Starship Sundays: Ambassador

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An official version of this ship is available in the Command Division sourcebook.

Welcome to Starship Sunday, presenting a new spaceframe for the Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game, filling in some gaps until official material can be released.
To kick off 2018 we’re journeying to the prominent class of starship in the little seen “Lost Era”, known as such not because it was forgotten but because little canonically occurred during in that time period. The Lost Era covers the years between Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country  (or the launch of the Enterprise-B at the start of Star Trek Generations) and the beginning of Star Trek The Next Generation. First off is the Ambassador-class. 

This design replaced the Excelsior-class as the chief exploratory vessels of the Federation, following in the footsteps of the Constitution and Einstein-class ships. One of the most prominent ships of the line was the Enterprise-C, the fourth Starfleet vessel to bear the name. In addition to exploring the frontier and numerous scientific and diplomatic missions, the Ambassador-class served bravely during the prolonged Federation-Cardassian War.

For the longest time, the look and history of the Enterprise-C was a mystery (as was the Enterprise-B for that matter). It wasn’t until the episode Yesterday’s Enterprise that the backstory for the ship was revealed. Despite its status as the flagship for a generation, the Ambassador-class has seldom been seen on the screen, and was only featured in four episode of franchise. This is odd given many older classes of ship continued to be used, such as the Excelsior and Miranda classes. Presumably, many Ambassador ships were lost in battle with the Cardassians.

The Ambassador-class is an excellent ship to tell stories akin to those of Star Trek: The Original Series and The Next Generation, performing similar missions in the fifty years between the class’ launch and Encounter at Farpoint. With the loss of the Enterprise-C in 2344, Starfleet was also missing a flagship and primary vessel for key missions, creating a void that a player’s ship could fill. The Enterprise-C was also in service for a dozen years before it was lost at Narendra III, leaving plenty of time for missions prior to that date. The players could be serving under Captain Rachel Garrett, or they could be a heretofore unknown original crew that served on the ship before Garrett took command. An Ambassador-class would also be an excellent ship to crew during a campaign set around the Federation-Cardassian War, telling stories similar to the Dominion War but in an earlier era. Alternatively, the an Ambassador ship could be used in the current era of the game, being an older ship refit for combat missions against the Dominion.

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