[Request/Balance] - Federation Warp-Ins

posted on May 20th, 2011, 9:52 am

About 7-12 were seen oncreen

attached are 2 images of the fleet, in 1 shot, 4 are visible, in another 5 are visible. it would be optimistic to assume that all 9 of those ships are distinct and there wasnt a repeat.

The exact number isn't known other than it's higher than TNG backstage sources originally said, but there's still not even close to as many as the Excelsior.

gene roddenberry said 6 were made, another non canon source added another 6 because starfleet wanted big guns cos the borg scared them. thats a grand total of 12, of which 3 (ent d, odyssey, yamato) are known to be destroyed.

even if you treble the estimate of 12, thats still only 36 ships.

I am still curious as to the 'replaced by Sovvie' part I keep hearing, largely due to the lack of canon in it. I assume it's strictly a FO timeline thing?

why would they continue building galaxies, when sovvies are better? they are newer, and obviously the galaxy isnt the best in the fleet anymore, the enterprise is usually the biggest/fanciest ship in the fleet.

Oh, so a 100-year-old chassis isn't old but 50 and 60-year-old chassis are old.  There's no reason that those chassis can't be refitted like you say the Excelsior's were.  Especially since the Excelsior chassis age is about double that of the Ambassador, Galaxy, and Nebula.  And the Nebula has 3 variants.

The fact that Starfleet would retires 50 and 60-year-old chassis but not retire 100-year-old chassis is illogical.

its not illogical at all. the excelsior has proven itself to be a viable ship to refit. maybe when it was designed it was made so that it would be cheap and easy to refit. a workhorse for the fleet for years to come. like the ktinga (which was even older). the galaxy was a fancy, ornate, giant ship, which presumably didnt refit as well. in an alternate universe in tng, riker had to fight starfleet to keep his ship, because they didnt wanna refit it. presumably it costs a fortune to refit a galaxy, probably more than it costs to build a newer ship.

there are plenty of devices these days which last longer than newer devices of the same function. sometimes a design is just better.

and who said starfleet is building new excels? they arent, they just refitted many. they arent building 50-60 year old chassis any more either. the akira/sabre is probably as old as they are building. and they will probably stop building them soon, and if they refit well, then they will get refitted.

a lot of these excels were probably last refitted over a decade ago, but have captains/admirals aboard them that dont want starfleet to scrap the ship they like. they have loyalty to a ship that has served them well.

Space is a far more dangerous environment for equipment than earth.

thats a silly comparison to make, boat/aircraft with spaceship. one of our boats/aircraft is built from far flimsier materials than a starship, and we dont have structural integrity fields to help keep them together. a boat sits on the water, in contact with massive amounts of water, all the time. a spaceship doesnt. its impossible to make a comparison between the two, since spaceships are so completely different from boats/aircraft.

The excelsior was a successful design, but one that was replaced by the Ambassador Class.
Once a design is no longer top of the line, production will slow down.

the ambassador didnt replace the excelsior, the ambassador was a new design all of its own, that just fitted into the excelsiors old slot of "finest ship in the fleet", probably what we would call a battleship in combat terms. the excelsior by that time had become a cruiser and was still produced. the ambas didnt replace it, and couldnt replace it. just like the galaxy couldnt.

by the time galaxies were being made the excelsior was the fleet's workhorse, it was easy to make in numbers. the galaxy is a flying city that has all the latest tech, starfleet cant afford to replace their workhorse with a cruise liner ship.

back in the days when battleships were important (ie before carriers took over) no navy would spam the expensive battleships, they would make some battleships (galaxies) and some lighter ships (excels).

starfleet couldnt afford to spam galaxies, the galaxy was produced in very small numbers.

in fleetops time, starfleet wont spam sovvies, the akira is now the workhorse, the akira is the replacement for the excelsior. look at those attached pictures and see that akiras are numerous. sabres/steamies too. galaxies are not the workhorses, that was the excel, then the akira.

What episode is that??? I'd love to see a lil tiny Nova kick down a ship that is supposed to be the Klingon flagship. Isn't that like the best that the Klinks got (on the show)?

as said above, its endgame, and it doesnt kick down just 1, it embarasses 2 of them at the same time.

and yes somehow that imbecile kim got promoted to captain. i dunno what the writers were thinking having 2 neggies there. why not just make it 1 vorcha? that could still take any shuttle down, and would have still made it completely obvious that janeway's super armour is reallly really really tough. but no, her armour had to shrug off 2 battleships, making the klingons look pathetic.

But isn't it also possible that the Ambassador was built for a specific purpose and not for mass production.

i think that is the case. it was the biggest ship at the time, the prestigious ship. the class that got the uss enterprise. they cant afford to spam them. they were built for the same reason the galaxy and sovvie were, the showcase federation tech/expertise/fly the flag. everyone knows that starfleet as a military force depends far more on excels/akiras/other workhorses.

Attachments

posted on May 20th, 2011, 11:52 am

attached are 2 images of the fleet, in 1 shot, 4 are visible, in another 5 are visible. it would be optimistic to assume that all 9 of those ships are distinct and there wasnt a repeat.

The number doesn't only include the fleet, but also various shots from the fight with ships in different areas going in different directions. There's nothing to say they aren't seperate ships, either.

That we also don't see most of the fleet, either all the ships at the fight or the ones in other fights, probably doesn't help.

gene roddenberry said 6 were made, another non canon source added another 6 because starfleet wanted big guns cos the borg scared them. thats a grand total of 12, of which 3 (ent d, odyssey, yamato) are known to be destroyed.

What Roddenberry said doesn't always match canon. Your attached image with the fewest number of the ships already shows more were built than he claimed. 3 + 4 = 6?

why would they continue building galaxies, when sovvies are better? they are newer, and obviously the galaxy isnt the best in the fleet anymore, the enterprise is usually the biggest/fanciest ship in the fleet.

Why would they only build the best? They don't mass produce Sovereigns, despite being the best ships. They still build less capable ships and nothing ever said Sovereign was better. More advanced and with more guns, but that doesn't always make it better by default.

Anyway, don't you normally shoot down the 'X replaced by Y' claims?

posted on May 20th, 2011, 12:03 pm

What Roddenberry said doesn't always match canon. Your attached image with the fewest number of the ships already shows more were built than he claimed. 3 + 4 = 6?

thats why i mentioned that someone else mentioned another 6 to make 12. gene roddenberry died before ds9 even if you're generous, there are at most a couple dozen galaxies.

Why would they only build the best? They don't mass produce Sovereigns, despite being the best ships. They still build less capable ships and nothing ever said Sovereign was better. More advanced and with more guns, but that doesn't always make it better by default.

Anyway, don't you normally shoot down the 'X replaced by Y' claims?

in this case its about role. the galaxy had its role as biggest and fanciest and costly ship. the sovvie took that role over, carrying the flag. neither ship was that important to starfleet as a military force, like the japanese yamato class ships werent really important in WWII, it was about carriers and tactics. starfleet relies on the workhorses to be the backbone, excels and akiras. with the galaxy being "bigger" in the sense of having more mass and more metal going into it, but the sovvie being more technologically advanced, i would expect them to be about the same relative cost. ie they are both about as difficult to produce as each other considering the difference in time in which they are constructed.

also i personally consider the galaxy a failure, the idea of a flying city seemed to be a failure. and the class itself seemed to get its arse kicked a lot.

the sovvie was a refined version. i personally think starfleet would make even fewer sovvies than they made galaxies, as the role of ship isnt very important and starfleet spent loads of money on galaxies getting destroyed, then had a war that's left them weak. you cant build enough of these grand ships to do the two most important functions of starfleet, be a military force, and explore the galaxy. you need more practical ships like akiras to do the grunt work. the sovvies (and the galaxies that havnt been scrapped/killed yet) are there to fly the flag and get the new federation members aboard.

[Tyler]

posted on May 20th, 2011, 12:19 pm

Last edited by Tyler on May 20th, 2011, 12:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.

also i personally consider the galaxy a failure, the idea of a flying city seemed to be a failure. and the class itself seemed to get its arse kicked a lot.

Now you're bringing plot and Riker into it? Convincing... not that 'flying city' fail means much, just build it without as much civilian stuff or as many of the useless type of civilians. City fail solved.

Going by plot, the Galaxy would actually be one of the better ships as it's one of the only ships that have never been defeated in a fair fight. All 3 deaths (and non-death defeats) required plot-induced stupidity or its defense removed entirely.

the sovvie was a refined version. i personally think starfleet would make even fewer sovvies than they made galaxies, as the role of ship isnt very important and starfleet spent loads of money on galaxies getting destroyed, then had a war that's left them weak. you cant build enough of these grand ships to do the two most important functions of starfleet, be a military force, and explore the galaxy. you need more practical ships like akiras to do the grunt work. the sovvies (and the galaxies that havnt been scrapped/killed yet) are there to fly the flag and get the new federation members aboard.

The Sovereign hasn't been shown enough to give the impression there's anything similar about them. It showed none of the same abilities as the Galaxy, which had an entire series of 'character development' that the Sovereign lacks.

in this case its about role. the galaxy had its role as biggest and fanciest and costly ship. the sovvie took that role over, carrying the flag. neither ship was that important to starfleet as a military force, like the japanese yamato class ships werent really important in WWII, it was about carriers and tactics. starfleet relies on the workhorses to be the backbone, excels and akiras. with the galaxy being "bigger" in the sense of having more mass and more metal going into it, but the sovvie being more technologically advanced, i would expect them to be about the same relative cost. ie they are both about as difficult to produce as each other considering the difference in time in which they are constructed.

A fully constructed version is probably similar in cost, though built half-finished like the Galaxy might not be the same story.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 12:42 pm

Now you're bringing plot and Riker into it? Convincing... not that 'flying city' fail means much, just build it without as much civilian stuff or as many of the useless type of civilians. City fail solved.

what else can you do with a giant flying bucket? put more crew in it? dont need that many crew. put more tech in it? what more can you put, they had enough labs and stuff already. carry troops? they already have troop transports for that (mentioned in ds9 needing an escort, probably not a well armed ship). evacuations? use dedicated transports and medical ships. the only things that you could do with the space are extremely situational, and dont warrant building such a complex and expensive ship.

the reason they build these sorts of ships (just like the reason navies on earth built huge ships when smaller ones were more cost effective) is that they like to have a small number of prestige ships, to fly the flag, and show that the feds are clever and important.

Going by plot, the Galaxy would actually be one of the better ships as it's one of the only ships that have never been defeated in a fair fight. All 3 deaths (and non-death defeats) required plot-induced stupidity or its defense removed entirely.

theyve been defeated (not destroyed, just damaged/embarassed) many times in tng, a lot of the time they technobabbled a solution or picard speechified the enemy to death. they lost a galaxy class (the ent D) despite it having plot armour a kliometre thick )

yeah a lot of these were just shitty writing, like rascals. but such a giant spending of resources cant afford losses.

The Sovereign hasn't been shown enough to give the impression there's anything similar about them. It showed none of the same abilities as the Galaxy, which had an entire series of 'character development' that the Sovereign lacks.

what things could the galaxy do that a sovvie couldnt? the only advantage it has is in sheer space inside. otherwise the sovvie has to be better in almost every other way. the sovvie is still massive, it almost certainly has plenty of labs and stuff. the role for the ships dictates what the design. impractical, costly, but showcases all of starfleet's best stuff, best tech, best crews.

[Tyler]

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:18 pm

Last edited by Tyler on May 20th, 2011, 1:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

We are comparing a ship with much canon formation and plot convinience to a ship with little canon information and plot priority. How did we even get here? We started out talking about numbers already built!

what else can you do with a giant flying bucket? put more crew in it? dont need that many crew. put more tech in it? what more can you put, they had enough labs and stuff already. carry troops? they already have troop transports for that (mentioned in ds9 needing an escort, probably not a well armed ship). evacuations? use dedicated transports and medical ships. the only things that you could do with the space are extremely situational, and dont warrant building such a complex and expensive ship.

They'd do exactly what they already do; more free space for future upgrades or diplomatic functions.

the reason they build these sorts of ships (just like the reason navies on earth built huge ships when smaller ones were more cost effective) is that they like to have a small number of prestige ships, to fly the flag, and show that the feds are clever and important.

They're not the best, and your comment about only building a ship if it's the best would oppose them being built.

theyve been defeated (not destroyed, just damaged/embarassed) many times in tng, a lot of the time they technobabbled a solution or picard speechified the enemy to death. they lost a galaxy class (the ent D) despite it having plot armour a kliometre thick )

They've been damaged, but only a few shots were fired to show the enemy was serious while the Enterprise almost never fought back. Defeat would imply a fight happened, it never did. Technobabble and speech proves little, as they resolve disputes with races that have pre-ENT era ships that same way. It's just Picards way.

Enterprise has plot armor most of the time, but Generations had the plot in the Klingons favor. We all know the plot wanted its shiney new Sovereign.

The Galaxy never used it's full power against anyone but the Borg, so nothing says the advantage some aliens have would mean victory. They're likely stronger than the pacifist battleship Picard ran, but strength never works for non-Borg.

but such a giant spending of resources cant afford losses.

Same with the Sovereign, but that argument goes against any large-sized ship.

what things could the galaxy do that a sovvie couldnt? the only advantage it has is in sheer space inside. otherwise the sovvie has to be better in almost every other way. the sovvie is still massive, it almost certainly has plenty of labs and stuff. the role for the ships dictates what the design. impractical, costly, but showcases all of starfleet's best stuff, best tech, best crews.

The Galaxy is multi-purpose, the Sovereign has only shown good weapons and combat systems. The Galaxy was shown to be capable of most jobs, the Sovereign has not. We don't know what the Sovereign role is because we don't know what it has inside it, though Nemesis implies it's happy to waste plenty of space on bottomless pits.

Never being seen in peace-time (except 1 diplomatic function, supposedly during the War) doesn't add much information.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:34 pm

though Nemesis implies it's happy to waste plenty of space on bottomless pits.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:41 pm

I think of the Sovereign as a larger, better equipped defiant, focused on fighting the enemies of the federation and being able to get there quickly, the galaxy however is more focused towards exploring, hence the labs etc, but is still able to defend itself well, not go on the attack like the sov. So the roles are quite different.Also in war, while the sov would be at the forefront, i feel the galaxy would be a command and control style ship, directing other ships to where needed. However the "flagship" type of ship is usually the most technologically advanced design of the time, which would be the Sovereign, since how the galaxy was becoming slightly out of date

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:55 pm

Just slap a third nacelle and that undersaucer mega-phaser and she won't be outdated.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:57 pm

They'd do exactly what they already do; more free space for future upgrades or diplomatic functions.

lol upgradability isnt about how many empty rooms you have free for new technobabble generators. face it, the galaxy used that space for an experiment of having a city in space, that experiment was quickly abandoned when every angry race in the galaxy started shooting at the enterprise for fun.

They're not the best, and your comment about only building a ship if it's the best would oppose them being built.

the galaxy and sovvie are the best. it was even stated explicitly in tng that the galaxy was their most advanced tech. galaxies and sovvies were always prestigious assignments, everyone wanted to be on starfleet's fancy ship.

and i never said this role of ships shouldnt be built. there is a role for galaxy/sovvie, its low production numbers, and do some diplomacy and flying the flag. that is a role. its not the most crucial role, but its a valid reason to build them in low numbers (which appears to be what starfleet did with both classes).

They've been damaged, but only a few shots were fired to show the enemy was serious while the Enterprise almost never fought back. Defeat would imply a fight happened, it never did. Technobabble and speech proves little, as they resolve disputes with races that have pre-ENT era ships that same way. It's just Picards way.

we must have different memories of tng then, because they got in fights often and beaten quite frequently. the galaxy was full of too many civilians to be perfect at combat.

The Galaxy never used it's full power against anyone but the Borg, so nothing says the advantage some aliens have would mean victory. They're likely stronger than the pacifist battleship Picard ran, but strength never works for non-Borg.

lol, you dont think this sounds a bit like too much love for the galaxy? explain away all its bad days by saying the only really tried against the borg (the one enemy they have no business beating in a fair fight).

Same with the Sovereign, but that argument goes against any large-sized ship.

my point was that the galaxy took way more losses than is acceptable for such expensive ships, we never saw a sovvie lost, but we never saw much of the sovvie at all, so its hard to say the sovvie was not a failure too. if they keep these big ships from taking so many losses, then they can execute their role better and not be a waste of money.

The Galaxy is multi-purpose, the Sovereign has only shown good weapons and combat systems. The Galaxy was shown to be capable of most jobs, the Sovereign has not. We don't know what the Sovereign role is because we don't know what it has inside it, though Nemesis implies it's happy to waste plenty of space on bottomless pits.

you say multipurpose, i say jack of all trades master of none. transports are better at transporting people, hospital ships are better at being hospitals, cargo ships are better at shipping. making something capable of so many tasks is innefficient, as its not gonna be doing enough work on any of its tasks to be specialised at it. thats why they refined the idea for the sovvie. making the sovvie focus on being a showcase of starfleet's awesomeness. a way to get more members and resources for the federation. also we dont know that the sovvie isnt capable of all of these, just to a lesser degree. so in an emergency the sovvie is still massive enough to perform an evacuation of a planet etc.

we did see more than combat systems in the sovvie as well. support for several advanced shuttles etc, a library for scientists to do sciency stuff in, a research lab. presumably it has nearly all the stuff the galaxy had, just less space for civilians.

that bottomless pit was down to stupid action film crap.

Never being seen in peace-time (except 1 diplomatic function, supposedly during the War) doesn't add much information.

actually we saw the sovvie 3 times, twice of those were diplomatic functions:
1) insurrection, get new allies and money
2) nemesis, make peace with romulans/remans (the mission starfleet originally sent it on not knowing shinzon was hungry)

in FC the ent was still on its shakedown, ie had no mission when the borg came and said hai.

so 2 out of 3 times starfleet were using it for diplomacy (ie flying the flag). thats a full 2 thirds of the time. all of the time if u discount shakedown cruising.

i dont think the sovvie's role is combat, the defiant has shown itself to be the best warship the feds have. for a realistic war you dont build loads of fancy expensive ships, you build something mainstream, like akiras and defiants. the sovvie is purely extravagence and pomp.

Just slap a third nacelle and that undersaucer mega-phaser and she won't be outdated.

that was one of the most stupid things star trek has ever done. perfectly matches its idiot captain admiral riker.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 1:59 pm

that was one of the most stupid things star trek has ever done. perfectly matches its idiot captain admiral riker.

Dont go on BC files and type Europa, its a 4 nacelle varient of the Galaxy....

posted on May 20th, 2011, 2:40 pm

the galaxy and sovvie are the best. it was even stated explicitly in tng that the galaxy was their most advanced tech. galaxies and sovvies were always prestigious assignments, everyone wanted to be on starfleet's fancy ship.

Talking about the smaller ships...

we must have different memories of tng then, because they got in fights often and beaten quite frequently. the galaxy was full of too many civilians to be perfect at combat.

Fights? 1 or 2 shots to announce presence and intent isn't a fight. Trying to talk through problems also isn't a sign of defeat, it's a sign the captain doesn't like to fight. Not all captains are like Kirk.

Having civilians aboard doesn't make it less perect as a fighter, the captain caring about them does. Stick Klingons as the command crew and you'de never know there were civilians.

lol, you dont think this sounds a bit like too much love for the galaxy? explain away all its bad days by saying the only really tried against the borg (the one enemy they have no business beating in a fair fight).

I like the Galaxy, I already accepted the Sovereign and Defiant (probably a few other ship) are stronger and the Intrepid is more advanced. I don't justify the bad days as 'not trying' (though it's justified as Picard rarely ever passed went 'warning shot', bloody frenchman), I justify them as plot putting a good show (or I assume that was the writers intended when they had it CAPTURED BY FERENGI!) before anything else.

my point was that the galaxy took way more losses than is acceptable for such expensive ships, we never saw a sovvie lost, but we never saw much of the sovvie at all, so its hard to say the sovvie was not a failure too. if they keep these big ships from taking so many losses, then they can execute their role better and not be a waste of money.

Considering the fleet already Starfleet has, 3 ships worth of resources is probably notgoing to be missed that badly. Even crew losses weren't that low for 2 of them.

you say multipurpose, i say jack of all trades master of none. transports are better at transporting people, hospital ships are better at being hospitals, cargo ships are better at shipping. making something capable of so many tasks is innefficient, as its not gonna be doing enough work on any of its tasks to be specialised at it. thats why they refined the idea for the sovvie. making the sovvie focus on being a showcase of starfleet's awesomeness. a way to get more members and resources for the federation. also we dont know that the sovvie isnt capable of all of these, just to a lesser degree. so in an emergency the sovvie is still massive enough to perform an evacuation of a planet etc.

we did see more than combat systems in the sovvie as well. support for several advanced shuttles etc, a library for scientists to do sciency stuff in, a research lab. presumably it has nearly all the stuff the galaxy had, just less space for civilians.

that bottomless pit was down to stupid action film crap.

Specialists do a better job at there specialty, but are mainly useless at anything else. I've been saying 'we don't know X' about the Sovereign already. Your own assumptions about the Sovereign sound quite like the 'all eggs in one basket' complaint about the Galaxy...

It has a shuttlebay, the Galaxy has a shuttlebay. It has shuttlecraft, the Galaxy has shuttlecraft. No detail there about how much more advanced they were, whatever difference there may have been.

Scientists don't work in a library, they work in a lab. Why they even had a library when any console would be good enough I dont get.

actually we saw the sovvie 3 times, twice of those were diplomatic functions:
1) insurrection, get new allies and money
2) nemesis, make peace with romulans/remans (the mission starfleet originally sent it on not knowing shinzon was hungry)

in FC the ent was still on its shakedown, ie had no mission when the borg came and said hai.

so 2 out of 3 times starfleet were using it for diplomacy (ie flying the flag). thats a full 2 thirds of the time. all of the time if u discount shakedown cruising.

i dont think the sovvie's role is combat, the defiant has shown itself to be the best warship the feds have. for a realistic war you dont build loads of fancy expensive ships, you build something mainstream, like akiras and defiants. the sovvie is purely extravagence and pomp.

1 time it happened, the other it was the only ship close enough that was capable (naturally).

Defiant is the best fighter, Sovereign would likely be more powerful and a command ship. The only time there was battle, Starfleet went out of their way to keep it away because Picard was on it.

Not that Starfleet ever settles on a particular role, anyway... as the science Defiant shows.

posted on May 20th, 2011, 2:52 pm

This is going nowhere... again, and I don't feel like rewatching 7 seasons to double-check little non-fight, so Agree to Disagree?

Our own discussion is off its own topic! It was supposed to be pre-existing numbers, not a technical comparison between it and the rest of the Galaxy...

posted on May 20th, 2011, 3:07 pm

Fights? 1 or 2 shots to announce presence and intent isn't a fight. Trying to talk through problems also isn't a sign of defeat, it's a sign the captain doesn't like to fight. Not all captains are like Kirk.

as i said, we remember tng differently. you will defend the ship you love, even though i see it as a failure.

Having civilians aboard doesn't make it less perect as a fighter, the captain caring about them does. Stick Klingons as the command crew and you'de never know there were civilians.

its not the civilians that bring down the combat abilities, its the fact that the ship was designed with loads of useless civilians in mind that is the problem. more room for civilians = less room for torp launchers.

Considering the fleet already Starfleet has, 3 ships worth of resources is probably notgoing to be missed that badly. Even crew losses weren't that low for 2 of them.

losing 1 galaxy is way more serious than losing 1 excelsior/akira. the galaxy is a massive investment of resources in 1 convenient place. its so tempting a target.

Specialists do a better job at there specialty, but are mainly useless at anything else. I've been saying 'we don't know X' about the Sovereign already. Your own assumptions about the Sovereign sound quite like the 'all eggs in one basket' complaint about the Galaxy...

the sovvie probably suffers from the same issues as the galaxy in that regard, i never said it didnt. the thing is, that isnt the galaxy's/sovvie's role. it doesnt matter that they are not good at practical stuff, they werent built for that. they were built as a showcase of starfleet's prowess.

It has a shuttlebay, the Galaxy has a shuttlebay. It has shuttlecraft, the Galaxy has shuttlecraft. No detail there about how much more advanced they were, whatever difference there may have been.

the sovvie shuttlbay was clearly bigger, and it had a shuttle with a jeep (why? because patrick stewart loves driving )

Scientists don't work in a library, they work in a lab. Why they even had a library when any console would be good enough I dont get.

i was using scientist in a general case, basically anyone on the ship with a blue uniform and an iq higher than 100 people who would want to research stuff. including a library shows that they at least included the sciency stuff on the sovvie class, not just combat.

1 time it happened, the other it was the only ship close enough that was capable (naturally).

insurrection: they intended to be at that diplomacy thing with the vegetarian midgets. they werent just the closest ship.

nemesis: they happened to be the closest ship, but picard has huge experience with both the romulans and diplomacy, and would have got the mission if he was anywhere within range. who else could janeway pick? picard gives speeches like no other.

Defiant is the best fighter, Sovereign would likely be more powerful and a command ship. The only time there was battle, Starfleet went out of their way to keep it away because Picard was on it.

of course the sovvie is more powerful 1 on 1, it also is several times as big and costs many times more. if u look at combat prowess per unit of money that goes into building it and crewing it, the defiant would easily be more efficient. in the resources (including time and crew) it takes to get 1 fully combat ready sovvie, you could probably get 2 or 3 defiants which would bum rush that sovvie.

Not that Starfleet ever settles on a particular role, anyway... as the science Defiant shows.

the only time we saw them doing anything sciency was "one little ship" an episode i liked, but you gotta admit it was a huge bag of horse manure as believability goes. also that was during a war, so no sciency ships were about (most were either hiding cos they were scared, or refitted with more guns for the war)

This is going nowhere... again, and I don't feel like rewatching 7 seasons to double-check little non-fight, so Agree to Disagree?

sounds good to me.

Our own discussion is off its own topic! It was supposed to be pre-existing numbers, not a technical comparison between it and the rest of the Galaxy...

lol we answered numbers ages ago, i think we're both agreed that a few dozen is the most the galaxies got, while the excelsiors got vastly more, and hence are still around and getting refitted as they are a baseline ship. the galaxies are still around too cos they arent as old, just in far fewer numbers.

posted on May 21st, 2011, 3:45 pm

Personally I like it how it is with the warp in's and the rare ones. However I do think they need to be more costly, perhaps have a supply cost to start with. So players will really only use them for early game boosts to their fleet, or for the Descent and Teutoburg. One thing that can be annoying is Fed players who use warp-ins all the time and only build destroyers and intrepids during their game then brag that they only researched chas 1.

the excelsior vessels in service are of course not 100 years old at least not the majority which you warp-in in Fleet Operations. It is a very successful chassis, capable of everything Starfleet needs. That's why it was produced in large masses and there were a lot of resources put into refits and similar programs. Unlike the Galaxy or the Ambassador, which are more or less exotic in both their size and mission outline.

Yes some Excelsiors in TNG and DS9 have regestry numbers much higher than many Ambassadors. Ambassadors were introduced somewhere before 2344 (Yesterday's Enterprise), which is 50 years after the Excelsior was, however many of the original Excelsiors would've been retired or close to it by then.

The excelsior was a successful design, but one that was replaced by the Ambassador Class.
Once a design is no longer top of the line, production will slow down.

Take all these things in consideration it is a stretch of imagination that the vessel is still present in such large numbers 60 years (FO timeline) after it was replaced by the Ambassador.

The Ambassador never out produced the Excelsior, the design (Excelsior) proved to be reliable and Ambassadors were costly. I think I read somewhere (canon or not) that the costs of one Ambassador equaled to 3 excelsiors or something. As for the age thing, many Excelsiors in FO were no doubt built in the 2340 or 50 or perhaps during the Dominion war to boost numbers quickly. So I have no issues personally about Excelsior in FO. Also at the time of the Ambassador's introduction the Galaxy and Nebula classes were alredy being worked on, but there were numerious delays which caused the Nebula not to be launched till the mid/late 2350's and the Galaxy the follow decade in the early 2360's. Plus I think I also ready (canon this time I believe... god I hate that word sometimes) that the Sovereign herself was on the drawing board in the 2350's. Pretty much Starfleet researches a replacement as soon as the previous one hits shelves. That way they keep progressing rather than fall behind other powers.

Just my two cents.