Quick question regarding Naval terminolgy:

[stofsk]

In the Imperium, what is the prefix for ship names? Like in the USN it would be "USS Enterprise" which stands for United States Ship Enterprise. Or the Royal Navy would be "HMS Victory" for His/Her Majesty's Ship Victory. Civilian ships go by SS Whatever, SS standing for Sea Ship I do believe.

So in the Imperium, what would it be? His Majesty's Ship? His Imperial Majesty's Ship (Never liked that one, to be honest. Always sounds pompous)?

What would a Navy ship have vs a Scout Service ship vs a Marine/Army transport vs a civilian ship?

 

[Ptah]

A couple of options:

ISS = Imperial Star Ship; or Imperial Scout Ship
INS = Imperial Navy Ship
ICS = Imperial Citizen Ship, Imperial Corporate Ship, Imperial Civilian Ship, etc.

HIS = His Imperator's Ship
HISS = His Imperator's Star Ship
SSS = Solmani Star Ship

Other alternatives:
ISV = Imperial Star Vessel

I actually always liked the pompous HMS, pompous is what made it good.

 

[Black Globe Generator]

Originally posted by stofsk:
Civilian ships go by SS Whatever, SS standing for Sea Ship I do believe.

The abbreviation "S.S." stands for steamship - "R.M.S" stands for Royal Mail steamer. Another common prefix for modern commercial vessels is "M.V." which stands for motor vessel..

IMTU "IN" is Imperial Navy, "IS" is Imperial Scout, and "IM" is Imperial Merchant. Planets use a vareity of designations - planetary navy ships serving in the colonial fleet use the prefix "CN."

 

[princelian]

IMTU, it's IDSV for civilian starships, which is Imperial Deep Space Vessel. (ISV is Imperial Space Vessel for civilian spaceships.)

For Imperial vessels, it's ISS for Imperial Starships and Spaceships_that_are_big_enough_to_name, alike.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

IMTU:

INS - Imperial Navy Ship
ISS - Imperial Scout Ship
IMV - Imperial Merchant Vessel (IMS is too close to INS)

CNS - (Solomani) Confederation Navy Ship

 

[stofsk]

Out of the ones I've read, I like ISV - Imperial Space Vessel - the most.

 

[aramis]

I like ISS, especially since it is also a Trek-Mirror-Universe reference...

 

[KrisComet]

Follow-up

Has anyone ever answered this? I always used for Imperium ships, INS, but I'm not sure that is canon.

My apologies, it seems many people did, for some reason my computer was damaged by winged space monkeys and I did not see the responses.

 

[mike wightman]

This quote is from MWM's novel Agent of the Imperium:

ship prefix. Starships of the Imperial Navy are prefixed with INS in formal usage
(“Imperial Navy Starship”). Civilian shipping in the Third Imperium is generally not
given a prefix (it’s the “100-ton Beowulf”, never the “100-ton SS Beowulf”).

 

[KrisComet]

Thanks a lot shipmate, I assumed as much, and found the same answer, after some simple google searches. I've decided to become active on this forum again, after so many years away. For some strange reason, my computer didn't show all the responses so I thought that the original question someone posted a while back had gone silent, but someone just a thoughtful and diligent as you had answered it... tks again.

 

[ShapeShifter]

SSM: Starship -- Manuoeuvre-capable only
SSJ: Starship -- Jump-capable

HPGMSS: His Pangalactic Majesty's Starship

 

[whulorigan]

Has anyone ever answered this? I always used for Imperium ships, INS, but I'm not sure that is canon.

My apologies, it seems many people did, for some reason my computer was damaged by winged space monkeys and I did not see the responses.

Also, from the old FASA material:

• ISCV - Inter-Stellar Commercial Vessel
• ISPMV - Inter-Stellar Para-Military Vessel
• ZISMV - Zhodani Inter-Stellar Military (or Merchant?) Vessel (Presumably an Imperial designator)