now thats a cool ship

Thanks, matey... it came out really well I thought. Oniontrain is an amazing artist.

wow, that's excellent!

The detail on not just the ship but both of the planets is pretty incredible... well worth every red cent, this commission.

A very sleek machine, but the reveals give a sense of a more complex interior. Form follows function?

Vanguard interior design is strictly utilitarian and simple. Although vessels of battleship size are not intended for atmospheric work, they are capable of it. But the overall design is due to the way they're manufactured in modules...

...not to mention I just like the semi organic lines of it

organic shapes tend toward more complex mathematics. You're vanguard are smert fellers. Now where to put the frilly curtains?

*SOME* Vanguard are smert fellers... some are as thick as a 4x2. And you're right about the complex mathematics, something I fail at... oh to have an engineer's brain.

And if the frilly curtains are made of a Titanium/Beryllium alloy with a high tensile strength and melting point, then you're in business

But do they come in paisley? This is serious business! Oh, to travel in space, though I would probably find it boring after a while. I am a man who needs ground under his feet, though where that ground is, does not matter.

Y'know, as much as I fantasize about space-travel, the reality is that I would probably end up horribly, horribly space-sick. All that no-gravity and weird perspectives and angles and dizzying movement... ugh, I feel nauseous just thinking about it. This is why in my sci-fi universe they have artificially generated gravity on board the Vanguard vessels

So... you'd be happy as a clam dumped on somewhere like New Home then?

Yes, until I had to face the locals and saw nothing but knee caps everywhere i went. Well, at 3 meters tall, I'd see nothing but tight alien abdominals, so I suppose I can deal :D I want to try the vomit comet some time. That and sky diving. I'll save the halo jumps for the professionals.
As a side note, if an architect were to design a ship without gravity of any kind, would they need a reflected ceiling plan? I am giddy just thinking about this! Where's my data pad?

Actually with your height you'd be more looking at their pecs rather than abdominals. Still a good view At least you'd know the locals would treat you well - on that planet, anyway. Although heights freak me out, I'd actually be somewhat comfortable doing a sky-dive, it wouldn't worry me in the slightest. Go figure! I think temporary weightlessness would be okay, it's just the prolonged stuff that would make me horribly ill.

Hmm, if you designed a spaceship that did NOT have artificial gravity, you'd be popular with the Arbiters

Mmm. Alien pecs. Unsecured heights freak me out. If the structure were swaying with the wind I may panic a bit. My college career began with a ropes course with one portion being 30 feet in the air where a handrail-less swinging bridge had to be transversed. It was 20 feet long and I just kept shaking my head. it was so much fun though :D Amazing what you can do when you are actually confronted with it.
Hmm, I can do without the Arbiter love. Live and let live, and all that but...yeah, no.

Bingo, and we have a winner. Unsecured heights. At least with skydiving and the like it's high enough that height almost seems to be an abstract concept. Plus you know there is a safety mechanism there that is pretty close to 100% reliable with a backup usually.

Hardest thing I've ever had to do was bungie jumping from a bridge in Queenstown (back home in NZ). Glad I did it, but never, ever again.

Hey, arbiters have pecs? Several sets, even? All furry and lethal...

And some with appendages with guns. NOT IN THE LIVING ROOM! Go play universal conquest outside!

They'll eat your neighbours. They'll eat your neighbourhood.

Not on the grass, please. I just watered it WITH THE BLOOD OF MY ENEMIES!

My my Mr. V-taar, you do have a veritable blood-thirsty streak running through you, hmm? Is it bad this made me laugh out loud for real?
FOR THE LULZ!!

Wood flooring for easy cleaning of those many bloody footprints the Arbiters leave behind.
I do it for you, sir, I do it for you.

Actually, I prefer carpet over wooden flooring given the option. But blood out of carpet is impossible.

Not that I would know...

Awww you really know how to whisper sweet violent nothings in a man's ear, don't you?

Sure you don't...
;)
I speak softly and take no prisoners.

Taking prisoners is for the weak! It's a war out there. People are supposed to die a lot.

I die all the time! it's someone else's turn, otherwise I am taking my spaceship of doom and going home! Harumph!

You can smite the disgusting fleshies from the safety of your battleship of doom, rain death and destruction on their ridiculously bloated mortal heads from above...

But what soundtrack should I play? Oh the decisions!
How about this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCv2cgIlnHA

You had no idea, but I actually like Richard Cheese and have an entire album of his

Did you get sprung? I had a classmate play "Baby Got Back" during architecture studio every other song one night. Oh, the times we had! Richard Cheese and playing with sharp knives, all on a Tuesday night.

I have his album "Lounge against the machine"... rather good. Hmm, that night sounds like a lot of laughs... did you end up pinning your class-mate to the wall with all the sharp knives?

I ended up participating in a music war. He started this due to some shmuck listening to rap music on crappy laptop speakers in the room. He blasted them out with mister Cheese, then I added some Slipknot. They went home soon after. Loud music in the studio can be funny, but headphones are made for a reason. We cut our own fingers too many times to threaten others. You know it was time to go home when you sat staring at materials or your computer for 15 minutes and did not do anything. :D

Music wars are terrible. You can put up with some crappy music as background noise sometimes... but when played loudly it just makes you want to eviscerate something. Or someone. Not conducive to a good working environment, either.

Very true. Headphones saved my rear (and others) on many an occasion. They did nothing to protect my fingers, though. :P

I used to be quite handy with a craft knife and balsa-wood & plastic when I was younger, still have many of the scars to prove it... oh wait, that wasn't handy, that was clumsy

And well, with your taste in music it is definitely a kindness to others that you wear headphones...

(runs away and hides behind the couch)

Oh look, I found Jesus! And a $5 note! Sweet as!

My music can scare people. Then again, so can I. It just works. trust me.
What did you craft with your materials and blades and how did Jesus end up behind your couch? I hope none of those stains were his :P

JESUS IS COMING! *SPLURT*

Ahem.

All sorts of things, mainly large, scratch-built balsa-wood gliders, model rockets, models, toys. And Jesus was hiding from the Jehova's Witnesses that kept coming around to visit and inflict their Watchtower™ magazines on us...

And no, the irony wasn't lost on him, either.

Ooo...Lincard DaVinci? No fair! Even if physics did not allow your models to function properly, you had Jesus to fix that problem! :(

Standard plastic model kits I found rather boring because they were so limited, it did not require much if anything in the way of imagination. This is why the majority of stuff I built was built from scratch of my own design. The glider design I came up with worked really well and was the basis for the rocket-glider I later came up with. After studying other people's efforts with rocket gliders, I went with the sliding wing design. At launch the main wing was locked in position at the rear of the craft (centre of gravity (CG) has to be in front of the centre of area (CA) in order for a rocket to fly in a stable configuration). But I engineered it so the main wing slid forward to the front when the ejection charge in the rocket motor blew, thus altering the config from rocket to glider.

Only problem was, it's second flight was on a rather windy day. Unfortunately the massive surface area of the wings made it fly horizontal instead of vertical a few metres in the air after take-off and it smashed into an embankment under full thrust, literally exploding Its maiden flight was picture perfect, however - I was so proud.

See what happens when you get Jesus involved? Things invariably turn to crap.

You should have gotten mosses...he could have parted the embankment. So many names to remember to bring with you for different occasions and battles! this sounds very similar to pokemon...
is there video of this flight? I want to see it in action.

No, this was pre-digital... it happened in 1991 I think so almost 20 years ago.

Moses parting the embankment... and what about the hospital right behind it? It would have crashed to the ground killing thousands... Therefore, by logic, Moses = Evil, and is satan.
Although the irony of having a hospital nearby when playing with rockets wasn't lost on me

Plan A: Aim away from face.
Plan B: See Hospital
Plan C: Repeat

"Is there a doctor in the house? I appear to have a rocket-glider stuck in my face."

Well there's your problem! I have the sudden urge to sing "Rocket man". Not the way Shatner did it...

That reminds me, someone recently said that a Shatner album put out recently is actually not half bad. I shall have to remember to look it up on iChoonz sometime.

You gonna sing it karaoke style? Can I pelt you with bar-nuts and beer-soggy cardboard place-mats?

Just don't toss sharp-edged coasters at me, and we have a deal!
I don't like nuts...throw Oreos.

Oreos might not be so easy to find in a bar. But anything for you. Can it be in the form of cookies & cream ice-cream?

/me biffs a 2 litre container of it at you

Everyone's a critic...

That works. Tis one of the BEST FLAVORS EVAR! Bar Oreos sound skeevy.

I tried cookie-dough ice-cream once. Waste of time. Not very nice. But cookies'n'cream is da bomb.

Bar Oreos are skeevy. And skanky.

I want me some of that cream filling o'yours, honey!
You do not like cookie dough ice cream? And here I though you were a cool guy...
;) Kidding.
If an Oreo gets out of line, I am reaching back and slapping a ho ho (http://homepage.mac.com/craigstephe.....mages/hoho.jpg)

Wait until I get you to NZ to try some hokey-pokey ice-cream.

When I was in the US for the first time a few years back, Pete took me to a 7-11 or something and we bought lots of packets of ho-hos, ding-dongs and lots of other strange things with silly names. They were all universally AWFUL. I don't know how people can stomach them enough that they could get fat from eating them?

A lot of them taste like anything but fresh. I agree, they can be pretty awful. I stay away from them.
Sponge toffee in my ice cream? I may give it a shot. I am a simple man with simple tastes and usually go for plain vanilla.
Where in the states have you visited?

It's like plain vanilla with delicious caramelly toffee chunks... it really is rather divine. And I also like plain vanilla ice-cream. Let's get married - your BF can join in and we can pretend we're mormons without the ridiculous religion attached.

LA (only at the airport), SF (hated it), Boston (loved it), NY (meh), Washington (interesting) and Philladelphia (only stepped off the train, got scared and immediately leaped back on the next one).

I have enough crazy already to need a religion, too :P
I apologize if I frightened you when you were in Philadelphia. Sometimes I forget I am in public :P Philly has its nice parts and its bad parts, like all cities, though I found Boston to be much much cleaner, especially the subways. How do they do that? LA is just one huge sprawl, though there are some nice parts and interesting places. I have not been to San Fran, though. The other cities are nice, but I could never live there. I am glad i am living in a major city, but one day I'll settle down in the country side. I love my trees.

Ja, I hear ya on that one. Oh, so you're a Philly lad? I always liked the concept of the Philly Cheese-steak. The reality is a little disappointing compared with the theory.

SF is full of those homofaggots. You gotta watch your bum there. And actually, it's quite a dirty, unpleasant city I found. The only good thing it has going for it is once you get out of the city a bit, you can find those Fry's mega electronic mall places.

Those rock.

Nice :) I learned a friend has moved to the area near SF so i may get a chance to visit. Would you go with a steel chastity belt or a brushed nickel finish?

Actually, go with one with a Teflon™ non-stick coating. You don't want anything sticking to it and also something that can be hosed off afterward. SF isn't that bad, I guess. Especially if your friend can play tour guide for you.

I am sure she will have thoroughly explored the areas, though come to think of it, I believe she said she was out side Los Angeles, not SF. Silly me. I will go "weeeeee!" down all the hills.

LA? Weeee! down the hills until you get eaten by an LA street-gang, or choke on the pollution. Flying into LA from over the Pacific is a horrifying experience, everything is all...brown

You can buy yourself a small yap-dog to put into your man-purse.

It's European! It can be rather disgusting. I will wear a respirator next to my rocket powered nerf gun.

Definitely a unique-looking design.

Thank you... I wanted something that had an almost natural, oganic feel in terms of design, and lots of graceful curves accomplishes that more than straight lines.

Very cool looking ship, I always wondered what the Vanguard ships looked like. Love the sleek curves and the look of those weapon pods if that's what they are. Overall it's a awesome looking piece of work.

Thank you - I gave Oniontrain the general idea and let him run with it. Those little ports are for the particle-beam cannons and missile launchers, but subtly does it, no point in having bits poking out and exposed where they are easy to pick off

Yeah, it's very striking, he did a fantastic job of it, and the details are amazing.

"Wack tits onto anything"? Y'know, I hadn't really noticed before you said anything, but now that you mention it... a few of those domes on that ship kiiiiiinda look like *SMACK!*

Er... ow. Anyhoo, love the ship design... it has a really almost organic, H.R. Giger type of style to it. And those two planets in between are lookin' pretty sharp, too. All things considered, this would be a pretty sweet ride to cruise the galaxy in, although I could help but hear the imperial march in my head everytime I see it come flying by.

/me slaps you into the middle of next week

Not tits. The only tits in here are the ones getting all frisky in my user-icon.

And thank you - it was supposed to have a bit of an organic feel to it Some of the most imaginative and interesting interpretations of my creations have been done by Oniontrain. He's got a freaky-cool artistic muse when it comes to things out of the ordinary.

I AM YOUR FATHER.

That's... that's not true!! That's...NNNNNNOOOOOooooooOOOOO...*** HEY! Pony up my child support payments, old man! You own me 23 years worth!! And don't give me that crap about being out of work, I KNOW you're still getting royalties from CNN!

And I want my own Death Star! With spinning rims and neon lighting!

Even though he's creepy, old and probably dead, doesn't that "THIS...is CNN" voice just make you go a little weak at the knees? Sending you a back-dated child support cheque now... it's bouncing its way across the Atlantic as we speak. Bounce, little rubber cheque, bounce!

Bioxz, you so ghetto wid da bling.

JOIN THE DARK SIDE. We have a great dental plan.

(You get 1000 points for the rubber cheque tangent .)

Since when has old, creepy and... dead? *checks* Nope! Anyways, since when has that stopped anyone? I know Connery's knocking on 120, but with voices like that and all the tail he's demonstrably still pulling in, you just have to have some set asides. You just... you just need to make a few compromises here and there.

Oh James... James... *states at his face and gags just a little* Uh, wear the Vader mask. Gooooooooood. Now talk dirty to me...

Man you crack me up sometimes, mate. You do raise a good point, actually. Mr. Connery in The Hunt For Red October? Dear god I've never jonsed so hard after an older guy in my life. CRIKEY!

The voice thing is interesting... harking back to that voice-meme that we did a while back? Accents can go a long way to making even the most awful creature the most desirable thing in the world. Coupled with a sense of humour... you're going to make some girl (or guy) very happy one day.