What do (or don't) you like about the U.S.S. Yeagar? I am referring to the ship that hung around Deep Space 9. Please speculate about the origin, nature, use, and future of this starship.
First of all, it’s “Yeager.” Also, I once speculated that the model was built as an in-joke, as its first appearance was in “Doctor Bashir, I Presume,” which guest starred Robert Picardo as Doctor Lewis Zimmerman. To celebrate the crossover of a VOY character/actor in DS9, somebody (presumably Gary Hutzel) might have had a little fun with a far background ship. At the time, most people were watching the show on smaller standard-definition TVs, and like me, probably wouldn’t have been able to make out what the model was made from. I always thought it was a standard Intrepid class until screencaps started showing up on the internet which revealed otherwise.
It's a hideous kitbash if you ask me, and even in-universe wise, it doesn't make any sense because Starfleet has transporters and replicators, both of which can reshape matter on a subatomic level or even make matter out of energy. Making this kind of 'bash' between a Maqui raider and a modern Intrepid doesn't make sense. There is 0 design flow of any kind and it makes the thing look plain ugly. No in-universe 'reason' could probably exist behind the existence of this ship. Some fans suggested that SF was in a 'rush' to complete some ships... but in a world with extremely advanced automation, transporters and replicators that can convert energy into matter, this REALLY makes 0 sense. I think people might not have really understood how advanced technology in UFP really is, and with different writers coming in over time, things were seemingly (and progressively) dumbed down during DS9's run (mind you, other series did similar things). To me a Nebula class looks far better as a kitbash design, but, its basically just a Galaxy class without the neck, not two different ships merged into one. The Nebula class DOES come with its own secondary hull deflector dish design (which is different than the one on the Galaxy class), and a triangular appendage on the aft top section of the ship (dependent on the mission profile - which can carry a larger sensor array or more torpedo tubes). So, despite the fact that the Nebula is basically a kitbash of a Galaxy class (aka, almost the same ship with mostly same parts on the whole), it has some unique bits to it which make it also 'original' to a limited extent. The Yeager... not so much
I'd treat the Yeager as a "One-Off" experimental design that didn't go anywhere. It was a Dominion War experiment that didn't pan-out the way they hoped, so they kept the one ship and never made more units again.
I love the kitbash ships, even the ugly ones. As for the Yeager specifically, I'd guess it was a one off design, either built out of spare parts or for some experimental tech reason. I'd be up for seeing it, or any of the kitbash ships, again in one of the shows, although its very, very unlikely.
For its design as yet another type of ship in the Sovereign/Intrepid/Nova family, I think that it works, but I do not think that it should be assumed that its secondary hull is a Maquis raider. I also think that its wings should be assumed to move like the Intrepid's. It is just an Intrepid-like class of ship with more and different details on its hull. I could see it as a lighter or heavier ship that has slightly different shields weapons and sensors.
Honestly, you kinda have to ignore the fact that the ship uses a scaled-up Maquis raider as the secondary hull, and use suspension of disbelief to imagine that it's something else. But consider this: If you hadn't seen the Maquis raider beforehand and just saw this ship, would you have been able to accept its design better?
I can't say I would have. This is because the blocky nature of the Maqui raider's design simply doesn't 'mesh' with the Intrepid's smoother forward section at all. SF ships usually have some kind of a 'design flow' to them... heck, even the Nebula class as a kitbash has that because it has a certain 'flow' to the design' - its mainly a compact Galaxy class without the neck and inverted nacelle pylons... sure, there is 'some' interruption to it, but nothing that radically disrupts the overall design of the ship... so it manages to get away with it and look good in the process. With the Yeager, there's way too much interruption to the design to make it work - even in universe wise. The forward section is completely mis-matched with the aft section.
Do we ever get close enough to Yeager to clearly see the kitbashed parts or are they all tiny as shown at Memory Alpha's screenshots?
I think the two screencaps on the MA page are pretty much the only times we saw it (I only remembered the top one). The view from below does make the Maquis Raider shape more apparent than I'd hoped, but I suppose it'd still be possible to stay within the bounds of reason to pull an E.C. Henry and design something that matches the general shape while being less busted in the details of how it all fits together and is still consistent with the few pixels that were actual in the episode.
Yeah I agree that a detailed Yeager could be designed to fit the few pixels that are seen and not have the kitbashed Raider piece so apparent.
Nope. That was the whole point of making it a far background ship: so we wouldn’t see what it was really made out of on our tiny 13-inch standard definition TV screens of the ‘90’s.
The Voyager hull tapers to that same width as the spine of the Ju'day https://stexpanded.fandom.com/wiki/Ju'day_class