In a recent Captain's Log there was a "scout" version of the Federation battle cruiser, with special sensors in the two "option mounts". (Yeah - I know they're not true option mounts in the Orion sense.) The ship's purpose was RTN hunting, but before it was completed the galactic powers had pretty much managed to take down the RTN. So the ship was completed as a conventional battle cruiser (BCG version if I recall correctly) and the "scout" battle cruiser (I believe it was called the "Ranger") remained an "unbuilt variant".

I though the ship was a great ship and my only complaint was that it should have been completed as a "real" rather than "unbuilt variant" ship, on the grounds that the Feds would still need RTN hunters for the attack into the LMC. But on reflection, it has occurred to me that it could have been an even better RTN hunter if it had been based on the BCV, with an F-14 squadron or, even better, 6 F-14s and 6 F-111s.

I am proposing (based on the notion that Captain's Log ships are basically "playtest" rather than the final version) that the Ranger be based on the BCV instead of the BCG and also that it would be a "real" ship to support "Operation Wow-these-LMC-guys-have-wierd-shields,-don't-they?"<sup>*


*</sup>It's possible my memory of the actual name of the operation is a little off.