Edit
An official version of this ship is available in the Command Division sourcebook.
Welcome to Starship Sunday, presenting a new spaceframe for the Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game, filling in some gaps until official material can be released.
For November we’re journeying back to the very early days of Starfleet, for the Star Trek: Enterprise era, which sees the rise of the Federation, the war with the Romulan Star Empire, and humanity’s first steps out into the stars. This week is the NX-Class.
The Rise of the Federation era begins in 2151 with the launch of the first Warp 5 vessel: the Enterprise captained by Jonathan Archer. This is followed by the Columbia NX-02 in 2154, and several other vessels came shortly after. Future ships are given contradictory names according to novels and other non-canon sources and other NX-class ships include: NX-03 Challenger / Excalibur; NX-04 Discovery / Constellation; NX-05 Atlantis / Slayton; NX-06 Defiant / Endeavour / Lexington; NX-07 Lexington / Intrepid; and the NX-09 Avenger. Several of these were lost during the Earth-Romulan War spanning 2156 to 2160, starting with the Columbia.
Later versions of the class received an upgrade in the mid-2160s, becoming the Columbia-class. This refit added a secondary hull below the ship, mimicking the look of the later Constitution-class. This redesign was initially planned for a theoretical fifth season of Star Trek: Enterprise and the design lives on in novels and other fiction, which retcon the Enterprise as receiving this refit and returning to service following the series finale. This sub-spaceframe can be created by using the standard refit rules, possibly rounding up to the next decade.
This class works for campaigns set in the years leading to the Earth-Romulan War along with stories set during the war itself. A campaign set during the early days of the Federation would be interesting, with the players crewing a Columbia-class vessel that is maintaining the newly formed alliance and bringing in new member species.
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Assuming Phase Cannons are not Phaser Cannons (specifically being called weak in the show), have you published the weapon stats for that anywhere?
Further to the previous comment I see there are some rudimentary rules in the Intrepid/Ganges post.
It’s one of those things that probably best handled via the enemies being fought rather than hard coded, so an NX ship works normally against Klingons of the 22nd Century, but would be ineffective for narrative reasons against a Constitution-class ship.
The alternative is complicated parallel rules that likely wouldn’t mesh with the existing rules.
I’m hoping to get a smaller advice article on this out before the end of the month.
nice ship, just one wee thing the picture you used is of the nx refit, which could be a cool next ship (hint hint).
Huh… so it is.
The NX Refit would be neat. But it’s a pretty minor upgrade stat-wise. It’s probably best handled through the refit rules in the game.