What Ships Do You Use?

[Steve Long]

Time for an impromptu and utterly unscientific survey.

1. a. What ship(s) do the PCs in your series use?
b. Did they pick it, or did the Narrator?
c. In either case, why that ship? What features about it make it so appealing and/or useful?

2. What ships frequently appear in your series as adversaries? If you're the Narrator, why do you use those particular ships?

Steve Long

[SIR SIG]

1)
a. Finally a Akira after 5years and 8 ships later. (see Cpt Stryker)

b. Me the narrator chose all vessels they post to.

c. Something new and 'nasty' after all the those older ships that were prone to blow up. (eg. Horatio, Saratoga)

2. Romulans have featured heavily. Mainly warbirds but there was a full romulan taskforce with 2 of every ship from Way of D'era; plus a home made dreadnaught.

Borg cubes show up now and then

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SIRSIG
AKA: SirPostalot
AKA: The MapMaker
AKA: The Trek Cartographer
AKA:...Well I could keep going forever

[Dan Gurden]

OK, easy one.
1.a; My ICON PBEM uses a Galaxy class. When my Tabletop gets up and running (if ever, it will be aboard an Intrepid Class)

My PBEM also has a couple of Runabouts, a Talon class scount and a Romulan courier floating about as player vessels.

b; As Narrator I picked the ship.

c; I picked the Galaxy because the large ship suited the mission (a 10-year long range exploration), and it allowed me greater leeway of stories, if I wanted a Fed heavy episode then the might of the Galaxy is there, if I wanted a challenge I can send the players out in the 'small ships'.

The fact that the Galaxy (like the Intrepid) has been seen on screen for 7 years and is thus easy to visualise, has some deck plans available, is well documented. All of these were bonuses, and probably helped decide the details.

Oh yeah, they are among my favourite ship types too.

2. Adversarys.

Well, I cant say too much, as most of the players are here, and likely to read this.

Current adversaries have thus far been 'Pirate ships' that looked suspiciously like the templates for some Federation vessels. <G>

Future adversaries will include Romulan , A DY-100, Hirogen, Space Amobias (or other anomaly) and the Borg. Possibly...

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Dan.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[calguard66]

My old FASATrek campaign used a Larson class destroyer... I just really like the ship, and it gave the players a challenge.

My LUGTrek campaign started aboard the Nebula class Endeavor. It was a lower decks campaign, so the Nebula provided enough resources and opportunities for the players. The history of Endeavor allowed a great background for the campaign... without being Enterprise. It also allowed them to get promoted without suddenly being in charge of the ship.

Now the group is the "senior" staff of the Nova class USS Pathfinder under the command of a alcoholic and disillusioned Commander who will never see his 4th pip. They are researching the construction and technology of the Dyson sphere... piggybacking off Owen's excellent campaign idea.

Fairly soon they will transfer to a new ship, under Dave Biggins' NPC character Captain John Hawk. Haven't decided if it will be the old Excelsior class Fearless (a name I'm attached to myself from the Honor Harrington novels) or if Captain Hawk has finally earned himself a newer ship. If he has, I'm not sure what it will be.

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"I'd rather die standing than live on my knees..."
Shania Twain

[Homer]

By series (short campaign, 7-15 eps.)

Of Dragons and Giants:

Nova class vessel sent to mediate a war between the Tholians and Species 8472. I wanted to make the crew use diplomacy and not a full spread of photon torpedoes, so I chose it.

Boldly Going Forward:

Homebrew Constitution class refit, the USS Yamato. Class was chosen by players, set in moives era TOS, before Praxis.

Music of the Spheres:

Currrent campaign, players started on an Excelsior class, and are about to be transferred to the newest Sovreign class ship, the latest Yamato. (See a pattern here?) Before anyone asks, only ONE crewmember is decended from the first Crew, the Engineer.

For one offs and such there have been:
Nebula class
Miranda Class
and a home brew of the Andor class from FASA.

[Calcoran]

1.

a. The PCs use a Hideki: The USS Phoenix. This makes us very frustrated since it is about the only ship that never made it to the Spacedock statistics.

b. I as the narrator gave it to them.

c. Many reasons. First I wanted something small. My Campaign is a DS9 style one, with PCs on a station. I did not want them to be able to go around too much and nor did I want them to be confident in their firepower. The hideki class is by far the best looking small craft class that was available (easy, compared to the ugly soap-box danube class). Since the station is a joint operation between the Federation and (what remains of) Cardassia, the Detapa Council scraped this one and offered it to the Federation liaison team (the PCs). Hence the USS registration.
(by the way, the PCs love it)

2. Adversaries: A few Romulan ships ... D'deridex when I want to show them that they are clearly outpowered and had better run, or the warpshuttle when the Romulans are on to something that requires a bit subtlety. Cardassian Galors too ... the PCs are still outpowered, but usually manage to escape rather easily. A few pirate/privateer ships when there is no need to put them in trouble. And renegade Dominion Attack Fighters when I need a good fight (pretty equally powered I'd say).

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Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.
-- (Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms)

[Homer]

OOOPS! forgot the ships that guest star, and villians.

For TOS, I use a lot of semicanon ships from the Starfleet museum site.

For movies, I uses lots of Miranda's and such, keeps the flavor

For next Gen, I really like to pop up oddballs like Freedom class, and Deneva class. It makes these classes more visible and allows the players to feel good about knowing that the four or five ships on screen are not the whole fleet.

Bad guys, well I use the Romulans and the occasional home brews like the Tholians.

Romulans in my setting use a lot of vessels, but the main bad guy in the current campaign is Commander of a squadron of updated Winged Defenders (the FASA ship). I also use swift Warbirds, as big beefy firepower when sneaky and cunning is too subtle.

For the movie era, I am working on basic icon stats for the ships in Starfleet Command, like the Gorn, and Orions. I have stopped to await the new system, and to see if the rules will require tons of modification. I do hope Engage! or what ever it will now be called will follow quickly, it may act as a gateway to conver some of the SFB'ers round here.

Hope this helps Steve, I try to put at least one of the game canon ships in each sceanario to stir the mix, and I like all the ships done to date.

I tend to choose starting ships, but as the players move about as needed by circumstance, I modify the orders to reflect the ship of the month for them. For example, it was a dead heat fro a Defiant and a Sovreign for this game, I pushed Sovreign, to allow for more gratuitous redshirt kills.

Seriously, this campaign, the Yamato will face an enemy more akin to a certain animated Japanese Spaceship, and a Defiant just doesn't have the resources needed.

[J T]

1. a. What ship(s) do the PCs in your series use?

My PCs are a Section 31 Trouble Shooting Team. Every adventure they have a new ID and a new posting. Sometimes they aren’t even Starfleet. However since Peter David suggested that Admiral Nechyev was head of Section 31 the PCs are occasionally bailed out by the Admiral’s Flagship, the USS Gorkon (Excelsior Class). Being the flagship of the head of Section 31 the ship has of course (in the best James Bond tradition) been uprated well beyond legal limits (probably beyond its SU limit too!).

b. Did they pick it, or did the Narrator?

I picked it. I’m the Narrator.

c. In either case, why that ship? What features about it make it so appealing and/or useful?

The ST Encyclopedia said that the USS Gorkon was Nechyev’s Flagship and Peter David’s New Frontier novels strongly suggest the Necheyv is very high in Section 31’s command structure.

In general I make frequent use one of the High-Speed Courier ships listed in the DS9 tech manual (the ones with a cruising speed of WF 9+). This is hand when you want to get the PCs from one side of UFP space to the other before the end of the season. Unfortunately there are no ICON or Spacedock stats for this ship (Hint, hint Mr. Long)
I also use a lot of Ambassador (because I have a nice model to put on the table) and Nebula classes. The Heroes have been stationed (as Security forces) on the USS Defiant twice so far.
In general I prefer using the ships that I know the most about. The more visual references and tech references that I have on a ship the more likely I am to use it. I almost never use a Starfleet ship without at least a picture. So my campaign tends to use lots of Constitution, Excelsior, Defiant, Galaxy, Nebula, Miranda, and of course Sovereigns.

2. What ships frequently appear in your series as adversaries? If you're the Narrator, why do you use those particular ships?

What ever fits the story, With Klingons I tend towards Klingon BOPs because I have LOTS of reference material on BOPs.

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Just remember, even though it’s a vacuum,
In space no one can hear you Clean.
-J.T.


[This message has been edited by J T (edited 06-29-2001).]

[Liquidator Queeg]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Steve Long:
Time for an impromptu and utterly unscientific survey.

1. a. What ship(s) do the PCs in your series use?
b. Did they pick it, or did the Narrator?
c. In either case, why that ship? What features about it make it so appealing and/or useful?

2. What ships frequently appear in your series as adversaries? If you're the Narrator, why do you use those particular ships?

Steve Long</font>

1a) We used a Sabre-class in my TNG game.

1b) As Narrator, I chose the ship.

1c) I love the Sabre 'cause it's small, fast, and packs a mean punch for its size; because the crew was so small I was able to detail each one to help make them seem more like "family" as opposed to nameless, faceless crewmen.

2) For the most part I used small Rommie vessels I converted from FASA Trek, and a Klingon B'Rel as well. We didn't have much in the way of ship combat in our games, though, so I only used a few small ships--mostly for "background flavour." The ships I did use had to be small and possess limited firepower, otherwise if things went wrong the crew's Sabre might have been blown to itty bitty bits.

Steve

[qerlin]

Our TNG/DS9 camapign started on a Steamrunner, USS Vanguard. After the ship was irrepably damaged, much of the crew transfered to USS Constitution, a Galaxy class. Recently, the player characters have been split between two ships (due to scheduling probs with the players): one group is on a Galaxy (Constitution) and the other is aboard USS Eagle, a Sovereign.

Our TMP is set on USS Courageous, a Miranda.

[Phantom]

The last game I was in we were aboard the USS Ajax Apollo-class. I think the narrator chose it because it was known as a test bed vessel, Kominski's first warp experiment was on the Ajax plus there were a few upgrades made as well.

We were on the RMZ so enemy vessels were pretty much Romulan.

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In the Praetors Name!

[Cybrludite]

I'm in a few online Trek sims with the Star Trek: Genesis group. (www.stgenesis.com)In the F.O.R.T. Apache sim, we have a modified Revenge-class ship USS Renown, the Apache & Apache II class fighters, what used to be a standard Federation outpost station which now has an assortment of refits and is in the process of upgrading to a full starbase, and a Galaxy-class explorer, the USS Atlantis. The ships were picked by the commanding officers of the various sims. (Renown & the Apache's by Capt. Starr, Apache II's & Atlantis by Capt. James West) A number of the ships in our sims were designed (Graphics-wise. We're free-form, instead of Icon based) by one of the players, Scott Crown. Opposing ships so far have been Kelvins, Thetans, the very occasional Tholian, and most recently, Romulans who were a long way from home.

Jon

[This message has been edited by Cybrludite (edited 06-29-2001).]

[Thanatos]

This is a question I rather like

1a) A homegrown Romulan Colonisation Vessel modified for cargo/troop transport and mercantilism as a whole

b) While technically the PCs picked it (from a list of Romulan vessels I'd prepped - I dun have the Way of D'era and am praying to every gawd i've ever heard of my connection in town can find it, though i doubt it), I (the narrator) designed it afterwards. Hence one might say we both chose it.

c) The player chose the ship described on my list as being "the really frickin' big thing that's butt-ugly but takes a beating with one disruptor to shoot back with" because... actually I don't know why, he's playing the Romulan equivalent to a pirate (complete with using a pair of disruptors as his main hand weapons in true pirate fashion ). I personally would've picked the one described as "small, fast, and nifty lookin' think B'Rel but purtier" but that's jes me.

2) The opposition? Not sure yet, really. Mostly Ferengi and other scoundrels at the moment while they fight for Dominion War salvage (mid-war no less), but they're coming to a head where they're going to have to start choosing sides so they could end up fighting anybody or everybody (they're not really connected to the Romulan Star Empire, though the Empire is not yet in the war and there is a -slim- chance of the crew actually getting the Rommies to side with the Dominion).
The main adversaries in the Ferengi aspect tend to be some homegrown right-ups I did (am using Spacedock, btw) which are designed for more efficient salvage and a few light Ferengi "fighters". I use fighter in quotation marks because they may be designated that, but I wouldn't really call thm fighters... more like armed manned worker bees

[Antonio Cabañas]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Steve Long:
Time for an impromptu and utterly unscientific survey.

1. a. What ship(s) do the PCs in your series use?
b. Did they pick it, or did the Narrator?
c. In either case, why that ship? What features about it make it so appealing and/or useful?

2. What ships frequently appear in your series as adversaries? If you're the Narrator, why do you use those particular ships?

Steve Long</font>

1.a We are running several series with several GMs on various eras:
TOS: A Larson-class destroyer, the USS Wellington (the GM picked the statistics from the site) lost a long time ago, in a Galaxy far, far away...
Movies: a "lower decks" campaign on the Enterprise-A between ST V y ST VI.
TNG: A Galaxy-class starship, USS Corsair.
DS9: The USS Caravelle, a forerunner of the Intrepid class (currently we are running the last adventure, The Hunt for the Borg Cube, and is going to be substituted by the USS Pioneer, Intrepid-class)
1.b All the narrators pick their ships
1.c Wellington: well, the narrator wanted to do a better work that the Voyager producers with a lot in space situation.
Enterprise-A: the narrator want to us to known the feeling of the extras
Corsair(my series): some time ago I ran a campaign in a Constitution-class starship called the USS Corsair, so I reused the name, and some of the background.
Caravelle: he is a fan of the Intrepid-class, and a fan of modelling, so designed the ship and throw us there.

2. Wellington: well, the Empire (what do you expect?)
Enterprise-A: klingons, romulans, and some home-made menaces.
Corsair: Romulans, Ferengi, renegade Klingons, Cardassians, Borg (the usual suspects), the Empire (we like the crossovers)
Caravelle: Cardassians, Maquis, Borg

[Greg Smith]

In my Thunderchild campaign: the Defiant-class Thunderchild. Why? Because its small and tough. Very suitable in an agressive campaign that includes the Klingon war and the Dominion war.

Foes: the Thunderchild's crew take great delight in having beaten every major race in the Galaxy.

In my Dominion campaign: They are currently tootling around the Galaxy in a Runabout, but will get their hands on the Miranda-class USS Bodicea. Why? Because it's not tough enough to go up against anything big in a fight.

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Greg

"Calm may work for Locutus of Borg here, but I'm freaked and intend to stay that way."
Xander, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Prophecy Girl.