[Your Opinion] Size Matters

[SovWell]

I would like to see a major differance in ship sizes durring combat. Like the mamoth Galaxy classs vrs the small klingon bord of prey. Size does matter, visualy, and in playability. As in example in combat speeds and movement, the Defiant quickly circled around in and out up and over the enemy larger vessels when in combat. I would very much like to see this rather than a face off on head to head combat. That way, we can say my ship is bigger than yours, but then also counter, my ship is faster than yours. Who do you think will win? The big bad heavy firepower who is slower than the quick buble bee with a large sting? I know, it depinds on who is using what and what their experiance in combat is like, but you get the idea.

[Musterion]

I would hope ships are relatively to scale, after all, the mammoth Vo'Quv should be ultra-imposing! The only problem is I can't see how they would make it so that the vo'quv could easily target say a Defiant or something through clicking (assuming they're not npc only ships).

This makes me wonder what ships around DS9 will be like - will it be all be properly sized etc

[Varrangian]

There needs to be "scale" but there also needs to be game design. Realism will not work perfectly in this case. If you look at the borg cube scene from the trailer or the screen shots, I think it has a good blend of realism vs. necessity. Some of the ships might need to be a bit bigger for game play purposes, but I think that is legitimate.

[Tain]

There needs to be "scale" but there also needs to be game design. Realism will not work perfectly in this case. If you look at the borg cube scene from the trailer or the screen shots, I think it has a good blend of realism vs. necessity. Some of the ships might need to be a bit bigger for game play purposes, but I think that is legitimate.

There is no reason they can't do true scale in a space game. There is no terrain, they have plenty of wiggle and maneuver room. People aren't going to be doing manual clicking for targeting anyway, so there is nothing to be worried about on that front. You can bet its going to be the standard tab-targetting, next/previous enemy thing you find in every other mmo.

[Manta2015]

The only exceptions I heard in this matter were if you were flying a Shuttle/Runabout-sized vessel, but everything else will be the sizes they should be :

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/fleet-chart-1060.jpg

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/alien-chart.jpg

Every size chart has discrepancies, but this one gets most of 'em right =)


-Manta-

[IIntrude]

I believe the devs have talked about this sometime in the past. I think they said that the scales will be approximate, but for reasons that effect gameplay, smaller ships will not be to exact scale.

[codeminer]

As in example in combat speeds and movement, the Defiant quickly circled around in and out up and over the enemy larger vessels when in combat. I would very much like to see this rather than a face off on head to head combat. That way, we can say my ship is bigger than yours, but then also counter, my ship is faster than yours. Who do you think will win? The big bad heavy firepower who is slower than the quick buble bee with a large sting?

From what I have read, speed and maneuverability will be just as important as size and firepower . . . to an extent. Being able to turn quick enough so that the enemy can't keep pounding on the same shield facing will be a key strategy, just as being able to maneuver so you can pound on the enemy's same shield facing.

However, IMO, I would not want to see, say a single small destroyer take out a battleship no matter what the skills of the players. The devs said they were going to put some balance between smaller and larger ships in combat, but come on . . . a truly overpowering match like that would just feel too unrealistic.

In WWII, a few brave destroyer captains were able to disable a heavy cruiser with their torpedoes, but to take on a super battleship like the Yamato, was just out of the question. It took dozens of torpedoes and bombs from planes to take the Yamato out.

Let's make at least some battles that should just not be fought, except with large numbers of small ships vs. a very large ship.

[Musterion]

This made me wonder about a Defiant vs a Vo'Quv, omnidirectional weapons, and only there only being 4 shield facings.. will the smaller size and higher maneuverabiity of a Defiant really have any effect if it can't make runs on the Vo'Quv's weak spots (every ship has them surely :p), if it has just 4 shield facings and omnidirectional weapons?

A Defiant should be able to find an angle of attack where the Vo'Quv can only get a limited number of or weaker weapons on it, and keep pounding on that shield facing, but with just four facings, attacking from beneath won't provide much of or any advantage as it's just "the side" or "the back" of the vo'quv being hurt. The Defiant might be harder to hit, at least.

Basically despite being the fllea on the back of the vo'quv, would a tiny defiant be an different from a scaled-up defiant which would be hitting the same places as easily?

[Saladin_Class]

If you attack a big ship with a little ship, you will get towed home.

If you attack a big ship with a pack of little ships, firing outside the main guns range of the big ship, you will wear down the big ship.

Unless they have thier own little ships.

I am one of those little ship captains, in charge of a pack of destroyer class ships.

[Manta2015]

Seeing that it's 2409, I'm sure there's plenty of newly developed counter-measures against the Defiant or escort classes like so. It'll probably take at least a few Defiants to take down a Vo'Quv, which also has ablative armor.

Gotta take that thing out with a good mix of ships.

Size definitely matters in several respects, or at least I hope it does, and not in any game-breaking way =)


-Manta-

[Tain]

Seeing that it's 2409, I'm sure there's plenty of newly developed counter-measures against the Defiant or escort classes like so. I

Especially when you consider the fallout from the Dominon war. The Alpha quadrant suffered immensely against a power that specialized in swarming with smaller attack craft, the good ole' bug ship. You can bet by now, 30 years after the fact, every ship under the sun is packing firepower to swat down the little guys.

[Deyvid]

The only exceptions I heard in this matter were if you were flying a Shuttle/Runabout-sized vessel, but everything else will be the sizes they should be :

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/fleet-chart-1060.jpg

http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/alien-chart.jpg

Every size chart has discrepancies, but this one gets most of 'em right =)

-Manta-

Unfortunately (but understandably) Ex Astris Scientia (http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/index.htm) does not allow for hot-linking of their images. It produces a small error/warning image instead. Here's the page that links to those images: Fleet Charts (http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/fleet-charts.htm)

I would like to see a major differance in ship sizes durring combat. Like the mamoth Galaxy classs vrs the small klingon bord of prey. Size does matter, visualy, and in playability. As in example in combat speeds and movement, the Defiant quickly circled around in and out up and over the enemy larger vessels when in combat. I would very much like to see this rather than a face off on head to head combat. That way, we can say my ship is bigger than yours, but then also counter, my ship is faster than yours. Who do you think will win? The big bad heavy firepower who is slower than the quick buble bee with a large sting? I know, it depinds on who is using what and what their experiance in combat is like, but you get the idea.

The Bird of Prey may or may not be tiny, depending on which class we refer to (and which will be in the game.) It is established in the Star Trek Encyclopedia that the B'rel-class Bird of Prey is the smaller scout, and the K'Vort-class Bird of Prey is the larger cruiser. But actual dimensions of those ships have never really been pinned down conclusively.

Memory Alpha lists "Bird of Prey (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Klingon_Bird-of-Prey)" as 110m -- while it mentions in text that there are different types of Birds of Prey (B'rel and K'Vort) it does not really refer to any size difference.

The DS9 Technical Manual lists the B'rel scout as 157.76m and the K'Vort cruiser as 678.36m.

Looking at the Ex Astris Scientia page, "The Bird of Prey Size Paradox (http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/articles/bop-size.htm)", we see that in Star Trek III, the Bird of Prey (which would later be dubbed the "HMS Bounty" in Star Trek IV) was between 60m and 110m. In Star Trek IV the size ranges from 60m to 330m (the 330m being based on the obvious exaggeration of the scene with the Bird of Prey hovering over the whaling ship). In TNG: A Matter of Honor, the Bird of Prey facing off with the Enterprise-D is roughly 230m. In TNG: The Defector the Birds of Prey appear to be an estimated 642m. In TNG: Yesterday's Enterprise, we see the first on-screen reference to the K'Vort class, and the ship is estimated at 350m. In TNG: Reunion, the Birds of Prey are estimated at 320m, which is also the estimated size in TNG: Redemption. TNG: Rascals refers to the Birds of Prey in that episode as B'rel but they are also shown to be around 350m long (the same as the ship previously referred to as K'Vort in Yesterday's Enterprise, so is the Star Trek Encyclopedia mistaken?). In DS9: Past Prologue Lursa and B'Etor's BoP is about 110m again.

In the interest of brevity (too late), there are several more examples given from various episodes that estimate the size of various Birds of Prey to be, 50m, 100m, 135m, 200m, 350m, even up to almost 700m.

For a sense of scale and comparison, the Defiant-class ship is listed as 120m, and the Galaxy-class is listed as 642m. So in some on-screen appearances, a "Bird of Prey" has been shown to be around the size of the Defiant, and in other on-screen appearances, they have shown to be half the size of Galaxy's saucer, and about half as big as a Romulan D'deridex-class warbird (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/D%27deridex_class).

To see the crazy inconsistent sizes of the "Bird of Prey", check out this sizing reference image (http://i296.photobucket.com/albums/mm184/deyvid_mmo/Star%20Trek/bird-scaling.jpg) (originally from Ex Astris Scientia, credit where credit is due).

Also...
Check out this sweet little pic (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v521/MontgomeryGooo/compare.jpg) posted by Reinkaos (in the Vo'Quv thread (http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=23585)) showing size comparison between the Klingon super carrier Vo'Quv and the Federation ships, Sovereign, Galaxy, Akira, Intrepid, Defiant.



The question of size and scale was brought up in the Sept. 4, 2008 edition of Ask Cryptic (http://www.startrekonline.com/dev_blog/ask_cryptic_09-04-08):
One inherited flaw that I have found in current Star Trek games is that the ships are not in scale with one another. For example, in Bridge Commander, the Defiant was as large as a Galaxy class saucer section, which is not canon. What will Cryptic's plans be with scaling of the ships?

We have been working on that recently, and we are in the process of defining ship scale and size ratios. Most of the time it is not a problem. But there are a few exceptionally small ships, such as shuttlecrafts, that become problematic. At true scale, they become nearly unperceivable when you are flying a ship the size of a Galaxy class, and that's simply not fun.

We want to deliver a canonical Star Trek experience, but we also want to deliver a fun game, so we have to find a balance. Expect larger starships, from escorts to battle cruisers and Borg cubes, to have their scale represented fairly accurately. There will also be some small ships in STO – take a close look at the trailer and you may see some.