Federation Commander

Maybe it's just me, but it seems like the Romulan Star Empire. An empire obsessed with birds, could have made some much more elegant and beautiful ships than they did. Now, don't get me wrong, the Warbird and Kestrels design are very nice ships, but did the Praetor have all the old designer executed when work began on the new Hawk line of ships? The Sparrowhawk and Skyhawk are a box, with warp naceles, and a boom that looks like a popsicle stick stuck on the front. Does anyone else feel like the Empire was shorted in looks, or is it just me?

Indeed, the "old" Warbird style had some style.

I think you have the various Hawk-series ships confused.

The SkyHawk and SeaHawk are both a bit lacking in the grace department (they do kind of have a "box with a stick coming out the front" look to them).

However, the SparrowHawk doesn't look like that at all. It has a graceful flare to the front extension, both from the top and especially from the side. It also has those nifty flared pillars for all three engines. I think the SparrowHawk is one of the best looking and most unique ships in the game.

The FireHawk stole some of the grace of it's little-brother, but still looks pretty spiffy.

The Condor doesn't really do grace. It's a bit fugly, but in an imposing way (kind of like the B-10). They are both built like linebackers. That huge "bulb" at the front of the Condor just says "I don't care if you think I'm pretty. I have a plasma-R in here. What to you have little human?".

To me, "lacking in looks" is the Lyrans. They are just flat plates with some cutouts in them. Other than the engines, they lack any dimensionality at all for the most part. They could be paper cutouts and some folks wouldn't even notice. A totally logical design from an engineering standpoint, but they can't hold a candle to the grace that the SparrowHawk has.

They're nowhere near as ugly as Seltorian ships, with all the 'blank' holes where there should be a hull section, the hull sections themselves looking like broken pencils, and the warp engines looking like something in a toy shop, or possibly a pensioners' novelty hosepipe nozzle.

The Romulan Hawks are actually my 2nd favorite for "looks", right after my beloved Federation Starfleet.

The Sparrowhawk and Firehawk in particular are quite beautiful.

The Sparrowhawk/Firehawk boom looks like a bathroom water faucet.

On the other hand, I still think the Klingon ships look so much better when they use Romulan technology ...

I was somewhat surprised at the Starline Hawk-series initially, having been exposed to the versions in Starfleet Command first. (The SFC Firehawk and Sparrowhawk in particular stand out among those for me.)

Can't say I'm overly fond of the Starline versions, but I will agree that the cruisers look that little bit better than the SkyHawk and SeaHawk, to me at least.


Now, in light of the kind of design evolution shown with Adam's CX and DX art, I hope that the likes of the Fire-Axe might prove to have a sleeker outline than its current TL12 counterpart...

The lyran ships are a joke.

Literally... it's a cat-amaran hull, geddit? And the Kzinti ships look like cats. The engines are the legs and tail... the booms are the forelegs... and the radar dishes, the ears.

It don't matter to me what a ship looks like. I'm more interested in what it can do.

Blasphemy!!

terryoc wrote:...And the Kzinti ships look like cats. The engines are the legs and tail... the booms are the forelegs... and the radar dishes, the ears.

Here's a Kzinti I did that illustrates this point nicely...

I like the Lyran ships, myself.


The Hydrans, on the other hand, aren't my favourites - but at least I do like how they have such distinct design styles across their range of ships. (Fleets containing ships which all look like larger or smaller versions of each other are not always appealing.)


EDIT: When it comes to Seltorians, I like the look of that Nest Ship, though the engines seem slightly Andromedan-ish.

Regarding the main Selt fleet, I like the two-boom ships, and the DNL - but the single-boom ships and the NCA don't really work for me, to be honest.