Why The K'tinga Kinda Sucked... 

The Miranda class is the federation’s version of the K’tinga in the dominon war.

At 20min: "THE TORPEDO KNOWS WHERE IT IS BECAUSE IT KNOWS WHERE IT ISN'T" ;D

Klingons: "CHARGE!!!!" Also Klingons: "Hold on. Should we have brought supply ships with us?"

Love the homage to Lazerpig! By the way, there was a K'tinga on active service in Season 1 of TNG ("Heart of Glory").

If Laserpig cared more about Star Trek, and was ever sober….

Remember that Klingon fleets are made up of the house fleets. I am positive that many of these houses had a bunch of those ships and said "These ships are great we don't need something new"

When I was a kid, we had a friend of the family who explained to me, what he called, the "Circle of Command"... Not to be confused with the "Chain of Command"... The "Circle of Command", as he explained it, was... A ship is only as good as her Captain, a Captain is only as good as the crew, and the crew is only as good as their ship... One fails, they ALL fail... I would say "Outside Influences" contribute to the circle too...

The problem with the K'Tinga was that it wasn't given enough screen time ever since the Bird of Prey debuted in Search for Spock. Then they introduced the Vor'Cha which filled the Klingon capital ship role that was originally for the K'Tinga. The K'Tinga was a victim of writers' injustice.

The real grueling thing is that the K’tinga could have been utilized in a much more effective manner. Bringing the old glory out of mothballs for one last charge on the battlefield. Use her as a troop transport and planetary siege ship. Her fire control system, aged cloaking system, lack of secondary weapons, aren’t that large of a detriment. Static defenses wouldn’t be hard to target, your opponent would already know your in the area, and your secondary disrupters are more of a point defense system.

Is the beginning a Lazerpig reference?!? A man of culture, I see.

I am also curious what part Klingon romanticism may have held in all this and the K'tinga as a symbol. It was THE Klingon ship as the Empire was at its height, its days of true glory, their powerful heavy cruiser. This may be a big part why they chose to employ it once more while hoping to go into another true and glorious war.

Old Cold War Veteran here. I like the comparisons in this video. The 23rd Century was like our Cold War era. And the Current year is like the Dominion War era.

"In war truth is the first casualty"-Hiram Johnson

The K'Tinga....the T-62 of the ST universe.

Just a hypothesis after watching this that might be worthy of a video - Starfleet and the KDF were really quite the same at the late 2350s and early 2360s. Both depending on very large fleets of obsolete ships that were 100 years old that played vital roles in fleet operations. K'tinga for the KDF and Miranda for Starfleet. Both had more advanced ships in the Vorcha and Project Galaxy ships respectively but not a lot. The true difference was that Starfleet had Excelsior vs Karmalag (spell). Anyway. Starfleet got its wake up call about the real state of their fleet from the Borg. The Kingons didn't get theirs until the Cardassian invasion. Starfleet had years more time to move the Miranda's into a more suitable role and years to start upgrading their fleet to anti-Borg tactics and ships. Thus, the Federation was at least somewhat prepared as to what they would face from the Dominion, even though they still suffered greatly with all those Miranda's The Kingons had no such preparation time to upgrade their fleet (setting aside Gowron.) Their wake up to the state of their fleet left them no time to upgrade before the Dominion war and they suffered much more for it having to depend on an obsolite ship. So I guess it would be - even with the obvious better position of the Federation fleet with the Excelsior system vs Karmalag - how important was Wolf 359 to the Dominion War for the Federation vs not having such a blistering defeat for the Klingons when it came to their core obsolite ships?

In all fairness I don't think anyone actually thought the K'tinga was all that, we saw them die in droves from single hits from DS9's defensive armament

We can no longer be friends

I never thought of it that way your right the Borg may have saved star-fleet by destroying it I never payed much attention to the Klingon ships just the vorcha and the d7 and the bird of pray.

The Klingon empire is a feudal one. So It makes sense the most powerful houses would want something big and showy...

Warning for headphone users: Unexpected Klingon jump-shock at the beginning there. In the 24th century, the K'tinga has long passed its prime and the niche it was designed for no longer really exists. It does represent just how much of a shadow the Klingon Empire had become; not unlike a certain other country you repeated reference in this video. Also, what was the name/spelling of that 24th century Klingon monitor design? Krom? Crom? Ckrom?

"it's more important to be seen to be fighting the war" in some ways losing an epic battle makes a better story than winning just look at the mythology that's been spun around the various Jacobite risings and the defeat at Culloden. Also, I wonder if some of the willingness to accept sub-par vessels is an understanding that there are too many Klingon warriors for the empire to support. this is a socially acceptable way to cull that warrior class, or "if the young upstart male dies 'heroically' on the command deck of a K'tinga he can't challenge me for leadership later"

This is exactly why I'm a big fan of the Star Trek Online timeline. The KDF did have this come to Jesus moment after the Dominion War and realized its fleet was utterly inadequate and launched a huge program of modernization. By 2411 the KDF is keeping up with Starfleet using newer and more effective Birds-of-Prey and powerhouse capital ships like the Bortasqu' battleships and the absolutely colossal Vo'Devwl battle carrier. The Klingon Empire of Star Trek Online is one that learned it's lesson and decided it didn't want to be the sick man of the Alpha Quadrant anymore. Granted it still has a corruption problem but it's learned that they can't just brainlessly hang on to 100 year old ships and expect them to keep up.

Most of the Klingon empires ships in the Dominion war were obsolete older designs, plus take into account the losses with its conflicts with the cardassians previously and the federation

Someone is also a fan of Lazerpig I see...

"You don't just...upgrade things." (U.S.S. Lakota has entered the chat) I am enjoying your content quite a bit, been binging your stuff as it comes up in my feed!

Dude remember the Ukraine are using western updated T 72 battle tanks . This makes me wonder what if Star fleet helped update some of those old Klingon warships. Given how Star fleet update the excelsior class , it’s not to far off the mark to say they could do the same for the Klingons

Well done, my friend! Excellent fusion of policy and design. The sad thing is that in the hands of a more functional society, the K'Tinga, like the Miranda, could be refashioned into decent destroyers or escorts. Put in some new engines, give it a decent heavy phaser and wing disruptors, and some ventral and dorsal phasers, and it could do a decent job in that destroyer role to support the Vorcha or K'Vort. But, as you say, such a wholistic refit would require a proper scientific and industrial base for the massive refit to work. And the Klingons don't have that anymore. You know things are bad for the K'Tinga when pre-War Galor commanders see a K'Tinga and rub their hands together in anticipation and pre-order the celebratory kanar.

Am a lazerpig subscriber for a long time and am very very proud of you

I always imagined they gave these ships to old veterans for basically suicide missions. Funny we don’t see Klingon ramming attacks so much, seems up there alley.

I don't care how good or bad was in universe, the K'tinga and the BoP simply are some of the most bad ass looking designs in all of trek :)).

Personally, I think it's because it's available en masse. Like the mirandas in the federation. it is a ship with a known legacy, but certainly not a first-rate ship. Also, If my memory is correct, DS9's deffences were modified with federation tech as well as the cardassian tech.

I dunno I still think it would have been possible to retrofit the K'tinga just enough, so it could be of use. Perhaps not as a frontline ship, but more of an escort and or strife cruiser. I mean the idea of making it a monitor in itself was not a bad idea as I do think the K'tinga was still able to fit the role but certainly the implementation and execution left a lot to be desired. I would just up the weapons, the targeting systems and the cloaking device, replace the main computer, and perhaps you could have something. Now rather if one can do this without a complete overhaul is unknown, but the overall framework of the K'kinga is robust enough, so I think it could work if given time. Its that time thing is where the biggest both came from TBH.

Opening goes full laserpig...... I keep a sub. In all honesty the K'tinga languished in the TNG era due to a major focus on Bird of prey development and the Vorcha and Neg'varh programs. If properly upgraded or given a successor based on it's frame it would serve a very good light battlecruiser role. The fact that in STO the K'tinga has a 25th century "refit" that is an entirely new ship built around it's old concept and is shown to be a powerful ship says something about the base frame.

Klingon Armchair Generals must be on a whole 'nother level.

K'tinga sounds like armpit smell in portuguese. I always get a grin when hearing it's name

The Ktinga is an ancient ship that was updated from the even more ancient D-7 . Instead of creating an entirely different ship. They refitted old ships with new technology. This would make it compared to the Constitution class refit.

Clicked for a deconstruction of K'tinga in DS9 and Khitomer Massacre, got a decent commentary of the Ukraine conflict.

Great video and analysis. Love you bringing some real world events as examples. Again your ability to read between lines and expand the Trek universe warfare, is next level.

1st People seems to always underestimate the Klingon Emperor. If the Federation did not save the Detapa Council the Klingon would have won the war befor it even started. 2nd with Martok as the new Chancellor the Emperors was only going to be getting stronger.

There are limits to how far a platform can be upgraded. With any platform, there is a finite amount of space that can be used for upgrading and improving it. Eventually, you just run out of space.

Well, we do kind of have the Fek'lhr-class lighter cruiser, from Starfleet Command III and Armada 2, as I recall? Over a hundred metres longer than the K't'inga, packs a good portion of a Vor'cha's mass and firepower... May not be numerous or flexible enough, though, to replace the K't'Inga outright, yet.

I'd also point out that in that volley of return fire from DS9, They also knocked out a minimum of 2 Vor'Cha. Total losses of Vor'Cha 6, Total Losses of K'Tinga 11. -MemAlpha, Take with salt. I'd say for such an old ship, it wasn't too far behind the Vor'cha in losses. If we want to take that battle as an example, from what we see, Vor'Cha didn't stand too much better a chance than K'Tinga. And many of their losses would have been mitigated if the didn't close to point blank range to make attack runs. K'Tingas should of sat back and Pummeled DS9 from range, it's the perfect job for them. They didn't do that, and they got wrecked for it. That's a failure of Tactics, not a failure of equipment. Feels like a bit of a Swing of the Pendulum too far to one side here. K'Tinga was old as balls, sure, but it wasn't as bad as you are making it out to be.

Congratulations Venom: you made the Miranda's fans feel a little less down-trodden.😁

It all goes back to the destruction of Praxus. The Klingon Empire fell considerably after that and never really recovered. The infiltration by the Shape Shifters also slowed much progress of rebuilding. K'Tinga Warships were built as you say in the 23rd Century and the Klingon's had very little natural resources and financial means to build any new significant fleets/space faring ships. I would compare the Klingon Empire to North Korea, starving its masses while building a few nukes and new missiles, outfitting most of the infantry with new small arms/uniforms while riding into war in 1960's/70's armor fighting vehicles.

The upgrade argument kinda explains why the tos constutiom and tmp constitution look like different ships is basically is a different ship

Topical! And I agree- the K'Tinga's performance in the battle of Kiev was abysmal. It was as if they weren't even there.

I remember my mother got my a napoleononic war chess set . ( napoleon is King Josephine, queen, ect ) wonderful figures. ( birthday present. I think o was 12ish )

Ohh, the nostalgia hit when you started the engines part...

I can't understand why the Vorcha wasn't put into mass production. Seemed odd to me

Killer vid Micheal! Thank you!

God, imagine klingons beaming whole elite marine regiments into the void instead of DS-9, then losing their flagship to the planet without navy, then losing thousands of ships because the fuel tankers got bogged down in the space mud or something, and many, many other things happening to them. The memes, Jack!

OMG love that opening!

So a half hour video to tell us that the K'tinga is really, really old? Thaanks.

The president of Belarus with a presentation on the K'tinga bit. That was awesome. 🤌

The real problem, for all countries who use Tanks, IFV, APC etc... Is that there is a new generation of Anti-tank weapons, which are capable of knocking out any modern MBT, and many forces across the world possess these relatively cheap weapon systems Its not just the Russians loosing tanks, propaganda on both sides are not showing their own losses or the scale of said losses Other conflicts in recent years has demonstrated the same results in regards to the loss of armored vehicles and light armored vehicles. This is why laser based defense systems are being developed and deployed to see and knock out incoming rounds and missiles, by groups like DARPA and Rienmettal. We only are talking about this now, because western media Dosen't show the losses of western forces on tv.

Can't believe gallon was replaced with a shapeshifter

What's the point of the long neck, it looks like a major weakness. There don't seem to be any important systems inside of it, so why don't just remove it and shorten the way between the bridge and the rear section?

Multiple factors why the Klingon stop their Invasion. 1. Dominion threat. Didn't want to lost many ships so soon. It wasn't a question if Dominion would invade. It rather when. 2. Not wanting to risk open war with Federation, especially with Klingon forces divided with one third of their forces on other side of Federation with their leader trap behind enemy line. 3: cut supply if war opens. Klingon force would need time to dig in the occupied space they took. They likely didn't think Federation would react so quickly as they did. 4. Cardassins while putting up a stiff resistance would likely be overrun or at least Klingon would be in striking range to threaten Cardassins prime. They were going through some changing the guard and government reforms when suddenly attack. Compare being under the Dominion were they was more organized. 5.DS9 was more of a challenge then previous believe along with Federation reinforcements which I do believe was key objective to take at some point after the invasion. Ultimately, the situation was becoming more hotter then Klingon were expecting.

An excellent video, both in acknowledging your missteps and correcting them. While I would like to have seen a more content on the new KDF Montior, it was still a great video. Also...would you say this was a T-80 but in space? On a side note, if you still wanted to support the UAF based on the current situation- why not videos covering thr Earth-Romulan War? (Outside the battles as I know those were covered)

Personally, I think the K'tinga shows the problem with Tex Talk Battletech's Good Enough argument. Good enough for a brief time to be a mass-produced capital ship, but quickly fell behind as evident when the new light poor man ships the Miranda Class Light Cruiser, later Frigate, was able to beat it in one on one combat, and Starfleet produced the next line of Standard Cruiser, the Excelsior. Honestly, I think the only ship that would follow further from grace is the Scarb (Jem'Haddar Attack Fighter) Class Attack Ship. I mean, it was a ship made to be built in mass numbers and be good enough to threaten others in mass numbers. It quickly became one of the slowest ships at FTL and later Impulse to other similar size ships, and its weaponry was limited. I suspect that in the next 30 years, the Dominion will need to find a replacement if they continue a rivalry with the Alpha and Beta Quadrants. Also, I hate to tell you this, but once you reach a certain design, it is really hard to justify making a new class. There is a reason all tanks, warships, and aircraft look similar to how they look in the 1970s, we kind of reached a sort of Plato in design that outside inner components, there is not more you can do to improve it. So they generally either upgrade ones or design similar models with new components to be built to replace aging older models (F-15C to F-15EX being a good example). That is why I don't find it weird to see the Excellisor still in service a hundred years later. It's a fairly good armored design for a standard cruiser that was designed to be upgradable after Starfleet learned its lessons from the Constitution. Then making the Obena and Excelsior II with just incorporated new technology while keeping the prime design for Starfleet still need a brawling armored standard cruiser to fight with their heavier counterparts. I mean to put in protection from working with the US Airforce, to build a C-5 Super Galaxy, it cost 1.6 billion to build a new one. Upgrading an old one by replacing the engines and inner components to get the same performance level, cost around 300 million. While old, we can get 40 more years of life before we have to retire so we just upgrade them.

Got a soft spot for it though...

K'Tinga the Klingon Excelsior. Could we get a video on the Klingon Alliance (or assistance/aid) to the Federation Sect the Marqis? That will be interesting.

It does have a bussard ramscoop, on the aft superstructure ahead of the shuttlebay.

The fact that any factions in the Trek universe use hundred-year-old ships has always baffled me, especially the use of ancient K’Tingas in the Dominion War. This video makes so much sense; thank you!

Was not expecting a Lazerpig rant for the intro 😂

I clicked on this thinking I would hate it, but you gave very good and thoughtful points and now I don't think I can watch a ds9 episode again with this ship in it and take it serious anymore...👍👍👍🖖 Good job

Brilliant analysis and tie in to modern events. Is the K'tinga basically a T-64? Excellent in its prime, but upgrades can only take a 60 year old frame so far?

Would there have been a better way to modernize the K’tinga? Like as a destroyer similar to the Miranda or could it not have had the agility to do anything like that?

So basically the Ktinga is like the klingons version of an excelsior or miranda, built in the late 23rd century and by the time of the dominion war effectively no longer fit for purpose, even with refits. That a bit like with buff up Galaxy class varients, of said war, necessitated a complete rebuild as anew class to make it useful as a warship again.

Honestly I think the VFX artists just had the same kind of fun with the K'Tingas as they did with the Mirandas, which was that they had a recognizable ship to use as cannon fodder. Of course, they also rather annoyingly seemed to forget that shields were a thing, which is why you had fans inventing reasons for that (hull-hugging shields instead of the traditional layered bubbles because reasons). In universe it really doesn't have to be any more complicated than the fact both the K'Tingas and Mirandas were both 100 year old designs that were just inadequate both defensively and offensively against more modern ships using more modern weapons and shields.

PhaserTorg showing once again why the Klingon's stopped really being a power that's just been coasting bye on their reputation.

It's common practice for militaries to find use of older platforms - it's a huge hunk of steel / duranium you got to put together for new ships. In war you need numbers so it's either that or you accept producing low quality new platforms (ala Liberty boats in WW2). Mind you NATO also keep M-60s and Leopard 1's around. In terms of use / tactic, they can still serve for lower tier missions. Not every outpost is DS9. KDF can probably set up fire brigades to bombard softer targets like mining colonies.

Back in your Dominion War Arms Race video, you mentioned the Starfleet doctine shift for units sizes. In particular interoperation with Klingon forces. The K'tinga may do marginally better with Starfleet forces. It is still designed to fight another kind of war.

The K'tinga's loss is the Kreosian F5's gain.

I appreciate the missile meme reference.

I wonder how much it frosts K'tinga commanders than an Excelsior can be equipped with quantum torpedoes and modern phasers and shields. The Federation can deploy their outmoded ships to some degree of success, while theirs just demonstrate the extent of the power creep since the time of Kirk.

5:35 : 'Bolognium engine shields', huh? 😉

i seen way way more propaganda from Ukraine then Russia.

The issue is that the Klingons kept the D7/K'Tinga in production for waaaaaaaay too long, relying on quantity rather than quality and lacking the Federations huge industrial base, the Federation can do both quality and quantity. By the standards of the time the Excelsior class was a huge overmatch for almost anything out there, and they farted them out in huge numbers. The Klingons with the D7 had a decent ship, it was a match for the Constitution class and they would probably have a numerical advantage. But as the Federation moved onto the Excelsior and Ambassador the KDF didn't move on and just kept iterating on the D7 and its family. Whilst the KDF probably did have other designs for larger ships (we see some in Klingon Academy) the empire was set up to keep churning out the D7/K'tinga classes and all they could really do was iterate on them as best they could to get the best performance out of a clearly aging ship. As time went on even the growing obsolecence of the D7 couldn't be ignored and we get the KDF switching over to the Vor'cha as its main cruiser but there was so many hundreds of K'Tinga's in service that they couldn't replace them all. Although we'd probably see the K'tinga being shuffled into the House Fleets as the Vor'cha comes online in greater numbers. Really the K'tInga saw its best days as the Ambassador and co came out, it was still inferior to them individually, but would probably have the numerical advantage. Of course, this advantage went out the window as the Federation just spammed the Excelsior which was still a massive overmatch for the K'Tinga.

I love this shit. And I absolutely love the idea that these combined arms tactics of the opposing sides truly do make sence. But does it really and do all these random factiods really fit together like particular pieces of a puzzle that can be fit together into an overarching logical framework that does actually hold together, or is it really just mental masterbation?

I wonder when the D7 production stopped. Probably when the Kamarag entered production. You are absoletly right about upgraades but that doesn't mean a Mark 1 D7A from the 2260s is the same beast as a Mark 5 D7K from the 2310s.

My personal spin is this; the Klingons liked keeping ships in service, but weren't rigid in their classifications (or expectations) of them. The K'tinga stayed in service because they had plenty of them, but rather than being the main combat unit of a fleet they appeared to be downshifted into a light cruiser / fleet screen role, where the deficiencies in the design compared to newer peers in other fleets was counter-balanced by advantages from her heavy cruiser construction. This is somewhat based on the Starfleet Universe setting, where the Klingon Empire never bothered to build a 'light' cruiser, instead assigning D6 Cruisers to the job once they were replaced by the D7.

This was great. Keep it up

Any monitor in the Klingon fleet is going to struggle, I doubt the replacement for the K'Tinga did much better, because it does not fit the fast moving ad hoc tactics that Klingon's employ. I agree that the K'Tinga was a desperation move which they probably thought would work due to the weaker technology and not very agile Cardasian ships. But similar to what we are seeing in Ukraine when the opposition is provided with newer tech and faster ships from the Dominion and Breen the poor K'Tinga's are going to have a really bad time.

so, the k'tinga is basically the klingon starship equivalent of the muzzleloader flintlock musket ? (whereas other galaxy powers are using some form of 'bolt-action rifle' sort of starship, at the very oldest ?)

Interesting take. I, too, felt the inclusion of K'Tingas in ST: DS9 felt a bit like desperation on the part of the Empire. Changing the forward torpedo tube to a lance was also kinda dumb since it would have a limited firing arc... the torpedoes that were meant to be fired from there could seek/find targets so the lance thing was kinda dumb. Still, I like the K'Tinga and perhaps not all were turned into monitors... like, say, the B'Moth from "Soldiers Of The Empire."

I really do like this long form laser pig inspired critique

For a second I thought I clicked lazerpig

@5:46 what is going on with his left hand?! I really did not think an opposite Vulcan "Live long and prosper" hand sign was possible. Yet there it is! Good gawd man -- the movie industry is helping them! He's giving them the sign that they will understand -- to "die soon and disintegrate"!

I saw the title to this and just laughed. Okay, Admiral! Convince me. 😂

The intro sounded like you were trying your best laser pig impression

Well that came out of left field. 9:43 The Undertaker in a Star Trek fan documentary!

That opening was worthy of Laserpig.

It's the lack of a refit that is the issue. The shields and targeting were outdated. If you update the targeting, you need to update the weapons since they weren't very aimable. The frame, and engines are acceptable, but likely have a lot of wear on them. With a refit you have some options. You could gut a lot out, and use it as a crew and supply transport. You could modernize all the systems, but the cost would be about the same as building a new ship. You could update only what needs to be updated, but you have half the cost of a new ship, and only get a less reliable ship that is 80% as good as a new one. I'd opt for a mix of refits to keep the enemy guessing. Some fully updated to project the power of the design. Some partially updated to provide support from the rear of the fleet. Some as supply ships, that might not even still have weapons (you can store a lot of gagh in a gutted torpedo room).

That intro gave me big lazerpig energy

About accuracy you said couldn't hit the a barn door. There's actually 3 levels of this. The one you mentioned, 2. Can't hit the broadside of a barn door and 3. Can't hit the broadside of a barn door with the broadside of another barn door.

Mind warning us when you open like this video so I can turn down the audio and not have the dog jump up and hit the ceiling. I'm going to go change my shorts now.

Hi lazerpig called said he wanted his wine back.....

So, I suspect you have been picking up some influences from Lazerpig and his video on the T-37, judging by that intro. I expect further videos by 24th Century military historian Phasertarg

I wonder how badly would the Constitution-class Heavy Cruiser Refit if the ships has been retained into service just like the Miranda-class Light Cruiser. So how would that class fair into the Dominion War?