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Discussion: What other fandoms would inspire a fun X-Fleet ship?

Posted Oct. 14, 2020, 3:05 p.m. by Fleet Captain Sharon Miller (Supervisor of Experiments) (Sharon Miller)

Posted by Timothy Frogue in Discussion: What other fandoms would inspire a fun X-Fleet ship?

Posted by Fleet Captain Sharon Miller (Supervisor of Experiments) in Discussion: What other fandoms would inspire a fun X-Fleet ship?

Posted by Russell Watt in Discussion: What other fandoms would inspire a fun X-Fleet ship?
Posted by… suppressed (18) by the Post Ghost! 👻
Hey all,

so as you probably all know, when I first came up with the idea for the (former X-Fleet ship) Leviathan, I took inspiration not just from Star Trek but also from the show ‘Stranger Things’ and the internet concept ‘SCP’.

What other fandoms do you think could provide fun inspiration for an X-Fleet ship? You don’t have to have any plans to actually make these ships, I just thought it would be interesting to discuss and might start some people thinking…

  • Sharon (Supervisor of Experiments)

I didn’t realise that Stranger Things was part of your inspiration for Leviathan, I also didn’t know of the internet concept ‘SCP’ (which I’ve just now learnt means Secure, Contain, Protect. I just know it seems to be a fun concept.

SCP is amazing. If you ever want to be thoroughly creeped out then reading some of their top rated SCP’s is always a night well spent!

Anyway, here are some thoughts of mine

-Sliders Trek: a Federation scientist/engineering team has created ship-based technology that allows the ship to travel to parallel universes, where its the same year, and they are the same ship/people only everything else is different. A universe where the Borg won, another where your loved one didn’t die in that fatal bombing, perhaps one where your doppleganger is the Federation President or the assassin who is trying to kill the president.

I love this! And in fact, I’ve had someone else mention a Sliders-style crossover to me as well, so it’s definitely a popular idea! I think it would work really well and keep the ship constantly new and engaging!

-The Real Desperate Housewives of Betazed: The hit ‘Reality’ tv show in space in which the Betazoid housewives (and their long suffering husbands/manservants) share their lifes and loves with each other and the audience. Wait for their trip to Risa with bikinis and more. (Note, I promise you, I truly don’t believe the shows it is based on are either a hit or reality.)

This would be such an amazing guilty pleasure! I would so play on a ship like this, haha! (We might want to offer an option for people to play under pseudonyms though, lol!)

-FCIS (First Contact Investigative Service) - they are the women, men and those who are neither who the Federation sends in to consider whether or not a potential new member world has what it takes to become a member and/or to discover how a society that was operating at 18th Century equivalent technology one week suddenly is shooting phaser like weapons the next … - (NCIS, anyone)

Shamefully, I have never seen NCIS, but the idea sounds cool!

-SS Alpha Princess - Come aboard our flying playground where we want to match you up with love, exciting and new, and remember we’re expecting you. The Alpha Princess where your every whim is our command and we hope you’ll engage with love.

The STF ‘Love Boat’! I love it!!! :P

Is this a West World kinda love with robots or more set up like Married at First Site or Love Island with a bunch of singles? I would be up for any of that lol — Ty

West World is another great idea! Or any kind of permanent ‘holodeck’ style adventure ship!

Married at First Sight? LOL! You know I would be all over that ship! XD

  • Sharon

-White Collar - Join the Ferengi Commercial Authority and track down females making a profit, workers forming a union, and more. (I did a search on tv shows based around accountants and this was the only one - it features a criminal who helps the Feds track down other crims for his freedom, and as Ferengi are basically accountants but with more personality, it seemed most relevant)

  • Russell

I definitely think a Ferengi-themed ship could be fun. Roaming the quadrant in search of prizes and profits!

Thanks for these, Russ, I enjoyed reading them!

  • Sharon

I am an old CJ Cherryh fan, so one has to vote for merchanters luck or pride of Channer. A generational deep space freighter (Clinton Reed, or “Stores” on the Dresden is based on this concept. Or a freighter full of Catalan…
The later if we can get Sharon to play Payanfar.

As to sliderrs; I am more of the “Callahan’s cross time Saloon” persuasion…

Charles Stevens

Perhaps Mallory and the EC5 Norway....
What’s a little piracy between friends…

C

I am sadly unfamiliar with her work, Charles, but a quick read of the wiki on the Alliance-Union universe and I shall be getting them for my kindle tonight! :P

And in general, piracy is also a really fun theme! How about an X-Ship crewed by Orion pirates?

  • Sharon

Its funny you mention an orion pirate xship it actually was such an idea that ran briefly a few years back but fell out of favor due to everyone suddenly having busy lives come up at once. I was storyteller for it and worked up three sims in fact! I even did an unoffical spec for it called the Wanderer class blockade runner which you can find here. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pdHcaaQ7VDpkCe_1vet39G_RhpjF4wEY_gYaiALAkSI/edit?usp=sharing if we got a crew together again for that i’d be down for storytelling it!

I had a conversation with… David Eads and/or Daniel Lerner recently about a “Lower Decks” themed ship - just the idea of everyone being an Ensign IC, never really dealing with a “main sim”, just doing side sims and the minutiae that goes along with being a starship. There’s actually a Storyteller… but he just tells you what is going on in the background/around the crew/to the “main crew”. I don’t know that it would be great for a long-term sim, but would that’s what makes it perfect for X-fleet.

I’ve often wondered why we have civilian/part civilian planets, but no civilian ships. Something like “Firefly”, or what we see in “Picard”. Characters like The Outrageous Okona and Cyrano Jones exist in Star Trek, and I don’t think we see enough of them.

Nathan

Oh, I would love to do a Firefly crossover! Outside of Trek it’s probably my favourite sci-fi show and there’s so much scope in the Trek world to do something similar!

And yeah, Lower Decks would be fun also. Especially with the new Lower Decks show (that I haven’t actually watched yet).

Some great ideas here, Nathan. Thanks!

  • Sharon

Speaking of previous xships I’d love to give another go around to the founding federation era (2161 post rommie earth war) in feeling out the likely teething troubles the Federation faced post war and in rebuilding things again I got a Daedalus class variant spec already approved for it in fact! Which you can find here https://www.star-fleet.com/library/bookshelf/tm/unity.html the idea is to merge the style of Enterprise era to the later TOS/Disco era. Again if someone got a crew together of interest i’d love to story tell this!

Robert Archer

These look so much fun, Rob! Particularly the Wanderer class. We definitely need a pirate ship here in X-Fleet! :P

  • Sharon

So I was going to say a Firefly ship. Wandering the outskirts of Federation territory where it’s all pirates and merchants and ferengi traders. Maybe a small ship that is actually federation that kind of keeps an eye on the roughness that is the outer colonies. OR Orville! I know it’s based on Star Trek but some of the species and situations they encounter are awesome (Ducks before people start throwing rotten vegetables)
Jennifer

This thread is really showing me up for how little current sci-fi I watch, haha! So yeah, I think I’ve only ever seen one episode of the Orville. But if it could lend some inspiration to a fun X-Ship then I’d be all for it.

Looks like quite a few of us are interested in a Firefly/Pirate kind of theme though! Hopefully someone might get inspired by this thread and take that one on! :)

  • Sharon

I love the Orville and Firefly. If one like that with a pirate theme were to be done, I would suggest the New Frontier books as a location. That was where I wanted to place the Infinite Fleet but didnt happen. There are a lot of cool species and a territory not explored by any series that gives loads of room for imagination and creativity

Ty

Setting a ship in the New Frontier area is a great idea (particularly for those familiar with the books). So much scope for new races and new types of planets! Great idea!

  • Sharon

In a series of books I have bubbling along in the background … my fantasy world is totally inspired by Star Trek (kind of reverse to this - but yeah) - The fantasy races are ‘The United Alliance of Races’ and they have a dedicated navy, including a flag ship that is always the only one in the area of that world’s oceans where story things happen. They even have a ship’s mage who always senses things going on around them, and whos forever wanting to pilot the ship despite her lack of skills in that area. So anyway, that makes me think … given the scenes in Generations of the Enterprise D crew on the sailing ship … a sailing ship sim - they are clearly known in the Star Trek universe. :P

  • Russell

I’m sure we could make that work within the rules with a bit of creative thinking! Even if it was just a super-long holodeck mission!

Although when you mentioned a mage, you also made me think about having a Star Trek / classic D&D crossover, where we can be an adventuring party down on some primitive planet :P

  • Sharon

In my mind (in very very broad strokes of my imaginary brush) - and these were what I was thinking of - TNG was the main inspiration for this, with a bit of DS9 and Voyager thrown in for good measure … As well as the crew on the ship, I also had a fort towards the Eastern edge of the Alliance lands and I referred to them as the Eastern Fighters - original, I know :P

Humans = Humans
High/Wood Elves = Vulcans
Dark Elves = Romulans
Dwarves = Klingons
Hobbits/Halflings/Kendar = Ferengi/Talaxian
Orcs = Klingons/Orions
Magi = Betazoids
Clerics = Bajorans
Fighters = Pakleds

I also had a lot of fun with it … all the minor characters who were going to get killed and/or dragged from Earth to the UAR world all had names starting with N.E. (eg Nicholas Edwards) and they were wearing something red … and the kid who owned the dog Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan in the story heard Khaaaaaaaaaan howling in pain at one stage, and ran down to see what was happening, ripping his shirt and calling “KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!” as he went. Khan survived, but the Police Officer on the scene, Natasha Elderberry, wasn’t as lucky.

My Khan for this November is a white cat which is a familiar for a Witch by the name of Witch, so I’m expanding my use of Khaaaaaan as a character.

So whoever said you can’t teach an old tribble new tricks isn’t totaly correct. :P

  • Russell

I think how you’ve matched up the D&D races is spot on, Russ! And I can definitely think of a few really good Trek episodes where it was a planet-based adventure the whole way through. And here’s the thing that possibly some people haven’t realised - an X-Fleet ship doesn’t have to last forever. If you have a limited story that might play out for a couple of months and then never be heard from again then that is absolutely fine! Part of the ‘experimental’ nature of this fleet is getting to try out things like this. So please don’t all think that any X-Fleet idea has to be something that would last for years and be a candidate for the main fleets eventually, because that’s absolutely not the case!

  • Sharon

Maybe a ship could go a planet much like the He-Man Series…meet prince Adam and fight for truth and justice? LOL

Timothy

Lol! As long as I can play She-Ra!

  • Sharon

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