Trek Ships Are Too Small Compared to Star Wars

[Timo]

Given how few starships we see that would not be Kelvin-sized, I'm not sure any incarnation of Starfleet would have voluntarily downscaled at any point.

...TOS has none, apart from the hero ship; TOS movies have two designs plus the damsel-in-distress science boat; DSC shows almost exclusively Kelvin-sized ships while very much insisting that the TOS hero ship is part of the same universe, at the TOS size.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[matthunter]

But by the same token, a Galaxy class ship can fire ten torpedoes and instantly destroy ten fighters.

If it wants to use overkill, yes.

Torpedoes are cap-ship killers. The whole point of fighter-torp platforms is that they are relatively inexpensive in both construction and crewing costs to the ships they are meant to engage.

 

[Tomalak]

If it wants to use overkill, yes.

Torpedoes are cap-ship killers. The whole point of fighter-torp platforms is that they are relatively inexpensive in both construction and crewing costs to the ships they are meant to engage.

But we literally never see fighters do that in Star Trek, so therefore they are totally ineffective against starships.

The only exception is the Jem'Hadar against the Odyssey, which was nothing to do with torpedoes and everything to do with weapons which could bypass Starfleet shields, and the Jem'Hadar's willingness to engage in a kamikaze attack.

 

[Maurice]

^ Yet they still made the exhaust port large enough to fly a squadron of fighters into the reactor core!

They never said it was an exhaust port, and the station was unfinished so god knows what that opening was and why the reactor was accessible by flying through the incomplete superstructure.

 

[Timo]

Of course, the second Death Star was also supposed to be a lot larger than the first one. So it might have had a ventilation shaft fifty meters across, and it wasn't Tuesday yet so the all-new, security-improving cast iron grid across the shaft was still missing and the Falcon could get through.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Tomalak]

Of course, the second Death Star was also supposed to be a lot larger than the first one. So it might have had a ventilation shaft fifty meters across, and it wasn't Tuesday yet so the all-new, security-improving cast iron grid across the shaft was still missing and the Falcon could get through.

Timo Saloniemi

The whole point was that it was a trap to lure the rebels - and Skywalker in particular - so there had to be the appearance of a weakness to target.

It was, however, a terrible plan, as obviously the rebels were able to destroy it without too much trouble.

What they really needed was a cast-iron security gate which could deploy at the opportune moment. Whoops!

 

[Timo]

One wonders why fighters are so useless against fighters in Star Wars. The TIEs or Separatist drones basically always outnumber the hero craft ten to one, but get few kills and seldom manage to divert the heroes from their target...

The Emperor had plenty of fighters to keep the Rebels out. And from the audience viewpoint, he had not yet witnessed the futility of such defenses. In-universe, though, he was at the thick of it, watching with his own no-yet-so-yellow eyes how fighters always get through swarms of opposing fighters...

Can Trek fighters fight fighters? A runabout is one of the few Starfleet assets to ever have missed a phaser shot, against the suicidal Jem'Hadar bug in "Jem'Hadar". Attack fighters hit the runabouts with more accuracy, and vice versa, in "The Maquis", but nobody scored a kill. Perhaps the unseen "interceptors" do better than "attack fighters" there?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[CorporalCaptain]

^ Yet they still made the exhaust port large enough to fly a squadron of fighters into the reactor core!

That wasn't the exhaust port. Ackbar called it the superstructure in the briefing. It was open because the DSII was still under construction. The Empire was relying on the shield that Han knocked out to protect the incomplete battle station.

 

[Timo]

...Which makes one ask why he didn't build a false forcefield generator the Rebels could infiltrate and blow up. It was a trap from the very start, so why not to the very finish as well?

At least when the Dominion put everything on a single card, it was out of desperation and not out of willingness to use inexhaustible resources for creating elaborate traps.

Timo Saloniemi