Spoilers Starship Design in Star Trek: Picard

[C.E. Evans]

Wasn't that future erased when the NX-01 destroyed the Sphere network?

The future timeline that featured the Sphere Builder War may have been negated, but it's still possible that there could be an Enterprise-J during that time period doing something else. Whether that Enterprise resembles the one suggested in "Azati Prime," however, remains to be seen, IMO. It could be either the same "Universe-class" design or something totally different...

 

[cooleddie74]

Trek usually finds a way to make ships seen in the distant future still happen even if the circumstances surrouding their service become different. I won't be surprised if the 1701-J is more or less what we saw in "Azati Prime" twenty years ago.

 

[137th Gebirg]

We also have smaller things like the uniform insignias from the AGT anti-time alternate future that have started to pop up in the main timeline, slightly altered, in Picard.

AGT:

PIC:


There's no reason we can't see a Universe-class Enterprise-J in the lineage somewhere. I'm thinking we might potentially see it in some form in the upcoming final DSC season. This will either settle the matter that the E-J is prime universe canon once and for all, or solidify some people's opinion that DSC was always an alternate universe to begin with. Same shit, different day...

 

[Markonian]

We also have smaller things like the uniform insignias from the AGT anti-time alternate future that have started to pop up in the main timeline, slightly altered, in Picard.

AGT:
View attachment 39042

The same combage is in use by Starfleet in 2383 and 2384 on PRO.

 

[Tuskin38]

slightly altered, in Picard.

They also appear unaltered in Prodigy

 

[Dukhat]

The Odyssey-class is big. Big even by late 24th and early 25th century standards!

Is it just me, or is the Inquiry class far larger than it should be? I mean, look at its windows, and compare them to the other ships. They must be frickin' huge for a 640 meter ship. Not to mention that the old Eaves concept art it was based on made it look Intrepid-class-sized, precisely because it was a variant design of that class.

The future timeline that featured the Sphere Builder War may have been negated, but it's still possible that there could be an Enterprise-J during that time period doing something else. Whether that Enterprise resembles the one suggested in "Azati Prime," however, remains to be seen, IMO. It could be either the same "Universe-class" design or something totally different...

If one adopts the theory that if the Sphere Builders were not stopped in the 22nd century (which was what that alternate future was depicting), then the entire lineage of Enterprises would have been different, because they would all have been warships built to fight the Sphere Builders for the next 400 years. The entire reason why the Ent-J looks the way it does is because it was a future extrapolation of the NX-01. So the lineage of Enterprises from the NCC-1701 to the 1701-J would theoretically have been based on the original NX class design in this case, and not like the ships depicted in the prime timeline.

Trek usually finds a way to make ships seen in the distant future still happen even if the circumstances surrouding their service become different. I won't be surprised if the 1701-J is more or less what we saw in "Azati Prime" twenty years ago.

But then this could also be true (and would most likely be the case based on the familiarity with the design for the last 20 years, which would throw the above speculation out the window.)

 

[fireproof78]

Trek usually finds a way to make ships seen in the distant future still happen even if the circumstances surrouding their service become different. I won't be surprised if the 1701-J is more or less what we saw in "Azati Prime" twenty years ago.

Please no.

 

[Tuskin38]

If one adopts the theory that if the Sphere Builders were not stopped in the 22nd century (which was what that alternate future was depicting)

Daniels says that the Sphere Builders were active in the 22nd Century because they saw the Ent-J Future where they're defeated and wanted to prevent it.

So it wasn't because they weren't defeated in the 22nd Century.

 

[Dukhat]

Daniels says that the Sphere Builders were active in the 22nd Century because they saw the Ent-J Future and wanted to prevent it.

So I don't think that's true at all.

Where was that stated? I thought Daniels was showing Archer a future where the Sphere Builders had expanded the Expanse from the 22nd century to the 26th?

 

[Tuskin38]

Where was that stated?

Azati Prime

DANIELS: The Federation wins the battle, they drive the enemy back into their trans-dimensional realm. If the Federation had lost, the Sphere Builders would have spread throughout the galaxy. They would have wiped out everything. This species has technology which allows them to examine alternate timelines. They've seen this future and they want to change the outcome, so they contacted the Xindi and convinced them that humanity was a dangerous threat.

 

[Dukhat]

Azati Prime

DANIELS: The Federation wins the battle, they drive the enemy back into their trans-dimensional realm. If the Federation had lost, the Sphere Builders would have spread throughout the galaxy. They would have wiped out everything. This species has technology which allows them to examine alternate timelines. They've seen this future and they want to change the outcome, so they contacted the Xindi and convinced them that humanity was a dangerous threat.

But the Sphere Builders were defeated in the 22nd century despite what they saw in their vision of the future. So that battle will never happen.

 

[Tuskin38]

But the Sphere Builders were defeated in the 22nd century despite what they saw in their vision of the future. So that battle will never happen.

Yes, but the Battle wasn't because they were left alone in the 22nd Century.

 

[Dukhat]

Yes, but the Battle wasn't because they were left alone in the 22nd Century.

What was it then?

 

[Tuskin38]

Is it just me, or is the Inquiry class far larger than it should be? I mean, look at its windows, and compare them to the other ships. They must be frickin' huge for a 640 meter ship. Not to mention that the old Eaves concept art it was based on made it look Intrepid-class-sized, precisely because it was a variant design of that class.

I do wonder when they came up with that number, because the STO devs said CBS didn't have one when they added the Inquiry to their game. IIRC STO's Inquiry is around 400~ meters to fit with their Avenger Class.

What was it then?

We don't know.

 

[137th Gebirg]

The same combage is in use by Starfleet in 2383 and 2384 on PRO.

They also appear unaltered in Prodigy

Good catch - forgot about that!

 

[Dukhat]

We don't know.

Here's what we do know.

DANIELS: You're on Enterprise. Enterprise J to be exact, a distant relative of your ship. We're four hundred years in the future.
ARCHER: I'm going to assume you brought me here for a good reason.
DANIELS: Look out there. It extends fifty thousand light years in all directions, and it is growing.
ARCHER: I've seen it before.
DANIELS: I know, in the Expanse.
ARCHER: You know about the alien we found, the test subject?
DANIELS: He belongs to the same race that built the Spheres. They're altering this space to make it habitable for their species. It's a prelude to invasion.
ARCHER: We came to the same conclusion.

The Milky Way galaxy is 100,000 LY across. So by the 26th century, half the galaxy is covered by the Expanse. But we know that by the start of the 25th century, none of this has happened yet. And the implication is that this didn't happen overnight. So if this is still going to happen, it's going to happen at some point within a time span of a little over 100 years.

But this isn't really what they were implying. They were implying that if Archer didn't stop the Sphere Builders and make peace with the Xindi, that the Expanse was going to expand from the 22nd century onward so that by the 26th century, it would have taken over half the galaxy. Not that they would create a new Expanse later on and go from there. That's my interpretation, anyway.

 

[C.E. Evans]

If one adopts the theory that if the Sphere Builders were not stopped in the 22nd century (which was what that alternate future was depicting), then the entire lineage of Enterprises would have been different, because they would all have been warships built to fight the Sphere Builders for the next 400 years. The entire reason why the Ent-J looks the way it does is because it was a future extrapolation of the NX-01. So the lineage of Enterprises from the NCC-1701 to the 1701-J would theoretically have been based on the original NX class design in this case, and not like the ships depicted in the prime timeline.

Or the Federation and the Sphere Builders didn't go to war until after the Enterprise-J was already in service. We actually don't know when the Sphere Builder War began, only that it ended sometime in the 26th-Century and the Builders weren't happy with the outcome. The length of the direct conflict is unknown.

 

[Dukhat]

Or the Federation and the Sphere Builders didn't go to war until after the Enterprise-J was already in service. We actually don't know when the Sphere Builder War began, only that it ended sometime in the 26th-Century and the Builders weren't happy with the outcome. The length of the direct conflict is unknown.

See my post above yours.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I love ships in Trek but I do find the Odyssey kind of stands out in size but yeah we have the J which is even bigger. Who knows it may yet happen in a future Trek that we see the Enterprise J on screen. I happen to like the Enterprise J though.

 

[C.E. Evans]

See my post above yours.

I did, but we still don't know the full details of the war's beginning, so there's no way of knowing what impact it had (if any) on the design of the ship.