How would a Gala-class super-battleship from the Duchy of Terra series compare with ships from Star Wars, Star Trek, and similar settings?
Short answerIts weapons are judged extremely powerful compared with many other settings, but the panel disagrees over whether that scale weakens the fiction or serves its intended appeal.
NotesThe Gala-class question specifies hyperfold cannons, proton beams, interface missiles, single-port hyperspace missiles, and tachyon scanners. These weapons are judged extremely powerful compared with Star Wars and Star Trek equivalents. One criticism is that Stewart's weapon effects become so large that they undermine the conflicts in his own settings, particularly Castle Federation. The reply is that he understands the scale and deliberately writes ships with overwhelming weapons because readers enjoy that approach. Millions of tonnes of displacement do not settle the comparison, since that mass is still modest by some science-fiction standards.