Hey guys, it's been awhile since I made a post in here to keep you appraised.
I'm still working on the overhaul. At this point, the overhaul is extensive enough - both in changes and in scale - for me to admit that while some design lineage points have been kept that this is shaping out to be a rather different ship. On the scale issue, I reserve myself the right of a slight retcon, though =P
As things might have to go in character,
Miharu is likely going to be dismantled and recobbled together with a lot of new components to account for its revised spaceframe. It won't be an Himiko-class anymore (as that project stopped). It's new designation will probably be a
Miharu-class exploration cruiser.
Exterior design - my biggest hurdle - is starting to cement together nicely. I've yet things to double-check in regard to ship's scale and how the detailing will turn out because of it (for example airlock apertures should be within 4 x 4 meters and escape pods are about the same size). My current 'guesstimate' on the number of decks it'll have is 8. I'm not sure of how big she'll be exactly, since that will depend on how much its hangar bay will be able to cram in it - I plan to use it as a reference for the internal mapping of the ship, which will then affect the external detailing of the ship (windows and stuff).
The most significant design change made to the ship was to toss out anti-matter power. Why? In effect, I'm supposed to be designing a new and better iteration of a top-of-the-line KFY design. The Star Army of Yamatai uses aether generator - they don't tone down to volatile anti-matter and other stuff just because it might be more realistic and stuff. I decided that it would be better, especially if the ship is to see wider use than as just a prototype, that breaking the mold to that extent was undesirable.
So, instead, I plan on detailing things a bit more so that my aether generators don't end up as nondescript boxes. I've opened a Q&A thread on the topic... but seeing Wes only minimally chimed in... I'll likely need to cobble up my own version like Soresu recommended.
I'm uncertain still of where that will put anti-matter weapons (particle or positron cannons), seeing that anti-matter will have less reason to be carried around. Perhaps - despite original intents - I'll place greater emphasis on aether weaponry.
One design hurdle I've had was as to if the Miharu-overhaul would have a super-heavy weapon like the Aether Shock Array. I've tried considering the use of it - seeing most Star Army vessels do have such a weapon - but the addition of the weapon seemed to dramatically alter the prow of the vessel, making a departure to the tapered nose and instead adopting a more forked shape (similar to the Nozomi-class). Having the Aether Shock Array makes sense... but I feel it's visually too much a design departure to motivate the vessel still being in the same 'design lineage'. Thus far, unless I get mentions from my players that they don't like the pointed nose and the ship's general arrowhead shape, I plan to leave the super-heavy weapon out.
One highlight is how I can still bring in some other engine-works components into consideration, such as coolant and fuel. Yes, fuel: the Turbo Aether Plasma Drives work on the idea of turning some gaz into plasma and then shunting it out for propulsion so there's that aspect. That aspect also encourages more care going in the design of the storage facilities and the matter collection systems too.
Another point of note is how I believe I've dramatically decreased the amount of maintenance crawlways the ship has. Oh, there are access corridors to key systems and such... but most of them won't require to crawl through. This
does contribute to the ship's size but I figured that if Tom would have a role in the overhaul, he'd try to make the ship a bit more technician-friendly.
Power armor storage and outfitting facilities are still being ironed out. There are some innovations I have on the backburner that I plan to try out so to bring out suits from storage and into active use more easily, to fix them more handily, to alter their modular components with more efficacity. So far, it looks like the ship will have the equipment to support 50 active power armored infantry, with 50 more power armors in storage (for replacements).
I've devoted a significant effort fleshing out the 'sciency' side of the ship. I've considered the inclusion of several laboratory facilities and tried to have them described as more than merely 'geological lab', 'exobiological lab' and so on. I wanted to put those in and detail them in a fashion that would help players use them and have the means thanks to them to complete certain goals (for example, if you salvage a chunk of Mishhu ship, there'd be a place in the ship where you could run an analysis of the debris, or the alien corpses, and so on).
The Medical facilities have been significantly fleshed out - basically, I remembered Moonman's mention of medics not getting too much love and - based on prior experiences read on SARP I tried to design something that would meet the needs of the players.
Right now, I'm calling it the Medical Center (which has several sections in it, like the medlab and the sickbay). It needed an entryway which lead to more casual use for the crew, but with quick access to more elaborate equipment if there was a need. There's an examination/consultation area. There's a soul transfer device close to the entry. I wanted the medical officer to have a place to work, so I added an office area for him and his nurses, and then from his office I figured that it was important to have access to a medlab.
My idea of the medlab is more as a work area for the medical staff, rather than for treating wounded. If you need to sterilize instruments, you go there. If you need special medications, specific tools and such, you go there as well.
I wanted a greater capacity for the sickbay, so it includes two patient wards. The first is for wounded that come in, and get triaged before treatment. There are means there to perform first aid, but it's not an operation area. The second patient ward is post-treatment; where you go to recover after you've been treated but aren't yet fit to return to duty or to your quarters, or where you're still held for observation.
Then, there's the operation area, which is somewhat bigger than anything I've seen so far in Miharu's size-class. After the emergencies seen in the Bowhordia mission, I figured Miharu should - at the very least - be able to cope with such a situation so there are several operating facilities.
I'm working on the ship's quarantine/decon facilities. It's not an aspect that's touched a whole lot in SARP, but I figured considering it was better than being caught pants down.
There's a section with the hemosynthetic tanks. There are several and there are some added details for them that I've considered. I also want to add in the same section ST recording devices. The first close to the entry to for routine backup... but those might be used as last ditch attempts to save a dying person by recording its memory for respawning. It'd be the area where the soul information would be held in storage.
Tangent: I want to ditch soul savior pods, and make it so that the recordings be combined with the escape pods. Somehow, it feels less awkward and more efficient.
Another element I've considered was a retrieval area for battle wounded similar to the rapid launch bays with atmospheric shielding. In an event where a power armored pilot gets seriously wounded, instead of dragging him to the power armor bay and then to a lift... it felt smarter to give the sickbay its own retrieval facilities for servicing wounded infantry in emergencies.
Finally, I added in a morgue. The place to store corpses (because it happens *points Aoiko*) and carry out autopsies.
There where some details I considered for living accomodations, but they're vague presently - the living areas are in the decks immediately above the hangar areas so the size of the hangar area will tell me how much space I have to work with.
An important design element for me was to make sure that the more the person is awake and ready to work, the closer she is to the main passageways.
I mean, we just had Wazu on board... and Wazu - in our wardroom - was watching out crew shuffle all zombie-like to the pubic baths. Somehow, I don't think guests should be made to see that!
So, I figured the crew quarters, bathrooms, laundry rooms, and the baths would be clustered in this one section. Higher ranked personnel would have better chances of getting a room closer to the outer hull of the ship (that means windows and viewports for these people).
The style of the rooms hasn't been decided yet. I've seriously considered, at some point, designing it more like a japanese inn/hotspring resort with sliding doors, sleep-over-the-tatamis futons and such to enhance the oriental/japanese theme Yamatai is supposed to have... instead of the typical crew cabins. I relented, though I did use that theme as an inspiration for certain cosmetic choices.
One thing I decided was that it would be very unlikely for any non-commissioned officer to have a room to himself. Why? because I noticed that when PCs shared a room, it more or less forced them to interact (for example, if Kai and Takuma shared the same room, Takuma probably would never have had the luxury of being as withdrawn as he was in the beginning on Miharu).
Moving on... once a crewmember has woken up, washed, dressed, tossed in her laundry, she's ready to move on further toward the main passeway. The next area is the wardroom and the kitchen. Plenty of seats around to sit down, chat and eat (do remember Miharu's crew will be around 70 people so it'll be quite the communal area). There's probably going to be a lift coming up close to the kitchen from lower decks so to help move around food supplies and crew luggage.
The wardroom then opens up on the main passageway. At lunchtime, people can return easily, since it's right next to the main passageway. Also, the wardroom has stairs that lead up to the next deck, which is like a upper tier balcony area to the wardroom - that's more or less the lounge and observation deck (thanks to the large viewport looking aft - though not as large as the one Miharu currently has!), with access to recreation rooms too. Closer to the main passageway are the Virtual Reality Chambers, which will be somewhat bigger than their predecessors in order to credibly simulate environments like a tennis court and such.
That's about all I have to say about it for the moment. I'll keep you guys posted!