Worst ship design in sci-fi?

Sionnach Glic · Post by **Sionnach Glic** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 9:45 am

Yeah, the Omega class was the main one I was thinking of. Then we have the ship that can't do anything for three whole minutes after it fires.

Deepcrush · Post by **Deepcrush** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 2:59 pm

I on hand will come to the Omega's side. I liked the overall design. It was an aircraft/troop carrier. 36 fighters plus 2,000 troops and their vehicles is a fair payload. Now, we always see these things going against each other or membari. Not a great way to judge them. The EA fleet was equal in tech to the Narn but was well known to heavily outnumber them. Before the Earth-Membari the Centari looked at earth as a child like nation. After the war, or more to the fact, 11 years after the war as earthforce had rebuilt that all changed. When the Narn-Centari war started and Earth sent ships to keep an eye on the Centari, the only threat to come was the thought of war with earthforce. Now there were any number of reasons to this, but that includes that earth is no longer lumbering about in little Hyperions but now has a ship (Omega) that can match the fire power of even the toughest Centari warships. The biggest fault that people take is the thought that the Omega was a battleship at heart and she wasn't. EA was far behind the Centari, God knows the Membari and pre-Membari-Earth war even behind the Narn. If you want to see a battleship ideal then you would want to look at the Nova.

The hyperion was just a poor thought ship. EA wanted a cheap long range ship, and failed. The Hyperion needed to stop off often for crew cycling since they had no A.Grav. The Omega was a vast improvement over these. Longer range, more&larger weapons, more fighters, can carry a fair number of troops, doesn't need crew cycles and was the first ship in earth history to match the Narn or Centari. All of this was ment to be filled out by the Hyperion and it failed.

Sionnach Glic · Post by **Sionnach Glic** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 3:13 pm

The problem with the Omega was the design, not how it was deployed.

RK_Striker_JK_5 · Post by **RK_Striker_JK_5** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 3:54 pm

Rochey wrote:Yeah, the Omega class was the main one I was thinking of. Then we have the ship that can't do anything for three whole minutes after it fires.

The one from the spinoff series, right? Man... I know the ship, too. And the series. It's been ages since I saw anything of B5.

Deepcrush · Post by **Deepcrush** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 5:36 pm

Rochey wrote:The problem with the Omega was the design, not how it was deployed.

I think the biggest problem was how it was shown on TV. Its deployment was just blah. It was built as a ''do it all'' kind of ship. We always saw the Omega up against WS which were some very tough ships. Between the jamming tech of the Membari and the power of the weapons I was happy to see that the Omegas held out as well as they did. But, the show itself showed the Omega as a battleship type. Always in the thick of battle which wasn't a good place for it to be. They were the first EA ships to carry medium range weapons that weren't missiles. Saying that a group of Whitestars could rip at one is just a duh moment. "Say it ain't so! One of the newest races got beat by the most powerful race in the galaxy! Is that possible?" If you want a fair judgment on the Omega then you have to compare it to the ships that were its equal. The Narn G'Quan, the Centari Primus and the Brakiri Heavy Cruiser.

Sionnach Glic · Post by **Sionnach Glic** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 6:00 pm

I know the Omega was effective, but it could have been so much better had they scrapped the craptastic design they used for it. The thing obstructs it's own firing lines, has a massive target profile, and it's hanger bay is completely exposed.

I still love it, though.

Deepcrush · Post by **Deepcrush** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 6:17 pm

Its forward cannon weren't well placed and the hanger bay was kind of silly.

On the other hand, it has a massive profile because it is a massive ship.

What I would like to see is a Nova class (EarthForce) that replaces its short range plasma cannons with the more powerful and updated pulse cannons used on the Omega. Now that would be a nice ship of the line.