Why No Federation Ships Bigger Than A Galaxy Class?

[cardinal biggles]

^You left out the Botany Bay.

I think the idea that TOS was "more imaginative" than TNG because TOS had to use spinning balls of light or not show the other ship at all is ridiculous. It's a matter of limited budget and limited technology. The same reason you don't see the other ships on TOS is the same reason you only ever see one or two other ship at a time on TNG. It's not until CGI takes over on DS9 and VOY that they can cost-effectively render an Federation battle fleet or dozens of Borg cubes.

Television is a visual medium; it's better to show rather than tell. If they'd had the budget to show the alien baddie every week, don't you think they would have?

 

[BolianAuthor]

Timo said:
In retrospect, we saw precious few ships overall in TNG. Those we saw usually served the story purpose of "enemy warship" (meaning they'd be small for the same reasons the Starfleet combat ships are small, only even smaller because the E-D had to triumph over them) or "vehicle for introducing the single guest character for the episode" (so small would be simpler).

There would have been some opportunities to see vast civilian-commercial vessels and installations, but usually the writers were told to make it possible for the producers to skip actually showing anything. Thus, we hear of thousands of people in distress aboard the Constantinople in "The Schitzoid Man", but we never see this vessel (which the Okudas later label as Starfleet anyway). Ditto with the Denver in "Ethics", even if the passenger count was somewhat lower there. The heroes do visit a number of large civilian installations such as the Argus Array or the Particle Fountain, though.

There would certainly be plotlines where humungous civilian vessels could plausibly be shown, but only the most recent shows could afford the actual visuals. Say, the uncrewed Woden from TOS "Ultimate Computer" could plausibly have been hundreds of kilometers long (hauling ore from star to star would seem to call for massive bulk), but that just didn't happen. And I fear the visual remake will retain an implausibly small design for the Woden, perhaps recycling the robotic freighter from TAS and from the "Charlie X" remake.

Also, generally the presence of a vast vessel would bring complications. If she really is that large on the outside, how come we never get to see much of her interior? If she really has so many people aboard, how come only one or two of them interact with our heroes, and only about eight to ten deaf-mute ones are ever seen on the background? If she is powerful enough to haul her bulk around, how come the hero ship still has to perform all the heroics? DS9 featured several episodes where these complications really hurt the stories... "Second Sight" perhaps worst of all.

Timo Saloniemi

TNG was pretty good about not going overboard with uberships... as you state, the ones we did see on TNG fit the story. The Husnok ship was suppoded to be big and powerful, because Kevin Uxbridge wanted to drive the Enterprise away for good. The Borg ship... well, it's the Borg, no more to say about that. During TNG the biggest Klingon ship was the Vor'Cha... the Negh'Var was first seen on DS9. The Warbirds were MEANT to be massive, to seemingly intimidate our heroes, but unfortunately, the true sense of scale was never showcased on the TV run, and instead of seeing it on the big screen, the writers cheaped out, and showed us the Valdore.

But in regards to Federation-based cruise vessels... this brings up a few interesting questions...

Number one... how far do you want these ships to go? Because with a universe where speeds up to warp 9 are possible, a well-to-do cruise line company could well have a small fleet of uber-luxury-liners, that could travel at warp speeds between the UFP worlds. OTOH, it has been established that for instance, the Rigel System is the most populous Federation system, with at least 3 known Class-M worlds. It could also be possible for a cruise ship to simply have full impulse drive, and just tour the individual systems it is in.

So... if a cruise ship is meant to travel to far-off places, it would make sense for it to be large, for added comfort during a lengthy voyage. But if it's inter-system, then I would think s smaller ship would do.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I could see a mega, ultra, superdooper deluxe-sized starship being necessary if its intended to operate very far from home for very long periods of time. It would basically need to carry everything it could possibly need itself, because it would have to operate without support from other ships and outposts.

It would pretty much have to be a warp-capable starbase in that regard.

 

[Wingsley]

BolianAdmiral said:
^

In regards to civillians, that's not really fair of you to say that TNG did not take them seriously... on multiple occasions, we saw the 1701-D warping to help out Federation research teams... NOT Starfleet people... research and scientist-like people... the anthropologists on Mintaka III, the scientists on that weather station from "A Matter of Time", the inventor of the soliton-wave technology, who was even an alien to boot. And we also saw Dr. Leah Brahms return.

I was talking about the civilian presence on-board the Enterprise-D. Civilians on-board ship were often treated as silly, or as a nuisance, or as a plot device.

 

[USS KG5]

C.E. Evans said:
I could see a mega, ultra, superdooper deluxe-sized starship being necessary if its intended to operate very far from home for very long periods of time. It would basically need to carry everything it could possibly need itself, because it would have to operate without support from other ships and outposts.

It would pretty much have to be a warp-capable starbase in that regard.

Not really - the Galaxy is plenty big enough for its crew of 1000 and all the equipment you would need to basically rebuild her - with replicator technology it would be practical in a much smaller ship, as we saw in Voyager.

 

[Dayton3]

USS KG5 said:

C.E. Evans said:
I could see a mega, ultra, superdooper deluxe-sized starship being necessary if its intended to operate very far from home for very long periods of time. It would basically need to carry everything it could possibly need itself, because it would have to operate without support from other ships and outposts.

It would pretty much have to be a warp-capable starbase in that regard.

Not really - the Galaxy is plenty big enough for its crew of 1000 and all the equipment you would need to basically rebuild her - with replicator technology it would be practical in a much smaller ship, as we saw in Voyager.

No offense to anyone here.

But from a Trek Tech and dramatic standpoint, Voyager was a joke.

 

[Wingsley]

Cary L. Brown said:

Wingsley said:
It's not a matter of confusion. It's a matter of authenticity.

After 40 years, TOS remains "the real McCoy." The rest had some interesting eps, but they remain the spin-offs, the copies of copies, the pretenders to the throne. TOS relied on imagination. The spin-offs relied on "badder is bigger". (Or was it "bigger is badder"? Or "Badder is better"? Never mind.)

AH... I see.

You're refusing to acknowledge that the other series are intended to be in the same "Star Trek reality" as TOS was.

Fair enough... it's all fiction, after all... but 99.999% of the rest of the world doesn't see things the same way, I expect.

In TOS, we had the following:

The USS Enterprise
The Fesarius
The Romulan Bird-of-Prey
The shuttlecraft Galileo, Columbus, and Galileo II
The Klingon Battlecruiser
The Tholian webspinner (which became the SS Aurora)

And THAT'S IT. Not much of a pool to compare around, really. Now, in the Remastered Trek we get to see a Gorn ship, a family of freighters based upon the TAS robotic freighter, an Orion ship, and maybe one or two other minor variations (maybe an Eyemorge ship?). But... it sounds like you're inclined to disregard those, too?

My comment was simply made from the standpoint... not an unreasonable one, I think... that whether it was "good" or "bad," anything that came after that carried the name "Star Trek" is, technically, still Star Trek.

I think my comments are being misunderstood here.

The budget and SFX limitations that often hampered TOS have turned out to be a blessing in disguise, in my opinion. Remastered TOS is rehabilitating the show, to be sure, but it is also exposing something very interesting:

TOS, for all its triumphs and flaws, was the pioneer. This is the show that took chances. Roddenberry, Shatner, et. al, were working professionals in their fields before TOS, but they were not well known. They are still "hungry" and willing to take take chances, experiment, go the extra mile, etc. They made eps that did not rely on SFX like contemporary SciFi TV routinely has over the last 20+ years. Berman & Co. inherited a successful franchise, and became STAR TREK's custodians, not its originators. TNG gave us fine episodes like "The Measure of a Man", "The Ensigns of Command", "The Defector", etc. DS9 also gave us some interesting outings. But when TV Guide picked TOS above TNG and DS9 back in the '90's as the best TREK, I just nodded my head and smiled. Berman was a corporate ladder climber. He managed other people's creativity. TNG started out as Roddenberry's idea and Berman reshaped it for his agenda. Berman wasn't hungry. He was a studio executive. TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT sadly reflected that. If it wasn't for TOS, there would not be any of the other series.

No, the sequel and prequel shows are not "TINO", but they aren't "boldly going" anywhere, either.

That's why I think it's neat that fan films are trying to recapture TOS. They're flawed too, but at least they don't need to go to the 24th or 22nd centuries to tell a new story. Fan shows like FARRAGUT just want to "remake" TOS, and they're hungry, too. They get it. Berman didn't.

That's why there's no more Enterprise-D.

 

[USS KG5]

Dayton3 said:

USS KG5 said:

C.E. Evans said:
I could see a mega, ultra, superdooper deluxe-sized starship being necessary if its intended to operate very far from home for very long periods of time. It would basically need to carry everything it could possibly need itself, because it would have to operate without support from other ships and outposts.

It would pretty much have to be a warp-capable starbase in that regard.

Not really - the Galaxy is plenty big enough for its crew of 1000 and all the equipment you would need to basically rebuild her - with replicator technology it would be practical in a much smaller ship, as we saw in Voyager.

No offense to anyone here.

But from a Trek Tech and dramatic standpoint, Voyager was a joke.

It was a TV show with flaws like the rest of the franchise.

BUT - this forum is supposed to be for discussing trek tech as depicted on-screen in all the shows.

Voyager had no problems repairing itself and why would it? Replication on an industrial scale is established as quite possible in other shows.

Also, in real life the Royal Navy's sub-depot ships helped fit themselves out during their construction with their onboard facilities, with 1940s technology.

Apart from anything else there were some great Voyager episodes I really enjoyed, lets face it there were stinkers in all the shows.

 

[Dayton3]

The replicator as shown in modern Trek would never be possible.

It is shown as basically being a miracle device that can create something out of nothing.

If it were possible to create matter out of energy as shown, the energy requirements would be staggering. Something not even a starship could do on a regular basis.

 

[USS KG5]

Dayton3 said:
The replicator as shown in modern Trek would never be possible.

It is shown as basically being a miracle device that can create something out of nothing.

If it were possible to create matter out of energy as shown, the energy requirements would be staggering. Something not even a starship could do on a regular basis.

However this is the Trek Tech forum where we discuss Trek Tech where they DO use replicators on a regular basis, quite casually, except in the early years of Voyager where it is "rationed".

If you wish to discuss the real life plausibility, great, thats what the S&T forum is for, but you cant debate it as a part of trek tech for all the series since TOS can you?

 

[Wingsley]

Replication was never explicitly shown as "creating something out of nothing".

I always thought that replicators were transmutation and transportation devices, albeit at the molecular-resolution level. (Human-rated transporter beams supposedly work at the quantum-resolution level.) I envisioned replicators as taking raw material, transforming it into a desired form, and materializing it where the request was made. So think of it this way: starships keep storage bins filled with some sort of "tofu" like substance, someone pages a chicken salad sandwich at a replicator in the ship's mess, and the replicator draws a small quantity of the tofu, transforms it into a chicken salad sandwich, and beams it to the point-of-request.

I cite two reasons for expecting this method to be what was meant by replication: first, "The Trouble With Tribbles", in which Scotty referred to the replicators as "food processors"; second, the early 1980's TMP-era novel "The Prometheus Design" by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Colbreath, in which clothing materializes on the occupant in a sonic shower. Scotty described a malfunction as "transporting in straight, hot base instead of a uniform." That made sense.

 

[Wingsley]

Mind if I suggest a new direction for this thread?

Let's assume, after the Dominion and the Borg were beaten back and no longer a primary security risk, that the Federation set to work rebuilding Starfleet. Let's assume, for sake of argument in this thread, that Starfleet had to decide between either refitting the Galaxy class with a new "Block 2" technology and design upgrade, or scrapping the class and replacing it with a new Galaxy II class.

What would this new generation of super-duty explorer ships look like? How would they differ from their Galaxy-class forebears?

 

[Dayton3]

Wouldn't that depend on both their missions and the evaluation of the Galaxy class performance in the Dominion War?

From what we saw on DS9, the Galaxy class did very well in fleet combat actions.

 

[Deks]

Voyager was hardly a trek tech joke.

It was constructed after wolf 359 and was a perfect candidate to incorporate technologies capable of fighting the Borg.
Simply because it was smaller, it doesn't mean anything it did was 'way out there, even for Trek'.
Alien races that SF encountered were doing extremely large things with probes ... I guess that our heroes began to learn a few tricks (which may have been a cop out on some occasions, but come on, it was bound to happen and not like any other show didn't have it's own 'gems').
Besides, it's far more practical for SF to build smaller ships that would be just as powerful as the bigger ones as it cuts the time needed to actually construct such ships.
All SF are capable of scientific research.
True that more internal space would enable you to make dedicated labs, but one universal lab such as the 'Astrometrics lab' on Voyager would have done the trick for the most part.
Replicators used energy to create matter (and energy was already in abundance but also recycling was used as one of the energy sources), but prior to 'Void' episode in Season 7, the energy the replicators used was intensive and were mostly used only when actually needed (such as battle situations and rarely for replicating food).
Neelix was a cook on that ship for a reason after all.
Shuttles can be easily explained that the crew transported the damaged ones back on board and repaired them but was simply not addressed on screen).
Constructing a new shuttle from scratch such as a Type 9 would be relatively easy for the crew.
They had the schematics in their database and could use various wreckage they happened to come across (or use unusable shuttles for recycling), and were bound to make pit stops that were not addressed on screen that would help them repair their battle damage and replenish some energy supplies.

Torpedoes are tricky, but again, they could have made new ones off screen by meeting warp capable races that had anti-matter in abundance along with several materials (for which Janeway could have made a trade).
Just because it wasn't explained on screen, doesn't mean it was implausible or that the ship would have battle damage all the time.

Episodes we saw mostly occurred with a week or two in between.
Plenty of time to repair any battle damage or make pit-stops.

In Year of Hell, the ship was under constant attack from the Krenim which was why the crew was unable to repair the structural (and other) damage like before.

 

[C.E. Evans]

USS KG5 said:

C.E. Evans said:
I could see a mega, ultra, superdooper deluxe-sized starship being necessary if its intended to operate very far from home for very long periods of time. It would basically need to carry everything it could possibly need itself, because it would have to operate without support from other ships and outposts.

It would pretty much have to be a warp-capable starbase in that regard.

Not really - the Galaxy is plenty big enough for its crew of 1000 and all the equipment you would need to basically rebuild her - with replicator technology it would be practical in a much smaller ship, as we saw in Voyager.

I was really playing devil's advocate for having a very large ship--I actually favor smaller vessels. With the criteria you mentioned above, you actually don't need one as big as the Intrepid-class, IMO.

To me, you only really need a big ship in Trek if you plan for it to carry a lot of people.

 

[Wingsley]

One thing about super-huge starships:

If you got much larger than a Galaxy-class vessel, would a Captain be of sufficient rank to command her? Or would such a large starship require a flag officer in the center seat?

 

[C.E. Evans]

^^^
Perhaps it would be time for Starfleet to bring back the rank of commodore at that point.

 

[Malleus]

^^^ I prefer something based off of Russian/Soviet rankings myself, actually. Having "first-rank," "second-rank," and "third-rank" commanders (plus, IMHO, a "fourth-rank" commander for the smallest ships aided by a "subcommander") would sound more modern than archaic English words (hence why I also ditched the word "captain").

 

[Wingsley]

I prefer to think that, in the Federation Starfleet, the rank of Commodore was never abolished.

 

[Unicron]

Me too.