Part of the Enterprise mystique is that the vessel is crewed by Starfleet's finest. Naming every ship Enterprise would only tarnish the vessel's reputation. --Sran
Every Starfleet crew thinks they're the finest in the fleet. Apparently having an incredibly huge ego and mountains of self-confidence is the hallmark of a Starfleet officer. Might explain why so many of the admirals go crazy - they're conditioned to believe that they're the best of the best of the best, and their merely lucky survival from rookie redshirt to egotistical admiral isn't going to diminish their self-confidence.
But only a single crew actually earns this distinction. Unless the admiral's name is Kirk. Being chained to a desk nearly killed his self-confidence. --Sran
We have no idea the strength of the Federation fleet, so we don't know how many that way compared to it. That's because he really was the best of the best.
No but we know it has to be a large fleet because of the federation being large. Think of all the dutys. VIP transport and escort Exploration Border patrol (must take hundreds or possibly thousands of ships seeing as it borders are huge) Humanitarian aid and disaster relief. Diplomatic missions Anti Piracy and other policing duties Monitoring and surveying natural phenomenon Monitoring and spying on local and external threats Guarding the frontier Anti Terrorism Dangerous cargo transport And remeber ships between dutys are always being refited so there has to be enough in the fleet to cover ships in down time. So its obvious that starfleet consists of more than a few dozen ships. The reason you dont see many in TNG is because most the time the Enterprise is off exploring outside the federation or on its frontiers so only a few ships will be nearby.
He may not have one now, but he clearly had one during the television series and another during the films. How else do you explain the drastic change in his hairstyle before The Motion Picture? --Sran
Battles in Star Trek were usually limited to a few ships at a time until Deep Space Nine. The most notable DS9 episodes are: 3x21 - The Die Is Cast 4x01 - The Way of the Warrior 5x26 - Call to Arms 6x06 - Sacrifice of Angels 6x26 - Tears of the Prophets 7x20 - The Changing Face of Evil 7x25 - What You Leave Behind Here's a compilation video of DS9 battle sequences but it might spoil the impact of the episodes if you watch it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWi-pJLO2m4
Wasn't a lot of the Federation fleet in the Dominion War made up of Miranda class ships taken out of mothball or built quickly?
In the TNG we see alot of miranda floating about doing stuff.Same wth the excelliors Im guessing it was a easy refited reliable design. Loads were built over a number of decades with many older ones in mothball and the newer ones still out there being used.
Age. Let's ask Google... <googles> Hard to tell. A lot of people say yes but I can't be sure. Anyway, he's not wearing one now, as far as I can tell. Implants, maybe.
^I remember reading once, probably in these parts, that he insisted on doing the underwater bit in STIV to show off his then-new plugs.
I wish I could sit down more often and just watch. I'm not going to watch any clips as I don't want to ruin the experience, but I am awfully aching for some massive battles.