Perfect sense, not all ships the travel the stars, are starships.
This could explain how the TOS Enterprise was both a "Constitution class," and a "Starship class" at the same time.
How many ships?
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This could explain how the TOS Enterprise was both a "Constitution class," and a "Starship class" at the same time.
It was spelled out in "Bread and Circuses"
CLAUDIUS: You're a clever liar, Captain Kirk. Merikus was a spaceship captain. I've observed him thoroughly. Your species has no such strength.
MERIK: He commands not just a spaceship, Proconsul, but a starship. A very special vessel and crew. I tried for such a command.
http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/43.htm
And remember, in TOS proper it was never Constitution class, but Starship class, as per the bridge plaque. And there were only 12 like her, as per "Tomorrow is Yesterday"
I don't think anyone is suggesting the Connies are the only ships called starships, just that all warp driven ship aren't referred to thusly.
Starship is a smaller group of ships, if starfleet has support ships they might not be called starships, even if they have warp drive. Civilian shipping the same thing.
Starship is a smaller group of ships, if starfleet has support ships they might not be called starships, even if they have warp drive. Civilian shipping the same thing.
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Maybe. But certainly if there were something like one of Franz Joseph's Saladin class destroyers running around, I'd think of that as a Starship too. But I wouldn't expect Kirk to think of it as being "like the Enterprise".
Maybe. We really don't have any canonical indication of what exactly qualifies a ship as a Starship.
One thought I had - it may be like a "Dreadnought". Dreadnought was a specific ship, and Dreadnought was a type of battleship. But since HMS Dreadnought was such a revolutionary type of ship with many advancements, ships that shared those advancements were called "Dreadnoughts" and others "Pre-Dreadnoughts", even though both were subtypes of the Battleships. And later still there were "Super-Dreadnoughts".
So "Starship" may refer to a group of ships of different classes, used just because they are so much better than what went before even though they are technically still the same sort of ships.
Just a thought.
When I first heard the term "starship", my assumption was that it was just a fancier sounding way of saying spaceship, while also implying it's an interstellar spaceship. It seems to have been the assumption most people have made. I think it's probably best to ignore the reference in Bread and Circuses because it requires too much mental gymnastics.
I would write off the "Starship Class" thing as well. It's nothing more than sixties writers and prop makers trying to improvise lingo that sounds futuristic. It doesn't mesh with the way the word is used in real life for both civilian and military ships, nor is it used that way in aviation or space travel.
I would write off the "Starship Class" thing as well. It's nothing more than sixties writers and prop makers trying to improvise lingo that sounds futuristic. It doesn't mesh with the way the word is used in real life for both civilian and military ships, nor is it used that way in aviation or space travel.
I don't feel we need to ignore Bread & Circuses? I mean I feel it makes perfectly logical sense most Earth ships wouldn't be Federation Starships? Like I think Starships means it's Starfleet? Those would be special ships, but there could be oh so many science vessels or cargo ships or just anything you can think of that just wouldn't be the same. Oh and even when you call someone's ship a starship, there can be like lowercase starships and uppercase Starships, and they're different, you know what I mean?
I just loved what they were doing in Next Generation with like the floating city starship, I feel that just feels so right what the Federation would do? For me it feels so much more romantic this way.
I just loved what they were doing in Next Generation with like the floating city starship, I feel that just feels so right what the Federation would do? For me it feels so much more romantic this way.
IIRC, Wasn't Merick a washout from the command track at the Academy...so we're never told
what class of ship he was with....
And I agree, they're all starships...
I get what you mean, but I just think it poses a problem with how it's been used elsewhere in the franchise, and it's a few too many leaps in logic to get there.
I'd also chime in, the conflicts in D.S.9 probably caused the Federation to re-activate ships out of services and retrofit older ones that were not battle ready (or at least ready for the battles of that series). And call back ones out on unnecessary missions (considering the doom of the Federation) that otherwise might have stayed out in the starfield.
Oh dear, some might feel endless cartoon explosions swing the awesome/suck meter the other way?
I feel too since we're in The Next Generation, should we really be so concerned about Deep Space Nine, since it's like a totally different show with a very different style? I think I'd feel different if we were like in the general Star Trek, right?
Do you mean 5,000 starships with real combat capabilities or combat as primary function? If you're saying the latter I'd disagree and say that'd be 0. I so agree with @Herbert those numbers are way, way too high, I feel Federation Starships are in the hundreds for vessels on active exploration duty. I do feel there are lesser starships that are old and such used for important courier type duties, like how we see so many old Excelsiors transporting Admirals?
I was curious about this so I googled a bit and there is some speculation by fans that the fleet could be in the 30,000-50,000 range. I'm sure it's mostly just speculation though based on events from the Dominion War.
I keep going back to what is said at the end of Best Of Both Worlds. The implication is that the fleet was severely weakened by the battle at Wolf359 and that it would take some time to get it back up to strength. If you take that as fact, then it's hard to believe the fleet by the time of the Dominion War was 30 to 50 K.
On the other hand, I believe those numbers include all ships, even small stuff like shuttles. In that event, those numbers could be viable.
I keep going back to what is said at the end of Best Of Both Worlds. The implication is that the fleet was severely weakened by the battle at Wolf359 and that it would take some time to get it back up to strength. If you take that as fact, then it's hard to believe the fleet by the time of the Dominion War was 30 to 50 K.
On the other hand, I believe those numbers include all ships, even small stuff like shuttles. In that event, those numbers could be viable.
Probably in the 500 range if there's no war going on, and not all of those are "Starships." They likely have a bunch in storage somewhere that don't run, that have been stripped of all the cool trinkets.
In DS9, they were shocked that the Dominion could build and man fleets in the 1,000's, and were scrambling to catch up.
In DS9, they were shocked that the Dominion could build and man fleets in the 1,000's, and were scrambling to catch up.
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