Ship chat: Akira class

[@weldonwin]

"Sir, you think we have enough torpedo tubes?" "More!" "But we have fifteen already" "MORE!!!" "But sir..." *"MOAR DAKKA!!!!"*

[@Dr.Chibbins]

“WAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHH, Sir!”

[@weldonwin]

@@Dr.Chibbins Okay, so, fifteen torpedo tubes, all able to multi-fire up to five torpedoes at once, all able to track individual targets. Fire them all at once, it's going to be like a full Itano Circus

[@rohenthar8449]

@@weldonwin It was nicely portrayed in Star Trek Online as a Torpedo Point-Defense Module. It fire up to 6 torpedoes at 8 different targets at the same time, which is 48 torpedoes in total.... So, yeah its a beast.

[@weldonwin]

@@rohenthar8449 As I said, that is a Full on Itano Circus of torpedoes

[@aldariontelcontar]

@@weldonwin If we go by Sovereign class, all these tubes are single-shot. So higher sustained fire than something like Galaxy class starship, but not necessarily higher burst fire.

[@occultatumquaestio5226]

Of the anti-Borg ships of the 24th century, the Akira is probably the most famous after the hero-ship classes of the Sovereign and Defiant. It is also indeed continues to be one of the most combat orientated designs that Starfleet has thus fare developed. She is definitely a ship of war, but retains to noticeable amount of Starfleet's exploratory mindset. "We come in peace but don't try us."

[@Sephiroth144]

Wonder if Sisko had a hand in designing the Akira too... I mean, it would conform to his introduction philosophy: "This is my shaking hand, and this is my pimp hand- which one do you want?"

[@artbrann]

Sisko and others (like the rest of the designers for the Akira, Norway, and Steamrunner classes) obviously follow the General Mattis school of diplomacy "I come in peace. I didn’t bring artillery. But I’m pleading with you, with tears in my eyes: If you fuck with me, I’ll kill you all." just updated to I didn't bring quantum torpedoes or something

[@mrtencza]

"Never hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting, but never hit soft." -Theodore Roosevelt

[@rohenthar8449]

No, there is another design, its Avenger and its upgraded version the Arbiter class, but sadly is not canonical, and available in Star Trek Online.

[@tjmobleycpc]

Under utilized. Should have been a hero ship.

[@rohenthar8449]

Agree.

[@KH4444444444N]

It was a hero ship.

[@Boxfortress]

I'm ok with it being the most bad ass of background support ships. Let's me enjoy it more for myself.

[@garronn]

When I first saw it in First Contact, I thought nothing of it. I played Star Trek Armada and I fell in love with it, in that game that ship and the Steamrunner were beyond OP. And that is what got me to actually take a look at it and read up on it.

[@Sephiroth144]

One of the two Eaglemoss ships I have... But, as you said, between the deflector and the forward shuttle bay, there is a torpedo tube- its shown in First Contact (in the same shot as the Ent-E drops the Quantum torpedoes). So, not really an assumption as "yup, there be torpedoes here"

[@HeadlessChickenTO]

My first thoughts of the Akira when it was introduced was missile/torpedo cruiser naval equivalent. And seeing it work in tandem with Defiants when we see a taskforce in pursuit of the Prometheus was an amazing scene that really shows how it fits within a wartime Starfleet doctrine. It would have been nice to see it operate as a tactical carrier on screen.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Yeah missed opportunity but the cg model wasn't detailed enough to open the shuttlbay

[@Frankforsthoevel]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 hi it's 7 Months but the 5th launcher inside the source is canon it's fireing in the battle of sector 001: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gYPbiWB3iaecebM and hugging by the futage it's also some sort of burst fire launcher but a difrend style like a revolver launcher?

[@bluehydro88]

That Akira and 2 Defiants fought off 3 warbirds. Starfleet was so confident that they only sent one.

[@Nabuchadnezar]

I loved this ship in Star Trek: Bridge Commander. Not only cause it was fun to fly in the skirmish mode, but it also had a part in the single player storyline. Its captain was a badass.

[@timsimms65707]

It was love at first sight for me when I saw an Akira class starship, she's a real beauty. Thank you for another fine video.

[@Athrin01]

Star Trek: The magazine The location of the tubes was given in the article, and is as follows : Pod: 7 total, 4 in upper section of pod, 3 in lower section, all face forward Saucer: 7 total, 3 forward below the front shuttle bay doors, 4 in dorsal surface, 2 port, 2 starboard. The latter four face out to port and starboard, respectively - so far as I know these are the only torpedo tubes we've ever seen which don't fire parallel to the direction of motion. Finally there is 1 in the lower hull section, just below the deflector dish. Info on the Akira class specs are all over the place. some say 17 launchers and 6 phasers, some say only 3 launchers. The Battle for the Prometheus clip is awesome, shows Akira taking on fire of 3 warbirds while the 2 Defiant class fire on the Prometheus.

[@philly83]

I wish we could get a look inside one of these. This is a great ship.

[@casbot71]

Like the Miranda with its roll bar, the Akira could perhaps later on be retrofitted with other pods besides the torpedo launchers … of course should StarFleet need sudden firepower that's an issue - you can't get a shipyard to swap the modules in time to intercept a Borg Cube, or just a suprise skirmish. But even that's not necessary for a bit of exploration, *it's not just torpedoes that can be carried in the pod* Just load it up with probes and you've got a very effective large scale rapid explorer. It gets to a wholly unexplored sector and fires a spread of probes in different directions (and as it just travels along) and _then_ the Runabouts do follow up on the probes that send interesting telemetry _with some idea of what they're flying into._ Then the large torpedo magazines became probe magazines, allowing it to check out a wide swath of space as it travels … and not run into any nasty surprises unaware [like how Tuvok's probe gave Voyager the heads up about BorgSpace]. But one upgrade that the Akira should get (as a minor refit) is a couple of Phaser Cannons (in swivel mounts) covering the rear blind spots. That would be the most appropriate weapon as the shorter range of the phaser cannon is not an issue as it's only purpose would be to swat smaller ships that got to close to be safely hit with a torpedo. And for that phaser cannons are great against attack fighters as they are short range rapid fire heavy hitters that even knock their targets around if they don't destroy them. If they are out of range of the phaser cannons, they are in range of the torpedoes. Another use of the flight deck could also be to carry and launch *heavier ordinance* … basically giant cruise missiles that make a tricolbolt device look trite. Something like a scaled down version of _Dreadnaught_ (the Cardassian/Marquis Doomsday weapon that Voyager encountered) that could one shot a wing or severely damage a fleet.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Great point we see many variants of the miranda. So it makes sense that over time you'd see a similar number of variants. And I don't know if starfleet designed it with the intention of carrying such weapons. But it would come in handy.

[@SBrown7525]

Lol. The Torpedo Pod was designed to be Ejectable.

[@athena139c]

Great video! The historical comparisons I can think of for this ship are the Japanese torpedo cruiser Kitakami, an old light cruiser the Japanese Navy refitted with 40 torpedo tubes, and the Graf Zepplin, an aircraft carrier/cruiser hybrid ship.

[@cdrocrossdiscovery]

I have 2 Akira class Starcraft models in my collection; The Thunderchild and the Taiho. They also figure prominently in a couple of episodes in my story. Another story finely told. More please!

[@toddmiller2226]

Don't forget. This is a SPACE ship. You don't need to position the ship in relation to the wind to launch the fighters, so you could launch at the same time from the back hatch of the hanger as well. That is 2 too 4 fighters (if you changed the hatches) at a time.

[@Sephiroth144]

No, but you do have to position the fighters; I mean, are they backing out like the hatchback at the grocery store, or throttling forward...? Depending on how much space there is in the shuttle hangar to maneuver the light craft, it might make more sense to have one entrance and one exit (direction). (This would doubly matter during in-battle resupply situations.)

[@starrellington7942]

I love this ship throw in a cloaking device and two to four K'Vort 's and you have a nice little squadron

[@lyinarbaeldeth2456]

One of my favourite ships. Great analysis. Only one note: That speculative torpedo tube near the deflector is confirmed, we see an Akira fire a volley from it in the First Contact battle. I love flying this thing in STO, and was very happy when it got an updated hi-res model. That model, of course, adds some additional phasers to cover the rear arc, which given the weakness you pointed out seems like a smart refit as the vessel goes into more general service.

[@Deepingmind]

As a carrier it makes perfect sense from what we saw in DS9. SF was fielding large numbers of fighters that would need to be housed somewhere prior to launch. As well as a place to rearm when their rather limited payloads were expended.

[@billc3271]

I would love too see this as a hero ship in some future series

[@jaymikevillanueva1212]

I think you're spot on about the Akira. Good explanation over it but I'll also add my 2 cents, especially on the only glaring weakness of what is literally a flying artillery vessel. It is an offense oriented ship and was literally designed from the ground up to fight the Borg head-on, so the logic of Starfleet's designers and engineers was sound by having most the weapon systems of the Akira fire facing forward. Firing an ungodly volley of torpedoes, supplemented by streams of phasers, to hurt the Borg cube makes the Akira the iron fist whilst other ships, say, a couple of Sabers or Steamrunners (or even a quartet of Defiant escorts) act as support vessels and provide additional firepower from their own phaser banks. The fact the Akira as four impulse engines allows the Akira surprising nimbleness and speed to catch up with the smaller and maneuverable ships. This is where I'll talk about weakness you mentioned earlier. You're certainly correct the rear sight of fire of the Akira is where it's lacking. Sure, you see 6 torpedo tubes at the aft of the torpedo module but the angle of those tubes is at 45° on each side so it's not really facing the back of the ship. I think that's where the need for being fast and maneuverable enough is important for the Akira so it doesn't get hit there but also it stresses the need for smaller ships to cover at the the rear. This may support the idea that the Akira is intended to be the heart of a small wolfpack formation and that's where it's at it's fullest potential against a far stronger opponent (such as a Borg cube). The formation also works as protection in allowing the fighters assigned to the Akira to launch as quickly as possible in the middle of a battle. An Akira can fight up close and dirty but it still needs support ships to cover the rear. Perhaps a post-Dominion War refit to add at least 4 smaller phaser pulse cannons or strips could make the rear less vulnerable without sacrificing it's role as the heavy hitter of a small attack squadron.

[@AllenorLP]

With every ship class i always wonder how they would've handled the Situation that the Voyager was put in

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

akira could have been far bolder, but wouldn't have gone so far.

[@bluehydro88]

The Akira would've messed the Delta quadrant up.... the Kazon in particular would've been screwed. Not to mention it's one of the few ships that wasn't scared to take on a borg cube. In first contract, a couple of Akira class ships held off a Borg cube for days before Picard got there from the neutral zone.

[@danielboatright8887]

I love the idea of the Akira as torpedocruiser carrier, it has so many uses for so many scenarios. Enemy starbase needs removing ? Have a few Akiras stand off a long distance and rapid torpedoes at it until they run out. Program them smart for a fixed target at extended range and the enemys first warning may be a stream of hundreds of torpedoes entering sensor range at extremly high sublight speeds.... we never get speed info on then, but given the speed capabilties of impulse engines half to three quarters the speed of light sounds reasonable, and its not like they loose speed overtime either, you wouldnt need to be in the same star system even, just fire nearby it. If a planet were lost to the borg this tactic would be an excellent standoff method to wipe the planet, sparing any possible survivors assimilation and slowing the borg down. On the other hand, for peacetime, or even wartime recon, probes designed to be launched from torpedo tubes could be launched in massive numbers, allowing a single akira to establish an effective probe network rather quickly, or do most of thebinital survey of a system from a long distsnce at no risk to crew. The Akira, properly equipped, could even have specality probes designed to create a medium range sensor network to detect a cloaked ship at a rapid rate.

[@andrewcraig3722]

Very informative ship chat Thanks Venom 👌

[@matthewwhite4564]

Starfleet: How many torpedo launcherse can we install on this ship? Also Starfleet: after much thought, we have decided that the answer to this question is YES

[@lanebowles8170]

Good video! In this video you state (in your version of in-universe canon) that the Akira class was always intended as an anti-Borg ship. I always preferred the version of history presented by "Starship Spotter" as it went with the idea that the Akira class initially conceived of during the conflict with the Cardassians and then originally served (or perhaps was going to serve) as a testbed ship for improving phasers and torpedoes. Then after the disaster of Wolf 359, it was reworked into the powerhouse we enjoy today. What moves me about this particular version of history is an echo of the Grumman F6F Hellcat's story which started as a modest update to its predecessor, the Wildcat, then underwent a major design to compete and surpass the Japanese Zero. I see in this video, you went for the combo fighter and torpedo carrier. Personally, doing both seemed a bit much as hanger space, including weapon supplies for the fighters, would take up so much room (particularly if the standard compliment was 40 fighters!) that there would be little room left for safely storing a sufficient complement of torpedoes to supply all those torpedo launchers with any more than a single volley. To me it makes much more sense that there are two types/sub-classes of Akira with essentially the same internal layout that could be easily modified for either role. One is the Fighter carrier with only a modest supply of torpedoes. The other is the Torpedo carrier with only a small complement of support craft and shuttles. On the outside, both ships are basically identical, and yet the interiors are not so different that a stay in dry dock to swap between the sub-classes would take more than a couple of months. Sure the work would probably be very rough and "unfinished", but as to point out, this is a warship, few will complain about the lack of carpets. What do you think?

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

personally i never saw any reason why the border wars, which the federation fought with a hand tied around their back. would necessitate such innovation. i would agree that there were probably some ships which specialized towards carrying fighters whilst others specialized as torpedo ships. but in application they would perform much the same, standing off from the main combat zone.

[@lanebowles8170]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 "personally i never saw any reason why the border wars, which the federation fought with a hand tied around their back. would necessitate such innovation." My answer to this would be the fact that the Cardassians were catching up to the Federation in technology, ship production, and fleet organization/doctrine, Starfleet fighting with a hand tied behind its back notwithstanding. The idea is that while Starfleet was currently filling out their ship rosters with vessels of the Galaxy/TNG tech era, there would be a minor branch of Starfleet's design bureau whose purpose was to draw up concept proposals for the Admiralty for the next generation of ships to service possible future needs cited by the Admiralty. The admiral/admirals requesting the hypothetical design that would have eventually evolved into the Akira class would have been considered a "warhawk" holdover eccentric from the bygone days of Kirk when there were rivals to the Federation that were on something approaching a equal footing. I envision such an admiral/admirals as an older version of Captain Edward Jellico and would have been similarly alienated by the mainstream Admiralty that espoused more pacifistic ideals (yes, I know Jellico's isolation in those episodes was at least as much his own fault as it was the crew's, but the concept seems solid enough to me). These "warhawk" designs would have been permitted as far as concepts to be flushed out for theoretical testing in simulations since the "warhawk" admiral/admirals had enough influence to necessiate appeasement of their "whims", but it was also thought that there would never be a need for such ships, much less someone "foolish" enough to green light an actual prototype. Another point I like to make is that the design to would have been initially proposed for the Akira might have had little to do with the eventual produced vessels. There might have been several competing proposals that were whittled down and/or consolidated into what the Akira would eventually become. Your selection of a more streamlined version of the history of the Anti-Borg ships is acceptable, I just prefer a little more "relief/context" to the history.

[@MrSpacepauls]

Would have loved to see a stand alone Star Trek show with an Akira as the hero ship.

[@ussvoyager8650]

The Akira class is most definitely 1 of my favourite Federation Starships a really COOL looking vessel

[@robdead4550]

Your last sentence clinched it for me. +1 sub.

[@mickeyholding7970]

Great video, I see a lot of the NX-01 Enterprise in her design and Miranda too.

[@liamh2255]

Lol. Appreciate the Shelley Curry class nod

[@stevenewman1393]

🖖😎👍Very cool and very nicely well done and very well informatively explained and executed in every detail way shape and form possibly provided indeed, And I myself like the Akira class but I see it more like a cross that of the NX-01 Enterprise and that of a Miranda class combined by its design and look of the ship indeed👌.

[@daryld4457]

Great channel, great video.

[@lancep2002]

Store the fighters as patterns in a transporter to be materialized as needed

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Could definitely see that in the future...

[@SirAroace]

the pod also makes it easier to retrofit the ship for other jobs.

[@k1productions87]

According to the cutaway you had shown (at 8:45), the warp core is not between the two aft shuttle bay doors. Rather there are two separate warp cores, one for each engine, housed within the "shoulder" struts, allowing for their verticality, and not interfering with the larger hangar/launch bay

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Yeah it's a fan made cutaway so take it with a pinch of salt. There's no reason for this ship to mount 2 warp cores.

[@k1productions87]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 well, structurally, its the only way to feed the warp nacelles while still having a through-deck launch bay. I feel the original designers didn't consider this when creating the design. Still, it is best to avoid such contradiction in one's video, particularly if there are no layouts that show how/where a warp core in the centerline of the saucer would actually work

[@miamijules2149]

Ahhh Sweet!! Thank You Venom!!! And Exactly Right! I always counted more too! Maybe a weird number on the tactical pod could make it work but yes! Great job as usual. NOW SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!! 🤣😂

[@Z1gguratVert1go]

My understanding of photon Torpedoes is that they use antimatter which is not stored in the torpedo. Usually the torpedo launchers are close to the warp core to be close to the antimatter pods. Photon Torpedoes are loaded with antimatter right before they are fired. Having lots of torpedo launchers everywhere means having to have antimatter pods everywhere, and Starfleet Engineers definitely don't like to spread those things around.

[@birdmonster4586]

I like to think of Akira as a Medium Cruiser with a Heavy Torpedo emphasis and light carrier. As for it's design. I guess I like to think that it's design program was started after the Nebula, But a bit before the Intrepid. That helps explain why it has so many windows. Like the slapped the Ablative Armour on later to help out, I feel like if it was built for combat out-and-out there would be less windows anyway. It also explains why she's not quite as bleeding edge advanced as the Intrepid. Part of what made Runabouts so good is their modulartiy so I feel like an Akira wouldn't be able to carry that many, since they'd also need to carry along different modules to get the most out of them Or carry less of them and kind of miss the point of them. But the idea of sending out a Bigger-Better more independant Auxilary craft to aid with Survey missions is exactly the reasoning behind the Intrepid's Aeroshuttle and the eventual Type-11 Shuttlecraft. The Type-11 would be a great boon to the Akira. I feel like the Phasers were an oversight. Specs on them are all over the place and it really doesn't make sense to me since starfleet is usually pretty good about giving SOME all-round coverage for their ships

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

The main reason for the poor phaser coverage is the very broken up structure at the back which makes good coverage difficult

[@birdmonster4586]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 I feel it's something they would fix in a second/third tranche/Refit. Like how we see some Galaxy class ships with extra arrays during the war.

[@roetemeteor]

@@birdmonster4586 You probably could add a supportive strust on the launcher there down to the rest of the hull and attach a rear phaser array or two on it. It would be an issue if you had to go into atmosphere, but largely if an akira is going into atmosphere, then something has done very, VERY wrong.

[@stanislavkostarnov2157]

my headcannon was that the main way of launching shuttles was to have a the required number of them teleported out to a certain coordinate still at range from the battle... the door being basically mostly for landing the shuttles.

[@JCDFlex]

2:35 "there is a gap that *could* house a torpedo launcher" There IS one. Check the battle sequence against the borg cube in first contact right before the Enterprise launches its quantum torpedoes. You can clearly see an Akira launch torpedoes from that gap.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Oh OK thanks for clearing that Up

[@JCDFlex]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 You're welcome

[@shanenolan8252]

Oh great subject. Thanks commander

[@MrPalp]

Keep in mind that a photon torpedo is just an inert shell before it is loaded, the AM/M content are injected into them just as they are loaded. So there is no risk to the magazine as such. That is more about where the AM pods are stored.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Well presumably it's the antimatter injectors then. I only thought that was the case in the 22nd century

[@MrPalp]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 Hmm, lets see. If you accept the old TNG tech manual it have some information on torpedoes from 2215: "The first was a simple 1:1 matter/antimatter collision device consisting of six slugs of frozen deuterium which were backed up by carbon-carbon disks and driven by microfusion initiators into six corresponding magnetic cavities, each holding antideuterium in suspension. As the slugs drove into the cavities, the annihilation energies were trapped briefly by the magnetic fields, and then suddenly released." Which do not specify directly, however a bit later it also mentions: "While a torpedo could coast indefinitely after firing, the maximum effective tactical range was 750,000 kilometers because of stability limits inherent to the containment field design." If those containment fields are so short term they are unlikely to contain AM long term. But you are quite right in that the injector system could well be an explosive target if less so then a magazine of loaded torpedoes. Could also be a matter of propulsion fuel as I am not sure if older torpedoes used the warhead AM for that.

[@barrybend7189]

fun fact the Akira class is named after the anime of the same name with two of the STO subvariants called the Alita and Armitage classes. turns out the TNG teams were major anime fans. 11:17 in other models they fix the forward shuttlebay doors.

[@occultatumquaestio5226]

If the UFP ever has an Akira that goes by the name USS Kamchatka, combining the American influenced prefix, Russian influenced ship name, and Japanese influenced class name, it would either the 2nd only to the Enterprise as the most powerful ship in Starfleet or it will make the standard Oberth seem like a Borg Tactical Cube in comparison.

[@weldonwin]

Sorry, the Kamchatka? They named it after probably the single worst ship in naval military history?

[@chrissonofpear1384]

Good, one to add to the pile - I have gone on just a blitz-krieg finding ship names from across many many sources and cultures, to fill out fleets lately (often town or regional names - far beyond USA or UK)

[@artbrann]

how do you throw binoculars off in space?, transporter?, airlock?, thru the hanger bay shield?

[@NashmanNash]

@@weldonwin Would be hillarious..Starfleet moves a fleet to intercept the Borg for example and within 24 hours the USS Kamtchatkas warpdrive would be dissabled by friendly fire :D

[@dragonsword7370]

You mentioned that the major launch module in the aft end was a great idea in case you had the magazines ripple explode, by being away from the saucer. True enough, but I wonder if it's not armored enough in case that happens. The reasoning that I would question that position in the superstructure is exactly where it's located and attached to. The two main pylons and outboard of those points are the nacelles. There is Alot of plasma, busard collected 'stuff' flowing through those attachment points and pylons into the saucer and if that torpedo module explodes that can be alot of damage points to plasma conduits on the end of those pylons. Maybe it's just an issue that battleships have to deal with, choose your strong points and weak areas as best as possible, I just recall that proton torpedos have ALOT of bang, and there are probably Alot in that module. It's reminiscent of three engine jetliners, UA flight 232 on a DC10 where infamously the tail end engine blew apart from the fan and it ruptured the hydraulic lines that all ran through that section of the aft end of the plane causing it to bleed all it's fluid and lose full control. Only pilotable barely by the two wing mounted engines using more or less thrust to turn left or right, up and down. Alot of flowing fluid\gaseous important material flowing near a weak point, now that I think of it nacelle pylons are like that normally anyways. Hrmm... Oh by the way Great video topic and coverage on a cool looking borg killer dude!

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

The torpedo module is heavily armoured And can be separated from the Eps grid. As for the booms they are also well armoured.

[@MandoMTL]

There's no way in hell launcher modules aren't isolated and designed to "blow out". Your reasoning is 100% applicable to civilian vehicles, but this is a basic contingency for military ones, even today.

[@Hjered_of_Reno]

This was a very well thought out and executed analysis of the Akira class. Bravo!

[@jonuiuc]

Everytime I see the ship name, I think of a punk on a red motorcycle, while someone yells KANEDA! over and over.

[@Boxfortress]

"LEAVE ME ALONE! AAAAAAAH"

[@CaptPatrick01]

Ah, now that I look at it and compare the models, STO appears to have added 4 tiny phaser strips rather oddly placed at the rear of the torpedo pod, presumably so the aft beam effect has a hardpoint to emit from.

[@mattshriner4897]

About the peacetime usage, survey ships, at least a few of the ones long operated by the US government, are built to deploy and recover up to 7 smaller boats at a time. Giving up to 8 available sonar survey arrays in operation for mapping the seabed for creating nautical charts. So, good existing precedent.

[@rayhatton7683]

When you see this ship. You better be under peace. If not you will find yourself on the business end of this ship or run. A fleet of these ships and you will find yourself definitely running. Even a wing of Akira ships you will watch out for these gun boats. Picard out.

[@frederickbehn5610]

You truly do a great Job here, a greater understanding of these ships are greatly needed and well appreciated. This information is very much awesome.

[@rmcdudmk212]

Thanks for another awesome ship chat video Venom. Keep them coming 👍

[@spacepolicemanofspace6073]

Wondering what you'll write up about the Ambassador Class!

[@The1stImmortal]

In theory I guess a carrier could beam fighters into space en masse, into safe "shadows" formed by the ships hull, and within its shield envelope...

[@NCC-72545A]

Vitamgeek media you kind of forgot that even in the mid to later half of the 24th century Starfleet still used phaser emitters alongside the phaser stress so it could be very easy to put a small number of them on the aft of the Akira for instance you can put an emitter above and below the app launchers of the torpedo pod

[@miamijules2149]

She’s A Ship Of Peace!!! Peace By Strength! Lolol

[@rabid_si]

More like "You wanna peace of me?"

[@superzentredi]

I think the Akira is supposed to have 2 rear phaser arrays pointing aft. Possibly on the engine pylons. Although they don't seem to be present one any of the models I've seen.

[@s3p4kner]

Echoing previous comments the modern age equivalent of the Akira would have to be the Soviet era Kiev class 'Heavy Aviation Cruiser', Soviet designation Project 1143 Krechyet (gyrfalcon). The front of the ship is covered in supersonic heavy anti-ship missiles (with reloads?). Designed to volley a US carrier battlegroup with her escorts and saturate US point defense systems to the point they're overloaded. They're also fitted with 10x Torpedo tubes. So like attacking a cube? A helicopter squadron provides anti-sub and search and rescue operations, and the VTOL jump-jet fighters the YAK-36 & 38 provides fleet defence. The last ship of the line, Admiral Gorshkov, was sold to India in 2004. The supersonic VTOL replacement fighter, the YAK -141 was sold off to Lockheed-Martin in 1991 and a Trillion dollars later we have F-35. Also, the larger Soviet era Kuznetsov class aircraft carrier in fact has 12 massive anti-ship missile launchers under the deck which were later swapped out for the supersonic Kalibr Cruise missile in 2017. AFAIK she was meant to serve for many more years but then someone dropped a crane on it, and there's also been a fire while in maintenance, and the floating dock carrying her sank, and she travels everywhere with a tug boat. She'll probably be scrapped, circumstances permitting. Proposition: Akira, using BOTH sets of doors to launch it's craft can conduct: Search and rescue, Combat strike, and Defensive screening operations while firing it's guided torpedoes at the same time. * Can fighters in Star Trek use micro torpedoes to 'intercept' incoming enemy munitions? They get minced without the ECM from their carriers otherwise and are pointless, so if they could, they'd be incredibly valuable? With all craft deployed Akira can if needed, sweep past the Borg Cube while still firing torps and add Phaser fire at the same time. With those 4 impulse she can GTFO while continuing torpedo fire and begin recovery operations when required. Beast. OR, hang back and act as artillery, so quite versatile deployment! Lack of aft Phasers? Can we honestly put that down to oversight? No. This is a fleet ship, I wouldn't expect it to ever be deployed alone, on the front lines. In peace time? Anti-piracy ops? You don't want to go up against that thing in your 'not a real military ship' pirate ship.

[@rohenthar8449]

Yeah, Akira is a marvelous ship. In my opinion, one of the smartest and most beautiful Federation designs except Sovereign and Arbiter.

[@MitchellFields0]

"would you like some ship with your torpedo tubes?"

[@casbot71]

Imagine if they ever fire a torpedo with a malfunctioning guidance system and it veers down…

[@bluehydro88]

I always wondered how well an Akira would've done in the Delta quadrant instead of the Intrepid in Voyager. It's almost as fast about double the size and comparably advanced.

[@stanislavkostarnov2157]

also, when facing a large tactical cube, my guess is, sometimes you may need to fire a spread of 75 torpedoes simultaneously (before the cube can adapt)... especially when you consider the earlier less powerful Torpedoes of the prequantum age

[@MandoMTL]

The Akira is my favorite design. I do understand that designing infallible uber-ships defeats the purpose of fleet diversity, but the phaser blind spots irk the hell out of me. Slap on dorsal+ventral aft cannons to circumvent the array deadzones. Simple. The Federation had to know by then that ships absolutely needed a certain level of autonomy, be it due to war casualties or simple deployment logistics. I suppose it's a less glaring design flaw if the ship is packing a few squadrons of fighters, but we never do see that materialise on screen. Sorry for being that guy, buy yeah. Still love her though. xD

[@MandoMTL]

Ranting aside, you make great content. I hope the algorithm notices and boosts you up soon.

[@dmsturgeon8762]

It looks just like the NX-1, except the nacells and back cross support is upside down. My favorite star trek spacecraft is the NX-1, so this this vessel is pretty cool.

[@farshnuke]

For years I thought the Akira Class was a fan made variant of the NX-01 or of that era. The fact that one of the toughest ships of the dominion war looks so much like the NX-01, the paper plane that won the Xindi war, is great.

[@Boxfortress]

Fun fact the NX-01 was inspired by the Akira :D The idea came about while the designers wanted a connection to the later chronology.

[@farshnuke]

@@Boxfortress That's cool.

[@Boxfortress]

@@farshnuke it really is! And if I remember correctly, the NX was the in universe inspiration for the Akira's design :D

[@farshnuke]

@@Boxfortress Okay. I know the ship I want to serve on in Star Trek then since the NX-01 is my favourite ship but the Akira has those 24th century luxuries you know.

[@Boxfortress]

@@farshnuke absolutely, both ships are easily in my top 5. Beautiful ships

[@chrisortega7521]

Torpedoes are matter/anti-matter warheads. No amount of "weapons safe" will stop those from detonating if they lose magnetic containment. I'm thinking that the Enterprise's magazine was designed, for safety reasons, to be able to take a direct hit without shields.

[@HalferLandPerformance]

Watched this like 5 times. Just love the Akira

[@kookoobrick54]

It's torpedoes are definitely it's primary armament, but I Don't think it's as defenseless to the rear as you might think. Like you mentioned torpedo systems by the 24th century can track multiple targets, so these weapons don't really have a limited arc. Of course a more direct firing line allows for a quicker response time. But I don't see a reason a torpedo can't swing around and hit a target behind the ship.

[@Paleorunner2]

At time stamp 8:50 you show 2 warp cores, on in each boom. That's always been my though for the arrangement. If it has 2 corps not only does it have more power but one can be damaged and the ship can still escape.

[@45580677]

I wonder any chance for the Terran Rebellion ideas on ships they use besides the Peregrine and Defiant maybe Intrepid, Luna and such something a Resistance Navy with shipyards hidden in the Badlands can do plus man wise

[@artonline01]

I am new to your videos. I have watched probably close to a few dozen the last few weeks and the one thing that is consistent is you breath hard into your mic when you get serious :) Not a bad thing when it lets up know you love the topic but for the listener its probably not optimal to hear you breath that hard. I often listen to these kind of videos late at night and often fall to sleep to them, when you play loud music at the end will stop me from listening to them. If you do need outro music dont make it louder than the voice of the main video. Thats what I need to keep listening do it or dont you may have a style that that conflicts with.

[@joelbilly1355]

Used to use a lot of them in star trek armada

[@simonwillis1529]

Just found this after your upload of the steamrunner

[@BdogFinal14]

This is one of my favorite ship designs. One would think, after the Dominion War and the Dominion’s effective use of small attack ships, Star Fleet would upgrade its anti-fighter and torpedo defenses. It wouldn’t be that difficult to add additional phase batteries to the Akira’s dorsal torpedo launcher and warp nacelles. I’d love to see an Akira as a hero ship as well. But with it fighter wings, I don’t think Paramount would go for it. Too much like BSG and Star Wars.

[@DrewLSsix]

I can't imagine torpedoes spend much time at all actually armed with antimatter onboard, it seems more likely that antimatter is taken from the engine supply some time before their anticipated use thus creating a significant engineering issue. The Constitution refit addressed this by placing the launcher and magazine directly adjacent to the warp core, meaning rapid direct access to antimatter, the reliant placed them further away leading to a readiness delay as well as the technical complexity of diverting antimatter across the ship, through several pylons and many meters of conduit. This might go a ways to explain why the reliant isn't in fact a class above the Constitution despite having apparently far more guns. The actual deployment of these guns are dramatically less effective than the Connies. This all may be less of an issue with the Akira, assuming technology has progressed significantly and knowing these are combat ships, its likely that they are willing to assume greater risks heading into active combat with more primed warheads and advanced and redundant means of charging warheads in sitsu. Similarly, the many launchers may be more about redundancy than raw fire rate since the logistics of providing antimatter is probably the choke point for sustained fire. An Akira certainly presents an intimidating alpha strike, however we know that doctrine favors phasers for weakening shields and torpedoes against un shielded targets, so there's likely a tactical squeeze point where a locked and loaded Akira can't really use its load to best effect until other ships have depleted enemy defenses, and in the meantime they represent a very juicy target if all tunes are loaded and followup volleys are already charged. In this scenario I wonder which ships represent the spear tip? What ships favor phasers the way Akira favors torpedoes? Defiant are tough and pack a punch but are likely not adequate to take down large enemy ships shields rapidly enough to count. Closest I can think of is the Sovereign, even though it's clearly a more balanced multi role ship more likely to be the command ship of an operation than the ship taking point.

[@lahummer5759]

The ultimate design end of the Miranda.

[@TheWoblinGoblin]

Thing is, we never really get information about the capabilities of the launchers. It is likely that they are not able to fire salvoes of 10 like the Galaxy's. That's fine and probably a design decision (as you said, redundancy). However it would be kinda nice to think about fighting the Borg with opening salvoes of literally thousands of torpedoes. On loading the torpedoes - while I get your point, I think you overlooked the sheer advancement of technology. A modern industrial robot moves crazy fast and it wouldn't be any issue today to load an object like a torpedo at lightning fast speeds. 24th century autoloaders are probably really, really fast equipment...

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Fast but not that Fast. 1 round per second seems reasonable.

[@Jeff55369]

​@@venomgeekmedia9886 I don't see why they can't use a magazine or clip design. Even better would be to have the torps be belt fed. Considering their tech, all of that could even be done with force projectors. Would allow for rapid burst projection. Brrrt.

[@ISAF_Ace]

When it comes to the argument about the Akira and it’s fighter systems I think it would make more sense of there were two variants of the Akira, a torpedo boat variant and a carrier variant. The carrier variant would sacrifice torpedo bays for a significantly larger fighter compliment. As for the torpedo boat variant, while it still would carry fighters yes I think of them as less of an offensive weapon and more as something that can cover its arcs of fire and lack of on its back. And when it comes to the carrier it does not make sense of sacrificing firepower against the Borg for more fighters, it makes sense for carrier variants of the Akira to have only been retrofitted into existence after contact with the dominion and their jem’hadar fighters which wings of fighters could ward away. Burst torpedoes are a weapon that I would see as useful to long pre battle and fire off a very large opening salvo before switching to standard fire, the huge number of torpedoes launchers on the Akira loaded before battle against the Borg would make sense to try and cripple or even disable a Borg cube in your opening salvo before they adapt.

[@gicking3898]

I think the lack of rear phaser straps was just an oversight, given this wasn't meant to be a main hero ship. Or perhaps the designers weren't thinking tactically, just aesthetically. It's easy to rectify. Defiant has same problem. Phaser on top, but none below, so it always is seen doing fancy 180 degree flips.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

true but the defiant is much smaller and agile. which compensates.

[@spencerjones841]

Honestly the Akira probably could use phaser strips on either the rollbar supports and/or the nacelles and probably the ventral engineering bulge. And given how small you can make phaser strips I don't see a reason at least volume wise not to. Maybe its a issue of power?

[@cross3052]

The fact that torpedoes are guided means whatever direction they happen to be launched in is irrelevant. The Akira's ability to deliver sustained torpedo fire is one of my favorite things about it. Ships like Akira can dominate a combat zone right up until it runs out of ammo. Speaking of, ships in the Star Trek universe can literally materialize their own ammunition. As long as they have raw material to feed the replicators and matter to flip into antimatter they can just keep on truckin'. Plus it looks cool.

[@Jeff55369]

Clearly it's intended as a fleet ship, so it doesn't really need rear facing arcs. Ideally, you'd want all your weapons facing the same direction so you can maximize your damage output. In STO, I believe the ship has 3 forward phaser slots and one rear. I recall using the 45degree arc for the forward phasers (since they did the most damage) and a 360 degree phaser cannon for the rear, so I could have even more forward facing damage. Once you deplete the target's shields, you'd do a full salvo of torpedoes. As you said in your video, it's a very Klingon type of vessel, not only for the design aesthetics, but the intended employed tactics.

[@RandomGamer-qy6ys]

Akira class reminds me of the NX-01 and her companions

[@chrismurphy5629]

It actually has 10 phaser strips and 15 torpedo tubes and can deploy mines as well. I found this information from 4 different sources so it has almost 360 degree of phaser fire.

[@richardtrue2758]

Well the part about the phasers is interesting but lets not forget that phaser strips aren't the only phaser banks in use at the time. I alway thought the Akira class had a number of phaser turrets on its rear quarter's and maybe they went with turrets because of maintenance or the fact its a smaller target and allows for more armour plating?

[@apotheases]

The Akira would pair well with the Kanada fast attack ship.

[@leeprice2849]

My favorite of the Anti-Borg ships. Akira

[@sagesheahan6732]

So, it's a Starfleet Battlestar. In effect.

[@AshHaddy]

10:41 Didn’t the Akira have 2 warp cores? One on either side of the shuttle bay not going through it?

[@dontdrunkimshoot8220]

This is what happens when starfleet builds a ship in the 'heavy cruiser' weight class that isn't simply 'general purpose'. A 2370s Akira is exactly what a 2270s miranda was. A non general purpose heavy cruiser, not optimized for exploration and utility. While this does have a ton of torpedo launchers, not all launchers are created equal. You under sold the galaxy, each of its launchers can fire bursts of 10, 3 times, before it has to reload its pre loaded torpedo magazines. This is an enormousness weapon system, with out any redundancy. Wile impressive its no surprise a more varied assortment of launchers are the norm on the newer, smaller, more combat oriented ships. On smaller ships like the akira, sovereign, intrepid, etc, each of their launchers are ether single shot of burst 3 of 4, with maybe 1 or 2 preloaded magazines it can quick load for a follow up burst. As far as its phaser's go, the akira is one of the last canon star trek ships that was designed CORRECTLY, pretty much every new design you might see in STO and else were intentionally make the phaser arrays short or split in half for no reason. Unlike with number of torpedo launchers, number of phaser arryas does not mater AT ALL, as long as the ship design itself doesn't leave too many glaring blind spots in the main array's coverage. A ship with a large number of arrays probably has pretty bad firing arcs on its main forward arrays, and pretty weak firepower from all other angles. The more concentrated a ship's emitter are into the least number of arrays, the more powerful its best shot can be. The large dorsal array on the akira is about the same size as the sovereign's largest, these ships have phaser firepower 3rd only to the galaxy/nebula and sovereign. The 2 ventral arrays are at least as long and powerful as the main guns on an ambassador class too, all you might expect for a ship this size. The akira's phaser firepower is not out of balance with its torpedo output, both are very high. Those fireing arcs you had for it weren't quite right, a phaser array can hit anything it has line of sight with, it could fire its main array over its shoulder easily, with its mobility nothing could hide in the tiny blind spots the akira design has. Was never a fan of the through carrier thing, they simply didn't scale the ship large enough if they wanted that to be physically possible. The rim of the saucer is only a single deck thick, even recessed a bit, the door? on the front couldn't even be 2 decks tall, its not just the width thats insufficient. That whole space up front is so nondescript, it just screams 'this space intentionally left blank'. Im sure this place has a purpose, most likely a peace time purpose, but in the interest of building a fleet of combat focused heavy cruisers ASAP, they left it to be developed post war/borg.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

The rear doors are better. But with sf ships it's not a lack of capacity for fighters it's the size of the doors

[@dontdrunkimshoot8220]

@@venomgeekmedia9886 Ya the rears are a fine size. Hell, even Mirandas could be a more believable carriers, the 2 3 deck tall shuttle doors in the back could even accommodate runabouts.

[@Eshanas]

Dunno why starship creators just cram torpedo launchers into their ships, it doesn’t help with anything? Even the most armed submarines have rear tubes, front tubes, missile tubes. And that’s generally overkill. Sure there’s the burst fire capability, but it’s probable to have rapid firing, auto loaded launchers as well. With the pod and maybe two tubes aft and two tubes toward, the Akira would be already potent. I still love it of course! I see it as the 23rd century upgrade to the Miranda, about time. It looks a little clunky from the side but in angle and front profile, it’s great. Could use some strips on the pylons, as you mentioned. Never saw it as a carrier, at all. The detail never translated on screen, and I just always assumed it had a rear shuttle bay in the saucer.

[@LoreReloaded]

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!

[@IronWarhorsesFun]

#WhereWasAkiraAt357????

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Senpai noticed me!

[@miamijules2149]

Yo Lore, check out Venom’s Wings of Romulus series and his First Contact/Warp 1 video….. the man is seriously talented; I’m sure you’ll agree.

[@philliphall1563]

The Akira class is my personal favourite. My main ship in Star Trek Online, And also the ship I use in my Star Trek short stories I used to type.

[@Phil-D83]

Basically a space faring artillery carrier

[@tomxaros48]

Love that ship! I would add phaser on the rear of the outer pylons (above and below like a galaxy)

[@robertcook5233]

The Akira class looks so good that if the sovereign class wasn't thought of it could possibly be a Enterprise...just saying

[@robertbarrows6687]

Which is the better carrier in your opinion: the Venator-class Star Destroyer or the Akira-class Carrier Cruiser?

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

Venator easy.

[@chrismurphy5629]

A Akira with two K'Vort birds of prey would be a great team and my two favorite ships. Give the Akira a cloaking device and 2 forward disruptor cannons. Perfection.

[@GoodOldGamer]

It's funny that you say the Akira needs other ships to cover its flank. Pretty sure it carries those on the flight deck. 😉 And here's food for thought. Let's say it does have 15 torpedo launchers. Let's say each can only fire a spread of 3 torpedoes per tube. If the captain calls for a full spread, that's 45 torpedoes! How much phaser fire do you really need with that many self guided torpedoes anyway? 🤭

[@franksmedley8619]

Hello Venom. I tend to agree with your assessment of the Akira Class. To me it is a fusion of the Miranda and several other classes of ships. The overall hull design harkens to the Steamrunner Class, and the only other 'in-system' exploration carrier design I can think of is the Cheyenne Class, that can also carry large amounts of cargo, as well as dozens of fighters for combat carrier operations, or dozens of runabouts and standard shuttles for quick star system charting. I also agree with your impression of the 'aggressive' look of the ship. It's low slung nacelles harkening to the Klingon school of starship design. Four Impulse engines allow for a maneuverability not usually seen in starships, especially combat related designs. Usually, a 'combat' starship would have a pair of enlarged Impulse drives, or a single secondary drive at some other location upon the hull. The concentration of torpedo launchers in the 'pylon' section makes perfect military sense when they are backed up with secondary launchers on port, starboard, and bow (you did mention the bow launchers, but not specifically that they are actually far enough to each side to act as independent launchers, rather than a single linked launcher system). This totals to around 16 total torpedo launchers. Given the Akira's design, the entire 'pod' of the pylon section must contain 10 launchers and a massive torpedo magazine. Each of the other three locations (four if you count the bow launchers as independent systems) having it's own magazine of torpedoes. This 'array' of torpedo launchers give a tactical advantage of six launchers along the axis of travel. And for long ranged bombardments in tactical formations of Akiras, you can easily see how an enemy's formation could be overwhelmed by the numbers of torpedoes several Akiras could launch in their faces. Having two aft arc facing torpedo launchers actually gives both a redundancy to the aft launchers and a 'parthian shot' style of combat. Waggling the Akira's aft port and starboard and releasing three torpedoes at a time. This is where the four impulse engines come into their own, allowing the ship to 'waggle' it's aft at the enemy and keep a constant stream of torpedoes raining down upon them if they try to attack it's rear. The ability to carry and deploy such numbers of fighters is also a tactical advantage unto itself. And I can only think that the displayed single door for the bow shuttle bay is an example of an 'earlier' design of the ship. Once in combat, the narrowness of the egress of the shuttle bay would be apparent, and fixed in later upgrades of the Class. The upgrade consisting of moving the torpedo launchers as far to the sides as possible, and adding a second bay door for more tactical flexibility in launching the ships' compliment of fighters faster and easier. I had a thought about those 'windows' as well... Perhaps they are 'fake' windows, put there to lure an enemy to fire upon the outsides of the ship's dorsal supports where the armor is actually thicker than the inner surfaces. Yes, this would mean MUCH fewer actual windows for the ship, but would be a canny ploy to use against an aggressive enemy that would just love to do as much damage to crew compartments as possible. Just a few thoughts.

[@venomgeekmedia9886]

i agree with pretty much everything. except your explanation for the windows since it still has far fewer than other ships of the time, so i think that its just where there's less armor since the habitation area's are not critical systems.