Hey Everybody Daniel from Spacedock here, before I get started I just wanted to point
out that the upload of this video marks the end of Spacedock’s first year of activity,
so thank you all so much for watching and getting involved and helping the channel grow
as much as it has, now if you stick around to the end of the video I’ll be revealing
some details about an upcoming Q&A I have planned and how you can get involved in that.
But without further ado, my personal top five favourite sci-fi capital ship designs.
NUMBER FIVE.
In fifth place I’ve got the Venator Class Star Destroyer from Star Wars.
Now this is a design that I’ve always been a huge fan of, it’s a flawless adaptation
of the classic star destroyer design, into a carrier role.
The way the dorsal spine of the ship opens up to reveal the launch bays is just inspired
and never fails to look fantastic on screen.
The Venator is a crucial part of the Clone Wars era Republic Aesthetic which I think
is pretty excellent across the board, and the style really demonstrates how more Sith-inspired
intimidating spaceframes are working their way into mainstream use.
I’m a big fan of the ship’s twin bridge model, one for Starfighter coordination and
one for primary ship functions, and when the ship is flanked by light cruisers and frigates
with squadrons of V-19 Torrents and ARC-170’s flying patrols around it, it makes for one
the best images of a proper battle group in the Star Wars fiction, and a defining picture
of the clone wars era.
NUMBER FOUR.
On to fourth place I’ve put the SR2 Normandy from Mass Effect, now this a close one as
by the standards of Mass Effect the SR2 only just about qualifies as a capital ship, with
its predecessor the SR1 not even coming close.
But I’m glad it does so I can talk about it because this truly is one of my all-time
favourite starship designs, the spaceframe is just perfect, sleek and efficient, it looks
fast standing still.
Being able to fully navigate the interior of the ship in-game is just brilliant, and
I’ve spend literally hundreds of hours across dozens of playthroughs wandering around the
SR2.
Overall I’m a huge fan of the starship designs in Mass Effect, particularly those of the
Systems Alliance, but the SR2 has to be my favourite, it just takes the already great
design of the SR1 which was more of a corvette style ship that felt like an attack submarine
or something from the inside, and they just expanded on it to turn it into this hard as
nails cruiser with a shuttlebay and more weaponry and a perfect interior design, and when the
Alliance came in with a repaint and new interior layout for ME3, it only made the ship even
better in my opinion.
NUMBER THREE.
Ok in third place I’ve got the fantastic BC-304 Daedalus Class from Stargate.
Now I just love this kind of design in starships, if it’s ironclad grey with little spinning
radar dishes and black and yellow hazard lines around the hatches I’m probably going to
love it, I just can’t get enough of that kind of real-world naval design applied to
spacecraft.
The whole frame of this ship just looks fantastic, it’s a perfect multifunction design, it’s
got the two big launch bays for F-302’s which are one of my all-time favourite sci-fi
fighters, and it’s rows of VLS missile tubes and railgun batteries just make the whole
thing look exactly as tough as it is.
I really like the bridge of this ship and it’s interior design, I love seeing the
translucent tactical plots and displays with pilot Callsign arrayed down them, it just
makes it all look like a real world aircraft carrier with all the sci-fi tech layered on
top.
And I’ve said this about Stargate before but I’ll say it again, the very best thing
about the SG franchise is that everything can be traced back to some episode where it
was discovered or developed, so you really feel like you’re watching the growth of
a spacefaring civilisation, so when they finally get these badass ships, you can look at them
and see all the inspirations from their previous ships, all the histories and backstories of
every reactor on the walls, every sidearm in the armory, you can look at any piece of
this ship and say “I remember the season 2 episode where they found the metal that’s
made out of” or something to that effect, and that is just fantastic.
NUMBER TWO.
Ok in second place, my favourite Star Wars ship ever, the Sith Empire’s Harrower Class
Dreadnought.
Just massive props to whatever legend at Bioware designed this thing, because this is the Sith
Empire made manifest, it’s just perfect.
It’s sharp and sleek, it’s covered in launch bays, the twin hangers at the front
between the split in the frame is just brilliant.
I love the triangular engine housings on the aft, I love the way the hull widens at the
back, the interior looks fantastic and the lower profile of its bridge tower and weapons
hardpoints make the whole thing look cutting edge and high-tech.
Every time one of these comes on screen in The Old Republic, it looks fantastic, and
the couple of occasions in-game when you get to see these ships outfitted with the silencer
and gauntlet superweapons, they fit perfectly into the design without looking out of place
and make for brilliant scenes.
To me the Sith Empire has the best visual style in Star Wars, the uniforms, blasters,
structures, ships and stations all look fantastic, and the harrower class is the perfect centrepiece
to the overall design, cannot say enough good things about this ship.
NUMBER ONE.
Ok here it is, first place, the Mercury Class Battlestar from Ron Moore’s BSG.
This to me, is just the best looking fictional starship, ever put to screen, it’s just
perfect.
I love the Galactica, but to me, she doesn’t even come close to challenging the Mercury
Class, the ship looks tough as old boots, it’s huge and thickly armoured, with that
angular bow section that looks like the head of a giant metal alligator, and the rest of
the ship looks just as good with the massive engine cluster at the aft and the fantastic
inverted flight pod design.
It’s a good thing the Pegasus never truly came to blows with the Galactica in the show
because I can’t see the Galactica lasting more than a few minutes no matter what Adama
managed to come up with, the Mercury’s got a pair of huge high-yield batteries laid into
the nose and we’ve seen them perforate the central spine of cylon basestars, just tearing
them to ribbons, and that’s not even mentioning the 34 cannon batteries spread across the
ship, and the enormous complement of Mark VII Vipers.
Ok Spoilers for Battlestar Galactica coming up now so turn off if you’re not interested
in getting this spoiled, but for pities sake what the heck happened at the Battle of New
Caprica, I should do a video on that at some point just explaining how I would have approached
that battle, and maybe even got both battlestars out alive, but even failing that, Lee Adama
should not be congratulated for what he did in that battle, he threw away a ship that
was so valuable to the human race that I’m surprised they didn’t immediately shoot
the guy for incompetence, not to mention he did it in defiance of orders, to save like
15 people and a battered 50 year old ship.
The Pegasus was Ideal for the situation they were in, perhaps more than any other ship.
The mercury class can build vipers and other pieces of technology, it has VR bays to train
pilots, and loads more internal space and comfortable living quarters, it’s exactly
the kind of ship you want with you when you’re stuck with 50,000 civilians in the middle
of nowhere, Adama should have transferred his flag to the Pegasus as soon as it arrived,
no question.
But yeah, rant aside, I just love seeing this ship on-screen, it never fails to look amazing,
and I wish it had stuck around til the final season because it’s just fantastic.
END So there it was my personal top-five capital
ship designs, now I’ll just give you the quick lowdown on this Q&A.
I’m planning to answer the questions in a video that will be uploaded on the 20th,
so if you’re watching this on release day you’ve got a week to come up with questions,
if you’re a patreon supporter you can find a post on the patreon page that you can put
your questions on and they will be prioritised above all others, if you’re not a patreon
supporter you can send your questions to the Spacedock Facebook page, the Spacedock Twitter
@SpacedockHQ, or the Spacedock Subreddit, but be sure to amend #SpacedockQ&A to your
question, so I know it’s for the Q&A.
If your question doesn’t make the cut I apologize in advance, but I’ll see If I
can move missed questions to later Q&A’s or failing that simply respond to them on
social media.
Just to remind you all, the questions for this video should not simply be video requests,
if you’ve a ship you want to see covered I’d encourage you to leave it in the YouTube
comments or on the Subreddit request thread, this Q&A is for specific questions about ships
or sci-fi series or my own opinions on matters within the genre.
Thank you all for watching and I hope to be answering some of your questions next week.