Galaxy class

[Carpathia86]

Hey all!

I was wondering what my fellow TNG fans like about the Galaxy class; either about the design or the ship's abilities. I feel like the class gets a lot of undue hatred, and that ain't right.

Haters, please stay out of this.

 

[Phil123]

I love it. In my top 5 starships if not higher. I don't find it particularly top/front heavy, and anyway like that matters in space.

I get that the inside looks a bit like a hotel, but they were going for a ship so advanced it could be that comfortable.

It's a beautiful ship that looks like it's from a more civilised future, something they strayed away from in later ships.

Such a wonderful evolution from the 1701 refit and the Excelsior. Totally different, but still recognisable.

 

[Timo]

Built to last. That is, designed with such frugality of elements that little or nothing connects it to today, so there is nothing to become dated. No bloody gun turrets or manipulator arms or protruding docking ports to yell 20th century. No greeblies unless you look real close.

My only lament is with those rocket nozzles on the impulse engines. TOS had none, so the unfortunate case of the TOS movies could have been ignored as a brief aberration... Oh, well. At least there is no rocket blast, nothing to connect the red glow to a state of propulsion.

This is prequel maker heaven. Whenever a designer inserts an "interesting" detail to the NX-01 or the NCC-1031, for "realistic", "contemporary" look, it makes the ship look fittingly more primitive than this 1980s design gem.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Tosk]

I think she's lovely.

 

[Qonundrum]

In 1987, it looked like they changed the saucer from concave to convex (interesting), added a bunch of windows (cool), shrunk the nacelles in half (iffy), then stepped on it to give it that flat look (ugly). They still kept aspects of the TMP enterprise - glowing deflector dish (though merged it with the radar style of the 60s original) and had nacelles glowing blue all the time, even when warp engines were active but not in use. Like a car engine in idle. (TMP onward glowed blue, from the inside only, and only when warp drive was activated.)

From the start, I liked the phaser arrays. That answered a lot of questions about space combat. I also liked the saucer separation idea, though if they're traveling at warp, as long as the Engineering hull doesn't go faster, the Saucer would still coast until met by a counterforce, which would cause it to slow down. Wish they used it more and, yes, one can have drama and some action/adventure too. It didn't need to be done every week but seasons 4-7 might have had a boost. Then again, they really changed the format of the show for season 5...

By "Generations", it grew on me. I adored the design, nacelles and pancake look and all. It grew on me. Immeasurably. And is iconic. The new interior lighting, while meant to hide knackered sets, made it all look far more formidable, powerful, and cool.

Its influence on the "E" - my favorite ship design - is palpable and impeccable in design, taking the best of "1701 refit" and "E" and making something as art-deco inspired as the 1979 refit as well as combining the best bits of "D". Makes me wish the TV show had the "E" design, that's how cool it looks, even with the secondary cargo bay at the rear of the Engineering hull. Or if the movies were superior than the quality of the TV show from which it stemmed.

 

[USS Firefly]

I think the Galaxy class looks great especially in Generations.
And was happy to see so many of them in DS9 and that she could show her teeth

 

[STEPhon IT]

I thought the Enterprise was beautiful; an uber vessel, and the sucker was fast. What I found interesting was the ship sounded bombastic when it was traveling through space. Generations didn't do justice to the Enterprise; it was slow -- unlike what I'd seen from the series-- and it couldn't shoot Tri-photon torpedoes like it normally did in the series. After seeing the great strains this ship went through, it was established the windows were made out of transparent aluminum, in Generations the windows are now made of glass.

 

[Riley]

Love the E-D. My fave is the original 1701, followed by the refit and then the E-D. I LOATHE the Sovereign Class. Pure garbage IMO.

 

[Galileo7]

My favorite is the 1701-Refit/1701-A Constitution class. However, the Galaxy class was a fine ship. The 1701-E should have been a Galaxy class too.

 

[Phil123]

I used to absolutely love the Sovereign, but I like it less and less these days. I think it's where the secondary hull meets the sauser at the deflector. I love the pylons sweeping into the cool nacelles.

But between the two, D all the way.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I loved how the design looked like a skyscraper in space with all those windows when I was a kid. Then I was meh on the design. But I must admit, seeing her in HD for the first time did bring back some of the old tingles...

 

[JesterFace]

I've said it before but I'll say it again.

Enterprise-D, the most beautiful starship ever. Or should I say best looking?

 

[JesterFace]

I think I've mentioned something like this before but I'll say it again.

Enterprise-D, best looking starship ever.

 

[Carpathia86]

Here's my list of favorite hero ships/classes.
1. Galaxy class/Constitution refit (a very close tie, which makes sense since they were both designed by Andrew Probert).
2. Constitution original
3. Defiant class
4. NX class
5. Sovereign class
6. Intrepid class

I haven't watched Discovery, yet so I can't rate anything from that show.

 

[Infern0]

Beautiful ship with timeless design.

It's interior made perfect sense considering the function of the vessel, it was designed to be the best of everything starfleet had to offer and to have families on board etc.

 

[matthunter]

The E-D works because she doesn't look like something constrained by pragmatism. She's a decent warship and exploration vessel, but looks like a work of art rather than a militaristic frame or a spaceborne radio telescope. She's a flying statement of "here's how far we've come over the last century" to the TOS audience - elegant and designed for crew comfort but still capable.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I like everything except the separation mechanics. Though it makes more sense as a ship alone on a deep space mission, like a moving colony. It doesn't make as much sense as a warship.

 

[IMC Headquarters]

The luxury offered by the Galaxy class makes you forget just how freakin' dangerous space travel is. Which is a good thing when you consider you're hurling your body at unnatural velocity toward instant death should your computers err, or else you are set upon by malevolent forces. It is truly wonderful to have bright, spacious, and soft surroundings to cushion you from the cold vacuum of interstellar space with its assorted death traps. No roughing it like on the NX-01.

All the windows are nice. Like a cruise ship the views are sold as premium. No point in traveling at warp if you can't look outside. Ten-Forward is a nice touch, too.

Individual quarters have more luxury and space than a modern RV. Wow! Sign me up! Me go explore galaxy!

 

[Sareesataka]

Love the Enterprise-D. Beautiful ship. She went before her time.

 

[Arpy]

The Galaxy Class may very well be my favorite ship. It's often a toss-up between the Refit and the Galaxy. Both are brilliant for different reasons. The Galaxy is the closest to how I'd actually want us to go out into space. Forget Star Trek and aliens altogether. If it's a NASA ship, in an empty infinite amoral soulless universe, I'd be okay with all of it warping around in this thing. It says, to me, the future more than anything else that's usually overly techy and/or anachronistic.

I just wish we got to see more of it, and I wish they upped some of the futurism a bit. It certainly looks organic -- why not have parts of it grown or cybernetic, in the way Data is, if perhaps not Gomtuu?

Some unseen interiors from my thread Starships of the Galaxy Era.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I think the Galaxy class looks great especially in Generations.

There is something about the GEN version that just looks different from the TNG one, but I can't figure out just what it is.

 

[Timo]

...More texture to the surface, from shadowing of the raised detail as the ship is lit at "low angles"?

They also dragged out the separation-capable bigger model, with slightly different dimensions to the rim and all (but with less raised detail). This one gives less texture in the nice "lit by nearby stars" scenes, and more warm smooth glow.

Timo Saloniemi