Vessel Nomeclature
After many years
of creating deckplans I have created a nomenclature to cover the ships in my
Star Wars Universe. It became obvious to me that whilst most of the ships available
are listed as freighters, they don't really fit that description. The word freighter
is best used to describe vessels whose primary function is the transportation
of freight. However, most freighters in the game have little room for freight,
and lots of room for the crew and passengers. To my mind this better describes
a COURIER, a ship which is designed to move small cargoes or passengers from
place to place. On this site I will be using the term Courier to describe most
stock light freighters, and the term Freighter to describe those few ships which
feature a very large cargo capacity.
This is mainly a phraseology issue, characters within my Star Wars Universe
will use the terms somewhat interchangeably and I'm on no campaign to correct
an error, but it would be remiss of me not to mention it.
Whilst it is not immensely important on this site yet, I'm going to
give a run down of the nomenclature of capital ships here.
Ships in the Star Wars Universe are named using conventional naval terminology,
destroyers, corvettes, cruisers etc. The main issue with this is that they have
been named very haphazardly. This isn't just an issue with Star Wars, it is
pretty much universal in Sci-Fi and the really irritating thing is it is completely
unnecessary. Here's a basic run down of the primary military classifications;
Destroyer
- These are small, fast vessels used mainly for escort duties to protect convoys
from small threats. Originally the small threats were mainly the early submarines,
known also as torpedo boats during World War One because they hardly ever submerged.
The term Destroyer is actually a contraction of 'Torpedo Boat Destroyer'.
Frigate
- These are small vessels emphasising firepower and defensive capabilities over
speed. Frigates are traditionally used as major components for attacks. Escort
frigates tend to be a lot faster and emphasise defence through attack, being
generally built more for aggressive stances than destroyers.
Corvette
- These are small vessels which feature mainly blistering speed. Corvette are
generally defensive ships which operate as interdictors. They would use numbers
to make up for their relative lack of firepower. During the 'Golden Age of Piracy'
corvettes were highly prized as piracy vessel because they could generally outrace
any merchantman whilst carrying a full military weapons array. They were in
plentiful supply since the English were using them to counter the Pirate's primary
method of gaining booty; the blockading of ports and harbours to conduct raids
and take hostages. English high-speed corvettes were able to keep patrolling
ports of call regularly and were very well able to engage even fairly large
pirate fleets who were by definition immobile. Corvettes were also able to do
one thing virtually no other ship could do; move fast enough to escape from
a pirate blockade to get word to other warship fleets, thusly, corvettes also
had a reputation as 'blockade runners'.
Cruiser
- The Cruiser is the primary ship of the line for any military force. They are
well armed and fairly fast, large enough to take a severe pounding, and to mount
weapons that can devastate any reasonable enemy. Cruisers are generally considered
to be powerful enough to engage coastal cities, even ones with defended harbours.
Cruiser is something of a catch-all term to describe larger warships with light,
heavy and even escort types existing. During the build up to World War One the
English created a kind of cruiser that was perfectly capable, in theory, of
engageing the flagships of the Kaiser's fleet. She was only the size of a normal
cruiser, but powerful steam engines allowed her to carry exceedingly strong
armour, and almost dangerously oversized weapons systems. She was called the
Dreadnaught (the 'Fear Nothing') and she spawned an entire category of warships
all on her own; those ships which are capable of engaging a group of enemy warships
on their own.
Very Heavy Cruisers (Battlecruisers) are known to exist, and these are effectively battleships in their own right, however, Cruisers are generally intended to be capable of engaging any reasonable threat, whereas Battleships concentrate on shipping.
Battleship
- The largest warships of a given fleet are the Battleships. These are truly
monstrous vessels designed to locate, engage and utterly destroy the naval forces
of an enemy. They carry the heaviest armour, the heaviest weapons, they feature
the most powerful engines. Battleships have one real mission; they sink enemy
ships. They are not generally configured to defend or attack other targets,
such as aircraft or submarines, since unlike Dreadnaughts they always travel
with large groups of warships with those capabilities. During World War Two
the battleship philosophy was severely tested, and generally found to be impractical
when compared with carrier operations. Many battleships ended up conducting
the hugely embarrassing duty of shore bombardment (typically a role of the frigate)
whilst towards the end of the war (and a great deal following it) several of
the older battleships were converted to carrier operations.
Carrier - The Carrier is a vessel designed to transport, launch and arm a group of aircraft. of course in Star Wars this would be Starfighters. Note that Carriers do not actually have to be able to retrieve those fighters to qualify, many of the first carriers were incapable of conducting landing operations, so the planes would have to either divert to land bases or ditch at sea. Carriers form one distinct difference to the nomenclature which I'll discuss properly later.
Right, now these are the basics. We then get onto the rather gritty problem that in Star Wars A New Hope a Star Destroyer dwarfs a corvette. There are many possible reasons for this, but in my universe I use the following, and I have been greatly pleased to notice that it appears to be supported by the prequel movies.
The prequels have shown that the creation of really BIG warships is somewhat
new. It also shows that the ships are fantastically fast, Yoda can make Coruscant
to Kamino (approx 40,000 LY) and there assemble a 200,000 strong army with support
units and gear and get from there to Geonosis (which is a fair jump, since Kamino
is in Wild Space and Geonosis the Outer Rim, say around 10,000 LY) in a few
hours. That's virtually instant. I know a LOT of Star Wars fans find this difficult
to chew (See Adopting a Prequel Child) but I find
it completely compatible with my mental model of the Star Wars Universe, so
I at least, was well pleased. This simple change in perspective completely changes
the nature of the Imperial military, the structure of the universe and the essence
of gameplay in ways I am still trying to fathom, and it is all for the better.
George just has this damn knack.
Anyhoo, the basics
of my nomenclature is that until the Battle of Geonosis malarkey the warships
of the universe were small and very much local. The CR90 corvette is a corvette
from the point of view of a local defence force, in such a force a battleship
might have a length in the order of three to four hundred meters. The naming
conventions of the Republic are pretty consistent on this. When the Acclimators
and other really BIG ships come along they simply couldn't fit into the established
naming conventions; even a relatively small vessel like the Acclimator would
have to be named something like a 'super-mega-crikey-m'lud'swe'jesu'wow-o-ship'
which is a mouthful and a half. So, from the beginning these new vessels would
simply upscale their names. Star Destroyers are 'small, fast mostly escort vessels'
and yet they dwarf local corvettes. This is due to one other major concept.
The big ships can travel very quickly from place to place, much faster than
smaller vessels. I maintain this is mostly due to fuel consumption, inadequate
shielding and low powered navigational equipment since local ships would rarely
leave their local area of space. I chose to interpret the 'Star' bit as a prefix
indicating that the vessel is of a scale far higher than local ships. 'Star'
ships are able to jump without regard to distance, able to leap directly from
one side of the galaxy to the other without stopping or asking for directions.
The smaller ships have a nominal 'Space' prefix, (as in 'there isn't enough
life on this rock to fill a space cruiser') though this would most likely be
used pretty much solely by the crew of 'Star' vessels and the military hierarchy.
I will be using the
Star and Space nomenclature throughout the site.