Saga Best Ship Design (fighter, cruiser, frigate, etc.) of the entire saga

Here are my favourite designs:

Original Trilogy
Fighter: Y-Wing, with the Tie Bomber a close second.
Transport: Dead heat between the Millenium Falcon and the Lambda-class imperial shuttle Tydirium.
Starship: Nebulon-B
Non-space vehicle: Snowspeeder

Prequel Trilogy
Fighter: The Naboo ships
Transport: Dead heat between the pre-Lambda class shuttle used by Palpatine at the end of Revenge of the Sith, Dooku's Solar Sailor and Bail Organa's predecessor of the Blockade Runner.
Starship: Probably the early Star Destroyers seen at the very end of ROTS, though none of the large ships in the prequels were particularly memorable IMHO.
Non-space vehicle: Bongo Gungan submarine.

Special mention of my favourite non-Star Wars ship: The Liberator from Blake's 7

One thing that stands out to me is that the vehicles in the prequel trilogy are rarely even named onscreen, which makes them less appealing to me. Millenium Falcon was a character in her own right and I was expecting Amidala's silver ship in Phantom Menace to become the iconic ship the heroes would use throughout the prequels in the same way. Instead, it is never even named nor makes any other appearances. In fact, does any single ship or class of ship appear in all three prequels? I felt we never really got to "know" any of the ships or come to think of them as "home".

Likewise, we know the heroes have X-Wings and Y-Wings and the villains have Tie Fighters in the OT but I am hard-pressed to think of what any of the fighters in the PT are called. Am I correct in thinking the ones in Phantom Menace are simply called Naboo Fighters and Obi-Wan's ship in AOTC is simply called a Jedi Starfighter?

The only other ships from the PT I know by name are Slave-1 (and that was in the OT), Invisible Hand and the Gungans' Bongo. I am not sure how many of these are named onscreen and how many I have picked up from other sources. So overall, I prefer ships that have names and characters of their own, not generic taxis that are swapped at will.

 

Probably my favourite overall would have to be Count Dooku's Solar Sailer.

 

One thing that stands out to me is that the vehicles in the prequel trilogy are rarely even named onscreen, which makes them less appealing to me. Millenium Falcon was a character in her own right and I was expecting Amidala's silver ship in Phantom Menace to become the iconic ship the heroes would use throughout the prequels in the same way. Instead, it is never even named nor makes any other appearances. In fact, does any single ship or class of ship appear in all three prequels? I felt we never really got to "know" any of the ships or come to think of them as "home".

TF battleships are in all three.

Also, the ROTS starfighters are Eta-2s.

 

I have several favored ship designs in the saga.


A very unique looking design.


Love how it foreshadows the upcoming Tie fighters.






Love how frightening they look.



Just love there design.

 

Boba's Slave One and Dooku's solar sail ship are great. AOTC Jedi Starfighters are good too.

 

I enjoy the X-wing and the Venator.

 

The V-wings and Venators are my favourites. Basically, if it has a V in the name I love it.





The Solar Sailor is very unique though. I wish we could have seen more of it.

 

Always preferred Republic-style Star Destroyers over Imperial style. I dunno, just looks more clean and pretty to me - maybe because technology's a bit better, although I prefer the design as well. Although, I love the TIE fighters a bit more than the Republic starfighter ships.

Millennium Falcon, Slave I, and Jedi Starfighters get honorable mentions.

 

Obiously the Millenium Falcon ranks high. But the most beautiful and elegant design is the Imperial shuttle in ROTJ for me.

 

Repurposed Star Wars Technology - Back from the Drawing Board, Part 2 | StarWars.com

great article about using unused concepts or other sw stuff.

 

I really like the design of the Droid ship, number 17. It looks like a mix between the Droid landing craft and the MTT.

 

The Venator-class Star Destroyer. Really cool looking ship.

 

All the ship designs in Star Wars are extremely unique and iconic in their own ways. Ralph McQuarrie was a genius.

 

I absolutely agree. I think at lot of the OT ships lose their "wow" value in the clutter of newer or later PT and EU designs, which seem so symmetrical and always need to seem cool, modern and usually aggressive. With a few exceptions like the Solar Sailor, it's like the PT and EU designers stopped trying new things.

With that said however there are a few symmetrical designs that serve their purpose, particularly the Imperial Star Destroyers. They are so striking, intimidating, and iconic. It's symmetrical, but with the absolute and specific purpose of instilling might and terror. Who could ever forget the first scene where it comes in from the top of the screen, and keeps coming, and coming and coming, lol!



I love the designs that are idiosyncratic or unique, like the Millennium Falcon and the entire Alliance Fleet - the transports, the EF76 Nebulon B Frigates, or the organic looking Mon Calamari Star Cruisers. And Xwings. They can look boring symmetrical but then BAMN! their S-foils open up to resemble predatory birds.

 

I've always been a fan of the Scimitar aka Sith Infiltrator aka Maul's starship. It gives a foreshadowing of the tie design but with a lot more usefulness than the TIEs.

Getting into Legends area, there's two ships I've always liked:
- Yuuzhan Vong ships. The idea that they're grown and not built really is intriguing to me. And the propulsion being a creature that can pull itself toward an object? That's just freaky, man! That's some real out-of-the-box thinking!
- Mara Jade's Jade Shadow. Where to begin? It doesn't have an external hatch release, you have to be force sensitive to be able to get into it in the first place. That it can hold Luke's X-Wing inside it. That it is as fast as (faster?) than the Falcon. And the armament? Do NOT piss that lady off!

A lot of folks have said the Super Star Destroyers. You can have that opinion. I can't imagine there would ever be a use for a ship that big. You can transport the entire Imperial military from place to place. Good for you. Once you get there, part of your complement will be needed in four other systems. I'll post a link to a picture for this one. It's too big to post in a comment. It shows the relative size of the Executor to other ships in other galaxies. The amazing thing to me beyond this is that the Imperial ships just kept getting BIGGER. Really, how big do you need?

 

This site is better. And doesn't have nearly as many fanon-only ship depictions:

http://www.merzo.net/index.html

 

VERY nice! Hard to believe that the Cloud City station is as big as the Executor, but I guess they've done their research. Thank you!

 

it is a whole city.

 

I like The Sith Infiltrator, Rogue Shadow, Tie Advanced, Tie Defender, Tie Phantom and Tie Interceptor, Jedi Starfighters, Slave I, Star Destroyers, B-Wings, A-Wings, X-Wings, Vulture Droids, Tri-Droid Fighters, ARC-170's, V-Wings, Clone Headhunters, Clone Y-Wings. I could go on and on.

I guess Maul's ship is probably my overall favorite when he used it. I do like the Mandalorian Guantlets but I think they should Maul his own personal design like his old concept ship being that now the Infiltrator belongs to Sidious again.

 

My favorite from the PT would have to be the J-Type 327 Nubian Royal Starship, while from the OT it would have to be the TIE/sh VIP shuttle, which I discovered recently and really love.

 

Also like Slave 1 for its unique design.

 

I love the Eta-2 Jedi Interceptors, such a step up from the triangle AOTC Jedi Starfighters.
Also have soft spots for X-Wings and ARC-170s.

 

Slave I, Tie Interceptor, B-Wing and ofcourse the Nubian J-Type 327.

 

The Tools to Creating Blockades and Wars, Courtesy of the Trade Federation | StarWars.com

 

Harrower-class Dreadnaught from the Old Republic era. I love the early arrowhead design!