If there is one thing that Star Wars has always ignored, it was following prototypical ship class naming conventions.

It tends to play with military ranks a bit too...

Yeah, they decided to use British rank conventions, more or less (to go with the accent, I suppose), but then the Imperial Army, Navy, & Stormtroopers are all slightly different and differ as well from the clone trooper ranks. The which are also not terribly consistent.

I noticed they went with Navy Ranks for the most part for the Rebels. There are definitely times where you see overlap where they went with Army/Air Force Ranks (1st Lieutenant instead of Lt. Junior Grade, Captain instead of Lieutenant, etc.) I even remember seeing Flight Officer/Flight Sergeant in there somewhere (maybe a comic IDK). Basically with all of the different authors and writers, most without prior military service or knowing an established canon rank structure, they just kinda go with what sounds the coolest.

Personally, by mixing all of the ranks together for the Rebels, it really does a good job of showing that not all of the pilots, support dudes, grunts, etc. are from the same place and despite joining the Alliance Against the Empire, they might prefer their comparative military rank from their home world. It makes it fluffy.

There is no excuse for the Imperial forces to not have an established rank stucture beyond, Private, Sergeant, Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Admiral, etc. This is not to be confused with their duty positions, (Squad Leader, Executive Officer [XO], Captain [a Skipper], Grand Admiral [supreme Allied Commander]), It's one of the few incomplete things that irks me every so often, especially knowing that civilians are a wikipedia adventure away from actually learning and understanding rank structure. Even if only to create characters in a story.

I noticed they went with Navy Ranks for the most part for the Rebels. There are definitely times where you see overlap where they went with Army/Air Force Ranks (1st Lieutenant instead of Lt. Junior Grade, Captain instead of Lieutenant, etc.) I even remember seeing Flight Officer/Flight Sergeant in there somewhere (maybe a comic IDK). Basically with all of the different authors and writers, most without prior military service or knowing an established canon rank structure, they just kinda go with what sounds the coolest.

Personally, by mixing all of the ranks together for the Rebels, it really does a good job of showing that not all of the pilots, support dudes, grunts, etc. are from the same place and despite joining the Alliance Against the Empire, they might prefer their comparative military rank from their home world. It makes it fluffy.

There is no excuse for the Imperial forces to not have an established rank stucture beyond, Private, Sergeant, Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Admiral, etc. This is not to be confused with their duty positions, (Squad Leader, Executive Officer [XO], Captain [a Skipper], Grand Admiral [supreme Allied Commander]), It's one of the few incomplete things that irks me every so often, especially knowing that civilians are a wikipedia adventure away from actually learning and understanding rank structure. Even if only to create characters in a story.

I can forgive readers for not wanting to do the research, but not writers.

Research is part of their job.

But then we have, say, Ian Fleming giving James Bond an automatic pistol (PPK) and a shoulder holster with a make and model that not only was only ever made for revolvers, but whose defining characteristics mean that it couldn't work for anything other than a revolver. Which I suppose we can add to authors having characters deactivate external safeties on revolvers, the sound technicians for movies and TV shows making striker-fired Glocks make cocking sounds, and directors making people rack the actions of the same guns over and over and over again, such that they should have half their magazine scattered all over the floor by the time they start shooting... which is also up there with the shing! noise that swords (don't actually) make when they're unsheathed.

I can forgive readers for not wanting to do the research, but not writers.

Research is part of their job.

But then we have, say, Ian Fleming giving James Bond an automatic pistol (PPK) and a shoulder holster with a make and model that not only was only ever made for revolvers, but whose defining characteristics mean that it couldn't work for anything other than a revolver.

Did Fleming specify the make of the holster? It's been a while, I just remember that it was described as a soft holster which was the reason his Beretta got caught leading to the famous PPK.

I noticed they went with Navy Ranks for the most part for the Rebels. There are definitely times where you see overlap where they went with Army/Air Force Ranks (1st Lieutenant instead of Lt. Junior Grade, Captain instead of Lieutenant, etc.) I even remember seeing Flight Officer/Flight Sergeant in there somewhere (maybe a comic IDK). Basically with all of the different authors and writers, most without prior military service or knowing an established canon rank structure, they just kinda go with what sounds the coolest.

Personally, by mixing all of the ranks together for the Rebels, it really does a good job of showing that not all of the pilots, support dudes, grunts, etc. are from the same place and despite joining the Alliance Against the Empire, they might prefer their comparative military rank from their home world. It makes it fluffy.

There is no excuse for the Imperial forces to not have an established rank stucture beyond, Private, Sergeant, Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Admiral, etc. This is not to be confused with their duty positions, (Squad Leader, Executive Officer [XO], Captain [a Skipper], Grand Admiral [supreme Allied Commander]), It's one of the few incomplete things that irks me every so often, especially knowing that civilians are a wikipedia adventure away from actually learning and understanding rank structure. Even if only to create characters in a story.

I can forgive readers for not wanting to do the research, but not writers.

Research is part of their job.

But then we have, say, Ian Fleming giving James Bond an automatic pistol (PPK) and a shoulder holster with a make and model that not only was only ever made for revolvers, but whose defining characteristics mean that it couldn't work for anything other than a revolver. Which I suppose we can add to authors having characters deactivate external safeties on revolvers, the sound technicians for movies and TV shows making striker-fired Glocks make cocking sounds, and directors making people rack the actions of the same guns over and over and over again, such that they should have half their magazine scattered all over the floor by the time they start shooting... which is also up there with the shing! noise that swords (don't actually) make when they're unsheathed.

I guess it's better than swords making SCHWIIIINGGG! noises, right Wayne? (That's right Garth!)

Is the problem Hollywood trying to make things cool, or is it the uneducated expectations of the general audience that movies need to be dumbed down for?

The Sequel Trilogy has a chance to show consistent ranks on both sides, hopefully to make up for the 'everyone is a commander' gaff from ROTJ.

I can forgive readers for not wanting to do the research, but not writers.

Research is part of their job.

But then we have, say, Ian Fleming giving James Bond an automatic pistol (PPK) and a shoulder holster with a make and model that not only was only ever made for revolvers, but whose defining characteristics mean that it couldn't work for anything other than a revolver.

Did Fleming specify the make of the holster? It's been a while, I just remember that it was described as a soft holster which was the reason his Beretta got caught leading to the famous PPK.

Geoffrey Boothroyd wrote a letter to Ian Fleming suggesting that Bond be armed with something more powerful than the 25 Auto Beretta that he had been carrying, that he carry a revolver in 357 Magnum instead, and to carry it in a Berns-Martin holster. (Steve McQueen in Bullitt appears to carry his revolver in a Berns-Martin or a very similar holster, if you want to see the holster in action.) Ian Fleming agreed to every point - except the 357 Magnum revolver. And thus Ian Fleming armed his iconic spy with a weapon more powerful than his 25 Auto Beretta (a 7.65mm/32 Auto or 9x17mm Short/380 Auto PPK), carried in a Berns-Martin holster.

I noticed they went with Navy Ranks for the most part for the Rebels. There are definitely times where you see overlap where they went with Army/Air Force Ranks (1st Lieutenant instead of Lt. Junior Grade, Captain instead of Lieutenant, etc.) I even remember seeing Flight Officer/Flight Sergeant in there somewhere (maybe a comic IDK). Basically with all of the different authors and writers, most without prior military service or knowing an established canon rank structure, they just kinda go with what sounds the coolest.

Personally, by mixing all of the ranks together for the Rebels, it really does a good job of showing that not all of the pilots, support dudes, grunts, etc. are from the same place and despite joining the Alliance Against the Empire, they might prefer their comparative military rank from their home world. It makes it fluffy.

There is no excuse for the Imperial forces to not have an established rank stucture beyond, Private, Sergeant, Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Admiral, etc. This is not to be confused with their duty positions, (Squad Leader, Executive Officer [XO], Captain [a Skipper], Grand Admiral [supreme Allied Commander]), It's one of the few incomplete things that irks me every so often, especially knowing that civilians are a wikipedia adventure away from actually learning and understanding rank structure. Even if only to create characters in a story.

I can forgive readers for not wanting to do the research, but not writers.

Research is part of their job.

But then we have, say, Ian Fleming giving James Bond an automatic pistol (PPK) and a shoulder holster with a make and model that not only was only ever made for revolvers, but whose defining characteristics mean that it couldn't work for anything other than a revolver. Which I suppose we can add to authors having characters deactivate external safeties on revolvers, the sound technicians for movies and TV shows making striker-fired Glocks make cocking sounds, and directors making people rack the actions of the same guns over and over and over again, such that they should have half their magazine scattered all over the floor by the time they start shooting... which is also up there with the shing! noise that swords (don't actually) make when they're unsheathed.

I guess it's better than swords making SCHWIIIINGGG! noises, right Wayne? (That's right Garth!)

Is the problem Hollywood trying to make things cool, or is it the uneducated expectations of the general audience that movies need to be dumbed down for?

The Sequel Trilogy has a chance to show consistent ranks on both sides, hopefully to make up for the 'everyone is a commander' gaff from ROTJ.

I think it's a combination of Hollywood trying to make stuff cool, tradition, and a largely ignorant audience.

Cocking sounds are cool: HK slap, anyone? The shing! sound is cool. In fact, I believe Bob Anderson (who taught Errol Flynn and and Viggo Mortensen to fence and, as any good Star Wars fan knows, did a couple stand-ins for Darth Vader during lightsaber duels with Luke Skywalker) has said that swords don't make the noise, but that it sounds really cool, and he wishes that they did.

And then there is tradition: When Hollywood started making films, most guns were carried with empty chambers (automatic handguns - which also had external safeties as often as not, pump-actions shotguns, and lever-action rifles) or were double-action revolvers (which were commonly cocked for the lighter single-action trigger) or were single-action in the case of Westerns (which were quite popular for a long time).

And finally there is the ignorant audience. While aesthetic realism is the 'in' thing in Hollywood these days, the fact that so few people in the audience have ever handled a firearm means that they can get away with guns making random clicks and clacks, even when they don't actually make those noises in real life. Directors/producers for whom aesthetic realism is especially important - like Michael Mann - can generally get away from it, but most don't seem to.

Good thing we are still discussing the Raider in a thread about the Raider...

Are we certain the decks are all oriented the same way? I mean, with artificial gravity there's nothing keeping the decks from being oriented in all sorts of strange ways in relation to the outer hull or he bridge. Although as far as we have seen capital ships tend to have their decks oriented on top of each other. The Falcon and Slave one show that gravity doesn't have to oriented the same throughout a ship.

You might be able to make a lot more effecient use of space by orienting there decks in unexpected ways.

Most of the decks would be the same way, only a possibly gun turret would orient differently on this ship, and the way the turrets are pop-out batttteries, Id say not even then. Especailly if looking at it, there do not seem to be any odd areas on this ship. Not even the radiator panels seems to be large enough for crew access...if so then they'd probably have access ladders that orient ike the Falcon's turret.

Are we certain the decks are all oriented the same way? I mean, with artificial gravity there's nothing keeping the decks from being oriented in all sorts of strange ways in relation to the outer hull or he bridge. Although as far as we have seen capital ships tend to have their decks oriented on top of each other. The Falcon and Slave one show that gravity doesn't have to oriented the same throughout a ship.

You might be able to make a lot more effecient use of space by orienting there decks in unexpected ways.

Looking at it from underneath, over 60% of the Raiders' mass appears to be the structure of the main thruster. In fact, despite what the cards say, and regardless of the taper, most of the usable space looks to be in the front of the ship.

I'm right now trying to find an elegant way to connect the bridge (isolated on top of the thruster housing) with the rest of the ship; as well as figure out where the docking ports are (if any).

It's nigh-impossible to get definitive answers to these questions (FFG went easy on the lore for this thing; the Android writers must have been busy) so best-guesses are all we got.

(Those hatches on the top are about 4x2 meters, just in case you were wondering scale.)

Access tubes with ladders should probably be zero-g to keep crewmen from falling off the ladders and getting killed. But then the falcon has 'death ladders' to the gun ports.

Also bottomless pits should probably not be kept at 1G acceleration for their entire depth. Someone might drop something into the competely unguarded reactor of a Star Destroyer, and that would be a mess.

OneKelvin, lookup the Far Orbit Project- it shows the reactor area of a Nebulon B frigate which takes up a lot of space, and it has ladders/access corridors around it. The Farstar in the Darkstryder campaign also details engineering of a Correllian Corvette quite well. They are very crowded areas by the seems of both ships- and have a large engineering crew

If you keep running into issues with the reactor/engineering area, by making it much like the Imperial SD and Venator SD reactor spheres you could instead decide that since the SDs are so much larger that the Raider's sphere is smaller since it oesnt need to put out as much energy to the rest of the ship...in fact that makes a lot of sense considering the SDs are much much larger and have many more weapons.

As for your docking ports, there is likely a small boarding hatch for itcrew/cargo access, much like the Millenium Falcon's ramp, rather than flush to hull side airlock door...now the ramp likely leads to an airlock,but I'd think a shippp this size would possibly land in large hangars for most crew changes

The necro is weak but..

In the last episode of Rebels, last one I saw as I seem to miss them, Sabine and Chopper are chased by, I guess, Sabine's sister, dunno, just got home from overnight work and saw it listed and forced(HA!) myself to stay up a bit longer to watch it. Didn't catch the 1st 5-10 mins. Anyway, at the end, the light Imperial cruiser is on top of their ships trying to capture them. At some point, an order to fire on them is given and it seems as though the cruiser's turret was controlled from one of the 2 seated officers right there on the bridge. That would seem to me to make remote controlled turrets on [some] Imperial ships now canon.

Deleted.

... Whoops, wrong thread.

Or the Fire Control Officers are on the Bridge relaying orders to the gun crews. It same deal as in Star Trek TOS where it seems Sulu seems to be firing the Phasers except for when Kirk is shouting over the intercoms for the Phasers Crews to fire the Phasers.

Access tubes with ladders should probably be zero-g to keep crewmen from falling off the ladders and getting killed. But then the falcon has 'death ladders' to the gun ports.

Also bottomless pits should probably not be kept at 1G acceleration for their entire depth. Someone might drop something into the competely unguarded reactor of a Star Destroyer, and that would be a mess.

Jack McDevitt had a really cool idea about this in one of his books (won't say which in order to no spoil part of the story). A big ship with deep vertical shafts, however gravity is centered so, that when you fall into a shaft, you always fall towards the middle of the shaft and over time come to a stop there.

I'm right now trying to find an elegant way to connect the bridge (isolated on top of the thruster housing) with the rest of the ship; as well as figure out where the docking ports are (if any).

Use a ramp, a sloping passageway.

Allow me to apologize for completely failing to deliver in any respect, OneKelvin.

No contract, no obligation. Don't worry about it.

OneKelvin have you made any progress?

OneKelvin have you made any progress?

Short answer: No.

Long answer. Not really, it was originally for an RPG group that no longer exists. However, I've gotten better at shipbuilding recently and may finish it in the future.

Hello there X-Wingers,

I appreciate this endeavor so I'm going to add fuel to the fire.

http://swrpgrc.com/files/Dawn%20of%20Defiance%20Campaign%20Info/RPG%20-%20Star%20Wars%20D20%20Nebulon%20B.pdf

Pretty sure these deckplans would be of just as much help as the others.