#Klingon Battle Cruiser

[oldschoolfrp]

Star Trek scenes by Denis Loubet from The Space Gamer 42, Star Trek Special Issue, August 1981, featuring articles on Star Fleet Battles and the Star Fleet Battle Manual (previously, and)

[chernobog13]

AMT STAR TREK MODEL KITS

The mid-1970s weren’t the greatest for Star Trek collectors.  Sure, the show was in re-runs at least 5 times a week (at least where I lived; thank you WPIX Channel 11!).  And there was a proliferation of books (James Blish’s and Alan Dean Foster’ novelizations of the live-action and animated series episodes, original novels, and of course the Starfleet Technical Manual!).

However, Star Trek toys - at least before the Mego action figures arrived - were nearly non-existent.  And those that were around were just gawdsawful (Spock Helmet, anyone?).

Luckily, when Star Trek’s popularity skyrocketed in syndicated reruns, AMT (Aluminum Model Toys) decided to re-issue their original line of Star Trek model kits - the Enterprise and the Klingon D7 Battlecruiser - along with many new additions.

I lived at the edge of the boonies then, but despite that there were still a couple of shops I could reach by bicycle that carried almost the entire AMT line.  I managed to get nearly every one of them.  I also probably destroyed more than a few brain cells breathing in the fumes from all the Testors model glue I used.

The crown jewel of the line.  I remember having a terrible time trying to get the engine nacelles to stay at the correct angle when I glued them (Super Glue was only just hitting the market back then).  Inevitably, the nacelles or the deflector dish would break off, usually due to my younger brothers getting their hands on the model.  I ended up building three or four of these guys.

This guy, especially for someone like me with terrible model building skills, was actually a breeze to build.  Also, it was stable enough to stand on a shelf without a problem.  However, the rear landing leg was kind of fragile and would break off (again, usually do to my brothers getting their grubby little hands on it).

FUN FACT: As part of the agreement that gave AMT the rights to create Star Trek model kits, AMT built the 3/4-scale Galileo shuttlecraft used in the episode The Galileo Seven.

This was another relatively easy kit to put together, from what I’m told.  The day I saw it in the store I only had enough money to buy one model, and I chose the Star Trek Exploration Set instead of the Bird of Prey.  I hoped that the Bird of Prey would still be in the store the next time I came in.  My hopes were dashed when I returned and found it gone (which was weird, because - according to the store owner - I was the only person who bought the models).  It was never restocked, so I never had this ship in my fleet.

I freakin’ loved this model!  I didn’t realize until many years later AMT re-tooled  their Leif Ericson Galactic Cruiser model into this guy.  The original model did not have good sales, but I guess AMT made it a UFO to take advantage of the UFO-mania that was rampant back then.

I had this guy suspended by fishing line from my bedroom ceiling.  However, the scaredy cat little brother I shared the room with was terrified of the glow-in-the-dark ship.  So the next day, before I got home from school, he attacked it with a whiffle ball bat!  I tried to replace the model, but I never saw the kit again at the store.

This kit was the explosive (as kids these days say)!  These models were better than any Star Trek toys on the market at the time.  Sure, the models were 3/4 the size of the originals, but I didn’t care; they fit my kid hands perfectly!

The communicator screen flipped open, the tricorder head swiveled, and its compartment door opened!  I didn’t know what cosplay was back then, but with these I could dress as my favorite characters and be fully equipped.

This kit was so popular at my house that I ended up building four more kits, one for each of my brothers.  For some strange reason, this kit always seemed to be in stock at the store.

This model was a lot of fun to build, but I do wish that it had included all the bridge stations and more figures.  It had a favored spot on my bookshelf until one of my brothers decided to see if he could throw it like a Frisbee.

This diorama was originally an Aurora model kit from the 1960s; AMT used Aurora’s molds and re-issued it.  Relatively easy to build, and it gave me a chance to practice my painting skills.

I remember being quite proud that a painted a red spot on the one snake head to simulate where the phaser beam was striking it.

This lasted a long time on my shelf.  And then my brothers decided to take turns running over it with their bikes.

This kit was an easier build than the Enterprise.  I do remember, however, that there was one pain-in-the-butt chromed piece that was supposed to be glued inside the torpedo tube opening at the front of the ship.  I had the devil’s own time holding that in place until the glue dried.

The final fate of the model was my brothers shoving a lit firecracker inside the torpedo tube opening.  I managed to secure and build a second model, and that time my brothers used an M-80.

And my parents wondered why I kept trying to sell my brothers to the circus.

This was the final piece of the line: the space station from the episode The Trouble With Tribbles.  It looks like it would have been a fun build (it even came with the tiny in-scale Enterprise on the box cover), but I never got the chance.  I never, ever saw this model kit in any of the stores I frequented.  I only saw it for the first time at a science fiction convention many, many years later.

[nocternalrandomness]

USS Enterprise-A escorting Kronos One to Earth

[alphamecha-mkii]

Star Trek: The Next Generation - Klingon Vor'Cha Class Concept Art by Rick Sternbach

[leesargent]

Li'l Star Trek The Motion Picture

I actually really love TMP, even before the Director's Cut, but more so after that excellent edition. I like the aesthetics and the sense of wonder and size it invokes.

A lot of the visual effects stand up today - that opening sequence with the Klingon battle cruisers is so beautifully shot! And the Enterprise is a joy to behold.

[discoonthegrass]

The Trouble with Tribbles: To protect a space station with a vital grain shipment, Kirk and the crew must deal with Federation bureaucrats, a Klingon battle cruiser and a peddler who sells furry, purring, voracious little creatures as pets.

Plato’s Stepchildren: After Dr. McCoy helps the leader of a planet populated by people with powerful psionic abilities, they decide to force him to stay by torturing his comrades until he submits.

Feel free to reblog in order to help this poll reach the most people! Remember to vote on the other polls in this round, listed here!

[raisinchallah]

u kno kinda funny to me how many people are so obsessed with star trek ship design when tbh all of them like across the board kinda suck and are boring star trek ship design peaked at the klingon battle cruiser in the motion picture its been downhill since then deep space nine which is clearly not a ship and is a space station being beautiful and sexy is an exception and not counted

[glowing-disciple]

Everyone always talks about how Kirk screwed with the Kobayashi Maru test, but I don’t think y’all realize how much people screw with it on the regular.

Brief recap for the uninitiated: the Kobayashi Maru is a test designed to be unwinable. It’s supposed to gauge how well someone handles a no win situation. The premise of the exercise is simple: you are commanding a combat ready starship ferrying a large group of wounded civilians to a nearby colony where they can receive treatment. While in route, you receive a distress call from the Kobayashi Maru, a small starship that’s basically a space minivan. It’s been swept into the Klingon side of the neutral zone by an ion storm and is badly damaged. You can help them, but taking your ship into the neutral zone would constitute an act of war (if you’re caught).

The “fun” part is that the simulation is programmed to generate an infinite number of Klingon battle cruisers, so there’s no way for you to blast your way through, and the stricken ship is out of transporter range, so you can’t just magic your way out of this either.

People who have taken the test are also forbidden to discuss any of this with anyone who hasn’t taken it, so everyone goes into it blind.

But here’s the neat part: there is a novel where Kirk, Scotty, and Sulu talk about how they handled this test.

This is already a long post, so I’m just going to summarize how each of them tackled the problem…

Kirk: hacked the simulation so that the Klingons would recognize him as a famous hero and assist in the rescue.

Scotty: ended up surrounded by Klingon battle cruisers and decided to take a third option by using his engineering expertise to create an impossible situation. This crashed the simulation.

Sulu: said “not my problem” and completely ignored the Kobayashi Maru, to the shock and horror of his instructors and classmates.

I wonder what other things people have done during this test…

[staringdownabarrel]

I know the copy-paste fleet from PIC's Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt. II tends to get a lot of people riled up, but honestly, I feel like it makes a lot of sense from an in-universe perspective.

Like, one of the big issues Starfleet had in the TNG and DS9 eras was that basically any time a new threat rolled up at the border, their threat response was just whichever ships they could call up at short notice. This was one of the bigger reasons why the fleets in episodes like The Best of Both Worlds, Redemption, Pt. II, and the Descent two parter were a mish-mash of different classes: from Starfleet's perspective, it was quite literally just whoever they could drum up in the moment, not which ships were actually best for this job.

During the DS9 era, there was a shift from fleets being just whoever they could drum up to being actual formalised big fleets that consistently did maneuvers together. This is why it went from DS9 getting seven ships as reinforcements during the battle in The Way of the Warrior to there just being hundreds of ships that operated together a few seasons later. This is apparently a trend that continued after the Dominion War, too: in Nemesis, the fleet the Enterprise-E was supposed to link up with towards the end was referred to as Battle Group Omega.

I think having a couple hundred Inquiry-class ships operating as a single fleet would make sense in this context. A lot of the ships that were in service during the TNG/DS9 era would have been decommissioned or destroyed by this point, and Starfleet would have had to replace them with something. In seasons two and three of Picard, we've seen some of the other ships that have been introduced over the intervening decades; having a few rapid response units would also make sense.

This wouldn't necessarily square with Starfleet's exploratory and scientific missions, but I don't think it'd necessarily need to. Even in TNG, there were more military-focused officers like Captain Jellico and Admiral Nechayev who were very concerned with the Federation's security, and they didn't get in the way of the Enterprise-D's exploratory, scientific, or diplomatic missions.

The same would be true of the late 24th/early 25th century of PIC's first season: they could easily have both the heavily militaristic officers and the more pacifist officers working different missions for the most part. It's just that the part of the fleet we saw was the military part.

Plus, from a thematic point of view, this would tie into why Picard left Starfleet to begin with. In Remembrance, Picard straight up says he left because he felt that Starfleet wasn't Starfleet anymore. Having a noticeable chunk of the fleet set up to be the immediate military response to a new threat would make sense in that context. Picard's traditionally been the kind of guy who prefers peace and diplomacy (though he is a capable military guy when the chips are down), so Starfleet immediately being able, and potentially willing, to respond to everything with deadly force really would rub him the wrong way.

The other reason I don't mind there being a fleet of hundreds of Inquiry-class ships ready to go is because of the makeup of the Romulan, Klingon, and Cardassian fleets during DS9. While these powers did have some varieties in their fleets, for the most part they're just as guilty of flying copy-paste fleets as Riker was in Et in Arcadia Ego, Pt. II. While Starfleet was flying fleets with a large variety of ship classes, the Romulans were almost exclusively flying D'deridex-class warbirds, the Klingons mostly Vor'cha- and Negh'var-class battle cruisers with the occasional bird-of-prey and K'tinga-class, and the Cardassians exclusively Galor- and Keldon-class ships.

This doesn't necessarily mean that these are the only ships these powers had available, but they were very much the backbone of their battle fleets and were clearly considered to be the most capable of combat. Their other ships were probably made for much more specialised purposes.

This is probably a design philosophy Starfleet probably took as well. Instead of having most of their larger ships be jack-of-all-trade ships, they spent more time having specialised ships for specialised purposes. The end result of this is that they could have 200 Inquiry-class ships ready to go for this purpose rather than just have dozens of different classes that might not be the best for it, but would do in a pinch.

I feel like this is also something people would have warmed to a lot more over time, had the Picard writers not immediately try to back peddle in season two's opening episode, The Star Gazer. Had they just said, "Well, this is a new era, both of production and in-universe, and this is how Starfleet does battle fleets now," it might still be a contentious thing but people would eventually get used to it.

The other thing they probably should have done--and I still think they should do this at some point--is have a show set during this same period that focuses heavily on a five-year mission during this period. That'd allow room for an explanation that the copy-paste Inquiry fleets are mostly just for emergencies, and that other ship classes exist for different purposes. (I know eventually someone will say, "Yeah, but Lower Decks and Prodigy exist", but keep in mind they're set twenty-ish years prior to Picard.)

I think this would allow for starship classes to clearly be for much more set purposes rather than just be the jack-of-all-trade ships they've traditionally been. While there's been exceptions to this like the Oberth- and Nova-classes mostly being science vessels, the Defiant-class being a warship in all but name, and the Olympic-class being a medical ship, but these are mostly the exceptions.

Classes like the Constitution- and Excelsior-classes are nominally explorer classes, but have been shown to be used for military missions as well for example, and that tends to be the general rule for larger ships. For the most part, if they're a medium-to-large ship for the era, then they're used as a jack-of-all-trades ship rather than for a specialised purpose.

So really, the writers on Picard had the opportunity to really do something interesting with how starship classes get used and having a set canonical purpose for each new class, but then they chose to not do it because it didn't really gel with a lot of people. I feel like this is ultimately an unfortunate thing.

[tigerexe]

15! what is your favourite star trek starship?

tos enterprise is my special girl but shoutout to klingon battle cruisers! I love their weird shape. Especially in tmp i like the detail of the front being slightly charred from frequent torpedo fire

[stra-tek]

Episode six of Picard's third season is, without doubt, the most fanwanky thing the franchise has ever put out.

And that includes the novels.

We got:

Geordi, who now runs the Fleet Museum

Moriarty

Starship porn feat. OG Stargazer, Voyager from Voyager, the Bird of Prey from Star Trek IV, Doug Drexler's NX-01.5 refit (even though it never appeared in the actual Enterprise series), the old Klingon battle cruiser, the U.S.S. Enterprise-A and even a TOS-era Constitution-class ship (looking like TOS not SNW)

Data (again, again) and Lore

The cloaking device from Star Trek IV: The One With the Whales being stolen and used

A Data/Geordi reunion

Walking past a shitload of TOS and TNG episode references in the Daystrom Station vault

Walking past James T. Kirk's frozen remains (still with a heartbeat, according to some) which are part of something called Project Phoenix

Probably more stuff I've forgotten

[thewomancallednova]

Klingons on the viewscreen: *boy band noises*

Sam: Wow this is such a bop

James: Actually, it's a K't'inga class battle cruiser.

(Thanks to @zetabrarian for the idea)

[chernobog13]

K't'inga-class battle cruiser ready to fire!

[eomproject]

Admiral Agatha Drake (2205-2266)

Admiral Agatha Drake, C-in-C Klingon Command, 2258-2259. An accomplished explorer and fleet commander, Drake suffered from the curse of overpromotion; her skill at the fleet level did not transfer to competence as a theatre commander, where she struggled to delegate properly.

Drake was an accomplished explorer and regional commander by the time of the Klingon War. She, like many of her peers, had earned her spurs as a combat commander during the Klingon conflicts of the 2240s, fighting both at Axanar with Kelvar Garth and in the Archanis sector in the aftermath of the massacre. Her work leading a squadron of cruisers in this period and afterwards marked her out as a capable and inspiring commander to her peers and superiors, who supported her steady rise through the ranks. With the death of Admiral Anderson at the Battle of the Binary Stars, she would become C-in-C of the gutted 2nd Fleet.

Despite the heavy losses throughout the conflict and the litany of disasters across the entire front, Drake's reputation would survive the war relatively intact; 2nd Fleet fared better than many of the ad-hoc formations thrown into the line from the 5th, 7th and 9th Fleets, arguably due to her tactical strengths and instincts. By the end of the war, she was the ranking flag officer along the main front, and took an active hand in absorbing the remaining formations in the region into a newly reform 2nd Fleet. Her strengths and reputation as Second Fleet commander excelled in the early post-war months as she raced around the frontier putting out fires and providing neccesary support to colonies and neutral worlds.

It was these successes that convinced Lutheth,Shukar and Nogura to appoint her as Commander of the newly formed Klingon Border Operations Command - Klingon Command. Despite her strengths as a leader, this decision was most likely to her (and Starfleet's detriment). Drake was an excellent commander - but her style meant she had to lead from the front. As such, she failed to properly grasp the strategic and operational requirements of her new command, leaving logistics behind as she continued to fight fires herself, only managing to cause more difficulties in the meantime. She also did very little to fix the chaotic overlapping of operational areas, and even added to the gordian knot of jurisdictions with her prodigious use of Mendez Columns.

Drake also failed to understand how political her new position. Faced with managing both civilian political leaders in the region, and a jumble of disparate and disagreeable junior commanders underneath her, she failed to manage either of them. As officers bickered with each other over who was senior, Drake took matters into her own hands when it would have been more prudent to leave to a subordinate.

Her handling of the Suliban Crisis and later Operation Singapore are testament to her inability to grasp the big picture, as she drained 2nd and 4th Fleet of vital vessels and support craft in a botched attempt to extend Starfleet jurisdiction deep into the The Triangle. An overly complicated battle plan, combined with a shaky logistics system and poor recconassiance resulted in her Task Force's decimation by 2nd and 5th Klingon Fleet Groups between the 12th and 14th of September.

​In the aftermath of First Caleb IV, she was fired as KLICOM and replaced by Vaughan Rittenhouse. A short period as CO of South-Western Command was followed by four years as CO of the Reserve Fleet. In 2266 she was enroute to Starbase 4 when her shuttle was lost in an Ion Storm.

Read more at https://edgeofmidnight.weebly.com/

Portrait by @crowlls

[alphamecha-mkii]

[kosmos2999]

Star Trek: The Animted Series 50th Anniversary Episode Review

Episode: More Tribbles, More Troubles

Season: 1

Episode: 5

Stardate: 5392.4

Original airdate: October 6, 1976

Written by: David Gerrold

Directed by: Hal Sutherland

Music by: Yvette Blais and Jeff Michaels

Executive producers: Lou Scheimer and Norm Prescott

Studio: Filmation Associates

Network: NBC

Series created by: Gene Roddenberry

Cast:

Captain James T. Kirk (voice by William Shatner)

Mr. Spock (voice by Leonard Nimoy)

Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy (voice by DeForest Kelly)

Lt. Uhura (voice by Nichelle Nichols)

Lt. Hikaru Sulu (voice by George Takei)

Eng. Montgomery Scott, Koloth, Korax (voices by James Doohan)

Gest stars:

Cyrano Jones (voice by Stanley Adams)

Transporter Ensign (David Gerrold)

Synopsis:

The Enterprise is in an escort mission. A planet named Sherman is passing thru a famine and need the help of the Federation. There are two robot cargo ships carrying the quintotriticale, a special grain seed on the way to help the people of Sherman.

On the way to the planet, the Enterprise intercepts a Klingon battle cruiser attacking a single-passenger Federation scout ship. Kirk orders to advance the ship on warp 6 and Scott the rescue of the scout ship's pilot using the transporter.

Koloth, the Klingon cruise commander acuses the pilot of ecological sabotage and makes use of a new energy weapon to paralyze the Enterprise. To counter the Klingon's enrgy field, Kirk orders to bring the robot ships from different angles, so Klingon cruise ship's energy will be depleted and has to run away.

There is no other than Cyrano Jones and his infamous tribbles. This time, Jones claim that tribbles don't reproduce, they got fat. At first, Jones refuses to tell Kirk the reasons on why the Klingons are prosecuting him but later he confesses he sold tribbles to the Klingons. And he also stole a tribble predator called a gloomer.

As one of the robot ship was severely damaged, its cargo was transported to the interior of the Enterprise. Due to lack of cargo space, the grain was store between the halls of the ship. Scott advices Kirk about having both grains and tribbles aboard.

Once the Klingon cruiser refills its energy, it goes back to attack the Enterprise. Kirk send the second robot ship as a evasive manuver and it goes hit. During the battle, the containers of the quintotriticale and the tribbles ate much of it. Making them to grow fatter so very fast.

Spock devise a strategy to send the most of the fluffy critters to the enemy's battlecruiser. After a period of hesitation, Jones accept to deliver the gloomer back to the Klingons. Inside the Klingon cruiser, Koloth orders Korax to shoot the fattest tribbles, but it makes the situation worse for them. Even the gloomer runs away from the giant critters.

McCoy founds a way to get the tribbles back to their normal size. They hope the Klingons find the same manner to control them. Scott realizes if they have to got tribbles, it is the best they are small.

Fascinating Facts:

This is a sequel for an episode also written by Gerrold for The Original Series, “The Trouble With The Tribbles. This sequel was originally devised for the third season of TOS, but it was turned down by that season's producer, Fred Freiberger.

David Gerrold made an animated cameo appearence on this episode as an ensign at the transporter room. With any single line.

Cyrano Jones was voiced by the same actor who originally performed the character in the TOS episode, Stanley Adams.

The Klingon commander, Koloth was performed by William Campbell in the TOS episode but in this episode was vocally performed by James Doohan.

In the TOS episode, most of the tribbles were brown and some white, but in this episode were pink. The reason: the series director, Hal Sutherland was color blind.