The K'Tinga would probably make the most sense from a marketing standpoint as the ship's screen use spans from the first TOS movie all the way to the last episode of DS9.

Number of TNG episodes: 178

Number of TOS episodes: 79

TNG brought in what is now the majority of the Star Trek fan base and whilst casual or non fans but geeks see Spock and Kirk as the poster boys of Star Trek, TNG is probably the more popular.

Your argument is based upon a flawed assumption on your part. More episodes do not automatically equal greater overall popularity.

Actually the overall number of viewers for both the Original Series and Next Generation were quite comparable in their first runs.

TOS 1966: Average number of viewers = 9,800,000 per episode*

TNG 1987: Average number of viewers = 8,550,000 per episode*

*(Nielsen estimates)

The issue with TOS having fewer seasons had more to due the fact that it generally takes a higher overall viewership for a show to be considered a "success" for a major network than it does in syndication, which is why despite having a similar number of viewers, TOS was considered a "failure" at NBC while conversely,  TNG was considered a "hit" in syndication. 

Factor in that NBC's executives didn't get along well with Roddenberry and kept changing TOS's schedule to progressively worse time slots and the show's cancellation (twice) was guaranteed.

In any case, as you can see from the actual ratings data, there were easily as many fans of TOS in it's original run as there were fans of TNG.

Add in to that, many, many fans of TOS didn't even see the series in its original run but instead became hooked on the show in its subsequent decades in syndication and it should be clear that estimating TOS's popularity solely by its lower number of episodes is a flawed argument.

So what would make us, a tiny fraction of the fan base invested in DST, split with north of $100.00 to buy a DST Borg Cube...

Sorry, not interested in a $100 block of plastic that says "Resistance is futile".

For that kind of money the thing would need to have multiple, shifting laser emitters that projected in an arc to simulate the Borg tractor beam. 

Let's not forget here, that Star Trek: The Next Generation was far more popular than the Original Series. That popularity has lasted and I think one of the many reasons that the new movies don't resonate with the fan base is because they go back to Kirk and Spock. Household names but names long since surpassed by other iconic, household names like Picard, Data, Worf and Riker not to mention Janeway and 7of9.

 

Debatable to say the least. 

Number of original series films :6.5

Number of Next Generation films : 3.5

The reason why the "new" movies don't resonate with the fan base is because the of the bad writing, poorly executed internal continuity, terrible story lines and an almost complete lack of respect for the feel of the original series.

Ships that change size from scene to scene because the director thinks they "look better" in a different scale from one shot to the next, an Enterprise which literally has to be "bigger on the inside" in order to accommodate some of the cinematography, plot holes in the story line that you could drive a dreadnought through, etc. are the reasons the fan base has so poorly received the "reboot" Trek.

As to "surpassing" the original series as iconic characters.. ask a random person on the street who "Captain Kirk" is and they will likely be able to answer you. Ask them the same question about "Captain Janeway"... not so much.

Thanks I'll contact DST on Monday and see what they say. Pity the ones for some of the ships are so flimsy. I find it somewhat annoying the the base Playmates made for the 2009 movie Enterprise is so much more sturdy than the ones from DST/AA for the classic version of the Enterprise. The toy maker in me is tempted to make a modified base for the classic Enterprise models in the manner of the Playstation 2009 base just so I won't have to deal with any chance of future breakage.

I'll also like those acrylic ones. They look nice but cost just about what I have been paying for each of the ships themselves, used from Ebay.

Maybe I'll get some of those for the "special" ships I am looking to add to the collection like the ISS Enterprise (TOS version) or the SDCC 2015 Defiant.

So, I have managed to aquire several of the AA/DS ships that I was looking for off Ebay at a good price.

Problem being that some of the stands for the ships are either broken or missing.

Basically I am looking to replace the stand for a TOS enterprise which has broken just below the connector to the ship and both of the stands for the Enterprise D (All good Things edition).

If anyone has any to sell or point me in the right direction for replacements that would be great. Failing that, I may just have to make replacements myself in my shop.

Reliant should also have running lights on the hull similar to how they are on the TOS Enterprise. (but hopefully on the corect sides)

 

I completely agree with you about the Enterprise-C--I think the fact that it's the last Enterprise we need to complete our collections must add to its sales potential. As far as the Defiant goes though, I do think the Eaglemoss version is also an option, because at its small size--about five inches--it is actually in scale pretty well with the Diamond Select ships. If I get a Defiant at all (I always thought it's an ugly-looking ship, but I do respect what it did onscreen in DS9) I might go the Eaglemoss route, as I just don't think it will look very good on my shelf at a larger size.

 

I'm a little bit tempted to pick up the Playmates version of the Romulan Warbird and the Vor'cha myself. The only thing keeping me from grabbing the Warbird are those awful four buttons on top of its hull, and a general lack of detail (the lack of windows really stands out.) Is the Vor'cha any good?  

Both the Vor'cha and the Warbird are "Okay" when sitting in a display and viewed from a distance of say five feet or so. The lack of detail becomes much more apparent the closer you look at the pieces. Which makes sense really as they were intended primarily as toys as opposed to the AA/DS ships which are designed for display.

A very nice looking ship.

Is that C built up from a model kit?

The most requested ships according to what I've seen are:

Reliant, Defiant, Enterprise-C (popularity of this choice has jumped in recent years), and then Voyager.

That seems about right to me although I can see the order of those four ships being juggled around a bit from person to person. 

Of the Alien ships I would like to see the D-7, Romulan Warbird (TOS), Vor'cha, and the 24th century Warbird. That said, I do have the (albeit inferior) Playmates versions of both the Romulan ships and the Vor'cha to use as placeholders until DS/AA gets around to them so for me the D-7 is the highest priority.

The same goes for the Defiant and Voyager. Since I have nominal substitutes for them I personally would like to see the Reliant and Enterprise-C hit shelves first.

And as to the Enterprise-C's "limited appeal" from a business standpoint, it may have only had a brief amount of screen time but I do understand the growing demand for it. After all, we now have every other Trek "Enterprise" available to us and as collectors the C being missing just leaves a very noticable hole in the line of ships.

Well I love that the next ship is set to be the OS warbird out (hopefully) around the 50th anniversary.

There really aren't many OS ships left for them to do besides this one and the D-7 and the Warbird is probably easier from a production standpoint to make. 

Beyond that, they really only have "fringe" ships like the Botany Bay, Tholian, ect. or more variants of the Constitution Class that had brief moments on screen like the Lexington or the Hood which would probably have a very limited number of people willing to buy them.

That said, I personally would not mind seeing something like a "generic" Constitution Class ship being released which had all of the standard markings already applied but with the specific registry tags for each of the fourteen ships on a seperate decal sheet that would allow the buyer to designate the ship as any of them that they would like. Perhaps something like that could come with a sound chip that just included ship based ship sound effects and no voice overs.

That way, they could please both people who just want one or two variants as well as those who might want the whole "fleet" with just one release. I would think that this would be viable as the production costs would be lower overall than a totally new piece due to there being no new molds to produce.

Hi Zach,

 

I'm a first-time poster here and my love for Diamond Select Trek ships is what brought me to this board. So far I own The Wrath of Khan Enterprise, the Enterprise-B, the Enterprise-D, the All Good Things Enterprise, and the Klingon Bird of Prey from Undiscovered Country. (I also have the 2015 version of the HD Enterprise-1701 pre-ordered.) So I'm definitely invested in the future of this line. Since I've just started collecting, playing catch-up to get the ships I want through ebay and other online resellers, I haven't experienced the evident frustration some fans mention when they talk about the wait time between new ship releases and the occasional lack of new information provided. Reading your comments about this, I can completely understand why you guys wouldn't want to show pictures of prototypes in progress, as any little imperfections could lead to a flood of online negativity that really isn't fair considering prototypes are works in progress.

 

However, I'm not quite sure I understand your reasoning when it comes to not wanting to announce in advance your choices for which new ships will be produced. For instance, the next Federation ship is apparently being worked on but its identity hasn't been revealed. I guess you don't want to risk negative online reactions to ship choices, but wouldn't negative reactions in this type of situation be informative? For example, if the new Federation ship was something like the Botany Bay, which probably would be very far down on most fans' want lists behind the Enterprise C, the Defiant, Voyager, etc., and fans made their displeasure known, wouldn't that help you guys to realize that a more profitable choice could be made? I would think that, in the instance of ship selection, you guys might welcome feedback before you made a final decision and went into the production stage?

 

Anyway, I'd like to thank you for being a presence on these boards and giving us what information you can. It's appreciated!

 

--Mark

Hello,

While I agree that I'd love to know more about the release schedule for new Trek items in advance, as someone who designs and produces terrain models for role playing games I understand the other side of things as well. Over the years there have been  several projects in my shop that have been in various prototype stages which either ended up being altered dramatically or scrapped altogether due to either design/production flaws or necessary improvements to the final models which caused them to differ in some cases dramatically from the original concept pieces.

These changes resulted in confusion with some of our customers and this ultimately led to our adopting a policy similar to what AA has done where we only "preview" models which are ready to move into production rather than the early stage prototypes.

That said, we still occasionally "preview" potential concept pieces quietly at conventions we exhibt at in order to obtain feedback and potential interest in the new product.

Of course, we also don't have the issue AA does with having to obtain "final approval" from the executives at CBS/Paramount regarding the likeness and design of new models which I'm sure adds yet another layer of legal entanglement to any product announcements or previews as well.

I've always loved Star Trek but haven't been into collecting much in the way of toys since the big Playmates' run in the 90's.

The wife and I had a Star Trek themed Halloween this year though and what with hunting down tricorders and communicators for our costumes and other props and toys as decorations for the party I discovered all of the cool things which have been released over the past 15 years.

Over the past couple of months we picked up the props for our costumes, the OS door chime/wall communicator and a lot of tribbles.

Right now I am hunting down more of the DS/AA ships to add to my collection.