Starship design history in light of Discovery

[STR]

Are you kidding me here? We're not debating a matter of scientific or historical fact. It's just a story. The whole thing is made up. So whether it fits or not is purely a matter of whether you want it to fit. You don't want it to fit, so you're making up excuses for it not to fit. But people who do want it to fit can make up rationalizations that allow it to fit. Because that's how fiction works.

I'm not pretending to be making an argument of fact, because we're talking about an imaginary work. I'm just offering an example of an argument that could be used to reconcile the Franklin with existing Trek history if one wanted to do so. It's absurd to argue about whether the premise behind that argument is "real," because none of this is real. All of this is an exercise in imagination. If you're willing to make it fit, you can use your imagination and concoct a rationalization that justifies it. Heck, that's what I do for a living. In my 13 or 14 years writing Trek tie-ins for Pocket Books, I've reconciled plenty of inconsistencies equal to or greater than those pertaining to the Franklin.

You are the second person to DELIBERATELY NOT RESPOND TO HALF OF MY ENTIRE POST. I DID NOT CONCLUDE MY POST WITH "WRITER'S GUIDES DON'T COUNT". I directly answered your argument and (IMO) shown it to be nonsensical.

And then you pull the "it's all stories" line? WTH is up with you people and your inability to admit that maybe the other side has a point.

 

[Ithekro]

IF we consider how recent the invention of Earth's faster than Warp 2 drives are at that point in time, the first Warp 3 ships are just coming out, followed by the first Warp 4 starship, followed quickly by the first Warp 5 starship within only a few years at the most. Given that prior to the mid-2240s it would take a ship from Earth a five year round trip to investigate Terra Nova, it might not have been considered worth doing for such an old lost colony. With the new Warp 3 engines, they still might not have considered it since they had a lot of other things to do locally, as it be a roughly two year round trip. With the Franklin, they might have considered it, but Starfleet seemed like it was trying to err on the side of caution until Captain Archer pushed them to give long distance missions to Enterprise. And even that seemed like pulling teeth due to consideration for the Vulcan opinion.

Franklin would be gone nearly an entire year if she goes to Terra Nova. Enterprise was already out and about thanks to their delivery mission to Klingon Space. So giving Enterprise the okay to conduct exploration missions wasn't out of the question...she was already far from Earth, and because she was out already, going to Terra Nova isn't something that will keep her occupied with for too long, unlike any other ship in the fleet. Thus Franklin was not sent.

 

[shakham]

They apparently did. It's a brand new ship kept off the front lines while they worked on the drive.The're an entire engineering wing dedicated to the drive, as well as a prototaxis forest (copse? i dont know what you'd call it) in a large hold in the secondary hull.

As far as the spinning stuff, why to Bussards spin? Why do some nacelles have glowing blue things and some dont? Why do some deflectors glow and others look like they're ready to get free HBO in the 80s?

I view the spinning thing as a weak point. This is why the ships don't have large moving parts. The D was breaking ground with their saucer section, and Voyager with their moving nacelles. Spocks spinning ship.

Just feel like it was a breakthrough reserved for the future.

 

[Christopher]

Well, now who "doesn't want to make it fit"?

It's not about wanting, it's about the magnitude of the problem. The discrepancies between the Franklin backstory and ENT continuity are relatively slight, just a few minor details that are easily tweaked. But there's been a ton of Trek continuity established over the past few decades that totally disregarded "The Slaver Weapon" and established a version of pre-Federation history that just doesn't have room for four different wars in less than seven years after warp drive was invented. That is a gigantic inconsistency. The entire conceptual underpinnings of the two backstories are fundamentally incompatible and it would take an enormous amount of hacksawing and duct taping to create an ugly kludge that looked kinda like it forced them to fit together, but would really raise more continuity questions than it solved. When the discrepancies are on that great a scale, I've found it's better just to let each version of the story be itself rather than try to create a Frankenstein's monster out of the two.

And in this case, we're talking about something that rightfully belongs to Larry Niven's Known Space, not to Star Trek. Star Trek is not the end-all and be-all of science fiction. Ideally, it's just the gateway drug to the whole vaster world of SF literature. People who complain about not getting more Kzinti stories in Trek are missing out on the real thing, on "The Warriors" and Ringworld and The Man-Kzin Wars and all the rest. That's where the Kzinti belong. They fit there far better than they fit into Trek. They're more satisfying there, because they don't have to be crowbarred into tiny gaps in the continuity; they're integral pieces of the whole. I find that enormously preferable.

As I said, that's all going to be quite different from the Trek universe version of those events, both by necessity and by design. We would have found out more about how it all went here in the fifth season of ENT, in a planned episode called "Kilkenny Cats" written by Jimmy Diggs, who has long been a proponent of them returning to Star Trek, and has Niven's own personal support in that. Diggs and others have put a lot of thought into how to fit the Kzinti in with Trek history, and there's nothing unworkable about it.

If that had happened, though, it would still have had to contradict "The Slaver Weapon" considerably. It would've been essentially a whole new version of the Kzinti, maybe roughly based on the "Soft/Slaver Weapon" backstory but modified to fit what TNG and ENT had established about human history.

And of course, it didn't happen. Stories that weren't made aren't binding. Just because they considered doing a story about some version of the Kzinti, that doesn't prove the Kzinti exist in Trek. There are always many ideas that get considered and discarded along the way to the final work.

I never got the feeling Vulcans were going that far with Earth. Clearly they had a lot of influence on United Earth but it seemed more like they used aid/advancement as strings to keep Earth in line. I don't think they were policing the borders, or the known Earth colonies.

The point is, we saw in ENT that the Vulcan High Command had a pervasive presence throughout this region of space. Outside powers, such as the Klingons, probably saw it as Vulcan space. And the VHC did seem to be pretty proactive about maintaining law and order within its territory, as we saw in episodes like "Fallen Hero" and "The Seventh."

I just figure the Kzin in Trek are seperate from the Known Space Kzin. They had the same writer but it's two different fictional universes, even though obviously that was an odd choice on Niven's part.

But the thing that's odd about "The Slaver Weapon" is that it wasn't like that. What you suggest is how it normally would be done. When Dennis Bailey & David Bischoff adapted their original novel Tin Woodman into the TNG episode "Tin Man," they rewrote it massively to make it fit the Trek universe and the TNG characters. They borrowed some key ideas and plot points and character names from their book but reworked them into a substantially different story that fit neatly into the Trek universe. But Niven did the reverse. He didn't tailor his story's elements to the Trek universe, he tailored the Trek universe's elements to his story. He left out Kirk and the Enterprise altogether, which was unprecedented in a Trek episode. He cherrypicked the three Trek characters that made the best fit with Nessus and the Papandreous in "The Soft Weapon" and otherwise presented a streamlined but virtually verbatim retelling of "The Soft Weapon." And that's why it feels like a story that fits better in Known Space than it does in Trek. (Indeed, it makes a pretty poor Trek story, because it has no message, no theme, no moral, no compassion. It's just two battling factions playing strategy games until one side is killed off. It's the only TAS episode with onscreen deaths. It's actualy quite cold and nihilistic by Trek standards.)

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

You are the second person to DELIBERATELY NOT RESPOND TO HALF OF MY ENTIRE POST. I DID NOT CONCLUDE MY POST WITH "WRITER'S GUIDES DON'T COUNT". I directly answered your argument and (IMO) shown it to be nonsensical.

And then you pull the "it's all stories" line? WTH is up with you people and your inability to admit that maybe the other side has a point.

There are also points you seem to deliberately have ignored, as well. How about we all calm down, take a breath, and try to reason it out again?

A warp 4 ship could reach Terra Nova (which as the first human colony would be *the* first target of any deep space expedition) in <4 months (assuming 20ly distance).

The first Earth ship capable of Warp Four—which may well be the only one capable of it before NX-01—might not be able to. You seem to make a lot of implicit assumptions in your statement that are unwarranted. You assume she could duplicate and maintain this speed and that it wasn't a momentary fluke. You assume she was available for the purpose in question instead of otherwise engaged. Indeed, you assume that she was active and operational in the period in question rather than mothballed as a failure and only later revived after the Xindi attack, or pressed into service for the Romulan Wars. There is no evidence of any of those things. So why assume them?

It is absolutely clear that the Warp Three Barrier was broken by the NX-Delta in 2145, and Warp Three engines existed ready and waiting to be installed on freighters by the time of "Fortunate Son" (ENT) only a few episodes after "Terra Nova" (ENT). Following your same baselessly assumptive reasoning, a Warp Three ship could have reached Terra Nova within only nine months! (I found a nifty warp speed calculator to prop up my woeful math skills! Yay!) So the "problem" you raise exists irrespective of anything to do with the Franklin.

-MMoM

 

[Christopher]

Let's face it, "Terra Nova" is just a problematical episode. Why was the first human colony on a planet 20 light-years away, when we know that the dude who invented warp drive ended up living on Alpha Centauri, only 4.3 light-years away? That was a failure to understand both astronomy and Trek continuity.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

It's not about wanting, it's about the magnitude of the problem. The discrepancies between the Franklin backstory and ENT continuity are relatively slight, just a few minor details that are easily tweaked. But there's been a ton of Trek continuity established over the past few decades that totally disregarded "The Slaver Weapon" and established a version of pre-Federation history that just doesn't have room for four different wars in less than seven years after warp drive was invented. That is a gigantic inconsistency.

That all depends on the definition and application of the term "wars," which are almost infinitely variable.

It would've been essentially a whole new version of the Kzinti, maybe roughly based on the "Soft/Slaver Weapon" backstory but modified to fit what TNG and ENT had established about human history.

That's precisely what I and Jimmy Diggs and many others have proposed, after one fashion or another (and to which Larry Niven himself has given personal blessing no less). And what's wrong with that?

And of course, it didn't happen. Stories that weren't made aren't binding. Just because they considered doing a story about some version of the Kzinti, that doesn't prove the Kzinti exist in Trek.

TAS itself proves that. It isn't only "The Slaver Weapon" (TAS); they were also mentioned in "The Infinite Vulcan" (TAS) and one was seen in "The Time Trap" (TAS). Their homeworld of Kzin appears on the star map with all the TOS and TAS planets in "Conspiracy" (TNG) and elsewhere. You and other writers may (reasonably and justifiably) choose to ignore these things as non-binding, of course. But let's not forget that you entered this conversation citing examples from TAS as a contextual basis for interpreting other Trek productions, and have spent most of it advocating for rationalization of inconsistencies over simply disregarding problematic elements outright. And quite rightly, too. My general view is that it should all count—yes, even giant Spock—and does insofar as I'm personally concerned. I understand that you differ on that point, but it seems a little weird to me that you do it so...inconsistently?

-MMoM

 

[XCV330]

Keeping this within the thread topic, since Franklin may have initially been a MACO ship, it leads one to wonder how many of them there were and how far back. MACO's being elite teams of some organization that clearly was not Starfleet, suggests something like the Stellar Navy (I know, that movie did not get made, but MACO's report to somebody). If there was some separate military organization it existed for a reason and the Kzin Wars, even if there more like small brushfire conflicts, could have been it.

It also allows the Franklin to be the first Warp 4 ship if Starfleet's records on developing a homegrown system are taken sepreately from Franklin, or the Franklin type used alien tech to get there.

 

[STR]

There are also points you seem to deliberately have ignored, as well. How about we all calm down, take a breath, and try to reason it out again?


The first Earth ship capable of Warp Four—which may well be the only one capable of it before NX-01—might not be able to. You seem to make a lot of implicit assumptions in your statement that are unwarranted. You assume she could duplicate and maintain this speed and that it wasn't a momentary fluke

Nope, I tossed in a scenario that postulated that even if 4 was a one-time deal and the ship only averaged 3.5 (dubious, but conservative and IMO fair), it would take a max of 180 days. Still within the realm of probable, given the importance of the colony.

Let's face it, "Terra Nova" is just a problematical episode. Why was the first human colony on a planet 20 light-years away, when we know that the dude who invented warp drive ended up living on Alpha Centauri, only 4.3 light-years away? That was a failure to understand both astronomy and Trek continuity.

Right, the episode that's inconvenient to your argument is the problem, not the series of movies which purposefully eschewed any and all other Trek history for convenience and creative freedom (with the sole exception being fodder for easter eggs and throwaway lines).

There are 3 officially cited early colonization efforts: Terra Nova, Alpha Centauri and Vega. There are any number of reasons why TN would be colonized first, foremost being that TN was more hospitable/likely to succeed as a self sustaining colony than the other two. Both TN and AC were colonized within Cochrane's (original? natural?) lifetime, possibly Vega as well. It fits well enough.

 

[Rahul]

Let's face it, "Terra Nova" is just a problematical episode. Why was the first human colony on a planet 20 light-years away, when we know that the dude who invented warp drive ended up living on Alpha Centauri, only 4.3 light-years away? That was a failure to understand both astronomy and Trek continuity.

It would be illogical. But human behaviour and history is rarely entirely logical, and mostly emotional. It's also stupid no one ever sent out a probe or anything after Terra Nova. Sounds illogical as well.

The way I interpreted the whole "first colony" was always:
People were still rebuilding Earth. A few nutty people (maybe some extremely religious people or something) wanted to completely leave Earth and humanity behind as far away as possible, and started on a supremely unsafe journey to a planet that wouldn't be the first choice humanity ever traveled to the stars (because they wanted to leave humanity behind), told everyone "suck it", and basically left without even any kind of communication protocol or anything. Much like the first European colonies in the Americas, of which also quite a few were lost. Add nobody really caring for Terra Nova for quite some time (humanity probably building it's first real space colony and stuff), and it's a probable backstory.

Just, FYI, I fuckin' hated Terra Nova. It's just not a good episode.
I already hated VOY's "friendship one", and this felt like an even worse remake of an already weak plot that wasn't even old by then. But I do like the whole ENT "early space exploration" backstory, from NX-alpha to Fortunate Son, even though a lot of it doesn't really add up on first sight.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

Nope, I assumed that even if 4 was a one-time deal and the ship only averaged 3.5 (dubious, but conservative), it would take a max of 180 days. Still within the realm of possibility, given the importance of the colony.

And why assume she could fly any distance at all? Being the the first capable of something doesn't even have to mean she actually did it at the time! Scotty's statement comes from the standpoint of more than a century later.

The "importance" of the colony? Historically, sure, but not by ENT's time. It had been given up for lost seventy years earlier. It was naught but a curiosity, not high on the priority list.

There are 3 officially cited early colonization efforts: Terra Nova, Alpha Centauri and Vega.

Also the Deneva colony from "Horizon" (ENT), Terra 10 from "The Terratin Incident" (TAS), the S.S. Mariposa from "Up The Long Ladder" (TNG) and maybe others I can't recall.

-MMoM

 

[Christopher]

That all depends on the definition and application of the term "wars," which are almost infinitely variable.

So, what, you think they just flamed each other on the space Internet a bunch of times...?

That's precisely what I and Jimmy Diggs and many others have proposed, after one fashion or another (and to which Larry Niven himself has given personal blessing no less). And what's wrong with that?

It's not "wrong," it's just hypothetical. Yes, Diggs pitched the idea to Trek for years without success, and yes, Manny Coto indicated he was willing to consider buying it at long last, but it was never actually bought, never actually scripted. It never became "real." It was just one of the thousands and thousands of pitches that hundreds of different writers -- including me -- made to the Trek shows over the years. Just because it got more press than those other pitches, just because it got a bit farther in the process than most, doesn't make it anything more than an unused pitch. If the episode had been sold and produced, then we'd have something to talk about. But it wasn't.

But let's not forget that you entered this conversation citing examples from TAS as a contextual basis for interpreting other Trek productions, and have spent most of it advocating for rationalization of inconsistencies over simply disregarding problematic elements outright. And quite rightly, too. My general view is that it should all count—yes, even giant Spock—and does insofar as I'm personally concerned. I understand that you differ on that point, but it seems a little weird to me that you do it so...inconsistently?

It's not inconsistent to point out that individual cases are different from each other and that trying to apply one absolute blanket approach to every distinct instance is foolhardy. Each case needs to be assessed on its own merits. Yes, TAS as a whole does count, but my whole point to start with was that the whole and the parts are separate matters. There are individual episodes in TOS ("The Alternative Factor"), TNG ("The Host," in terms of virtually everything it established about the Trill), VGR ("Threshold"), and possibly others that have been completely ignored and contradicted by later canon, but that applies only to those individual episodes, not to the entire series. So my original point was that the same goes for TAS.

 

[Rahul]

Back to the main topic:

My main problem with the deisgn of all the DIS Federation ships is: They're all flat. And I don't think the angular warp nacelles look very good either. While every design looks good, they don't look that great as a fleet.

I think the Kelvin movies did a lot better with their background ships, they really felt like belonging in the same era, without outclassing the Enterprise. In fact, I would even go so far as to say the Kelvin background ships actually fit better in the prime universe 23rd century than DIS ships do!

That being said: I'm pretty sure none of the Kelvin designs (the Kelvin herself, Franklin, all those great bakground designs) will ever appear on DIS. I don't know wether that was a creative or a corporate decision, but DIS very obviously tries to stay very clear of any Kelvin-designs, at least for now.

 

[STR]

And why assume she could fly any distance at all? Being the the first capable of something doesn't even have to mean she actually did it at the time! Scotty's statement comes from the standpoint of more than a century later.

Right, the Franklin was being rented, and the MACOs would have to pay a surcharge if they crossed the state line. And naturally, Starfleet built Starbase Yorktown the next door down from Idris Elba's PLANET OF DOOM. They could've walked there.

The "importance" of the colony? Historically, sure, but not by ENT's time. It had been given up for lost seventy years earlier. It was naught but a curiosity, not high on the priority list.

It was important enough to be one of, if not the first, destinations on NX-01's itinerary. And it very well could have been the first destination after Qonos, as the episodes in between were "targets of opportunity".

Back to the main topic:

My main problem with the deisgn of all the DIS Federation ships is: They're all flat. And I don't think the angular warp nacelles look very good either. While every design looks good, they don't look that great as a fleet.

I think the Kelvin movies did a lot better with their background ships, they really felt like belonging in the same era, without outclassing the Enterprise. In fact, I would even go so far as to say the Kelvin background ships actually fit better in the prime universe 23rd century than DIS ships do!

I get that you like the Kelvin aesthetics better than John Eave's more recent work for "Discovery", but let's be honest: there was one background ship (the Kelvin) and it was sliced, diced, and copy-pasted into the other ships.

And I'd probably admit the Kelvin fit into the TOS aesthetic better than Discovery. I think that's the point though. The Binary Stars fleet, and Discovery herself, are mean to be distinct from the TOS Enterprise (probably in case it shows up later). Kelvin was meant to evoke TOS to emphasize their whole creative break moments later.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

It's not "wrong," it's just hypothetical. Yes, Diggs pitched the idea to Trek for years without success, and yes, Manny Coto indicated he was willing to consider buying it at long last, but it was never actually bought, never actually scripted. It never became "real." It was just one of the thousands and thousands of pitches that hundreds of different writers -- including me -- made to the Trek shows over the years. Just because it got more press than those other pitches, just because it got a bit farther in the process than most, doesn't make it anything more than an unused pitch. If the episode had been sold and produced, then we'd have something to talk about. But it wasn't.

Of course it's hypothetical. I'm not saying it happened. But it illustrates that while you may not feel yourself up to the task, or rather that it simply isn't one worth your while, other writers clearly haven't found it as "impossible to reconcile" as you suggest.

So, what, you think they just flamed each other on the space Internet a bunch of times...?

Heh, well, I hope you don't find anything I've said to you to approach flaming, because I had no such intention. I respect you, and your right to your own views, even if we rhetotically joust intensely at times.

But, if I may press, what exactly did you find flawed or problematic about this idea?

They could be mere raids or skirmishes on the outskirts that were easily quashed by the Vulcans before they got out of hand, but which the Kzinti nevertherless glorify, as they would even in defeat, and which the humans seldom mention because we like to think of ourselves as having moved beyond that sort of thing, and because it's a reminder of how dependent on the Vulcans' protection we are/were. That one of the first things that happened to us after we escaped horrific war on Earth by hopping into space is we got into another war out there doesn't seem odd, and would reinforce the Vulcans' obvous skepticism about our readiness to join the interstellar community, as expressed on ENT. Fits to me.

It was important enough to be one of, if not the first, destinations on NX-01's itinerary. And it very well could have been the first destination after Qonos, as the episodes in between were "targets of opportunity".

Or, by the same token, they could have just decided to drop by and clear up Travis' favorite childhood mystery because they were already in the neighborhood!

-MMoM

 

[STR]

Or, by the same token, they could have just decided to drop by and clear up Travis' favorite childhood mystery because they were already in the neighborhood!

-MMoM

I gotta say, I found this really funny. I guess I find it absurd, given that the writer's barely gave a damn about Travis, that somehow the other characters they wrote would either. Not that you should take that as an argument for/against anything. Just the first thing that popped into my head.

Seriously though, that doesn't make a lot of sense in-universe either. No starship, from the 1701-D to the NX-01 is ever just d*cking around in space. They always have a mission in the background. In that context, it makes far more sense that Terra Nova was their destination all along than turning the ship over to Blando McPilot and letting him pick the next stop off like it was a family road trip to Florida.

I mean, it was a one-of-a-kind asset. You don't waste its time on a whim. Okay, I know Archer wasted it, but captain's prerogative.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

Seriously though, that doesn't make a lot of sense in-universe either. No starship, from the 1701-D to the NX-01 is ever just d*cking around in space. They always have a mission in the background.

Fairly explicitly, the NX-01's originally intended mission was basically exactly that. Just go see what's out there, and check it out. Explore. Investigate. Make contact. Study. Swim. That was the background mission, with the specific tasks that came up being either incidental to, or temporary diversions from, it.

-MMoM

 

[SevenOfNiven]

I think the school of thought that starship design must be dictated by function first and foremost, and that there can be a straight line between each starship in each era is possibly not a useful assumption. (Trekyards on YouTube, which I generally enjoy, harps on this idea a lot.)

Here's an alternate scenario: I wonder if for example, while the two-nacelles-and-round-bussards might have been purely functional to begin with, perhaps the Constitution class mainly had had Phoenixesque nacelles as a design callback to the early days of Starfleet. What we thought was 2245 modern actually had strong retro influences. It might explain why the Bonaventure, allegedly the first vessel with warp drive installed in TAS (maybe better interpreted as the first ship designed for warp drive installation), appears to resemble the Enterprise more than anything else. I think the novels place the Daedalus-class as a design dating from the 2140s (that became more widely used during the Romulan War) so perhaps these two ships represent the Earth Starfleet of that period. The secondary hull of the Bonaventure becomes part of the Daedalus design, sidelined until the Romulan War, while the saucer is used as the basis for ships like the Franklin and Enterprise.

The rounded nacelles continue to be used out of necessity, growing larger and more powerful by 2233, but requiring constant maintenance and monitoring. This necessitates the large ship and crew size we see in the Kelvin.

Eventually warp engine design progresses to the point that powerful warp drives can be constructed without requiring massive rounded engines, freeing a new school of starship design to experiment with the angular nacelles of the Walker-class. Maybe it's the breaking of the time barrier (whatever that is) that marks a brief return to the rounded Conchrane design for the Constitution class and other ships before some admiral gets sick of the nostalgia and arbitrarily decides that it's only square nacelles from here on out. (The designers of the Nova and Sovereign classes might have been looking at the old Walker design or ships like it for inspiration. )

Regarding the Kzinti, while I think the four-wars-circa-2070/2100 is still compatible with Enterprise continuity, I can see where it might seem contradictory at first glance. But IIRC, all Sulu said was that the Kzinti fought four wars with humankind, not that all of them were post-First Contact conflicts involving Earth.

We've seen plenty of examples of groups of humans at large in the galaxy prior to First Contact: descendants of those abducted by aliens (the Skagarans, Gary Seven's agency, the Briori, and the Preservers), descendants of time-displaced starship crews (E2) and populations on 892-IV, Omega IV, and Miri's Planet which, while technically not humans from Earth, are culturally similar enough that they would probably identify themselves as humankind.

Maybe the Kzinti conflict with humanity began with a lost Omegan colony or former Skagaran slave world. Who knows.

 

[XCV330]

But IIRC, all Sulu said was that the Kzinti fought four wars with humankind, not that all of them were post-First Contact conflicts involving Earth.

<- This


makes sense


Interesting idea that TOS era ships are visual throwbacks to really early starships. The Bonaventure was ugly as hell. I honestly wish TAS would get completely new animation. Filmation was run by a man who was literally colorblind and from what I've heard there weren't a lot of sober people at work there most of the time.

 

[fireproof78]

I get that you like the Kelvin aesthetics better than John Eave's more recent work for "Discovery", but let's be honest: there was one background ship (the Kelvin) and it was sliced, diced, and copy-pasted into the other ships.

Isn't this Franz Josephs' work as well?