one-off awesome 'Trek concepts.

[Duskofdead]

The E-nil never took this kind of beating. About the same level of speciel effects to.

This is absolutely hysterical. Very good point.

[Captain Seafort]

This implies weapons were weaker. Unless the Federation knew of a hull material which made weapons do light scorching damage and later traded it in for a weaker, combustible material?

Why not? That's exactly what modern navies have done - the switch from heavily armoured battleships, to ships dependent on chaff and anti-missile missiles for survival. There's also the case of the Amazon class - built of aluminium, to satisfy the "flammable" part.

Against most/all ships, not just Federation ones. Are you implying a galaxy-wide change between TOS and TNG where all races pretty much built weaker ships, with weaker hull materials? Klingon ships, generally regarded as "tough, sensible warships" for the most part, go poof like popcorn with regularity in TNG+. (And their designs haven't changed appreciably, so an argument of overall superior design in TOS is invalid.)

No one's arguing that a Connie could outgun a GCS. What we are arguing is that, relative to the weapons of the time, the Connie was more solidly built. The E-nil and the Reliant both took direct hit to thir torpedo bays and survived. The Reliant had one of her nacelles blow off and survived. The E-nil also took heavy damage to her engineering hull, targeted to inflict as much damage as possible from access to her schematics, and survived. The E-A was hit by at least eight PTs at Khitomer and survived.

The E-D was destroyed by a glancing blow to a nacelle, and suffered about 14 hits during the Veridian battle, three of which were disruptor hits, two, and probably more, were torpedoes.

[Duskofdead]

No one's arguing that a Connie could outgun a GCS. What we are arguing is that, relative to the weapons of the time, the Connie was more solidly built. The E-nil and the Reliant both took direct hit to thir torpedo bays and survived. The Reliant had one of her nacelles blow off and survived. The E-nil also took heavy damage to her engineering hull, targeted to inflict as much damage as possible from access to her schematics, and survived. The E-A was hit by at least eight PTs at Khitomer and survived.

The E-D was destroyed by a glancing blow to a nacelle, and suffered about 14 hits during the Veridian battle, three of which were disruptor hits, two, and probably more, were torpedoes.

Given that we see single torpedo/phaser/disruptor hits completely vaporize ships with some regularity in TNG+, it is reasonable to assume that raw weapon power has increased tremendously since TOS. Additionally, it stands to reason that sufficiently fortifying ships to take extensive weapons damage unshielded is either extremely costly (Defiant, ablative armor, etc.) or perhaps in some cases infeasible. Nevertheless, generally speaking there are some really tough starships out there... the Ent-E in a prolonged battle where it lost or nearly lost various shield vectors throughout the course of the battle, followed up by a ram after which the ship still survived.

Weapons and materials/armor technology do somewhat keep pace with each other, but there are lag periods/leapfrogs very akin to sensors and cloaking technology always trying to outdo each other. At the near end of the TNG+ era (i.e. Star Trek Nemesis, Voyager's "Endgame", etc.) we have seen two dimensions which more or less had "fallen behind" for several years suddenly leap forward. Cloaking, in the case of the Remans, has been "re-perfected" in the sense that it has again leapt well ahead of all known ability to penetrate it. (Whether or not this technology will continue to exist or be implemented again is another discussion.) The ablative armor generation technology in Endgame, even taking into account that it is from the future, shows that sometime in the not very distant future the Federation advances with ablative armor implementation to the point that for virtually the first time (that we know of) armor in space combat surpasses shields as a potent defense system.

To make a long story short, I don't see much merit in the claim that a TOS era ship having considerably weaker weapons aimed at it is proof that those ships were more solidly designed than later ships, even taking "relative to the time" into account. Weapons booming to the level that they can vaporize ships in short order is not something you can just whip up an invention to slap onto existing hulls and balance it out again overnight. I think it's also to the point to call out that most of what people are basing the claim of weakness on is the GCS... a ship which not only routinely was outnumbered or facing more advanced enemies, but also was produced in incredibly small numbers to be primarily deep space explorers. If we take the Enterprise-D as an accurate pulse of the TNG+ Starfleet design sensibility it would be just as equally valid to use the Defiant instead and make the claim that all of TNG+ Starfleet was incredibly toughly designed. But in either case we would be broad-brushing an enormous fleet based off just one example.

[Captain Seafort]

Given that we see single torpedo/phaser/disruptor hits completely vaporize ships with some regularity in TNG+, it is reasonable to assume that raw weapon power has increased tremendously since TOS.

We've never seen such a feat - we've seen weapons hit ships, followed by the ships exploding. The actual destruction was probably due to the loss of antimatter containment, either in the magazines or fuel pods. To claim such events as evidence of hugely powerful weapons is akin to claiming that the Bismarck was armed with low-kT yield shells.

[Duskofdead]

Given that we see single torpedo/phaser/disruptor hits completely vaporize ships with some regularity in TNG+, it is reasonable to assume that raw weapon power has increased tremendously since TOS.

We've never seen such a feat - we've seen weapons hit ships, followed by the ships exploding. The actual destruction was probably due to the loss of antimatter containment, either in the magazines or fuel pods. To claim such events as evidence of hugely powerful weapons is akin to claiming that the Bismarck was armed with low-kT yield shells.

In "Way of the Warrior" ship vaporization was near instant. Many attacks resulting in the destruction of Jem'Hadar ships throughout the entire war were equally instant. You are correct that in some cases the ships took damage and had a "delayed destruction" a few seconds later, but instant vaporization or explosion was very common throughout DS9. Damage which vaporized enormous amounts of hull and did deep damage were common too; the damage visible on the D'Deridexes, Akira, Galaxy classes and others during the Chin'Toka ODP fight dwarfed any level of hull damage we saw in TOS on the E-Nil.

[Teaos]

With the massive increase in fire power the only way to void it are shields which do seem to have powered up a lot. Or slap on a HUGE amount of armour. Several feet of it. Since that is such an unrealistic option due to the insane amounts of resourses involved they really have no option.

[Captain Seafort]

In "Way of the Warrior" ship vaporization was near instant. Many attacks resulting in the destruction of Jem'Hadar ships throughout the entire war were equally instant. You are correct that in some cases the ships took damage and had a "delayed destruction" a few seconds later, but instant vaporization or explosion was very common throughout DS9.

Exactly - explosions, not vapourisation. Much the same as the destruction of the Hood.

Damage which vaporized enormous amounts of hull and did deep damage were common too; the damage visible on the D'Deridexes, Akira, Galaxy classes and others during the Chin'Toka ODP fight dwarfed any level of hull damage we saw in TOS on the E-Nil.

I'd strongly dispute the term "any", tough I agree it was rare - only the Constellation in "The Doomsday Machine", and the E-nil in ST3 displayed similarly extensive damage.

[Teaos]

I'd strongly dispute the term "any", tough I agree it was rare - only the Constellation in "The Doomsday Machine", and the E-nil in ST3 displayed similarly extensive damage.

As I pointed out the damage to the Constillation was not to bad. A few little chunks out of the outer rim of the hull missing and the end of a nacelle knocked off.

[Captain Seafort]

Hve a look at the remastered image Kendall posted on the previous page - the outer hull stripped away from the forward-starboard saucer back to the registry number, a massive crater in the aft-port saucer, the aft half of the port nacelle gone, and the port nacelle ripped open along most of its length. That's without even being able to see the engineering hull.

[Teaos]

Does the remastered over rule the original as canon?

Even in the remastered the damage seems to be limited to shell being ripped off. Even the nacelle only appears to be missing its shell.

While nasty it is hardly as bad as chunks being ripped away and crater blown in it.

[Captain Seafort]

Does the remastered over rule the original as canon?

It's the more up-to-date version. The product of more detailed research and/or better images becoming available in in-universe terms.

Even in the remastered the damage seems to be limited to shell being ripped off. Even the nacelle only appears to be missing its shell.

Generally, yes. The fore-starboard (particularly the inboard section of it) and aft-port saucer damage, however, looks a lot deeper than the rest. Plus the back of the starboard nacelle is missing.

[Teaos]

It is hard to see the depth of the damage but since it seems to retain its saucer shape it indicates that the damage is not to extensive.

[Captain Seafort]

An image to highlight my point.



The circled areas look to me like their in shadow, suggesting the damage extends deeper into the hull in those areas.

[Teaos]

I zoomed in on the area and dont really see the extent of the damage you claim. It is bad but not much worse than other damage we've seen ships take.

[Captain Seafort]

No worse, sure, but it's certainly as bad as any damage we've seen - either in ST3 or at Chintoka. I was simply making the point that it goes pretty deeply into the saucer, rather than being restricted to the outer hull being ripped away.