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 AndrewGPaul wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
That definitely was one model, and probably fit much closer in STOS. It was definitely a warship with exploration capabilities. STNG tended to push more of the "nonmilitary" schick. One gets images of Klingons guffawing behind their backs.

I'm not sure if it was ever really pushed as an idea in the series, but the Federation strikes me as the sort of state with so much military might that it never really has to use it. They think they're non-military because most of the time they never shoot anyone, even while a ship like the Galaxy-class vessels can go toe-to-toe with the ships-of-the-line of the other powers, while still devoting half their capacity to civilian accommodation and research. The Enterprise goes into battle with one hand tied behind its back because it's like an MMA champion going up against some chav hanging round the bus shelter. It's Teddy Roosevelt's Big Stick theory in the 24th century. You can see that when they finally come up against someone they can't easily steamroller - the Borg - then the gloves come off and the Defiant turns up.

I think DS9 series touches on this but this is a subject that doesn't really get raised in a big way until the Nemesis film. No matter your views on the plot of the film, the Romulan warship in that was a proper warship built for war with the tech of the setting. Dominion ships were heavily armed, but honestly were not hugely different to what the regular warships had. Even Klingons - the most warlike race of the major races - don't actually arm their ships all that heavily compared to what they could. The result is that Starfleet actually stands pretty well against the other factions even though their ships are not built with war in mind.

It's almost as if the other factions have only engaged in an arms race sufficient to meet standard with the Federation. Considering how many neutral zones there are it might be a little bit akin to nuclear weapons today - ergo everyone HAS super weapons and can build superwarships, but they mostly choose not to so that the other side doesn't push further - esp since the Federation - for all its peaceful overtones - does have a lot of potential allies to draw from and a very large resource base. Whilst the Dominion situation showed that they weren't really ready to mobilize for war in a very fast manner. I figure it was always a threat the other races never wanted to push too far with an arms race.

Costs and distribution could also be other aspects to consider. The Romulan warship was an epic warship, but at the same time it was a single warship not a fleet. It might well be that for the cost of that one ship, three, four or more Warbirds could have been built instead. One ship can only be in one place at a time whilst three or four ships can patrol in one group or can split up to deal with multiple threats. Considering the vast size of space the deployment of forces and not collecting all your eggs in one basket has to be considered by many of the races. It's not like most 4* games we play where most times a superfleet works best - in real wars you've got to hold multiple fronts; patrol; ensure that world and facilities are not chipped away at etc...

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
even while a ship like the Galaxy-class vessels can go toe-to-toe with the ships-of-the-line of the other powers, while still devoting half their capacity to civilian accommodation and research.

I've often thought of the Federation as much more advanced than any of its rivals technologically for this exact reason.

Their luxury liners are on par with Klingon and Romulan warships. Is that because the Federation is in denial about what Starfleet is, or is Starfleet so far ahead that they can boast rivaling military power without really trying?

 LordofHats wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
even while a ship like the Galaxy-class vessels can go toe-to-toe with the ships-of-the-line of the other powers, while still devoting half their capacity to civilian accommodation and research.

I've often thought of the Federation as much more advanced than any of its rivals technologically for this exact reason.

Their luxury liners are on par with Klingon and Romulan warships. Is that because the Federation is in denial about what Starfleet is, or is Starfleet so far ahead that they can boast rivaling military power without really trying?

I think it's more along the lines of the Federation has this innate sense that eventually all warfare will stop, and that the current fleet's combat capability is a necessary evil, which is why you had the Galaxy class that was basically a city with some guns on it. I think the lesson was learned, though, as the Sovereign class and onwards were much less about utilitarianism and more about "win a fight".

And that gets back to Yodhrin’s point that this is a fictional setting. The Dominion War isn’t a real thing that happened; it was a decision by some writers. And because of that decision, the setting went from “the flagship is a luxury liner” to “the Defiant is built to feth gak up the end” — this isn’t a “real life” lesson, that the world is a bad and violent place. The writers decided that a bad a violent setting would make for more interesting stories. This is kind of a problem going back to why Gene Roddenberry was muscled out of Star Trek. He pitched a setting with little to no conflict, which makes it hard to tell dramatic stories with space ships flying around shootin’ lasers and gak.

You can tell loads of dramatic space stories without lots of guns - heck the first Alien film hardly has any actual guns in it at all.


Also the Galaxy to Sovereign wasn't a huge upgrade in weaponry. If anything it was still a standard capital ship for exploration first even though it was the newest pride of the fleet in its day. Voyager was also not bristling with weapons and that ship went into service right after the Dominion War and its first mission was hunting Marquis in the Badlands.

This also reminds me of the Defiant's sister ship and the crew that trained for it and how they were different to regular Starfleet officers. Indeed one or two episodes dealt with the issue that the War caused a split, esp in the younger ranks inspired by a few of the older, in Starfleet between those who were still primarily in the exploration side and those who were being brought through the system almost purely for military training and deployment.

Indeed when you consider that the Sovereign, whilst strongly built, is not built with the same war focus that the Defiant is; one wonders if Starfleet, even after the Dominion War, is settling back into its old habits. Or perhaps Starfleet itself will steadily split into two distinct forces.

Both using the same tech, but one force focused on exploratory ends and the other focusing on military. The latter would likely be somewhat less numerous but designed to be the elite force; able to be called in as a proper show of force. With the Borg, the Dominion and continual general tensions between Klingons, Romulans and Cardassians (though this latter group was pretty much crushed during the Dominion war) a rise in Starfleet of even a handful of military focused vessels could be very much needed to enforce and restore peace.



Heck it would have been a really interesting twist to have played with Voyager and then a series after if Voyager had settled in the Delta Quadrant. Settling down and building a new Starfleet that might one day (in generations later) meet up with the original Alpha quadrant block to find them far more military focused!

Alien only had guns mentioned in the Directors cut iirc.

The original had no mention of them at all (well unless you count home made flame throwers as guns).

 Overread wrote:
You can tell loads of dramatic space stories without lots of guns - heck the first Alien film hardly has any actual guns in it at all.


Also the Galaxy to Sovereign wasn't a huge upgrade in weaponry. If anything it was still a standard capital ship for exploration first even though it was the newest pride of the fleet in its day. Voyager was also not bristling with weapons and that ship went into service right after the Dominion War and its first mission was hunting Marquis in the Badlands.

This also reminds me of the Defiant's sister ship and the crew that trained for it and how they were different to regular Starfleet officers. Indeed one or two episodes dealt with the issue that the War caused a split, esp in the younger ranks inspired by a few of the older, in Starfleet between those who were still primarily in the exploration side and those who were being brought through the system almost purely for military training and deployment.

Indeed when you consider that the Sovereign, whilst strongly built, is not built with the same war focus that the Defiant is; one wonders if Starfleet, even after the Dominion War, is settling back into its old habits. Or perhaps Starfleet itself will steadily split into two distinct forces.

Both using the same tech, but one force focused on exploratory ends and the other focusing on military. The latter would likely be somewhat less numerous but designed to be the elite force; able to be called in as a proper show of force. With the Borg, the Dominion and continual general tensions between Klingons, Romulans and Cardassians (though this latter group was pretty much crushed during the Dominion war) a rise in Starfleet of even a handful of military focused vessels could be very much needed to enforce and restore peace.



Heck it would have been a really interesting twist to have played with Voyager and then a series after if Voyager had settled in the Delta Quadrant. Settling down and building a new Starfleet that might one day (in generations later) meet up with the original Alpha quadrant block to find them far more military focused!

The de-militarisation post-Dominion war could be very deliberate. Most of the major Alpha Quadrant powers had taken something of a battering during the War, yet emerged with greater unity.

It's entirely possible that to preserve and possibly improve that unity, Starfleet decided to go back to their exploratory roots. Weapons for self defence only - make other powers less nervous, reassure colonists etc that the war was the exception, and not the new status quo.

 LordofHats wrote:
Is that because the Federation is in denial about what Starfleet is, or is Starfleet so far ahead that they can boast rivaling military power without really trying?

Something of a theme of TNG was that the federation had become arrogant and complacent due to their technological advantages in the quadrant, underpinning the Q arc somewhat.

Plus they appear (through humans) to advance technology faster than even their allies. Consider the Vulcans who are pretty much the closest allies humans and Starfleet have. When they started out the Vulcans had mystical levels of superior technology. In Enterprise it was a running theme that the Vulcans could do most of the stuff the crew were trying to develop - only better. Even the Warp engine - state of the art for Starfleet at that time - was still weaker than Vulcan ones.

By the time we hit even the Original series the Vulcan dominance in technology was dwindling to almost nothing; whilst in TNG Vulcans are very much on the back seat in technological terms.


Of course one could argue that as time passed the central government of Starfleet simply appropriated more of the Vulcan researchers.



Actually that gives me an idea of a theme they could have done which never have; which is to have a major faction leave the Federation. Klingons have always been pegged for that and they have taken moves toward it, but always gave up in the end. Seeing a faction go through with it - a major faction - and making it into a major story arc for a series would be really interesting to see. Both in how it affected the relationship between that faction and the Federation, but also how other races would react to it. Almost like how the loss of a few nations could start a potential tumbledown and how
starfleet would react. Both with whole worlds wanting to have their own independence, but then getting down to where you've got mixed race groups and generations of aliens raised on alien worlds or in space stations.

A powerful and complex look at real world situations and how the Federation might survive a time when its member factions might want to change their relationship and split away.

Interestingly, I think the only way Picard could disappoint me is if it glosses over the whole post-Dominion War thing.

As long as that's addressed, there'll be something to satisfy me!

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Interestingly, I think the only way Picard could disappoint me is if it glosses over the whole post-Dominion War thing.

As long as that's addressed, there'll be something to satisfy me!

I think it depends greatly on the scale and location of the story as to how the Dominion War will influence it. Lets not forget that at least 10 years or more has clearly passed since the Dominion War. So that's already quite a significant chunk of time. Furthermore the war never pushed too far into Federation space itself. Though there were strikes to Starfleet and Earth, it was mostly contained around the Cardassian boarders. So if the story is set far away from there, with the passing of time as well, the Dominion War could be a thing of the past.

It would be the kind of thing that might rear its head if he were to visit the Badlands, or DS9 or any of those regions. Or even deal with Cardassians, who might still be dealing with the aftereffects - in fact when you consider how the war ended they felt the worst brunt of it all when their home world was torn apart and their people slaughtered. Not that they were ever greatly trusted even at the start of DS9, but they might well have fallen far further. Or perhaps they had a big change of heart and wanted to prove themselves after the war that they helped cause.


The other aspect is the scale of the story. If its getting down to a "Firefly" level of a crew and story then it could well be that what they interact with are the little people and that big things like the War and that whole political side are simply on another level.

I still expect at least some mention of it.

The Dominion War was the first time the Alpha Quadrant had a common foe. That increased diplomatic ties at the time. So what happened after?

Were the various allies too shattered from an exhausting, narrowly won war to start politicking among themselves? Were the ties developed at that point strengthened?

Just....don't ignore it is all I ask.

There's still the Borg in the Delta quadrant, and one has to wonder if those'll ever come into conflict with the Dominion. The Dominion is also supposed to be thousands of years old, so their stagnancy might be keeping the Borg at bay (or uninterested). Then there's those super-advanced dinosaurs in their city ships in the Delta quadrant too.

There are what now?

Also, Borg were seemingly squished when Voyager hand-waviumed their way home.

The Voth, from the Voyager episode "Distant Origin."

Also, I thought it was just that transwarp hub that got boomed.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There are what now?

Also, Borg were seemingly squished when Voyager hand-waviumed their way home.

I think that's what the new Picard series will have a greater focus on: the aftermath of the Borg's defeat in Voyager and the fallout from the destruction of Romulus. The Dominion War will certainly be referenced, but given that Picard had little to no role in it (at least on screen), I doubt it will get addressed too much.

 Overread wrote:

.

It's almost as if the other factions have only engaged in an arms race sufficient to meet standard with the Federation. Considering how many neutral zones there are it might be a little bit akin to nuclear weapons today - ergo everyone HAS super weapons and can build superwarships, but they mostly choose not to so that the other side doesn't push further - esp since the Federation - for all its peaceful overtones - does have a lot of potential allies to draw from and a very large resource base. Whilst the Dominion situation showed that they weren't really ready to mobilize for war in a very fast manner. I figure it was always a threat the other races never wanted to push too far with an arms race.

Pax Federation - don’t cause too much trouble or you’ll be on the wrong end of a cloaked ship with. Genesis device ...

 Overread wrote:
Plus they appear (through humans) to advance technology faster than even their allies. Consider the Vulcans who are pretty much the closest allies humans and Starfleet have. When they started out the Vulcans had mystical levels of superior technology. In Enterprise it was a running theme that the Vulcans could do most of the stuff the crew were trying to develop - only better. Even the Warp engine - state of the art for Starfleet at that time - was still weaker than Vulcan ones.

By the time we hit even the Original series the Vulcan dominance in technology was dwindling to almost nothing; whilst in TNG Vulcans are very much on the back seat in technological terms.


Of course one could argue that as time passed the central government of Starfleet simply appropriated more of the Vulcan researchers.



Actually that gives me an idea of a theme they could have done which never have; which is to have a major faction leave the Federation. Klingons have always been pegged for that and they have taken moves toward it, but always gave up in the end. Seeing a faction go through with it - a major faction - and making it into a major story arc for a series would be really interesting to see. Both in how it affected the relationship between that faction and the Federation, but also how other races would react to it. Almost like how the loss of a few nations could start a potential tumbledown and how
starfleet would react. Both with whole worlds wanting to have their own independence, but then getting down to where you've got mixed race groups and generations of aliens raised on alien worlds or in space stations.

A powerful and complex look at real world situations and how the Federation might survive a time when its member factions might want to change their relationship and split away.

That's an old theme in sci fi and fantasy that the more advanced races who often have much longer life spans tend to stagnate in comparison to the humans who burn bright and hot for a short period and pack as much into there short lives as possible leading to rapid innovation.

My favourite if somewhat cheesy example is the alien federation who set off to conquer earth shortly after seeing the battle of agincourt and preparing as such as it's only a couple of hundred years to get there and arriving now to face modern mbt's f22's etc etc.

That’s a very interesting trope.

I mean, consider Warhammer.

Dwarfs first discovered black powder, and over their long, long lifespans, perfected it. They can take their time because they have it.

They then shared it with The Empire. Cue ‘look, I’m pretty smart and I’m sure this’ll work’ type approach. By Dwarfen standards, Empire Engineers are stupidly reckless. Yet, as a result, Empire blackpowder weapons can, on a good day, with luck, massively outperform their Dwarf equivalent. That such an occasion is rare doesn’t matter to humans. We’re prolific, and so one’s life is willingly sacrificed for the sake of this new super weapon actually working and the fame that comes with it.

After that? The Skaven nick it. Skaven. Who at 14 are often considered ancient (can’t remember where I read that, but I did!)? And breed in such numbers that life is literally a currency? Steal-steal man-thing weapon! Add more-much black Powder! Mix-stir Warpstone! If just one of them, just once, pulled it off, who knows the damage. But when you know your society only allows you to live so long? What’s the risk of testing your weapon, personally, as soon as it’s been built. Especially when you’re probably heavily indebted to another, higher ranking Skaven......what’ve you got to lose? If it kills you, at least it’s quick. If it works! KERCHING!

I am also in the camp of really liking DS9.

For me, it just felt like there was more to it because they didn't have to worry about exploring. They could actually look at the people who make up a small part of the universe and see how they act when they are not busy reacting. I wanted to see more, I wanted to know how they would deal with developing situations, and I wanted Miles to put Kiko in an airlock.

 ProtoClone wrote:
I am also in the camp of really liking DS9.

For me, it just felt like there was more to it because they didn't have to worry about exploring. They could actually look at the people who make up a small part of the universe and see how they act when they are not busy reacting. I wanted to see more, I wanted to know how they would deal with developing situations, and I wanted Miles to put Kiko in an airlock.

We could all dream of what could have been had DS9 gotten a season 8 XD Maybe the series finale wouldn't have gotten such a rush job.

 LordofHats wrote:

 ProtoClone wrote:
I am also in the camp of really liking DS9.

For me, it just felt like there was more to it because they didn't have to worry about exploring. They could actually look at the people who make up a small part of the universe and see how they act when they are not busy reacting. I wanted to see more, I wanted to know how they would deal with developing situations, and I wanted Miles to put Kiko in an airlock.

We could all dream of what could have been had DS9 gotten a season 8 XD Maybe the series finale wouldn't have gotten such a rush job.

All factions come to a peace agreement just to push Kiko out the airlock. Who would have known she was the one agitating force in the universe causing everyone to not get along? Without her, everyone was able to work on their relations and bettering the universe. That's how I imagine it ending.

I can't say Kiko ever bothered me that much, but we all have characters we hate XD

Let's push Eddington out the airlock to. So much wasted potential in that all over the place storyline...

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


After that? The Skaven nick it. Skaven. Who at 14 are often considered ancient (can’t remember where I read that, but I did!)? And breed in such numbers that life is literally a currency? Steal-steal man-thing weapon! Add more-much black Powder! Mix-stir Warpstone! If just one of them, just once, pulled it off, who knows the damage. But when you know your society only allows you to live so long? What’s the risk of testing your weapon, personally, as soon as it’s been built. Especially when you’re probably heavily indebted to another, higher ranking Skaven......what’ve you got to lose? If it kills you, at least it’s quick. If it works! KERCHING!

One Skaven (who I still argue has one of the best character models ever made), Ikit Claw, went far past black powder. He built a nuclear device! Well more a warp-nuclear device! Though I believe he never got to test it out, but yeah Skaven - building super weapons and laughing maniacally!

Manchu wrote:And that gets back to Yodhrin’s point that this is a fictional setting. The Dominion War isn’t a real thing that happened; it was a decision by some writers. And because of that decision, the setting went from “the flagship is a luxury liner” to “the Defiant is built to feth gak up the end” — this isn’t a “real life” lesson, that the world is a bad and violent place. The writers decided that a bad a violent setting would make for more interesting stories. This is kind of a problem going back to why Gene Roddenberry was muscled out of Star Trek. He pitched a setting with little to no conflict, which makes it hard to tell dramatic stories with space ships flying around shootin’ lasers and gak.

Overread wrote:You can tell loads of dramatic space stories without lots of guns - heck the first Alien film hardly has any actual guns in it at all.


Also the Galaxy to Sovereign wasn't a huge upgrade in weaponry. If anything it was still a standard capital ship for exploration first even though it was the newest pride of the fleet in its day. Voyager was also not bristling with weapons and that ship went into service right after the Dominion War and its first mission was hunting Marquis in the Badlands.

This also reminds me of the Defiant's sister ship and the crew that trained for it and how they were different to regular Starfleet officers. Indeed one or two episodes dealt with the issue that the War caused a split, esp in the younger ranks inspired by a few of the older, in Starfleet between those who were still primarily in the exploration side and those who were being brought through the system almost purely for military training and deployment.

Indeed when you consider that the Sovereign, whilst strongly built, is not built with the same war focus that the Defiant is; one wonders if Starfleet, even after the Dominion War, is settling back into its old habits. Or perhaps Starfleet itself will steadily split into two distinct forces.

Both using the same tech, but one force focused on exploratory ends and the other focusing on military. The latter would likely be somewhat less numerous but designed to be the elite force; able to be called in as a proper show of force. With the Borg, the Dominion and continual general tensions between Klingons, Romulans and Cardassians (though this latter group was pretty much crushed during the Dominion war) a rise in Starfleet of even a handful of military focused vessels could be very much needed to enforce and restore peace.



Heck it would have been a really interesting twist to have played with Voyager and then a series after if Voyager had settled in the Delta Quadrant. Settling down and building a new Starfleet that might one day (in generations later) meet up with the original Alpha quadrant block to find them far more military focused!

I was thinking less massive leaps in unbeatable war tech and more of the mindset to not stick a mass of kids in the front section of a ship. You know, the section that tends to eat the first torpedo shot.

While we're at it, though, the sleekness of the Sovereign design also lends itself to a much more military function. I'm betting the angles are there to make direct hits slightly less likely depending on the angle of approach.

Federation tech advancement makes a lot of sense in the setting for a lot of reasons.

-The Federation has members like the Zakdorn, who reputedly had a feared space fleet for thousands of years, as well as Deltans and Raandians and other aliens who had peaked with higher levels of technology than the current Federation thousands of years ago. Even the Vulcans once had psychic superweapons before their version of WW3 and the rise of Surak.

-The Federation values research into pure science more than most of its neighbors. This is how you get Genesis torpedoes or Soliton wave cannon.

-The Federation values Archaelogical research far more than their neighbors. Who needs to invent the next superweapons when you can download some dead super-empire's STC's?

-The Federation won the Time Game.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
This is how you get Genesis torpedoes

They weaponized the Genisis device from Star Trek II at some point? Or is it just a similar name?

I believe the Genesis device was originally a torpedo design wasn't it?

 Overread wrote:
I believe the Genesis device was originally a torpedo design wasn't it?

It was called the genesis device, but also IIRC when Carol Marcus is narrating the animation she calls it the genesis torpedo. I could be wrong.

 Overread wrote:
I believe the Genesis device was originally a torpedo design wasn't it?

My understanding is that the device could be mounted on a torpedo? Haven't seen the movie in awhile.