Proposal: D6 Base Hull Heavy Command Cruiser

This is a proposal to upgrade a D6 to a Heavy Command Cruiser by replacing the “crown” of the boom section (the decks above the “bulb”) with the equivalent structure from a C8 dreadnought. This would provide the D6 with additional weapons and expanded command facilities. Although proposed as new construction, the only ship of this class was a prototype converted from an existing D6.

Anatomy of a D Boom (based on the deck plans):
Neck: 1 imp, 3 lab, 1 hull
Bulb: 1 scty, 1 emer, 1 btty, 3 P-2, 2 hull
Crown: 1 Tran, 2 Trac, 2 Brdg, 1 Lab, 1 hull

Anatomy of a C Boom (extrapolated from the D-boom and C8 miniature):
Neck: 2 imp, 4 lab, 4 hull
Bulb: 2 scty, 2 emer, 2 bat, 8 hull
Crown: 2 Tran, 2 Trac, 4 Brdg, 2 Lab, 4 P-2, 2 Drn, 1 ADD, 1 Shtl

Replacing the D Crown with the C Crown:
Net gain: 1 Tran, 2 Brdg, 1 Lab, 4 P-2, 2 Drn, 1 ADD, 1 Shtl
Net loss: 1 Hull

Thus the CD6 has a total of 11 P-2 (7 in the boom), 4 Drn, 4 Disr, and 2 ADD (with the B refit).

The main weakness of this design was the lack of additional power but this was offset by the relatively modest power demands of the additional weapons: the 4 additional phasers could be armed at the same cost as a single overloaded disruptor and the drones/anti-drones did not require power.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Saturday, May 09, 2020 - 06:57 pm: Edit

Why would the Klingons put this boom on a D6 instead of a D7?

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Saturday, May 09, 2020 - 07:34 pm: Edit

I chose the D6 because by Y167 (the earliest this design could have been built) the D6 was likely considered undergunned and in greater need of an upgrade. The idea would have been to convert one D6 in each squadron of 3 to this design.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Saturday, May 09, 2020 - 08:14 pm: Edit

Yes, but a D7 would be better with this boom so it doesn't really make sense to not do it to a D7.

Also, there _WAS_ a D6C command ship during earlier times than Y167, but by that point it had been discontinued in favor of the D7C.

Presumably this would make the proposal you made unlikely.

Also, there is a heavy command cruiser version of the D7C which doesn't come out until considerably later than Y167, so this proposal doesn't really fit the timeline imo.

Finally, I think the move cost of the ship would increase.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, May 09, 2020 - 11:19 pm: Edit

I wonder If Richard is actually correct in this instance.

Normally, increasing a ships (for lack of a better term) displacement by 11 SSD boxes often does increase its movement cost.

But we need to verify what the movement cost of a D6 boom is in comparison to a C8 boom.

For some reason, I thought both the D6 boom and the C8 boom were 1/2=0.5 movement cost. (Perhaps for calculating towing energy calculations?)

If they are both the same 1/2=0.5 movement cost, then Douglas S. Proposal would be legal for all the wrong reasons.

It is an “artifact of game mechanics “.

I don’t know if it would be good for the game, but it technically may not violate the published game rules.

In this case, it’s been hiding in plain sight since the pocket edition. Generally, things that long in the game are seldom changed 40+ years after the fact.

By A David Merritt (Adm) on Saturday, May 09, 2020 - 11:34 pm: Edit

According to C3, C8/9-Bm MC =.5, the D6J-Bm MC =.25.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 12:50 am: Edit

Ah, sorry. Just misremembering.

Then that makes the difference in SSD boxes (11+15=26) (the 11 that Doug reported above, plus the 15 SSD box warp nacelles.

So the total of SSD boxes of the 0.25 MC D6 boom is 20 SSD boxes.

The total C8 SSD box count Is 42.

So (42-20)=22 SSD boxes, means the C8 boom and warp engine size difference compared to the D6 boom.

Just “ball parking” the net increase in Dougs command boom for the D6 11 SSD box difference (which is. Exactly half of the total burden of the C8 + warp engine.

Means the increase of the command boom MC is half of the net increase of the C8 boom.

Call it 0.25/2=0.125.

So the MC of the D6 heavy command cruiser (boom plus secondary hull) would be 1.125

So, either the D6HCC is slower than all other D6 variants, or what? New engines? Perhaps a 3 box warp boom engine?

Is it worth it?

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 12:56 am: Edit

It doesn't seem to me to fit into the established class histories, especially as it is based on a D6.

Also, it would have some phaser ones if they spent such effort on improving a ship, not 11 phaser twos. At least the central three phasers should be phaser ones.

It should probably be called a Super Heavy Cruiser (and be based on a D7). o_O.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 02:53 am: Edit

The C8 boom has a total of 46 internals (excluding the center warp engine and "tracks" but not excluding the disruptors, also I forgot to list the C-boom's two "bulb" phasers in my original post) while the proposed modified D-boom would have 31 internals (a gain of 11). That gain is still less than 1/2 the difference of 46-20=26 boxes. If we assume that the warp engine also has to push its own mass, the fraction would be even smaller(61-20=41 box difference).

Also I don't know how much faith we can put in the MC of separated sections. Tholian CoM and LCM's have the same movement cost even though the CoM has nearly twice the internals of an LCM. And the Federation BB saucer has twice the MC of a DNG saucer despite the fact that they have the same number of internals save for the addition of a 2nd engine to the BB saucer (which is an argument in favor of the idea that engines need to push their own mass). Given this lack of consistency, I don't think there is compelling argument to change the movement cost of the boom.

To make a different comparison, the D7W actually has more internals than the proposed ship and it still has a movement cost of 1 (though of course it has a different base hull). Other D6 variants also add significantly more boxes to the vanilla D6 without increasing movement cost.

As to class histories, the D6C was a distant memory (having gone out of service by Y148) by the time this ship entered service and I'm calling the ship a Heavy Command Cruiser because that's what best describes its capabilities (increased weapons and command facilities). The Klingons may have classified it differently so it very well could have been called a Super Heavy Cruiser or something else. I had imagined it more as a D6 squadron leader than a fleet flagship.

Regarding Phaser-1 vs. Phaser-2. I think the K-Refits weren't until Y175? I was worried the ship might be a bit overgunned for its era if it had phaser-1 or if it was based on a D7 hull.

(I made some edits to this post)

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 11:43 am: Edit

I'd say the ship IS overgunned for the period with 11 P-2, 4 drone racks and 4 disruptors and an ADD.

It'd kind of have to be considering it's supposed to be a CCH in an era where there aren't any.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 02:00 pm: Edit

Douglas Saldana,

K-refits were Y175. But flagships and leaders generally had some phaser-1s even before the K-refit.

Example - consider the D7. Prior to K-refit, vanilla D7 (and D7B) had 9 phaser-2s. The command cruiser version of the D7, The D7C, had the three boom phasers upgraded to phaser-1s, so 3 phaser-1s and 6 phasers-2s. This was all before K-refit, note. After K-refit, the D7K had the same phaser suite as the D7C, 3 phaser-1s and 6 phaser-2s. The K-refit applied to the D7C turned it into the D7L, which refitted two more phasers, yielding a total of 5 phaser-1s and 4 phaser-2s.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 03:05 pm: Edit

Anyone recall if the D6C had phaser-ones in the boom?

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 03:43 pm: Edit

The D6C has ph-2s in the boom. The D6L updgrades these to ph-1 but the ship description implies that no D6Cs were ever converted to D6Ls and none were built (so it is a conjectural design). The D6L has a nominal in service date of Y146.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 04:28 pm: Edit

Alternate Proposal (Plan B): The DSF required that any increased power demands in the new design had to be offset with savings if no additional power could be provided. To achieve these power savings the designers downgraded the crown and wing phasers to phaser-3 while upgrading the 3 FX phasers to phaser-1 to compensate for the reduced firepower. This resulted in the following weapons suite:

3 P-1, 8 P-3, 4 Disr, 4 Drn, 2 ADD

This is pretty close to the weapons suite of a Kzinti BC/CC:

4 P-1, 8 P-3, 4 Disr, 4 Drn

The power curves would also be pretty similar, 37 for the Klingon vs 36/38 for the Kzinti BC/CC.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 06:19 pm: Edit

There is a possible (plan C) *call it a combat upgrade.

Just add the gun deck part of the C8 boom to the D6 boom.

That adds 4 phaser 2, 2 Drone, 1 ADD. 7 total SSD box.

The add and drone racks have zero energy arming costs. The 4 phaser 2 have phaser capacitors.

Just a guess, but if the added Movement cost increase amounted to +0.0625 instead of the 0.125 suggested earlier, that would make this refitted D6 MC equal 1.0625.

Speed 30 would be (1.0625*30)=31.875 warp energy points, so the best tactical speed would be 28 hexes of warp movement costing 29.75 warp power.

With 1 point of impulse power, the refitted D6 tops out at 29 hexes per turn.

Not bad.

This could qualify for a mad scientists work shop thingy in a future stellar shadows journal.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 07:02 pm: Edit

Is the boom strong enough to carry the extra mass though?

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 08:09 pm: Edit

The penal version is strong enough to handle warp engine nacelles. Different kind of stress, granted but still a form of stress.

There is a reason the D 6 was chosen as the inspiration of the B-10 battleship designs. And it was later determined that the B-10 was over engineered to the tune of 6,000 tons. It is possible that a hidden strength Of the D-6 Is it’s structure.

Where in SFH is it stated the D-6 boom was too flimsy for conversion?

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 08:14 pm: Edit

My reservation with a "gun deck only" approach is that it's not as visually distinctive as the "Carmen Miranda" look you get with using the full C8 crown.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 08:49 pm: Edit

Jeff, I'm just going on visual observation of the models. It would be best not to use straw man arguments, as no one argued that SFB said anything on the topic of boom sturdiness. 11 more system boxes or so is a lot compared to how many are on it to start with.

As to the B10 data (which I had not previously commented on), my vague recollection is that the note on the additional mass was due to the requirement to strengthen the boom or ship or something.

Now if we're talking about making the boom structure itself sturdier to handle the crown type assembly it might be ok.

By Gregory S Flusche (Vandar) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 09:42 pm: Edit

So make the imp two APR and say it can not be detached due to the extra bracing needed to strengthen the boom.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 09:45 pm: Edit

Richard,

Most players would understand the Stellar Shadows Journal reference.

It is a place to try variations that normally violate rules.

The goal is to provide a variation that, hopefully, is “a blast to play” (svc quote from SSJ #1).

Not a straw man argument at all. It is a suggestion that the proposal move to the SSJ file.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Sunday, May 10, 2020 - 10:46 pm: Edit

I think it's premature to call this a SSJ proposal. If the engineering is a problem (and we don't know for sure it is) than Gregory's solution or something like it might work.

Now if we put a B10 crown on the D-Boom that would be another story.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Monday, May 11, 2020 - 06:29 am: Edit

Doug, I did not call this a SSJ proposal, I suggest that “Plan C” would be a SSJ idea, much in the same way the gun fighter variants are SSJ material.

By Douglas Saldana (Dsal) on Monday, May 11, 2020 - 11:19 am: Edit

My mistake! I need to mind my A, B, and C's.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, May 11, 2020 - 01:50 pm: Edit

A few comments, not endorsing this or shutting it down. (At the least, sometimes good things come out of conversations that cannot, themselves, work. Not saying that this cannot, or can.)

I would start with the CCH version of the D7 and count boxes. That should give you a limit on how many boxes you can add and stay under the limit on bending the movement cost.

Generally speaking, tinkertoy "add this part of ship A to ship B" don't work, but heck, sometimes they do work.

If this idea, or some other idea, would work, it would work on the D7 and probably the D5. Limiting it to the D6 isn't flyable. But your problem then is that the CCH version of the D7 already exists so you do not need this. You could just do a D6 what you did to a D7 to produce whatever the CCH version is. (I don't remember.)