The power of a starship

[Robert DeSoto]

CGI brought us some of the most amazing battles in Star Trek, battles that would not be possible with the regular filmed models. But it also cheapened the value of a starship.

Back in TOS, a starship was a thing of extraordinary power and commanding one was a position of extraordinary prestige.

Sending one Federation starship to your border was enough to say "watch it buddy, don't f--k with us". Admiral Neceyev sent the Enterprise-D to send that message to the Cardassians. A Federation ambassador sent the Defiant to the Tzenkethi border with that message (yes, I know the ambassador turned out to be a changeling, but thats beside the point).

Sending two or more starships was pretty much getting ready for war. Two starships were sent to assist the Enterprise-D in the Defector. Six starships were went to assist Deep Space Nine in Way of the Warrior. Fifteen starships were sent to the Romulan Neutral Zone in All Good Things (although only 3 ships including the Enterprise showed up in time).

A major fleet engagement is something very rare and very devastating. When the Klingons invaded Organia and a Federation Fleet closed in on their position, Kor said that the fate of the galaxy would be decided for the next 10 millenia. That one battle between the Federation and Klingon Fleet would've been armageddon.

When the Borg invaded Federation space and headed directly to Earth, a fleet of 40 starships was a force we have never seen before. When it was destroyed, Starfleet was down for a year (according to Shelby). Even when Captain Maxwell claimed that Cardassians were re-arming for war, Starfleet Command made it very clear that they were in no condition for another war.

When the Dominion invasion fleet first entered the Alpha Quadrant, the Federation, Klingons and Romulans rallied their forces at Deep Space Nine. If the Bajoran sun had gone nova, they would've "crippled" the Alpha Quadrant powers. Had a battle actually taken place, it would've been "armageddon". There was no talk about needing reinforcments from the Gamma Quadrant, or some 2000 warships on the other side of the wormhole. Those 50 odd ships that first came through the wormhole was enough to scare everyone into thinking they could potentially cripple the Alpha Quadrant forces.

Once the war started, however, Starfleet sent and lost hundreds of ships against the Dominion but survived. And the Dominion themselves had hundreds of ships. They kept losing hundreds of ships then rebuilding them with their shipyards.

This is when a starship was no longer a thing of extraordinary power. The starship became cannon fodder. You lose one, you just go to the shipyard and pump out a new one. And one invidual starship had very little power when everyone was divided into the "Seventh Fleet of 112 ships" or the 23rd Jem'hadar Division, Cardassian Fourth Order. Every ship was in a fleet. And these fleets would get destroyed then they rebuild back to full strength again.

To be perfectly honest, I love watching the massive fleet battles. I loved the Dominion War and Deep Space Nine. But I have to admit, I lost respect for the Defiant afterward.

When I see the Enterprise in TOS or TNG, I know that ship is a force to be reckoned with in the galaxy. And for the first few seasons of Deep Space Nine, so was the Defiant. But when the Federation loses 100 ships, then sends out another 100 ships to fight the Dominion, how important is one individual starship? The Defiant, no matter how powerful it is, is just one ship. It's not going to make a huge difference when fleet sizes go from six starships to hundreds of starships. And sending one starship to your border will no longer make anyone think "oh man, we better not f--k with Starfleet"

 

[uniderth]

Interesting post. In TOS the Enterprise had enough power to destroy the entire surface of a planet. In "The Cage" Before the upgrade the Enterprise had the power to destroy "half a continent."

 

[Timo]

I'd tend to disagree all the way, really. Throughout TNG, the writers were aware that the VFX people could not afford to show a great number of starships, but they still wanted to convey that only a very large number of ships could actually hope to achieve something - and that sending just one ship was a measure of extreme diplomatic delicacy, or then a bluff in lieu of an actual show of force.

When the E-D was sent to show the business end of the phasers to the Cardassians in "Chain of Command", she was explicitly mentioned to be the command vessel for a formation of ships, and was expected to counter a large formation of enemy vessels. Starfleet would have wanted to send a hundred ships but didn't have enough to spare.

Similarly, in "Redemption", Picard got a couple of dozen ships by begging and pleading, and considered that too little for any meaningful work - and the Romulans agreed, expressing puzzlement over why Starfleet would send that small a formation, when it obviously was too little for waging war.

Reinforcing the E-D in "The Defector" was an exercise in subtlety: sending a decisive force would have defeated the purpose of the mission, which was to preserve peace. In turn, reinforcing DS9 with six and nine ships, respectively, in "Way of the Warrior" and "The Die is Cast" was the best Starfleet could do for this distant outpost that had always been far away from help. Indeed, when DS9 really got rolling, the writers remained a bit conservative, speaking of fleets of dozens when hundreds of ships were actually seen; yet "Way of the Warrior" already confirmed that the Klingon invasion featured hundreds upon hundreds of ships, per wave of assault.

Is this in conflict with the TOS view of a starship as a mighty thing? I would say no. Kirk's Starfleet never went to war, and Kirk's ship never faced significant enemy defenses. The abortive almost-war in "Errand of Mercy" did involve fleets of ships, and even the small and as such insignificant Organia warranted more than half a dozen of them per side. (And Kor was just being Klingon when claiming that the battle had any historical significance. He'd have said the same thing about the fights in "Elaan of Troyius" or "Friday's Child", too...)

Kirk's ship could destroy a civilization on a planet's surface if left alone to do it. Picard's ship could do the same, or Sisko's. But Sisko was not left alone to finish the job, and we found out why single starships aren't decisive in war after all: planetary defenses can tear to shreds a fleet of a hundred ships in no time flat. TOS never tested this aspect of starship combat, but it never contradicted it, either.

It's really the classic sailing ship model through and through. TOS would show us a single frigate on lone assignment, much like Horatio Hornblower plied the oceans alone while Napoleonic Wars involving formations of hundreds of ships raged elsewhere. TNG would show something more akin to a ship of the line, but in peacetime, when such vessels would do solo flag-showing missions. DS9 would move the action to the actual hot focus of the maritime Napoleonic Wars and show for the first time how ships of the line fought. And just like in the early 19th century, it would be suicidally difficult for even a large formation of ships to successfully challenge a coastal fortification of note... But at the same time entirely possible for a single frigate to shell to submission a lesser defensive emplacement, or a single landing party to decide the fate of empires.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Good]

Interesting. I still wonder though how many of those ships we saw in DS9's war arc were simply mostly empty hulls with phasers and photons attached and a bridge module stuck on top, hastily slapped together for the war effort. The DS9 tech manual even alludes to this, if for no other reason than to explain all the kitbashed monstrosity starships in the background.

 

[Timo]

Then again, none of the ships in the war appeared to be particularly new - they all had lowish registries and represented tried and true classes, or had lowish registries and represented classes not seen before ST:FC but never particularly indicated to be brand new, either.

Even the kitbashes hardly differed from the in-focus ships in terms of "monstrosity": they were bashed from the very same components, to the same degree of structural implausibility that had already characterized Kirk's original ship. And none of those were seen fighting in a way that would have suggested diminished capabilities vs. a "standard" ship.

It may well be that starships cannot be built in less than four-five years (with the possible exception of certain very small ships), so no effect of shipbuilding could be observed during the Dominion War. What you had was what you fought with, for the first five years anyway. Which is why the Alpha side was losing so badly even when the Gamma side started out with just a handful of ships: the Dominion could actually produce attrition replacements during the war (thanks both to operating smaller ships and having a more advanced industrial base), while the Alpha powers could not.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[EmperorTiberius]

Also, a lot of ships were small bugships for the dominion and fighters for Federation.

 

[3D Master]

I really have one answer to that one:

Space is BIG. No, it's HUGE:

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/index.html

To understand the resources of the universe; 5,000 lightyears radius is 10,000 lightyears across, on the order of the size of the Federation at 8,000 lightyears:

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/5000lys.html

Amount of stars: 600 MILLION. The Federation has access to several HUNDRED MILLION solar systems, with ALL the resources thereof.

1 starship to cover an entire border, comprising multiple hundred lightyears and several 10,000 stars!? 40 and the entire fleet is down for an entire year!?

Simply put: even the fleet sizes we saw in DS9, are hopelessly TINY if one is realistic as to the size of the Federation and the Dominion. And the only ship around being the Enterprise is equally ridiculous. Writers never understood the sheer size of the universe; either that, or the budget couldn't cover what we should be seeing. More like both.

 

[kv1at3485]

I doubt that even a fraction of that "8000 light years" can even be considered explored by the Feds, let alone used.

Of course, what "8000 light years" exactly means is open to interpretation. It could very well be just a sliver snaking across that distance.

EDIT: As for the losses from Wolf 359. Shelby's comment about those makes much more sense in terms of personnel losses. You can build all the ships you want, or get them from mothballs, but there's no way of saying just how many people are graduating from the creches every year. That's a social and cultural issue easily fudged.

 

[EmperorTiberius]

I really have one answer to that one:

Space is BIG. No, it's HUGE:

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/index.html

To understand the resources of the universe; 5,000 lightyears radius is 10,000 lightyears across, on the order of the size of the Federation at 8,000 lightyears:

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/5000lys.html

Amount of stars: 600 MILLION. The Federation has access to several HUNDRED MILLION solar systems, with ALL the resources thereof.

1 starship to cover an entire border, comprising multiple hundred lightyears and several 10,000 stars!? 40 and the entire fleet is down for an entire year!?

Simply put: even the fleet sizes we saw in DS9, are hopelessly TINY if one is realistic as to the size of the Federation and the Dominion. And the only ship around being the Enterprise is equally ridiculous. Writers never understood the sheer size of the universe; either that, or the budget couldn't cover what we should be seeing. More like both.

yeah, the minimalism is in play, but I think Federation is vastly smaller than is portrayed, it might be that the distance between two far away points is 8000ly but that's it, it has to be much smaller, and the warp charts much different (faster than shown).

Taking your example above, say they have access to to "only" 100 million stars, and have, 10,000 ships, each ship would cover 10,000 systems. I know it's inaccurate and rough, but it gives you some sort of presentation about sheer size

 

[diankra]

You've got a good point throughout.. but there's possibly a historical parallel to factor in. HMS Hood was, during the 1920s and 1930s, seen as a massive demonstration of British naval power, which could enforce imperial will on naughty little countries very easily - yet it was sunk with only three survivors within half an hour of its first encounter with Nazi Germany's new warship, the Bismarck.
And the Bismarck was sunk within a few days of that, as it was cornered by an allied fleet in turn, before it had even returned to its home port once.
DS9 did get into a 'we can do hundreds of ships now, so why not?' attitude... but it's not unrealistic in showing how fast a big war can overturn assumptions about invincibility and ultimate firepower, etc.

 

[Timo]

Also, the ideas of space being big and the 1701-whatever being the only ship around are actually perfectly compatible with each other. An overarching feature of the Star Trek universe is that Starfleet is always too small to do things that would jeopardize jeopardy: there are never enough ships to secure the borders against intrusion by interesting foes, never enough ships to defuse a local crisis before it reaches an interesting flashpoint, never enough ships to corner an interesting fugitive without a chase.

That's both drama and realism. "Border patrol" was never feasible for the British Empire, either - all the Royal Navy could do was random patrols, punitive expeditions, and the occasional blockade. The same with the US Cavalry in the Wild West. What we get to see is those cases where the random patrol does run into an intruder, and has an adventure around that encounter. Undocumented go the thousands of times when an intruder intrudes unchallenged, or the couple of times when Starfleet by chance is present in decisive strength and the enemy dares not make any dramatically interesting move.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Strider]

Considering the size and technological sophistication of the Federation and comparable Alpha Quadrant powers, fleets of hundreds and thousands of starships would hardly seem surprising. Just look at how many metal hulls we've managed to float on Earth's oceans within just the last century with 20th Century technology and the industrial base of a single world. When we're talking about civilizations with replicator technology and the resources of hundreds of worlds, thousands of starships seems like a lowball estimate.

 

[Robert DeSoto]

I'd tend to disagree all the way, really. Throughout TNG, the writers were aware that the VFX people could not afford to show a great number of starships, but they still wanted to convey that only a very large number of ships could actually hope to achieve something - and that sending just one ship was a measure of extreme diplomatic delicacy, or then a bluff in lieu of an actual show of force.

When the E-D was sent to show the business end of the phasers to the Cardassians in "Chain of Command", she was explicitly mentioned to be the command vessel for a formation of ships, and was expected to counter a large formation of enemy vessels. Starfleet would have wanted to send a hundred ships but didn't have enough to spare.

Similarly, in "Redemption", Picard got a couple of dozen ships by begging and pleading, and considered that too little for any meaningful work - and the Romulans agreed, expressing puzzlement over why Starfleet would send that small a formation, when it obviously was too little for waging war.

Reinforcing the E-D in "The Defector" was an exercise in subtlety: sending a decisive force would have defeated the purpose of the mission, which was to preserve peace. In turn, reinforcing DS9 with six and nine ships, respectively, in "Way of the Warrior" and "The Die is Cast" was the best Starfleet could do for this distant outpost that had always been far away from help. Indeed, when DS9 really got rolling, the writers remained a bit conservative, speaking of fleets of dozens when hundreds of ships were actually seen; yet "Way of the Warrior" already confirmed that the Klingon invasion featured hundreds upon hundreds of ships, per wave of assault.

Is this in conflict with the TOS view of a starship as a mighty thing? I would say no. Kirk's Starfleet never went to war, and Kirk's ship never faced significant enemy defenses. The abortive almost-war in "Errand of Mercy" did involve fleets of ships, and even the small and as such insignificant Organia warranted more than half a dozen of them per side. (And Kor was just being Klingon when claiming that the battle had any historical significance. He'd have said the same thing about the fights in "Elaan of Troyius" or "Friday's Child", too...)

Kirk's ship could destroy a civilization on a planet's surface if left alone to do it. Picard's ship could do the same, or Sisko's. But Sisko was not left alone to finish the job, and we found out why single starships aren't decisive in war after all: planetary defenses can tear to shreds a fleet of a hundred ships in no time flat. TOS never tested this aspect of starship combat, but it never contradicted it, either.

It's really the classic sailing ship model through and through. TOS would show us a single frigate on lone assignment, much like Horatio Hornblower plied the oceans alone while Napoleonic Wars involving formations of hundreds of ships raged elsewhere. TNG would show something more akin to a ship of the line, but in peacetime, when such vessels would do solo flag-showing missions. DS9 would move the action to the actual hot focus of the maritime Napoleonic Wars and show for the first time how ships of the line fought. And just like in the early 19th century, it would be suicidally difficult for even a large formation of ships to successfully challenge a coastal fortification of note... But at the same time entirely possible for a single frigate to shell to submission a lesser defensive emplacement, or a single landing party to decide the fate of empires.

Timo Saloniemi

Yes, the VFX could not afford to show hundreds of ships, that why the Battle of Wolf 359, we only saw four starships in a fleet of 40. But this, according to Shelby was the bulk of Starfleet.

Also in Chain of Command, Starfleet only sent three starships to assist the Enterprise, but the line was cut in the final version. This is consistent with sending two starships in the Defector.

Also, if Starfleet wanted to preserve the peace in the Defector, the best way would be to send a large force to let the Romulans know they were ready. They wouldnt hold back hundreds of ships and only send two. They sent two because two starships (3 including the Enterprise) was a bad ass enough sized force in the TNG era.

Also the Klingon invasion fleet was only about 50 warships according to Dax. Not hundreds. And she also said it was 2/3rd of the Klingon Defense Force. Those 50 ships destroyed the Cardassian fleet and almost captured the Detapa Council. This is consistent with the 40 starships at Wolf 359.

Up until season 6 of ds9, fleet sizes ranged anywhere from 2 to 15. And a full out invasion meant 40-50 starships.

Suddenly a small fleet was 112 ships and large fleet could mean 600 ships.

Is this more realistic considering the size of Federation space? sure. Is it cooler to watch the battles? Damn right it is.

But is it consistent with previous fleet strengths? no. And thats what takes away from the intimidation factor of a single starship. When Starfleet is losing fleets of 100 ships on a regular basis, how intimidating is a single starship?

In TOS we had one Romulan Bird of Prey blasting away the Neutral Zone outposts single handedly. Kirk and his one starship went in and stopped their incursion.

Can you imagine one Jem'hadar Attack Ship being sent to take out all Federation bases and outposts along the DMZ? No, because the Federation probably has the "Ninth Fleet" of 100 ships or something like that ready to move in

 

[Timo]

But this, according to Shelby was the bulk of Starfleet.

Nope. This, according to Admiral Hanson, was what he could summon on short notice, although he kept hoping for more.

According to Shelby, loss of these ships would mean that "the Fleet" would be back in strength within a year. Since DS9 establishes that Starfleet consists of many Fleets, each with a low three-digit number of ships, it would be easy to say that Shelby spoke of the 3rd Fleet here. OTOH, we have to consider that building all-new ships the size of the lost ones within just twelve months is somewhat unlikely, so Shelby probably spoke of reshuffling between various components of Starfleet anyway.

Also in Chain of Command, Starfleet only sent three starships to assist the Enterprise, but the line was cut in the final version.

So it didn't happen.

This is consistent with sending two starships in the Defector.

Not really. In "The Defector", Starfleet only sent one ship, and that with utmost hesitation - they'd much rather have sent no ships at all. Picard managed to persuade the Klingons to send two of their ships in a shrewd political move. And that, too, was a nice balancing act: Picard would have had reason to suspect the Romulans would ambush him with what was needed to defeat a single ship, but he came equipped with what it took to fight this expected size of ambush force to a standstill. No more.

Also, if Starfleet wanted to preserve the peace in the Defector, the best way would be to send a large force to let the Romulans know they were ready.

Clearly, Starfleet strongly disagreed with you on the issue.

Also the Klingon invasion fleet was only about 50 warships according to Dax.

Wrong again. When "briefing" Garak, Dax says that there'll be well over a hundred ships in the first attack wave already. Obviously, the total invasion force would consist of more than the first attack wave. And obviously, what later faced the station in battle was not the total invasion force, nor the first attack wave. The largest number of ships we could see in a single shot there was 40, FWIW.

Up until season 6 of ds9, fleet sizes ranged anywhere from 2 to 15.

Except in those episodes that actually featured fleets, such as "Redemption" (where 23 ships was considered far too small to be an invasion fleet) or "Best of Both Worlds" (where 40 ships was nothing but a good start). We never saw space war in Trek before DS9. And when we did, the starships behaved just like they had always behaved before - it just took hundreds of them to make a difference.

In TOS we had one Romulan Bird of Prey blasting away the Neutral Zone outposts single handedly. Kirk and his one starship went in and stopped their incursion.

So? If the Romulans had sent two ships, Kirk would have needed a wingman. If the Romulans sent fifty, Kirk would have needed a flotilla of fifty, too. Apparently, the maximum practical number of ships to be sent is somewhere in the upper three digits, and this needs to be countered with a similar number. Or then with a fortified planet. Nothing has changed in that regard between TOS and DS9.

Can you imagine one Jem'hadar Attack Ship being sent to take out all Federation bases and outposts along the DMZ?

Sure. If "all" means "eight", and the DMZ is as neglected as it was after 100 years of total Romulan silence.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Dayton3]

I liked seeing the large scale battles.

But I'll admit that Deep Space Nine used the "oh god, we just lost 100 starships" as a cheap dramatic ploy to inform the audience how bad things were.

What I didn't like about the Dominion War was not how many ships they showed but how few battles they actually showed being fought.

Except in the big "fleet episodes" we actually saw or heard very little about the Dominion War.

 

[Timo]

That's what one gets from choosing a main character who administers a relatively insignificant space station.

Once the wormhole ceased to be a viable means of passage in "Sacrifice of Angels", the Bajoran system also lost its strategic significance, and basically reverted back to the backwater status it had held before Sisko and Dax first found the wormhole. Had Sisko participated in major battles, he would essentially have been deserting his post. Although the writers did find a flimsy excuse for him to play a part in the Chin'toka expedition, and to visit the battlefronts every now and then.

People die in peacetime. People die in a war. TV shows and movies make good dramatic use of both types of death - it can be just as dramatic when it only hits the single guy in the corner of a busy street, or when it hits that single guy and five thousand others in the middle of a busy battlefield. The same should hold for starships. In peacetime, we may lose one; in war, thousands. A single ship is just as likely to make a difference in either situation in dramatic terms, because drama only shows those ships that do make a difference...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[kent]

I think their might have been a difference in fleet strength pre and post dominion war. It's possible that the standard fleet number during engagements were in the upper double or in the low triple digits, and that was apropriate. Also, depending on what type of engagement, it might be 50 ships, or less. If diplomatic manuvering is involved, one ship might be enough. Whatever the situation, Starfleet was not prepared for the Dominion, or their poloron based weapons that acted like shields weren't even their. Their ships were massively powerful, more so I'd say to an extent over the capitol ships of the 2360's (Galaxy class' and Nebula classes). Those were the ships that Starfleet had to mostly rely on. Intrepid class' had JUST started to be built as did Sovereigns (there should've been more intrepid's though, they're small and easy to build).

With the Dominion advantage in overall strength and shipbuilding (they could build ships faster too.), they Federation most likely put out a mandate ordering Starfleet to speed up ship building, fast-activating the empty Galaxy class hulls, reintroducing seemingly outdated designs, kit-bashing parts, and rushing newer ships into production. This would probably account for the seemingly HUGE number of ships we saw versus the lesser amount of ships during TNG (it wasn't war time in TNG). I'm assuming that ships were built quicker and more of them were built as a logical counter-tactic to losing ships and an enemy building ships faster. Also, there appeared to be more Galaxy class ships than originally stated by Gene and the TNG tech manual of 6.

As for the Galaxy class descrepency, there were 6 original Galaxy class' launched (The E-D, Oddyssy, etc.), with 6 empty frames in space dock for fast activation, and then at least 15 more were built during the Dominion war. This also supports a faster ship building technique. And perhaps they scanvenged other heavily damaged ships, like Nebula's, and remade them into Galaxy class' using existing parts.

 

[Dayton3]

I always figured that Starfleet adopted the old Soviet practice of storing away military equipment in usable condition and keeping it preserved in case of war.

For example storing Excelsior and Miranda class starships away for some future need like the Dominion War.

Then once the war came the biggest challenge would be in manning them. Though in fairness you could probably reduce some of that with modern computers and automation.

This would account for why we saw so many "old" starships in the major fleet actions.

 

[Timo]

We certainly saw our share of seemingly intact older ships at the Qualor II depot in "Unification" - some of them were in pretty much immediate sailing condition, even, and could be flown away by an audacious thief.

On the other hand, we know that Starfleet is short on ships in peacetime, too. The cavalry always comes at the 11th hour if then, the 1701-whatever is the only ship within range, and so forth. I don't see how Starfleet could afford to idle any part of its force in times of peace. Hell, I'd much rather accept them mothballing half the fleet when a state of war is declared, because that frees them of their research, exploration and general support commitments!

Really, either Starfleet is maxed out all the time, or then criminally negligient in not being maxed out all the time...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Praetor]

I'd tend to think that all of their ships are normally dispersed in the various sectors, allowing those convenient "only ship in the x" moments. I would imagine they would have reserve fleets akin to the U.S. of deactivated ships that could be redeployed in time of need, the 'surplus' seen at Qualor II for example. I would think that most of the ships seen or implied on DS9 in the Dominion War were gatherings of all those far-deployed ships, supplemented by reactivated ships from the reserve.