Just WTF was the Enterprise-E doing in Insurrection?

Trogdor · Post by **Trogdor** » 2006-01-31 08:46am

Knife wrote:Captain Picard is hardly a tactician. In FC, he's actually assigned away from the battlefield. Granted, due to his 'Borg problems'. A conflict of interest. However, his tactics were hardly brillent when he went against orders and engaged the Borg. He just happened to hear/know a point that was weak due to 'comm. traffic'.

Perhaps Picard didn't come off as a tactician most of the time, but I got the idea that the writers imagined him as such (much like they had the idea of Riker being a brilliant officer on the fast track to command but failed to make him look and act like it) ever since the stuff about the Picard Maneuver came up. I don't think his lack of tactical eptitude would keep the E-E from the front.

Knife · Post by **Knife** » 2006-01-31 06:04pm

Trogdor wrote:
Knife wrote:Captain Picard is hardly a tactician. In FC, he's actually assigned away from the battlefield. Granted, due to his 'Borg problems'. A conflict of interest. However, his tactics were hardly brillent when he went against orders and engaged the Borg. He just happened to hear/know a point that was weak due to 'comm. traffic'.
Perhaps Picard didn't come off as a tactician most of the time, but I got the idea that the writers imagined him as such (much like they had the idea of Riker being a brilliant officer on the fast track to command but failed to make him look and act like it) ever since the stuff about the Picard Maneuver came up. I don't think his lack of tactical eptitude would keep the E-E from the front.

Really? Cause it always seemed to me that the writers were trying to make him 'super diplomat' not some brilliant tactician.

Trogdor · Post by **Trogdor** » 2006-01-31 08:48pm

Well, certainly Picard acted as a diplomat more often than a warrior, but I think he was envisioned as at least an above average tactician by the writers. I seriously doubt that they ever pictured him as being an incompetent fighter.

Making up tactics like the Picard Maneuver on the fly sounds like an impressive feat. I don't know for sure if it is or not; I don't know much about military tactics, but then again, trek writers don't either.

Writer's intention is, of course, an out of universe thing. However, Riker was of the opinion that Picard was "the perfect man to lead this fight" in FC, and Riker was obviously supposed to be a good tactician (despite the fact that he came as an idiot sometimes) who one could expect to know if his captain was bad at commanding a ship in a fight.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2006-01-31 09:14pm

I'm not sure how Picard could have done much worse than the guys who were already in charge... "uh hey yeah guys go ahead and just buzz around the Borg all angry-like and take a pot shot when you feel like it HURR".

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2006-02-01 10:12am

I think the writers were of two minds about Picard's tactical skills. On the one hand you had the idea that he was openly hostile to militarism, and in fact even objected to things like combat drills or wargames, as seen in "Peak Performance" where he even stated clearly that tactical skills were not particularly important for a Starfleet officer: a real low point for Star Trek's portrayal of Starfleet.

On the other hand, you have them wanking about the Picard Maneuver, which the writers no doubt intended to be perceived as evidence of great skill (let's leave aside how uninteresting it actually is). I think the only conclusion is that the writers think tactical skill is bred rather than taught. Some people just "have it", and Picard is supposedly one of those people, so he is able to think on his feet and devise tactics and strategies without the benefit of having studied tactics and strategies his whole life.

The conceit of Star Trek's writers seems to be that someone who picks up a smattering of every academic field is the ideal person to hold any job, because he's so well-rounded and never became one of those imbalanced specialists. I can only suspect that a lot of the Star Trek writers themselves are academic dilletantes like this, hence their belief that it's the way to go.

Lord Pounder · Post by **Lord Pounder** » 2006-02-01 01:47pm

Knife wrote:Captain Picard is hardly a tactician. In FC, he's actually assigned away from the battlefield. Granted, due to his 'Borg problems'. A conflict of interest. However, his tactics were hardly brillent when he went against orders and engaged the Borg. He just happened to hear/know a point that was weak due to 'comm. traffic'.

The question then that bares asking is that if Picard isn't a tactician why the hell isn't he commanding a obsolete Oberth class and doing the sicency missions thats seems to give him so much joy instead of the most advanced ship Starfleet has in service.

ngc7293 · Post by **ngc7293** » 2006-02-02 01:13am

Lord Pounder wrote:
Knife wrote:Captain Picard is hardly a tactician. In FC, he's actually assigned away from the battlefield. Granted, due to his 'Borg problems'. A conflict of interest. However, his tactics were hardly brillent when he went against orders and engaged the Borg. He just happened to hear/know a point that was weak due to 'comm. traffic'.
The question then that bares asking is that if Picard isn't a tactician why the hell isn't he commanding a obsolete Oberth class and doing the sicency missions thats seems to give him so much joy instead of the most advanced ship Starfleet has in service.

I think at the start of the show Picard was supposed to just have a Hobby in the sciences. I think perhaps he was envisioned as a Kirk type person. He got his command, not because of any true talent, but by luck, intuition and plain cheating.

Besides, in real life, haven't there been a few individuals given command when they really shouldn't have?

Tsyroc · Post by **Tsyroc** » 2006-02-02 11:40pm

ngc7293 wrote: Besides, in real life, haven't there been a few individuals given command when they really shouldn't have?

Oh hell yes there have been plenty.

Lonestar's current CO comes to mind as the most recent real life example I'm familiar with.

Really, if a person can play the political game and not make any major mistakes along the way then the promotion track will take care of them. In this case I thought Janeway being CO of a ship was actually pretty true to life.

Unfortunately Star Fleet doesn't seem to be able to unload officers to retirement via paygrade stagnation like the US military, or have a time limit on running a specific command.

Picard's alternate time line career where he had been a Lt Jg for 20-30 years wouldn't happen in the US Navy without the person having been prior Enlisted for a very long time before he/she became an officer. A regular track Lt Jg would have been discharged decades before the point we saw Picard. I don't know the specifics for O-2 but I do know that if a person hasn't made it to 0-4 (Lt. Commander) by a certain point then he/she won't be permitted to stay in long enough to reach 20 year retirement.

I'm assuming that an O-6 (Captain) probably can stick around until 30 years or more but there's no reason they have to keep getting command billets.