What are your thoughts on dedicated Captain's Yacht designs?

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Personally, I don't see the value in having the Captain's Yacht designed to fit aboard a cut-out within the StarShips hull.

It's just a giant waste IRL and "In-Universe". Why even bother wasting time to implement a one-off custom Shuttle Craft? What value does that little vessel bring that another one of your Shuttle Complement can't fulfill?

Honestly, we can just use more internal space within the Saucer and reserve one specific Shuttle Craft within the StarShips Shuttle Complement as the "Captain's Yacht" and give it a unique livery and ID # on board the vessel.

Existing Captain's Yacht vessel designs should be re-purposed for other uses within the UFP civilian market or for other purposes IMO.

 

[NCC-73515]

It has ceremonial purposes when it's a yacht, and other purposes when it's a waverider or aeroshuttle

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

In my head canon for the 26th century:

The Calypso design I re-purposed as a reward for making it to Captain's Rank.
It's a civilian use gift for when the Captain is on Vacation and Off-Duty.
The moment you earn Captain's Rank, you get to go to a Specialized HoloDeck Customization Program and customize your version of the "Calypso" design and make it personalized to their own Aestheitics on the inside & out.

The Cousteau design I re-purposed as the standard Shuttle Craft for UFP Government (Representatives/Senators/Executive Officials/Judges/etc) to travel around the Planetary System in.

The AeroShuttle design I re-purposed as the standard Bus-Style mass transit for UFP Government employees.

 

[Timo]

In navies of yore, the gig formally dedicated to the Captain was basically the opposite of what the Starfleet Yachts are to the usual shuttles. The gig would have been the smallest of the boats, often nested inside the others, and useless for anything but serving as the Captain's water taxi. In contrast, the E-E Yacht is more like a longboat or at least a pinnace, a larger-than-usual auxiliary that a sailing navy would have used for heavy hauling and amphibious warfare.

Perhaps that's exactly what the E-E Yacht is, then? It is well armed, capacious, but not particularly luxurious. It can be quickly deployed, and the one time it gets used, it indeed engages in amphibious warfare/planetary assault (albeit of the unopposed kind - but few sailing navies would have dared attempt an opposed landing!).

Picard actually flies around in standard shuttles that have plush couches. His putative Yacht on the E-D may have been an assault craft, too. Or then the E-D never had a Yacht. By which I mean

a) the bump at the bottom of the saucer always was an energy emitter for giving CPR to space jellyfishes, or
b) the bump was an auxiliary, but not a Yacht, and looked exactly like the Probert design and its Sternbach/Okuda reproduction, that is, it was a nearly immobile barge that could drop down on a planet and become an instant UFP Consulate.

Other ships would have other auxiliaries for other purposes, and the one at the bottom of a Nova is for planetary surveys, while the one at the bottom of an Intrepid is <insert preference>. They are then named accordingly.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[C.E. Evans]

I tend to see captain's yachts as being more a part of the actual starship than just an auxiliary craft. By its very nature, it could indeed be considered superficial and the times it may actually be needed may be few and far between, but Starfleet seems to have long ago embraced a policy of better to have something and not always needed it than to need something just once and not have it. The need of a yacht is debatable, but then so much of Starfleet is debatable as well.

In my own personal view, captain's yachts are really only ideal for special missions that will require the captain to be away from the ship for an extended period of time. Rather than have the entire ship be stuck in one location for who knows how long, the yacht can allow the ship to carry out another mission during that time and then allow the captain to catch up with it later. Sure, a personnel shuttle or a runabout could do the same job, but I do think the yacht is meant to be a superficial vehicle, Starfleet's equivalent of a limo. That could be all there is to it possibly.

It's also possible that while Picard may not have had much use of a yacht while in command of the Enterprise, other captains of similarly-equipped ships may have used it more regularly, IMO.

 

[Timo]

Which raises the possibility that Picard did not have a yacht on the E-D, but chose to have a nifty sensor package plugged in that socket instead... A yacht is only confirmed for the E-E, and even there only for Insurrection (in First Contact, it seemed to be a q-torp turret instead, perhaps supporting the modularity idea), while OTOH other blatant saucer-bottom auxiliaries are given names other than yacht (even if only off screen).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Markonian]

In the Eaglemoss book on the Picard’s D, the Calypso yacht was a luxury craft for diplomatic transfers where beaming was inappropriate. Eaglemoss is bringing a model of it in an upcoming release, so we might learn more from the included magazine.

In STO, the Aeroshuttle is a combat pet - a craft that can be deployed to aid its mothership in combat. The Aeroshuttle is effective in that.

Also in STO, the Enterprise-F has the Aquarius, a small escort (warship) tugged at the rear of the engineering hull. It is so large it can be flown as its own starship. It’s Klingon equivalent is a bird of prey resting on the dorsal “hump” of the imperial flagship.

Side note, in STO the captain’s yacht is for Starfleet, the general’s chariot for the Klingon Defense Force, and the Romulans have the commander’s gig.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Because of Timo, I included the Captain's Gig, Captain's Yacht, & Admiral's Barge as personal Auxilliary Vessels for each level of Captain or Flag Officer to use.

 

[matthunter]

Once we got the Ent-D having runabouts (or the capacity to have runabouts), the idea of a "larger, more comfortable shuttle" as a dedicated captain's yacht went out of the window.

 

[Go-Captain]

The fact we see a captains yacht used only once in several hundred hours of Star Trek really says everything about how useful the craft is.

I like the idea of making it a mission specific small craft, because that fits how the Delta Flyer is used, and it should have been the Aeroshuttle. The only problem is, the shuttles are so versatile I don't really see an issue with just stating the normal shuttles are adjustable and versatile enough to handle any situation a shuttle would be needed.

The standard shuttle has too weak a hull to survive a gas giant? Then slap more shield emitters on, and fill the cargo area with a power source. Shuttle too slow? Slap bigger warp engines on it. Still too slow? Give it a bigger warp core. Need to infiltrate a contested structure, provide close air support, and deliver combatants? Wrap a shuttle in a high power phaser array, give it transporters, and a tractor conveyor to drop combatants in case of transporter inhibitors.

 

[Timo]

The standard shuttle props still suffer from being small - but the partial builds of the Delta Flyer or the Yacht don't exactly help. The problem is the small and clumsy doorways, so that the shuttles are hard pressed to haul even the usual Trek cargo of man-handleable barrels and boxes, let alone classic military gear like burly guys and gals with a dozen pieces of equipment hanging from them.

The ST5:TFF prop and its TNG development work the best there; the rest just can't portray effective embarking or disembarking, no matter how impressively large their CGI-faked exteriors, since there are no proper doors.

I could very much see the need for special shuttles for special plot purposes, then, budgets allowing. Only, the Yacht(s) so far seen won't be the answer.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[XCV330]

My suggestion: Making captain's yachts gives Starfleet designers a place to flex their imagination and try out new ideas while waiting for the next design generation of ships of the line.

 

[UssGlenn]

Honestly, we can just use more internal space within the Saucer and reserve one specific Shuttle Craft within the StarShips Shuttle Complement as the "Captain's Yacht" and give it a unique livery and ID # on board the vessel.

But if the purpose is for only special occasions then you have a shuttle taking up space in the hanger that you hardly ever use. Better to clamp it on the outside of the ship. The internal volume lost is minimal, especially on bottom of the saucer where the outside walls are so slanted you don't have walking space.

 

[valkyrie013]

Depends on the ship and its Mission enterprise-d probably had a luxurious yacht. For first contacts more formal occasions where the E was more combat oriented and Voyager and the Nova more scientific so it's probably more sturdy craft heavy duty craft that's stuck on.
Or the enterprise-d being a luxury craft shuttle up dignitaries and VIPs probably presidents prime ministers excetera

 

[F. King Daniel]

It exists separately to a shuttle because someone thought the idea of a detaching shuttle was cool.

If JJ Abrams introduced it everyone would be furious

 

[Arpy]

I like Probert’s yacht painting. Can you spot Jean-Luc and his tea?

 

[Markonian]

I like Probert’s yacht painting. Can you spot Jean-Luc and his tea?

My goodness, I never realised you can see JL aboard!

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I like Probert’s yacht painting. Can you spot Jean-Luc and his tea?

I love the Calypso Captain's Yacht design, but it's meant to be a Civilian vessel IMO.

It doesn't feel like it matches the rest of the StarFleet design aesthetics of it's era IMO.

 

[Arpy]

I love the Calypso Captain's Yacht design, but it's meant to be a Civilian vessel IMO.

It doesn't feel like it matches the rest of the StarFleet design aesthetics of it's era IMO.

See I disagree. It’s built into the Starfleet vessel. It’s not docked in shuttle bay 1 next to Sisko’s solar sail craft. I think later yachts were designed more prosaically as kewl shuttles/runabouts. But this thing is exquisitely its own Galaxy Class attaché.

 

[Timo]

Well, "yacht" is exclusively a civilian term today, just like "freighter" is. Navies just plain don't do those, or if they do, they are very special civilian vessels under naval protection, such as the Royal Yacht.

Might be the Yacht has diffused down to the lowly level of mere Captains in the future, of course. Or then our single reference to a Captain's Yacht in the Star Trek universe is sarcasm - I mean, Troi's INS line otherwise is nothing but.

It would be pretty cool for Picard to have his own civilian yacht carried aboard. I mean, he has his own saddle; this isn't qualitatively different...

Timo Saloniemi