Category:Defiant class starships: Difference between revisions

The primary purpose of Starfleet was science and exploration, with military prowess not being a priority. With some notable exceptions made during the Earth-Romulan War, Starfleet had little experience designing ships specifically made for warfare. The Defiant-class began development a year before the Battle of Wolf 359, and the starship’s development and production was made a priority after the disastrous encounter with the Borg. The Defiant-class starship, officially an escort vessel, began development around 2366 as a small, highly-powered, heavily-armed warship intended to defend the United Federation of Planets against the Borg. The USS Defiant (NX-74205) was the prototype of what was to be a new Federation battle fleet. However, the ship had numerous design problems that were made apparent during its shakedown cruise. These flaws, combined with the decreased urgency of the Borg threat, caused Starfleet to table its plans for a battle fleet and put the Defiant in storage.

The Defiant prototype was pulled out of storage in 2371 when the Dominion threat emerged. After several upgrades by Deep Space 9 Operations staff, the ship was deemed worthy of use and more ships of the class were constructed. (DS9: "The Search, Part I", "Call to Arms"; VOY: "Message in a Bottle") As of 2381, the Defiant class was Starfleet's primary escort class.

The prototype USS Defiant (NX-74205) differed significantly from production models of the class by having a Romulan cloaking device. The amount of power required by the starship made the cloak less effective than if it was used on another starship of similar mass, and careful sensor sweeps were still able to detect Defiant at close range. These same power requirements resulted in the shelving of the design due to the extreme power draw required for its weapon systems.

The standard armament for the class included four forward-mounted pulsed phaser cannons, three secondary type-10 phaser strips, and a total of six (four forward and two aft mounted) multi-purpose torpedo launchers, able to fire both standard Mark IV photon torpedoes or the newly developed quantum torpedoes. The class’s maximum warp speed with weapons charged was warp 7, but with weapons offline, the Defiant class vessels could achieve an impressive Warp 9.5 from warp coils normally unable to produce such a steep subspace gradient. Power draw for propulsion was nearly identical at sublight speeds as the starship’s structural integrity field struggled to handle manoeuvres normally seen in single crew shuttles or fighters.

All of the weapon systems and power generation came at the cost of crew comforts. The Defiant-class was one of the smallest starships used by Starfleet in an active role with a standard crew size of 50. However, even with this small crew, all crew (except the captain) had to share quarters and rely on a single mess hall for any recreation while on board. The interior space did allow the inclusion of a small shuttlebay that was primarily for use when the starship was assigned to reconnaissance duties, and landing struts to facilitate emergency planetary landings or for planetary reconnaissance.