What should spaceships be like in an Awesome Scifi?

[yellowdingo]

Apart from the 'I want a Firefly' or 'I want a Millennium Falcon' crowd what are the hundred ideas that would make for a great space ship?

[Turin the Mad]

The ship has to answer to the essential needs of the crew: breathable air and its replenishment; potable water and its replenishment; foodstuffs and its replenishment.

Most of the remaining needs are:

What is the scope of operation - is the spaceship interplanetary, interstellar or intergalactic?

The scope of operation determines many of the other factors of a space/starship's design.

Is there any need for ship-scaled armaments? If there are only humans, and we're all singing kumbaya, there is no need for ship-scale weapons. "Hunting weapons" for crew are another matter. If the galaxy is crawling with man-eating monsters that field actual armed fleets, shipboard armaments are a must.

Is the ship operating in a genre? Hard Sci-fi, 'soft' Sci-fi and space opera are three examples. Which genre determines a great deal.

There is also just sheer scope of setting.

Are we talking
* Firefly (in-system or perhaps near-to-Earth long term interplanetary)
* Star Trek (part of our galaxy, not even a particularly large part)
* Star Wars (half or so of a "galaxy far, far away")
* or Lensmen (intergalactic, featuring minds so powerful they can melt entire starhips a loooong way away; planet-busting and star-shattering weaponry; perhaps the original Space Opera)?

All of these factors matter before getting into any more of a concept.

[Set]

For game purposes, a ship should be vast (and yet cramped) and labyrinthine and mostly automated, so that you can have a small-ish crew and scenes like those on board the Nostromo in Alien, or Maximilian chasing people around the Palomino in The Black Hole, or even the (mostly unexplored) Destiny from Stargate: Universe.

Metamorphosis Alpha seemed to go that route, which was one of several things that were cool about that game.

But if it was a space vessel I had to be on, in the real world? Something crazy futuristic, less like a ship and more like a Legion Time-Sphere or a Whovian Tardis. Or maybe one of those ships the Puppeteers would sell in Niven's Known Space, with hulls that are indestructible to anything short of antimatter.

Star Trek ships sound nice-ish, with the food replicators and transporters and warp drive and ridonkulously effective communications, translation and sensor technology.

Too bad the damn holodeck is going to malfunction and kill you when you try to set it to 'erotic shiatsu ménage a cinq.'

[Bruunwald]

USS BRUUNWALD painted on the bow.

[Freehold DM]

There is a ds game called infinite space- I think it's perfect for what you are talking about.

[Jail House Rock]

It should be about the size of Earth. Have an atmosphere, a weather system, and support trillions of organisms.

Yay, that would be a good space ship in an awesome scifi.

[Artanthos]

Jail House Rock wrote:

It should be about the size of Earth. Have an atmosphere, a weather system, and support trillions of organisms.

Yay, that would be a good space ship in an awesome scifi.

You ever read the book "Marrow"

The Ship is closer to the size of Jupiter and old beyond comprehension.

If you have ever read "Days of Solomon Gursky", I would be willing to accept Ua.

On an unrelated topic. The crew of The Ship have a near immortality that is very close to my ideal version. I would be willing to accept Solomon Gursky's version of immortality.

[LazarX]

They should be part of the stage in which the story is played out.

They should strike interest when you look at them, but the story should be good enough that you forget about them instantly when it's about something else.

Babylon 5 is a good measure on how ships were viewed. And in this context, we'll view the station itself in the same measure. There were things interesting about it, it was visually striking to look at, but it was never allowed to get in the way of actual storytelling itself.

Unless of course you enjoy Robert Forward novels, and you do so because you think that the purpose of science fiction is to conduct physics lectures without your audience falling asleep.

On the other hand, I judge science fiction on one basis, is there a good story being told here. The only difference is the stage on what the play is performed.

[Set]

LazarX wrote:

Unless of course you enjoy Robert Forward novels, and you do so because you think that the purpose of science fiction is to conduct physics lectures without your audience falling asleep.

[tangent]

Ugh. I'd forgotten that guy entirely. Sooooo tedious!

And I *like* science. I read science textbooks for fun! But he's got no sense of pacing, inserting pages and pages of hard science lecture into what should be a *story.*
[/tangent]

Stracynski, when asked how fast Starfuries or whatever travelled in B5, responded, 'They travel at the speed of plot.' Great advice. Everything about the ship in a story has to service the narrative. Don't want super FTL communications to wreck the isolation narrative? Don't give the ship super FTL communications stuff.

Same for magic, really. Don't want to worry about how resurrection is going to mess with your game setting? Make it all but impossible, and not something any schmuck with a 5th level spell can accomplish.

[Freehold DM]

Jail House Rock wrote:

It should be about the size of Earth. Have an atmosphere, a weather system, and support trillions of organisms.

Yay, that would be a good space ship in an awesome scifi.

every play phantasy star 1-4?

[Klaus van der Kroft]

I've always liked the depiction of spaceships like submarines: crammed, uncomfortable, volume-efficient tincans that are all about keeping the medium outside from getting in (or, in this case, the medium inside from getting out), very effective at hiding from sensors (since, well, sight probably won't be of much use in a long-range space battle) and relying on guided missiles and torpedoes.

[jemstone]

How are the answers in this thread not all "The Arcadia"?

Honestly, now!

[Artanthos]

"The Night's Dawn" trilogy had two takes on spacecraft.

Most of humanity used a standard model where the bulk of the ship is given over to cargo space and engines, with relatively small crews.

The Edenist's had living, sentient starships.

Both had advantages.

[Orthos]

jemstone wrote:

How are the answers in this thread not all "The Arcadia"?

Because some of us have no idea what that is. Provide links next time please. =)

[jemstone]

Orthos wrote:

jemstone wrote:

How are the answers in this thread not all "The Arcadia"?

Because some of us have no idea what that is. Provide links next time please. =)

I... I honestly thought I had!

Mea Culpa.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Harlock

[Orthos]

Ah, that guy. One of my players is a big fan of him.

[Freehold DM]

Orthos wrote:

Ah, that guy. One of my players is a big fan of him.

get him to play infinite space. He will be happy.

[yellowdingo]

So the ideal spaceship thus far is:
1. a colossal 'great machine' type spaceship
2. the size of a planet
3. with its own biosphere
4. but dominated by cargo
5. and huge engines
6. with a small human crew
7. and no light speed communications
8. and it exists to serve the plot narrative rather than the narrative be shaped to fit the ship (aka spent ten minutes in the seed dry-store trying to find what damaged the foil seed packets rather than twenty minutes getting to the seed dry-store from the habitat).
9. With a skull and crossbones motif
10. and a colossal weapons battery.

[yellowdingo]

11. The crew Habitat could be an elevator that moves through the ship as required. They are the maintenance crew after all.

[Kryzbyn]

David Weber ships from the Honorverse.

[Turin the Mad]

Depends ... if I get my choice of ship to take into other genres, I'll take a Lensman ship over all the rest of them. :D

[jemstone]

Turin the Mad wrote:

Depends ... if I get my choice of ship to take into other genres, I'll take a Lensman ship over all the rest of them. :D

You just say that because you want to fling galaxies at your enemies.

[Ensirio the Longstrider]

jemstone wrote:

Turin the Mad wrote:

Depends ... if I get my choice of ship to take into other genres, I'll take a Lensman ship over all the rest of them. :D

You just say that because you want to fling galaxies at your enemies.

Who Doesn't?!