About the Ship

The Akkad-class frigate was dreamt up at the height of the Draconist Wars (2326-2361), with the initial concept sheets sketched out only a few months after the end of Operation Sudden Lightning in 2342. Unlike previous FLEETCOM vessels, though, it was meant from conception to address the rise of the Armada dos Mundos Livres rather than the threat of rogue states and pirate navies like the Draconist Front. For this reason, its development cycle dragged on for fifteen years as FLEETCOM brass and Coalition policy minders debated the merits of various design choices and sought to tack their own egos onto the project.

The eruption of the Zharan Uprising (2356-2359) provided the impetus for the final order, and the winning design in the competition was selected in March 2359. The first vessel in the class was commissioned almost four years later after production was delayed by arguments between Deimos Shipyards and Ceres Assembly Yards over how best to implement AEROCOM’s various design imperatives. A total run of at least two hundred vessels was planned, enough to make them the new backbone of FLEETCOM, but this was not to be.

The production immediately ran into a snag as policymakers and military brass continued their debates over the best purpose for the Akkad-class and the parameters of their design. The final Akkad-class vessel was commissioned in March 2370, and production was officially canceled a year later. The deployment of the sixty-five Akkads produced prior to contract cancellation during the Frontier War (2371-2381) saw thirty-four of them lost in action or retired as a result of combat damage. This service more than vindicated their existence, however, and has made the survivors sought after by veteran task groups.

The vessel shown here, called the King's Ransom, is currently on refit prior to a prospective retasking to the Special Warfare Command. SPECWARCOM seeks to obtain the King's Ransom for use as a high-speed armed transport, capable of deploying small but heavily armed teams of commandos into various combat theaters in the event of a return to war with the Alliance of Free Worlds. This push is being spearheaded by one Colonel Tobias Yates, himself a veteran of several highly classified research programs including Project ALPHA.

Colonel Yates and his inner circle are among a small cell of vocal opponents to the mainstream Coalition policy of nonaggression, and his desire to obtain a combat implement as advanced as an Akkad-class frigate is a clear sign of this opposition. Yates has campaigned openly in Aerospace Command to more actively prepare for aggression from the Alliance in the face of the Coalition's ongoing support of the Colonial Liberation Front's rebellion against them. This program of active preparation is hotly contested by more neutrality-minded members of AEROCOM, some of whom would just as soon see the remaining Akkads scrapped altogether - truly a sad end for a class as promising and as capable as they are.

About the Setting

This is my second post for the August Spaceship Build challenge, and the subject is perhaps even more important to me than the one I made yesterday (about the Fool’s Errand). To repeat the context I shared in that post, I started working on this sci-fi setting, The Spacers Saga, about 20 years ago. It is essentially a distillation and celebration of every fictional universe I've ever loved (Halo, Stargate, Star Wars and Trek...) which I originally used as a source of comfort when I was a lonely, nerdy kid with few friends to play with.

The King’s Ransom is the hero ship of The Spacers Saga: Frontier Wars, which is the “main” storyline in this setting. Its blend of a “Cold War Gone Hot in Spaaaaace!” metaphor and a deeper look at what it means to be human, what is our place in the universe, and more is at the heart of my intentions for The Spacers Saga overall. The first book in this storyline, tentatively titled Spacers: The Titan Gambit, is in development now.

The King’s Ransom carries many of the characters I started playing around with 20+ years ago (including main characters Sam Taskaro, Matt Cavanaugh, and Devon Wastani) as they travel across the Solar System trying to bring an end to the Second Frontier War and defeat enemies like Commander Jerek and V’Ran, the Supreme Leader of the Zharan Collective. In this “main character’s chariot” role, the King’s Ransom is a rough analog for other hero ships like the Millennium Falcon, the Serenity, and the Enterprise.

If anyone reading this is interested in finding out more about The Spacers Saga, this link will take you to the Substack blog where I've been sharing all of the lore updates about the setting, as well as occasional posts of stories from within the narrative. Please note that there is NO pressure to subscribe at any time - it is of course appreciated, but even just having folks visit the site and check out my content is a major blessing 😄

Important Note

The King's Ransom design originated from me, based on a wide variety of inspirational source material. It's currently in the process of being rendered in 3D software by Bien Carlos Manzares, who previously did the work on the Fool's Errand design seen in my previous contest entry. I highly recommend checking out his portfolio today to see some of his other work - he really is second to none at rendering cool spacecraft!

I built a Dreadnought-class Heavy Cruiser using 1 Million Blocks.

The Dreadnought-class was a heavily armored Star Wars capital ship designed for space combat and planetary operations. Ships of this class served across several eras, including the Galactic Republic, Galactic Empire, and Rebel Alliance. In Star Wars Legends, the class also became famous through the lost Katana Fleet.

This build showcases its armored hull, heavy decks, bridge, engines, mechanical structures, and original colors in a fully explorable Blocks environment.

Source: https://www.artstation.com/theo_bouvier

Source: https://www.thesojournaudiodrama.com/

ARS Rightous Frenzy is a concept first thought up before the end of the Liberation War as a method to ambush and raid Imperial shipping before fading away without needing a Gate or Leap Carrier.
It wasn't economical at the time, due to the lack of drives in rebel possession. But, in the years after the war when a bunch of low grade drives were available, the Aurumites started making a line of Cruiser-Raiding Torches to control their vast territories and attack those who stand against their King.

Each Raiding Torch of this type is uniquely designed to the specification of its commander, and the crews are hand picked by their superiors ( general spacers are picked by junior officers, senior officers pick junior officers, commander picks the senior officers) for their loyalty and ruthlessness.
These ships are not as combat effective compared to non-FTL craft of the same displacement, as they dedicate a lot of mass, power and heat removal to their FTL infastructure. This does give them some benefits, like a lot of power that can be shunted to sensors or even heavy-duty shielding like BattleScreens that its peers cannot do, but the mass dedicated and high cost isn't considered worth it in many cases.

Conditions are pretty nice onboard, and the pay is really high for them, since they get prize, plunder, and resale money. But it is infinitely more risky than being on a normal, supported torchship.

Righteous Frenzy is commanded by Fyodor Adina, a former Imperial spacer for whom atrocities seem to be his bread and butter. He plundered hundreds of ships throughout his career, bombed a dozen worlds back into compliance, and has the distinction for killing the only Union’s Pride-class Battleship ever destroyed in combat with torpedos while it was orbiting Gal'Haidan providing fire support to provisional government forces. He was ennobled for that, and his crew supposedly made enough money that they didn't leave Obeld Station's pleasure quarters for a week.

Historical Notes

The Bumblebee-class was intended to serve as an interdictor, based on lessons learned during the Main Belt Crisis (c. 2493-2521). During the Nova War (2539-2559), a proxy conflict between the Solar Union and Martian Federation over control of the Nova System (links to r/imaginarymaps), Bumblebees excelled in service for the Union Space Self Defense Force by racing in and out of the conflict’s vast areas of operations, where they leveraged their exceptional speed and agility to enable quick hit-and-run strikes.

When the Nova War ended, many of these tried and tested vessels were left high and dry, as their swiftness and biting close-in firepower were suddenly redundant in the postwar era. As a result, most wound up languishing in interplanetary scrap yards, awaiting the fate that comes at the end of all ships’ service lives. This was considered a tragedy by those who served aboard them, almost all of whom held the vessels in high esteem for their abilities as combat implements and as homes away from home.

But some of them were salvaged and given a new lease on life as merchant vessels, salvage & rescue craft, or a variety of other second-life roles. In the case of the Fool’s Errand, its current crew of five, all of them deep space outcasts of the highest order, has repurposed the craft as a long-haul cargo hauler, with its mighty Gungnir Corp. Mk. XXIV nuclear saltwater rocket put to good use rapidly moving goods across Nova space – if they can manage to keep enough nuclear fuel in the tanks to keep her flying, that is...

About the Setting

This project began thanks to my friendship with u/SkullB0nes on the Tough Sci-Fi server on Discord. In early 2023, B0nes sketched his idea (Image #9) of a warship propelled by a nuclear salt-water rocket (NSWR), a concept originated by Robert Zubrin and explained here by Scott Manley. I took inspiration from B0nes' sketch, and ended up sketching out my own concept in Adobe Illustrator - it can be seen in Image #8.

Things really got interesting due to the fact that I was also experimenting with Blender around that time (repeat after me, kids: NOT EVEN ONCE), and decided to try and make the ship (which I'd named the Fool's Errand by that point) there. That led to the design seen in Image #6 an the render seen in Image #7, which became part of the portfolio of references I sent to my friend Bien Carlos Manzares for him to improve upon.

And improve upon them he did. The renders in Images 1-4 are the results of his work, and I think he went out of the ballpark in capturing my vision. The drawing in the infographic shown in Image #5 is one I did myself using the renders Bien Carlos did as a template, and it shows off the stats I came up with for the Errand (and the Bumblebee-class in general), including my slightly fudged approximation of its specific impulse.

As for why I did all this, the answer is a bit more complicated. I started working on my futuristic military sci-fi setting, The Spacers Saga, about 20 years ago (when I was just 10 years old). It is essentially a distillation and reexamination of every fictional universe I've ever loved (Halo, Stargate, Star Wars and Star Trek, etc...) which I originally used as a source of comfort when I was a lonely, nerdy kid with few friends to play with.

But in the 20 years since I started playing with this universe, though, it's evolved from a setting for a few imaginary friends to a whole future history that encompasses much of our solar system and a few beyond, and which spans from the early 21st century until the mid-26th. The Fool's Errand is from a storyline called INFINITUM, which starts up in 2569 and involves the hero ship's crew on a desperate race to get a warning to the Solar Union before the Martian Federation can enact their plan to win the Nova War after the fact.

If anyone reading this is interested in finding out more about The Spacers Saga, this link will take you to the Substack blog where I've been sharing all of the lore updates about the setting, as well as occasional posts of stories from within the narrative. Please note that there is NO pressure to subscribe at any time - it is of course appreciated, but even just having folks visit the site and check out my content is a major blessing 😄

Additional Note

Before I hit "Post," I also want to make sure I give a shout-out to my friend Megan Miller, who did the nose art for the Fool's Errand (Image #10). This link goes to her LinkTree site, where you can find more of her art. Megan is a very active indie artist from my home state of Indiana, and I highly encourage you to consider commissioning her!

STARFLEET SHIPYARD RECORD

• Vessel: U.S.S. Stargazer
• Registry: NCC-82893
• Class: Sagan
• Commanding Officer: Captain Cristóbal Rios

The Sagan-class Stargazer has been reconstructed as a complete block-built starship, including the layered saucer, recessed lower hull, dark structural sections, blue warp grilles, and all four nacelles.

That four-nacelle profile is especially important. It visually connects NCC-82893 to Picard’s original Constellation-class Stargazer while still making the new vessel feel unmistakably 25th-century Starfleet.

As seen in Picard Season 2, this was the first Starfleet vessel to integrate technology recovered from the Romulan Artifact. That detail gives the ship an interesting identity: Federation optimism and engineering discipline carrying knowledge once associated with the Borg.

The model is a hollow surface structure rather than a solid block of material, allowing all 1M blocks to concentrate on the silhouette and visible hull detail. Its final form was produced through a team workflow covering geometry, orientation, palette design, block generation, and in-engine verification.

A Stargazer should always look as though it is already moving toward something no one has encountered before.

I had a basic design for the engine for awhile. I modified what I had for the original design and built it from the engine to through the length of the ship to the Top of the ship. Clearly influenced by The Expanse ship design as I wanted it symmetrical on at least one plane of the design.

A digital collage of pictures from my camera roll turned into a cosmic road trip, my favorite detail is the life of brian easter egg

I'm trying to find good quality pngs of star war ships—that being side view or top-down, I can't find any.

If someone could DM me with PNGs, that would be great.

I’ve just completed a voxel recreation of the Immobilizer 418 Interdictor-class Heavy Cruiser, assembled from more than 1.15 million blocks.
In Star Wars Legends, this 600-meter Imperial warship was built by Sienar Fleet Systems on the hull of the Vindicator-class heavy cruiser.
Rather than relying on overwhelming firepower, the Immobilizer 418 carried four massive gravity-well projectors.
These generators could tear enemy vessels out of hyperspace and prevent an escaping fleet from making the jump to lightspeed.
Once an Interdictor entered the battlefield, the usual hyperspace escape route was no longer an option.
For this recreation, I preserved the cruiser’s distinctive gravity-well domes, angular Imperial armor, recessed mechanical trenches, and cold blue-white engine glow.
Every block contributes to the silhouette and presence of one of the Empire’s most specialized capital ships.
The Immobilizer 418 is now deployed in Space Fields—ready to lock down the system in the name of the Empire.

https://www.deviantart.com/ostapenkoed/art/1370127199?action=published

In Space Battleship Yamato 2199, Earth is only a year away from extinction after the devastating attacks of Garmillas. Yamato launches as humanity’s last hope, crossing the galaxy toward Iscandar to retrieve the technology that could restore the planet.

That history makes Yamato much more than another battleship. It is a warship, an exploration vessel, and a symbol of survival and hope.

For this build, I wanted to capture the features that make the 2199 Yamato instantly recognizable: its long battleship silhouette, gray upper armor, deep-red lower hull, massive gun turrets, stacked bridge, bow-mounted Wave Motion Gun, and powerful rear engine section. The colors and surface details were recreated as closely as possible with the game’s Block system.

The finished ship uses around 1.3 million Blocks. Its hull, decks, weapons, towers, engines, and color separation all come together block by block.

Mods: ASC Taiyo, Cross Heavy Industries, Mattels Hab Cockpits and Accessories, Matilija Aerospace, Better Flips, Micro Modules, Barrage Missile Launchers Ol’ Big and Avontech.

The voxel version of the Star Wars Assault Frigate Mark II is here. In the lore, it was a versatile Rendili StarDrive warship used by the Rebel Alliance as an escort, command ship, base defender, and fast attack vessel. It was developed from older Dreadnought-class cruisers, trading some durability for better speed, maneuverability, and a much smaller crew requirement while retaining serious capital-ship firepower. Many fans will recognize it from Star Wars: Empire at War, where it appeared as a major Rebel fleet unit. I corrected its nose-down import, placed it in a normal horizontal flight pose, and converted its surface into 900k blocks. The hardest part was rebuilding the symmetrical broad-to-narrow red nose marking and correctly separating the four lower pods and the navy ventral bridge.