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Federation Starship Design Guidelines

Roddenberry's starship design rules
1. Warp Nacelles must be in pairs.

2. Warp Nacelles must have at least 50% line-of-sight on each other across the hull.

3. Both Warp Nacelles must be visible from the front.

4. The bridge must be located at the top center of the primary hull.

TNG Tech Manual Excerpts
1. Specifications: Chapter 1.1 of the TNG Technical Manual lists the "mission objectives for the Galaxy-class project", comprising specs for the ship's propulsion, mission, environmental systems, tactical and lifetime. Although Rick Sternbach apparently conceived most of the specs when the design of the model was finished, it is obvious that usually their definition should take place at the very beginning of the design process. At least the basic purpose, size and speed of a ship should be known before the (24th century or 21st century) designer begins work on the actual plans, rather than marginal specs like "peak transitional surge reserve to exceed 4,225% of nominal output". The infamous Defiant size problem is an example of a design becoming inconsistent because of insufficient basic specs that are changed and thoughtlessly supplemented after the completion of the studio model.

2. Warp field and hull shape: A "hybrid angular-curvilinear shape" for future starship hulls as mentioned in chapter 17.2 seems to have been designed for the Intrepid class, which resembles the first depicted concept, and to a greater extent for the Norway, Steamrunner and Saber classes. The development from circular to elliptical and finally triangular saucers is apparently meant to reflect changes in the understanding of warp field vs. hull geometry. This should be taken into account when designing a ship supposed to fit into a certain era, although it is not imperative. Chapter 5.3 states that the typical "aft hull undercut allows for varying degrees of field flow attachment, effectively preventing pin-wheeling, owing to the placement of the nacelles off the vehicle Y-axis (dorsal-ventral) center of mass". Although this sounds nice, there are many starships whose nacelles are located at the very top or very bottom of the ship and have no undercut, so an "amateur" starship designer does not necessarily have to care.

My own guidelines
1. Starfleet ships must look aesthetically pleasing while still being practical for example, a starship's nacelles must be the the same length if not longer than the primary hull, the nacelle pylons must also be capable of withstanding the mass of the nacelle mounted to it.

2. The ship must have light colors to represent that the Federation is a peaceful organization, darker colors should only be used during wartime situations.

3. Since the Decks of the starship are three meters in height the windows must also give that impression.

4. The Bridge should be capable of partially submerging into the hull with retractable armored plating surrounding it in the event a starship is about to go into combat, this better protects the bridge from weapons fire.

5. Standard procedure in orbit of a planet will call for lowering the interior lighting to reduce power consumption, this allows for natural sunlight to shine into the windows to provide illumination and allow for a more natural day/night cycle. Just to make one thing clear, the lights won't be so low that it's hard to see but they will be low enough that they won't consume a majority of the power.

6. An Addendum to Roddenberry's third rule, If the ship has anything like the Miranda Class rear end or has a short neck and small secondary hull then the nacelles can be underslung. Otherwise the Ship's nacelles must be seen above the saucer when viewed from the front.

Mistakes to avoid
1. No or insufficient specifications
Don't just draw or build a starship without nailing down some very basic specs. At least its origin, age, purpose and size should be known in advance. Avoid the Defiant size paradox.

2. "Faster, bigger, stronger"
Don't mistake starship design for Olympic Games. Don't think that you can build an über-ship that outguns or otherwise outperforms every other design. While it can be assumed that starships are continually improved, sudden performance leaps and engineering miracles are unrealistic and silly. The same applies to monster ships such as the Vengeance. Take into consideration that most starships are slower, smaller and weaker than the most advanced ships of the respective era.

3. Unnecessary design lineage
The apparent use of similar components does not automatically imply that ships share a design lineage. The mere coincidence that the 200 years old Daedalus class and the Olympic class both have a spherical main hull does not mean that the latter must be derived from the first. The same applies to the "Akiraprise" and the Akira, although here the similarity at least of the models in the real world is intentional. Starship "family trees" drawn by fans may outline a rough development, but don't show actual design stages.

4. Drawing only one elevation
Don't draw either a top view or a side view only. Be aware that this can hardly give a complete impression of the ship's appearance. If one view looks technically correct and aesthetically pleasing, this does not necessarily apply to the other views.

5. Rashness
The first solution is almost never the best solution. There has been long evolution of good starship designs such as the Constitution or the Galaxy (see for instance The Art of Star Trek) up to their eventually built versions that look both aesthetic and technically correct.

6. Unmotivated kitbashing
If you just rearrange available components instead of creating a really new starship, you have to find excuses. For a 24th century starship engineer it is a huge amount of work to change the location of a major component such as a warp nacelle or to combine components of different starships, considering that countless power conduits, data transfer lines, environmental systems, Jefferies tubes and turbolifts have to be relocated and the whole computer system has to be reprogrammed. It's everything but simple. The benefit of the DS9 Technical Manual kitbashes is already hard to explain, but it is virtually impossible to build high-performance ships in this way as some fans insist on. Read more about kitbashing.

7. "Space dragsters"
Ever since Matt Jefferies conceived the original Enterprise, Starfleet ships are intentionally laid out to be sleek and to have only few and well-defined external components. Like with kitbashing too, be cautious when adding additional components to existing ships. As popular as the Enterprise-D from TNG: "All Good Things" may be in fan circles - the additional nacelle, cannons, spoilers and spikes totally ruin the graceful lines of the ship and turn it into an immature "space dragster".

8. Scaling of ship components
If not impossible, scaling is the worst choice of designing a new part based on a smaller or larger prototype (see Bird-of-Prey size paradox). A smaller or larger part will inherently have completely different mechanical, electromagnetic and subspace properties, so a completely new design and simulation is inevitable. The result might look similar to the original component, but not the same.

9. Resemblance where there should be none
The top view of the "Akiraprise" is almost identical to that of the 200 years younger Akira, and even several details are the same on the two ships. They have actually more in common than many Starfleet ship classes of the same era. It is almost inexplicable why the "Akiraprise" should be 200 years ahead of her time, or the Akira 200 years behind. No matter how much you like a certain existing ship design, imitating its look and transferring it to another time is a bad way to start. A good designer who wants a new ship to be "a tip of the hat" to another design should do this by retaining only the basic configuration while changing the ship's lines (as it was always nicely done with the various Enterprises from -nil to -E).

10. Arbitrary size and location of external components
Windows and lifeboats are arranged deck-wise, and one deck is 3-4m tall. Be aware that this predominantly determines the size of your ship, no matter what you say in your specs.

11. Naming and numbering inconsistencies
There are various lists of canon starships, so it should be possible to give your design a name and a number that fits into the Star Trek chronology without ambiguity. Furthermore, NCC-XXXX-A,B,C,D,E is an exceptional case and should not be applicable to starships other than the Enterprise. Even the TNG production crew themselves fixed the Yamato registry that was NCC-1305-E at first.

12. Early resignation
There are some people who design amazingly realistic looking ships. Not everyone has their artistic talent, but be aware that this only one aspect of a design. So don't give up after the first try, your result will definitely become better the more you work on it.
These are the guidelines that I have laid out for starship design in Star Trek Castaways. Most of the stuff seen here came from Ex Astris Scientia.

Star Trek and all related elements (c) Gene Roddenberry, Paramount Pictures and CBS Studios
Star Trek Castaways (c) :iconspidertrekfan616::iconp51cmustang::iconcaptnobviousftw:
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dim35's avatar
You said ... 5. Low lighting shall be standard procedure to reduce power consumption, this allows for natural sunlight to shine into the windows to provide illumination. Just to make one thing clear, the lights won't be so low that it's hard to see but they will be low enough that they won't consume a majority of the power. ... In deep space, they would be too far away for light from any star to make a difference.

The only time that this would be of benefit is when they are in orbit around a planet and even then it would be only 50% of the time because the other 50% of the time the light of the sun would be blocked by the planet that they are orbiting.