What Came First...

[C.E. Evans]

True enough. But as this condition, resulting from fairly routine operations rather than battle damage, eventually did force the evacuation of several decks...

Well, there actually was no evacuation order given of those decks. The closest was Data promising to initiate "radiation protocol," but after the main crisis had passed--something that the Sutherland's first officer protested as being heartless to the people currently on those decks.

...it wouldn't be too out of the line to speculate that the crew already had to avoid using certain functions and spaces when leaving port; having Main Bridge be one of these would then explain the use of this facility that seemed to lack classic things such as viewscreen or helm console.

Sure, one's free to speculate that. It's definitely plausible and there's nothing to contradict the idea. Otherwise, though, that facility could just be the Sutherland's main bridge and that it just had a different layout than what we're used to.

As for the Prometheus, the plot has our very small and low-ranking band of heroes play a major role in running the ship. This would be consistent with a small bridge where the top officer wears Lt (jg) pips; the use of the Nebula class exterior is the inconsistent thing here.

The Prometheus could also just had a main bridge with a different layout. And a lieutenant j.g. having the conn really isn't that out of place in a rotation of several junior officers that take turns being in charge of a non-alpha duty shift on a daily or weekly basis.

 

[SicOne]

We could argue the escalating registry numbers vis-a-vis starship chronology issue until we're all so blue in the face that we resemble Bolians, but it seems to me that (1) Nebula registry numbers are typically lower than Galaxy registries and would tend to indicate an earlier entry into service than the Galaxy-class, and (2) Nebulas seem to appear in greater numbers than Galaxies, suggesting an earlier start to the program (or at least fewer complications that hindered construction of the class).

There are certainly various speculations why the reverse may also be true, but I tend to lean towards the Nebula-first side of the discussion.

 

[Knight Templar]

Once again, registry numbers are in no way consistent in the U.S. Navy. Why would they be in Starfleet?

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

^ They are actually, though the U.S. Navy uses the "ship type" letter designations before the numbers.

CV-1 through the latest active carrier CVN-77. Destroyers use (DD) DDG-XXXX in order regardless of class name.

With the letter designation, it's obviously easier for them to reserve numbers as ships are planned. They even assigned numbers to ships that were never finished or even started.

The Federation assigns registry numbers in latter days with no consideration of class, even if they did so with something like the Constitutions.

 

[Knight Templar]

^ They are actually, though the U.S. Navy uses the "ship type" letter designations before the numbers.

CV-1 through the latest active carrier CVN-77. Destroyers use (DD) DDG-XXXX in order regardless of class name.

With the letter designation, it's obviously easier for them to reserve numbers as ships are planned. They even assigned numbers to ships that were never finished or even started.

The Federation assigns registry numbers in latter days with no consideration of class, even if they did so with something like the Constitutions.

Explain SSN-21

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

^ Are you referring to the fact there's an SS-21 & an SSN-21? There's a few numbers like that for subs (21, 22, 23). That seems to be one of the few oddities in USN ship numbering.

They were in different eras, so hard to tell what happened there.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

As for the Prometheus, the plot has our very small and low-ranking band of heroes play a major role in running the ship. This would be consistent with a small bridge where the top officer wears Lt (jg) pips; the use of the Nebula class exterior is the inconsistent thing here.

I've read in several places that was a wardrobe malfunction in that Piersall was supposed to be a Lieutenant Commander. It wouldn't be the first time that they forgot a rank pip on an epsiode (Lieutenant JG Data in "All Good Things...").

 

[Timo]

...However, since this character was never actually stated to be the commanding officer of the Prometheus, and indeed Seyetlik himself appeared to fill that role, we are not forced to believe in any particular backstage explanation or real-world backstory.

Lt (jg) Piersall could simply have been the hapless underling who had to cope with Sisko in a situation where the top brass of the ship was embroidered in Seyetlik's mad activities.

I have no real objection to the Prometheus having a small bridge, though. We have already seen that very small ships may have very large bridges - the Grissom, the Tsiolkovski and the Equinox are examples of the "guest bridge of the week" being if not larger, then at least more spacious-looking than the bridge of the much larger hero vessel. And yes, the standard TNG/DS9 guest bridge set in all its variations seemed to feature corridors reaching to other rooms on the same deck, suggesting a large if partitioned command center, and actually making the nerve centers of Kirk's various ships look smaller than any of the guest ones.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Knight Templar]

^ Are you referring to the fact there's an SS-21 & an SSN-21? There's a few numbers like that for subs (21, 22, 23). That seems to be one of the few oddities in USN ship numbering.

They were in different eras, so hard to tell what happened there.

I'm pointing out that the U.S. Navy designated the Sea Wolf class submarines as "SSN-21" and taking them out of the attack submarine numbering system because they wanted to distinguish them as "submarines for the 21st century".

Who is to say that Starfleet doesn't have equally ridiculous justifications for their registeries?

Perhaps some number combinations are offensive to some member races of the Federation.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I always saw the Nebula to Galaxy as akin to Miranda to Constitution. Different needs meant different configuration.

So maybe they had no consideration as to registry numbers having that kind of meaning.

I've assumed that Starfleet likes to design in pairs. With names that reflect a "big sister-little sister" relationship: Constitution-Miranda, Galaxy-Nebula. I even kitbashed a few for a website I did: Dadeleus-Icarus,

Ambassador-Envoy,

Excelsior-Eureka,

Sovereign-Regent,

Zodiac-Constellation.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

^ Those are great designs. I also remember a Ronin class that was a Sovereign class in the compact configuration, ala Nebula, with a pod.

 

[Nerys Myk]

^Thanks.

I found a few more:

Intrepid's little sister the Dauntless Class

A "prefit" Constellation

Her sister a "prefit" Zodiac

A "prefit" Miranda

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

It does seem to be the way Starfleet designers work.

I really like the look of the Zodiac-Class

 

[NebulaClassGuy]

...the Galaxy or the Nebula?

The Nebula-Class could have come first, as a test ship for some of the technology and design elements used in the Galaxy-Class. But then the Nebula could have come after the Galaxy as a 'cheaper' alternative.

The Nebula-Class came first. We know from various bits of evidence that it was around during the Cardassian War, and was likely the biggest and newest ship around at the time.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

An in-universe explanation could have been that the Galaxy had some design flaws they thought they could work out over time. Thus the Nebula got done first.

Considering what happened to Yamato & Odyssey, they might not have fixed whatever it was.

 

[NebulaClassGuy]

The Odyssey was destroyed via a kamikaze attack... it wasn't the result of some technical or design flaw with the ship.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

Wasn't it one Dominion ship hitting the "neck" area?

Maybe/maybe not a flaw, but a weak point.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Pretty much any area of a ship becomes a weak point when another ship flies through it.

 

[Mytran]

I think the dominion ship hit the main sensor / deflector array - a high energy piece of kit if ever there was one!

As said above, when one ship flies into another ship, damage WILL result.

 

[Timo]

...Although with the Odyssey, there was the extra twist of the shields being down (because they were considered an unnecessary drain when they proved to be useless against Dominion beam/bolt weapons). Curiously, no ramming was ever attempted against a shielded Starfleet ship, whereas supposedly shielded Klingon ships operating jointly with Starfleet ones were cut to pieces by ramming in two episodes. Does that support the idea that "damage WILL result", or does it instead establish that Starfleet shields are invulnerable to ramming?

Timo Saloniemi