I thought it was stated in the Path to 2409 that the Enterprise E was under the command of Data and that it'd gone through a massive upgrade and overhaul and was on a deep space assignment far from the Federation which is why it hasn't been seen in game? So why are they designing the Enterprise F?

Dont ask questions, just go with it,

Long story short: (spoilers )

Data and crew when to check something out. They haven't been heard of since.
I wouldn't be surprised to actually come across them after the Enterprise F is in-game. It wouldn't be the first time two Enterprises met.

Starfleet might have presume them lost so they went ahead and started to build the F.

B4 (Data is dead) and crew were sent to a space station to investigate something. The only reason we assume they are missing is because Cryptic announced the "Build the Next Enterprise" contest. Otherwise, no other details are known.

That's why I suggested the "Destroy the Enterprise" contest a few weeks ago.

Dont assume that just because its the F, that its being launched here and now in 2410.

It could be that the F launches in 2422 and at some point gets displaced back to 2410 for some hi-jinks with all of us.

The original premise of the contest was to be visited by another "future" Enterprise instead of the Enterprise J (by CBS' request) - and we only learned it was to be the "F" in the email we received from the marketing department a week or two ago.

So we don't know if the time-travel aspect has been scrapped or what. We'll have to wait for those answers.

They can't use the "E" yet because Paramount owns those rights, and they haven't licensed them to cryptic. So if we want and Enterprise, it's gonna have to be a new one. My guess it's probably just a new class of ship, that may later contain the enterprise in it's ranks.

Which I think is stupid. Cryptic already has the Sovereign Class in the game. The only thing they would need to do is add the name and registry. In other words, the ship is already in the game; it is just not properly labeled.

Well, the class and the specific ship are 2 different properties. So, though it may be stupid, that is the reason.

O, and CBS has rights to the Sovereign Class.


Theres also likeness rights with Brent Spiner to worry about.

Well, as I have maintained, Data is dead. I really have no desire to see B4....