Or the use of drones in the Discovery season 2 finale?
Problem with the probes idea, in STA, a Danube class shuttle (Scale 2) with the weapons pod configuration still isn’t a very effective vessel for combat unless facing a similarly scaled vessel. I use an Akira class vessel in my home game, and even with as many shuttlecraft dispatched as permitted, are great for story or creating an advantage/disadvantage in conflict situations, which would be the same situation created by having multiple combat capable probes, at least from my perspective.
Without needing to take up space for life support systems, and not needing the physical space that a crew might take up, plus the cargo capacity because it will just be a purely combat drone, I’d imagine it would have more space for powered up weapons.
This system limits the Akira to two Scale 2 vessels and another four Scale 1 vessels. That’s quite a bit to manage at the table in the game, but it’s laughably limited for something that is supposed to be a carrier. There really should be rules for running squadrons of small craft as single entities–effectively the reverse of MVAM.
Good points. However, within STA mechanics, they still wouldn’t be all that effective unless going up against other “fighter” craft, such as Maquis fighters or Star Fleet Valkyrie attack craft.
I still like the idea of MVAM and would like to see that developed better. Far less headaches and logistical nightmare than trying to figure out how to handle squads of attack craft, at least to me.
IN hindsight, I wish I would never have allowed my group to use an Akira class. I should have directed them toward a Centaur - Excelsior variant.
Who said that the Akira-class is a carrier? I’ve read this before but there is no canon evidence that this is the case. So the Akira-class being a carrier is pure fanon.
It comes straight from the mouth of ship’s designer, so it isn’t hard canon (and neither is the name “Akira” for that matter, yet no one challenges that) but not exactly fanon either.
I would probably work around the mechanics in a way, like… does a photon torpedo count as a size 1 ship? or does it count as being as powerful as the size of the ship that fired it? I would come up with some way to abstract the flight of fighter drones as being a system of the size of ship that launched them in order to keep damage on par with what it should be.
The problem with the carrier concept is that everyone assumes the carrier has to be a large ship. A size 3 Saber with “extensive shuttlebays” can carry the same two size 2 fighters the Akira can… or a size 4 Miranda can do it, which has extensive shuttle bays already.
That’s why so many Mirandas were around during the Dominion War: They were primarily fighter tenders.
If you want a real carrier, just give the Akira “thru-deck cruiser” extensive shuttlebays 3x… six fighters and 12 shuttles active at once, but not good for much else, which is how carriers are in real life anyway. Five talents allowed: ESx3, rapid fire torpedo launchers, ablative armor. Thru-deck cruiser done.
…and the best use of fighters or runabouts when a fighting “mother ship” is present isn’t in making their own attacks anyway. Better used assisting the main ship’s more powerful attack.
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