Obsolete discussion.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Tuesday, January 25, 2011 - 09:36 pm: Edit

Obsolete discussion.

By Jon Berry (Laz_Longsmith) on Tuesday, January 25, 2011 - 10:30 pm: Edit

The thing about those shadows on the clouds below the Warspite is that due to the cloud itself, it's impossible to say for certain that those are Romulans.

When I looked at them, I came to the conclustion that they could have been other F-4s closer to the cloud, casting a shadow on it (but then perspective would object), or perhaps something dark inside the cloud itself.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Tuesday, January 25, 2011 - 10:36 pm: Edit

They are pretty obviously Romulans at the higher resolution, though. When working on the image, I do it at 300dpi at 24" x 24". It's...awesome. LOL. Takes a MONSTROUS amount of memory, too, let me tell you...

I'm sure SVC scaled it down some, so not all detail would be revealed if it ever did get used for something, someday. Leave something to admire if you actually DO get to buy it.

In any case, as noted above - easy things to change. I'm doing this all on computer, so it's just a stack of (a few hundred) layers in Photoshop. Certain things are easy to change. Shadows? That's one of them!

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 01:21 am: Edit

Maybe the ship was making a low pass for an Air and Space show for the colony below and it experienced a bird collision!

(The shaddows of Romulan ships are balloons that the cruiser was going to phaser (low power) to complete the show.)

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 01:52 am: Edit

I was thinking the shadows in the low-res pic almost made me think of Probr ships.

(Maybe they could be? Perhaps the Warspite has been dumped through the Cosmic Nexus, and needs to link up with friendly FRA units to avoid capture. The fighters don't look like the ones used by the Auroran Navy; maybe they were brought over, too?)

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 04:23 am: Edit

Obsolete discussion.

By Terry O'Carroll (Terryoc) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 06:21 am: Edit

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Quote:

Maybe the ship was making a low pass for an Air and Space show for the colony below and it experienced a bird collision!

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By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 12:46 pm: Edit

Implying that Gorns SUCK is regarded by them as an act of war ..

Opinions on the Romulan side of the border differ ...

... greatly.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 12:52 pm: Edit

Obsolete discussion.

By Dal Downing Rambler (3deez) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 06:09 pm: Edit

What if some one really was trying to "ditch" a crusier in a ocean. Would it possible or pratical to do so? And just how desprate have you got to be to try it?

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 06:18 pm: Edit

'Ditched in the ocean' is how saucer section of the Hood went down. Captain's Log #25 details the return of the saucer section (the crew patched it up over a period of time, and it took off from the ocean into space).

By Troy Latta (Saaur) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 07:43 pm: Edit

How very Space Battlecruiser Yamato of them.

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 09:04 pm: Edit

Brings back memories of sitting in the movie theatre watching Star Trek Dont remember # as the Ent-E saucer went in ...

Someone else (not me) started yelling "TROI !!! WOMAN DRIVER !!! AIM FOR AN OCEAN OR LAKE !!!"

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 01:04 am: Edit

I'm watching both of you...spider sense tingling...I suspect booth time is in your future...

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 03:00 am: Edit

BTW, Mike, in your first posted, you observed:

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Quote:

Reminds me somewhat of the pilot to Firefly with the smoke spree out one engine.

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By Mike Kenyon (Mikek) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 09:20 am: Edit

It was the Reaver ship. I wonder if the Romulans (or others) have a Firefly waiting to rescue them from this big, bad GCA just over the next rise.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 11:11 am: Edit

Ditching in the ocean might put out that engine fire.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 11:38 am: Edit

Ditching in the ocean is part of the knowledgebase and was actually mentioned on the very oldest set of enterprise deck plans.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 02:32 pm: Edit

Here is the lastest version of the art from Xander.



I might comment that a cover is supposed to evoke thoughts of "wow, how did they get in that mess, and how are they going to get out" instead of "who didn't read the rulebook because there is no real game-based reason to dive into that atmosphere?" or "why did they waste a cover on that old clunker instead of a real ship?" I think the clunker problem can be solved by changing the name to a CA and minor changes to the saucer, but I'm still not getting a "story" out of it other than "going down in flames" which just isn't that interesting. Great technical art, but i cannot mentally make a cover out of it. Maybe somebody can tell me the story that makes that happen.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 02:52 pm: Edit

Unless I'm terribly misunderstanding the planetary landing/takeoff rules, this position for a ship considerably speeds up the ability to evacuate the planet.

A shuttle could take off on one turn (P2.4121), climb to 'atmospheric flight' on the second turn (P2.4122), on the third turn engage in 'atmospheric flight' (P2.4123) and land on the ship, then on turn 4 undock while still in the atmosphere and 'descend' - landing again on the surface by impulse 32 (P2.4123, again). If the shuttle can both dock with the ship and descend on the same turn, then that would even actually knock a turn off of that.

This saves at least a turn every trip vs shuttles having to leave the planet's atmosphere to land on a ship in orbit.

By Jon Berry (Laz_Longsmith) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 03:18 pm: Edit

Nice! Now I have to figure out why the Warspite is firing up into space, and at what.

By Robert Gamble (Robertgamble) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 03:39 pm: Edit

Could Warspite be firing at a plasma torpedo targeted on the colony? It doesn't answer the questions of why only the warp engine seems damaged, and why the ship is in the atmosphere.. Romulan attack could involve a sabotage as others have mentioned. Atmosphere is more problematic... unless this is a combination of the ship trying to safely land in a nearby ocean while taking the opportunity to fire its weapons in defense of the colony.

By Robert Gamble (Robertgamble) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 03:46 pm: Edit

I agree that the picture makes you wonder what happened to get the ship into this position, but I'm not sure I'd mind a piece of fiction in the Captain's Log associated with a cover, in which you find out that the Warspite didn't get themselves out of the mess. Or it could be an opening act to a larger story in which the attacking Romulans are caught by a Federation fleet after their attack.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 04:03 pm: Edit

Perhaps the domed colony had seen a biological attack on it as the guard ship was doing a 'showing the flag' mission in the area.

As the colonists were being evacuated to the Warspite, a group of 'Vulcans' managed to get out of the shuttle bay and blow the warp engine. Moments later, a pair of Romulan 'independent privateer' (Y168, the Romulan Empire isn't officially in the war, yet) Snipes decloak and fire on the colony.

Alternatively: replace the above with Orions. They'd be as likely to do such a thing, and perhaps more likely to be operating in the deeper regions within the Federation (where the guard ship is more likely to be).

Candidate locations from the Gazetter:

• Fornax (Federation protectorate in hex 3413)
• Gordan's Planet (Federation world in hex 3612...it's pretty close to a starbase, though. And listed as 'Class M', while the world pictured probably isn't. Maybe another planet in the system?)
• Brecon system (hex 3214. Federation member race, but not a major economic system.)