What happened to the Ambassador-class?

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

We got to see the Enterprise-C in "Yesterday's Enterprise." We got to see the Ambassador-class return as a background ship in some 2 or 3 episodes plus the DS9 premiere's opening flashback showing Wolf 359. After that, it's like everyone just completely forgot this class existed. What's up, everyone? I started a thread, because this is one of my favorite starship designs of the TNG-DS9-VOY era of Star Trek, and it's in like what, 5 episodes total?

 

[David cgc]

Logistics. The second Ambassador model (the Enterprise-C was a separate miniature, because of the battle damage) was damaged at some point after the filming for DS9's first episode, with one nacelle visibly lower than the other, and was released to the studio to use for promotional exhibitions and whatnot. For one reason or another, the existing ships that had CG versions made for DS9 were ones that had physical models on-hand (behind-the-scenes interviews at the time refer to them being "scanned" but that doesn't entirely add up, the wireframes are definitely hand-made, and there are some anomalies that had to be human error on the Voyager CG model), so that's probably why it never turned up in the big fleets in the late '90s.

Memory-Alpha has a good entry on the model.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

They remade the Excelsior model for the Voyager episode "Flashback," why not do the same for the Ambassador-class?

 

[David cgc]

They remade the Excelsior model for the Voyager episode "Flashback," why not do the same for the Ambassador-class?

"Flashback" was an event episode tying into TOS that had scenes on an established ship. I doubt there'd be a similar mandatory story-reason for an Ambassador-class over any other ship in any hypothetical episode of DS9 or VGR.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I doubt there'd be a similar mandatory story-reason for an Ambassador-class over any other ship

If there is no reason TO use an Ambassador, logically speaking there is also no reason NOT to use one.

 

[DGCatAniSiri]

If there is no reason TO use an Ambassador, logically speaking there is also no reason NOT to use one.

Every new model costs money to build - the artists' time and resources going to X takes away from their time and resources to do Y. That's probably also part of why they worked with the scans of physical models and didn't focus on other designs without a dedicated model or whose model had been damaged, something that gave them a baseline to build from, with the scale and proportions and details already something that they had references for, rather than build the whole thing from the ground up in the system.

Like there's the old tale of the Norway class, from First Contact - it was one of the designs created for that movie in CGI, the files corrupted between then and production of the various fleets in DS9, so it never appeared again, even though the other Starfleet ship designs from the movie did.

Sure, IDEALLY, they'd do this for every ship type, but when working with the time and budgets of a TV show, looking to put out weekly episodes, everything takes time and money, and you save both where you can. If the price of creating an Ambassador class model in CGI from scratch is (hypothetical easy to digest numbers incoming) $10000, and you can get both the Excelsior and Galaxy classes made by using their physical models as a baseline reference for about $12000 together, then that's the better investment.

This is why, for instance, we ended up with the infamous copy-paste fleet in Picard Season 1's finale, and why "all of the fleet" at Frontier Day was made up primarily of ship designs we'd seen at various points throughout the series, even though there was no reason not to expect a variety of Dominion War-era designs still around and in service a mere twenty-five years afterwards - every new design costs production money.

There's not really a good explanation for it in-universe, though one of the early DS9 novels did put out an idea that Bajor was allowed to build an Ambassador class as part of their efforts to get their own ship-building efforts back on their feet. Presumably, one could lean to the idea that the class/design had only a limited production run, and, by the time that Starfleet was in a position to build them on a larger scale, the Galaxy class design was already being finalized.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

Presumably, one could lean to the idea that the class/design had only a limited production run, and, by the time that Starfleet was in a position to build them on a larger scale, the Galaxy class design was already being finalized.

If we're looking for an in-story answer, I like the idea that Starfleet only produced, say 5-10 Ambassador-class ships, and rather than produce more, prioritized other starship classes. Makes sense, some designs will go into mass-production, some may only see a handful of ships.

 

[Dukhat]

Like there's the old tale of the Norway class, from First Contact - it was one of the designs created for that movie in CGI, the files corrupted between then and production of the various fleets in DS9, so it never appeared again, even though the other Starfleet ship designs from the movie did.

Actually, all four of the FC ships were corrupted in some way. The Akira class fared the best because it was meant to be seen closer up than the other three, but the Steamrunner and Saber classes didn't fare as well and were relegated to the far background in the DS9 Dominion war fleet shots. The Norway mesh wasn't actually lost like some reports claim, but it ended up being too corrupted to even be used as a FB ship.

If we're looking for an in-story answer, I like the idea that Starfleet only produced, say 5-10 Ambassador-class ships, and rather than produce more, prioritized other starship classes. Makes sense, some designs will go into mass-production, some may only see a handful of ships.

The prevailing fan theory of old was that most of the Ambassadors were out on deep space missions because that's what they were designed for. Unfortunately none of their actual uses on screen bear this theory out.

As for why they weren't used past DS9 Emissary? Besides the aforementioned damage to the physical model, there simply wasn't a need for it. Neither DS9 nor VOY needed to show random Starfleet vessels on a regular basis other than the Defiant and Voyager, and by the time they did, they had switched to CGI. And even before that, they had Greg Jein's Flashback Excelsior as a brand-new filming model, so they didn't need to build a new Ambassador or any other model to be used as a generic guest starship.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

Am I the only one who loves the Ambassador-class and would have liked to have seen this frequently along with the Excelsior and the Nebula class? We had a lot of TOS-era ship designs still around by TNG. We had a lot of post-TNG ship designs in the DS9-VOY-and-beyond era. When the Ent-D was cruising around in TNG, it felt like the only TNG-era ships we saw were other Galaxy-class ships, Nebula-class ships, and... that's it. That's why the Ambassador-class was so awesome, it belonged in that post-TOS / TNG-era design lineage, and then poof, forgotten.

 

[somebuddyX]

I love the Ambassador class and I love that there's kind of a family for it and the original Pegasus design.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

I love the Ambassador class and I love that there's kind of a family for it and the original Pegasus design.

What was the original Pegasus design?

 

[Ray Hardgrit]

I wouldn't have minded seeing Ambassador-class ships show up a bit more often (or at all), considering how many Excelsiors, Mirandas and Oberths were still around. They couldn't have all blown up and gotten replaced with Galaxy class ships.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

I wouldn't have minded seeing Ambassador-class ships show up a bit more often (or at all), considering how many Excelsiors, Mirandas and Oberths were still around. They couldn't have all blown up and gotten replaced with Galaxy class ships.

Thank you for this. haha First Contact had the Bozeman from TNG's "Cause and Effect" and an Oberth-class ship in the background, but no Ambassadors.

 

[somebuddyX]

What was the original Pegasus design?

or check out link for 3D view

U.S.S. Pegasus (Ambassador kitbash) - Download Free 3D model by raenfox

USS Pegasus was an Oberth-class ship lost in 2358. In 2370, the USS Enterprise D rediscovered her with half of the ship materialized within solid rock (TNG: The Pegasus). Originally not intended as an Oberth-class ship, but rather a kitbash made from the Enterprise C model, creating a more...

sketchfab.com

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

or check out link for 3D view

U.S.S. Pegasus (Ambassador kitbash) - Download Free 3D model by raenfox

USS Pegasus was an Oberth-class ship lost in 2358. In 2370, the USS Enterprise D rediscovered her with half of the ship materialized within solid rock (TNG: The Pegasus). Originally not intended as an Oberth-class ship, but rather a kitbash made from the Enterprise C model, creating a more...

sketchfab.com

I am sad this ship never happened.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I like to think in-universe that the Ambassador-class was gradually phased out in lieu of the Galaxy-class. Maybe lessons learned from the Ambassador-class were used to build a bigger, faster, and more powerful ship that eventually became the USS Galaxy. That doesn't mean that the Ambassador-class was weak, IMO, but it may have been known as an interim design between the Excelsior-class and the Galaxy-class that was only in service for a few decades perhaps. Other starship designs may also have been products of a certain period of time before they were superseded by later more advanced designs.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

I like to think in-universe that the Ambassador-class was gradually phased out in lieu of the Galaxy-class. Maybe lessons learned from the Ambassador-class were used to build a bigger, faster, and more powerful ship that eventually became the USS Galaxy. That doesn't mean that the Ambassador-class was weak, IMO, but it may have been known as an interim design between the Excelsior-class and the Galaxy-class that was only in service for a few decades perhaps. Other starship designs may also have been products of a certain period of time before they were superseded by later more advanced designs.

The Ambassador didn't replace the Excelsior, why would the Galaxy replace the Ambassador? The design wouldn't even be that old, maybe 30-40 years?

 

[C.E. Evans]

The Ambassador didn't replace the Excelsior, why would the Galaxy replace the Ambassador? The design wouldn't even be that old, maybe 30-40 years?

New technologies come along that may render some designs quickly obsolete. Starfleet seems to favor a policy of continually modernizing its fleet with new designs, so some ship classes may only be around for 30-40 years (if not less for some), IMO. Starfleet isn't like today's navy, it can afford to constantly churn out new designs like candy, so it's probably more rare than common for starship designs (like the Excelsior-class) to be around for more than a few decades.

 

[Admiral Jean-Luc Picard]

New technologies come along that may render some designs quickly obsolete. Starfleet seems to favor a policy of continually modernizing its fleet with new designs, so some ship classes may only be around for 30-40 years (if not less for some), IMO. Starfleet isn't like today's navy, it can afford to constantly churn out new designs like candy, so it's probably more rare than common for starship designs (like the Excelsior-class) to be around for more than a few decades.

Excelsior, Miranda, Constellation, Orbeth, and other designs are still around 100 years, but a 30-40-year-old Ambassador can't cut it? Additionally, aren't most Starfleet ship designs meant to last decades to a century?

 

[C.E. Evans]

Excelsior, Miranda, Constellation, Orbeth, and other designs are still around 100 years, but a 30-40-year-old Ambassador can't cut it? Additionally, aren't most Starfleet ship designs meant to last decades to a century?

Not according to onscreen material. Some designs can withstand the test of time, some can't. For every design that's around for 100 years, there is likely many more designs that aren't around even half that long, IMO.