Federation Capital Ship Numbers

[Alyeska]

So? We also saw nothing resembling 10,000 ships, and it makes sense that in the most crucial battles (which were the only ones we actually saw), they would try to use their newest and best ships.

We saw nothing resembling 10,000 ships only because its not possible to put that many on the screen at one time. We know final Dominion numbers as of WYLB and its fair to assume the FKR alliance had comparable numbers. That puts the Federation in the 10,000 ship range.

As to the newest and best ships. Judging the ship breakdowns it appears the older ships were equaly spread out among the fleets. This means that as a whole each fleet had similar numbers of Excelsiors and Mirandas. So when Sisko attacked DS9 with elements of two fleets the Starfleet could afford, he had an equal mixing. Attacking DS9 is important, but so is continuing to hold the line. Starfleet couldn't afford to make one area extremely weak by compounding lower then normal fleet sizes by also having them older and weaker ships.

Then explain why the fleet is so pitifully small in the TNG era, or why it would take them a year to recover from the losses incurred at Wolf 359, or why they could only muster a few dozen ships to defend Earth in STFC (and don't give me this bullshit about hundreds or thousands of ships in an offscreen battle lasting for weeks; it's nonsense and you know it).

First, there is a reason why TNG era had smaller fleets. The Federation was not on war footing. This means no reserve ships. Two, when not on war footing you tend to rotate your ships more evenly and do not send as many out as possible. This means of the ships Starfleet does have in active duty, only half of them are out on patrols. Last of all, in TNG era Starfleet quite simply was not building as many ships. It took the introduction of the Borg threat and learning about the Dominion before Starfleet seriously started building new ships.

As to Wolf 359. I already explained why they had smaller fleet numbers. Shelby said it would only take a year to replace the losses incurred at Wolf 359, nothing else. Truth be told this actualy says that Starfleet can build its ships extremely fast. This is supported by DS9 when the mirror universe was able to build a Defiant class ship in a month without a shipyards and how quickly the Sovereign class entered the line.

And as has been repeatedly mentioned there is plenty of unknown information in FC. We know two battles took place with an unspecified amount of time between them. We know that Borg ships tend to travel faster then Starfleet ones (though given that the Defiant was at both battles, something slowed the Cube down a fair degree, more ships attacking at warp maybe?). What we saw at Earth is merely what was left of what Earth could bring to bear. We already know that Starfleet was able to call a comparable number of ships in End Game in just minutes.

[Darth Wong]

So? We also saw nothing resembling 10,000 ships, and it makes sense that in the most crucial battles (which were the only ones we actually saw), they would try to use their newest and best ships.

We saw nothing resembling 10,000 ships only because its not possible to put that many on the screen at one time. We know final Dominion numbers as of WYLB and its fair to assume the FKR alliance had comparable numbers. That puts the Federation in the 10,000 ship range.

Depends on how you define "ship". I'd agree that they easily have that many ships if you count light craft and support vessels. But that many capital ships? Sorry, you'll need a lot more than you've got to prove that.

As to the newest and best ships. Judging the ship breakdowns it appears the older ships were equaly spread out among the fleets. This means that as a whole each fleet had similar numbers of Excelsiors and Mirandas. So when Sisko attacked DS9 with elements of two fleets the Starfleet could afford, he had an equal mixing. Attacking DS9 is important, but so is continuing to hold the line. Starfleet couldn't afford to make one area extremely weak by compounding lower then normal fleet sizes by also having them older and weaker ships.

In other words, "all of their fleets had the same distribution because the ones we saw did," even though that makes no sense.

First, there is a reason why TNG era had smaller fleets. The Federation was not on war footing. This means no reserve ships. Two, when not on war footing you tend to rotate your ships more evenly and do not send as many out as possible. This means of the ships Starfleet does have in active duty, only half of them are out on patrols. Last of all, in TNG era Starfleet quite simply was not building as many ships. It took the introduction of the Borg threat and learning about the Dominion before Starfleet seriously started building new ships.

I do like the way you propose your conjecture as fact.

As to Wolf 359. I already explained why they had smaller fleet numbers. Shelby said it would only take a year to replace the losses incurred at Wolf 359, nothing else.

A year to replace 37 ships, yet you figure that they shot up from a few hundred to 10,000 ships in a couple of years and there's no discrepancy to rationalize?

Truth be told this actualy says that Starfleet can build its ships extremely fast. This is supported by DS9 when the mirror universe was able to build a Defiant class ship in a month without a shipyards and how quickly the Sovereign class entered the line.

"Extremely fast". Nice qualitative statement. I suppose that's more convenient than looking at actual numbers, where your ramp-up from TNG's fleets to these imaginary 10,000 ship DS9 fleets in a few years would require ship construction rates on the order of 2000 ships per year or more. Yes, this is completely consistent with 37 ships per year

And as has been repeatedly mentioned there is plenty of unknown information in FC. We know two battles took place with an unspecified amount of time between them.

Wrong; no one has yet presented satisfactory evidence for two separate battles instead of one continuous battle.

We know that Borg ships tend to travel faster then Starfleet ones (though given that the Defiant was at both battles, something slowed the Cube down a fair degree, more ships attacking at warp maybe?).

Conjecture in order to support conjecture. Lovely.

What we saw at Earth is merely what was left of what Earth could bring to bear. We already know that Starfleet was able to call a comparable number of ships in End Game in just minutes.

Conclusion of conjecture which is supported by conjecture.

[Alyeska]

Depends on how you define "ship". I'd agree that they easily have that many ships if you count light craft and support vessels. But that many capital ships? Sorry, you'll need a lot more than you've got to prove that.

Every statement of ship counts indicates "Ships of the Line", capitalships. Klingon fleet counts, Wolf 359, Dominion forces. 10,000 ships for the Federation clearly means capitalships. The Dominion forces have NEVER been shown to have anything smaller then the Attackship. All Dominion counts are of their capitalships. Counting shuttles in the Federation fleet is illogical because it doesn't compare to the Federations enemies and allies.

other words, "all of their fleets had the same distribution because the ones we saw did," even though that makes no sense.

Incorrect. It makes perfect sense. You can only make estimates bassed on known evidence.

I do like the way you propose your conjecture as fact.

It fits the evidence and established motives of the Federation at the time.

A year to replace 37 ships, yet you figure that they shot up from a few hundred to 10,000 ships in a couple of years and there's no discrepancy to rationalize?

Do try and pay attention Mike. I explained why TNG era appeared to have fewer ships. TNG era likely only had 6,000 ships or so. Only 3,000 of them would be on duty. Considering the size of the Federation and where these ships would be distributed it is not surprising that in TNG era we would not see that many. 2,000 more ships are built between Wolf 359 and the start of the Dominion war and another 4,000 in reserve (using 12,000 as the total.)

"Extremely fast". Nice qualitative statement. I suppose that's more convenient than looking at actual numbers, where your ramp-up from TNG's fleets to these imaginary 10,000 ship DS9 fleets in a few years would require ship construction rates on the order of 2000 ships per year or more. Yes, this is completely consistent with 37 ships per year

Incorrect Mike. It was stated the losses could be replaced in a year. Normal ship building also occurs. What it says is that even the largest ships can be built in under a year. At 2,000 ships a year thats 14,000 ships in 7 years (the aproximate time between BOBW and the war). Now assuming Starfleet had 4,000 ships and 3,000 in reserve, that leaves 7 years to build 3,000 ships. Thats 430 ships a year and you get 10,000 ships by DS9. With 4,000 ships in TNG and only 2,000 on duty you get numbers we saw in TNG.

Wrong; no one has yet presented satisfactory evidence for two separate battles instead of one continuous battle.

All of which points to a much larger fleet then what we saw at Earth.

Conjecture in order to support conjecture. Lovely.

Galaxy class is one of the fastest ships in Starfleet and a Cube could run it down in minutes.

Conclusion of conjecture which is supported by conjecture.

Conclussion bassed on evidence. We know the battle started at the Typhon Sector and ended at Earth. We know that Borg ships are typicaly faster then Starfleet ships, though the Defiant maintaining indicates that the Cube was slowed down which means Starfleet could fight a running battle. This in turn means that Starfleet was fighting over a prolonged period of time and that more ships were engaged against the Cube then we saw at FC.

What this means is your claims about small fleet numbers is incorrect.

[Darth Wong]

Every statement of ship counts indicates "Ships of the Line", capitalships. Klingon fleet counts, Wolf 359, Dominion forces. 10,000 ships for the Federation clearly means capitalships.

Ah, I see. This is the "ships only includes capitalships because ships only includes capitalships" argument. Does the word "circle" mean anything to you?

The Dominion forces have NEVER been shown to have anything smaller then the Attackship. All Dominion counts are of their capitalships. Counting shuttles in the Federation fleet is illogical because it doesn't compare to the Federations enemies and allies.

And yet runabouts are given registry numbers and used as combat vessels, even in formation with capitalships.

other words, "all of their fleets had the same distribution because the ones we saw did," even though that makes no sense.

Incorrect. It makes perfect sense. You can only make estimates bassed on known evidence.

And what is your "known evidence"? Offscreen comments by a producer? Sorry, that's not evidence. The assumption that ship counts must exclude anything smaller than a few hundred metres? Sorry, that's not evidence either.

Do try and pay attention Mike. I explained why TNG era appeared to have fewer ships. TNG era likely only had 6,000 ships or so. Only 3,000 of them would be on duty.

And your evidence for these figures is ...?

Considering the size of the Federation and where these ships would be distributed it is not surprising that in TNG era we would not see that many. 2,000 more ships are built between Wolf 359 and the start of the Dominion war and another 4,000 in reserve (using 12,000 as the total.)

More conjecture in order to meet up with a totally non-canon offscreen statement that should hardly be considered more authoritative than the also non-canon but more thoroughly produced DS9 TM.

Incorrect Mike. It was stated the losses could be replaced in a year. Normal ship building also occurs. What it says is that even the largest ships can be built in under a year. At 2,000 ships a year thats 14,000 ships in 7 years (the aproximate time between BOBW and the war). Now assuming Starfleet had 4,000 ships and 3,000 in reserve, that leaves 7 years to build 3,000 ships. Thats 430 ships a year and you get 10,000 ships by DS9. With 4,000 ships in TNG and only 2,000 on duty you get numbers we saw in TNG.

So they started going on a "war footing" for the Dominion beginning at BOBW? Nice shell game. There is no indication whatsoever that ship production ramped up by an order of magnitude after BOBW.

Wrong; no one has yet presented satisfactory evidence for two separate battles instead of one continuous battle.

All of which points to a much larger fleet then what we saw at Earth.

Conjecture in order to support conjecture. Lovely.

Galaxy class is one of the fastest ships in Starfleet and a Cube could run it down in minutes.

Conclusion of conjecture which is supported by conjecture.

Conclussion bassed on evidence. We know the battle started at the Typhon Sector and ended at Earth. We know that Borg ships are typicaly faster then Starfleet ships, though the Defiant maintaining indicates that the Cube was slowed down which means Starfleet could fight a running battle.

Of course Starfleet can fight a running battle. How does this prove your hundreds of ships and weeks of battle?

This in turn means that Starfleet was fighting over a prolonged period of time and that more ships were engaged against the Cube then we saw at FC.

And yet ships engaged at the beginning were still there at the end.

What this means is your claims about small fleet numbers is incorrect.

No, it means that you're still insisting on treating your assumptions as fact.

[Alyeska]

Ah, I see. This is the "ships only includes capitalships because ships only includes capitalships" argument. Does the word "circle" mean anything to you?

Does the word common sense mean anything to you? Fleet counts for the opfor and allies has always counted its capitalships.

And yet runabouts are given registry numbers and used as combat vessels, even in formation with capitalships.

Irrelevent. The fleet count given for the Federation must not count such minor vessels. The reason why is because the fleet count for the Federation must be comparable to the fleet count given for the Dominion. There exists no evidence that the Federation had a massive advantage over Dominion forces.

[And what is your "known evidence"? Offscreen comments by a producer? Sorry, that's not evidence. The assumption that ship counts must exclude anything smaller than a few hundred metres? Sorry, that's not evidence either.

Offscreen comments by the person in charge of the series is evidence. Furthermore smaller ships are a red herring. We know that allied and opfor ships are counted only in relation to Capitalships. Now please tell me how a fleet of 10,000 Starfleet ships with roughly 80% of them being shuttles (Federation ships always carry multiple shuttles) can be compared to allied and opfor fleet counts. We know the Dominion had 30,000 ships near the end of the war. Shuttles were NEVER shown in any of the three races that made up the Dominion.

And your evidence for these figures is ...?

Common sense. You can not keep a ship active for an indinfinite amount of time. It requires constant repairs and upgrades and the crew also needs to be rotated. We know the Enterprise herself saw periodic upgrades and times where it was not on duty. However the Enterprise is a high endurance ship and much of Starfleet is not. Rotating the ships through active duty is a common occurance in scifi and is mandatory in the real world. Most often only 1/3 of a fleet is deployed in peace time conditions. Assuming 1/2 of Starfleet is deployed in peace time and using 4,000 as its main number you get just 2,000 ships on active duty.

More conjecture in order to meet up with a totally non-canon offscreen statement that should hardly be considered more authoritative than the also non-canon but more thoroughly produced DS9 TM.

Totaly irrelevent. Statements by the person most in charge of the series are quite acceptable as evidence. The only claim I've seen that TMs and offscreen statements are invalid is from a source lower down the totem pole then Berman or Moore.

So they started going on a "war footing" for the Dominion beginning at BOBW? Nice shell game. There is no indication whatsoever that ship production ramped up by an order of magnitude after BOBW.

The Borg taught the Federation a lesson. They started inreasing ship production as a logical upgrade in their readiness. Further Borg incidents throughout TNG would also be a very big sign that Starfleet should be more prepared. This would explain the relative abudance of newer ship designs by the time of First Contact. The first encounters with the Dominion would further increase ship production. Initial production increases would be much lower then 400 some ships a year. 400 is merely an average.

Of course Starfleet can fight a running battle. How does this prove your hundreds of ships and weeks of battle?

I made no such claim. You however claimed FC is evidence that Starfleet is very small because it had few ships at Earth. I pointed out (as did The Darkling) that FC has to many unknowns for that claim to be made.

And yet ships engaged at the beginning were still there at the end.

Only one known ship. Judging by past Borg encounters this was more sheer luck then anything. The Borg blasted through 40 ships at Wolf 359 in just ten minutes. It destroyed a pair of ships in just seconds at the initial battle at Typhon. Given the time frame we are dealing with (hours minimum) we know that the Borg had more time to get to Earth then ships to kill. This means the fleet at Earth does not accurately represent what was sent against the Cube.

No, it means that you're still insisting on treating your assumptions as fact.

Mike, loose the attitude. You claimed FC is representative of small fleets. I pointed out where this is wrong. Now its not my responsibility to do yours. You have yet to prove your assertation correct because you've cited no evidence, examples, or made anything other then a vague statement.

[Darth Wong]

Does the word common sense mean anything to you?

In short, your argument is based upon intuition rather than evidence. Thanks for admitting that.

Irrelevent. The fleet count given for the Federation must not count such minor vessels. The reason why is because the fleet count for the Federation must be comparable to the fleet count given for the Dominion. There exists no evidence that the Federation had a massive advantage over Dominion forces.

If the fleet count for the Federation excludes smaller ships, then the Federation should have a massive advantage, since its capships are all considerably larger than Dominion attack ships which are counted. Next time, try to prove your own point rather than mine.

Offscreen comments by the person in charge of the series is evidence.

Nope, sorry, according to StarTrek.Com, you're wrong.

Furthermore smaller ships are a red herring. We know that allied and opfor ships are counted only in relation to Capitalships.

Stop using your assumptions as evidence to support your conclusions.

Now please tell me how a fleet of 10,000 Starfleet ships with roughly 80% of them being shuttles (Federation ships always carry multiple shuttles) can be compared to allied and opfor fleet counts. We know the Dominion had 30,000 ships near the end of the war.

IIRC, we hear that the Dominion, Cardassian, and Breen fleets have a total of 30,000 ships near the end of the war, and their small attack ships are crewed by what, a dozen men? Not exactly what I would call a capship.

And your evidence for these figures is ...?

Common sense.

Read: "intuition". Get back to me when you have evidence.

You can not keep a ship active for an indinfinite amount of time. It requires constant repairs and upgrades and the crew also needs to be rotated. We know the Enterprise herself saw periodic upgrades and times where it was not on duty. However the Enterprise is a high endurance ship and much of Starfleet is not. Rotating the ships through active duty is a common occurance in scifi and is mandatory in the real world. Most often only 1/3 of a fleet is deployed in peace time conditions. Assuming 1/2 of Starfleet is deployed in peace time and using 4,000 as its main number you get just 2,000 ships on active duty.

Who the hell said I was contesting the ratio of deployment, as opposed to your overall number of 6000 ships?

Totaly irrelevent. Statements by the person most in charge of the series are quite acceptable as evidence. The only claim I've seen that TMs and offscreen statements are invalid is from a source lower down the totem pole then Berman or Moore.

And StarTrek.Com, but I guess that's of a lower ranking than Alyeska.

The Borg taught the Federation a lesson. They started inreasing ship production as a logical upgrade in their readiness.

Again, stating your propositions as if they were facts.

Further Borg incidents throughout TNG would also be a very big sign that Starfleet should be more prepared. This would explain the relative abudance of newer ship designs by the time of First Contact.

Like the Defiant-class, of which they had built a grand total of one. Yeah, that sounds like evidence for your order-of-magnitude increase in shipbuilding

The first encounters with the Dominion would further increase ship production. Initial production increases would be much lower then 400 some ships a year. 400 is merely an average.

More assumptions.

Of course Starfleet can fight a running battle. How does this prove your hundreds of ships and weeks of battle?

I made no such claim. You however claimed FC is evidence that Starfleet is very small because it had few ships at Earth. I pointed out (as did The Darkling) that FC has to many unknowns for that claim to be made.

Hardly. The battle is obviously not as long as you make it out to be, because ships which were there at the beginning are still there at the end. How long can a Federation ship really last in full-fledged combat against a Borg cube if it's tough enough to wipe out hundreds of them in a single running battle? And don't give me this "repaired and then caught up" bullshit; how hard do you need to piss on Occam's Razor?

Only one known ship.

And they didn't know the Admiral's ship was destroyed until they arrived at the battle despite a real-time comm-link, which means it was destroyed just before they got there. How likely is it such long-term survival against a ship which supposedly wipes out hundreds of capships on its own? Particularly when its commanding officer is a Klingon who is not exactly likely to hang back?

Judging by past Borg encounters this was more sheer luck then anything. The Borg blasted through 40 ships at Wolf 359 in just ten minutes. It destroyed a pair of ships in just seconds at the initial battle at Typhon. Given the time frame we are dealing with (hours minimum) we know that the Borg had more time to get to Earth then ships to kill. This means the fleet at Earth does not accurately represent what was sent against the Cube.

So? It is not likely to be an order of magnitude off, either. I love the way you make claims of uncertainties and then use them as a springboard to claim an ORDER OF MAGNITUDE increase in numbers over and above what is observed.

No, it means that you're still insisting on treating your assumptions as fact.

Mike, loose the attitude. You claimed FC is representative of small fleets. I pointed out where this is wrong.

How? By proposing an order of magnitude increase over what we see by appealing to uncertainty, proposing that Worf hung back to avoid risking his ship thus explaining his survival while hundreds of ships were destroyed around him, by inventing your own definition of canon with no real basis anywhere but your personal say-so (while simultaneously ignoring the small figures in the DS9 TM which you introduce with that definition), or by justifying all of your assumptions by simply calling them "common sense"?

[TheDarkling]

Like the Defiant-class, of which they had built a grand total of one. Yeah, that sounds like evidence for your order-of-magnitude increase in shipbuilding

The Defiant was designed, built as a prototype, found to have problems and shelved once the Borg threat became less immediate and then brought back up for the Dominion threat.
An increase in ship building could start whilst the Defiant was still being designed got up to the point where the Borg threat became less immediate, slacked off for a year or so and then brought up again upon discovery of the Dominion.

The fact that Starfleet took the Borg threat seriously enough to make a major design departure (a warship) makes it likely they also undertook a fleet build up programme (it would be odd if they didn't), a build up which was therefore already under way by the time the Dominion was discovered and then kept on for that reason.

[Darth Wong]

And oddly enough, we never actually heard about this tenfold shipbuilding increase, so your argument is basically "they had an incentive to do it, therefore they were capable of doing it, therefore they did it."

[Gil Hamilton]

Actually, they built three Defiant classes at the very least. The original Defiant (which got blown up), the Valiant (which got blown up), and the second Defiant (which replaced the original). That isn't evidence for alot of them, certainly not the wolfpack swarms of them that I've heard some Trekkies dream of, but there is more than one.

And for the record, Runabouts are counted as registered starships in StarFleets fleet counts. They've got registry numbers and Sisko identified one as a starship several times. That's good enough for me.

[TheDarkling]

Actually, they built three Defiant classes at the very least. The original Defiant (which got blown up), the Valiant (which got blown up), and the second Defiant (which replaced the original). That isn't evidence for alot of them, certainly not the wolfpack swarms of them that I've heard some Trekkies dream of, but there is more than one.

We see more than that, we see a couple in "Message in a Bottle Voy" and there are two in the fleet the Defiant joins at the end of "A call to Arms DS9".
We also see a couple more in the "Endgame" fleet.

I assumed Darth Wong meant a grand total of one was built initially.

And for the record, Runabouts are counted as registered starships in StarFleets fleet counts. They've got registry numbers and Sisko identified one as a starship several times. That's good enough for me.

I think Runabouts may be included in fleet counts (not the fighters though which is the mian point of contention usually), but we never seen them in fleet battles and they are relatively new so I doubt they effect total fleet numbers that much one way or the other.

[Sarevok]

Actually, they built three Defiant classes at the very least. The original Defiant (which got blown up), the Valiant (which got blown up), and the second Defiant (which replaced the original). That isn't evidence for alot of them, certainly not the wolfpack swarms of them that I've heard some Trekkies dream of, but there is more than one.

I think there was another two Defiants in "Message in a Bottle".