replace Voyager with enterprise

[Lord Revan]

IIRC it was phase 1 Galaxies (and some Ambassador-class ships) that were the "blows up if you look at it meanly", we know that the Enterprise was among the first ships of that class due to how people reacted to it during the TNG pilot and season 1 episodes, it could that there were some design bugs that got overlooked cause Starfleet wanted to get the phase 1 GCS on duty before the design was ready and phase 2 or later had those bugs fixed.

Hell even in Generations the Enterprise takes alot more damage then it previously could (in TNG it was generally "shields down=boom") on essentially bare hull since the Duras sister could fire thru the shields.

while it was no where the extent of the Defiant or the Voyager it was still improvement.

[Baffalo]

It is not without historical precedent that exploration ships for travelling to unknown regions are reinforced against excessive damage that would otherwise destroy or incapacitate a similar craft. IIRC, James Cook had this done specially to his ship when he sailed to the Pacific. It makes sense that they may have done this to the Intrepid class from the start, while Galaxies require external reinforcement or extensive overhauling to have a similar amount of damage resistance. (Or maybe the Enterprise just has shit luck...)

Couldn't the same be said of the original 13 Constitutions? I mean, they had a really shitty track record, but most of that was due to the nature of the mission itself. The original 6 Galaxies probably were the test bed and when they encountered problems, those designs were passed on to the next group to get put together.

I'm not saying this justifies the lack of fail-safes. If anything, it shows that Starfleet's MO when it comes to new explorer designs is to put a few together, then throw them at the frontier and see if any survive. Those that do must have done something right, and so that gets passed along to the next batch.

[The Romulan Republic]

Maybe Starfleet feels that given the variety of bizarre things that they deal with, their is no way they can prepare for everything, so they build vessels that aren't really prepared for a lot of specific situations and rely on giving their crews a lot of authority to improvise in the field to compensate. Though their is no excuse for not doing something as basic as making a warp core that isn't vulnerable to explosions.

[Lord Revan]

it could that the GCS-project was running slow (if you remember that episode where Geordi falls in love with the hologram of the designer, you see a what looks like a mostly built super structure of a GCS in the background), so Starfleet Command or the Federation Council or who ever was in charge rushed the project so it would be made in time. Thus the first batch of Galaxies would have problems that normally would have been found. But since some byrocrat was more concerned about saving face by having the ships done in time, rather then making sure they were ready, you have the poor safety record of the phase 1 GCS.

[Baffalo]

it could that the GCS-project was running slow (if you remember that episode where Geordi falls in love with the hologram of the designer, you see a what looks like a mostly built super structure of a GCS in the background), so Starfleet Command or the Federation Council or who ever was in charge rushed the project so it would be made in time. Thus the first batch of Galaxies would have problems that normally would have been found. But since some byrocrat was more concerned about saving face by having the ships done in time, rather then making sure they were ready, you have the poor safety record of the phase 1 GCS.

I read that and all I have in my head is Edward Teller, the scientist famous for two things:
a) Miscalculating and saying that the Trinity test would ignite the atmosphere, and
b) While developing the hydrogen bomb, miscalculated and underestimated the yield.

Now, I'm sure the man's absolutely brilliant, but after that I'd only put him on a project if someone followed him around double checking those numbers from time to time. I wonder if his later career was working with Gene to develop the Galaxy Class and it just carried over from real life.

[Themightytom]

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Metaphasic_shield

In 2370, Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge developed the Metaphasic shield program 1, an application of the metaphasic technology for use on the USS Enterprise-D. It involved a steady increase of the subspace compression factor of the shields, which corresponded in the decrease of the field distortion from 4,562 to 4,513 millicochranes, after which the metaphasic field was engaged

.

If memory alpha is doing it's job, this suggests the Enterprise wasn't originally equipped with metaphasic shields, they did some kind of modification to create them based on the Ferengi's model. Apparently Voyager could beam stuff through them as well.

on the other hand...

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Multiphasic_shield

was apparently in development around the time of the explosion of Praxis, and was used so commonly that it was standard in the 24th century. That doesn't sound like the same kind of shield, but also suggests that the Voyager's shields are really nothing special. I am not seeing anything to support my impression that the Voyager was particularly formidable due to some advances in technology, so the Enterprise would have a size advantage for that intimidation factor. if the Enterprise can soak up the same kind of hurt that the Voyager can at least as long as it's shields are up, then it really is a question of whether it can deal out punishment better than Voyager in a fight. It's bigger, so more discouraging, and as tough shield wise.

There seems to be some debate as to whether it is a death trap when un-shielded. In defense of the Odyssey's demise, wasn't it basically un-shielded when the Jem Hadar were pummeling it because the Federation had no idea what to do with phased polaron cannons?

I don't think it's size alone that is the intimdiating factor, Picard doesn't seem to offend as many people as quickly as Janeway does. I know they made a big deal in the show about the Kaizons spreading rumors about the voyager being a Ship Of Death, but did Janeway REALLY go out of her way to disprove that? She got into a fight practically every week.

If the Enterprise is both intimidating the small fish, while impressing the larger fish and making allies, maybe the Vidians for example don't start by trying to attack them, or, Where Harry Kim ended up with a harem of vampires, maybe the aliens who were trying to warn Voyager off in the first place would actually talk to the Enterprise?

If the Val Jean survived and there was no real reason to integrate the crew, maybe some of those situations are visited on Chakotay instead, letting the Enterprise focus on their progress

[Themightytom]

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Metaphasic_shield

In 2370, Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge developed the Metaphasic shield program 1, an application of the metaphasic technology for use on the USS Enterprise-D. It involved a steady increase of the subspace compression factor of the shields, which corresponded in the decrease of the field distortion from 4,562 to 4,513 millicochranes, after which the metaphasic field was engaged

.

If memory alpha is doing it's job, this suggests the Enterprise wasn't originally equipped with metaphasic shields, they did some kind of modification to create them based on the Ferengi's model. Apparently Voyager could beam stuff through them as well.

on the other hand...

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Multiphasic_shield

was apparently in development around the time of the explosion of Praxis, and was used so commonly that it was standard in the 24th century. That doesn't sound like the same kind of shield, but also suggests that the Voyager's shields are really nothing special. I am not seeing anything to support my impression that the Voyager was particularly formidable due to some advances in technology, so the Enterprise would have a size advantage for that intimidation factor. if the Enterprise can soak up the same kind of hurt that the Voyager can at least as long as it's shields are up, then it really is a question of whether it can deal out punishment better than Voyager in a fight. It's bigger, so more discouraging, and as tough shield wise.

There seems to be some debate as to whether it is a death trap when un-shielded. In defense of the Odyssey's demise, wasn't it basically un-shielded when the Jem Hadar were pummeling it because the Federation had no idea what to do with phased polaron cannons?

I don't think it's size alone that is the intimdiating factor, Picard doesn't seem to offend as many people as quickly as Janeway does. I know they made a big deal in the show about the Kaizons spreading rumors about the voyager being a Ship Of Death, but did Janeway REALLY go out of her way to disprove that? She got into a fight practically every week.

If the Enterprise is both intimidating the small fish, while impressing the larger fish and making allies, maybe the Vidians for example don't start by trying to attack them, or, Where Harry Kim ended up with a harem of vampires, maybe the aliens who were trying to warn Voyager off in the first place would actually talk to the Enterprise?

If the Val Jean survived and there was no real reason to integrate the crew, maybe some of those situations are visited on Chakotay instead, letting the Enterprise focus on their progress

[Borgholio]

maybe the Vidians for example don't start by trying to attack them

In that instance, the size of the E-D would probably ward off Vidian raiders, and when the two sides started talking, Crusher (in addition to being more experienced than the EMH) also has a much larger medical crew and facility than on Voyager. They might actually be able to cure the Phage.

[Themightytom]

maybe the Vidians for example don't start by trying to attack them

In that instance, the size of the E-D would probably ward off Vidian raiders, and when the two sides started talking, Crusher (in addition to being more experienced than the EMH) also has a much larger medical crew and facility than on Voyager. They might actually be able to cure the Phage.

Well they still have the EMH... but probably more nurses and or science personel. IDK if Troi has medical training or if she is just a therapist, but I would think having a bunch of biologists and labs might be more helpful than Paris and Kes.

[Elheru Aran]

It is not without historical precedent that exploration ships for travelling to unknown regions are reinforced against excessive damage that would otherwise destroy or incapacitate a similar craft. IIRC, James Cook had this done specially to his ship when he sailed to the Pacific. It makes sense that they may have done this to the Intrepid class from the start, while Galaxies require external reinforcement or extensive overhauling to have a similar amount of damage resistance. (Or maybe the Enterprise just has shit luck...)

Couldn't the same be said of the original 13 Constitutions? I mean, they had a really shitty track record, but most of that was due to the nature of the mission itself. The original 6 Galaxies probably were the test bed and when they encountered problems, those designs were passed on to the next group to get put together.

I'm not saying this justifies the lack of fail-safes. If anything, it shows that Starfleet's MO when it comes to new explorer designs is to put a few together, then throw them at the frontier and see if any survive. Those that do must have done something right, and so that gets passed along to the next batch.

So basically your argument is that Voyager simply got the benefit of better initial design than the Galaxy class thanks to observing starship evolution in action?

...I can buy that, actually. However, the Intrepid class ships aren't *that* much younger than the Galaxy. Twenty years or so. Memory Alpha says the Galaxy class is ca. 2350s, Intrepid is 2370s. IRL, the USN is just now completing submarines and carriers that were designed twenty years ago! If you accept that Starfleet's manufacturing is quite speedy-- they do manage to rebuild quite a bit after Wolf 359 to where they are in the Dominion War-- I suppose it's possible that they may have been able to design the Intrepids from scratch and build them by the 70s once the Galaxies had been in action for about a decade, long enough to really shake them down and run into a variety of different situations.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Even if they designed the Intrepids with no reference to the experiences of the Galaxy class (they serve two different functions after all), technology moved on in that time so they had new stuff to use, like the EMH, the bio-neural gel-packs instead of isolinear chips, that variable-geometry warp drive to give just three examples.

[Batman]

Well I guess technically 'on' and 'off' 'are' variations.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well I guess technically 'on' and 'off' 'are' variations.

I was more referring to the warp nacelles moving before jumping to warp speed, but whatever.

[Batman]

So was I. The Warp nacelles move to the exact same angle every time they go to Warp and never change it once they're underway. So far the 'variable geometry' Warp drive seems to vary only in that the nacelles fold upwards when they go to Warp, which begs the question of why they keep them folded down under impulse because they currently are doing jack all.

[Themightytom]

So was I. The Warp nacelles move to the exact same angle every time they go to Warp and never change it once they're underway. So far the 'variable geometry' Warp drive seems to vary only in that the nacelles fold upwards when they go to Warp, which begs the question of why they keep them folded down under impulse because they currently are doing jack all.

I'm guessing Federation Greenpeace insisted on that one and it's just a political stunt to demonstrate they care about the whole "Ripping apart the spacetime continuum" thing.

Voyager DID have an eject able warp core though which was an improvement over "Ditch half the ship and slowly fly away in the saucer section. I think that would have been game over the Enterprise even if they got further away than they did in Generations, without warp drive they are probably not getting home.

Did the bioneural gel packs really offer any advantage? You could.. on occasion... have one person fly the Voyager but the only time they ever used that was when Voyager got itself into something the Enterprise D wouldn't have. They also had transporters that worked faster and better than Enterprise. They plucked crewman out of crashing or exploding shuttles like it was easy.
I mean I get that they are blah blah gigquads faster but what was the actual application of them?

[Baffalo]

I'm guessing Federation Greenpeace insisted on that one and it's just a political stunt to demonstrate they care about the whole "Ripping apart the spacetime continuum" thing.

Voyager DID have an eject able warp core though which was an improvement over "Ditch half the ship and slowly fly away in the saucer section. I think that would have been game over the Enterprise even if they got further away than they did in Generations, without warp drive they are probably not getting home.

Did the bioneural gel packs really offer any advantage? You could.. on occasion... have one person fly the Voyager but the only time they ever used that was when Voyager got itself into something the Enterprise D wouldn't have. They also had transporters that worked faster and better than Enterprise. They plucked crewman out of crashing or exploding shuttles like it was easy.
I mean I get that they are blah blah gigquads faster but what was the actual application of them?

The only possible reason I can think of would be that the nacelles generate a low-power warp field that is used to propel the ship during impulse. They shift the geometry for higher warp so they can get better yield or something.

And yeah, they had the warp ejection system, which I imagine would have been VERY useful in Generations to keep from losing their star drive section. However, I imagine that the difference between Voyager and the Enterprise could be that the Enterprise core, which was tauted as being very advanced and one of the most sophisticated designs ever built, was simply too complicated to have an ejection system. Having said that, however, I don't think the Constitution had a warp core ejection system, though they used a horizontal system for the longest time. Perhaps they found they could fit the vertical system in better or something like that.

And lastly, the bioneural gel packs. I imagine this had as much to do with the 90s and the crazy way people felt that organic was clearly superior to technology and that it would totally save the day. That or they believed the gel packs could somehow relieve the system of having to think as much by providing feedback controllers in systems far from the central computer, giving it more local control.

My biggest issue with that is, as someone who's taken control theory and seen how it works in practice, it's not a real improvement unless you're stuffing a literal brain in those things to handle logic that's so fuzzy it can't be handled by a computer, something I find highly unlikely. I mean, yes, the ships are built to explore and run into weird situations. But you're not going to be needing a full brain in there to think of things. For most of their stuff, it's a matter of "Flow Rate A plus Flow Rate B must not exceed parameters C and D but must obey E" or something. We have such systems NOW, and while they may be limited, I don't see how electronics are going to do anything but improve between now and then.

[Batman]

Not to mention electronics rarely get sick

And the E-D warp core technically was ejectable too. The ejection system was just so badly designed it had, at least as seen in the series and the movie, a 100% failure rate

[Themightytom]

The only possible reason I can think of would be that the nacelles generate a low-power warp field that is used to propel the ship during impulse. They shift the geometry for higher warp so they can get better yield or something.

And yeah, they had the warp ejection system, which I imagine would have been VERY useful in Generations to keep from losing their star drive section. However, I imagine that the difference between Voyager and the Enterprise could be that the Enterprise core, which was tauted as being very advanced and one of the most sophisticated designs ever built, was simply too complicated to have an ejection system. Having said that, however, I don't think the Constitution had a warp core ejection system, though they used a horizontal system for the longest time. Perhaps they found they could fit the vertical system in better or something like that.

And lastly, the bioneural gel packs. I imagine this had as much to do with the 90s and the crazy way people felt that organic was clearly superior to technology and that it would totally save the day. That or they believed the gel packs could somehow relieve the system of having to think as much by providing feedback controllers in systems far from the central computer, giving it more local control.

My biggest issue with that is, as someone who's taken control theory and seen how it works in practice, it's not a real improvement unless you're stuffing a literal brain in those things to handle logic that's so fuzzy it can't be handled by a computer, something I find highly unlikely. I mean, yes, the ships are built to explore and run into weird situations. But you're not going to be needing a full brain in there to think of things. For most of their stuff, it's a matter of "Flow Rate A plus Flow Rate B must not exceed parameters C and D but must obey E" or something. We have such systems NOW, and while they may be limited, I don't see how electronics are going to do anything but improve between now and then.

Maybe the warp bubble helps cancel mass or something, didn't the enterprise have a warp field in place even though they were sitting still, in the episode where Doctor Crusher gets trapped in her own universe?

In the TOS they never called them "Warp cores" so maybe the concept of a "Core" was something they did later to integrate all of the systems. That might even explain why ships in TOS could get horribly mangled without blowing up, a cascade of failures could be more easily interrupted.

There WERE a plethora of weird effects that kept the original enterprise from going to warp at horribly inconvenient times, so maybe they decided to put everything together to make it run more smoothly, accepting the trade off that it was also more likely to explode.

I don't see any reason organic technology would have an advantage over electronic, you're still talking about the speed of processing electrical signals, the bio-neural gelpacks were said to "Organized information more efficiently". I know the human brain is understood to form linkages between information, one thing can remind us of another thing, which reminds us of another thing, I don't know if that is more efficient because we also percieve sensory information, so what we remembered learning in school might be bogged down with what we smelled in the classroom at the time, how we felt about the teacher, whether it was hot... how is any of that a useful ability for a machine?
Unless the Voyager is collecting zounds of nebulous information to regulate it's environmental systems, or it's power utilization, or detecting and responding to threats, I don't see it having made any difference. The ship was always on powersave mode with the dim lights and whatever. I didn't even see any lights coming on in the corridors as people walked down them.
With regards to combat the Enterprise had it's on auto response anyway, i remember dialogue from the first season where I think it was Worf commented "The shields just came on!" like he didn't know why.

[Enigma]

At least the Enterprise would be less likely come down with a cold. lol

[Borgholio]

At least the Enterprise would be less likely come down with a cold. lol

Believe it or not, several episodes of Voyager DID involve the gelpacks being infected with various bacteria and viruses.

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Bio-neural_gel_pack

[Captain Seafort]

I think that was his point.

[Borgholio]

Sarcasm detector is broken. Something may be wrong with MY neural gelpack...

[Enigma]

I'm guessing that the E-E would have an easier time getting home?

[The Romulan Republic]

Well, the Sovereign class is perhaps the finest canon type of vessel ever built by the Federation in terms of its technological capabilities, so...

[Baffalo]

Well, the Sovereign class is perhaps the finest canon type of vessel ever built by the Federation in terms of its technological capabilities, so...

The Big E definitely has some of the sleekest lines, heavy firepower, experienced command staff, and a captain who could probably get his crew home without committing planetary apocalypse, genocide, war crimes, etc.

It does make me wonder how much of Janeway's logbook got 'lost' before they finally reached Earth. Several of Janeway's actions are questionable at best and almost treasonous at worst.