I like the original idea. A cruiser with a Lt. Commander science slot is currently something you can only do with the Odyssey. I'd make the ensign a universal.

It's not necessarily a ship I would fly, but it would make a better support cruiser than the Star Cruiser. Better turn rate than a SC or Oddy, so more fun to fly.

In keeping with the Enterprise-C tradition, I'd make its special ability sort of a cross between Goes Down Fighting and Ramming Speed.

"Heroic Sacrifice", can be used when hull is 25% or less, causes a large stacking damage buff for ten seconds, followed by a warp core breach.

You missed the sarcasm apparently.

It's going to release as a fairly basic ship with a much better* version of it coming out a month or two later, possibly in a $50.00 pack.

So "What should the free one be?" is kind of irrelevant since it's going to be blown away by the c-store version not long after.

*Results my vary.

Just gonna say this now, and this is not a troll post or flame the OP post. This is what I feel about the Ambassador class ship.

That ship, along with the Connie and Excelsior, should only be used for hauling garbage. Or better yet, they should be hauled away. As garbage.

Due to another poster's request:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMrzdKzQTf8

If I could edit your quote to include a link to this, I certainly would.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMrzdKzQTf8

This is not understandable to me.... you would intentionally make a ship weak just so you can get it built?

You guys say fanfiction is bad but I would rather have an effective ship then a watered down log.

I wonder who's more of the fan here, the person who is watering down a ship to nothing just to get it on the boards or the one who's really trying to make it into what it really should be?

None of the big cruisers are worth getting because of this kind of blatant abuse that people are doing. All this concession-izing and coddling makes hose cruisers useless to every tac out there because none of them have any real bite to them and the only people willing to actually make a ship with some fight is PWE itself, come on people get it together. If you're going to make a ship that's more then likely not going to be made how you want it any how then at least have the courage to make it worth flying.

A big ship that can't rotate b-faw 3 or cvs 3 is seriously not a tanker ship to me, it won't be able to keep aggro, it won't b aggressive, and it will still fail to be anything but target on the field to be gunned down.

editing done =)

Not everyone measures a ship's worth on squeezing the last ounce of DPS out of it.

Just sayin'.

I'd rather enjoy the ship the OP describes. Hell. I'd enjoy it if it was a 4-fore 3-aft sci-cruiser hybrid..

But seriously...

What the Ambassador SHOULD be is the T3 Cruiser that you get before the Galaxy class makes its appearance at Tier 4. (Not saying it shouldn't get a T5 refit, mind you)

The Heavy Cruiser (Four Nacelle) should then, in turn, be made the hull type for Tier 2.

Get the Constitutions and ancient, "tall-ship" design theories out of the main line. If they have to be there, put them in the C-Store, with period-appropriate statlines.

(Yes, I'm bracing for the flame onslaught.)

Actually that Lt. Cmdr sci might mean more than some would think.

Not everyone wants another DPS cruiser. I personally loved flying my old Star Cruiser a long time ago in season 4-ish, before I bought my RA Excelsior.

Lt. cmdr sci opens a LOT of possibilities, far more than a Lt. Cmdr Engineer would.

That slot can hold...

Gravity Well 1
TSS 3
Sci Team 3
HE 3
Jam Sensors 3
Mask Energy Signature 3
Polarize Hull 3
Tachyon Beam 3
Tractor Beam 3
CPB 2
Energy Siphon 2
Feedback Pulse 2
Photonic Officer 2
TBR 2
SS 2
Tyken's Rift 2
Photonic Shockwave 1
Viral Matrix 1

Aside from heals, I could see some rather nasty things involving Viral Matrix for example. Buy some VM DOFFs, and suddenly cruisers are gonna start tossing out nasty science stuff, or disabling with PS 1, and so on from there.

Plus, having the Lt. Cmdr sci instead of a Lt. Cmdr engineer means fewer shared cooldowns on Engineering abilities, often times a great annoyance when it comes to cruisers.

It may not be a DPS cruiser, but then again, it's also not meant to be. Otherwise, it'd be little more than another copy of the Excelsior or Regent.

With the OPs idea (one I REALLY like btw), at least it'll have it's own new, and unique place in the game, while still being very useful.

I could post a whole build if I wanted, I already have a lot of ideas for it. If it does come with that Lt. Cmdr sci, that is gonna be AWESOME.

I had a similar thought a few months ago. I felt for awhile that the Ambassador should be the roughly 'sister' ship to the Excelsior. The Excel would be the more nimble and tac heavy one, with it's transwarp drive and all that, while the Ambassador would be the more appropriate tier 3 ship and such, or maybe a tier 3.5 as a C-store ship, with a tier 5 varient.

This really depends.

If they're going to give the Ambassador away to everyone, then they're going to realistically need it to be a T5 ship. A T3 ship is nearly useless to anyone who plays the game long enough to really start spending cash on it, and all things considered the trip to level 50 is not the beginning of the end, more the end of the beginning.

It's very unfortunate that all the ships that are obtained during leveling are essentially thrown away; I can think of a few great uses for them. However, I do know that the Ambassador's give-away version being a T3 ship would be essentially trolling the playerbase, and I can't imagine the rabid backlash.