Ship of the week: Ambassador

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Teaos
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Ship of the week: Ambassador

Post by Teaos »

The last of the Enterprises to be covered by us and the one we know the least about.

The name implies it was a diplomatic ship which suit the era of peace it was built during. But it also has a fair bit of fire power behind it as the Enterprise C was able to take on several Romulan warbirds and put up a damn good fight.

I personally think the ships is butt ugly but I like how it was built to fit the primary roll that was needed. The Feds had had an extended period of peace and thus built their flag ship accordingly. Now that they are under more threat they build stronger ships like the Sovereign. It shows a level of resourcefulness which I like.
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Post by JudgeKing »

I tend to think that the Ambassador Class is one of the few intellegent designs built by Starfleet. Even though, we've never seen it in combat, it would be nice for there to a movie about the Enteprise C's final mission. Back on topic, the Ambassador Class is probably more balanced in diplomatic/scientific capablities rather than combat ability.
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Post by Monroe »

JudgeKing wrote:I tend to think that the Ambassador Class is one of the few intellegent designs built by Starfleet.
I agree with you here.

Personally I think it looks great too. One of my favorite ships.
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Post by Teaos »

I think it looks like it was deisgned in a coffie brake by someone who doesnt give a shit.

But as far as balance goes... The name and era lead you to believe is it diplomatic heavy but the fight it put up in yesterdays enterprise is impressive to say the least.
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Post by Sionnach Glic »

I think it looks hideous, like the bastardized child of a Constitution and a Galaxy.
As for the name, it apears to have some serious fire power relative to other vesels of the time, so it might have been a deliberate missnaming, to throw enemies.
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Post by Captain Peabody »

Yeah...the Ambassador is a little on the ugly side. Though what's a mystery is why Excelsiors show up everywhere in the 24th century, while we've only seen 2 or 3 of their 'replacement'... though it may just have something to do with being more inclined toward scientific and diplomatic pursuits, and so not being really able to put up much of a fight. But still, if the Federation was pulling Miranda class starships out of storage to use in the Dominion war, why not Ambassadors? Are they really that weak?
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Post by Enkidu »

Personally, I like the Ambassador. I'm glad to see a couple of other people here do as well, as it seems to be one of the most unpopular ships with the fans. For me, it succeeds in looking like an evolutionary stage between the ships of TOS and the TNG.
Why do we see so few? With so many older ships going strong, they don't seem to need too many of the flagship ships in the post Excelsior era, and they seem to get sent on the dangerous exploration mission and first contact missions. Perhaps the production run between the end of the Exclesior production and the start of the Galaxys was quite small, and a number of have been lost.
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Post by Teaos »

Maybe they either had limited production run or were used in other positions.

And if the naming thing was to throw enemies off that is one of the most half assed atempts at misinformation ever.
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Post by Sionnach Glic »

And if the naming thing was to throw enemies off that is one of the most half assed atempts at misinformation ever.
Yeah, well, Starfleet is a half-assed organisation.

It's only a theory to explain why an aparently heavily armed ship was called such an unfitting name.
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Post by Teaos »

Heavily armed is a subjective term. While it may be strong compared to other ships of the time it may only give over a small amount of volume to weapons. It may be because at that point of time Starfleet had introduced several new systems giving them a rather large advantage (Phaser arrays and better torpedo launchers). So while it may only give over 20% of volume to weaponary and related areas it is still stronger than other ships.
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Post by Sionnach Glic »

True.
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Post by Captain Seafort »

Lookswise, I must agree with Rochey and Teaos - the Ambassador is downright ugly, probably because it has the blocky, circular cross-section primary and engineering hulls of the Connie without the slender neck and nacelle pylons to offset them. The Galaxy, which is certainly not the most graceful of ships, at least tapered the main hulls and blended them together.

Capability-wise, we haven't seen enough of it to get a good impression. The only real indication is that one can take on four mid-2340s Romulan ships and hold them off long enough to impress the Klingons. Not a shoddy performance, especially given the Feds' "sneeze-and-KABOOM" school of starship design.
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Post by Mikey »

Rochey wrote:I think it looks hideous, like the bastardized child of a Constitution and a Galaxy.
That's because it is the bastard child of a Connie and a Galaxy. Remember; the Amabassador was not designed on its own, it was designed to fit in between two already-established designs.

As far as the class name - forget it. It means nothing at all. Does a Prometheus-class incorporate a giant flamethrower? Does a New Orleans-class flood periodically?

I tend to judge the Ambassador solely as it was presented - a ship made to fill in, historically, between the Excelsior and the Galaxy. As such, and within thos constraints, I think it worked very well. Many people don't like it, but I've never heard anybody say that it doesn't make sense in a logical design progression.

My biggest problem with it is that with such a seemingly small production run, why would there be design variants - at least ones which didn't seem to upgun or upgrade it?
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Post by Captain Seafort »

Ironically, the orginal Ambassador design - the one depicted on the back wall of the E-D's conference room - is a much more elegant design than the one depicted in "Yesterday's Enterprise" onwards. If they'd only taken that ship as the basis of the E-C we might not be having this conversation.
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Post by Mikey »

Well, as I said, the one which actually flew was ugly, but it made sense for what it was. If that were the design for the hero ship of a series without a current sequel timeline already established, I'd be mad. But it wasn't.
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