescue fleet would also be inadvisable and point to toward scraping the bottom of the barrel for hulls, as was done for Wolf 359 or in the Dominion War with the use of fighters.

I would have liked to see more specialist ships in the fleet, but still basically the same hull form as with the Nebula or Miranda variants. Over all I would like to see a reworking of how Starfleet combat works so we can have battles with more thought underpinning how they proceed.

And based on the descriptions of the other ships, I think the one we got was the best choice. I’m sick of ships with completely unnecessary holes in the saucers.

Hull holes could be a way to get a particular warp field geometry but with lower mass for a higher speed. There's an episode of Voyager where 7 says the mass of a spacecraft makes it slower, and we have some circumstantial indication hull form dictates warp dynamics. Though I'm not a fan of mass effecting warp speed and would prefer to ignore that.

 

[Tuskin38]

- Agnes' "old school medical tricorder" has never been seen before, and would've been a good chance to see a TNG-era prop (and used a remixed TNG sound effect regardless)

There is a TNG Era Hypospray prop in the medkit.

Yup, that was Discovery's bridge alright. Back wall, side consoles, and CO chair. They must have flown Frakes up plus a couple costumes (or filmed this while he was directing an episode of DSC in Toronto) for this scene.

It was confirmed that the scene was shot when he was up there directing Discovery.

 

[Ronald Held]

Mass affects warp speed if any inertial dampers are used