ISO Standard Human Spaceship: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:RScreen0045 502.jpg|frame|It's a flying brick. [[More Dakka|With guns]].]]

{{quote|''"UNEF's first starships had been possessed of a kind of spidery, delicate beauty. But with various technological developments, structural strength had become more important than conserving mass (one of the old ships would have folded up like an accordion if you'd tried a twenty-five-gee maneuver), and that was reflected in the design; stolid, heavy, functional-looking."''|'''Joe Haldeman''', ''[[The Forever War]]''}}

The second design, mostly based on newer works and the “realistic” age of spaceflight, follows some simple rules:

While this is probably going to be [[Truth in Television]] for military spacecraft in the near-future (with the earliest favoring the tinkertoy/habitrail/industrial plumbing aesthetic of the International Space Station, just because of the limits of our launching methods—cylindrical rocket sections bolted together in space), eventually it may become a [[Zeerust|relic of the near-present]] as space-based construction becomes easier. In space, there is no gravity or air resistance to design around, and due to the distances involved [[Stealth in Space|and other factors]] visual camouflage probably won't be much use either. Historically, armies put quite a bit of thought into looking good and only stopped when it became necessary to do so; given the chance, it's likely that [[Bling of War|looking grand]] will be back on the agenda. The [[Awesome but Impractical|engineers will probably hate it]], but [[Executive Meddling|then again, they probably won't be controlling things]]. On the other hand, in this modern, cost-conscious world, the accountants might have a thing or two to say about [http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/gothic-space-bilge.php wasting money on decor]...to say nothing of what happens when news gets back to the [[The Federation|Federation Parliament]]...will the voters ever have a ''fit'' when they hear about the gobs of cash being spent to paint their ships in gold for no reason other than "it looks pretty."

Space wings are also often used in fiction as places to put extra weapons (like [[Macross Missile Massacre|missiles]]), and to store things (extra electronic equipment or fuel) inside them, although putting those things on or in the main hull makes more sense for a nonatmospheric [[Space Fighter]], as spreading out the ship's mass makes little sense for a vessel designed to maneuver in vacuum in three dimensions—better to keep it compact, to conserve angular momentum. You ''can'' increase maneuverability by putting thrusters on the tips of them a la ''[[Babylon 5]]'' Starfuries, using the wing as essentially a big lever to rotate the ship faster, but a simple pole (especially a retractable one) would do the same job just as well and with greater shear strength (again, compactness helps here), making it less likely to bend or break off during high-thrust maneuvers whose direction is perpendicular to the broad planar surface of the wing. Internal gyroscopic flywheeels could do the same thing ''and'' be less visibly obvious tells to the enemy (no signal lights before a turn). Only [[Space Fighter]] craft [[Space Plane|designed to go both ways]] (atmosphere and deep space) actually need wings—and [[wikipedia:Lifting body|some real airplanes don't even need them]].

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* ''[[Super Dimension Fortress Macross]]''/''[[Robotech]]''; Except for the ''Macross'' itself (which was, of course, alien in origin), most human vessels are pretty close to this. It should be noted that the ''Macross'' was in fact redesigned closer to those lines. Later subverted with the later Macross-class ships which were more angular, and ''Robotech's'' SDF-3, which was originally designed/disguised with Zentraedi-like lines, but by the end of the Third Robotech War had the same ''Mospeada''-style design.

* While all the different factions are usually human in ''[[Gundam]]'', the ships used by most incarnations of [[The Federation]] tend to be more boxy and utilitarian looking, [[Space Is an Ocean|generally designed to resemble naval battleships]] and come in shades of grey, olive or white, while the the various space colony factions tend to use more exotic, organic looking designs.

* ''[[Babylon 5]]'' : Humorously lampshaded in “Legend of the Rangers” with the human design of the [http://babylon5.wikia.com/wiki/Valen_(ship) Valen] looking like “a flying brick.” ([[Flying Brick|No relation]].) The later [http://babylon5.wikia.com/wiki/Valen_class_cruiser Valen] class was made by the Minbari, further reinforcing the trope.

{{quote|'''Ranger Dulann''': ''If human military designers had their way every colour of the spectrum would be removed except for grey, green and black and we would all live in windowless boxes.''}}

*** You can see both design philosophies incorporated in it. You have the Minbari traditional triple-fin hull structure, but it's also dark grey similar to the ''Omega''-class destroyers. Interestingly, the human ''Hyperion''-class heavy cruisers are brightly-colored with white and blue. However, those (as mentioned in the fluff) were designed by a different military contractor than the ''Nova''e and the ''Omega''s.

* ''[[Firefly]]'' mostly averts this trope, with the majority of ships seen having either a large cylindrical design or a smaller, more agile (but still not blocky) design, such as with Serenity herself. However, the ships do tend to have very metallic appearances, and several of the ships briefly shown do fit the trope better than the larger Alliance vessels and Serenity.