USS Stargazer The USS " Stargazer " ( NCC - 2893 ) was a 24th century Federation starship operated by Starfleet . ( ) History . In service . In 2333 , Lieutenant Commander Jean - Luc Picard served as a bridge officer on this vessel . He later described the " Stargazer " as an " " overworked , underpowered vessel , always on the verge of flying apart at the seams . " " ( ) When the ship ' s captain was killed and the first officer injured on the bridge , Picard took command of the situation , and the vessel . ( ) Starfleet Command looked so favorably on Picard ' s actions , that they appointed him as the vessel ' s new commanding officer , a post he held for twenty - two years . Picard ' s crew included Jack Crusher and a weapons officer named Vigo . ( ) The " Stargazer " saw action in the Cardassian Wars . The ship was involved in a truce offering by the Federation in sector 21503 . After making contact with a Cardassian warship , Captain Picard lowered the ship ' s shields as a gesture of good will , but the Cardassian commander ignored the gesture and took out most of the " Stargazer " s weapon s and damaged its impulse engine s . The " Stargazer " managed to regroup and flee . ( ) In 2353 , Jack Crusher was killed on an away mission , forcing Picard to present Crusher ' s remains to his widow , Beverly . ( ) In 2354 , the " Stargazer " visited the planet Chalna . ( ) In 2355 , the " Stargazer " was attacked and severely damaged by an unknown vessel in the Maxia Zeta system . Picard was able to destroy the attacking vessel , using what would later be named the Picard Maneuver . The " Stargazer " was overcome by fire and severe damage during the battle and had to be abandoned . The event was called the " Battle of Maxia " by the Ferengi . ( ) Recovery . As the loss of a starship was a court martial offense , Picard was court - martialed for the loss of the " Stargazer " , zealously prosecuted by Phillipa Louvois . In the end , he was absolved of all charges . ( ) In 2364 , the wreck of the " Stargazer " was found adrift and salvaged by the Ferengi . The Ferengi DaiMon Bok desired revenge against Picard , as his son had died commanding the attacking vessel at the " Battle of Maxia " . He falsified the logs of the " Stargazer " to indicate that it was the " Stargazer " that committed an unprovoked attack against the Ferengi vessel . Through the use of an illegal " thought maker " , Bok caused Captain Picard to relive the day of the battle in hallucination s , supposedly as a mental breakdown after the real truth had come out . When the devices were discovered , William T . Riker was able to convince the captain to destroy the " thought maker " causing his hallucinations . The " Stargazer " was towed to Xendi Starbase 9 . ( ) This incident was mentioned , as an example of Jean - Luc Picard ' s supposed incompetence , by Lieutenant Commander Dexter Remmick when questioning Deanna Troi . Remmick alleged that , according to Picard ' s own logs , he had suffered from a mental lapse . Although Troi protested that he had been under the control of a mind altering machine , Remmick wasn ' t swayed in his opinion . ( ) In 2365 , when speaking with Guinan about her origins , Wesley Crusher said that he had heard from some of the crew that she had met Picard when he was the commanding officer of the " Stargazer " . Guinan replied that she didn ' t know the captain until she came aboard the . ( ) In 2369 , Picard would look back fondly on his time commanding the " Stargazer " and once confided to Montgomery Scott that , even after several years of commanding the far superior USS " Enterprise " - D , there were still times he would give almost anything to command the " Stargazer " again . ( ) Appendices . Background information . A yellow painted model of the " Constellation " - class NCC - 7100 appeared in Captain Picard ' s ready room aboard the . This model was often mistakenly assumed to be of the " Stargazer " . This mistake was perpetuated by the . As noted in other sources , however , the idea of the " Stargazer " was conceived after that yellow model had been created , though it was eventually used to create the filming model for this ship . The " Stargazer " was intended to be a vessel , the same as Captain Kirk ' s . This was mentioned in the script by Geordi La Forge . In fact , the yellow NCC - 7100 model was replaced with a silver " Constitution " - class model in Picard ' s ready room for . When the " Stargazer " filming model was eventually designed , it was decided that a new model , derisively referred to as the " pie dish " , should be used . Since LeVar Burton had already recorded his line , the name of the new ship ' s class had to be similar to " Constitution " to make it easy to overdub ; the production crew settled on " Constellation " . In , Galoob produced a toy model of the " Stargazer " as part of their Micromachines line . The coloring on the model was completely wrong and was actually based on the coloring of the NCC - 7100 model seen in Picard ' s office . In a Starfleet Technical Database article ( ) written by Rick Sternbach , it was stated that , after the " Stargazer " was towed back to Xendi Starbase 9 , it was repaired , and returned to limited active duty for eight years ( from 2366 to 2374 ) , after which it was mothballed as a museum ship at the Copernicus Yard Museum , Luna , alongside the USS " Valkyrie " ( NCC - 2590 ) . Kept in a nitrogen - oxygen atmosphere for tours and academic study , the " Stargazer " was kept in a semi - operational state , to be re - activated for duty when circumstances dictated such an action . The bridge of the " Stargazer " was previously seen as the battle bridge of the " Enterprise " - D in . Before " The Next Generation " , the set was used as the bridge of the " Enterprise " in . ( " " ) The Starfleet orders giving Picard command of the " Stargazer " were preserved in the Picard family album . ( ) Apocrypha . The crew of the " Stargazer " had been featured in many novels by Michael Jan Friedman . First appearing in Pocket TNG : " Reunion " , a novel published by Pocket Books , it had spun off the " " series , during which the ship had a brief encounter with the mirror universe , as well as detailing Picard ' s first meeting with Guinan during a confrontation with Enabran Tain . The full circumstances of the Battle of Maxia , and Picard ' s history between the loss of the " Stargazer " and becoming captain of the " Enterprise " - D , are covered in the novel " The Buried Age " . The " Stargazer " was also included as a playable ship in the video game " " . During the story , it was revealed that the ship ' s captain , Ruhalter , is killed on the bridge and the ship severely damaged from a shock wave resulting from renegade Vulcan T ' Uerell destroying a planet in the Neutral Zone . Picard took command of the ship and attempted to stop stellar debris from destroying other planets in a Federation system . The player can control the " Stargazer " with Picard in command during this mission in the game . The " Stargazer " prevented an interplanetary war in the " " novel # 6 , " The First Virtue " . In " Star Trek Online " , a new USS " Stargazer " ( NCC - 2893 - A ) was built in the years after " Star Trek Nemesis " , as the first of a new class of heavy cruiser . The " Stargazer " - class was one of the available design choices ( along with the and " Dakota " - class ) for the Heavy Cruiser ship available to Federation characters at the rank of Commander . Additionally , the original " Constellation " - class , with a console that allows the ship to perform the Picard Manuever , can be purchased from the in - game store .