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USS Constellation II registry number in early TOS Novels

FatherRob

FatherRob

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Rear Admiral
So in looking over at Memory Beta, the second USS Constellation had three different registry numbers, 1017, 1728 (Tech Manual), and 1706. I understand 1017 and know the novel usages of it, the tech manual is obvious... but for the life of me, I cannot figure out (nor does MB specify) where 1706 is used in the novels as a Constellation registry.

Anyone care to put my curiousity out of its misery?

Rob+
 
To my knowledge the Constellation II's NCC-1706 registry number was never used in any novel. That sole registry comes from the FASA RPG modules, Federation Ship Recognition Manual and the Star Trek: The Next Generation Officer's Manual. However, in these sources, the Constellation II was referred to as Constellation because only vessels listed as missing were assigned a II designation.

Apologies for the infodump, its just I'm working on a wiki to rival and hopefully surpass Memory Beta, and you just happened to ask a question about something I was researching. :)
 
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Please, don't apologize! The Constellation is my favorite ship, and so I am most curious about the history of her use, especially in the immediate post-TOS era, as I am preparing to build the 1:350 scale Polar Lights refit Constitution model. I didn't realize FASA had numbered her as 1706. Do you know of anywhere I can find the registry listing of Constitution class ships they used?

Rob+
 
FatherRob said:
Please, don't apologize! The Constellation is my favorite ship, and so I am most curious about the history of her use, especially in the immediate post-TOS era, as I am preparing to build the 1:350 scale Polar Lights refit Constitution model. I didn't realize FASA had numbered her as 1706. Do you know of anywhere I can find the registry listing of Constitution class ships they used?

Rob+
Click to expand...

Check your PM
 
Thanks, all, for the references. That is helpful to me, and reminds me of the good-ole-days when I had some of the FASA material. I wound up investing in Star Fleet Battles instead, though I have only played once or twice.

Rob+
 
I've never played the FASA games, but I love the various Trek manuals. Their TNG Officer's Manual is one of my all-time favouites. Madusan navigators on the Enterprise-D, the excerpts from a UFP hearing about admitting Data into Starfleet Academy, an intervew with an alien military officer going through Starfleet's Rapid Intergration Program as his people's forces are absorbed into Starfleet, the many cool starship designs, the "Free Worlds of Klinzhai".... I love it. The official TNG Technical Manual is dry and boring. FASA's TNG Officer's Manual manual is fun, colourful and interesting.
 
Since I am on the topic of Constellation oddities, I do recall several early Pocket novels referring to the Enterprise as a Constellation class cruiser. Anyone else remember this? I actually think it would make more sense than Constitution class, as a good way to cover for the decal rearrangement on the Constellation. (An older ship was refitted to the spec, and then new build proceeded with hull 1700.)

Rob+
 
Yeah, I noticed that in a couple of novels from the 1980s, especially Enterprise: The First Adventure.

I think it was a couple of fan-produces technical manuals which suggested that the Constellation and the Republic were refitted from older starship classes (If I remember they were named the Horizon-class and Archon-class). To me, that makes a whole lot of sense and I wish that TOS Remastered had labelled the Constitution-class ships using the Franz Joseph numbers from the Star Fleet Technical Manual and put to bed the 1600 registries for the Farragut, Potemkin, Excalibur, Exeter and the Essex.

But, with Okuda aboard, I guess that was unlikely.
 
It had never hit me until I looked at that FASA list and compared it with the accepted list that there were a lot of 1600 hull numbers for the Connies.

Ships of the Star Fleet and its associated material reflected conversions of Horizon/Archon ships to form the Constellation and Republic in an essentially Constitution style. Adrias has done some interesting work in the last several years showing a more gradual revision of this concept.

Another idea, recently built over at the Starship Modeler board and going to kit-mastering is known as the Confederation class, and is a bridge between the Baton Rouge class of the Spaceflight Chronology and the Constitution. A very good job on it. It makes a very plausable (more plausable than a Horizon/Archon) base for the Constellation or Republic to have been converted from.

I am trying to remember if Diane Duane used the term Constellation class. I do seem to remember Vonda McIntyire using the term somewhere as well... I think in the ST III novelization.

Rob+
 
If it helps answer any questions, here's a link to a Novel (and other continuities) starship list some geek was compiling a few years back, though it, too, hasn't been updated in some years.*

http://www.angelfire.com/scifi/FirstofTwo/shiplist.html

*Because the geek in question decided to convert everything to excel attachments, and greatly expand the scoope of the lists, and then Real Life got in the way. I hear he went mad. ;)
 
FatherRob said:
Since I am on the topic of Constellation oddities, I do recall several early Pocket novels referring to the Enterprise as a Constellation class cruiser. Anyone else remember this?
Click to expand...

That's an error that originally cropped up in The Star Trek Concordance. Authors who relied on it as their primary reference often repeated its mistakes. (Which is also why some stories, like DC's first TOS annual, refer to Dr. Boyce as "Joe" instead of Philip.)

Although I'm not sure whether it's an error so much as an ambiguity. The "Constitution-class" designation wasn't set in stone back then, and it was based mainly on a piece of viewscreen graphics from, I believe, "The Changeling." The dedication plaque on the bridge set and the text and illustrations in The Making of Star Trek call it simply a "Starship Class" vessel. I'm not sure where Trimble got "Constellation-class" from. Maybe she saw that art from "The Changeling" and misread/misremembered it.
 
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