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.
