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On the Taxonomy of Sci-Fi Spaceships
An anonymous reader writes: Jeff Venancio has done some research that's perfect reading for a lazy Saturday afternoon: figuring out a coherent taxonomy for sci-fi spaceships. If you're a sci-fi fan, you've doubtless heard or read references to a particular starship's "class" fairly often. There are flagships and capital ships, cruisers and corvettes, battleships and destroyers. But what does that all mean? Well, there's not always consistency, but a lot of it comes from Earth's naval history. "The word 'corvette' comes from the Dutch word corf, which means 'small ship,' and indeed corvettes are historically the smallest class of rated warship (a rating system used by the British Royal Navy in the sailing age, basically referring to the amount of men/guns on the vessel and its relative size; corvettes were of the sixth and smallest rate). ... They were usually used for escorting convoys and patrolling waters, especially in places where larger ships would be unnecessary."
Venancio takes the historical context for each ship type and then explains how it's been adapted for a sci-context. "Corvettes might be outfitted to have some sort of stealth or cloaking system for reconnaissance or spec ops missions; naturally it would be easier to cloak a smaller ship than a larger one (though plenty of examples of large stealth ships exist). In some series they are likely to be diplomatic vessels due to their small size and speed, particularly seen in Star Wars, and can commonly act as blockade runners (again; their small size and speed makes them ideal for slipping through a blockade, where a larger ship presents more of a target)."
Venancio takes the historical context for each ship type and then explains how it's been adapted for a sci-context. "Corvettes might be outfitted to have some sort of stealth or cloaking system for reconnaissance or spec ops missions; naturally it would be easier to cloak a smaller ship than a larger one (though plenty of examples of large stealth ships exist). In some series they are likely to be diplomatic vessels due to their small size and speed, particularly seen in Star Wars, and can commonly act as blockade runners (again; their small size and speed makes them ideal for slipping through a blockade, where a larger ship presents more of a target)."
This is a whole new level of naval gazing.
There is no consistent approach and due to various changes, even the historical usage varies considerably.
Besides, sometimes the authors make their ships less dense than smoke.
Didn't read TFA but I can assume he neglected one key point:
Most authors pick their class names because they sound cool, not because they feel it accurately describes the tactical/operational role of the ship design in question. Which they probably wouldn't get correct anyway. It's not like these authors commonly employ professional military consultants to harden up the details of their in-universe militaries. And in most cases scrutinizing how a ship should be employed would also lead to scrutinizing the weapons complement/layout/fire arcs/etc.....leading to most "sexy" space warships needing a complete redesign to make any sense. And the creative types don't want fictional space engineering (naval architecture?) intruding on their storytelling.
I know authors have no control over cover art, which is why I still read books with bad covers. The kind that offend me most are space ships that look like water ships. They use a traditional battleship or what have you complete with mast and rudder and just stick it into space. I mean what the actual fuck!? It's worse than giving sci-fi soldiers swords because you're too lazy to think through the mechanics of something realistic.
Just a moment's thought is needed to realize that space ships will be guided by entirely different design constraints, technologies, and other considerations. A submarine in space? I could handle that. but a FUCKING SAILBOAT???? If you're doing that just make it a whale and a petunia.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
I'm missing a simple reference sheet.
So what "class" does the TARDIS fit into then? It's "small" but not small, doesn't really have any "firepower"...
The Death Star should have it's own classification, called "Fuckemup" class.
GCU, GSV, ROU.
Anything else is unnecessary
Here is the classification: common ship types (Culture).
Most dutchies would recognize korf, meaning basket.However that word is also a bit ancient. There is also a sport korfbal which looks a bit like basketball but is a bit older. For the ship the word korvet is propper dutch. http://nl.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korvet
Space belongs to the AI's that will rise, not to humans.
After all, what's the worst place an AI could be? The bottom of a gravity well...
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Interesting read, but imo he missed the mark by not including a size chart for a frame of reference.
Starship Size Comparison Chart
Because a picture is worth 1000 words. Or in this case, more.
You stereotypers are all the same...
Skimmed TFA. If I remember correctly the spacecraft construction volume for Traveller (an RPG probably most famous for the use of AI to figure out optimal solutions to the game rules, to defeat all human opponents in an annual competition), his spaceship classes are identical. Corvette, frigate/escort, destroyer, cruiser, battleship, carrier, dreadnaught.
I suppose it might not necessarily be plagiarism. Those classes are pretty similar to how most naval fleets are strategically divided.
We can tax starships? What a great idea! Especially since none of the owners are likely to be humans, so their vote won't count - even Norquist should be good with that
This is what space ships look like in the real universe.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I'm sorry but any article on ship naming that doesn't include GSVs, GCUs, ROUs and Very Fast Pickets is severely lacking in gravitas.
While this claims to be about Sci-Fi ships, it's really about 20th century naval ships, and the SF inspired by 2th century navies.
The article is interesting for its historical perspective, but if you pay any attention to that historical perspective, you can't help but come to the conclusion that the taxonomy has been turned upside down several times over the past 200 years. For centuries, sea battles were about a big line of ships delivering massive broadsides, with just frigates in a support role. Then suddenly, we get cruisers and massive iron battleships with a fairly small number of enormous, long range guns in turrets, which rule for a moment and then become obsolete again due to torpedoes and aircraft.
But the current supremacy of aircraft carriers is not something that will translate to space; carriers rule because they combine the advantages of two different media: the speed of small air craft, and the steady platform and durability of a large sea-going ship. But in space, every ship will have those advantages. There's no need for carriers, because any ship can be as fast as a fighter, and any ship can be as stable and self-sustaining as it wants to be. Very likely, fighters won't make any sense in space. The only reason they're so popular is because they're cool, and we're used to them because of our 20th century view. Space navies will be totally unlike modern navies, and any similarities in name between ship types will exist only because we like the names and making up new ones is hard.
Why am I talking about a 20th century view, and not 21st century? Because our current ship taxonomy is entirely the product of 20th century developments. No doubt the 21st century will change everything again, but we don't yet know how. Although unmanned drones will feature heavily. So maybe if we're going to have fighters in space, they're going to be unmanned drones. Maybe space battles will consist of smart torpedoes dogfighting with the smart missiles that try to intercept them.
This was all done decades ago, complete with illustrations and back story...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Or at least Firefly?
This combat technique sends drones out to attack. But they will be too far away from the main ship directly communicate soon enough. So you have a slower, hidden super carrier that transports drone carriers most of the way. Say, from Earth to within 20 light seconds of the target (Mars for example). When combat arrives, it launches smaller drone carriers while the super carrier goes dark for the duration of the battle. It never sends any electrical or heat signal, after launching the drone carriers.
The drone carriers will do the final approach, within a couple of light seconds of the target (Earth's moon is 1.5 light seconds away from the earth). Then they launch a bunch of attack drones, which are directly controlled by the drone carriers. Assuming an equal opponent, the drones will attack their opponent's drone carriers. Once all your opponent's drone carriers are taken out, you re-task your remaining drones as scouts looking for your opponent's super-carrier. Unless of course they surrender.
This allows the majority of your military support crew to be a safe distance from the battle until you have won/lost. It minimizes your own losses, while maximizing your opponents.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
The Japanese have done that, in anime:
Space Battleship Yamato
and
The Celestial Railroad
for example.
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Of course that's just my opinion...... you could be wrong.
If the answer is "we want to deploy as much firepower as possible from that hull", then a destroyer is what you get. You have less space for propulsion systems and fuel, hence you can be on the spot less soon and operate not so far away from home - but each and every ship present makes a relatively large impact upon the scene. This is the current choice of the German Navy, which has to patrol the East and North Seas, relatively close to naval bases.
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Creating a navel nomenclature is made difficult by history and historical context.
Sure, you can borrow terms for navel vessels from the English side of the Napoleonic Wars, but your classes will be arbitrary without background. A corvette was a small sailing ship of the time, but so was a sloop. Some military sailing vessels were known by their type of armament and/or the number of decks or masts they carried. A ketch is a vessel with two masts, a bomb ketches is a vessel with two masts armed with mortars used for coastal bombardment. Classically speaking, a frigate is...blah, blah, blah.
You can spend a lot of time in tail-chasing when trying to come up/steal dramatic sounding ship names for science-fiction and games when all you really want is to use a few names to project the idea of a (space) navy that projects power and wins battles. Here's an idea: Use ours.
The current U.S. navy has everything from aircraft carriers to eensy-weensy little patrol craft. All you have to do for scifi is drop the submarine, add one or two types of battle ship (find something that sounds more badass than "Dreadnought" I dare you) and you're on your way.
Remember. When you talk about nomenclature, reality often trumps the imagination. If you don't believe me, the next time you're in Manama, in Bahrain, look up the "Cyclone-class patrol ship (PC-10) USS Firebolt."
ok morons with too much time on your hands go buy EVE ONLINE and play for a year or so by then you can fly many ship types and more important you will realize each ship type EXISTS to perform a function ie they are a tool used to efficiently perform a function. The best at a task are the most popular ones. Nature abhors inefficiency so interstellar aliens ships will follow this principal too.
A few notes on the chronology of the names I've seen often used.
Superdreadnought: about 1910, applied to the larger British dreadnoughts with a broadside of 10 13.5" guns as opposed to 8-10 12" guns in the earlier dreadnoughts. Fell out of favor fairly soon.
Dreadnought, about 1906, applied to a new sort of battleship with lots of big guns instead of a combination of big and intermediate. Used for the rest of the century. IIRC, although the last time I'm aware of a dreadnought doing anything was shore bombardment in the Middle East in the 1980s.
Capital Ship: AFAICT coined to mean battlecruiser or battleship, probably in the early 1920s when they were lumped into one class for Treaty purposes.
Battlecruiser: 1910, from what I've read, used to denote a fast warship, typically with battleship-sized guns but fewer or slightly smaller, and less armor. There were only thirty built (plus six that some people call battlecruisers and some not), and the last of those was scrapped in the late 1940s. They captured the public imagination all out of proportion to their importance.
Battleship: 18th Century at latest, as something of a slang term for ship of the line. Typically heavily armored and heavily armed, usually slow relative to other warships (not really true of WWII battleships). After about 1910, all new ones were dreadnoughts (see above) or called something like "coast defense battleships" (slow, heavily armed and armored for their size, short-ranged).
Aircraft carrier (or airplane carrier, an early variation): Late WWI, when the British made specialized ships that could have aircraft launch and land on them. Currently the largest and most powerful warships, due to the combination of an oceangoing ship (for damage resistance, mobility, and staying power) and an aircraft (moving in air for greater speed and 3D operation). For space operations, it would need another excuse to exist.
Cruiser: a role rather than a class for a long time, first examples I know of as a type of warship maybe 1870-1880. Used for intermediate-sized warships that don't normally control the seas by themselves but patrol to enforce sea control. Modern cruisers are bigger and armed differently from the early ones, but are conceptually the same.
Armored Cruiser: 1880s or 1890s, at that time a large cruiser with belt armor. Smaller "protected" cruisers had an armored deck only, and there were still smaller cruisers with little or no armor at the time. After about 1910, no new ones were built, and the term died with the last armored cruisers.
Heavy cruiser: AFAICT, the term was introduced about 1930 when the London Naval Treaty allotted different quotas for building larger and smaller cruisers. Since all modern cruisers at that time were considered light cruisers, it was natural to call the larger ones heavy cruisers. Not really used after the 1970s or so.
Light Cruiser: 1890s or so, as "light armored cruiser", a small cruiser with side armor. Emerged from WWI with a great reputation, and countries started building light cruisers up to Washington Treaty limits. "Heavy cruiser" was an offshoot, with many cruisers being reclassified from "light" to "heavy". Not used quite as long as heavy cruisers.
Destroyer: 1880s or 1890s, ships designed to sink torpedo boats (hence "torpedo boat destroyers"), adopting the torpedo boat role as well. The smallest fleet warships through WWII, and still a very common class.
Frigate: 1700s at the latest, a sailing cruiser. In WWII, the British first used "corvette" as a small anti-submarine ship, and when they built larger ones called them "frigates". They have been mostly small slow destroyers postwar, except for a period when the USN referred to large destroyers as frigates. Extant now, in the modern definition.
Corvette: Same as "frigate", a small sailing cruiser, not always used. In WWII, the British built a series of small, fairly small ships to escort convoys against German submari
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Like the one in the 1981 movie Heavy Metal? https://www.google.com/search?...
Starfleet Battles is an excellent example of well defined ships & roles - it expands (and branches away from) the original series and does a good job of representing classes of ships from a multitude of different races.
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