STSTCSOLD&A | The Klingon Empire - Ship Recognition Manual

IN MY OPINION THE KLINGON SHIP RECOGNITION MANUAL is far and away the most interesting of the three that FASA produced for the STSTCS. The designs themselves are excellent, and the writing very imaginative (although apocryphal when compared to current trek canon). Many of the ships in this manual look very 'realistic' in that they adhere to the classic Klingon design philosophy established with the original D7 model ship that appeared in ST:TOS—something that I don't think either the Federation or the Romulan manuals did very well, especially the Federation manual. Designs like the D-10 and L-24 play excellently against their Federation opponents of similar class, and are aesthetically rooted in the Klingon motifs which typify several television series and motion picture productions. So much so that it's a shame the makers of those series and those movies never tipped their hats to the FASA books. An L-24 or D-10 would have looked right at home on an episode of either ST:TNG or ST:DS9. Versus the endless re-uses we saw of the 'Bird of Prey' model, which—if you follow Trek lore going back to the third film—was actually going to be a Romulan vessel.
Like all the old FASA manuals, this one was made thoroughly outdated by the both The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine television series, as well as movies like Star Trek VI. There was a late effort to bring the Klingon situation up to date with the introduction of the FASA-produced Next Generation Officer's Manual, but as with the older Klingon Empire recognition manual, the lone Klingon design in the TNG Officer's Manual is apocryphal, having little or no basis in the actual television program. I've therefore taken the liberty of extrapolating FASA game stats for the formidable Vor'cha and Negh'var classes, which exemplify Klingon top-of-the-line for Picard's time. As well as introducing a tiny handful of original fanships which mark the interim period between the sixth Star Trek motion picture, and the debut of ST:TNG.
Unless otherwise noted, all of the ships listed here can be found in the FASA Klingon Ship Recognition Manual 2nd Edition. Those ships which originate from other sources, such as the FASA TNG Officer's Manual, or Stardate Magazine's Jaynz files, have been designated accordingly. See the legend.

— BRT

Panorama of the Klingon capitol city, on the capitol planet of Qonos.

NOTE: where possible, I tried to scan each ship at as high a resolution as I reasonably could. But the original format of the drawings in the FASA manuals typically makes this very difficult. The designers at FASA used an old black and white layout trick where the "gray" color that shades the ships is not gray at all, but instead composed of thousands of tiny black dots on a field of white. (click here for an example!) The net effect viewed from afar by the human eye is that of 'grayness' but the scanner picks up every last dot and it takes a lot of softening/blurring and reduction via Paintshop Pro to get the ships to look halfway decent. Even then, the images sometimes don't come out nearly as crisp as I'd like. So if things seem a teeny bit fuzzy around the edges, or if the graphics don't look exactly as they did on paper, please understand that I did what I could with what I've got. In some cases I've re-drawn the schematics myself, or I have been able to find large-scale graphics from other sources for well-known canon ships. These graphics produce superior imagery compared to the Ship Recognition Manuals, and I have necessarily replaced the poor FASA graphics.

* Denotes ship class included with FASA Next Generation Officer's Manual

ⁿ Denotes ship class from the Next Generation era that is officially part of Star Trek canon, but which was not included in any of the FASA manuals. May include canon designs from Deep Space Nine And Voyager television series, as well as Next Generation era Star Trek feature films.

ª Denotes ship class of purely fan origin; also known as a "fanship". Not part of official Star Trek canon and never appeared in any FASA material.

∆ Denotes ship class that appeared as a Jaynz entry in Stardate magazine. Considered somewhat official by FASA standards, but not necessarily canon by contemporary Star Trek standards.

ASSAULT SHIPS
T-3 Mover	T-5 Throne Seeker	T-8 Frontier Transport	T-12 Carrier of Doom

BATTLESHIPS / BATTLE-CRUISERS
KDF-2 K'mirra	L-13 Fat Man	L-20 Keth Ke Se	L-24 Ever-Victorious
Negh'var ⁿ

CRUISERS
D-4 Predator	D-7 (K'tinga)	D-9 Seeker	D-10 Riskadh
D-12 Death Boot ∆	D-20 Death Rite	D-32 Stronger Bird	D-33 Tsunami ª
D-39 Shellback ª	Vor'cha ⁿ

DESTROYERS
D-2 Stongtongue	D-11 One Wing	D-14 Stinger	D-16 Swiftwind
D-18 Gull	One Wing (TNG) ª

ESCORTS
K-23 Little Killer	K-24 Winner	K-26	K-27 Grim Reaper

FRIGATES
L-6 Defender	L-9 Saber	L-42 Great Bird	L-50 Bastard ª

SCOUTS
K-14 Pathmaker	K-15 Unseen Creeper	K-17 Death Stalker	K-22 Bird of Prey

MISCELLANEOUS
G-3 Baka Re' Freighter	G-5 Tugboat Transport	G-6 Catapult Transport	G-8 Trader's Game Freighter
S-4 Mender Repair Tender	S-5 Healer Repair Tender	S-8 Murph Mobile Repair Facility

SHUTTLES
W-2 Koreba	W-4 Speedstar

SPACE STATIONS
Z-4 Deathgame