Stats/Information on the new Enterprise

[Tsukiyumi]

Are the trailers canon? Such as the ones that show the ship under construction?

Good question.

[Vic]

It seems to me the only hard rule for canon is "seen on live action screen", or something to that effect. Nothing about script or backroom development, just seen on screen in live action. So something seen on a preview would be canon under that definition.

[IanKennedy]

We would use anything from the main film as canon and the trailers as backstage information. Equally the writers interviews and stuff would probably be treated as backstage info.

[Kevsha]

Flexibility can only go so far. There is only one effective counter to a Battleship...Another Battleship.

not so much, in todays battlefield the battleship is useless and even in the waters of WWII theyt were beginning to reach the limits of thier usefulness. today its about aircraft, submarines, and missle cruisers.

in a large fleet battle te heavy hitters oft draw the most fire, being lumbering giants they arent really able to manuever. i would think in the trek iniverse a smaller amount of lighter ships even if they don't match up with the total firepower of a "battleship" type ship could take it down. especually since in trek most of the firepower of a ship is in front or behind the ship within the fixed torpedo arcs. as much firepower as it has it would still either have to focus on one ship or split its firepower up

[Tyyr]

There's no real comparison between the status of modern battleships and ones in Trek. The battleship is still the king and likely to stay that way.

Armor vs. Firepower
Modern aircraft can carry weapons easily capable of sinking modern cruisers. A single aircraft can sink a cruiser or even multiple destroyer sized vessels depending on how lucky they get with the ship's close in weapon systems. Small trek ships have a major problem, they have no such pound for pound advantage. A large trek ship can shrug off the attacks of a single small ship. Small trek ships have no one shot kill weapons to use versus large ones. It'd be like forcing aircraft to attack a surface ship with it's gun only.

Speed and Maneuverability
Small Trek ships are slower than large Trek ships at warp. It's a trend we've seen, the ships get bigger and faster as time goes on. For instance the Defiant is a modern small Trek ship but it's still significantly slower at warp than other larger ships of a similar era. At impulse all ships are pretty much equal. A small ship may have some advantages in terms of acceleration but in Trek combat it doesn't add up to much.

Range and Accuracy
Unlike aircraft small Trek ships have to come into the gun range of large Trek ships. While aircraft can launch their weapons at a distance and minimize the ability of a surface ship to fire back a small Trek ship is going to have to deal with a large ship unloading on it and it's not a pretty picture for the small ship. Additionally Trek ships have little issue hitting smaller ships no matter how they might be twisting and turning.

While small Trek ships have their place, and even fighter sized craft can be useful they're not going to eliminate the need for battlewagons.

[Teaos]

Big ships in trek fill a roll that is impossible to be filled by other craft.

Today it is possilbe for a modern fighter to take out, or at least cripple, a Battleship. No way in hell a trek fighter could take out anything even Intrepid size.

[Sionnach Glic]

not so much, in todays battlefield the battleship is useless and even in the waters of WWII theyt were beginning to reach the limits of thier usefulness. today its about aircraft, submarines, and missle cruisers.

Correct. But modern day naval warfare is not 24th century space warfare. There is no analogue of submarines or missile cruisers, and fighters are shown to be virtualy impotent against larger craft. In Trek, the battleship remains king.

in a large fleet battle te heavy hitters oft draw the most fire, being lumbering giants they arent really able to manuever.

They're not supposed to manouver. They're supposed to wade into the enemy battle lines and unleash an overwhelming amount of firepower at any ship in range. Their hull and shields are thick and strong enough to allow the ship to do this and survive.

i would think in the trek iniverse a smaller amount of lighter ships even if they don't match up with the total firepower of a "battleship" type ship could take it down.

Doubtful. Trek weapons are shown to have damn good accuracy against most ships. Meaning that your ships are going to have to be very small to dodge the battleship's guns. And when they're that small, it's unlikely they'll be able to so much as scratch the shields.
A proper battleship will also have full weapons coverage, leading to no blindspots to be exploited. Thus it just devolved into a case of the battleships swatting the small craft out of existance one by one.

The only role fore smaller craft in Trek combat is as support to the larger ships. To take down a battleship, the best tactic would be to have a battleship of your own engage it while smaller craft make pinpoint strikes on vital parts of the hull once the shields are down.

especually since in trek most of the firepower of a ship is in front or behind the ship within the fixed torpedo arcs. as much firepower as it has it would still either have to focus on one ship or split its firepower up

A properly designed battleship wouldn't have such a problem. And even then, many existing Trek ships do have full weapons coverage all around them.

[Deepcrush]

With trek (as we saw in the DW) there is nothing better in a fight then a Battleship.

[Kevsha]

except all of the arguements against are should and would. the problem is look at some fed "battle ships" while they do have 360 degree phaser archs, the torps are still limited to the front with the exception of the sov with its foward turret and the akira with its supposed side launchers. if you are taking on multiple opponents you need to pick one of them to put in your torpedo arch while you peck at the rerst with phasers, but also how many ships CAN you engauge. the more you do, the greater the power consumption. the range problem makes little sense as we have seen that pinpoint warp jumps can be made to rappidly close distance to a target . also we have seen alot in trek that a ships ability to survive is based primarily on its shield coverage. multiple smaller ships could out manuever a larger ship and coodinate thier attacks on one point then even if the BB would manage to keep one ship in front of shield coverage it couldn't do it with the others.

new i'm not saying there is no place for the big gun ships, i'm just saying that this:

Flexibility can only go so far. There is only one effective counter to a Battleship...Another Battleship.

is an entirly false assumption. well designed smaller attack ships (i.e NOT BoPs or Hidekis) when attacking in a group could take down a BB.

[Tyyr]

I say this as nicely as I can. English, it's a wonderful language. What the hell did it ever do to you to deserve that kind of treatment?

Yes they could, however a BB is going to chew smaller ships up and spit them out. If you're willing to watch many of your small ships get wasted every time you want to take down a large capital ship you can do it, it's just a really bad way to run a navy. That was the attitude with which the Sherman vs. Panther fights occurred in 1944-1945, yeah the Shermans won, but they were losing 5 to 6 Shermans for each Panther.

[Reliant121]

I generally see along the lines as GK does with the coalition universe. Sort of world war II navy ish, just without the fighters.

In a fleet action, which is generally what we take as the standard measure, small ships engage small ships, large ships engage large ships, fighter vs. fighter and BB vs. BB.

[stitch626]

Why is it BB? Wouldn't it be BS?

Small Trek ships are slower than large Trek ships at warp.

Not true. The Intrepid is faster than most ships, and the Prometheus is as well. And they're both on the small side.
Also, other than the Defiant, we have no canon numbers for the smallest ships (Saber, etc).

[Tyyr]

The US designation for a battleship is BB. I went with it.

[stitch626]

The US designation for a battleship is BB. I went with it.

Thats... odd. Oh well, whatever works.

[Tyyr]

Not as odd as calling your most powerful ship BS 61.